"Buttonhole" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... simply must promise to come before he went away; she insisted. And she asked suddenly: "When I saw you on the seventeenth, didn't you have a bow in your buttonhole?" ...
— Shallow Soil • Knut Hamsun
... that natural aristocracy in which Shakspeare or Homer or Dante was king? Was the world a brotherhood, and they the public enemy, the enemy of the great perfect race to come, who helped one brother take advantage of another? Were those ribbons in the buttonhole, the gifts of kings, of no more worth than ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 2 • Various
... watchers, who picketed the block where Parnell and his wife lived, and telegraphed to Christendom the time the lights were out, and whether Mr. Parnell appeared with a shamrock or a rose in his buttonhole. The facts that Mrs. Parnell wore her hair in curls, and smilingly hummed a tune as she walked to the corner, were construed into proof of brazen guilt and a desire to affront ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 13 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Lovers • Elbert Hubbard
... less handsome but equally picturesque. His white head and iron-grey beard placed him outside the active army. He wore in his buttonhole a tiny bow of ribbon, the usual badge of ...
— The Lure of the Mask • Harold MacGrath
... desuetude, produced by the "music" of old Kentucky Bourbon; but he could not withstand the power of the melody below. Quickly he donned his clothing; he put his vest on over his coat; put his collar on hind side foremost; buttoned the lower buttonhole of his coat on the top button, stood before the mirror and arranged his hair, and started down to see the ladies and listen to the music. But he stumped his toe at the top of the stairs, and slid down head-foremost, and turned ...
— Gov. Bob. Taylor's Tales • Robert L. Taylor
... not disappointed of his walk. He appeared dressed in his best, with a large bunch of primroses, bought in the market the day before in his hand, and two or three in his buttonhole. ...
— Bristol Bells - A Story of the Eighteenth Century • Emma Marshall
... took two crocuses in his fingers, and cleverly slipped them into a buttonhole, for which they were not very well suited. Then he went on talking about flowers for a minute or two, but the subject was soon exhausted, for his knowledge lay among garden flowers, and Riette knew ...
— Angelot - A Story of the First Empire • Eleanor Price
... man?" She wrinkled her nose. Then she flushed, conscious that he was a bit surprised at her tone of disdain. "Why, he will wear a frock-coat and a flower in the buttonhole and will bow in my customers. You didn't think my young man ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... turned her buttonhole in fine style, and at lightning speed, to show the coolness of her mind, then with a rattling of all her lockets, looked up and waited for ...
— Marcella • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... her with a hand that was perfectly steady, held it a moment, seemed to hesitate, finally withdrew it and planted it in his own buttonhole. ...
— The Knave of Diamonds • Ethel May Dell
... trousers by the waist and place together the first two suspender buttons, one on the left and the other on the right. This will make the fold preserve the natural crease and dispose of the extra material, button and buttonhole tab at the waist. Trousers carefully folded will only need pressing about twice a year. Hose should be well shaken, and unless perfectly clean, thrown in the soiled-linen basket. Evening silk hose can be worn several times. The undervest, or undershirt, ...
— The Complete Bachelor - Manners for Men • Walter Germain
... with the flowing white locks and the white rose in his buttonhole bore down upon Quin and enveloped his hand in ...
— Quin • Alice Hegan Rice
... my father. He dressed neatly and well. His trousers were never without their fresh crease. He was very vain of his neat appearance, even to the wearing of a fresh-cut flower in his buttonhole. This vanity made him also wear his derby indoors and out, because of his ...
— Tramping on Life - An Autobiographical Narrative • Harry Kemp
... "The first man you'll meet in the legislative lobby next winter, sugar on his speech and alum on his finger, so that he can get a good firm grip of your buttonhole, will be Arba Spinney, drawing his salary as the paid agent of half-a-dozen schemers. He may seem a little wilted just now, but he's a hardy ...
— The Ramrodders - A Novel • Holman Day
... be who has made himself all that he is? As long as his brain is sound, his capital is unimpaired. When I walked into Mowbray Langdon's office, I was like a thoroughbred exercising on a clear frosty morning; and my smile was as fresh as the flower in my buttonhole. I thrust out my hand at him. "I ...
— The Deluge • David Graham Phillips
... still, as Zinariola was a seaport, it was very cosmopolitan, and one saw all sorts of people on its streets. Many were just natural-looking people, like Pirlaps and Avrillia; but some were of chocolate, like Yassuh, and some were Chinese, with long pigtails of black buttonhole-twist; and some were Parisians, with hats exactly like the one that the Japanese doll wore so unbecomingly. (Yes, Sara knew in her heart that it was unbecoming, though she would not have admitted it, even to you.) On the gay Parisian lady-fairies, ...
— The Garden of the Plynck • Karle Wilson Baker
... people amused themselves on the lawn, and played at ball; they wandered among the flowers, and each of the young girls broke off a flower, and fastened it in a young gentleman's buttonhole. But the young Scotch lady looked round, for a long time, in an undecided way. None of the flowers seemed to suit her taste. Then her eye glanced across the paling—outside stood the great thistle bush, with the reddish-blue, sturdy flowers; she saw them, she smiled, ...
— Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen • Hans Christian Andersen
... the cramp from her limbs, and said: "Some time we will have to see where this road leads. There may be more surprises beyond." She broke a flower from its stem and fastened it in Kirk's buttonhole, while he gazed down at ...
— The Ne'er-Do-Well • Rex Beach
... and girls on the streets, some on 'em sellin' posies for charity, I bought two little bunches, one on 'em I put in Josiah's buttonhole, though he objected and said it would probable make talk for a man of his age and dignity ...
— Samantha at the St. Louis Exposition • Marietta Holley
... about the usual business of his toilet. In taking off his dress-coat he noticed the Legion of Honor which Miss Talcott had given him at the ball. He pulled it out of his buttonhole and tossed it into the fire-place. When he had finished dressing he saw with surprise that it was nearly ten o'clock. Ruby Glenn was already ...
— The Greater Inclination • Edith Wharton
... Lord Reggie alone in the room reading his letters. He was dressed in loose white flannel, and in the buttonhole of his thin jacket a big green carnation was stuck. It ...
— The Green Carnation • Robert Smythe Hichens
... of Mr. Leath's opinions was enhanced by the distinction of his appearance and the reserve of his manners. He was like the anarchist with a gardenia in his buttonhole who figures in the higher melodrama. Every word, every allusion, every note of his agreeably-modulated voice, gave Anna a glimpse of a society at once freer and finer, which observed the traditional forms but had discarded the underlying prejudices; whereas the world she knew had discarded ...
— The Reef • Edith Wharton
... fair hair. There was a light in the room, so as she comes back through the window I sees her as plain as I sees you now. I knows her in a minute. It was the young lady as every Sunday morning pesters my life out of me to cut her a rose for her buttonhole: Miss Taylor, I ...
— The New Girl at St. Chad's - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil
... Rousselin's for the cognac. They came from sea and land, and were chary of relating the things they had seen—not because they were more wonderful than the fantasies of the Ananiases of print, but because they were so different. And I was a perpetual wedding-guest, always striving to cast my buttonhole over the finger of one of these mariners of fortune. This Captain Malone was a Hiberno-Iberian creole who had gone to and fro in the earth and walked up and down in it. He looked like any other well-dressed man of thirty-five whom you might meet, except that ...
— Roads of Destiny • O. Henry
... a single-thread machine. This stitch is made by taking the thread toward the worker, and before the needle is drawn out of the cloth the thread is held by the thumb under the point of the needle, as in a buttonhole, making a loop. The needle is inserted in the last loop for the next stitch. The chain stitch is used in modern embroidery as an outline and for darning, but in old embroidery, the outline and chain stitches were used for filling as well. They are found in ...
— Textiles and Clothing • Kate Heintz Watson
... 25 there was a hearing before the General Assembly. The opponents had rushed into town every farmer and small politician they could secure and the women "antis" pinned a red rose in his buttonhole. The suffragists had given a yellow jonquil to every friend. Behind the Speaker's desk hung a huge yellow banner inscribed "Votes for Women," and so crowded was the room with determined men and eager women that the sergeant-at-arms had to clear a space for the Senate. ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume VI • Various
... fellow, what on earth should we men do going about with purity and innocence? A carefully thought-out buttonhole is much more effective. ...
— Lady Windermere's Fan • Oscar Wilde
... Angy sought a pin hidden beneath her basque. "Father, shall I pin yer 'old-man' in yer buttonhole?" she quavered. Then as he stooped for her to arrange the posy, she whispered: "I wouldn't care, 'cept fer what folks must say. Le' 's hurry before any one sees us. I told everybody that we wa'n't a-gwine ter ...
— Old Lady Number 31 • Louise Forsslund
... a year. His master had absolute control of his life and actions, and sometimes would enforce it with the whip-stock. But now the farm lad has the hardihood and the right to summon his employer before a magistrate, goes to "Lunnon" at holiday time, walks with a stick, wears a buttonhole in his coat, and, mirabile dictu! has been seen to ride home from his work on a "bone-shaker"! In place of the old bent figures in smock-frocks, there are spruce young fellows in black coats; in place of the old indoor farm service, its hearty living, but liberty to thrash a boy, there ...
— Fragments of Two Centuries - Glimpses of Country Life when George III. was King • Alfred Kingston
... character," "loss to the community," "soul of integrity" and other stock expressions. At the end he begged to inform his friends that flowers might be deposited at the Banner office or at his room in Mrs. Camp's boarding-house, as he was buried in both places. Buttonhole bouquets could be pinned upon him any day by simply stopping his customary funeral procession about town. Such attentions should always be accompanied by gentle words or exclamations of satisfaction, as for example: "How natural you look!" or "You owed me ten dollars, but I forgive you," or ...
