"Woo" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... "of the fair hair," the woman is proud and beautiful Gyda, whose former scorn for him, in the days when he was nothing but the petty chief of a few barren mountains, provoked that strange wild vow of his, "That he would never clip or comb his locks till he could woo her as sole king ...
— Letters From High Latitudes • The Marquess of Dufferin (Lord Dufferin)
... boy, in another few months I shall pack up and return to America, and once more woo the elusive editor. I am looking forward to our sitting by your fireside and, through the cloud of tobacco-smoke, weaving again our old romances. I am really proud of you, Edgerton, and know that you must be a tremendous power ...
— The Parts Men Play • Arthur Beverley Baxter
... Sue only made Jude the more miserable that he was unable to woo her, and he left the cottage of his aunt that day with a heavy heart. He would fain have glanced into the school to see the room in which Sue's little figure had so glorified itself; but he checked his ...
— Jude the Obscure • Thomas Hardy
... to him. At present the discomfort and sorrow of not feeling at liberty to make love to the woman he loved was some excuse for avoiding thought, and he found distraction in hard work and social engagements. With regard to Sophia he stayed his mind on the belief that if he dared not woo she was not being wooed, either by any man who was his rival, or by those luxuries and tranquillities of life which nowadays often lure young ...
— What Necessity Knows • Lily Dougall
... who, although she was twenty years old, and had by no means been without her admirers, had never yet kissed any man but her father and brothers, put up her rosy lips, as confidingly as a little child, to be kissed by this strange wooer, who wooed only for leave to woo. ...
— Between Whiles • Helen Hunt Jackson
... hand, by our fireside. Gloomy as it may seem, there is an influence productive of cheerfulness, and favorable to imaginative thought, in the atmosphere of a snowy day. The native of a southern clime may woo the muse beneath the heavy shade of summer foliage, reclining on banks of turf, while the sound of singing birds and warbling rivulets chimes in with the music of his soul. In our brief summer, I do not think, but only exist in the vague enjoyment of a dream. My hour of inspiration—if that ...
— Snow Flakes (From "Twice Told Tales") • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... talk much in the train, he and Tyler. It was a sleepy lot of boys that that train carried back to the Great Central Naval Station. Tyler was undressed and in his hammock even before Moran, the expert. He would not have to woo sleep to-night. Finally Moran, too, had swung himself up to his precarious nest and relaxed with a tired, ...
— Cheerful—By Request • Edna Ferber
... the interior of the country lay an old baronial hall, and in it lived an old proprietor, who had two sons, which two young men thought themselves too clever by half. They wanted to go out and woo the King's daughter; for the maiden in question had publicly announced that she would choose for her husband that youth who could arrange his ...
— Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen • Hans Christian Andersen
... the first season Passed of that wild desolation, a son to my youth had been given. Therefore I praise thee, Hermann, that thou, with an honest assurance, Shouldst, in these sorrowful days, be thinking thyself of a maiden, And amid ruins and war shouldst thus have the courage to woo her." ...
— Hermann and Dorothea • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
... harmonious tint as regards the prevalent tone of the forest glades wherein we counted on roaming in a care-free manner, was by reason of its very name inappropriate, since in a carnal sense we should not be hunters at all, meaning to woo the wild creatures by acts of kindness rather than to slay them ...
— Fibble, D. D. • Irvin Shrewsbury Cobb
... the master to the youth, "Ere yet its secrets were applied to use— Ere yet it served beleaguered Syracuse:— Ask'st thou from art, but what the art is worth? The fruit?—for fruit go cultivate the earth.— He who the goddess would aspire unto, Must not the goddess as the woman woo!" ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... pool, with well-spring nigh, And through the grass a streamlet fleeting by. The porch with palm or oleaster shade— That when the regents from the hive parade Its gilded youth, in Spring—their Spring!—to prank, To woo their holiday heat a neighbouring bank May lean with branches hospitably cool. And midway, be your water stream or pool, Cross willow-twigs, and massy boulders fling— A line of stations for the halting wing To dry in summer sunshine, has it shipped A cupful aft, or ...
— The Adventures of Harry Revel • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... mighty arms, earn great merit by saving my life. I seek thy shelter, O best of men! Thou protectest always, O son of Kunti, the afflicted and the masterless. I seek thy protection, weeping in sorrow. I woo thee, being filled with desire. Therefore, do what is agreeable to me. It behoveth thee to gratify my wish by yielding thy ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa - Translated into English Prose - Adi Parva (First Parva, or First Book) • Kisari Mohan Ganguli (Translator)
... eyes of deepest blue Enthralled all who to Yale were true. Her crimson lips, too, conquests made: Fair Harvard's sons their homage paid, And many a suitor came to woo ...
— Cap and Gown - A Treasury of College Verse • Selected by Frederic Knowles
... art blam'd shall not be thy defect, For slander's mark was ever yet the fair; The ornament of beauty is suspect, A crow that flies in heaven's sweetest air. So thou be good, slander doth but approve Thy worth the greater being woo'd of time; For canker vice the sweetest buds doth love, And thou present'st a pure unstained prime. Thou hast passed by the ambush of young days Either not assail'd, or victor being charg'd; Yet this thy praise cannot be so thy praise, ...
