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Costly   Listen
adjective
Costly  adj.  
1.
Of great cost; expensive; dear. "He had fitted up his palace in the most costly and sumptuous style, for the accomodation of the princess."
2.
Gorgeous; sumptuous. (Poetic.) "To show how costly summer was at hand."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Costly" Quotes from Famous Books



... costly articles of food for the sick we relied mostly on the agents of the Sanitary Commission. I do not wish to doubt the value of these organizations, which gained so much applause during our civil war, for no one can question the motives ...
— The Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman, Complete • William T. Sherman

... and fruitage the characters of their immediate parent and it almost appears as if the good qualities of these hybrids may be perpetuated from seeds, thus dispensing in a great measure with vegetative propagation—always costly and ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association, Report of the Proceedings at the Seventh Annual Meeting • Various

... picture, these two women, as they stood together for a moment on the green with the brilliant September sun throwing golden reflections and luminous shadows on their slender forms. Marguerite, tall and queen-like in her rich gown, and costly jewels, wearing with glorious pride the invisible crown of happy wifehood: Juliette, slim and girlish, dressed all in white, with a soft, straw hat on her fair curls, and bearing on an otherwise young ...
— The Elusive Pimpernel • Baroness Emmuska Orczy

... also appeared out of a hollow. It was a high, narrow gig of ancient make, drawn by a horse too low for the shafts and too fat for work. In the gig sat two people closely pressed together by reason of its narrow dimensions. The lady wore a black silk dress, of good and indeed costly material, but white with the dust that had settled upon it. Her hands were covered with black cotton gloves, and she held a black umbrella. Her face was hidden by a black veil; thin corkscrew curls fringed the ...
— Hodge and His Masters • Richard Jefferies

... zone. A quick turnaround is not in the offing in the foreseeable future. Growth in 2001-03 fell short of 1%, rising to 1.7% in 2004. The modernization and integration of the eastern German economy continues to be a costly long-term process, with annual transfers from west to east amounting to roughly $70 billion. Germany's aging population, combined with high unemployment, has pushed social security outlays to a level exceeding contributions from workers. Structural rigidities ...
— The 2005 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency

... struck me as being a small, wiry, sly person, of fifty or thereabouts, with a dark brown or Creole complexion and watchful light grey eyes. Nor will I mention, for the reasons just alleged, that I thought her dress, though it was of the plainest black silk, inappropriately costly in texture and unnecessarily refined in trimming and finish, for a person in her position in life. I should not like these things to be said of me, and therefore it is my duty not to say them of Mrs. Rubelle. I will merely mention that her manners were, not perhaps unpleasantly reserved, but ...
— The Woman in White • Wilkie Collins

... familiar to every one who has visited Bohemia, as also the spot of his martyrdom at Prague, indicated by some brass stars let into the parapet of the Steinerne Bruecke, on the right-hand side going from Prague to the suburb called the Kleinseite. As the story goes, he was offered the most costly bribes by Wenzel, king of Bohemia, to betray his trust, and after his repeated refusal was put to the torture, and then thrown into the Moldau, where he was drowned. The body of the saint was embalmed, and is now preserved in a costly silver shrine of almost fabulous ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 51, October 19, 1850 • Various

... parents had been obtained the marriage was considered invalid and the children illegitimate. (Garcilasso de la Vega, I., 207.) As regards the Mexicans, Bandelier shows (612, 620) that the position of woman was "little better than that of a costly animal," and he cites evidence indicating that as late as 1555 it was ordained at a concile that since it is customary among the Indians "not to marry without permission of their principals ... and the marriage among free persons is not as free as ...
— Primitive Love and Love-Stories • Henry Theophilus Finck

... neglected temples of Amon and the elder gods once more rang with the hymns of praise. Inscriptions tell us that the King "restored the temples from the marshes of the Delta to Nubia. He fashioned a hundred images with all their bodies correct, and with all splendid costly stones. He established for them daily offerings every day. All the vessels of their temples were wrought of silver and gold. He equipped them with priests and with ritual-priests, and with the choicest of the army. He transferred to them lands and cattle, supplied with ...
— The Treasury of Ancient Egypt - Miscellaneous Chapters on Ancient Egyptian History and Archaeology • Arthur E. P. B. Weigall

... looked better. Her cheeks glowed with health. She was happy—Alan was safe, what else mattered? She was radiant. Baron Childs did not conceal his admiration. She wore costly furs; they became her well. She walked proudly because of her hero, the man of the hour, the bravest ...
— The Rider in Khaki - A Novel • Nat Gould

... into a magnificent room, where a grand ball was being held. The guests surrounded the harper and became very friendly, and, to his wonder, addressed him by name. This hall was magnificently furnished. The furniture was of the most costly materials, many things were made of solid gold. A waiter handed him a golden cup filled with sparkling wine, which the harper gladly quaffed. He was then asked to play for the company, and this he did to the manifest satisfaction of the ...
— Welsh Folk-Lore - a Collection of the Folk-Tales and Legends of North Wales • Elias Owen

