"Fret" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... every respect, than in former times, because their understandings were better cultivated[7]. It was an undoubted proof of his good sense and good disposition, that he was never querulous, never prone to inveigh against the present times, as is so common when superficial minds are on the fret. On the contrary, he was willing to speak favourably of his own age; and, indeed, maintained its superiority[8] in every respect, except in its reverence for government; the relaxation of which he imputed, ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 3 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... find ourselves drawn there again and again at evening out of the narrow canals and streets of the city, to watch the wreaths of the sea-mists weaving themselves like mourning veils around the mountains far away, and listen to the green waves as they fret and sigh along the ...
— The Stones of Venice, Volume II (of 3) • John Ruskin
... to his writing. It was a labored effort, not for want of skill, but for the reason he had no desire to fret the heart of the wife ...
— The Triumph of John Kars - A Story of the Yukon • Ridgwell Cullum
... of the fret and the fever of life; away from the scorching heat of self, and enter the inward resting-place where the cooling airs of peace will calm, renew, and ...
— The Way of Peace • James Allen
... look at him and think: 'He can't help being as he is, but if such a misfortune should befall him, I should be grieved for him. They have been settled at the manor from father to son; half the churchyard is full of them, they have all grown up here. Even a stone would fret if it were moved from such a place, let alone a man. Surely, he can't be bankrupt like other noblemen? It's well known that ...
— Selected Polish Tales • Various
... thought, of course, that his views were insufficiently appreciated; but he complained, not of individuals, but of general causes which were practically irremovable, and against which it was idle to fret. If, in writing to his closest friends, he indulges in a momentary grumble over the 'bursting of a bubble,' he always adds that he is ashamed of himself for the feeling, and emphatically declares himself to be one of the happiest and most fortunate of ...
— The Life of Sir James Fitzjames Stephen, Bart., K.C.S.I. - A Judge of the High Court of Justice • Sir Leslie Stephen
... please don't! I'm not a truly pig, I'm a little girl; and if you'll let me run home, I'll never fret when I'm ...
— The Louisa Alcott Reader - A Supplementary Reader for the Fourth Year of School • Louisa M. Alcott
... on the principle of giving them as much physical labour and exercise as possible, so as to destroy all tendency to a morbid concentration of thought; and thus Clare was kept away from books and paper, and made to go into the garden, to plant, and dig, and water the flowers. He seemed to fret at first on being deprived of the solace of his poetry, and eagerly seized every occasion to scribble verses upon odd slips of paper, or with, chalk against the wall. But as the months passed on, his new forced habits grew upon him, and he left off writing to a great ...
— The Life of John Clare • Frederick Martin
... teaches the same lesson. Nature will not have us fret and fume. She does not like our benevolence or our learning much better than she likes our frauds and wars. When we come out of the caucus, or the bank, or the Abolition-convention, or the Temperance-meeting, or the Transcendental club into the fields and woods, she says ...
— Essays, First Series • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... person, as it sounded, for help. I ran to the river and jumped in, and had the pleasure of saving a life. I got some bruises which have laid me up for a day or two; but I am getting over them very well now, and you need not worry about me at all. I will write again soon; so pray do not fret yourself, for I have had no hurt that will trouble me for ...
— The Guardian Angel • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... seems my fate to fret away my years in this country. Not for a second do I regret being American—indeed, I think that a regret typical of very vulgar people, and I feel sure we are the great coming nation—yet"—and she sighed—"I feel my life should have drowsed away close to an older, mellower civilization, ...
— This Side of Paradise • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... the higher circles of Paris recall the glowing descriptions of the fret and fever of existence in the Austrian capital during the historic Vienna Congress a hundred years ago. Dancing became epidemic and shameless. In some salons the forms it took were repellent. One of ...
— The Inside Story Of The Peace Conference • Emile Joseph Dillon
... ending we had fairly earned? Either he was right to let CHARLES STUART escape that day in the mist, in return for former generosity, or he was wrong; and one would have expected him to make up his mind and there an end, and not fret himself into a pother and Mr. JOHN FOSTER'S story into a most inartistic anti-climax over such a subtlety. All the same a rattling good tale, full of hard knocks as well as bright eyes, and with more than a smack ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152. January 17, 1917 • Various
... on board soon found reason to be thankful for the preservation of life, and got something very different to think of than fret at the contrary winds. A leak sprung in the ship, which alarmed them all so much that a consultation was held among them whether if any ship came near they should hail it and go on board wherever ...
— The Power of Faith - Exemplified In The Life And Writings Of The Late Mrs. Isabella Graham. • Isabella Graham
... than any other plants, they thrive in the shade, they withstand the uncongenial conditions usually found in the house, and are among the hardiest of plants suitable for house culture. And yet how many women will fret and fume over a Lorraine begonia or some other refractory plant, not adapted at all to growing indoors, when half the amount of care spent on a few ivys would grace their windows with frames of living green, giving a setting to all their other plants which ...
— Gardening Indoors and Under Glass • F. F. Rockwell
... fared with him in his dealings, and if he has brought the wrong sort of sugar or thread he will wheedle away the displeasure from that leaden face as a pastrycook girl will drive bluebottles off a stale bun. And that man has known what it was to coax the fret of a thoroughbred, to soothe its toss and sweat as it danced beneath him in the glee and chafe of its pulses and the glory of its thews. He has been in the raw places of the earth, where the desert beasts have whimpered their unthinkable psalmody, and their eyes have shone back ...
— Reginald in Russia and Other Sketches • Saki (H.H. Munro)
... tusks, and would have injured him severely had he not been torn away from him. No one trumpeted and screamed louder at first, but in a short time he lay down quietly, as if he saw that it was folly to fret himself about what could not ...
— My First Voyage to Southern Seas • W.H.G. Kingston
... go, "Don't fret yourself on that account!" he said. "My wife will treat my friends exactly as she ...