— Shakespeare's Sonnets • William Shakespeare
... strict observance to this point? O, would it were! therein I could afford My spirit should draw a little near to theirs, To gaze on novelties; so vice were one. Tut, she is stale, rank, foul; and were it not That those that woo her greet her with lock'd eyes, In spight of all th' impostures, paintings, drugs, Which her bawd, Custom, dawbs her cheeks withal, She would betray her loath'd and leprous face, And fright the enamour'd dotards from themselves: But such is the perverseness ...
— Cynthia's Revels • Ben Jonson
... singeth through the year. Robin! Robin! Merry Robin! So I'd have my true love be: Not to fly At the nigh Sign of cold adversity. "When the spring brings sweet delights, When aloft the lark doth rise, Lovers woo o' mellow nights, And youths peep in maidens' eyes, That time blooms the eglantine, Daisies pied upon the hill, Cowslips fair and columbine, Dusky violets by the rill. But the ivy green cloth grow When the north wind bringeth snow. Ivy! Ivy! Stanch and ...
— The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood • Howard Pyle
... intelligent, as honest, as proud, and, unfortunately, she was, like you, as obdurate, which reminds me of the unfortunate gentleman whose emissary I now am. In his madness he requested me—yes, Miss Mathews, me a poor tinker—to woo you for him—to say to you all that he would have said had he been admitted to your presence—to plead for him—to kneel for him at your feet, and entreat you to have some compassion for one whose only misfortune was to love—whose only fault was to be poor. What ...
— The Poacher - Joseph Rushbrook • Frederick Marryat
... smile I'd witch and woo; With gay and girlish guile I'd frenzy you— I'd madden you with my caressing, Like turtle, her first love confessing— That it was "mock", no mortal would be guessing, With so much winsome wile ...
— The Complete Plays of Gilbert and Sullivan - The 14 Gilbert And Sullivan Plays • William Schwenk Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan
... a rare mood: nor, being wise, was she given to expressing it in this gloomy fashion. It was her habit, rather, assiduously to woo him: this with kisses, soft and wet; with fleeting touches; with coquettish glances and the sly display of her charms; with rambling, fantastic tales of her desirability in the regard of men—thus practicing all the familiar fascinations ...
— The Mother • Norman Duncan
... Alas, that she should have it! It yields no mercy to desert Nor peace to those that crave it. Sweet Sun, when thou look'st on, Pray her regard my moan! Sweet birds, when you sing to her, To yield some pity woo her! Sweet flowers, that she treads on, Tell her, her beauty dreads one; And if in life her love she'll not agree me, Pray her before I die, she ...
— Tudor and Stuart Love Songs • Various
... It's the poorest way to woo a woman. But I have tried every other way. I have pleaded, and been answered with silence. I have wooed you with caresses, and ...
— King Arthur's Socks and Other Village Plays • Floyd Dell
... An armistice was signed in 1953, splitting the peninsula along a demilitarized zone at about the 38th parallel. Thereafter, South Korea achieved rapid economic growth with per capita income rising to roughly 18 times the level of North Korea. In 1987, South Korean voters elected ROH Tae-woo to the presidency, ending 26 years of military dictatorships. South Korea today is a fully functioning modern democracy. In June 2000, a historic first North-South summit took place between the South's President KIM Tae-chung and the ...
— The 2004 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... away from the wonderful sight to take that step. Two strides back and you are standing awestruck on the edge of the stupendous precipice. The fascination of the place is overpowering, whether you gaze straight down into the black depths or whether the mists, rolling up like great waves of foam, woo you gently to certain death. No wonder the place is called "The Rejection of the Body," and that men and women longing to free themselves from the weary Wheel of Life, seek the "Peace of the Great Release" with one wild leap into ...
— A Wayfarer in China - Impressions of a trip across West China and Mongolia • Elizabeth Kendall
... She stared at me a space, then said, "What have wooings long or short to do with weddings? You talk as if you did your wooing first and then came to marriage—we get married first and woo afterwards!" ...
— Gulliver of Mars • Edwin L. Arnold
... There seemed to Bridge nothing unusual about the man's act, nor had there been any indication either of stealth or haste to arouse the American's suspicions. Bridge lay back again upon his pillows and sought to woo the slumber which the sudden awakening seemed to have banished for the remainder ...
— The Mucker • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... "You stay away from that kid," he growled, thinking of George Willard, and then, not knowing what else to say, turned to go away. "If I catch you together I will break your bones and his too," he added. The bartender had come to woo, not to threaten, and was angry with ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1919 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... a heavy word to speak—a lady fair doth lie Within my daughter's rightful place, and certes! she must die— Let it be noised that sickness cut short her tender life, Then come and woo my daughter, and she shall be your wife:— What passed between you long ago, of that be nothing said, Thus, none shall my dishonour know—in honour you ...
— Mediaeval Tales • Various
... obliged to trust to his own legs, and after walking a long way he reached a big town. Here he found a great crowd and much commotion in the streets, and a herald rode about announcing, 'The King's daughter seeks a husband, but whoever would woo her must first execute a difficult task, and if he does not succeed he must be content to forfeit his life.' Many had risked their lives, but in vain. When the youth saw the King's daughter, he was so dazzled by her beauty, that he forgot all idea of danger, ...
