"Mirthful" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... with herself, and she gripped him to her soul in wild interest and new curiosity. Yet this childish friendship was so new and incomprehensible a thing to her that she did not know how to express it. At first she pounced upon him in mirthful, almost impish glee, teasing and mocking and half scaring him, despite his fifteen years of ...
— The Quest of the Silver Fleece - A Novel • W. E. B. Du Bois
... Miss Blythe?" asked Fuller, with a slow solemnity of inquiry which would have made the question richly mirthful to an auditor. "Do you mean to tell me as you go about spyin' after wheer my little wench puts her letters to her sweetheart? Why, fie, fie, ma'am! That's a child's trick, not a bit ...
— Aunt Rachel • David Christie Murray
... this moment it could not positively have been asserted that the man, in spite of his tantalizing declaration, was really in earnest. The spectators had indeed taken the proceedings throughout as a piece of mirthful irony carried to extremes; and had assumed that, being out of work, he was, as a consequence, out of temper with the world, and society, and his nearest kin. But with the demand and response of real cash ...
— The Mayor of Casterbridge • Thomas Hardy
... will be a mingled one, for so is our theme; having a sympathy alike for our mirthful and sorrowful moments, which it alike spiritualizes; striking the light, gleesome chord to the one, and attuning the soul to more ethereal joy; while by its soft influence it tones down the harshness of bitter, unavailing ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 364, February 1846 • Various
... anxiously, contends? If the grammatical rule is imperative within the verse, as much, one would think, must it be so at its termination. That Chaucer admits the doubled ending we see by numerous unequivocal instances from all moods of the verse, mirthful and solemn; these show a versification friendly to the doubled ending; and must go far to remove any scruple of admitting Tyrwhitt's conception of ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 57, No. 356, June, 1845 • Various
... long silence of the house, opening as it were a window to admit the sun, a voice had uplifted itself in song. The voice had some of the tones of Anne's voice, and something that reminded him of her voice. But when had he heard her sing? When had aught so clear, so mirthful, or so young fallen from her as this; this melody, laden with life and youth and abundance, that rose and fell and floated to his ears through the half-open door ...
— The Long Night • Stanley Weyman
... would like to kill that other person very, very slowly. I ask no questions, but I dare to trust the man I know of, even in defiance of that man's own voice. I dare protest the man no thief, but in all things a madly honourable gentleman. My poor bruised, puzzled boy," said Melicent, with an odd mirthful tenderness, "how came you to be blundering about this miry world of ours! Only be very good for my sake and forget the bitterness; what does it matter when ...
— Domnei • James Branch Cabell et al
... parts of the game. Four a side is the almost ideal number, but a few more or less do not make any very great difference. But be sure to get some Scotchmen. They take the game seriously and do much to make the whole affair bright and mirthful. A slight sprinkling of Irishmen often serves to bring out more prominently the flavour ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 146., January 21, 1914 • Various
... down the mountain sides, along the roads, or across the fields, and settling at last into one broad sheet of fire. Many a loud laugh might then be heard ringing the night echo into reverberation; mirthful was the gabble in hard guttural Irish; and now and then a song from some one whose potations had been, rather copious, would rise on the night-breeze, to which a chorus was subjoined by a dozen voices from the ...
— The Hedge School; The Midnight Mass; The Donagh • William Carleton
... lances at some wide-spread prejudice, or toy with the tangles of some mighty Naerea's hair. Undines and satyrs, cupids and merry fauns, may spring laughing from under the artist's hand, but it is from the unyielding marble that these slender children of his mirthful hours are carved. It was not in her infancy that Rome produced her Juvenal. Martial and Plautus caricatured the passions of humanity after Carthage had been destroyed and Julius Caesar had made of his tomb a city of palaces. Aristophanes wrote when Greece had ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I. February, 1862, No. II. - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... thanks to the care of good Aunt Isabel. Her eyes, like her mother's, were large, black, and shaded by long lashes; sparkling and mirthful when she laughed; when she did not, thoughtful and profound, even sad. Her curly hair was almost blond, her nose perfect; and her mouth, small and sweet like her mother's, was flanked by charming dimples. The little thing, idol of every one, lived amid smiles and love. ...
— An Eagle Flight - A Filipino Novel Adapted from Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... aunt—cutting paper into fantastic figures, and placing them upon the wall to please children, or dressing a doll for little sister? Who would not rather see their young daughter a jumping delicate little romp, chasing a bird in mirthful glee, as if she verily ...
— Mrs Whittelsey's Magazine for Mothers and Daughters - Volume 3 • Various
... hand, is a drama in which the characters are placed in more or less humorous situations. The movement is light and often mirthful, and the play ends in general good will and happiness. The historical drama aims to present some historical age or character, and may be either a comedy or a tragedy. The following list includes the best of Shakespeare's plays in each of the three classes; ...
— English Literature - Its History and Its Significance for the Life of the English Speaking World • William J. Long
... be long ere you hear me again," said De Valette, angrily. "I shall be careful not to excite your mirthful humor ...
— The Rivals of Acadia - An Old Story of the New World • Harriet Vaughan Cheney
... Hungary and Central Austria. The army had halted there in the course of the afternoon, but, as night approached, the hum of action gradually ceased, and gloomy silence reigned throughout. No groups of merry soldiers gathered round the camp-fires with laugh, or jest, or mirthful song. Some slept from exhaustion and discouragement, others sat mournfully gazing toward the east, which, unlike the dark horizon around, was lit up with a fiery glow, that marked the advance of the ferocious invaders. In one tent pitched on a hillock ...
— Prince Eugene and His Times • L. Muhlbach
... explaining carefully how hard worked they were and how often they went under shell-fire. The fighting officers, English, Scottish, Irish, Welsh, jeered at them, laughed hugely at the latest story of mirthful horror, arranged rendezvous at the Godebert restaurant, where they would see the beautiful Marguerite (until she transferred to la cathedrale in the same street) and our checks which Charlie cashed at a discount, with a noble faith in British honesty, not often, ...
— Now It Can Be Told • Philip Gibbs
... communicates itself it ceases to exist. One might say that outbursts of merriment need to be encouraged, that they are not self-sufficient. Not to share them is to blow upon them and extinguish them. When, in an animated and mirthful group, some one remains cold or gloomy, the laughter immediately stops or is checked. Yet those whom the common people call, in their picturesque language, wet blankets, spoil-sports, or kill-joys, are not necessarily hostile ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park
... shimmering under the sweet, hot sky of twilight, and the distant uplands telling of calm and deep peace in other places. Truly a court of love, and truly loved by those who, for an hour or so, dwell in it. Tread lightly, you that pass. It may move you to mirth, but there is nothing mirthful here; only the eternal sorrow and the eternal joy. Perchance you do not make love in this way; but love is love.... Under every brooding oak recline the rapt couples, snatching their moments in this velvety green. ...
— Nights in London • Thomas Burke
... Diana, sharply and suddenly; but Elaine's amusement had too much impetus on it to be stopped all at once. She was sitting with her back to the door, her mirthful laughter ringing through the room, when the door was suddenly flung open, and two ladies appeared behind it. The startled, terrified expression on the faces of Olympias and Roisia warned Clarice that something unpleasant ...