— Anderson Crow, Detective • George Barr McCutcheon
... Brenner, is a gold watch and chain. The man who was killed, Mrs. Brenner, had a piece of gold chain to match this in his buttonhole. The rest of it had ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1920 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... bland, prosperous personage was growing in him. From the rim the top-hat had left upon his shining forehead to the tightly-screwed eyeglass that assisted his left eye; from the pink Malmaison carnation in the buttonhole of his frock-coat to the buff spats that matched his expansive waistcoat in shade, the large Major was the personification of luxurious, pampered, West End swelldom, the type of a class Saxham abhorred. He had seen the ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves
... at him somewhat disapprovingly, but said nothing; and presently the three rose, without vocal suggestion from any of them, and strolled thoughtfully back to the theatre, pausing a moment by the way, while Tinker bought a white carnation for his buttonhole. There was a good deal, he remarked absent-mindedly, in what Mr. Potter had said about lightening ...
— Harlequin and Columbine • Booth Tarkington
... buttonhole you on your way to school, and say, 'Jackson, a word in your ear. You stick on side.' Or did he lead up to it in any way? Did he say, 'Talking of side, you stick it on.' What had ...
— Mike • P. G. Wodehouse
... clothes, with a rose from the Dovecot hot-house for buttonhole (which he slipped into his pocket when he saw other boys approaching), delivered them at the doors of the aristocracy, where, by the way, he had been a few weeks ...
— Sentimental Tommy - The Story of His Boyhood • J. M. Barrie
... the dairy window, which, overgrown with creepers, made a dark frame for the brightly-coloured picture. There was Mr Buckle, a young farmer of the neighbourhood, in a light-grey suit with a blue satin tie and a rose in his buttonhole. There was Bella, her face covered with self-satisfied smiles, mounting to his side. There was Agnetta carrying the new parasol high in the air with all its lace fluttering. How gay and happy they all looked! Mrs ...
— White Lilac; or the Queen of the May • Amy Walton
... there. She had on a new habit, and a gardenia in her buttonhole, and she gave Nikky her hand to kiss, but only nodded ...
— Long Live the King • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... I had noticed members of the diminutive army to smile down on them. I saw the princely arms and colours on various houses and in the windows of shops. Emblems of a small State, they belonged to the history of the Empire. The Court-physician passed with a bit of ribbon in his buttonhole. A lady driving in an open carriage encouraged me to salute her. She was the wife of the Prince's Minister of Justice. Upon what ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... the Straits would be occupied—and, in one month from to-day, our warships will have Constantinople under their guns. If K. won't listen to me, then, having been officially mis-informed that the War Council wish to see me (the last thing they do wish), I will take them at their word. I will buttonhole every Minister from McKenna and Lloyd George to Asquith and Bonar Law,—and grovel at their feet if by doing so I can hold them on to this, the biggest scoop that is, or ever has ...
— Gallipoli Diary, Volume 2 • Ian Hamilton
... pyramid; but before he reached the top he had realised that there was a man leaning over the parapet of the Embankment and looking out across the river. As a figure he was quite conventional, clad in a silk hat and frock-coat of the more formal type of fashion; he had a red flower in his buttonhole. As Syme drew nearer to him step by step, he did not even move a hair; and Syme could come close enough to notice even in the dim, pale morning light that his face was long, pale and intellectual, and ended in a small triangular tuft of dark beard at the very point of the chin, all else ...
— The Man Who Was Thursday - A Nightmare • G. K. Chesterton
... this time I find only the blue and gold thing which, such as it is, I send you, you are to take from me. I could not even put in what I pleased but I have said all about it in the word or two of preface, as also that I beg leave to stick the bunch in your buttonhole. May I beg that Mrs. Tennyson will kindly ...
— The Brownings - Their Life and Art • Lilian Whiting
... unpinned with a masterful touch the delicate cluster of Noisette rosebuds she wore at her throat and transferred them to his buttonhole as he answered courteously: "Certainly. My time, as you know, ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to 1901 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... run a seam, overcast, roll and whip, hem, tuck, gather, bind, make a French seam, make buttonhole, sew on buttons, hooks and eyes, darn and patch. Submit ...
— Scouting For Girls, Official Handbook of the Girl Scouts • Girl Scouts
... well-shaped, almost philosophical head, and movements light and temperate as those of a meditative squirrel. Having just dined he was naturally in evening dress, with a butterfly tie, gleaming pumps, and a buttonhole of violets. He shut the door gently, glanced at his nice-looking grandmothers, and, walking forward very quietly and demurely, applied his eye to the telescope, lowering himself slightly by a Sandow ...
— The Prophet of Berkeley Square • Robert Hichens
... nothing except the expression of Noble's face and the somewhat ill-chosen pansy in his buttonhole hinted of the remarkable. Yet even here was a thing for which he was not responsible himself; it was altogether the work of Julia. What her work was, in the case of Noble Dill, may be expressed in a word—a word used not only by the whole Atwater family connection, in completely ...
— Gentle Julia • Booth Tarkington
... One would have thought that there was some charm about this rose so strangely cherished, for he stood gazing at it, as it twirled between Captain Frere's strong fingers, as though it fascinated him. "You're a pretty man to want a rose for your buttonhole! Are you going out with your sweetheart next Sunday, Mr. Dawes?" The gang laughed. "How did you get this?" Dawes was silent. "You'd better tell me." No answer. "Troke, let us see if we can't find Mr. Dawes's tongue. Pull off your shirt, my man. ...
