"Half-penny" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... that youth who is reading for the Bar. Why, the property is all entailed, and he will scarcely have a half-penny, for his mother brought no money to the Arnotts. Oh, this is too much! To throw up Mr. Russell for an Anthony. Are you engaged to him with your parents' consent, may I ask, and if so, why was the matter concealed from me, who would certainly have declined to drag ...
— Smith and the Pharaohs, and Other Tales • Henry Rider Haggard
... pass "The Red Lion," No. 48, Parliament Street, "at the corner of the very short street leading into Cannon Row," where David Copperfield ordered a glass of the very best ale—"The Genuine Stunning with a good head to it"—at twopence half-penny the glass, but the landlord hesitated to draw it, and gave him a glass of some which he suspected was not the "genuine stunning"; and the landlady coming into the bar returned his money, and gave him a "kiss that was half-admiring and half-compassionate, but all womanly ...
— A Week's Tramp in Dickens-Land • William R. Hughes
... near us two men had sat and were talking even as we, but one had a half-penny paper, and turned the flimsy thing about, I fancy ...
— Hurricane Island • H. B. Marriott Watson
... to buy some vegetables in the middle of the morning she got me a half-penny journal. It was just such a one as these upon my desk, only that the copy I read was damp from the press, and these are so dry and brittle, they crack if I touch them. I have a copy of the actual issue I read that morning; it was a paper called emphatically the New Paper, but ...
— In the Days of the Comet • H. G. Wells
... John Newton said, "I see in this world two heaps of human happiness and misery; now if I can take but the smallest bit from one heap and add it to the other, I carry a point; if as I go home a child has dropped a half-penny, and by giving it another I can wipe away its tears, I feel I ...
— Architects of Fate - or, Steps to Success and Power • Orison Swett Marden
... examined the document he had left, and found a most righteous statement of the services rendered by this great and good man; which, after giving credit to Mr. Bumpkin for cash received from Mr. Skinalive, Mr. Prigg's friend, of seven hundred and twenty-two pounds, six shillings and eightpence-half-penny, left a balance due to Honest Lawyer Prigg of three hundred and twenty-eight pounds, seven shillings and threepence,—subject, of course, to be ...
— The Humourous Story of Farmer Bumpkin's Lawsuit • Richard Harris
... a man has not a half-penny, ought he to ask a woman to share it? Rather an Irish way of putting the matter," with a laugh, not without bitterness, "but you understand. Ought he not to wait till he has at least something to offer besides himself: Is it not mean, selfish, cowardly, to bind ...
— The Laurel Bush • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
... years that had swallowed a half-penny, Atkins reports rupture of the innominate artery. No symptoms developed, but six weeks later, the child had an attack of ulcerative stomatitis, from which it seemed to be recovering nicely, when suddenly it ejected two ounces of bright red blood in clots, and became collapsed out of proportion ...
— Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine • George M. Gould
... Welsh to the Norman Conquest. Henry was designated in them as the lion of justice, and it was given as a sign of his reign that the symbol of commerce would be split and the half be round. The prophecy had already been fulfilled by the regulation for breaking coin at the mint, and making the half-penny a round piece by itself. In 1279 Edward issued the farthing as an entire coin. The change recalled the memory of Merlin's prophecy; and the vague oracles, that had been compiled to describe Henry's dominion over ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume VI. • Various
... with cottages, and bounded with undulating hills, with now and then glimpses of blue water; and as we walk down Citadel Hill, we feel half-reconciled to Halifax, its queer little streets, its quaint, mouldy old gables, its soldiers and sailors, its fogs, cabs, penny and half-penny tokens, and all its little, odd, outlandish peculiarities. Peace be with it! after all, it has a quiet charm ...
— Acadia - or, A Month with the Blue Noses • Frederic S. Cozzens
... advertisements, the yearly cost of a daily paper, such as the New York Tribune for instance, is only 5 dollars, or one guinea. The price of a single copy of such papers is only 2 cents, or one penny; and many papers are only one cent, or a half-penny per copy. ...
— American Scenes, and Christian Slavery - A Recent Tour of Four Thousand Miles in the United States • Ebenezer Davies
... told them this morning), 'do you suppose that if the d'Esgrignon family have lost their manorial rights, that therefore they have been robbed of their hoard of treasure? The young Count has a right to do as he pleases; and so long as he does not owe you a half-penny, you have no right to ...
— The Jealousies of a Country Town • Honore de Balzac
... generation, submitted to female influence, with his eye fixed immovably all the time on his own interests. Many a young man of the past generation, who was no fool, has sacrificed everything for love. Not one young man in ten thousand of the present generation, except the fools, has sacrificed a half-penny. The daughters of Eve still inherit their mother's merits and commit their mother's faults. But the sons of Adam, in these latter days, are men who would have handed the famous apple back with a bow, and a "Thanks, no; it might get me into a scrape." When ...
— Armadale • Wilkie Collins
... your captain is brave and vows reformation. There shall be in England seven half-penny loaves sold for a penny; the three-hooped pot shall have ten hoops, and I will make it a felony to drink small beer. All the realm shall be in common, and in Cheapside shall my palfrey go to grass. And when I am ...
— Tolstoy on Shakespeare - A Critical Essay on Shakespeare • Leo Tolstoy
... one-half in my demand; upon which he stared at me and told me his hands were full. I attempted others without finding employment, and was actually reduced to a very uncomfortable prospect, when I bethought myself of offering my talents to the printers of half-penny ballads and other such occasional essays, as are hawked about the streets. With this in view I applied to one of the most noted and vociferous of this tribe, who directed me to a person whom I found entertaining a whole crowd of them with gin, bread, and cheese; he ...
— The Adventures of Roderick Random • Tobias Smollett
... blew her off the rock into the sea. The Covenanters, one of whom had shot at the Archbishop of St. Andrews, and hit the Bishop of Orkney, were very harshly treated. 'They were obliged to drink the twopenny ale of the governor's brewing, scarcely worth a half-penny the pint,' an inconvenience which they probably shared with the garrison. They were sometimes actually compelled to make their own beds, a cruel hardship, when their servants had been dismissed, probably for plotting ...
— The Red True Story Book • Various
... St James's Street, saw a cart at Fox's door, with copper and an old chest of drawers, loading. His success at Faro had awakened a host of creditors; but, unless his bank had swelled to the size of the Bank of England, it could not have yielded a half-penny apiece for each. Epsom too had been unpropitious; and one creditor had actually seized and carried off Fox's goods, which did not seem worth removing. Yet, shortly after this, whom should Walpole find sauntering by his own door but Fox, who came up and talked to him at the coach window, on the ...
— The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume I (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz
... twice, charmed by her sympathetic way, confided some of his griefs to her. He found it, he told her, extremely difficult to make the toy-shop pay; and Sibyl, in consequence, considered it her bounden duty to spend every half-penny she could spare at this special shop. She entered now, went straight up to the counter and ...
— Daddy's Girl • L. T. Meade
... and filled the glasses himself, telling the young gentleman that the brandy was the best in England, a relic of the old smuggling days, but far too good for scoundrels who had never paid the King's revenue one half-penny. Then when Mr. Benson had left the room he began to talk about the field again, and how anxious he was to start the excavations. That was about all I heard, sir, for shortly afterwards Mr. Glenthorpe told me to clear away the things, which took ...
