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Dowry   Listen
noun
Dowry  n.  (pl. dowries)  
1.
A gift; endowment. (Obs.)
2.
The money, goods, or estate, which a woman brings to her husband in marriage; a bride's portion on her marriage. See Note under Dower.
3.
A gift or presents for the bride, on espousal. See Dower. "Ask me never so much dowry and gift, and I will give...; but give me the damsel to wife."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Dowry" Quotes from Famous Books



... he not carried off the wife and the dowry I had marked for myself! Yet, after all," added Nicot, musingly, "had he served instead of injured me, I should have hated him all the same. His very form, and his very face, made me at once envy and detest him. I felt that there is something antipathetic in our ...
— Zanoni • Edward Bulwer Lytton

... marriage William was to sail upon a long, long voyage, and might not be expected to return for more than twelve months. This was a severe trial for poor Tibby, and she felt as if she would not be able to stand up against it. As yet her husband knew nothing of her dowry, and for this hour she had reserved its discovery. A few days before their marriage she had lifted her money from the bank and ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Vol. XXIII. • Various

... between his father and his daughter," said the old man; "besides, if the marriage is annulled, she will be nothing to him. He could soon marry that woman off again with the dowry that I would give her. Everything is changed since he went away. My fortune is much larger.... He will have riches, honor and position. Surely it isn't a little half-caste that ...
— Nobody's Girl - (En Famille) • Hector Malot

... damsel were agreed, every thing else—threats, denunciations, sarcasms, cuttings-off with a shilling, and loss of a ponderous dowry—all went for nothing. They were married, as some thousands were before them in just the like circumstances. But if the Bohemian maid was not mad, it must be confessed that Hans was rather so. He was monstrously exasperated at the contempt ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 4, September, 1850 • Various

... heaps untold That swell the Miser's hoard, I claim the birthright of the bold, The dowry of the Sword— ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 33, June 15, 1850 • Various

... indeed a very fine place, with statues in the hall and pictures in the gallery and peacocks on the terrace. Lady Jane, the daughter of a wealthy peer, who had almost put things on their old footing with her ample dowry, was a very great lady, and had been used, I was told, to an even more splendid home; but to me, who had no mother, she was simply the kindest and most gracious woman ...
— Stories By English Authors: Italy • Various

... beau monde nor to the haut commerce, he gleaned from them the information he desired. Mr. Hammond lived in the very heart of a certain circle in Paris, which but few Englishmen ever penetrate. In that circle Mr. Hammond had, on receiving his late wife's dowry, become the partner in a private gambling hell; in that hell had been engulfed all the monies he had received—a hell that ought to have prospered with him, if he could have economised his villanous gains. His senior partner in that firm ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... back and almost fainted when she saw this great crowd and all its magnificence. Aladdin desired her at once to follow the procession of slaves to the palace, and present to the Sultan the dowry ...
— The Elson Readers, Book 5 • William H. Elson and Christine M. Keck

... thrifty, clean, well-conducted, and sensible. All these things were better than money would be in the hands of a bad housewife. Moreover, she had a few sous, left her by a woman who had reared her, a good number of sous, almost a little dowry, fifteen hundred francs in the savings' bank. The old people, overcome by his talk, and relying, too, on their own judgment, were gradually giving way, when he came to the delicate point. Laughing in rather a ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume VIII. • Guy de Maupassant

... and said, "There is no God, but the God, who All-might is over all things! Knowest thou, O my daughter, who it was that became the husband of thy virginity?" "No," answered she, and he said, "Verily he is the son of my brother, thy cousin, and this thousand dinars is thy dowry. Praise be to Allah! and would I wot how this matter came about!" then opened he the amulet which was sewn up and found therein a paper in the handwriting of his deceased brother, Nur al-Din the Egyptian, father of Badr ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton

... Tancred, the King of Sicily, who had usurped the throne and imprisoned Richard's sister Joan, widow of the former king. These envoys were bidden to demand of Tancred the instant release of Joan, the payment of her dowry, and the delivery of a rich legacy which Richard asserted had been left by her husband to Henry II. This bequest included a gold table twelve feet long, twenty-four gold cups and saucers, a large silk tent, and a hundred fine galleys. ...
— With Spurs of Gold - Heroes of Chivalry and their Deeds • Frances Nimmo Greene

... choose for themselves. In such cases when of suitable age, the young man and woman begin to live together without other ceremony than a mutual agreement and understanding between them and their relatives, and the bestowal of presents and dowry upon the bride. When the parties make their own selections, which is now oftenest done, and the young man falls in love, he tells his mother, who goes to the mother of his sweetheart, (ka-ta-dha,) and makes a ...
— Official report of the exploration of the Queen Charlotte Islands - for the government of British Columbia • Newton H. Chittenden

... marriage. Andre Maranne is not rich, far less of noble blood; but luckily the old book-keeper has not the same ideas of grandeur that his wife had. They love each other, they are young, healthy and virtuous, qualities which constitute a handsome dowry and one which the notary will not make a heavy charge for recording. The new household will take up its abode on the floor above. They will continue the photographing business unless the receipts ...
— The Nabob, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Alphonse Daudet

... now," said he to the Enchanter. He opened the door and the King of Ireland's Son drew Fedelma to him. "This is the maiden I choose," said he, "and now give her her dowry." ...
— The King of Ireland's Son • Padraic Colum

... an insipid little chit. Is that what you mean? Having no fortune she can't hope to marry as they marry here; so that Isabel will have to furnish her either with a maintenance or with a dowry." ...
— The Portrait of a Lady - Volume 1 (of 2) • Henry James

... besieged both by land and sea. So energetic was our blockade, that the enemy quickly proposed a parley, and sent ambassadors to ask for peace on reasonable conditions. The emperor offered to me his daughter, the handsomest of the lionesses, in marriage, and the half of his empire as a dowry. These conditions, although very honorable, were very displeasing to me, for I considered it both unsafe and illicit to forsake my wife, whom I left behind in pregnancy, and marry a lioness. I therefore sent back ...
— Niels Klim's journey under the ground • Baron Ludvig Holberg

... exceedingly foolish marriage at twenty, and had acquired two houses in Moscow as part of his wife's dowry. He began doing them up and building a bath-house, and was completely ruined. Now his wife and four children lodged in Oriental Buildings in great poverty, and he had to support them—and this amused him. He was thirty-six and his wife was by now forty-two, and that, too, amused him. His mother, ...
— The Darling and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov

... father, Sir Jeremy de Chavasse, had been poor before him. The younger son of that Earl of Northallerton who cut such a brilliant figure at the Court of Queen Elizabeth, Jeremy had married Mistress Spanton of Acol Court, who had brought him a few acres of land heavily burdened with mortgage as her dowry. They were a simple-minded, unostentatious couple who pinched and scraped and starved that their two sons might keep up the appearances of gentlemen at ...
— The Nest of the Sparrowhawk • Baroness Orczy

... the household is very strictly run. Our mistress, owing to her strict life and her piety, looks after that very carefully. Now just take this: she herself marries off the protegees and housemaids whom she likes. If a man pleases her, she marries the girl off to him, and even gives her a dowry, not a big one—needless to say. There are always two or three protegees on the place. The mistress takes a little girl from some one or other and brings her up; and when she is seventeen or eighteen ...
— Plays • Alexander Ostrovsky

