"Idly" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... combination of both, seems to evolve only in big cities, escorting a young lady from the vestibule. Then Theydon remembered that he had noticed this self-same girl's remarkable beauty as she was silhouetted in white against the dark background of a first-tier box. He had even speculated idly as to her identity, and had come to the conclusion, on catching her face in profile, that she must be the daughter of the man seated by her side but ...
— Number Seventeen • Louis Tracy
... to his son, a lad of about twelve years old, who sat on the bench by the Court House door, idly whistling, and throwing up a ...
— All's Well - Alice's Victory • Emily Sarah Holt
... the statesman, "if I had not felt it, do you think I should have been, and that I should be to the last, the joyless drudge of public life? Bronze though you call my nature, it would have melted away long since like wax in the fire, if I had sat idly down and dreamed ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... mentioned by Mr. Joseph Sylvester, quoted by Dr. Clarke, who wrote a poem on tobacco which he inscribed to Villiers, Duke of Buckingham. The title of this tirade is very quaint, viz. "Tobacco battered, and the Pipes shattered (about their Ears who idly idolize so base and barbarous a Weed; or at least-wise overlove so loathsome a Vanity) by a Volley of holy Shot from ...
— The American Quarterly Review, No. 17, March 1831 • Various
... Ezra Jennings, had told his master that he had seen me; and Mr. Candy, in his turn, wanted to see me and say something to me, when I was next in the neighbourhood of Frizinghall. What was to be said in answer to that, which would be worth the paper it was written on? I sat idly drawing likenesses from memory of Mr. Candy's remarkable-looking assistant, on the sheet of paper which I had vowed to dedicate to Betteredge—until it suddenly occurred to me that here was the irrepressible Ezra Jennings getting in my way again! I threw a dozen portraits, ...
— The Moonstone • Wilkie Collins
... full moons from the year 2200 to the year 2299 inclusive. But St. Margaret's, Meade Cantorum, was a different church from St. Jude's, Slowbridge, and for Esther Ogilvie to ignore the joyfulness of worshipping there in order to ponder idly the complexities of Golden Numbers and Dominical Letters could not be ascribed to inward dreariness. Besides, she wasn't dreary. Once Mark saw her coming down a woodland glade and almost turned aside to avoid meeting her, because ...
— The Altar Steps • Compton MacKenzie
... upon a stool beside the lattice, where the honeysuckle and woodbine entwined their tender stems, and stealing into the room filled it with their delicious breath. Her grandfather was basking in the sun outside, breathing the perfume of the flowers, and idly watching the clouds as they floated on ...
— The Old Curiosity Shop • Charles Dickens
... fancied the bright face was a little clouded. Fern laughed and talked as much as ever, and worked as busily for them all; but more than once, when she had returned earlier than usual, she had found Fern with her hands lying idly in her lap, and a very thoughtful look on her face. Fern would jump up at once, with a merry laugh at her own idleness; but her mother did not always forget the look. It was far too dreamy and abstracted, she said to herself, as ...
— Wee Wifie • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... the subject drop loyally. And, indeed, with Ching Po and French Eva both out of the way, she had become quite normal again. Of course, if I would not let her question me, I could not in fairness question her. So we talked on idly, neither one, I dare say, quite sure of the other, and both ostensibly content to wait. Or she may have had reasons as strong as mine for wishing to forget the ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1921 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... longer-lived artificial elemental created by a strong definite thought, but simply with the result produced by the stream of half-conscious, involuntary thoughts which the majority of mankind allow to flow idly through their brains, so that the intelligence is obviously not derived from the mind of the thinker; and we certainly cannot credit the elemental essence itself, which belongs to a kingdom further from individualization even than the mineral, with any sort of awakening of ...
— The Astral Plane - Its Scenery, Inhabitants and Phenomena • C. W. Leadbeater
... reparation?—and to whom do I owe reparation? But I love; I love passionately. My love is my life. If I, without apparent motive, suggest to a young girl accustomed to luxury, to elegance, to a life fruitful of all enjoyments of art, a young girl who loves to idly listen at the opera to Rossini's music,—if to her I should propose that she deprive herself of fifteen hundred thousand francs in favor of broken-down old men, or scrofulous paupers, she would turn her back on me and laugh, or her confidential friend would tell ...
— The Red Inn • Honore de Balzac
... Arthur Chappell,—thanks to him Whose every guest henceforth not idly vaunts "Sense has received the utmost Nature grants, My cup was filled with rapture to the brim, When, night by night,—ah, memory, how it haunts!— Music was poured by perfect ministrants, ...
— Browning's England - A Study in English Influences in Browning • Helen Archibald Clarke
... to know, but to act according to thy knowledge, is thy destination." So says the voice which cries to me aloud from my innermost soul, so soon as I collect and give heed to myself for a moment. "Not idly to inspect and contemplate thyself, nor to brood over devout sensations—no! thou existest to act. Thine actions, and only ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries: - Masterpieces of German Literature Translated into English, Volume 5. • Various
... there brushing her hair and letting her thoughts drift along idly over the events of the evening. Reginald Henson would have felt less easy in his mind had he known what these thoughts were. Up to now that oily scoundrel hugged himself with the delusion that nobody besides Frank Littimer and himself knew that the second copy of "The Crimson Blind" had passed into ...
— The Crimson Blind • Fred M. White
... Creagan, an uneasy third inquisitor, breathed hard through his nose. Anastacio Barela, the fourth and last inquisitor, maintained unmoved the disinterested attitude he had held since the interrogation began. Feet crossed, he lounged in his chair, graceful, silent, smoking, listening, idly observant of ...
— The Desire of the Moth; and The Come On • Eugene Manlove Rhodes
... in one of the easy-chairs and idly twitching blossoms from the hyacinths in a bowl near her. All day she had been especially nervous and irritable, her least movements were characterized ...
— From the Car Behind • Eleanor M. Ingram
... time he sat on the lifting, breathing swell, floating idly. There was nothing else on the face of the lonely waters except himself and a flock, or fleet, I should say, of razorbills and guillemots, very far away, who alternately showed all white breasts, and vanished—as ...
— The Way of the Wild • F. St. Mars
... from the hammock where I had swung idly during the scene, and, beginning with a balancez and an avant-deux, terminated my terpsichorean exhibition by a regular "double shuffle" and sailor's hornpipe. The delirious laughter, cracked sides, rollicking ...
