"Descant" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the Sunne was climing vp in haste, To view the world with his ambitious eye. Faire Myrha; yet alas, more faire then chaste. Did set her thoughts to descant wantonly; Nay most inhumane, more then bad, or ill, As in the sequell you may reade ...
— Seven Minor Epics of the English Renaissance (1596-1624) • Dunstan Gale
... having left your hero and heroine in a situation peculiarly interesting, with the greatest nonchalance, pass over to the continent, rave on the summit of Mont Blanc, and descant upon the strata which compose the mountains of the Moon in central Africa. You have been philosophical, now you must be geological. No one can then say that ...
— Olla Podrida • Frederick Marryat
... Joseph on such occasions was like his predecessor's coat, polychromatic. The Klosking read him, and wondered. "Alas!" said she, "with what versatile skill do you descant on a ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade
... went to the fourth cage, where he found a Bulbul[FN62] which, at sight of him, began to sway to and fro and sing its plaintive descant; and when he heard its complaint, he burst into tears ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... 1861, he was destined to become the idol of his countrymen, and consequently the victim of the friars and General Polavieja. Often have I, together with the old native parish priest, Father Leoncio Lopez, spent an hour with Jose's father, Francisco Mercado, and heard the old man descant, with pride, on the intellectual progress of his son at the Jesuits' school in Manila. Before he was fourteen years of age he wrote a melodrama in verse entitled Junto al Pasig ("Beside the Pasig River"), which ...
— The Philippine Islands • John Foreman
... on. I will hear you out." And then, seeing him stand before her with so much obvious disrelish to the task, she was suddenly overcome with laughter. Julia's laugh was a thing to ravish lovers; she rolled her mirthful descant with the freedom and the melody of a blackbird's song upon the river, and repeated by the echoes of the farther bank. It seemed a thing in its own place and a sound native to the open air. There ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 7 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... on with much modesty to descant upon the literary and fashionable departments of the Pall Mall Gazette, which were to be conducted by gentlemen of acknowledged reputation; men famous at the Universities (at which Mr Pendennis could scarcely help ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray
... fair The yellow amber:—Like a flattering glass Comes in too soon; for, writing of her eyes, I'll say that like a glass they catch the sun, And thence the hot reflection doth rebound Against my breast, and burns the heart within. Ah, what a world of descant makes my soul Upon this ...
— A Study of Shakespeare • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... of mountain ranges which many thousand years ago had their bases submerged by the rising of the sea or had gradually settled down beneath the surface of the ocean, may, of course, account for the poverty of Japan in regard to the animals therein. I must leave other pens than mine to descant on that interesting if highly speculative matter. Be that as it may, if the fauna of Japan is poor, the country certainly makes up for it by the variety and magnificence of its flora—a flora which deserves to be studied, ...
— The Empire of the East • H. B. Montgomery
... ornament, elegance, and comfort. In all such things the Americans are far ahead of us. Look at the steamboats running up and down the Thames, what miserable craft they are. You could put six or eight of them on board one of the American steam-ferries described, not to descant on the absence of all decent accommodation. I like to be fair and give the Americans their due. There is much I must decry. Will it make my praise appreciated on the other side of the Atlantic? I doubt it; but it will, I feel sure, make my English readers believe ...
— The Truth About America • Edward Money
... descant Ornamental melody or counterpoint sung or played above a theme. Highest part sung in part music. Discussion or discourse on ...
— Life and Public Services of John Quincy Adams - Sixth President of the Unied States • William H. Seward
... reached Rosebery by the morning train. Dinner had gone rather quietly, and our host had looked bored, I thought. Then, when the ladies had left us, Browne had kindled up, and we all three had a glorious hour, voicing the praises of Africa in a sort of three-man descant or glee. Meanwhile the fourth man, Drayton, a dark, plump and smiling youth, listened to us with a charming air of respectful attention. Transvaal tobacco was good, and the talk was good, though I say it who should not. Drayton's ...
— Cinderella in the South - Twenty-Five South African Tales • Arthur Shearly Cripps
... We descant volubly upon the subjects of citizenship and civilization but, as yet, have achieved no adequate definition of either of the terms upon which we expatiate so fluently. Our books teem with admonitions to train for citizenship in order that we ...
— The Reconstructed School • Francis B. Pearson
... wrought larch or marble, and with cornices of shining metal, "that glittered like stars through the dark foliage of the orange groves;" and the whole is compared to "an enamelled vase, sparkling with hyacinths and emeralds." [25] Such are the florid strains in which the Arabic writers fondly descant on the ...
— History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella V1 • William H. Prescott
... are at once nouns and verbs, the verb has commonly the accent on the latter, and the noun on the former syllable; as, to descant, a descant; to cement, a ...
