"Merriment" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... to tickle him while he continued in this mood, I began making any number of feeble jokes—feeble, but quite as good as the one which had provoked such outrageous merriment—for it amused me to see him acting in this unusual way. But they all failed of their effect—there was no hitting the bull's-eye a second time; he would only stare vacantly at me, then grunt like a peccary—not appreciatively—and ...
— Green Mansions - A Romance of the Tropical Forest • W. H. Hudson
... a burlesque production of the nature of the Pyramus and Thisbe interlude in the Midsummer Night's Dream, and flavoured with something of the comic rusticity of Greene's Carmela eclogue in Menaphon. It is needless here to summarize the plot of the 'merriment' which the ingenious author, no doubt a student of St. John's, evolved from Ovid's account in the third book of the Metamorphoses, and which runs to the respectable length of some eight hundred lines.[342] I may be allowed, however, to note that echo verses, ...
— Pastoral Poetry and Pastoral Drama - A Literary Inquiry, with Special Reference to the Pre-Restoration - Stage in England • Walter W. Greg
... amusement in it. "He seems a sort of Prince Charming that everybody takes a liking to." Wayne and Valdez were already returning, with Runyon between them. They pretended to lead him captive and his face radiated merriment and good nature. He walked with the elasticity of a feline creature; he carried his body as if it were the depository of precious jewels. Never was there a man to whom nature had been kinder—nor any man who was more graciously proud of what ...
— Children of the Desert • Louis Dodge
... of the trees,—to remarks made in the shape of confidential communications, and observations, mysteriously exchanged, succeeded the noisiest bursts of laughter;—from the very outriders to royalty itself, merriment seemed to spread. Every one began to laugh and to cry out. The magpies and the jays fluttered away uttering their guttural cries, beneath the waving avenues of oaks; the cuckoo staid his monotonous cry in the recesses of the forest; the ...
— Ten Years Later • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... infectious hilarity that, notwithstanding my ignorance of the nature of the fun, I joined in with hearty sympathy. As soon as he partially recovered his composure he gasped out, "The natives took you for the Emperor!"—and then he went off in another spasm of merriment which threatened to terminate either in suffocation or apoplexy. Lost in bewilderment I could only smile feebly until he recovered sufficiently to give me a more intelligible explanation of his mirth. It appeared that the courier who had been sent from Petropavlovsk to apprise the ...
— Tent Life in Siberia • George Kennan
... blame, excused him for his error, named the case a mistake on both sides. That long sleep of ours, we said, was really something laughable; we laughed at the recollection of it, a lamentable piece of merriment. ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... Boolooroo, wiping the tears of merriment from his eyes. "We will proceed with the Ceremony of ...
— Sky Island - Being the further exciting adventures of Trot and Cap'n - Bill after their visit to the sea fairies • L. Frank Baum
... the coming doom, The feast, the song, the revel here abounds; Strange modes of merriment the hours consume, Nor bleed these patriots with their country's wounds; Nor here War's clarion, but Love's rebeck sounds; Here Folly still his votaries enthralls, And young-eyed Lewdness walks her midnight rounds: Girt with the silent crimes of capitals, Still ...
— Childe Harold's Pilgrimage • Lord Byron
... was heard, long, loud, and irresistible. Then another voice joined in—the merriment seemed uncontrollable. The Sutherland family looked at each other in angry astonishment. Could it be the new footman indulging ...
— The Harmsworth Magazine, v. 1, 1898-1899, No. 2 • Various
... along, youngster, for I don't wish to be hard on you; I'm only laughing at the ridiculous figure you cut," he said, giving way to a burst of rough merriment. By the time it was over we reached the door of the berth, where the midshipmen were ...
— Paddy Finn • W. H. G. Kingston
... repeated the soldiers. Don Filipo turned his back and they went away. In order not to disturb the merriment he told no ...
— The Social Cancer - A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... this attitude of despair. However, in spite of all our efforts, we could not, at the finish, help bursting out laughing in the faces of MM. Debienne and Poligny, who, seeing us pass straight from the gloomiest state of mind to one of the most insolent merriment, acted as though they thought that we had ...
— The Phantom of the Opera • Gaston Leroux
... course my polite and pugilistic instructor would take. To my utter amazement, he bowed to me as civilly as usual when we met in the yard; he never denied my version of the story; and when my friends laughed at him as a thrashed man, he took not the slightest notice of their agreeable merriment. Antiquity, I think, furnishes us with few more remarkable characters than ...
— A Rogue's Life • Wilkie Collins
... neither to pity nor to the ties that bound us together. Never shall I forget her last hours. Love had been won back, her mind was at rest about her child, and happiness triumphed over suffering. The comfort and luxury about her, the merriment of her child, who looked prettier still in the dainty garb that had replaced his baby-clothes, were pledges of a happy future for the little one, in whom she saw ...
— The Country Doctor • Honore de Balzac
... a difficult thing, even for a master, to fully render with an ordinary steel pen and a drop of common ink (and of a size no bigger than your little finger nail) the full face of a beautiful woman, let us say; or a child, in sadness or merriment or thoughtful contemplation; and make it as easily and unmistakably recognizable as a good photograph, but with all the subtle human charm and individuality of expression delicately emphasized in a way that no photograph ...
— The Martian • George Du Maurier
... patrol the porch. "I'm in a rather rebellious state of mind just now, I reckon," he admitted. "Seems to me that a lot of folks, including myself, are getting kicked. I'm smarting! I have a fellow-feeling for the oppressed." He laughed, but there was no merriment in his tones. "It's the little children who will suffer most in this, Miss Candage," he went on. "They are not to ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... merriment sat ill upon him. He was like some good-natured father or tutor who is pleased with his young charges, and lets himself go for their amusement, yet at the same time tries to show them that one can enjoy oneself decently and in an honourable ...
— Youth • Leo Tolstoy
... the booty? 'Behold, they were spread abroad upon all the earth, eating and drinking, and dancing, because of all the great spoil that they had taken out of the land of the Philistines (from Ziklag) and out of the land of Judah' (1 Sam 30:16). Here again you find a joy and merriment like these that we have under consideration, and that upon such like accounts. Nothing pleases the wicked more, than to see the godly go down the wind; for their words, and lives, and actions are a plague and a torment to them: As 'tis said of these two prophets, 'They tormented ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... margins were flecked with sunshine, and beautiful with columbines, violets, arbutus, and houstonias. Fragments of rock and large pebbles interrupted its flow and deepened its mellow song; above it brooded the twilight of the tall pines and walnuts, responding to its merriment with solemn murmurings. What playfellow is more inexhaustible than such a brook, so full of life, of motion, of sound and color, of variety and constancy. A child welcomes it as an answer to its own soul, with its mystery and transparency, its bounded lawlessness, its love ...
— Hawthorne and His Circle • Julian Hawthorne
... for the moment little part in the chatter and merriment, for she had received a considerable shock, stood talking with Copley. Ruth had given him her hand again and Chess clung to it rather more warmly—so the watchful Tom thought—than was needful. ...