... the loss of his expectations when you realized your hope of an heir; you told me also how this generous intention on your part had been frustrated by a natural indignation at the elder Gordon's conduct in his harassing and costly litigation, and by the addition you had been tempted to make to the estate in a purchase which added to its acreage, but at a rate of interest which diminished your own income, and precluded the possibility of further savings. Now, chancing to meet your ...
— Kenelm Chillingly, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... interesting and popular Mrs. Beaumont. The cavalcade reached from the principal front of the house to the south gate of the park, a distance of three-quarters of a mile. Mrs. Beaumont and her daughter, two lovely brides, in a superb landau, were attired in the most elegant, becoming, fashionable, and costly manner, their dress consisting of the finest lace, over white satin. Mrs. Beaumont's was point lace, and she was also distinguished by a long veil of the most exquisite texture, which added a tempered grace to beauty in its meridian. In the same landau appeared ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. V - Tales of a Fashionable Life • Maria Edgeworth

... nature. It is the outcome of many qualities which need cultivation; the soil that produces such fruit must have been carefully tilled. In our day epistolary correspondence has been in great measure destroyed by the penny post and by rapidity of communication. In the last century postage was costly: and although the burden was frequently and unjustly lightened by franks, the transmission of letters was slow and uncertain. Letters, therefore, were seldom written unless the writer had something definite to say, and had leisure in which ...
— The Age of Pope - (1700-1744) • John Dennis

... be real Indians; and the Aethiopians, sometimes known by that name, were never used by the ancients as guards or followers: they were the trifling, though costly objects of female and royal luxury, (Terent. Eunuch. act. i. scene ii Sueton. in August. c. 83, with a good note of Casaubon, ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 4 • Edward Gibbon

... the fair, fragile being, whose attitude was one of intense suffering. Her bright hopes had faded at sight of that colorless garb, and the bridal wreath was to wither on her brow! What to her sad soul were the costly things before her? The jewels that sparkled on their snow-white satin case, the long fairy veil of beautiful lace that lay side by side with ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol. XXXII No. 2. February 1848 • Various

... (not necessarily underfed), ill-clothed, unwashed, and deprived of good air for sleeping. What is the duty of the public? This is one of the burning questions of the moment. Send missionary teachers to the homes, some say, but that is costly; the selection of the suitable missionary is difficult, and the result may be slight. Others say, give one good luncheon at the school, for which the children pay in part or in whole, and make that an education ...
— Euthenics, the science of controllable environment • Ellen H. Richards

... silver and silk of different colours: under the canopy of state are these words embroidered in pearl, "VIVAT HENRICUS OCTAVUS." Here is besides a small chapel richly hung with tapestry, where the Queen performs her devotions. In her bedchamber the bed was covered with very costly coverlids of silk: at no great distance from this room we were shown a bed, the tester of which was worked by Anne Boleyn, and presented by her to her husband Henry VIII. All the other rooms, being very numerous, are adorned with tapestry of gold, silver, and velvet, in some of which were ...
— Travels in England and Fragmenta Regalia • Paul Hentzner and Sir Robert Naunton

... suggestions of the devil; and you will see them therefore trotting regularly to mass, to midday offices, even to vespers. This false devotion exhibits itself, first of all in the shape of pretty books of devotion in a costly binding, by the aid of which these dear sinners attempt in vain to fulfill the duties imposed by religion, and long neglected ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac

... extraordinary that after so many years of constant practice in works of mercy you are not ruined. Your life seems to me one vast symphony of generosity, munificence, charities, gifts and attentions as delicate as they are costly. To begin with, there are Garibaldi and his people, and to continue indefinitely there are those poor German fellows, ill at Rome, and buried there at your expense; and then the fighting Cretans, the infirm people in your hospital at Jena, the societies for the protection of ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 2: "From Rome to the End" • Franz Liszt; letters collected by La Mara and translated

... Mrs. Hoar and ask her to give him a dollar, as a favor to her she would do it. The draft on the bank of kindness was duly honored. And I think the legacy was valued as highly by her who paid it as if it had been a costly gem or a work of art from an ...
— Autobiography of Seventy Years, Vol. 1-2 • George Hoar

... would undoubtedly have been more hazardous and much more decisive, one way or the other, than any of the plans actually adopted. It certainly promised success proportionate to the cost, instead of a costly failure, which the assault of fortified lines had almost invariably ...
— Forty-Six Years in the Army • John M. Schofield

... asked why they did not work their mines continually for the silver. They explained that they could not work to good advantage for lack of transportation facilities which made it very difficult and costly to bring in machinery for developing their prospects into mines. Therefore, until the advent of railroads they chose to perform ...
— Tales of Aztlan • George Hartmann

... whether this giddy child, or my sage self, have most pleasure in looking at the shop-windows. We love the silks of sunny hue, that glow within the darkened premises of the spruce drygoods' men; we are pleasantly dazzled by the burnished silver, and the chased gold, the rings of wedlock and the costly love-ornaments, glistening at the window of the jeweller; but Annie, more than I, seeks for a glimpse of her passing figure in the dusty looking-glasses at the hardware stores. All that is bright ...
— Little Annie's Ramble (From "Twice Told Tales") • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... simple yet elegant costume of silver-gray silk, trimmed with rich black lace. A cluster of pearls gleamed fair and white at her throat, and a dainty little cap of costly lace rested lightly upon her soft, brown hair, which as yet had not a visible ...
— His Heart's Queen • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon

... of the way was lined with files of spectators. Nothing, indeed, was ever seen so beautiful and brilliant in the sultan's palace, and the richest robes of the emirs of his court were not to be compared to the costly dresses of these slaves, whom they supposed ...
— The Junior Classics, V5 • Edited by William Patten

... the maximum of work out of them, requires long experience and constant attention. The carter, therefore, is a man of much importance on a farm. If he is up to his duties he is a most valuable servant; if he neglects them he is a costly nuisance, not so much from his pay, but because of the hindrance and disorganisation of the whole farm-work which such ...
— Hodge and His Masters • Richard Jefferies

... influential at court. The name no doubt expresses some clinging hope which La Verendrye still cherished of obtaining help from the King. Already he was hard pressed for resources. Where were the means to come from for this costly work of building forts? From time to time he sent eastward canoes laden with furs which, after a long and difficult journey, reached Montreal. The traders to whom the furs were consigned sold them and kept the money as their own on account ...
— The Conquest of New France - A Chronicle of the Colonial Wars, Volume 10 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • George M. Wrong

... his leave of the Queen. But his protestations had altered her mind not at all. She sent him messages daily, and costly gifts, but these he refused and returned, till at last the royal dame, stung to anger by his repulses, conceived a violent hatred for him, and resolved to be revenged upon him for the manner in which ...
— Legends & Romances of Brittany • Lewis Spence

... and if Bartley had thought, as other collegians think, of devoting himself to newspaper life, he would have turned his face toward the city where its prizes are won,—the ten and fifteen dollar reporterships for which a font years' course of the classics is not too costly a preparation. But, to tell the truth, he had never regarded his newspaper as anything but a make-shift, by which he was to be carried over a difficult and anxious period of his life, and enabled to attempt something worthier his powers. He had no illusions concerning it; if ...
— A Modern Instance • William Dean Howells

... clothier would be able to furnish proper clothes for his party, and his guess had proved a correct one. Moreover, the treasury of Dick & Co. had been easily able to endure the drain, for these white clothes had not been costly. ...
— The High School Boys' Training Hike • H. Irving Hancock

... candle; this delighteth; this adoreth: yet all but three men. Then, for your ladies, the most proud, witty creatures, all things apprehending, nothing understanding, perpetually laughing, curious maintainers of fools, mercers, and minstrels, costly to be kept, miserably keeping, all disdaining but their painter and apothecary, 'twixt whom and them there is this reciprock commerce, their beauties maintain their painters, and ...
— Cynthia's Revels • Ben Jonson

... Leonora's marquee was filled with costly knick-knacks, which, as Meta justly said, had not half the grace and appropriate air that reigned where Flora had arranged, and where Margaret had worked, with the peculiar freshness and finish that distinguished everything to which she set ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge

... peace. Napoleon still struggled for the dictatorship of Europe, and Englishmen were wondering to what extent they would have to share in the attempt to foil his ambition. The Peninsular campaign was costly enough to the British taxpayer; but his chagrin vanished—for the moment, at least—when Wellington's victories appealed to his pride. Since the beginning of the century the attention of Parliament and people had been directed mainly to foreign affairs. ...
— Lord John Russell • Stuart J. Reid

... tulwar that he had drawn across his knees when he sat down. It was a magnificent weapon, such as a cunning Indian or Persian cutler and jeweller would devote months of his life in making; for the hilt was of richly chased silver inlaid with gold, while costly jewels were set wherever a place could be found, and the golden sheath was completely encrusted with pearls. It must have been worth a little fortune; and, while my eyes rested upon the gorgeous weapon, he smiled, ...
— Gil the Gunner - The Youngest Officer in the East • George Manville Fenn

... ministers, and I surmised that Mr. Manners had rented this house, and its furniture, from some great man who had gone out of office, plainly a person of means and taste. The hall, like that of many of the great town-houses, was in semi-darkness, but I remarked that the stair railing was of costly iron-work and polished brass; and, as I went up, that the stone niches in the wall were filled with the busts of statesmen, and I recognized among these, that of the great Walpole. A great copper gilt chandelier hung above. But the picture of the drawing-room I was led into, with all its colours, ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... this subject. We go a step further, and find that we can decompose metals as well as liquids, and that we can make a pure metal out of an impure one, as well as make the foulest water pure. But we shall also, in the course of our experiments, find that a cheap metal can be coated with a costly one by means of electricity—that we can ...
— Electricity for Boys • J. S. Zerbe

... Moreover, the prince wrote a letter to the princess's father, advising him of all that had befallen her and how she was now married to him and in all health and happiness, and sent it by a messenger, together with costly presents and rarities. The messenger, in due course, arrived at the city of Senaa and delivered the letter and the presents to the King, who, when he read the former, rejoiced greatly and accepted the presents, rewarding ...
— The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume IV • Anonymous

... about eighty years ago. There was a chest of drawers against the wall, in which we found, half rotted away, old- fashioned articles of a man's dress, such as might have been worn eighty or a hundred years ago by a gentleman of some rank; costly steel buckles and buttons, like those yet worn in court dresses, a handsome court sword; in a waistcoat which had once been rich with gold lace, but which was now blackened and foul with damp, we found five guineas, a few silver coins, and an ivory ticket, probably ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.

