"Festivity" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the strengths of his strange, crustacean genius that he never had heard of anybody.) I took it on myself to say that Herr Browning would send his private gondola, propelled by his two gondoliers, to conduct Herr Ibsen to the scene of the festivity. I think it was this prospect that made him gradually unbend, for he had already acquired that taste for pomp and circumstance which was so notable a characteristic of his later years. I hastened back to the Palazzo Rezzonico ...
— A Christmas Garland • Max Beerbohm
... the parish church, on week-days as well as on Sundays, was a very useful and agreeable place to most of the parishioners. The 'holy' days, or saints' days, 'holidays' indeed, were times of rejoicing and festivity, and the Church processions and services were pleasant events in the lives of many who had few entertainments, and who for the most part could neither read nor write. Printing was not yet invented, at least not in Europe, and as every ...
— The Book of Art for Young People • Agnes Conway
... the auspicious day arrived. One of the grandest palaces of the King himself was the scene of the festivity. The costumes worn represented many of the great names of history, from Julius Caesar to Napoleon Bonaparte, and from Cleopatra to Marie Antoinette. The height of the great occasion was reached somewhat after midnight when the quadrille d'honneur was announced. The great ...
— The Arena - Volume 18, No. 92, July, 1897 • Various
... a funeral was regarded in the Swan Creek country as a kind of solemn festivity. In those days, for the most part, men died in their boots and were planted with much honor and loyal libation. There was often neither shroud nor coffin, and in the Far West many a poor fellow lies as he fell, wrapped in his own ...
— The Sky Pilot • Ralph Connor
... discussions took place in the old oak parlour over the approaching festivity! How was it to be conducted? What was to be the programme for the evening? and who were to be included in the list ...
— Aunt Judith - The Story of a Loving Life • Grace Beaumont
... high, thou dost preserve me and prosper me with fatness! Boundless abundance, yea, sublime abundance dost thou bring me! Praise, profit, pleasure, jollity, festivity, feasting, trains of victuals, eatables, drinkables, satiety, joy! Never will I toady to human being more, I now resolve it. Why, I can bless my friend or blast my foe, now that this delightful day has loaded me down with its delightful delightfulness! I've landed ...
— Amphitryo, Asinaria, Aulularia, Bacchides, Captivi • Plautus Titus Maccius
... the reader lays it down without having realized that no such wanton interference on the part of their rulers would be tolerated by the Chinese people. But we are wandering away from merry-making and festivity. ...
— The Civilization Of China • Herbert A. Giles
... of their conversation, as every anecdote which one told was in emulation tried to be outdone by the other by some incident equally if not more entertaining,—and it may be well supposed that the healthful exercise of a walk of this description disposed every one to enjoy the festivity which was to ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott
... without revealed that the town was in festivity, though little of the festival, whatever it might have been, could be seen here. Bells began to ring, and the notes came into the room through the open window, and travelled round Jude's head in a hum. They made her restless, and at last ...
— Jude the Obscure • Thomas Hardy
... of our old acquaintances and some of their friends entered the dwelling of Rabbi Winenki, glancing furtively behind them as though in fear of being watched. In the Rabbi's house there was some show of festivity, although the attempt was half-hearted and conveyed an ...
— Rabbi and Priest - A Story • Milton Goldsmith
... their feet on the rose-colored cloud, which instantly carried them to the palace of the king. The Fairy of the Fountain, to complete her benefactions, rendered Patipata as handsome as he was amiable, and the nuptials were celebrated with suitable pomp and festivity. We are informed that Papillette had, at first, some slight returns of her natural disposition; but in one year she became a mother, and from thenceforward never ...
— The Fairy Book - The Best Popular Stories Selected and Rendered Anew • Dinah Maria Mulock (AKA Miss Mulock)
... yet prolonged solemnity, I conceived the desire to be among the very last to return home from the outing. Accordingly I stayed away three days and three nights, and spent the time chiefly in gambling, a pastime which from the first night of our festivity cast its devilish snares around me. Some half-dozen of the smartest club members chanced to be together at early dawn in the Jolly Peasant, and forthwith formed the nucleus of a gambling club, which was ...
— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner
... duelo fought openly under the guise of a contest for the medal and a prize which was well worth any man's best efforts—surely, Don Andres was wily, as Valencia said. But with all the people of the valley there to see, their partisanship inflamed by the wine of festivity and the excitement ...
— The Gringos • B. M. Bower
... servant presented a number and received a present from the tree, and that ended the festivity. But so typical of the fatherland, so paternal, so like one ...