— A Grammar of the English Tongue • Samuel Johnson
... thoroughly bibliographical. After having examined some of the finer books before mentioned, and especially having dwelt upon the Latin Bible of Mentelin, and a few copies of the rarer Classics, I ventured to descant upon the propriety of parting with those for which there was no use, and which, without materially strengthening their own collection, might, by an advantageous sale, enable them to enrich their collection by valuable modern books: of which they obviously stood in need. ...
— A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume Two • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... two volumes, have been written to prove the origin of that cosmopolitan, half-Gregorian descant known here as "America," and in England as "God Save the King." William C. Woodbridge of Boston brought it home with him from Germany. The Germans had been singing it for years (and are singing it now, more or less) to the ...
— The Story of the Hymns and Tunes • Theron Brown and Hezekiah Butterworth
... the Third Part (p. 136) Phil.'s brother Polymathes comes with him to Gnorimus for a lesson in Descant—i.e., the art of extemporaneously adding a part to the written plainsong.[1] This brother had had lessons formerly from a master who carried a plainsong book in his pocket, and caused him to do the like; "and so walking ...
— Shakespeare and Music - With Illustrations from the Music of the 16th and 17th centuries • Edward W. Naylor
... of the feats of himself and the scowling rascal his colleague, to remind me of my high obligations to them, and talking as usual with most bitter malevolence against Henley, he soon began to descant on the old subject; gaming—To ask a madman why he is mad were vain! I was importuned by his jargon—'He had been pigeoned only last night of no less than seven hundred pounds!' Repetitions, imprecations, ...
— Anna St. Ives • Thomas Holcroft
... reappearing Christ, whose life-giving understanding Christian Science imparts, must answer the constant inquiry: "Art thou he that should come?" Woman should not be ordered to the rear, or laid on the rack, for joining the overture of angels. Theologians descant pleasantly upon free moral agency; but they should ...
— No and Yes • Mary Baker Eddy
... a la Bugaboo; and then looked round for admiration. "Ah! je l'avais oublie!" he exclaimed. Upon this he pulled out a large shabby green pocket-book from his coat; took off a greasy black stock, displaying a collarless shirt and neck, upon the tinge of which it would be needless to descant, and then extracting from the pocket-book two curvilinear pieces of dirty white paper, which had been folded more than once, and had an ink spot or two on their surface, applied them to his chin, holding their ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 57, No. 356, June, 1845 • Various
... not understand Christian self-sacrifice, for ends which seem to it shadowy as compared with the solid realities of helping material progress or satisfying material wants. A hundred critics, who do not do much for the poor themselves, will descant on the waste of money in religious enterprises, and smile condescendingly at the enthusiasts who are so unpractical. But love knows its own meaning, and need not be abashed by the ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. John Chapters I to XIV • Alexander Maclaren
... and it was vain to ask redress for this affront from any but the highest personage in the state. Faliero, brooding over his own imagined wrongs, disclaimed that title, and gladly seized occasion to descant on his personal insignificance. "What wouldst thou have me do for thee?" was his answer: "Think upon the shameful gibe which hath been written concerning me, and think on the manner in which they have punished that ribald Michele Steno, who wrote it; and see how the ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 17, No. - 481, March 19, 1831 • Various
... occasion of speech to such men as of evil will are ready to find faults. This delay of ripe time for marriage, besides the loss of the realm (for without posterity of her highness what hope is left unto us?) ministereth matter to these leud tongues to descant upon, and breedeth contempt. I would I had but one hour's talk with you. Think if I trusted not your good nature, I would not write thus much; which nevertheless I humbly pray you to reserve ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin
... to me the smiling mornings shine, And reddening Phoebus lifts his golden fire: The birds in vain their amorous descant join, Or cheerful fields resume their green attire. These ears, alas! for other notes repine; A different object do these eyes require; My lonely anguish melts no heart but mine; And in my breast the imperfect joys expire; Yet morning smiles ...
— The Prose Works of William Wordsworth • William Wordsworth
... need to descant on the weather. The sun shone as brightly as could be desired, and as the interesting procession passed under the green bowers, cheer after cheer rose on the air, handfuls of flowers were trodden under the horses' feet, and hats, by common consent, performed ...
— Louis' School Days - A Story for Boys • E. J. May
... fifty years hence it will be as common to remove oaks a hundred and fifty years old, as it is now to transplant tulip-roots. I have even begun a treatise or panegyric on the great discoveries made by posterity in all arts and sciences, wherein I shall particularly descant on the great and cheap convenience of making trout-rivers-One Of the improvements which Mrs. Kerwood wondered Mr. Hedges would not make at his country-house, but which was not then quite so common as it will be. I shall talk of a secret for roasting a wild-boar ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole
... at all, or at least but cursorily touching on the sufferings and love of their Redeemer; and are little apt to kindle at their Saviour's name, and like the apostles to be betrayed by their fervor into what may be almost an untimely descant on the riches of his unutterable mercy. In addressing others also whom they conceive to be living in habits of sin, and under the wrath of God, they rather advise them to amend their ways as a preparation for their coming ...