— The Shrieking Pit • Arthur J. Rees
... added, gingerly extracting a filthy and dilapidated rag, "is a particularly interesting specimen. Apparently, upon close inspection, merely a valuable security, worth, to be exact, a shade under twopence-half-penny, it is in reality a talisman. Whosoever touches it, cannot fail to contract at least two contagious diseases within the week. In view of the temperature of my coffee this morning, I'm ...
— Jonah and Co. • Dornford Yates
... wounded to restore her to cheerfulness. You can't attend to a poor brave devil grinning with pain, while a surgeon pokes a six-inch probe down a sinus in search of bits of bone or shrapnel, and be acutely conscious of your own two-penny-half-penny little miseries. Many a heartache, in this wise, has been cured in the ...
— The Red Planet • William J. Locke
... I told him, "for a quarter of a million. Mr. Heathcote shot himself. I am told that there is a probable dividend of sixpence-half-penny in the pound to come ...
— The Betrayal • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... asked you to dinner, but you will never come. As for At Home cards I never dream of sending them to you. It is a waste of precious half-penny stamps." ...
— The Morals of Marcus Ordeyne • William J. Locke
... fivepence and a half-penny," said Comus, reflectively. "It's a ridiculous sum to last me for the next three days, and I owe a card ...
— The Unbearable Bassington • Saki
... abuse the Allies, particularly the British, and misrepresent their motives and ideals. This sort of journalism "cuts no ice" in the United States. It is just "yellow journalism." Voila tout! Why take it seriously? But the British people do not know this; and as the British half-penny Press, when it does quote the American Press, rarely quotes anything but the most virulent extracts from this particular class of newspaper, one is reduced yet again to wondering whence the blessings of a common language ...
— Getting Together • Ian Hay
... If any Member tells Stories in the Club that are not true, he shall forfeit for every third Lie an Half-Penny. ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... correct, that you pay him for his silence and not for his sounds. In spite of his discordant gurglings and squealings, he is welcomed by the nursery-maids and their infant tribes of little sturdy rogues in petticoats, who flock eagerly round him, and purchase the luxury of a half-penny grind, which they perform con amore, seated on the top of his machine. If, when your front garden is thus invaded, you insist upon his decamping without a fee, he shews his estimate of the peace and quietness you desiderate by his unwillingness to retire, which, however, he at length consents ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 430 - Volume 17, New Series, March 27, 1852 • Various
... crayter next door was quite helpless. The next house was, in some respects, more comfortable than the last, though it was quite as poor in household goods. There was one flimsy deal table, one little chair, and two half-penny pictures of Catholic saints pinned against the wall. "Sure, I sold the other table since you wor here before," said the woman to my friend; "I sold it for two-an'-aightpence, an' bought this one for sixpence." At the house of another Irish family, my friend inquired where all the chairs were ...
— Home-Life of the Lancashire Factory Folk during the Cotton Famine • Edwin Waugh
... had come up to Will, tossed the boy a half-penny, and then began to laugh heartily, at the rapid contortions of ...
— A Girl of the People • L. T. Meade
... it without prejudice, it seemed quite a good proposition on paper. So on we went. The Turf Tissue was to be sold to the public at twopence a copy, a half-penny of which was to go to the seller. It was a good commission, but by giving it we hoped to attract a very large number of the newsboys who sold the evening paper, in view of the fact that by publishing the Tissue ...
— The Chronicles of a Gay Gordon • Jose Maria Gordon
... March 15th, 1900, they privately and unexpectedly visited the Restaurant in City Road and inspected this praiseworthy effort to supply wholesome food at low prices to the poor. After walking about and speaking to many of the people, they enjoyed a "three-course dinner" costing four pence half-penny, and left amid ...
— The Life of King Edward VII - with a sketch of the career of King George V • J. Castell Hopkins
... that very hand now pinioned flat, Has hob-a-nobbed with Pharaoh, glass to glass; Or dropped a half-penny in Homer's hat; Or doffed thine own to let Queen Dido pass; Or held, by Solomon's own invitation, A torch at ...
— Museum of Antiquity - A Description of Ancient Life • L. W. Yaggy
... a new evening dress. I don't like you to be behind any one else, my dear, and that green skirt with the white jacket, though genteel enough, doesn't seem quite the thing. I can't tell what's the matter with it, for the mohair in the skirts cost nine-pence half-penny a yard, and the first day you wore those dresses, girls, they shone as if they were silk, and your father asked me why I was so extravagant, and said that though he would like it he hadn't money to dress you up ...
— The Honorable Miss - A Story of an Old-Fashioned Town • L. T. Meade
... look about me! All the deposits would have been covered. All the securities I had dealt with so daringly should have been in their places again as before. Vast companies were within a hair's-breadth of being floated. Not a soul should have lost a half-penny. ...
— John Gabriel Borkman • Henrik Ibsen
... small, and had "luggled" along with some difficulty to feed and fatten him into a respectable size. Yes, he was a pretty clever pig; nor was that all—the nailing business had become better, by a half-penny a thousand, than when I was with them in the summer; and Josiah could now earn ninepence a day. He wanted to send all his children to school; if they could not read, they would be poor, even if they should come to own parks and carriages, he could not bear to see them growing up with no ...
— Jemmy Stubbins, or The Nailer Boy - Illustrations Of The Law Of Kindness • Unknown Author
... same time to mention, that Hugh rarely made use of a crossing on a muddy day, without finding a half-penny somewhere about him for the sweeper. He would rather walk through oceans of mud, than cross at the natural place when he had no coppers — especially if he had patent leather ...
— David Elginbrod • George MacDonald
... subscription—L.800 of which was contributed by 20,000 of the working-classes. To their honour be it recorded! But the inhabitants have done yet more; they have made over the library to the town-council, that it may become one of their public institutions, and have agreed to pay a half-penny rate to provide the necessary funds for its perpetual maintenance. May ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 456 - Volume 18, New Series, September 25, 1852 • Various
... with a definite stamp When two German waiters escaped from a camp. Unaided he captured those runaway Huns Who had lived for a week on three half-penny buns. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Sept. 12, 1917 • Various
... whenever I attempted to work. I had no relation living, and I never kept a friend above a week when I was able to joke. Thus I was forced to beg my bread, and a sorry trade I have found it, Mr. Harley. I told all my misfortunes truly, but they were seldom believed; and the few who gave me a half-penny as they passed, did it with a shake of the head, and an injunction not to trouble them with a long story. In short, I found that people do n't care to give alms without some security for their money,—such as a wooden leg, or a withered arm, for example. So I changed my ...
— McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... 31, 1712, Addison wrote: 'This is the day on which many eminent authors will probably publish their last words.' On August 1 the Stamp Tax came into operation, and every half-sheet periodical paid a duty of a half-penny. The price of the Spectator rose to twopence, and only half the former number of copies were sold, yet towards the close of the seventh volume about ten thousand copies ...
— The Coverley Papers • Various
... though the paper was a half-penny morning one; he did not make extravagant demands on fate, or anything else; nevertheless, Julia ...