— Ruth Fielding on the St. Lawrence - The Queer Old Man of the Thousand Islands • Alice B. Emerson
... was no longer doubtful. A melancholy winter it had been to them all, but the joy of once more seeing Emma resume her duties, and Alfred, supported on cushions, able to be moved into the sitting-room, had a very exhilarating effect upon their spirits. True, there was no longer the mirth and merriment that once reigned, but there was a subdued gratitude to Heaven, which, if it did not make them at once cheerful, at least prevented anything like repining or complaint. Grateful for the mercies vouchsafed to them in having Alfred and Emma spared to them, Mr and Mrs Campbell consoled themselves ...
— The Settlers in Canada • Frederick Marryat
... tied in its place by string. A young, wild, woodland squirrel gambolled near, though there were no woods for it anywhere within sight: it leaped and played as though rejoicing in youth, with such merriment as though youth had but come to it newly or been lost ...
— Don Rodriguez - Chronicles of Shadow Valley • Edward John Moreton Drax Plunkett, Baron, Dunsany
... bowery walk. But nothing of this kind gladdened our eyes as we toiled along the hot streets. Every house of public resort was crowded from the top to the bottom with emigrants of all ages, English, Irish, and Scotch. The sounds of riotous merriment that burst from them seemed but ill-assorted with the haggard, careworn faces of many of ...
— The Backwoods of Canada • Catharine Parr Traill
... the scene; it took her back to happy days, before black care had taken his seat behind her. She sat in a kind of dream, only half hearing the merriment of the young people, and only half tasting her ice. How she loved this old town, with its streets deep in black spring mud, its mud-plastered "buck-boards" and saddle horses hitched at every telegraph pole! Its banks and stores and law offices seemed shabbier after one had ...
— Sylvia's Marriage • Upton Sinclair
... instruments of music. The show-booths were the first on entering the fair, being situated on the north side of the high road. Here were three companies of players, viz. the Norwich company, a very large booth; Mrs. Baker's, whose clown, Lewy Owen, was "a fellow of infinite jest and merriment;" and Bailey's. The latter had formerly been a merchant, and was the compiler of a Directory which bore his name, and was a work of some celebrity and great utility. Fronting these were the fruit and gingerbread stands. On the opposite side of the road stood the cheese ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 333 - Vol. 12, Issue 333, September 27, 1828 • Various
... something. Just as she is entering, the station-man rings the bell. The woman, evidently unaccustomed to railway travel, rushes hastily back to the train. Everybody greets her performance with good-natured merriment. Finding the train not pulling out, and encouraged by some of the passengers, the woman ventures to try it again. As she reaches the waiting-room door, the station-man blows a shrill blast on his whistle. The woman rushes back, as before. Again the people laugh, ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens
... Alfrida, The height and pride of all this bounding ill; To post amain, plead love in his behalf, To court for him, and woo, and wed the maid. But have you never heard that theme? Deceit in love is but a merriment To such as seek a rival to prevent. Whither, distraught, roams my unruly thoughts? It is the king I cosen of his choice, And he nill brook Earl Ethenwald should prove False to his prince, especially in love. Then thus it shall ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VI • Robert Dodsley
... said Mr. Halloway, bubbling over with suppressed merriment at the intense fun of it all. "There isn't one of you here who will refuse. I never knew any thing so delightful and novel in my whole life. This condensed combination, in one afternoon party of charity, literature, and indigestion is masterly. Miss ...
— Only an Incident • Grace Denio Litchfield
... intimate knowledge of the hidden life of London, can understand Dickens's first newspaper success perfectly. His best known work, Pickwick, was published serially in 1836-1837, and Dickens's fame and fortune were made. Never before had a novel appeared so full of vitality and merriment. Though crude in design, a mere jumble of exaggerated characters and incidents, it fairly bubbled over with the kind of humor in which the British public delights, and it still remains, after three quarters of a century, one of our ...
— English Literature - Its History and Its Significance for the Life of the English Speaking World • William J. Long
... fond of merriment, was highly diverted with these sallies of Abou Hassan, and artfully promoted drinking, often asking for wine, thinking that when it began to operate, he might from his talkativeness satisfy his curiosity. He asked him his name, his business, and how he spent his life. "My name, sir," replied he, ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Complete • Anonymous
... the morning pass away in the most agreeable and auspicious manner; but after dinner an unexpected incident occurred, which clouded all the merriment of the unfortunate ...
— The History of Sandford and Merton • Thomas Day
... reached home in his car and entered the hall with rather a weary step, the somewhat noisy merriment which greeted him brought ...
— The Making of a Soul • Kathlyn Rhodes
... the Shield indoor merriment and outdoor noises would begin. Wherever in the lowlands any many-chimneyed city, proud of its size, rose by the sweep of watercourses, or any little inland town was proud of its smallness and of streets that terminated in the fields; ...
— Bride of the Mistletoe • James Lane Allen
... at other times by a governess. It shocked him a little to see a girl in a tousled blue cotton frock, with a green stain on the front of it, with a tangle of damp fair hair hanging round her head in shining strings, with unabashed fearless eyes which looked at him with a certain shrewd merriment. ...
— Priscilla's Spies 1912 • George A. Birmingham
... after him and shook it (it only looks gruesome in the dark, you know) he never stopped, and he stumbled on the first step, and then he rolled—My! how he did bump"—and naughty Peter sat down on the stalls and held his sides for very merriment. ...
— An Unwilling Maid • Jeanie Gould Lincoln
... the profession of your poor cousin, Captain," and the look of disquiet upon Leadbury's face was quickly relieved and he joined heartily and almost boisterously in the merriment. A moment later, Clarissa was alarmed to find him bending upon herself a look in which suspicion, distrust, fear, ...
— The Strange Adventures of Mr. Middleton • Wardon Allan Curtis
... watchword. One day the distinguishing mark might be blackened cheeks; the next, two strokes on the breast; the next, a white shell suspended from a strip of white cloth round the neck, and so on. Before any formal fight, they had a day of feasting, reviewing, and merriment. In action they never stood up in orderly ranks to rush at each other. According to their notions that would be the height of folly. Their favourite tactics were rather of the surprise and bush-skirmishing order. In some of their ...
— Samoa, A Hundred Years Ago And Long Before • George Turner
... her the man stopped without touching her. For a moment his horrid white-rimmed eyes glared searchingly into her face, immediately following which he burst into maniacal laughter. For two or three minutes the creature gave himself over to merriment and then, stopping as suddenly as he had commenced to laugh, he fell to examining the prisoner. He felt of her hair, her skin, the texture of the garment she wore and by means of signs made her understand ...
— Tarzan the Untamed • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... the Follow Me were secretly delighted to observe that the smaller craft made much easier going. The Adventurer seemed to be having a thoroughly good time, for she kicked up her heels and waved her nose and fairly rolled in merriment as the seas came sliding under her quarter. The bridge deck was a damp place until both side curtains were lowered and laced to the rails and stanchions. Poor Joe stood it as long as he could, getting paler and paler and sitting, hands in pockets, gazing fixedly at the brass kickplate at ...