— A Practical View of the Prevailing Religious System of Professed Christians, in the Middle and Higher Classes in this Country, Contrasted with Real Christianity. • William Wilberforce
... rebelled at its task and thought of cool, green grottoes with heated men frantically falling over the home-plate, while the multitude belched bravos as Teddy McCorkle made three bases. Instead of the national game the class was wrestling with figured bass and the art of descant, and again ...
— Old Fogy - His Musical Opinions and Grotesques • James Huneker
... before." He struck four simple chords on the lute, very gently, and with a sort of dainty preciseness; and then at the same moment the little pipe and his own voice began; the pipe played a simple descant in quicker time, with two notes to each note of the song, and the man in a brisk and simple way, as it were at the edge of his lips, sang a very sweet little country song, in a ...
— Paul the Minstrel and Other Stories - Reprinted from The Hill of Trouble and The Isles of Sunset • Arthur Christopher Benson
... he to his Indian counsellor, "be so obliging as to tell me what you had for breakfast." The other, immediately putting on the wild stare of the maniac, cried out, "Hobnails, Sir! It is shameful to think how they treat us! They give us nothing but hobnails!" and went on with a "descant wild" on the horrors of the cookery of Bethlehem Hospital. Burke staid no longer than that his departure might not seem abrupt; and, on the advantage of the first pause in the talk, was glad to make his escape. I was present when Paley ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 14, Issue 405, December 19, 1829 • Various
... Roe, having collected his little audience round him, began to descant with glowing countenance on the preciousness of some fragments of a reputed Druidical font lately dug up in the crypt, two naturalists, who should have been hanging on his lips, were busy polishing up the ...
— The Master of the Shell • Talbot Baines Reed
... of the wagon began to descant glowingly upon the many advantages of going on a road hike aided by the service that such a specially constructed wagon would give. In fact, Mr. Titmouse dwelt so enthusiastically upon the value of his wagon that Dick ...
— The High School Boys' Training Hike • H. Irving Hancock
... Evening on, and Twilight gray Had in her sober livery all things clad; Silence accompanied; for beast and bird, They to their grassy couch, these to their nests Were slunk, all but the wakeful nightingale. She all night long her amorous descant sung; Silence was pleased. Now glowed the firmament With living sapphires: Hesperus that led The starry host, rode brightest, till the Moon, Rising in clouded majesty, at length Apparent queen, unveiled her peerless light, And o'er the dark her ...
— The Astronomy of Milton's 'Paradise Lost' • Thomas Orchard
... waters, after having experienced their inefficacy. The diversions of the place they are not in a condition to enjoy. How then do they make shift to pass their time? In the forenoon they crawl out to the Rooms or the coffeehouse, where they take a hand at whist, or descant upon the General Advertiser; and their evenings they murder in private parties, among peevish invalids, and insipid old women — This is the case with a good number of individuals, whom nature seems to have intended ...
— The Expedition of Humphry Clinker • Tobias Smollett
... nails or using a tooth-pick. She will not eat peanuts or fruit or candy, or chew gum, in public places. In fact, I cannot imagine a really refined young lady chewing gum even in the privacy of her own room, so offensive is it to good taste. She will not descant upon bodily ailments in the drawing-room or at the table. She will not rush noisily up and down stairs or through the house, clashing doors and startling everyone with unpleasant noises. She will not interrupt ...
— Letters to a Daughter and A Little Sermon to School Girls • Helen Ekin Starrett
... put in a plea for this pursuit, as about the least costly foible to which those who can afford to indulge in foibles can devote themselves, one might descant on certain auxiliary advantages—as, that it is not apt to bring its votaries into low company; that it offends no one, and is not likely to foster actions of damages for nuisance, trespass, or assault, ...
— The Book-Hunter - A New Edition, with a Memoir of the Author • John Hill Burton
... times a curious examiner of the human mind, and pleased with an undisguised display of what had passed in it, he called to me with warmth, 'Give me your hand; I have taken a liking to you.' He then began to descant upon the force of testimony, and the little we could know of final causes; so that the objections of, why was it so? or why was it not so? ought not to disturb us: adding, that he himself had at one period been guilty of a temporary neglect of religion, ...
— Life of Johnson - Abridged and Edited, with an Introduction by Charles Grosvenor Osgood • James Boswell
... that he was, began to descant volubly on the advantages and charms of the hotel, its Swiss guides, and the distinguished travellers who stayed there; dragging rugs and bags meanwhile out of the car. Nobody listened to him. Everybody in the little ...
— Lady Merton, Colonist • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... It is needless to descant on such a theme. It is impossible to give any true idea of the literary labors of those men, without having seen and perused their huge folios, many of which have not yet been published to the world. Poor Colgan could give ...
— Irish Race in the Past and the Present • Aug. J. Thebaud
... mingled with the reports of artillery. I can assure you, I think myself very fortunate to have escaped the possibility of another such week of desolation, and to be peaceably roosted at Antwerp. Were I not still fatigued with my heavy progress through sands and quagmires, I should descant a little longer upon the blessings of so quiet a metropolis, but it is growing late, and I must retire ...