— Captain Canot - or, Twenty Years of an African Slaver • Brantz Mayer
... except they were sure of his company. Then he would carry it openly, be as they, say, damn them and sink them[41] as they. If they railed on good men, so could he; if they railed on religion, so could he; if they talked beastly, vainly, idly, so would he; if they were for drinking, swearing, whoring, or any the like villainies, so was he. This was now the path he trod in, and could do all artificially as any man alive. And now he thought himself a perfect man, he thought ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... attentive to good advice from others, capable of forming judicious plans, and quick and active in carrying them into execution. Loudoun, instead of defending the colonies with his great army, left them totally expos'd while he paraded idly at Halifax, by which means Fort George was lost, besides, he derang'd all our mercantile operations, and distress'd our trade, by a long embargo on the exportation of provisions, on pretence of keeping supplies from being obtain'd by the enemy, but in reality for beating down their ...
— Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin • Benjamin Franklin
... for tea, and was sitting idly. It was not easy to recognise her as Lydia's sister; if you searched her features the sisterhood was there, but the type of countenance was so subtly modified, so refined, as to become beauty of rare suggestiveness. She was of pale complexion, and had golden ...
— Thyrza • George Gissing
... premises, as was well known. Before long a still mare arrant piece of dishonesty gave him an opportunity for revenge. A young man of good family, who was boarding with him in order to gain some business experience, having gone into Derues' shop to make some purchases, amused himself while waiting by idly writing his name on a piece of blank paper lying on the counter; which he left there without thinking more about it. Derues, knowing the young man had means, as soon as he had gone, converted the signed paper into ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... much to tell you, my friends," he began thoughtfully. "Much that will interest you, shall we say from a socialistic standpoint? I shall make it brief, for we have no time to sit idly talking. ...
— The Girl in the Golden Atom • Raymond King Cummings
... my things; I was as idly and as frivolously employed as the most idle and most frivolous woman living. I went through my dresses, and my linen. What could be more innocent? Children go through ...
— Armadale • Wilkie Collins
... they must either have given away some of the good things they possessed in enormous quantities, or have suffered them to spoil and moulder. So, many of the people missed what it was more agreeable to get idly than to work for; and the monks who were driven out of their homes and wandered about encouraged their discontent; and there were, consequently, great risings in Lincolnshire and Yorkshire. These were put down by terrific executions, from which the monks themselves did not ...
— A Child's History of England • Charles Dickens
... building before him formed the letters of a word. The word was "GLORIA." Seeing it again as he had seen it in the morning, but now identified and explained, he grew hot and cold by turns, and his brain, which refused to think, felt like a sail that is flapping idly on ...
— The Christian - A Story • Hall Caine
... you I want to show. (MARY pays no attention, but sits down idly drumming her fingers on the table.) There now—pay particular attention to this. (She takes the cannister from KATE, opens it and ladles out the tea with a spoon into the teapot.) One spoonful for your father and uncle, one for my brother and Mr. Mackenzie, one for yourself ...
— The Drone - A Play in Three Acts • Rutherford Mayne
... a class struggle cannot very well be denied by the optimistic Americans who say: "A class struggle is monstrous. Sir, there is no class struggle." The class struggle is here, and the optimistic American had better gird himself for the fray and put a stop to it, rather than sit idly declaiming that what ought not to be is not, ...
— War of the Classes • Jack London
... basking idly under the window, jumps to his feet, shouting, "It is Monsieur the Bishop!" Minima claps her hands, and cries, "The prince, Aunt Nelly, ...
— The Doctor's Dilemma • Hesba Stretton
... dreams is, first, that he fails to see how easy-running the association or recall mechanism is. It isn't necessary to look for big, mysterious driving forces, when we know that A makes you think of B, and B of C, with the greatest ease. The dreamer isn't laboring, he is idly playing, and his images come largely by free association, with personal desires giving ...
— Psychology - A Study Of Mental Life • Robert S. Woodworth
... should lose command of himself under the unexpected influence of her beauty, of old memories, of the failing light, of the tender shadows that still lingered under her eyes, of that exquisite small hand that lay idly on the sofa beside her, just within his reach. He rose abruptly, ...
— Whosoever Shall Offend • F. Marion Crawford
... idolatrous word, nor would he allow of the fashion of calling the day of rest 'the Sabbath.' 'We keep not holy,' said he, 'the seventh-day Sabbath of the people of Israel, but the first day made holy for us by the resurrection of our Lord;' and I saying idly to him, out of the poet Shakespeare, ...
— Andrew Golding - A Tale of the Great Plague • Anne E. Keeling
... idly from me. Our poesy is as a gum, which issues From whence 'tis nourish'd. The fire i' th' flint Shows not till it be struck: our gentle flame Provokes itself—and like the current flies ...
— Characters of Shakespeare's Plays • William Hazlitt
... they had either been seized on the way by the Carlists, or that my letter had miscarried. I then thought of applying to England for a supply, but I abandoned the idea for two reasons. In the first place, I should have to remain idly loitering, at least a month, before I could receive them, at a place where every article was excessively dear; and, secondly, I was very unwell, and unable to procure medical advice at Santander. Ever since I left Coruna, I had ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow
... night and for several others that followed. As for the days they went by pleasantly and idly. Heda walked about on her father's arm, conversed in friendly fashion with the doctor, always watching him, I noticed, as a cat watches a dog that she knows is waiting an opportunity to spring, and for the rest associated with us as much as ...
— Finished • H. Rider Haggard
... about that," answered Walter doubtfully. "Yes, you may try," he decided finally, extending the whip that he had been idly tapping against his legging. "But don't hit him, ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in the Rockies • Frank Gee Patchin
... further the cause of peace and freedom in the world. Much is at stake here, and the Nation and the world are watching to see if we go forward together in the national interest or if we let partisanship weaken us. And let there be no mistake about American policy: We will not sit idly by if our interests or our friends in the Middle East are threatened, nor will we ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... to the stove, and stood looking idly at the card-players, blue wreaths of tobacco smoke circling up from the bowl of his pipe. Some one opened the street door, letting in a babel of noise, and walked heavily across the office floor. Westcott turned about to observe the newcomer. He ...
— The Strange Case of Cavendish • Randall Parrish
... minutes Miss Wingate stood leaning over the top rail of the low gate idly watching a group of Pratts, Turners, Mosbeys, Hoovers and Pikes playing a mysterious game, which necessitated wild dashes across a line drawn down the middle of the Road in the white dust, shrill cries of capture and frequent change of base. The ...
