"Dancing" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... dear Major, are naturally dear to a girl's heart," continued Uncle John, musingly; "and we who are not girls have no right to condemn their natural longings. Girls love dancing, pink teas and fudge-parties, and where can they find 'em in all their perfection but in high society? Girls love admiration and flirtations—you do, my dears; you can't deny it—and the male society swells have the most time to ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces in Society • Edith Van Dyne
... grow alarmingly long in the wick,—comparative darkness involves the sage assembly,—and first one, then another, drops off into a placid and harmonious repose. Then what dreams float before the eyes of their imagination! Blue silk pelisses jostling shovel hats, church spires dancing in most admired disorder, fat incumbents falling down in a fit, neat clerical-looking gigs standing at vicarage doors, and these all incongruously commingled with white veils, lawn sleeves, roast ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 13, - Issue 350, January 3, 1829 • Various
... we were still in full enjoyment of sunny France, where, in our own experience, it had rained two months steadily. Indeed, at this moment it was raining, raining a steady, cold, sodden drizzle that had not even the grace to pick out the surface of the harbour in the jolly dancing staccato that goes far to lend attraction to ...
— African Camp Fires • Stewart Edward White
... familiar. "That's about the ticket, I think, my lady. Yes, just so. I found a nice old hag waiting to claim her five pounds reward; for, you see, the men at the police-office at Murford Haven contrived to keep her dancing attendance backward and forwards—call again in an hour, and so on—till I was there to cross-question her. A precious deep one she is, too; and a regular jail-bird, I'll wager. I soon reckoned her up; and I ...
— Run to Earth - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... curious way of changing their location by means of opening their shells and then closing them with great force, which sends them off at an angle, and so they go dancing along the bottom till they reach a spot that suits them. This shell-fish forms a beautiful ...
— Harper's Young People, August 17, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... cushions. At the far end of the room was a slightly-raised dais, to the corner of which the grand piano had been pushed, on the top of which, with its braying trumpet pointing straight at Lucia was an immense gramophone. On the dais was Olga dancing. She was dressed in some white soft fabric shimmering with silver, which left her beautiful arms bare to the shoulder. It was cut squarely and simply about the neck, and hung in straight folds down to just above her ankles. She held in her hands ...
— Queen Lucia • E. F. Benson
... with eight, and Aswatthaman with seven shafts. And Bhurisrava pierced him with three shafts and the ruler of the Madras with six. And Sakuni pierced him with two, and king Duryodhana with three shafts. The valiant Abhimanyu, however, O king, seemingly dancing on his car, pierced each of those warriors in return with three shafts. Then Abhimanyu, filled with rage in consequence of thy sons' endeavouring to frighten him thus, displayed the wonderful strength he had acquired from ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 2 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... at the Median Court, observing the unwarlike temper of the existing generation of the Medes, who had not seen any actual service, and despising the personal character of the monarch, who led a luxurious life, chiefly at Ecbatana, amid eunuchs, concubines, and dancing-girls, resolved on raising the standard of rebellion, and seeking at any rate to free his own country. It may be suspected that the Persian prince was not actuated solely by political motives. To earnest Zoroastrians, ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 3. (of 7): Media • George Rawlinson
... Prissy with her enamel snuff-box, bearing an exact representation of that ugly building of St. James's; and Fiddy with her "equipage"—scissors, tablets, and all, chased and wreathed with tiny pastorals, shepherds reclining and piping on sylvan banks, and shepherds and shepherdesses dancing on velvet lawns. ...
— Girlhood and Womanhood - The Story of some Fortunes and Misfortunes • Sarah Tytler
... his feet. During the repast, the guests reclined on couches with pillows, among and along which were set small tables. After the solid meal came the "symposium" proper, a scene of music, merriment, and dancing, the two latter being supplied chiefly by young girls. There was a chairman, or symposiarch, appointed by the company to regulate the drinking; and it was his duty to mix the wine in the "mighty bowl." From this bowl the ...
— The Book of Household Management • Mrs. Isabella Beeton
... estate, and it was also the largest crop on the island for that year. With these extraordinary stimulants and excitements, operating in connection with the influence of habit, the people were strongly inclined to have a dance. Mr. B. told them that dancing was a bad practice—and a very childish, barbarous amusement, and he thought it was wholly unbecoming freemen. He hoped therefore that they would dispense with it. The negroes could not exactly agree with their manager—and said they did not like to be disappointed in their expected sport. Mr. ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... active Jack was climbing the rocks to gather some of these figs; but he had not remarked that they were covered with thousands of slender thorns, finer than the finest needles, which terribly wounded his fingers. He returned, weeping bitterly and dancing with pain. Having rallied him a little for his greediness, I extracted the thorns, and then showed him how to open the fruit, by first cutting off the pointed end, as it lay on the ground; into this I fixed a piece of stick, and then ...
— The Swiss Family Robinson; or Adventures in a Desert Island • Johann David Wyss
... in this country might well justify the exclamation of an ancient philosopher, who thanked God that he was born a man and not a woman. The only employment of girls, till their fourteenth year, is singing, dancing, amusements, attending on children, and fetching water; [57] after which they are taught, by their mothers, to sew, cook, tan the skins of animals, construct houses, and navigate boats. It is common for the men to stand by as idle spectators, while the women ...
— Female Scripture Biographies, Vol. II • Francis Augustus Cox
... Music and dancing had their share in the entertainment. These opened their hearts, already half opened by love: The aunt Forbes, and the lover's sister, kept them open by their own example. The hero sung, vowed, ...
— Clarissa Harlowe, Volume 9 (of 9) - The History Of A Young Lady • Samuel Richardson
... the brightest day you ever saw. The sun is sparkling on the water so that I can hardly bear to look at it. The tide is in, and the fishing boats are dancing like mad. Upon the green-topped cliffs the corn is cut and piled in shocks; and thousands of butterflies are fluttering about, taking the bright little red flags at the mastheads for flowers, and panting with ...
