"Coy" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... appeared now and then a bit of lazy life. I could imagine the place under some weird spell, and was half-minded to search out the princess. An old ragged black man, honest, simple, and improvident, told us the tale. The Wizard of the North—the Capitalist—had rushed down in the seventies to woo this coy dark soil. He bought a square mile or more, and for a time the field-hands sang, the gins groaned, and the mills buzzed. Then came a change. The agent's son embezzled the funds and ran off with them. Then the agent himself disappeared. Finally the new agent stole even the books, and the company ...
— The Souls of Black Folk • W. E. B. Du Bois
... for Heriot W. That's to say, he could do with a lassie of that age fine, and, by Gad, he shouldn't wonder but Ellen mightn't have rather cottoned to him if her heart had been free. She looked deuced coy when she thought he was proposing. Yes, a girl like Ellen was the ticket for him. But in that case, what ...
— The Prodigal Father • J. Storer Clouston
... to increase my passion by every thing I behold; for every sound that meets the sense is thy proper music, oh love, and every thing inspires thy dictates; the winds around me blow soft, and mixing with wanton boughs, continually play and kiss; while those, like a coy maid in love, resist, and comply by turns; they, like a ravish'd vigorous lover, rush on with a transported violence, rudely embracing their spring-dress'd mistress, ruffling her native order; while the pretty birds on the dancing branches incessantly make love; ...
— Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister • Aphra Behn
... make, to as much as hesitate an assent; which, therefore, readily giving in the style of a carte blanche, I received fresh kisses of compliment from them all, in approval of my docility and good nature. Now I was "a sweet girl... I came into things with a good grace... I was not affectedly coy... I should be the pride of the house," ...
— Memoirs Of Fanny Hill - A New and Genuine Edition from the Original Text (London, 1749) • John Cleland
... Did coy Marcella own a Soul As beauteous as her Eyes, Her Judgment wou'd her Sence controul, And teach her how to prize. But Providence, that form'd the fair In such a charming Skin, Their outside made its only care, And never ...
— Essays on the Stage • Thomas D'Urfey and Bossuet
... as Coach Corridan warmed up to his vision, "you don't want much, Coach! Why don't you ask Ted Coy, the famous ex-Yale full-back, to give up his business and play the position for you? Maybe you can persuade Charlie Brickley, a fair sort of dropkicker, to quit coaching Hopkins, and kick a few goals for old Bannister! I get you, Coach—you want a fellow about the size of ...
— T. Haviland Hicks Senior • J. Raymond Elderdice
... around one half of the sidewall of the Shed. In shape, its upper part was like the top half of a loaf of bread. In motion, here, it rested on some sort of wheeled vehicle, and it was reared up like an indignant caterpillar, and a blue-white flame squirted out of its tail, with coy and frolicsome flirtings from side ...
— Space Platform • Murray Leinster
... flowery region just above the Colonel's head. A perplexed balloonist was at one and the same time suppressing an outburst of hysterical laughter, and encouraging coy soil-theories to evolve themselves from the blank ...
— The Harmsworth Magazine, v. 1, 1898-1899, No. 2 • Various
... into a fervent description of many meetings with his coy subjects, and the tricks he was compelled to resort to in order to let them understand he meant ...
— The Outdoor Chums at Cabin Point - or The Golden Cup Mystery • Quincy Allen
... music of guitars and the clacking of castanets; the fandango, the bolero, the malaguena, the chaquera vella; all the classical dances of old Spain, and each one a variant on the theme of love, the woman coy, coquettishly retreating; the man persuading or demanding, the woman yielding in ...
— The Car of Destiny • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... breathes the wind, the glittering water boils. Here the charm'd BYSSUS with his blooming bride Spreads his green sails, and braves the foaming tide; The star of Venus gilds the twilight wave, 440 And lights her votaries to the secret cave; Light Cupids flutter round the nuptial bed, And each coy sea-maid hides ...
— The Botanic Garden. Part II. - Containing The Loves of the Plants. A Poem. - With Philosophical Notes. • Erasmus Darwin
... upon the world! Their ears To one demand alone are coy; They will not give us love and tears, They bring us light and warmth ...
— Poetical Works of Matthew Arnold • Matthew Arnold
... in country inns when Turpin rode to Rippleside! Puck tuned the fiddle-strings, and country maids grew coy, Tavern doors grew magical when Colonel Jack might tap at them, The gay Golden Farmer and the ...
— The Lord of Misrule - And Other Poems • Alfred Noyes
... the campus be your joy, And whispered loves your lips employ, What time the twilight shadows gather, And tryst you keep with the maiden coy. ...
— Horace and His Influence • Grant Showerman
... never-to-be-forgotten Mr. Edward T.—a kingfisher had dwelt by a little streamlet of artificial origin which supported a few withered minnows and sticklebacks and dace. This kingfisher was one of the sights of the domain. Visitors were taken to see it. The bird, though sometimes coy, was generally on view. Nevertheless it was an extremely prudent old kingfisher; to my infinite annoyance, I never succeeded in destroying it. Nor did I even find its nest, an additional source of grief. Lancashire naturalists may be interested to know that this bird was ...
— Alone • Norman Douglas
... lodging, it was covenanted that, without any more ado, I should resign myself to clerical employment at Nantes. The merchant there is a friend of the family, and had offered to demonstrate his friendship by paying me too little to live on. Enfin, Fame has continued coy. The year expires to-night. I have begged a few comrades to attend a valedictory dinner—and at the stroke of ...