— As Seen By Me • Lilian Bell
... except one window—the window of the boudoir—and there the light was of the dim and melancholy hue that instinctively gives the impression of the sick-chamber. Was Clotilde still there, feebly counting the hours of pain, while all within her hearing was festivity? The answers which I had received to my daily enquiries were cheerless. "She had not quitted the apartment where she had been first conveyed."—"The duchess insisted on her not being removed."—"Madame was inconsolable, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 337, November, 1843 • Various
... us. January was drawing to its close; the weather was growing more and more winterly; high winds, piercingly cold, were raving through our narrow streets; and still the spirit of social festivity bade defiance to the storms which sang through our ancient forests. From the accident of our magistracy being selected from the tradesmen of the city, the hospitalities of the place were far more extensive than would otherwise have happened; for every member of the corporation gave two annual entertainments ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.
... herself agreeable. Some women—young girls more particularly—seem to think too much cannot be done for their entertainment. They make themselves burdensome by their wish to have "something doing" all the time. The visitor who conveys the impression that she is neglected unless some festivity is in the immediate ...
— Mother's Remedies - Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remedies from Mothers - of the United States and Canada • T. J. Ritter
... party looked dismal enough as they slowly, and almost in funereal fashion, left the scene of festivity. The strongest of the party had to take turns to carry poor Nora's litter, for she could not endure any ...
— Red Rose and Tiger Lily - or, In a Wider World • L. T. Meade
... whether I was most interested, dear Mrs. Ticknor, in your picture of your domestic life and happy house and home, or in the view you gave me of your public festivity and celebration of your American day of days—your national festival in honour of your Declaration of Independence. It was never, I suppose, more joyously, innocently, and advantageously held than on the day you describe so delightfully with the ...
— The Life and Letters of Maria Edgeworth, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth
... Holy-tide, to propitiate the minds of his subjects and vassals, they were invited in large numbers to partake of a princely festivity at Castell-Coch, or the Red- Castle, as it was then called, since better known by the name of Powys-Castle, and in latter times the princely seat of the Duke of Beaufort. The architectural magnificence of this noble residence is ...
— The Betrothed • Sir Walter Scott
... upwards of two centuries, received an unprecedented opposition from vulgar prejudice, which all the philosophy of the age was unable to dissipate, until Louis XIV. wore a bunch of the flowers of the potatoe, in the midst of his court, on a day of mirth and festivity. The people then, for the first time, obsequiously acknowledged its utility, and began to express their astonishment at the apathy which had so long prevailed with regard to ...
— Thaumaturgia • An Oxonian
... Paris in the intervals of his triumphant progress through France, he lived a life of perpetual festivity in the shape of weddings and suppers. When he was in the provinces, the correspondents in the smaller towns made much of him; in Paris, the great houses feted and caressed him. Welcomed, flattered, and fed wherever he went, it came to pass that to breakfast or to ...
— Parisians in the Country - The Illustrious Gaudissart, and The Muse of the Department • Honore de Balzac
... arrived. They had sent out a large number of invitations, and many who had missed the laying of the foundation-stone, which was reported to have been so charming, were the more careful not to be absent on the second festivity. ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. II • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... one scene of festivity and rejoicing. The people were everywhere collected, and everywhere delighted. We passed through Salisbury, where a magnificent arch was erected, of festoons of flowers, for the king's carriage to pass under, and mottoed with "The king restored," and "Long live the ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madam D'Arblay Volume 2 • Madame D'Arblay
... specimens of the comparatively rude manufacture—of that rude age! London was filled with foreigners from all parts of the earth; the whole kingdom was in a commotion, indeed, but a commotion of hospitable festivity, in which it shook hands with ...
— The Eclipse of Faith - Or, A Visit To A Religious Sceptic • Henry Rogers
... by those cannibal feasts customary with the Hurons on such occasions. Once, when the Fathers had been strenuous in their denunciations, a hand of the victim, duly prepared, was flung in at their door, as an invitation to join in the festivity. As the owner of the severed member had been baptized, they dug a hole in their chapel, and buried it with solemn rites of sepulture. [ Lalemant, Relation des Hurons, ...
— The Jesuits in North America in the Seventeenth Century • Francis Parkman
... St. Patrick's Day after the evacuation of New York City by the British, there was a glorious celebration "spent in festivity and mirth." As the newspaper reporter put it, "the greatest unanimity and conviviality pervaded" a ...
— Our Foreigners - A Chronicle of Americans in the Making • Samuel P. Orth
... quite admit that in form it may, and probably will, survive the earlier stage of Socialism, but its ultimate disappearance is none the less certain. The sentiment of the national patriotism will then, let us hope, be reduced to its last expression—the holding of annual dinners, or some harmless festivity of this sort, such as is affected by the natives of certain English counties resident in the metropolis. The Nationalist movement, therefore, is an old Radical 'plank' which clearly no longer belongs ...
