"Vivacity" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... traits should be added, but for want of room, anecdotes which show the quick decision and vivacity of her mind. Her face was in harmony with this combination. Her brow is as ideal and the eyes and lids as devout and modest as the Italian picture of the Madonna, while the lower part of the face has the simplicity and childish strength of the Indian ...
— Woman in the Ninteenth Century - and Kindred Papers Relating to the Sphere, Condition - and Duties, of Woman. • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... plumage: attraction, of himself, to all visitors of taste. Number two. Canaries of unrivalled vivacity and intelligence: worthy of the garden of Eden, worthy also of the garden in the Regent's Park. Homage to British Zoology. Offered ...
— The Woman in White • Wilkie Collins
... And Pearse had not failed to notice the green jade skull-charm that depended from Milo's columnar neck, a jade skull with pearls for teeth like the altar brooch of Dolores. And Tomlin, for all his expressed scorn, was tingling with ardent desire for such piquant beauty and vivacity as Pascherette's. If such a creature were the slave, then what could the mistress be? He assumed a more complaisant attitude, and added his vote: "A good way of passing away this odious calm spell, ...
— The Pirate Woman • Aylward Edward Dingle
... an interview which I had begun to persuade myself had something of a romantic character! I rubbed my thorax, tried to laugh at the little slut's vivacity, but could not get rid of the uneasy annoyance peculiar to misunderstood people. Perhaps I had been taken for a robber—perhaps something I had said in my broken Italian had been thought insulting. I grew ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 2, No. 8, January, 1851 • Various
... helpless state; and already knowing her to be an invalid, not entirely recovered from her accident, he was only agreeably surprised to see the beauty of face he had loved so long, retaining all its vivacity of expression. And when he met Alison the next morning with a cordial brotherly greeting and inquiry for her sister, her "Very well," and "not at all the worse for the excitement," were so hearty and ready ...
— The Clever Woman of the Family • Charlotte M. Yonge
... preface and notes. This led to a controversy between her and La Motte, who had spoken slightingly of Homer. Madame Dacier wrote, in 1714, "Considerations sur les Causes de la Corruption du Gout," in which she defended the cause of Homer with great vivacity, as she did also against Father Hardouin, who had written an "Apology of Homer," which was more a censure than an apology. The warmth, however, with which both the Daciers resented any thing that was said against the ancient writers was carried ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 3, February, 1851 • Various
... obstinate as a mule, and equally audacious and unrelenting, every one who has witnessed his actions or meditated on his transactions must be convinced. The least opposition irritates his pride, and he determines and commands, in a moment of impatience or vivacity, what may cause the misery of millions for ages, and, perhaps, his own repentance ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... the man's presence she ceased to be the tired, discouraged, irritable woman, and became once more the Evelyn Grant whose vivacity and wit had made her conspicuous in the ...
— The Black Creek Stopping-House • Nellie McClung
... developed symptoms of the disease, and had been dismissed and sent to the mission hospital, while he was yet able to bear the journey; a handsome young man, hardly more than a youth, with all the fire, vivacity and pride of the Spaniard, tempered in his case with a touch of sadness, lending an indefinable charm to his countenance. It was an attractive face, and so Apolinaria found it; but with a second glance at the young solder, ...
— Old Mission Stories of California • Charles Franklin Carter
... than intellectual. There was much in it to win the regard of the young and superficial. An eye that sparkled with fire, a mouth that glowed with animation—cheeks warmly colored, and a contour full of vivacity, seemed to denote properties of mind and heart equally valuable and attractive. Still, a keen observer would have found something sinister, in the upward glancing of the eye, at intervals, from the ...
— Charlemont • W. Gilmore Simms
... Florentine Academy: a thing like a huge fern, with medallion histories in each frond, it can scarcely be considered a work of art, and stands halfway between a picture and a genealogical tree. Yet in some of its medallions there is a great vivacity of imaginative rendering; for instance, the Massacre of the Innocents represented by a single soldier, mailed and hooded, standing before Herod on a floor strewn with children's bodies, and holding up an infant by the arm, like a dead hare, preparing slowly ...
— Renaissance Fancies and Studies - Being a Sequel to Euphorion • Violet Paget (AKA Vernon Lee)
... modesty of a little mother. In order always to wear gowns like those of her daughter, she made Annette wear toilettes suitable for a fully-grown young woman, a trifle too old for her; and Annette who showed more and more plainly her joyous and laughing disposition, wore them with sparkling vivacity that rendered her still more attractive. She lent herself with all her heart to the coquettish arts of her mother, acting with her, as if by instinct, graceful little domestic scenes; she knew when to embrace her at the effective moment, ...
— Strong as Death • Guy de Maupassant
... was again struck with the vivacity which may be exhibited by a creature whose life is really ended. As I fired, the animal gave a loud "whish!" and sped away like the wind, disappearing behind a jut of rock five or six rods farther away; but five feet from that point I found it dead. This post mortem activity, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 88, February, 1865 • Various
... saw by the vivacity with which she scratched the back of her head with a knitting-needle that she was writhing mentally with the torture of unsatisfied curiosity; and I took a malignant pleasure in her suffering. The white flannel that I was wearing was the ...
— Two Summers in Guyenne • Edward Harrison Barker
... too, was typical, but in a totally different way. She was a type of that county life which railways have gradually modified, and by this time almost obliterated. She was a woman remarkable for her vivacity, wit, and humor. At county balls she was an institution. At country houses throughout Devonshire and Cornwall she was a familiar and welcome guest, and to half of her hosts and hostesses she was in one way or another ...
— Memoirs of Life and Literature • W. H. Mallock
... composition with the Parliament. Nevertheless, despite the drawbacks of subject-matter, the autobiography is a very interesting piece of English prose. The narrative style, for all its coxcombry and its insistence on petty details, has a singular vivacity; the constructions, though sometimes incorrect ("the edict was so severe as they who transgressed were to lose their heads"), are never merely slovenly; and the writer displays an art, very uncommon in his time, in the alternation of short and long sentences and the general adjustment of the paragraph. ...
— A History of English Literature - Elizabethan Literature • George Saintsbury
... in the month of May, 190—, Edmund Melrose had just passed his seventieth birthday. But the extraordinary energy and vivacity of his good looks had scarcely abated since the time when, twenty-three years before this date, Netta Smeath had first seen him in Florence; although his hair had whitened, and the bronzed skin of the face had developed a multitude of fine wrinkles that did but add ...
— The Mating of Lydia • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... much warmth and vivacity into this exclamation, that Noel looked at him with astonishment. He felt his face grow red, and he hastened to explain himself. "I said, 'you too,'" he continued, "because I, thanks perhaps to my inexperience, am persuaded ...
— The Widow Lerouge - The Lerouge Case • Emile Gaboriau
... that I was beguiled out of my personal examination of this chapel, since I have seen the plates of it in my Baronial Sketches. It is the rival of Melrose, but more elaborate; in fact, it is a perfect cataract of architectural vivacity and ingenuity, as defiant of any rules of criticism and art as the leaf-embowered arcades and arches of our American forest cathedrals. From the comparison of the plates of the engravings, I should judge there was less delicacy of taste, and ...
— Sunny Memories Of Foreign Lands, Volume 1 (of 2) • Harriet Elizabeth (Beecher) Stowe
... as a raconteur, the supper passed off pleasantly enough. This great man could unfold the varied pages of his mind with disconcerting ease. He knew everything, and could talk and act with inimitable vivacity. His anecdotes were always instructive, drawn from his manifold sources of knowledge in art or science. Mlle. Frahender was stupified by so much eclecticism, the philosopher forgot his grief, Madame Darbois realized for the first time that there ...