— A Chair on The Boulevard • Leonard Merrick
... passivity, an absorbed pre-occupation in the end to be attained."[313] In the examples we have studied of the courtships of birds we saw that it is by no means a universal law that the male is eager and the female coy. I need only recall the instance noted by Darwin[314] in which a wild duck forced her love on a male pintail, and such cases, as is well known, are frequent. High-bred bitches will show sudden passions for low-bred or mongrel males. ...
— The Truth About Woman • C. Gasquoine Hartley
... "Girls are uncommon coy critters," said he, with a grave smile in his eyes. He handed back the child, and once more was ...
— The Last Trail • Zane Grey
... spirrids or soopernatural beins vatsohever. All I shall 'ave ze honour of showing you will be perform by simple Sloight of 'and, or Ledger-dee-Mang! (He invites any member of the Audience to step up and assist him, but the spectators remain coy.) I see zat I 'ave not to-night so larsh an orjence to select from as usual, still I 'ope——(Here one of the obvious Confederates slouches up, and joins him on the platform. ) Ah, zat is goot! I am vair moch oblige to you, Sare. (The Confederate ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 99, November 15, 1890 • Various
... coy, but use your time, And while ye may, go marry; For having lost but once your prime, You may ...
— The Onlooker, Volume 1, Part 2 • Various
... would prove Her pretty chit-chat to convey, P'rhaps be the record of her love, Told in some coy enchanting way. ...
— Poems • Sir John Carr
... that this moose, at least, had come to what he thought was the call of a mate. Moonlight is deceptive beyond a few feet; so when the low grunt sounded in the shadow of the great rock he was sure he had found the coy creature at last, and broke out of his concealment resolved to keep her in sight and not to let her get away again. That is why he swam after us. Had he been investigating some new sound or possible danger, he would ...
— Wood Folk at School • William J. Long
... in Maxim's so gay and kittenish and coy as she! She was the essence of youth. Her hair was as yellow as gold and so thick and undulating that one could not help wondering how far down her back it would drop if released. Her lips were red with the rich, warm blood ...
— Her Weight in Gold • George Barr McCutcheon
... that scene attunes my soul to song, awaking any muse from the silence in which she has long slumbered. But the voice of the coy maiden is less melodious than of yore: she shies me for my neglect: and despite the gentlest courting, refusing to breathe her divine spirit over a scene worthy of a sweeter strain. And this scene lay not upon the classic ...
— The Wild Huntress - Love in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid
... still coy," said the young Spaniard, telling Ulrich to wait at the narrow door, which opened upon the balcony. "There sits the angel! Just look! I gave her the pomegranate blossom in her magnificent hair—did you ever see more beautiful tresses? Take notice! ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... woman, in our hours of ease, Uncertain, coy, and hard to please, And variable as the shade By the light, quivering aspen made, When pain and anguish wring the ...
— How to Get on in the World - A Ladder to Practical Success • Major A.R. Calhoon
... this is courtly now, this is sweete, this plaine, this is familiar, but by the Court of France, our peevish dames are so proud, so precise, so coy, so disdainfull, and so subtill, as the Pomonian Serpent, mort dieu the Puncke of Babylon was ...
— A Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. III • Various
... limbs. For those minutes courage flowed like wine out of the November dusk, and he was the eternal hero, one with the sea-rover on the prow of a Norse galley, one with Roland and Horatius, Sir Nigel and Ted Coy, scraped and stripped into trim and then flung by his own will into the breach, beating back the tide, hearing from afar the thunder of cheers... finally bruised and weary, but still elusive, circling an end, twisting, changing pace, straight-arming... falling behind ...
— This Side of Paradise • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... desires of man who, issuing from all, is none the less ever longing. But that, Wilfrid, is only a woman's thought. You find seductive fancies in the wreathing mists, the light embroidered veils which Nature dons like a coy maiden, in this atmosphere where she perfumes for her spousals the greenery of her tresses. You seek the naiad's form amid the gauzy vapors, and to your thinking my ears should listen only to the virile voice of ...
— Seraphita • Honore de Balzac
... bad good morning to the day, O' th' sudden Roscius breaks in a bright ray: Gods with your favour, I've presum'd to see A mortal fairer then a deitie. With looks and hands a satyre courts the boy, Who draws back his unwilling cheek as coy. Although of marble hewn, whom move not they? The boy ev'n seems to weep, ...
— Lucasta • Richard Lovelace
... next two reigns is far too wide a subject to be entered upon here. Grave or gay, satirical or idyllic, coy or wanton, there is scarcely a poet of note or obscurity who did not contribute his share. Nowhere is a rarer note of pastoral to be found than ...
— Pastoral Poetry and Pastoral Drama - A Literary Inquiry, with Special Reference to the Pre-Restoration - Stage in England • Walter W. Greg
... present my daughter, my aide chirurgeon." Thus introduced, Lucrece, raising her head, bestowed a modest smile of welcome on her father's guests and divided between them a coy courtesy. ...
— A Dream of Empire - Or, The House of Blennerhassett • William Henry Venable
... sizing him up. And that brought me back to his chin—back to that big, oozing cut. I had been waiting for an opportunity to ask him about it, and didn't know myself how to go about it. Just from that you can realize how he had me guessing, for it takes quite some jolt to make me coy. So I followed his own lead finally and blurted the question right out, without any fancy conversational trimmings, and he told me ...