— For the Term of His Natural Life • Marcus Clarke
... seventy dressed as a man, thin and emaciated, but still proud of her looks, and with claims to past beauty. His cheeks and lips were painted, his eyebrows blackened, and his teeth were false; he wore a huge wig, which, exhaled amber, and at his buttonhole was an enormous bunch of flowers, which touched his chin. He affected a gracious manner, and he spoke so softly that it was often impossible to hear what he said. He was excessively polite and affable, and his manners were those of the Regency. His whole appearance was supremely ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... knew: not only one another, but the majority of the gentlemen into the bargain, which made it all as pleasant and lively as could be. Signor Billsmethi, in black tights, with a large blue bow in his buttonhole, introduced the ladies to such of the gentlemen as were strangers: and the ladies talked away—and laughed they did—it was delightful ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... hair danced wildly over his shoulders, as if electrified: he had a quick eye, and wore enviably well-fitting ducks: his neck, besides supporting his head and all its contents, supported an inextricable labyrinth of gold chains; from every buttonhole of his waistcoat the chains they came in, and the chains they came out, like the peripatetic man on the Boulevards who sells them: his gloves, well-fitting, and buttoning at the wrist, were of the whitest kid, and grasped ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 361, November, 1845. • Various
... dresses, ensconced herself each day on the big couch hammock of the front porch to wave to Martin Landis as he passed on his way to the trolley that took him to his studies in the city. Sometimes she ran to the gate and tossed him a rose for his buttonhole. Later in the day she was at her post again, ready to ask pleasantly as he passed, "Well, how did school go to-day?" Such seemingly spontaneous interest spurred the young man to ...
— Amanda - A Daughter of the Mennonites • Anna Balmer Myers
... round sharply. The Gadfly, with a cigar in his mouth and a hot-house flower in his buttonhole, was holding out to him a slender, carefully-gloved hand. With the sunlight reflected in his immaculate boots and glancing back from the water on to his smiling face, he looked to Martini less lame and more conceited than usual. ...
— The Gadfly • E. L. Voynich
... He looked the personification of fasting; but he carried his nose very high, for he was a weather prophet. In his buttonhole he wore a little bunch of violets, but they were ...
— Good Stories For Great Holidays - Arranged for Story-Telling and Reading Aloud and for the - Children's Own Reading • Frances Jenkins Olcott
... home by a little dancing-party to-night.... I write this arrayed in my dress-coat with a rose in my buttonhole, a circumstance, I think, worth mentioning. It reminds me of Buffon, who used to array himself in his full dress for writing 'Natural History.' Why should we not always do it when we write letters? We should, no ...
— Authors and Friends • Annie Fields
... have a posy, too; I like you to wear one in your buttonhole as the ladies' grooms do in the Park," said the child, settling a scarlet poppy ...
— The Mysterious Key And What It Opened • Louisa May Alcott
... pasteboard countenances close to the sculptor's with an unchangeable grin, that gave still more ludicrous effect to the comic alarm and sorrow of their gestures. Just then, a figure came by, in a gray wig and rusty gown, with an inkhorn at his buttonhole and a pen behind his ear; he announced himself as a notary, and offered to make the last will and testament of the assassinated man. This solemn duty, however, was interrupted by a surgeon, who brandished ...
— The Marble Faun, Volume II. - The Romance of Monte Beni • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... be alone in the National Gallery in the dead of the night with a tiny electric lamp in one's buttonhole and a sponge of alcohol and turpentine in one's hand. While he worked the little Madonna's eyes rested upon him and it could hardly have been mere fancy that made him believe they were full of gratitude and trust. At the end of ...
— The Best British Short Stories of 1922 • Edward J. O'Brien and John Cournos, editors
... which he had entered and which opened into the main lobby he slowed his gait long enough to undo the overcoat and slip out of it. The top button caught fast in its buttonhole, the coat being new and its buttonholes being stiff. He gave a sharp tug at the rebellious cloth, and the button, which probably had been insecurely sewed on in the first place, came away from its ...
— From Place to Place • Irvin S. Cobb
... the kitchen, and seemed upon the whole a most loving, kissing, kind-hearted gentlemen. He has a pair of very good eyes in his head, which not being sufficient as it should seem for the many nice and difficult purposes of a senator, he has a third also, which he wore suspended by a riband from his buttonhole. The boys halloo'd, the dogs barked, Puss scampered, the hero, with his long train of obsequious followers, withdrew. We made ourselves very merry with the adventure, and in a short time settled into our former tranquillity, never probably to be ...
— Selected English Letters (XV - XIX Centuries) • Various
... the decadents for maintaining the certain requisite melancholy apparently necessary to sing a certain way. In the struggle of that period, he must have seemed like a very clear, though a very sad singer. There were no lilies or orchids in his buttonhole, and no strange jewels on his fingers, for you remember, it was the time of "Monsieur Phocas", and the art of Gustave Moreau. He was plain and sincere, and pathetic, old-fashioned too in that he was bohemian, or at least ...