— A Forgotten Hero - Not for Him • Emily Sarah Holt
... us; and there, if we don't know Justice, we, and all our budgets and Acts of Parliament, shall find lodging when the day is done!"—The official person, a polite man otherwise, grinned as he best could some semblance of a laugh, mirthful as that of the ass eating thistles, and ended ...
— Latter-Day Pamphlets • Thomas Carlyle
... and incidentally touched upon her sister-in-law's views of the relation between expensive boys' schools and private tutors. Her dryly humorous version of this set her husband off in a great mirthful roar, to which Sylvia, after a moment of blankness, suddenly joined a burst of her own clear laughter. At the time she had seen nothing funny in Aunt Victoria's statement, but she was now immensely tickled to remember Aunt Victoria's Olympian certainty of ...
— The Bent Twig • Dorothy Canfield
... excited in a smothered way. He at once connected this repressed excitement with Landini; but then, the face was mirthful, too, in the same lurking manner, and the proposals of a serious man could hardly affect even the most frivolous quite like a ...
— Aurora the Magnificent • Gertrude Hall
... the body of Peter Snell, Thirty years clerk of this Parish. He lived respected as a pious and mirthful man, and died on his way to church to assist at a wedding, on the 31st of March, 1811, Aged ...
— The Parish Clerk (1907) • Peter Hampson Ditchfield
... porridge, and quaffing a bowl of well-spiced elder wine, the mummers would enter, decked out in ribands and strange dresses, execute their strange antics, and perform their curious play. So the wintry days passed until Twelfth Night, with its pleasing associations and mirthful customs. ...
— Old English Sports • Peter Hampson Ditchfield
... cut-up concealed behind the lace curtains, though, and none of the sashes was raised. If it hadn't been for the way things had been comin' criss-cross at me, I suppose I'd wiped off my collar and gone along, lettin' it pass as a joke; but I wa'n't feelin' very mirthful just then. I'm ready to follow up anything in the trouble line; so I steps into the area, drops my baggage, shins up over the side of the front steps, and flattens myself against the off side of the ...
— Torchy • Sewell Ford
... The Spaniards, by whom it was built, forgot, probably, that this kind of shelter would not be so desirable here as in their own climate. The manufacture of tapestry, which a single line of Shakespeare has immortalized, and associated with the mirthful image of his fat Knight, has fallen into decay. The manufacturers of linen and woollen are but inconsiderable; and one, which existed till lately, of a very durable porcelain, is totally neglected. The principal article of commerce is lace, which is made here in great quantities. ...
— A Residence in France During the Years 1792, 1793, 1794 and 1795, • An English Lady
... laughed a queer, little, odd, supercilious note, summed up in a single word: "Ha!" There was nothing mirthful in it. There was no reproach in it. It was just an expression of her honest feeling at the bare suggestion of ...
— Peg O' My Heart • J. Hartley Manners
... hardly varied for a moment. And loud above all this hurly-burly I could hear the changeful voices of the Roost and the intermittent roaring of the Merry Men. At that hour there flashed into my mind the reason of the name that they were called. For the noise of them seemed almost mirthful, as it out-topped the other noises of the night; or if not mirthful, yet instinct with a portentous joviality. Nay, and it seemed even human. As when savage men have drunk away their reason, and, discarding speech ...
— The Pocket R.L.S. - Being Favourite Passages from the Works of Stevenson • Robert Louis Stevenson
... his brow were soft and silky as a child's—time and sorrow had traced him but a gentle path, 'twould seem by the light which yet beamed in his calm blue eye and placid smile, the expression was far different from mirthful happiness, but breathed of holy peace and spirit pure, tempered with love and kindness for all—living in the past dreams of youth, he loved the present, when it recalled their sweet memories in brighter beauty from the tomb of faded years, ...
— Sketches And Tales Illustrative Of Life In The Backwoods Of New Brunswick • Mrs. F. Beavan
... flexibility, no command over mirthful inspiration, such as we hear in Mozart, Rossini, or even Donizetti. But his monotone is in sublile rapport with the graver aspects of nature and life. Chorley sums up this characteristic of Bellini ...
— Great Italian and French Composers • George T. Ferris
... A collection of Mirthful and Pleasing Games and Forfeits: with Plain Directions for Playing each Game, and ...
— The World's Fair • Anonymous
... humorists, he was of a melancholy temperament, and no doubt felt attracted by all that was mirthful and bright, and in happy contrast to his habitual mood. Seldom if ever does a drop of his inner sadness ooze out through his pencil-point—and never a drop of gall; and I do not remember one cynical touch in ...
— Social Pictorial Satire • George du Maurier
... brains out with brandy, if he had sous enough to buy any, or to do some dexterous bit of thieving on a native, if he had not. Many a time knowing him to be there sufficed to restrain the talk around from lewdness and from ribaldry, and turn it into channels at once less loathsome and more mirthful, because they felt that obscenity and vulgarity were alike jarring on his ear, although he had never more than tacitly shown that they were so. A precisian would have been covered with their contumely and ridicule; a ...
— Under Two Flags • Ouida [Louise de la Ramee]
... been wont, with gentle care, to see him safely covered, was given up for a rude heap of straw in a corner of the smithy. And the rich food to which he had been used gave place to the coarsest and humblest fare. But the lad did not complain. The days which he passed in the smithy were mirthful and happy; and the sound of his hammer rang cheerfully, and the sparks from his forge flew briskly, from morning ...
— Hero Tales • James Baldwin
... once seen, could never be forgotten. It was grave and sweet, yet having a certain resolute expression about the mouth which might have marred its expression somewhat had it not been for the mirthful gleam which now and then leaped into his clear, dark-brown eyes, and which betrayed that, beneath the gravity and dignity which a life of care and the burden of poverty had chiseled upon his features and imparted to his bearing, ...
— His Heart's Queen • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... and half a dozen more had rushed between the two. The twitching muscles of Perez' face and that strange tone as of a man appealing to be saved from himself, had suddenly roused all around from mirthful or curious contemplation of the scene to a perception that a terrible tragedy had barely ...
— The Duke of Stockbridge • Edward Bellamy
... what time Amy should have been deep in study, that Clint Thayer, across the table, had his attention wrested from his book by the sound of deep, mirthful chuckles. He glanced over questioningly. Amy continued to chuckle until, being bidden to share the joke or shut up, he took Clint into his confidence. Clint was forced to chuckle some himself when he had heard Amy through, but the chuckles were followed by earnest efforts ...
— Left Guard Gilbert • Ralph Henry Barbour
... Mike Macascree, was upwards of sixty, but still in the full vigour of life, with features which, though not ill-looking, bore no particular resemblance to those of his daughter. He had a good-humoured, jovial countenance, the mirthful expression of which even his sightless orbs could not destroy. Long white locks descended upon his shoulders, and a patriarchal beard adorned his chin. He was wrapped in a loose grey gown, patched with different coloured cloths, and supported himself with a staff. His pipe was suspended from ...