— British Socialism - An Examination of Its Doctrines, Policy, Aims and Practical Proposals • J. Ellis Barker
... Hermon went on board Archon's splendidly equipped vessel and, instead of a tiresome journey, began a new and riotous period of festivity. ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... one word describe those venerable ancestral dinners—"All silent!" Contrast this infernal silence of voice and fury of eye with the "risus amabilis," the festivity, the social kindness, the music, the wine, the "dulcis insania," of a Roman "coena." We mentioned four tests for determining what meal is, and what is not, dinner; we may now add a fifth, viz. the spirit of festal joy and elegant enjoyment, of anxiety laid aside, and of honorable social pleasure ...
— Miscellaneous Essays • Thomas de Quincey
... see it. This was her only compensation for the tears shed over the delayed return of a selfish and unfilial daughter, for the anticipated ordeal of the gay social happenings which were to follow that return, for the besetting thought that some dread misfortune might displace all this future festivity by a worse alternative, and make the lightest ...
— With the Procession • Henry B. Fuller
... that this simplicity in the matter of food which is characteristic of French entertainments is a great encouragement to the givers of soirees in general. With us, to entertain as other people do requires not only a lengthy purse, but a degree of care and forethought in the preparation for any festivity which is very wearing on body and mind alike. If Mrs. Quakercity wishes to invite fifty people to her house, her soul is vexed within her and her body is worn to a shadow with the magnitude of her preparations before ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Volume 15, No. 89, May, 1875 • Various
... had asked Miss Heredith to bring all her guests. The event was to mark the close of the house party, which was to break up on the following day. Unfortunately, Mrs. Heredith had fallen ill a few hours previously, and it was doubtful whether she would be able to join in the festivity. ...
— The Hand in the Dark • Arthur J. Rees
... slowly and uneventfully. The cold was severe, but he did not feel it, the office being well warmed, and the heat in the crowded prison far greater than was agreeable to him. At Christmas there were three days of festivity. The people of Kara, and the peasants round, all sent in gifts for the prisoners. Every one laid by a little money to buy special food for the occasion, and vodka had been smuggled in. The convicts of the different prisons were allowed to visit each other freely, and although there was much drunkenness ...
— Condemned as a Nihilist - A Story of Escape from Siberia • George Alfred Henty
... for, harassed as we are by foul conspiracy, our stay's precarious; and 'till we're summon'd to the scene of danger, let loud festivity and outward show dismiss our ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 6, June 1810 • Various
... which was the only room at The Priory capable of accommodating all the classes and the various friends invited to attend. The walls were hung with flags, and beautiful vases of flowers were placed on the window sills to give an air of festivity to the scene. Patty felt there was something very inspiriting in the fact that she was a member of such a large community. She was only one amongst many, it is true, but units make numbers, and, as Miss Lincoln often reminded the girls, each had her own place to fill, and must try to do ...
— The Nicest Girl in the School - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil
... parish, with whom were the church-wardens, determined to commemorate their victory by roasting a bullock whole on the brow of the hill which overlooked their vicar's residence, and for the preparation of which festivity they also sent their instructions. The next grand point was, how to 289convey the witnesses, who were very numerous, to the scene of action, a distance of eighteen miles. To have despatched them in post-chaises, could they have found a sufficient ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle
... old and familiar. All the afternoon Fritz, and apparently his wife too, were occupied only with a ball that was to be given. Fritz forgot more and more whatever might have caused him uneasiness, in thinking of the impression that he, as the chief person, would make on the new-comer at the festivity, and made use of the time till it should begin in giving him a foretaste of the affair by means of tales and hints dropped of the honor and attention shown him on such occasions by the most prominent citizens. He became noticeably more cheerful, ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IX - Friedrich Hebbel and Otto Ludwig • Various
... formations of the animal itself as are favorable to the growth of fat, other things being equal. There must be size where large weights are expected. Christmas beef, for instance, is expected to be large as well as fat. The symbol of festivity should be capacious, as well as prime in quality. But it is so much a matter of choice and circumstance with the grazier, that profit alone will be his guide. The axiom will be, however, as a general rule, that the better ...
— Cattle and Their Diseases • Robert Jennings
... the hapless females of Zahara with their children expiring in their arms. On every side the accents of pity for the sufferers were mingled with execrations of the barbarity of the king. The preparations for festivity were neglected, and the viands which were to have feasted the conquerors ...
— Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada • Washington Irving
... the taxi-driver has been wielding over London during the past week or so of mitigated festivity, let me tell a true story. I was in a cab with my old friend Mark, one of the most ferocious sticklers for efficiency in underlings who ever sent for the manager. His maledictions on bad waiters have led to the compulsory re-decorating of half the restaurants of London months before their ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, January 3, 1917 • Various
... months before the anticipated date of the big feast there is a preliminary festivity, which is regarded as a sort of intimation that the long-intended feast is shortly to take place. To this festivity people of villages of any neighbouring communities, say within an hour or two's walk, are invited. ...
— The Mafulu - Mountain People of British New Guinea • Robert W. Williamson
... Amarilly, clad in the white gown and with black velvet hair-ribbons, went forth at an early hour to the house of festivity. ...
— Amarilly of Clothes-line Alley • Belle K. Maniates
... the necessity of keeping up a neighbourhood, and maintaining his interest in the county, as the first duties of man. Ostensibly Sir Ulick had no motive in all this, but the hospitable wish of seeing Castle Hermitage one continued scene of festivity; but under this good fellowship and apparent thoughtlessness and profusion, there was an eye to his own interest, and a keen view to the improvement of his fortune and the advancement of his family. With these habits and ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. IX - [Contents: Harrington; Thoughts on Bores; Ormond] • Maria Edgeworth
... the spectacle of thirty-eight gentlemen meeting in a quiet city, and peacefully settling the terms of a national union between thirteen sovereign States, most of which gave up, voluntarily, what the sword alone was once supposed capable of extorting. In all his orations on days of national festivity or mourning, we observe that his weightiest eulogy falls upon those who were conspicuous in this great business. Because Hamilton aided in it, he revered his memory; because Madison was its best interpreter, he venerated his name and deferred absolutely ...
— Famous Americans of Recent Times • James Parton
... were no more attempts at festivity. The clouds gathered quickly and a silent gloom settled over all the cotton-spinning and weaving districts of England. But I shall only touch this subject as it refers to the lives and characters of my story. Its facts and incidents are graven on thousands of lives and chronicled in numerous ...
— The Measure of a Man • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... not contain more than a thousand persons of real musical appreciation, that a number of these could not afford to attend the operatic performances, and that opera week was, consequently, in reality more an occasion of great social festivity than of devout homage ...
— American Adventures - A Second Trip 'Abroad at home' • Julian Street
... London's feast of folly? Has the bronzed and bearded Barndale anything to do with it? Lady Dives Luxor gives a ball; and Lady Dives, being Lilian's especial patroness and guardian angel and divinity, insists on Lilian being present thereat. This ball is designed as the crowning festivity of a brilliant year; and to Lilian, blest with youth and beauty and high spirits, and such a splendid lover, shall it not be a night to remember until the grey curtain fall on the close of the last season, and nothing is any more remembered? ...
— An Old Meerschaum - From Coals Of Fire And Other Stories, Volume II. (of III.) • David Christie Murray
... figures performed in these assemblies of savages, are regulated by time beaten upon stretched skins or drums,—the only musical instrument that is commonly seen among them; and while the light of blazing boughs is thrown upon the scene of festivity, the rude music is accompanied by a song. Darkness seems essential to the effect of the whole; and the painted figures coming forward from the obscurity of the background, while the singers and beaters ...
— Australia, its history and present condition • William Pridden
... himself and brethren, from the farmers and visitors, to make a "frolick" afterwards, called "the largess spending." By way of returning thanks, though perhaps formerly of much more, or of different signification, they immediately leave the seat of festivity, and with a very long and repeated shout of "a largess," the number of shouts being regulated by the sums given, seem to wish to make themselves heard by the people of the surrounding farms. And ...
— Wild Flowers - Or, Pastoral and Local Poetry • Robert Bloomfield
... de Conti, great lovers of festivity, pleasure, and costly delights, which are suited only for people of their kind, dragged the Comte de Vermandois, as a young debutant, into one of those licentious parties where a young man is compelled to see things ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... richly compensate for both. Through the thick gloom of the present, I see the brightness of the future as the sun in heaven. We shall make this a glorious, an immortal day. When we are in our graves, our children will honor it. They will celebrate it with thanksgiving, with festivity, with bonfires, and illuminations. On its annual return they will shed tears, copious, gushing tears, not of subjection and slavery, not of agony and distress, but of exultation, of gratitude, and of joy. Sir, before God, I believe the hour has come. My whole heart is in it. All that I ...
— America First - Patriotic Readings • Various
... swayed gently back and forth as they talked. They sat close to the low, broad window which presented so beautiful a picture of the blue Bay and the white shipping. The huge "Consternation" lay moored with her broadside toward the town, all sign of festivity already removed from hull and rigging, and, to the scarcely slumber-satisfied eyes of the girls, something of the sadness of departure seemed to hang as a haze around the great ship. The girls were not discussing the past, but rather anticipating ...
