"Anecdote" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... quotes, in proof of their virtue, one trait which does honour to his own, and especially to his simplicity: he declares that an immoral man of his acquaintance offered several gold ounces to a pretty gitana, and offered them in vain. An Andalusian, to whom I retailed this anecdote, asserted that the immoral man in question would have been far more successful if he had shown the girl two or three piastres, and that to offer gold ounces to a gipsy was as poor a method of persuasion as to promise a couple of millions to a tavern ...
— Carmen • Prosper Merimee
... A curious anecdote is related in connection with these military reforms. When Babek, the new paymaster, was about to hold his first review, he issued an order that all persons belonging to the army then present in the capital should appear before him on a certain day. The troops ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 7. (of 7): The Sassanian or New Persian Empire • George Rawlinson
... This anecdote may tend better than any thing else to show us how Nature and grace were united in the Irish soul, to warm it, purify it, exalt it above ordinary feelings and earthly passions, and keep it constantly in a state ...
— Irish Race in the Past and the Present • Aug. J. Thebaud
... curiosity, the more because Job showed no inclination to gratify it. I managed, however, at last to get at the incident which made Job the possessor of this comical little figure, and as the circumstance worthily illustrates his character, I will relate it as the anecdote was told to me. ...
— The Adventures of a Dog, and a Good Dog Too • Alfred Elwes
... parallels! Whenever I try to improve your soul, you always drag in some anecdote from your very shady past. Pigs aren't the British public; and self-respect is self-respect the world over. Go out for a walk and try to catch some self-respect. And, I say, if the Nilghai comes up this evening can I ...
— The Light That Failed • Rudyard Kipling
... the loss of his pet clerk, and savagely angry at the desolation in his charge, he had once damned the collective eyes of his "intelligent local board" for a set of haramzadas. Which act of "brutal and tyrannous oppression" won him a Reprimand Royal from the Bengal Government; but in the anecdote as amended for Northern consumption we find no record of this. Hence we are forced to conclude that Mrs. Hauksbee "edited" his reminiscences before sowing them in idle ears, ready, as she well knew, to exaggerate good or evil. And Otis Yeere bore himself as ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... 1 The following anecdote is particularly illustrative of canine sagacity. It shews that the dog is sensible of unmerited injury, and will revenge it accordingly; it exhibits the dog also, as a reflective animal, and proves that, though he has not the gift of speech, he is yet endowed with the power ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... the 13th Light Dragoons, and subsequently in the 11th. He saw no service, and was an excellent soldier at mess and off duty. I am not qualified to speak with authority about his fulfilment of the trumpery trivialities which fill up garrison life, but here is one anecdote about him. ...
— The Reminiscences of an Irish Land Agent • S.M. Hussey
... enjoyable period, Lawrence and Lewis made themselves better acquainted with Baptist Le Croix, the chamois-hunter, whose quiet, gentle, and unobtrusive manner was very attractive to them. Many an anecdote did he relate of adventures among the Alpine peaks and passes while pursuing the chamois, or guiding travellers on their way, and it is probable that he might have roamed in spirit among his beloved ...
— Rivers of Ice • R.M. Ballantyne
... Scott says: "There are several instances, at least in tradition, of persons so much attached to particular tunes, as to require to hear them on their death-bed. Such an anecdote is mentioned by the late Mr. Riddel of Glenriddel, in his collection of Border tunes, respecting an air called the 'Dandling of the Bairns,' for which a certain Gallovidian laird is said to have evinced this strong mark of partiality. It is ...
— The Lady of the Lake • Sir Walter Scott
... recital in a Club; came off quite honourably there. Regarding Major Worrell, the tale of him showed him to have a pass among men. He managed cleverly to get his pleasures out of a small income and a 'fund of anecdote.' His reputation indicated an anecdotist of the table, prevailing in the primitive societies, where the art of conversing does not come by nature, and is exercised in monosyllabic undertones or grunts until ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... the zenith of his fame, was often among her guests. Madame Necker did not always abstain from slightly veiled allusions to the past, but it is pleasant to see that a warm and solid friendship seems to have grown up between Gibbon and both his host and hostess. A pretty anecdote is related of how, on one occasion, after he had left the house, they agreed in expressing the deep regret with which they looked forward to his approaching departure for England; when their little daughter, who was then just ...
— Historical and Political Essays • William Edward Hartpole Lecky
... side of the picture, sir, after all,' resumed Mr. Bung, laying aside the knowing look and flash air, with which he had repeated the previous anecdote—'and I'm sorry to say, it's the side one sees very, very seldom, in comparison with the dark one. The civility which money will purchase, is rarely extended to those who have none; and there's a consolation even ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... to you my feelings on hearing Mr. Everett's eulogy on Lafayette? No; I did not. That was exquisite. The old, hackneyed story; not a new anecdote, not a single reflection of any value; but the manner, the manner^ the delicate inflections of voice, the elegant and appropriate gesture, the sense of beauty produced by the whole, which thrilled us all to tears, flowing from a deeper and purer source than that which answers to ...
— Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli, Vol. I • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... in a restricted space a writer has no scope for anecdote and gossip, if they are not actually out of place in a technical undertaking. Yet we have endeavoured to lay before our readers, in as legible a form as possible, a view of the subject and counsel as to the various ...
