"Curtsey" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... mischievously. "Mais pourquoi pas, mignonne? You are old enough. Maud will come and be hostess, won't you, Maud? You shall have Jake too for a watch-dog, if you want him. After that, you shall be presented at Court, when you've learnt to curtsey prettily instead of turning somersaults. You must let your hair grow, Nonette, and leave off wearing breeks. You've got to ...
— Charles Rex • Ethel M. Dell
... girl made a curtsey of approbation. She moved her little head with a quiver like that of the magnetic needle; raised her chin slightly as if she would ...
— The Physiology of Marriage, Part II. • Honore de Balzac
... are your manners to, that you come into the parlour without a curtsey?" said she. "And indeed, I must ask you to excuse her, ma'am, for she's but a nobody's girl from the village, and doesn't know how to ...
— The White Riband - A Young Female's Folly • Fryniwyd Tennyson Jesse
... now red as any rose; and the tears' that had been in her eyes seemed turned to sparks of fire. She rose from the table and made a deep curtsey ...
— Andrew Golding - A Tale of the Great Plague • Anne E. Keeling
... made her curtsey and got herself away in some manner that was sufficiently awkward, and Mrs. Trevelyan curtseyed also as she rang the bell; and, though she was sore and wretched, and, in truth, sadly frightened, she was not awkward. In that encounter, so far as it had gone, ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope
... stopped and looked at the children curiously; and the old woman stepped forward and made a polite curtsey. ...
— Soap-Bubble Stories - For Children • Fanny Barry
... addressing a little pale, plain looking girl who sat in the first row of the other division, and whom I had remarked as being at once the ugliest and the most attentive in the room; she rose up, walked over to me, and delivered her book with a grave, modest curtsey. I glanced over the two dictations; Eulalie's was slurred, blotted, and full of silly mistakes—Sylvie's (such was the name of the ugly little girl) was clearly written, it contained no error against sense, and but few faults of orthography. I coolly ...
— The Professor • (AKA Charlotte Bronte) Currer Bell
... of our rejoicing that Piers set foot on the verandah. For a moment he stood staring, pardonably bewildered, at the two smugglers, who were saluting one another respectively with a profound curtsey and the most elaborate of bows. Then he pulled open the great window and stepped hesitatingly into ...
— Jonah and Co. • Dornford Yates
... sir," she said, dropping a curtsey, in answer to Lionel's inquiry. "May be, he'll not be long. It's his time for coming home, but there's ...
— Verner's Pride • Mrs. Henry Wood
... hardly sealed her letter before her father and Robert returned. She closed the door behind them, and made them a little curtsey. ...
— The Doings Of Raffles Haw • Arthur Conan Doyle
... delicious glow of the fire, the bright light that revelled in every corner of the room, the savoury smells, the comfortable sounds of a boiling kettle, and the hissing, frizzling ham. With a little old-fashioned curtsey she shut the door, and replied with a loving heart to the boisterous and surprised greeting ...
— Mary Barton • Elizabeth Gaskell
... bottles of strong waters, and glittering rows of silver flagons, looked kindly after the young gentleman as he passed through the inn-hall from his post-chaise, and the obsequious chamberlain bowed him upstairs to the Rose or the Dolphin. The trim chambermaid dropped her best curtsey for his fee, and Gumbo, in the inn-kitchen, where the townsfolk drank their mug of ale by the great fire, bragged of his young master's splendid house in Virginia, and of the immense wealth to which he was heir. The postchaise whirled the traveller through the most ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... Masser Mile," Dido began with a curtsey, meaning "Welcome back from being half-drowned;" "ebberybody so grad you ...
— Miles Wallingford - Sequel to "Afloat and Ashore" • James Fenimore Cooper
... to start. * So the King said goodbye very politely, and Mrs. Mouse gave him a kiss on each cheek in her homely way. * Adelaide put out a paw in a lackadaisical fashion, and Elvira shook hands like a pump handle, while Miss Stilton made him a beautiful cheese of a curtsey, and then stared at him through her eyeglass until he was out of sight. * Adolphus, too, was very gushing, and conducted him as far as the lid of the tin, and offered to introduce him at the Polo Club, for ...