... behalf did not, however, seem to extend itself in that quarter, where, according to the general opinion, it is most efficiently displayed; in labouring, namely, to establish her in life, either by a large dowry or a wealthy marriage. By an old settlement, almost all the landed estates of the Baron went, after his death, to a distant relation; and it was supposed that Miss Bradwardine would remain but slenderly provided ...
— Waverley • Sir Walter Scott

... chevalier was not only condemned to pay back the dowry which he had had with his wife, but was prohibited from contracting another marriage—the lady, on the contrary, was allowed to enter into any other engagement she might think fit, as being considered entirely freed from ...
— Aphrodisiacs and Anti-aphrodisiacs: Three Essays on the Powers of Reproduction • John Davenport

... house of the Pneumatic Institution was situated in Dowry Square, Hotwells; the house in the corner, forming the north-east angle of ...
— Reminiscences of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey • Joseph Cottle

... the way, there lived a farmer who had a young daughter. The name of this farmer was Knife. He was a happy-go-lucky person and he could not give his child a large dowry. ...
— Ancient Man - The Beginning of Civilizations • Hendrik Willem Van Loon

... none, do what they would, could waken him, the King said, "A maiden will likely take more trouble to waken him than others, seeing how handsome he is. Send forth a proclamation that if any maiden in my realm can waken this young man, she shall have him in marriage, and a handsome dowry ...
— English Fairy Tales • Flora Annie Steel

... income bequeathed it by pious persons, from which, together with the alms gathered by the brethren, four or six orphan girls are married yearly, to each of whom three hundred pesos are given as a dowry. ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume XX, 1621-1624 • Various

... Francis, who had been bullied by Napoleon upon the field of Austerlitz, ridiculed and insulted in every proclamation issued during the late campaign, gave up his daughter for what was called the good of his people, and reconciled himself to a son-in-law who had taken so many provinces for his dowry. Peace had not been proclaimed four months when the treaty was signed which united the House of Bonaparte to the family of Marie Antoinette. The Archduke Charles represented Napoleon in the espousals; the Archbishop of Vienna ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe

... next day. That was odd, wasn't it? Though I don't know, exactly, why it should have seemed odd. It had to happen on some day. Why not that one? I was glad I should have a good dowry—quite proud to be of some use to the convent. I didn't think what I might have done for myself, if I'd been in the world—not then. But afterward, thoughts crept into my head. I used to push them out again as fast as they ...
— The Guests Of Hercules • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson

... in Flanders and Artois. They had since obtained Dunkirk by purchase from Charles II. Moreover Louis XIV had married the eldest daughter of Philip IV, whose only son was a weakly boy. It is true that Maria Theresa, on her marriage, had renounced all claims to the Spanish succession. But a large dowry had been settled upon her, and by the treaty the renunciation was contingent upon its payment. The dowry had not been paid nor was there any prospect of the Spanish treasury being able to find the money. Besides ...
— History of Holland • George Edmundson

... thank you to pass your way," she said sharply. "I am glad you are to have such a wife and such a dowry. Also a father-in-law who will be at the kind trouble of paying your college fees till you are quite ready to marry his daughter. It is a thing not much practised among gentlefolk, but, what with being so much with your mantua-makers, you will ...
— The Dew of Their Youth • S. R. Crockett

... father, if Mr. Milburn needs any reminder of his promise to repay mamma's dowry, this will give it. He intended his gift to be my marriage dower, and were I to convey it to you I should first ask his consent; not in law, perhaps, but ...
— The Entailed Hat - Or, Patty Cannon's Times • George Alfred Townsend

... to Venice, for Janus was of those who would bear no thwarting nor delay. The princely dowry was forthcoming, for it had been offered by Messer Andrea Cornaro himself, and the condition of adoption by the Republic, "that the bride might be of a station befitting the royal alliance," well became the pleasure of the ...
— The Royal Pawn of Venice - A Romance of Cyprus • Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull

... revelation, the old claims of inerrancy for them can not be maintained; that in studying them men had been misled by mistaking human conceptions for divine meanings; that, while prophets have been inspired, the prophetic faculty has not been the dowry of the Jewish people alone; that to look for exact knowledge of natural and spiritual phenomena in the sacred books is an utter mistake; and that the narratives of the Old and New Testaments, while they surpass ...
— History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom • Andrew Dickson White

... were able the more surely to pay their rents. Young girls often acquired a very sufficient dowry, and towns-folk who wished to eat them had to ...
— The Physiology of Taste • Brillat Savarin

... little or nothing thought of. Marriage here is generally a money speculation, and is very frequently brought about through means of regular brokers or agents, who receive a per centage on the bride's dowry. A woman without a pretty good dowry has very little chance of a husband, unless she is young and very pretty, and willing to accept an old man. There are very few women in Geymonat's congregation. The ...
— Pilgrimage from the Alps to the Tiber - Or The Influence of Romanism on Trade, Justice, and Knowledge • James Aitken Wylie

... brazen statues, and the arts: admire gems, and Tyrian dyes: rejoice, that a thousand eyes are fixed upon you while you speak: industrious repair early to the forum, late to your house, that Mutus may not reap more grain [than you] from his lands gained in dowry, and (unbecoming, since he sprung from meaner parents) that he may not be an object of admiration to you rather than you to him. Whatever is in the earth, time will bring forth into open day light; will ...
— The Works of Horace • Horace

... place, though I was left little money by my father, both on account of his misfortunes and the calamity that befell the city, yet I married off my two sisters, giving them thirty minae as a dowry; and I so divided the property between myself and my brother that he admits that he had more than his share. And in all other relations of my life I have so behaved that no one ever brought an indictment against me. 11. I think the ...
— The Orations of Lysias • Lysias

... with elaborate arrangements among these people, and the female friends of both parties usually make the "engagement," after which the bridegroom's friends go to the bride's father, talk over the dowry, make presents, and pay the marriage expenses. Commonly, especially among the higher classes, the bridegroom does not see the lady's face until the marriage day. Marriage is legalized by a religious ...
— The Golden Chersonese and the Way Thither • Isabella L. Bird (Mrs. Bishop)

... terrritories at this time belonging to the nation, the broad region of the Northwest, it was already made impossible, by the Ordinance of Freedom, even before the adoption of the Constitution. The District of Columbia, with its Fatal Dowry, was not ...
— American Eloquence, Volume II. (of 4) - Studies In American Political History (1896) • Various

... transferred to Norman hands, and ere long castles and chateaux like ours at home will rise everywhere, and as an English noble with broad lands it is but fit that your residence should vie with others. But this shall be my care, and shall be my daughter's special dowry. I foresee that it will be long ere matters wholly settle down. Moreover, though William's hand is strong that of his successor may be weak, and in time there will be the same troubles here among the barons that there were in Normandy before William put them down with a strong ...
— Wulf the Saxon - A Story of the Norman Conquest • G. A. Henty

... this world, and bless you there, in the world to come. If men seek to do evil unto you, pray for them, and you will be delivered from all evil by the Lord. On account of my forbearing patience I received the daughter of my master to wife, and her dowry was a hundred talents of gold, and God gave me also beauty like the beauty of a flower, more than all the children of Jacob, and He preserved me unto mine old age in vigor and beauty, for in all ...
— The Legends of the Jews Volume 1 • Louis Ginzberg