— Dickens-Land • J. A. Nicklin
... first time in months, perhaps, of labor and loneliness on the range. With the gates of good-nature opened, a veritable flood of gaiety burst out. It glittered in their eyes, it rose to their lips in a wild laughter. They seemed to be dancing more furiously fast in order to forget the life which they had left, and ...
— Riders of the Silences • Max Brand
... was no other than Satouriona, of old the ally of the French—that he had come to visit them, make friendship with them, and bring them presents. At this last announcement, so grateful to Indian ears, the dancing was renewed with double zeal. The next morning was named for a grand council. Satouriona sent runners to summon all Indians within call; while Gourgues, for safety, brought his vessels within ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 85, November, 1864 • Various
... upon it in gold letters, lowered a boat, into which four seamen, a coxswain, and a big, black-bearded officer dropped. When the frail craft, propelled by the four sturdy oarsmen, pushed off, and went dancing, light as an empty eggshell, over the purple swell toward the convict ship, the officers on the bridge of which did not fail to note that the crew of the stranger had carefully trained two long, beautifully polished guns and a couple of ...
— The Cruise of the Thetis - A Tale of the Cuban Insurrection • Harry Collingwood
... nails which were cut off in life and the clothes that were worn, and these images are as much venerated by those people as if they were their gods. Frequently they take the [body] out into the plaza with music and dancing, and they always stay close to it, day and night, driving away the flies. When some important lords come to see the cacique, they go first to salute these figures, and they then go to the cacique ...
— An Account of the Conquest of Peru • Pedro Sancho
... the state of affairs. He pitied Le Gardeur, and excused him, speaking most kindly of him in a way that touched the heart of Amelie. The ball went on with unflagging spirit and enjoyment. The old walls fairly vibrated with the music and dancing of the ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... immediately acquiring a wife or two and settling down for the good of the tribe—all this in the intervals of drinking coffee, listening to the most monotonous native music and watching barbaric dances. There was one particularly well-made dancing girl that the old man tried to induce Ahmed to buy, and he made a show of bargaining for her—not from any real interest he took in her, but merely to see the effect that it would have on me. But I refused to be ...
— The Sheik - A Novel • E. M. Hull
... had again made itself felt in his foot. She had eagerly lamented it, and in doing so deplored the fact that she would never be permitted to share the pleasure of dancing with the man she loved and who had first taught her how beautiful life was. This perhaps incautious remark had roused the ire of ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... glad with morning light; places that had shown ugly and distrustful all night long, now wore a smile; and sparkling sunbeams dancing on chamber windows, and twinkling through blind and curtain before sleepers' eyes, shed light even into dreams, and chased away the shadows of the night. Birds in hot rooms, covered up close and dark, felt it was morning, and chafed and grew restless in their little cells; bright-eyed ...
— The Old Curiosity Shop • Charles Dickens
... with a little thrill of laughter—laughter of silly joy. She hugged him closer. "Been away a long time this time," she said. "Quite a sailor, ain't you?... Did you have rough weather? Ship all sloppy with the waves? And you dancing about to ...
— Coquette • Frank Swinnerton
... who speak of what they do not understand; who talk of Poetry as of a matter of amusement and idle pleasure; who will converse with us as gravely about a taste for Poetry, as they express it, as if it were a thing as indifferent as a taste for rope-dancing, or Frontiniac or Sherry. Aristotle, I have been told, has said, that Poetry is the most philosophic of all writing: it is so: its object is truth, not individual and local, but general, and operative; not standing upon external testimony, but carried alive into the heart by passion; ...
— Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books - with Introductions, Notes and Illustrations • Charles W. Eliot
... agilely in the darkness, like shining fleas. These approached the river bank, and gathered there. Then the assembled lights began to come toward the house. You could now see these lights were carried by dwarfs who had the eyes of owls and the long beaks of storks. These dwarfs were jumping and dancing about Freydis like ...
— Figures of Earth • James Branch Cabell
... "You are all in all to me. You know it. Oh, very well do you know and abuse your power, you adorable and lovely baggage, who have kept me dancing attendance for a fortnight, without ever giving me an honest yes or no." He gesticulated. "Well, but life is very dull in Deptford village, and it amuses you to twist a Queen's adviser around your finger! I see it plainly, you minx, and I acquiesce because, it delights me ...
— O Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1919 • Various
... the rest laughed and shouted, and begged to be blindfolded, sure that they could do it. Mr. Reed gave each a chance in turn, but each failed as absurdly as Josie. Finally, by acclamation, the bandage was put over Dorothy's dancing eyes, though she was sure she never, never could—and lo! after revolving like a lovely Chinese top, the blindfolded damsel, with a spring, and one long, vigorous stroke, tore the bag open from one side to the other. ...
— Donald and Dorothy • Mary Mapes Dodge
... were designed by A. Stirling Calder and John Bateman, while the spandrels over the curve of the portals are the work of Albert Weinert, as are also the graceful, classic vases on either side of the entrances, the latter banded in low relief by dancing bacchanalian figures, while grinning satyr heads finish the curved handles. In the arch of the doorways, are three fine mural paintings, harmonizing in subject and coloring with the spirit of the Court—"Fruit and Flowers," by Childe Hassam, on the West, "The Pursuit of Pleasure," by Charles ...
— The Architecture and Landscape Gardening of the Exposition • Louis Christian Mullgardt
... had a chorus or refrain in which every one joined. But by degrees the refrain was dropped and the dancing too. Now we think of a ballad as a simple story told in verse. Sometimes it is merry, but more ...
— English Literature For Boys And Girls • H.E. Marshall
... lifelike than any others that I have seen on antique vases. Some of these inlaid pictures represent love-scenes with a childlike simplicity and freedom of manner which would not commend itself to the taste of the present day. Others again give pictures of maidens dancing, and yet others of hunting-scenes. For instance, the very vase from which we were then drinking had on one side a most spirited drawing of men, apparently white in colour, attacking a bull-elephant with spears, while on the reverse was a picture, not quite so well done, of a hunter shooting an arrow ...