— The Adventure Club Afloat • Ralph Henry Barbour
... took this mistimed merriment in very good part, generally answering with a ghastly contortion which he meant for a smile, or, if he did trouble himself to find words, with, "Well, that's funny! What makes you laugh? At me, I suppose? I don't wonder at it; ...
— Roughing it in the Bush • Susanna Moodie
... or would not touch the abominable brown bread, and, while waiting for the girls to serve the eggs or chops or whatever there was for supper, passed the time in trying to make out the meaning of the chatter and laughter that filled the room with merriment. There seemed to be a gleam of sense discoverable now and then, but, on the whole, it was impossible to catch the significance of the rapid-fire talk volleying from table to table. Indeed, it was always difficult for a stranger to swing into the ...
— My Friends at Brook Farm • John Van Der Zee Sears
... the country that I had met with: A little bantering took place between the young lady, her husband, and myself, which ended in my reading off, as well as I could into Spanish, the description I had just written down. It occasioned a world of merriment, and was taken in excellent part. The lady's cheek, for once, mantled with the rose. She laughed, shook her head, and said I was a very fanciful portrait painter; and the husband declared that, if I would stop at St. Filian, all the ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... redoubled vigor. May-poles, wrestling-matches, bear-baitings, puppet-shows, bowls, horse-racing, betting, rope-dancing, romping under the mistletoe on Christmas, eating boars' heads, attending the theatres, health-drinking,—all these old-fashioned ways, in which the English sought merriment, were restored. The evil was chiefly in the excess to which these pleasures were carried; and every thing, which bore any resemblance to the Puritans, was ridiculed and despised. The nation, as a nation, did not love Puritanism, or any thing pertaining to ...
— A Modern History, From the Time of Luther to the Fall of Napoleon - For the Use of Schools and Colleges • John Lord
... usurers. And the rotund Bishop's words were as the crackling of dry thorns Under a pot, bubbling without use in the desert of dreary platitudes. The story he told was spiced and garnished with profane words, Whereat the Leaders laughed in their cups, making great show of merriment, So that the banquet-hall rang, and wine was spilt on the linen. Wine as red as blood—the blood of the shattered miner, Blood of the boy in the rifle-pits, blood of the coughing child-slave, Blood of the mangled trainman, blood that ...
— The Air Trust • George Allan England
... only a woman—a woman all by herself, if she likes, and without any man to help her—who can turn a house into a home." See how her heart sinks, how her voice, full of mirth and glee and music before his coming, dies in her throat, how the little ones, full of merriment all day long, tremblingly hide in the corner, or withdraw from the room; see how the intrusion of this grim spectre of malcontent shuts the door upon domestic peace and happiness, and withers every pious resolve to make home the dearest, ...
— The Jericho Road • W. Bion Adkins
... church. That is a record and no mistake," laughed Ned. Wilbur and his father joined him in the merriment, but Mr. Hill felt a twinge of conscience. "I might have let him have a horse if he was so determined ...
— The Hero of Hill House • Mable Hale
... pupil to hop around the large table on one foot. The hilarity of the festivity was not lessened when the Reverendo himself joined in the frolic, his robes flapping around him, as they all contributed to the merriment. The Marchesa has many a dainty note written to her by Penini's mother. Once it is as Pen's amanuensis that she serves, praying the loan of a "'Family Robinson,' by Mayne Reid," to solace the boy in some indisposition. "I doubt the connection between Mayne Reid ...
— The Brownings - Their Life and Art • Lilian Whiting
... indeed, sir. She is all gentleness and sweetness, yet is full of mirth, too, and graceful merriment." ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 1 July 1848 • Various
... OF THE GREAT REBELLION. Fearful adventures of soldiers, scouts, spies, and refugees; daring exploits of smugglers, guerillas, desperadoes, and others; tales of loyal and disloyal women; stories of the negro, and incidents of fun and merriment in camp and field. By Lieut. CHARLES S. GREENE, late of the U. S. Army. With Illustrations in Oil. Cloth. ...
— Cattle and Their Diseases • Robert Jennings
... fell silent. They sat staring at each other, and then suddenly she leaned back in her chair and began to laugh. Once she had started, burst after burst of merriment swept over her. "I try to stay angry, Allan!" she gasped. "It seems as if I ought to. But, ...
— The Moneychangers • Upton Sinclair
... other side of it in your letter,' cried Mrs. Frost, giving way to her merriment. 'The Arabian Nights themselves, the two viziers laying their heads together, and sending home orders to us to make up ...
— Dynevor Terrace (Vol. I) - or, The Clue of Life • Charlotte M. Yonge
... to see so large a gathering. (Cheers.) They quite reminded him of the clients who thronged his passage on the first day of Term, waiting for his chamber doors to open. (Laughter.) There was nothing in the remark he had just made to provoke merriment. He wished it to be clearly understood that he appealed to their reason. (Cheers.) It had been objected that some of the entertainments given at what had been called political pic-nics had nothing to do with the reasoning faculties of the spectators. This he emphatically denied. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 103, December 10, 1892 • Various
... his merry visits, and with his ludicrous presence delights the drawing-room, cheers the study, and causes side-shakings in the kitchen,—entitles him to be called a missionary of good. Grant this,—then allow, on the average, five minutes of merriment to each reader of each issue of Punch,—then multiply these 5 minutes by—say 50,000, and this again by 52 weeks, and this, finally, by 17 years, and thus cipher out, if you have a tolerably capacious imagination, the amount of happiness which has flowed and spread, like a river of gladness, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly , Volume 2, No. 14, December 1858 • Various
... the blue eyes, and laughter on the red lips, and merry lilt in the soft voice. But the pink had faded from the girl's cheek; the shadow had chased the sunshine from her eyes; her lips had taken a downward turn, and a note of sadness had stolen the merriment from her voice. ...
— A Son of Hagar - A Romance of Our Time • Sir Hall Caine
... travelling. Sumichrast told us that we had scarcely three hundred feet more to ascend, and shouldered the basket himself. Now that I was a mere spectator, I could readily forgive him his fit of merriment. Nothing, in fact, could be more grotesque than the contortions he went through trying to keep his balance. L'Encuerado was the only one who retained his countenance. As for Lucien, he seemed to feel the efforts of Sumichrast as much as if they ...
— Adventures of a Young Naturalist • Lucien Biart
... overclouded and his evil passions stimulated by the fumes of intoxication. His evenings were ordinarily given to revelry. People who saw him only over his bottle would have supposed him to be a man gross indeed, sottish, and addicted to low company and low merriment, but social and goodhumoured. He was constantly surrounded on such occasions by buffoons selected, for the most part, from among the vilest pettifoggers who practiced before him. These men bantered and abused each other for his entertainment. ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 1 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... consumed at this eventful wedding, with which we wind up our eventful history; nor even to pity the breathless, flushed, and over-heated Babette, who was so ill the next day, as to be unable to quit her bed; nor can we detail the jokes, the merriment, and the songs which went round, the peals of laughter, the loud choruses, the antic feats performed by the company; still more impossible would it be to give an idea of the three tremendous cheers, which shook the Lust Haus to its foundations, when ...