— The Green Fairy Book • Various
... misunderstood, longings of the human heart. Inly we sigh for that repose.' O dear brethren, if it is true that into our agitated and struggling lives there may steal, and in them there may abide, this priceless blessing of a great tranquillity, surely nothing else should be needed to woo us to accept the conditions and put forth the trust. It is strange that we should turn away, as we are all tempted to do, from that rest in God, and try to find repose in what was only meant for stimulus, ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Isaiah and Jeremiah • Alexander Maclaren
... Joan, Wilt thou have me? I prithee, now wilt? and I'se marry with thee My cow, my calf, my house, my rents, And all my land and tenements— Oh, say, my Joan, will that not do? I cannot come each day to woo. I've corn and hay in the barn hard by, And three fat hogs pent up in a sty; I have a mare, and she's coal black; I ride on her tail to save her back. I have cheese upon the shelf, And I cannot eat it all myself. I've three good marks that lie in a rag In the nook of the chimney instead ...
— A History of Nursery Rhymes • Percy B. Green
... spreading and shady! Two, three ombu-trees grow near; but I have seen de great tiger sleep in one. My brother cacique have seen him too. When de big moon rise, and all is bright like de day, and no sound make itself heard but de woo-hoo-woo of de pampa owl, I get quietly up and go to de ombu-tree. I think myself much more brave as my brother cacique. Ha! ha! he think himself more brave as me. When I come near de ombu-trees I shout. Ugh! de scream dat comes from ...
— Our Home in the Silver West - A Story of Struggle and Adventure • Gordon Stables
... also a secret feeling of resentment. He had taken no pains to woo Katherine until some one else wanted her. It was universally conceded that he had been the first to draw his sword, and thus indulge his own temper at the expense of their child's good name and happiness. Taking these faults as rudimentary ones, Lysbet could enlarge on them ...
— The Bow of Orange Ribbon - A Romance of New York • Amelia E. Barr
... be in the music, cousin, if you be not woo'd in good time: if the prince be too important [importunate], tell him, there is measure in everything, and so dance out the answer. For hear me, Hero; wooing, wedding, and repenting, is as a Scotch jig, a measure, and a cinque-pace: the first suit is hot and hasty, like a Scotch ...
— Shakespeare and Music - With Illustrations from the Music of the 16th and 17th centuries • Edward W. Naylor
... as Aunt Julia is freed of her incubus—so soon as I am gone—you will see to it she is not lonely. You will woo her, beginning at once, both together or turn about, because I would not have her—this best, this noblest and most generous of women—forfeit anything of happiness on my account; because, having neither father nor mother that I ever ...
— Peregrine's Progress • Jeffery Farnol
... Pembroke, and there had been something of accident and something of furtiveness in their lucky discovery of each other. There had been a flush in it; there was dash in it. But Edith he saw and chose and had to woo. There was no rushing together; there was solicitation and assent. Edith was a Bachelor of Science of London University and several things like that, and she looked upon the universe under her broad forehead and broad-waving brown hair with quiet watchful ...
— Mr. Britling Sees It Through • H. G. Wells
... was a friend instead of a lover, how much easier were his relations with Fraeulein! Brooding sensitiveness and responsibility passed into lightsomeness. The unnatural and crankling proceeding of his trying to woo a German girl was smoothed away into a genial indifference. The mental picture of Elsa would remain as one that had attracted him on the wall of his German memories. And like the hundred maids that a youth is smitten with, she would gradually blend into the dim gallery ...
— Villa Elsa - A Story of German Family Life • Stuart Henry
... first was the Princess Marya, the second the Princess Olga, the third the Princess Anna. When their father and mother lay at the point of death, they had thus enjoined their son:—"Give your sisters in marriage to the very first suitors who come to woo them. Don't go keeping them ...
— Russian Fairy Tales - A Choice Collection of Muscovite Folk-lore • W. R. S. Ralston
... Nice situation, sitting here and listening to a strange man woo my wife in terms of ...
— Theft - A Play In Four Acts • Jack London
... marriage, which is as follows: when a girl has reached the age of eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, or fifteen years she has suitors, more or less according to her attractions, who woo her for some time. After this, the consent of their fathers and mothers is asked, to whose will the girls often do not submit, although the most discreet and considerate do so. The lover or suitor presents to the girl some necklaces, chains, and bracelets of porcelain. ...
— Voyages of Samuel de Champlain V3 • Samuel de Champlain
... "'I long woo'd your daughter, my suit you denied; Love swells like the Solway, but ebbs like its tide— And now am I come, with this lost love of mine, To lead but one measure, drink one cup of wine. There are maidens in ...
— The Prose Marmion - A Tale of the Scottish Border • Sara D. Jenkins
... a specious loyalty to a false wife, but that Kathleen O'Connor might become accustomed to him in his new position. He would not hurry nor attempt to constrain her; he preferred to give her time to consider him as one permitted to woo her honourably. He became more attentive, more openly anxious to give the girl whatever she desired, more courteous in speech and action; but he refrained from asking ...
— Grey Town - An Australian Story • Gerald Baldwin
... tashtego. Start her, Tash, my boy —start her, all; but keep cool, keep cool— cucumbers is the word —easy, easy —only start her like grim death and grinning devils, and raise the buried dead perpendicular out of their graves, boys —that's all. Start her! Woo-hoo! Wa-hee! screamed the Gay-Header in reply, raising some old war-whoop to the skies; as every oarsman in the strained boat involuntarily bounced forward with the one tremendous leading stroke which the eager Indian gave. .. But his ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville
... so strenuous and uninterrupted the leader found opportunity to woo and win "a fair ladye." She was a daughter of a veteran Abolitionist, George Benson, of Brooklyn, Conn., who with his sons George W. and Henry E. Benson, were among the stanchest of the reformer's followers and supporters. The young wife, before her marriage, was not less devoted to the cause than ...