— Old Saint Paul's - A Tale of the Plague and the Fire • William Harrison Ainsworth
... and money, and involves a matter of taste. Some people like character; I prefer money. If I am hated and despised, I chuckle over the "per contra." I find it pleasant for members of a proud aristocracy to condescend from their high estate to fawn, feign, flatter; to affect even mirthful familiarity in order to gain my good-will. I am no Shylock. No client can accuse me of desiring either his flesh or his blood. Sentimental vengeance is no item in my stock in trade. Gold and bank-notes satisfy my "rage;" or, if need be, a good mortgage. Far from seeking revenge, ...
— The International Monthly Magazine, Volume 5, No. 1, January, 1852 • Various
... for Rose. She well knew her aunt's general weakness of intellect, and especially its weakness on this particular subject, but she would suffer no one to manifest contempt for either, if in her power to prevent it. It is seldom one so young, so mirthful, so ingenuous and innocent in the expression of her countenance, assumed so significant and rebuking a frown as did pretty Rose Budd when she heard the mate's involuntary exclamation about the "twelve masts." Harry, ...
— Jack Tier or The Florida Reef • James Fenimore Cooper
... mirthful at once, and genial as I had never seen any one genial before—a person to confide in, to tell all one's troubles to, without even an introduction! When she laughed she showed both top and bottom teeth, which were perfect, and her eyes ...
— Peter Ibbetson • George du Marier et al
... way for the sake of the beer which a single slip of the foot would make him spill. At his knock and call the solid oak door, four centuries old if one, flew open, and the boy darted in with his beer, and shouted, with all the force of mirthful lungs, "Oh, dear Hirschvogel, but for the thought of ...
— Famous Stories Every Child Should Know • Various
... Taylor, the brisk, the mirthful Taylor is pressed and sent to sea. I cannot help observing here the art of the poet in letting us into the condition of Taylor: we may guess from his being pressed that he was not free of the city, and was most likely a journeyman cobler, coblers being famous for ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 6, June 1810 • Various
... Away with her and waft her hence to France.— And now what rests but that we spend the time With stately triumphs, mirthful comic shows, Such as befits the pleasure of the court? Sound drums and trumpets!—farewell sour annoy! For here, I hope, begins our ...
— King Henry VI, Third Part • William Shakespeare [Rolfe edition]
... with a loud voice, a woman of quick decision, represented order and arithmetic in the business house which her husband enlivened by his mirthful activity. ...
— Mademoiselle Fifi • Guy de Maupassant
... interview a girl not yet out of short dresses stood behind the counter, measuring out some calico for a woman in a scoop shovel-bonnet. The girl's face was as mirthful as Mike's, and her black eyes twinkled with mischief. She heard all that was said, and read the youth like a book. He looked more at her than at her mother, and could not help being pleased with the lively young lady. Never ...
— The Launch Boys' Adventures in Northern Waters • Edward S. Ellis
... simplicity and mirthful dignity seemed to be the heirlooms which they shared as common heritors; and, chiefest of credentials, when they stood in the library amid the shades of ancestors preserved in oils, I felt no sense ...
— St. Cuthbert's • Robert E. Knowles
... relatives. Still, whatever else they lacked, Henry Mesurier loved to insist that these various connections were rich in character, one or two of them inexhaustible in humour; and their rare and somewhat timorous visits to the castle of their exalted relative, James Mesurier, were occasions of much mirthful embarrassment to the young people. Here the reader is requested to excuse a brief parenthetical chapter by way of illustration, which, if he pleases, he may skip without any loss of continuity in the narrative, or the least offence in the world to the writer. This ...
— Young Lives • Richard Le Gallienne
... one of the first names on the lengthening list of those who were to be admitted at all sorts of hours. Reed Opdyke accepted him in mirthful gratitude to the Providence which had arranged so equable a quid pro quo. Prather was manifestly out for copy, despite his constant disavowals of what he termed an envious slander hatched by Philistine ...
— The Brentons • Anna Chapin Ray
... disposition softened. Some of her school-friends had seen her smile—a wonderful and charming phenomenon, during which her expression grew sweet and bewitchingly animated and her brown eyes radiant with mirthful light. It was not the same ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces Abroad • Edith Van Dyne
... Yshrouded in his feathering bright and sheen, Shaping the print of Argus' hundred een. Among the bowis of the olive twists, Sere[24] small fowls, working crafty nests, Endlong the hedges thick, and on rank aiks[25] Ilk bird rejoicing with their mirthful makes. In corners and clear fenestres[26] of glass, Full busily Arachne weaving was, To knit her nettis and her webbis sly, Therewith to catch the little midge or fly. So dusty powder upstours[27] in every street, While corby gasped for ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan
... a nod and a mirthful look which troubled the visitor, who sat with his face contracted, and a spasm seeming to run through him every time the boat made a leap and dive ...
— Three Boys - or the Chiefs of the Clan Mackhai • George Manville Fenn
... the Mercers' Company, in case he should die childless;" and "for the sewer performance of the premysses, the said Sir Thomas, in the presens of the persons afore named, did give his house to Sir William Garrard, and drank a carouse to Thomas Rowe." This mirthful affair was considered of so much importance as to be entered on the books of the Corporation, solemnly commencing with the words, "Be it remembered, that the ixth day of February, ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... Paul de Kock's, was one of his triumphs, and another was Le Caporal et la Payse, Englished as "Seeing Wright." In short, he occupies a high position amongst the half-dozen drolls who, night after night, send home the audience of the Palais Royal brimful of mirthful reminiscences. ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCLXXVI. February, 1847. Vol. LXI. • Various
... in a sort of girlish and innocent satisfaction. Then her eyes met their own reflexion, and she grew suddenly grave again, and something in them told her that they were not laughing with her lips, and might not often look upon things mirthful. ...
— Taquisara • F. Marion Crawford
... merry time forming the divisions, and deciding the order of precedence; for every one was in mirthful mood. ...
— Elsie's Kith and Kin • Martha Finley
... smile seemed to mock both her and himself. She was weary and dreary, but probably only because she wanted her bed. It was a mistake, as a rule, to attribute to her other than the simplest desires. The moment we were outside, Wetter turned on me with a savagely mirthful expression ...
— The King's Mirror • Anthony Hope
... clothing than to the expression of his countenance; for although his skin was dark with accumulated grime, his long whiskers, moustache, and black greasy locks matted and unkempt, and his features frightfully scarred with small-pox, there was a genial, mirthful sparkle in his coal-black eyes that somewhat ...
— The Log of a Privateersman • Harry Collingwood
... peril, the young Kentuckian could not repress a smile when he glanced back and saw Otto picking himself up; but the smile was gone instantly, for the situation was anything but a mirthful one. ...
— The Lost Trail - I • Edward S. Ellis
... Fortune, unable to suffer the glory of this fair dance, hurled upon us a strange rain and tempest; and the confusion of the sudden evening retreat by boat across the river brought out next day as many mirthful anecdotes as the lavish festival itself ...