— Dreams, Waking Thoughts, and Incidents • William Beckford
... tree-tops faintly rustle beneath the breeze's flight, A soft and soothing sound, yet it whispers of the night; I hear the wood-thrush piping one mellow descant more, And scent the flowers that blow when the heat of day ...
— Poetical Works of William Cullen Bryant - Household Edition • William Cullen Bryant
... words of the Scotch divine are doubtless strong; too strong, I think. And yet they may be serviceable, if they warn us against that proneness to depreciate the intellectual value and serious purpose of the religious books of that land. It is worse than useless to confidently descant upon the errors, inconsistencies, the follies and absurdities of these writings without acknowledging at the same time the profound thought, the deep spiritual yearning and the sublime poetic ...
— India's Problem Krishna or Christ • John P. Jones
... lit it with a blazing sulphur match before he continued; and we all walked on again. I remember it all very distinctly, because it was the beginning of Nino's madness. Especially I call to mind his expression of indifference when Ercole began to descant upon the worldly possessions of the Lira household. It seemed to me that if Nino so seriously cast his eyes on the Contessina Edvigia, he might at least have looked pleased to hear she was so rich; or he might ...
— A Roman Singer • F. Marion Crawford
... nature, Deform'd, unfinish'd, sent before my time Into this breathing world scarce half made up, And that so lamely and unfashionable That dogs bark at me as I halt by them;— Why, I, in this weak piping time of peace, Have no delight to pass away the time, Unless to spy my shadow in the sun, And descant on mine own deformity: And therefore,—since I cannot prove a lover, To entertain these fair well-spoken days,— I am determined to prove a villain, And hate the idle pleasures of these days. Plots have ...
— The Life and Death of King Richard III • William Shakespeare [Collins edition]
... Imagination were here, For he is peerless at need; Labour to him, sirs, if ye will your matters speed. Now will I sing, and lustily spring; But when my fetters on my legs did ring, I was not glad, perde; but now Hey, troly, loly, Let us see who can descant on this same; To laugh and get money, it were a good game, What, whom have we here? A priest, a doctor, or else a frere. What, Master Doctor Dotypoll? Cannot you preach well in a black boll, Or dispute any divinity? ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Volume I. • R. Dodsley
... descant loudly on the chaste elegance of the design, the richness of the tracing, etc., and beg me to furnish them with a copy of it when I got home, for their sisters to work window curtains or tidies by. They were sure that so striking a novelty in patterns would be very acceptable. ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy
... also, full of joyous animal spirits, began to sing aloud, in a fine tenor voice, the song, "Seats of the Vikings! Groves old and hoary," in which the children soon joined their descant, whilst they marched in time to the song. Elise, who gave herself up to the full enjoyment of the beautiful day and the universal delight, had neither inclination nor wish to interrupt this by any disagreeable ...
— The Home • Fredrika Bremer
... I must clearly disappoint feminine expectation, by forbearing to descant upon Charles's slight but manly form, and his Grecian beauty, &c., all the better for the tropics, and the trials and the troubles he ...
— The Complete Prose Works of Martin Farquhar Tupper • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... eternall life, and at these times he wished her to confesse nothing to any of them, but continue constant in her made promise, rely vpon him, and hee would saue her. This was too high a straine aboue his reach to haue made it good, and a note of his false descant, who hauing compassed this wretched woman, brought her to a shamefull and vntimely end; yet doing nothing herein contrary to his malicious purposes, for hee was a murtherer from the beginning, Iohn 8. 44. Now then, to descend to particulars, and the effects of this hellish association ...
— A Treatise of Witchcraft • Alexander Roberts
... through the groves, with quiet tread, On his accustomed haunts he sped, The mother-thrush, unstartled, sung Her descant to her callow young, And fearless o'er his threshold prest The wanderer from the sparrow's nest, The squirrel raised a sparkling eye Nor from his kernel cared to fly As passed that gentle hermit by. No timid ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol. XXXII No. 2. February 1848 • Various
... principals, where the best is to be found, and as the honor of their respective houses is to be sustained, it may well be imagined that all the bon-vivants on earth, were they to meet at one table, could hardly produce such a variety of fine old Madeira, as the clerks of Funchal then sip and descant upon. In no place do mercantile clerks hold so respectable a position in society as here; owing to the tacit understanding between their principals and themselves, that, at some future day, they are to be admitted as partners in the houses. This is so general a rule, that the clerk seems to hold ...
— Journal of an African Cruiser • Horatio Bridge
... pity upon us. We are brands plucked from the burning." And continued for several minutes to descant upon the theme of everlasting torture by incandescence and thirst. Nominally addressing a deity, but in fact preaching to his audience, he announced that, even for the veriest infant on a lorry, there was no escape ...