— Perez the Mouse • Luis Coloma
... think it her business to interfere, but she thought she ought not to let so good a customer pass without speaking. So she ups to him and bobs a curtsey and said: "Gooden, sir, I hopes as how your good lady and the little one are as ...
— English Fairy Tales • Joseph Jacobs (coll. & ed.)
... a smart little curtsey. 'Although we're going to have luncheon in less than an hour, somebody was going to insist (out of pure mistaken philanthropy) in taking me for a walk. I've told Freddy that when I've departed for realms of bliss, he is to put on my tombstone, "Died of changing ...
— The Convert • Elizabeth Robins
... scarce to a curtsey bred, Would I much rather than Cornelia wed; If supercilious, haughty, proud, and vain, She brought her father's triumphs in her train. Away with all your Carthaginian state; Let vanquish'd Hannibal ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... after all any woman would or could baulk herself of a fraction of any man's admiration, supposing that it would only cost a trick to extort it. And while I was wondering she herself stooped, picked up the fan, and good-humouredly dropped me a curtsey for my lack of manners. Esteban presented me to her that evening. There followed two magical months in Paris and a ...
— Ensign Knightley and Other Stories • A. E. W. Mason
... then, her home?—this section of a barrack-row of dwellings, all alike in steps, pillars, doors and windows? When she got inside the servant who had opened the door bobbed a curtsey to her: should she shake hands with her and say, "And are you ferry well?" But at this moment Lavender came running up the steps, playfully hurried her into the house and up the stairs, and led her into her own drawing-room. ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII, No. 28. July, 1873. • Various
... as a young colt who first feels the bit. "Gramercy for your rede, young sir!" she said, with a little curtsey. "As I understand your words, you are grieved that you ever met me, and look upon me as a preaching devil. Why, my father is a bitter man when he is wroth, but hath never called me such a name as that. It may be his right and duty, but certes it is none of thine. So it would be best, since ...
— The White Company • Arthur Conan Doyle
... to ye, Mistress Elliott," said she, and hostility and gentility were nicely mingled in her tones. "A fine day, mem," the laird's wife would reply with a miraculous curtsey, spreading the while her plumage - setting off, in other words, and with arts unknown to the mere man, the pattern of her India shawl. Behind her, the whole Cauldstaneslap contingent marched in closer order, and with an indescribable air of being in the presence ...
— Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... dropped a curtsey that was full of gratitude; and the glance of triumph that she cast at her other guests may be said to have terminated the discussion that was about to commence, as the dignitaries appeared. It disposed of the question ...
— The Wing-and-Wing - Le Feu-Follet • J. Fenimore Cooper
... an Old Lady of Chertsey, Who made a remarkable curtsey; She twirled round and round, till she sank underground, Which distressed all the ...
— Nonsense Books • Edward Lear
... little boy?" She made me a mock curtsey that set the gems dancing with fire. "Come and choose, then!" She put out both hands to the darkness by the wall, and a whole cascade of jewels came sliding down and poured themselves with a rush about her feet and across the floor of the gallery. She ...
— Poison Island • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch (Q)
... that stale servility of address which most expressed to our young minds the rich burden of a Past, the consequence of too much history. I liked for my own part a lot of history, but felt in face of certain queer old obsequiosities and appeals, whinings and sidlings and hand-rubbings and curtsey-droppings, the general play of apology and humility, behind which the great dim social complexity seemed to mass itself, that one didn't quite want so inordinate a quantity. Of that particular light and shade, however, the big broom of change has swept the scene bare; more history ...
— A Small Boy and Others • Henry James
... pink all over. "An' I wish you joy av the perjury," sez she, duckin' a curtsey. "You've lost a woman that would ha' wore her hand to the bone for your pleasure; an' 'deed, Terence, ye were not thrapped...." Lascelles must ha' spoken plain to her. "I am such as Dinah is—'deed I am! Ye've lost a fool av a girl ...
— Soldier Stories • Rudyard Kipling
... in very stately and with a fine dress. She curtseys. Aunts curtsey and sit down again. Prince bows uneasily ...
— Three Wonder Plays • Lady I. A. Gregory
... flattered to the core at hearing her parents blamed; she felt inclined to rise and say, "'K you," with the great stage bow: her right hand on her heart, the other raising her dress, her body bent forward in a sweeping curtsey. ...