— The Idol of Paris • Sarah Bernhardt
... a chivalrous soul, and so had Dick; the vivacity of this very friendly young lady was like an oasis in the wilderness of travel. In the evening they loved to sit in the sunshine of her smile. She was singularly unconventional, this landlord's daughter, and made many informal calls on her ...
— The Dodge Club - or, Italy in 1859 • James De Mille
... are young intellects so imperfect as to be incapable of distinguishing between fancy and falsehood, it is most desirable to develop in them the power to do so, but, as a rule, in childhood, we appreciate the distinction with a vivacity which as elders our care- ...
— The Art of the Story-Teller • Marie L. Shedlock
... to these defects, which are of less real consequence than may appear from their brief enumeration, Kingsley has been freely credited with a certain ever-pleasing vivacity and gallantry of style far too rare in literature to be overlooked. The warmest of his admirers in his own country have even attempted to raise him to a position above that ...
— Australian Writers • Desmond Byrne
... rest of the party, who were joined, however, by the two priests. The young girl no sooner caught sight of the Bishop from the farther end of the hall, where the little dog had followed her among the orange trees, than all trace of her vivacity disappeared. ...
— The Last Look - A Tale of the Spanish Inquisition • W.H.G. Kingston
... and correction, he must be placed first among Americans of all the several generations to which he belonged, excepting only Franklin; and if Franklin excelled him in humor and geniality, he far surpassed Franklin in compass and vivacity. Indeed, it is only by the recent publication of his letters that his gifts in these respects are becoming well known. The first installment of his private letters published during his lifetime, though not deficient in these characteristics, ...
— Hidden Treasures - Why Some Succeed While Others Fail • Harry A. Lewis
... the drink with an avidity Bobby was not used to seeing among his own women friends, and almost immediately it heightened her vivacity. There could be no question that she was a fascinating woman. Again Bobby had that strange sense of revulsion, and again he was conscious that, in spite of her trace of a tendency to indecorum, there was a subtle ...
— The Making of Bobby Burnit - Being a Record of the Adventures of a Live American Young Man • George Randolph Chester
... eyes were now dimmed by sorrow; the cheek was wasted with toil; the brow was clouded by cares. Yet, "as it is the best part of beauty which a picture cannot express," [1] so there is something superior to the mere charms of form and colour; and an air of high-toned feeling, of mingled vivacity and sensibility, gave a grandeur to the form and an expression to the countenance which more than atoned for the want ...
— Marriage • Susan Edmonstone Ferrier
... reserves for some nymph whom he meets in the air. Mounting by easy flights to the top of the tallest tree, he launches into the air with a sort of suspended, hovering flight, like certain of the finches, and bursts into a perfect ecstasy of song,—clear, ringing, copious, rivaling the goldfinch's in vivacity, and the linnet's in melody. This strain is one of the rarest bits of bird melody to be heard, and is oftenest indulged in late in the afternoon or after sundown. Over the woods, hid from view, the ecstatic singer warbles his finest strain. In this song you instantly detect his ...
— In the Catskills • John Burroughs
... not always successful in restraining the cruel giggles of childhood when she spoke of planchette's writing such beautiful messages from her long-since-dead husband and children. Although he had a dramatic sympathy for her sorrow, Professor Marshall's greater vivacity of temperament made it harder for him than for his wife to keep a straight face when Cousin Parnelia proposed to be the medium whereby he might converse with Milton or Homer. Indeed, his fatigued ...
— The Bent Twig • Dorothy Canfield
... correspondence was constant and voluminous, as was that, in fact, of Miss Barrett with all of her intimate friends. These letters of hers from her sick room are no more remarkable for number than for brightness and vivacity. Little mention is made of her ailments, except when her friends have specifically demanded news of her health, and the letters deal rather with literary than with other subjects. This was, of course, most natural; the invalid could have little news to communicate from her couch to her friends in ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 7 • Charles H. Sylvester
... dropped casually in on Mrs. Popper. She was a woman of great brilliance and delicacy, both in her physical and mental perceptions, of exceptional vivacity and cleverness. She must have studied me more closely than I was aware of, for I believe she relied on diverting my attention whenever she desired to produce one of her really wonderful results. Needless to say, I was completely mystified by her performance. She did spirit writing that ...
— The Silent Bullet • Arthur B. Reeve
... the European riding master is often misunderstood, even by his older pupils, and young girls almost invariably mistake his patient reiteration and his methodical vivacity for anger, so that his classes seldom contain any pupils not really anxious to learn, or whose parents are not determined that they shall learn in his school and no other. Teaching is a matter of strict conscience with him, and even after years of experience, and in ...
— In the Riding-School; Chats With Esmeralda • Theo. Stephenson Browne
... Miss Wylie, left behind in disgrace, made a surpassing grimace at Miss Lindsay, who glanced back at her. When she was alone, her vivacity subsided. She went slowly to the window, and gazed disparagingly at the landscape. Once, when a sound of voices above reached her, her eyes brightened, and her ready lip moved; but the next silent moment she relapsed ...
— An Unsocial Socialist • George Bernard Shaw
... counsel in the courts." Mrs. Gaines was a remarkable woman. She carried on a suit for many years against the city of New Orleans to recover property that belonged to her, and, through untold difficulties and delays, triumphed at last. She preserved her youth, beauty and vivacity until late in life. All who knew her can readily recall her bright, sparkling face, and wonderful powers of conversation. In her long experience in litigation, she became well versed in the laws regarding real estate and the right of descent. Mrs. Gaines was a generous woman ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various
... them is the best excuse I can give for the little progress I have made in your charming language. I listened through curiosity to the discourse of these little creatures; but as they, in their national vivacity, spoke three or four together, I could make but little of their conversation. I found, however, by some broken expressions that I heard now and then, they were disputing warmly on the merit of two foreign musicians, one a cousin, ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry
... the chapel with the same vivacity she had shown in leaving it, leading by the hand her father, whose sluggish though firm step, vacant countenance, and heavy demeanour, formed the strongest contrast to the rapidity of her motions, and the anxious animation of her address. Her task of dragging ...
— The Betrothed • Sir Walter Scott
... again he saw her asleep in the coach on the road from Ganlook; again he recalled the fervent throbs his guilty heart had felt as he looked upon this fair creature, at one time the supposed treasure of another man. Now she was Miss Calhoun, and her gray eyes, her entrancing smile, her wondrous vivacity were not for one man alone. It was marvelous what a change this sudden realization wrought in the view ahead of him. The whole situation seemed to be transformed into something more desirable than ever ...
— Beverly of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... these aborigines, still we know with certainty from the narrative of Columbus, and those of some of his most intelligent followers, that they were docile, artless, generous, but inclined to ease; that they were well-formed, grave, and far from possessing the vivacity of the natives of the south of Europe. They expressed themselves with a certain modesty and respect, and were hospitable to the last degree. Reading between the lines of the records of history, it is manifest that after their own rules ...
— Due South or Cuba Past and Present • Maturin M. Ballou
... Clapperton, attended by a singular train. He rode upon a handsome steed, followed by an admiring crowd; six young girls, each flourishing spears, and who had only a fillet on their heads, ran by his side as he galloped on. "Their light form, the vivacity of their eyes, and the ease with which they appeared to fly over the ground, made them appear something more than mortal." When the king entered the hut in which the travellers sat, these damsels, having deposited their weapons at; the door, ...