— Clayhanger • Arnold Bennett
... observing me, detached himself instantly from the group, and followed. "I am told you want a pony," said he; "there now is mine feeding amongst those horses, the best in all the kingdom of Leon." He then began with all the volubility of a chalan to descant on the points of the animal. Presently the friar joined us, who, observing his opportunity, pulled me by the sleeve and whispered, "Have nothing to do with the curate, master, he is the greatest thief in the neighbourhood; if you want a pony, my brother has a much ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow
... words we have left to descant upon: they are such as should be the last; and, like Joseph Surface, "moral to the end." The glowing passions the fervent hopes, the anticipated future, of the loving pair, all, all are frustrated! The great lesson of life imbues the elaborate ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, September 25, 1841 • Various
... shed, Cast from these cloudy eyes so dark with woe; Thou stream that still dost know What fell pangs pierce my heart, So dost thou murmur back my moan; Lone bird that chauntest tone for tone, While in our descant drear Love sings his part: Nymphs, woodland wanderers, wind and air; List to the sound out-poured from my despair! Seven times and once more seven The roseate dawn her beauteous brow Enwreathed with orient jewels hath displayed; Cynthia ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds
... listeners, all of whom, by their years, gravity, and deportment, I made no question were savants. As he drew near, I found he was discoursing of the marvels of his late voyage. When within six feet of us the whole party stopped, the Doctor continuing to descant with a very proper gesticulation, and in a way to show that his subject was of infinite interest to his listeners. Accidentally turning his eye in our direction, he caught a glimpse of our figures, and making a few hurried apologies ...
— The Monikins • J. Fenimore Cooper
... into the air so sweetly and imperceptibly that silence was taken unawares and so charmed that she would gladly have renounced her nature and existence for ever if her place could always be filled by such music.' Comp. Par. Lost, iv. 604, "She all night long her amorous descant sung; Silence was pleased"; also ...
— Milton's Comus • John Milton
... always shyed most fearfully when an Opposition coach approached them. Indeed, it was well known that the horses selected for these duties were, generally speaking, vicious and unsound, and not taken from the most able and powerful, but from the most showy classes. He then proceeded to descant upon the general wrongs of horses. He congratulated the community upon the abolition of bearing reins, those grievous burdens upon the necks of all free-going horses; and he trusted the time would soon arrive when the blinkers would also be taken off, every corn-binn thrown open, and every ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXIX. January, 1844. Vol. LV. • Various
... men, the spirit-stirring Dandy was removed to bed, whence he arose to return, without delay, to London by the shortest possible road, even with the fear of another fieri facias before his eyes, to descant on vinous acidities, Gin Lakes, and the liver-consuming ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 335 - Vol. 12, No. 335, October 11, 1828 • Various
... papers, one for him who is to play the ground (upon an organ, harpsichord, or other instrument), the other for him who plays upon the Viol, who having the said ground before his eye (as his theme or subject) plays such variety of descant and division thereupon as his skill and present invention do then suggest to him." The poet's allusion to "Th' incendiary vile (Viol) that is chief author and engineer of mischief" humorously points to the popularity of the Viol. The poet's mention ...
— The Violin - Its Famous Makers and Their Imitators • George Hart
... descant for the lady of the house, the rest of the company were all eager to have their fortunes told likewise, but she put them off till the next Friday, when they promised to have silver coin ready for crossing their palms. The senor lieutenant now came in, and heard a glowing account of the charms ...
— The Exemplary Novels of Cervantes • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... is one musical echo and aspiration. He finds his theme and illustration constantly in music. His amorous descant never fails him: his lute is always by his side. Following the "Steps of the Temple," a graceful tribute to Herbert, we have the congenial title, "The Delights of the Muses," opening with that ...
— Gifts of Genius - A Miscellany of Prose and Poetry by American Authors • Various
... conceive the tumult arisen among the books upon the close of this long descant of AEsop: both parties took the hint, and heightened their animosities so on a sudden, that they resolved it should come to a battle. Immediately the two main bodies withdrew, under their several ensigns, to the farther ...
— The Battle of the Books - and Other Short Pieces • Jonathan Swift
... a Dear-stealer, that he might at the same time remember his Warwickshire Prosecutor, under the Name of Justice Shallow; he has given him very near the same Coat of Arms which Dugdale, in his Antiquities of that County, describes for a Family there, and makes the Welsh Parson descant very pleasantly upon 'em. That whole Play is admirable; the Humours are various and well oppos'd; the main Design, which is to cure Ford his unreasonable Jealousie, is extremely well conducted. ...
— Some Account of the Life of Mr. William Shakespear (1709) • Nicholas Rowe
... our leader and spokesman: eloquently did he descant upon all our grievances, not forgetting mouldy bread, caggy mutton, and hebdomadal meat pies. He represented to Mr Root the little honour that he would gain in the contest, and the certain loss—the damage to his property and ...
