"Urbane" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... he reached the steps before the door every trace of disturbance had vanished, and he was once more the urbane, handsome, debonair gentleman who played such havoc among ...
— The Guinea Stamp - A Tale of Modern Glasgow • Annie S. Swan
... the Choir, with Ghirlandaio's urbane Florentine pageant in the guise of sacred history, and pass on to the next chapel, the Cappella Gondi, where that crucifix in wood is to be seen which Brunelleschi carved as a lesson to Donatello, who received it like the gentleman he was. I have ...
— A Wanderer in Florence • E. V. Lucas
... writers accuse some of the American crew of treachery; the Americans, in turn, accuse the British of revolting brutality. Of course in such a fight things are not managed with urbane courtesy, and, moreover, writers are prejudiced. Those who would like to hear one side are referred to James; if they wish to hear the other, to the various letters from officers published in "Niles' Register," especially ...
— The Naval War of 1812 • Theodore Roosevelt
... world? . . . Oh, yes, you use it, fast enough, whenever you go back to Cambridge and play the condescending metropolitan in Combination Room. There, seventy minutes from Liverpool Street, you pose—yes, pose, Jack—as the urbane man, Horatius Flaccus life-size; whereas your job as a citizen is confined to cursing the rates, swearing if a pit in the wood pavement jolts you on the way home from the theatre, supposing it's somebody's business, supposing there's graft in it, and talking ...
— Foe-Farrell • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... the limitations of his mind and character. With his almost acid sharpness of insight, with his almost animal dexterity in act, there went none of that large, unconscious geniality of the world's heroes. He was not easy, not ample, not urbane, not even kind; his enjoyment was hardly smiling, or the smile was not broad enough to be convincing; he had no waste lands nor kitchen-midden in his nature, but was all improved and sharpened to a point. "He was bred to no profession," says Emerson; "he never ...
— Familiar Studies of Men & Books • Robert Louis Stevenson
... plans, and struts for an hour before the public eye. So with the writer in his preface: he may have never a word to say, but he must show himself for a moment in the portico, hat in hand, and with an urbane demeanour. ...
— An Inland Voyage • Robert Louis Stevenson
... accommodated with paper and ink, the young jeweller made out the account and receipt, whilst M. Lambert, the secretary, counted out before him 105 crisp Bank of England notes of L100 each. Then, with a final bow to his exceedingly urbane and eminently satisfactory customer, Mr. Schwarz took his leave. In the hall he saw and spoke to Mr. Pettitt, and then he went out ...
— The Old Man in the Corner • Baroness Orczy
... well-known Cherry Valley family, built for his residence in 1807 the house which still stands on Lake Street facing the length of Chestnut Street. He was a man of stout build, with a full face, slightly retiring forehead, a trifle bald, urbane and unassuming in deportment. As a pleader at the bar he was only moderately eloquent, but he was popularly designated far and near as "the honest lawyer," and his advice was not only much sought but implicitly relied upon. In a period not much devoted to the ...
— The Story of Cooperstown • Ralph Birdsall
... been obeyed with urbane alacrity, Sam called out again, very much as if he were piping all hands to osculation: 'Rev. Mr. Rippledean, step aft ...
— John Gayther's Garden and the Stories Told Therein • Frank R. Stockton
... Julian's godfather, a curious blend of the fashionable and the devout, the anchorite and the man of the people; Lord and Lady Shervinton, elderly connections of the nondescript variety; Mr. Hannaway Wells, reserved yet, urbane, a wonderful type of the supreme success of mediocrity; a couple of young soldiers, light-hearted and out for a good time, of whom Julian took charge; an Oxford don, who had once been Lord Maltenby's tutor; and last of all the homely, very pleasant-looking, middle-aged lady, Princess Torski, followed ...
— The Devil's Paw • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... you the compliment of saying, my dear Captain Okewood," Clubfoot remarked in that urbane voice of his which always made my blood run cold, "that never before in my career have I devoted so much thought to any single individual, in the different cases I have handled, as I have to you. As an individual, you are a paltry thing: it is rather your remarkable ...
— The Man with the Clubfoot • Valentine Williams
... one of Vermont's best men. A kind yet faithful commander in camp, gallant and fearless on the field. He was the highest type of a man; a christian gentleman. Colonel Stone had been killed instantly on the 5th. His urbane manners were remembered by all who frequented our division head-quarters, and his bravery had endeared him to his men. Colonel Tyler, too, of the Second was among the mortally wounded, and all ...
— Three Years in the Sixth Corps • George T. Stevens
... pallid, but bland and urbane, strolled out to the porch, saluting us gracefully. He paused beside Dorothy, who slipped her needle through her work and held out her hand for him ...
— The Maid-At-Arms • Robert W. Chambers
... benevolent in the train, I had already begun to fear this urbane old man far more than I had previously feared the tramp at Broughton. With an uncomfortable feeling that he had got me in his power, I could see no way of quickly getting out of it. To refuse to hand ...
— Chatterbox, 1905. • Various
... contented nature, and bear their poverty with cheerfulness and even dignity. While they partake of the ardour and strong temper which characterize the inhabitants of the South of France, they are probably, on the whole, more grave and staid than Frenchmen generally, and are thought to be more urbane and intelligent; and though they are unmanageable by force, they are remarkably accessible to kindness and ...
— The Huguenots in France • Samuel Smiles
... Invisible is the thing he does, and yet it is done. Let us hope that some sense of this tardy appreciation may soothe his spirit beyond the grave. On the present occasion there was nothing to soothe his spirit. The Speaker sat, urbane and courteous, with his eyes turned towards the unfortunate orator; but no other ears in the House seemed to listen to him. The corps of reporters had dwindled down to two, and they used their pens very listlessly, taking down here ...
— Can You Forgive Her? • Anthony Trollope
... went up to the first lieutenant and preferred his request, fully anticipating a refusal, but to his surprise the officer in question was all that was urbane and pleasant. ...
— Middy and Ensign • G. Manville Fenn
... the stern had picked up a magazine and was lolling back reading it. As the boat passed under him Cleggett saw on the cover page of the magazine a picture of the very man who was perusing it. It was a singularly urbane face; both the counterfeit presentment on the cover page and the real face were smiling and calm and benign. Cleggett could read the legend on the magazine cover accompanying the ...
— The Cruise of the Jasper B. • Don Marquis
... those who already agree with the speaker, but with these people he should be little concerned; a debater worthy of the name seeks to change the opinions of those who disagree with him. For this reason he is diplomatic, courteous, and urbane. ...
— Practical Argumentation • George K. Pattee
... no farther than the wharf, where the last object visible was his comely and smiling countenance as he waved his adieux. Conspicuous among the group on the after-deck, as we glided out of the smooth harbor of Boston, was an urbane and dignified gentleman of perhaps sixty years of age, with a clean-shaven mouth and chin, finely moulded, and with what Tennyson would call an educated whisker, short and gray, defining the region ...
— Hawthorne and His Circle • Julian Hawthorne
... flattering when one sees it to be so completely deserved?" Ludovic Quayle inquired in his most urbane manner. "Prompt and perpetual sacrifice of private conviction to party interest, for example—how can such devotion ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... He smiled back through the closed visor of an overmastering preoccupation, and moved past her to the fireplace and stood with his elbow on one end of the mantelpiece, listening to the sounds that came in from the parlour through the half-open door: Marion's urbane voice, thin and smooth like a stretched membrane, the click of the front-door handle, the last mounting squeal from Roger, which was cut short by a gruff whine from Poppy, and, loudest of all, the silence that fell ...
