"Decorum" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... learning. Beside and beyond these there is a further range of social facts which shade off from the region of learning into that of physical habit and dexterity. Such are what is known as manners and breeding, polite usage, decorum, and formal and ceremonial observances generally. This class of facts are even more immediately and obtrusively presented to the observation, and they therefore more widely and more imperatively insisted on as required evidences of a reputable degree of leisure. ...
— The Theory of the Leisure Class • Thorstein Veblen
... this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling, By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore, "Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou," I said, "art sure no craven, Ghastly, grim, and ancient Raven, wandering from the Nightly shore;— Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian ...
— The Ontario Readers: The High School Reader, 1886 • Ministry of Education
... at that point that the maharajah grew so exasperated at the thought of another's knowledge of a secret that he considered rightly his own by heritage, that his language exceeded not only the bounds of decorum but the limits of commonplace blasphemy as well. Turning his back on the priest he rushed from the room, slamming the door behind him. And, being a ruminant fat mortal, the priest sat so still considering on which side of the equation his own bread might be buttered ...
— Guns of the Gods • Talbot Mundy
... indebted for most of those elegant love-verses, which are so well known and so often quoted. The lines "Uncouth is this moss-covered grotto of stone," were addressed to Miss Linley, after having offended her by one of those lectures upon decorum of conduct, which jealous lovers so frequently inflict upon their mistresses,—and the grotto, immortalized by their quarrel, is supposed to have been in Spring Gardens, then the fashionable place of ...
— Memoirs of the Life of the Rt. Hon. Richard Brinsley Sheridan V1 • Thomas Moore
... midriff. Should any one see his most intimate friend any where with a woman, he must never take notice of it, or mention it afterwards. Every thing of this nature is conducted with all imaginary gravity and decorum, by which the practice of gallantry becomes decent and easy; yet there are some jealousies in this regular commerce of love, which sometimes end fatally. A story of this kind happened shortly before I went to Lima. A young lady, who thought herself sole sovereign in the heart ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 11 • Robert Kerr
... in it, and grew luxuriantly, but she insisted upon wearing it simply parted in the middle and coiled in a mass of plaits behind, while one braid stood up coronet fashion well at the back of her head. She was addicted to rich satins and velvets, and had a general air of Victorian repose and decorum. There was no attempt to retain departed youth; no golden wigs or red and white paint disfigured her person, which had an immense natural dignity and stateliness. It made her shiver to see some of her contemporaries dressed and arranged to represent not more than twenty years of age. But so many ...
— Beyond The Rocks - A Love Story • Elinor Glyn
... married," said Chrissie suddenly,—"there! To Jack Metcalfe—there! So you'll have to learn to love him. He's going to try and love you for my sake." To his sister's dismay the captain got up, and brandishing his fists walked violently to and fro. By these simple but unusual means decorum was preserved. ...
— Many Cargoes • W.W. Jacobs
... the Queen-Consort to the Louvre. The Duke de Nemours led the Queen-Mother. As they began to march, she stepped back a little, and told the Queen her daughter-in-law, it was her place to go first; but it was easy to see, that there was more of spleen than decorum ...
— The Princess of Cleves • Madame de La Fayette
... Tribune. I had seen him before, on the fearful night which prepared the attack on the palace; but he was then in the haste and affected savageness of the rabble. He now played the part of leader of a political sect; and the commencement of his address adopted something of the decorum of public council. In this there was an artifice; for, resistless as the club was, it still retained a jealousy of the superior legislative rank of the assembly of national representatives, the Convention. The forms of the Convention ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 341, March, 1844, Vol. 55 • Various
... clouds, and sundry other ingenious Dutch fancies. The beaux distinguished themselves by their adroitness in replenishing this pot from a huge copper teakettle. To sweeten the beverage, a lump of sugar was laid beside each cup, and the company alternately nibbled and sipped with great decorum; until an improvement was introduced by a shrewd and economic old lady, which was to suspend, by a string from the ceiling, a large lump directly over the tea table, so that it could be ...
— Eighth Reader • James Baldwin
... entering into the busy part of our hero's life, where we shall find him acting in various characters, and performing all with propriety, dignity, and decorum.—We shall, therefore, rather choose to account for some of the actions of our hero, by desiring the reader to keep in mind the principles of the government of the mendicants, which are, like those of the Algerines, and other ...
— The Surprising Adventures of Bampfylde Moore Carew • Unknown
... either in the family form, the productive industry, or the political discipline. The Hawaiians were a people of a very cheerful and playful disposition. The missionaries trained the children in the schools to serious manners and decorum. Such was the method in fashion in our own schools at the time. The missionary society refused the petition of the Hawaiians for teachers who would teach them the mechanic arts.[155] This is like the refusal of the ...
— Folkways - A Study of the Sociological Importance of Usages, Manners, Customs, Mores, and Morals • William Graham Sumner
... very nose, he was perfectly aware, though his mouth watered to taste it, that he had not a chance until I came up and shot it. He was, in consequence, the staunchest dog in the country. Only once, in this respect, did I know him guilty of a breach of decorum, and that too, I must say, under ...
— Confessions of an Etonian • I. E. M.
... somewhat amusing to see the anxiety which Dryden uses to justify the hazardous experiment, of ascribing to emperors and princesses the language of nature and of passion. He appears with difficulty to have satisfied himself, that the decorum of the scene was not as peremptory as the etiquette of a court. "Aureng-Zebe" was received with the applause to which it is certainly entitled. It was ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Volume 5 (of 18) - Amboyna; The state of Innocence; Aureng-Zebe; All for Love • John Dryden
... did indeed behave herself with remarkable decorum. Her opinion was that Nelly's strange sister had grown more unlike other people than ever since she had last seen her. She seemed to be in a perpetual brown study, which was compatible, however, with a curious ...
— Missing • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... good intentions. He had cared for her as if he occupied the place of her own brother who fell in the battle of Marchfield. It would have given him most pleasure—he had said so himself—to dance everything with her, but decorum and the royal dames who kept him in attendance would not permit it. However, he came to her in every pause to exchange at least a few brief words and a glance. During the longest one, which lasted more than an hour and was devoted ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... But I cannot see how it well could, when thou wert all head o'er ears o' love with some gallant or other— the saints know whom. I reckon it undecent, in very deed, Clarice, to meddle up a love-tale with matters of religion. I do wonder thou hast no more sense of fitness and decorum." ...
— A Forgotten Hero - Not for Him • Emily Sarah Holt
... with soft smiles and glances. Two little girls, imaginably sorry the feast was over, suppressed their regret in the tutelage of the maiden aunts and grandmothers who put up cakes in napkins to carry home; and then the party vanished in unbroken decorum. When they were gone we found that in studying the behavior of the bride and her friends we had not only failed to identify the bridegroom, but had altogether forgotten ...