— The Good Comrade • Una L. Silberrad
... horse, within the borough, pays one penny to the mayor (sheriff?) and the purchaser another; of an ox, a half-penny; of a man, fourpence, in whatsoever place he may be brought ...
— Highways & Byways in Sussex • E.V. Lucas
... extraordinary: you desire I would burn your letters; I desire you would keep mine. I know but of one way of making what I send you useful, which is, by sending you a blank sheet: sure you would not grudge three-pence for a half-penny sheet, when you give as much for one not worth a farthing. You drew this last paragraph on you by your exordium, as you call it, and conclusion. I hope, for the future, our correspondence will run a little more glibly, with dear George, and dear Harry; not ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole
... "I have not a half-penny to my purse, and owe more than ten thousand livres in this city, which have been lent me since I have been held prisoner here. I cannot well ask more ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 6 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality. French. • Charles Morris
... harshly. "I've lost her! It was only the kiddie that bound us together. She never cared a half-penny about me. I always knew I should never hold her unless we had a child. And ...
— The Way of an Eagle • Ethel M. Dell
... to the most homely dish in life. Who was the blundering idiot who said that "fine words butter no parsnips"? Half the parsnips of society are served and rendered palatable with no other sauce. As the immortal Alexis Soyer can make more delicious soup for a half-penny than an ignorant cook can concoct with pounds of vegetables and meat, so a skilful artist will make a few simple and pleasing phrases go farther than ever so much substantial benefit-stock in the hands of a mere bungler. Nay, we know that substantial ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... me, that at another time, when Johnson and Garrick were dining together in a pretty large company, Johnson humorously ascertaining the chronology of something, expressed himself thus: 'that was the year when I came to London with two-pence half-penny in my pocket.' Garrick overhearing him, exclaimed, 'eh? what do you say? with two-pence half-penny in your pocket?'— JOHNSON, 'Why yes; when I came with two-pence half-penny in MY pocket, and thou, Davy, with ...
— Life of Johnson - Abridged and Edited, with an Introduction by Charles Grosvenor Osgood • James Boswell
... as pretty a piece of table-turning as any audience need desire. I wish I could explain how the DUKE plays with his enemies, and finally—but no, I said I wouldn't, and I will keep my word. Two little carpings, however. Surely it is wrong to speak of "catch half-penny" journalism in the time of WELLINGTON. My impression is that the journalists of those days caught at least fourpence by their wares. And I confess to an emotion of disappointment when the heroine bounced up at the court-martial ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Volume 152, March 21, 1917 • Various
... patriotic than enlightened; republican ideas being as firmly implanted here as any where in France. You see portraits of M. Thiers and Gambetta everywhere, and only good Republican journals on the booksellers' stalls. It would be interesting to know how many copies of the half-penny issue of La Republique Francaise are sold here daily; and whereas in certain parts of France the women read nothing except the Semaine Religieuse and the Petit Journal, here they read the high-class ...
— Holidays in Eastern France • Matilda Betham-Edwards
... Yun-nan is the only country of China in which cowries had continued in use, though in ancient times they were more generally diffused. According to him 80 cowries were equivalent to 6 cash, or a half-penny. About 1780 in Eastern Bengal 80 cowries were worth 3/8th of a penny, and some 40 years ago, when Prinsep compiled his tables in Calcutta (where cowries were still in use a few years ago, if they are not now), 80 cowries were worth 3/10 ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo, Volume 2 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... deserving the same epithets—for six. If you were a luxurious person, you paid half-a-crown a bottle for the genuine produce of the Charente, little or not at all inferior to Martell or Hennessy, and a florin for excellent Scotch or Irish whiskey.[110] Fourpence half-penny gave you a quarter-pound slab of gold-leaf tobacco, than which I ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 2 - To the Close of the 19th Century • George Saintsbury
... woman of a high spirit, was to-day absent on an errand to the town; and Edith, who loved children, stopped at the threshold to notice two or three little curly-headed prattlers, who were playing together at grotto making, an amusement which cost grandfather many a half-penny. Some dispute seemed to have arisen at the moment of their entrance between the young builders, for a good-humoured, plain-looking girl, of twelve, the nursemaid of the baby, and the care-taker of four other little ones, was trying to pacify the aggrieved. In vain—little ...
— Emilie the Peacemaker • Mrs. Thomas Geldart
... catch hold of in a biscuit-box by Huntley & Palmer," replied Raffles; "that was why I sent you for one. And I didn't write a word upon a sheet of paper which could possibly be traced. I simply printed two or three on a virginal post-card—another half-penny to the bad—which might have been bought at any post-office in the kingdom. No, old chap, the G.P.O. was the one real danger; there was one detective I spotted for myself; and the sight of him has left me with a thirst. Whisky and Sullivans for ...
— Raffles - Further Adventures of the Amateur Cracksman • E. W. Hornung
... is important to note that the concessions made during its course to the convictions of Tories and Churchmen, in the matter of religious education, stirred the bitter and abiding wrath of the political Dissenters." The measure was passed, while the half-penny postage for newspapers, and the half-penny post cards ...
— The Grand Old Man • Richard B. Cook
... of this realm, in which he speculated to considerable advantage. Nor did he trouble his borrowers with abstract calculations of figures, or references to ready-reckoners; his simple rule of interest being all comprised in the one golden sentence, 'two-pence for every half-penny,' which greatly simplified the accounts, and which, as a familiar precept, more easily acquired and retained in the memory than any known rule of arithmetic, cannot be too strongly recommended to the notice of capitalists, both large and small, and more especially of money-brokers and bill-discounters. ...
— The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby • Charles Dickens
... to Hambledon, in Hampshire, to see the cradle of cricket, as it is called—the old ground on Broad Half-penny Down where they used to play cricket in tall hats, as described in John Nyren's book, which ...
— The Slowcoach • E. V. Lucas
... singing—when I left the theatre for ever I had not in my purse one half-penny. Roland gave me fifty dollars; that came from Elizabeth—that was all I had. When it was gone, Roland was employed by Mr. Lanhearne. I ...
— A Singer from the Sea • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... statute concerning the passing of pence, which I give you here as I got it translated into English; for some of our laws at that time were, as I am told, writ in Latin: Whoever in buying or selling presumeth to refuse an half-penny or farthing of lawful money, bearing the stamp which it ought to have, let him be seized on as a contemner of the king's ...
— Political Pamphlets • George Saintsbury
... protested week by week against mediocrity in paint, settled down to keeping the mediocre paintings against which his protests were loudest. He who thundered against the degeneracy of journalism accepted the patronage of the titled promoter of the half-penny press. Architects carried their respectability to the professional chair it adorns, and illustrators rested in the comfortable berths provided by Punch. Friendships cooled, and friends who never missed a Thursday look the other way when they meet ...
— Nights - Rome, Venice, in the Aesthetic Eighties; London, Paris, in the Fighting Nineties • Elizabeth Robins Pennell
... of new lighthouses, and the maintenance of the general establishment. By the new Act the duties levied under former Acts were repealed, and it was enacted that every British vessel, and every private foreign vessel should pay the toll of one half-penny per ton for every time of passing, or deriving advantage from any light, with the exception of the Bell-Rock, for which one penny per ton is the toll. Every foreign vessel not privileged must pay double toll. Exemptions were ...