— The Judge • Rebecca West
... embodied in his masterful volume on "Systematic Theology." Dr. Joseph Addison Alexander, who, Dr. Hodge said, was, taking him all in all, "the most gifted man with whom I was ever personally acquainted," was in the chair of Hebrew and Old Testament literature. Urbane, old Dr. Samuel Miller, was the Professor of Ecclesiastical History. Those wise men taught us not only to think, but to believe. All education is atmospheric, and the atmosphere of Princeton Seminary was deeply and ...
— Recollections of a Long Life - An Autobiography • Theodore Ledyard Cuyler
... at the head of the receiving-line, attended strictly to the task in hand as an urbane ...
— All-Wool Morrison • Holman Day
... a handsome and urbane gentleman of Castilian courtesy and debonnaire manners, came to Coralio with the task before him of striking upon the cold trail of the lost money. There he conferred with the military authorities, who had received instructions to co-operate with ...
— Cabbages and Kings • O. Henry
... Parker, nor can it be acquired by effort. Vigour we may cultivate, and clearness we must; it is essential. On a level with these I should place propriety. Propriety teaches us to regulate our speech by the occasion; to be incisive at times and at times urbane; to adapt the 'how' to the 'when,' as I might put it. I do not think—I really do not think—that Christmas Eve is a happily chosen moment for calling Mr. Disraeli 'a ...
— Shining Ferry • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... spirit of each man, had cast the transforming flame and shadow over the outward form. And now they were alike only in their long, graceful figures, in their thin Roman features, in their general air of urbane distinction. ...
— One Man in His Time • Ellen Glasgow
... Chesterfield, wasn't it, who spoke of "Suaviter in modo, fortiter in re"? That is General Huguet. A tall man, dark, keen and of most soldierly bearing; beside the genial downrightness of the British officers he was urbane, suave, but full of decision. His post requires ...
— Kings, Queens And Pawns - An American Woman at the Front • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... profession, said Chevenix, a prince. He had no territory, and was not apparently scheming to get any, either of his own or other people's. Nobody at the Foreign Office believed that he corresponded with any intransigent; he used to go there often and exchange urbane gossip with under-secretaries. He lodged in Duke Street, gave dinner-parties at the Bachelors, had a large visiting-list, and was, as they say, always "about." One saw him everywhere—in the city, in Mayfair ...
— Rest Harrow - A Comedy of Resolution • Maurice Hewlett
... her youth, dull, smoke-grimed, fog-soaked; for roomy spaciousness and gentle luxury had been exchanged the dinginess and squalor of the place in Soho. The occasional visits to the theatre where her father played the flute, now and then a Sunday walk with him when the weather was sufficiently urbane (marred, always, by his peering watch of every passing face, which had never been rewarded till they met the staring stranger in Hyde Park) had been almost the only variations of a dull routine of ...
— The Old Flute-Player - A Romance of To-day • Edward Marshall and Charles T. Dazey
... cause a loss of considerable time and a deflection from the intended route, was declined in courteous terms by Marcoy through the interpretation of Pepe Garcia. Among civilized folk this urbane refusal would have sufficed, but the savages, taking such a reply as a challenge to verbal warfare, returned to the charge with increased tenacity. It were hard to say what natural logic they put ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, No. 23, February, 1873, Vol. XI. • Various
... a la prairie. She had tired of looking at the same half-dozen raw-boned gallants, and had come to the grand final decision, that her charms should not be wasted thus; and now that she was surrounded by those urbane solicitors, which do mingle with those of more enlargement of brain in fashionable life, they, in turn, began to fear lest those charms might not prove for such ...
— Natalie - A Gem Among the Sea-Weeds • Ferna Vale
... a quantity of their hair before the image of St. Urbane, trusting that by so doing their hair would grow ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant
... Tagals after they were deprived of their houses in Manila, among whom were the families of Raja Matanda and Raja Soliman. San Augustin says that even in his day many of the ancient nobility dwelt there, and that they where very urbane and cultured. "The Men hold various positions in Manila, and certain occupations in some of the local public functions. The women make excellent lace, in which they are so skilfull that the Dutch women cannot surpass them." This is still ...
— History of the Philippine Islands Vols 1 and 2 • Antonio de Morga
... fourth novel, or 'Entertainment' as he prefers to call his stories; and readers of the preceding three may find some old acquaintances. The scene is again laid principally in London, and again an odd company of types converse and have urbane adventures. ...
— Werwolves • Elliott O'Donnell
... had paid Chichikov no particular attention, though giving him full credit for his gentlemanly and urbane demeanour; but from the moment that there arose rumours of his being a millionaire other qualities of his began to be canvassed. Nevertheless, not ALL the ladies were governed by interested motives, since it is due to the term "millionaire" rather than to the ...
— Dead Souls • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... Medow Street where he had once been in a tikka-gharri with Auntie Jan to get some books for Mummy. Peter had recommended the shop, and the name instantly seized upon Tony's imagination and will remain with it evermore. He never for one moment connected it with the urbane gentleman in eyeglasses and a funny little round hat who owned the shop. For Tony "Taraporevala" will always suggest endless vistas of halls, fitted with books, shelves, and tall stacks of books, and counters laden with piles of books. It seemed amazing to find anything ...
— Jan and Her Job • L. Allen Harker
... and urbane reader; follow us undaunted whither we go, nor charge us with tracing crime in a bad cause. We will leave the old prison, the dejected inebriate, the more curious group that surround him, and the tale of the destroyer it develops, and escort you in our walk to the mansion of Madame ...
— Justice in the By-Ways - A Tale of Life • F. Colburn Adams
... rain they have to face, many a time have their beards been shaken by the hurricanes of the Minch. If you speak to a ship-captain, you are certain to get the utmost civility and politeness. It is true that most of them have several sets of vocabularies: to passengers they are urbane and choice of speech; but they have, within easy reach, another set of phrases, which they find of service in ...
— Literary Tours in The Highlands and Islands of Scotland • Daniel Turner Holmes
... their pockets, and why Mr. Prigg should have done so on this occasion I am not aware. I merely saw in my dream that he did so. There was not a change in his countenance; his piety was intact; there was not even a suffusion of colour. Placid, sweet-tempered, and urbane, as a Christian should be, he looked pityingly towards the hot and irascible Bumpkin, as though he should say, "You have smitten me on this cheek, now smite me on that!" and placed the great envelope on the table before ...
— The Humourous Story of Farmer Bumpkin's Lawsuit • Richard Harris
... already awaiting them at their private table, but it was far from a social group which sat down to dinner that evening. The elder Mainwaring still preserved an ominous silence, and in his dark, glowering face few would have recognized the urbane guest whom Hugh Mainwaring had introduced to his small coterie of friends less than three months before. The younger man, though holding a desultory conversation with the attorney, yet looked decidedly bored, while from time to time he regarded his father with a cynical expression entirely new ...
— That Mainwaring Affair • Maynard Barbour
... had been heard to state that white neck-cloths were of no consequence. The dinner went off successfully. Burgess—desirous, perhaps, of favourably impressing the chaplain whom the Bishop delighted to honour—shut off his blasphemy for a while, and was urbane enough. "You'll find us rough, Mr. Meekin," he said, "but you'll find us 'all there' when we're wanted. This is a little ...
— For the Term of His Natural Life • Marcus Clarke
... he was speaking the fitful energy died away. The old man ceased to talk; his eyelids fell. But the smile still lingered about his mouth, and as he settled himself on his pillows, like one who rests, the spectators were struck by the urbane and distinguished beauty of his aspect. The purple flush had died again into mortal pallor. Illness had masked or refined the weakness of mouth and chin; the beautiful head and countenance, with their characteristic notes of youth, impetuosity, ...