— Familiar Spanish Travels • W. D. Howells
... which is not only felt to be a restraint upon the freedom of virtuous principle itself, but is observed with that jealous circumspection which considers even suspicion as a stain upon its purity. No matter how intense affection in a virtuous bosom may be, yet no decorum of life is violated by it, no outwork even of the minor morals surrendered, nor is any act or expression suffered to appear that might take away from the exquisite feeling of what is morally essential ...
— Jane Sinclair; Or, The Fawn Of Springvale - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton
... would she, aware as she undoubtedly was of the meaning of my look or smile, hesitate to respond to them by some legitimate bit of coquetry. In short, we often held converse in that language of smiles, glances, blushes, pauses, gestures, which is the gesture language of sex across the barrier of decorum. ...
— The Rise of David Levinsky • Abraham Cahan
... in this painful emergency merits and receives my approbation. His love of order and his efforts to preserve proper decorum in the school-room are worthy of the highest commendation," continued Mr. Parasyte; "and I would gladly remit the penalty I have imposed upon him without any conditions whatever; but I feel that such a course, after the extraordinary events of this day, would be ...
— Breaking Away - or The Fortunes of a Student • Oliver Optic
... new Governor, Davey, arrived. He had been a colonel of marines, and had shown himself a good soldier, but he had few of the qualities of a Governor. He was rough and excessively coarse in his manners, and utterly regardless of all decorum. He showed his defiance of all conventional rules by the manner of his entry. The day being warm, he took off his coat and waistcoat, and marched into the town in a costume more easy than dignified; he listened to the address of welcome with careless indifference, and throughout showed ...
— History of Australia and New Zealand - From 1606 to 1890 • Alexander Sutherland
... mother, with neither having timidity, modesty, nor charm," she writes, "or at least you suppose that I have these qualities, but that I refrain from showing them, and you are quite certain that I have no outward decency nor decorum. You ought to know me before judging me in this way. You would then be able to form an opinion about my conduct. Grandmother is here, and, ill though she is, she watches over me carefully and lovingly, and she would not fail to correct me if she considered ...
— George Sand, Some Aspects of Her Life and Writings • Rene Doumic
... and described by other men. I reason without prejudice, can endure contradiction, and, as the company perceives, even bear impertinent censure without passion or resentment. I quarrel with none but the foes of virtue and decorum, against whom I have declared perpetual war, and them I will everywhere attack as the natural ...
— The Adventures of Sir Launcelot Greaves • Tobias Smollett
... the crowd was the most stirring and remarkable feature of the ceremony. It began with an almost European placidity of decorum, standing quietly behind the wooden railing on three sides of the Campus, and as quietly filling the seats in and about the glowingly draped grand stand before the University building. As the ceremony proceeded, however, the crowd ...
— Westward with the Prince of Wales • W. Douglas Newton
... conservatives. The whole bent of his mind was towards moderation in all things. Temperamentally, he hated all forms of extravagant eccentricity; he loved the old if only because it was old; he had the keenest sense not only of decorum but of the essential dignity which is the best guardian of order. Yet here he was committed to a policy which aimed deliberately at outraging all the established decencies—at disregarding ostentatiously all the usages by which an assembly of gentlemen ...
— John Redmond's Last Years • Stephen Gwynn
... good Chancellour, only a little too rough, but very impartial in the administration of justice. He never seemed to understand foreign affairs well: And yet he meddled too much in them. He had too much levity in his wit, and did not always observe the decorum of his post. He was high, and was apt to reject those who addressed themselves to him with too much contempt. He had such a regard to the King, that when places were disposed of, even otherwise than as he advised, yet he would justify what the King ...
— Characters from 17th Century Histories and Chronicles • Various
... delicacy to leave her severely alone. She supposed that, in his own stupid, good-natured way, he may have understood that she would wish to remain alone, while those white sails disappeared into the vague horizon, so many miles away. He, whose notions of propriety and decorum were supersensitive, had not suggested even that an attendant should remain within call. Marguerite was grateful to her husband for all this; she always tried to be grateful to him for his thoughtfulness, which was constant, and for his generosity, which really was boundless. She tried ...
— The Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... Edith did not make her appearance. There were four or five ladies in attendance on the school, which, under the superintendence of one of them, a woman past middle life, with a pale, serious face and a voice clear and sweet, was conducted with an order and decorum not often maintained among a class of children such as were there ...
— Cast Adrift • T. S. Arthur
... her beauty, her air of command, awed the bully and silenced every voice in the room. She was our hostess and as such assumed the right to enforce decorum. Fixing her glance upon Joe whom she recognized as the chief disturber, she said, "You'd better go home. This is no place ...
— A Son of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland
... decorous maid's composure vanished at once—likewise her decorum. She clapped her hand over her mouth and fled, uttering sounds. The governess, however, set herself to comfort her heartbroken charge, and presently succeeded in restoring Miss Rennsdale to a semblance of that poise with which a lady receives callers and accepts invitations to dance cotillons. ...
— Confessions of a Book-Lover • Maurice Francis Egan
... the British House of Commons are disappointing to the pilgrim in search of decorum. The Mother of Parliaments has trouble with her ...
— Humanly Speaking • Samuel McChord Crothers
... table, and found himself watching the people with a stir of pleasure. Afterwards he went round to a famous club, of which he had once been made a life member, but towards midnight he was wearied of the dull decorum of his surroundings, and returning to the hotel, sought the restaurant once more. The stream of people coming in to supper was greater even than at dinner-time. He found a small table, and ordered some oysters. The sight of this bevy of pleasure-seekers, all apparently with multitudes ...
— The Yellow Crayon • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... been brought, at other times admitted some, lest by impudently denying what was manifestly true their forgiveness might be the more difficult; and then, even admonishing the conscript fathers to be guided by the rules of decorum and moderation in their prosperity, he said, that if the Carthaginians had listened to himself and Hanno, and had been disposed to make a proper use of circumstances, they would themselves have dictated terms of peace, instead of begging it as they now did. That it rarely happened that good ...
— History of Rome, Vol III • Titus Livius
... and distinct existence? He chose to think that this was the case. Who, within his inner consciousness, does not feel that same ferine, savage man struggling against the stern, adamantine bonds of morality and decorum? Were those bonds burst asunder, as it was with this man, might not the wild beast rush forth, as it had rushed forth in him, to rend and to tear? Such were the questions that Mainwaring asked himself. And how ...