— She • H. Rider Haggard
... that their Congresses met, to adopt a policy which terminated in the conquest of the country south of it—it was there that the tramping feet of thousands of plumed and painted warriors shook Pe-quod-e-non-ge, while dancing their war dances—it was from there that the startling sound of the war yell of these thousands was wafted to the adjacent coast and islands, making the peaceful welkin ring with their unearthly shouts of victory or death. In process of time a Chapel and Fort were erected, and it became ...
— Old Mackinaw - The Fortress of the Lakes and its Surroundings • W. P. Strickland
... died about the same time, and was buried in his own quiet yard, in the little village that had been the theatre of his life. That young form that had been educated for the express purpose of dancing on his grave, was tossing beneath the tumultuous waves of the briny ocean, ...
— Withered Leaves from Memory's Garland • Abigail Stanley Hanna
... than he won from them, but it was these infrequent winnings that encouraged him. He believed that some day he would make a big "killing"; the thought of that was ever before him, beckoning him on like the dancing will-o'-the-wisp. He took no note of the fact that these bland gentlemen could pocket their losings as well as their winnings. It was part of their trade to suffer loss. They had everything to gain and nothing to lose, so ...
— Viola Gwyn • George Barr McCutcheon
... by Heaven, a lovely eve! Long streams of light o'er dancing waves expand! Now lads on shore may sigh, and maids believe: Such be our fate when we return to land! Meantime some rude Arion's restless hand Wakes the brisk harmony that sailors love: A circle there of merry listeners ...
— Childe Harold's Pilgrimage • Lord Byron
... a glass which showed the figures of many more, and Banquo, all bloody, smiled upon Macbeth, and pointed to them; by which Macbeth knew that these were the posterity of Banquo, who should reign after him in Scotland; and the witches, with a sound of soft music, and with dancing, making a show of duty and welcome to Macbeth, vanished. And from this time the thoughts of Macbeth were all bloody and dreadful. The first thing he heard when he got out of the witches' cave was that Macduff, Thane of Fife, had fled to ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb
... the subject of the outing, and did not again refer to it till the evening before the fete. Estelle had been very eager to see the dancing at the Fontaine des Eaux, which was to begin at six o'clock that evening. Mrs. Wright had consented, and both were ready to start by five. It was quite half an hour's walk, but the way being on level ground ...
— Chatterbox, 1906 • Various
... sensuous, tropical night. There was dancing in the saloon, and the glare from the skylight and the banging of the piano and chatter of voices gave forth strange contrast to the awesome stillness of the great liquid plain, the dewy richness of ...
— The Sign of the Spider • Bertram Mitford
... sisters had never been so much together in their lives as they were when the time came to demolish the old home. Sally, with a train of dancing children, came up every morning after breakfast, and she and Martie and Lydia patiently plodded through store-rooms, attics, and closets that had not ...
— Martie the Unconquered • Kathleen Norris
... pale-faced, tender-eyed Maria Zerega who had died of the plague, and the baby, the boy. Jamaica, too, swept into his vision. There was his wife shrinking away from him in the very articles of death. There was young Ebenezer Hornigold, dancing right merrily upon the gallows together with others of the ...
— Sir Henry Morgan, Buccaneer - A Romance of the Spanish Main • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... me to mention a third point of resemblance between Moses and Christ. Moses was the great intercessor when the Israelites sinned: while he was in the mount, his people corrupted themselves; they set up an idol, and honoured it with feasting and dancing. Then God would have cut them off from the land of promise, had not Moses interposed. He said, "Lord, why doth Thy wrath wax hot against Thy people? Turn from Thy fierce wrath, and repent of this evil against Thy people[12]." In this way ...
— Parochial and Plain Sermons, Vol. VII (of 8) • John Henry Newman
... vines and weeds. Still moving forward one reaches Olympus, and climbing to its heights, one sees away below, in the far distance, the Coast Range—like a rampart of strength; the blue waters of the bay, sparkling and dancing in the sunlight—steamers flashing their path on its bosom; and tiny white specks scudding in the breeze. Below is the city, its houses, small, and closed in, like toy villages in Christmas boxes; whilst the slopes around are green with fresh ...
— The Sorcery Club • Elliott O'Donnell
... the book that she kept on a system of double entry a clean blank page for Monsieur Rouault. But when she heard he had a daughter, she began to make inquiries, and she learnt the Mademoiselle Rouault, brought up at the Ursuline Convent, had received what is called "a good education"; and so knew dancing, geography, drawing, how to embroider and play the piano. ...
— Madame Bovary • Gustave Flaubert
... to me it must have been burned on my memory as though you'd take a red hot poker and make marks on the clean kitchen floor. When I shut my eyes nights and try to go to sleep it keeps dancing in front of me. Before I know what I'm doing I find myself grabbing out for it, and then I want to kick myself for being so foolish, when I know it's all just a ...
— The Boy Scouts of Lenox - Or The Hike Over Big Bear Mountain • Frank V. Webster
... have known men who, while they were smirking, and smiling, and telling other lies to their partners, were keeping the calendar of the whole room,—knew who was dancing with whom, and who was looking at pictures, and that Brown had sent up to the lady of the house to tell her that supper was served, and that she was just looking for her husband that he might offer Mrs. Grant his arm and take her down stairs. But do you think their partners ...
— How To Do It • Edward Everett Hale
... ladies and five gentlemen, (the latter with handkerchiefs around their arms to signify their sex.) who timed their feet to the solemn wheezing of a melodeon; but even this melancholy orgie was voted to be sinful, and dancing was discontinued. ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... great quickening and life-sustaining power in nature, the god who presided over the labours of the husbandman and granted the increase; his crowning attribute, strength; worshipped on hill-tops with sacrifices, incense, and dancing. Baal-worship, being that of the Canaanites, was for a time mixed up with the worship of Jehovah in Israel, and at one time threatened to swamp it, but under the zealous preaching of the prophets ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... planted, or when from Nature's own laws they were reproduced without the aid of man, was the occasion of thanksgiving and rejoicing with general merry-making and general good-will. Again, in harvest time there was feasting and rejoicing and music and dancing; and we have no reason to believe that this very natural method of showing their gratitude and their happiness was accompanied by any ...