— The Top of the World • Ethel M. Dell
... A sea-fret, cool and wetting, fell. A few big rain-drops splashed heavily down. The wind rose with a leap and roared past them up the rocky track. And the water-gates ...
— Bob, Son of Battle • Alfred Ollivant
... his fancy forgetfully at work as before. He could not at once realize that the tragedy of this romance, such as it was, remained to him alone, except perhaps as Ehrhardt shared it. With him, indeed, Elmore still sought to fret his remorse and keep it poignant, and his final failure to do so made him ashamed. But what lasting sorrow can one have from the disappointment of a man whom one has never seen? If Lily could console herself, it seemed probable that ...
— A Fearful Responsibility and Other Stories • William D. Howells
... got all that old oak carvin' out of Bideford Church, when they were restoring it (Ruskin says that any man who'll restore a church is an unmitigated sweep), and stuck it up here with glue? Well, King came in and wanted to know whether we'd done it with a fret-saw! Yah! He ...
— Stalky & Co. • Rudyard Kipling
... says Balzac, "are apparently at peace in the deep bed that they have made for themselves, where they seem to sleep, though all the while they never cease to fret and ...
— Jean-Christophe Journey's End • Romain Rolland
... as the women who surround it, gorgeously apparelled, but without conversation, conscious of defective parts of speech. "There is much music, excellent voice, in that little organ," but there is no one there who can "make it speak." They may "fret" the noble instrument; they "cannot ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 117, July, 1867. • Various
... struck in the factor, and went on to say that he would see about the coffin and everything—there was no need for little Snjolfur to fret about it any more. Without thinking, he found himself opening the door for his guest, diminutive though he was,—but the boy stood there as if he had not seen him do it, and it was written clear on his face that he had not yet ...
— Seven Icelandic Short Stories • Various
... with brightened face and eager eyes. How foolish she had been to fret. Now—now everything would be different. Ah! how thankful she was to God for being so ...
— Emily Fox-Seton - Being The Making of a Marchioness and The Methods of Lady Walderhurst • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... College was not wholly smooth that winter, and annoyances rose to fret the fine edge of President West's virgin enthusiasms. The opening had been somewhat disappointing. True, there were more students than last year, the exact increment being nine. But West had hoped for an increase of fifty, ...
— Queed • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... sure that He will bless the exercise of the prerogative by which He exalts us above inferior creatures, and makes us capable of toil. You can influence to-morrow. What you can influence by work, fret not about, for you can work. What you cannot influence by work, fret not about, for it is vain. 'They toil not, neither do they spin.' You are lifted above them because God has given you hands that can grasp the tool or the pen. Man's crown of glory, as well as man's curse and punishment, ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ezekiel, Daniel, and the Minor Prophets. St Matthew Chapters I to VIII • Alexander Maclaren
... And if her eyes were darkness, there was light within her soul; and if her ears were silence, there was music within her heart. She was brighter than the sun which she could not see, and sweeter than the songs which she could not hear. She was joyous as a bird in its narrow cage, and never did she fret at the bars which bound her. And, like the bird that sings at midnight, her cheery ...
— The Scapegoat • Hall Caine
... sure to come up and say,—'You had no business to have parted at that fence, Dutton; the horse took it well enough!' Then I have no 'hands,' I am told. Certainly, whenever I take up the rudder-lines to put his head for any particular course the brute takes it as a personal affront, and begins to fret, go sideways, and bore and all but tell me what a duffer he thinks me. There's my cousin Kate, who will spoon with me by the hour in a greenhouse, and dance as often as I like to ask her, but at the cover-side she is so ashamed of me she ...
— Bluebell - A Novel • Mrs. George Croft Huddleston
... companioned this heavenly night without thy preaching," she said serenely, as Eloisa, half repenting her quickness, turned back to wave her a farewell, "for the breezes are comforting after the day, and fret me not with questions. And for my loyalty"—she lingered mockingly on the word—"my loyalty will serve King Janus well enough, unless he seeketh to enforce ...
— The Royal Pawn of Venice - A Romance of Cyprus • Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull
... that you must not leave this place. You will have a little princess more beautiful than Venus herself. Let nothing fret you; time alone ...
— Old-Time Stories • Charles Perrault
... observing, I thought, as ever any thing, to see how upon these two scores, Sir G. Carteret, the most passionate man in the world, and that was in greatest haste to be gone, did bear with it, and very pleasant all the while, at least not troubled much so as to fret and storm at it. Anon the coach comes: in the mean time there coming a News thither with his horse to go over, that told us he did come from Islington this morning; and that Proctor the vintner of the Miter in Wood-street, and his son, are dead this morning there, of the plague; he having ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... have much to fret about, now, have these old windows; and that makes us think whether the larmiers of the roof over them do not ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 2, No. 29, October 15, 1870 • Various
... putting out of some of the Privy-council is over, the King being at last advised to forbear it; for whereas he did design it to make room for some of the House of Commons that are against him, thereby to gratify them, it is believed that it will but so much the more fret the rest that are not provided for, and raise a new stock of enemies by them that are displeased, and so all they think is over: and it goes for a pretty saying of my Lord Anglesey's up and down the Court, that he should lately say to one of them that are the great ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... low-down on you with me roosting close at hand. Putting two plain facts together it works out right natural and simple that he's on the square. As easy as that," he finished triumphantly. "So don't you fret. And in case he acts up I'll clamp down on him real sudden," he added ...
— The Settling of the Sage • Hal G. Evarts
... was upon him now, and he took no pains to check or analyze the reasons for his decision. The thought of her loveliness in his arms once more, far up among the perfumed wooded heights, as the silent darkness stole upon them, stirred in him such a fret to be gone that it was like a fever. He slipped away to the barracks with instructions for his corporal, but was back again in a moment. Finally he took up his burden of blanket and food, ...