— Howard Pyle's Book of Pirates • Howard Pyle
... not judge society by the mad pranks of a few of its members," she responded, in her most agreeable manner. "If we are not to set an example in decorum to the rest of the world we are surely unfitted to occupy the high place accorded us. But you must see and decide ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces in Society • Edith Van Dyne
... misfortune to have an example of bad grammar, false metaphors and similes, with all the usual errors of feminine diction, placed before a female writer. But if, disdaining the construction of sentences,—the precise decorum of the cold grammarian,—she has caught the spirit of her author,—if, in every altered scene,—still adhering to the nice propriety of his meaning, and still keeping in view his great catastrophe,—she has agitated her audience with all the various passions he depicted, the rigid criticism ...
— Lover's Vows • Mrs. Inchbald
... all assembling to public worship astonished the natives greatly, though they always behaved with the utmost decorum when admitted into the house where the ceremony takes place. On the day in question the minister endeavoured to explain the sacred mysteries of our religion to a number of the chiefs who were present. They listened attentively ...
— A Narrative of a Nine Months' Residence in New Zealand in 1827 • Augustus Earle
... only she was unlucky enough or stupid enough to be found out. Her admirers were so indiscreet that they had not left her a shred of reputation, and in a court where a cardinal is the lover of a queen, a hypocritical appearance of decorum is indispensable to success. So Angelique had to suffer for the faults she was not clever enough ...
— Quotes and Images From "Celebrated Crimes" • Alexander Dumas, Pere
... with them indefinitely. Miss Forde, when she sat imperturbably on a cushion in the middle of the floor after dinner and sang to a guitar the songs of Albert Chevalier, was an anomaly in English decorum that was as pleasing to observe as ...
— The Pool in the Desert • Sara Jeannette Duncan
... a menacing flicker of them almost across her eyeballs, so close they lay to her experience, and yet how she could laugh when Getaway made a feint toward the one on her beat, straightening up into exaggerated decorum as the eye of the law, ...
— The Vertical City • Fannie Hurst
... Princess of Orange; and, above all, the circumstance of his having, when driven from England, twice chosen Holland for his asylum. By his cousins he was received, not so much with the civility and decorum of princes, as with the kind familiarity of near relations, a reception to which he seemed to make every return of reciprocal cordiality. It is not rashly to be believed, that he, who has never been accused of hardened wickedness, could have been upon such terms with, and so ...
— A History of the Early Part of the Reign of James the Second • Charles James Fox
... her, had instilled into his soul a hatred of all things artificial and at variance with her august decrees. He was shy and suspicious with the men and women who regulated their lives by the narrow standards of civilisation and decorum; but with the children of the tents and the vagrants of the wayside he was a single-minded man, eager to learn the lore of the open air. He recognised in these vagabonds the true sons and daughters of "the Great Mother who mixes ...
— The Life of George Borrow • Herbert Jenkins
... see, Hiram was bound out to my grandfather when he was a boy, and when grandfather died Hiram said he 's'posed he went with the farm, 'long o' the critters,' and he has been there ever since. He was my mother's only refuge from the decorum of my aunts. They are simply workers. They make me think of the Maine woman who wanted her epitaph to be, 'She was a ...
— Shapes that Haunt the Dusk • Various
... prisoner's head was hung an account of his misdeeds, placed there by some of his cronies. These crimes were in the nature of certain breaches of public decorum and decency, the details of which the bystanders were discussing with ...
— The Panchronicon • Harold Steele Mackaye
... this brandy." She obeyed without comment, but after a pause she opened her eyes again and looked down at the new garment which clad her. She had that moment turned back from the door of death, but her first breath was used to set the scene for a return to a decent decorum. ...
— Americans All - Stories of American Life of To-Day • Various
... Priam discovered a bell-push, and commanded China tea and muffins. He felt that he now, as it were, had an opportunity of making a fresh start in life. He grew almost gay. He could be gay without sinning against decorum, for Mrs. Challice's singular tact had avoided all reference ...
— Buried Alive: A Tale of These Days • Arnold Bennett
... her husband had left America owing to the impossibility of living there with the finish and decorum which the Boykin standard demanded; but in the isolation of their exile they had created about them a kind of phantom America, where the national prejudices continued to flourish unchecked by the national progressiveness: a little ...
— Madame de Treymes • Edith Wharton
... treated in this way, and then a man may be seen stating his case with great fluency, and not a soul listening to him. But if it is a case between influential men, or brought on by under-chiefs, then the greatest decorum prevails. If the chief does not see his way clearly to a decision, he remains silent; the elders then rise one by one and give their opinions, often in the way of advice rather than as decisions; and when the chief finds the general sentiment agreeing in one ...
— Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa - Journeys and Researches in South Africa • David Livingstone
... to think so then. The birds were singing in the sunshine, and the rural aspect was dear to the hearts of the older people. They rose and walked about in the fragrant air. Now and then some one bowed gravely to Stephen. There was a Sunday decorum over all. ...
— A Little Girl in Old New York • Amanda Millie Douglas
... the smile died upon his lips. What was it? What was the young man reading? Verse which were not in the collection, and which were more remarkable than he had ever heard from his young poets. "Those are not in the Annual," cried Gleim, quite forgetting decorum,—"that—" ...
— Old Fritz and the New Era • Louise Muhlbach
... was the ambitious reply of the little woman and she now essayed to regain her former elevation, but finding this could not be done without some climbing and straining—a sacrifice of decorum not to be thought of—and being utterly disdainful of aid in the presence of a strange young gentleman, she relinquished the high chair for a low stool: towards that low stool Graham drew in ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte
... enthusiastically drank to the success of "the cause." The privileged old head-waiter, dressed in professional black, (and ridiculously like an old magpie as he hopped about the room with his head on one side,) "whose custom it was of an afternoon" to get drunk, but always with Scotch decorum, nodded approval of the festivities, until, overcome by his feelings (or Usquebaugh) he ...
— The Narrative of a Blockade-Runner • John Wilkinson
... always flow westward,—converting, as in London, the market-gardens of the poor into the 'Palace Gardens' of the rich; and, with steady advance, sweeps away our landmarks,—turning the gravel pits of western London into the decorum of ...
— Normandy Picturesque • Henry Blackburn
... and deceit (Stein, Ancient Khotan, p. 49 n). Stein, p. 70, recalls Hiuan Tsang's opinion: "The disposition of the men is fierce and impetuous, and they are mostly false and deceitful. They make light of decorum and politeness, and esteem learning but little." Stein adds, p. 70, with regard to Polo's statement: "Without being able to adduce from personal observation evidence as to the relative truth of the latter statement, I believe that ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo, Volume 2 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... the Latournelles judged her; for no devotion of friends can take the place of a mother's eye. The monotonous life in the dainty little Chalet, surrounded by the choice flowers which Dumay cultivated; the family customs, as regular as clock-work, the provincial decorum, the games at whist while the mother knitted and the daughter sewed, the silence, broken only by the roar of the sea in the equinoctial storms,—all this monastic tranquillity did in fact hide an inner and tumultuous life, the life of ideas, the life of the spiritual being. We sometimes wonder ...