— Adventures in the Arts - Informal Chapters on Painters, Vaudeville, and Poets • Marsden Hartley
... Thessalonian play was the topic of the hour, and the very mention of it almost made him ill. If he had been elected he would have been an usher at the play with the other new members and worn the club colors in his buttonhole to be admired by the girls and envied by the other fellows. But now there was none of that charmed fellowship for him. He nourished his feeling of bitterness and hatred until his scheming mind began to grope for some way of spoiling the success of the play. As usual, ...
— The Camp Fire Girls at School • Hildegard G. Frey
... of forceythia out of his buttonhole. "I can believe it. I found this in one, of the squares, and I think it belongs to you." He. offered it with a bow and a laugh, and she took it in ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... it is for the good sense of the public to distinguish true remedies from false, pure wine from adulterated; or, it is for the good sense of the public to distinguish in a buttonhole the decoration awarded to merit from that prostituted to mediocrity and intrigue. Why, then, do you call yourselves the State, Power, Authority, Police, if the work of Police must be performed by the good sense ...
— The Philosophy of Misery • Joseph-Pierre Proudhon
... to class he plucked up courage to purchase a small buttonhole for her, and blushed a very warm red when Joan took his offering with a smile and pinned it ...
— To Love • Margaret Peterson
... on her sweet, sad face. "She's thinking of her wretched, ill-doing son," quoth the gossips, one to another. But who comes in now, with an air as if the whole church belonged to him? An imposing, pompous man, stern and grim, in a new flaxen wig, and a white rose in his buttonhole. It is Mr. Justice Hare, and he leads in one, whom folks jump upon seats to get a ...
— East Lynne • Mrs. Henry Wood
... room, Margaret arose and faced him. The Englishman was well dressed, and newly shaven, and wore a rosebud in his buttonhole. Evidently, he had spent some time over his toilet in honor ...
— The Mansion of Mystery - Being a Certain Case of Importance, Taken from the Note-book of Adam Adams, Investigator and Detective • Chester K. Steele
... any place without being assailed by insignificant accidents, miserable details, that forced their way into my imagination and scattered my powers to all the four winds. A dog that dashed by me, a yellow rose in a man's buttonhole, had the power to set my thoughts vibrating and occupy me for a length ...
— Hunger • Knut Hamsun
... building which would have accommodated two or three hundred for every unit he had before him. That was the first occasion in my life on which I wore a dress suit; and amidst the unwashed, coally-flannelled handful, I daresay that my expanse of shirt front, and the flower in my buttonhole, made me conspicuous. I was a red-hot Liberal in those days, for no better reason, probably, than that my father held that form of creed, and I was quite persuaded that Kenealy was a paid impostor. So when, in that raucous voice of his, ...
— Recollections • David Christie Murray
... looked puzzled, and might have spoken but for a violent interruption. A man had entered the car with an orange ribbon in his buttonhole. ...
— The Art of Disappearing • John Talbot Smith
... his arm, and they trotted off. In Madison Square they saw a gallant and courtly old man with military shoulders and pink cheeks, a debonair gray mustache, and a smile of unquenchable youth, greeting April with a narcissus in his buttonhole. He was feeding the sparrows with crumbs and smiled to see one of them fly off, carrying a long wisp of hay, bustling away to build for himself and his sparrow bride a bungalow in the foot-hills of the ...
— The Trail of the Hawk - A Comedy of the Seriousness of Life • Sinclair Lewis
... died down and the round of mechanical drudgery took its place. An hour later someone knocked at an inner door which led to steep side stairs connecting with a side street entrance. Wondering who it was Mary opened it, to find Steve, very flushed and handsome, a flower in his buttonhole yet no hint ...
— The Gorgeous Girl • Nalbro Bartley
... saw him come into the dining-room with his hair carefully combed, his mustache curled, wearing his best suit with a rose in the buttonhole. The Bohemian laughed boisterously. The last straw! He was crazy; they would ...
— Woman Triumphant - (La Maja Desnuda) • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... cutter slot, as before, it is turned at right angles to the cutter, and then slid down the slot until the cap-screw unbuttons from the cutter. The object in sliding the cap up the slot before turning it, is to prevent the danger of injuring the edge. Some caps are now made with the buttonhole at the ...
— Handwork in Wood • William Noyes
... who had made it, but deceivingly unconventional to the eye of the uninitiated. This he put on, taking particular pains to select a very plain cravat, and to fasten in it with care the scarf-pin bestowed upon him by old Benson, the little watchmaker on the corner below. Through the buttonhole in the lapel of his coat he drew a spicy-smelling sprig of ground-pine, chanting whimsically as he did so ...
— The Brown Study • Grace S. Richmond
... up the little sprays set ready for them, and putting one in his own buttonhole, fastened the other in her bodice with a ...
— The Treasure of Heaven - A Romance of Riches • Marie Corelli
... "Of course—to my buttonhole, here. There Mr. Monkey, you can't complain of that for a nest—see here! Don't scratch so, you little varmint! You'll tear ...