— The Bill-Toppers • Andre Castaigne
... must seize this opportunity to thank your Eminence for having deigned to make an exception in favor of a very obscure and humble servant of the Church," said the princess to the cardinal, with a very deep and respectful curtsey. ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue
... again how to make ourselves known; and then Mrs. Thrale again resolved to take courage and enter. She therefore opened another door, and went into another apartment. I held back, but looked after, and observing that she made no curtsey, concluded she was gone into some wrong place. Miss Thrale followed, and after her went little I, wondering who was to receive, or what was to ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 1 • Madame D'Arblay
... other with bright inquiring eyes, striving to compensate for the want of other faculties. She was teaching them to form that delight of childhood, a cowslip ball, the other children supplying her with handfuls of the gold-coated flowers, and returning a pull of the forelock or a bobbed curtsey to ...
— Heartsease - or Brother's Wife • Charlotte M. Yonge
... presents lie thick as autumn leaves. The bonne says you might fill a portmanteau with madame's fans. Bertram is recognised by a dozen ladies at once. The lady of the house receives me with the lowest curtsey. No ambassadress could be more gracieuse. The toilettes are amazing. It is early, after all Bertram's impatience. The state is that of a duchesse for the present. Bertram leaves me and is lost in the crowd. The conversation is measured and orderly. The dancing begins, and I figure in ...
— The Cockaynes in Paris - 'Gone abroad' • Blanchard Jerrold
... machine into a weak thread, and here we see the use of the young hands, boys and girls, who piece one of these pipes as they are drawn through the machine by a slow clockwork motion, bending one knee every time as they curtsey sideways toward the machine. They earn very good wages and look healthy; but, where the wool is dyed, what with the dye and what with the oil, the piecers are all ready toileted to sing to a banjo; and sometimes, with rubbing their faces with their ...
— Rides on Railways • Samuel Sidney
... carefully where she may be seen, being so smart. And then, when she dances!—a born dancer, bouncing like a little goat, and twirling more than a mill-wheel; and when she has finished she makes you such a curtsey; no citizen's wife in Florence can curtsey as she does. It was in April that he first fell in love. She was picking salad in the garden; he begged her for a little, and she sent him about his business; las, alas! ...
— Euphorion - Being Studies of the Antique and the Mediaeval in the - Renaissance - Vol. I • Vernon Lee
... kiss on the hand Helene held out to him. As Madame Desroches approached, Helene made a formal curtsey, which Gaston returned by an equally ...
— The Regent's Daughter • Alexandre Dumas (Pere)
... winding up with the smallest. It was one of his rules that they should go directly home, without lingering to play round the door of the school-house, and they knew the Mede and Persian character of his laws too well to disobey them. When Mittie went out, making a demure curtsey at the door, she lingered a little longer than usual, supposing he would release Helen from her prison house; but Master Hightower was one of the most absent men in the world, and he had forgotten the little prisoner ...
— Helen and Arthur - or, Miss Thusa's Spinning Wheel • Caroline Lee Hentz
... is pleased to present you with a house, silver, and lace. You are, he thinks, a beggared, dowerless girl. Make a curtsey, thank your ...
— The Precipice • Ivan Goncharov
... the man of violence whom we expected, a very old and wrinkled woman hobbled into the apartment. She appeared to be dazzled by the sudden blaze of light, and after dropping a curtsey, she stood blinking at us with her bleared eyes and fumbling in her pocket with nervous, shaky fingers. I glanced at my companion, and his face had assumed such a disconsolate expression that it was all I could do to ...
— A Study In Scarlet • Arthur Conan Doyle
... standing by, till the rest were gone. Then she took the last loaf left in the basket, the smallest of the lot. She looked up to the window where the gentleman stood; smiled at him; threw him a kiss, and made a low curtsey in token of her gratitude, and ...
— The Life of Jesus Christ for the Young • Richard Newton
... her chair and laid her bit of sewing aside. For a moment he almost expected her to make the little curtsey Mademoiselle had taught her to make when older people came into the schoolroom. She looked so exactly as she had looked before life had touched her. There was very little change in her girlish figure; the child curve of her cheek had returned; the Jacqueminot ...