— Life and Travels of Mungo Park in Central Africa • Mungo Park
... in general low and immoral to a disgusting degree.... Awfully dark, indeed, was their moral character, and notwithstanding the apparent mildness of their disposition, and the cheerful vivacity of their conversation, no portion of the human race was ever, perhaps, sunk lower in brutal licentiousness and moral degradation than this isolated ...
— Primitive Love and Love-Stories • Henry Theophilus Finck
... common interests and pursuits had brought them together, and each had been attracted by the other's knowledge. And then gradually something had been added to this. Kennedy had been amused by the frankness and simplicity of his rival, while Burger in turn had been fascinated by the brilliancy and vivacity which had made Kennedy such a favourite in Roman society. I say "had," because just at the moment the young Englishman was somewhat under a cloud. A love-affair, the details of which had never quite come out, had indicated a heartlessness ...
— Tales of Terror and Mystery • Arthur Conan Doyle
... I am like you in that respect. I can not help admiring that life and vivacity. Ah! (a sigh) I wish I could make poor Jane a little more ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... was moving towards the door. Suddenly she turned with a quick, odd vivacity: "Perhaps I had. Oh, Peter, there was such a lovely little squaw I saw the last time I was at Oak Bottom! She was no darker than I am, but so beautiful. Even in her little cotton gown and blanket, with ...
— Tales of Trail and Town • Bret Harte
... independent minister, in that part of North America, which is called Nova Scotia. The vivacity of his genius made him soon grow impatient of the gloomy education he received in that country; which he therefore quitted in order to seek his fortune in England; but it was his fate, upon his first arrival here, to engage in an employment more formal, if possible, than his ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Vol. III • Theophilus Cibber
... wrote with more nature and fire, though with less art and precision—Steele, who in his comedies successfully engrafted modern characters on the ancient drama—Farquhar, who drew his pictures from fancy rather than from nature, and whose chief merit consists in the agreeable pertness and vivacity of his dialogue—Addison, whose fame as a poet greatly exceeded his genius, which was cold and enervate; though he yielded to none in the character of an essayist, either for style or matter—Swift, whose muse seems to have been mere misanthropy; he was a cynic rather than a poet, and his natural ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... Florence are in general ill-looking; nor have I seen one handsome woman since I came here. Their costume too is singularly unbecoming; but there is an airy cheerfulness and vivacity in their countenances, and a civility in their manners which is pleasing to a stranger. I was surprised to see the women, even the servant girls, decorated with necklaces of real pearl of considerable beauty and value. On expressing ...
— The Diary of an Ennuyee • Anna Brownell Jameson
... Her vivacity was rising fast, and for some reason, Berthe darted an angry look of warning on Mr. Boone. But the poor fellow was blind to Jacqueline's jealousy of a distant conflict, ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle
... the Art of the Singer, says of messa di voce, 'It is by the emission of tones swelling and diminishing that we impart to song that wave-like undulation which gives it vitality and tonal vivacity.' But when speaking of the rendition of Handelian arias, he evidently uses the term vibrato in the same sense as Sieber does tremolando. He declares it probably hopeless to plead for the abolition of the cheap and vulgar vibrato in the delivery of these old arias, remarking further that there ...
— Sixty Years of California Song • Margaret Blake-Alverson
... of the first mention of this land to the plaintiff, who were present? A. (Witness speaking with hopeful vivacity, as if he hoped they were now coming to the merits of the case.) The plaintiff, the ...
— Punchinello, Volume 2, No. 37, December 10, 1870 • Various
... no danger of that little boat's overtaking this large ship!" exclaimed Sir George, with a vivacity that did great credit to his philanthropy, according to the opinion of Mr. Dodge at least; the latter having imbibed a singular bias in favour of persons of condition, from having travelled in an eilwagen with ...
— Homeward Bound - or, The Chase • James Fenimore Cooper
... old-style tavern on Pennsylvania Avenue, which, during the sessions of Congress, included among its guests many of the leading statesmen of that day. Of this number were Benton, Randolph, Eaton, Grundy, and others equally well known. The daughter, a girl of rare beauty, on account of her vivacity and grace soon became a great favorite with all. She was without question one of the ...
— Something of Men I Have Known - With Some Papers of a General Nature, Political, Historical, and Retrospective • Adlai E. Stevenson
... her. "But I may as well say beforehand, that I must decline the proposal it contains to pay a visit here. I trust I may be excused for desiring an interval of complete freedom from such distractions as have been hitherto inevitable, and especially from guests whose desultory vivacity makes their presence ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot
... had danced, to whom I had made pretty speeches, and had given the bell button that was sewn just over my heart. She certainly was not the best of them, for I can see now that she was vain and shallow, with a pert boldness, which I mistook for vivacity and wit. Three years ago, at the age of twenty, my knowledge of women was so complete that I divided them into six classes, and as soon as I met a new one I placed her in one of these classes and created her according to the line of campaign I had laid down ...
— Captain Macklin • Richard Harding Davis
... shop. Timothy paid his respects to the ladies, and then went down with Ephraim, who took him under his protection. In a few days, he was as established with us as if he had been living with us for months. I had some trouble, at first, in checking his vivacity and turn for ridicule; but that was gradually effected, and I found him not only a great acquisition, but, as he always was, a cheerful and affectionate companion. I had, during the first days of our meeting, recounted my adventures, and made many inquiries of Timothy relative ...
— Japhet, In Search Of A Father • Frederick Marryat
... were still appalled, respected the silence of its chief; but Fragoso, comprehending scarce half the gravity of the situation, and carried away by his customary vivacity, came up to ...
— Eight Hundred Leagues on the Amazon • Jules Verne
... her hand she carried a naked sword instead of a riding-whip. Her countenance is described as being agreeable, and her figure handsome;[279] her eyes were fine, and her hair as black as jet. In conversation she was full of intelligence and vivacity.[280] The Prince, it is said, rode out of the lines to receive her, and to welcome the addition to his army, and conducted her to a tent with much ceremony. It was reported that Mrs. Cameron continued in the camp as the commander of her troop, and accompanied the Prince ...
— Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745. - Volume I. • Mrs. Thomson
... without them, that excited admiration. One feature of an object may be as distinct, and excite as different emotions, from the aggregate as any two things the most remote, as a beautiful woman, and a map of Madagascar. It is 'the symmetry of person, the vivacity, the voluptuous softness of temper, the affectionate kindness of feelings, the imagination and the wit' of a woman that excite the passion of love, and not the mere distinction of her being female. Urged by the passion of love, men have been driven into acts ...
— An Essay on the Principle of Population • Thomas Malthus
... to take a little rest. Numerous birds were swimming and fluttering about round the vessel; amongst others, the doctor observed some alca-alla, very much like the teal, with black neck, wings and back, and white breast; they plunged with vivacity, and their immersion often ...
— The English at the North Pole - Part I of the Adventures of Captain Hatteras • Jules Verne
... lines I seemed to miss that air of cheerful confidence which had been so evident at Roche Abeille. The men greeted their general with cheers, and I had no doubt they would do their duty; but they lacked that eager vivacity which goes so far toward ...
— For The Admiral • W.J. Marx
... Her sudden vivacity relieved him. "I see what's the matter," he said gently, looking down at her feet, "these little shoes were not made to keep step with a moccasin. We must try another way." He stooped as if to secure the erring ...
— Frontier Stories • Bret Harte
... the years that they had passed together in the country. He could not forget the German who was always hovering around him, affectionate and submissive as a younger brother. When his family commented with a somewhat envious vivacity upon the glories of their Berlin relatives, Desnoyers would say smilingly, "Leave them in peace; they are paying very dear for ...