— A Midsummer Drive Through The Pyrenees • Edwin Asa Dix
... Gironde, of the Garonne: a man unfortunately of indolent habits; who will sit playing with your children, when he ought to be scheming and perorating. Sharp bustling Guadet; considerate grave Censonne; kind-sparkling mirthful young Ducos; Valaze doomed to a sad end: all these likewise are of that Gironde, or Bourdeaux region: men of fervid Constitutional principles; of quick talent, irrefragable logic, clear respectability; who will have the Reign of Liberty establish ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... from the clergyman the fact that he had arrived in time, and he again gave the girl in the doorway a mirthful glance, then turned on his heel to attend to his ...
— Miss Lou • E. P. Roe
... cheering power of spring, It made him whistle, it made him sing; His heart was mirthful to excess, But the ...
— The Children's Garland from the Best Poets • Various
... and the wall. Half a dozen sunburnt children were putting one of the partially overturned megaliths to a happy use by clambering to the top of it and sliding on their little behinds down its smooth and sloping side amidst much mirthful squealing. ...
— The Secret Places of the Heart • H. G. Wells
... guess that she loved him? Her cheeks kept reddening again and again at the terrible suspicion. What must he think of her? Would he pity her? Would he wonder at her—would he feel shocked and sorry, or only gently mirthful? Did he regard her only as a more or less precocious child? What had she said—how had she looked—had her eyes revealed her, or her trembling lips, or her anger, or the tone of her voice? A young man accustomed to ways of abstinence is tempted ...
— The Dictator • Justin McCarthy
... are, Joseph," said Mrs. Hopper, in loud tones of disapproval, that were wafted through the open window to us. "Did we want the old folks forever runnin' after us before we was married?" Mr. Longworth tried not to steal a mirthful glance at me, but he found it hard to resist. "Oh! pshaw, Ma," replied the old man gently. "There ain't none of that goin' on. He ain't a marryin' man," and we heard his slippered feet pattering softly over the oil-clothed ...
— A Village Ophelia and Other Stories • Anne Reeve Aldrich
... little pretenders. To those whose qualities of mind and whose habits were congenial to his own, and whom he permitted familiarly to approach him, he was exceedingly affable, and with such he frequently jested, and hilariously enjoyed the piquant story in mirthful humor; but this was for the few. He was a proud man, and was at no pains to conceal his contempt for pert folly or intrusive ignorance, wherever and ...
— The Memories of Fifty Years • William H. Sparks
... the centre point of branching alleys, or to find the aqueduct trailing, thousand-footed, through the brush. It is not a wilderness; it is rather a preserve. And, fitly enough, the centre of the maze is not a hermit's cavern. In the midst, a little mirthful town lies sunlit, humming with the business of pleasure; and the palace, breathing distinction and peopled by historic names, stands smokeless ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 16 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... the camp-fire or as guests at the dinner-table. Indeed, the best talkers I know are men of science—not the mere students of a knowledge already garnered, but those who discover new facts or who spend their lives in original research. The most mirthful, cheery, happy and liberal-minded of men are to be found in the limited ring of those who are known in this country as investigators. On the European continent the same remark holds true, but in Europe this class is very often less refined than with us. In England the same class ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 15, - No. 87, March, 1875 • Various
... heartily; and after some mirthful chat, we resolved upon leaving the valley as soon as we could do so with a ...
— Omoo: Adventures in the South Seas • Herman Melville
... dark suspicion nor of guile Was limned on Begum; his the mirthful glance, The genial port, the comprehensive smile:— The very sunbeams shimmering loved to dance Within that honest, open countenance;— And far as eye could pierce, his roomy grin Was pink, as ...
— Rhymes of the East and Re-collected Verses • John Kendall (AKA Dum-Dum)
... and fertility of thought we must think the author of the "Analogy" holds some slight advantages over the author of "The Eclipse of Faith"; and we seriously doubt if the lovers of Charles Lamb will be likely to rush into mirthful ecstasies over the humor of "The Greyson Letters." But we suppose that Henry Rogers himself would make no pretensions to the rank of a writer, or reasoner, or humorist of the first class. Far from being a great man, he occasionally ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I, No. 1, Nov. 1857 • Various
... out thy blossom-arrow, The bow slung careless on thy breast the while, Thine eyes in mirthful, sidelong glance grow narrow, Thy conference with friendly ...
— Translations of Shakuntala and Other Works • Kaalidaasa
... Sarranian flutes)—The "Sarranian" or "Tyrian" pipes, or flutes, are supposed to have been of a quick and mirthful tone; Madame Dacier has consequently with much justice suggested that the representation being on the occasion of a funeral, the title has not come down to us in a complete form, and that it was performed with the Lydian, or grave, solemn pipe, alternately with the Tyrian. This opinion is also ...
— The Comedies of Terence - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Notes • Publius Terentius Afer, (AKA) Terence
... to steal from here to Paris on my stocking-feet?" said Israel, whose late easy good living at White Waltham had not failed to bring out the good-natured and mirthful part of him, even as his prior experiences had produced, for the most part, something like a ...
— Israel Potter • Herman Melville
... Provencal life, the "Lettres de mon Moulin." After the war, Daudet reappeared in Paris, greatly strengthened and ripened by his hermit-existence in the heart of Provence. He produced one masterpiece after another. He had studied with laughter and joy the mirthful side of southern exaggeration, and he created a figure in which its peculiar qualities should be displayed, as it were, in excelsis. This study resulted, in 1872, in "The Prodigious Feats of Tartarin of Tarascon," one of the most purely delightful ...
— The Nabob • Alphonse Daudet
... canst play the maker [old Scottish for poet] yet?" said the glover. "What, shall we have our ballets and our roundels again? our lusty carols for Christmas, and our mirthful springs to trip it round ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott
... scriptural subjects; or heroes, chieftains, and monarchs, including the Duke of Wellington and Louis XVIII. le Desire—are among the taille-douces specified in the imprints. Madame did me the honour of shewing me some of her choicest treasures, as her husband was from home. Up stairs was a parcel of mirthful boys and girls, with painting brushes in their hands, and saucers of various colours before them. Upon enquiry, I found that they received four sous per dozen, for colouring; but I will not take upon me to say that they were over ...
— A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume One • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... strength of voice in the upper notes that is vast and surprising: without screaming she produces echoes, the loud and soft notes being almost simultaneous. In the artist's green-room she is kind and courteous without being either mirthful or expansive. Moreover, she is indefatigable, which is a precious quality for the manager. She never stays at the same hotel with the rest of the troupe, which is a rather imperial proceeding; but it is better so: we are more at our ease. She lives her own concentrated ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, October, 1880 • Various
... a man of moderate stature, light, sinewy, and strong; a face browned with continual exposure; small, mirthful, yet commanding blue eyes, glittering from beneath an arching brow, and prominent cheekbones; a long hawk's nose, almost resting upon a salient chin, a pendent moustache, and a thick, brown, curly beard, prematurely grizzled; ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... maintain his situation by the strong arm; but he now was enabled to repose upon his hard-won laurels, to smoke "the calumet of peace," and quaff his tipple with impunity. For one of gipsy blood, he presented an unusually jovial, liquor-loving countenance: his eye was mirthful; his lip moist, as if from oft potations; his cheek mellow as an Orleans plum, which fruit, in color and texture, it mightily resembled. Strange to say, also, for one of that lithe race, his person was heavy and hebetudinous; the consequence, no ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth
... some whooping, some scolding, some babbling. The wine had brought out, as it were, each man's inmost character. Some were loud and quarrelsome, others sentimental and whining; some, whom we had hitherto thought dull, most mirthful; some, whom we had ever regarded as discreet and taciturn, most garrulous and uproarious. I remember that in the midst of our clamorous gayety, my eye fell upon the cavalier Signor Zanoni, whose conversation ...