— The Book-Collector • William Carew Hazlitt
... diverted with this anecdote, which the teacher related in English so good that we certainly could not have supposed him a native but for the colour of his face and the foreign accent in his tone. Next day we walked out with this interesting man, and were much ...
— The Coral Island - A Tale Of The Pacific Ocean • R. M. Ballantyne
... as a writer in the February Gossip says, that "it is what Mr. Mill has omitted to tell us in his Autobiography, quite as much as what he has there told us, that excites popular curiosity," the following anecdote told by John Neal, one of Jeremy Bentham's secretaries, may be found interesting. The father of John Stuart Mill, it seems, was in the habit of borrowing books of Bentham, and was even allowed the privilege ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, April 1875, Vol. XV., No. 88 • Various
... conductors," began the drummer. And we listened to his anecdote. It was successful with his audience; but when he launched fluently upon a second I strolled out. There was not enough wit in this narrator to relieve his indecency, and I felt shame at having been ...
— The Virginian - A Horseman Of The Plains • Owen Wister
... thought that his conduct was as scrupulous as his principles, or his will as sovereign as his intelligence. That he was a loose-liver while in London is well attested. Contemporary anecdotes generally hit off a man's peculiarities, and the only anecdote of Shakespeare that is known to have been told about him in his lifetime illustrates this master trait of his character. Burbage, we are told, when playing Richard III., arranged with a lady in the audience to visit her after the performance. Shakespeare ...
— The Man Shakespeare • Frank Harris
... An anecdote I derived from Colonel Lear shortly before his death in 1816, may here be related, showing the height to which his passion would rise yet be controlled. It belongs to his domestic life which I am dealing with, having occurred under his own roof, ...
— Washington in Domestic Life • Richard Rush
... been very kind and attentive to them in every way, and never said a discouraging word to them. She then discourses a little on phrenology, at that time quite a new thing in this country, and relates an anecdote of ...
— The Grimke Sisters - Sarah and Angelina Grimke: The First American Women Advocates of - Abolition and Woman's Rights • Catherine H. Birney
... of personal anecdote, or personal reminiscence, is constant and illustrative in his preaching, just as it is when he lectures, and the reminiscences sweep through many years, and at times are really startling in the vivid and ...
— Acres of Diamonds • Russell H. Conwell
... which looks as if made by a hand accustomed to almost any labor except that of the pen,—these are all we have to build upon. One record, in dribbling Latin, relates to the christening of "Gulielmus filius Johannes Shakspere"; a second, unreliable as a village gossip, tells an anecdote of the same person's boyhood; a third refers to Shakespeare as "one of his Majesty's poor players"; a fourth records the burial of the poet's son Hamnet; a fifth speaks of "Willi. Shakspere, gentleman"; a sixth is a bit of wretched doggerel ...
— Outlines of English and American Literature • William J. Long
... copy of this work was lent to many of my friends at different times for the purpose of gaining their opinions and criticisms on many parts of it, and I found the following anecdote written with a pencil opposite to this page, but am not certain by whom. "I remember seeing the pretty young actress, who succeeded Mrs. Arne in the performance of the celebrated Padlock, rehearse the musical parts at her harpsichord under ...
— Zoonomia, Vol. I - Or, the Laws of Organic Life • Erasmus Darwin
... yet, to certain dicta of the experienced Aunt who had superintended her youth, to the intent that a lazy man is a nuisance to himself and to everybody else; and, at last, she disguised this saying as an anecdote and repeated it pleasantly to ...
— Here are Ladies • James Stephens
... the navy, the state administration, and his court, and yet finds time to supervise his children's lessons and amusements. He attends even to the pulling out of the milk teeth of his little ones and permits no one else to do it, as the following little anecdote, concerning Prince Oscar, his ...
— The Secret Memoirs of the Courts of Europe: William II, Germany; Francis Joseph, Austria-Hungary, Volume I. (of 2) • Mme. La Marquise de Fontenoy
... eye of the pig, through all gradations, to the brilliant sparkling eye of the genius. The look of wisdom, even of the best kind, is different from that of genius, since it bears the stamp of serving the will; while that of the latter is free from it. Therefore the anecdote which Squarzafichi relates in his life of Petrarch, and has taken from Joseph Brivius, a contemporary, is quite credible—namely, that when Petrarch was at the court of Visconti, and among many men and titled people, Galeazzo Visconti asked his son, ...
— Essays of Schopenhauer • Arthur Schopenhauer
... to-day than the difficulty of discovering what the novel in his hand is about. What was the novelist's intention, in a phrase? If it cannot be put into a phrase it is no subject for a novel; and the size or the complexity of a subject is in no way limited by that assertion. It may be the simplest anecdote or the most elaborate concatenation of events, it may be a solitary figure or the widest network of relationships; it is anyhow expressible in ten words that reveal its unity. The form of the book ...
— The Craft of Fiction • Percy Lubbock
... drinking one glass and pouring another on her grave until it was emptied, prefacing every libation by declaring how well she had loved it during her life. He appeared to be in a state not far from insanity, as this anecdote certainly testifies; but the melancholy event had not had any ...