— The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... that any Spaniard, with rare exceptions, has more penetration, more vivacity, more nobility, more talent, and more courage than a Filipino. This superiority can do no less than have its effect.... For the rest, few in Manila have an exact idea of the Filipino character. Their arrogance may ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume 40 of 55 • Francisco Colin
... making the distinction of impressions and ideas to depend upon their relative strength or vivacity. Yet it would be hard to point out any other character by which the things signified can be distinguished. Any one who has paid attention to the curious subject of what are called "subjective sensations" ...
— Hume - (English Men of Letters Series) • T.H. Huxley
... the French members speak from a stand immediately beneath the chair of the president, called a tribune. Absurd as this may seem, I believe it to be a very useful regulation, the vivacity of the national character rendering some such check on loquacity quite necessary. Without it, a dozen would often be on their feet at once; as it is, even, this sometimes happens. No disorder that ever occurs in our legislative ...
— Recollections of Europe • J. Fenimore Cooper
... presence and vivacity of Geraldi roused Teresa from her serious, almost melancholy manners, and the wise ones looked knowing, and said:—"They had always thought it ...
— The Duke's Prize - A Story of Art and Heart in Florence • Maturin Murray
... and vivacity, the young wife went on from one point to another, higher and higher; her lithe figure brought out against the sky, as occasionally she plunged her iron-pointed staff deep into the snow, and turned to admire the vast panorama at her feet. Her husband ...
— Scenes in Switzerland • American Tract Society
... The pert vivacity of La Fille at Montreuil was all we could find there worth remarking: it filled up my notions of French flippancy agreeably enough; as no English wench would so have answered one to be sure. She had complained of our avant-coureur's behaviour. "Il parle sur le bant ton, mademoiselle" ...
— Observations and Reflections Made in the Course of a Journey through France, Italy, and Germany, Vol. I • Hester Lynch Piozzi
... of her life, together with many anecdotes hitherto unknown or forgotten, told with a saucy vivacity which is charming, and an air vividly recalling the sprightly, arch demeanour, and black, sparkling eyes of the fair Queen of Navarre. She died in 1615, ...
— Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois, Complete • Marguerite de Valois, Queen of Navarre
... blue eyes, and light chestnut hair; it was not exactly an Anglo-Saxon countenance, in which, by the bye, there is generally a cast of loutishness and stupidity; it partook, to a certain extent, of the Celtic character, particularly in the fire and vivacity which illumined it; his face was the mirror of his mind; perhaps no disposition more amiable was ever found amongst the children of Adam, united, however, with no inconsiderable portion of high ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow
... interesting rather than prosperous. They were an ardent and impetuous race, easily moved to tears or to laughter, to fury or to love. Alone among the nations of northern Europe they had the susceptibility, the vivacity, the natural turn for acting and rhetoric, which are indigenous on the shores of the Mediterranean Sea. In mental cultivation Scotland had an indisputable superiority. Though that kingdom was then the poorest in Christendom, it already vied in every branch of learning ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 1 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... glad to have my letter. I can defend every word in it. It contains the simile of the elephants, which I am sorry for, as I fear those described as tame may be foolish enough to endeavour to show they are not so by affecting a degree of vivacity beyond their nature; but still I can ...
— A Political Diary 1828-1830, Volume II • Edward Law (Lord Ellenborough)
... often deep or sustained,—exuberance and enthusiasm, love of light and life, are predominant; and the verse, absolutely free from strong and heavy combinations of consonants, ripples and glistens with its pretty terminations, full of color, full of vivacity, ...
— Frederic Mistral - Poet and Leader in Provence • Charles Alfred Downer
... right principles, though he had some misunderstandings of Free Grace himself:" a man, adds Baxter, "of excellent natural parts for affection and oratory, but not well seen in the principles of his Religion; of a sanguine complexion; naturally of such a vivacity, hilarity, and alacrity, as another man hath when he hath drunken a cup too much;" and whom Baxter had once heard, in a battle, when the enemy began to flee, "with a loud voice break forth into the praises of God, with fluent expressions, as if ...
— The Life of John Milton Vol. 3 1643-1649 • David Masson
... cricket, and other sports, as well as winter evening games, filled up the ample leisure from the duties of the schoolroom. One or two extracts from his journal are sufficient to show that, although still weakly, he was not lacking in boyish vivacity and in a healthy desire to emulate his elders. When Grenville and Fox joined their forces and so brought about the Ministry of 'All the Talents' the lads obtained a holiday—a fact which is thus recorded in sprawling schoolboy hand by Lord John ...
— Lord John Russell • Stuart J. Reid
... Such a superior person had been eagerly welcomed to the Blue Vein Society, and had taken a leading part in its activities. Mr. Ryder had at first been attracted by her charms of person, for she was very good looking and not over twenty-five; then by her refined manners and by the vivacity of her wit. Her husband had been a government clerk, and at his death had left a considerable life insurance. She was visiting friends in Groveland, and, finding the town and the people to her liking, had prolonged her stay indefinitely. ...
— The Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, 1995, Memorial Issue • Various
... Treatise on the use of such instruments in War, and was never happy unless he was seeing or doing something—preferably under arms. And in every sentence also there is that curious directness of statement which is of such advantage to vivacity in any memoir. Thus of Gobert, who served under him, he has a little footnote: "This unfortunate young man lost his head at the same time General Dillon suffered, and a very amiable young man he was, ...
— On Something • H. Belloc
... a Canadian lady of ripe age, yet of a vivacity not to be reconciled with the notion of the married state, capered briskly about among her somewhat stolid and indifferent friends, saying, "They're going to fire it as soon as we round the point"; and presently a dull boom, as of a small piece of ordnance discharged in the neighborhood ...
— A Chance Acquaintance • W. D. Howells
... uncle, the Sieur de Vauban, at La Rochelle. Now he was back in Quebec from months on the frontier, he was summoned to the Major's house, and yet he stayed and laughed at the children. For the Major's wife was older, too, and the vivacity of her youth was thinning out and uncovering the needle-like tongue beneath. A slim little urchin was squirming between his boots, with a pursuing rabble close behind, and the Captain had to take hold of ...
— The Road to Frontenac • Samuel Merwin
... this biography, was born on the 2d of November, 1755. Few of the inhabitants of this world have commenced life under circumstances of greater splendor, or with more brilliant prospects of a life replete with happiness. She was a child of great vivacity and beauty, full of light-heartedness, and ever prone to look upon the sunny side of every prospect. Her disposition was frank, cordial, and affectionate. Her mental endowments were by nature of a very superior order. Laughing at the restraints of royal etiquette, she, by ...
— Maria Antoinette - Makers of History • John S. C. (John Stevens Cabot) Abbott
... rival seemed to her a wrong done to both the living and the dead. Naturally taciturn, unjoyful, and ever oppressed by that brooding consciousness of guilt hanging like a cloud over her memory, formless, vague, but never lifting, Fina's changeful temper and tumultuous vivacity were intensely wearisome to her. Nevertheless, she was forbearing if not loving, and the people said rightly when they said she ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - February, 1876, Vol. XVII, No. 98. • Various
... associations rise to the mind at the name of MOORE! The brilliant wit, the elegant scholar, the most charming poet of sentiment our literature possesses! His vivacity and versatility were quite as remarkable as his fancy and command of melody. He has been admitted, by rare judges of personal merit, to have been, with the single exception of the late Chief Justice Bushe, the ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 2, July, 1850. • Various
... the surface we could see brilliant points, some of dazzling brightness, outshining the daylight. There was also an astonishing variety in the colors of the broad expanses beneath us. Activity, vivacity and beauty, such as we were utterly unprepared to behold, expressed their presence on ...