— Rattlin the Reefer • Edward Howard
... theory of root culture. And he was a mechanic. He could build house or barn to the last beam, and ship or boat to the last joint; nay, he once devised the model of a self-righting life-boat, which I have often heard shipmasters, and even real shipwrights, descant upon in the highest terms of praise. Moreover, I can affirm that he was a navigator. It is true that the science of seamanship, as set forth in books, he had never mastered. But he knew right well what winds of a certain force and ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I., No. IV., April, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... it is time; The rosy mom long since left Tithon's bed, All ready to her silver coach to climb; And Phoebus 'gins to show his glorious head. Hark, how the cheerful birds do chant their lays And carol of love's praise. The merry lark her matins sings aloft; The thrush replies; the mavis descant plays; The ouzel shrills; the ruddock warbles soft; So goodly all agree, with sweet consent, To this day's merriment. Ah! my dear love, why do ye sleep thus long, When meeter were that ye should now awake, To await the coming of your joyous mate, And hearken ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 2 (of 4) • Various
... people, in opposing the Gospel, descant upon the hypocrisy of religious persons; they pick up every vague report that they hear to their disadvantage, and narrowly watch for the halting of such as they are acquainted with; and then they form general conclusions from a few distorted and uncertain stories. Thus they endeavour to ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... May—this lady listened to Ingram in the garden. Of all sounds in the world the sweetest music for her ear was made by a man's voice embroidering the theme—"You are lovely, you are cruel, I die." Ingram's descant on the golden phrase was querulous, after his manner. He took his lover's smarts, as one must suppose them, hardly. As thus: "You are lovely—but what's that to me, if I can't touch you? You sting my eyes, you inflame, ...
— Rest Harrow - A Comedy of Resolution • Maurice Hewlett
... taken upon you to contrast Nature and Fortune, you could not have chosen a happier theme upon which to descant, for both have made a trial of their strength on the subject of your Memoirs. What Nature did, you had the evidence of your own eyes to vouch for, but what was done by Fortune, you know only from hearsay; and hearsay, I ...
— Memoirs And Historical Chronicles Of The Courts Of Europe - Marguerite de Valois, Madame de Pompadour, and Catherine de Medici • Various
... would probably have led me, through a false association, to regard the parties to which they attach as scarcely less specifically different from our country folk themselves. I suspect we are misled by associations of this kind when we descant on the peculiarities of race as interposing insurmountable barriers to the progress of improvement, physical or mental. We overlook, amid the diversities of form, color, and language, the specific identity of the human family. The Celt, for instance, wants, it is said, those powers of sustained ...
— The Cruise of the Betsey • Hugh Miller
... her chair. She wondered how many more times Mrs. Meadowsweet would descant on the elegancies of her drawing-room. She need not have feared. Whatever Mrs. Meadowsweet was she was honest; and at that very moment her eyes lighted on the felt which covered the floor. Mrs. Meadowsweet had never been ...
— The Honorable Miss - A Story of an Old-Fashioned Town • L. T. Meade
... indignation is kindling against us, and thick darkness covers the heavens, and the hour of retribution is at hand; but we are obstinate in our transgression, we refuse to repent, we impiously throw the burden of our guilt upon our predecessors, we affect resignation to our unfortunate lot, we descant upon the mysterious dispensations of Providence, we deem ourselves objects of God's compassion rather than of his displeasure. 'Shall I not visit for these things? saith the Lord. Shall not my soul be avenged on such ...
— Thoughts on African Colonization • William Lloyd Garrison
... point, and, if you feel for him, you take him by the button-hole, or put your hand in his, and say, "My dear fellow, I am very sorry for you; is there any way in which I can help you?" If you have a friend afflicted with a fatal malady, and you see it, and he does not, you don't begin to descant on the power of disease and the way people may secure health, but you say, "My dear fellow, I am afraid this hacking cough is more serious than you think, and that flush on your cheek is a bad sign. I am ...
— Godliness • Catherine Booth
... concerns my embassy, being so much a fresh man as your Excellency sees I am in this Court, visible it is by what proceeds, I can as yet have nothing to descant or touch upon, but matter of ceremony only from and towards me, divisible into two considerations; the first, in reference to the past, of which I have already said the same hath been, as from, and to, other Ambassadors, in all this and all other ages; the second, in reference ...
— Memoirs of Lady Fanshawe • Lady Fanshawe
... concealment. When they were alone, though always calm, she would talk with freedom and vivacity; but in the presence of others she rather led to their display, and encouraged them, often with a certain degree of adroit simplicity, to descant on topics which interested theme or of which they were competent to treat. Alone with Lothair, and they were often alone, though she herself never obtruded the serious subjects round which he was always fluttering, she never avoided them, and without involving herself in elaborate ...
— Lothair • Benjamin Disraeli
... poet. A man of the legal profession being not long since brought to see a study furnished with all sorts of books, both of his own and all other faculties, took no occasion at all to entertain himself with any of them, but fell very rudely and magisterially to descant upon a barricade placed on the winding stair before the study door, a thing that a hundred captains and common soldiers see every day without taking any notice ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne
... think of all this? and while you read it, did you ever picture to yourself what my feelings would probably be during its perusal? Most likely not; but I am not going to descant upon them now: I will only make this acknowledgment, little honourable as it may be to human nature, and especially to myself,—that the former half of the narrative was, to me, more painful than the latter, not that I was at all insensible to Mrs. Huntingdon's wrongs ...