— Zanoni • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... heartily in his way over a good story. Wise and witty H——, in whom wisdom and wit are so ingrained that age only increases his subtile spirit, and greatly enhances the power of his cheerful temperament, always had the talismanic faculty of breaking up that thoughtfully sad face into mirthful waves; and I remember how Hawthorne writhed with hilarious delight over Professor L——'s account of a butcher who remarked that "Idees had got afloat in the public mind with respect to sassingers." I once told him of a young woman who ...
— Yesterdays with Authors • James T. Fields
... in which they all confess defeat, is, I suppose, the explanation of their miserable system. But they might see in the girls' school at Tai-o-hae, under the brisk, housewifely sisters, a different picture of efficiency, and a scene of neatness, airiness, and spirited and mirthful occupation that should shame them into cheerier methods. The sisters themselves lament their failure. They complain the annual holiday undoes the whole year's work; they complain particularly of the heartless ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 18 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... eaten so many ices there as I have, nor passed so many patient hours amid the screeching, chattering, and devouring, which make it most like a cage of strange birds, or the monkey department in the Jardin des Plantes.—Mem. I always observed that the monkeys just mentioned seemed far more mirthful than their brethren in the London Zooelogical Gardens. They form themselves, so to speak, on a livelier model, and feel themselves more at ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 23, September, 1859 • Various
... it so! "His falsehood I could bear—but hers! ah! no. "She is not false—I feel she loves me yet, "And if my boding bosom could forget "Its wild imaginings, with what sweet pain "I'd clasp my Florence to my breast again." With that came many a thought of days gone by, Remembered joys of mirthful infancy; And youth's gay frolic, and the short-lived flow Of showering tears, in childhood's fleeting wo, And life's maturer friendship—and the sense Of heart-warm, open, fearless confidence; All these ...
— The Culprit Fay - and Other Poems • Joseph Rodman Drake
... fair hall-board, Carved to his uncle and that lord, And reverently took up the word. "Kind uncle, woe were we each one, If harm should hap to brother John. He is a man of mirthful speech, Can many a game and gambol teach; Full well at tables can he play, And sweep at bowls the stake away. None can a lustier carol bawl; The needfullest among us all, When time hangs heavy in ...
— Marmion: A Tale of Flodden Field • Walter Scott
... of Eumaeus the seeming beggar took his way, leaning on his staff, till he reached the palace, entering in at the hall where the suitors sat at meat. They in the pride of their feasting began to break their jests in mirthful manner, when they saw one looking so poor and so aged approach. He who expected no better entertainment was nothing moved at their behaviour, but, as became the character which he had assumed, in a suppliant posture crept by turns to every suitor, and held out his hands for some charity, ...
— Books for Children - The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 3 • Charles and Mary Lamb
... style and treatment, for the first was written so early as 1755, while the last belongs to his later years. But they are all characterized by the same combination of manly earnestness, rich invention and mirthful spirit. The form is concise and symmetrical, the part-writing is clear and well-balanced, and a "sunny sweetness" is the prevailing mood. As a discerning critic has remarked, there is nothing in the shape of instrumental music much pleasanter ...
— Haydn • J. Cuthbert Hadden
... followed their hereditary taste, the New England settlers would have illustrated all events of public importance by bonfires, banquets, pageantries, and processions. Nor would it have been impracticable, in the observance of majestic ceremonies, to combine mirthful recreation with solemnity, and give, as it were, a grotesque and brilliant embroidery to the great robe of state, which a nation, at such festivals, puts on. There was some shadow of an attempt of this kind in the mode of celebrating ...
— The Scarlet Letter • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... a pair of mirthful eyes upon her for a moment, and noting with wonder the pale, anxious face and quivering lip of her sister, seemed ...
— Ester Ried • Pansy (aka. Isabella M. Alden)
... these mirthful attacks had listened like one too confident of his established reputation to feel concern; but at the sound of the last speaker's voice, he grasped the bushy covering of one entire cheek in his hand, and turning a reproachful and irritated glance at the already half-repentant ...
— The Wept of Wish-Ton-Wish • James Fenimore Cooper
... everything. Theresa provided her with what was necessary, and I prevailed upon her to forget her dignity and partake of a rustic collation, with which she seemed highly satisfied. It was late, and her stay was short; but the interview was so mirthful that it pleased her, and she seemed disposed to return. She did not however put this project into execution until the next year: but, alas! the delay was not ...
— The Confessions of J. J. Rousseau, Complete • Jean Jacques Rousseau
... or scientific apparatus, and the house was brightened with works of art chosen in the studios which Miss Walworth advised him to visit. All the amiabilities of his character came into free play; with Marcella he was mirthful, affectionate, even caressing. He grew scrupulous about his neckties, his gloves, and was careful to guard his fingers against corroding acids when he worked in the laboratory. Such indications of hopefulness caused Marcella more misgiving than pleasure; she made no remark, ...
— Born in Exile • George Gissing
... brilliant array of servants and guests, His Royal Highness at her side! life in free, joyous happy England—how infinitely remote it now seemed. Her ears were filled with the sound of a voice, drawly and quaint and gentle, a voice and a laugh half shy, wholly mirthful, and oh! ...
— The Elusive Pimpernel • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... towards it, then broke into a laugh, perhaps the first real mirthful sound that had passed his lips since his brother's death. It made Rachel's heart beat faster with ...
— Joyce's Investments - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry
... and limb; with a countenance extremely winning, not only from the comeliness of its features, but its frankness, manliness, and good nature. His was the bronzed, rich complexion, the inclination towards embonpoint, the athletic girth of chest, which denote redundant health, and mirthful temper, and sanguine blood. Robert, who had lived the life of cities, was a year younger than his brother; nearly as tall, but pale, meagre, stooping, and with a careworn, anxious, hungry look, which made the smile that hung upon ...
— Night and Morning, Volume 1 • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... she saw a great terror leap up in her eyes. Veronica looked at her a moment, the expression of astonishment frozen on her face, and then to Sahwah's great bewilderment she laughed aloud, a genuine, mirthful, ...
— The Camp Fire Girls Do Their Bit - Or, Over the Top with the Winnebagos • Hildegard G. Frey
... of the wonderful power of adaptation which makes him of all men the best cosmopolitan, he never is quite perfect in his assumption of another nationality, and he generally falls short of a thorough appreciation of its mirthful principle. If he emigrate to France, he soon feasts upon frogs as freely and speaks with as accurate an accent as the Parisian, but he cannot quite assume the gay insouciance of the French; if to England, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 58, August, 1862 • Various
... of his brothers upon an excursion. He was a young man of fine address, intelligent, smart, and promising, though fond of fun and frolic. He was a fashionable young man, too; we should call him a dude now. He wore "dark brown hair, tied behind with blue ribbon; had clear, mirthful eyes; wore boots that reached above his knees, and a broad-skirted scarlet coat, with gold lace on the cuffs, the collar, and the skirts; with a long waistcoat of blue silk. His breeches were buckskin; his hat was three-cornered, set jauntily higher on the right than on the ...