— Snarley-yow - or The Dog Fiend • Frederick Marryat
... all these little disagreeables seemed immensely jolly; so, whenever the captain or Mr Marline or Harry happened to get capsized in this way down in the cabin during the day, it sent me at once into fits of merriment, the fact of my being washed off my feet as well only adding to the enjoyment of the joke, for I could grin quite as much with my own head in the scuppers and my mouth full of water as I would when the ...
— The White Squall - A Story of the Sargasso Sea • John Conroy Hutcheson
... of its gushing water, Glad as the tones of merriment and glee That joyous burst from children in their laughter, Swift dashes onward to the ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, January 1844 - Volume 23, Number 1 • Various
... door, his treasure carefully tied up in a handkerchief. He will deliver it to no one but the manager, and in spite of his other duties that functionary is compelled to receive it in person. This done, the old man, to the merriment of certain wags who delight to speculate on his childlike credulity, takes a seat in the parquette, wipes clean his venerable spectacles, and placing them methodically over his eyes, forms a unique picture in the ...
— Justice in the By-Ways - A Tale of Life • F. Colburn Adams
... be a very fashionable and leisurely throng—so long had he been absent from people either modish or easeful. He felt himself to be hopelessly outside all this youth and brilliancy and merriment, and he looked upon it all with ...
— The Spirit of Sweetwater • Hamlin Garland
... with roses, To that a carved hook or well-wrought scrip, Gracing another with her cherry lip; To one her garter, to another then A handkerchief cast o'er and o'er again; And none returneth empty that hath spent His pains to fill their rural merriment. ...
— Pastoral Poems by Nicholas Breton, - Selected Poetry by George Wither, and - Pastoral Poetry by William Browne (of Tavistock) • Nicholas Breton, George Wither, William Browne (of Tavistock)
... Peabody did not hear the merriment that followed, or he would have given up the editorial staff of the Centreville "Gazette" as maliciously disposed to underrate his ...
— Risen from the Ranks - Harry Walton's Success • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... answered by two streams of laughter,—one from Mary, sitting up in bed, and the other from Miss Prissy, holding her sides, as she sat dissolved in merriment ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various
... state of mental doubt—it might equally have been a condition of obscure hope—he had been rudely shoved toward pessimism; the converse of the announced purpose of the picture. The audience, for one thing, was so depressingly wrong in the placing of its merriment: it laughed delightedly at a gaunt feminine vindictiveness hurrying through the snow on an errand of destruction. The fact that the girl's maternity was transcendent in a generous and confident heart, made lovely by spiritual passion, escaped everyone. The phrase, spiritual ...
— Cytherea • Joseph Hergesheimer
... endure. As to any attempt to make herself heard, she knew from the first that was of doubtful result, and now must certainly be of no avail when all but the warders were asleep. But to spend the night thus was a far less evil than to be discovered by the staring domestics, and exposed to the open merriment of her friends, and the hidden mockery of her enemies. As to Caspar, she was certain of his silence. So she sat on, like the lady in Comus, 'in stony fetters fixed and motionless;' only, as she said to herself, there was no attendant spirit to summon Caspar, ...
— St. George and St. Michael • George MacDonald
... all the Ghettos, Jewries, and Mellahs. The more part received the divine message in uproarious jubilation. The Messiah was come, indeed! Those terrible twenty-four hours of absolute fasting and passionate prayer—henceforward to be hours of feasting and merriment! O just and joyous edict! The Jewish Kingdom was on the eve of restoration—how then longer ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... reach the third plank on the angles, and about fifteen feet from the ground, my barrow rolled off, and down came sand, barrow, and myself to the ground below. I could have cried with shame and mortification, for my misfortune created much merriment for the good natured workers. But it mortified me to death to think I was not man enough to fill a soldier's place. My good coworker and brother soldier exchanged the shovel for the barrow with me, and then began the first day's work I had ever done of that kind. Hour after ...
— History of Kershaw's Brigade • D. Augustus Dickert
... I replied, tossing him a half-dollar piece, and throwing a handful of smaller coin among the women. A general scramble followed, in which the old fellow nimbly joined, shouting out between his boisterous explosions of merriment: ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 3 No 2, February 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... Married to Kusanabha, bare A hundred daughters lovely faced, With every charm and beauty graced. It chanced the maidens, bright and gay As lightning-flashes on a day Of rain-time, to the garden went With song and play and merriment— And there in gay attire they strayed, And danced, and laughed, and sang, and played. The God of Wind who roves at will All places, as he lists, to fill, Saw the young maidens dancing there, Of faultless shape and mien ...
— Hindu Literature • Epiphanius Wilson
... Miss Cooper came in from a walk, radiant with tidings. Her face, as I have observed, wore a continual smile, being dimpled and punctured all over with merriment,—so that, when an unusual cheerfulness was super-diffused, it resembled a tempestuous little pool into which a great stone has ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 89, March, 1865 • Various
... WAS hard luck!" said Elizabeth, as they sobered down after the gale of merriment caused by Marion's mishaps, and her ...
— A Garland for Girls • Louisa May Alcott
... banquet into a temple of initiation, representing there the sacred procession and mysteries of Ceres; now such things as these, in my opinion, ought not to be suffered by a steward, but he must permit such discourse only, such shows, such merriment, as promote the particular end and design of such entertainments; and that is, by pleasant conversation either to beget or maintain friendship and good-will among the guests; for an entertainment is only a pastime table with a glass of wine, ending ...
— Essays and Miscellanies - The Complete Works Volume 3 • Plutarch
... persons in the window nodded to one another significantly, and began smiling in a constrained manner, as if there were something quite preposterous in the inquiry. The man, a corpulent, red-faced person, seemed on the point of suffocating with merriment. ...
— The Queen of Sheba & My Cousin the Colonel • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... job was over. "The Pioneers will get over it, Tim," she rejoined. "They've swallowed a lot in their time. Heaven's gate will have to be pretty wide to let in a real Pioneer," she added. "He takes up so much room— ah, Timothy Denton!" she added, with an outburst of whimsical merriment. ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... One of her midshipmen sang popular songs in French, German, and Spanish, and one (so he said) in Russian. If the audience did not know the lingo of one song from another, it was no drawback to the merriment. ...
— Sailing Alone Around The World • Joshua Slocum
... wealth. Men are reduced by men to a state of servitude, and are repeatedly afflicted (at the hands of their own species) with death, imprisonment, and other tortures. Although such is their condition, yet even they (without yielding to grief) laugh and sport and indulge in merriment. Others again, though endued with might of arms, and possessed of knowledge and great energy of mind, follow censurable, sinful, and miserable professions. They seek to change such professions for other pursuits (that are more dignified) but then they are bound ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... could only press her hand and depart, muttering something indistinguishable. She watched him vanish, after which she sat down again on the log and really did laugh. Still, it was a queer kind of merriment, for by degrees it turned ...