— Lady Rose's Daughter • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... for everybody that had seen him appear (and he had been all over the town appearing to 'em, and endearin' himself to 'em, cleer out beyond Jonesville as far as Spoon Settlement and Loontown), why, they jest thought their eyes of him, he wus so thoughtful and urbane and helpful. Why, there hain't no tellin' how much helpfuler he wuz ...
— Sweet Cicely - Or Josiah Allen as a Politician • Josiah Allen's Wife (Marietta Holley)
... tolerated by those who aspire to urbane and liberal judgments because they think it can be defended on humanistic grounds. But, as a matter of fact, it is as offensive to the thoroughgoing humanist as it is to the sincere religionist. They have a common quarrel with it. Take, for example, ...
— Preaching and Paganism • Albert Parker Fitch
... that occur in this town; we have been using a repressed and obsolete style which is painful to those who enter into the joyous spirit of such occasions, and last night's wedding in the family of the patrician Skinners we assigned to our gentlemanly and urbane Mr. J. Mortimer Montague, late of the publicity department of the world-famed Robinson Circus and Menagerie. The following graceful account from Mr. Montague's facile pen is the most accurate and satisfactory report of ...
— In Our Town • William Allen White
... manner, a diplomatist in mind, moving in an entourage of state and worldly circumstance, occupied in the arts, constructing the grandest building of his time, learned without pedantry, agreeably cultivated in knowledge, urbane in his judgment of mankind, a power in the councils of his country, a voice in the destinies of the world—so we see him moving in a large and splendid orbit, complete in fine activities, dominant in his assured position, almost superhuman in success. And as he moves, he presses into the flesh ...
— Essays in Rebellion • Henry W. Nevinson
... exclusiveness!—lying there, with none so poor to do him reverence! He was a type—and, by reason of his happy temperament, an exceedingly favourable type—of the 'gentleman,' shifting for himself under normal conditions of back-country life. Urbane address, faultless syntax, even that good part which shall not be taken away, namely, the calm consciousness of inherent superiority, are of little use here. And yet your Australian novelist finds no inconsistency in placing the bookish student, or ...
— Such is Life • Joseph Furphy
... acquaintance while at Wilmslow, were the Gregs of Quarry Bank, a refined and philanthropic household, including among the sons William R. Greg (born in the same year as Mr. Gladstone), that ingenious, urbane, interesting, and independent mind, whose speculations, dissolvent and other, were afterwards to take an effective place in the writings of the time. 'I fear he is a unitarian,' the young churchman mentions to his father, and gives sundry ...
— The Life of William Ewart Gladstone, Vol. 1 (of 3) - 1809-1859 • John Morley
... reconcile both science and theology with sincerity and good breeding, to make our experts understand that they are nothing if they are not single-minded and urbane. Get them to understand this, and there will be no difficulty ...
— The Note-Books of Samuel Butler • Samuel Butler
... by Sir Victor Catheron's side. "Who giveth this woman to be married to this man?" say the urbane tones of the rector of Chesholm, and the Right Honorable the Earl of Wroatmore comes forward on two rickety old legs and gives her. "If any one here present knows any just cause or impediment why this man ...
— A Terrible Secret • May Agnes Fleming
... ago. I there said, in referring to the Gadarene story, "Everything I know of law and justice convinces me that the wanton destruction of other people's property is a misdemeanour of evil example." On this, Mr. Gladstone, continuing his candid and urbane observations, remarks ("Impregnable Rock," p. 273) that, "Exercising his rapid judgment on the text," and "not inquiring what anybody else had known or said about it," I had missed a point in support of that "accusation against our Lord" which he has now been constrained ...
— Collected Essays, Volume V - Science and Christian Tradition: Essays • T. H. Huxley
... became the urbane and alert showman. He explained how the pressure was regulated. He pulled the capstan-like arms of the motive wheel and the blanketed steel bed slid smoothly under the glittering cylinder. Although George had often been in his stepfather's printing works he now felt for ...
— The Roll-Call • Arnold Bennett
... I will give orders to have your suspicions investigated," replied the patient, urbane official. "A detective shall leave by the next train for Montauban with a request to the Prefect of Police of the Department of Tarn-et-Garonne for the arrest of the individual in question, if ...
— The Stretton Street Affair • William Le Queux
... to meet the gentleman who entered, though I knew she could not help but feel keenly the niggardly appearance of the board she left with such grace. The stranger—he was certainly a stranger; this I could see by the formality of her manner—was a gentleman of urbane bearing and a general ...
— Room Number 3 - and Other Detective Stories • Anna Katharine Green
... Raymond Rashleigh sat before a blazing sea-coal fire, in his cozy study, in comfortable, after-dinner mood. He lay back in his cushioned and carved arm-chair, a florid, portly, urbane prelate, with iron-gray hair and patriarchal whiskers, a steaming glass of wine punch at his elbow, that day's paper open upon his lap, an overfed pussy purring at his knee, the genius of comfort personified in his own ...
— The Unseen Bridgegroom - or, Wedded For a Week • May Agnes Fleming
... immense and constant stream of new and vigorous blood, it never suffices to raise the urban population to the same level of physical and nervous stability which the rural population possesses. More alert, more vivacious, more intelligent, even more urbane in the finer sense, as the urban population becomes,—not perhaps at first, but in the end,—it inevitably loses its stamina, its reserves of vital energy. Dr. Cantlie very properly defines a Londoner ...
— The Task of Social Hygiene • Havelock Ellis
... was for one moment also absolutely paralysed with amazement and concern, then saying hurriedly, "Forgive me, Lady Chaloner, I must go and see what has happened," he quickly followed. Lord Stamfordham drew up his chair to the table and sat down. His urbane, genial manner had returned, and he spoke as though nothing had happened; the rest instantly took their cue ...
— The Arbiter - A Novel • Lady F. E. E. Bell
... distinct moral turpitude like hypocrisy and avarice, but against inordinate affection for lap-dogs (Melampe), pietistic objections to masked balls {Masquerades}, and superstitious belief in legerdemain (Witchcraft). Holberg voices the urbane humanistic spirit that characterized the eighteenth century at ...
— Comedies • Ludvig Holberg
... trials, and worries, Angut was at all times unvaryingly urbane, kind, sedate, equable, obliging, honest, and self-sacrificing. It mattered not that other men spoke freely—sometimes even a little boastfully—of their exploits. Angut never did so of his, although ...
— Red Rooney - The Last of the Crew • R.M. Ballantyne
... humility displeases. During these terrible transitions, which induce fierce distraction, Job himself would become irritable, insanely furious, and choleric. A man in such a state regards himself as the focus of all miseries. When recovered, he feels chastened, becomes urbane and ludicrously amiable, he conjures up fictitious delights from all things which, but yesterday, possessed for him such awful portentous aspects. His men he regards with love and friendship; whatever is ...
— How I Found Livingstone • Sir Henry M. Stanley
... acquaintance with Borrow's works was far behind that of some Borrovians who did not know Lavengro in the flesh, such as Saintsbury and Mr. Birrell. Borrow was shy, angular, eccentric, rustic in accent and in locution, but with a charm for me, at least, that was irresistible. Hake was polished, easy and urbane in everything, and, although not without prejudice and bias, ready to shine ...
— George Borrow and His Circle - Wherein May Be Found Many Hitherto Unpublished Letters Of - Borrow And His Friends • Clement King Shorter
... really almost seem purposely arranged to entrap the unwary in this strangely under-side-up country, is the fact that while the ennobled and those of high official rank are courteous in their attitude and urbane—frequently even to the extent of refusing money from those whom they have obliged, no matter how privately pressed upon them—the low-caste and slavish are not only deficient in obsequiousness, but are permitted to retort openly to ...