— From Boyhood to Manhood • William M. Thayer
... while I saw the son of Valdez Rush by with flaring torch: he likewise enter'd. There was another and a longer pause; And once, methought, I heard the clash of swords! And soon the son of Valdez re-appear'd: He flung his torch towards the moon in sport, And seem'd as he were mirthful! I stood listening, Impatient for ...
— Specimens of the Table Talk of S.T.Coleridge • Coleridge
... ancient arches and substructures rising high above the natural soil below. But before Aurelian erected the splendid building to record his conquest of Palmyra, the same spot was the site of the 'Little Senate,' instituted by Elagabalus in mirthful humour, between an attack of sacrilegious folly and a fit ...
— Ave Roma Immortalis, Vol. 1 - Studies from the Chronicles of Rome • Francis Marion Crawford
... should be—a leading consideration when ordering one's conduct in public. It is not enough that we know ourselves to be above reproach; we must take care that the stranger who observes us gets no impression to the contrary. Friends who know her irresistibly mirthful disposition, may excuse the girl who laughs boisterously on the street-car; but she will not be able to explain to the severe-looking stranger opposite that she did not do this to ...
— Etiquette • Agnes H. Morton
... of the Lord that shone so brightly became dim, and at the close of one year I sought the society of the gay and mirthful, more effectually to drown my bitter regrets for having turned aside from the path so clearly marked out for me. I fully realized that the dark cloud overshadowing me was ...
— A Woman's Life-Work - Labors and Experiences • Laura S. Haviland
... atmosphere distilled perpetually that soft dewiness characteristic of the perfect complexion of young children or of goddesses. And like a goddess the queen appeared that moment,—an untidy, earth-chained goddess, mirthful, voluptuous. ...
— The Long Day - The Story of a New York Working Girl As Told by Herself • Dorothy Richardson
... ready food and brought the tray, and they two ate and drank and were merry and mirthful. Presently Ala al-Din besought her to let him hear a little music; so she took the lute and played a melody that had made the hardest stone dance for glee, and the strings cried out in present ecstacy, "O Loving One!'';[FN69] after which she passed from the adagio ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 4 • Richard F. Burton
... incapable of 'transactions,' of compromises; most honourably incapable of earning his bread by agreeing, or seeming to agree with opinions which were not his. He could not endure (here I think he was wrong) to have his pieces of light and mirthful verse touched in any way by an editor. Even where no opinions were concerned, even where an editor has (to my mind) a perfect right to alter anonymous contributions, Murray declined to be edited. I ventured to remonstrate with him, to say non ...
— Robert F. Murray - his poems with a memoir by Andrew Lang • Robert F. Murray
... witty old Irishman to act as the spokesman of "the defendant" on the ground that the Irishman was not now in the defendant's employment, the sheriff sternly said to the would-be witness: "Now, answer me truthfully, mirthful Michael, are you or are you not in the defendant's employment?"—"Well, my lord of lords," was the reply, "that is to say, in the learned phraseology of the law, pro tem I am and ultimo ...
— Law and Laughter • George Alexander Morton
... Mr. Piper's laugh was more insulting than mirthful. 'That's why she comes and hugs you on the lawn ...
— Australian Writers • Desmond Byrne
... been paid and receipts duly given, when the old man raised his eyes and fixed them on Mary's face. She had been sitting back in the deep recess of a window, terribly afraid of a mirthful explosion from Mark, and therefore drawing herself as far out of sight as possible; but now a bright ray of sunshine cast itself full on her sweet, loving features, and as Mr Tankardew caught their expression he uttered a sudden exclamation, and stood for a moment as if transfixed to ...
— Nearly Lost but Dearly Won • Theodore P. Wilson
... weather, and the date to be finally chosen. The baronet had proposed this rustic fete when his own heart had been light and happy; now he looked forward to the day with a sickening dread of its weariness. Others would be happy; but the sound of mirthful voices and light laughter would fall with a terrible discordance on the ear of the man whose mind was tortured by hidden doubts. Sir Oswald was too courteous a host to disappoint his visitors. All the preparations for the rustic festival ...
— Run to Earth - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... which can render dulness itself agreeable. Schiller had many friends in Dresden, who loved him as a man, while they admired him as a writer. Their intercourse was of the kind he liked, sober, as well as free and mirthful. It was the careless, calm, honest effusion of his feelings that he wanted, not the noisy tumults and coarse delirium of dissipation. For this, under any of its forms, he at no time showed ...
— The Life of Friedrich Schiller - Comprehending an Examination of His Works • Thomas Carlyle
... ashes (human ashes!) from a blackened spot on the sand, and were throwing them into the salt water. The wind tossed back a soft grey dust in their faces, mixed with the surf and spray. It was dark before the crowd swept by me again, now chanting in what appeared to be a mirthful manner, and with faces so smiling and happy that I could scarcely believe they had just taken part in such abominable cruelty. On the other hand, a weight seemed to have been removed from their consciences. So deceitful ...
— In the Wrong Paradise • Andrew Lang
... about her and saw all the children, how they were never alone, that their eye's danced, and their voices were mirthful, she would ask herself why she, too, was not happy. Then courage would come to her, and she would strike a gay air, and call the children to her side; but, when she had finished, she was glad to creep away by herself, and lean ...
— The Angel Children - or, Stories from Cloud-Land • Charlotte M. Higgins
... handsome, talented man, whose joyous disposition, and mirthful humour, could scarcely be trammelled down by the severe conventional rules of the Society to which he belonged. Adam's exquisite taste for music, and his great admiration for horses and dogs, savoured rather of the camp of the enemy. But his love ...
— Flora Lyndsay - or, Passages in an Eventful Life • Susan Moodie
... who us'd to lead the country-round, Youthful Mirtillo, here he comes grief-drown'd. Ambo. Let's cheer him up. Sil. Behold him weeping-ripe. Mir. Ah! Amaryllis, farewell mirth and pipe; Since thou art gone, no more I mean to play To these smooth lawns my mirthful roundelay. Dear Amaryllis! Mon. Hark! Sil. Mark! Mir. This earth grew sweet Where, Amaryllis, thou didst set thy feet. Ambo. Poor pitied youth! Mir. And here the breath of kine And sheep grew more sweet by that breath of thine. This flock of wool and this rich lock of hair, This ball of ...
— The Hesperides & Noble Numbers: Vol. 1 and 2 • Robert Herrick
... animal characteristic is to be found here save the pointed ears; the face, however, retains a suggestion of the traditional satyr-type. "The whole statue, unlike anything else that ever was wrought in that severe material of marble, conveys the idea of an amiable and sensual creature— easy, mirthful, apt for jollity, yet not incapable of being touched by pathos." [Footnote: Hawthorne, "The Marble Faun," Vol ...
— A History Of Greek Art • F. B. Tarbell
... spiritful enough for one who wishes to ride well and gayly. I would have one that shakes his head and rattles his bit and stamps about uneasily." This was more than his Lordship could stand, and he broke forth in a mirthful laugh,— ...
— Mistress Penwick • Dutton Payne
... one on Treasury Bench exceeds Mr. G. in vivacity or overflowing energy. SQUIRE OF MALWOOD looks very fit, but there's a massivity about his mirthful mood that becomes a Chancellor of the Exchequer with a contingent surplus. Is much comforted by consciousness that, whilst SAGE OF QUEEN ANNE'S GATE views composition of Ministry with mixed feelings, and will not commit himself ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 104, February 4, 1893 • Various
... hand in the water and smoothed her stray locks; they curled up again. She was distressed, and Notely's mirthful eyes gave her ...
— Vesty of the Basins • Sarah P. McLean Greene
... kingdoms of earth. Men petted but did not propose to her; affected to confide in her, but carefully withheld the heart of their confessions. Tall, thin, gently hurried and bird-like, she yet bore a quaint, almost mirthful, resemblance to her brother, Sir Charles Verity. Such was the lady who responded, in a spirit of liveliest charity, to Theresa's wildly ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... Clancy," Miss Ainsley asked, with mirthful eyes, "that a party in the South had the power to array your section against the North again, would you go ...
— The Earth Trembled • E.P. Roe
... feeling, and before another half hour had passed they found themselves absolutely within the precincts of Whitehall, passing along corridors where fine-feathered gallants and royal lackeys and pages walked hither and thither, and where their appearance excited some mirthful curiosity, although nobody spoke ...
— The Sign Of The Red Cross • Evelyn Everett-Green
... species, which waits, perhaps, for a name with us, and might accept that of the Ghastly, or at least, of the Ghostly-Humorous, the Gay-Horrible. The story of the PRIEST'S WELL soars boldly upon this pinion; that of the WILL-O'-THE-WISP HUSSAR has gone stark-raving in the same grimly-mirthful temper. The mind in which Burns imagined and chaunted his TAM-O'-SHANTER, is right down Upper Lusatian, in this key. Our Elves, however, are not ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Vol. 56, No. 346, August, 1844 • Various
... barriers, little or great, which kept him from Mercy. But there were many days when his sense of deprivation made him sad, subdued, and quiet. When, in these moods, he came into Mercy's presence, and found her radiant, buoyant, mirthful even, he wondered; and sometimes he questioned. He strove to find out the secret of her joy. There seemed to him no legitimate reason ...
— Mercy Philbrick's Choice • Helen Hunt Jackson
... pray that I may have the power (Since we again for life shall be united, And hope 'mid mirthful mem'ries be relighted), To brighten now their every evening-hour! When children's children in their arms shall be, Oh, let them morning in their evening see! So shall they gladly lay, when death gives warning, Their gray heads down to greet ...
— Poems and Songs • Bjornstjerne Bjornson
... contortion of the human countenance, voluntary or involuntary, superinduced by a concatenation of external circumstances, seen or heard, of a ridiculous, ludicrous, jocose, mirthful, funny, facetious or fanciful nature and accompanied by a cackle, chuckle, chortle, cachinnation, ...
— The Foolish Dictionary • Gideon Wurdz
... the formidable machinery of beautification about the room struck a chord of compassion in the flapper's breast, which was, however, at once compounded with humour in her mind. And then she could control herself no longer, and was forced to smile,—one of those broad mirthful smiles that are parlously near a laugh. Feeling, however, that her mood was one of derision, she turned quickly aside,—but not soon enough successfully to ...
— Too Old for Dolls - A Novel • Anthony Mario Ludovici
... child was kept in suspense by mirthful Dr. Gray, who pretended that he should bring the baby to her some time when she did not expect it. She often rushed into the parlor, saying, "O, I thought I heard somethin' cryin';" and almost cried herself because there was no baby there. "I ...
— Little Prudy's Dotty Dimple • Sophie May
... have grown very dull. I think my wits are not so bright as they used to be. At home, I used to be reckoned one of the pleasantest of us: the boys used to laugh when I said things: but not even the most hysterically mirthful could find food for laughter ...
— Nancy - A Novel • Rhoda Broughton
... he thought of the lieutenant's handsome face, and the idea tickled him for the moment; but the next moment he sighed and felt angry with himself for his mirthful display, and forgot the lieutenant's ...
— The Queen's Scarlet - The Adventures and Misadventures of Sir Richard Frayne • George Manville Fenn
... hours of tedious travelling—in the flaming glow of day, or in the still, cool watches of the night, he had with him a recollection—Lilith Ormskirk's face haunted him. Those eyes seemed to follow him—sweet, serious; or again mirthful, flashing from out their dark fringe of lashes, but ever entrancing, ever inviting. Her whole personality, in fact, seemed to pervade his mind, warring for sole possession, to the exclusion of all ...
— The Sign of the Spider • Bertram Mitford
... since he had been brought here, Charley's face took on a look of interest. In half-an-hour he was at work, smiling and perspiring, and quickly learning the craft. He seldom spoke, but he sometimes laughed a mirthful, natural boy's laugh of good spirits and contentment. From that day his interest in things increased, and before two months went round, while yet it was late autumn, he looked in perfect health. He ate moderately, drank a great deal of water, and slept half the circle of the clock each ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... arm-chair with little Sam Peabody on his knee, and the women of the house gathered about him, looking on as he narrated the courses and adventures of his last voyage. The widow listened with a sad interest. Mopsey rolled her eyes and was mirthful in the most serious and stormiest passages; while little Sam and the Captain's wife rivalled each other in regarding the Captain with innocent wonder and astonishment, as though he were the most extraordinary man that ever sailed the sea, or sat in a chair telling about it, ...
— Chanticleer - A Thanksgiving Story of the Peabody Family • Cornelius Mathews
... with the children in the parlour, whence shrieks of merriment drifted out into the hall. Nanny might have been with them had she chosen, but she preferred to sit alone in the darkest corner of the hall and gaze with jealous, unhappy eyes at the mirthful group about the fire, listening to their story and jest and laughter with unavailing protest in her heart. Oh, how could they have forgotten so soon? It was not yet a full year since Miss Avis had gone. Last Christmas Eve she had sat there, a sweet and saintly ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1905 to 1906 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... wine out of a glass, and caressing a woman in fashionable dress. At ——— a nice, comfortable boarding-house tavern, without a bar or any sort of wines or spirits. An old lady from Boston, with her three daughters, one of whom was teaching music, and the other two schoolmistresses. A frank, free, mirthful daughter of the landlady, about twenty-four years old, between whom and myself there immediately sprang up a flirtation, which made us both feel rather melancholy when we parted on Tuesday morning. Music in the evening, ...
— Passages From The American Notebooks, Volume 1 • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... of ancient days Have led their children through the mirthful maze, And the gray grandsire, skilled in gestic lore, Has frisked beneath ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume 3 • Various
... Dames of ancient days Have led their children through the mirthful maze, And the gay grandsire, skill'd in gestic lore, Has frisk'd beneath ...