— A Rock in the Baltic • Robert Barr
... of Oxford, Eng., this day is an annual solemnity in honor of the benefactors of the University, when orations are delivered, and prize compositions are read in the theatre. It is the great day of festivity ...
— A Collection of College Words and Customs • Benjamin Homer Hall
... in search of a white waistcoat and one or two other necessary contributions to the festivity of the evening, picking my way with the utmost care among the greatly-engrossed couples who impeded every step; and finally arrived at my dressing-room, to find that that hallowed apartment had been turned into a ladies' cloak-room, and that every available article of furniture ...
— The Right Stuff - Some Episodes in the Career of a North Briton • Ian Hay
... proceed. The next day, being his Majesty's birthday, Park halted, pitched one of the tents, and purchased a bullock and a calf for the soldiers, who were drawn up in the afternoon, and fired a salute. They made this as much a day of festivity as circumstances would admit of, though they were under the necessity of drinking the king's health in water, in the absence of any more stimulating and genial fluid. At Baniserile, a Mahometan town, they met with a most ...
— Life and Travels of Mungo Park in Central Africa • Mungo Park
... broken only by lagging footsteps on the stairs, as one by one the servants crept away to bed; there was an occasional burst of stifled laughter, a last echo of the wedding festivity, or doors were opened as they still talked among themselves, then shut. A smothered sound came now and again from the bedrooms, a chair fell, the old coachman coughed feebly, ...
— A Woman of Thirty • Honore de Balzac
... three happy figures modeled with grace and much refinement are placed on a background divided into panels by a vine. But "Harvest" is quiet and serious; the goddess, bearing the torch of Indian Summer, receives the sheaves of the gleaners. So in "Winter," one panel shows Festivity, with the old bard, the Christmas garland and the gaieties of the home; the other, the distaff by the fireside, the huntsman and ...
— The Sculpture and Mural Decorations of the Exposition • Stella G. S. Perry
... were infinitely superior in every respect but perhaps cleanliness, which, after all, matters little in these wilds. With all their faults our Whalen friends were just and generous in their dealings, though occasionally disquieting during their periods of festivity. The Eskimo we found boorish and surly at all times, and the treachery of these people is shown by the fact that a few years previously they had brutally murdered Mr. Lopp's predecessor by shooting him with a whale-gun. A monument on the cliff ...
— From Paris to New York by Land • Harry de Windt
... such principle of repression as the church has preached for years past? No; we find abuse condemned, and use allowed and approved. The Savior is at the hilarious merry-making of the marriage, contributing to the festivity. His own parable is on record, bidding men put the gospel into all the forms and developments of life, to refine and fit them for human enjoyment. The long list of exceptions with which men are forbidden to bring the gospel leaven into contact has been added by men, not by Christ. He was condemned ...
— Amusement: A Force in Christian Training • Rev. Marvin R. Vincent.
... the banquet-hall upon a scene of festivity introduced by the graceful bee dance of the Almas. It is followed by the powerful appeal of the Queen for Assad's life, rising to an intensely dramatic pitch as she warns the King of the revenge of her armed hosts ("When Sheba's iron Lances splinter and Zion's Throne in Ruins falls"). ...
— The Standard Operas (12th edition) • George P. Upton
... held, each one came to offer him a white plume as a sign of vassalage and tribute, which is an ancient custom dating from the time that this land was conquered by these Cuzcos.[12] This done, they sang and danced, making a great festivity, in which the new king neither arrayed himself in clothes of price nor placed the fringe upon the forehead in the manner in which the dead lord was wont to wear it. And when the governor asked him why he did so, he replied that it was the custom of his ancestors when they took possession ...
— An Account of the Conquest of Peru • Pedro Sancho
... slow progress of the fall's plowing, the gathering of the threshing crew was a most dramatic event to my mother, as to us, for it not only brought unwonted clamor, it fetched her brothers William and David and Frank, who owned and ran a threshing machine, and their coming gave the house an air of festivity which offset the burden of extra work which ...
— A Son of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland
... twinkling constellation is the residence of the martyrs; that group of twelve luminaries is the celestial home of the Apostles. Perhaps that steep of light is the dwelling-place of angels cherubic, seraphic, archangelic. A mansion with as many rooms as worlds, and all their windows illuminated for festivity. ...
— New Tabernacle Sermons • Thomas De Witt Talmage
... marriage. Had there been a grand party, that going away of the bride and bridegroom might be very well; but the countess felt that on such an occasion as this nothing but the presence of the body of the sacrifice could give any reality to the festivity. So Crosbie and Lady Alexandrina Crosbie heard Mr Gresham's speech, in which he prophesied for the young couple an amount of happiness and prosperity almost greater than is compatible with the circumstances of humanity. His young friend Crosbie, whose acquaintance he had been ...