— Edison's Conquest of Mars • Garrett Putman Serviss
... you," and he nodded good humoredly to Jim. The two friends went out into the crisp, clear air. The snow crunched under their feet as they paced along the platform, and the elixir of the atmosphere made every bit of them tingle with its vivacity ...
— Frontier Boys in Frisco • Wyn Roosevelt
... Nicholas's vivacity of temperament made him feel the loss of his cousin at first very keenly, but it soon wore off. He vowed amendment and reformation on the model of John Bruen, whose life offered so striking a contrast to his own, that it has very properly been placed in opposition by a ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... of skill is necessary, for, as everybody knows, the salmon is full of vivacity, and both strong and swift. So the fisher takes his victim dexterously by head and tail, and throws it ashore immediately. It is caught up by persons who are specially appointed to this duty, and flung to a still greater distance from the stream. ...
— The Story of Ida Pfeiffer - and Her Travels in Many Lands • Anonymous
... proprietor thereof must have great satisfaction in contemplating these improvements, so extensive, made under his direction, and, I may add, by his own active industry. Judge Gill is a gentleman of singular vivacity and activity, and indefatigable in his endeavors to bring forward the cultivation of his lands; of great and essential service, by his example, in the employment he finds for so many persons, and in all his attempts to serve the interests of the place where he dwells, and in his ...
— Rural Architecture - Being a Complete Description of Farm Houses, Cottages, and Out Buildings • Lewis Falley Allen
... which he possessed in an uncommon degree when he chose to exert them. His handsome and intelligent features, with his active and neat, though slight figure, gave him additional advantages. His manners could scarcely be called elegant, but made up in vivacity and variety of expression, and often in great spirit and energy, for what they wanted in ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, Supplementary Number, Issue 263, 1827 • Various
... print, and with good people has produced the apprehension of another earthquake. Your friend St. Leger was at the head of these luxurious heroes—he is the hero of all fashion. I never saw more dashing vivacity and absurdity, with some flashes of parts. He had a cause the other day for ducking a sharper, and was going to swear: the judge said to him, "I see, Sir, you are very ready to take an oath." "Yes, my lord," replied St. Leger, "my father was ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole - Volume I • Horace Walpole
... while sickness of every description had carefully avoided him, he looked even younger than his years. He was a tall, powerful, and strikingly handsome man, of very dark complexion, with black hair, beard, and moustache, and dark eyes that sparkled with good humour and vivacity; and his every movement and gesture were characterised by the stately dignity of the true old Spanish hidalgo. He had spoken but little during dinner, his English being far from perfect; moreover, although he had paid the most elaborately courteous ...
— The Cruise of the Thetis - A Tale of the Cuban Insurrection • Harry Collingwood
... ditty of a convivial order. She put into it much vivacity, appealing to the audience to join in the chorus with a pleading, "Now all together, boys." She had tripping steps and dainty kicks that went well with the melody. When she went off half a dozen men rose in their places, and aimed nuggets ...
— The Trail of '98 - A Northland Romance • Robert W. Service
... cup for a second supply; a waitress brought a plate of hot cakes; the occupants of the corner table stood up, fastening furs and coats, and passed out of the door. With their going Major Carew regained his vivacity, chaffed the girls on their silence, recounted the latest funny stories, and to Claire's relief addressed himself primarily to his fiancee, thus putting her in the ...
— The Independence of Claire • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... heard those words of mine, he exclaimed with his usual energy and vivacity: 'Habes me consentientem, labes me consentientem.' From that moment all coldness between us was at an end, and we approached, without any embarrassment, a host of questions in one conversation in which I endeavored, as I had ...
— Principles Of Political Economy • William Roscher
... I discerned that he was old, his long hair being white and his wrinkles many; it was an aged visage, in short, such as I had not at all expected to see, in spite of dates, because his books talk to the reader with the tender vivacity of youth. But when he began to speak, and as he grew more earnest in conversation, I ceased to be sensible of his age; sometimes, indeed, its dusky shadow darkened through the gleam which his sprightly thoughts diffused about his face, but then another flash of youth came out of his eyes and made ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 11, Issue 67, May, 1863 • Various
... capital painter is the vivacity of the phantasy; the first and most capital poet is the inspiration that originally arises with the impulse of deep thought, or is set up by that, through the divine or akin-to-divine breath of which they feel themselves moved to the fit expression ...
— Montaigne and Shakspere • John M. Robertson
... to wonder or fancy; they sat down, and P. engaged in conversation, without much vivacity, but with his usual ease. The first quarter of an hour passed well enough. But soon it was observable that Mrs. P. was drinking glass after glass of wine, to an extent few gentlemen did, even then, and soon that she was actually excited by it. Before ...
— At Home And Abroad - Or, Things And Thoughts In America and Europe • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... and his vivacity dispelled the alarm excited in the mother's heart by Rybin. The Little Russian walked up and down the room, his feet sounding on the floor. He rubbed his head with one hand and his chest with the other, and spoke looking ...
— Mother • Maxim Gorky
... in lawyer's phrase, 'cease and determine,' as soon as our Earth reaches the age of maidenly bashfulness. Poor thing! It's quite natural, you know, in a healthy growing girl. A little overflow of vivacity, a pirouette more or less, what harm should that do to any of us? Nobody takes more delight than I in the fawn-like sportiveness of an innocent girl, at this period of life: even a shade of espieglerie ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey
... them, for instance, from the listlessness of retirement to the business and bustle of the city; give them a variety of imperative employments, and so place them in society as to supply to their cerebral organs that extent of exercise which gives health and vivacity of action, and in a few months the change produced will be surprising. Health, animation, and energy, will take the place of former insipidity ...
— A Treatise on Anatomy, Physiology, and Hygiene (Revised Edition) • Calvin Cutter
... his solicitude? Indeed! He almost smiled his contempt of the supposition. Why, when on one or two occasions he had betrayed a least little bit of kindly interest,—what? Up had gone their youthful vivacity like an umbrella. Oh, yes!—like all young folks—their affairs were intensely private. Once or twice he had shaken his head at the scantiness of all their provisions for life. Well? They simply and unconsciously stole ...
— Dr. Sevier • George W. Cable
... Madonna enthroned is by Perugino, in the Vatican Gallery at Rome; one of the artist's best works in power and vivacity of color. The throne is an architectural structure of elegant simplicity of design, apparently of carved and inlaid marble. The Virgin sits in quiet dignity, her face bent towards the bishops at her right, St. Costantius and St. Herculanus. On the other side stand the youthful ...
— The Madonna in Art • Estelle M. Hurll
... "shirt-waist" with pearl studs, and a big grey hat with a voluminous blue silk veil. Her small face was smaller than ever, but her eyes were as round and as bright as a mouse's or a bird's, and her talk was full of glitter and vivacity. ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves
... hitherto had been passive spectators of the scene, but as the intelligence of the Pickwickians being informers was spread among them, they began to canvass with considerable vivacity the propriety of enforcing the heated pastry-vendor's proposition: and there is no saying what acts of personal aggression they might have committed, had not the affray been unexpectedly terminated by the interposition ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... the thoughts that now stirred in Hester's mind, with as much vivacity of impression as if they had actually been whispered into her ear. And there was little Pearl, all this while, holding her mother's hand in both her own, and turning her face upward, while she put these searching ...