— The Road to Providence • Maria Thompson Daviess
... brilliant sunshine despite the season, with a light dry west wind crinkling the surface of the sea, Mary and Constance, with Fan between them, were seated on a heap of shingle sheltered from the wind by a sloping bank. Constance, with hands folded over the closed book on her lap, sat idly gazing on the blue expanse of water, watching the white little wave-crests that formed only to vanish so quickly. The quiet restful life she had experienced since Merton's death had had its effect; her form had partially recovered its roundness, ...
— Fan • Henry Harford
... days slip by idly, only wondering how I could manage to remain in Havana and breathe the air of the same island with the girl who had delivered me. Perhaps some day we might meet—who knows? I was ...
— Romance • Joseph Conrad and F.M. Hueffer
... and just look at the ocean," suggested Amy, when they had walked some distance down the beach, and while they were thus idly employed, and when the afternoon was waning, they spied a solitary figure approaching them down ...
— The Outdoor Girls at Ocean View - Or, The Box That Was Found in the Sand • Laura Lee Hope
... should go and have a pennyworth of the mysteries of time and space! How long will Edison's latest magic toy survive this popularisation, I wonder? For a little moment it awakens the sense of wonder in the idly curious, who set the demon tube to their ears; but if they make any remarks at all, it is of the cleverness of Mr. Edison, the probable profits of the invention—and not a word of the wonder of the world! So it would be with the undiscovered country. I was blamed ...
— Prose Fancies (Second Series) • Richard Le Gallienne
... rain That from a passing cloud descended: Was heard thus idly to complain: "My brief existence now is ended! Outcast alike of earth and sky, Useless to live, unknown to die!" It chanced to fall into the sea, And there an open shell received it; And after years how rich was he Who from its prison-house released it! ...
— The Talking Beasts • Various
... the piano again, idly thrumming soft minor chords. She was waiting for him to speak; she wanted to test his voice, to know and measure its emotion. At times she turned her head and shot a sly glance at him as he sat there musing. There was a wrinkle of contempt and amusement lurking at the corners of her eyes. Had ...
— The Puppet Crown • Harold MacGrath
... property; making rafts, carrying people on their backs, and going through the inundated streets with boat-loads of food for the hungry, shut up in their ill-provided houses. Usually at such times the priests did this work; but now they stood idly looking on, and saying it was a judgment on the people for their treatment of the Pope. The people were troubled because the priests refused to pray for them: but otherwise they snapped their fingers at the sullen old gentlemen in the Vatican; and the brisk, brave troops worked ...
— Shawl-Straps - A Second Series of Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag • Louisa M. Alcott
... she went into the dimly lighted house, through the drawing-room, which was quite dark, into the music-room beyond; and there she sat down upon a chair by the piano—a little gilded chair that revolved as she pushed herself idly, now to the ...
— A Young Man in a Hurry - and Other Short Stories • Robert W. Chambers
... European alliance for this purpose, and publicly censured those who remained careless and inactive. "Ruined or lazy," he wrote to Conrad Zinck of Constance, a member of the Council, "are they, who look on idly and never trouble themselves about raising up a force sufficient to make the Emperor feel, that he will labor in vain to restore the dominion of Rome, occupy the Free Cities and conquer us Helvetians. Rouse Linden; rouse your neighbors to action. He is a fool who builds ...
— The Life and Times of Ulric Zwingli • Johann Hottinger
... (642/5. See "Fertilisation of Orchids," Edition II., page 68.) Let me hear about the sporting Imatophyllum if it flowers. Perhaps I have blundered about Primula; but certainly not about mere protrusion of pollen-tubes. I have been idly watching bees of several genera and diptera fertilising O. morio at this place, and it is a very pretty sight. I have confirmed in several ways the entire truth of my statement that there is no vestige of nectar in ...
— More Letters of Charles Darwin Volume II - Volume II (of II) • Charles Darwin
... suggestions, cheerfully, and he and the captain departed to carry out their own task. When they returned laden with the balance of the canoe's cargo, Walter was standing idly by the fire watching ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... day. But it no longer entertains us very much, and it is the source of considerable injustice done by modern criticism to the real merits of Sterne. When so acute a writer as Bagehot condemns much of Tristram Shandy as "a sort of antediluvian fun, in which uncouth saurian jokes play idly in an unintelligible world," he hits the nail on the head of why so many readers nowadays turn with impatience from that work. But they should persevere, for Sterne himself saw his error, and gradually dropped the "uncouth saurian ...
— Some Diversions of a Man of Letters • Edmund William Gosse
... assembly? Why do the villagers, and these ragged and savage fellows whom you have incorporated among you—why do they lounge about idly, with arms in their hands, and faces that still ...
— Guy Rivers: A Tale of Georgia • William Gilmore Simms
... surmount the impassable barrier of the Alps. Opening his window, he saw three devils dancing merrily on the housetops. He called them. "Which of you is the speediest?" he asked. "I," said one, "I am swift as the wind."—"Bah!" cried the second, "I can fly like a bullet."—"These two talk idly," said the third. "I am quick as the thought of a woman." The worthy prelate chose the third. The hour being late, he bargained that he should be carried to Rome and back before cockcrow, the price for the service to be his saintly soul. The imp flew well, and returned to the valley of the Rhone ...
— The Silent Barrier • Louis Tracy
... The lads, excited by my criticisms and good cheer, were eager for a demonstration at the keyboard. So was I. I let them play first. This is what I heard: The dark-skinned youth, who looked like the priestly and uninteresting Siloti, sat down and began idly preluding. He had good fingers, but they were spoiled by a hammer-like touch and the constant use of forearm, upper-arm, and shoulder pressure. He called my attention to his tone. Tone! He made every individual wire jangle, and I trembled for my smooth, ...
— Old Fogy - His Musical Opinions and Grotesques • James Huneker
... atrocious Rebellion? Hundreds upon hundreds of young men I see in stores and shops, doing work that women could do quite as well; and large numbers of older men who have grown wealthy under the protection of our benign government, are idly grieving over the taxation which the war imposes, and meanly asking if it will not soon end, that their coffers may become plethoric of gold; while the question is still unsettled whether the Rebellion shall sweep them and their all into the vortex ...
— Thirteen Months in the Rebel Army • William G. Stevenson
... half to herself. I slipped down on my treasured wolf-skin rug near her chair, and with hands locked about my knees, sat in silence, knowing it was the one and only way to lure her to speech. She arose, helped herself to more tea, and with the toe of her beaded moccasin idly stroked one of the wolf-skin paws. "Yes," she said, with some decision, "the Indian men of magic say that the falls are cobwebs twisted ...