— Robin • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... late, and Isabel after a "company tea" wanted her supper: by a footpath through the churchyard, closely mown and planted with rosebushes: and so into the church, where, after dropping a hurried professional curtsey to the altar, she set about her evening duties. Isabel called herself the curate, but she did a good deal which is not expected of a curate, such as shutting windows and changing lesson-markers, propping up the trebles when they went astray in the pointing of the Psalms, altering ...
— Nightfall • Anthony Pryde
... through a perpetual cloud of dust and a succession of narrow lanes did indeed suggest the torments of purgatory; but the happiness of madame's gracious welcome is an all-sufficient compensation for our fatigue," mademoiselle replied, with a deep curtsey. ...
— London Pride - Or When the World Was Younger • M. E. Braddon
... she said aloud, with a little curtsey to the radiant reflection. "It is all the dress, I know. I feel like a queen in it—no, like a girl again—and ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1902 to 1903 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... moons. You couldn't have predicted, at any given time, what would become of 'em next. And when old Fezziwig and Mrs. Fezziwig had gone all through the dance; advance and retire, hold hands with your partner; bow and curtsey; corkscrew; thread-the-needle, and back again to your place; Fezziwig "cut"—cut so deftly, that he appeared to wink with his legs, and came upon his ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 6 • Charles H. Sylvester
... to you, sir," answered Mrs. Banfield, with a curtsey, and gazed hard at his basket. "Nothing wrong up to the garrison, ...
— Major Vigoureux • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... which led into the kitchen, where the farm servants were seated at supper. Betto moved the beehive chair into a cosy corner beside the fire for the young master, the men-servants all tugged their forelocks, and the women rose to make a smiling bob-curtsey. ...
— By Berwen Banks • Allen Raine
... than usual, opened her door, and stood with the handle in her hand, making a little curtsey, enframed in the door-case; and Sir Bale, being in a fume, when he saw her, ceased whacking the panels of the corridor, and stamped on ...
— J. S. Le Fanu's Ghostly Tales, Volume 3 • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
... worlds," said Miss Sharp, starting back as timid as a fawn. She had previously made a respectful virgin-like curtsey to the gentleman, and her modest eyes gazed so perseveringly on the carpet that it was a wonder how she should have found an ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... with merry eyes laughing above her flushed cheeks. "Please, sir, it's the new cook," she said, dropping him a curtsey. ...
— Anxious Audrey • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... it out at the top of her shrill little voice, executing a war-dance of defiance to the tune, and concluding with an elaborate curtsey. ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand
... not suspect, the intrigue in which you move? I find it in my heart to pity you! We are both women after all - poor girl, poor girl! - and who is born a woman is born a fool. And though I hate all women - come, for the common folly, I forgive you. Your Highness' - she dropped a deep stage curtsey and resumed her fan - 'I am going to insult you, to betray one who is called my lover, and if it pleases you to use the power I now put unreservedly into your hands, to ruin my dear self. O what a French ...
— Prince Otto • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Palace bulged out, the angle on the top and the pyramid below it swayed once or twice, and threatened to crush either the Sansovino's Library or the Basilica of San Marco in their fall, then the whole colossus subsided gently, almost noiselessly, upon itself, as it were in a curtsey, the ruined brick and mortar spread out in a pyramidal heap, a dense column of white powder rose from the Piazza, and the Campanile was ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume 7 - Italy, Sicily, and Greece (Part One) • Various
... but had a frate—sometimes two, once four—in her company. The number of religious was exorbitant, and even more remarkable was it to observe the respect in which they were held. Every woman, meeting one, dropped him a curtsey, every man saluted him. My gentleman, if you please, hardly gave himself the trouble of acknowledging the grace. I saw a couple of Theatines scolding a poor lady to tears; I saw another shake off a fine gentleman, who ran after him to kiss his hand. I ...
— The Fool Errant • Maurice Hewlett
... with the delight of thirteen, at her own unexpected importance. Her father had never paid her so much attention before. Well, at least he should see that she was worthy of it now. And Joyce dropped her lowest, most formal, curtsey, as the stranger bowed low over her hand. To curtsey at the edge of a flight of steps, and in a clinging riding skirt, was an accomplishment of which anyone might be proud. Was the stranger properly impressed? He appeared grave enough, anyhow, and a very splendid figure ...