— An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales, Vol. 1 • David Collins
... of a man of the world, who is incomparably better informed than the mass of his congeners. Mr Browning is the readiest, the blithest, and the most forcible of talkers. Like the Monsignore in Lothair he can 'sparkle with anecdote and blaze with repartee,' and when he deals in criticism the edge of his sword is mercilessly whetted against pretension and vanity. The inflection of his voice, the flash of his eye, the pose of his head, the action of his hand, all lend their special emphasis to the condemnation." The mental ...
— Robert Browning • Edward Dowden
... tells what he knew." So, indeed, there was a letter by Watson. Oddly enough it left out all that was of direct importance; but it left in this statement, that he, an authentic person, wrote the dear old "American Anecdote" story. That was something. So then I gratefully confessed ignorance again, and again, and again. And I have many friends, so that there were many brave men, and many fair women, who were extending the various tentacula of their feeling ...
— How To Do It • Edward Everett Hale
... even here, relinquish the theory of subconscious perceptions? Do we know and can the author of the anecdote, whose good faith is not in question, tell us that certain unperceived circumstances, such as the grating of the wheel or the swaying of the carriage, did not give him the first alarm? After all, we know how easily stories of this kind involuntarily ...
— The Unknown Guest • Maurice Maeterlinck
... we always had a big fire at night in the open near the tents, and around this we sat upon logs or camp-stools, and listened to the President's talk. What a stream of it he poured forth! and what a varied and picturesque stream!—anecdote, history, science, politics, adventure, literature; bits of his experience as a ranchman, hunter, Rough Rider, legislator, Civil Service commissioner, police commissioner, governor, president,—the frankest confessions, ...
— Camping with President Roosevelt • John Burroughs
... was also punished with death by the law of Massachusetts; and Hutchinson, vol. i., p. 441, says that several persons actually suffered for this crime. He quotes a curious anecdote on this subject, which occurred in the year 1663. A married woman had had criminal intercourse with a young man; her husband died, and she married the lover. Several years had elapsed, when the public began to suspect the previous intercourse of this couple; ...
— American Institutions and Their Influence • Alexis de Tocqueville et al
... only capable of addressing each other in one-line sentences. He has the traditional love of the fine speech such as we find it in the ancient poets and historians and dramatists and satirists. He loves a monologue that passes from mockery to regret, that gathers up by the way anecdote and history and essay and foolery, that is half a narrative of things seen and half an irresponsible imagination. He can describe a runaway horse with the farcical realism of the authors of Some Experiences of an Irish R.M., ...
— Old and New Masters • Robert Lynd
... of dwarfs called Heinzelmaennchen, who used to live and perform their exploits in Cologne. These were obviously of the same class as the brownies of Scotland, Teutonic house-spirits who attached themselves to the owners of certain dwellings, and Keightley culled the following anecdote regarding them from a ...
— Hero Tales and Legends of the Rhine • Lewis Spence
... that there is a good deal of childishness in human nature, and especially in the enjoyment of story.[84] Only by very slow degrees were writers of fiction to learn the great difference that small matters of this kind make, and how the mere "anecdote," the dry argument or abstract of incident, can be amplified, varied, transformed from a remainder biscuit to an abundant and almost inexhaustible feast, by touches of individual character, setting of interiors, details of conversation, description, nomenclature, and what not. ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 - From the Beginning to 1800 • George Saintsbury
... This well-authenticated anecdote has been told by writers who expressed the most adulatory sentiments towards the present Czar. It is to be found in Castille's highly flattering biography of Alexander II., published about the time of his ...
— The Contemporary Review, Volume 36, September 1879 • Various
... was far from unpleasant, despite the labor involved and the discomfort of the leaking canoe. The men were full of cheer and hope, some of it possibly assumed to strengthen my courage, but no less effective—Barbeau telling many an anecdote of his long service in strange places, exhibiting a sense of humor which kept us in continuous laughter. He was, indeed, a typical adventurer, gay and debonair in presence of peril, and apparently without a care in the world. De Artigny caught something of ...
— Beyond the Frontier • Randall Parrish
... to say that all the Armenians are not Mahomedans. Many are Christians, but, alas! they know very little about Christ except his name. I will tell you a short anecdote to show ...
— Far Off • Favell Lee Mortimer
... the truth. Whereupon, it occurred to him as a vain thing to undertake to describe what had occurred on the vast theater of the world, when he could not ascertain the truth about an event occurring within a bow-shot. The anecdote simply illustrates, however, the difficulty of getting at the exact truth respecting details,—a difficulty constantly exemplified in courts of justice. The fact of the conflict in the court of the Tower, the general cause, ...
— Outline of Universal History • George Park Fisher
... an influence over the imaginations of his followers, that he has expressly forbidden them in his Koran; and the reason is given in the following anecdote:—An Arabian merchant having long resided in Persia, returned to his own country while the prophet was publishing his Koran. The merchant, among his other riches, had a treasure of romances concerning the Persian ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli
... to this. The order of precedence was appointed by lot, and one of the gentlemen made the beginning with a merry student's anecdote, which he declared he had experienced himself. Then it was the turn of some young girls, who preferred to pay forfeits, and then he himself ...