— Modeste Mignon • Honore de Balzac
... window-seat on which she had precipitated herself, and kicking at the bar of the table, by which manifestation she of course succeeded in deferring her hopes, by a reproof which caused her to draw herself into a rigid, melancholy attitude, a sort of penance of decorum, but a rapid motion of the eyelids, a tendency to crack the joints of the fingers, and an unquietness at the ends of her shoes, betraying the restlessness of the digits ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... this, I think I shall be able to show most clearly the true motives which have given rise to this measure; to strip the thin, the cobweb veil from it, as well as the pretended ones of religion, humanity, and love of liberty; and to show, to use the soft terms the decorum of debate oblige me to use, the extreme want of modesty in those who are already as fully represented here as they can be, to go the great lengths they do in endeavoring, by every effort in their power, public and private, to take from the Southern ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 3, 1918 • Various
... invest Koenigsberg, and East Prussia was overrun with the enemy. The report as to the behavior of these troops met with great indignation in Germany; but better information insists that they behaved with decorum and discretion. The peasantry of East Prussia, remembering wild tales of the Cossacks of a hundred years before, fled in confusion with stories of burning and slaughter ...
— History of the World War - An Authentic Narrative of the World's Greatest War • Francis A. March and Richard J. Beamish
... was found, by a post mortem examination, between the external nose and the brain. The late Gov. Sullivan, speaking of Gov. Hancock, the early President of Congress, says, "Gov. Hancock was an immoderate chewer of tobacco; but being a well-bred man, and a perfect gentleman, he, from a sense of decorum, refrained from spitting in company, or in well-dressed rooms. This produced the habit of swallowing the juice of the tobacco, the consequence of which was, his stomach became inactive, and a natural appetite seldom returned; the agreeable sensations ...
— A Disquisition on the Evils of Using Tobacco - and the Necessity of Immediate and Entire Reformation • Orin Fowler
... Nash, called also "King of Bath;" a Welsh gentleman, who for fifteen years managed the bath-rooms of Bath, and conducted the balls with unparalleled splendor and decorum. In his old age he sank into ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama, Vol 1 - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook • The Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D.
... exhibitions of human nature, would have mostly cultivated that class of society in which the feelings are more elementary and simple, in which the thoughts speak a plainer language, and in which the restraints of factitious or conventional decorum are exchanged for the restraints of mere sexual decency. It is a noticeable fact to all who have looked upon human life with an eye of strict attention, that the abstract image of womanhood, in. its loveliness, its delicacy, and its modesty, nowhere makes itself more impressive ...
— Biographical Essays • Thomas de Quincey
... of such talents preaches decency, he will, nevertheless, sometimes feel himself tempted to transgress the boundaries of propriety and decorum, since from time immemorial genius has reckoned such escapades among its prerogatives. Wieland indulged this impulse when he sought to assimilate himself to the daring, extraordinary Aristophanes, and when he was able to translate his jests, as audacious as they were witty, though he ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. II • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... admitted that in protesting against hypocrisy he has occasionally been led beyond the limits prescribed by good taste. He is at times abusive of those who differ from him. This, with other offences against decorum, which here and there disfigure his pages, can only be condoned by an appeal to the general tone of his writing, which is reverential. Burns had a firm faith in a Supreme Being, not as a vague mysterious Power; but as the Arbiter of human life. Amid the vicissitudes ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various
... meantime, we, as patrons of the said churches and the others in our Indies, command persons to be named to those benefices who will assume charge of them. You will likewise see that the divine services are carried out with the necessary reverence, decency, and decorum, and that the natives of the said district are instructed in the Holy Catholic faith; you will see that the said priests and others who reside in the said provinces live honestly, and that those who are charged with the education of the Indians in the teachings of our Holy ...
— Bartholomew de Las Casas; his life, apostolate, and writings • Francis Augustus MacNutt
... short of the majesty of the holy Scriptures when describing heaven and hell, so that in comparison they are childish and trifling;" and yet, perhaps, he had the most regular and best governed imagination of any man, and observed the greatest decorum in his descriptions. "There are I know," said the elegant Joseph Addison, "men of heavy temper and without genius, who can read the words of Scripture with as much indifference as they do other papers; however, ...
— Museum of Antiquity - A Description of Ancient Life • L. W. Yaggy
... encounters with a pleasing and suitable object) towards this great lord, which argued a non-perpetuity; the second was a fault in the object of her grace, my lord himself, who drew in too fast, like a child sucking on an over uberous nurse; and had there been a more decent decorum observed in both, or either of these, without doubt, the unity of their affections had been more permanent, and not so in and out, as they were, like an instrument well tuned, ...
— Travels in England and Fragmenta Regalia • Paul Hentzner and Sir Robert Naunton
... rule the actions of these worse than savages. When murder and crimes of all sorts are committed without scruple, without even thought. Latterly things have changed, and these orgies are less frequent among the Breeds, or, at least, conducted with more regard for decorum. But we are talking of some years ago, at a time when the Breeds had to learn the meaning of civilization—before good order and government were thoroughly established in this great Western country; in the days when ...
— The Story of the Foss River Ranch • Ridgwell Cullum
... a few minutes with the Chief when the orderly was again startled out of his military decorum by the bursting open of the Superintendent's door and the sharp ...
— The Patrol of the Sun Dance Trail • Ralph Connor
... with each other, rarely in couples, with all their faces turned one way—namely, to the south-east, or (if you want precision) precisely to Hyde Park Corner. I have remarked upon the silence: that was really surprising; so also was the order observed, and what you may call decorum. There was no ribaldry, no skylarking, no shrill discord of laughter without mirth in it to break the solemnity of the gracious night. These people just stood or squatted about; if any talked together it was in secret whispers. It is true that they were under the watch of a tall ...
— Lore of Proserpine • Maurice Hewlett
... do but immediately spread its little wings, and go hopping and fluttering up the doorsteps! Tap, tap, went the staff, on the kitchen floor; nor did it rest until it had stood itself on end, with the greatest gravity and decorum, beside Quicksilver's chair. Old Philemon, however, as well as his wife, was so taken up in attending to their guests, that no notice was given to what the ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry
... important matters which are equally dangerous: for example, money. And in any case there are decisive reasons; superior, like the reasons for suspending conventional reticences between doctor and patient, to all considerations of mere decorum, for giving proper instruction in the facts of sex. Those who object to it (not counting coarse people who thoughtlessly seize every opportunity of affecting and parading a fictitious delicacy) are, in effect, advocating ...