— A Book of Quaker Saints • Lucy Violet Hodgkin
... to Millicent, awoke her, and helped her tidy her hair. She bade her be sure and curtsey nicely to the Honourable John Ruffin, brought her into the sitting-room, and presented her to him. Millicent's big eyes were shining brightly from her sleep; her silken hair was prettily waved by its so recent washing; and the excitement ...
— Happy Pollyooly - The Rich Little Poor Girl • Edgar Jepson
... Bennet, 'when your best things are put on to-morrow, you must take care not to rumple or soil them before you appear in Mrs. Howard's presence; and when you come into her parlour you must stop at the door, and bow low and curtsey; and when you are desired to sit down, you must sit still till dinner is brought in; and when dinner is ready, you must stand up and say grace before you eat; and you must take whatever is offered you, without saying, "I will have ...
— The Fairchild Family • Mary Martha Sherwood
... opens—then, after admitting the entrance of two small figures, is carefully closed again, and the two small figures, with a military salute from the boy, a bob, conscientiously intended for a curtsey, from the girl, advance a step or two into ...
— "Us" - An Old Fashioned Story • Mary Louisa S. Molesworth
... Wyllys-Roof, after having made her parting curtsey to Mrs. G——-. Her parents lived at Charleston; but as her constitution was delicate, and required a more bracing air than that of Carolina, Jane had been more than once, for a twelvemonth at a time, entirely under Miss Wyllys's ...
— Elinor Wyllys - Vol. I • Susan Fenimore Cooper
... nearest tree; he will himself deposit them within it, and the wind that whispers through the boughs will be their only requiem. But then they pay neither taxes nor tithes, are never expected to pull off a hat or to make a curtsey, and will live and die without hearing or uttering the dreadful ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XIX. No. 540, Saturday, March 31, 1832 • Various
... acquaintance; a sharp-faced woman stood in their path, with a little girl in her hand, and arrested them with a low curtsey, and not a very pleasant voice, addressing herself to Flora, who was quite as tall as Richard, and appeared ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... And starting bravely to the field He tells the milkmaid by the door: "We're going to make these acres yield More than they've ever done before." She smiles to hear his gallant brag, Then drops a curtsey to the flag. And in her eyes there seems to shine ...
— Just Folks • Edgar A. Guest
... you!" Bea swept her a curtsey. "But don't hurry. Didn't you know that I promised him a dance as a reward for listening to my dissertation on reform. Some day I'll maybe ...
— Beatrice Leigh at College - A Story for Girls • Julia Augusta Schwartz
... was; but she had no sooner put a bit into her mouth, which Miss Bella gave her, than she said, she had never in her life tasted any thing so nice. She then asked her what was her name, when the girl, rising, and making her a low curtsey, said it ...
— The Looking-Glass for the Mind - or Intellectual Mirror • M. Berquin
... no harm neither in what I said: it is no sin to talk of matrimony—and so, Madam, as I was saying, if my Lord Manfred should offer you a handsome young Prince for a bridegroom, you would drop him a curtsey, and tell him you would rather ...
— The Castle of Otranto • Horace Walpole
... at once ran to their grandfather and kissed him, while Alison dropped a curtsey. The Flamp stood up and bowed as gracefully as he could, and the Liglid returned the salute, not without some ...
— The Flamp, The Ameliorator, and The Schoolboy's Apprentice • E. V. Lucas
... Catherine dropped a low curtsey, and said, "Well, I don't know if you are joking a poor country girl, as all you soldier gentlemen do; but his honour LOOKS like a lord: though I never ...
— Catherine: A Story • William Makepeace Thackeray
... successor. There were, indeed, a housekeeper and some maids,—the latter of whom I only saw disappearing at the end of a passage, or whisking out of a room when one of "the gentlemen" appeared. Mrs. Weir, indeed, I saw nearly every day; but a curtsey, a smile, a pair of nice round arms which she caressed while folding them across her ample waist, and a large white apron, were all I knew of her. This was the only female influence in the house. The drawing-room I was aware of only as a place of deadly good order, ...
— The Open Door, and the Portrait. - Stories of the Seen and the Unseen. • Margaret O. (Wilson) Oliphant
... a significant curtsey, "I'm thinkin' ye ken my maister Colin amaist as weel as I do. He's the true son of his forbears, an' Gowanbrae used to be always open in the auld lord's time, that's his grandfather Foreby, that he owes so much kindness ...