— All Aboard - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry
... only upon producing an imitation of the Bagdad curtains in linsey woolsey, it would be easy to weave narrow lengths of various colours, and by choosing those which were good contrasts or harmonies, and embroidering them together with buttonhole-stitch, or cat-stitch, or any ornamental stitch, to get something very like them in effect and far better in quality. But it should be the aim of domestic manufacture to do something which is distinctive, ...
— How to make rugs • Candace Wheeler
... appropriate hue, and told them to go the limit. And they have been going it faithfully ever since. What the Marines are to the Senior Service, "I." is to us. Should a Subaltern come in with the yarn that the spook of HINDENBURG accosted him at Bloody Corner and offered him a cigar, or a balloon cherub buttonhole you with the story of a Bosch tank fitted with rubber tyres, C-springs and hot and cold water, that he has seen climbing trees behind St. Quentin, we retort, "Oh, go and tell it to 'I.'" and then sit back and see what the inspired official organ of the green tabs will ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Oct. 17, 1917 • Various
... shoes, her gloves, the little tie about her throat, were all the last word in the simple elegance of suitability. Fischer walked by her side—a powerful, determined figure in a carefully-pressed blue serge suit and a brown Homburg hat. He wore a rose in his buttonhole, and he carried a cane—both unusual circumstances. After fifty years of strenuous living, Mr. Fischer seemed suddenly to have found a new ...
— The Pawns Count • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... honesty and loyalty, is he not the chosen dragoman of kings and princes when they journey into far distant lands (he speaks seven languages and many tribal dialects), and is he not today wearing in his buttonhole the ribbon of the order of the Mejidieh, bestowed upon him by his Imperial Highness the Sultan, in reward for ...
— The Veiled Lady - and Other Men and Women • F. Hopkinson Smith
... the shoulders a pair of straps cried out for useless epaulettes; these military appendages were there like a petition without a recommendation. This old gentleman's coat was of dark blue cloth, and the buttonhole had blossomed into many colored ribbons. He, no doubt, always carried his hat in his hand—a three cornered cocked hat, with a gold cord—for the snowy wings of his powdered hair showed not a trace of its pressure. He might have been taken for not more than fifty years ...
— The Purse • Honore de Balzac
... Turning the corner of the street leading to his Bloomsbury attic, the author was tapped on the shoulder by a resplendent Bond Street being. That is, the said being wore a perfectly-fitting frock-coat, a silk hat, trousers with the regulation fold back and front, an orchid buttonhole, grey gloves, boots that glittered, and carried a gold-topped cane. The fact that Paul wheeled without wincing showed that he was not yet in debt. Your Grub Street old-time author would have leaped his own length at ...
— The Opal Serpent • Fergus Hume
... child can easily manipulate the cord with his tiny fingers. Aim to have the loops of uniform size. Finish with a loop five inches long, leaving an end of the same length. Now, placing together the two ends of the chain, we have a loop and two single ends of cord. Take these single cords together and buttonhole them over the loop for about three inches, then twist. Tie the single ends with a square knot, and fringe ...
— Construction Work for Rural and Elementary Schools • Virginia McGaw
... a moment, with her head on one side, and a finger hooked confidentially through the Captain's buttonhole. "Well," she said, "I've had a very interesting time, Daddy Captain. First I cleaned the lamps, of course, and filled and trimmed them. And then I played Samson a good ...
— Captain January • Laura E. Richards
... with thankfulness the kind offer of his host, and when he approached the daughter to take leave of her, she graciously stuck a sprig of water-cress in his buttonhole. ...
— John Gayther's Garden and the Stories Told Therein • Frank R. Stockton
... not want long books and least of all story books in the woods—these are for the library—but rather scraps and extracts and condensations from which thoughts can be plucked like flowers and carried for a while in the buttonhole. So it is that I am fond of all kinds of anthologies. I have one entitled "Traveller's Joy," another, "Songs of Nature," and I have lately found the best one I know called "The Spirit of Man" by Robert ...
— Great Possessions • David Grayson
... receives a buttonhole, but no one sings him a song. In the opera he is not on the stage during the bridesmaids' chorus. I have not been able to find out whether the quaint pretty verses are by Friedrich Kind, who founded the libretto of the opera on a story ...
— Home Life in Germany • Mrs. Alfred Sidgwick
... fails to bestow on an attractive woman in a fine equipage. The Countess di Moccoli had left her own phaeton for a seat beside Mrs. Denvil—an attention the most gratifying in public—to discuss the Nile voyage. Also the Count Martellini, in faultless attire, a jasmine blossom in his buttonhole, and yellow gloves, having assisted at this exchange, had consented to take a seat opposite the two ladies. He seldom drove with Mrs. Denvil. The count punctiliously observed appearances. He did not ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 7 • Various
... the landlord, who seemed to have been proud of the official visit to his guest. He was profuse in his attentions, and even introduced him to a singularly artistic-looking man of middle age, wearing an order in his buttonhole, whom he met casually ...