— Smeaton and Lighthouses - A Popular Biography, with an Historical Introduction and Sequel • John Smeaton
... in the uncongenial society of Burghley once more manifested itself. After taking infinite pains to that end, he had the satisfaction of convincing his father and mother that his poetry was of somewhat greater merit than the half-penny ballads sold at the village feast; but his neighbours could not bring themselves to approve John's course of life, and they adopted various disagreeable modes of showing that they thought he was a mightily presumptuous ...
— Life and Remains of John Clare - "The Northamptonshire Peasant Poet" • J. L. Cherry
... caused great inconvenience. Tabitha Twitchit immediately raised the price of everything a half-penny; and she continued to refuse to ...
— A Collection of Beatrix Potter Stories • Beatrix Potter
... found its way into vulgar popularity, as a term for small coins, and sometimes for money in general, is the diminutive of the Gipsy word pashero or poshero, a half-penny, from pash a half, and haura or harra, ...
— The English Gipsies and Their Language • Charles G. Leland
... good company.—Save ye, save ye, gentlemen all—What, a la mort, and nothing stirring to keep the spirits up, and make a night on't?—the last we shall have, I take it; for a make [Footnote: A half-penny] to a million, but we trine to the nubbing cheat [Footnote: Hang on the gallows] to-morrow.—Patron—noble patron, how goes it? This was but a scurvy trick of Noll so far as you were concerned: as for me, why I might have deserved something of ...
— Woodstock; or, The Cavalier • Sir Walter Scott
... is mine," he said, crossing himself quickly, and holding out his hand. "Take the money; it's my forest. That's Ryabinin's way of doing business; he doesn't haggle over every half-penny," he added, scowling ...
— Anna Karenina • Leo Tolstoy
... a bad half-penny," said the sailor; and sitting down wearily on a chair which Katie placed for him directly, Bolton gave a short account of what he called the most unlucky mischance that had ever happened to him in the course of ...
— Happy Days for Boys and Girls • Various
... majority were taken to Chagres. From there they were sent in a ship to Porto Bello, a neighboring coast town, Morgan threatening that place with destruction unless a heavy ransom was sent him. The inhabitants sent word back that not a half-penny would be paid, and that he might do what he pleased. What he pleased to do was to carry out his threat ...
— Historical Tales - The Romance of Reality - Volume III • Charles Morris
... London. Formerly it was a game in very great vogue among the macers, who congregated nightly at the 'flash houses.' One of these is described as follows:—This gaffer laughed a great deal and whistled Moore's melodies, and extracted music from a deal table with his elbow and wrist. When he hid a half-penny, and a flat cried 'head' for L10, a 'tail' was sure to turn up. One of his modes of commanding the turn-up was this: he had a half-penny with two heads, and a half-penny with ...
— The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume II (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz
... himself. Had Lecount got her smelling-bottle? Excellent creature! let her give it directly to Miss Bygrave, and let the coachman drive carefully. If the coachman shook Miss Bygrave he should not have a half-penny for himself. Mesmerism was frequently useful in these cases. Mr. Noel Vanstone's father had been the most powerful mesmerist in Europe, and Mr. Noel Vanstone was his father's son. Might he mesmerize? Might ...
— No Name • Wilkie Collins
... sound of your name. It was the greatest trust God ever placed in one man's hand—and you—you abused it. They were afraid of you—the aristocrats, and they bought you. Oh, we are not blind up there—there are newspapers in our public houses, and now and then one can afford a half-penny. We have read of you at their parties and their dances. Quite one of them you have become, haven't you? But, Mr. Brott, have you never been afraid? Have you never said to yourself, there is justice in the earth? Suppose it ...
— The Yellow Crayon • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... get very well paid, for the people in the poorer shops and in the foreign parts of London like the noise, and give them pennies. Sometimes the man has a monkey, which always attracts the children. Other men walk about with barrows selling ice-cream; this is sold at a half-penny a time, and the children lick it out of little glasses and have no spoons: one wonders how often the glasses are washed. But that does not trouble the little street children at all; they follow the ice-cream ...
— The Children's Book of London • Geraldine Edith Mitton
... was to continue to 'butter' the King;—hence he laid it on with a thick brush, wherever the grease of hypocrisy could show off best. But work as he would, the 'shares' in his journalistic concerns were steadily going down,—none of his numerous magazines or 'half-penny rags,' paid so well as they had hitherto done; while the one paper which had lately been so prominently used by the King, continued to prosper, the public having now learned to accept with avidity and eagerness the brilliant articles which bore the signature of Pasquin Leroy, as though they ...
— Temporal Power • Marie Corelli
... the smallest coin is considered a sufficient guerdon for a service so light. But what he has lost in substantial emolument, he has gained in morale; he is infinitely more polite and attentive than he was; he sweeps ten times as clean for a half-penny as he did for twopence or sixpence, and thanks you more heartily than was his wont in the days of yore. The truth is, that civility, as a speculation, is found to pay; and the want of it, even among the ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 437 - Volume 17, New Series, May 15, 1852 • Various
... to find that for our drive through the town, half a mile beyond it and back again, we are charged the astonishingly modest fare of two-pence half-penny! ...
— The Pearl of the Antilles, or An Artist in Cuba • Walter Goodman
... pennies, and when anyone wanted a half-penny, he chopped the silver penny in two, and if he wanted a farthing he chopped the silver penny in four, so that money was all sorts of queer shapes. But Edward the First had caused round copper half-pennies and farthings to be made, and when the Welsh prince ...
— Royal Children of English History • E. Nesbit
... London in March 1737. His pupil, David Garrick, went with him to study law, and when Garrick was a rich, famous and rather vain man, Johnson, who liked to curb the "insolence of wealth" once referred to 1737 as the year "when I came to London with twopence half-penny in my pocket; and thou, Davy, with three-halfpence in thine." Nothing came of this first visit to the capital. He lived as best he could, dining for eightpence, and seeing a few friends, one of whom was Henry ...
— Dr. Johnson and His Circle • John Bailey
... does shine as bright as day, Leave your supper, and leave your sleep, And meet your play-fellows in the street; Come with a whoop, and come with a call, And come with a good will, or not at all. Up the ladder and down the wall, A half-penny roll will serve us all. You'll find milk and I'll find flour, And we'll have pudding in half ...
— Aunt Kitty's Stories • Various
... currency, but on the policeman taking his prize to the station house to lay the information, he discovered that he had been outwitted. The rouleau contained a hundred good farthings, for each of which he had paid two pence half-penny. ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 1, April, 1851 • Various
... sliding-scale, and are sometimes out of stock altogether: Pussy's provider, on the contrary, sticks to one price from year's end to year's end, and never, in the memory of the oldest Grimalkin, was known to disappoint a customer. A half-penny for a cat's breakfast has been the regulation-price ever since the horses of the metropolis began to submit to the boiling process for the benefit of ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 448 - Volume 18, New Series, July 31, 1852 • Various
... now and then," he added, "and we'll talk about the stars, the future of Socialism, and the Woman Question—anything you like except about yourself and your twopenny-half-penny affairs." ...