... his friends. "I ask your pardon for leaving you so long without any news of me, but I was spending my honeymoon." And he narrated the story of his union with the charming creature who had brought him as a dowry her eighteen years and a half, two porcelain cups, and a sandy haired cat named Mimi, ...
— Bohemians of the Latin Quarter • Henry Murger

... this flax," said the Queen, "and when thou has spun it all, thou shalt have my eldest son for a husband. Although thou art poor, yet I do not despise thee on that account, for thy untiring industry is dowry enough." ...
— Childhood's Favorites and Fairy Stories - The Young Folks Treasury, Volume 1 • Various

... chest which lies beneath the anchor is my dowry," said she; "carry it up into thy boat, and put the ring that thou seest on my finger. With this thou dost make me thy bride. So now I am thine till the sun dances north-westwards into ...
— Weird Tales from Northern Seas • Jonas Lie

... sent over at an early age to the unhappy Island of St. Domingo, with a view to some connections there by which he hoped to profit, he had been fortunate enough to marry a young woman who brought him a plantation for her dowry, which was reputed to have yielded him a revenue of 2000 sterling per annum. But this, of course, all went to wreck in one day, upon that mad decree of the French convention which proclaimed liberty, without distinction, without ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey

... Alba's dreaminess, Dorsenne once gone, and it required that Hafner should call her attention to it. To the scheming Baron, if the novelist was attentive to the young girl it was certainly with the object of capturing a considerable dowry. Julien's income of twenty-five thousand francs meant independence. The two hundred and fifty thousand francs which Alba would have at her mother's death was a very large fortune. So Hafner thought he would deserve the name of "old friend," by taking Madame Steno aside ...
— Cosmopolis, Complete • Paul Bourget

... Austria, nube (Let others wage war; do thou marry, O fortunate Austria!). There were three great stages in Habsburg marriage policy. In 1479 Maximilian married the heiress of Charles the Bold, thus acquiring the priceless dowry of the Low Countries (what are now Belgium and Holland). In 1506 his son Philip added the crown of Spain and the Indies by his marriage with the heiress of Ferdinand and Isabella. In 1526, when the ...
— The War and Democracy • R.W. Seton-Watson, J. Dover Wilson, Alfred E. Zimmern,

... the advanced age of sixty and that the marriage contract was sealed not in the town but at a country house. Lastly, there is the most invidious of all these accusations, namely, that which concerns the dowry. It is into this charge they have put all their force and all their venom; it is this that vexes them most of all. They assert that at the very outset of our wedded life I forced my devoted wife in the absolute ...
— The Apologia and Florida of Apuleius of Madaura • Lucius Apuleius

... conceive—the very idea was too boundless even for fancy to present. "Surely," thought she, "I am in some fairy palace, where the combined wealth of every clime is accumulated; and the king of the genii, or some old and ugly ogre, has certes fallen in love with me, and means to present it for my dowry." Smiling at this thought, even in the midst of her apprehensions—for the blow which severed her from her friends was too stunning to be felt immediately in all its rigour—she stood as one almost transported with admiration ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby

... had married, in 1469, Margaret, daughter of Christian I of Denmark. The islands of Orkney and Shetland were assigned as payment for her dowry, and so passed, a few years later, ...
— An Outline of the Relations between England and Scotland (500-1707) • Robert S. Rait

... where the Apennine looks down On Arno, till he perches, it may be, 170 Within my all inexorable town, Where yet my boys are, and that fatal She,[294] Their mother, the cold partner who hath brought Destruction for a dowry—this to see And feel, and know without repair, hath taught A bitter lesson; but it leaves me free: I have not vilely found, nor basely sought, They made an Exile—not ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 4 • Lord Byron

... Burgundy" should be given up to him. The ambassadors were received with all outward respect, but their request was refused, and they were sent home with the answer, that "the Duchess of Burgundy being absolute sovereign in the lands of her dowry, the archduke could not meddle with her affairs, or hinder her from doing what she thought fit." Henry in resentment cut off all intercourse with the Low Countries, banished the Flemings, and recalled his own subjects from these provinces. ...
— Celebrated Claimants from Perkin Warbeck to Arthur Orton • Anonymous

... slaughter if we can. And O if any one should wound or kill Minos! No one surely would have the heart to do it; yet ignorantly, not knowing him, one might. I will, I will surrender myself to him, with my country as a dowry, and so put an end to the war. But how? The gates are guarded, and my father keeps the keys; he only stands in my way. O that it might please the gods to take him away! But why ask the gods to do it? Another woman, loving ...
— Bulfinch's Mythology • Thomas Bulfinch

... first adequate expression. And, what is worth noting in the case of one who was to range over so many fields, it was in lyric poetry that his genius first expressed itself. The problem with Goethe is to discover which among his various gifts was nature's special dowry to him. What, at least, is true is that at different periods of his life he produced numbers of lyrics which the world has recognised as among the most perfect things of their kind. And among these perfect things are the few songs and ...
— The Youth of Goethe • Peter Hume Brown

... as he proceeded. 'What a noble figure she has; and what magnificent black eyes; and what a fine spirit of her own; and what a tongue of her own, too, when she likes to use it. I perfectly adore her! But never mind, Milicent: I wouldn't have her for my wife, not if she'd a kingdom for her dowry! I'm better satisfied with the one I have. Now then! what do you look so sulky ...
— The Tenant of Wildfell Hall • Anne Bronte

... money, paid for them in labor—seven years a piece. Gen. xxix. 15-29. Moses probably bought his wife in the same way, and paid for her by his labor, as the servant of her father. Exod. ii. 21. Shechem, when negotiating with Jacob and his sons for Dinah, says, "Ask me never so much dowry and gift, and I will give according as ye shall say unto me." Gen. xxxiv. 11, 12. David purchased Michal, and Othniel, Achsah, by performing perilous services for their fathers. 1 Sam. xviii. 25-27; Judg. i. 12, 13. That the purchase of wives, either with money or by ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society

... Certain de La Coste, who shared the same quarters and belonged, like him, to the company de Noailles. On their return to the country they saw much of each other, and he made the acquaintance of Mlle. Du Puy. Mlle. Du Puy was pretty and high spirited, and although she would have little in the way of dowry, and although several rich matches were offered to my father, he preferred Mlle. Du Puy, and ...
— The Memoirs of General the Baron de Marbot, Translated by - Oliver C. Colt • Baron de Marbot

... Peregrine communed with his sister on the subject of her match with Mr. Clover, who, she told him, had offered to settle a jointure of four hundred pounds, and take her to wife without any expectation of a dowry. She moreover gave him to understand, that, in his absence, she had received several messages from her mother, commanding her to return to her father's house; but that she had refused to obey these orders, by the ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett

... years most happily, and with her father's consent, to one of his brother officers. Captain Sedgwick was of good family, but poor; and they were waiting for his promotion, for at that time Colonel Middleton would have been unable to give his daughter any dowry. Elizabeth was young and happy, and she could afford to wait. No girl ever gloried in her lover more than she did in hers. Capel Sedgwick was not only brave and singularly handsome, but he bore a reputation through the ...
— Not Like Other Girls • Rosa N. Carey