— Once to Every Man • Larry Evans
... office fire, Miss Thornhill read a magazine in the indolent fashion so much affected at Baldpate Inn during the heated term; while the mayor of Reuton chatted amiably with the ponderously coy Mrs. Norton. Into this circle burst the envoys to the hermitage, ...
— Seven Keys to Baldpate • Earl Derr Biggers
... Then I perceive we are deluded both. For when I offered many gifts of Gold, And Jewels to entreat for love, She hath refused them with a coy disdain, Alledging that she could not see the Sun. The same conjectured I to be thy drift, That faining so she might be rid ...
— Fair Em - A Pleasant Commodie Of Faire Em The Millers Daughter Of - Manchester With The Love Of William The Conquerour • William Shakespeare [Apocrypha]
... power, T' encounter Eucharis: first, like the flower That Juno's milk did spring,[97] the silver lily, He fell on Hymen's hand, who straight did spy The bounteous godhead, and with wondrous joy Offer'd it Eucharis. She, wonderous coy, Drew back her hand: the subtle flower did woo it, And, drawing it near, mixed so you could not know it: 220 As two clear tapers mix in one their light, So did the lily and the hand their white. She viewed it; and her view the form bestows Amongst her spirits; ...
— The Works of Christopher Marlowe, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Christopher Marlowe
... great horror Mrs Neptune cried out in a voice so gruff, that one might have supposed she had attempted to swallow the best-bower anchor, and that it had stuck in her throat, "Now my pretty Master Green, let me give you a buss, to welcome you to the Polar Seas. Don't be coy ...
— Peter the Whaler • W.H.G. Kingston
... the noble brow of the goddess Diana was not so unruffled as Homer describes it, her countenance expressed care and unrest, and in her great black eyes there glowed such fire as had never shone in the orbs of the coy goddess. ...
— Frederick The Great and His Family • L. Muhlbach
... meadows, and deliciously fragrant. In the swampy hollows were yellow marsh marigolds and blue forget-me-nots; on the drier soil of the rising bank the wild hyacinths were just shaking open their bells, and heartsease here and there lifted coy heads to the sunlight. ...
— The Madcap of the School • Angela Brazil
... depositaries of these national treasures, believe that the inquirer can have any real interest in the matter. They fear that the question is only put to turn them into ridicule; for the popular mind is a sensitive plant; it becomes coy, and closes its leaves at the first rude touch; and when once shut, it is hard to make these aged lips reveal the secrets of the memory. There they remain, however, forming part of an under-current of tradition, ...
— Popular Tales from the Norse • Sir George Webbe Dasent
... the Figure of Twinnes.] Ye haue yet another manner of speach when ye will seeme to make two of one, not thereunto constrained, which therefore we call the figure of Twynnes, the Greekes Endiadis thus. Not you coy dame your lowrs ...
— The Arte of English Poesie • George Puttenham
... its outer plates, directed a plastic hose which stretched out impossibly far and clamped to one drone with a magnetic grapple. He maneuvered it to the hull and made it fast. He captured a second, which was worked delicately within reach by coy puffs of ...
— Space Tug • Murray Leinster
... are too coy To them that chastely seeke them, And yet are apt to toy With baser Jacks ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 121, November, 1867 • Various
... to overwhelm him for a moment. Certainly of late Marjorie had been uncertain, coy, and very hard to please. Marjorie had suffered, and was suffering. She was contrasting Tom with Hugh, and Hugh with Tom, and it made her heart ache and made her angry with herself for her own previous blindness. And, womanlike, being in a very bad temper with ...
— The Imaginary Marriage • Henry St. John Cooper
... George will be interested in the advertisement of this sale," she suggested, with a coy emphasis which made Doctor Taylor want to smother the well-meaning creature with ...
— A Soldier of the Legion • C. N. Williamson
... words shall run. Far, far be envy, far be jealous fear, With discord dark and drear, And all the choir that is of love the foe.— The season had returned when soft winds blow, The season friendly to young lovers coy, Which bids them clothe their joy In divers garbs and many a masked disguise. Then I to track the game 'neath April skies Went forth in raiment strange apparelled, And by kind fate was led Unto the spot where stayed my soul's desire. The beauteous ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Second Series • John Addington Symonds
... down, and make you equals. Now for the means to assure him thine, observe me; Remember he's a courtier, and a soldier, And not to be trifled with; and therefore, when He comes to woo you, see you do not coy it. This mincing modesty hath spoil'd many a match By a first refusal, in vain ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 4, April 1810 • Various
... to his Nose. He bought a Pound of it, for which De Suaso charged him at the moderate rate of Four Guineas; and desires to know his Lodging, that he may send his Friends to buy some of this Incomparable Mixture. The Artful Rogue then affects the Coy, says that his Stock of the Snuff is very low, and by degrees raises his price to Eleven Pistoles a Pound, until the English in Brussels have been half-poisoned with his filthy Remnant; when there comes upon the scene a certain Mr. Dubiggin, a rich old English Merchant ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 3 of 3 • George Augustus Sala
... proceedings of this particular night at the Green Dragon. The pipes charged, and those of the guests who smoked, well fixed behind them, celestial Harmony was invoked through the slowly curling clouds. In Britain the Goddess is coy. She demands pressure to appear, and great gulps of ale. Vastly does she swell the chests of her island children, but with the modesty of a maid at the commencement. Precedence again disturbed the minds of the ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... and sent detachments in pursuit of Stewart. A victory was claimed by both parties. Washington seemed to consider it as such for Greene. "Fortune," he said, in a letter to him, "must have been coy indeed, had she not yielded at last to so persevering a pursuer as you have been." Yet there was no victory in the case. The advantage evidently lay with the Americans. The contest had been a most sanguinary one. The loss of ...