— Love Eternal • H. Rider Haggard
... rest of the fast fellows keeping a lookout for donkeys; when one is seen, a hideous imitative bray is set up by the man of music, and his quadrupedal brother, attracted by the congenial sound, rushes to the roadside—mutual recognition, with much merriment, is ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... more, shaking with merriment like a jolly old fellow amused by a funny story, he took his departure, not forgetting, however, to set his great hob-nail boots on each of the compromising footprints which his ...
— The Eight Strokes of the Clock • Maurice Leblanc
... but, instead of kissing each other, they smacked their mouths over each other's shoulders and uttered expressions of joy in imitation of them. The girls were greatly amused, and the storekeeper almost went into convulsions of merriment. ...
— Fred Fearnot's New Ranch - and How He and Terry Managed It • Hal Standish
... country-house party he was usually the life and soul. No man could invent so many practical jokes or carry them on with such refinement of humour as he. Therefore, if the hostess wished to impart merriment among her guests, she sought out and sent a pressing invitation to "Jimmy" Flockart. A first-class shot, an excellent tennis-player, a good golfer, and quite a good hand at putting a stone in curling, he was an all-round sportsman who was sure to be highly popular with his fellow-guests. Hence up ...
— The House of Whispers • William Le Queux
... their level, and called for names. He mentioned Thaddeus Stevens, Charles Sumner, and Wendell Phillips as men who worked against the fundamental principles of the government, and excited the boisterous merriment of the audience by calling John W. Forney, the Secretary of the Senate and a prominent journalist, "a dead duck" upon whom "he would not waste his ammunition." Again he spoke of his rise from humble origin,—a tailor who "always ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol 31, No 2, June 1908 • Various
... and choosing a fable that would specially lend itself, she started the class off translating it into an English fabrication that convulsed both pupils and mistress. Hal, of course, followed suit, and the merriment grew fast and furious after ...
— Winding Paths • Gertrude Page
... kinsman Wilfred's glove better than my whole person. There she stands to avouch it—nay, blush not, kinswoman, there is no shame in loving a courtly knight better than a country thane,—and do not laugh neither, Rowena, for grave-clothes and a thin visage are, God knows, no matter of merriment. Nay, as thou wilt needs laugh, I will find thee a better jest—Give me thy hand, or, rather, lend it me, for I but ask it in the way of friendship. Here, cousin Wilfred of Ivanhoe, in thy favour I renounce and abjure—Hey! our ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VII • Various
... could see the marks of horror, which the dismal work they had been about had left behind it, viz. the blood, the bones, and part of the flesh, of human bodies, eaten and devoured by those wretches with merriment and sport. I was so filled with indignation at the sight, that I now began to premeditate the destruction of the next that I saw there, let them be whom or how many soever. It seemed evident to me ...
— The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe Of York, Mariner, Vol. 1 • Daniel Defoe
... give in marriage with such dowry as his circumstances will admit of: and should anything befall either of the legatees, then let his portion pass to the survivor. The reading of this will caused some merriment among the hearers, who knew of Eudamidas's poverty, but did not know anything of the friendship existing between him and his heirs. They went off much tickled at the handsome legacy that Aretaeus and Charixenus (lucky dogs!) ...
— Works, V3 • Lucian of Samosata
... over his forehead, and shut his eyes. When he again opened them, he saw that the man had turned to laugh and that the friar had caught his sides as though to save himself from bursting with merriment, then he saw them point toward his house and ...
— The Reign of Greed - Complete English Version of 'El Filibusterismo' • Jose Rizal
... they laughed at M. de la Tourelle, and told him that he would be hearing such woman's drivelling some day. Up to that moment, I think, I had only feared him, but his unnatural, half-ferocious reply made me hate even more than I dreaded him. But now they grew weary of their savage merriment; the jewels and watch had been apprised, the money and papers examined; and apparently there was some necessity for the body being interred quietly and before daybreak. They had not dared to leave him where he was slain for fear lest people ...
— The Grey Woman and other Tales • Mrs. (Elizabeth) Gaskell
... the window. I saw the people outside running and jumping about on the ice; I saw the beautiful flags waving in the wind; I heard the boys shouting, 'Hurrah!' and the lads and lasses singing, and everything full of merriment and joy. But there was the white cloud with the black spot hanging over them. I cried out as loudly as I could, but no one heard me; I was too far off from the people. Soon would the storm burst, the ice break, and all who were ...
— Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen • Hans Christian Andersen
... frankness which must have almost made their author shake in his grave, the secret note-books of this famous wit; and are thus enabled to trace the jokes, in embryo, with which he had so often made the walls of St. Stephen's shake, in a merriment excited by the happy appearance of sudden unpremeditated ...
— Books and Authors - Curious Facts and Characteristic Sketches • Anonymous
... into great merriment. After they had enjoyed their laughter awhile, my Northern lady-friend said, 'Did ...
— The Sable Cloud - A Southern Tale With Northern Comments (1861) • Nehemiah Adams
... it is so much the nature of laughter to communicate itself that when it no longer communicates itself it ceases to exist. One might say that outbursts of merriment need to be encouraged, that they are not self-sufficient. Not to share them is to blow upon them and extinguish them. When, in an animated and mirthful group, some one remains cold or gloomy, the laughter immediately ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park
... have you with us"; of Dr. Theophilus's "You grow younger every day, ladies. Will you dance to-night?"; of General Bolingbroke's "I never missed an opportunity of coming to you in my life, ma'am"; of a confused chorus of girlish murmurs, of youthful merriment. ...
— The Romance of a Plain Man • Ellen Glasgow
... To slow and sere consumption he shall change, And with invisible mutation strange, Withered and wasted send them to the earth; Whilst hushed, and by the mace of ruin rent, Sinks the forsaken hall of merriment! Bright bursts the sun upon the shaggy scene! The aged rocks their glittering summits gray 160 Hang beautiful amid the beams of day; And all the woods, with slowly-fading green, Yet smiling wave:—severer thoughts, away! The night is distant, ...
— The Poetical Works of William Lisle Bowles, Vol. 1 • William Lisle Bowles
... that slips In lazy laughter from the lips That marvel much if any kiss Is sweeter than the apple's is. Blow back the twitter of the birds— The lisp, the titter, and the words Of merriment that found the shine Of summer-time a glorious wine That drenched the leaves that loved it so, In orchard lands ...
— Riley Farm-Rhymes • James Whitcomb Riley
... merchandise. I know it is the general lot of women, Each miserably mated to some man Wrecks her own life upon his selfishness: That it is general makes it not less bitter. I think I never heard a woman laugh, Laugh for pure merriment, except one woman, That was at night time, in the public streets. Poor soul, she walked with painted lips, and wore The mask of pleasure: I would not laugh like her; No, death were better. [Enter GUIDO behind unobserved; the DUCHESS flings herself down before a picture of the ...
— The Duchess of Padua • Oscar Wilde
... and pushed him violently over the edge into the icy water of the harbour. His lusty shouts caused searchlights to be turned on and he was rescued promptly, but the episode, small and unimportant as it was, caused considerable merriment—except to the principal actor—for many ...