— A Treatise on Parents and Children • George Bernard Shaw
... formidine.... Cogitate itaque corde vigili, ut a collo vestrae servitutis catena decidat, et universitas vestra in libertatis et quietis gaudio reflorescat; sitque ubertate conspicuum, ita divina favente potentia secura sit libertate decorum" (Raynaldus, ...
— The History of Freedom • John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton
... at Cornelia for the effect of this boldness upon her, and the girl frowned to keep herself from laughing, and then gave way. Mrs. Maybough smiled with a ladylike decorum which redeemed the excess from impropriety. Charmian seemed to know the bounds of her license, and as if Mrs. Maybough's smile had marked them, she went no farther, and her mother began softly to question Cornelia about herself. ...
— The Coast of Bohemia • William Dean Howells
... indignation began to swell, and the chorus of discontent grew louder and louder, until the whole land was filled with the clamors of a multitudinous army of martyrs. For the first three months after the inauguration the Democratic party was a model of decorum, harmony, and contentment. All was delight and enthusiasm. Frank Pierce was the man of the time; his Cabinet was an aggregation of the wisdom of the country; his policy the very perfection of statesmanship. Even the Whigs did not utter one word of discontent. Frank Pierce was still President, ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore
... astounded to indulge in any very abstracted grief, and Sir Gervaise and Atwood were both extremely vexed. In short, the feelings, usual to such occasions were but little indulged in, though there was a strict observance of decorum. ...
— The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper
... consume an inhospitable Samaritan village. Moreover, we shall see as we go on that the times in which this apocalypse was written were times in which the mildest, mannered men would be apt to forget their decorum, and speak with unwonted intensity. A man with any blood in him, who undertook to write in the year 68 of the themes with which the soul of this apostle was then on fire, would be likely to show, no matter in what vehicle of speech his thought might be conveyed, ...
— Who Wrote the Bible? • Washington Gladden
... plan with delight, but Gram objected both because of the fact that the hay-rack had no springs, and also upon grounds of decorum. ...
— When Life Was Young - At the Old Farm in Maine • C. A. Stephens
... (the Hon. Alexander Gordon, third son of the Earl of Aberdeen) was a judge distinguished in his day by his ability and decorum. "He adorned the bench by the dignified manliness of his appearance, and polished urbanity of his manners[46]." Like most lawyers of his time, he took his glass freely, and a whimsical account which he gave, before he was ...
— Reminiscences of Scottish Life and Character • Edward Bannerman Ramsay
... canons were wholly given over to chess-playing. It was dreadful! In other monasteries the monks positively hunted; not only the abbots, but the common domestic monks! Nay, such things were to be found as monks keeping dogs, or even birds, in the cloister, Peckham denounces these breaches of decorum as grave offences, which were not to be passed over and not to be allowed. What! a black monk stalking along with a bull-pup at his heels, and a jackdaw, worse than the Jackdaw of Rheims, using bad words in the garth, and showing an evil example to the chorister ...
— The Coming of the Friars • Augustus Jessopp
... delightful mischief. The critic was no other than Pen: he jumped and danced round about his subject with the greatest jocularity and high spirits: he showed up the noble lady's faults with admirable mock gravity and decorum. There was not a word in the article which was not polite and gentlemanlike; and the unfortunate subject of the criticism was scarified and laughed at during the operation. Wenham's bilious countenance was puckered up with malign pleasure as he read the critique. ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray
... plate of the candies and sweetmeats provided. Sometimes she accepted them, but most generally pointed to her duenna or chaperon behind, who held up her apron and caught the refreshments as they were slid into it from the plate. The greatest decorum was maintained at these dances, primitively as they were conducted; and in a region so completely cut off from the world, their influence was undoubtedly beneficial to a considerable degree in softening the rough ...
— The Memoirs of General Philip H. Sheridan, Vol. I., Part 1 • Philip H. Sheridan
... before you some of the circumstances of this plague of hunger. Of all the calamities which beset and waylay the life of man, this comes the nearest to our heart, and is that wherein the proudest of us all feels himself to be nothing more than he is: but I find myself unable to manage it with decorum; these details are of a species of horror so nauseous and disgusting, they are so degrading to the sufferers and to the hearers, they are so humiliating to human nature itself, that on better thoughts I find it more advisable to throw a ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 7 • Various
... exerted himself to convince them of the utility, justice, and necessity of this war; but one[9] of them, in particular, often interrupted him with impatience; for when a discussion had once commenced, Napoleon submitted to all its little breaches of decorum. ...
— History of the Expedition to Russia - Undertaken by the Emperor Napoleon in the Year 1812 • Count Philip de Segur
... Balzac, however, seductive and charming, however worthy of being adored and being his "star," had a high temper. This was the natural temper of an aristocratic woman. It never passed the limits of decorum, but it was violent and easily provoked.[*] Then too, she had been accustomed to luxury and had never known poverty. She was ill also and ...
— Women in the Life of Balzac • Juanita Helm Floyd
... the delay of a week, he answered in such an unsatisfactory way that Lord John wrote to him that he could no longer remain Foreign Secretary, for that perpetual misunderstanding and breaches of decorum were taking place which endangered the country. Lord Palmerston answered instantly that he would give up the Seals the moment his successor was named! Certain as we all felt that he could not have continued long in his place, we were quite taken by surprise when we learnt of the denouement.... ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Vol 2 (of 3), 1844-1853 • Queen Victoria
... to see if I could get any news of our friend Jack Waring," he began, then hesitated to wonder whether her letters reached Barbara uncensored or whether sharp-eyed, subdued Lady Crawleigh would ask tonelessly, "Who's your letter from, Babs?" Decorum, he decided, should blossom between the lines and shed its waxen petals round each word. . . . "His sister was dining with us to-night, and I am sorry to say . . ." "Did you know him well? He was one of my greatest friends at Oxford. I ...
— The Education of Eric Lane • Stephen McKenna
... our legs. And sit we upon the highest throne of the world, yet sit we upon our own tail. The best and most commendable lives, and best pleasing me are (in my conceit), those which with order are fitted, and with decorum are ranged, to the common mould and human model; but without wonder or extravagancy. Now hath old age need to be handled more tenderly. Let us recommend it unto that God who is the protector of health and fountain of all wisdom; but blithe and social." And with a stanza of Epicurean ...
— A History of French Literature - Short Histories of the Literatures of the World: II. • Edward Dowden
... now the imminent hazard of trampling too rudely on the jealous pride of the Spaniards; and the events of the 17th, 18th, and 19th March were well qualified to confirm his impression, that although all sense of dignity and decorum might be extinguished in the court, the ancient elements of national honour still remained, ready to be called into action, among the body of the people. He, therefore, sent Savary, in whose practised cunning and duplicity he hoped ...