— Washington and the American Republic, Vol. 3. • Benson J. Lossing
... row) as she descended from the platform. She had not the hardihood to glance toward the great man until the indistinct stockman had had his wish, and Mrs. Clarkson, in her fine new raiment, had both sung and acted a coy ditty of the previous decade, wherein every line began with the word "somebody." It was an immediate success; the obstreperous stockman led the encore; but Miss Bouverie, who duly accompanied, extracted solace from the depressed attitude in which Sir Julian Crum sat looking ...
— Stingaree • E. W. (Ernest William) Hornung
... not mean the sort, Sweet marrow-pulp, for babes and maidens fitter, But that wherein the golden fishes sport On oranges seas (with just a dash of bitter), Not falsely coy, but eager to parade Their Southern birth—in short, ...
— The Sunny Side • A. A. Milne
... then, Sisters of the sacred well, That from beneath the seat of Jove doth spring, Begin, and somwhat loudly sweep the string. Hence with denial vain, and coy excuse, So may som gentle Muse With lucky words favour my destin'd Urn, 20 And as he passes turn, And bid fair peace be to my sable shrowd. For we were nurst upon the self-same hill, Fed the same flock by ...
— The Poetical Works of John Milton • John Milton
... smoke till we came to Strasburg, where I got some caporal." The man's mind is full, very likely, of the great sights which he has seen, of the great emotions with which the vast works of nature have inspired it. But his enthusiasm is too coy to show itself, even to his closest friend, and he veils it with a cloud of tobacco. He will speak more fully of confidential evenings, however, and write ardently and frankly about that which he is shy of saying. The thoughts and experience of his travel will come forth in his writings; ...
— The History of Pendennis, Vol. 2 - His Fortunes and Misfortunes, His Friends and His Greatest Enemy • William Makepeace Thackeray
... handled by her tire-women, than the slender whale- boat by her crew. And out of its element, it seems fragile enough to justify the utmost solicitude. For truly, like a fine lady, the fine whale-boat is most delicate when idle, though little coy at ...
— Mardi: and A Voyage Thither, Vol. I (of 2) • Herman Melville
... should touch you, that I might the better conceal it if its silent demonstrations should displease you; or till I could express it even more delicately than in words if I found favor in your eyes. However, after having listened for long to the coy fears that fill a youthful heart with alarms, I write in obedience to the instinct which drags useless ...
— Louis Lambert • Honore de Balzac
... the females at first withdraw from the males; they are coy, and have to be sought out, and sometimes held by force. This tracking and grasping of the females by the males has given rise to many different characters in the latter, as, for instance, the larger eyes of the male bee, and especially of the males of the Ephemerids (May-flies), some ...
— Darwin and Modern Science • A.C. Seward and Others
... more, since thou art dead, Shall we e'er bring coy brides to bed, No more, at yearly festivals, We cowslip balls Or chains of columbines shall make, For this or that occasion's sake. No, no! our maiden pleasures be Wrapt in thy winding-sheet ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin
... days of still sunshine, reflected back from our selves! O ye haunts endeared evermore by a look, tone, or smile, or rapt silence, when more and more with each hour unfolded before me that nature, so tenderly coy, so cheerful though serious, so attuned by simple cares to affection, yet so filled, from soft musings and solitude, with a poetry that gave grace to duties the homeliest, setting life's trite things to Music! Here nature and fortune concurred alike,—equal in birth and pretensions, ...
— The Caxtons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... gentleman quite well at the time—that it was not Sue at all that he longed for at this precise moment, even though he hurried to meet her. It was more the WOMAN IN HER—the something that satisfied his inner nature when he was with her—her coy touches of confidence, her artless outbursts of admiration, looking up in his face as she spoke, the dimples playing about the corners of her mouth. He revelled in all those subtle flatteries and cajoleries, and in all the arts ...
— The Fortunes of Oliver Horn • F. Hopkinson Smith
... her aunt's house, not expecting to meet him, and the lover had had an opportunity of speaking his mind freely. She also had spoken hers freely. She would not engage herself to him without her father's consent. With that consent she would do so,—oh, so willingly! She did not coy her love. He might be certain that she would give herself to no one else. Her heart was entirely his. But she had pledged herself to her father, and on no consideration would she break that pledge. She went on to say that after what had passed she thought that they had better ...
— The Prime Minister • Anthony Trollope
... sentimental, which means, of course, I was thinking about you. And then I imagined this whole scene—only a little different; I in this dress, and you at my feet, worshipping me and calling me all sorts of sweet names. And I was coy and held back!" ...
— Cleo The Magnificent - The Muse of the Real • Louis Zangwill
... summer's heat More thirst for drink than she for this good turn. 92 Her help she sees, but help she cannot get; She bathes in water, yet her fire must burn: 'O! pity,' 'gan she cry, 'flint-hearted boy: 'Tis but a kiss I beg; why art thou coy? 96 ...