— The Barrier • Rex Beach
... it was the coast that Was just describing—Yes, it was the coast— Lay at this period quiet as the sky, The sands untumbled, the blue waves untost, And all was stillness, save the sea-bird's cry, And dolphin's leap, and little billow crost By some low rock or shelve, that made it fret Against ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron
... white-capped nurse came forward between the rows of little beds each with its child occupant, her finger on her lips. "He is so much weaker to-day," she explained, "I would say he had better not see any one, except that he will fret, so please stay only a few moments," and she led them to where Joey lay, his white bed shut off from his little neighbors by a screen. His eyes were closed and a young resident physician ...
— The Angel of the Tenement • George Madden Martin
... to myself, "My Mary weeps For the dead to-day: Haply her blind old grandsire sleeps The fret and the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 6, April, 1858 • Various
... our wives?" quoth another, resignedly, "Dwell they on our deeds?" "Deeds of home; that live yet Fresh as new—deeds of fondness or fret, Ancient words that were kindly expressed or unkindly, These, these have ...
— Old and New Masters • Robert Lynd
... with tears, thy goodnight." He charges Tekla not to let her mother, who regarded Kosciuszko with sincere affection, fret herself sick over what had happened. "Embrace her as fondly as she loves thee. ... Amuse and distract her so that her thoughts may incline her to sleep." He complains that Tekla does not tell him how she herself has weathered the storm: ...
— Kosciuszko - A Biography • Monica Mary Gardner
... hotly. "It makes me think of what I read with him one day about that Roman emperor—what was his name?—playing while Rome was burning. But don't you fret, mother; London won't be burnt ...
— The Young Castellan - A Tale of the English Civil War • George Manville Fenn
... shall turn once more The glass of Time, for all we fret! The present enters at my door, And ...
— Enamels and Cameos and other Poems • Theophile Gautier
... the doorway; "don't fret, because maybe I'll find something pretty to bring you when I ...
— Grandmother Elsie • Martha Finley
... part prove that she is guilty. Besides, we don't want to stir up any more sediment. We'll do everything on the Q. T. Money talks, and the little lady is not deaf. My legal advice to you is, 'Don't fret,' and my medical advice is, 'Go to bed and stay there till I send you word that it's all over.' Remember one thing, there never was a storm so big that ...
— We Can't Have Everything • Rupert Hughes
... "Oh, well; never fret!" she managed to say at last. "Plenty more dances before I'm dead. We won't make a trouble about ...
— The Privet Hedge • J. E. Buckrose
... the two youths who called David Ramsay master; and with both of whom he used to fret from morning till night, as their peculiarities interfered with his own, or with the quiet and beneficial ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott
... busy to fret. There was Grandpa who needed more help every morning with his dressing, and every evening with the Hindmost Hymn. There was her mother, whose tasks must now grow lighter each year, there was Jimmie to be helped with his lessons on Saturdays, there was a Sunday school class with two of the ...
— In Orchard Glen • Marian Keith
... not be much harm on parade, except to worry and fatigue them; but how would it be in a bayonet charge against the enemy, when they want the free use of every muscle, and all their strength thrown forward? I would not give much for their chance of victory. And it is just the same with horses: you fret and worry their tempers, and decrease their power; you will not let them throw their weight against their work, and so they have to do too much with their joints and muscles, and of course it wears ...
— Black Beauty • Anna Sewell
... come by again— And there stood the post in the wet. "Helloa." said the Magpie. "What you here Pray tell me I beg is there sheltering near— A terrible day for this time of the year. T'would make a Saint Anthony fret." ...
— Pepper & Salt - or, Seasoning for Young Folk • Howard Pyle
... with sea-water. When Bligh discovered the offence, he flew into a rage and "longed to flog the whole company." But the offender could not be discovered, and the irate captain had to let his passion fret itself out. ...
— The Life of Captain Matthew Flinders • Ernest Scott
... authenticity seems, however, probable. See, contra, Hardy, vol. iii. of his "Descriptive Catalogue." See also the MS. Royal 14 C vii., with maps and itineraries; a great Virgin on a throne, with a monk at her feet: "Fret' Mathias Parisiensis," fol. 6; fine draperies with many folds, recalling those in the album ...
— A Literary History of the English People - From the Origins to the Renaissance • Jean Jules Jusserand
... for a short time at getting into the stir of actual life, the routine and sordidness soon palled and he began to fret in the harness. This mood kept him from composition till he forced from himself, in 1848, the last of his short stories, including "The Great Stone Face" and "Ethan Brand." Despite the effort, the stories rank well. In 1849 he was dismissed from office ...
— The Short-story • William Patterson Atkinson
... herself, "though I am sure I cannot tell what it is. In old times, Rosie would have burst forth with it all, as soon as we came up-stairs. But it is nothing that can trouble her, I am sure. I hope it is nothing that will trouble her. I will not fret about it beforehand. We do not know our troubles from our blessings at first sight. It ought not to be less easy to trust for my darling than for myself. But, oh! Rosie, I am afraid I have been at my old ...
— Janet's Love and Service • Margaret M Robertson
... over win the world in one girl's eyes, Twice over lift her name up to the skies; Twice to hope all things, so to be twice born— For he lives not who cannot front the morn Saying, "This day I live as never yet Lived striving man on earth!" What if the fret Of loss and ten years' agonizing snow Thy hairs or leave their tracery on thy brow, Each line beslotted by the demon hounds Hunting thee down o' nights? Laugh at thy wounds, Laugh at thy eld, strong lover, whose blood flows Clear from the fountain, singing as it goes, ...
— Helen Redeemed and Other Poems • Maurice Hewlett
... stirs the grove, In plaintive moans replying, To every leafy bough above His tender tale is sighing; Ruffled beneath his viewless wing Thy wavelets fret and wimple, Now forth rejoicingly they spring ...