— Sex=The Unknown Quantity - The Spiritual Function of Sex • Ali Nomad
... that there was a troop of elephants doing tap dancing up here. But that isn't the point—just what are ...
— Ralestone Luck • Andre Norton
... sticks over the top, she struck the match across the sole of her shoe, shielded it with her hand, and watched it anxiously. The little blue light quivered, paled, almost went out, and then leaped cheerfully upon a dry leaf, and in an instant the pile was alive with snaps and sparkles and dancing flames. The children gave quite a ...
— Harper's Young People, September 21, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... accidentally occurring, without any set obligation of time or place, and falling naturally into every action, will insensibly insinuate itself. By which means our very exercises and recreations, running, wrestling, music, dancing, hunting, riding, and fencing, will prove to be a good part of our study. I would have his outward fashion and mien, and the disposition of his limbs, formed at the same time with his mind. 'Tis not a soul, 'tis not a body that we are ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne
... Gentleman of the Inner Temple, who besides his other learned Works, hath contributed largely to the Stage, in his Comedies of Love in a Wood, The Gentleman Dancing-Master, The Country ...
— The Lives of the Most Famous English Poets (1687) • William Winstanley
... boat hewn from a single tree, seamless and stoutly fashioned to be the unharmed plaything of such rocks and boisterous waters as these. In these rapids the river waked to consciousness of mighty life, tossing our little craft through a riot of dancing waves, whirling it round the base of perpendicular rocks set like adamant in the hissing waters, sweeping it helpless as a petal down some glassy plane stilled, as it were, into a concentrated wrath of movement. ...
— Apologia Diffidentis • W. Compton Leith
... Mrs. Elliot-Smith good-by," said Rosalind, her eyes still dancing. "She is at the other end of the drawing-room; come, ...
— A Sweet Girl Graduate • Mrs. L.T. Meade
... the dancing girls came, but he paid them no attention, and gradually fell into an uneasy slumber. At midnight he awoke, and sent Channa for his horse. While waiting for the steed Gautama gently opened the door of the room where Yasodhara was sleeping, surrounded by flowers, with one hand on the head of ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1 • Various
... to go home together, which we did, followed by several of the natives. We had not been many minutes at our own village, when Aimy, and his brother also, arrived; and in the evening, a great feast was given to the people by Aimy. During the greater part of the night, the women kept dancing a dance which is called 'Kane-Kane,'[AU] and is seldom performed, except when large parties are met together. While dancing it, they stood all in a row, several of them holding muskets over their heads; and their movements were accompanied by the ...
— John Rutherford, the White Chief • George Lillie Craik
... him from the passage door, telling him that Mr. Thomas FitzHerbert was within. Mr. Fenton was one of these, come over from North Lees, where he had his manor, a brisk, middle-aged man, dressed soberly and well, with a pointed beard and pleasant, dancing eyes. ...
— Come Rack! Come Rope! • Robert Hugh Benson
... postern whereby the mummers would come when their work were done. Thereat they stationed themselves in shadow. A bitter night, with a lather of snow on the cobbles; but they were heedless of that: love and their dancing hearts warmed them. ...
— A Christmas Garland • Max Beerbohm
... craft would be top-heavy and over he would go, as the kayah has no keel and carries no ballast, and if we should try a kayah, it would certainly be on land. But those Greenlanders learn to handle themselves so well that their kayahs will go dancing over the big billows and then fly through a ragged, dangerous surf. From their kayahs, too, they will fight the fierce ...
— Connor Magan's Luck and Other Stories • M. T. W.
... cried Sir Christopher, gloating over it when 'twas past. "There rides my lady like an empress, Devil going as dainty as a dancing-master, and all the grandees doffing hats to her down the line. And of a sudden one man hears hoofs pounding and turns, and there he comes, my lord Duke of Osmonde, and he sees but one creature and ...
— His Grace of Osmonde • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... sad Sunday and this was why a little dancing is not refining. It shows more than just this. It shows balance and continuation and believing in marking and it also does show that some one will settle there. It does mean that. More see the price. That is a pleasant ...
— Matisse Picasso and Gertrude Stein - With Two Shorter Stories • Gertrude Stein
... fires were burning hotly. At these fires they had roasted two horses, and had feasted to satiety. They were now dancing franticly around these fires, brandishing their weapons, shouting their rude songs of defiance and exultation, interspersed with occasional bursts of the shrill and piercing war-whoop. The savages outnumbered the trappers many to one. They were also armed with rifles and ...
— Christopher Carson • John S. C. Abbott
... fresh life and labor. Now and then a flame from Lucifer's torch swallowed up a stretch of morning mist, while the Hours escorted Phoebus Apollo, whose radiant diadem of beams was just rising above the haze; Melissa could have declared she saw them dancing forth before him and strewing the path of the sun with flowers. All this was beautiful—as beautiful as the priest's chant, the aromatic sweetness of the air, and the works of art in cast bronze or hewn marble ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... In her determination to show the world in general, represented then by the two hundred people who were enjoying Lady Kelsey's hospitality, that she, the person most interested, did not for an instant believe what was said about Alec, Lucy had insisted on dancing with him. Alec thought it unwise thus to outrage conventional opinion, but he could not withstand her fiery spirit. Dick and Mrs. Crowley were partners at the time, and the disapproval which Lucy saw in their eyes, made her more vehement in her defiance. She had caught Bobbie's glance, ...
— The Explorer • W. Somerset Maugham
... rich man was invited with his wife to a wedding among their kinsfolk; and among those who were present to do honour to the bridal was the young Lord of Avannes, who was exceedingly fond of dancing, as was natural in one who surpassed therein all others of his time. When dinner was over and the dances were begun, the rich man begged the Lord of Avannes to do his part, whereupon the said lord asked him with whom he ...