— The Moccasin Maker • E. Pauline Johnson
... seamen to trim the yards in readiness to meet it. By the time that this had been done the line of demarcation was so near that the musical tinkling of the advancing ripples could be distinctly heard, although the sails still hung limp, idly flapping to the roll of the ship. Another minute, however, sufficed, then with a gentle preliminary rustling the canvas filled, the blue ripples reached the ship, passed inshore of her, and she began to draw slowly through ...
— Two Gallant Sons of Devon - A Tale of the Days of Queen Bess • Harry Collingwood
... afternoon in late summer, I found a delightful little bungalow in process of building, on a side street not so very far from the proper avenue. I investigated idly, and found that the rent was thirty dollars less than we were paying. Yet even ...
— How To Write Special Feature Articles • Willard Grosvenor Bleyer
... the winding trail. His right foot was clear of the stirrup, and he swung it idly. His left hand, in which he held the reins, rested lightly on the horn of his saddle, and his right gripped the cantle at his back. He hummed a ditty of the desert, but his gaze, keen and alert, continually sought the open stretches ...
— The Coyote - A Western Story • James Roberts
... the air, every stirring of the leaves, every whisper among these men, made Sissy tremble, for she thought it was a cry at the bottom of the pit. But the wind blew idly over it, and no sound arose to the surface, and they sat upon the grass, waiting and waiting. After they had waited some time, straggling people who had heard of the accident began to come up; then the real help of implements began to arrive. In the midst ...
— Hard Times • Charles Dickens*
... a whisper, "God knows that I do not wish to make you unhappy, nor do I wish to make you do what is wrong. I spoke so because I could not help it. Do you think that I can love you, and know you to be what you are, and then stand idly by and see you passing to another? I believe in silence and endurance, but not in such silence and endurance as that. It is too much! God never asks ...
— The Candidate - A Political Romance • Joseph Alexander Altsheler
... of Art. Once again heartiest thanks; please also to thank Mr. Manns properly for his excellent conducting of "Mazeppa." Things of that kind are awkward both for conductors and performers. But how can one go on making music with what is idly convenient, even when this is raised into importance under the guise ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 2: "From Rome to the End" • Franz Liszt; letters collected by La Mara and translated
... the library to find that the others had retired, presumably to dress for dinner. Mechanically I crossed to the tallboy, which we had so fruitlessly surveyed, and began to finger it idly, wondering all the time whether my dream was wanton, or whether there was indeed some secret which we might discover. It did not seem possible, and yet.... That distant voice rang in my ears. "Measurements tell, measurements tell. But ...
— Berry And Co. • Dornford Yates
... over their golden harps, or they stroke idly their violins. Clearer and clearer the note of each instrument ascends like larks arising from the dew, till suddenly they all blend together and a new melody is born. Thus, every morning, the musicians ...
— The Sword of Welleran and Other Stories • Lord Dunsany
... introduction, and motioned his visitors to two chairs silently produced by the Javanese boy. He sat in ponderous silence for a space, his piggy eyes dwelling on Barry with steel-point steadiness, his great hands resting idly on the desk before him. Then he ...
— Gold Out of Celebes • Aylward Edward Dingle
... Basin of Minas Somewhat apart from the vil|lage, and nearer the Basin of Minas. But a celestial bright|ness—a more etherial beauty. And the retreating sun the sign of the scorpion enters. In-doors, warmed by the wide-|mouthed fireplace idly the farmer, Four times the sun had ris|en and set; and now on ...
— Legends of the Northwest • Hanford Lennox Gordon
... to want to know Sally myself." Bruce let his eyes go drowsing toward the pale river up which the slow rain was beating, and talked foolishness idly: "Red-cheeked Sally! Freckled Sally! Roly-poly Sally! What's a Missouri girl ...
— Sally of Missouri • R. E. Young
... succour of Missolonghi, and which had for some time actually protected it against a Turkish fleet double its number, nine had already, hopeless of pay, returned to Hydra, while the sailors of the remaining five, from the same cause of complaint, had just quitted their ships, and were murmuring idly on shore. The inhabitants, seeing themselves thus deserted or preyed upon by their defenders, with a scarcity of provisions threatening them, and the Turkish fleet before their eyes, were no less ready ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. 6 (of 6) - With his Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... lovers of literature. These publications were long the chronicles of taste and science, presenting the existing state of the public mind, while they formed a ready resource for those idle hours, which men of letters would not pass idly. ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli
... attention," says the King. [OEuvres de Frederic, vi. 26.] He gives no date to this curious statement; nor does anybody else mention it at all; but we may fancy it to have been of Winter, 1769-1770,—and leave it with the curious, or the idly curious, since nothing came of it now ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XXI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... out against a keen north-east wind, in order to gain the known route to Fort Providence. We saw a number of wolves and some crows on the middle of the lake, and supposing such an assembly was not met idly, we made for them and came in for a share of a deer which they had killed a short time before, and thus added a couple of meals to our stock. By four P.M. we gained the head of the lake, or the direct road to ...
— Narrative of a Journey to the Shores of the Polar Sea, in the years 1819-20-21-22, Volume 2 • John Franklin
... He was idly fingering his cylinder; he gazed at me as I sat docile on my bunk. "Did you think George Prince was a leader of this? A mere boy. I engaged him a year ago—his knowledge of science ...
— Brigands of the Moon • Ray Cummings
... fascinated me and aggrieved me. From the conditions of our acquaintance—we were colleagues—I had to study him with some thoroughness, observing him under these circumstances and those. I have, by the bye, sometimes wondered idly how he would react to alcohol—a fluid he avoids. It would, I am sure, be an entirely novel and remarkable kind of Drunk, and I am also certain it would be an offensive one. But I can't imagine it; I have no data. I could as soon evolve from ...
— Certain Personal Matters • H. G. Wells
... these states is small, fifteen or twenty being sufficient for a farm of two hundred or three hundred acres; and their labour, which is mostly confined to tending stock, is not only very light, but of the quality most agreeable to the negro. Half the day you will see him on horseback with his legs idly swinging—as he goes along, or seated on a shaft-horse driving his wagons. He is quite in his glory; nothing delights a negro so much as riding or driving, particularly when he has a whole team under his control. He takes his wagon for a load of corn to feed the hogs, sits on the edge of the ...
— Diary in America, Series One • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)
... grass, with squaws kneeling around them, engaged in the operation of graining. Girls, with water-tight baskets, poised upon the crown of the head, were coming from or going towards the stream. Men stood in groups, idly chatting, or squatted upon the turf, playing at games of chance. Boys were busy at their bow-practice; and still younger children rolled their naked bodies over the grass, hugging half-grown puppies—the ...
