"Fancier" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... derived from a common stock, the diversities of these pigeons were such that 'a score of them might be chosen which, if shown to an ornithologist, and he were told that they were wild birds, would certainly be ranked by him as well-defined species.' The simple principle which guides the pigeon-fancier, as it does the cattle-breeder, is the selection of some variety that strikes his fancy, and the propagation of this variety by inheritance. With his eye still directed to the particular appearance which he wishes to exaggerate, he selects it as it reappears in successive broods, and thus adds ...
— Fragments of science, V. 1-2 • John Tyndall
... considered a fair exchange. Thus a silver-plated spoon may have gone from its associate cup one night, but in that cup you may find a long pine cone or a surplus nail, by which token you may know that a Pack-rat has called and collected. Sometimes this enthusiastic fancier goes off with food, but leaves something in its place; in one case that I heard of, the Rat, either with a sense of humour or a mistaken idea of food values, after having carried off the camp biscuit, had filled the vacant dish with the round pellets ...
— Wild Animals at Home • Ernest Thompson Seton
... likely that he will satisfy the wounded honour of his opponent by promptly expiring. There was another bronze figure which always stood near the toads, also of French manufacture, and also full of comic suggestion. It was a statuette of a dog-fancier, such a one as you used to see on the bridges or quays of Paris, with a profusion of little dogs stuck under his arms and into his pockets, and everywhere where little dogs could possibly be insinuated, all ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... Il n'y a que le premier pas qui coute, and just as, with all the sapience of medicine, there is but a degree betwixt the Doctor and the Student, so, after the first step, there is but a degree betwixt the Demirep and the gazetted Cyprian, who is known by head-mark to every insipid Amateur and Fancier in the town. ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... whom everybody wishes out of the way, giving utterance to hopes that they are not on shore. Then the obedient papa is sent on shore to look after "that dear little Harry," who is probably all the time in the ladies' saloon on some child-fancier's lap eating bonbons. The board is drawn in— the moorings are cast off—the wheels revolve—the bell rings—the engine squeals, and away speeds the steamer down the calm waters of Lake Ontario. Little children and inquisitive young ladies are knocked down or blackened in coiling ...
— The Englishwoman in America • Isabella Lucy Bird
... him to be a retired silk-worm fancier, a chronic juryman, or something of the sort. But shiver my windshield if he wasn't a ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1920 • Various
... descending when they had wings and could flee?" The teacher was nonplussed, but got out of the difficulty by saying—"Perhaps some of the other boys can answer." "I think I ken," ventured a little fellow, whose father was a bird fancier, "maybe they wad be moultin' at ...
— Children's Rhymes, Children's Games, Children's Songs, Children's Stories - A Book for Bairns and Big Folk • Robert Ford
... dispute, which was dropped in all appearance, though the mechanic still retained his resentment; and after breakfast, when the company broke up, accosted his adversary in the street, desiring to know how he durst be so insolent as to make that scurrilous reflection upon his family. The fly-fancier, thus questioned, accused the mathematician of having been the aggressor, in likening his head to a light cabbage; and here the altercation being renewed, the engineer proceeded to the illustration of his mechanics, tilting up his hand like a balance, thrusting it forward by way of lever, embracing ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett
... buzz and an attempt to sting from my old friend S. B. Brittan, the ex-Universalist minister—the very surprisingly efficient "man Friday" of Andrew Jackson Davis, in the production of the "Revelations" of the said Davis, and also ghost-fancier in general; who has gently aired part of his vocabulary in a communication to the "Banner of Light," with the heading "Exposed for Two Shillings." I can afford very well to expose friend Brittan and his spiritualist humbugs for two shillings. ...
— The Humbugs of the World • P. T. Barnum
... of glass that act as lenses. Picture galleries can only be lighted from above; Magus opens and closes his shutters himself; he is as careful of his pictures as of his daughter, his second idol. And well the old picture-fancier knows the laws of the lives of pictures. To hear him talk, a great picture has a life of its own; it is changeable, it takes its beauty from the color of the light. Magus talks of his paintings as Dutch fanciers ...