— Enthusiasm and Other Poems • Susanna Moodie
... and it runs through all my veins. I need no sheep-skins. I go along and don't worry about anything. That's the sort of man I am! What do I care? I can live without sheep-skins. I don't need them. My wife will fret, to be sure. And, true enough, it is a shame; one works all day long, and then does not get paid. Stop a bit! If you don't bring that money along, sure enough I'll skin you, blessed if I don't. How's that? He pays twenty kopeks at a time! What can I do with twenty kopeks? Drink it-that's ...
— What Men Live By and Other Tales • Leo Tolstoy
... the World moralized, or emblematically described, where most are short, over, wide or wrong-Byassed, and few justle in to the Mistress Fortune: On one side we find Heraclitus and his Followers fret, vex, rail, swear and cavil at every thing; on the other side Democritus, and his Company rejoice and laugh, as if they were created for that purpose. On one side you may see the Mimick screwing and twisting ...
— The School of Recreation (1684 edition) • Robert Howlett
... loathing, and revenged the other's hated touch, his gray eyes held a pleased, proud look. Once more in the soiled big shirt and trousers, with the strap coiled about his middle, he could put Barber aside for the day—not brood about him, harboring ill-will, nor sulk and fret. ...
— The Rich Little Poor Boy • Eleanor Gates
... and brilliant. She did not permit herself to be rendered unhappy or anxious as to the possible attitude of the King and Queen towards her, —she was prepared for all contingencies, and had fully made up her mind what to say. Therefore, there was no need to fret over the position, or to be timorously concerned because she was called upon to confront those who by human law alone were made superior in rank ...
— Temporal Power • Marie Corelli
... it is so now; and it will be so till the crack of doom. Manners may change, and costume; but hearts filled with the wine of life are not to be altered. They are fashioned that way, and the world does not vary, else Eve might regain Paradise, and all the fret and ...
— The Silent Barrier • Louis Tracy
... the grass, Saw the shining column pass; Saw the starry banner fly, Saw the chargers fret and fume, Saw the flapping hat and plume,— Saw them with his moist and shy Most unspeculative eye, Thinking only, in the dew, That ...
— Complete Poetical Works of Bret Harte • Bret Harte
... his leafy spouse all in tears over her staglocythic house-cleaning, or the conduct of the youngest cave child? Did she complain of her back, did she have a headache every time they disagreed, did she fuss and fret until he lost his patience and dashed madly out to the Cave ...
— The Nervous Housewife • Abraham Myerson
... cheery smile and clapped him on the back. "You must not fret, Panje. Don't fret because your wife is good friends with Becker." She cast a covert glance at him as she said it, for she was curious to know what kind of a ...
— Absolution • Clara Viebig
... will!" he answered. "You did the square thing by me once, and now I'll see you through; don't you fret." ...
— Soldiers of the Queen • Harold Avery
... I didn't do this thing, and I shall come out all right," replied Bobtail. "Don't fret ...
— Little Bobtail - or The Wreck of the Penobscot. • Oliver Optic
... am vowed to celibacy, and Adeline de Courval is leman where she should be wedded dame. Methinks I fret at that thought even ...
— Rienzi • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... "Don't thee fret about me, dear; the way will open. Thy father has thought and planned for us. Have patience while I tell thee. Thee knows that Walter Evesham's pond is small and his mill is doing a ...
— In Exile and Other Stories • Mary Hallock Foote
... to fret about it, you know, Miss Dorry. Come, now, you'll have the awfulest headache that ever was, if you don't brighten up. When you're in trouble, count your blessings—that's what I always say; and you've a big share of 'em after all, dear. Let me make you a nice warm cup of tea—that'll ...
— Donald and Dorothy • Mary Mapes Dodge
... Cresswell, she had told him, was his refuge. "Why should his soul submit to bonds which the world had now declared to be intolerable? Divorce was not now the privilege of the dissolute rich. Spirits which were incompatible need no longer be compelled to fret beneath the same couples." In short, she had recommended him to go to England and get rid of his wife, as she would with a little encouragement have recommended any man to get rid of anything. I am sure that, had she been skilfully brought on to the subject, she might ...
— Stories By English Authors: Italy • Various
... too, had not been able to sleep for hunger, and had heard what their step-mother had said to their father. Grettel wept bitterly and spoke to Hansel: "Now it's all up with us." "No, no, Grettel," said Hansel, "don't fret yourself; I'll be able to find a way to escape, no fear." And when the old people had fallen asleep he got up, slipped on his little coat, opened the back door and stole out. The moon was shining clearly, and the white pebbles which lay in front of the house glittered like bits of ...
— The Blue Fairy Book • Various
... they, for a small tip, will cover sheets of stamped paper with malicious quibbling attacks on their neighbours. And then there's a lawsuit commences between them, sir, and no end to the worry and fret. They bring it before the court here, and go off to the chief town, and there everyone in court is on the look-out for them and they clap their hands with glee when they see them. Words do not take long, but deeds are not soon done. ...
— The Storm • Aleksandr Nicolaevich Ostrovsky
... think I envy you; on the contrary, I am as grateful, even more grateful than if such good fortune had fallen to my own lot; but I cannot help fretting at the thought of being left here without you: and I shall fret until ...
— Jacob Faithful • Captain Frederick Marryat
... Hun was set on making us fret For lack of food to eat, When up there ran a City man In gaiters trim and neat— Oh, just tell me if a farm there be Where I can get employ, To plough and sow for PROTH-ER-O, And he a farmer's boy, And be ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, March 7, 1917. • Various
... those fanciful saws of which the only justification is that it works. Any one can test the truth of it by taking the highway. Well, friend Davenant is taking it. He'll reach the House called Beautiful as straight as a die. Don't you fret about that. You'll owe him nothing in the long run, because he'll get all the reward he's entitled to. When's the wedding? Fixed ...