— The Wild Huntress - Love in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid
... seen less frequently than before hanging on the gate, or sitting idly on the bench before his mother's dwelling; and when you did find him there, as of old, you saw a different expression on his face. Soon the children, who had only looked at him, half in fear, from a distance, or come closer to the gate where he ...
— After a Shadow, and Other Stories • T. S. Arthur
... which our two sovereigns received[2]. King Khang did not dare to rest idly in it, But ...
— The Shih King • James Legge
... much interested to know how well Inga succeeded, but she returned to the palace of Ozma at the Emerald City of Oz the next day and other events made her forget the boy Prince of Pingaree for a time. However, she was one day idly looking at Ozma's Magic Picture, which shows any scene you may wish to see, when the girl thought of Inga and commanded the Magic Picture to show what the boy was ...
— Rinkitink in Oz • L. Frank Baum
... going away again?" asked Marjorie, as the girls skated idly to and fro, waiting for the boys to join them. "I thought he came in from camp only ...
— In Blue Creek Canon • Anna Chapin Ray
... breathing irregularly, rather rapidly, pretty head bent, apparently considering her hands, which lay idly in her lap. Then she lifted her blue eyes and inspected him. And it was curious, too, that, now when she came to examine him, she did not seem to discover ...
— The Gay Rebellion • Robert W. Chambers
... 1879 was idly spent. Boyton visited the most celebrated watering resorts of America and enjoyed a well earned good time. As the autumn leaves began to fall, he was seized with an irresistible desire to feel himself again afloat, so he turned his attention ...
— The Story of Paul Boyton - Voyages on All the Great Rivers of the World • Paul Boyton
... humming idly still, looked up, calmly surveyed the captain, and then went on as if he had heard merely empty wind instead ...
— Harrigan • Max Brand
... met—the road to Hampstead, along which I had returned, the road to Finchley, the road to West End, and the road back to London. I had mechanically turned in this latter direction, and was strolling along the lonely high-road—idly wondering, I remember, what the Cumberland young ladies would look like—when, in one moment, every drop of blood in my body was brought to a stop by the touch of a hand laid lightly and suddenly on ...
— The Woman in White • Wilkie Collins
... a mere tautology or repetition. The Holy Spirit does not idly repeat words, as those superficial minds believe, which, having read through the Bible once, throw it aside as if they had gathered all its contents. Yet these very repetitions of Moses contain a statement more startling than any to be found in heathen records—that Noah entered ...
— Commentary on Genesis, Vol. II - Luther on Sin and the Flood • Martin Luther
... beside Mere Jupillon—sound asleep with her spectacles on her nose—and holding the dogs rolled in a ball in the skirt of her dress; and while the lamp, almost dying, burned pale upon the counter, she would sit idly there, letting her glance lose itself at the back of the shop, and gradually grow dim, with her ideas, as her eyes rested vaguely upon a triumphal arch of snail shells joined together with old ...
— Germinie Lacerteux • Edmond and Jules de Goncourt
... officers of the fourth Pennsylvania regiment were engaged in a game of 'fives.' In the midst of their sport, they discovered the commander-in-chief leaning upon the enclosure, and beholding the game with evident satisfaction. In a moment, all things were changed. The ball was suffered to roll idly away; the gay laugh and joyous shout of excitement were hushed into a profound silence, and the officers were gravely grouped together. It was in vain the chief begged of the players that they would proceed with their game; declared the pleasure he had experienced from witnessing ...
— Washington and the American Republic, Vol. 3. • Benson J. Lossing
... "O Tsar, permit me to bring thee the sword." And the Tsar replied: "Do this service and I will set thee above all my knights; but if thou talkest idly, thou shalt be safe neither in water, nor under the earth, nor among the rocks." And so saying, the Tsar returned into the city, and Yaroslav rode up to the Knight's Head and said: "Sir Knight's Head, I trust to thy love and friendship to fulfil thy promise and give me up this ...
— The Russian Garland - being Russian Falk Tales • Various
... additional lessons. I have learned to see a hand, in all its clouds, which guides man and kingdoms with more than human power. In these remembrances, I have spoken but little of religion. It belongs to the chamber more than to the council; and it is less honoured than humiliated by being brought idly before men. But by that light I have been able to see, where subtler minds have been blind. The man may be bewildered by the glare of the torch in his hand, who would have found his way by trusting to ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 360, October 1845 • Various
... 6, long. 24 degrees 38 minutes W.—Crossed the Line, to the great satisfaction of all on board, as we had been becalmed more than a week, and were weary of gazing upon the unruffled waters around us, or watching the sails as they idly flapped to and fro. Chess, backgammon, books and cards, had ceased to beguile the hours away, and the only amusement left was lowering a boat and rowing about within a short distance of the ship, but this (even by those not pulling at the oars) was considered too fatiguing work, for a tropical ...
— A Lady's Visit to the Gold Diggings of Australia in 1852-53. • Mrs. Charles (Ellen) Clacey
... together, talking little, and still with that expression of uneasy vigilance on Seaton's face. He pulled out his watch as we stood gazing idly over the green meadow and the ...
— The Best British Short Stories of 1922 • Edward J. O'Brien and John Cournos, editors
... quid, and some the smell; There are who think that smoke doth both excel, I smile to see these votaries so misled, And think their several tastes are idly bred. Perchance one, here and there, may virtue find, In 'bacco' fumes, when much perplexed with wind. But sure, the human frame, frail as it is, Is not so subject to the qualms as this; Three times a day to need the burning herb, To cure the evils which so much ...
— Religion in Earnest - A Memorial of Mrs. Mary Lyth, of York • John Lyth
... house, but from somewhere beyond it, a car flashed into view and cut smoothly and quickly down through the street, almost deserted now. The boy followed it idly with his eyes. The low-built, graceful lines of it held them. It approached, and slowed down directly under the windows, and the ...
— The Wishing Moon • Louise Elizabeth Dutton
... Idly the boys watched the perspiring party, pressing handkerchiefs to their faces meanwhile, since, despite the wrappings of canvas, the valuable mass gave most decided proof of its being in the vicinity, and when the boat started for the shore Neal and Teddy clambered into ...
— The Search for the Silver City - A Tale of Adventure in Yucatan • James Otis
... A.I. Konovalov, Minister of Commerce and Industry in he Provisional Government, and then scratched out as the hopelessness of the situation became more and more evident. The geometrical figure beneath was probably idly drawn while the Ministers were waiting ...