— The Tales Of The Heptameron, Vol. III. (of V.) • Margaret, Queen Of Navarre
... husband in expectation of gaining a place on the throne of Constantinople. Ducange, however, rejects the story, and so does Gibbon.] wife of Robert Guiscard, first took upon her to distinguish herself by manly deeds of emprise, and rival her husband, as well in the front of battle as at the dancing-room or banquet." ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott
... and the open space thoroughly swept. Rows of Chinese lanterns, carefully stayed so that the candles should not set them afire, were strung from end to end of the barn. Overhead the beams of three great lanterns were reflected downward upon the dancing-floor. ...
— The Corner House Girls at School • Grace Brooks Hill
... that his blood is a frightful mixture!" said Mrs. Cadwallader. "The Casaubon cuttle-fish fluid to begin with, and then a rebellious Polish fiddler or dancing-master, was ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot
... transitory life, it seemed as a foil to the vast eternal scene. The hanging judge still strutted with his cigar, peering jocosely from under the broad brim of his Panama; the great actor still posed aloof, the human Matterhorn of the group. I descried no showy woman with a tall youth dancing attendance; among the brick-red English faces there was not one that bore the least resemblance to the latest photograph ...
— No Hero • E.W. Hornung
... the women hearing him (many of them were hanging about near the Forum inquisitive to know how the affair would come out) rushed into the assembly denouncing the law; and accordingly, as it was speedily repealed, they put on some ornaments right there in the assembly and went out dancing. ...
— Dio's Rome, Volume 1 (of 6) • Cassius Dio
... will get it for you, and I hope that Madame Millaise will have the mantle ready for you, for I must have it on Monday evening to throw over my shoulders after dancing," Mrs. Montague responded, as she turned back ...
— Mona • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... while the other was covered by a half-dome, and a flight of twelve steps, leading to an alcove in which stood a high wooden couch. The queens and princesses spent their lives in this prison-like bit-riduti: their time was taken up with dress, embroidery, needlework, dancing and singing, the monotony of this routine being relieved by endless quarrels, feuds, and intrigues. The male children remained in the harem until the age of puberty, when they left it in order to continue their education as princes and soldiers under ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 7 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... and it wouldn't crack very easy. So he had to hit it as hard as he could. Somehow he missed it, and smack went the hammer right on his thumb. My goodness! You'd ought to have heard him yell. He hopped up and began dancing around the kitchen, sucking his thumb and trying to swear with his mouth full. Ma says,—this is all she said,—Ma says: 'Did you hit your finger, Lucius?' Pa let fly the hammer. It didn't miss her head a foot. Then he fired ...
— Anderson Crow, Detective • George Barr McCutcheon
... looked up the General had toddled same distance away, and was travelling along as fast as ever his little fat legs would carry him, thinking he was racing her. Just as she, started after him he looked back, his eyes dancing, his face dimpled and ...
— Seven Little Australians • Ethel Sybil Turner
... ice, and with a piteous sigh Dallas drew back and crept to where Abel lay rolled in his rugs. Just then the dancing flame died out, and it was in the pitchy darkness that Dallas felt for his ...
— To Win or to Die - A Tale of the Klondike Gold Craze • George Manville Fenn
... front of the house was lighted, and there were pipes and fiddles, and as much dancing and deray within as used to be in Sir Robert's house at Pace and Yule, and such high seasons."—See Wandering Willie's Tale in Redgauntlet, borrowed perhaps from ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 23 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... democracies in the days of antiquity, in which the citizens met upon the public places with garlands of roses, and spent almost all their time in dancing and theatrical amusements. I do not believe in such republics any more than in that of Plato; or, if the things we read of really happened, I do not hesitate to affirm that these supposed democracies were composed of very different elements from ours, and that they ...
— Democracy In America, Volume 2 (of 2) • Alexis de Tocqueville
... Street up Avenue A. They walked fast; and it seemed suddenly to Joe that he had been dancing on a thin crust, and that the crust had broken and he was falling through. ...
— The Nine-Tenths • James Oppenheim
... doubt have been to good shows, seen good dancing and attractive posing and grouping, with rich scenery, proper lighting and appropriate music, and have wished that you, too, might share in the applause of the audience for your own ...
— The Art of Stage Dancing - The Story of a Beautiful and Profitable Profession • Ned Wayburn
... cinematograph, and waves threw themselves among the rocks with loud gurglings and splashings. The air was suddenly full of the noise and hurry of the waters. He got up and went to the end of the peninsula. In spite of the dancing light upon the surface and the merry sounds of the ripples, the water, he could see, was deep and dark; a little way out a pale smooth stone rose a few feet above the level of it, its top draped in a velvet green shawl of moss. A fat sea-gull sat there; ...
— The Ashiel mystery - A Detective Story • Mrs. Charles Bryce
... stand about in a genially foolish way and greet those whom his wife had invited. And so long as he could maintain his gravity very solemnly and greet people without being required to say much, it was not too painful for him. Singing was indulged in at times, a little dancing on occasion, and there was considerably more "company to dinner," informally, than there had ...
— The Financier • Theodore Dreiser
... plentiful, persistent, drumming on the tightened canvas over our heads, waking us now and then to pleasant thoughts of a rising stream and good water for the morrow. Breaking clouds rolled before the sunrise, and the lake was all a-glitter when we pushed away in dancing canoes to find the outlet. This is one of the problems in which the voyager learns to know something of the infinite reserve, the humorous subtlety, the hide-and-seek quality in nature. Where is it—that mysterious outlet? Behind yonder long point? Nothing here but a narrow ...