— Familiar Quotations • John Bartlett
... upon what you mean by the term," responded Katherine, with a ripple of mirthful laughter. "I assure you I love a good time as ...
— Katherine's Sheaves • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... two faculties are distinct, Wit being intellectual and occupying a small space adjacent to Causality or Reason, while Mirthfulness, or the sentiment of the ludicrous, is just above it, and should properly be called Humor. The mirthful or playful faculty is in the posterior region adjacent to Approbativeness, and may be quite conspicuous when there is neither wit nor humor in the mirth. Imitation, Mirth or Humor, and Wit follow each other in a line. The so-called organ of Wit ...
— Buchanan's Journal of Man, October 1887 - Volume 1, Number 9 • Various
... general feeling of relief. The Vicar was almost jocose, and Mrs. Lorimer made timid attempts to be mirthful though the parting with her children sorely tried ...
— The Bars of Iron • Ethel May Dell
... it yet appears Crowned, as it then seemed, with a chearful grace. Young prattling Maiden, on the Thames' fair side, Enlivening pleasant Sunbury with your smiles, Time may have changed you: coy reserve, or pride, To sullen looks reduced those mirthful wiles. I will not 'bate one smile on that clear brow, But take of Time a rigorous account, When next I see you; and Maria now Must be the Thing she was. To what amount These verses else?—all hollow and untrue— This was not writ, ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb IV - Poems and Plays • Charles and Mary Lamb
... knowing that too much must not be expected at once, she made no comment. That night, as she sat reading at eleven o'clock, a strange sound arose in the back part of the house; it was a man's voice, hilariously mirthful and breaking into rude song. After listening for a few minutes, Miss Rodney rang her bell, and the ...
— The House of Cobwebs and Other Stories • George Gissing
... fame, or liberal principles has appeared, and while worthless rank and heartlessness have been perpetuated by marble and the prostituted energies of literature, genius, talent, and honor, have been left to the obscurity of the grave; not one of those who shared his gay and mirthful hours, who listened enraptured to his eloquence and flashes of wit, which as Hamlet says 'were won't to set the table in a roar,' have endeavoured by giving to the world his literary labours, or even a sketch of his life, to preserve his memory from oblivion. Henry Cooper was the son ...
— A Sketch of the Life of the late Henry Cooper - Barrister-at-Law, of the Norfolk Circuit; as also, of his Father • William Cooper
... accustomed to wear when he drove Mr. Boosey's fly on great festivals. Most of the cottages in the single street sported a bit of holly in their windows, and altogether the appearance of Billingsfield was singularly festive and mirthful. At precisely ten minutes to eleven the vicar and Mrs. Ambrose, accompanied by John, issued from the vicarage and went across the road by the private path to the church. As they entered the porch Mr. Reid, who stood solemnly tolling ...
— A Tale of a Lonely Parish • F. Marion Crawford
... the king was always very fond, showing skill in it both as a critic and a performer. Many stories, mirthful and affecting, are told of his behaviour at the concerts which he ordered. When he was blind and ill he chose the music for the Ancient Concerts once, and the music and words which he selected were from Samson Agonistes, and all had reference ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... do it?" he was saying. "Kin I do it?" Then he would stop his walk and his cogitations would bloom into a mirthful chuckle. Something very pleasant was ...
— The Strength of Gideon and Other Stories • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... they hear so well. And they never forget. These four"—with a sweep of my cigarette—"have long memories of things, some sweet, some stern, some full of tears, and some again so mirthful that they split their panelled sides with merriment whenever they call ...
— The Brother of Daphne • Dornford Yates
... perished, and, from every account we hear of them, appear to have been loose and indelicate." Similarly, the classical dictionaries define "Milesiae fabulae" to be "licentious themes," "stories of an amatory or mirthful nature," or "ludicrous and indecent plays." M. Deriege seems indeed to confound them with the "Moeurs du Temps" illustrated with artistic gouaches, when he says, "une de ces fables milesiennes, rehaussees de peintures, que la corruption romaine recherchait ...
— Vikram and the Vampire • Sir Richard F. Burton
... women in the great six o'clock homeward march, jostled them as they went along. With dumb, dull curiousness, she looked into one after another of the limitless stream of faces, and she fancied she saw in them every emotion but pity. The faces were gay, were anxious, were sorrowful, were mirthful, were lined with thought, or were merely flat and expressionless, but not one was turned toward her in compassion. The expressions of the faces might be various, but an underlying callousness was discoverable beneath every ...
— The Octopus • Frank Norris
... that mirthful period, during which Folly seemed to have taken possession of all the inhabitants of this populous city. Every thing that gaiety, whim, humour, and eccentricity could invent, was put in practice to render it a sort of continued jubilee. From morn to night, the concourse of masks of ...
— Paris As It Was and As It Is • Francis W. Blagdon
... again already, perverse enthusiast? You stole away from the festive banquet, and marred the mirthful ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... think Miss Garston has been saying, Susan? That we must be a comfort to each other. Fancy my being a comfort to you! You poor thing, when I am the plague and burden of your life,' And she laughed again, in a way that was scarcely mirthful. ...
— Uncle Max • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... and filled his long pipe, and we smoked. Then I told an old mirthful story to get him in the humor ...
— Indian Heroes and Great Chieftains • [AKA Ohiyesa], Charles A. Eastman
... application!" they shouted in hoarse and mirthful chorus, for they were certainly near that state favourable to destruction by the gods. One black fellow with a sliding gait ran into the closet and brought a sheet of thin iron, and a strange torch-like tube, which he lighted ...
— The Dragon of Wantley - His Tale • Owen Wister
... race, especially of the Gy-ei, and most especially of the accomplished Zee. The children of the Vril-ya, having upon their minds the weight of so many active duties and grave responsibilities, are not generally mirthful; but Taee, with all his wisdom, had much of the playful good-humour one often finds the characteristic of elderly men of genius. He felt that sort of pleasure in my society which a boy of a similar age in the upper world has in ...
— The Coming Race • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... which Chatham and Pericles in manhood had not. His unaffected lamentations when he lifts up his voice on high, or, more beautiful, the sobbing child,—the face all liquid grief, as he tries to swallow his vexation,—soften all hearts to pity, and to mirthful and clamorous compassion. The small despot asks so little that all reason and all nature are on his side. His ignorance is more charming than all knowledge, and his little sins more bewitching than any virtue. His flesh ...
— Ralph Waldo Emerson • Oliver Wendell Holmes
... crowded up against Big Pete, who occupied a position but slightly in advance and a little above me. My agony of fear having somewhat subsided I ventured to steal a momentary glance at my comrade's face. To my unutterable surprise I discovered a whimsical twinkling at the corners of his eyes and a mirthful expression of mischief in his countenance. This was incomprehensible to me, for I could imagine no more awe-inspiring position than the one we ...
— The Black Wolf Pack • Dan Beard
... from me the sportive jest, The mirthful jibe, the gay reflection; These social baubles fly the breast That owns the sway ...
— The Wit of Women - Fourth Edition • Kate Sanborn |