... already been promised (August 1477), and hostilities soon broke out between the two princes. Mary died through a fall from her horse in March 1482, and in the same year the treaty of Arras confirmed Louis XI. in possession of the duchy. Franche-Comte and Artois were to form the dowry of the little Margaret of Burgundy, daughter of Mary and Maximilian, who was promised in marriage to the dauphin. As to the lands proceeding from the succession of Charles the Bold, which had returned to the Empire (Brabant, Hainaut, Limburg, Namur, Gelderland, &c.), they constituted the "Circle ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various

... rite, taken all the available cash from home, was gaily and agreeably spending his days at the races and in the summer villas. Meanwhile Dolly and the children had moved into the country, to cut down expenses as much as possible. She had gone to Ergushovo, the estate that had been her dowry, and the one where in spring the forest had been sold. It was nearly forty miles from Levin's Pokrovskoe. The big, old house at Ergushovo had been pulled down long ago, and the old prince had had the lodge done up and built on to. Twenty years before, when Dolly was a child, the lodge had been roomy ...
— Anna Karenina • Leo Tolstoy

... was neither handsome nor pleasant. People thought she must have gained the King's love by the charms she worked, for her whole dowry was a desert island, with a huge pit in it that could never be filled, and she was so greedy that the more she got the greedier she grew. In course of time the King and Queen had an only daughter, who was to be the heiress ...
— Granny's Wonderful Chair • Frances Browne

... that he would grant him the maid in marriage, and Hengist accorded her with goodwill. But first he took counsel with his brother and his friends. These praised the marriage, but counselled Hengist to give the damsel only on such covenant that the king should deliver him Kent as her dowry. The king coveted the maiden so greatly, he doted so dearly, that he made her his queen. She was a pagan woman, and became his wife according to the rites of the paynim. No priest blessed that marriage, there was neither Mass nor prayer. So hot ...
— Arthurian Chronicles: Roman de Brut • Wace

... poor tinker, was ed. at a free school, after which he worked at his father's trade. At 17 he was drafted as a soldier in the Civil War, and served for two years at Newport Pagnell. At 19 he m. a pious young woman, whose only dowry appears to have been two books, the Plain Man's Pathway to Heaven and the Practice of Piety, by which he was influenced towards a religious life. In his autobiographical book, Grace Abounding, B. describes himself as having led an abandoned ...
— A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature • John W. Cousin

... Straits, in spite of its exposed haven, was a famous place for rovers, but its prosperity was destroyed by Philip II. in 1564. Ceuta was always semi-European, half Genoese, then Portuguese (1415), and finally Spanish (1570 to this day). Tangiers, as the dowry of Charles II.'s Queen, Catherine of Portugal, was for some time English territory. Spanish forts at Penon de Velez de la Gomera and Alhucemas, and Portuguese garrisons, repressed piracy in their vicinity; and in later times Sal[e] ...
— The Story of the Barbary Corsairs • Stanley Lane-Poole

... his land and of its devolution to his son if he had one. Finally he was given the power of making a will. But he was still obliged to contribute to such expenses of the patron as ransom in war, fines imposed by the courts, or the dowry of a daughter. [187] The client was considered as a member of the family and bore its name. [188] But he was not a proper member of the family or gens, because his pedigree never ascended to a pater or the ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India—Volume I (of IV) • R.V. Russell

... it out! They're all drunk! Besides, they are chiefly after her dowry. Just think what they give with the girl! Two furs, my dear, six dresses, a French shawl, and I don't know how many pieces of linen, and money as ...
— Redemption and Two Other Plays • Leo Tolstoy et al

... house to guard her! Thou precious bark! freighted with all our treasures! The sports of tempests, and yet ne'er the victim, How many may claim salvage in thee! Take her, son! A queen that brings with her a richer dowry 385 ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... and impressed upon them what they ought to learn. In the afternoon, they were urged by their grandmother to depart even before it was time, so that they should in no case reach home too late. Although the dyer had given his daughter no dowry and had vowed not to give away anything of his fortune before his death, his wife did not hold herself so strictly bound. She not only frequently made the children presents of pieces of money, sometimes of considerable ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VIII • Various

... But I make no bargains! I, who know where the treasure is! Why should I offer to share what is mine? I will have a marriage contract drawn, and you shall be a witness. That treasure is my dowry. Listen! Bubru Singh my father died without a son—the first of all that long line who left no son to follow him. The custom was that he should tell his son, and none else, the secret of the treasure. He hated Gungadhura; and, not knowing which the English would ...
— Guns of the Gods • Talbot Mundy

... her to live. "You know what I mean. Only brag about me. Twenty-two years old, a good fellow, good manners, a bright eye, fire, the best dough for a husband that heaven has ever kneaded. I will give you five per cent. on the dowry." "Since yesterday," he writes in another letter, "I have given up dowagers and have come down to widows of thirty. Send all you find to Lord Rhoone [this remarkable improvisation was one of his early noms de plume]; that's enough—he is known at ...
— The Galaxy, Volume 23, No. 2, February, 1877 • Various

... In which I'le be your helper: we are two, and they are two: two Sisters, rich alike, only the elder has the prouder Dowry: In troth I pity this disgrace in you, yet of mine own I am senceless: do but follow my Counsel, and I'le pawn my spirit, we'l overreach 'em yet; ...
— The Scornful Lady • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher

... Diodora. "After the wedding ceremony I shall hand you over Flamma's dowry, which she has inherited from her grandfather. It consists of a million ...
— Dr. Dumany's Wife • Mr Jkai

... at the court of Yakinlu, and very shortly received an embassy of submission. Like Baal, Yakinlu sent a daughter to take her place among the great king's secondary wives, and with her he sent a large sum of money, in the disguise of a dowry.[14175] The tokens of subjection were accepted, and Yakinlu was allowed to continue king of Arvad. When, not long afterwards, he died,[14176] and his ten sons sought the court of Nineveh to prefer their claims to the succession, they were received with favour. Azi-Baal, ...
— History of Phoenicia • George Rawlinson

... of December, 1584, he was married to Catalina. Not many years ago, the marriage contract was found in the public registry of Esquivias. It contains an inventory of the marriage-dowry promised by the bride's mother, of "lands, furniture, utensils, and live-stock." Then follows the details, "several vineyards, amounting to twelve acres, beds, chairs, brooms, brushes, poultry, and sundry sacks of flour." It is spoken of as a very respectable ...
— Wit and Wisdom of Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

... of Piotr. He has grown perfectly rigid with stupidity and dignity, but he too is married, and received a respectable dowry with his bride, the daughter of a market-gardener of the town, who had refused two excellent suitors, only because they had no watch; while Piotr had not only a watch—he had a pair of ...
— Fathers and Children • Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev

... death with torture, the terrified people were forced to maintain 5,000 boar hounds, with strict responsibility for their health and safety. The taxes were extorted by every conceivable sort of compulsion; seven daughters of the prince received a dowry of 100,000 gold florins apiece; and an enormous treasure was collected. On the death of his wife (1384) an order was issued 'to the subjects' to share his grief, as once they had shared his joy, and to wear mourning for a year. The coup de main (1385) by which his nephew Giangaleazzo got him into ...
— The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy • Jacob Burckhardt

... sure, there was a Mrs. Wormser. She came of a good Frankfort family. Dowry: a million and a half. She was modern to the very tips of her nervous, ...
— The Indian Lily and Other Stories • Hermann Sudermann