— The Mirror of Kong Ho • Ernest Bramah
... and conditions which he began to comprehend and have an amiable contempt for, he became urbane and conversational, and a little amused to find navigation so simple, even when out of his ...
— The Dark Star • Robert W. Chambers
... B——, Northamptonshire, and my daughters, Lady Egerton and Miss Jarvis." Lady Egerton bowed stiffly to the recognising smile the dowager now condescended to bestow; but Sarah, remembering a certain handsome lord in the family, was more urbane, determining at the moment to make the promotion of her mother and sister stepping-stones ...
— Precaution • James Fenimore Cooper
... The Firs, happiness of a kind to dwell in the memory and be a resource in darker days. Though mere personal ease was little the subject of her thoughts, she prized for its effect upon her mind the air of graceful leisure, of urbane repose, which pervaded the house. To compare The Firs with that plain little dwelling on the skirts of a Yorkshire manufacturing town which she called her home, was to understand the inestimable advantage of those born into the material refinement which wealth can command, of those who ...
— A Life's Morning • George Gissing
... rises up eastward out of Epernay, and asked how things were going in Paris. He was, says Barnet, a round-faced man, dressed very neatly in black—so neatly that it was amazing to discover he was living close at hand in a tent made of carpets—and he had 'an urbane but insistent manner,' a carefully trimmed moustache and beard, expressive eyebrows, ...
— The World Set Free • Herbert George Wells
... and spent the next day crossing Nebraska, fertile, rich and interesting. On the afternoon of the second day he left the train and took a branch line toward the mountains and Norada, and from that time on he became an urbane, interested and ...
— The Breaking Point • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... countercharge, When many a samurai Fierce-panoplied fell at its pale, Suppressing groan or cry; Suppressing all but silent hates That swept from eye to eye, While lips smiled decorously on, Or mocked urbane goodbye. ...
— Nirvana Days • Cale Young Rice
... but fair question, and Gervase found himself curiously perplexed by it. He offered no reply, neither did Denzil, and they all three slowly entered the Mena House Hotel, there to be met with deferential salutations by the urbane and affable landlord, and to be assured that they would find their rooms comfortable, and also that "Madame la Princesse Ziska" expected them to dine with her that evening. At this message, Denzil Murray made a sign to Gervase that he wished to speak to him alone. Gervase ...
— Ziska - The Problem of a Wicked Soul • Marie Corelli
... I tempt you to forswear One pastoral joy, or rural frolic. I call you to a city where The most urbane are most bucolic. 'Twill charm your poet's eyes to find Good husbandmen in brokers burly;— Their stock is ever on their mind; To water it ...
— In Divers Tones • Charles G. D. Roberts
... active. He had blue eyes, rather a fair complexion, prominent features, and a high, capacious forehead. His aspect was severe and forbidding; his voice clear and powerful; his action dignified, but neither graceful nor engaging; his tone and manners, although urbane and complacent in society, were lofty, and even arrogant, in the senate. On entering the house, it was his custom to stalk sternly to his place, without honouring even his most favoured adherents with a word, a nod, or even a glance ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 20, Issue 558, July 21, 1832 • Various
... two men than the space that divided the Sage of Lindenwald from Prince John. In one particular, however, they were alike. Each had that personal magnetism that binds followers to leaders with hooks of steel. The father was grave, urbane, wary, a safe counsellor, and accustomed to an argumentative and deliberate method of address that befitted the bar and the Senate. Few knew how able a lawyer the elder Van Buren was. The son was enthusiastic, frank, bold, and given to wit, repartee, ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander
... international Novel to a complete absorption in transatlantic studies, making his peculiar application of the realistic formula to the inner life of the spirit: a curious compound, a cosmopolitan Puritan, an urbane student of souls. His share in the British product is perhaps appreciable; but from the native point of view, at least, it would seem as if his earlier work were, and would remain, most representative both because of its motives and methods. ...
— Masters of the English Novel - A Study Of Principles And Personalities • Richard Burton
... comparatively easy words) were greeted with some laughter, and the ridiculed spellers sought their seats with hanging heads. By and by, however, the failures were not all at the bottom of the class; here and there such lists as "inane, profane, humane, insane, mundane, urbane," or, "staid, unlaid, mermaid, prayed, weighed, portrayed" began to pick out uncertain ones the entire length ...
— Ruth Fielding of the Red Mill • Alice B. Emerson
... Chief Justice urbane. The income of the kingdom barely sufficed for their two salaries, and they judged it incumbent (as they could do nothing else) to be as polite as possible to the American consul. But jails? Oh, no, they couldn't oblige ...
— Wild Justice: Stories of the South Seas • Lloyd Osbourne
... upon the sandy bluff above us. The captain, in a nautical way, claimed us as salvage, and we were soon enjoying his generous hospitality. In this isolated town, once a busy cotton-shipping port, there was a population of about one thousand souls, among whom, conspicuous for his urbane manners and scientific ability, lived Dr. A. W. Chapman, the author of the "Flora of the ...
— Four Months in a Sneak-Box • Nathaniel H. Bishop
... to a cause which he had near at heart, when he heard Katharine upon the stairs. A moment later it was plain that he had been mistaken, it was not Katharine; but he could not settle himself to his letter. His temper had changed from one of urbane contentment—indeed of delicious expansion—to one of uneasiness and expectation. The dinner was brought in, and had to be set by the fire to keep hot. It was now a quarter of an hour beyond the specified time. He bethought him of a piece of news which had ...
— Night and Day • Virginia Woolf
... yellow-haired "devil" arrived at the office of the Jack Creek Pizenweed, at 7 o'clock, and found the editor in. It was so unusual to find the editor in at that hour that the boy whistled in a low contralto voice, and passed on into the "news room," leaving the gentlemanly, genial and urbane editor of the Pizenweed as he had found him, sitting in his foundered chair, with his head immersed in a pile of exchanges on the table and his venerable Smith & Wesson near by, acting as a paper-weight. The gentlemanly, genial and ...
— Nye and Riley's Wit and Humor (Poems and Yarns) • Bill Nye
... concerning this urbane and gifted prince of swindlers that Adrian Stanley talked with William Sherman, manager of the banking house of Turner, ...
— Port O' Gold • Louis John Stellman
... examples: Cicero, in employing 'favor,' a word soon after used by everybody, does it with an apology, evidently feels that he is introducing a questionable novelty, being probably first applied to applause in the theatre; 'urbanus,' too, in our sense of urbane, had in his time only just come up; 'obsequium' he believes Terence to have been the first to employ. [Footnote: On the new words in classical Latin, see Quintilian, Inst. viii. 3. 30-37.] 'Soliloquium' seems to us so natural, indeed so necessary, a word, this ...
— On the Study of Words • Richard C Trench
... their acquaintance, Mr. Lorimer had sought to draw her out on the subject of her experiences during this period, but he had found her reticent. And so whenever a letter came addressed in the strong, masculine hand of her Australian correspondent, some urbane remark was invariably made, while his small daughter Gracie swelled with indignation at the further end ...