— The Small House at Allington • Anthony Trollope
... the young women, all of whom, in their best dresses, attend the Ram Feast, as it is called. Dancing, wrestling, and other games, assisted by copious libations of cider during the afternoon, prolong the festivity till nightfall. ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 180, April 9, 1853 • Various
... insistent calls elsewhere, Dr. Earl remained long enough to help lend an air of festivity to the small party, which Silvia presided over with infinite tact, and with a last admonition to Mrs. Bell to keep the little girl in bed until he came again, and as quiet as possible, he took his departure, and Silvia went ...
— An American Suffragette • Isaac N. Stevens
... Tobalito's trusted friend, hearing the sounds of festivity and snuffing the Paras brandy from afar off, came in to join them; and being informed of the happy issue of Pepe's love affair, and of Pepe's noble project, he gladly joined in drinking the double toast and in adding his good wishes to theirs. So they made merry over their hopeful ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 10 • Various
... Police, but at this period flourishing in vast numbers. Besides these plunderers, there were others with whom the disposal of their pillage necessarily brought them into contact, and who seldom failed to attend them during their hours of relaxation and festivity;—to wit, dealers in junk, old rags, and marine stores, purchasers of prize-money, crimps, and Jew receivers. The latter formed by far the most knavish-looking and unprepossessing portion of the assemblage. One or two of the tables were occupied by groups of fat frowzy women in flat ...
— Jack Sheppard - A Romance • William Harrison Ainsworth
... all right. Why, it was a rig I'd be glad to see Winnie in, when she gets older, and if I've made it sound rather—er—gay and festive, it's my bungling way of describing it, and also, because Vicky's personality would add gayety and festivity to any raiment. ...
— Vicky Van • Carolyn Wells
... they had spent in London had brought them very close together. He had assumed the footing of a brother, but she had felt that pleasant and kind as he was to all the rest of the party it was for her sake alone that this festivity had been arranged. They had had but one talk together alone, and she had then said that she hoped the expressions he had used in his letter to her with reference to his health were not altogether justified, ...
— One of the 28th • G. A. Henty
... at Lambeth, where he resided, was to mortify Dr. Tenison, the archbishop, by a public festivity on the surrender of Dunkirk to Hill; an event with which Tenison's political bigotry did not suffer him to be delighted. King was resolved to counteract his sullenness, and at the expense of a few barrels of ale filled the ...
— Lives of the Poets: Gay, Thomson, Young, and Others • Samuel Johnson
... appeared very serious and silent on the way. Could she be ignorant of the pleasure I was anticipating? I danced along by her side; hardly feeling the earth beneath my feet; I was already at the scene of expected festivity. I noticed that my mother carried a fan. It was not a hot day and I wondered much what the fan was for. We arrived at the house where there was already a considerable assemblage of the neighbors and friends from a distance. ...
— Confessions of Boyhood • John Albee
... expression of his calm, gentle face, that always greatly interested the masters and made them rejoice in his success; and among his comrades he was a universal favourite. His brother joined him at Eton during the ensuing year, when the Queen's wedding afforded the boys another glimpse of Royal festivity. Their tumultuous loyalty and audacity ...
— Life of John Coleridge Patteson • Charlotte M. Yonge
... which crossed the hill. To make for home he had first to walk some little distance along it; and scarcely had he descended into it for that purpose, when he found himself in the front of a band of revellers, who were returning from some scene of impious festivity. They were arrayed in holiday guise, as far as they studied dress at all; the symbols of idolatry were on their foreheads and arms; some of them were intoxicated, and ...
— Callista • John Henry Cardinal Newman
... of the truce was first brought to Count Mauritz at Recife, all the outward marks of festivity and great rejoicings were exhibited. A general fraternization ensued, and the late enemies and temporary friends regaled each other at various banquets. Thus Paulo da Cunha, the Brazilian patriot, upon whose outlawed head the Count had put a price ...
— South America • W. H. Koebel
... of festivity at Hohen-Cremmen were past; all the guests had departed, likewise the newly married couple, who left the evening of the ...
— The German Classics Of The Nineteenth And Twentieth Centuries, Volume 12 • Various
... invitations to a house-warming in his new bachelor-apartment. He had invited a number of his gayer friends and ladies exclusively from so-called artistic circles. So far all was quite Parisian. Only the journalists who might, next morning, have proclaimed the glory of the festivity to the world—these were excluded. Berlin, for various reasons, did not seem an ...