— William Lloyd Garrison - The Abolitionist • Archibald H. Grimke
... scream and the grey Doves coo, Little green, talkative Parrots woo, And small grey Squirrels, with fear askance, At alien me, in their furtive glance, Come shyly, with quivering fur, to see The stranger under their Tamarind tree. Daylight dies, The Camp fires redden like angry eyes, The Tents show white, In the ...
— India's Love Lyrics • Adela Florence Cory Nicolson (AKA Laurence Hope), et al.
... seraphic, Did I woo my phantom fay, Till the nights grew long and chilly, Short and shorter grew the day; Till at last—'twas dark and gloomy, Dull and starless was the sky, And my steps were all unsteady For a little flushed was I,— To the well-accustomed ...
— The Bon Gaultier Ballads • William Edmonstoune Aytoun
... of its kin that grow in clover-like heads, each one of the gay wings has beauty enough to stand alone, Its oddity of structure, its lovely color and enticing fringe, lead one to suspect it of extraordinary desire to woo some insect that will carry its pollen from blossom to blossom and so enable the plant to produce cross-fertilized seed to counteract the evil tendencies resulting from the more prolific self-fertilized cleistogamous flowers ...
— Wild Flowers, An Aid to Knowledge of Our Wild Flowers and - Their Insect Visitors - - Title: Nature's Garden • Neltje Blanchan
... o'clock on the third night (the first outside the danger zone, when every other passenger might reasonably be expected to be in his berth) Lanyard lay in a deck-chair deep in shadows, wondering if it was worthwhile to go below and woo sleep in his stateroom. By way of experiment he shut his eyes. When after a moment he opened them again he was no ...
— The False Faces • Vance, Louis Joseph
... they suit you best—although They woo you roughly it is said: Their way of courtship is a blow Struck with a ...
— The Poems of Henry Kendall • Henry Kendall
... her to her mother. He seemed half inclined to comply with her entreaties; but old Alan shook his head. It was then Handassah put in a word; the minx was ever ready at that. 'Fear not,' said she, 'that she will wed Sir Ranulph. Deliver her to her friends, I beseech you, Sir Luke, and woo her honorably. She will accept you.' Sir Luke stared incredulously, and grim old Alan smiled. 'She has sworn to be yours,' continued Handassah; 'sworn it by every hope of heaven, and the oath has been sealed by blood—by Sybil's blood.'—'Does she speak the truth?' asked Sir Luke, trembling ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth
... with the glittering wampum have I come thy smiles to woo; But I offer a cabin passage down life's river in my canoe; And to beguile the voyage, if thou wilt come aboard, Till sunset fire the waters the fire-water shall be poured. While clad in noiseless moccasons the feet of the years shall fall; And I will cherish thee, my love, ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol V. Issue III. March, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... I go to brave a world I hate, And woo it o'er and o'er; And tempt a wave and try a fate Upon a ...
— April's Lady - A Novel • Margaret Wolfe Hungerford
... alone in a smaller drawing-room; it was not possible for the guests in the other saloon to see them. He drew the finger from her lips and pressed it to his own. He would woo the truth from this beautiful fool. His words meant one ...
— A Modern Mercenary • Kate Prichard and Hesketh Vernon Hesketh-Prichard
... hard fate forced on To kill herself for Demophon; But fables we'll relate; how Jove Put on all shapes to get a Love; As now a satyr, then a swan, A bull but then, and now a man. Next, we will act how young men woo, And sigh and kiss as lovers do; And talk of brides; and who shall make That wedding-smock, this bridal-cake, That dress, this sprig, that leaf, this vine, That smooth and silken columbine. This done, we'll draw lots who shall buy And gild the bays and rosemary; What posies for our wedding ...
— A Selection From The Lyrical Poems Of Robert Herrick • Robert Herrick
... whene'er I woo her, Yet she's vext if I give over; Much she fears I should undo her, But much more to lose her lover: Thus, in doubting, she refuses; And ...
— The Comedies of William Congreve - Volume 1 [of 2] • William Congreve
... court?—No! But of the woman I marry, very likely indeed! Woman is a changeable thing, as our Virgil informed us at school; but her change par excellence is from the fairy you woo to the brownie you wed. It is not that she has been a hypocrite,—it is that she is a transmigration. You marry a girl for her accomplishments. She paints charmingly, or plays like Saint Cecilia. Clap a ring on her finger, and she ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... bustle and animation. The breeze, after faintly ruffling the glassy surface of the water with an occasional cat's-paw, came softly stealing out from the E.S.E., and every sail was immediately trimmed with the most scrupulous nicety to woo the gentle zephyr. The lighter and more lofty sails first acknowledged its welcome presence, alternately swelling out and fluttering to the masts, like the gentle rise and fall of the breast of sleeping ...
— Under the Meteor Flag - Log of a Midshipman during the French Revolutionary War • Harry Collingwood
... is unanswerable. I must return to my humble station, and woo my rustic muse in my wonted way at the plough-tail. Still, my lord, while the drops of life warm my heart, gratitude to that dear-loved country in which I boast my birth, and gratitude to those her distinguished sons, who have honoured me so much with their patronage and approbation, shall, while ...
— The Letters of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... by my critics, especially by my female critics, that in saying this, Adela went a long way towards teaching Mr. Wilkinson the way to woo. Indeed, she brought that accusation against herself, and not lightly. But she was, as she herself had expressed it, driven in the cause of truth to say what she had said. Nor did she, in her heart of ...