— The Bars of Iron • Ethel May Dell
... of lines about a mouth whose predominant expression was one of mingled cynicism and suspicion. There was suspicion, too, in his small black eyes, as well as a sort of lurking fierceness which not even his most urbane and elaborate smile could altogether eliminate. In person he was very thin and somewhat under the middle height, and had all the air of a confirmed valetudinarian. He was dressed as no English gentleman would care to be seen dressed in public. A long brown velvet coat trimmed ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 2, February, 1891 • Various
... himself on evenings of light pressure after the Washington copy was run off, and blink rapidly. At the same moment Mr. David Sterne gave utterance to an exclamation, partly of annoyance, partly of surprise. Mr. Harrington Surtaine, wearing an expression both businesslike and urbane ...
— The Clarion • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... characteristics, and of the little bursts of warmth and affection that would render it delightful. It was not soothing to think of all this being lavished on a shabby young man who was not always urbane in demeanor and who stubbornly objected to ...
— Vagabondia - 1884 • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... a firm belief in Providence, confirmed by his long life of varied experience and thoughtful observation. Proverbially courteous and urbane, he was, at the same time, inflexible in the withdrawal of all confidence when once deceived or disappointed in character. Clear and strong in his religious convictions, he was none the less free from intolerance; ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 3, September 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... the Federal Court on the ground that he had induced Dodge to attempt to jump his bond. In place of the blustering Kaffenburgh was sent another member of the famous law firm of Howe and Hummel, David May, an entirely different type of man. May was as mild as a day in June—as urbane as Kaffenburgh had been insolent. He fluttered into Houston like a white dove of peace with the proverbial olive branch in his mouth. From now on the tactics employed by the representatives of Hummel were conciliatory in the extreme. Mr. May, ...
— True Stories of Crime From the District Attorney's Office • Arthur Train
... looked at life as if she were a horse under him, to whom he must give way just so far as was necessary to keep mastery of her. A man to whom ideas were of no value, except when wedded to immediate action; essentially neat; demanding to be 'done well,' but capable of stoicism if necessary; urbane, yet always in readiness to thrust; able only to condone the failings and to compassionate the kinds of distress which his own experience had taught him to understand. Such was Miltoun's younger brother ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... fellow, but he seems to me a little—what shall I say?—too elaborate. Too urbane; too ornate. He expresses himself so dreadfully well! I don't believe he ever uses a shorter word ...
— Bird of Paradise • Ada Leverson
... cronies meeting in the streets of Kingston after a temporary separation; when about pistol—shot asunder, both would begin to tug and rug at the right—hand glove, but it is frequently a mighty serious affair in that hissing hot climate to get the gauntlet off; they approach,—one, a smart urbane little man, who would not disgrace St James's Street, being more kiln—dried and less moist in his corporeals than his country friend, has contrived to extract his paw, and holds it out ...
— Tom Cringle's Log • Michael Scott
... hostler adored them, especially Mr. Joseph; when the latter was there, which he was every Saturday till Monday, he would stroll over the stable with Squires—that was the hostler's name—joking incessantly, and treating the latter to an occasional cigar. Urbane Mr. Joseph would joke with anybody, Mr. George was more severe and had according to the landlady, the most perfect and ...
— Crowded Out! and Other Sketches • Susie F. Harrison
... day of Sir Marmaduke's martyrdom. He was first requested, with most urbane politeness, to explain the exact nature of the government which he exercised in the Mandarins. Now it certainly was the case that the manner in which the legislative and executive authorities were intermingled in the affairs of these ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope
... How reconcile that urbane gunner-general, a genius among experts you were told, as the master of a thunderous magic which shot its deadly lightnings over the German area! Let him move a red pin on the map and a tractor was towing a nine-inch ...
— My Second Year of the War • Frederick Palmer
... smiles of her mother. The other young ladies came forward and joined in the conversation, but Miss Carmichael did not show her face until the family was summoned for prayers. The colonel came down in his usual urbane smiling way, saying that he had taken the liberty of looking in upon his dear friend and prisoner, and was rejoiced to find that he had spent a good night. The captain could be heard descending the staircase, and telling somebody that he was becalmed again with a spell of ...
— Two Knapsacks - A Novel of Canadian Summer Life • John Campbell
... little skipper in the blandest and most urbane humour. He received me with a courtesy that almost made me feel affection for him. We found Mr Farmer, the first-lieutenant, with him, and had it not been for a sly twinkling of the eye of the captain, and very significant looks that now and then stole from Mr Farmer, as ...
— Rattlin the Reefer • Edward Howard
... our first-class carriage. It was clean and comfortable; but the Cantankerous Old Lady made the porter mop the floor, and fidgeted and worried till we slid out of the station. Fortunately, the only other occupant of the compartment was a most urbane and obliging Continental gentleman—I say Continental, because I couldn't quite make out whether he was French, German, or Austrian—who was anxious in every way to meet Lady Georgina's wishes. Did madame desire to have the window open? Oh, ...
— Miss Cayley's Adventures • Grant Allen
... national variety of rich and poor, plain and fashionable, urbane and rustic; they elbowed and shouldered each other upon a perfect equality in a place where all were as free to come as to the White House, and they jostled quaint groups of almond-eyed legations in the ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... had in the meanwhile put his crumpled toilet in order and now turned with an urbane smile to ...
— The Nest of the Sparrowhawk • Baroness Orczy
... of your servants can give the necessary information," replied the urbane official. If I had lost an umbrella he could not have viewed my plight with ...
— The Morals of Marcus Ordeyne • William J. Locke
... was no master, no pontiff in the arts. Palizzi bore rule at Gretz - urbane, superior rule - his memory rich in anecdotes of the great men of yore, his mind fertile in theories; sceptical, composed, and venerable to the eye; and yet beneath these outworks, all twittering with Italian superstition, his eye scouting for omens, and ...
— Across The Plains • Robert Louis Stevenson
... followed him through a scene of melancholy interest. Beside the mast, within a shattered palisade, lay huddled the vast corpse of the Mylodon of Patagonia, couchant amidst his fodder of chopped hay. The expression of the huge animal was placid and urbane in death. He was the victim of the ceaseless curiosity of science. Two of the five-horned antelope giraffes of Central Africa lay in a confused heap of horns and hoofs. Beside an immense tank couched a figure in evening dress, swearing in a subdued tone. Logan recognised ...
— The Disentanglers • Andrew Lang
... brightening. The New Yorker's urbane but obvious excitement mollified Mr. McLean. "Ever seen rain made, Mr. Ogden?" ...
— Lin McLean • Owen Wister
... that Christian ministers are never called on by God's word to insult the convictions, or even the prejudices, of their brethren; and that religion is at any rate not less susceptible to urbane and courteous conduct among men, than any other study which men take up. I am sorry to say that I cannot defend Mr Slope's sermon in the cathedral. But come, my dear, put on your bonnet, and let us walk round the dear ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... is famed among tourists for its beautiful scenery and attractive falls at the head of navigation. Pleasure parties make frequent excursions from St. Paul, and the trip is truly enjoyable if you are always sure of so urbane and obliging an officer as is ...
— Minnesota; Its Character and Climate • Ledyard Bill
... he wrote practically no other kind. Long practice gave him an easy command of rhythm, and a careful training added delicacy to his diction. He became remarkably dexterous in rhyme, and grew to be the recognized celebrant of class reunions and public dinners. Urbane, felicitous and possessing an unflagging humor, he was the prince of after-dinner poets—not a lofty position, be it observed, nor one making for immortal fame. His highwater mark was reached in three poems, "The Chambered Nautilus," ...
— American Men of Mind • Burton E. Stevenson
... an unusually urbane hotel clerk. "Why, usually they leave their keys and get their mail from the floor clerk. But Mr. Griebler seems to ...