... according to the family tradition, was of no very exalted origin, being in fact the only daughter and heiress of one Monsieur Tartine, Perruquier in chief at the Court of Versailles. But what this lady wanted in birth, she made up in fortune, and the modest estate which her husband purchased with her dowry came down to us unimpaired through five generations. In the substantial and somewhat foreign-looking red-brick house which he built (also, doubtless, with Madame's Louis d'ors) we, his successors, had lived ...
— In the Days of My Youth • Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards

... Dame Elsie, who had heard the last words,—"go into a convent and leave your poor grandmother all alone, when she has toiled night and day for so many years to get a dowry for you and find you a ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 8, No. 46, August, 1861 • Various

... horrid villanies.' Having money in hand, either from savings during the four years' sojourn abroad, where his expenses (including all purchases of objects of art and vertu) did not amount to more than L300 a year, or else from his child-wife's dowry, he dabbled in land speculation with the fairly satisfactory result that on the whole he does not appear to have lost much ...
— Sylva, Vol. 1 (of 2) - Or A Discourse of Forest Trees • John Evelyn

... roundabout proposals which etiquette demands, and began to gather a dowry for Leah and to recall extraordinary outstanding securities to that end. But, before these things were accomplished, his sons and his troubles returned upon him. With renewed energy, stimulated imagination, and enriched profanity, "them Yonowsky devils" came home, ...
— Little Citizens • Myra Kelly

... that the fruit may now be gathered, I (Did chance or my misfortune so dispose?) Am worthiest found; and those broad lands that lie Without the walls which that fair town enclose, — The fishy flat no less than upland dry — Extending twenty miles about that water, He gives me for a dowry, with his daughter. ...
— Orlando Furioso • Lodovico Ariosto

... with Cousin Hans that if a woman is to fulfil her mission in this life (that is to say, to be a man's wife) she ought clearly to have no other acquirements than those her husband wishes her to have, or himself confers upon her. Any other fund of knowledge must always be a dowry of exceedingly doubtful value. ...
— Tales of Two Countries • Alexander Kielland

... Ctimene, the youngest of her children; we were boy and girl together, and she made little difference between us. When, however, we both grew up, they sent Ctimene to Same and received a splendid dowry for her. As for me, my mistress gave me a good shirt and cloak with a pair of sandals for my feet, and sent me off into the country, but she was just as fond of me as ever. This is all over now. Still it has pleased heaven to prosper ...
— The Odyssey • Homer

... Women and children were sitting upon sunny doorsteps, with their pillows on their knees and their bobbins moving quickly in dexterous fingers, busy at the lace-making which had been established in Buckinghamshire more than a century before by Catherine of Aragon, whose dowry was derived from the revenues of Steeple Claydon. The Curate had returned to the grey old church, and rural life pursued its slumbrous course, scarce ruffled by rumours of maritime war, or plague, or fire. They rode to Thame—a stage on the journey to Oxford, Angela thought, as she noted ...
— London Pride - Or When the World Was Younger • M. E. Braddon

... a fresh pause and continued, "I have a wife who is seamstress to the queen, monsieur, and who is not deficient in either virtue or beauty. I was induced to marry her about three years ago, although she had but very little dowry, because Monsieur Laporte, the queen's cloak bearer, is her godfather, ...
— The Three Musketeers • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... leave her husband by a repudiation made by her and prove no cause for her divorcing him, the gifts which she received as bride shall be taken away and she shall likewise be deprived of her dowry, and be subjected to the punishment of deportation; and to her we deny not only the right of marriage with another man, but also the right of post-liminium.(145) But if the woman opposed to the marriage prove faults of morals and vices, though of no great gravity, ...
— A Source Book for Ancient Church History • Joseph Cullen Ayer, Jr., Ph.D.

... which Richelieu had consecrated, was being built, the French priests out along the shores of Superior were preparing the way for this new-world university. Certain lands in that iron region which they first explored were given by the nation as dowry to the university. These were not thought to be valuable, as at the time of the grant the most valuable timber and farming land had been sold. Fifteen years ago, more or less, a train-load of iron ore was brought down from that region to Allouez, a town on the lake ...
— The French in the Heart of America • John Finley

... are now separated still formed one stock speaking the same language, they attained a certain stage of culture, and they had a vocabulary corresponding to it. This vocabulary the several nations carried along with them, in its conventionally established use, as a common dowry and a foundation for further structures of their own. In it we find not merely the simplest terms denoting existence, actions, perceptions, such as -sum-, -do-, -pater-, the original echo of the impression which the external world made on the mind of man, but also a number of words ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen

... reply was firm, yet bland, And in a calmer mood: "I thank you, sir, for your offer'd hand, With dowry large ...
— The Poetry of Wales • John Jenkins

... end of the courtship. For though Farette came every Sunday evening and smoked by the fire, and looked at Julie as she arranged the details of her dowry, he only chuckled, and now and again ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... naturally not wanting in history. It was the residence of the old Dukes of Brittany, and was brought, with the rest of the province, by the Duchess Anne, the last representative of that race, as her dowry, to Charles VIII. I read in the excellent handbook of M. Joanne that it has been visited by almost every one of the kings of France, from Louis XI. downward; and also that it has served as a place of sojourn less voluntary on the part of various other ...
— A Little Tour in France • Henry James

... punctiliously. At the earliest possible date your daughter shall be married at the Embassy to my friend, Francis Scrymgeour, your brother's acknowledged son. You will oblige me by offering not less than ten thousand pounds dowry. For yourself, I will indicate to you in writing a mission of some importance in Siam which I destine to your care. And now, sir, you will answer me in two words whether or not ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 4 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... you were at all a man of the world, I should not have to explain that in marrying into a noble house I bring my dot, my dowry...
— The Man from Home • Booth Tarkington and Harry Leon Wilson

... had this union warmly at heart. This scroll, signed with his own hand, will show it." He bent his knee as he gave the paper. "The wife of De Lacy will have, as the daughter of Raymond Berenger merits, the rank of a princess; his widow, the dowry of a queen." ...
— The Betrothed • Sir Walter Scott

... skill. Her father therefore proclaimed a tournament, which was to take place, in the words of an ancient writer, at "Peverell's Place in the Peke," inviting all young men of noble birth to compete for the hand of the beautiful "Mellet," whose dowry was to be Whittington Castle. The contest, as might be supposed, was a severe one, and was won by a knight bearing a maiden shield of silver with a peacock for his crest, who vanquished, amongst others, a Knight of Burgundy and a Prince of Scotland. He proved to be Fitzwarren, and the Castle of Whittington ...
— From John O'Groats to Land's End • Robert Naylor and John Naylor

... between Henry, Richard's father, and Louis, the French king. They had had a fierce dispute about the portion of another of Louis's children that had been married in the same way to one of Richard's brothers named Henry. The English king complained that the dowry was not sufficient, and the French king, after a long discussion, agreed to make it up by giving another province with his daughter Alice to Richard. The reason that induced the King of England to effect these marriages was, that the provinces that were bestowed with ...
— Richard I - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott

... matter how slight the service he asks of me, my flesh creeps and my limbs refuse to move, till I have whispered an Ave. But what of Lady Maria-Rosa? Both heaven and earth smile upon her. To-night she wears a poor girl's dowry, a separate fortune, on her head, her neck, her hands, yes, on her little jeweled feet. One tiny shoe of hers would make me free to wed ...
— The Poems of Emma Lazarus - Vol. I (of II.), Narrative, Lyric, and Dramatic • Emma Lazarus