— Submarine Warfare of To-day • Charles W. Domville-Fife
... well lighted with gas, but most of the bordering houses were dark. Now and then a single foot-farer passed with loud, hollow-sounding boots along the pavement; or two girls would come laughing along, their merriment echoing rude in the wide stillness. A cold wind, a small, forsaken, solitary wind, moist with a thin fog, seemed, as well as wee Gibbie, to be roaming the night, for it met him at various corners, and from all directions. But it had nothing to do, ...
— Sir Gibbie • George MacDonald
... young lady. She was now tall and slender and quite grown up, her head was finely poised on a graceful neck; her skin was soft and fair, shading into a fresh pink about the cheeks; her eyes were deep and thoughtful, and her mouth, around which mischief and merriment had once played, now expressed seriousness and ...
— Jerusalem • Selma Lagerlof
... the bereaved landlady, and the result was as usual. And when, long years after, Johnson would solemnly explain that it was a pure love-match on both sides, the statement never failed to excite much needless and ill-suppressed merriment on the part of the listeners. In mimicking the endearments of Johnson and his "pretty creature"—so the admiring husband called her—Garrick many years later ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 5 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard
... to the quay, through the dark by-ways, in a cart, the only vehicle which at that day could navigate the muddy, unpaved streets of Detroit, was a theme for much merriment, and not less so, our descent of the narrow, perpendicular stair-way by which we reached the little apartment called the Ladies' Cabin. We were highly delighted with the accommodations, which, by comparison, seemed the very ...
— Wau-bun - The Early Day in the Northwest • Juliette Augusta Magill Kinzie
... asking for all sorts of favors, bedding, silver spoons, a silk umbrella, or begging her to invest some money in the manufacture of an article, warranted "to take the kink out of the hair of the negro," she would always check the merriment of her family by saying, "Don't laugh too much; ...
— Lives of Girls Who Became Famous • Sarah Knowles Bolton
... like yourn that was afraid, and a face, nuther. Oh, when it comes to looks, you are there all right. Well, sir," he added, "the town's stirred up. Old Ebenezer is all of a titter. Afraid to laugh out loud, but she's tickled all the same." The old man leaned back with a chuckle, and in his merriment he slowly clawed at the rim of gray whiskers that ran around under his chin. "I like to see ...
— Old Ebenezer • Opie Read
... is a man with a past. He is now a cavalry subaltern and he was once a sailor. As a soldier at sea is never anything but an object of derision to sailors, correspondingly the mere idea of a sailor on horseback causes the utmost merriment among soldiers. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, Jan. 8, 1919 • Various
... but Kitty and Billy did not seem to mind the dampness or the chill for the moon was beautiful, and they seated themselves in the hammock. Bobberts had been put to bed, and his parents had become almost merry with their old-time merriment as they contemplated the speedy over-throw of the Fenelby Domestic Tariff. The joy that comes from a tax repealed is greater than the peace that comes from paying a tax honestly. There is no fun in paying taxes. ...
— The Cheerful Smugglers • Ellis Parker Butler
... secured in the ground, that their united strength could not pull it down. All the time they were shouting and crying to each other, every now and then giving way to hoarse laughter, which occasionally broke into shrieks of merriment. "Bery good fun for dem, but bad for us," observed Macco, as the violent shocks made us expect every instant to be hurled to the ground. At length they stopped, and there was an ominous silence. We felt as people do during the lull of a hurricane, when they know it will come back with tenfold ...
— In the Eastern Seas • W.H.G. Kingston
... merriment in Maoriland at the idea that Rangihaeta, hitherto sternly opposed to our roads, should himself be constructing one. That was as I had hoped, and he made no more difficulties for us. How could he? There he was, almost every afternoon, driving on the sands in all the pride of ...
— The Romance of a Pro-Consul - Being The Personal Life And Memoirs Of The Right Hon. Sir - George Grey, K.C.B. • James Milne
... again, on his side, is described as so thoroughly degraded, that he makes the disfiguration of his own person by the knout, the cancellation of his back by stripes and scars—a subject of continual merriment. Between two parties thus incapacitated by law and usage for manly intercourse, the result was exactly such by consummation as on many parts of the Continent it still is by tendency. The master welcomed from his slave that spirit of familiar impertinence which stirred the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine—Vol. 54, No. 333, July 1843 • Various
... plunge suddenly into an atmosphere of merriment within a few yards of the men posted at the periscopes along the sandbagged parapet. The electric lights were burning, and a blue haze of tobacco smoke obscured the air from a semicircle of listeners, sitting on packing-cases and forms round the piano on the platform, ...
— With Haig on the Somme • D. H. Parry
... of a flirt, no doubt. She had many partners, walked in the garden with them impartially, divided her dances, sat on the stairs. Wherever her yellow draperies moved, nonsense, merriment, and ...
— Penelope's English Experiences • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... as they rode toward the house. Their gay voices came to him lifted into soft laughter; their light merriment, so in tune with the springtime, fell jarringly ...
— The Short Cut • Jackson Gregory
... not laugh any more; she only looked at me with her large eyes, which were bright with merriment. "He would not have stooped." "Why?" I persisted. "Just suppose that he had let his hat fall, he would have been sure to pick it up, and then... I was well prepared to defend myself, in this costume!" She put her two strong, round ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume III (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant
... enjoy an unrivalled reputation for gaiety and merriment. Bread is considered a love charm, and the two who eat from the same loaf will fall in love with each other. The suitor often sends an ambassador to a girl he has never seen, and if his proposal is accepted he calls the ...
— The Etiquette of Engagement and Marriage • G. R. M. Devereux
... reply, Saya Chone and U Saw burst into a great shout of mocking laughter. They rolled to and fro in their mirth, and the room rang again with their hideous merriment. Mr. Haydon looked from one to the other, his brow knitted in ...
— Jack Haydon's Quest • John Finnemore
... brutal soldiers stood upon the borders of the morass with shouts of merriment, as they witnessed the sudden discomfiture of their leader; a discomfiture the more ludicrous, in contrast with his gorgeous attire, and his invariably proud and lofty bearing. At length Porcallo extricated ...
— Ferdinand De Soto, The Discoverer of the Mississippi - American Pioneers and Patriots • John S. C. Abbott
... the child was big enough to dance about in farm-yard and garden, looking like a flower with long golden stamina. She was simply brimming over with merriment and delight in being alive; and now Captain Rauchfuss condescended to take notice of his daughter. He brought her home all sorts of toys and trifles, and took great pleasure in seeing how quick and clever the little creature was, in watching her scramble about and in listening to ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various
... that these are the only women who never deceive a man, and whose affection remains constant through all trials. Think of the hours that the kind soul must have passed, lonely in the street, listening to the din and merriment within my apartments, the clinking of the glasses, the laughing, the ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... have various ways of serving their country. Some go to the firing line to be shot and others stay at home to be a source of innocent merriment to ...
— New York Times, Current History, Vol 1, Issue 1 - From the Beginning to March, 1915 With Index • Various
... she had been sitting broodingly for a long while, the cloud slowly dissipated from her face. In her eyes a twinkle of merriment battled with the fire of righteous indignation, and at last she even laughed with a low pealing note like ...