— Selected Stories • Bret Harte
... me to make discord; so quiet, indeed, was all the earth that I became startled by the sudden chatter of a squirrel disturbed at my approach, and unthinkingly I stooped to pluck a delicate pink flower blooming in the grass, and placed it in a ragged buttonhole of ...
— My Lady of the North • Randall Parrish
... forget to elevate their employees, using the word with a double e, as being more vigorous and Anglo-Saxon (he had the strong Imperialistic tendencies of his cloth). It was his salutary custom to buttonhole a director afterwards, and ask him whether he thought the coming year would be good or bad; and, according to the trend of the answer, to buy or sell three ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... related to the mayor of New York without knowing it, and he resolved to expatiate on that subject when he went back to Barton. He decided that his new acquaintance must be rich, for he was dressed in showy style and had a violet in his buttonhole. ...
— The Erie Train Boy • Horatio Alger
... stopped in his tracks and fastened on me the hard, appraising scrutiny that a policeman might turn on a hitherto respectable acquaintance discovered in converse with some notorious crook. For an instant he seemed disposed to buttonhole me and remonstrate. Then he shrugged his stocky shoulders, the gesture indicating that one can't save a fool from his folly, and established himself at a near-by table, from which coign of vantage he ...
— The Firefly Of France • Marion Polk Angellotti
... were red roses and smelt of summer—the kind of roses you always want so desperately at about Christmas-time when you can only get mistletoe, which is pale right through to its very scent, and holly which pricks your nose if you try to smell it. So now everyone had a rose in its buttonhole, and soon everyone was sitting on the grass in Regent's Park under trees whose leaves would have been clean, clear green in the country, but here were dusty and yellowish, and brown at ...
— The Story of the Amulet • E. Nesbit
... all shifted to one side," said his niece, sternly, "and the stud's out of your buttonhole. I wish you'd be a little tidier when you come here, uncle; it looks bad for ...
— A Master Of Craft • W. W. Jacobs
... barrels of their rifles, simple kitchen utensils which constituted almost the whole of their cooking equipment. Their blankets and rubber sheets for sleeping were carried in light rolls on their backs. A toothbrush was stuck in a buttonhole. On their flanks or in front rode the cavalry, led by the redoubtable Turner Ashby, and there was in all their number scarcely a single horseman who did not ride like the Comanche Indian, as if he were born in the ...
— The Scouts of Stonewall • Joseph A. Altsheler
... their buttonhole flowers naturally. Martin smiled at my choice for him, which was a small, but chubby, red and yellow, uncompromising Dutch tulip, far too stout to be able to follow its family habit of night closing, except to contract itself slightly. Evan caressed his lilies-of-the-valley ...
— People of the Whirlpool • Mabel Osgood Wright
... one was looking in the same direction. On the threshold stood a tall, gaunt man, gazing in upon the scene before him with an expression of distinct aversion, mingled with indifference. He was dressed just like the other men, in a long frock coat, and he had a white gardenia in his buttonhole. But there was something about him distinct and noticeable—something in the quiet easy manner with which he at last moved forward to greet his hostess, which seemed to thrill her through and through with a sense of sweet familiarity. And then she caught ...
— The New Tenant • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... was she, this little Lisette, who had the impudence to flout him? A girl in a florist's, if you can believe me, with no particular beauty herself, and not a son by way of dot! And yet—one must confess it—she turned a head as swiftly as she made a "buttonhole"; and Pomponnet, the pastrycook, was paying court to her, too—to say nothing of the homage of messieurs Tricotrin, the poet, and Goujaud, the painter, and Lajeunie, the novelist. You would never have guessed ...
— A Chair on The Boulevard • Leonard Merrick
... called out to Karl, "and see what I've found now!" She showed him a clump of pure white heather; "it is tremendously lucky," she said, "and you shall have a bit too." So saying she stuck a piece of white heather in his buttonhole—real white heather, not the faded flowers which children sometimes mistake for it. ...
— Fairy Tales from the German Forests • Margaret Arndt
... across the shiny bald pate. A low collar of enormous circumference encircled his short neck and his tie was drawn through a Zodiac ring. His clothes were ill-fitting—shapeless trousers and a voluminous morning coat, in the buttonhole of which was a pink carnation with a silver papered stem, an immense watch-chain spread across a coarsely knitted waistcoat of Berlin wool. And he seemed out of breath. The pistol in his extended hand vibrated in sympathy with ...
— Men of Affairs • Roland Pertwee
... was slowly making its way into the car, while Yerkes at the further end, resplendent in a buttonhole and a white cap and apron, was watching the scene, and the special engine, like an impatient horse, was puffing and hissing to be off, a man, who had entered the cloak-room of the station to deposit a bundle just as ...
— Lady Merton, Colonist • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... bunk for money. Each time he performed the journey with greater swagger, but he never brought more than a few dollars at a time. He grew maudlin, familiar, could hardly see the cards or sit upright. As a preliminary to another journey to his bunk, he hooked Wolf Larsen's buttonhole with a greasy forefinger and vacuously proclaimed and reiterated, "I got money, I got money, I tell yer, an' ...