— The Indian Lily and Other Stories • Hermann Sudermann
... it being my private secretary, Professor Crane, since acting president of Cornell University, and sundry of the more important men in the expedition. To these I explained the situation. It seemed bad enough to lose all means of presenting a suitable appearance at the approaching festivity, but this was nothing compared with the idea that I had requited the hospitality of my host by spreading through his ...
— Volume I • Andrew Dickson White
... and festivity begins in the fall, after the birds have left us and the holiday spirit of nature has commenced to subside. How much his presence adds to the pleasure of a saunter in the still October woods. You step lightly across the threshold ...
— Squirrels and Other Fur-Bearers • John Burroughs
... joy according to their ability. The streets were crowded with officers in habits of ceremony, mounted on horses richly caparisoned, each attended by a great many footmen. Aladdin's mother asked the oil merchant what was the meaning of all this preparation of public festivity. "Whence came you, good woman," said he, "that you don't know that the grand vizier's son is to marry the Princess Buddir al Buddoor, the sultan's daughter, to-night? She will presently return from the bath; and these officers whom you see are to assist at the cavalcade to ...
— Fairy Tales Every Child Should Know • Various
... Leoline the conquest Warbeck had obtained over himself; and Leoline, touched to the heart, would not consent that the wedding should take place immediately. "Let him, at least," said she, "not be insulted by a premature festivity; and give him time, amongst the lofty beauties he will gaze upon in a far country, to forget, Otho, that he once loved her who is the beloved ...
— The Pilgrims Of The Rhine • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... attraction towards this young girl. It was not like the sudden shock which he had received from that other, that emotional agitation in which were mingled the desire to flee, to escape from a possession and the persistent melancholy of the morrow of a festivity, extinguished candles, the lost refrains of songs, perfumes vanished into the night. In the presence of this young girl as she stood superintending the family table, seeing if anything were wanting, enveloping her children, her grandchildren, with the active tenderness of her eyes, there ...
— The Nabob • Alphonse Daudet
... wait before the first guests were likely to arrive, and Dick sat in the band-room low-spirited and dreamy; for the festivity seemed a trouble now, and he would have given anything to have been ...
— The Queen's Scarlet - The Adventures and Misadventures of Sir Richard Frayne • George Manville Fenn
... started with a fixed idea that a regatta differed from a Primrose Fete, if at all, then only in being non-political. He could not get it out of his head that public speeches were of the essence of the festivity; and when, with all the tact at my command, I insisted on aquatics, he countered me by proposing to invite down a lecturer from the Navy League! As he put it in the heat of argument, 'Weren't eight Dreadnoughts aquatic enough for anybody?' But in the voting the three young ...
— Corporal Sam and Other Stories • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... retired to their rooms for a little rest and there were some changes of dress. Then they all mounted their chariots and hackneys and issued forth on the streets in great triumph and wonderful were the jousts of the Tree of Gold. Several days of festivity followed when the usual pantomimes and shows ...
— Charles the Bold - Last Duke Of Burgundy, 1433-1477 • Ruth Putnam
... desirous, and I am too, of noting this day with white chalk. If I be not exceeding the bounds of curiosity, and, in a moment of conviviality, the conventionalities of society, may I ask the reason of so much festivity?" ...
— A Yacht Voyage to Norway, Denmark, and Sweden - 2nd edition • W. A. Ross
... balls, to which access was as difficult as it is now to a court festivity, have dwindled to public affairs with paid subscriptions, yet even in their changed conditions they are somewhat of an event in the winter life of a neighborhood. Everybody has the entree who can command ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. October, 1878. • Various
... moment Cyrus and his Persians were entering by the river gates, which had been left open in that time of careless festivity. One end of the city knew not that the other was taken; and ere the night was past Belshazzar lay dead in his palace, and the Assyrian empire was over ...
— The Chosen People - A Compendium Of Sacred And Church History For School-Children • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... of festivity to be on the left hand is the prized position; on occasions of mourning, the right hand. The second in command of the army has his place on the left; the general commanding in chief has his on the right;—his place, that is, is assigned to him as in the rites of mourning. He who ...
— Tao Teh King • Lao-Tze
... absented herself from the festivity at Sombwelo. It was no great exaggeration to plead that she was ill, for her spirit was sick if her body was not. But no one spared her the details of a successful and delightful day. It seemed that Druro had been a perfect host and Mrs. Hading a graceful ...
— Blue Aloes - Stories of South Africa • Cynthia Stockley
... now enters the tale—somewhat tardily, and making a quick exit, all in a morning coat too tight about the shoulders, and a smile of festivity too tight about the lips. He looked as improbable as an undertaker's rubber-plant. Yet in his brief course he had a mighty effect upon the progress of civilization as exemplified in the social career of ...