— Venus and Adonis • William Shakespeare
... unpuritanic days lovers keep late hours; and as I listened to the wooing of fair Brooklyn by the eloquent son[1] of New York I thought we might be here till papa turned out the gas. Brooklyn is a New England maiden and a trifle coy, and it may take even more than an hour's pleading and persuasive wooing to win her. [Applause.] You ask me, sir, to turn our thoughts back from these considerations of pressing and immediate problems, from discussion ...
— Modern Eloquence: Vol II, After-Dinner Speeches E-O • Various
... no good in't. Its outside also they must beautify, When in it there's scarce common honesty. Their bodies they must have tricked up and trim, Their inside full of filth up to the brim. Upon their clothes there must not be a spot, But is their lives more than one common blot. How nice, how coy are some about their diet, That can their crying souls with hogs'-meat quiet. All drest must to a hair be, else 'tis naught, While of the living bread they have no thought. Thus for their outside they ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... street turned off from the road, and saying in a low tone, "This way," she led Diodoros, to his surprise, into the shadow. His heart beat high. Did she, whose coy and maidenly austerity before and after the intoxication of the dance had vouchsafed him hardly a kind look or a clasp of the hand-did she even yearn for some tender embrace alone and in darkness? Did the quiet, modest girl, who, since she had ceased to be a child, had but rarely given ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... found him obdurate. West was then deputed to wait upon the greatest English painter, and to leave no means untried in the way of persuading him to join the new association. For a time Reynolds was cold and coy enough, but influenced at last by the allurement of probable knighthood, or the force of other arguments, he permitted himself to be carried in West's coach to the meeting at Wilton's. He was at once declared president; ...
— Art in England - Notes and Studies • Dutton Cook
... it is customary for the ladies to be seated first at the refreshment-table, where the most substantial articles of diet are boiled ham with sugar frosting, cakes flavored with the native lime, and lemon soda. Like the coy nun in Chaucer's "Prologue," she who is most elegant will take care not to spill the food upon her lap, eat with the fingers, or spit out the bones. At wedding feasts the gentlemen are given preference at ...
— The Great White Tribe in Filipinia • Paul T. Gilbert
... gay and attentive as I suppose he was on the journey—this is how they speak of it—and made one or two quite risque jokes down the ear trumpet, and Aunt Maria blushed and looked so coy. Apparently she had had hysterics at Folkestone originally—did you have them when you married, Mamma? I never thought of such a thing when Harry and I—but I did not mean to speak of him again. Aunt Maria wears the same shaped bonnet now as she did then, and strangely enough ...
— Elizabeth Visits America • Elinor Glyn
... joy, In songbirds trill, in flowerlets coy, Shall we, also, voices raise, Sing our gentle spring ...
— Ohio Arbor Day 1913: Arbor and Bird Day Manual - Issued for the Benefit of the Schools of our State • Various
... she said. Why should she hesitate, and play the coy girl, and pretend to any doubts in her mind which did not exist there? She did love him, and had so told herself with much earnestness. To him, while his words had been doubtful while he had simply played at making love to her, she had given no hint of the state of her affections. ...
— The Belton Estate • Anthony Trollope
... join'd, Spur thee to deeds of pith, where courage, tried In Reason's court, is amply justified: Or, fond of knowledge, and averse to strife, Shouldst thou prefer the calmer walk of life; Shouldst thou, by pale and sickly study led, Pursue coy Science to the fountain-head; Virtue thy guide, and public good thy end, Should every thought to our improvement tend, 40 To curb the passions, to enlarge the mind, Purge the sick Weal, and humanise mankind; Rage in her eye, and malice in her breast, ...
— Poetical Works • Charles Churchill
... fix upon any cause to which female delicacy is to be ascribed. If we attend, however, to the whole animal creation, if we consider it attentively wherever it falls under our observation, it will discover to us, that in the female there is a greater degree of delicacy or coy reserve than in the male. Is not this a proof, that, through the wide extent of creation, the seeds of delicacy are more liberally bestowed upon ...
— Sketches of the Fair Sex, in All Parts of the World • Anonymous
... Nor loose Anacreon E'er taught so bold assuming of the bays When they deserv'd no praise. To rail men into approbation Is new to your's alone: And prospers not: for known, Fame is as coy, as you Can be disdainful; and who dares to prove A rape on her shall gather ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli
... might have it" He paused, as though expecting an answer. But she had not yet quite made up her mind. Had she known her mind, she would have answered him frankly. She was quite resolved as to that. If she could once bring herself to give him her hand, she would not coy it for a moment. "I will be your wife, Larry." That was the form on which she had determined, should she find herself able to yield. But she had not brought herself to it as yet. "If you can take me, Mary, you will,—well,—save me from lifelong misery, ...
— The American Senator • Anthony Trollope
... "She is very coy," said the emperor. "All my gold and diamonds have won me not a smile—she will not yield up her secret. But I believe that she has responded to the love of one happy ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... by the chatrynge pye. Whiche doth hyr nest and byrdes also betraye By hyr grete chatterynge, clamoure dyn and crye Ryght so these folys theyr owne foly bewraye. But touchynge wymen of them I wyll nought say They can nat speke, but ar as coy and styll As the horle wynde or clapper ...