— Dame Care • Hermann Sudermann
... Brady and his companions once more, who again fired; but the bullet, instead of entering the skull, glanced round it. He fell senseless to the ground, and was thrown into a dry creek; he, however, recovered, and long survived these adventures.[171] The high authority on which this anecdote rests, is quite necessary to suppress the question of ...
— The History of Tasmania , Volume II (of 2) • John West
... purchased his own Stradivarius, which was worth at least five hundred guineas, at a Jew broker's in Tottenham Court Road for fifty-five shillings. This led him to Paganini, and we sat for an hour over a bottle of claret while he told me anecdote after anecdote of that extraordinary man. The afternoon was far advanced and the hot glare had softened into a mellow glow before we found ourselves at the police-station. Lestrade was waiting for us at ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 25, January 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... another Nation in the World" (p. 12). In 1704 Defoe had written The Dyet of Poland, a poem in which he had made a similar unflattering comparison between England and Poland. A far more substantial case for Defoe's authorship can be made from the existence of the anecdote of John White, Edinburgh's hangman, in both a letter to Harley (18 November 1710) and the Review (for 30 November 1710), as well as in Atalantis ...
— Atalantis Major • Daniel Defoe
... the Yana River to the Polar Sea, for I doubt if there is a more gloomy, desolate region on the face of this earth. So sparsely is it peopled that even a small town can moulder away here into non-existence and no one be the wiser for years after its disappearance. The authenticity of the following anecdote is vouched for by Mr. George Kennan, the American traveller, who quotes from ...
— From Paris to New York by Land • Harry de Windt
... tales told of this pretty animal's amical disposition towards man are strictly true, I hear; and it is no longer ago than yesterday I was told an odd anecdote of a young farmer, who, carrying a basket of figs to his mistress, lay down in the field as he crossed it, quite overcome with the weather, and fell fast asleep. A serpent, attracted by the scent, twined round the basket, and would ...
— Observations and Reflections Made in the Course of a Journey through France, Italy, and Germany, Vol. I • Hester Lynch Piozzi
... after which it was frequently bathed in sweet milk, the addition of a little sugar being the concluding stroke in the process. This "sweet fresh butter from Epping" was sold at a profit of 100 per cent. Our dairy farmers might take a hint from this anecdote. Does it not prove that the mere removal of the salt added to Irish butter doubles the value ...
— The Stock-Feeder's Manual - the chemistry of food in relation to the breeding and - feeding of live stock • Charles Alexander Cameron
... Aye, if I were to give you the money and the bond, to divide among those brats, it would make a nice anecdote in the newspapers. Zounds! I am apt to think, that, when you come to the possession of all my property, you will scarce do so much as to erect a small monument to ...
— The Lawyers, A Drama in Five Acts • Augustus William Iffland
... is apt to produce a similar affection in other girls of the same age who see the attacks. For this reason, hysterical girls should not be sent to large schools, but cured at home. Often a strong mental impression restores them. The anecdote is told of a celebrated surgeon (Boerhaave) who was called to a female seminary where there was a number of hysterical girls. He summoned them together, heated a number of iron instruments before their eyes, and told them that the first one who had a fit should be cauterized down the spine. ...
— The Physical Life of Woman: - Advice to the Maiden, Wife and Mother • Dr. George H Napheys
... Robert, early associated with the game in Scotland, and was an original member of the Queen's Park. Mr. Archibald Rae, the first secretary of the Scottish Football Association, and at one time an active member of the Queen's Park (and a beautiful dribbler in his day), tells an amusing anecdote of Smith, while playing against the Hamilton Club, leaping on the top of a hedge to win a touch-down, which in those days counted a point in the game. This entirely coincided with poor Smith's play, as he was sometimes ...
— Scottish Football Reminiscences and Sketches • David Drummond Bone
... magnate of the Supreme Court, the next night. He had a varied and useful audience of important politicians and their wives and daughters, the latter specially fitted to act as mediums of transmission to other audiences. He told the anecdote well. It was a good picture, that of the room on Miss Burford's upper floor, the large claimant smiling like a benign Jove, and the handsome youngster bending his head to kiss the girlish hand as if he were doing homage ...
— In Connection with the De Willoughby Claim • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... host. The Marquise, a type of the grande dame, with blue eyes and snow white hair survived her husband many years. During the war of 1870 they, like many other chatelains, had Prussian soldiers in their house. The following characteristic anecdote of the Marquise was told to me ...
— Chateau and Country Life in France • Mary King Waddington
... One anecdote told of him displays a reckless and whimsical humor. Having need of money, Carlos asked of a merchant, named Grimaldo, a loan of fifteen hundred ducats. The money-lender readily consented, thanked the prince for the compliment, and, in the usual ...
— Historical Tales - The Romance of Reality - Volume VII • Charles Morris
... appreciation is found in Dryden's estimate of other writers who might have seemed to lie beyond the field of his immediate vision. Of Milton he is recorded to have said: "He cuts us all out, and the ancients too". [Footnote: The anecdote is recorded by Richardson, who says the above words were written on the copy of Paradise Lost sent by Dorset to Milton. Dryden, Poetic Works, p. 161. Comp. Dramatic Works, i. 590; Discourse on Satire, p. 386.] On Chaucer ...