— Ten Days That Shook the World • John Reed
... slowly towards Vorse. In his tread there was something of the quality of a tiger's, the light, deliberate, poised advance, the easy and dangerous movement of body, the effortless glide of a powerful animal ready to spring and strike. His hands swung idly at his sides, but that did not mean they would not be swift once they responded to the call of the ...
— In the Shadow of the Hills • George C. Shedd
... The superintendent was playing idly with a paper knife. His gaze seemed to be directed to the lower buttons of his head clerk's waistcoat. "Interference?" he repeated. "Interference? Mr. Grump, you have a reputation for humor, or so I judge. I've been listening to you trying to bedevil that man out there, but I'm afraid your humor ...
— Wide Courses • James Brendan Connolly
... evening gowns, but her cheeks were bright with colour and her grey eyes brilliant, and the lights touched her thick chestnut hair with a ruddy glory, so that more than one man turned to watch her pass, and the idly contemptuous indifference of more than one woman ended at her neck ...
— The Dark Star • Robert W. Chambers
... work. Duly regulated, it is as promotive of health as bodily exercise; and, where due attention is paid to the physical system, it seems difficult to put more upon a man than he can bear. Merely to eat and drink and sleep one's way idly through life is vastly more injurious. The wear-and-tear of rust is even faster ...
— Character • Samuel Smiles
... imposing a fine of forty pounds upon the importation of a Gypsey, induces the belief they were much in request in England at that period. The attention which their low performances attracted in those times, will not perhaps excite surprise, when we see the encouragement given in our day, to their idly disposed countrymen, termed, Indian Jugglers. It is remarkable, that the earliest account of Gypsies in Great Britain, is in a work published to expose and detect ...
— A Historical Survey of the Customs, Habits, & Present State of the Gypsies • John Hoyland
... closed it behind me? Coates, my batman, had turned in, having placed a cold repast upon the table in the little dining-room; but although I required nothing to eat I partook of a stiff whisky and soda, idly glancing at two or three letters ...
— The Green Eyes of Bast • Sax Rohmer
... a down-town apartment, not over three blocks away, and that would take but a very short time. He wandered over to the public square. Some old men were sitting on a row of iron benches lining the sidewalk, facing the street. They surveyed him critically as he passed by. He walked up and idly inspected the kiosk where the weather-bureau reports were posted. He noticed it predicted continued fair. Then he turned and walked in the street for about a block, gazing in shop windows. There was nothing in any of them that he particularly wanted. He stopped at a street corner and looked ...
— Stubble • George Looms
... see why I shouldn't have a wife as well as another," says the professor, idly tapping his forefinger on the table near him. "She would bore me. But a great ...
— A Little Rebel • Mrs. Hungerford
... advanced day, to rear up a family by an illiterate woman might well be considered a crime. As a race, if we would possess the intelligence desired, our children must be kept in school, and not allowed to roam idly through the streets when the schoolhouse is open. Since, in most of the Southern states, countless numbers of our people have been disfranchised, our educated women should institute a movement which will bring about compulsory education and a general ...
— Twentieth Century Negro Literature - Or, A Cyclopedia of Thought on the Vital Topics Relating - to the American Negro • Various
... face, and she drew in her breath suddenly, glanced at him for a second, and then looked away, her eyes resting at last on the distance where a ship lay, her sails hanging idly in the dim haze. It might have been a dream-ship. At Keith's words a picture came to her out of the past. A young man was seated on the ground, with a fresh-budding bush behind him. Spring was all about them. He was young and slender and sun-browned, with deep-burning ...
— Gordon Keith • Thomas Nelson Page
... up-town clubs. He became nervously humble, intensely polite, he felt he was being carried as an honored guest into the very heart of the Four Hundred, and when the car jogged slowly down the main street of Yonkers, although a policeman stood idly within a yard of him, instead of shrieking to him for help, "Izzy" Schwab looked at him scornfully across the social gulf that separated them, with all the intolerance he believed ...
— The Scarlet Car • Richard Harding Davis
... let her fingers rest idly along the rim of the bowl. "When I was a girl . . ." she began. Then it was Anna's turn ...
— Autumn • Robert Nathan
... countrymen are dependent upon the cotton crops of America; their destiny may be said, without any kind of hyperbole, to hang upon a thread. Should any dire calamity befall the land of cotton, a thousand of our merchant ships would rot idly in dock; ten thousand mills must stop their busy looms; two thousand thousand mouths would starve, for lack ...
— Cotton is King and The Pro-Slavery Arguments • Various
... dead. There was no doubt of that; neither was there any doubt that the big, frowzy, red-headed, red-faced, over-fat woman sitting near the door-way, smoking a pipe quite comfortably, was very much alive. She rocked idly back and forth amid her surroundings of squalid disorder, and paid no attention whatever to the piercing wails proceeding from a cradle in ...
— Rilla of Ingleside • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... how fond our ancestors were of a play upon the name of the deceased when it admitted of a double sense. The following is an instance of this propensity not idly indulged. It brings home a general truth to the individual by the medium of a pun, which will be readily pardoned for the sake of the image suggested by it, for the happy mood of mind in which the epitaph is composed, for the beauty of the language, and for the sweetness of the versification, ...
— The Prose Works of William Wordsworth • William Wordsworth
... floor lay Balder dead; and round Lay thickly strewn swords, axes, darts, and spears, Which all the Gods in sport had idly thrown At Balder, whom no weapon pierced or clove; But in his breast stood fixed the fatal bough Of mistletoe, which Lok, the Accuser, gave To Hoder, and unwitting Hoder threw— 'Gainst that alone had ...
— Myths of the Norsemen - From the Eddas and Sagas • H. A. Guerber
... very madness of truth, he had not," Robert answered. "So this rogue has rusted here idly through a generation of eating and sleeping. Very likely his sword is grown with ivy. But now he must stretch his sinews, now he must scour his scimitar, now he begins to be ...
— The Proud Prince • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... of all the gay sights that are waiting for it in the Grand Canal," the boy thought idly. "It may well know," he added in his thought; "it ...
— Rafael in Italy - A Geographical Reader • Etta Blaisdell McDonald
... There is one more! "Whose is this image?" It is that of David bringing the ark from Kirjath-jearim, and playing his harp and dancing before it. What a goodly array of pictures! All—all about the glories and successes of David. David paces idly through the halls, he sees the tapestries and paintings, but he regards them not, "My sin is ever before me." He sees only one picture, which is not upon the wall, which the flattering painter has omitted, his guilt ...