— Paul Kelver • Jerome Klapka, AKA Jerome K. Jerome
... just like a beggar, crave One penny or one half-penny to have; And if you grant its first suit, 'twill aspire, From pence to pounds, and so will still mount higher To the whole soul: but if it makes its moan, Then say, here is not for you, get you gone. For if you give it entrance at the door, ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... a hole made in your best coat, Master Ford. This 'tis to be married; this 'tis to have linen and buck-baskets! Well, I will proclaim myself what I am; I will now take the lecher; he is at my house. He cannot scape me; 'tis impossible he should; he cannot creep into a half-penny purse, nor into a pepper box; but, lest the devil that guides him should aid him, I will search impossible places. Though what I am I cannot avoid, yet to be what I would not, shall not make me tame; if I have horns to make one mad, let the proverb ...
— The Merry Wives of Windsor • William Shakespeare [Craig, Oxford edition]
... Arrack, Rum and French Brandy is made into Punch, with the other of the finest Ingredients—viz., A quart of Arrack made into Punch for six shillings; and so in proportion to the smallest quantity, which is half-a-quartern for fourpence half-penny. A quart of Rum or Brandy made into Punch for four shillings; and so in proportion to the smallest quantity, which is half-a-quartern for fourpence half-penny; and gentlemen may have it as soon made as a gill of ...
— All About Coffee • William H. Ukers
... presented to almost every passer-by, in the hope of finding purchasers; while, after one had passed rudely on, another had looked at her young face and smiled, another had said, "What a nice child!" but not one had taken the flowers, and left the penny or the half-penny that was to pay for them the little girl, as if accustomed to all this, only arranged again the pretty nosegays that had been disarranged in the vain hope of selling them, and commenced anew in her pretty singing tone, "Come, buy my ...
— Fanny, the Flower-Girl • Selina Bunbury
... been three weeks out of employment, I found a new place, and after pawning all my best clothes to pay expenses, when the cart set us down at the new home on Monday morning, I had the total sum of ten pence half-penny left, to provide for myself, my wife and child, till the ...
— The Wonders of Prayer - A Record of Well Authenticated and Wonderful Answers to Prayer • Various
... States, the number of letters would be reduced from 300,000,000 to 200,000,000 a year. There is, however, a class of letters which in the States are passed through the post-office at the rate of one half-penny a letter, whereas there is no rate of postage with us less than a penny. Taking these half-penny letters into consideration, I am disposed to regard the average rate of American postage at about five farthings, which ...
— Volume 2 • Anthony Trollope
... and ragged, there were bald patches of skin on the jaw; one inferred that he wore that beard only to save the trouble of shaving. He was sitting next to me, the middle passenger of the three on my side of the carriage, and he was absorbed in the pages of a half-penny paper—I think he was reading the police reports—which was interposed between him and the child in the corner diagonally opposite ...
— The Wonder • J. D. Beresford
... a year of the abolition of Monopoly, a very good smokeable cigar could be purchased in the estancos [140] from one half-penny and upwards, but as soon as the free trade project was definitely decided upon, the Government factories, in order to work off their old stocks of inferior leaf, filled the estancos with cigars ...
— The Philippine Islands • John Foreman
... one in our country villages, and these books reflect its thoughts and manners as half-penny ballads do the life of the streets of London. The ballads are not more true to the facts; but they give us, in a coarser form, far more of the spirit than we get from the same facts reflected in the intellect of a Dickens, for instance, or of ...
— Woman in the Ninteenth Century - and Kindred Papers Relating to the Sphere, Condition - and Duties, of Woman. • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... silver, which after five shillings the ounce is 187 pounds, ten shillings." This would be in American money over nine and a quarter millions of dollars as the sum of the ten thousand talents. The same authority gives as the value of the penny (Roman) sevenpence half-penny, or fifteen cents, making the second debt equivalent to about fifteen dollars. Comparison with talents mentioned elsewhere may be allowable. Trench says: "How vast a sum it was we can most vividly realize to ourselves by comparing it with other sums mentioned in Scripture. ...
— Jesus the Christ - A Study of the Messiah and His Mission According to Holy - Scriptures Both Ancient and Modern • James Edward Talmage
... This sharing can not be; 'Tis written in the testament That Brentford spoke to me, 'I do forbid Prince Ned to give Prince Tom a half-penny. ...
— The Humourous Poetry of the English Language • James Parton
... lady? Oh, her. She is not a young lady—leastways she is not dressed like one, but like a plain, decent body. She was all of a piece—blue serge! Bless your heart, the peddlers bring it round here at elevenpence half-penny the yard, and a good breadth too; and plain boots, not heeled like your'n, miss, nor your'n, ma'am; and a felt hat like a boy. You'd say the parish had dressed her for ten shillings, and got a ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade
... way, my friend; here we are opposite the Adelphi Theatre, and this is the man who used to be a black man, or else it's another, who does duty as talking finger-post, and shews you, if you are a stranger, how you are to get at the half-penny boat. Come, we must dive down this narrow lane, past the 'Fox under the Hill,' a rather long and not very sightly, cleanly, smooth, or fragrant thoroughfare; and here, in this shed-looking office, you must pay your half-penny, which guarantees you ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 438 - Volume 17, New Series, May 22, 1852 • Various
... 62-1/2 cents; shilling, 25 cents; sixpence, 12-1/2 cents. Also a three-penny piece and a four-penny piece, but the latter is being called in, and is nearly out of circulation. The copper coins of Great Britain are the penny, half-penny and farthing. ...
— Burroughs' Encyclopaedia of Astounding Facts and Useful Information, 1889 • Barkham Burroughs
... boot, the mother admitted that she had cut the boy's face because he had called her by an opprobrious German name. On the advice of the magistrate the family have decided to discontinue their subscription to the half-penny press. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Aug 8, 1917 • Various
... forgiving our sins when we stop committing them, but for all our aims and objects. Nothing that concerns us is so small but that His Infinite Intelligence follows it; no need of ours is so large but that His All-Ownership can meet it. "Do not two sparrows sell for a half-penny?" is our Lord's illustration on this point, "yet not one of them will fall to the ground without your Father's leave. But as for you," He reasons, in order that we may understand the infinitesimal nature of God's care, "the very hairs on your ...
— The Conquest of Fear • Basil King
... him short by giving him the letter from his pocket. Toby would have got a shilling too; but Mr. Filer clearly showing that in that case he would rob a certain given number of persons of ninepence-half-penny a-piece, he only got sixpence; and thought himself very ...
— A Budget of Christmas Tales by Charles Dickens and Others • Various
... one,—there is the government Beneficenza, which the more intelligent part account a great curse. Some fifteen hundred or two thousand persons, many of them able-bodied men, receive fifteen baiocchi,—sevenpence half-penny,—per day, in return for which they pouter about with barrows, removing earth from the old ruins, or cleaning the streets, which are none the cleaner, or picking grass in the square of the Vatican. Many deplorable tales are ...
— Pilgrimage from the Alps to the Tiber - Or The Influence of Romanism on Trade, Justice, and Knowledge • James Aitken Wylie
... the morning papers were very inferior to the Northern Whig, and he was certain that the North Down Herald was far more interesting than the Times. The London evening papers, he said to Hinde, gave less value for a half-penny than the Belfast Evening Telegraph, and he complained that there was nothing ...