— English literary criticism • Various
... a while it has been my luck to meet among old soldiers the twenty-seven hundred and forty-sixth man who can tell a story well. Ben Tillye is one of them, and here is an anecdote I heard from him, which is rather interesting, and which ...
— Duffels • Edward Eggleston
... Y, p. 511. The following anecdote is so remarkable, and tends so much to the honour of the British soldiery, that we insert it without fear of the reader's disapprobation:—Captain Ochterlony and ensign Peyton belonged to the regiment of brigadier-general Mouckton. They were nearly ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... ashamed of herself she declines to continue, and full of self- reproach she retires to her own room. Later she re-enters, beaming, with the street and number pat. But by that time she has forgotten the anecdote." ...
— Tea-table Talk • Jerome K. Jerome
... in an address, "Auduboniana, and Other Matters of Present Interest," engaged the delighted attention of the Congress on the morning of the second day's session. His audience was large. In a biographical sketch of Audubon the Man, interspersed with anecdote, he said so many interesting things that we regret we omitted to make any notes that would enable us to indicate at least something of his characterization. No doubt just what he said will appear in ...
— Birds Illustrated by Color Photography [December, 1897], Vol 2. No 6. • Various
... stood near the head of the regiment for coolness and courage,—the defect of discipline showing itself only in their extreme unwillingness to halt when once let loose. It was at this time that the small comedy of the Goose occurred,—an anecdote which Wendell Phillips has ...
— Army Life in a Black Regiment • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... by the fact that it has always been sung thus, and the composer himself must often have heard the substitution. He would certainly have forbidden its use, had he not approved of it, for he was particularly averse to having changes made in his music. The following anecdote illustrates this trait in his character. It was related by the late Mme. Marie Saxe, better known under her Italianized name of Marie Sasse. This distinguished soprano singer, a member of the Paris Opera for a number ...
— Style in Singing • W. E. Haslam
... on the table, and in this hush she heard the voice of Colonel Buffington telling a story in dialect. It was an immemorial anecdote of Cousin Jimmy's—she had heard him tell it a dozen times—and while she listened, it made her feel ...
— Life and Gabriella - The Story of a Woman's Courage • Ellen Glasgow
... but I must explain the joke. The evening before, a Russian princess had told us an anecdote of this gentleman. He had suffered frightfully from sea-sickness in crossing the Channel, and turned tail when he got near Italy, because he had heard some one speak of "crossing" the Alps. "Thank you; I've had quite enough ...
— Letters of Two Brides • Honore de Balzac
... transmit a summary of his work, we shall willingly receive it; if any literary anecdote, or curious observation, shall be communicated to us, we will carefully insert it. Many facts are known and forgotten, many observations are made and suppressed; and entertainment and instruction are frequently lost, for want of ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume V: Miscellaneous Pieces • Samuel Johnson
... and child, a pair of lovers, a family group, festival, tavern scene, or battle charge are illustrations. In Dutch painting the social life of Holland in the seventeenth century found its record; yet there is little or no anecdote. The genre, the representation of a group of people united by some common interest and with an appropriate background, has the same legitimacy, if not the same eminence, as the portrait. It does not possess the rank of the portrait because, since the interest ...
— The Principles Of Aesthetics • Dewitt H. Parker
... of his friendship with cloak and suit buyers. For example, it appeared that he knew Rudolph Rosenwater, buyer for Feigenson & Schiffer, of San Francisco, to the extent of an anecdote containing a long, intimate dialogue wherein Rosenwater commenced all ...
— Potash & Perlmutter - Their Copartnership Ventures and Adventures • Montague Glass
... particular person. There may be a flirtation in the background. Yet these people are not hollow as gourds, and they are not caricatured. The Dutch Little Masters have indulged in numberless characterizations of mundane humanity. But they are never so preoccupied with the story that it is an anecdote rather than a picture. It is, first of all, a piece of elegant painting-fabric. Next it is a scrap of Dutch philosophy ...
— The Art Of The Moving Picture • Vachel Lindsay
... may here insert an anecdote, which seems to prove that Charles attributed his misfortunes in a great measure to the counsels of Archbishop Laud. On the last night of his life, he had observed that Herbert was restless during his sleep, and in the morning insisted on knowing the cause. ...
— The History of England from the First Invasion by the Romans - to the Accession of King George the Fifth - Volume 8 • John Lingard and Hilaire Belloc
... had immediately erected a barrier between them; not from her words, but from their hidden sense. He at once turned to Anne and recounted an anecdote relating to her distinguished grandsire. But covertly he watched madame; watched the half-drooping eyelids, the shadow of a dimple in her left cheek, the curving throat, the shimmering ringlet which half obscured the perfect ...
— The Grey Cloak • Harold MacGrath
... (Vol. ii., p. 413.).—Ray's anecdote concerning the proverb, "Bate me an ace, quoth Bolton," is perhaps more correctly told in the Witty Aunsweres and Saiengs of Englishmen (Cotton ...