— The Bertrams • Anthony Trollope
... cat went down-stairs, and sent the suitor away. Soon there was another knock at the door. It was another fox come to woo. He had two tails, but he met with no better success than the first. Then there arrived more foxes, one after another, each with one more tail than the last, but they were all dismissed, until there came one with nine tails like old Mr. ...
— Household Stories by the Brothers Grimm • Jacob Grimm and Wilhelm Grimm
... The light breeze which blew off the land stirred loose ringlets of her hair, and flattened the thin robe against her sunlit figure. So had she stood a thousand times in old days, in her youth, in her maidenhood. So in her father's time had she stood to see her lover come riding along the sands to woo her! So had she stood to welcome him on the eve of that fatal journey to Paris! Thence had others watched her go with him. The men remembered—remembered all; and one by one they stole shamefacedly away, fearing lest she should speak or turn tragic ...
— Count Hannibal - A Romance of the Court of France • Stanley J. Weyman
... heat of the day. In the evening they passed a house which was lighted up as if for company. The father and mother stood at the door, and invited them to choose brides from among their rich and beautiful daughters. The eldest brother answered that they were not come to woo brides, and had no thought of marriage; but the second brother said he should like the girls to come out to swing with them; and they were forthwith summoned. Then the youngest brother said he hoped the young ladies would not distress themselves, but really he ...
— The Hero of Esthonia and Other Studies in the Romantic Literature of That Country • William Forsell Kirby
... every man in this Duchy woo. As I have won, let every man that is worthy win. For, unless he so woo, and unless he so win, vain is his wooing, and vain is his winning, and a fig for his wedding, say I, Deodonato! I, that was Deodonato, and now am—Deodonato ...
— Frivolous Cupid • Anthony Hope
... incidents from these conflicting accounts so as to make a reasonable sequence; but, as North says, "we are not to marvel, if the history of things so ancient, be found so diversely written." Shakespeare simply states that Theseus "woo'd" Hippolyta "with his sword." Later in the play we learn that the fairy King and Queen not only are acquainted with court-scandal, but are each involved with the past histories of Theseus and Hippolyta ...
— The Sources and Analogues of 'A Midsummer-night's Dream' • Compiled by Frank Sidgwick
... more foole I shall appeare By the time I linger here, With one fooles head I came to woo, But I goe away with two. Sweet adue, Ile keepe my oath, Patiently ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... crown he had won, kissed it and gave it to Beltane, saying: 'The half of a crown availeth no man, take therefore my half and join it with thine, for well do I know thy heart, my brother—and thou art the elder, and Duke; go therefore and woo this lady to wife, and God speed thee, my lord.' But Beltane said: 'Shame were it in me to take advantage of my years thus; doth age or rank make a man's love more worthy? So, get thee to thy wooing, my brother, ...
— Beltane The Smith • Jeffery Farnol
... hall, the curtain rose upon a modern interior, in which a fashionably attired young lady kissed a frock-coated old gentleman. It was a dire disappointment to me and my comrade, who had come thirsting for gore. But how completely the poet conquered us! Each phrase seemed to woo our reluctant ears, and the pulse of life that beat in the characters and carried along the action awakened in us a delighted recognition. Truth to tell, we had but the very vaguest idea of what was the prima causa ...
— Essays on Scandinavian Literature • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... them] The Duke said rightly that I was alone; Deserted, and dishonoured, and defamed, Stood ever woman so alone indeed? Men when they woo us call us pretty children, Tell us we have not wit to make our lives, And so they mar them for us. Did I say woo? We are their chattels, and their common slaves, Less dear than the poor hound that licks their hand, Less fondled than the hawk ...
— The Duchess of Padua • Oscar Wilde
... the garden trimly bordered, Assisted by the merle, I mean to woo The Heavenly Nine, by young Apollo wardered," And Araminta answered, "Yes, dear, do. The deck chair's in the outhouse; lunch is ordered For ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, May 27, 1914 • Various
... I careless play'd, Or plied the quiv'ring oar, on conquest bent:— Again, beneath the tall elms' silent shade, I woo'd the fair, ...
— The International Weekly Miscellany, Volume I. No. 9. - Of Literature, Art, and Science, August 26, 1850 • Various
... pretends to have been at the University of Padua, but knows no more Latin than many modern critics. Gullio rants thus: 'Pardon, faire lady, though sicke-thoughted Gullio makes amaine unto thee, and LIKE A BOULD-FACED SUTOR 'GINS TO WOO THEE.' This, of course, is from 'Venus and Adonis.' Ingenioso says, aside: 'We shall have nothinge but pure Shakespeare and shreds of poetry that he hath gathered at the theaters.' Gullio next mouths a reminiscence of 'Romeo and Juliet,' and Ingenioso ...
— The Valet's Tragedy and Other Stories • Andrew Lang
... and escort her through his rooms. The idea came to her that she would behave just as if nothing at all had yet happened between them. Not once would he be able to read in her glance the recollection of the previous evening; he would have to win her all over again, he would have to woo her—not with words alone, but also with his music.... Yes.... Wasn't she going to hear him play that very forenoon?... Of course—in the Church.... Then she remembered the sudden jealousy which had seized her the previous evening.... ...