— The Foolish Lovers • St. John G. Ervine
... out of his path, if he did not serve him worse than that. But he looked at it as a coin-collector would look at a Pescennius Niger, if the coins of that Emperor are as scarce as they used to be when I was collecting half-penny tokens and pine-tree shillings and battered bits of Roman brass with the head of Gallienus or some such old ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... shall be, in England, seven half-penny loaves sold for a penny, the three-hooped pot shall have ten hoops; and I will make it felony to drink small beer: all the realm shall be in common, and, in Cheapside shall my palfrey go to ...
— Home as Found • James Fenimore Cooper
... the First Lieutenant sorrowfully, "that's the third half-penny for swearing this year. You mean that the Doctor has always evinced a marked partiality for the society of ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Aug 29, 1917 • Various
... goods and transact business in their own dwellings. But there was something pitifully small in this old Pyncheon's mode of setting about his commercial operations; it was whispered, that, with his own hands, all beruffled as they were, he used to give change for a shilling, and would turn a half-penny twice over, to make sure that it was a good one. Beyond all question, he had the blood of a petty huckster in his veins, through whatever channel it may have ...
— The House of the Seven Gables • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... more productive portions of the Italian mainland. Sicily could never have revealed the marvellous fertility of the valley of the Po, where a bushel and a half of wheat could be purchased for five pence half-penny, and the same quantity of barley was sold for half this price;[205] but it was easier to get Sicilian corn to Rome by sea than to get Gallic corn to Rome by land; and the system of taxation and requisitions which had grown out of the provincial organisation of the island, rendered it peculiarly ...
— A History of Rome, Vol 1 - During the late Republic and early Principate • A H.J. Greenidge
... is very strongly flavoured with cress; and for salads and cold meats, &c. it is a great favourite with many: the quart of sauce costs only a half-penny more than the vinegar. ...
— The Cook's Oracle; and Housekeeper's Manual • William Kitchiner
... Old Bailey is so situated that evidence is given with the back to the light; thus, though her heavy veil was raised at last, and it could be seen that she was very pale, it was not yet that Rachel Minchin afforded a chance to the lightning artists of the half-penny press, or even to the students of physiognomy behind the man with the white hair. This listener did not lean forward an inch; the questions were answered in so clear a voice as to render it unnecessary. Yet it was one of these questions, put by her own counsel, which caused the white-headed ...
— The Shadow of the Rope • E. W. Hornung
... saw them all five in china in Mrs. Watkins's left hand corner-cupboard, china images she called them, and I thought them so pretty. Give me the fourpence half-penny for buns, Fern—one Bath, two plain, and a half-penny to the sweeper that takes me ...
— Wee Wifie • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... reading, playing at dominoes. Here too are more cafes and cabarets, open-air stalls for the sale of fried fish, and cheap restaurants for workmen and students, where, for a sum equivalent to sevenpence half-penny English, the Quartier Latin regales itself upon meats and drinks of dark and enigmatical origin. Close at hand is the Place and College of the Sorbonne—silent in the midst of noisy life, solitary in the heart of the most crowded quarter of Paris. ...
— In the Days of My Youth • Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards
... have begun to drink it already, in such quantities, that there is not a drop left for the hogs in the whole neighbourhood of Bristol. I'll have our butter-milk barrelled up, and sent twice a-week to Aberginny, where it may be sold for a half-penny the quart; and so Roger may carry his pigs to another market — I hope, Docter, you will not go to put any more such phims in my brother's head, to the prejudice of my pockat; but rather give me some raisins (which hitherto you have not done) ...
— The Expedition of Humphry Clinker • Tobias Smollett
... suggested to Rafael. "I have heard that whoever wishes to return to Rome, should go to the fountain on the last evening of his visit, take a drink out of the basin with his left hand, then turn and throw a half-penny into the water over his left shoulder. I surely wish to ...
— Rafael in Italy - A Geographical Reader • Etta Blaisdell McDonald
... the finest and largest canes that can be imagined are produced with very little care, and yield a much larger proportion of sugar than the canes in the West Indies. White sugar is sold here at two-pence half-penny a pound; and the molasses makes the arrack, of which, as of rum, it is the chief ingredient; a small quantity of rice, and some cocoa-nut wine, being added, chiefly, I suppose, to give it flavour. A small quantity of indigo is also produced here, not as an article ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 13 • Robert Kerr
... town; and what do I find? Nothing but bills, and I can't pay one of them. After settling for the special license, my fare back to town, and that telegram to Aurora. (feels in pocket, produces coppers) I've got sevenpence half-penny in the wide world and a wife! It's all Quayle's fault! Damn Quayle! I'll never believe in him again. I don't even know where my next meal is coming from, (walks up ...
— Oh! Susannah! - A Farcical Comedy in Three Acts • Mark Ambient
... At last one of the children observed to the following effect:—"You should have taken it to master, because he would know if it was bad better than you." This was a convincing argument, and to my great delight, the boy replied—"How much did the song cost?" The reply was, "A half-penny." "Here, then, take it," says the child, "I had one given me to-day; so now remember I have paid you for it, but if you bring any more songs to school I will tell master." This seemed to give general satisfaction to the whole party, who immediately dispersed to their several amusements. ...
— The Infant System - For Developing the Intellectual and Moral Powers of all Children, - from One to Seven years of Age • Samuel Wilderspin
... coins mixed in with our large copper cents,—all kinds, from the Russian "kopeck" to the "half-penny token" of Great Britain. Those were the days when we had half cents in circulation to make change with. For part of our currency was the old-fashioned "ninepence,"—twelve and a half cents, and the "four pence ha'penny,"—six ...
— A New England Girlhood • Lucy Larcom
... romantic thing; economy is more romantic than extravagance. Heaven knows I for one speak disinterestedly in the matter; for I cannot clearly remember saving a half-penny ever since I was born. But the thing is true; economy, properly understood, is the more poetic. Thrift is poetic because it is creative; waste is unpoetic because it is waste. It is prosaic to throw money ...
— What's Wrong With The World • G.K. Chesterton
... the beggars on the road! I would not take a copper half-penny! I'll take nothing but what has come to me from your ...
— Three Wonder Plays • Lady I. A. Gregory
... was this: Le Grice was in the habit of eating apples in school-time, for which he had been often rebuked. One day, having particularly pleased the master, the latter, who was eating apples himself, and who would now and then with great ostentation present a boy with some half-penny token of his mansuetude, called out to his favorite of the moment: "Le Grice, here is an apple for you." Le Grice, who felt his dignity hurt as a Grecian, but was more pleased at having this opportunity of mortifying his reprover, ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 2, July, 1850. • Various
... whose deplorable health forced her to live with her relatives in a distant province, received an anonymous letter specifying that M. Paul Visire, who had not a half-penny when he married her, was spending her dowry on a married woman, E— C—, that he gave this woman thirty-thousand-franc motor-cars, and pearl necklaces costing twenty-five thousand francs, and that he was going straight to dishonour and ruin. Madame Paul ...