— Personality Plus - Some Experiences of Emma McChesney and Her Son, Jock • Edna Ferber
... excellent company, pleasant companions, good-natured, easy-going, and urbane. Their self-conceit is inordinate, and remains undiminished in spite of repeated failures in the most important affairs of life. They see themselves fall immeasurably behind those who are admittedly their inferiors in cleverness, yet they are not only cheery and content, ...
— Epilepsy, Hysteria, and Neurasthenia • Isaac G. Briggs
... affable and urbane with her than any one whom Pollyooly had ever met. He was careful to ask her whether she disliked the smell of tobacco smoke before taking her into the smoking-room, where he made a light meal on whiskey and ...
— Happy Pollyooly - The Rich Little Poor Girl • Edgar Jepson
... dignity and glamour. There seemed to be a great tradition which enriched and upheld him. Mr. Beagle senior used to stand on the little balcony at the rear of the main floor, transfixed with the pleasure of seeing Gissing move among the crowded passages. Alert, watchful, urbane, with just the ideal blend of courtesy and condescension, he raised floorwalking to a social art. Female customers asked him the way to departments they knew perfectly well, for the pleasure of hearing him direct ...
— Where the Blue Begins • Christopher Morley
... tried to blow up one of the ships of Admiral Blake. This new kind of artist avoids studio slang as much as he does long hair and red waistcoats. He might be a young barrister, only he is more polished; or a young doctor, only he is more urbane. No doubt there exist men of the ancient species—rough-and- ready men as strong as bargees, given to much tobacco, amateurs of porter or shandygaff, great hunters of the picturesque, such wild folk as Thackeray knew and Mr. Charles Keene occasionally caricatures. These are the artists whom ...
— Lost Leaders • Andrew Lang
... The urbane young baron alighting, assisted Annette to mount his noble steed, who, though overwhelmed by his kindness, refused to listen to all the consolation, or banterings, with which he endeavoured to cheer her on her way to Castle Mortimer, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, - Issue 560, August 4, 1832 • Various
... generally "in full fig."—(Mem.—Write to Notes and Queries, Unde derivatur—"Full fig?") who advances briskly but quietly towards me. My visitor has evidently made some mistake in the number of his room. At least, I hope the mistake isn't on my part, or on the urbane Manager's part, in putting me up here. Smart visitor bows. I am about to explain that he is in error, and that this is my room, when he deprecates any remark by saying, "Delighted to meet you; my name is CAPES. The porter told me ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101, August 8, 1891 • Various
... arrived, his smooth, shiny face glistening with perspiration. He wore a new cassock and carried his broad-brimmed hat under his arm. His appearance made quite a stir. He passed from group to group, urbane, affable, shaking hands right and left; he assumed a set smile of amiability which never left his face ...
— The Octopus • Frank Norris
... at an end, Ocock mentioned, in his frigidly urbane way, that he had recently been informed there was an excellent opening for a firm of solicitors in Ballarat: could Mr. Mahony, as a resident, confirm the report? Mahony regretted his ignorance, but spoke in praise of the Golden City ...
— Australia Felix • Henry Handel Richardson
... situation, features interesting and intelligible to men of other ages and climes. They are lucid and well constructed. Their plots turn about a simple action with unique effect. Their style is alert, urbane, discreet, and rich, seeking its effect only through concrete and simple means. They deal but very slightly with lyrical emotion, they deal with ...
— Quatre contes de Prosper Mrime • F. C. L. Van Steenderen
... modern men to comprehend the position of women in the primitive Church, is strikingly shown in Chalmers' commentary on the fact that Paul used exactly the same title in addressing Priscilla that he uses in greeting Urbane, Although conceding that Priscilla had shared the work of an Apostle in teaching Apollos "the way of God more perfectly," and, although he knows nothing whatever of Urbane's work, yet Chalmers unhesitatingly concludes that Urbane's help to Paul must have been in things spiritual, ...
— The Woman's Bible. • Elizabeth Cady Stanton
... Genteel? Lo, Genteel Jack in hurricane weather, Shagged like a bear, like a red lion roaring; But O, so fine in his chapeau and feather, In port to the ladies never once jawing; All bland politesse, how urbane was ...
— John Marr and Other Poems • Herman Melville
... note of warning that was sounded came from Mrs. Fallows, who sat on the porch of Your Hotel, and, like the Greek Chorus, foretold the disasters that would befall, and prophesied nothing but evil for the entire enterprise. Even the urbane Jimmy became ruffled by her insistent iteration, and declared that she "put him in mind of a darned ...
— Mr. Opp • Alice Hegan Rice
... and down the room with the Duc de Grandlieu. Both were men of fifty-six or thereabouts, and still hale; both were short, corpulent, flourishing, somewhat florid-complexioned men with jaded eyes, and lower lips that had begun to hang already. But for an exquisite refinement of accent, an urbane courtesy, and an ease of manner that could change in a moment to insolence, a superficial observer might have taken them for a couple of bankers. Any such mistake would have been impossible, however, if the listener ...
— The Thirteen • Honore de Balzac
... to him through one of his fellow employees in the railroad offices—a Mexican who had spent four years in an American university, and who was universally respected for his urbane manner and kind heart. Valdez, his name was. He had heartily invited Harboro to go to the wedding with him as his guest; and when he saw traces of some sort of difficulty in Harboro's manner, he suggested, with the ready simpatia of his race, that doubtless there was a Mrs. Harboro ...
— Children of the Desert • Louis Dodge
... is perfect on you," she remarked in honied accents. "It was one of my best models last season, and as I said before, Madame, you are so fortunate as to wear your clothes with a grace." She was urbane, but she was anxious to be rid of her, this young Mrs. Fowler could see at a glance. "Your head is well set on your shoulders, and that is rare—very rare! It would surprise you to know how few women have heads that are well set on their ...
— Life and Gabriella - The Story of a Woman's Courage • Ellen Glasgow
... "Urbane" is a word which etymologically bears witness that the ancient world believed the arts of courtesy to be the products of the town rather than of the country. Something of the same distinction may occasionally be traced ...
— Collections and Recollections • George William Erskine Russell
... considerable time at his bothered seconds, shrugged his shoulders slightly. This affair had hopelessly and unreasonably complicated his existence for him. One absurdity more or less in the development did not matter. All absurdity was distasteful to him; but, urbane as ever, he produced a faintly ironic smile and said in his ...
— The Point Of Honor - A Military Tale • Joseph Conrad
... the personal loyalty already existing there. The Toronto Globe of April 20, 1903, voiced a strong feeling in Canada when it hoped for a future Royal visit to the Dominion and declared that "it would be a mistake to suppose that Edward VII. is merely an urbane gentleman, not to say a lover of the common people; he is a statesman and diplomat of breadth of view, depth of insight, and quickness of intuition. He knows how to time his visits in the interest of the peace of the world for which he humanely ...
— The Life of King Edward VII - with a sketch of the career of King George V • J. Castell Hopkins
... self-denial, and brotherly charity. Over and above the mere literary charm of his works, too—and herein, perhaps, lies no small part of the secret of his popularity—the warm heart and thoroughly urbane nature of the man are felt instinctively by his readers, and draw them to him as to ...
— Horace • Theodore Martin
... VIDA. Hastily.] It seems to me that horses are like the fourth gospel. Any conversation about them becomes animated almost beyond the limits of the urbane! [VIDA, disgusted by such plainness of speech, rises and goes to PHILIP who waves her ...