— Days Off - And Other Digressions • Henry Van Dyke
... oftenest thought of the people of Stockbridge was that of a team of horses which he was driving. There had been a little runaway, and he had been pitched out on his head. Let him once get his grip on the lines again, and the whip in his hand, and there should be some fine dancing among the leaders, or his name was not Jahleel Woodbridge, Esquire, and the whipping post on the green was nothing but ...
— The Duke of Stockbridge • Edward Bellamy
... eyes, had just ventured to the door with Billy. "We'll just peep," she said to her brother in the gay young tones that penetrated so much further than she realized. "But I shall never dare to dance. Why, I've never even seen the inside of a ballroom before. And as to dancing with a real live man—" She broke off as she caught sight of the two brothers standing together near ...
— Greatheart • Ethel M. Dell
... of fairies; the people worshipped an Idea, and invited the fairy folk to all their parties, as we who are proper here invite the clergy; only the fairy folk did not get behind the door, or leave the room, when dancing commenced. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I., No. 3, January 1858 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various
... the hawk is feinting and darting in his efforts to catch a chicken, and the chickens are dancing defensively, the hen trying ...
— The Mule-Bone: - A Comedy of Negro Life in Three Acts • Zora Hurston and Langston Hughes
... stand beside Cora, in the latter's room, a moment later, her thought seemed warranted. Cora, radiant-eyed, in high bloom, and exquisite from head to foot in a shimmering white dancing-dress, a glittering crescent fastening the silver fillet that bound her vivid hair, was a flame of enchantment. Mrs. Madison, almost weeping with delight, led her daughters proudly, an arm round the ...
— The Flirt • Booth Tarkington
... was again reached they found the babies wide awake and cooing contentedly. Mrs. Morris had dressed them up as best she could, and she was holding one while Rodney held the other. Little Nell was dancing around ...
— On the Trail of Pontiac • Edward Stratemeyer
... Himself all dark. Ah, I remember me: Christ said to Martha—"Whosoever liveth, And doth believe in me, shall never die"! I wait, I wait, wait wondering, till the door Of God's wide theatre be open flung To let me in. What marvels I shall see! The expectation fills me, like new life Dancing through all my veins. ...
— The Poetical Works of George MacDonald in Two Volumes, Volume I • George MacDonald
... attended a dancing-party yet," he said. "I couldn't waltz if my life depended on it. ...
— Under the Skylights • Henry Blake Fuller
... and sullen repartee, and quarrelling with the slave-girls. Berille the loud-lunged, or Aminah the pert, would insist upon extinguishing the fat- fed lamp long ere bed-time, or would enter the room singing, laughing, dancing, and clapping a measure with their palms, when, stoutly aided by old Sultan, who shrieked like a hyaena on these occasions, we ejected her in extreme indignation. All then was silence without: not so—alas!— within. Mad Said snored fearfully, and Abtidon ...
— First footsteps in East Africa • Richard F. Burton
... are to this day called the Dance-hills, from the following occurrence. A lad named Hans was at service in Bubbelgaard, and as he was coming one evening past the hills, he saw one of them raised on red pillars, and great dancing and much merriment underneath."[A] This feature is met with in several of the stories collected by Keightley, and is made use of in Cruikshank's picture, which forms the frontispiece to that volume. Lastly, in a number of cases there is not merely a habitation, but a vast country underneath ...
— A Philological Essay Concerning the Pygmies of the Ancients • Edward Tyson
... the meanwhile, and for a brief holiday, let us laugh and be as pleasant as we can. And you elder folk—a little joking, and dancing, and fooling will do even you no harm. The author wishes you a merry Christmas, and welcomes ...
— The Rose and the Ring • William Makepeace Thackeray
... long one, and Kitty on this occasion was determined to avoid the neighborhood of the "Spotted Leopard." In preference she took the short cut across the common. It was very lonely here, but she had no fear of ghosts or bogies. She walked with her upright, young carriage, her quick, alert, dancing step. It was ten o'clock however, before she reached Constantine Road. She ran up the steps of No. 14, and rang the bell. The door was opened to her ...
— Wild Kitty • L. T. Meade
... stay here," said Dorsain, "if you must do so much violence to your feelings, I think you had better go nearer to those who are dancing." ...
— The Young Lord and Other Tales - to which is added Victorine Durocher • Camilla Toulmin
... his own big, hot palm, until it was wet and her fingers lost all feeling. From group to group they moved, and when they crossed the dancing space of the saloon, the revellers stepped aside to allow the man to pass. She noticed that in the main they confined themselves to country dances, some of which were new to her. And all the time Boolba kept up a continuous ...
— The Book of All-Power • Edgar Wallace
... was too young, this little elf, With troublesome questions to vex himself; But for many days a thought would rise, And bring a shade to his dancing eyes. ...
— McGuffey's Fourth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... that dance on the sea, Dancing a ring-around in glee From furrow to furrow, while overhead The foam flies up to be garlanded, In silvery arches spanning the air, Saw you my true love anywhere? Welladay! Welladay! For the winds of May! Love is ...
— Chamber Music • James Joyce
... as a cloud That floats on high o'er vales and hills, When all at once I saw a crowd,— A host of golden daffodils Beside the lake, beneath the trees, Fluttering and dancing in ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 7 • Charles H. Sylvester
... A Dancing Archbishop.—Dr. King, Archbishop of Dublin, having invited several persons of distinction to dine with him, had, amongst a great variety of dishes, a fine leg of mutton and caper sauce; but the doctor, who was not fond of butter, and ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 19. Issue 539 - 24 Mar 1832 • Various
... the natives of Western Australia are very fond of singing and dancing: to a sulky old native his song is what a quid of tobacco is to a sailor; is he angry, he sings; is he glad, he sings; is he hungry, he sings; if he is full, provided he is not so full as to be in a state ...
— Journals Of Two Expeditions Of Discovery In North-West And Western Australia, Vol. 2 (of 2) • George Grey
... easily!—that she saw Rhoda, as she had often seen her, tripping along the causeway, with her bonny, merry face, and her dancing feet. But she knew well it was only a trick her memory was playing. The fold lay all silent and deserted beneath her watchful eyes, with every door safely closed, and the gate at the far end locked. Everything was ...