— The Tenant of Wildfell Hall • Anne Bronte
... Perch had but to show himself in the court outside, or, at farthest, in the bar of the King's Arms, to be asked a multitude of questions, almost certain to include that interesting question, what would he take to drink? Then would Mr Perch descant upon the hours of acute uneasiness he and Mrs Perch had suffered out at Balls Pond, when they first suspected 'things was going wrong.' Then would Mr Perch relate to gaping listeners, in a low voice, as if the corpse of the deceased House were lying unburied in the next room, how Mrs Perch ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens
... with an eager and resolute face that she confronted her father that evening, as they sat down to dinner. He thought she would descant on her experiences of the morning, and he was anxious for a chance to say how truly he appreciated Mr. Van Berg's cordial manner, but she ...
— A Face Illumined • E. P. Roe
... I have them dished up occasionally by mother, although she prefers to descant upon the immortal eighties, when she was a leader herself and 'money wasn't everything.' We never had so much of it anyhow. I know Grandfather Ballinger ...
— The Sisters-In-Law • Gertrude Atherton
... entered the sanctuary. The sermon is the sixth in his printed collection. A fling at the French was at all times a favourite topic with him. In the discourse delivered before George III on the Sunday preceding his Coronation, he has stretched the text a little that he may take occasion to descant on the blessings of civil liberty, and has quoted Montesquieu's opinion of the British Government. In praising our religious toleration, he is careful to justify our exception of the church of Rome from the general indulgence. Nor was it in the pulpit only that he acted the politician. ...
— Lives of the English Poets - From Johnson to Kirke White, Designed as a Continuation of - Johnson's Lives • Henry Francis Cary
... be remembered that more people can give the list of Dr. Samuel Johnson's sins against good manners than can quote from his "Rasselas" and "Rambler," while there will always be more who can descant upon the selfish, tyrannical ill-breeding of Thomas Carlyle than can estimate the value and immensity ...
— Social Life - or, The Manners and Customs of Polite Society • Maud C. Cooke
... gratifying curiosity, or affording assistance to the ambitious; we are very sure that the moral influence of the Lexicon Balatronicum will be more certain and extensive than that of any methodist sermon that has ever been delivered within the bills of mortality. We need not descant on the dangerous impressions that are made on the female mind, by the remarks that fall incidentally from the lips of the brothers or servants of a family; and we have before observed, that improper topics ...
— 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue • Captain Grose et al.
... not at quite such a discount with Mrs. Mervale as with her daughter and her friend; and she continued to descant upon the high standing of Mr. Hazlewood the elder, not one word in ten of which the girls heard, for she, like most old ladies, once started upon former times, was thinking of the pleasant young John Hazlewood of early days, who brought back with him a host of reminiscences, with which she ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 3 September 1848 • Various
... purity and sweetness were cast back to their places, with every sign of tenderness and regret. Though rendered less connected by many and general interruptions and outbreakings, a translation of their language would have contained a regular descant, which, in substance, might have proved to possess a train of ...
— The Last of the Mohicans • James Fenimore Cooper
... attended, by invitation, a garden party, and a ball at which the Prince and Princess of Wales were present, and had spent several weeks in the country houses of some of the wealthy English. Consequently, she considered herself quite au fait with their style and customs, which she never failed to descant upon, greatly to the amusement of her listeners, and the mortification of Grey, who was now old enough to see how ridiculous it made his ...
— Bessie's Fortune - A Novel • Mary J. Holmes
... through a lady's lattice. She carelessly took up her cithern. A few wild chords flew from her touch. She bent her head towards the instrument, as if wooing its melody—the vibrations that crept to her heart. She hummed a low and plaintive descant, mournful and tender as her own thoughts. The tone and feeling of the ballad we attempt to preserve in the ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby
... to boo where the other applauded, riot and disorder the inevitable result, unless by a coincidence rare as snow at Midsummer the rival associations might be won upon to display a unanimity of approval, upon which the dramatic Press-critics would rapturously descant in the newspapers ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves
... who openly regret that they have never come across a woman to whom they cared to tie themselves for life might be in a position to descant on the inability of wives to enter into their husbands' inmost feelings, if only they—the bachelors—had known on a past occasion how to act with sudden promptitude on the top ...
— Prisoners - Fast Bound In Misery And Iron • Mary Cholmondeley
... why had he felt called so publicly to descant upon the natural history of the Lone Wolf? In order to focus upon that one the attentions of his enemies? Or to ...