... an idol's consequence. The fact was, she had been rich—very rich; and though, for the present, without the command of money, she was likely one day to be rich again. At Basseterre, in Guadaloupe, she possessed a large estate, received in dowry on her marriage sixty years ago, sequestered since her husband's failure; but now, it was supposed, cleared of claim, and, if duly looked after by a competent agent of integrity, considered capable of being made, in ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte

... is one thing that baffles my powers of comprehension. My dowry was the only temptation to M. de Valorsay, was it not? Why does he still wish to marry me, now that ...
— Baron Trigault's Vengeance - Volume 2 (of 2) • Emile Gaboriau

... say, the 15th August, that the victory had been won. This having been decided on, the Republic sent ambassadors to Rome to the Pope and to King Henry of Germany, and the Pope sent the church many privileges, and the King a royal dowry. So they began to build the temple where stood the old Church of S. Reparata, and more anciently the Baths of the Emperor Hadrian; and they brought marble from Africa, Egypt, Jerusalem, Sardinia, and other far places to adorn the church. In 1065 we read that the Pope received under his ...
— Florence and Northern Tuscany with Genoa • Edward Hutton

... of some poor human brain,—or even testify in favor of this Head-Worker, and of the sense he shows, especially of the patience. For example: that of the "Polish Towns and Villages, ordered" by this Tyrant "to deliver, each of them, so many marriageable girls; each girl to bring with her as dowry, furnished by her parents, 1 feather-bed, 4 pillows, 1 cow, 3 swine and 3 ducats,"—in which desirable condition this tyrannous King "sent her into the Brandenburg States to be wedded and promote population." [Lindsey, LETTERS ON POLAND (Letter 2d). p. 61: Peyssonnel (in some. French ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XXI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle

... for her would be a pleasure; he would no longer be depressed, but would finish her book, which would be a masterpiece, sell it for three thousand ecus, pay all his creditors within two years, amass a dowry for her and become ...
— Women in the Life of Balzac • Juanita Helm Floyd

... had been the elder Austin's wedding-gift to his son, so Alaire's dowry from her father had been La Feria, a grant of lands across the Rio Grande beyond the twenty-league belt by which Mexico fatuously strives to guard her border. And to Las Palmas had come the bride and groom to live, to love, ...
— Heart of the Sunset • Rex Beach

... a princess of a race as beloved by the people; the only daughter of the Duc de Penthievre. Lovely, amiable, and virtuous, she brought to her husband as dowry, with the vast fortune of the Duc de Penthievre, that amount of consideration and public esteem which belonged to her house. The first political act of the Duc d'Orleans was a bold resistance to the wishes ...
— History of the Girondists, Volume I - Personal Memoirs of the Patriots of the French Revolution • Alphonse de Lamartine

... afterwards began and were broken off; tales of monstrous and prehistoric things in Park Lane; things done by an English Evangelist that smelt like human sacrifice and hordes of slaves. Money was wanted, too, for his daughter's dowry; for to him the fame of wealth was as sweet as wealth itself. He snapped the last thread, whispered the word to Brazil, and wealth poured in from the enemies of England. But another man had talked to Espado the Vulture as well as he. Somehow the dark, grim young major from Ulster ...
— The Innocence of Father Brown • G. K. Chesterton

... discontented face in this court. You say you are contented—happy, unselfish, and satisfied with what the gods have given you. Answer me this! Why, then, do you scowl and jostle one another? Why do you want to marry any one—least of all, a princess with half the riches of a great kingdom as a dowry, to spoil your happiness? Greedy fortune-hunters! Do you ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf (Vol 2 of 17) - Folk-Lore, Fables, And Fairy Tales • Various

... middle of the fifteenth century, James the Third, King of Scotland, married Margaret of Denmark, and the Orcades were given to Scotland as a security for her dowry. The dowry was never paid, and after a lapse of a century and a half Denmark resigned all her Orcadean rights to Scotland. The later union of England and ...
— An Orkney Maid • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr

... Dublin Fusiliers is one of the oldest regiments in the service. It was raised in February and March, 1661, to form the garrison of Bombay, which had been ceded to the Crown as part of the dowry of the Infanta of Portugal, on her marriage with King Charles II. It then consisted of four companies, the establishment of each being one captain, one lieutenant, one ensign, two sergeants, three corporals, two drummers, and 100 privates, and arrived at Bombay on September 18th, ...
— The Second Battalion Royal Dublin Fusiliers in the South African War - With a Description of the Operations in the Aden Hinterland • Cecil Francis Romer and Arthur Edward Mainwaring

... is too much! Whose fault is it that this girl has to have a dowry? You seem to forget who is her child's father; but, no doubt, you would abandon her altogether if you had ...
— The works of Guy de Maupassant, Vol. 5 (of 8) - Une Vie and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant 1850-1893

... educated for Hammud. So she paid four Turkish pounds for a little Nusairy girl named Zahara or Venus, whose widowed mother had removed to her village. This payment was in accordance with Nusairy customs, and constituted the girl's dowry. After the betrothal in 1863, Hammud sent her to Latakiah, where she was taken into the family of the late Dr. Dodds for instruction and training. She gladly received the truth, and Hammud labored earnestly for her enlightenment. Everything seemed bright ...
— The Women of the Arabs • Henry Harris Jessup

... to me, especially when I am one of a family that is low, and without any glory or honor." Now when Saul was informed by his servants what answer David had made, he said,—"Tell him that I do not want any money nor dowry from him, which would be rather to set my daughter to sale than to give her in marriage; but I desire only such a son-in-law as hath in him fortitude, and all other kinds of virtue," of which he saw David was possessed, and that his desire was to receive of him, on account of his marrying his daughter, ...
— The Antiquities of the Jews • Flavius Josephus

... not merely to be very happy; she was to live in a heaven on earth. Aglaya's husband was to be a compendium of all the virtues, and of all success, not to speak of fabulous wealth. The two elder sisters had agreed that all was to be sacrificed by them, if need be, for Aglaya's sake; her dowry was to be colossal ...
— The Idiot • (AKA Feodor Dostoevsky) Fyodor Dostoyevsky

... victim, moreover, first and last, for the paltriest of motives—money. And money in no large, imaginative sense, but in the very lowest terms in which it could be at all conceived as a theme for tragedy. A dowry, and a tiny one: this created "that old woe" which "steps on the stage" again for us in The ...
— Browning's Heroines • Ethel Colburn Mayne

... are not such things known in Europe? Do ladies of the demi-monde never make good marriages? Mesalliances are far rarer in Japan than with us. Certainly among the lowest class of the population such, marriages may occasionally occur, for it often happens that a woman can lay by a tempting dowry out of her wretched earnings-, but amongst the gentry of the country they ...
— Tales of Old Japan • Algernon Bertram Freeman-Mitford

... of "The Fair Penitent" was entirely ineffective, and did neither me nor the theater any service; the play itself is a feeble adaptation of Massinger's powerful drama of "The Fatal Dowry," and, as generally happens with such attempts to fit our old plays to our modern stage, the fundamentally objectionable nature of the story could not be reformed without much of the vigorous and terrible effect of the original treatment evaporating in the refining ...
— Records of a Girlhood • Frances Anne Kemble