— Bertha Garlan • Arthur Schnitzler
... Pierce the soft labyrinth of a lady's ear With rhymes of this per cent. and that per year? Or court a wife, spread out his wily parts, Like nets or lime-twigs, for rich widows' hearts; Call himself barrister to every wench, And woo in language of the pleas and bench? Language, which Boreas might to Auster hold More rough than forty Germans when they scold. Cursed be the wretch, so venal and so vain: Paltry and proud, as drabs in Drury Lane. 'Tis such a ...
— Essay on Man - Moral Essays and Satires • Alexander Pope
... Christine. Aunt Christine acted on the principle of the proverb, "Spare the rod, spoil the child," and Eadgyth spoke in after days of the whippings she had received because she refused to wear a nun's veil. Professor Freeman tells us how on one occasion the Red King came to Romsey to woo Eadgyth, for it must be remembered that she was now the eldest female representative of the old Wessex kings, and a marriage with her would do much to weld together Normans and English. But, although he was admitted ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: A Short Account of Romsey Abbey • Thomas Perkins
... cannot share your trust, But I will tempt this soul again Whate'er befall. 82 With new promises will I woo her When from the Church she shall have come Forth to the street Upon her journey: I will to her, And beshrew her If I turn not all their ...
— Four Plays of Gil Vicente • Gil Vicente
... I repeat, Thy country's tongue shalt teach; 'Tis not so soft, but far more sweet Than my own native speech; For thou no other tongue didst know, When, scarcely twenty moons ago, Upon Tahite's beach, Thou cam'st to woo me to be thine, With many a speaking ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XIX. No. 542, Saturday, April 14, 1832 • Various
... Nursemaids had done their worst on the subject of stepfathers; fairy tales had presented the pattern. He knew exactly what was going on in her mind, and—quite as earnestly beneath his persiflage as he had set himself to woo the widow—he set himself to win her daughter. It was a matter of moments only before he saw the color coming back into her square little face and the horror seeping out of her eyes. It was a matter of days only until she sought him out and told him, in her mother's presence, that she believed ...
— Play the Game! • Ruth Comfort Mitchell
... came on became tranquil—Silent lovely Rome I now gaze on thee—thy domes are illuminated by the moon—and the ghosts of lovely memories float with the night breeze among thy ruins— contemplating thy loveliness which half soothes my miserable heart I record what I have seen—Tomorrow I will again woo Fantasia to lead me to the same walks & invite her to visit me with her visions which I before neglected—Oh let me learn this lesson while yet it may be useful to me that to a mind hopeless & unhappy as mine—a moment of forgetfullness ...
— Mathilda • Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
... said tenderly, "here at the edge of the forest is your rightful home and not in this grim castle, and here will I woo thee again, ...
— The Strong Arm • Robert Barr
... but recently recovered from the severe wounds with which he had returned from the campaign. But while he knelt before Els and his eyes met hers, love had overmastered him so swiftly and powerfully, that at the end of a few days he determined to woo her. ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... white plume on his top floats inland, that is one sort of weather; when it streams out to sea, that is another. But I can never tell which is which: nor in my experience does it much matter; for it seems impossible for Sorrento to do anything but woo us with gentle weather. But the use of Vesuvius, after all, is to furnish us a background for the violet light at sundown, when the villages at its foot gleam like a silver fringe. I have become convinced ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... Cunning master of debate, Cunning soother of all sorrow, Ruthless robber of to-morrow; Tyrant to our dallying feet, Though patron of a life complete; Like Puck upon a rosy cloud, He rides to distance while we woo him,— Like pale Remorse wrapped in a shroud, He brings the world in sackcloth to him! O dimly seen, and often met As shadowings of a wild regret! O king of us, yet feebly served; Dispenser of the dooms reserved; So silent at the folly done, So deadly when ...
— Along the Shore • Rose Hawthorne Lathrop
... Though love were not, If no breath of his burn through them, Joy must borrow Song from sorrow, Fear teach hope the way to woo them. ...
— Poems & Ballads (Second Series) - Swinburne's Poems Volume III • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... thus begun to woo the girl he loves, he should spend his time with her and amuse her with various games and diversions fitted for their age and acquaintanceship, such as picking and collecting flowers, making garlands of flowers, playing the parts of members of ...
— The Kama Sutra of Vatsyayana - Translated From The Sanscrit In Seven Parts With Preface, - Introduction and Concluding Remarks • Vatsyayana
... incidents and characters, seeking to make it appear that, owing to the substitution of the waiting-maid, and the neglect of the wedded princess of Brittany, Yseult had never belonged to any man save Tristram, nor Tristram to any woman save Yseult; or that King Mark had sent his nephew to woo the Irish queen's daughter merely in hopes of his perishing in the attempt, and that his whole subsequent conduct was due to a mere unnatural hatred of a better knight than himself; touching up here and there with a view to justifying and excusing to some degree the long ...
— Euphorion - Being Studies of the Antique and the Mediaeval in the - Renaissance - Vol. II • Vernon Lee
... he sat beside her, reading, as quiet as a mouse, so that she might sleep if the tumble-down Empire sofa did but woo her that way, she suddenly put up her arm and drew him down ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... parka from her shoulders and standing before them in her purple pajamas, she began again the motion and the song. Slow, dreamy, fantastic was the dance and with it a chant as weird as the song of the north wind. "Woo-woo-woo." It grew in volume. The motion quickened. Her feet touched the floor as lightly as feathers. Her swaying arms made a circle of purple about her. Then, as she spun round and round, her whole body seemed a purple ...