— The Christmas Child • Hesba Stretton
... for me! We must not linger.' There was a wistful ring in the child's voice as she spoke. Little Mary Samm looked longingly towards a clump of wood anemones dancing in the sunshine, as she followed her aunt, Joan Dewsbury, through a coppice of beech-trees on the outskirts of the city of Warwick. It was a bright windy day of early spring in the year 1680. Mary was ...
— A Book of Quaker Saints • Lucy Violet Hodgkin
... elephantiasis. Among the whole population of the Peninsula, there is only one person with a hunch back, and two or three who are lame. During the day they work or rest; but the night is reserved for dancing and conversation. As soon as the sun has set, the tambourine is heard, the women sing; the whole population is animated; love and the ball set every body in motion. "Africa dances all the night," is an expression which ...
— Narrative of a Voyage to Senegal in 1816 • J. B. Henry Savigny and Alexander Correard
... arm and presenting him to his (the Governor's) lady. Yet the newly-arrived guest kept his head sufficiently to contrive to murmur some such compliment as might fittingly come from a middle-aged individual of a rank neither excessively high nor excessively low. Next, when couples had been formed for dancing and the remainder of the company found itself pressed back against the walls, Chichikov folded his arms, and carefully scrutinised the dancers. Some of the ladies were dressed well and in the fashion, while the remainder ...
— Dead Souls • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... his vague smile, titubated a moment, advanced with a sort of circumspect dancing motion to the rail of the poop, laid two shaking hands upon it, heaved a long ...
— The Mayor of Troy • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... mark from him then and there, also a nickname. Then they all sang and danced furiously. If a stranger came to be admitted, silence reigned while he denied his salvation, spat upon the Bible, kissed the Devil, and swore absolute obedience to him. Singing and dancing was resumed, a mythical formula being used in the singing. When tired, they sat down and told of their evil deeds; those who had not been bad enough were scourged by Satan himself with thorns and ...
— The Necessity of Atheism • Dr. D.M. Brooks
... the flash of dark, deep-set eyes. There was no need of the beating of weapons against shields, no need of the roar and howls and shrill screaming in a score of tongues to tell the stranger's name. Most of the soldiers kept ranks, but here and there a Gaul would bound forward, dancing with strange leaps and whirling his sword about his head, to throw himself prone before and beneath the vermilion hoofs that never paused or swerved in their gallop. Not a movement, not a glance of the rider ...
— The Lion's Brood • Duffield Osborne
... little ladies I have to take home! Those veils are really all right, and hugely becoming. Would you like to start now, or wait an hour or two?" As he asked the question his brown eyes were dancing. ...
— Princess Polly's Playmates • Amy Brooks
... maidens vanished in the wood; the fragrance grew stronger—three coffins, and in them three lovely maidens, glided out of the forest and across the lake: the shining glow-worms flew around like little floating lights. Do the dancing maidens sleep, or are they dead? The odour of the flowers says they are corpses; the evening bell ...
— Andersen's Fairy Tales • Hans Christian Andersen
... sprang up, and made haste with her bathing and dressing, so that in less than half an hour she was dancing downstairs to begin her Lucky Birthday. Her presents were heaped round her plate, and the parcels were so enticing in appearance, that she could scarcely eat ...
— Marjorie at Seacote • Carolyn Wells
... fronts over the rims of pure-white snow fountains, and from the end of each front a hearty stream coming in a succession of falls and rapids over the terminal moraines, through patches of dwarf willows, and then through the spruce woods into the bay, singing and dancing all the way down. On the opposite side of the bay from here there is a small side bay about three miles deep, with a showy group of glacier-bearing mountains back of it. Everywhere else the view is bounded by comparatively low mountains densely ...
— Travels in Alaska • John Muir
... ignoble. Besides Madame, there were two under-mistresses, whose duties consisted in keeping company with the young ladies who were placed there. They sometimes dined with new comers, instructed them in polite behaviour, and aided them in their musical lessons or in dancing, history, and literature in which these were instructed. Then followed a dozen women of lower station, creatures for any service, half waiting women, half companions, who kept watch over the young ladies, and neglected ...
— "Written by Herself" • Baron Etienne Leon Lamothe-Langon
... I used to lead an old blind woman about the town for five kopecks a day . . . the frosts were cruel, wicked. One would go out with the old woman and begin suffering torments. My Creator! First of all you would be shivering as in a fever, shrugging and dancing about. Then your ears, your fingers, your feet, would begin aching. They would ache as though someone were squeezing them with pincers. But all that would have been nothing, a trivial matter, of no great consequence. The trouble was when your whole body was chilled. One ...
— The Horse-Stealers and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... mighty halo, as on clouds of flame, a girl was dancing. She was black, and lithe, and tall, and willowy. Her garments twined and flew around the delicate moulding of her dark, young, half-naked limbs. A heavy mass of hair clung motionless to her wide forehead. Her arms twirled and flickered, and body ...
— The Quest of the Silver Fleece - A Novel • W. E. B. Du Bois
... of money. She, one day, gave a silver cup, containing about a quart, to the daughter of her mistress, a girl about four years old, to carry to her mother, who refused to receive it. The narrator adds, that he had seen her dancing in the orchard among the trees, and that she informed him she was then dancing with the Fairies. The report of the strange cures which she performed, soon attracted the attention of both ministers and magistrates. The ministers ...
— Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, Vol. II (of 3) • Walter Scott
... which brought in 500 fathoms of line in thirty minutes, including stops. One stop was due to water having run over the friction gear and frozen. It was a day or two later that we heard a great yell from the floe and found Clark dancing about and shouting Scottish war-cries. He had secured his first complete specimen of an Antarctic fish, apparently a ...