— Free Air • Sinclair Lewis
... one of the greatest advantages which resulted to Greece, from the solemnization of these games. The republics, separated by distance of country, and diversity of interests, having the opportunity of meeting from time to time, in the same place, and in the midst of rejoicing and festivity, allied themselves more strictly with one another, stimulated each other against the Barbarians and the common enemies of their liberty, and made up their differences by the mediation of some neutral state in alliance with them. The ...
— The Ancient History of the Egyptians, Carthaginians, Assyrians, • Charles Rollin
... toilette for her, and insisted upon dragging her from place to place, and wearying her with gayeties from which her sad young heart shrank. Each afternoon their equipage was to be seen upon the Champs Elysees, and each evening it stood before the door waiting to bear them to some place of festivity. ...
— Esmeralda • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... fort, who were not a little surprised to see me. The commencement of the new year is the rejoicing season of the Canadians, when they are generally intoxicated for some days. I postponed making any demand till this time of festivity should cease; but on the same day I went over to the Hudson's Bay Fort, and delivered Lieutenant Franklin's letters to Mr. Simpson. If they were astonished on one side to see me, the amazement was still greater ...
— Narrative of a Journey to the Shores of the Polar Sea, in the years 1819-20-21-22, Volume 2 • John Franklin
... retired to Stratford, where the remaining five years of his life were spent in honour and prosperity. Early in 1616 his health began to give way, and he made his will. In the spring he received a visit from his friends, Jonson and Drayton, and the festivity with which it was celebrated seems to have brought on a fever, of which he d. on April 23. He was survived by his wife and his two dau., both of whom were married. His descendants d. out with ...
— A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature • John W. Cousin
... were always attended with feasting, and consequently were highly grateful to the multitude, the Pope ordered that oxen, should as usual be slaughtered near the church, and the people indulged in their ancient festivity.[39] Whatever popular customs of heathenism were found to be absolutely not incompatible with Christianity were retained; and some of them were continued to a very late period. Deer were at a certain season brought into St. Paul's church in London, ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... East Angles, and his violent seizing of that kingdom. This young prince, who is said to have possessed great merit, had paid his addresses to Elfrida, the daughter of Offa, and was invited with all his retinue to Hereford, in order to solemnize the nuptials. Amidst the joy and festivity of these entertainments, he was seized by Offa, and secretly beheaded; and though Elfrida, who abhorred her father's treachery, had time to give warning to the East Anglian nobility, who escaped into their own country, Offa, having extinguished the royal family, ...
— The History of England, Volume I • David Hume
... at next door, who was then provided with plenty of soles, and whitings, and lobsters, far superior to those which adorn a city feast. This discovery being made by accident, we completed the best, the pleasantest, and the merriest meal, with more appetite, more real solid luxury, and more festivity, than was ever seen ...
— Journal of A Voyage to Lisbon • Henry Fielding
... is at her old best, and all her children are exalted and exhilarated by the knowledge that they are at their best also. Even the trippers are perpetually in Sabbath clothes, as a sign that they are infected with the prevalent feeling of festivity. ...
— Too Old for Dolls - A Novel • Anthony Mario Ludovici
... on the following Wednesday, offered a propitious opportunity for an excursion such as she suggested. The girls were accustomed to celebrate the occasion with some little festivity, and were delighted when it was arranged that they should visit the town of Appleford, about ten ...
— The Manor House School • Angela Brazil
... deficiency, while it is of common occurrence among Rosaceae and Pomaceae. In the latter group the St. Valery apple, so often referred to, is an illustration. To obtain fruits from this variety it is necessary to apply pollen from another flower, a proceeding made the occasion of festivity and rejoicing by the villagers in some parts of France. In some of the Artemisias, especially in Artemisia Tournefortiana, all the florets have been noticed to be female, owing to the suppression of the stamens, and this suppression is associated with a change in the form ...
— Vegetable Teratology - An Account of the Principal Deviations from the Usual Construction of Plants • Maxwell T. Masters
... tinsel, and paper angels, suspended by invisible wires over the counters, and all glittering and shining and twinkling with light, a strong whiff of evergreen fragrance came to her, and the aroma of fir-balsam, and it was to her the very breath of all the mysterious joy and hitherto untasted festivity of this earth into which she had come. She felt deep in her childish soul the sense of a promise of happiness in the future, of which this was a foretaste. When she went into the department where the dolls dwelt, ...
— The Portion of Labor • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... The marriage festivity was on the threshold of evil days. The great rivalry between Louis of Orleans and John the Fearless, Duke of Burgundy, had been forsworn with the most reverend solemnities. But the feud was only in abeyance, and John of Burgundy still conspired in secret. On November 23, 1407 - in that black ...
— Familiar Studies of Men & Books • Robert Louis Stevenson |