— Notes and Queries, 1850.12.21 - A Medium of Inter-communication for Literary Men, Artists, - Antiquaries, Genealogists, etc. • Various
... order to elucidate that point, Ifirst quoted instances taken from those who in other matters have the right of saying car tel est mon plaisir, and then from others. Ifeel a little guilty in not having mentioned the anecdote about carrosse; but not being able to verify it, Ithought I might leave it to my opponents. However, after having quoted the two Emperors, Iquoted a more humble personage, Protagoras, and referred to other attempts at purism in language; but all ...
— Chips from a German Workshop - Volume IV - Essays chiefly on the Science of Language • Max Muller
... barren of those elements of the social picturesque which give piquancy to anecdote. And without anecdote, what is biography, of even history, which is only biography on a larger scale? Clio, though she take airs on herself, and pretend to be "philosophy teaching by example," is, after all, but a gossip who has borrowed Fame's speaking-trumpet, and should be figured with a ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 121, November, 1867 • Various
... evidences of new vigour. The Observer was established at York, in 1820, and the Canadian freeman in 1825, the latter, an Opposition paper, well printed, and edited by Francis Collins who had also suffered at the hands of the ruling powers. An anecdote is related of the commencement of the journalistic career of this newspaper man of old times, which is somewhat characteristic of the feelings which animated the ruling powers of the day with respect to the mass of people ...
— The Intellectual Development of the Canadian People • John George Bourinot
... From this anecdote, the general truth of which is indubitable, the principal fault of Charles Edward's temper is sufficiently obvious. It was a high sense of his own importance, and an obstinate adherence to what he had once ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott
... around him usefully employed, and in the manner most suited to each. He knew how to develop innate talent, and did not crush or overpower those around him. He owed much to the early training of a sensible mother, and he gives an anecdote of his early ...
— Richard Lovell Edgeworth - A Selection From His Memoir • Richard Lovell Edgeworth
... with four husbands, and her name had twice been changed to that of Hussey: she was of a most delightful disposition, of a retentive memory, highly entertaining, and liberally communicative; and to her I have frequently been obliged for an interesting anecdote. She was, after the death of her second husband, Mr. Hussey, a fashionable sacque and mantua-maker, and lived in the Strand, a few doors west of the residence of the celebrated Le Beck, a famous cook, who had a large portrait of himself for the sign of his house, at the north-west ...
— Fielding - (English Men of Letters Series) • Austin Dobson
... event or on any condition they would ever consent to re- union; and yet they equally omitted to declare that they would not so consent." The proceedings left no special interest, except one characteristic anecdote of Mr. Lincoln. The Confederate agents desired the recognition of the power of "President" Davis to make a treaty. Mr. Lincoln would not consent to this, would not in any event or in any way recognize another "President" within the territory of the United States. Mr. Hunter cited ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Vol. 1 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... said ower their wine, or brandy, or what not: he gaed in as light as a lark, and he came out wi' his feet foremost. I was at the winding of the corpse; and when the bluid was washed off, he was a bonny bouk of man's body." It may be easily believed that this ill-timed anecdote hastened the Master's purpose of quitting a company so evil-omened and so odious. Yet, while walking to the tree to which his horse was tied, and busying himself with adjusting the girths of the saddle, he could not ...
— Bride of Lammermoor • Sir Walter Scott
... reminding his brother-in-law of his position, he alluded two or three times in a casual fashion to his wife. The skipper hardly listened to him, and patting Miss Harris's cheek in a fatherly manner, regaled her with an anecdote of the mate's boyhood which the latter had spent a goodly portion of his life in denying. He denied it again, hotly, and Miss Harris, conquering for a time her laughter, reprimanded him ...
— Lady of the Barge and Others, Entire Collection • W.W. Jacobs
... of the hero of the foregoing anecdote was one of the most extraordinary ever known in the West. He made his advent in Texas at an early period, and continued to reside there until his death, which happened some two years ago; but, although he had many warm personal friends, no one could ever ascertain either the land ...
— Thrilling Adventures by Land and Sea • James O. Brayman
... being made chief-justice of the Superior Court of Tennessee, with no more fitness for administering the law than he had for making it, or interest in it. Mr. Parton tells an anecdote of Jackson at this time which, whether true or not, illustrates his character as well as the rude conditions amid which he made himself felt. He was holding court in a little village in Tennessee, when a great, hulking fellow, armed with a pistol ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XII • John Lord
... Life of Thomas Day, Esq., an anecdote is related of Miss B——, afterwards Mrs. Day, shewing with what remarkable effect presence of mind and courage can tame the ferocity of ...
— The Book of Enterprise and Adventure - Being an Excitement to Reading. For Young People. A New and Condensed Edition. • Anonymous
... absurd quadruped went about all day as perky as a schoolgirl in a new frock; and when they took the wreath off she became quite sulky, and they had to put it on again before she would stand still to be milked. This is not a Percy anecdote. ...
— Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow • Jerome K. Jerome
... commiseration for the weakness and lot of humanity. To such a man its moral must ever be "profoundly sad." Vulgar minds cannot know it. Hence it has ever been the favorite with the intellectual class, while Gil Blas has more generally won the applause of men of the world. An amusing anecdote of the almost universal admiration for the chef d 'oeuvre of Le Sage may be found in Butler's Reminiscences. That bigotted, yet extraordinary man, Alva, predicted, with prophetic precision, the effects which the satire on Chivalry would produce in Spain. See Broad Stone of Honour, ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson - Volume IV [The Rambler and The Adventurer] • Samuel Johnson
... who came within the sphere of his moral magnetism. Emerson called him 'the most ideal of men, for he wanted to put all his ideas into action.' His absolute superiority to all selfish aims and narrowing pride of opinion touched an answering chord in the self-devotion of Mr. Stearns. A little anecdote illustrates the modest estimate of the work he had in hand. After several efforts to bring together certain friends to meet Captain Brown at his home in Medford, he found that Sunday was the only day that would serve their ...
— History of the Negro Race in America from 1619 to 1880. Vol. 2 (of 2) - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George Washington Williams
... there was a vile conspiracy against it; and what made the conspiracy successful was, that among the leading conspirators were officers of the law—the very men without whose active co-operation it was impossible for it to be successful. Allow me to illustrate what I mean by an anecdote: A few years ago there was a gang of desperadoes, who operated in one of the south-western states. They robbed every one with perfect impunity for several years, all attempts to capture them proving abortive, for they seemed, in some mysterious manner, to get notice of any move ...
— From Wealth to Poverty • Austin Potter
... essentially an antiquary and it is amusing to observe that he is unable to suppress his learning even in his prayers. One is reminded of the anecdote of the New England minister, who, in the course of an unctuous prayer, proclaimed, with magisterial authority, "Paradoxical as it may appear, O Lord, it is nevertheless ...
— Roman Farm Management - The Treatises Of Cato And Varro • Marcus Porcius Cato
... into which he could pour the inexhaustible stream of his acquired eloquence. I was delighted to listen to beautiful passages from the classic as well as modern poets, dramatists, philosophers, and orators, and recalled the anecdote of the man sitting under a fluent divine, who could not refrain from muttering, "That is Jeremy Taylor; that, South; that, Barrow," etc. It was difficult to suppress the thought, while Mr. Sumner was talking, "That is Burke, or Howard, Wilberforce, Brougham, Macaulay, Harriet Beecher ...
— Destruction and Reconstruction: - Personal Experiences of the Late War • Richard Taylor
... twenty English miles of ULM. Nothing particular occurred, either by way of anecdote or of scenery, till within almost the immediate approach, or descent to that city—the last in the Suabian territories, and which is separated from Bavaria by the river Danube. I caught the first glance of that celebrated river (here of comparatively trifling width) with no ...
— A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume Three • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... impossibility. In 1829 there were queer doings in America. Joe Smith's Mormons 'spoke with tongues,' like Irving's congregation at the same time, but there were no modern spiritualists. Kohl's informant should have said 'ten years ago,' if he wanted his anecdote to be credited, and it is curious that Kohl did not notice ...
— Cock Lane and Common-Sense • Andrew Lang
... early companions as a wit and story-teller. The women complained because at their parties all the men were drawn off to hear Abe Lincoln's stories. When he came to be a public speaker, he feathered the shafts of his argument with jest and anecdote. The vein of humor in him was rich and deep; it helped him through the hard places. When as President he announced to his cabinet the Emancipation Proclamation, he first refreshed himself by reading to them a chapter from ...
— The Negro and the Nation - A History of American Slavery and Enfranchisement • George S. Merriam
... a worthy couple, and really attached to each other. But they had a habit of contradicting each other's statements, and opposing each other's opinions, which, though mutually understood and allowed for in private, was most trying to the bystanders in public. If one related an anecdote, the other would break in with half-a-dozen corrections of trivial details of no interest or importance to any one, the speakers included. For instance: Suppose the two dining in a strange house, and Mrs. Skratdj seated by the host, and contributing ...
— The Peace Egg and Other tales • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... merely by example and casual anecdote, but by precepts as solemnly expounded as bible-texts. "Remember, my dear, a woman with a husband is like a lion-tamer with a whip!" And the old lady would explain what a hard and dangerous life was lived by lion-tamers, how their safety ...
— Sylvia's Marriage • Upton Sinclair
... refuses facts, and reason declines to create fictions. The mind is dull and dead. Suddenly the step of some friend long absent is heard at the door. Then how do the faculties awake! Through all the long winter evening, the mind brings forth its treasures of wit, of anecdote, of instructive fact and charming allusion. Here is some Edison, with an enthusiasm for invention, who found his electric lamps that burned well for a month had suddenly gone out, and read in the morning paper the judgment of the scientist ...
— A Man's Value to Society - Studies in Self Culture and Character • Newell Dwight Hillis
... anecdote to the effect that, much earlier, when Serge was still a little boy in his small native town in the province of Tver, in northern Russia, he would arrange the parlor chairs in rows and, with some score open in front of him, conduct them. Once in a while he'd stop short and berate the chairs. Then ...