— Representative Plays by American Dramatists: 1856-1911: The New York Idea • Langdon Mitchell
... Trevor, but Lawrence was dragged past me by several Affghans, whom I saw wrest his weapons from him. Up to this moment I was so engrossed in observing what was taking place, that I actually was not aware that my own right arm was mastered, that my urbane friend held a pistol to my temple, and that I was surrounded by a circle of Ghazees, with drawn swords and cocked juzails. Resistance was in vain, so, listening to the exhortations of Gholam Moyun-ood-deen, which were enforced by the whistling of divers bullets over my head, I hurried ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXVIII. February, 1843. Vol. LIII. • Various
... they offer me no assistance; there is but one dated, and that one merely headed: "Dusseldorf, 19th Cent." Well, in 1857, then, let us take it, the Antwerp Academy was under the direction of De Keyser, that most urbane of men and painters. Van Lerius, well known to many American and English lovers of art, her Majesty included, was professor of the Painting Class, and amongst the students there were many who rapidly made themselves a name, as Tadema, M. Maris, Neuhuys, Heyermans, and the armless artist, ...
— In Bohemia with Du Maurier - The First Of A Series Of Reminiscences • Felix Moscheles
... Colwyn bestowed a swift glance on his companion which took in everything. The tall man in glasses looked too human for a lawyer, too intelligent for a schoolmaster, and too well-dressed for an ordinary medical man. Colwyn, versed in judging men swiftly from externals, noting the urbane, somewhat pompous face, the authoritative, professional pose, the well-shaped, plump white hands, and the general air of well-being and prosperity which exuded from the whole man, placed him as a successful practitioner in the more lucrative path of medicine—probably ...
— The Shrieking Pit • Arthur J. Rees
... work was done as editor. He was editor of Putnam's Magazine at the time of its failure in 1857, and undertook to pay up every creditor, a task which consumed sixteen years. He wrote the Easy Chair papers in Harper's Monthly. A volume of these essays contains some of his easiest, most urbane, and humorous writings. They are light and in the vein of Addison's Spectator. In Orations and Addresses are to be found some of his strongest and most polished speeches on ...
— History of American Literature • Reuben Post Halleck
... Ostend and the Golden Horn) had just brought soup and a bottle of thin Hungarian claret, when the other three chairs at my table were taken by a Rumanian family returning from a holiday in Budapest—an urbane gentleman of middle age, a shy little daughter, and a dark-eyed wife, glittering with diamonds, who looked a ...
— Antwerp to Gallipoli - A Year of the War on Many Fronts—and Behind Them • Arthur Ruhl
... people once; but I confess that, when I thought of those dear Granvilles, their entrees stuck in my throat." The "dear Granvilles" in question were the parents of the second Lord Granville, whom we all remember as the most urbane of Foreign Secretaries, and of Frederick Leveson-Gower. The first Lord Granville was a younger son of the first Marquess of Stafford and brother of the second Marquess, who was made Duke of Sutherland. He was born in 1773, entered Parliament at twenty-two, ...
— Prime Ministers and Some Others - A Book of Reminiscences • George W. E. Russell
... next puzzle was the French, urbane, amenable and suave. Negro emotions and French sensibilities mingled even without recourse to the vehicle of language. Imbued with all the finer Latin qualities and characteristics, the French ever invited the black man to a social ...
— Kelly Miller's History of the World War for Human Rights • Kelly Miller
... silver-tongue, the sentences flowing from his mouth as smooth as butter and as neatly dovetailed as a parquet floor. He had a sort of man-of-the-world manner, treating his opponents with condescending geniality, deprecating all passion and exaggeration and making you feel that his urbane statement must be right, for if he had wanted he could have put the case so much higher. I watched him, fascinated, studying his face carefully; and the thing that struck me was that there was nothing in it—nothing, that is to say, to ...
— Mr. Standfast • John Buchan
... State Convention was a new experience for him. He walked behind the Duke, who made his slow, urbane way here and there, drawling good-humored replies to salutations. He had quip ready for jest, handclasp for his intimates, tactful word for the newer men who were dragged forward to meet him. Even ...
— The Ramrodders - A Novel • Holman Day
... developement of humour went a moderation won from humour, whether in matters of religion, of politics, or society, a literary courtesy and reserve, a well-bred temperance and modesty of tone and phrase. It was in the hands of the town-bred essayist that our literature first became urbane. ...
— History of the English People, Volume VII (of 8) - The Revolution, 1683-1760; Modern England, 1760-1767 • John Richard Green
... EDWARD MARSHALL HALL, K.C., "will describe the methods of conducting civil actions." What GILBERT WHITE would say to all this brick-and-mortar sophistication we do not dare to guess. All that we venture to do is to suggest one or two more urbane adventures. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, Jan. 29, 1919 • Various
... the old fable of The Town Mouse and the Country Mouse. We will vouch that the following read us as luminous a comment thereon as may be desired: 'Polite,' 'urbane,' 'civil,' 'rustic,' 'villain,' 'savage,' 'pagan,' 'heathen.' Let us ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. III, No IV, April 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... intensity, her lifted hand shook a long slender forefinger at Chick, and that urbane young man had just about all he could ...
— Patty Blossom • Carolyn Wells
... to her animated chat. He is never less urbane than when hungry, and I took pains to have his favourite soup served quite almost at once. This he fell upon. I may say that he has always a hearty manner of attacking his soup. Not infrequently he makes noises. He did so on this occasion. I mean to say, there was no finesse. I hovered near, ...
— Ruggles of Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson
... aware of having accomplished a great and noble act of surrender. She hoped the best from it. In particular, she hoped that she had saved the honour of her party and put it at last on a secure footing of urbane convivial success. For that a party of hers should fail in giving pleasure to every member of it was a menace to her legitimate pride. And so far fate had not been propitious. The money in the house had been, and was, on her mind. Then the lateness of the guests had disturbed ...
— The Price of Love • Arnold Bennett
... of Pope Urbane And Valmond, Emperor of Allemaine, Apparelled in magnificent attire, With retinue of many a knight and squire, On St. John's eve, at vespers, proudly sat And heard the priests chant the Magnificat. ...
— Tales of a Wayside Inn • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... and take refuge in the quiet haven of the Oratory at Birmingham, with his great Protagonist, who, throughout an equally long life spent in painful controversy, and wielding weapons as terrible as Carlyle's own, has rarely forgotten to be urbane, and whose every sentence is a 'thing of beauty.' It must, then, be owned that too many of Carlyle's literary achievements 'lack a gracious somewhat.' By force of his genius he 'smites the rock and spreads the water;' but then, like Moses, 'he desecrates, ...
— Obiter Dicta • Augustine Birrell
... verse in amplest store— Methinks he fathers thousands ten or more Indited not as wont on palimpsest, 5 But paper-royal, brand-new boards, and best Fresh bosses, crimson ribbands, sheets with lead Ruled, and with pumice-powder all well polished. These as thou readest, seem that fine, urbane Suffenus, goat-herd mere, or ditcher-swain 10 Once more, such horrid change is there, so vile. What must we wot thereof? a Droll erst while, Or (if aught) cleverer, he with converse meets, He now ...
— The Carmina of Caius Valerius Catullus • Caius Valerius Catullus
... said the Bishop. He was an old man, very tall and very thin, looking as though he had crushed out of himself all taste for the pomps and vanities of this wicked world, but singularly urbane in his manner, with an old-fashioned politeness. He smiled as he invited the Dean to a seat, and then expressed a hope that nobody had been much hurt. "Very serious injuries have been spoken of here, but I know well how rumour ...
— Is He Popenjoy? • Anthony Trollope
... ready for action. So close were the two frigates at this moment that the jib-boom of the Phoebe hung over the bulwarks of the Essex, and Porter called out sharply that if so much as a rope was touched he would reply with a broadside. The urbane Captain Hillyar, perceiving his disadvantage, exclaimed, "I had no intention of coming so near you. I am very sorry indeed." With that he moved his ship to a respectful distance. Later he had a chat with Captain Porter ashore and, when asked if he intended to maintain the neutrality ...