— Cousin Pons • Honore de Balzac
... compass. In the baths and gymnasia where all young men of free birth spent part of their mornings in running, leaping, wrestling, or swimming, he could daily watch the beautiful bodies of athletes in every variety of pose and action. He knew them as a trainer knows horses, or a fancier knows dogs. He would have little need of a special model; but would daily observe some fresh detail of muscles, some notable pose which he could add from memory to his ...
— The Legacy of Greece • Various
... home at last, like a flock of pigeons that were once turned loose snow-white from the sky, and made to descend and fight one another and fight everything else for a poor living amid soot and mire. If then the hand of the unseen Fancier is stretched forth to draw us in, how can he possibly smite any one of us, or cast us away, because we came back to him black and blue with bruises and besmudged ...
— A Kentucky Cardinal • James Lane Allen
... of Buck Row, the greatest dog-fancier in the Five Towns, stood at the bottom of the steps: a tall, fat man, clad in stiff, stained brown and smoking a black clay pipe less than three inches long. Behind him attended ...
— The Old Wives' Tale • Arnold Bennett
... carefully by Mr. Darwin,—the case of the domestic pigeons. I dare say there may be some among you who may be pigeon 'fanciers', and I wish you to understand that in approaching the subject, I would speak with all humility and hesitation, as I regret to say that I am not a pigeon fancier. I know it is a great art and mystery, and a thing upon which a man must not speak lightly; but I shall endeavour, as far as my understanding goes, to give you a summary of the published and unpublished information which I have gained from ...
— The Perpetuation Of Living Beings, Hereditary Transmission And Variation • Thomas H. Huxley
... these variations being of no service to man, and not beneficial, far more often injurious, to the creatures themselves? Did he ordain that the crop and tail-feathers of the pigeon should vary, in order that the fancier might make his grotesque pouter and fantail breeds? Did he cause the frame and mental qualities of the dog to vary in order that a breed might be formed of indomitable ferocity, with jaws fitted to pin down the bull for man's ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 11 • Various
... head to foot, much as a fancier does a prize ox at Smithfield, Mr. Burns found the life power good, and the muscles well nourished, the working faculties being in a high state of activity. The head—I blushed to hear—measured ...
— Mystic London: - or, Phases of occult life in the metropolis • Charles Maurice Davies
... Conrad, 'you can't always tell a bird by its feathers, especially if you don't happen to be a bird fancier. Whether they were Saxons, Imperialists, or Swedes, I do not know. The soldier that tried to kill me spoke good German, and he wore a blue ...
— The Young Carpenters of Freiberg - A Tale of the Thirty Years' War • Anonymous
... ain't relieved. Bein' a no-account Injun, of course, I don't paw him over much for brands; but do you know, Pickles, from the casooal glance I gives, it strikes me at the time it's mighty likely to be your oncle. This old bronco fancier's skelp is over on my bridle, if ...
— Wolfville Days • Alfred Henry Lewis
... garden was its dovecote, formed of a large cider-barrel on a mast. The barrel was pierced with pigeon-holes, and fitted with ledges on which the birds stood to preen themselves. Mr Pinsent did not profess himself a fancier. His columbarium—a mixed collection of fantails and rocketers—had come to him by a side-wind of business, as offset against a bad debt; but it pleased him to sit on his terrace and watch the pretty creatures as they wheeled in flight over the harbour and among the masts of the ...
— Corporal Sam and Other Stories • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... was a Wondersmith? people asked each other. No one could reply. Madame Filomel was consulted, but she looked grave, and said that it was none of her business. Mr. Pippel, the bird-fancier, who was a German, and ought to know best, thought it was the English for some singular Teutonic profession; but his replies were so vague, that Golosh Street was as unsatisfied as ever. Solon, the little humpback, who kept the odd-volume book-stall at the lowest corner, could throw ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various
... saw in America, and therefore shows to much greater advantage, in spite of the Yankee sometimes ornamenting his head with hairs from his tail; while on the other hand, though an Englishman considers a pair of nags that will go a mile in five minutes a great prize, no man in America who is a horse fancier would look at a pair that could not do the same distance in four; nor would he think them worth speaking about, if they could not do the distance in a very few seconds over three minutes. On one side of the water, pace is almost the ...