... sweeping inquiry, you see; hence this necessary comparison with shop, factory, and office work. As to the other professions, taking, for instance, law or medicine, preparations for practice must be very costly. A girl puts her family to a great strain to pay her college expenses, or if some family friend advances funds, when she finally passes all the dreaded examinations, and has the legal right to hang out her ...
— Stage Confidences • Clara Morris

... territorial acquisitions, and whether it was proper for them to enjoy a monopoly of trade. Some of the members argued that the company had a right, while on the other side some maintained that, from the costly protection afforded it, government had an equitable claim to the revenues of all territory acquired by conquest. It was the opinion of the cabinet, that the state did not possess its proper share of the company's profits, and the chancellor of the exchequer conceived that by either taking ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan

... upon Italy, and was coincident not with the murderous war against Hannibal and the subsequent campaigns, costly though they were, in Spain, Syria, and Macedonia, but with the Hellenisation of social life. Lucan, under Nero, complains that the towns have lost more than half their inhabitants, and that the country-side lies waste. ...
— Outspoken Essays • William Ralph Inge

... But it happened that the china which had come to them from their forebears had for the most part been broken in the course of their wanderings from place to place, and in its place was an ornate and rather costly, and unpaid-for, set. Eddy now quite openly lifted the saucer of thin, pink-and-gold china, in which his teacup rested, and held ...
— The Debtor - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

... apothecary at Boston, had died in 1833, leaving John, his only son, a fortune of some L10,000. In rather less than ten years Webster had run through the whole of his inheritance. He had built himself a costly mansion in Cambridge, spent a large sum of money in collecting minerals, and delighted to exercise lavish hospitality. By living consistently beyond his means he found himself at length entirely dependent on his professional earnings. These were small. His ...
— A Book of Remarkable Criminals • H. B. Irving

... articles the poor wretches had stowed away in their dirty cellars. There was everything from barrels of sugar and starch to tobacco and bird-seed. Said a morning paper: "Mahogany and rosewood chairs with brocade upholstering, marble-top tables and stands, costly paintings, and hundreds of delicate and valuable mantel ornaments, are daily found in low hovels up-town. Every person in whose possession these articles are discovered disclaims all knowledge of the same, except that they found them in the street, and took them in to prevent them being ...
— The Great Riots of New York 1712 to 1873 • J.T. Headley

... early days. The bonnet occupied a place in the store of Samuel Hill at New Salem. It was taken from the store by Mrs. Hill, worn for a time by her, and has been carefully preserved to this day. It is an imported bonnet—a genuine Leghorn—and of a kind so costly that Mr. Hill made only an occasional sale of one. Its ...
— McClure's Magazine December, 1895 • Edited by Ida M. Tarbell

... social contributions on wages - have made unemployment a long-term, not just cyclical, problem, while Germany's aging population has pushed social security outlays to exceed contributions from workers. The integration and upgrading of the eastern German economy remains a costly long-term problem, with annual transfers from the west amounting to roughly $100 billion. Growth slowed to 1.5% in 1999, largely due to lower export demand and still-low business confidence. Recovering Asian ...
— The 2000 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.

... dynamic private sector is denied both financing and access to markets. Reform of the banking sector is proceeding slowly, raising concerns that the country will be unable to tap sufficient domestic savings to maintain current high levels of growth. Administrative and legal barriers are also causing costly delays for foreign investors and are raising similar doubts about Vietnam's ability to maintain the inflow of foreign capital. Ideological bias in favor of state intervention and control of the economy is slowing progress toward a ...
— The 1998 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.

... of pleasure trips, of visits from and to good friends, of many little events of every-day life. Then came some accounts, written in pencil, of shopping expeditions to the city. Costly laces and jewels had been bought, and linen garments for children by the dozen. "She is rich, generous, and charitable," thought the detective, for the book showed that the considerable sums which had been spent here had not been for the writer herself. ...
— The Case of The Pocket Diary Found in the Snow • Grace Isabel Colbron and Augusta Groner

... despondency. Assassination has never changed the history of the world. I will not refer to the remote past, though an accident has made the most memorable instance of antiquity at this moment fresh in the minds and memory of all around me. But even the costly sacrifice of a Caesar did not propitiate the inexorable destiny of his country. If we look to modern times, to times at least with the feelings of which we are familiar, and the people of which were animated and influenced by the same interests as ourselves, the violent deaths of two ...
— The World's Best Orations, Vol. 1 (of 10) • Various

... the pompous pile, Or glitt'ring, costly dome, I'd gaze upon those ancient trees, Round ...
— The Snow-Drop • Sarah S. Mower

... seems at times, almost universal. No one but a woman, unless it were a young man of true fibre, would have broken the vessel. Your middle-aged or old man would have cautiously taken out the stopper, that the costly unguent might have been expended economically, even on the Saviour. But this woman, in her uncalculating devotion, broke the vessel, that all its contents might issue forth in one consecrated gift of love. And it was what this broken vase symbolized that ...
— Men in the Making • Ambrose Shepherd

... people prove and probe Each eye's profound and glorious globe, Till they detect the kindred spark In those depths so dear and dark, {580} Like the spots that snap and burst and flee, Circling over the midnight sea. And on that round young cheek of thine I make them recognize the tinge, As when of the costly scarlet wine They drip so much as will impinge And spread in a thinnest scale afloat One thick gold drop from the olive's coat Over a silver plate whose sheen Still through the mixture shall be seen. {590} For so I prove thee, to one and all, Fit, when my people ope ...
— Introduction to Robert Browning • Hiram Corson