— The Street Called Straight • Basil King
... the frontiersmen pressed into the West, they continued to fret and strain against the Spanish boundaries. There was no temptation to them to take possession of Canada. The lands south of the Lakes were more fertile than those north of the Lakes, and the climate was better. The few American settlers ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume Four - Louisiana and the Northwest, 1791-1807 • Theodore Roosevelt
... was having rather a hard time of it to conceal his dismay at the blow to all the plans and preparations so finely in progress for the garden party. "Well, it means we must make the best of it all, and not fret." ...
— Five Little Peppers and their Friends • Margaret Sidney
... that. I don't want my job to turn me into an ogre. There are people who don't feel that way about me." He laughed slyly. "Don't you fret about being haled into court. Several persons besides ourselves wish to meet those two distinguished gentlemen we are after. When we get them they will have to be shipped to Chicago and various other cities. You stand ...
— Christopher and the Clockmakers • Sara Ware Bassett
... and anon, the querulous voice of the woman, keeping watch by the lifeless clay, which she had laid in decent order upon its humble pallet, in the Gull's Nest, floated over the cliffs, and died away on the bosom of the waters. At times, Roupall would growl and fret as a chained mastiff; but the anxiety of the Skipper had so increased, that he ceased moving, and stood on the bold brow of the crag, like ...
— The Buccaneer - A Tale • Mrs. S. C. Hall
... somehow we emerged. We reached a stretch of ground where the snow was just high enough to cover the hocks of the horses. It was a hollow scooped out by some freak of the wind. I pulled in, and the horses stood panting. Peter no longer showed any desire to fret and to jump. Both horses apparently felt the wisdom of sparing their strength. They were all white with the frost of their sweat and the spray of ...
— Over Prairie Trails • Frederick Philip Grove
... deep issue or decision till the summer itself glided away. Mrs. Cohn, anxiously following the courtship through Sim's love-smitten eyes, her suggestion that the girl be brought to see her received with equal postponement, began to fret for the great thing to come to pass. One cannot be always heroically stiffened to receive the cavalry of communal criticism. Waiting weakens the backbone. But she concealed from ...
— Ghetto Comedies • Israel Zangwill
... with Ba'tiste to his cabin, only to fret nervously about the place and at last to strike out once more, on foot, for the lumber camp. He was worried, nervous; in a vague way he realized that he had been curt, almost brusque, with a woman for whom he felt every possible gratitude and consideration. Nor ...
— The White Desert • Courtney Ryley Cooper
... said the foolish clown, "kill me the red humblebee on the top of that thistle yonder; and, good Mr. Cobweb, bring me the honey-bag. Do not fret yourself too much in the action, Mr. Cobweb, and take care the honey-bag break not; I should be sorry to have you overflown with ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb
... minute after they laid im down—an I ses, 'Jamie, ow did it appen' an he ses, 'Mother, it wor John Burgess—ee opened my lamp for to light hissen as had gone out—an I don't know no more.' An then after a bit he ses, 'Mother, don't you fret—I'm glad I'm goin—I'd got the drink in me,' he ses. An then he give two three little breaths, as though he ...
— Sir George Tressady, Vol. I • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... something known by others, and requiring only to be studied and learned by the child, rules out such conditions of fulfilment. It condemns the fact to be a hieroglyph: it would mean something if one only had the key. The clue being lacking, it remains an idle curiosity, to fret and obstruct the mind, a dead weight ...
— The Child and the Curriculum • John Dewey
... married, do they always bill and coo? Do they never fret and quarrel as other couples do? Does he cherish her and love her? Does she honor and obey? ...
— The Book of Humorous Verse • Various
... the last place in the world that one would have imagined to be the scene of his activities: such a face surely could not be nourished amid smoke and mud and fog and dust; such an open countenance could never even have seen anything of 'the weariness, the fever, and the fret' ...
— A Pair of Blue Eyes • Thomas Hardy
... arrangement will atone for the feebleness of its power of portraiture. On the porch of a Northern cathedral we may seek for the images of the flowers that grow in the neighboring fields, and as we watch with wonder the gray stones that fret themselves into thorns, and soften into blossoms, we may care little that these knots of ornament, as we retire from them to contemplate the whole building, appear unconsidered or confused. On the incrusted building we must expect no such deception of the eye or thoughts. It may sometimes ...
— Stones of Venice [introductions] • John Ruskin
... Magnificence with them was an art in itself, and, combined with beauty, was one of their highest aims. Minuteness of finish and perfection of detail were lavished with Oriental profuseness. If we carefully examine the fret-work upon the walls of the various corridors and apartments, it becomes evident that it represents flowers and geometrical lines, though at a casual glance it has rather a confused appearance. The various spaces are filled with lines from the Koran; the words "There is no ...
— Due West - or Round the World in Ten Months • Maturin Murray Ballou
... "Don't you fret any about that. I've brought Smith along. Smith is the only living Englishman who speaks the Megalian language. He's been explaining the situation to the high priest of the island for the last half-hour while ...
— The Island Mystery • George A. Birmingham
... however stern the estrangement be, However time with laggard lapse may fret, That haunt of our fond friendship I shall hold As loved this hour as when elate I see Its draperies, dark with absence and regret, Slide softly back on memory's ...
— The New England Magazine, Volume 1, No. 1, January 1886 - Bay State Monthly, Volume 4, No. 1, January, 1886 • Various
... cups and plates, and putting them away in a cupboard, she drew her rocking-chair to the lamp and sat down to a heap of mending. Evelina, meanwhile, had been roaming about the room in search of an abiding-place for the clock. A rosewood what-not with ornamental fret-work hung on the wall beside the devout young lady in dishabille, and after much weighing of alternatives the sisters decided to dethrone a broken china vase filled with dried grasses which had long stood on the top shelf, and to ...