— The Ship of Fools, Volume 1 • Sebastian Brandt
... yet The best, when Noey brought him, for a pet, A little flying-squirrel, with great eyes— Big as a child's: And, childlike otherwise, It was at first a timid, tremulous, coy, Retiring little thing that dodged the boy And tried to keep in Noey's pocket;—till, In time, responsive to his patient will, It became wholly docile, and content With its new master, as he came and went,— The squirrel ...
— A Child-World • James Whitcomb Riley
... Coy was their look, but true their pleasure, While the maidens listed the woodman's measure; Nor shrunk they at laughter of herdsman or hind, But mixed with the mirth, ...
— The Baron's Yule Feast: A Christmas Rhyme • Thomas Cooper
... the Heavenly flame; he had lasted the Waters of Inspiration: he had drained the Crystal Cup of Fancy, finding therein neither Lees nor Dregs, which bite the tongue, stifle the song, of lesser Men; he had reverently kissed the coy hand of Fame, when she had crowned his Worthy Brow, with her Wreath Immortal! His Poems, homely, simple, sweet—springing from the lap of Nature—had spread, like wild-fire of the Forest, into the Four Quarters ...
— A Spray of Kentucky Pine • George Douglass Sherley
... And I was unwilling to force the matter for fear of losing entirely that coy and canny fish. I did get him, though, to let me rewrite the line last month, so as to include some property not at first insured, and that ties it up until next April. And maybe before next April comes around, the hard-hearted ...
— White Ashes • Sidney R. Kennedy and Alden C. Noble
... windows, when I heard my daughter scream in the kitchen. Whereupon I straightway ran in thither, and was shocked and affrighted when I saw the sheriff himself standing in the corner with his arm round my child her neck; he, however, presently let her go, and said, "Aha, reverend Abraham, what a coy little fool you have for a daughter! I wanted to greet her with a kiss, as I always used to do, and she struggled and cried out as if I had been some young fellow who had stolen in upon her, whereas I might ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V2 • William Mienhold
... burrow, called an earth, belonging to somebody else, for he has very lax morals concerning property, and a great idea that right is established by possession. If he should be caught and put in confinement, he is very ferocious, or dies of ennui; but he is much too coy and clever to be easily entrapped. His cry is a sort of yelp, which, however, he is much too cautious to utter when ...
— Anecdotes of the Habits and Instinct of Animals • R. Lee
... am he, And just as warm as he is chilling; Imagine, too, that thou art she, But quite as coy ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... a coy reference to Pyrrhus, who was murdered while his marriage to Hector's widow was being celebrated with royal pomp. As he fell, it will be remembered, the King placed his crown upon ...
— The Palmy Days of Nance Oldfield • Edward Robins
... a bird of prey, All tense the muscles of her seemly flanks; She, the coy creature that the idle day Sees idly riding in the ...
— Silverpoints • John Gray
... moment a short knock sounded on the back door, and an instant change came over Becky Boozer. It was impossible to imagine that anyone as ponderous as Becky could be coy, but at the sound of the knock, this is what she became. Wiping her hands hastily on one of many petticoats, she pushed and pulled at her hat (which remained immovable), straightened her fichu, and smoothing her dress, ...
— Mr. Wicker's Window • Carley Dawson
... she returned, with a coy, sidelong look from her mild blue eyes, and then, at last, she shut ...
— The Wilderness Trail • Frank Williams
... woman" who "stoops to folly"—nor woman who in our hour of ease is uncertain, coy, and hard to please. But Woman, the weekly Woman who is doing uncommonly well and in her fifty-third number, gave the week before Christmas, her idea of a Christmas dinner, and, but for "sweetbread cutlets," a very good and simple dinner it was. The same Woman gave also, among ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100., January 3, 1891. • Various
... The phrase is Marvell's. 'Cf. To his Coy Mistress' (a favourite poem of Tennyson's), "my vegetable ...
— The Early Poems of Alfred Lord Tennyson • Tennyson
... citizens in each. The instruction of Congress on this important point is much to be desired. For my part I think a temporary stipulation of that sort might be expedient. They mean to court us and in my opinion we should avoid being either too forward or too coy. I have no faith in any Court in Europe, but it would be improper to discover that sentiment. There are circumstances which induce me to believe, that Spain is turning her eyes to England for a more intimate connexion. They are the only two European powers, which have ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. VIII • Various
... would be but little set by; for what greater matter is there in "I will in no wise cast out," if another stood by that could receive them? But here appears the glory of Christ, that none but he can save. And here appears his love, that though none can save but he, yet he is not coy in saving. "But him that comes to me," says he, "I will ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... lovers who had been so coy, They hardly knew whether they loved or not, 650 Would rise out of their rest, and take sweet joy, To the fulfilment of their inmost thought; And when next day the maiden and the boy Met one another, both, like sinners ...
— The Witch of Atlas • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... enjoyed things—the coy tremble of the tiller and the backwash of air from the dingy mainsail, and, with a somewhat chastened rapture, the lunch which Davies brought up to me and solicitously ...
— Riddle of the Sands • Erskine Childers
... but requir'd with gentle sway, And by her yielded, by him best receiv'd,— Yielded with coy submission, modest pride, And sweet, reluctant, ...