— Penguin Island • Anatole France
... custom to pay a half-penny each for all queen wasps in the spring, but Mr. C.S. Martin, who had many years' experience on the fruit plantations of the Toddington Orchard Company, extending to about 700 acres, as well as on his own plantations at Dunnington, writes to me as ...
— Grain and Chaff from an English Manor • Arthur H. Savory
... city parsons were cut down. The fee for baptism was not to exceed forty pence, whilst that for marriage was not as a general rule to be more than half a mark. One farthing was all that could be demanded for a mass for the dead, and the priest was bound to give change for a half-penny when requested or forego his fee.(645) Steps were taken at the same time to improve the morality of the city by ridding the streets of lewd women and licentious men. On the occasion of a first offence, culprits of either sex were subjected to the ignominy of having their ...
— London and the Kingdom - Volume I • Reginald R. Sharpe
... sorts of little mean, dirty things. Economy is not meanness. The misfortune is, also, that this class of persons let their economy apply in only one direction. They fancy they are so wonderfully economical in saving a half-penny where they ought to spend twopence, that they think they can afford to squander in other directions. A few years ago, before kerosene oil was discovered or thought of, one might stop over night at almost any farmer's house ...
— A Unique Story of a Marvellous Career. Life of Hon. Phineas T. • Joel Benton
... son?" said Dick, and he kissed every one, beginning with Hester and finishing with the dolls. Then they all sat down to the tea-party, and partook largely of the delicacies, and after tea Dick solemnly asked the children if they had seen the flying half-penny he had brought back with him from Australia. The children crowded round him, and the half-penny was produced and handed round. Each child touched it, and found it real. Auntie Hester and Auntie Rachel examined it. Boulou was requested to smell it. And then ...
— Red Pottage • Mary Cholmondeley
... manner, that even the most seahardy fled. It was humorously observed of this vessel that she was in danger of making a round turn and appearing with her keel uppermost; and that she would even turn a half-penny if laid upon deck.' By two o'clock on the morning of the 15th July this purgatorial vessel was moored by ...
— Records of a Family of Engineers • Robert Louis Stevenson
... rides in his carriage. The Jew's profits are 500 half-crowns, or L60 odd, per week—that is upwards of L3,000 a-year. Women are mostly engaged at the paletot work. When I came to work for the cheap show-shop I had L5, 10s. in the saving bank; now I have not a half-penny in it. All I had saved went little by little to keep me and my family. I have always made a point of putting some money by when I could afford it, but since I have been at this work it has been as much as I could do to live, ...
— Alton Locke, Tailor And Poet • Rev. Charles Kingsley et al
... gold-mines, that there is no fear of these islands being ever exhausted of that commodity. A pound weight of cloves or nutmegs, for the company has the entire monopoly of both, does not in fact cost the company much more than a half-penny, and every one knows at what rate the spices are sold in Europe. Amboina is the centre of all this rich commerce; and to keep it more effectually in the hands of the company, all the clove-trees in the other islands are grubbed up and destroyed; and ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 11 • Robert Kerr
... o'er, come row me o'er, Come boat me o'er to Charlie; I'll gie John Ross another bawbee, [half-penny] To boat ...
— Robert Burns - How To Know Him • William Allan Neilson
... lakhs of rupees the unfortunate Cashmeeries were handed over to the tender mercies of "the most thorough ruffian that ever was created — a villain from a kingdom down to a half-penny," and the "Paradise of the Indies," after remaining rather less than a week a British possession, was ...
— Diary of a Pedestrian in Cashmere and Thibet • by William Henry Knight
... apply at the office; the charge is twopence for cleaning a room, making the bed, bringing water, &c. If there is more than one bed in a room, a penny must be paid for every bed over the first. Boots can be cleaned for a penny, shoes for a half-penny. For carrying wood, &c., either a halfpenny or a penny will be exacted according to the time taken. Payment for these services must not be made to the servant, but ...
— Alps and Sanctuaries of Piedmont and the Canton Ticino • Samuel Butler
... may end. I would like to have concluded by a protestation that, in making these frank statements as to the working of, and against, the Conspirators, I personally draw no pecuniary benefit of any sort, not a sovereign, not a bob, not a half-penny stamp. It is perhaps better, however, to anticipate discovery by owning up to the fact that my frankness is being paid for at so ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, November 3, 1920 • Various
... not an affair that was visible from Bun Hill; it was something that occurred in private grounds or other enclosed places and, under favourable conditions, and it was brought home to Grubb and Bert Smallways only by means of the magazine page of the half-penny newspapers or by cinematograph records. But it was brought home very insistently, and in those days if, ever one heard a man saying in a public place in a loud, reassuring, confident tone, "It's bound to come," the chances were ten to one he was talking of flying. And Bert got a box lid and ...
— The War in the Air • Herbert George Wells
... German cigar. B. says that when you consider they only cost a penny, you cannot grumble. But what I say is, that when you consider they are dear at six a half-penny, you can grumble. Well boiled, they might serve for greens; but as smoking material they are not worth the match with which you light them, especially not if the match be a German one. The German ...
— Diary of a Pilgrimage • Jerome K. Jerome
... nonsense, his successes and miscarriages in this world depend upon their motions and activity, and the different tracks and trains you put them into, so that when they are once set a-going, whether right or wrong, 'tis not a half-penny matter,—away they go cluttering like hey-go mad; and by treading the same steps over and over again, they presently make a road of it, as plain and as smooth as a garden-walk, which, when they are once used to, the Devil himself sometimes shall not be ...
— The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman • Laurence Sterne
... bullet,' said one of them, putting his finger into a clean circular aperture as large as a half-penny. ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... and the sum total had given him a slight shock. He was like many extravagant people, subject to passing spells of almost contemptible economy; and at that hour the proposed future outlay of thousands did not trouble him so much as the actual penny-half-penny value of his ...
— The Squire of Sandal-Side - A Pastoral Romance • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... interest to him. She was convinced that he had made a great advance in intelligence since his journey down to Pyechurch: not once did he hail a sheep as a gee-gee. She promoted him to the use of his proper Christian name, and called him Roger. The duke had grown calm once more, and read a four-penny-half-penny magazine with every appearance of ...
— Happy Pollyooly - The Rich Little Poor Girl • Edgar Jepson
... had felt considerable relief by the fall in the price of bread, since the commencement of the year, when the quartern loaf was as high as one shilling and four-pence half-penny; but it had now fallen to ten-pence. The misery that had been entailed upon the poor during the winter of 1804-5, in consequence of the enormous price of all sorts of provisions, was most heart-rending and revolting to the feelings ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 2 • Henry Hunt
... experience extraordinary raptures mingled with the most exquisite philosophic calm, from believing that unconscious matter is the cause of conscious thought, that the truest human affection is nothing worthier than the love of a spoonful of nitric acid for a copper half-penny, and that annihilation is the most satisfactory end of human life. From such views both the intellect and the heart of man will recoil with well-founded disgust—his logical powers will perceive the absurdity of the argument, and his taste and affections will ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2, May, 1851 • Various
... in a Surrey bank has explained a shortage of a half-penny in her postage-stamps by admitting that she swallowed one. It is thought that the extremely ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, July 25, 1917 • Various
... in life, these people are guilty of a crime; whereas they are only guilty of a misfortune. The one other slip that George Ponderevo has made is a slight yielding to the temptation of caricature, out of place in a realistic book. Thus he names a half-penny paper, "The Daily Decorator," and a journalistic peer, "Lord Boom." Yet the few lines in which he hints at the tactics and the psychology of his Lord Boom are masterly. So much for the narrator, whose "I" writes the book. I assume that Wells purposely left these matters uncorrected, ...