— Bunner Sisters • Edith Wharton
... may sink and settle, other loves may loose and slack, But I wander like a minstrel with a harp upon his back, Though the harp be on my bosom, though I finger and I fret, Still, my hope is all before me: for I ...
— Poems • G.K. Chesterton
... back, to make the Descent more gradual, and thereby render the Task a little more feasible, Major Collier, who commanded the Train, came to me; and perceiving the Difficulties of the Undertaking, in a Fret told me, I was impos'd upon; and vow'd he would go and find out Brigadier Petit, and let him know the Impossibility, as well as the Unreasonableness of the Task I was put upon. He had scarce utter'd those Words, and ...
— Military Memoirs of Capt. George Carleton • Daniel Defoe
... attention had gone away. Kate thereupon roamed round the room, peeped from the window and saw that it looked into a dull black-looking narrow garden, and then studied the things in the room. There was a piano, at which she shook her head. Mary had tried to teach her music; but after a daily fret for six weeks, Mr. Wardour had said it was waste of time and temper for both; and Kate was delighted. Then she came to a book-case; and there the aunts had kindly placed the books of their own younger days, ...
— Countess Kate • Charlotte M. Yonge
... could help it. It wouldn't make so much difference about those old frontier officers or a common cowman, but if one of those young lieutenants was to get his feet wet, the chances are that those Washington City contractors would fret and worry for weeks. Of course, any little inconvenience that any one incurred on their account, they'd gladly come all the way back from Europe to make ...
— The Outlet • Andy Adams
... of a colonel if he wasn't. There, dear lad, don't you fret yourself about that. I've heered the men here say you did wonders for such a boy, and a big sergeant who fetched you off your horse ...
— Crown and Sceptre - A West Country Story • George Manville Fenn
... it, Tom?" asked Pearson; "have the other lads been plaguing? Such a big, hearty fellow as you ought not to fret for that." ...
— Happy Days for Boys and Girls • Various
... Fret not thyself because of evil doers, Neither be thou envious against the workers of iniquity; For they shall soon be cut down like the grass, And wither as the green herb. Trust in the Lord, and do good; ...
— McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... then?' I said mischievously. But, observing how really worried she seemed, I added, 'Don't fret, Miriam. You may ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to 1901 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... sincerely religious persons. But there is no help for it, if we are to combat the adversaries on their own ground; and because it is thus only that, while we startle a few, we can prove to all that the torrent of negations is but a passing rush of waters, which, fret as they may in their channel, shall be found to have left not so much as a trace of their passage upon ...
— The Heavenly Father - Lectures on Modern Atheism • Ernest Naville
... 'Don't fret, old dear; Emil is one of the happy-go-lucky sort who always fall on their legs. I'll see to Nat, and Dan is in a good way now. Let him take a look at Kansas, and if the farm plan loses its charm, he can fall back on poor Lo, and really do good out ...
— Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott
... magnesia at the outset, followed up with quinine and calomel, or perhaps quinine and sulphur. The patient is not allowed to take any nourishment while the fever lasts, and if he keeps quiet, avoids sudden changes of temperature, and does not fret, he generally recovers in a week or ten days. He suffers from languor and prostration, however, for a fortnight or more, and if he overeats, moves about in the sunshine, or exposes himself to the night air, he is liable to have another ...
— Campaigning in Cuba • George Kennan
... day. We read on with a good-natured pity, akin to the feeling which the gods of Epicurus might be supposed to experience when they looked down upon foolish mortals,—and when we shut the book, go out into our own world to fret, fume, and wrangle over things equally transitory ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 21, July, 1859 • Various
... dear, my pretty girl, For whom thou waitest, comes not yet, Because he's seeking ev'ry pearl Where out at sea the billows fret. ...
— Japanese Literature - Including Selections from Genji Monogatari and Classical - Poetry and Drama of Japan • Various
... of his friend, he justified the truth of what he had advanced, by telling them plainly that there are some men so variously affected towards their friends, that, while they are in calamity and distress, they will compassionate and succour them, but when they are well and in prosperity will fret at and envy them. "But this," he said, "is a fault from which wise and good men are free, and never to be found but ...
— The Memorable Thoughts of Socrates • Xenophon
... He must be a man, I say, able to use a small-sword creditably, who knows one end of a horse from another, who can win well but lose better, who can follow the hounds over the roughest country and not fall sick for a trifle of mud, nor fret a week over a splashed coat—in a word, he must be a ...
— The Honourable Mr. Tawnish • Jeffery Farnol
... musick too; but such As is beyond all voice or touch; My minde can in faire order chime, Whilst my true heart still beats the time; My soule['s] so full of harmonie, That it with all parts can agree; If you winde up to the highest fret, It shall descend an eight from it, And when you shall vouchsafe to fall, Sixteene above you it shall call, And yet, so dis-assenting one, They both shall ...
— Lucasta • Richard Lovelace
... remember this one rule: Don't fret. Don't wear a look of trouble and worry. Above everything else, remember those delicious ...
— The Woman Beautiful - or, The Art of Beauty Culture • Helen Follett Stevans
... But fret as she might, and burn as she might, with impatience, love-created anger and resentment of some infamy, doubtless practiced on them both, there was nothing in ...
— The Furnace of Gold • Philip Verrill Mighels
... "Well, well, Dorothy—don't fret about it till it happens—thar'll be plenty o' time then," said Younker, gravely; "and perhaps it won't ...
— Ella Barnwell - A Historical Romance of Border Life • Emerson Bennett
... your door, What means this bustle, Betty Foy? Why are you in this mighty fret? And why on horseback have you set Him whom ...