— The Scarlet Letter • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... himself, and at the carnival balls sometimes assumed a character. He was actually incomparable in Arlequin and Pierrot. The public masquerades at Vienna, during the carnival, were supported with all the vivacity of Italy; the emperor occasionally mingled in them, and his example was generally followed. We are not, therefore, to measure these enjoyments by ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 361, November, 1845. • Various
... serious war it has ever been engaged in. We do not understand it. A few weeks ago I visited France. We had a conference of the Ministers of Finance of Russia, France, Great Britain, and Belgium. Paris is a changed city. Her gayety, her vivacity, is gone. You can see in the faces of every man there, and of every woman, that they know their country is in the grip of grim tragedy. They are resolved to overcome it, confident that they will overcome it, but ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 2, May, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... Stockholm. Some proposed to choose a stranger, and Marshal Bernadotte was thought of. During our occupation of Pomerania he had known how to render himself agreeable to the population over whom he ruled, and to persons of consideration who had known how to appreciate the vivacity and capacity of his mind. He was a kinsman of the Bonapartes, and conspicuous amongst the lieutenants of Napoleon. An obscure member of the Diet repaired to Paris, and knitted the first threads of an intrigue, destined ...
— Worlds Best Histories - France Vol 7 • M. Guizot and Madame Guizot De Witt
... like a fish moving his fin, and on tiptoe I retired with a mysterious smile which might be translated "I will not be the one to prevent him committing an act of infidelity to Urania." She nodded her head with one of those sudden gestures whose graceful vivacity is not to be ...
— The Physiology of Marriage, Part II. • Honore de Balzac
... drink pure, cold water, and bathe in it daily; be taught to practice temperate, prudent, and regular habits; learn the laws of health and how to obey them, the physiology of their own bodies, and what is demanded for health and strength. Such a course of early physical training will impart beauty, vivacity, cheerfulness, amiability, strength of mind, warmth of heart, and moral stability, more surely and rapidly than can otherwise be done. Girls thus trained will possess a higher and nobler womanhood, exert a wider and deeper influence in their families and spheres, impart firmer bodies and ...
— Aims and Aids for Girls and Young Women • George Sumner Weaver
... with a strong resemblance of Paul Veronese: he has all the vivacity and ease of that great painter, and fully equals him in his fancy for the singular and the shining in his draperies; but, as he shares his beauties, he is not without his faults. His composition is sometimes improper, and his design always incorrect; ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 5, May 1810 • Various
... the confidence of Venice revived. The fleet, now superior in strength to the enemy, began to attack them with vivacity. After several months of obstinate resistance, the Genoese—whom their republic had ineffectually attempted to relieve by a fresh armament—blocked up in the town of Chioggia, and pressed by hunger, were obliged to surrender. Nineteen ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... neither of the guests suspected it. Shelby was diverted by Mrs. Van Dam's unimagined vivacity; while his wife had no immediate room for any impression save satisfaction that this autocrat, who held that punctuality should be the politeness of democracy no less than princes, had been caught napping. It was clear ...
— The Henchman • Mark Lee Luther
... Athenian literature. The democracy demanded a literature of a popular kind, the vivacity of the people a literature that made a lively impression; and both these conditions were fulfilled by the drama. But though brought to perfection among the Athenians, tragedy and comedy, in their rude and early origin, were Dorian inventions. Both arose out of the worship of Dionysus. ...
— A Smaller History of Greece • William Smith
... consulate. In spite of his shabby clothes, this man, prematurely bald, with dissipated features, had polished manners and an air of refinement; and, thoroughly enjoying his position, he was talking to his companion with vivacity. It was plain that Louise was only half listening to him; with a faint, absent smile on her lips, she, ...
— Maurice Guest • Henry Handel Richardson
... platform beside the open door, and began a conscientious description of the progress of Sacramento, its new buildings, hotels, and theatres, as it had struck him on his last visit. For a while he was somewhat entertained by the girl's vivacity and eager questioning, but presently it began to pall. He continued, however, with a grim sense of duty, and partly as a reason for watching her in her household duties. Certainly she was graceful! Her tall, lithe, but beautifully moulded figure, even in its characteristic ...
— Mr. Jack Hamlin's Mediation and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... the hearing becomes dull, the eyes lose their luster, vivacity, and strength, and vision becomes in general shorter, ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 620, November 19,1887 • Various
... confused him more than smile or stare From all the 'squires and 'squiresses around, Who wonder'd at the abstraction of his air, Especially as he had been renown'd For some vivacity among the fair, Even in the country circle's narrow bound (For little things upon my lord's estate Were good small talk for others still ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron
... you do, you can't keep me from being sweet." And in this strained sweetness there was something touching, something wistful, a hint of inner weariness which showed now and then beneath the restless vivacity. ...
— Life and Gabriella - The Story of a Woman's Courage • Ellen Glasgow
... Mrs. Edson, under the tuition of her strong-minded, sensible aunt, regained a share of her former vivacity, and declared she would be quite herself again were it not for that great black jail in the adjoining yard, which frowned on her every morning and ...
— Eventide - A Series of Tales and Poems • Effie Afton
... sometimes get a little girl to talk to. But with all these resources, and the aid of the Botanical Garden, the time passes rather heavily; and I am in some danger of dying of ennui, with the apparent symptoms of extreme vivacity. Did you ever hear that most of the Quakers die of stupidity—actually and literally? I was assured of the fact the other day by a very intelligent physician, who practised twenty years among them, and informs me that few of the richer sort live to be fifty, but die of a sort ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 435 - Volume 17, New Series, May 1, 1852 • Various
... fiddler into the parlour, where their punch-bowl steamed—a most agreeable and roistering sinner, who sang indescribable songs to the quaver of his violin, and entertained the company with Saturnalian vivacity, jokes, gibes, and wicked stories. Larry Cleary, thou man of sin and music! methinks I see thee now. Thy ugly, cunning, pitted face, twitching and grinning; thy small, sightless orbs rolling in thy devil's merriment, and thy ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... in conscious superiority. "Ah, Cousin Sabina!" said she, "you are very unsophisticated. Don't you know that a party goes off with much more eclat for being associated with some name of importance. Now Julia Goldsborough, from her beauty and vivacity, and the fashion and fortune of her family, is to be the belle of the season, and a party got up for her must necessarily make a sensation. All her friends, and they are at the head of society, will attend on her account, if for nothing else, and everybody else ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various
... different from that in which they existed whilst yet their scattered dwellings were not collected round the habitation of a missionary. Their number has considerably augmented, but the sphere of their ideas is not enlarged. They have progressively lost that vigour of character and that natural vivacity which in every state of society are the noble fruits of independence. By subjecting to invariable rules even the slightest actions of their domestic life, they have been rendered stupid by the effort to render them obedient. Their subsistence is in general more certain, and their habits more ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America • Alexander von Humboldt
... the latest Parisian fashion gladdened the eye with pictures of grace and beauty which Paris itself could not have surpassed. Gentlemen in full dress, in an age when dress was an essential part of a gentleman's distinction, accompanied the ladies with the gallantry, vivacity, and politeness belonging to France, and ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... hateful, was because some pretty girl had flirted with him outrageously. He turned up his ugly nose especially at 'blue stockings'; said all literary women were 'hopeless pedants and slatterns,' and quoted that abominable Horace Walpole's account of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu's 'dirt and vivacity.' I really thought Gordon would throw him overboard. I wonder what he would say if he could see you darning Uncle Allan's socks. Oh, Edna, dearie! I am sorry to find ...