— The False Faces • Vance, Louis Joseph
... have bestrid the beast to win the Derby. Understand the creature galled to death and desperation by gad-flies, cormorant-winged, worse than beset Inachus's daughter. This he tells, this he brindles and burnishes, on a winter's eve; 't is his star of set glory, his rejuvenescence to descant upon, Far from me be it (da avertant!) to look a gift-story in the mouth, or cruelly to surmise (as those who doubt the plunge of Curtius) that the inseparate conjuncture of man and beast, the centaur-phenomenon that staggered all Dunstable, might have been the effect ...
— The Best Letters of Charles Lamb • Charles Lamb
... broke forth bright and serene. Marston and his guests, after passing a pleasant night, were early at breakfast. When over, they joined him for a stroll over the plantation, to hear him descant upon the prospects of the coming crop. Nothing could be more certain, to his mind, than a bountiful harvest. The rice, cotton, and corn grounds had been well prepared, the weather was most favourable, he had plenty of help, a good overseer, and faithful drivers. ...
— Our World, or, The Slaveholders Daughter • F. Colburn Adams
... went cannily round to all the other members, and represented to them, one by one, how proper it was that the lamps should be set up, both for a credit to the town, and as a conformity to the fashion of the age in every other place. And I took occasion to descant, at some length, on the untractable nature of Mr Hickery, and how it would be proper before the next meeting to agree to say nothing when the matter was again brought on the carpet, but just to come to the vote at once. Accordingly this was ...
— The Provost • John Galt
... are almost at this day extant, I will commend vnto you that modell which beareth the proportion of the Roman H. which as it is most plaine of all other, and most easie for conuaiance, so if a man vpon that plaine song, (hauing a great purse) will make descant, there is no proportion in which he may with best ease show more curiositie, and therefore for the plaine Husbandmans better vnderstanding I will here shew him a facsimile (for to adde a scale were needlesse in this generall worke, all men not being desirous to build of one bignesse) ...
— The English Husbandman • Gervase Markham
... further be gauged by his tardiness; while "The Tenure of Kings and Magistrates" had been written in little more than a week, his "Eikonoklastes," a reply to a book published in February, did not appear until October 6th. His reluctance may be partly explained by his feeling that "to descant on the misfortunes of a person fallen from so high a dignity, who hath also paid his final debt both to nature and his faults, is neither of itself a thing commendable, nor the intention of this discourse." The intention it may not have ...
— Life of John Milton • Richard Garnett
... ceremonious dinner to the king. This was the time when he had meant to bring Melodious message of young Lisa's love; He waited till the air had ceased to move To ringing silver, till Falernian wine Made quickened sense with quietude combine; And then with passionate descant made ...
— How Lisa Loved the King • George Eliot
... discourse much at large, for they were holy-minded persons, little esteeming the pageantries of this world. But my aunt, for Agnes Kilspinnie being in progress of time married to my father's fourth brother, became sib to me in that degree, was wont to descant and enlarge on the theme with much wonderment and loquacity, describing the marvellous fabrics that were to have been hung with tapestry to hold the ladies, and the fountains that were to have spouted wine, which nobody was to be allowed ...
— Ringan Gilhaize - or The Covenanters • John Galt
... common Mother saw; Now earlie greets black Flores banefull Ile, (Flores, from whence afflictions selfe doth draw The true memorialls of a weeping stile;) And with Caisters Querristers[1] which straw Descant, that might Death of his darts beguile, He tunes saluting notes, sweeter then long, All which are made ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of The English Nation, v. 7 - England's Naval Exploits Against Spain • Richard Hakluyt
... little necessary to descant here on the different fleeces, and various flavours of mutton which the numerous breeds of sheep afford. The least reflection and observation, teach us their unspeakable value as sources of food, clothing, and other purposes; my task therefore ...
— Anecdotes of the Habits and Instinct of Animals • R. Lee
... much dignity: dignity of an unrelenting physical order, which need not express any remarkable pride of spirit. The family gossips who, on both sides, were vain of this rare couple, and would always descant on their beauty, even when they had occasion to slander their characters, said, to distinguish them, that Henrietta Maria had a Port, and Melchisedec a Presence: and that the union of a Port and a Presence, and such ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... written or pricked down, in opposition to plain-song, where the descant rested with the will of the singer." Chappell's Popular ...
— Old English Plays, Vol. I - A Collection of Old English Plays • Various
... day that same Alessandro del Dardo won her to himself by his descant upon the theme, "How a gentleman may dismember himself without dishonour for a lady's love; and ...
— Little Novels of Italy • Maurice Henry Hewlett
... nature will not compensate for the solitude of the heart, which is continually yearning after sympathy; we wish for something beyond the pleasures of the eye, and I would that you were with me. I would take you up to me Alhambra, and descant to you for hours upon its perfections and its romantic history. To me this wondrous pile has become familiar; I have seen it at all hours of the day, and have visited it in the enchantment of moonlight; and never will pass from my memory the pleasant hours I have spent within its sacred ...
— International Weekly Miscellany, Vol. 1, No. 2, July 8, 1850 • Various |