— The Sea-Wolf • Jack London
... was about to reply when a short, fat gentleman waddled around the corner of the barn and paused, wheezing, at the door of the stall. A new owners' badge dangled prominently from his buttonhole, and this he fingered from time to time with manifest pride. He peered in at Last Chance and beamed upon the Bald-faced Kid with the utmost friendliness, his thick eyeglasses giving him the appearance of a ...
— Old Man Curry - Race Track Stories • Charles E. (Charles Emmett) Van Loan
... the adoring pride of his downward gaze at her, stirred all the women's hearts and roused a sympathetic thrill in the men's breasts. Colin made a good show in the regulation bridegroom's frock coat, and with a sprig of orange blossom in his buttonhole. There was no doubt that he was extremely happy. He gave a short manly speech in response to Sir Luke's rather academic oration proposing the health of the wedded pair. The Premier too made a speech, and so did the Attorney-General, who was best man. Bridget's ...
— Lady Bridget in the Never-Never Land • Rosa Praed
... said Mr. Tooting, with fine indignation. "I was a poor boy, and had to earn my living, but I've made up my mind I've worn the collar long enough—if I have to break rocks. And I want to repeat what I said a little while ago," he added, weaving his thumb into Mr. Crewe's buttonhole; "I know a thing or two, and I've got some brains, as they know, and I can make you governor of this State if you'll only say ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... to be conceded. Much that he has learned from Shelley he passes on to his readers, but before they receive it, it has become, not Shelley's, but Francis Thompson's. To stick a lotos-flower in our buttonhole—harris-cloth or broadcloth, it does not matter—is an impertinent folly that makes a guy of the wearer. But this man's raiment is his own, not that of other men, and Shelley himself would willingly have ...
— Among Famous Books • John Kelman
... stuck in the buttonhole of the schoolmaster's coat, a pale tea-rose. If Dr. Knowles had been a man of fine instincts, (which his opaque shining eyes would seem to deny,) he might have thought it was not unapt or ill-placed even in the shabby, scuffed coat. A scholar, a gentleman, though in patched shoes and ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, No. 48, October, 1861 • Various
... can say that a Servian knife is in itself a complete tool-chest. With its one tough and keen blade one may skin a sheep, file a saw, split wood, mend a wagon, defend one's self vigorously if need be, make a buttonhole and eat one's breakfast. No Servian who adheres to the ancient costume would consider himself dressed unless the crooked knife hung from his girdle. Although the country-side along the Danube is rough, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, August, 1878 • Various
... elegantly dressed, and their animals decorated to the horns with flowers and coloured ribbons harmoniously blended. And last of all came the exhibitor who was to receive the first prize—a slouching man, plainly dressed, with a pair of farmer's gaiters on, and without even a flower in his buttonhole. "Who is he?" asked the spectators. "Why, he is the Englishman," was the reply. "The Englishman!—that the representative of a great country!" was the general exclamation. But it was the Englishman all over. He was sent ...
— Character • Samuel Smiles
... these waited on their customers in silence, she was full of lively talk, and as unblushing in her eagerness to sell as a 'bouquetiere' by profession. She had grown dangerously pretty. Fred was dazzled when she wanted to fasten a rose into his buttonhole, and then, as he paid for it, gave him another, saying: "And here is another thrown in ...
— Jacqueline, v2 • Th. Bentzon (Mme. Blanc)
... buttonhole of his light linen coat she placed a flower of satin face of purest gold, the five petals rounded, but sharply tipped, a heavy mass of silk stamens, pollen dusted in the heart. She pushed back the left side of his coat and ...
— Her Father's Daughter • Gene Stratton-Porter
... pretty Aunt Maria, Molly would never have known her but for the portrait—kissed her uncle, and then she took a Christmas rose out of her dress and put it in Mr. Sheldon's buttonhole, and put up her face to him and said, 'Good-night, James.' He kissed her; Molly heard the loud, jolly sound of the kiss, and Aunt Maria ...
— Oswald Bastable and Others • Edith Nesbit
... buttonhole. For one is something and the other nothing, and what in the very nature of things could be more antagonistic ...
— Martin Pippin in the Apple Orchard • Eleanor Farjeon
... the steps of the Palazzo Venier and the deep-scented darkness of the garden. As we passed through to supper, I plucked a spray of yellow Banksia rose, and put it in my buttonhole. The dew was on its burnished leaves, and evening had drawn forth ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece • John Addington Symonds
... Lord Henry, settling his buttonhole in his coat; "and when they grow older they know it. But I don't want money. It is only people who pay their bills who want that, Uncle George, and I never pay mine. Credit is the capital of a younger son, and one ...
— The Picture of Dorian Gray • Oscar Wilde
... First of all, there was a perfect jam in the town hall. I sat up in front, with a lot of fellows, and had a splendid view. The old Italian came out dressed in his best suit of clothes black broadcloth, flower in his buttonhole, and so on. He made a fine bow, and he said he was 'pleased too see ze fine audience, and he was going to show zem ze fine animals, ze finest animals in ze world.' Then he shook a little whip that he carried in his hand, and he said 'zat zat whip didn't mean ...
— Beautiful Joe • Marshall Saunders |