— A Pagan of the Hills • Charles Neville Buck
... otherwise he would not let us depart from hence, neither give us our wives to take with us, and he would take from us the swords Colada and Tizona which he gave us.... We will therefore turn this thing into merriment before him and his people, to the end that they may not suspect what we have at heart. While they were thus devising their uncle Suero Gonzalez came in, and they told him of their intent. And he counselled them to keep their wrath secret, ...
— Chronicle Of The Cid • Various
... old world is comin' to an end, don't it? What times we've 'ad—if you don't mind me puttin' it like that! I remember when I had to be awful careful always to say 'Sir' to you, and 'Mr. David' or 'Mr. Williams'"—and a roguish look, a gleam of merriment came into Bertie's eyes, and he laughed a laugh that was half sob. "If you was to write your life, no one 'ud believe it, miss. It licks any novel I ever read—and I've read a tidy few, looking after the ...
— Mrs. Warren's Daughter - A Story of the Woman's Movement • Sir Harry Johnston
... night, a hundred years ago, there was great merriment in the house of a farmer who had fixed his abode within the arctic circle, in Nordland, not far from the foot of Sulitelma, the highest mountain in Norway. This dwelling, with its few fields about it, was in a recess between the rocks, ...
— Feats on the Fiord - The third book in "The Playfellow" • Harriet Martineau
... be right in the swim, eh, Droom?" he said. The irony of it all appealed strongly to his sense of humour. "I don't suppose you know those swells?" he added, patronisingly. Droom was listening intently to the bursts of merriment which were enlivening the restaurant. Like a small boy at a circus who fears that something will happen that he will not see, he was continually turning his head and letting his eyes travel critically over the company at ...
— Jane Cable • George Barr McCutcheon
... worth going miles to hear. There are all shades of temperament and character in laughter, which is the one thing of which we are least self-conscious; hers revealed not only a sense of humor, rare in her sex, but a blithe, happy nature, which made allies at once of those upon whose ears her merriment fell. Trowbridge's eyes sparkled with ...
— Hidden Gold • Wilder Anthony
... animal to set up a loud yell, and retreat to his master much faster than he came, passing first one fore-paw and then the other over his nose, to wipe away the pain, in such a ridiculous manner as to excite loud merriment, not only from our party on the bench, but also from others who had ...
— The King's Own • Captain Frederick Marryat
... his glory! On this occasion the joke of the evening was an English traveller. The ideal Englishman on the Continent is a never-failing source of merriment. The presence of five Americans gave additional piquancy to the show. The corpulent, double-chinned, red-nosed Englishman, with knee-breeches, shoe-buckles, and absurd coat, stamped, swore, frowned, ...
— The Dodge Club - or, Italy in 1859 • James De Mille
... merriment danced in Rose's eyes, but the rest of her face was graver than ever. ("Good," he thought; "she ...
— The Creators - A Comedy • May Sinclair
... those lips that I have kissed, I know not how oft. Where be your gibes now, your gambols, your songs, your flashes of merriment that were wont to set the ...
— Modern Painters Volume II (of V) • John Ruskin
... been characterized by feasting and merriment and some undesirable mummery. Puttenham, in his "Arte of Poesie" (1589), observes: "On St. Nicholas' night, commonly, the scholars of the country make them a Bishop, who, like a foolish boy, goeth about blessing and preaching with such childish terms as make the people laugh at his foolish ...
— The Customs of Old England • F. J. Snell
... about that alarming conversation? Well,"—(here Mr. Glover was so overcome with merriment, that, after a proper time, the interposition of official authority became necessary,)—"well, I am an engraver. My business is mainly to cut heads. Sometimes I use steel, sometimes copper. My brother, who is also an engraver, and I were discussing a new commission. I told him ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 32, June, 1860 • Various
... was detailed, a night or two afterwards, by Thomas Shepard, one of the boys, at a drinking conclave in the village, where bon vivants, and some persons inimical to Mr. F. were present, and created high merriment. From that den it was spread. It appeared that Miss S. had, for some time, had doubts on the subject of her conversion, and sought a conversation with her ...
— Personal Memoirs Of A Residence Of Thirty Years With The Indian Tribes On The American Frontiers • Henry Rowe Schoolcraft
... spite of her disapproval, even to her there was something very attractive in the pretty girlish merriment and interest of ...
— Eve to the Rescue • Ethel Hueston
... Hush-a-byes" in cradle or mother's lap will now give place to the quiet cribside talks called "The Palace Bed Time" and "The Queen Mother's Counsel"; and in the story hour "The Palace Jest-Book" will furnish merriment for the youngsters who laughed the year before over the simpler ...
— Pinafore Palace • Various
... card dealers that I stood near began to give a part of their attention to the group that sat in the corner. There was in me a desire to leave this room. So far my hours at Medicine Bow had seemed to glide beneath a sunshine of merriment, of easy-going jocularity. This was suddenly gone, like the wind changing to north in the middle of a warm day. But I ...
— The Virginian - A Horseman Of The Plains • Owen Wister
... present, sharing heartily in the merriment of his flock. Voices greeted him on all sides with intonations of tender respect. The rudest man there was loyal to the kind-hearted priest, and would as soon have thought of shooting him as of giving him any but the most reverent attention. It is to be noted, however, that their understanding ...
— Alice of Old Vincennes • Maurice Thompson
... week, and the female officers were doing their best to excite merriment over the decorations. Snow was falling, but the flakes, after hesitating for a moment, thawed into sludge on the surface of the asphalte yard. Seeing Alfred shivering about under the shed, the superintendent sent him to the office for a plan of ...
— Essays in Rebellion • Henry W. Nevinson
... beguiled into thinking Olivia loves him, and into appearing before her cross-gartered and wreathed in the smiles {171} which accord so ill with his sour visage. All the more affecting in contrast to this boisterous merriment is the frail figure of Viola, who knows so well "what love women to men may owe." Amid the perfume of flowers and the sob of violins the Duke learns to love this seeming boy better than he knows, and easily forgets the romantic melancholy ...
— An Introduction to Shakespeare • H. N. MacCracken
... we approached. Here and there a coif, or cotton cap, nodded, and the slit of a smile would gape between the nose and the meeting chin. A high good humor appeared to reign among the groups; a carnival of merriment laughed itself out in coarse, cracked laughter; loud was the play of the jests, hoarse and guttural the gibes that were abroad on the still air, from old mouths that uttered strong, ...
— In and Out of Three Normady Inns • Anna Bowman Dodd
... Her husband sometimes called her the Laughing Goddess. She had two aspects to her beauty—one when she was soft and motherly, the other when she rallied those she loved and sparkled with merriment. Her still beautiful copper-coloured hair had hardly a white thread in it. She was very charming to look ...