... the side of England to the side of France after the Treaty of Arras had been bought by the cession to its Duke of the towns along the Somme, of that Picardy which brought the Burgundian frontier to some fifty miles from Paris. Sacrifices even more costly would have to buy the aid of Burgundy in a ...
— History of the English People, Volume III (of 8) - The Parliament, 1399-1461; The Monarchy 1461-1540 • John Richard Green

... bird begging his line to hold and he the one who made that costly fumble!" cried a Yale supporter, who somehow had obtained a seat in the Harvard sections. It was next to that of Davies'. "Wonder if he thinks they'll pay any ...
— Interference and Other Football Stories • Harold M. Sherman

... administration. In stages over the next dozen years, Iraq attained its independence as a kingdom in 1932. A "republic" was proclaimed in 1958, but in actuality a series of military strongmen ruled the country until 2003, the last was SADDAM Husayn. Territorial disputes with Iran led to an inconclusive and costly eight-year war (1980-88). In August 1990, Iraq seized Kuwait, but was expelled by US-led, UN coalition forces during the Gulf War of January-February 1991. Following Kuwait's liberation, the UN Security Council (UNSC) required ...
— The 2007 CIA World Factbook • United States

... every luxury wealth can command. You are lounging, perhaps, upon a softly cushioned divan, with tiny, slippered feet half buried in the glowing carpet. There are brilliants blazing upon the delicate hand which shields your face from the warm sunlight, and as you glance around, a costly mirror reveals at full length ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 6 June 1848 • Various

... Evelyn—who, where she once liked, found it difficult to withdraw regard—sought to overlook Caroline's blemishes, and to persuade herself of a thousand good qualities below the surface; and her generous nature found constant opportunity of venting itself in costly gifts, selected from the London parcels, with which the officious Mr. Merton relieved the monotony of the rectory. These gifts Caroline could not refuse without paining her young friend. She took them reluctantly, for, to do her justice, ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... intoxication and madness, an impenetrable horror, an exhibition of hypocrisy and disease, A dizziness seized her as if she were falling from a high tower. She was ashamed of her showy dress, its conspicuous finery, and in passionate excitement she tore the costly lace from her arms and, with an expression of the utmost loathing, threw ...
— The German Classics, v. 20 - Masterpieces of German Literature • Various

... costly robes aside," For you may never be another's bride: That line I learnt not in the ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 5 • Edited by E. V. Lucas

... wedding present a very costly and magnificent dining-room set, fondly hoping that the jeweller's clerk would experience a great deal of trouble in living up to it. At first I had thought of a Marie Antoinette bedroom set, but gave it up ...
— A Fool and His Money • George Barr McCutcheon

... was piled high with books of all descriptions, some in sets and others separate, from cheap reprints to costly volumes filled with ...
— Richard Dare's Venture • Edward Stratemeyer

... from his business, or his inheritance, or both. He lives in a luxuriously appointed home, with many fine pictures and works of art and curios which it is enjoyable to have. He has a choice library including some fine costly old prints and editions, and enjoys adding rare books on subjects in which he is specially interested. He belongs to some literary and social and athletic clubs. He has an interesting family growing up around him whose education is being carefully looked after. He is ...
— Quiet Talks on Following the Christ • S. D. Gordon

... universal sympathy, pretended or real, supplied the attentions that flattered and pleased when they led the giddy world of fashion. The silence of grief hung around the magnificent saloons, once so gay; the wardrobe that contained the costly apparel, the casket that treasured the pearls of Ceylon and gems of Golconda, were all closed and neglected. The treatment of their father was an agony of domestic trouble, in which they were tried as ...
— Alvira: the Heroine of Vesuvius • A. J. O'Reilly

... things, however, the first experiments will be costly and must be combined with business of a sure kind. In this instance the heating and hot-water supply was made possible by a combination with factory plant. But if a larger group of, say, one hundred houses were run by a central establishment, the Morris Building Company estimates ...
— The Cost of Shelter • Ellen H. Richards

... dining-room and drew up the blind. Though the furniture was less than a year old, and by no means of the cheapest description, slovenly housekeeping had dulled the brightness of every surface. On a chair lay a broken toy, one of those elaborate and costly playthings which serve no purpose but to stunt a child's imagination. Though the time was midsummer, not a flower appeared among the pretentious ornaments. The pictures were a strange medley—autotypes of ...
— In the Year of Jubilee • George Gissing

... still lingered in Central and Northern Europe long after its use had been abandoned for that of iron in the South. Neither, when it was first introduced, did it put a stop to the use of stone. It was necessarily costly, and on its first appearance in a country, brought hither by trade, could only be afforded by rich and powerful chiefs and warriors. As time advanced, and they learned to make it cheaper, and each country took up its ...
— The Prehistoric World - Vanished Races • E. A. Allen

... also with some of the worst parts of our social system, but capable of being directed to better result than this commercial endeavour, we see lately a most powerful impulse given to the production of costly works of art, by the various causes which promote the sudden accumulation of wealth in the hands of private persons. We have thus a vast and new patronage, which, in its present agency, is injurious to our ...
— Lectures on Art - Delivered before the University of Oxford in Hilary term, 1870 • John Ruskin