— South! • Sir Ernest Shackleton
... 'This man (said he) I thought had been a Lord among wits; but, I find, he is only a wit among Lords![779]' And when his Letters to his natural son were published, he observed, that 'they teach the morals of a whore, and the manners of a dancing master.[780]' ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... Then I let him go his own way, and now it's 1.45 p.m. Had a charming lunch—two oeufs a la coque, the, and croissants. Now I'm sitting by the side of the river—very peaceful. There's a white goat on the other bank, and its reflection is dancing gently all the time. ...
— Letters to Helen - Impressions of an Artist on the Western Front • Keith Henderson
... appointed, he makes his approach to Mansoul, and the gates were set open for him, there also the ancients and elders of Mansoul met him, to salute him with a thousand welcomes. Then he arose and entered Mansoul, he and all his servants. The elders of Mansoul did also go dancing before him till he came to the castle gates. And this was the manner of his going up thither. He was clad in his golden armour, he rode in his royal chariot, the trumpets sounded about him, the colours were displayed, his ten thousands went up at his feet, and the elders of Mansoul danced ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... dancing is finished the sponsor takes a basket of corn prepared for ceremonial use and deposits it fifty yards or more to the east of the circle. The girl arises and runs around the basket, then back to the blanket on the ground, followed by little boys and girls. The ...
— The North American Indian • Edward S. Curtis
... timbrels and tabors and harps; bands of young men and women sang songs in praise of the king; story-tellers went about relating old tales of famous heroes. The young men showed their strength by tumbling and wrestling, and their grace by dancing; the ...
— King Arthur and His Knights • Maude L. Radford
... skirting the base of a barren range covered with heaps of lava blocks, and its foot marked by piles of stones, the memorials of deeds of blood, the lofty conical peak of Jebel Seearo rose in sight, and not long afterwards the far-famed Lake Assad, surrounded by its dancing mirage, was seen sparkling ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 341, March, 1844, Vol. 55 • Various
... seemed so delicious that, feeling ready to give an hundred pound for the chance of entering, he smote at a small wicket and was admitted by a courteous maiden named Idleness. On the sward in the garden were dancing its owner, Sir Mirth, and a company of friends; and by the side of Gladness the dreamer saw the God of Love and his attendant, a bachelor named Sweet-looking, who bore two bows, each with five arrows. Of these bows the one ...
— Chaucer • Adolphus William Ward
... converts and stimulating the zeal of their flock than on eradicating Protestantism. They thought that the only means to obtain such a result was to attract the people by pleasant surroundings and not to rebuke them by morose asceticism. They were the first to introduce dancing, music and games into their colleges. They organized processions and sacred pageants. They surrounded the first solemn communion with a new ceremonial. They stimulated emulation and showered prizes on all those ...
— Belgium - From the Roman Invasion to the Present Day • Emile Cammaerts
... news of the dismissal of Necker, a cry of rage arises in the Palais-Royal; Camille Desmoulins, mounted on a table, announces that the Court meditates "a St. Bartholomew of patriots." The crowd embrace him, adopt the green cockade which he has proposed, and oblige the dancing-saloons and theaters to close in sign of mourning: they hurry off to the residence of Curtius, and take the busts of the Duke of Orleans and of Necker and carry them about in triumph.—Meanwhile, the dragoons of the Prince de Lambesc, drawn up on the Place Louis-Quinze, ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 2 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 1 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... a limber elf, Singing, dancing to itself, A fairy thing with red round cheeks, That always finds, and never seeks, Makes such a vision to the sight 660 As fills a father's eyes with light; And pleasures flow in so thick and fast Upon his heart, that he at last Must needs express ...
— Coleridge's Ancient Mariner and Select Poems • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... in writing; could sign her own name without missing a letter, and so legibly that her aunts could read it without spectacles. She excelled in making little elegant good-for-nothing, lady-like knicknacks of all kinds, was versed in the most abstruse dancing of the day, played a number of airs on the harp and guitar, and knew all the tender ballads ...
— The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. • Washington Irving
... and MULHONI, I think are the next on my list, All adepts in the beautiful science of giving a pocket a twist; JEMMY CARRICK must follow his leaders, ould PURNEY who put in a huff, By dancing a hornpipe at Tyburn, and bothering the hangman ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth
... them, dear mother," he cried exultingly, dancing round the table and shaking the florins in his hat. "See what luck your blessing brought me this morning!" and he related his ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, October 1878, No. 12 • Various
... Mrs. Jenkins were rigid Methodists and would not tolerate any such worldly amusement as dancing. Kissing games were substituted, and if, as the Jenkins believed, these were more elevating, they were certainly coarser and rougher than the dancing ...
— Chicken Little Jane on the Big John • Lily Munsell Ritchie
... terrace overlooking a moonlight garden and under these romantic circumstances, is urging his suit more persistently than before. She, however, is a little too fond of flirting to let her real sentiments be known at once. But when, as if giving up the riddle in her dancing eyes and seemingly mocking smile, he appears about to lead her back into the ballroom, there is, at least so I like to read the music, a pretty little laugh, as much as to say, "Can't you read my real feelings under my mask of banter," a tender glance indicated by a retard ...
— The Pianolist - A Guide for Pianola Players • Gustav Kobb
... proud to feel that any drink from my cellars could have produced such a majestic jag. It restores one's faith in post-war whisky. Besides, I couldn't be peeved at anything tonight. I am like a little child clapping its hands and dancing in the sunshine. For though it has been some time getting a move on, Bertie, the sun has at last broken through the clouds. Ring out those joy bells. Anatole ...
— Right Ho, Jeeves • P. G. Wodehouse
... for pageantry, and plays, Thou hast thy eves, and holydays: On which the young men and maids meet, To exercise their dancing feet: Tripping the comely country Round, With daffadils and daisies crown'd. Thy wakes, thy quintels, here thou hast, Thy May-poles too with garlands graced; Thy Morris-dance; thy Whitsun-ale; Thy shearing-feast, which never fail. Thy harvest home; thy wassail bowl, ...
— A Selection From The Lyrical Poems Of Robert Herrick • Robert Herrick |