— Triple Spies • Roy J. Snell
... superstitious, I should even beg for an interest in your prayers. I am in the black fit; the evil spirit of King Saul, the hag of the merchant Abudah, the personal devil of the mediaeval monk, is with me—is in me," tapping on his breast. "The vices of my nature are now uppermost; innocent pleasures woo me in vain; I long for Paris, for my wallowing in the mire. See," he would continue, producing a handful of silver, "I denude myself, I am not to be trusted with the price of a fare. Take it, keep it for me, squander it on deleterious candy, throw it in the deepest of the river—I ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 6 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... thought of you, Jimmy. Didn't I woo you with every trick I know, but with my whole heart, too, for all that? It's been ...
— In the Roaring Fifties • Edward Dyson
... said Sholto, "you have all of her favour you need without working by means of another's petticoat. But how about marrying? You cannot wed or woo if you are a clerk. You did not use to be so unfond of a lass in the gloamings along the sweet strand called the Walk of ...
— The Black Douglas • S. R. Crockett
... very close to Caterina's own feeling. But her emotion, instead of being a hindrance to her singing, gave her additional power. Her singing was what she could do best; it was her one point of superiority, in which it was probable she would excel the highborn beauty whom Anthony was to woo; and her love, her jealousy, her pride, her rebellion against her destiny, made one stream of passion which welled forth in the deep rich tones of her voice. She had a rare contralto, which Lady ...
— Scenes of Clerical Life • George Eliot
... adventure, which a new love affair has furnished him. His custom is not new to you, I believe: often does he neglect the heavens for the earth; and you are not ignorant that this master of the Gods loves to take upon himself the guise of man to woo earthly beauties. He knows a hundred ingenious tricks to entrap the most obdurate. He has felt the darts of Alcmene's eyes; and, whilst Amphitryon, her husband, commands the Theban troops on the plains of Boeotia, Jupiter has taken his form, and assuaged his pains, in the possession of ...
— Amphitryon • Moliere
... already, aren't you?" asked Oliver. He got up from the table and approached the mantelpiece as if to show that the discussion was ended. "No, my dear Rosalind," he said, "I'm booked. I am going to woo and wed Miss Ethel Kenyon and her twenty thousand pounds. She will be sick of her fad for the stage in twelve months. And then we shall live very comfortably. But I'll tell you what I will do to please you. I'll flirt with this Lesley girl, ...
— Brooke's Daughter - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... superior of the rest. There is A spur in its halt movements, to become All that the others cannot, in such things As still are free to both, to compensate 320 For stepdame Nature's avarice at first. They woo with fearless deeds the smiles of fortune, And oft, like Timour ...
— The Works of Lord Byron - Poetry, Volume V. • Lord Byron
... me, and I stand here to-night a beggar, save for the sword I wear; but I love you as never man loved woman before, and my life shall be given to tenderness and care for you. Surely your own home with me is better than exile with that cur! And I'll make you love me! I'll woo you till I win you, my sweet, if it take a life to do it." Raising the hand he held, the aide kissed it fondly. "I know I've given you reason to think me disrespectful and rough; I know I have the devil's own temper; ...
— Janice Meredith • Paul Leicester Ford
... and temples where Nature pays homage in the courts of the Divine Architect, I dismiss all modes of conveyance, and with well-nailed shoes, rough clothes, a staff, and a lunch, I take the kingdom by force. When once in, I am royally entertained; for though coy and apparently hard to woo, Nature is a most delightful companion when once ...
— Trail Tales • James David Gillilan
... thou, foolish thing! Heave and flutter to his sighs, 10 While the flatterer, on his wing, Woo'd and whisper'd ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... indeed a kind of venom in his antipathies, nor would he suffer his ears to be assailed or his heart to relent in favour of those against whom he entertained animosities, however capricious and unfounded. In one pursuit only was he consistent: one object only did he woo with an inflexible attachment; and that ...
— Book-Lovers, Bibliomaniacs and Book Clubs • Henry H. Harper
... heart to marry a wife. No daughter of his own land would he woo, though there were many fair maidens in the Rhineland. But there came to him tidings of a Queen that dwelt beyond the sea; not to be matched was she for beauty, nor had she any peer for strength. Her love she proffered to any warrior who could vanquish her ...
— Heroes Every Child Should Know • Hamilton Wright Mabie
... woo'st me to reverse thy Husband's Doom, And I woo thee for Mercy on my self, Why shoud'st thou sue to him for Life and Liberty, For any other, who himself lies dying, Imploring from thy Eyes a ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. II • Aphra Behn
... to have lived here," I said dreamily, when we had got out of the car. "A nymph whose beauty was celebrated all over the world, so that knights from far and near came to this lovely place to woo her." ...
— The Motor Maid • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson
... our blankets, on the floor of a Chinese compound ... adventurers bound up and down the river, to and from Tien-Tsin and Woo-shi-Woo and Pekin ... a sort ...
— Tramping on Life - An Autobiographical Narrative • Harry Kemp
... Peter, Joseph rejoined. I'm thinking it may have been the Samaritans that vexed him. Peter lifted his heavy shoulders and muttered: the Samaritans? We give no heed to them: and he began to speak, at first with diffidence; Joseph had to woo him into speaking, which he did; but after the first few minutes Peter was glib enough, telling Joseph that last night there had been stirs and quarrels among the disciples regarding his boats, and John's and James' boats ...