— Lands of the Slave and the Free - Cuba, The United States, and Canada • Henry A. Murray
... true, however," said the proud deviser and proprietor of the splendid mansion—"A country Phillis might well reconcile herself to such a prison as this, even without a skilful bird-fancier to touch a bird-call. But I wonder where she can be, this rural Phidele. Is it possible she can have retreated, like a despairing commandant, into her bedchamber, the very citadel of the place, without even an attempt to defend ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott
... of his best known books, Mr. Darwin brings out a fact which may be illustrated in some such way as this: Suppose a bird fancier collects a flock of tame pigeons distinguished by all the infinite ornamentations of their race. They are of all kinds, of every shade of color, and adorned with every variety of marking. He takes them to an uninhabited island and allows them to fly off wild into the woods. They ...
— Natural Law in the Spiritual World • Henry Drummond
... the deed," said Wemmick. "By the by; you were quite a pigeon-fancier." The man looked up at the sky. "I am told you had a remarkable breed of tumblers. Could you commission any friend of yours to bring me a pair, of you've no further ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens
... fortunate accident, I at last got the truth about Mr. Merrick. This event arose from the action of a right-minded butcher, who, having exhausted his stock of The Pigeon-Fancier's Gazette, sent me my weekly supply of dog-bones wrapped ...
— A Chair on The Boulevard • Leonard Merrick
... friendly as he expressed his thanks, and one day, catching Ingred by the gate with Derry, he had volunteered the information that "that fox terrier of yours is a fine dog, and no mistake, and would be worth something to a fancier!" ...
— A Popular Schoolgirl • Angela Brazil
... to make him amiable: a dog-fancier, a friend of mine, has provided the ondeniable where dogs is concerned: whereby Garrett draws the varmint into the scullery, and shuts him in, while I get the key from the other. It's ...
— Hard Cash • Charles Reade
... we walked past a row of trumpery pop-guns, on green and red carriages, and so through the most filthy and odoriferous bazaar I ever met with, till we reached the residence of Saifula Baba, the great shawl merchant of Sirinugger. Here we found a noted shawl fancier inspecting the stock, and were inducted to the mysteries of the different fabrics. Some that we saw were of beautiful workmanship, but dangerous to an uninitiated purchaser. They ranged from 300 to 1,000 rupees generally, but could be ordered ...
— Diary of a Pedestrian in Cashmere and Thibet • by William Henry Knight
... Confound your impudence! Dog-fancier! No, sir! I have not become a dog-fancier in what you are pleased to call my old age! But while there is no law to prevent a lot of dashed young puppies like yourself, sir—like yourself—sending your confounded pug-dogs ...
— A Wodehouse Miscellany - Articles & Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... required the special intervention of the intelligence of man, so some anthropoid form may have been evolved by variation and natural selection; but it could never have given rise to man, unless some superior intelligence had played the part of the pigeon-fancier. ...
— Darwiniana • Thomas Henry Huxley
... also on record the case of a good-looking spaniel which was bought in London from a dog-fancier by a wealthy young man. The new owner soon observed that, when out with the dog, if he entered a shop the animal invariably remained outside for a time, and that, when at last he did follow his master, ...
— Stories of the Border Marches • John Lang and Jean Lang
... across the street. With my mind's eye I can see him at the Queen's Birthday celebration on Beacon Hill. The chief event of the year was the racing on that day, and the mayor was an enthusiastic horse fancier, and a steward of the Jockey Club. These celebrations were nothing without Mr. Harris. The bell rings (John Butts was bellman) and the portly figure of Mr. Harris on horseback appears. "Now, gentlemen, clear the course," and then there is ...
— Some Reminiscences of old Victoria • Edgar Fawcett
... a dealer in animals, birds, and snakes. He had a fancier's shop on Groome Street, in the heart of the Bowery. This was on the ground floor. His living abode was in the upper story of that house, and it was there that he kept the twenty-three cats whose necks ...
— The Prince and Betty - (American edition) • P. G. Wodehouse
... are not many of them who would care to stand up against a man who has been champion, and so I have plenty of time on my hands. I am a hard hitter, too, even with the gloves; that is one reason why Jack had best take you on until you get a little handy with your fists. I do more in the dog fancier line than I do with boxing, but there is nothing I like better than getting the gloves on with an amateur who is likely to be a credit to me. That is my card, sir; you will find me in pretty nearly any time of ...