— Familiar Quotations • John Bartlett
... poetical, but once commonly applied to gaudiness in dress, has given Gerrish. Quaint, which has so many meanings intermediate between its etymological sense of known or familiar (Lat. cognitus) and its present sense of unusual or unfamiliar, survives as Quint. But Coy is usually local, ...
— The Romance of Names • Ernest Weekley
... gave him one of those shy, timid glances he had noticed before, and began coiling something around her fingers, with a suggestion of coy embarrassment, indescribably inconsistent with her ...
— Tales of Trail and Town • Bret Harte
... bed, she clung still more fondly to Wilhelm, and murmured in coy and halting tones—"Perhaps you have not noticed that everything in this room, except the altar and the priedieu, is new; I had this fresh little nest arranged for us while we were in St. Valery. I hope our rest may be sweet and our ...
— The Malady of the Century • Max Nordau
... which kept the cold from her heart, her waist round as a young oak and all fresh and clean and pretty, like the first frost, green and tender as an April bud; in fact, she resembled all that is prettiest in the world. She had eyes of a modest and virtuous blue, with a look more coy than that of the Virgin, for she was less forward, never ...
— Droll Stories, Complete - Collected From The Abbeys Of Touraine • Honore de Balzac
... cannot: Heaven has bent me down. To you, Paolo, I could look, however, Were my hump made a mountain. Bless him, God! Pour everlasting bounties on his head! Make Croesus jealous of his treasury, Achilles of his arms, Endymion Of his fresh beauties,—though the coy one lay, Blushing beneath Diana's earliest kiss, On grassy Latmos; and may every good, Beyond man's sight, though in the ken of heaven, Round his fair fortune to a perfect end! O, you have dried the sorrow of my eyes; My heart is beating with ...
— Representative Plays by American Dramatists: 1856-1911: Francesca da Rimini • George Henry Boker
... reflected hue To purple changed Loch Katrine blue; Mildly and soft the western breeze Just kissed the lake, just stirred the trees, And the pleased lake, like maiden coy, Trembled but dimpled not for joy The mountain-shadows on her breast Were neither broken nor at rest; In bright uncertainty they lie, Like future joys to Fancy's eye. The water-lily to the light Her chalice reared of silver bright; The doe awoke, and to the lawn, Begemmed ...
— The Lady of the Lake • Sir Walter Scott
... is love, sings Corydon, Since Phyllida is grown so coy? A flattering glass to gaze upon, A busy jest, a serious toy, A flower still budding, never blown, A scanty dearth in fullest store Yielding least fruit where most is sown. My daily note shall be therefore— Heigh ho, chil love ...
— Lyrics from the Song-Books of the Elizabethan Age • Various
... I see early pricks the tree that will prove a thorn: hath my familiar conversing with you made you coy,[1] or my good looks drawn you to be thus contemptuous? I can quickly remedy such a fault, and I will bend the tree while it is a wand. In faith, sir boy, I have a snaffle for such a headstrong colt. You, sirs, lay hold on him and bind him, and then I will give him ...
— Rosalynde - or, Euphues' Golden Legacy • Thomas Lodge
... love with Mr. Ryde," says Monica, sweetly, with averted face and a coy air, assumed for ...
— Rossmoyne • Unknown
... had a faint heart, young as he was, but he had been dealing with an exceedingly coy and high-spirited mistress. However, even she had not been able to defy the effect of the last month of incessant intercourse, of being engrossed in common with one object of interest, when both had hung, as it were, on a man's failing breath, and were indissolubly linked while it lasted. In the ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Sarah Tytler
... my knowledge, I deem it my duty to call a special meeting of the shareholders of 'The Island Navigation Coy.,' to consider circumstances in connection with the purchase of Mr. Joseph Pillin's fleet. And I give you notice that at this meeting your conduct ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... the little white hands more tightly in his own, and whispered sweet words to her that brought a bright flush to her face and a love light to her eyes. She drooped her head with the coy, pretty shyness of a bird, listening to words that seemed to her ...
— Marion Arleigh's Penance - Everyday Life Library No. 5 • Charlotte M. Braeme
... head, to Surya he said, "Soon as thy maiden sister Di Caps with her copper lid the dark blue sky, And through the fissures of her clouded fan Peeps at the naughty monster man. Go mount yon edifice, And show thy steady face In renovated pride, More bright, more glorious than before!" But ah! coy Surya still felt a twinge, Still smarted from his former singe; And to Veeshnoo replied, In a tone rather gruff, "No, thank you! one ...
— Rejected Addresses: or, The New Theatrum Poetarum • James and Horace Smith
... few good jokes, but is mostly elaboration. Opus 8 is a fiery romanza appassionata. Opus 9 is a Scherzo-Caprice. This is probably his best work. It is dedicated to Liszt, and though extremely brilliant, is full of meaning. It has an interlude of tender romance. "Coy Maiden" is a graceful thing, but hardly deserves the punishment of so horrible a name. "A Gypsy Dance" is too long, but it is of good material. It has an interesting metre, three-quarter time with the first note dotted. There is a good effect gained ...
— Contemporary American Composers • Rupert Hughes
... was a sure winner from the first, for he had learned to draw his sword, wave it dramatically over his head, cheer for a few seconds in monkey talk, then break and dash to the rear. "Paterno" was an easy candidate for second honors. He gave a giddy dance and looked coy. ...