— The History of Napoleon Buonaparte • John Gibson Lockhart
... conscientious indulgence of the same, were proverbial among her acquaintances, but no one—not even prudish and fearsome maidens of altogether uncertain age, and prudent mammas, equally alive to expediency and decorum—had ever labelled her "Dangerous," while with young people she was a universal favorite. Although, with an eye single to her hobby, she regarded a man as an uninteresting molecule of animated nature, unless circumstances ...
— At Last • Marion Harland
... been attentively listened to and fully grasped. While conversing, other audience-seekers would drop in, and, while waiting their turn, coffee would usually be served to all. The manners observed are devoid of any stiffness of etiquette, but rather marked with a cordial decorum approaching intimacy, most assuring to the ...
— Origin of the Anglo-Boer War Revealed (2nd ed.) - The Conspiracy of the 19th Century Unmasked • C. H. Thomas
... the magnificent Suzanne before him, holding her legs between his knees. She let him do as he liked, although in the street she was offish enough to other men, refusing their familiarities partly from decorum and partly for contempt for their commonness. She now stood audaciously in front of the chevalier, who, having fathomed in his day many other mysteries in minds that were far more wily, took in the situation at a single glance. He knew very well that no young girl ...
— The Jealousies of a Country Town • Honore de Balzac
... private life the Athenians were courteous, generous, and humane. Whilst bold and free in the expression of their opinions, they paid the greatest attention to rules of politeness, and were nicely delicate on points of decorum. They had a natural sense of what was becoming and appropriate, and an innate aversion to all extravagance. A graceful demeanor and a quiet dignity were distinguishing traits of Athenian character. They were temperate and frugal[34] in their habits, and little addicted to ostentation ...
— Christianity and Greek Philosophy • Benjamin Franklin Cocker
... 'Time, Death, and Judgement'. Its position there shows how little we can draw the line between the different classes of subjects as they were handled by Watts. A courtier like Rubens could, after painting with gusto a rout of Satyrs, put on a cloak of decorum to suit the pageantry of a court, or even simulate fervour to portray the ecstasy of a saint. He is clearly acting a part, but in Watts the character of the man is always seen. Whether his subjects are drawn from the Bible or from pagan ...
— Victorian Worthies - Sixteen Biographies • George Henry Blore
... poor young thing nothing to say, no little pretence even to herself that she had guarded the proprieties, had comported herself circumspectly, leaving her with not even a little rag of a claim that she had conducted herself with seemly decorum, she sprang from him and began to cry. Whatever the cause, Mr. Middleton could not look upon feminine unhappiness with composure and here where he was himself responsible, he was indeed smitten with ...
— The Strange Adventures of Mr. Middleton • Wardon Allan Curtis
... beyond Spring Pond, would trot on toward the rolling hills of Middleton. After dinner, or a dance, or, perhaps, mere chat over a late supper, they rode away at midnight singing as they whipped up their sleepy nags and otherwise disturbing the decorum of night in Middleton. Or, maybe, routed out early on a frosty October morning, after lighting pipes and a word with the stable-boy, they would snuggle into overcoats and spin away over the hard roads where ...
— The Man Who Wins • Robert Herrick
... during dinner. When it was at last terminated we retired to the drawing-room, and listened with great decorum to several pieces of music. Miss Latouche was pressed to perform upon the harp, which she did with her usual melancholy grace. To-night she was in a rich white robe, which enhanced the peculiarly dusky effect of her olive skin and masses of dark hair. Her face was very pale; and, to my surprise, ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 1, January, 1891 • Various
... is a glittering veil of verse thrown over the features of nature and of old romance. The deep incisions into character are "skinned and filmed over"—the details are lost or shaped into flimsy and insipid decorum; and the truth of feeling and of circumstance is translated into a tinkling sound, a tinsel common-place. It must be owned, there is a power in true poetry that lifts the mind from the ground of reality ...
— The Spirit of the Age - Contemporary Portraits • William Hazlitt
... in the village who would think they could have a good time in spite of the officers, because they are of the same age, and I thought it would be well to get them to vote for good order in the first place. We shall never accomplish any thing in such a society unless we have as much decorum as there is in the meetings of adults, and without it we shall ...
— The Bobbin Boy - or, How Nat Got His learning • William M. Thayer
... regum Margareta Piscatori dixit laeta 'Audi quod propositum; Est remigium decorum Suavis strepitus remorum ...
— St. John's College, Cambridge • Robert Forsyth Scott
... into a dull pantomime. All that is finest in the play is lost in the representation. The spectacle was grand; but the spirit was evaporated, the genius was fled.—Poetry and the stage do not agree well together. The attempt to reconcile them in this instance fails not only of effect, but of decorum. The ideal can have no place upon the stage, which is a picture without perspective: everything there is in the fore-ground. That which was merely an airy shape, a dream, a passing thought, immediately becomes an unmanageable ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... Clive Newcome in London, whither they came a few months after their marriage, and where Rosey appeared as pretty, happy, good-humoured a little blushing bride as eyes need behold, Mrs. Pendennis's reception of her was quite a curiosity of decorum. "I, not receive her well?" cried Laura. "How on earth would you have me receive her? I talked to her about everything, and she only answered yes or no. I showed her the children, and she did not seem to care. Her only conversation was about millinery ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... to one's aesthetic sense was the clerk himself. Squatting behind his wretched desk, Elias Droom peered across the litter of papers and books with snaky but polite eyes, almost as inviting as the spider who, with wily but insidious decorum, draws ...
— Jane Cable • George Barr McCutcheon
... degree of LL.D. from a Scotch University, and wrote for the booksellers in a great variety of branches. Though he certainly was not without considerable merit, he wrote with so little regard to decency and principles, and decorum[1458], and in so hasty a manner, that his reputation was neither extensive nor lasting. I remember one evening, when some of his works were mentioned, Dr. Goldsmith said, he had never heard of them; upon which ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell
... for him from habit, from a sense of decorum, and for the fitness of things; but that was not love. He shrugged his shoulders scornfully, looking for some word to express the mildly pleasant, unagitating emotion. James, who had been devoured by it, who had struggled with it as with a deadly sin, who ...
— The Hero • William Somerset Maugham
... institutions is increased by "the discontented babies" whom no one persuades into living. Something of the same sort is necessary in that second birth at adolescence. The young people need affection and understanding each one for himself, if they are to be induced to live in an inheritance of decorum and safety and to understand the foundations upon which this orderly world rests. No one comprehends their needs so sympathetically as those mothers who iron the flimsy starched finery of their grown-up daughters late into the night, and who pay ...