— Love of Brothers • Katharine Tynan
... the party, however, was apparently engrossed by other thoughts than those of the mirth and merriment around; for in the midst of all he would turn suddenly from the others, and devote himself to a number of scattered sheets of paper, upon which he had written some lines, but whose crossed and blotted ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 1 (of 2) • Charles Lever
... help him on with a good kick. It is so absurd to advance into the presence of savage royalty after the fashion of an Irishman driving a pig to market, for that is what we looked like, and the idea nearly made me burst out laughing then and there. I had to work off my dangerous tendency to unseemly merriment by blowing my nose, a proceeding which filled old Billali with horror, for he looked over his shoulder and made a ghastly face at me, and I heard him murmur, "Oh, ...
— She • H. Rider Haggard
... us all off, as the locust-cry of some full-throated soprano drags a multitudinous chorus after it. It was plain that some dam or other had broken in the soul of this young girl, and she was squaring up old scores of laughter, out of which she had been cheated, with a grand flood of merriment that swept all before it. So we had a great laugh all round, in which the Model—who, if she had as many virtues as there are spokes to a wheel, all compacted with a personality as round and complete as its tire, yet wanted that one little addition of grace, which seems ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, No. 20, June, 1859 • Various
... The merriment went on until somebody called for Veronica to play on her violin and she came downstairs with her violin in her hands. Then a hush fell on the crowd, and the merrymakers listened, spellbound and dreamy-eyed, ...
— The Camp Fire Girls Do Their Bit - Or, Over the Top with the Winnebagos • Hildegard G. Frey
... spat; they chewed; they nudged each other. Here and there a ripple rose to a roar. One man turned his back, and hands deep in his pockets, laughed silently in the face of heaven. Another was stuffing his pig-tail into his mouth to stifle his merriment. ...
— The Gentleman - A Romance of the Sea • Alfred Ollivant
... at once. Keineth, looking down the length of the room, decked with the holly the children had fastened over doors and windows, thought that nowhere could Christmas be merrier than right there at the Lees! And what helped make the merriment was the comforting thought that Tim and his family were eating a ...
— Keineth • Jane D. Abbott
... off her hat, rolled up her sleeves, and began on vigorous ablutions. She had laughed, yes, and heartily, but in her complicated many-roomed heart a lively pique rubbed shoulders with her mirth, and her merriment was tinctured with a liberal amount of the traditional feminine horrified disgust at having been uncomely, at having unconsciously been subjected to an indignity. She was determined that no slightest stain should remain on her smooth, fine-textured skin. She felt, as ...
— The Bent Twig • Dorothy Canfield
... honk up the road startled him. Then an auto with blazing lights leaped out of the night. The old man was standing right in its way, unconscious of his danger. Almost instinctively two strong hands clutched him and hurled him into the ditch as the car swept past. Shouts of merriment sounded forth upon the night air from the occupants of the car. The fright they had given the two by the side of the road evidently gave them much amusement. Their laughter caused the rescuer to straighten ...
— Under Sealed Orders • H. A. Cody
... topic—they all decided to enter the suitcase race and provide some merriment for the School by the costumes they would produce. The party broke up reluctantly to dress for dinner. But Catherine managed to detain Judith for a moment and ...
— Judy of York Hill • Ethel Hume Patterson Bennett
... lightness of heart which had dressed them in masquerade habits, had decorated their tents, and assembled them in fantastic groups, appeared a sin against, and a provocative to, the awful destiny that had laid its palsying hand upon hope and life. The merriment of the hour was an unholy mockery of the sorrows of man. The foreigners whom we had among us, who had fled from the plague in their own country, now saw their last asylum invaded; and, fear making them garrulous, they described to eager listeners ...
— The Last Man • Mary Shelley
... you spoke rashly, when you said you should be glad of it," said Louis, who was full of merriment at his brother's misfortune. ...
— Louis' School Days - A Story for Boys • E. J. May
... suggested putting back the clocks, but he advanced a step or two on that proposal, and while dancing was going on vigorously, stepped away and hung all the ladies' cloaks on a large tree not far from the front door. Imagine the confusion and merriment! I have often heard him tell ...
— Charles Philip Yorke, Fourth Earl of Hardwicke, Vice-Admiral R.N. - A Memoir • Lady Biddulph of Ledbury
... noonday meal arrived, Isy appeared with her mother- in-law and old Eppie, carrying their food for the labourers, and leading little Peter in her hand. For a while the whole company was enlivened by the child's merriment; after which he was laid with his bottle in the shadow of an overarching stook, and went to sleep, his mother watching him, while she took her first lesson in gathering and binding the sheaves. When he woke, his grandfather sent the whole family home ...
— Salted With Fire • George MacDonald
... they went at it. Never have I beheld such a jolly scene of labor. Tugging these wet and heavy boards over a bridge of boats ashore, then across the slimy beach at low tide, then up a steep bank, and all in one great uproar of merriment for two hours. Running most of the time, chattering all the time, snatching the boards from each other's backs as if they were some coveted treasure, getting up eager rivalries between different companies, pouring great choruses of ridicule on the heads of all shirkers, they made the whole scene ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 85, November, 1864 • Various
... all of them, and flew Straightway indoors to talk the matter o'er, They all were anxious Ma should know it too, And met that worthy matron at the door Who liked the thought of merriment in store, And reveled in it just as much as they, For things a very pleasant aspect bore While all were thinking of the happy day, Talking of all their wants ...
— The Minstrel - A Collection of Poems • Lennox Amott
... a contrary effect to that the Ranger had intended. It pictured a fancied scene—one to which both Walter and the Buccaneer had long been strangers; and a lengthened and painful pause succeeded to the brief moment of forced merriment. It was broken by the ...
— The Buccaneer - A Tale • Mrs. S. C. Hall
... the faces from which all merriment has fled, forgetting the precentor's discomfiture, and looking only to their own deliverance from the guns now turned against themselves. But Archie did not forget—into a secret Scottish place he had retreated, his hot, burning ...
— St. Cuthbert's • Robert E. Knowles
... look of enlightened surprise. When Mrs. Banks laughed there were three dimples plainly showing, which did not entirely discourage her merriment. ...
— The Black Creek Stopping-House • Nellie McClung
... to get some first," she retorted, impishly; and the girls, who were in a mood when everything strikes them funny, began to laugh. The more they laughed, the more they tried to stop, the more impossible it became, until the whole house rang with merriment. Lucile was the first ...
— Lucile Triumphant • Elizabeth M. Duffield
... rushed off towards the harbour, shrieking out, "Ship! ship! ship!" as if their only hope of escaping was to get on board the vessels in the harbour. The Highlanders, who were still lying down, watched them with contemptuous looks, and not a little merriment, as they observed the frightened expression of their countenances. Within sight, behind them, was the Highlanders' camp. As the terror-stricken Osmanlis were scampering away past it, some even attempting to find shelter within, there issued forth a tall figure with ...
— The Three Commanders • W.H.G. Kingston
... mighty voice. After that he became restless and increasingly snappish; his face darkened at "Fallen Leaves," and he began to look positively dangerous when a young man who was a railway porter in town, now home for a holiday, made a ghastly attempt at merriment by singing a low-class music-hall catch. What he would have done or said I do not know, for at that moment the announcement was made which the reader has been expecting—that Mrs. Abel ...
— Mad Shepherds - and Other Human Studies • L. P. Jacks |