... profession say that they will give the same amount that they would give their husbands if they married; and that, since God is their spouse, they wish to give it to Him so that a convent capable of sustaining many nuns may be built, so that they may serve his Majesty. Some have as their dowry only the spiritual wealth that the rule requires. Consequently, there are liable to be many orphan girls who serve God, daughters and granddaughters of conquistadors, who are calling aloud, and they refuse ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XXII, 1625-29 • Various

... emp'ror, or her lust. All in the face of Rome, and the world's eye Though Caesar's wife, a public bigamy She dares attempt; and that the act might bear More prodigy, the notaries appear, And augurs to't; and to complete the sin In solemn form, a dowry is brought in. All this—thou'lt say—in private might have pass'd But she'll not have it so; what course at last? What should he do? If Messaline be cross'd, Without redress thy Silius will be lost; If not, some two days' length is all he can Keep from the grave; just so ...
— Poems of Henry Vaughan, Silurist, Volume II • Henry Vaughan

... being out of harmony with the Russian character, it was withdrawn. All the male children share equally in the father's estate as in title. The female children receive by law only an extremely small portion of the inheritance, but their dowry is not limited. ...
— Russian Rambles • Isabel F. Hapgood

... young woman; also, that when, in the ordinary course of nature, the condition of the temporary Madame the Marquise could no longer be concealed, the Marquis was in the habit of providing a lump sum of some hundreds of pounds as dowry in order to induce someone (usually a working man) to marry his mistress. Mavis was shocked at what she heard; it seemed strange to her that such things should exist and be discussed as if they ...
— Sparrows - The Story of an Unprotected Girl • Horace W. C. Newte

... estate in tail male, estate in tail female, estate in tail general. limitation, term, lease, settlement, strict settlement, particular estate; estate for life, estate for years, estate pur autre vie[Fr]; remainder, reversion, expectancy, possibility. dower, dowry, jointure[obs3], appanage, inheritance, heritage, patrimony, alimony; legacy &c. (gift) 784; Falcidian law, paternal estate, thirds. assets, belongings, means, resources, circumstances; wealth &c. 803; money &c. 800; what one is worth, what one will cut up for; estate ...
— Roget's Thesaurus

... as she had laid down her provisions, she was going to pull off her veil; but her son prevented her, and said: "Mother, let us lose no time; before the sultan and the divan rise, I would have you return to the palace with this present as the dowry demanded for the princess, that he may judge by my diligence of the ardent desire I have to procure myself the honour of this alliance." Without waiting for his mother's reply, Aladdin opened the street-door, and made the ...
— The Arabian Nights - Their Best-known Tales • Unknown

... or seven years before the marriage ceremony can take place. The marriage-ties are sacred even with this savage race. The groom-to-be, making from time to time, gifts of wild hogs, rice, and weapons to the parents of the bride-elect, is finally rewarded with the bride, and with a dowry as well; perhaps a slave, a bucket of tuba, or a silver-mounted bolo. The average value of a bride is five or six slaves, which the bridegroom pays if he is able. At the marriage ceremony the contracting parties generally present each other with small ...
— The Great White Tribe in Filipinia • Paul T. Gilbert

... please him, assuring him that he need not trouble about his wife. So the good steward wandered out of sheer good nature into this marriage. The day of the wedding, bereft of all her reasons, and not able to find objections to her pursuer, she made him give her a fat settlement and dowry as the price of her conquest, and then gave the old knave leave to wink at her as often as he could, promising him as many embraces as he had given grains of wheat to her mother. But at his age a ...
— Droll Stories, Volume 1 • Honore de Balzac

... could have wished. MRS. P. (crossing to Alexis) Oh, sir, I entreat your forgiveness. I am aware that socially I am not everything that could be desired, nor am I blessed with an abundance of worldly goods, but I can at least confer on your estimable father the great and priceless dowry of a true, tender, and lovin' 'art! ALEXIS (coldly) I do not question it. After all, a faithful love is the true source of every earthly joy. SIR M. I knew that my boy would not blame his poor father for acting on the impulse of a heart that has never yet misled him. ...
— The Complete Plays of Gilbert and Sullivan - The 14 Gilbert And Sullivan Plays • William Schwenk Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan

... religion, and seems a flat contradiction of Junius's assertion that "there are proselytes from atheism, but none from superstition." With some South African tribes it is unlucky to include goats amongst the animals paid by a young man's parents as the dowry for his bride; it was equally bad to pay dowry in odd numbers of cattle. The payment must be made in an even number of oxen, sheep, or other animals or articles, such as two, four, six, eight, ten, and so on. The man who could not afford more than one sheep to seal the marriage ...
— Native Life in South Africa, Before and Since • Solomon Tshekisho Plaatje

... should be educated at his expense, which was finally acceded to, adding, that in case he—Captain Joseph Winepipes—should live to see Rose Glenn a bride, he should provide for her wedding, and give her a dowry. ...
— The Humors of Falconbridge - A Collection of Humorous and Every Day Scenes • Jonathan F. Kelley

... the girl's family to see if his proposal is acceptable, he sends some female relatives or friends to discuss the marriage. Before the wedding the boy is presented with a chhap or ring of gold or silver with a small cup-like attachment. A mehar or dowry must be given to the bride, the amount of which is not below Rs. 50 or above Rs. 250. The bride's parents give her cooking vessels, bedding and a bedstead. After the wedding, the couple are seated on a cot while the women sing songs, and ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume II • R. V. Russell

... these indications are posterior to a letter printed in Nicholson's Journal, in October, 1800, p. 150, and entitled: "Additional Experiments on Galvanic Electricity in a Letter to Mr. Nicholson." The letter is dated Dowry Square, Hotwells, September 22, 1800, and is signed by Humphry Davy, who at this epoch was assistant to Dr. Beddoes at the Philosophical Institution ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 430, March 29, 1884 • Various

... said that, as we had obtained the Island of Bombay in the East Indies and the City of Tangier in Africa as the dowry of the Queen, and had received the Island of Poleron for our East India Company by the treaty with Holland, our commerce everywhere increased, and raised their jealousy higher and higher. There was nothing in this of which complaint could be made by the Dutch Government, but nevertheless ...
— When London Burned • G. A. Henty

... house was literally walled with books. How he got 'em I don't know. It was currently believed that he was full of information, but I never heard of any one who was able to get very much out of him. His wife had been a beauty; that was her dowry to ...
— A Spoil of Office - A Story of the Modern West • Hamlin Garland

... Margaret Phillips, the youngest daughter of Mr Phillips, late of Longbridgemoor, in Annandale. By this union he became brother-in-law of his friend Mr James Gray, whose first wife was a sister of Mrs Hogg. At the period of his marriage, from the profits of his writings and his wife's dowry, he was master of nearly a thousand pounds and a well-stocked farm; and increasing annual gains by his writings, seemed to augur future independence. But the Shepherd, not perceiving that literature was his forte, resolved to embark further in farming speculations; ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume II. - The Songs of Scotland of the past half century • Various