— Twenty Years At Hull House • Jane Addams
... just as her hands were clutching at the railings of the arena. She was promptly removed by the police. Under the circumstances the woman's conduct was pardonable, perhaps, but we suggest that such exhibitions interfere with the decorum which should be preserved during the performances, and are highly improper in the presence of the Emperor. The Parthian prisoner fought bravely and well; and well he might, for he was fighting for both life and liberty. His wife and children were there to nerve his arm with their ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... hold it to be delicate to offer marriage to ladies, even in jest, nor do I approve such sort of jocularity; yet for once I must break through the rules of decorum, and Propose a match myself for Miss Burney. I therefore nominnate Sir ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 1 • Madame D'Arblay
... not. For the wearinge of their myters is included in these woordes, And myters more then one or two. W{hi}che wordes are curteyled for the verse his cause, that the same mighte kepe an equall proport{i}one and decorum in the verse, whiche would be lengthened one foote or sillable moore than the other verses, yf your readinge shoulde stande. But yf yo{u} saye, that in this and other thinges I am overstreyghte laced and to obstinatlye bente to defende the former printed editione, in that ...
— Animaduersions uppon the annotacions and corrections of some imperfections of impressiones of Chaucer's workes - 1865 edition • Francis Thynne
... future. Settlers, hidalgos, traders, argonauts, government officials of army and navy, and transient adventurers of no mean ability. A little press already works with its magical talking types. A navy chaplain is the Franklin of the West. Some order and decorum appear. The calm voice of prayer is heard. The mingled amens of the conquerors thank God for a most unjustifiable acquisition of the lands of others. They are ours only by the right of the strong against ...
— The Little Lady of Lagunitas • Richard Henry Savage
... contributed to the speedy release of the Territory from the regime of the pistol and bowie-knife. They not only performed their new duties without losing any of the womanly virtues, and with dignity and decorum, but good results were immediately seen. Chief Justice J. H. Howe, of the Supreme Court, under whose direction women were first drawn on juries, wrote in 1872: "After the grand jury had been in session two ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume IV • Various
... For Nancy of the lengthened skirts and the massed braids was now a person of reserves. Even in that innocent insolence of first womanhood, with its tentatively malicious, half-conscious flauntings, she was one of reticences toward the world including herself, with petticoats of decorum draping the child's anarchy of thought—her luxuriant young emotions "done up" sedately with her hair. She was now one to be cautious indeed of imputations so blunt as this concerning Allan. Besides, how nobly he had spoken of Bernal. Then she wondered why ...
— The Seeker • Harry Leon Wilson
... temples, rather intense eyes, and lines running by the corners of his nose, which slightly looped his mouth upward in an expression of decision and self-reliance. He was already called a small man. But I did not see him so. He was of pleasing presence of distinguished decorum, and chivalrous manner. But after all Douglas was the center of attraction. Mr. Polk escorted Mrs. Clayton to the wedding breakfast, and Douglas took in Mrs. Rutledge, ...
— Children of the Market Place • Edgar Lee Masters
... persuasive argument from Mr. Troy) resented this ingenious idea as an insult. She declared that if Isabel was watched the girl should know of it instantly from her own lips. The police listened with perfect resignation and decorum, and politely shifted their ground. A certain suspicion (they remarked) always rested in cases of this sort on the servants. Would her Ladyship object to private inquiries into the characters and proceedings of the servants? Her Ladyship instantly objected, in the most positive terms. ...
— My Lady's Money • Wilkie Collins
... loved. It was a most austere Shylock, inveterate of purpose, vindictive, malignant, cruel, ruthless; and yet it was human. No creature was ever more logical and consistent in his own justification. By purity, sincerity, decorum, fanaticism, the ideal was aptly suggestive of such men as Robert Catesby, Guy Fawkes, and John Felton—persons who, with prayer on their lips, were nevertheless capable of hideous cruelty. The street scene demands utterance, not repression. The Jew raves there, and no violence would seem ...
— Shadows of the Stage • William Winter
... with this joyous company, whose mirth seemed as pure as it was sincere, and I never saw a ball managed with greater decorum. There is a coquetry and gallantry appropriated to all conditions, and to see the different manner in which it was expressed in this little set, from what one is accustomed to behold in higher life, afforded me great amusement; and the little arts used among these young ...
— A Description of Millenium Hall • Sarah Scott
... from eight thousand throats at once. British soldiers flung their helmets in the air; the band lost its head and broke into a triumphant clash of discord; while Colonel Buchanan, forgetful of his Scottish decorum, stood up in the drag and shouted ...
— Captain Desmond, V.C. • Maud Diver
... The society owns its own plate, damask, china and glassware, and used to own a good stock of wines. Of late years, I believe, wines have not been served, the beverage of the evening consisting of coffee, hot and iced. The greatest decorum is observed at the balls. Young ladies go invariably with chaperones; following each dance there is a brief promenade, whereafter the young ladies are returned to their duennas—who, if they be Charleston dowagers in perfection, usually carry turkey-feather fans. Cards ...
— American Adventures - A Second Trip 'Abroad at home' • Julian Street
... laboured hard to impress every body with as full a belief in his extraordinary powers as she felt herself; but as a female interpreter of the rank and appearance of Madame Blavary did not exactly correspond with the count's notions either of dignity or decorum, he hired a person named Vitellini, a teacher of languages, to act in that capacity. Vitellini was a desperate gambler, a man who had tried almost every resource to repair his ruined fortunes, including among ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds • Charles Mackay
... that, the earl's succumbing or surviving was a trivial matter; and the concern they had manifested in Sir James' news—when the important, well-nourished physician who had bled his lordship came to inform them that there was hope—was outward only, and assumed for pure decorum's sake. ...
— The Lion's Skin • Rafael Sabatini
... importance than that in the schools away from home, our preparatory schools and colleges will have less trouble in securing good behavior on the part of those in attendance, and the problem of how to maintain proper decorum will have lost ...
— Stories Worth Rereading • Various
... gossip; but gradually he saw that, whether true or not, it had sufficient circulation to cast a shade of ambiguity on the persons concerned. Bessy alone seemed deaf to the rumours about her friend. There was something captivating to her in Mrs. Carbury's slang and noise, in her defiance of decorum and contempt of criticism. "I like Blanche because she doesn't pretend," was Bessy's vague justification of the lady; but in reality she was under the mysterious spell which such natures cast over the less venturesome imaginations of their ...