— The Brook Kerith - A Syrian story • George Moore
... found a weak policy in me, either to betray myself or my country with imaginations; neither am I so far in love with that lodging, watching, care, peril, diseases, ill savours, bad fare, and many other mischiefs that accompany these voyages, as to woo myself again into any of them, were I not assured that the sun covereth not so much riches in any part of the earth. Captain Whiddon, and our chirurgeon, Nicholas Millechamp, brought me a kind of stones like sapphires; what ...
— The Discovery of Guiana • Sir Walter Raleigh
... were covered with a cap of richest Mechlin lace, which had been her mother's and her grandmother's before it came to her. Men spoke already, though she had but twelve years, of the good wife she would be for their sons to woo and win; but she herself was a little gay, simple child, in no wise conscious of her heritage, and she loved no playfellows so well as Jehan Daas's ...
— Stories of Childhood • Various
... this maiden. She smiled on them all and they called her Smiling Moon. Now there lived on the Great Lake a Wyandot chief. He was young and bold. No warrior was as great as Tarhe. Smiling Moon cast a spell on his heart. He came many times to woo her and make her his wife. But Smiling Moon said: 'Go, do great ...
— Betty Zane • Zane Grey
... love entered Guido's heart than he had determined to do some great feat of emprise or adventure, some high achievement of deringdo which should make him worthy to woo her. ...
— Nonsense Novels • Stephen Leacock
... their loins the dark robe clinging, In fleshless hands the torches swinging, Now to and fro, with dark red glow— No blood that lives the dead cheeks know! Where flow the locks that woo to love On human temples—ghastly dwell The serpents, coil'd the brow above, And the green asps with ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. III • Kuno Francke (Editor-in-Chief)
... His mane is dapple-gray; Ride along, ride a cock-horse, Little boy, ride away. Where shall the little boy ride to? To the king's court to woo"— ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... spring their song is sometimes heard before they leave us to woo and to nest in the north. Mr. Bicknell describes it as "a crisp call-note, a simple trill, and a faint, whispered warble, usually much broken, but not ...
— Bird Neighbors • Neltje Blanchan
... woman, and a rich one, Mrs. Kurston turned with all the ardor of a sentimental woman to her first and—as she chose to consider it—her only true affection. She was now in a position to woo the poor lawyer, dependent in a great measure on her continuing to him the management of ...
— Winter Evening Tales • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... saw it now, did not make this supposition too monstrous for belief; that is, if she secretly loved this man who did not dare, or was too burdened with responsibility, to woo her. And who can penetrate a woman's mind? To give him—possibly without his knowledge—what every one who knew him declared him to stand in special need of—money and relief from too exacting work—might have seemed ...
— The Millionaire Baby • Anna Katharine Green
... like to be forgotten. Mothers would have broken hearts if their children left them and never wrote a word or sent any memento of their affection; and God pleads over backsliders as a parent over loved ones who have gone astray. He tries to woo them back. He asks: "What have I done that you ...
— The Way to God and How to Find It • Dwight Moody
... palace at Tara. The princess was the loveliest lady in all the land. She was as proud as she was beautiful. The princes and chieftains of Erin in vain sought her hand in marriage. From Alba and Spain, and the far-off isles of Greece, kings came to woo her. From the northern lands came vikings in stately galleys with brazen prows, whose oarsmen tore the white foam from the emerald seas as they swept towards the Irish coasts. But the lady had vowed she would wed with no one except a battle champion who could excel in music ...
— Irish Fairy Tales • Edmund Leamy
... their high estate to express their pleasure that Dick had found the "nice girl" who was to settle him and make him everything a Cavendish should be. Ah, had that been but all! Dick was no coxcomb; but he had read so much in Chatty's modest eyes as warranted him in believing that he would not woo in vain. Though he could still laugh, being of that nature of man, his heart, in fact, was overwhelmed with a weight of trouble such as might have made the strongest cry out. But crying out was not in his constitution. He went about his occupations, his work, which, ...
— A Country Gentleman and his Family • Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant
... but half undressed, he threw himself upon his uneasy pallet, he was overwhelmed with a weariness amounting to pain, while upon his lips was a bitter after-taste which seemed to permeate his whole being. Thus, at the close of his long exile, did he first woo sleep in the city to which he had so eagerly desired to return. And here, when morning was about to break, the heavy and dreamless sleep of exhaustion came to console the ...
— Casanova's Homecoming • Arthur Schnitzler
... with purple-colour'd face Had ta'en his last leave of the weeping morn, Rose-cheek'd Adonis tried him to the chase; Hunting he lov'd, but love he laugh'd to scorn; 4 Sick-thoughted Venus makes amain unto him, And like a bold-fac'd suitor 'gins to woo him. ...
— Venus and Adonis • William Shakespeare
... be delivered to you by Mrs. Hyslop, landlady of the Globe Tavern here, which for these many years has been my howff, and where our friend Clarke and I have had many a merry squeeze. I am highly delighted with Mr. Allan's etchings. "Woo'd an' married an' a'," is admirable! The grouping is beyond all praise. The expression of the figures, conformable to the story in the ballad, is absolutely faultless perfection. I next admire "Turnim-spike." What I like least is "Jenny said to Jockey." Besides the ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... Your praises are too large; but that your youth And the true blood, which peeps forth fairly through it, Do plainly give you out an unstained shepherd; With wisdom I might fear, my Doricles, You woo'd me the false way. ...
— Characters of Shakespeare's Plays • William Hazlitt |