— Bamboo Tales • Ira L. Reeves
... the north, addressed, in pale, sprawling characters, to Skipper Tommy Lovejoy of our harbour—a crumpled, greasy, ill-odoured missive: little enough like a letter from a lady, bearing (as we supposed) a coy appeal to ...
— Doctor Luke of the Labrador • Norman Duncan
... among the unchiseled palaces and temples where Nature pays homage in the courts of the Divine Architect, I dismiss all modes of conveyance, and with well-nailed shoes, rough clothes, a staff, and a lunch, I take the kingdom by force. When once in, I am royally entertained; for though coy and apparently hard to woo, Nature is a most delightful companion when ...
— Trail Tales • James David Gillilan
... Ingeborg, If thou wilt not be coy and cold, A shirt, I trow, for me thou’lt sew, And array that shirt ...
— Marsk Stig - a ballad - - - Translator: George Borrow • Thomas J. Wise
... environs will please you no less. The country immediately surrounding it is ravishing; the hedges are full of flowers, honeysuckles, roses, box, and many enchanting plants. It is like an English garden, designed by some great architect. This rich, coy nature, so untrodden, with all the grace of a bunch of violets or a lily of the valley in the glade of a forest, is framed by an African desert banked by the ocean,—a desert without a tree, an herb, a bird; where, on ...
— Beatrix • Honore de Balzac
... to him in public as His Reverence!" Olive sighed. "It is almost as bad as her coy flirtation with him, during sermon time. If I were in his place, I'd ...
— The Brentons • Anna Chapin Ray
... effort at individual character, but as being one of the oldest pieces founded on a classic original; the author claiming, in his prologue, to have taken "Plautus' first comedy" as his model. Master Bongrace sends his lacquey Jenkin to Dame Coy, his lady-love; but Jenkin loiters to play at dice and steal apples. Jack Juggler, who enacts the Vice, watches him, gets on some clothes just like his, and undertakes to persuade him "that he is not himself, but another ...
— Shakespeare: His Life, Art, And Characters, Volume I. • H. N. Hudson
... upon this flowery bed, While I thy amiable cheeks do coy, And stick musk roses in thy sleek, smooth, head, And kiss thy fair, large ears, ...
— Sunny Memories Of Foreign Lands, Volume 1 (of 2) • Harriet Elizabeth (Beecher) Stowe
... Even Pearl had her own ideas, as was once shown in a confidence when they were alone in Stephen's bedroom after helping her to finish her dressing, just as Stephen herself had at a similar age helped her Uncle Gilbert. After some coy leading up to the subject of pretty dresses, the child putting her little mouth to ...
— The Man • Bram Stoker
... the inspired train, Fair Saccharissa loved, but loved in vain; Like Phoebus sung the no less am'rous boy; Like Daphne she, as lovely, and as coy! With numbers he the flying nymph pursues, With numbers such as Phoebus' self might use! Such is the chase when Love and Fancy leads, O'er craggy mountains, and through flow'ry meads; Invoked to testify the lover's care, Or form some image of his cruel fair. 10 Urged with his fury, like a wounded ...
— Poetical Works of Edmund Waller and Sir John Denham • Edmund Waller; John Denham
... Coy, silent Monster, Matron of the fields, I sing to you; And all the fondest love that summer yields I bring to you; Yet there you squat, immense in your disdain, Heedless of all the tears of streaming rain My eyes drip over you—your breathless swain; ...
— A Prisoner in Fairyland • Algernon Blackwood
... standing so as to be completely hidden by the door: and Marvel, not seeing his friend, addressed himself, as soon as he had breath, to his mistress.—The lady's manner changed, and Wright had an opportunity of seeing and admiring her powers of acting. To Marvel, she was coy and disdainful. ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth
... you preach last Sunday," she said, glowing with interest. He began to look coy. Then her voice changed to something colder than the wind. "The most lamentable sairmon I ever listened to. Neither lairning nor inspiration. And ...
— The Judge • Rebecca West
... from James West, the first of April last a servant man, named Willis M'Coy, a small short fellow, his right eye looks red; he had on when he went away, a blue jacket and a striped flannel jacket under it, a pair of trowsers, and under them a pair of cloth breeches, too long for him, and were ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Vol. I. Jan. 1916 • Various
... trots with a jog, jog, jog, And a jog, jog, jog; and a jog, jog, jog. And the old road makes a little jog, jog, jog, To the west, jog, jog; and the north, jog, jog. While the farmer drinks some cider from his jug, jug, jug, From his coy jug, jug; from his joy jug, jug. Till he accumulates a little jag, jag, jag, And he jigs, jigs, jigs, with his ...
— Free Air • Sinclair Lewis
... won't? Never mind, now. There's a time coming when you'll not be so coy, and when I shan't any longer kneel supplicating you. For know, Nell, you're completely in my power, and I can command, do with you what I will. I don't intend any harm, nor mean to be at all unkind. It'll be your own fault ...
— The Death Shot - A Story Retold • Mayne Reid
... The dance goes on; hearts are beating, wit is flashing, eyes encounter eyes with the leveled lances of their beams, merriment and joy and sudden bright surprises thrill the breast, voices are throwing off disguise, and beauty's coy ear is bending with a venturesome docility; here love is baffled, there deceived, yonder takes prisoners and here surrenders. The very air seems to breathe, to sigh, to laugh, while the musicians, with disheveled locks, streaming brows ...
— The Grandissimes • George Washington Cable |