— Lyrical Ballads 1798 • Wordsworth and Coleridge
... now, Jemima, as if the Lord was dealing a bit hard with you; but never you fret yourself; He'll explain it all and make it all up to you in His ...
— The Farringdons • Ellen Thorneycroft Fowler
... wonderfully, my boy, an' when I tell Hannah Morse, she'll be pleased, 'cause a speck of dirt anywhere about the house does fret ...
— Aunt Hannah and Seth • James Otis
... material things. The Science of the age has its hands upon the pillars of the Temple, and rocks it to its foundation. As yet its destructive efforts have but torn from the ancient structure the worm-eaten fret-work of superstition, and shaken down some incoherent additions—owl-inhabited turrets of ignorance, and massive props that supported nothing. The structure itself will be overthrown, when, in the vivid language of a living writer, "Human reason leaps into ...
— Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry • Albert Pike
... can I stoop to fret And lie and haggle in the market-place, Give dross for dross, or everything for nought? No! let me sit above the crowd, and sing, Waiting with hope for that miraculous change Which seems like sleep; and though ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 32, June, 1860 • Various
... extent and grandeur of the hall in timid wonder, approached a marble stair-case. The arches here opened to a lofty vault, from the centre of which hung a tripod lamp, which a servant was hastily lighting; and the rich fret-work of the roof, a corridor, leading into several upper apartments, and a painted window, stretching nearly from the pavement to the ceiling of the hall, became ...
— The Mysteries of Udolpho • Ann Radcliffe
... her, briskly. "But they ain't gonna do it if I can help it. Don't you fret. It will all come out right. Shore it will. Can't ...
— The Heart of the Range • William Patterson White
... with every luxury; let us cease to strive or fret; let us be elegant, refined, gentle, harmless, and, above all, undisturbed in mind and body." "We have had enough of motion and of action we." "Surely, surely, slumber is more sweet than toil." "Let us get through life the ...
— Interludes - being Two Essays, a Story, and Some Verses • Horace Smith
... richness, showing us that agriculture, providing most of the food of the people, must be a favorite science with many, and one that brought rich rewards. It was pleasing to see everything going on in such a quiet, orderly manner, and so many people at work without friction and with no look of fret, hurry, or fatigue. Everyone seemed to be enjoying his work, if that could be called work which looked so much ...
— Daybreak: A Romance of an Old World • James Cowan
... it stamp wrinkles in her brow of youth; With cadent tears fret channels in her cheeks; Turn all her mother's pains and ...
— Something of Men I Have Known - With Some Papers of a General Nature, Political, Historical, and Retrospective • Adlai E. Stevenson
... again. It was noticeable that his lips moved slightly at each stage of this laborious visual journey. "Forty-seven." "Forty-nine." "Forty-eight." Stokes was immensely interested in that compelling frieze. He counted and recounted the number of figures in the Greek fret with painful iteration. Apparently he was satisfied at last, and then his eyes began to study the inkstand in front of the President. The President seemed an enormous distance away, but the inkstand very near and very large, and he found ...
— Leaves from a Field Note-Book • J. H. Morgan
... fret, the fever, the unrest endures, But the time flies.... Oh, try, my little lad, Coming so hot and play-worn, to be glad And patient of the long hours ...
— Poems • William D. Howells
... despotism," said Mr. Henderson, "and gets into a perfect fret about it. Why, sir, the Southern States have presented nothing but a despotism for the last six years. During the rebel rule it was a despotism, the veriest despotism ever established upon earth; and since the rebel rule ceased, the President of the United States certainly has governed the Southern ...
— History of the Thirty-Ninth Congress of the United States • Wiliam H. Barnes
... at which we fret, That seem to prison and control, Are but the doors of daring set Ajar before ...
— Mother Carey's Chickens • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... to the passions as well as the consciences of men in their hate of the sum of all villainies, as John Wesley called slavery. They not only met their foes half way, they carried the war into the hearts and homes of the enemy. From time to time wicked and sorrowful things happened to fret their fanaticism and keep it at a white heat. Peaceable negroes were attacked in their homes by ruffianly whites, their cattle killed, their fields wasted; and sometimes they made a bloody resistance. They were not always harmless, and they were not always ...
— Stories Of Ohio - 1897 • William Dean Howells
... and so lovely her face, That never a hall such a galliard did grace; While her mother did fret, and her father did fume, And the bridegroom stood dangling his bonnet and plume; And the bride's-maidens whisper'd, ''Twere better by far To have match'd our ...
— The Prose Marmion - A Tale of the Scottish Border • Sara D. Jenkins
... impulsiveness of the modern girl had undone him. How was he to pay Hargate the money? Hargate must be paid. That was certain. No other course was possible. Lord Dreever's was not one of those natures that fret restlessly under debt. During his early career at college, he had endeared himself to the local tradesmen by the magnitude of the liabilities he had contracted with them. It was not the being in debt that he minded. It ...
— The Intrusion of Jimmy • P. G. Wodehouse
... the glamourie They have stolen my wee brother, Housed a changeling in his swaddlings For to fret my own poor mother. Pules it in the candle light Wi' a cheek so lean and white, Chinkling up its eyne so wee Wailing shrill at her an' me. It we'll neither rock nor tend Till the Silent Silent send, Lapping in their awesome arms Him they stole with spells and charms, Till they take ...
— Peacock Pie, A Book of Rhymes • Walter de la Mare
... it will gather in a soft little roll, with the touch almost of floss silk. The machine-made net is hard, stiff, and wiry, and remains perceptibly so in this test. Also, the mesh of machine-made lace is as regular as though made with a fine machine fret-saw, that of hand-made lace being of varying sizes, and often following the ...
— Chats on Old Lace and Needlework • Emily Leigh Lowes
... and we sank into a grim city of hoarse, roaring streets, wherein the endless throngs swirled and surged as I had seen the yellow waters curve and fret, contending, where the river pauses, rock-bound. Here were no bright costumes, no bright faces, none stayed to greet another; all was stern, and swift, and voiceless. London, then, said I to myself, is the city of the giants. They must live in these towering ...