— The Clever Woman of the Family • Charlotte M. Yonge
... and a sprite of a girl, who took the hand of little Primrose, a beautiful little maiden with rich chestnut wavy curls. They all paused at the door, the boys making a salute, the girls a little curtsey. Primrose's was as pretty a little ...
— The Two Sides of the Shield • Charlotte M. Yonge
... two sons, clothed in the dark habiliments of mourning. Domina Lucrezia threw back her thick black veil, revealing upon her kindly face a sorrowful expression and her eyes suffused with tears. Making a lowly curtsey she drew herself up—a queenly figure—and holding the hands of Lorenzo and Giuliano, on either side, made her way to where Messer ...
— The Tragedies of the Medici • Edgcumbe Staley
... and running backwards, getting into her place as best she could, and then starting again. It always appeared to be her turn, and it was so sweet to see her dear William, and such a strange excitement to run forward to meet young Mr. Preston, to curtsey to him, and then run away; and this ...
— Esther Waters • George Moore
... ghost like Banquo's, with no guilty eye to discern my presence at the table. Lastly came the Austrian, who had paused to speak to a servant, and, as she passed, she gave us a fleeting smile and a slight bow, the mere shadow of a curtsey, acknowledging our presence as human beings, to whom some measure of ...
— Americans and Others • Agnes Repplier
... a load of turf. Mrs. Doherty was washing her couple of blue-checked aprons in an old brown butter-crock, and Mick thought he had introduced the subject rather happily when he told her "she had a right to be takin' her hands out of the suds, and dippin' the finest curtsey she could conthrive, and she wid the Commander-in-Gineral of the Army Forces steppin' in to pay her a visit." Of course this statement required, as it was intended to require, elucidation, so Mick proceeded to announce: "It's himself's off to Fortbrack a-Monday, 'listin' ...
— Stories by English Authors: Ireland • Various
... he's 'ad three shirts, as is twelve-and-six, and cheap at the price, too, sir," corroborated Mistress Poll Nash, with a low curtsey to the lieutenant. "Yes, sir, and two pair of trousers for thirty shillin', besides a hoilskin and a serge jumper; and this monkey jacket here, sir, which makes three ...
— Crown and Anchor - Under the Pen'ant • John Conroy Hutcheson
... near the schoolroom door until all her pupils had arrived. As each girl entered the room she made a curtsey to the pretty teacher, and then said "good-morning" to the pupils who had already arrived, and took her seat. When the clock struck nine Miss Rosalie would take her place behind the desk on the platform at the further end of the room, and say a little ...
— Yankee Girl at Fort Sumter • Alice Turner Curtis
... was rather glad there was no one listening, this time, as it didn't sound at all the right word) "—but I shall have to ask them what the name of the country is, you know. Please, Ma'am, is this New Zealand or Australia?" (and she tried to curtsey as she spoke—fancy curtseying as you're falling through the air! Do you think you could manage it?) "And what an ignorant little girl she'll think me! No, it'll never do to ask: perhaps I shall ...
— Alice's Adventures in Wonderland - Illustrated by Arthur Rackham. With a Proem by Austin Dobson • Lewis Carroll
... bow of Fanny's cavalier with a delightful little curtsey, and would have retired into the house again. But this Miss Fanny, for reasons best known to herself, was determined to prevent—reasons which a close observer might have possibly guessed, after looking at her blushing cheeks and timid, uneasy eyes. For everybody knows ...
— The Last of the Foresters • John Esten Cooke
... a kind voice; and turning round, Mrs. Myles saw the curate of the parish, the Reverend Mr. Stokes, standing just at the entry of her own house. To curtsey with the respect which in the "good old times" was customary towards those who "meekly taught, and led the way," and invite the minister in, was the work of a moment; the next beheld Mrs. Myles and her visiter ...
— Turns of Fortune - And Other Tales • Mrs. S. C. Hall
... was that she had heard the common tradition which is yet current in East Lancashire, Cumberland, and elsewhere, that it is a sin to point at the moon. Certain old gentlemen, who ought to be better informed, still touch their hats, and devout young girls in the country districts still curtsey, to the new moon, ...
— Moon Lore • Timothy Harley |