... by God!" answered the earl, drawing himself up, dashing the tear from his eyes, and endeavouring to recover his composure. "I pray your Majesty's pardon, but he shall marry her, with her dishonour for her dowry, were she the veriest courtezan in all Spain—If he gave his word, he shall make his word good, were it to the meanest creature that haunts the streets—he shall do it, or my own dagger shall take the life that I gave him. If he could stoop to use so base a ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott

... wife): "I am so happy to be married to you, that I consider it ungentlemanly and improper to speak of or even mention a dowry. Hush, don't ...
— Note-Book of Anton Chekhov • Anton Pavlovich Chekhov

... a wife called Sophia being daughter vnto Thomas Palalogus, which is reported to haue had her dowry out of the Popes treasury, because the Moscouite had promised to conforme himselfe vnto the Romish Church. This Sophia being a woman of a princely and aspiring minde, and often complaining that she was married vnto the Tartars ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, • Richard Hakluyt

... and the French crown. The King of France and his most powerful rival, the Duke of Burgundy, had each a daughter. To make sure of one of them, Henry secretly proposed to both. After long and fruitless negotiations the French King declined to grant the enormous dowry which the English King demanded. The latter gladly interpreted this refusal as equivalent to a declaration ...
— The Leading Facts of English History • D.H. Montgomery

... custom called the coutume de mauvais gre or the droit de marche. Under this custom a tenant-farmer in Picardy considered himself entitled to sell the right to till his landlord's fields to anybody he liked, to give it as a dowry to his daughter, or to leave it to be divided among his heirs; and all this without reference to the expiration of his lease. If the landlord objected and went so far as to lease his land to another person, the previous tenant was regarded ...
— France and the Republic - A Record of Things Seen and Learned in the French Provinces - During the 'Centennial' Year 1889 • William Henry Hurlbert

... in bare money, two and a half farthings owing to me, half a pound of dried apples, a handful of prunes, and a handful of roots; and don't you call that a capital dowry? Pif-paf Poltrie, what trade are you? ...
— Childhood's Favorites and Fairy Stories - The Young Folks Treasury, Volume 1 • Various

... says, how providence causes its work to be done, not on high motives only, but also on the ordinary ones which influence mankind. He concludes by observing that providence dealt with the Indians as a prudent father who has an ugly daughter, but makes up for her ugliness by the help of a large dowry. By the ugliness in this case he means the seas to be traversed, the hunger to be endured, and the labours to be undertaken, which he considers no other nation but the Spaniards would have encountered, even with the ...
— The Life of Columbus • Arthur Helps

... organized the traffic in indulgences, and threw one-half of Europe into heresy, was it to increase the number of Christians, or to give a dowry to ...
— The Roman Question • Edmond About

... were not imposed upon, then how can we account for their conduct? They had lost much when they lost their sister. When he arrived at La Grange-aux-Ormes, Pierre du Lys had just quitted a Burgundian prison; his ransom had been paid with his wife's dowry, and he was then absolutely destitute.[2680] Jean, Bailie of Vermandois, afterwards Governor of Chartres and about 1436 Bailie of Vaucouleurs, was hardly more prosperous.[2681] Such circumstances explained much. And yet it is unlikely that they ...
— The Life of Joan of Arc, Vol. 1 and 2 (of 2) • Anatole France

... give thy sister's hand, as thou didst formerly agree, but a happy life now coming on awaits him. But, O Menelaus, suffer Orestes to reign over Argos. But depart and rule over the Spartan land, having it as thy wife's dowry, who exposing thee to numberless evils always was bringing thee to this. But what regards the city I will make all right for him, I, who compelled him ...
— The Tragedies of Euripides, Volume I. • Euripides

... daughter, however, and she would not refuse it. Contarini had never seen her either; he might have heard that she was a pretty girl, but there were famous beauties in Venice, and if he wanted Marietta Beroviero it could only be for her dowry. The marriage was therefore a mere bargain between the two men, in which a name was bartered for a fortune and a fortune for a name. Zorzi saw how absurd it was to suppose that Marietta could care for ...
— Marietta - A Maid of Venice • F. Marion Crawford

... its little Norman church buried from sight amongst leafy trees. The effigy of a lady in the chancel of this church is said to be that of Matilda, wife of Henry I. This is the more likely in that the lands of Bewick formed part of her dowry, and were given by her to the monks of Tynemouth Priory. At Bewick Bridge the little stream ceases to be the Breamish, and becomes the Till; as an old ...
— Northumberland Yesterday and To-day • Jean F. Terry

... purpose, and by the true goodwill which they had perceived in me, my parents determined—God reward them for it!—to bestow upon my desired domestic establishment the sum of money which they had put aside for my dowry, in case I married. Indeed, their and my sisters' kindness made them find pleasure in arranging all for me in the best and most comfortable manner; and when I left the paternal roof for my own new home, it was with tears of real pain. Yet I had too clearly studied my ...
— The Home • Fredrika Bremer

... belongs, in all probability, the last extant letter which Michelangelo wrote to his father. Lodovico was dissatisfied with a contract which had been drawn up on the 16th of June in that year, and by which a certain sum of money, belonging to the dowry of his late wife, was settled in reversion upon his eldest son. Michelangelo explains the tenor of the deed, and then breaks forth into the, following bitter and ironical invective: "If my life is ...
— The Life of Michelangelo Buonarroti • John Addington Symonds

... being retained, she grew stiff with Fear, and stood trembling as Corn waves in the Field, or Reeds on the River Bank, when fanned by the Wind. To whom the God; Behold, Madam, a more faithful Lover at your Feet: Fear nothing, Lady fair, you shall be the Wife of Bacchus. The Sky shall be your Dowry, where shining in a bright Constellation, by the Name of Ariadne's Crown, you shall often direct the doubtful Mariner's Passage. He said; and leaping from his Chariot, lest Ariadne should be afraid of the Tygers, the Sand sunk under the Weight of his ...
— The Lovers Assistant, or, New Art of Love • Henry Fielding

... evening. When her husband approached the card-table, she was always in the habit of covering with her hand the trumpery losses scored up against her; but she had made over to him, without reserve, all her dowry, all the money she had. She brought him two children—a son named Ivan, our Fedor's father, ...
— Liza - "A nest of nobles" • Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev

... period of his attachment to Lucie, he accidentally discovered that most of her fortune had become involved in the private speculations of her guardian, and was probably lost to her. But he often declared, that he asked no dowry with such a bride, and if he could obtain her hand, he should never seek redress for the patrimony she had lost. La Tour, conscious that he had wronged her, and fearing that no other suitor would ...
— The Rivals of Acadia - An Old Story of the New World • Harriet Vaughan Cheney

... whose life abounds with curious features, married Mademoiselle d'Aubigne, afterwards the celebrated Madame de Maintenon, who was at that time only sixteen years of age. On his marriage, the notary asked him what dowry he would settle upon his wife? he replied, "Immortality: the names of the wives of kings die with them, but the name of Scarron's wife shall live for ever." He was accustomed to talk to his superiors with great freedom, and in a very jocular style. In a dedication to the king, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 13, - Issue 352, January 17, 1829 • Various

... who suing for favor at her feet, had at the same time lined their vows of love and constancy with the yellow dust, which had they known the strong chest to have been at their backs, while in this humble posture, it were uncertain to which might have been made an apology,—the fair lady or her dowry. ...
— Natalie - A Gem Among the Sea-Weeds • Ferna Vale



Words linked to "Dowry" :   gift, dowery, portion



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