— Paul Kelver • Jerome Klapka, AKA Jerome K. Jerome
... duomo of Milan, only to put the change well before your eyes, because you all know that building so well. The duomo of Milan is of entirely bad and barbarous Gothic, but the passion of pinnacle and fret is in it, visibly to you, more than in other buildings. It will therefore serve to show best what fulness of change this pulpit of Niccola ...
— Val d'Arno • John Ruskin
... considerably better, to-night," remarked Jan. "She'll get about now, if she does not fret too much ...
— Verner's Pride • Mrs. Henry Wood
... smirking, and pleasant, and big with adventure, And ogling the stake which is fix'd in the centre. Round and round go the cards, while I inwardly damn 5 At never once finding a visit from Pam. I lay down my stake, apparently cool, While the harpies about me all pocket the pool. I fret in my gizzard, yet, cautious and sly, I wish all my friends may be bolder than I: 10 Yet still they sit snug, not a creature will aim By losing their money to venture at fame. 'Tis in vain that at niggardly caution I scold, 'Tis ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Oliver Goldsmith • Oliver Goldsmith
... he said, in a low, unsteady voice that to his own ears sounded full of suppressed yet passionate appeal. "Forgive me, lady, that for one moment I have seemed discourteous. I am not so, in very truth. Sad fancies fret my brain at times, and—and there is that within thine unveiled beauty which sword-like wounds my soul! I am not joyous natured: ...unlike Sah-luma, chosen favorite of fortune, I have lost all, all that made my life once ...
— Ardath - The Story of a Dead Self • Marie Corelli
... Newark, New Jersey, Jackson Wylie, Sr., was growing impatient. In spite of his son's weekly reports he had begun to fret at the indefinite nature of results up to date. This dissatisfaction it was that had induced him to cable his invitation to the Royal Commission to visit the Atlantic plant. Mr. Jackson Wylie, Sr., had a mysterious ...
— Laughing Bill Hyde and Other Stories • Rex Beach
... still have confused recollections of that illness. I especially remember the tenderness with which my mother tried to soothe me in my waling hours of fret and pain, and the agony and bewilderment with which I awoke after a tossing half sleep, and turned my eyes, so dry and hot, to the wall away from the once-loved light, which came to me dim and yet more dim each day. But, except for these fleeting memories, if, ...
— Story of My Life • Helen Keller
... end, "butchers of both classes, high and low, are aristocratized."—In the same way, "the women in the markets, except a few who are paid and whose husbands are Jacobins, curse and swear, fume, fret and storm." "This morning," says a merchant, "four or five of them were here; they no longer insist on being called citoyennes; they declare that they "spit on the republic."[3389]—The only remaining patriot females are from the lowest of ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 3 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 2 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... approximate to Silverton and the shoes which Katy told Esther she used to bind when a girl. Will need not be disturbed, for Sybil Grandon was never half as pretty as Katy, or half as much admired. Neither need Mrs. General Reynolds fret about Bob, as if he would care ...
— Family Pride - Or, Purified by Suffering • Mary J. Holmes
... truly, get up, and not fret a bit, if you'll only help me look. Please come now to dress me, and see if you can ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag VI - An Old-Fashioned Thanksgiving, Etc. • Louisa M. Alcott
... said that one day the tree itself must die, and the leaves no longer live therein; and so, also, that the very God or Life of the World will one day perish, as all that is born must surely in the end die. But they who fret upon such grounds as this must be in so much want of a grievance that it were a cruelty to rob them of one: if a man who is fond of music tortures himself on the ground that one day all possible combinations and permutations ...
— God the Known and God the Unknown • Samuel Butler
... corn, and wheat, and garden stuff, and fruit. He buys his groceries and clothing and tobacco. Reuben buys everything. At the close of the year Lucien puts from $100 to $300 in the bank or takes a trip to Washington. Reuben does well if he come out even. Lucien does not fret; Reuben grumbles. ...
— The Young Farmer: Some Things He Should Know • Thomas Forsyth Hunt
... he paused and spake this blessing: 'Gift of my kind Father's love! Fret not, little plant, thy record Shineth in the book above. By the careless eye unheeded, Bear thy lowly, humble lot; Thou hast eased my weary walking, Thou art ne'er in ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. II. July, 1862. No. 1. • Various
... rude and wild, Till his chair falls over quite. Philip screams with all his might, Catches at the cloth, but then That makes matters worse again. Down upon the ground they fall, Glasses, plates, knives, forks, and all. How Mamma did fret and frown, When she saw them tumbling down! And Papa made such a face! Philip is in ...
— Struwwelpeter: Merry Tales and Funny Pictures • Heinrich Hoffman
... awake at night and fret and fume, to think Of bank officials on a spree with what he's toiled to get. He is not driven by his woe quite to the verge of drink By wondering if his balance in the bank remains ...
— Cobwebs from a Library Corner • John Kendrick Bangs
... inviolable; the rights of property have been extended to us, in this land of freedom; our industry has been, and still is, liberally rewarded; and so long as we live under a free and happy government which denies us not the protection of its laws, why should we fret and vex ourselves because we have had no part in framing them, nor anything to do with their administration. When the fruits of the earth are fully afforded us, we do not wantonly refuse them, nor ungratefully repine because we have done nothing towards the cultivation of the ...
— Twenty-Two Years a Slave, and Forty Years a Freeman • Austin Steward
... home,— From our wanderings afar, From our multifarious labours, From the things that fret and jar; From the highways and the byways, From the hill-tops and the vales; From the dust and heat of city street, And the joys of lonesome trails,— Evening brings us home at last, ...
— 'All's Well!' • John Oxenham |