— The World's Great Men of Music - Story-Lives of Master Musicians • Harriette Brower
... and that doubtless the newer mode had reached New York before it reached Mr. Vigne! These are trifles, but they are the trifles that make up the sum of national peculiarities, ignorance of which leads us into a thousand fruitless and absurd conjectures. In this little anecdote we learn the great rapidity with which new fashions penetrate American usages, and the greater ductility of American society in visible and tangible things, at least; and the heedless manner with which even those who write in a good spirit of America, jump ...
— Recollections of Europe • J. Fenimore Cooper
... conversation has a little resemblance to a common-place book; his habitual deportment to a piece of clock-work. He is not remarkable either as a reasoner or an observer: but he is quick, unaffected, replete with anecdote, various and retentive in his reading, and exceedingly happy in his play upon words, as most scholars are who give their minds this sportive turn. We have chiefly seen Mr. Southey in company where few people ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... of birth was a feeling common alike to mother and son, and, at times, even became a point of rivalry between them, from their respective claims, English and Scotch, to high lineage. In a letter written by him from Italy, referring to some anecdote which his mother had told him, he says,—"My mother, who was as haughty as Lucifer with her descent from the Stuarts, and her right line from the old Gordons,—not the Seyton Gordons, as she ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. II - With His Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... of the company formed a circle round them, and listened meekly to the dialogue until luncheon. What an appalling picture! One sympathizes with Carlyle on the occasion when he was asked to dinner to meet a great talker, who poured forth a continuous flow of jest and anecdote until the meal was far advanced. Then came a lull; Carlyle laid down his knife and fork, and looking round with the famous "crucified" expression on his face, said in a voice of agonized entreaty, "For God's sake take me away, and put me in a room ...
— From a College Window • Arthur Christopher Benson
... and that's the truth." But she really was a good-natured, kind creature, ready to oblige in everything; and I believe that she thought that she was amusing you when she talked on in this way. Unfortunately she had no anecdote, for she had a very bad memory, and therefore there was nothing to be gained from her. By way of amusing me, she used to say, "Now, Tom, sit down here, and I'll tell you all about my bad leg." And then she would commence ...
— Poor Jack • Frederick Marryat
... Baron Baillie, for the purpose of keeping good order within their Barony of Town Yetholm. The person whom I remember first in possession of that office, was an old man called Doctor Walker, from his being also the village surgeon; and from him I had the following anecdote:— ...
— A Historical Survey of the Customs, Habits, & Present State of the Gypsies • John Hoyland
... and this conversation, which had been carried on apart, was suddenly broken into by the tall doctor, who wanted to know whether his lordship had ever heard the anecdote about Lord Thurlow and the late king. The anecdote was as long as the doctor himself; and when it was over, the gentlemen adjourned to the drawing-room, and all conversation was immediately drowned by "Row, brothers, row," which had only been suspended till the arrival of Mr. ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... the empty safe, which circumstance, however, did not prevent our old cashier, a great stickler for forms, from changing the key-word of the lock every two days, as though all the treasures of the Bank of France had been inside. M. Louis appeared to find my anecdote entertaining. But the most astonishing was what the little Bois l'Hery, with his Parisian street-boy's accent, related to us concerning the ...
— The Nabob • Alphonse Daudet
... the ability to attempt any thing higher; and, fortunately for the reader, I have also wanted the presumption. What, however, I can do, I will. Instead of critical remark, I will furnish him with anecdote. He shall trace from beginning to end the progress of the following work; and in proportion as I have the happiness to engage his attention, I shall merit the name of a ...
— The Iliad of Homer - Translated into English Blank Verse • Homer
... exception is the book in which Beyle has embodied his reflections upon Love. The volume, with its meticulous apparatus of analysis, definition, and classification, which gives it the air of being a parody of L'Esprit des Lois, is yet full of originality, of lively anecdote and keen observation. Nobody but Beyle could have written it; nobody but Beyle could have managed to be at once so stimulating and so jejune, so clear-sighted and so exasperating. But here again, in reality, it is not the question ...
— Books and Characters - French and English • Lytton Strachey
... Wimbledon Common and in Dulwich Wood, where he composed his lines upon Shelley; asserts there is romance in Camberwell as well as in Italy; "Sordello"; the charge of obscurity against "Sordello"; the nature and intention of the poem; quotations therefrom; anecdote about Douglas Jerrold; Tennyson's, Carlyle's, and M. Odysse Barot's opinions on "Sordello"; "enigmatic" poetry; in 1863 Browning contemplated the re-writing of "Sordello"; dedication to the ...
— Life of Robert Browning • William Sharp
... having read no further than the preliminary anecdote; "well, you shouldn't do such things!" Then she came upon commentary and surmise, with dates, chapter, and verse. It did not amount to very much, but such facts as there were to go upon were insidiously underlined, and the Prince of Schnapps-Wasser ...
— King John of Jingalo - The Story of a Monarch in Difficulties • Laurence Housman
... of the story of Ethelberta's escapade, which had been dragged from Neigh the previous evening by the friend to whom he had related it before he was so enamoured of Ethelberta as to regard that performance as a positive virtue in her. 'Nobody was told, or even suspected, who the lady of the anecdote was,' Picotee concluded; 'but I knew instantly, of course, and I think it very unfortunate that we ever went to that dreadful ghostly estate of ...
— The Hand of Ethelberta • Thomas Hardy |