... already, or will have been before spring, in all the great continental libraries from Russia to France, and from Denmark to Turkey. In the second place, copies in cloth have been presented to reformers, publicists, editors, etc, in every country of the old world. This generous distribution of a costly work has already begun to produce an effect. Besides a large number of private letters from all parts of Europe acknowledging the receipt of the volumes and bestowing on their contents the highest praise, the History has been reviewed in numerous reform, ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various

... round to face the sofa and stared at the stranger with haughty scrutiny. Her flowing skirts seemed to fill the little room; her cloak was thrown back, showing a glimpse of costly sable lining; her imperious beauty made her appear older than the gentle Bridgie, a hundred times more formidable. The formal bend of the head brought with it an acute sense of discomfiture to the recipient. For the first time since crossing that hospitable threshold ...
— More about Pixie • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey

... is to convert the nitrogen of our soils, or of green crops plowed under, or of manure, into nitric acid, and then to convert this nitric acid into profitable products with as little loss as possible. Nitrogen, or rather nitric acid, is the most costly ingredient in plant food, and unfortunately it is very easily washed out of the soil and lost. Perhaps it is absolutely impossible to entirely prevent all loss from leaching; but it is certainly well worth our while to understand the subject, and to know exactly what we ...
— Talks on Manures • Joseph Harris

... ciuilitie haue ordained to couer their naked bodies, would be halfe ashamed or greatly out of countenaunce to be seen in that sort, and perchance do then thinke themselves more amiable in euery mans eye, when they be in their richest attire, suppose of silkes or tyssews & costly embroderies, then when they go in cloth or in any other plaine and simple apparell. Euen so cannot our vulgar Poesie shew it self either gallant or gorgious, if any lymme be left naked and bare and not clad in his kindly clothes and coulours, such as may conuey ...
— The Arte of English Poesie • George Puttenham

... unfaltering enthusiast when once his great idea had possession of him, Mr. Field was a man of strong common sense. From first to last he went upon well-ascertained facts; when he failed he did so simply because other facts, which he could not possibly know, had to be disclosed by costly experience. Messrs. Whitehouse and Bright, electricians to his company, were instructed to begin a preliminary series of experiments. They united a continuous stretch of wires laid beneath land and water for a distance of 2,000 miles, and found that through this extraordinary circuit they ...
— Little Masterpieces of Science: - Invention and Discovery • Various

... of a couple of quaint, old-fashioned settees, and on one of these he noticed a straw hat with blue ribbons—did it belong to her?—and on the other, he saw a parasol of a certain peculiar watered silk, with carved, costly handle, set with a large blue stone. Where had he seen this parasol before? A painful presentiment seized him, and, without giving himself time to clear his recollection, he hastily rang the bell. What he would do, he must do quickly. ...
— Captain Mansana and Mother's Hands • Bjoernstjerne Bjoernson

... "taught men to make swords, and knives, and skins, and coats of mail, and made known to them metals, and the art of working them, bracelets and ornaments, and the use of antimony, and the beautifying of the eyebrows, and the most costly and choicest stones, and all colouring tincture, so ...
— The Works of Lord Byron - Poetry, Volume V. • Lord Byron

... magnificent dimensions, of lamps, lustres, and sconces. The ceiling and borders set off into compartments, showered over with arabesques, the gilded pillars, the moving mass of promenaders, the endless labyrinth of human beings assembled from every region in Europe, the costly dresses, repeated by a host of mirrors, all this combined, which the eye conveys to the brain at a single glance, utterly fails in description. As with the eye, so it is with the ear; at every step a new language falls ...
— The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume I (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz

... exposed to the indignities inflicted on Carbajal's, whose quarters were hung in chains on the four great roads leading to Cuzco. Centeno saved Pizarro's body from being stripped, by redeeming his costly raiment from the executioner, and in this sumptuous shroud it was laid in the chapel of the convent of Our Lady of Mercy in Cuzco. It was the same spot where, side by side, lay the bloody remains of the Almagros, ...
— The History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William H. Prescott

... triumph over the Christians, threatening to make them feel as fatal effects of their severity, as they themselves had heretofore from the Roman powers.[20] The news was no sooner spread abroad than contributions came in from all hands. The Jewish women stripped themselves of their most costly ornaments to contribute towards the expense of the building. The emperor also, who was no less impatient to see it finished, in order to encourage them in the undertaking, told them he had found in their mysterious sacred books that this was the time in which they were to return to their country, ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler

... character, yet of surpassing sweetness of disposition; singularly disdainful of office, and indeed of preferment of every sort; a profuse maker and a prodigal spender of money; who, his needs and recognition assured, cared nothing at all for what he regarded as the costly glories of the little great men who rattled round in places often ...
— Marse Henry, Complete - An Autobiography • Henry Watterson

... us. Then come rivers, hills, accidents, heavy and muddy roads. These are so many difficulties to be overcome; in order to do which, causeways are constructed, bridges built, roads cut and paved, railroads established, &c. But all this is costly, and the article transported must bear its portion of the expense. There are robbers, too, on the roads, sometimes, and this necessitates railway guards, a police ...
— What Is Free Trade? - An Adaptation of Frederic Bastiat's "Sophismes Econimiques" - Designed for the American Reader • Frederic Bastiat