— The Fight for a Free Sea: A Chronicle of the War of 1812 - The Chronicles of America Series, Volume 17 • Ralph D. Paine
... the Tube at Charing Cross, and drove in a taxicab to her husband's place of business. One or two urbane men, strangers to her, hurried forward as she alighted from the cab, inquiring her pleasure, and she said, smiling: "I want my ...
— Married Life - The True Romance • May Edginton
... of fact the dealer had been expecting someone and his manner as he passed into the shop was unmistakably suggestive of a caller of importance. But at the first glance towards his visitor the excess of deference melted out of his bearing, leaving the urbane, self-possessed shopman in the presence of the ...
— Four Max Carrados Detective Stories • Ernest Bramah
... attentions to; do homage to &c (respect) 928. prostrate oneself &c (worship) 990. give one's duty to, send one's duty to, &c n.. render polite &c adj.; polish, civilize, humanize. Adj. courteous, polite, civil, mannerly, urbane; well-behaved, well- mannered, well-bred, well-brought up; good-mannered, polished, civilized, cultivated; refined &c (taste) 850; gentlemanlike &c (fashion) 852 [Obs.]; gallant; on one's good behavior. fine spoken, fair spoken, soft-spoken; honey-mouthed, honey- tongued; oily, bland; obliging, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... him for a while, mid-way down the stairs, trying to get at the thoughts which lay beyond that thin, fox-like mask. But Chauvelin remained urbane, sarcastic, mysterious; not a line betrayed to the poor, anxious woman whether she need fear or whether she dared ...
— The Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... "Urbane" on the lips of Jacob had mysteriously all the shapeliness of a character which Bonamy thought daily more sublime, devastating, terrific than ever, though he was still, and perhaps would ...
— Jacob's Room • Virginia Woolf
... by the same road through France. The Latin hyacinth[)i]nus and adamant[)i]nus are parallel words, yet Milton has 'hyacinthin' for the one and 'adamantine' for the other. One classification goes a little way. Thus 'human' and 'urban' must have come through French, 'humane' and 'urbane' direct from Latin. On the other hand while 'meridian' and 'quartan' are French, 'publican', 'veteran', and 'oppidan' are Latin. Words with a long i, if they came early through France, shorten the vowel, as 'doctrine', ...
— Society for Pure English Tract 4 - The Pronunciation of English Words Derived from the Latin • John Sargeaunt
... the inn. Tiny as it was all Ipek seemed to be plucking poultry in it. An urbane old woman came forward, evidently the owner. She had short arms, and her hair grey at the roots was stained with henna, which matched her eyes. A dog fancier once told us never to buy a dog with light-coloured eyes ...
— The Luck of Thirteen - Wanderings and Flight through Montenegro and Serbia • Jan Gordon
... the heads of the great World Steel Corporation knew that the urbane and polished proprietor of the cafe was a criminal of the blackest kind, whose liberty and life itself were dependent upon the will of the Corporation; or that the restaurant was especially planned and maintained as a blind for its underground activities; or that Perkins ...
— The Skylark of Space • Edward Elmer Smith and Lee Hawkins Garby
... with an admiring smile. He had never ceased to wonder at the multifarious qualities which enabled the man to remain indispensable to native and cottager alike. Courteous, handsome, urbane, diplomatic, debonair, when a matron of the very highest caste sent for him to enlist his efforts in the regaining of some jewel, tiara, or piece of vertu, missing after a weekend, he never for a moment forgot that it was all a bit of carelessness, which the gentlest sort of reminder ...
— Prince or Chauffeur? - A Story of Newport • Lawrence Perry
... my guarded scrutiny could gather was that Miss Warren was a little too devoted and thoughtful of her urbane lover, and that her cheerfulness lacked somewhat ...
— A Day Of Fate • E. P. Roe
... of picking her up." Garlock grinned. "I haven't been able to find any urbane way of scraping her off. ...
— The Galaxy Primes • Edward Elmer Smith
... unless Grassette himself disclosed the situation. He looked at Grassette with a look of poignant pity and interest combined. In his own placid life he had never had any tragic happening, his blood had run coolly, his days had been blessed by an urbane fate; such scenes as this were but a spectacle to him; there was no answering chord of human suffering in his own breast to make him realize what Grassette was undergoing now; but he had read widely, he had been an acute ...
— Northern Lights • Gilbert Parker
... brother of Pope Urbane, And Volmond, emperor of Allemaine, Apparelled in magnificent attire, With retinue of many a knight and squire, On St. John's eve at vespers proudly sat, And heard the ...
— Practice Book • Leland Powers
... cent. of intelligence. The fact is that the farmer of the West is not the clodhopper, at whose expense the funny man of the modern journal likes to crack jokes. He reads more widely and thinks more deeply than tradesmen or city people do, as a class. Tradesmen wear better clothes, are more urbane, and obtain a certain polish and self-possession which comes only from close contact with one's fellows in the business and social world; all of which is very useful to them in improving the "main chance" in a competitive struggle, and might be labelled ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 21, August, 1891 • Various
... of a toad going through the motor-car craft would be merely incomprehensible and exasperating. The superficial scheme of the story is so childishly naive, or so daringly naive, that only a genius could have preserved it from the ridiculous. The book is an urbane exercise in irony at the expense of the English character and of mankind. It is entirely successful. Whatever may happen to it in the esteem of mandarins and professors, it will beyond doubt be considered by authentic experts as a work highly distinguished, ...
— Books and Persons - Being Comments on a Past Epoch 1908-1911 • Arnold Bennett
... brow did not clear. He was a wiry, tall man, of beautiful manners and a singularly urbane demeanour, but he could not hide the annoyance which this letter caused him. He finished it, turned abruptly to the beginning, and read it through again; then looked at Captain Salt with a shade of severity on his face. "Sir," he ...
— The Blue Pavilions • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... and softened almost out of recognition: the stern peremptory disciple of John the Baptist, who never addresses a Pharisee or a Scribe without an insulting epithet, becomes a considerate, gentle, sociable, almost urbane person; and the Chauvinist Jew becomes a pro-Gentile who is thrown out of the synagogue in his own town for reminding the congregation that the prophets had sometimes preferred Gentiles to Jews. In fact they try to throw him down from ...
— Preface to Androcles and the Lion - On the Prospects of Christianity • George Bernard Shaw
... all to do with it," interrupted the urbane reporter. "I've always been this way. It was born ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... for alarm," explained the secretary in his urbane manner. "He has ventured as far as Lower Claybury station. The visit was unavoidable. He particularly requested that we should commence luncheon, but hoped to be back ...
— Fire-Tongue • Sax Rohmer
... men yawn and cultivated women are earnest and playful; of a world in which people must pretend courageously that life is very important for fear of discovering that it hardly signifies. It is a strange world, faded, friendly, urbane, and, we are happy to ...
— Pot-Boilers • Clive Bell
... in American public life has unbosomed himself so completely as this son of Massachusetts in the pages of his diary. There are no half tones in the pictures which he has drawn of himself, no winsome graces of mind or heart, only the rigid outlines of a soul buffeted by Destiny. Gallatin—the urbane, cosmopolitan Gallatin—must have derived much quiet amusement from his association with this robust New Englander who took himself so seriously. Two natures could not have been more unlike, yet the superior flexibility of Gallatin's temperament made their association ...
— Jefferson and his Colleagues - A Chronicle of the Virginia Dynasty, Volume 15 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Allen Johnson |