— Colonel Thorndyke's Secret • G. A. Henty
... Every dahlia fancier who came into our garden or who had an opportunity of seeing a bloom elsewhere; and, sooth to say, we were rather ostentatious in our display; John put it into stands, and jars, and baskets, and dishes; Dick ...
— The Lost Dahlia • Mary Russell Mitford
... There is the chicken which you find in the barnyard, in the incubator, or on a hat. And there is the type indigenous to State Street, Chicago. Each is known by its feathers. The barnyard variety may puzzle the amateur fancier, but there is no mistaking the State Street chicken. It is known by its soiled, high, white canvas boots; by its tight, short black skirt; by its slug pearl earrings; by its bewildering coiffure. By every line of its slim young body, by ...
— Roast Beef, Medium • Edna Ferber
... as a marriage-gift from a friend of his; and that each had said to the other that the dog's name was "Crusoe," without reasons being asked or given on either side. On arriving at New York the major's friend, as we have said, made him a present of the dogs. Not being much of a dog fancier, he soon tired of old Crusoe, and gave him away to a gentleman, who took him down to Florida, and that was the end of him. He was never ...
— The Dog Crusoe and His Master - A Story of Adventure in the Western Prairies • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... cheese-fancier, like a melon-picker, can tell if a Cheddar is rich, ripe and ready for the Rabbit. When you hear your dealer say, "It's six months old ...
— The Complete Book of Cheese • Robert Carlton Brown
... this all. There exist stimuli to inquiry in the one case which do not exist in the other. The money-interest and the interest of the fancier, acting now separately and now together, have prompted multitudinous individuals to make experiments which have brought out clear evidence that fortuitous variations are inherited. The cattle-breeders who profit by producing certain shapes and qualities; the keepers of pet ...
— Essays: Scientific, Political, & Speculative, Vol. I • Herbert Spencer
... roll. He stared at Anna-Rose with unblinking eyes. Then he turned his head away and spat along the station, and then, again fixing his eyes on Anna-Rose, he said, "Young gurl, you may be a spiritualist, and a table-turner, and a psychic-rummager, and a ghost-fancier, and anything else you please, and get what comfort you can out of your coming backs and the rest of the blessed truck, but I know better. And what I know, being a Christian, is that once a man's dead he's either in ...
— Christopher and Columbus • Countess Elizabeth Von Arnim
... money, which went on accumulating at a most alarming rate, he took it into his head to select for himself, from all the follies of his country and of his age, one of the most elegant and expensive,—he became a tulip-fancier. ...
— The Black Tulip • Alexandre Dumas (Pere)
... remark was, 'Nom d'une pipe!' and he added something more which I couldn't catch, but when we became friends he promised to engage the services of a dog-fancier ...
— Blake's Burden • Harold Bindloss
... snappish, choleric Lady Bountiful, at another a humble parasite on a wealthy skinflint merchant, then a private secretary to a goggle-eyed gentleman, with his hair cut in the English style, then she promoted him to the post of something between butler and buffoon to a dog-fancier.... In short, Fate drove poor Tihon to drink drop by drop to the dregs the bitter poisoned cup of a dependent existence. He had been, in his time, the sport of the dull malignity and the boorish pranks of slothful masters. How often, alone in his room, released ...
— A Sportsman's Sketches - Volume II • Ivan Turgenev
... my first term I was not very agreeably impressed by something that PETER did. A dog-fancier happened to come through the street in which we both lodged, and PETER began to bargain with him for a fox-terrier, who, according to the fancier's account, had a pedigree as long and as illustrious ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 102, February 6, 1892 • Various
... loose from some place near," said Jenny. "The milkman told me this morning that Smith, the fancier, had one the other day which crammed a lot of cinders down the baby's throat and nearly killed it, and that Mr Smith was obliged ...
— Young Tom Bowling - The Boys of the British Navy • J.C. Hutcheson
... but it's no use crying over spilt milk." Here he drew a heavy shingling-hammer out of the bag and wiped off with his sleeve something that looked like blood. Malachi had been edging round for the door, and now he made a rush for it. But the skull-fancier was ...
— While the Billy Boils • Henry Lawson
... a little fancier than I like to see girls, but then she's a nice girl and can't do Amanda ...
— Amanda - A Daughter of the Mennonites • Anna Balmer Myers |