— Books and Persons - Being Comments on a Past Epoch 1908-1911 • Arnold Bennett
... excitements of an actor's life, promised me all sorts of things—and brought tears and sorrow. . . . An actor's lot is a bitter one! I have lost youth, sobriety, and the divine semblance. . . . I haven't a half-penny to bless myself with, my shoes are down at heel, my breeches are frayed and patched, and my face looks as if it had been gnawed by dogs. . . . My head's full of freethinking and nonsense. . . . He robbed me of my faith—my evil genius! It would have been something if I had had talent, but as ...
— The Schoolmaster and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... a mark as that unless it was bewitched. I've got to melt up that money of mine, or the thing will never be worth a half-penny again." ...
— The Riflemen of the Miami • Edward S. Ellis
... while in Canada, at the time of my visit, it was worth twenty-four and four pence. There your shilling is fifteen pence, or a quarter-dollar; while your quarter-dollar is a shilling. Your sixpence is seven pence-half-penny, or a "York shilling;" while your penny is a "copper" of indeterminate value apparently. Comparatively speaking, very little metallic money is in circulation. You receive bills marked five shillings, when, to your surprise, you can only change them ...
— The Englishwoman in America • Isabella Lucy Bird
... notebook on the other side of the bridge. I thought to myself, "Bless the lad, he's jotting down some picturesque notes of something that has struck his romantic eye." And just then he spoke—"Four and eleven pence half-penny so ...
— Shandygaff • Christopher Morley
... this martial spirit was more violent than in Greece, because, when war actually came, the Greeks were themselves exposed to all its horrors and sufferings, but in England the bloodthirsty mind could enjoy the conflict in a suburban train with a half-penny paper. As in bull-fights or gladiatorial shows, the spectators watched the expensive but entertaining scene of blood and death from a safe and comfortable distance. They gave the cash and let the credit go; they thoroughly appreciated the rumble of a distant drum. "Blood! blood!" they cried. ...
— Essays in Rebellion • Henry W. Nevinson
... their large slices of brown bread and a bottle of wine, for 2d. a head. Many, again, of the lower classes of labourers bring their own home-baked bread in their pockets, and get their large tumbler of good wine to moisten it for a half-penny. ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 446 - Volume 18, New Series, July 17, 1852 • Various
... was sure of being treated to the consolations of smuggled brandy; in which, besides it's intrinsic excellence, every glass would derive an additional zest from the consideration that it had been the honored means of cheating government out of three pence half-penny.—With all his horror however of regular government and subordination, Mr. Dulberry was made sensible that on the present occasion he must submit to some such oppression; for, as he was wholly unsupported in his annoyance, ...
— Walladmor: - And Now Freely Translated from the German into English. - In Two Volumes. Vol. I. • Thomas De Quincey
... franc. Later it rose to 3 francs then 5, then 9, then 15 francs. Then with a sudden leap it reached 23 francs on one day. That was the high-water mark, for it came down after that. The Times was too expensive for the likes of me. I used to content myself with the Flandres Liberale, a half-penny paper published then in Ghent and sold in Brussels for a franc or more according to the difficulty in getting it in. These papers used to be wrapped up very tight and small and smuggled into Brussels ...
— Field Hospital and Flying Column - Being the Journal of an English Nursing Sister in Belgium & Russia • Violetta Thurstan
... Senior Wrangler,' said Claude, 'will you tell me where is the difference between a half-penny ...
— Scenes and Characters • Charlotte M. Yonge
... person if the advice was given wisely, either for him or for the poor; how much more often does it happen that we perceive a man to have all sorts of good qualities except money, and feel that his real duty lies in getting every half-penny that he can persuade others to pay him for his services, and becoming rich. It has been said that the love of money is the root of all evil. The want of money ...
— Erewhon • Samuel Butler
... high sweet voice: "A penny, a penny, twopence, a penny and a half, and a half-penny! Now do you go away, all of you, for the wisdom of Helmas is too strong for us. There is no way for you to get into, nor for me to get out of, this place of buttered willow wands, until I have deluded and circumvented this pestiferous, squinting ...
— Figures of Earth • James Branch Cabell
... salesman, has given up a lucrative addition to his regular business—the purveying of oysters—for the sake of having more time to attend the office. Nimblecut, the hairdresser, has been endeavouring to raise his charge for shaving one half-penny per chin, to be enabled to speculate more largely. Shavings, journeyman carpenter, calculates upon clearing considerably more by 'Sister to Swindler' than a year's interest from the savings-bank. There are thousands of ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 447 - Volume 18, New Series, July 24, 1852 • Various
... of London and the mill hands in the midland counties. In the district of Huddersfield, where the people bore their sufferings with admirable patience, a committee of masters stated as a fact that "there were 13,000 individuals who had not more than twopence half-penny a day to live on". When parliament met on February 4, 1830, the prevailing distress was recognised in the king's speech, but in guarded terms, and the ministers attributed it in the main, probably with justice, to unavoidable causes. This gave the enemies ...
— The Political History of England - Vol XI - From Addington's Administration to the close of William - IV.'s Reign (1801-1837) • George Brodrick
... raw lads, lazy vagabonds, that shirk every kind of work, and lead a life of low dissipation, hanging about the public-houses until they've sent their last half-penny down their throats. But I'm determined to put a stop to the trade of these professional blackguards once and for all. It's in the public interest to do so, not only ...
— The Dramatic Works of Gerhart Hauptmann - Volume I • Gerhart Hauptmann
... fat patient—'you'd tell me all that concerns your health, and know that Tom Toole would put his hand in the fire before he'd let a living soul hear a symptom of your case; and here's some paltry little folly or trouble that I would not—as I'm a gentleman—give a half-penny to hear, and you're afraid to tell me—though until you do, neither I, nor all the doctors in Europe, can do ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... atrium or reception-room of a Roman villa. The walls of two or three other small rooms were afterwards discovered. Many fragments of pottery, other objects, and coins of several Roman emperors, dating from 133 to 361, and perhaps to 375 A.D., were likewise found. Also a half-penny of George I., 1715. The presence of this latter coin seems an anomaly; but no doubt it was dropped on the ground during the last century, and since then there has been ample time for its burial under a considerable depth of the castings of worms. ...
— The Formation of Vegetable Mould through the action of worms with • Charles Darwin
... making the attempt. "I'll be revenged on her!" he whispered to himself, still absorbed in his jealous frenzy of rage against the woman who had deceived him. "I'll be revenged on her," he repeated, in louder tones, "if I spend every half-penny I've got!" ...
— Armadale • Wilkie Collins
... last words I should have expected from him, for he looked absolutely the type that reads only a half-penny daily and a sporting sheet and puts in the rest of its leisure at gossip or cards, and as I am interested in people's taste in literature, I determined to improve his acquaintance and discover something as to his favourite ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, April 8, 1914 • Various |