— The Fruit of the Tree • Edith Wharton
... said no more during the journey. The other gentlemen having lost nothing by the various failures, discussed matters with philosophy and praiseworthy decorum. Sometimes, indeed, "the third person" grew slightly facetious and jocose when he represented to himself what he termed "the queer cut" that some old friend would display on presenting his cheque for payment ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... record had no brilliancy; he aimed at nothing of the kind, knowing his limitations—or rather his distinctions; but he was quietly conscious that no graduate of his year better understood the niceties of decorum, more creditably represented the tone of that famous ...
— The Crown of Life • George Gissing
... found fresh material for the sarcasms which a hundred and fifty years before he had lavished on the Variations of the Protestant Churches. Yet this curious movement, bleak and squalid as it may seem to men nurtured in the venerable decorum of ecclesiastical tradition, was at bottom identical with the yearning for stronger spiritual emotions, and the cravings of religious zeal, that had in older times filled monasteries, manned the great orders, and sent wave upon wave of pilgrims and crusaders to holy places. 'It is really amazing,' ...
— Critical Miscellanies, Vol. 1, Essay 5, Emerson • John Morley
... in the dress Dwindling the clothes to nothingness Saving, for due decorum placed, A huckaback about the waist, Or wanton towel-et, whose touch Haply may spare to chafe o'ermuch: A languid frame, from head to feet Prankt in the arduous prickle-heat: An erring fly, that here and there Enwraths the crimsoned sufferer: An upward toe, whose skill enjoys The slipper's ...
— Rhymes of the East and Re-collected Verses • John Kendall (AKA Dum-Dum)
... besides their origin, there was some terrible stain on Harold, and that society could not admit them; so that if I persisted in casting in my lot with them, I should share the ban. Indeed, he would have thought my own good sense and love of decorum would have taught me that the abode of two such youths would be no fit place for the daughter of such respected parents, and there was a good deal more that I could not understand about interceding with his sister, and her overlooking ...
— My Young Alcides - A Faded Photograph • Charlotte M. Yonge
... sense of propriety pertaining to conventional life. You are not responsible for what you say or do, provided always that you do not offend against the abstract rules of decency, or the requirements of natural decorum. You can lay around loose; the lazier you are the better the boatman in your employ likes it. If you choose to drift leisurely and quietly under the shadow of the hills along the shore, examining the rocks that lie there ...
— Wild Northern Scenes - Sporting Adventures with the Rifle and the Rod • S. H. Hammond
... scene, but he purified the audience; and for the first time since the reign of Charles II, a father might have taken his daughters to a public theatre with as much safety from all that could shock decorum as if he had taken them to the house of a friend. And for this reason the late lamented Bishop of Norwich made it a point to form the personal acquaintance of Mr. Macready, that he might thank him, as a prelate of the Church, for the good he had ...
— Modern Eloquence: Vol II, After-Dinner Speeches E-O • Various
... minute to be disgusted and shocked: but no! I must say this for Mr. Charles, that in no way did he trespass the bounds of reverence and decorum. His harangue, though given as a sermon, was strictly and simply a moral essay, such as might have emanated from any professor's chair. In fact, as I afterwards learnt, he had given for his text one which the simple rustics received ...
— John Halifax, Gentleman • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
... Nepenthe and its evil-smelling waters. It was one of those scholarly, ponderous and yet helplessly straightforward jokes of the late Renaissance; a joke to which Monsignor Perrelli does not allude, both for reasons of local patriotism and of general decorum; some vulgar dictum, in short, connected with the name of the patron saint of Nepenthe who, he urged, was ...
— South Wind • Norman Douglas
... so impious and irreligious as that which his curiosity and passion now led him into. But being unable to eat or drink or rest until he was at ease on the matter, he determined, all piety and law and decorum to the contrary notwithstanding, to look upon the faces of Ashimullah's wives with his own eyes, and determine for himself to whom the crown of beauty belonged, and whether the brown or the black, or the golden or the ruddy, might most properly and truthfully lay claim to it. But this resolution ...
— Frivolous Cupid • Anthony Hope
... Propriety and decorum were extinguished among the helpless sick. Females of rank seemed to forget their natural bashfulness, and committed the care of their persons, indiscriminately, to men and women of the lowest order. No longer were women, relatives or friends, found in the ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... falling on his head. Rossetti was naturally angry, and, for the first and only time in my experience of him, lost control of his temper, bursting out on the culprit with a torrent of abuse which cooled the hilarity of the poet instantly, and reduced him to decorum with the promptness of a wet bath. To hear Swinburne read his own poetry was a treat, and this I enjoyed several times at Rossetti's; the terrible sonnets on Napoleon III. after Sedan, amongst the readings, being the most ...
— The Autobiography of a Journalist, Volume II • William James Stillman
... think the widows ought to raise a statue to my honor, for having done my possible to prove that, for the sake of decorum, morals, and order, they ought to have ...
— The History of Emily Montague • Frances Brooke
... fruitful, and the first ardour of their love fresh and unabated; for as they were not satiated like those that are always with their wives, there still was place for unextinguished desire. When he had thus established a proper regard to modesty and decorum with respect to marriage, he was equally studious to drive from that state the vain and womanish passion of jealousy; by making it quite as reputable to have children in common with persons of merit, as to avoid ...
— Ideal Commonwealths • Various
... The mother brings the dinner and her tawny brood of nestlings. A shady spot is selected for the feast. The father dips his wooden spoon first into the vapory bowl, and mother and babes follow with grave decorum. Idle loungers passing these patriarchal groups, on their way to a vapid French breakfast at a restaurant, catch the fragrance of the olla and the chatter of the family, and envy the dinner ...
— Castilian Days • John Hay
... in the fifteen years of its occupancy by Champlain, it was as much a mission as a fort. The historian says:—"A stranger visiting the Fort of Quebec would have been astonished at its air of conventual decorum. Black-robed Jesuits and scarfed officers mingled at Champlain's table. There was little conversation, but in its place histories and the lives of the saints were read aloud, as in a monastic refectory. Prayers, masses and confessions followed each other, and the bell of the adjacent chapel ...
— Famous Firesides of French Canada • Mary Wilson Alloway
... defects? That they are, few if any will now dare to deny. While the best of Dryden's own Plays, and still more those of his forgotten contemporaries, infinitely inferior to Shakspeare's in all those very excellences, are choke-full of all manner of faults and flagrant sins against decorum and congruity, in the eyes of mere taste; and with a few exceptions, according to no rules can be rated high as works of art. The truth of all this manifestly forced itself upon Sir Walter's seldom erring judgment, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 57, No. 352, February 1845 • Various
... between them and whites are forbidden in some of the States where slavery does not exist, and they are prohibited in all the slaveholding States, and when not absolutely contrary to law, they are revolting, and regarded as an offense against public decorum.' ...
— History of the Thirty-Ninth Congress of the United States • Wiliam H. Barnes |