... regiments be cracked to pieces because their leaders did not know how to withdraw them gradually from the furnace of action, and the lesson will be all the better remembered because taught by a costly example. Our early mishaps were all predicted, sometimes in formal shape, as in various letters dated long before the breaking out of hostilities, and very often in the common talk of those about us. But, after ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, No. 48, October, 1861 • Various

... three with his repeating rifle, and, when the last struggle came, appeal to his revolver and knife. He smiled, grimly at the reflection, that he had every ground for believing, that the victory of the Murhapas would prove the most costly they had ever won. Jared Long was his equal in markmanship and coolness, and, as he coolly remarked, there would be no ammunition wasted, ...
— The Land of Mystery • Edward S. Ellis

... "life-blood of the ranch" flashed across her suddenly. She knew nothing of irrigation or the costly appliances by which the Californian agriculturist opposed the long summer droughts. She only vaguely guessed that the dreadful earthquake had struck at the prosperity of those people whom only a few hours ago she had been proud to call ...
— A Sappho of Green Springs • Bret Harte

... years King Henry, we are told, asked the Chancellor why he had erected so magnificent a place. "To show how noble a palace a subject may offer to his Sovereign," was the reply of the Cardinal—a truly courtly and an unquestionably costly compliment. The King accepted the noble gift, but Wolsey continued from time to time to occupy his own whilom palace at Hampton and was besides given permission to make use of the royal palace at Richmond. This was in 1525, and already it may be ...
— Hampton Court • Walter Jerrold

... said the curate; "but I cannot persuade myself of its truth; and if it has been invented, the author's invention is faulty, for it is impossible to imagine any husband so foolish as to try such a costly experiment as Anselmo's. If it had been represented as occurring between a gallant and his mistress it might pass; but between husband and wife there is something of an impossibility about it. As to the way in which the story is told, however, I ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

... the statements of Napoleon I, his assumption that victory is always on the side of the strongest battalions was costly. ...
— Battle Studies • Colonel Charles-Jean-Jacques-Joseph Ardant du Picq

... of the fairies, there lived a young princess in a very grand palace. Its walls were of the purest white marble, the doors were of orange-wood, the window-frames were of gold, and the furniture of the rooms was of the most costly description. The princess's drawing-room was hung with beautiful tapestry, the curtains were of the richest crimson silk, all over golden flowers, the mirrors reached from the floor to the ceiling, and the chairs were ...
— Tales From Catland, for Little Kittens • Tabitha Grimalkin

... horses—and there was the pretty, smiling bride herself upon her brother's arm. How sweet she looked as she mounted the broad grey steps, with cheeks a little rosy, eyes downcast, and her smiles half concealed by the costly lace in which she had veiled herself! There was never a prettier bride than Ethel Kenyon, although she had not attired herself in all the bridal finery that ...
— Brooke's Daughter - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant

... asylum, fled the offending slave, And garlanded the statue and implored His young lost Lord to save: Remembrance then Softened the father, and he loved to see The votive wreath renewed, and the rich smoke Curl from the costly censer slow and sweet. From Egypt soon the sorrow-soothing rites Divulging spread; before your [7] idol forms By every hearth the blinded Pagan knelt, Pouring his prayers to these, and offering there Vain ...
— Poems • Robert Southey

... I can look deeper and see the hidden meaning." Sometimes diamonds are done up in rough packages, so that their value cannot be seen. When the tabernacle was built in the wilderness there was nothing rich in its outside appearance. The costly things were all within, and its outward covering of rough badger skin gave no hint of the valuable things which it contained. God may send you, dear friends, some costly packages. Do not worry if they are done up in rough wrappings. You may be sure there are treasures of love, ...
— Days of Heaven Upon Earth • Rev. A. B. Simpson

... also, as I then believed, for the last time. With all its faults it is a great building, and, though unfinished, is effective; its very size and pretension give it a certain majesty. What will be the fate of that vast pile, and of those other costly public edifices at Washington, should the South succeed wholly in their present enterprise? If Virginia should ever become a part of the Southern republic, Washington cannot remain the capital ...
— Volume 2 • Anthony Trollope

... the treasury were not of her creation. Nevertheless the change in social habits, and the alteration in the value of money, had prevented the reduction of the expenditure from being carried to the extent which had been contemplated; the marriage had been in many ways costly, and large sums had been spent in restoring plundered church plate. So great had been the difficulties of the treasury, that, although fresh loans had been contracted with the Jews, the wages of the household were ...
— The Reign of Mary Tudor • James Anthony Froude

... "St. Elizabeth" we admire the composition of the work, but the subject rather repels than holds us. With the diadem of a queen upon her head, with the delicate hands of a gentlewoman, and from a costly basin St. Elizabeth bathes the scrofulous head of a beggar. Her ladies-in-waiting turn from the loathsome object of her care, while other patients await their turn. In the distance is the court feast that goes on joyously in the palace while Elizabeth, ...
— Great Artists, Vol 1. - Raphael, Rubens, Murillo, and Durer • Jennie Ellis Keysor

... hope of securing some of the splendid prizes that were at that time to be obtained through pluck and audacity, in the shape of Spanish galleons richly and heavily laden with spices and gold from Manila, plate from Acapulco, or costly silks and fabrics and treasure untold from the new Spanish ...
— Across the Spanish Main - A Tale of the Sea in the Days of Queen Bess • Harry Collingwood