— St. Elmo • Augusta J. Evans
... viziti. Visiting-card vizitkarto. Visitor vizitanto. Visor viziero. Visual vida. Vital vivema. Vital necesega. Vitality vivemo. Vitiate difekti. Vitreous vitreca. Vitrify vitrigi. Vitriol vitriolo. Vivacity viveco. Vivid (color) hela. Vivifying viviga. Vixen vulpino. Viz nome, tio estas, t.e. Vizier veziro. Vocabulary vortareto. Vocal vocxa. Vocalist kantisto. Vocation profesio, inklino, emo. Voice vocxo. Voice (vote) vocxdono. Void (empty) ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes
... exertions. The forces destined for the invasion, and which were denominated by anticipation the army of England, had been encamped around the town. The characteristic arrogance—the undoubting anticipation of victory—the utter thoughtlessness—the unsinking vivacity of the French soldiery, were then at the highest pitch. Some little idea of the gay and light-hearted sentiments with which they contemplated the invasion of England, may be formed from the following song, which was sung to us with unrivalled spirit and gesticulation, as we came in sight ...
— Travels in France during the years 1814-1815 • Archibald Alison
... Moriaz never ventured again on the mountains without being attended by a guide, who received orders from Antoinette not to leave him, and not to let him expose himself. One day he came in later than usual, and his daughter reproached him, with some vivacity, for the continual anxiety he caused her. "The glaciers and precipices will end by giving me the ...
— Samuel Brohl & Company • Victor Cherbuliez
... MISS FERRIER—I should not have been so long in thanking you for your kind present, had I not wished to subject Destiny to a severer test than that chosen by the French dramatist. His old woman probably partook of the vivacity of her nation, but my old aunt, as Mary will tell you, is sick and often very sorrowful, and yet Destiny has made her laugh heartily, and cheated her of many wearisome hours of lamentation. My grandson, Archibald Taylor, too, forsook football and cricket for your fascinating book, and ...
— Marriage • Susan Edmonstone Ferrier
... insults, I resolved at once to reconquer his esteem. The judgment of the world I have consistently despised, but I had already begun to set a certain value on the good opinion of my entertainer. Beginning with a note of pathos, but soon brightening into my habitual vivacity and humour, I rapidly narrated the circumstances of my birth, my flight, and subsequent misfortunes. He heard me to an end in silence, gravely smoking. 'Miss Fanshawe,' said he, when I had done, 'you are a very comical and ...
— The Dynamiter • Robert Louis Stevenson and Fanny van de Grift Stevenson
... the majority. Some beautiful faces and forms were clothed in rags; the plaited hair and necks of these even were loaded with ornaments. The females were rather under the middle stature, strongly built, and possess considerable vivacity, and liveliness. The complexion of those not much exposed to the sun was of ...
— Lander's Travels - The Travels of Richard Lander into the Interior of Africa • Robert Huish
... around her, not one of which was lost on her impressionable little mind, and we need not wonder that she began to suffer from an excitement that gathered in strength from day to day. She grew thin, morbid, nervous, ate almost nothing, and lost her usual vivacity, sitting absorbed in dreamy fits, from which it was difficult to arouse her, and which were very different from the quiet, happy silence in which she used to remain contented by her father's side for hours. All night she was haunted with ...
— My Little Lady • Eleanor Frances Poynter
... and secondary morals, yet are of no mean importance in the regulation of life. A moral taste is not of force to turn vice into virtue; but it recommends virtue with something like the blandishments of pleasure, and it infinitely abates the evils of vice. Rousseau, a writer of great force and vivacity, is totally destitute of taste in any sense of the word. Your masters, who are his scholars, conceive that all refinement has an aristocratic character. The last age had exhausted all its powers in ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. IV. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... to celebrate all such occasions as polo matches, big race days, Hunt Club meetings, by holding dinner parties at the club, often attended by fifty or sixty of the younger members, with a sprinkling of the older sports, who thoroughly enjoyed the vivacity and exuberance of the younger men. These were dinners to be remembered, full of joyous spirits, where many amusing incidents used to occur. As the hours of the evening grew late and the early morning approached the fun was at its height. I happened to ...
— The Chronicles of a Gay Gordon • Jose Maria Gordon
... abode in the manor of which my father was a vassal, she visited his cottage. I was at that time a child. She was pleased with my vivacity and promptitude, and determined to take me under her own protection. My parents joyfully acceded to her proposal, and I returned with her ...
— Edgar Huntley • Charles Brockden Brown
... Whitehall, and levees at Kensington, are described with great vivacity, though in very bad Latin, by Gerard Croese. "Sumebat," he says, "rex saepe secretum, non horarium, vero horarum plurium, in quo de variis rebus cum Penno serio sermonem conferebat, et interim differebat audire praecipuorum nobilium ordinem, ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 1 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... the pair happened to come to a halt close to him. "Shockin' time they're playing this waltz in," he heard the soldier exclaim with humorous vivacity (he was apparently the funny man of the regiment, and had brought a silent but appreciative comrade with him as ...
— The Tinted Venus - A Farcical Romance • F. Anstey
... is, after all, very far from dead, exhibiting in fact a marvellous vitality, and discoursing of the ins and outs of the various harassing Land Acts, and the astute diplomacy needful to save something from the wreck, with a light, airy vivacity, and a rich native humour irresistibly charming. The recital of her troubles, losses, and burdens, the dodgery and trickery of legal luminaries, and the total extinction of rent profits is delivered with an easy ...
— Ireland as It Is - And as It Would be Under Home Rule • Robert John Buckley (AKA R.J.B.)
... of the hall springs an ornamental fountain, the water of which continually throws itself into new shapes and snatches the most diversified lines from the stained atmosphere around. It is impossible to conceive what a strange vivacity is imparted to the scene by the magic dance of this fountain, with its endless transformations, in which the imaginative beholder may discern what form he will. The water is supposed by some to flow from the same source as the Castalian spring, and is extolled ...
— The Hall of Fantasy (From "Mosses From An Old Manse") • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... opening lines we subjoin the original—to the vivacity and spirit of which it is, perhaps, impossible to ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 53, No. 331, May, 1843 • Various
... the poor mother, suddenly losing all her vivacity, and looking so pitifully miserable that the sympathetic Di incontinently jumped off her chair, ran up to her, and threw her arms ...
— Dusty Diamonds Cut and Polished - A Tale of City Arab Life and Adventure • R.M. Ballantyne
... apply to poetry or eloquence, round which the controversy has most violently raged. For poetry and eloquence do not depend on correct reasoning. They depend principally on vivacity of imagination, and "vivacity of imagination does not require a long course of experiments, or a great multitude of rules, to attain all the perfection of which it is capable." Such perfection might be attained in a ...
— The Idea of Progress - An Inquiry Into Its Origin And Growth • J. B. Bury
... caught sight of the music that the young man felt again at ease, and his vivacity returned to him. Leaving his chair, he began enthusiastically to examine the tall piles that filled one side of the room. The volumes lay richly everywhere, making a pleasant disorder; and as perfume comes out ...
— The Jimmyjohn Boss and Other Stories • Owen Wister
... possess beauty, but they are celebrated for discretion, modesty, and unfeigned diffidence, as well as wit, vivacity, and good nature. Whoever heard of a Philadelphia lady setting up for a reformer, or standing out for woman's rights, or assisting to man the election grounds, raise a regiment, command a legion, or address a jury? Our ladies glow ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... purified by the vote, and he naturally depicted them with the man-engendered vices that were then a part of their unhappy heritage. This "NeugierdeMotiv" (Curiosity Motive) is made up of agitated, sharply accentuated sixteenth notes played with incredible vivacity and culminating in a terrifying orchestral crash where entrance is made into the hidden chamber, with its famous tableau so eloquent of the polygamous instinct of man; an instinct only kept in subjection by the most stringent laws and ...