— The Village Pulpit, Volume II. Trinity to Advent • S. Baring-Gould
... talk by day and with the light dance-music in the parlors by night—all these are active sources of a passive pleasure. And to lie at length upon the tawny sand, watching, through half-closed eyes, the heaving waves, that mount against a dark blue sky wherein great silvery masses of cloud float idly on, whiter than the sunlit sails that fade and grow and fade along the horizon, while some fair damsel sits close by, reading ancient ballads of a simple metre, or older legends of love and romance—tell me, my eater of the fashionable lotos, is not this a diversion ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 5 • Various
... enchanting story one morning, and was glancing idly down the hill, watching the toilers who bent over as if they were carrying heavy loads, or drawing something behind them. Physical culture had not yet been applied to the fine ...
— A Little Girl of Long Ago • Amanda Millie Douglas
... and a waving blind, And the beat of a clock from a distant floor: On this scene enter—winged, horned, and spined - A longlegs, a moth, and a dumbledore; While 'mid my page there idly stands A sleepy fly, that rubs ...
— Poems of the Past and the Present • Thomas Hardy
... proposed destruction, I turned the letter over idly and my preoccupied gaze rested on the postmark. After a moment I leaned forward and examined it more attentively. The letter directed to me was postmarked Fort Carcajou, Cook's Peninsula, Baffin Land; and now I recalled the handwriting, having already seen it three or four times ...
— Police!!! • Robert W. Chambers
... we halted upon a little hill to rest ourselves. While reclining beneath the trees I noticed unusual carvings upon a huge block against which Lev-el-Hedyd was supporting his back. They were unlike any we had seen, and yet they were not unfamiliar. As I lay there gazing idly at them it flashed upon me they were Egyptian. We at once fell to examining the block, and found to our amazement an obelisk of Egyptian granite, covered with Egyptian hieroglyphics of an antiquity ...
— The Last American - A Fragment from The Journal of KHAN-LI, Prince of - Dimph-Yoo-Chur and Admiral in the Persian Navy • J. A. Mitchell
... something of intelligence and sympathy; but I could not commune with mud walls and an earthen pot. Feeling my loneliness too acutely, I began to regret that I had left Rima, then to feel remorse at the secrecy I had practiced. Even now while I inclined idly in my hammock, she would be roaming the forest in search of me, listening for my footsteps, fearing perhaps that I had met with some accident where there was no person to succour me. It was painful to think of her in this way, of the ...
— Green Mansions - A Romance of the Tropical Forest • W. H. Hudson
... the opportunity to slip idly from his hands. In the first quarter of an hour after the younger ladies had gone, he said little or nothing, but sat with a wine-glass before him, which once or twice he filled from the decanter. "I'm afraid the wine is not very good," ...
— Can You Forgive Her? • Anthony Trollope
... children, gone! What a stupendous fragment is stricken from the fabric of those enriching satisfactions which give life its truest value and its purest charm! Ages roll on. They see the same everlasting faces, confront the same returning phenomena, engage in the same worn out exercises, or lounge idly in the unchangeable conditions which bear no stimulant which they have not exhausted. Thousands of years pass. They have drunk every attainable spring of knowledge dry. Not a prize stirs a pulse. All pleasures, ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger
... to dusk. She lifted up on one elbow and half turned away from me to switch on the bedside lamp. The light came on and I looked down at her, lovingly, admiringly. Idly, I started to ask her, "How did you get those little scars on your leg there and ... those little scars? Like buckshot! Julia! Once, along about ten years ago—you must have been a little girl then—in the mountains—sure. You were hit by ...
— Inside John Barth • William W. Stuart
... helpless, that brought him. There he perched, and the keeper reviled him, wishing that he had but saved one of his cartridges, and forgetting that even then the barrels of his gun were too full of earth. After a while the crow flew idly across to the other side of the glade, and went out of sight; but it was only for a short time, and presently he came back again. This the crow did several times, always ...
— Wood Magic - A Fable • Richard Jefferies
... of the cabin hatch, however, there was enough breeze to flutter a piece of paper that had been caught in the mainsail halyard; it fluttered there lonely in the morning. Nothing else was astir but it and I, and I took it up in my hand, idly. As I did so, George ...
— Pieces of Eight • Richard le Gallienne
... shaped like a swan And sails of rainbow hue. Swiftly it came with a wake of foam And lying on its side Like an arrow's flight towards the Knight, Tho' none sat there to guide. And in the shallows by the shore It came to rest at last, The cordage slacked and the rainbow sail Flapped idly on the mast. And the Swan-prow with the ruby eyes Opened his silver beak, And with a musical, magic voice He thus began to speak. "Step in, step in, my gallant lad, Your youth shall be my fare. For you my mistress opes her door And combs her wine-dark ...
— A Legend of Old Persia and Other Poems • A. B. S. Tennyson
... flood tide passed, and then the ship began to swing idly as the slack came. Then with the turn of tide came little flaws of wind, and we hoisted the sail, and Kenulf hove the anchor short. Yet we heard no more sounds ...
— Wulfric the Weapon Thane • Charles W. Whistler
... gilding, agleam in the early sun, and from thence turned my gaze where (hard beside the pool upon the green) rose the grim shape of Sir Richard's new pillory. Just now it stood untenanted and I wondered idly what unhappy wight was destined next to suffer there. Thus stood I some while, staring round me on this peaceful hamlet where all (save only myself) forgot their cares awhile in blessed sleep; the wide road, the gabled cottages, oast-house ...
— Black Bartlemy's Treasure • Jeffrey Farnol
... we can The coming tempests, hence both harvest-day And seed-time, when to smite the treacherous main With driving oars, when launch the fair-rigged fleet, Or in ripe hour to fell the forest-pine. Hence, too, not idly do we watch the stars- Their rising and their setting-and the year, Four varying seasons to one law conformed. If chilly showers e'er shut the farmer's door, Much that had soon with sunshine cried for ...
— The Georgics • Virgil
... Then would she sit adown upon the green, And piteously *into the sea behold,* *look out on the sea* And say right thus, with *careful sikes* cold: *painful sighs* "Eternal God! that through thy purveyance Leadest this world by certain governance, *In idle,* as men say, ye nothing make; *idly, in vain* But, Lord, these grisly fiendly rockes blake, That seem rather a foul confusion Of work, than any fair creation Of such a perfect wise God and stable, Why have ye wrought this work unreasonable? For by this work, ...
— The Canterbury Tales and Other Poems • Geoffrey Chaucer
... restrained; but what I could I did. I watched her narrowly, and by good Luck found her in the Embraces (for which I had two Witnesses with me) of a wealthy Spark of the Court-end of the Town; of whom I recovered 15000 Pounds, which made me Amends for what she had idly squanderd, and put a Silence to all my Neighbours, taking off my Reproach by the Gain they saw I had by it. The last died about two Years after I married her, in Labour of three Children. I conjecture they were begotten by a Country ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... vaunted idly when I told the prisoner that our plans were ready. I had scarcely dropped the latch of the commandant's door when I saw Singing ...
— Montlivet • Alice Prescott Smith
... remark, he walked ahead to show the way, and the whole party went over, holding on to the creepers, and supporting themselves by the trees, when they saw a still larger quantity of fallen leaves on the surface of the water, and the stream itself, still more limpid, gently and idly meandering along on its circuitous course. By the bank of the pond were two rows of weeping willows, which, intermingling with peach and apricot trees, screened the heavens from view, and kept off the rays of the sun from this spot, which ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... yachts went the lighter became the wind, and each in turn ran into "soft" spots, when balloon top-sails hung up and down idly. ...
— The Young Oarsmen of Lakeview • Ralph Bonehill
... briskly on her way. Her little cottage was no longer on the outskirts of the town. Stately mansions had risen up about her, and a long procession of houses now stretched far up to the northward. The people idly looking forth from the windows of the stately mansions, did not realize how much a part of the landscape the little black figure had become, passing and repassing their doors. A small meek figure it was, with little indication of the bright spirit ...
— Peak and Prairie - From a Colorado Sketch-book • Anna Fuller
... air, this seems a very necessary provision. By means of these eyes, it can see in almost every direction at the same instant. Dragon-flies are extremely voracious, and are the greatest tyrants of the insect tribe. When we think them idly and innocently flitting about in the cheerful sunshine, they are, in fact, only hovering up and down ...
— Domestic pleasures - or, the happy fire-side • F. B. Vaux
... finding his expenses greater than his income, and yet, when he looks into those expenses, finds that his wife is frugal too, and industrious, and applies diligently to the managing her family, and bringing up her children, spends nothing idly, saves every thing that can be saved; that instead of keeping too many servants, is a servant to every body herself; and that, in short, when he makes the strictest examination, finds she lays out nothing ...
— The Complete English Tradesman (1839 ed.) • Daniel Defoe
... uncles left me in Damascus, and pursued their journey. After their departure, I used mighty caution not to lay out my money idly; but, at the same time, I took a stately house, all of marble, adorned with pictures of gold, and a pure branched work, and excellent water-works. I furnished it, not so richly indeed as the magnificence of the place deserved, but at least handsomely ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Volume 1 • Anonymous
... but she read it idly. It made no more appeal to her just then than did half a dozen of the other advertisements—"personal," ...
— The Corner House Girls at School • Grace Brooks Hill
... of conquest, and enough of war! Ambition's cloy'd—the heart resumes its rights. When England's king, and England's good, requir'd, This arm not idly the keen falchion brandish'd: Enough—for vaunting misbecomes a soldier. I live, I am return'd—am near Elwina! Seest thou those turrets? Yes, that castle holds her; But wherefore tell thee this? for thou hast seen ...
— Percy - A Tragedy • Hannah More
... of the pink, or green, or grey kinds, and he would have none of these. Perhaps he would have changed his mind about it had he had to carry all the stone himself, but he, the great lazy fellow, made his wife Cornelian fetch all the heaviest blocks, while he lay idly by ...
— Cornwall's Wonderland • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... form his camp; he had to divide it into three parts, which were posted on different heights, and his tents whitened the sides of the neighboring hills. When the encampment was formed the army remained gazing idly at the castles. The artillery was upward of four leagues in the rear, and without artillery all attack ...
— Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada • Washington Irving
... warmed it, so deftly had she flavored it, so daintily had she garnished it that it seemed food ambrosial. Felicia let her fork slide into delectable crust underneath which snuggled the tenderest chicken she'd ever tasted in her life. Bits of carrots and celery and potatoes drifted idly about a sea of creamy gravy—um—when you go to Montrose Place order "Old Fashioned ...
— Little Miss By-The-Day • Lucille Van Slyke
... new face Either in fields, of yellow summer eves, On islets yet unnamed amid the sea; Or pace for shelter 'neath a portico Out of the crowd in some enormous town Where now the larks sing in a solitude: Or muse upon blank heaps of stone and sand Idly conjectured to be ...
— A Handbook to the Works of Browning (6th ed.) • Mrs. Sutherland Orr
... she put the question altogether idly, but, for the moment, with a portion of genuine earnestness; for, such was Pearl's wonderful intelligence, that her mother half doubted whether she were not acquainted with the secret spell of her existence, and ...
— The Scarlet Letter • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... Verne tirely. The sail flapped idly against the mast, and John had it furled. The tide alone carried the raft to the shore, but steering had become impossible, and its passage was impeded by immense ...
— In Search of the Castaways • Jules Verne
... in his capacious tweed suit, a Stetson felt hat, and a pair of brogues with eloquent Broadway welts, liquidated the business that had detained him in the "Cheshire Cheese" and drifted idly in ...
— The Sins of Severac Bablon • Sax Rohmer
... greeting, if they would yearn of Arthur's gold; and thereafter full soon ride into Rome, and tell them tidings of the King of Britain, and Rome-walls repair, that were of yore fallen down;—"And so will I rule the fierce Rome-folk!" All this boast was idly done, for otherwise it fared, all otherwise it happened: the people he left, through wicked tiding, all through Modred his relative, wickedest of ...
— Brut • Layamon
... liberty. What could he know about the matter? He had not seen Saunders Duff's registers, and of a certainty Godfrey McCulloch had not spoken. Still, she finished by liking to hear him say the words, and often left the real Stair idly tossing stones into the water, in order to go into the cool kitchen of Tower Rathan, to sit on one of the ancient oaken chests, a row of which ran round the walls, and hear tales of the dare-devil Stair, and especially to listen for the respectful ...
— Patsy • S. R. Crockett
... troubled. She did not at all wish to sing. "The songs," she said, "were sung idly at home while we sat at needlework. They did not mean anything to me. I thought ...
— Gudrid the Fair - A Tale of the Discovery of America • Maurice Hewlett
... go to practical details. Take a girl who wants to be good and dutiful and useful, to be a comfort at home, to keep her brain in good working order, and to enjoy herself: what should she resolve upon if she is to be of use in the world and not drift idly along? She must think it out for herself, and no longer wait for orders. She must put the salt of self-denial and effort into every day, of her own accord, and not feel absolved because her mother has not given any special orders. You are responsible for your own life, and it is horribly ...
— Stray Thoughts for Girls • Lucy H. M. Soulsby |