... piano that met his doubtful gaze; a vast and costly instrument, stained with the rains of the afternoon and defaced with recent scratches. The light of the vesta was reflected from the varnished sides, like a staice in quiet water; and in the farther end of the room the shadow ...
— The Wrong Box • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne

... base ball as a national pastime, in fact, that the growth of athletic sports in general in popularity is largely due; and the game pointed out to the mercantile community of our large cities that "all work and no play" is the most costly policy they can pursue, both in regard to the advantages to their own health, and in the improvement in the work of their employees, the combination of work and play judiciously, yielding results in better work and more satisfactory service than was possible ...
— Spalding's Baseball Guide and Official League Book for 1889 • edited by Henry Chadwick

... were kept at great expense, and when they died costly funerals took place. When the Apis died at Memphis, in the reign of Ptolemy the son of Lagus, his funeral cost not less than L13,000 sterling. When a cat died, the family it belonged to expressed great ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant

... progress this edifice will be one of the 'wonders' of the Western world. Three or four good brick houses on the corner of Broadway and Spring Street have been levelled, I know not for what purpose—shops, no doubt. The houses—fine, costly edifices, opposite to me extending from Driggs's corner down to a point opposite to Bond Street—are to make way for a grand ...
— Fifth Avenue • Arthur Bartlett Maurice

... the answer, "but costly. If big reservoirs are built on all the headwater streams so that—no matter what the rainfall may be—only a constant amount is allowed to flow out of these reservoirs, then floods will be avoided, there will be plenty of water for irrigation, and a steady depth ...
— The Boy With the U. S. Fisheries • Francis Rolt-Wheeler

... was naturally not aware that her remark implied the most exquisite torture for Lecoq. Ah! if it should be as she said, if he should never find the lady who had lost this costly jewel! Smarting under the marchioness's unintended irony, he would have liked to apostrophize her in angry terms; but it could not be, for it was advisable if not absolutely necessary that he should conceal his true identity. ...
— Monsieur Lecoq • Emile Gaboriau

... joyous applause. Paris was beside itself when in the morning of March 20, 1811, there sounded the twenty-second report of a cannon, announcing that the Emperor had, not a daughter, but a son. He lay in a costly cradle of mother-of-pearl and gold, surmounted by a winged Victory which seemed to protect the slumbers of the King of Rome. The Imperial heir in his gilded baby-carriage drawn by two snow-white sheep beneath the trees at Saint Cloud was a charming object. He was but a year old when Gerard ...
— The Happy Days of the Empress Marie Louise • Imbert De Saint-Amand

... of aunt Susan. It was an awful waste for him to eat these luxuries; but selling the gifts of Levi was monstrous to her, and her protest was so energetic that she carried her point, and the miser was compelled to eat food which was so costly that ...
— Freaks of Fortune - or, Half Round the World • Oliver Optic

... cent to cover all the freightage charges, before indicated, on her commodities of less bulk though more value in proportion, twenty-five per cent on the average will not be too much, certainly, to cover those charges on the more bulky products of Russia, more especially when the long, costly, and intricate navigation of the Baltic, and the White and Black Seas, are taken into account. The ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXII. - June, 1843.,Vol. LIII. • Various

... found themselves in a spacious and elegant saloon, resplendent with gilding, and adorned on all sides by costly mirrors. They sat down to a small table with a marble top, and ...
— Ragged Dick - Or, Street Life in New York with the Boot-Blacks • Horatio Alger

... moorland huts. There is too much hearsay, and storytelling not to the purpose, and trifling gossip of "exquisite potatoes" and "rascally sherry"—details which would disgrace a half-crown guide book, and ought certainly not to be set forth with spaced large type in hotpressed octavos at a costly rate. Nevertheless, the work may suit club-room tables and circulating libraries, though it will not be allowed place for vivid display of Wild Sports. We quote two extracts—one, a narrative which the author knows to be substantially ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 574 - Vol. XX, No. 574. Saturday, November 3, 1832 • Various

... to be—and ordered "more candles!" The candles were brought, after some delay, and Mr. Richard amused himself by spilling their meltings upon the carpet. "Let's have 'luminashon!" he cried; and climbing with muddy boots upon the costly chairs, scraping with his feet the polished table, attempted to fix the wax in the silver sconces, with which the antiquarian tastes of Mr. Francis Wade had ...
— For the Term of His Natural Life • Marcus Clarke

... determined not by its circumstances, but by its contents.—Moral nature supernatural to physical.—Nature a hierarchy of natures.—Supernatural Religion historically attested by the moral development it generates.—Transfer of its distinctive note from moral ideals to physical marvels a costly error.—Jesus' miracles a revelation, of a type common with others before and after.—The unique Revelation of Jesus was in the higher realm of divine ideas and ideals.—These, while unrealized in human life, still exhibit the fact of a supernatural Revelation.—The distinction ...
— Miracles and Supernatural Religion • James Morris Whiton

... income of L17,000 per annum. He was sacrificing over L5,000 per annum in order to be free from an investor's anxieties, and he reckoned that his peace of mind was cheap at a hundred pounds a week. This detail alone shows to what an extent the man's taste for costly luxuries ...
— Mr. Prohack • E. Arnold Bennett



Words linked to "Costly" :   dear, expensive, high-priced, pricy, dearly-won



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