— Bluebeard • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... tall and graceful figure of Chancellor Livingston, and his polished wit and classical taste, contributed not a little to deepen the impression resulting from the ingenuity of his argument, the vivacity of his imagination, and the dignity of his station."—Chancellor Kent's address before The Law Association of New York, October 21, 1836. George Shea, ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander
... clearly as a future fine lady, in velvets and satins and furs, bewitching every-body by her gay spirits, her piquant vivacity, and the loving heart that lay underneath all the nonsense and gave ...
— The Story Of Waitstill Baxter • By Kate Douglas Wiggin
... mankind. It is found in Egypt, and in many others parts of Africa, in Georgia, and in India. The power of changing color which it possesses is not really its most remarkable characteristic. Far more worthy of notice are its slow pace, extraordinary form, awkward movements, vivacity, and control of eye, and marvellous rapidity of tongue. It is the most grotesque of reptiles. With protruding and telescopic eyes, that move at will in the most opposite directions, with an ungainly head, a cold, dry, strange-looking skin, ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 5. (of 7): Persia • George Rawlinson
... others, I think it was the Princess Mary, appeared to have considerable vivacity in her manners; she was without any covering to her head, her hair was sandy, which she wore cropped; her complexion was probably fair originally, but was rather red now; her features ...
— Samuel F. B. Morse, His Letters and Journals - In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Samuel F. B. Morse
... Pamphlet I know not, and am in no condition to guess. A certain snappish vivacity (very unlike the style of Frederick whom it personates); a wearisome grimacing, gesticulating malice and smartness, approaching or reaching the sad dignity of what is called 'wit' in modern times; in general the rottenness of matter, and the epigrammatic unquiet graciosity of manner in ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. III. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—The Hohenzollerns In Brandenburg—1412-1718 • Thomas Carlyle
... different persons. One belongs to Streatham, the other to Bath; one is "always young and always pretty," the other a rouged old woman. But it is unfair to push the contrast too far. Mrs. Piozzi at seventy or eighty was as sprightly, as good-natured, as Mrs. Thrale at thirty or forty. She never lost her vivacity, never her desire to please. But it is a sadly different thing to please Dr. Johnson, Burke, or Sir ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 7, No. 43, May, 1861 • Various
... crudeness. It is, in fact, the very principle upon which impressionist painters work, giving pure colour instead of mixed, but in such minute and broken bits that the eye confounds them with surrounding colour, getting at the same time the double impression of softness and vivacity. ...
— How to make rugs • Candace Wheeler
... were less formidable to deal with as a lover. That is how I came to consent to the walk we took in the forest. Ah me! I should have taken warning from your enigmatical silence. And indeed I did tremble with vivacity in my effort to break it. But you only looked mysteriously confident about something and kept your own counsel, giving me a nod or a quizzical smile now and then, as if what I was saying really had ...
— The Jessica Letters: An Editor's Romance • Paul Elmer More
... kept up with the never-flagging vivacity peculiar to this nation, and, as I conclude, so continued till a very late hour in the morning. At half past eleven I withdrew, with a friend whom I chanced to meet, to Very's, the famous restaurateur's in the Tuileries, where ...
— Paris As It Was and As It Is • Francis W. Blagdon
... even say a handsome villain. Fair denotes what is bright, smooth, clear, and without blemish; as, a fair face. The word applies wholly to what is superficial; we can say "fair, yet false." In a specific sense, fair has the sense of blond, as opposed to dark or brunette. One who possesses vivacity, wit, good nature, or other pleasing qualities may be attractive without beauty. Comely denotes an aspect that is smooth, genial, and wholesome, with a certain fulness of contour and pleasing symmetry, tho falling short of the beautiful; ...
— English Synonyms and Antonyms - With Notes on the Correct Use of Prepositions • James Champlin Fernald
... turned to the younger with a new veiled scrutiny. Her gaze rested for an instant on Orsi and then moved contemplatively to Gheta and Abrego y Mochales. It was evident that her thoughts were very busy; a faint sparkle appeared in her eyes, a fresh vivacity animated her manner. Suddenly she included Lavinia in her remarks; she put queries to the girl patently intended to draw her out. Gheta grew ...
— The Happy End • Joseph Hergesheimer
... not excepting even Mecklenburg, there had been no more anarchic spot than Ost-Friesland for the last sixty or seventy years. A Country with parliamentary-life in extraordinary vivacity (rising indeed to the suicidal or internecine pitch, in two or three directions), and next to no regent-life at all. A Country that had loved Freedom, not wisely but too well! Ritter Party, Prince's Party, Towns' Party;—always two or more internecine ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XIV. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... full length for one end of his large dining-hall. It should be exhibited at the Royal Academy: 'Portrait of Lord Battersby's mother,' she said to herself, and her heart fluttered with all its wonted vivacity. If she could not sit, happily, she had been photographed not so very long ago, and the portrait had been as successful as any photograph could be of a face which depended so entirely upon its expression ...
— The Way of All Flesh • Samuel Butler
... or the information he obtained from the Indians, was not always to be trusted. He goes on to speak of the tribes, whose people and customs he found very different from the Indians of Canada. "They have large public squares, games, and assemblies. They seem mirthful and full of vivacity. Their chiefs have absolute authority. No one would dare to pass between the chief and the cane torch which burns in his cabin and is carried before him when he goes out. All make a circuit around it with ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 2 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... unalterable clearness. His forehead, wrinkled in straight lines and yellowed by time, was small and narrow, hard, and crowned with silver-gray hair cut so short that it looked like felt. His delicate mouth showed prudence, but not avarice. The vivacity of his eye showed the purity of his life. Integrity, a sense of duty, and true modesty made, as it were, a halo round his head, bringing his face into the relief of ...
— Rise and Fall of Cesar Birotteau • Honore de Balzac
... these effects—is full of interest, worthy of study and fruitful of suggestions. Its superabundant energy seemed to create demands in order that it might expend itself in satisfying them. Its persistence was toughened by failure as much as by success. Its vivacity, verging upon boisterousness, was incapable of being chilled. Its strenuousness knew no lassitude, and needed no repose. In play as in work, in physical exercise as in mental labor, in all his projects, purposes and performances, Dickens seems to have been in a perpetual state of tension that allowed ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 11, - No. 22, January, 1873 • Various
... so as to enfilade the exterior plain and salient glacis. The captain, though not recovered from a severe contusion in the shoulder, received from one of the enemy's shells, promptly took his position, and served his field piece with vivacity and effect. Captain Farming's battery likewise played upon them at this time with great effect. The enemy were in a few moments entirely defeated, taken or put to flight, leaving on the field 222 killed, 174 wounded, and 186 prisoners. ...
— The Medallic History of the United States of America 1776-1876 • J. F. Loubat
... society of those geniuses; but I found them exceedingly formal and reserved — They seemed afraid and jealous of one another, and sat in a state of mutual repulsion, like so many particles of vapour, each surrounded by its own electrified atmosphere. Dick, who has more vivacity than judgment, tried more than once to enliven the conversation; sometimes making an effort at wit, sometimes letting off a pun, and sometimes discharging a conundrum; nay, at length he started a dispute upon the hackneyed comparison betwixt blank ...
— The Expedition of Humphry Clinker • Tobias Smollett
... grimace or solicitous wrigglings: also it was perhaps not possible for a breathing man wide awake to look less animated. The correct Englishman, drawing himself up from his bow into rigidity, assenting severely, and seemed to be in a state of internal drill, suggests a suppressed vivacity, and may be suspected of letting go with some violence when he is released from parade; but Grandcourt's bearing had no rigidity, it inclined rather to the flaccid. His complexion had a faded fairness resembling that of an ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot |
