"Fair sex" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... least two hours in reaching the head of the town. During the whole time the populace stood in the water, the front rank up to the middle, to get a peep at the strangers. Hitherto among the spectators there had generally appeared full as many of the fair sex as of the other; and the elderly dames, in particular, had been so curious as to dip their little stumps into the water in order to have a peep into the barges as they glided slowly along; but here, among the whole crowd, not a single female was visible. Although ...
— Travels in China, Containing Descriptions, Observations, and Comparisons, Made and Collected in the Course of a Short Residence at the Imperial Palace of Yuen-Min-Yuen, and on a Subsequent Journey thr • John Barrow
... so many, a large volume might be wrote of them. The juice taken inwardly cures the green-sickness and other infirmities of the like sort, and is a true specific in most disorders of the fair sex. It indeed often causes tumours in the umbilical region; but even those being really of no ill consequence, disperse of themselves in ...
— The Ladies Delight • Anonymous
... dinner indeed, including a flask of drinkable Chianti, for four or five shillings. At some of the simple German restaurants one gets excellent German fare and beer, but these are seldom available for ladies. The fair sex, however, takes care to be provided with more elegant establishments for its own use, to which it sometimes admits its husbands and brothers. The sign of a large restaurant in New York reads: "Women's Cooeperative Restaurant; tables reserved for gentlemen," in which ...
— The Land of Contrasts - A Briton's View of His American Kin • James Fullarton Muirhead
... grand for it. Colonel Pompley, with his own sonorous voice, ordered the joints, and with his own heroic hand dispensed the stores. In justice to the Colonel, I must add—at whatever risk of offense to the fair sex—that there was not a house at Screwstown so well managed as the Pompleys'; none which so successfully achieved the difficult art of uniting economy with show. I should despair of conveying to you ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 3, July, 1851 • Various
... be kept waiting, Lord Arthur,' said Mr. Podgers, with his sickly smile. 'The fair sex is ...
— Lord Arthur Savile's Crime and Other Stories • Oscar Wilde
... famously. Above all things, he prided himself on being a ladies' man, and the fair sex (as he always called them) admired him without disguise. His manner towards them was gallant yet deferential, tender yet manly. He conceded everything to their weakness; yet no man in Troy could treat a woman ...
— The Mayor of Troy • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... me, no. Were I to suggest a pilgrimage, a fast, or scourgings even, the fair sex would undertake the remedy at once, for they like some eclat about their smallest doings. All I want them to do is to correct their little spirit of self-will and ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. October, 1878. • Various
... my disposition; you are not ignorant that the society of the ladies is to me a mere recreation, and that I have never sacrificed my principles to the fair sex. I pay but little attention to recommendations, and I only take them into consideration when the person in whose behalf I may be ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... tall as Miss Brown, who is certainly not stumpy, and is some years older, if I am any judge of the fair sex." ...
— Molly Brown's Orchard Home • Nell Speed
... become a jest in the vestibule; lackeys and footmen threw it at each other whenever there entered a new guest "all alone!" And we laughed and were put in good-humour by it. But M. Nicklauss, with his great experience of the world, deemed this almost general abstention of the fair sex unnatural. ...
— The Nabob • Alphonse Daudet
... amiable and beautiful person that eye ever beheld,—a person also of innate modesty, virtue, and courtly deportment, which made him then, but especially after when he retired to the great city, much admired and adored by the fair sex.' Soon after this, he was chosen by the county of Kent to deliver a petition from the inhabitants to the House of Commons, praying them to restore the King to his rights, and to settle the government. Such offence was given by this to the Long Parliament, that Lovelace was thrown into prison, ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan
... house that Hildebrand Horden, an actor of talent and one who promised to win a great name, was killed in a brawl. Colley Cibber tells that he was exceedingly handsome, and that before he was buried "it was observable that two or three days together several of the fair sex, well dressed, came in masks, and some in their own coaches, to visit the theatrical hero in ...
— Inns and Taverns of Old London • Henry C. Shelley
... in the more important concerns of the family, made a point of never interfering with her husband's whims or prejudices; and it is a compromise which we would heartily recommend to all managing matrons of our acquaintance; for it is surprising how much real power will be cheerfully resigned to the fair sex, for the pleasure of being allowed to ride one's hobby in peace ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott
... according to Bossu's rule, and Homer's and AEsop's practice, chose the moral first, I cannot pretend to say, though some, who resolve the whole poem into an allegory, favour that opinion. Certain it is, the moral is excellent: the ill effects of inconstancy; and I am sure the fair sex will be obliged to the poet's gallantry. There are also some of what I may call collateral truths to be derived from the poem; such as not to trust too much to prosperity, exemplified in the mirth and downfall ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 6, June 1810 • Various
... worthless unit in a family is an ill-managing wife, or an indolent woman of any sort. The fair sex are sometimes very acute in what concerns themselves. They keep a tight hand over their dressmakers and milliners. They can tell to a thread when a flounce is too narrow or a tuck too deep. But if their knowledge only extends to their ...
— Thrift • Samuel Smiles
... were of his bride, who still slumbered in their stateroom amidships. In his bachelor days he never had imagined he could find such contentment as had come with his marriage to Ora. He had fought shy of the fair sex on Earth. Somehow, the women he knew back home had bored him; angling for a man's money and position, most of them, and incapable of giving real love and companionship in return for the luxuries they demanded. He was resigned to ...
— Creatures of Vibration • Harl Vincent
... folly is in the air to-day, few will dispute. It seems to be perpetrated unconsciously by the greater number, with no particular object in view, simply because other people do it. An unanswerable argument when used by one of the fair sex! ...
— The Ways of Men • Eliot Gregory
... and trappers had the one-eye-open habit. I was awakened by hearing something crack, and there standing about twenty feet away with its side turned to me was a deer. It must have belonged to the fair sex, as it had no horns. Talk about shaking! I would have shaken my best friend. I finally pulled myself together, and remembering the ducks, I let her have both barrels at once. She kicked her feet up in the air, turned her head, and on the ...
— Billy Baxter's Letters • William J. Kountz, Jr.
... how to assume a manner that should add force to the feelings he expressed, and rarely did he employ his powers of persuasion in vain, particularly with the fair sex, never with his cousin, to whom he was really attached, and who was wholly ...
— Gladys, the Reaper • Anne Beale
... long streamed out to meet and welcome us, overjoyed at being free at last. We presented, I am afraid, but a sorry appearance, as compared to the neatly-dressed ladies and the spick-and-span troops who greeted us, for one of the fair sex was overheard to remark, 'Was ever such a dirty-looking lot seen?' Our clothes were, indeed, worn and soiled, and our faces so bronzed that the white soldiers were hardly to be distinguished from ...
— Forty-one years in India - From Subaltern To Commander-In-Chief • Frederick Sleigh Roberts
... out people whose presence would work more harm than good. All assistance from women was courteously refused. "This is solemn business," said the Governor, in response to a telephone from some of the fair sex, "and the introduction of the feminine element might throw about it a social atmosphere which would result in loss of time. And then some of the boys might feel called upon to put on their ...
— Lifted Masks - Stories • Susan Glaspell
... disappointed to find that but few of the Neapolitan ladies possessed any commanding grace or beauty, neither did their dress betoken much refinement of taste. As the theatre is the time and place for the fair sex to shine its brightest, I took this as a convincing proof that my previous strictures on Italian beauty were not unjust or uncharitable. The opera, which chanced to be "Lucia di Lammermoor," was very good, both vocally ...
— Fair Italy, the Riviera and Monte Carlo • W. Cope Devereux
... this Lady appears in the Boxes the grave part of the fair Sex are seen to put their Fans before their Faces; and are heard to whisper one another— Lud what an indecent Sight Miss Giggle's Neck is— It is really quite obscene! I wonder somebody does not tell her of it, ...
— The Covent Garden Theatre, or Pasquin Turn'd Drawcansir • Charles Macklin
... the salon deserted by all but the two young ladies, who sat apart, apparently absorbed in novels, while each was privately longing for somebody to come, and with the charming inconsistency of the fair sex, planning to fly ...
— Kitty's Class Day And Other Stories • Louisa M. Alcott
... his witticisms and ridiculous situations. Yedaya Penini, another poet, looked upon it as a serious production, and in his allegory, "Woman's Friend," destitute of poetic inspiration, but brilliant in dialectics, undertook the defense of the fair sex against the misanthropic aspersions of ...
— Jewish Literature and Other Essays • Gustav Karpeles
... good or bad quality that does not affect both sexes, so it is not to be imagined but the fair sex must have suffered by an affectation of this nature, at least as much as the other: the ill effect of it is in none so conspicuous as in the two opposite characters of Caelia and Iras. Caelia has all the charms of person, together with an abundant sweetness ...
— The Young Gentleman and Lady's Monitor, and English Teacher's Assistant • John Hamilton Moore
... said the lady, laughing affectedly; "you should really have been a Catholic priest instead of a Presbyterian. What an invaluable father confessor have the fair sex lost in you, Mr. Cargill, and how dexterously you would have evaded any cross-examinations which might have ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott
... mind is beyond the comprehension of men's "arithmetical understanding." The Chinese ideogram denoting "the mysterious," "the unknowable," consists of two parts, one meaning "young" and the other "woman," because the physical charms and delicate thoughts of the fair sex are above the coarse mental calibre of our sex ...
— Bushido, the Soul of Japan • Inazo Nitobe
... PUNCHINELLO has a great admiration. He never takes tea, having been advised by his physician to drink nothing but lager-bier, with an occasional beaker of rum, gin, or brandy, or Monongahela, or whatever may be handy on the shelf. Nevertheless, as an admirer of the fair sex, 'Squire PUNCHINELLO believes in Old Hyson and Hyson Jr., in Oolong and Bohea, in Souchong and Gunpowder, in Black and Green; and if there were Scarlet or Yellow or Blue Teas, Col. PUNCHINELLO would equally admire, steep, sweeten and ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 17, July 23, 1870 • Various
... me to address the following Piece to the Fair Sex, is, because the principal Matters contained in it are within the Liberty of their Province. The Art of Oeconomy is divided, as Xenophon tells us, between the Men and the Women; the Men have the most dangerous and laborious Share of it in the ...
— The Country Housewife and Lady's Director - In the Management of a House, and the Delights and Profits of a Farm • Richard Bradley
... across this sage chronicler of his dead wife, circulating testimonials to her excellences, to which no doubt he was oblivious in her lifetime. 'They had,' he writes, 'from their earliest years lived in the most intimate and unreserved friendship.' His love of the fair sex has been already mentioned (he had quoted the song of 'the Soapers' in our first chapter), and she was the constant yet prudent and delicate confidante of all his 'egarements du coeur et de l'esprit.' This we may doubt, and the gracefully allusive French quotation reminds ...
— James Boswell - Famous Scots Series • William Keith Leask
... for a roof, and then persuades himself and others that he has been enjoying himself. Let such an one come and make trial of a deliberate, well-organized picnic of a fortnight's duration, such as the one now before us, with plenty of sport in the neighbourhood, while the presence of the fair sex in camp renders the pleasures of the drawing-room doubly delightful after those of ...
— A Journey to Katmandu • Laurence Oliphant
... “surround” presented the appearance of one vast slaughter-house. He who had been the most successful in the work of devastation was celebrated as a hero, and received the highest honours from the fair sex, while he who had been so unfortunate as not to have killed a single buffalo was jeered at and ridiculed by the ...
— The Great Salt Lake Trail • Colonel Henry Inman
... and with, consid'able pleasure." The sombrero completed a semicircular sweep and arrived in the neighborhood of Mr. Hank's heart in significance of his vassalage to the fair sex. ...
— Judith Of The Plains • Marie Manning
... who were doubtless envious of Gifted's popularity with the fair sex, attempted in the most unjustifiable manner to play upon his susceptible nature. One of them informed him that he had seen that Lindsay fellah raound taown with the darndest big stick y' ever did see. ...
— The Guardian Angel • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... future. According to the first number, published on April 12, 1709, the aim was to instruct the public what to think, after their reading, and there was to be something for the entertainment of the fair sex. The numbers were published three times a week, on the post-days, at the price of one penny. Each paper consisted of a single folio sheet, and the first four were distributed gratuitously. Steele probably ...
— The Tatler, Volume 1, 1899 • George A. Aitken
... settled policy The Daily Giggle will appeal more especially to the fair sex. There is more than a touch of pathos in the signature "Orphan Boy," which will appear at the foot of his letter on the subject, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, July 29, 1914 • Various
... then another open house contained another veritable hag. Passing several other houses, tightly closed, we found a third old woman, and I saw that we were destined to secure nothing but decrepit hags, as representatives of the fair sex. At the next closed house, I stopped, and turning to an official, who spoke Spanish, said, "I am tired of these closed houses; who owns this house?" His name was given, and I wrote it down. "Very well," said I, "I shall recommend to the jefe of the ...
— In Indian Mexico (1908) • Frederick Starr
... no sooner cast her Eyes on this young Friar, but her Face was overspread with Blushes of Surprize: She beheld him stedfastly, and saw in his Face all the Charms of Youth, Wit, and Beauty; he wanted no one Grace that could form him for Love, he appear'd all that is adorable to the Fair Sex, nor could the mis-shapen Habit hide from her the lovely Shape it endeavour'd to cover, nor those delicate Hands that approach'd her too near with the Box. Besides the Beauty of his Face and Shape, he had an Air altogether great, in spite of ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn - Volume V • Aphra Behn
... true knights. This respect for women had a softening and ennobling influence, which was of great value in times when such influences were rare. It was probably derived (according to a French writer) from our ancestors, the Germans, "who attributed somewhat of divinity to the fair sex." It is the sign of a corrupt age and degraded manners when this respect ceases to ...
— Old English Sports • Peter Hampson Ditchfield
... there were not many houses in Poland that surpassed theirs in magnificence. In introducing to the reader the various ornaments and appendages of the magnate's court, I shall mention first, giving precedence to the fair sex, that there lived under the supervision of a French governess six young ladies of noble families. The noblemen attached to the lord of the castle were divided into three classes. In the first class ...
— Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician - Volume 1-2, Complete • Frederick Niecks
... decrees of Fate, he did not rather flatter himself on being a successful man of intrigue,—whether he did not take some glory to himself for his good fortune with women, and pride himself amidst his self-reproaches for the devotion which had been displayed for him by the fair sex in general. It is quite possible that he taught himself to believe that at one time Dorothy Stanbury was devotedly in love with him, and that when he reckoned up his sins she was one of those in regard to whom he accounted himself to have ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope
... which I had inspired in Taee. But this conviction gave me none of that complacent gratification which the vanity of man ordinarily conceives from a flattering appreciation of his personal merits on the part of the fair sex; on the contrary, it inspired me with fear. Yet of all the Gy-ei in the community, if Zee were perhaps the wisest and the strongest, she was, by common repute, the gentlest, and she was certainly the most popularly beloved. The desire to aid, to succour, to protect, to comfort, to bless, ...
— The Coming Race • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... admirer of the fair sex, and always imagining himself in love with some unattainable beauty, he had a passionate craze for music, and played upon the violin and flute with considerable taste and execution. The sound of a favourite melody operated upon the breathing automaton like ...
— Roughing it in the Bush • Susanna Moodie
... Lovelace to John Belford, Esq.—Pride, revenge, love, ambition, or a desire of conquest, his avowedly predominant passions. His early vow to ruin as many of the fair sex as he can get into his power. His pretences for it. Breathes revenge against the Harlowe family. Glories in his contrivances. Is passionately in love with Clarissa. His high notions of her beauty and merit. Yet is incensed against ...
— Clarissa, Volume 1 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... women who take care of the rooms: there is about one to each staircase, that is to say, to every eight rooms. For obvious reasons they are selected from such of the fair sex as have long passed the age at which they might have had any personal attractions. The first intimation which your bed-maker gives you is that she is bound to report you to the tutor if ever you stay out of your rooms all night.—Bristed's Five Years in an ...
— A Collection of College Words and Customs • Benjamin Homer Hall
... I am counting on your visit at my own house. As for the hindrances which the fair sex can oppose to it, you will not notice them (be sure of it) any more than did the others. My little stories of the heart or of the senses are not displayed on the counter. But as it is far from my quarter to yours and ...
— The George Sand-Gustave Flaubert Letters • George Sand, Gustave Flaubert
... endeavours of "The Society for the Protection of Birds," the harpy Fashion appears still, and even increasingly, to make endless holocausts of small fowl for the furnishing forth of "feather trimmings" for the fair sex. We are told that to obtain the delicate and beautiful spiral plume called the "Osprey," the old birds "are killed off in scores, while employed in feeding their young, who are left to starve to death in their nests by hundreds." Their dying cries are described as "heartrending." But they evidently ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 102, May 14, 1892 • Various
... who early in life fell in love with the rich heiress of the Vernons of Hanbury. A marriage was eventually arranged, but this union proved a complete failure, and terminated in a divorce. Thereupon young Cecil, distrustful of the conventionalities of society, and to prevent any one of the fair sex marrying him on account of his position, resolved "on laying aside the artificial attractions of his rank, and seeking some country maiden who would wed him from disinterested ...
— Strange Pages from Family Papers • T. F. Thiselton Dyer
... Purcell seems to have had an admiration for the beauties of nature, particularly as developed in the fair sex; a habit of mind which has been rather improved upon than discontinued by his ...
— The Purcell Papers - Volume II. (of III.) • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
... like all rogues, he was a great calumniator of the fair sex,*—"one woman is enough to dark the fairest ploy that was ever planned; and how could I be such an ass as to expect to carry through a job ...
— The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... degree with spoken words, have widely different significations, according to the object of their exhibition, as well as the context. Panurge (Pantagruel, Book III, ch. xix) hits the truth upon this point, however ungallant in his application of it to the fair sex. He is desirous to consult a dumb man, but says it would be useless to apply to a woman, for "whatever it be that they see they do always represent unto their fancies, and imagine that it hath some relation to love. Whatever signs, shows, or gestures we shall make, or whatever our behavior, ...
— Sign Language Among North American Indians Compared With That Among Other Peoples And Deaf-Mutes • Garrick Mallery
... blood up, theologically or politically. He has a cool head and a quiet tongue- -two excellent articles for general wear which three-fourths of the parsons in this country have not yet heard of. He is well liked by the male portion of his congregation, and is on excellent terms with the fair sex. He is a batchelor, but that is his own fault. He could be married any day, but prefers being his own master. He may have an ideal like Dante, or a love phantom like Tasso, or an Imogene like the brave Alonzo; but he has published neither poetry nor prose ...
— Our Churches and Chapels • Atticus
... whole of this sacred region, the name of which I am compelled to withhold, there was not a single female. Everybody in it was given up to contemplation and ascetic absorption; and it is well known that profound contemplation, for any length of time, and the presence of the fair sex, are incompatible. I was much troubled by this vacuous sensation, which I felt to be in the highest degree derogatory to my fifth principle, and the secret of which I discovered, during a trance-condition which lasted for several months, to arise from a subtle magnetism, ...
— Fashionable Philosophy - and Other Sketches • Laurence Oliphant
... old gentleman; "yet it was not till he had attained the age of twenty-two that he appeared to know he had anything to do in the world besides dressing and attending on the fair sex. His taste produced the first, whilst the urbanity of his disposition gave birth to the latter. When Berrington arrived at his title, he was about five-and-twenty. Sorrow for the death of his amiable parents, who died in the same month, afforded ...
— Thaddeus of Warsaw • Jane Porter
... adorning his own person, under the hands and instructions of his barber and valet de chambre. If he learns to play upon the flute or the fiddle, he is altogether irresistible. But he piques himself upon being polished above the natives of any other country by his conversation with the fair sex. In the course of this communication, with which he is indulged from his tender years, he learns like a parrot, by rote, the whole circle of French compliments, which you know are a set of phrases ridiculous ...
— Travels Through France and Italy • Tobias Smollett
... I must bring you acquainted with. The best account I know of them is in a French book call'd 'Le Comte de Gabalis', which both in its title and size is so like a Novel, that many of the Fair Sex have read it for one by mistake. According to these Gentlemen, the four Elements are inhabited by Spirits, which they call Sylphs, Gnomes, Nymphs, and Salamanders. The Gnomes or Daemons of Earth delight in mischief; but the Sylphs whose habitation is in ...
— The Rape of the Lock and Other Poems • Alexander Pope
... account him comparatively chaste and moral. Neither must we overlook certain circumstances in the existing state of the theatre. The female parts were not acted by women, but by boys; and no person of the fair sex appeared in the theatre without a mask. Under such a carnival disguise, much might be heard by them, and much might be ventured to be said in their presence, which in other circumstances would have been absolutely improper. It is certainly to be wished that decency should be observed ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IV • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... time is enough for me to care for properly," he said to me in the winning manner with which, and his wealth, unintentionally and unconsciously made slaughter among the hearts of the fair sex. ...
— My Brilliant Career • Miles Franklin
... admiration of her beauty, and astonished with the overfrankness of her manners, which seemed the more extraordinary, at a time when the dictates of politeness, flowing from the court of the Grand Monarque Louis {104} XIV., prescribed to the fair sex an unusual severity of decorum. I was left awkwardly enough stationed in the centre of the court of the old hall, mounted on one horse, and ...
— A Book of English Prose - Part II, Arranged for Secondary and High Schools • Percy Lubbock
... authorities of the place. Their haughty and careless adversary had the advantage or disadvantage of a fine person and handsome face, which, with his other recommendations, gained him universal popularity with the women; and his success and familiarities with the fair sex were not likely to escape the vigilance of spies anxious to collect damaging proofs. What inflamed to the utmost the animosities of the two parties was the success of Canon Mignon in obtaining the coveted position of confessor to the convent of Ursulines in Loudun, to the exclusion of Grandier, ...
— The Superstitions of Witchcraft • Howard Williams
... contrast with Richardson. He was gentle-born, distinguished and fashionable in his connections: the son of younger sons, impecunious, generous, of strong often unregulated passions,—what the world calls a good fellow, a man's man—albeit his affairs with the fair sex were numerous. He knew high society when he choose to depict it: his education compared with Richardson's was liberal and he based his style of fiction upon models which the past supplied, whereas Richardson had no models, blazed his own trail. ...
— Masters of the English Novel - A Study Of Principles And Personalities • Richard Burton
... including the furniture of his gambling-house, were sold at auction, attracting crowds of the most fashionable people in Washington, and probably for the first time since the descent of Proserpine, the gates of Hades were passed by troops of the fair sex. ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore
... never to have entertained particular affection towards any of the fair sex. We have ascertained that, at different periods, he paid court to two females of his own rank. The first of these was Jean King, sister of his friend John King, one of the minor poets of Paisley; she afterwards married a person ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume II. - The Songs of Scotland of the past half century • Various
... such evidences of veneration for the fair sex. The lover worships the very ground she trod on, and is enraptured at the thought of breathing the same atmosphere that surrounded her. To express his adoration he thinks and talks, as we ...
— Primitive Love and Love-Stories • Henry Theophilus Finck
... otherwise disagreeable as looking due south, becomes interesting after sunset. Here you may see the young bloods of Taranto leaning in rows against the railing with their backs to the sea—they are looking across the road whence, from balconies and windows, the fair sex are displaying their charms. Never a word is spoken. They merely gaze at each other like lovesick puppies; and after watching the performance for several evenings, I decided in favour of robuster methods—I decided that courtship, under conditions such as the Corso ...
— Old Calabria • Norman Douglas
... never allowed myself to be caught in the net of matrimony, I had many friends among the fair sex, particularly among those who graced the footlights; and some of my evening parties did not break up until dawn was glinting over the roofs of the respectable mansions round about me. It was a gay life, but it cost money—almost more ...
— The Confessions of Artemas Quibble • Arthur Train
... years ago Kincardineshire had its wise women. At the time referred to, a recruiting sergeant (whom we shall call Donald Campbell), equally devoted to his sovereign and the fair sex, made a favourable impression on the inhabitants of a small town fifteen or twenty miles from Aberdeen. The parish minister, the parochial teacher, and the doctor had something favourable to say of the sergeant. Nurses and other servant-maids could see nothing but the ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant
... reasonable to suppose that the bilingual lady who composes the fashion columns of the Daily Horror is most anxious to know how the fair sex was accoutred at our dinner party that night, I hasten to inform her that Charlotte was gowned in an elegant confection of Puttoo of a simply indescribable nuance of creme de boue—the train, extremely decolletee at the lower end, cunningly revealing at every turn glimpses ...
— A Holiday in the Happy Valley with Pen and Pencil • T. R. Swinburne
... that she is as fine-looking a woman as I have ever seen," he said, "but I believe that I am proof against the blandishments of the fair sex upon principle; for," more gravely, "I have never had any desire to change my condition since I lost my wife. My reason for requesting the introduction was, I thought Mrs. Montague might be able to give ...
— Mona • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... the female on a similar occasion, he brought his gallant, one William Barton, a fortune of no less than fifteen pounds, which, even supposing it to have been the Scottish denomination of coin, was a very liberal endowment compared with his niggardly conduct towards the fair sex on such an occasion. Neither did he pass false coin on this occasion, but, on the contrary, generously gave Burton a merk, to keep the fifteen pounds whole. In observing on Satan's conduct in this matter, Master George Sinclair observes that it is fortunate the ...
— Letters On Demonology And Witchcraft • Sir Walter Scott
... lady, who, if not so beautiful as Mademoiselle von Schwerin, was still pretty enough to be called one of the fair sex. She was dressed in a charming and tasteful morning robe, which was eminently adapted to display to advantage the beautiful contour of her tall ...
— Frederick the Great and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... authenticity of which it is impossible to answer. They are all handsome, and remarkable for an almost nun-like shyness and sweetness of expression. She was certainly a woman of refined taste and cultivated mind, and at a time when female modesty was the only rare adornment of the fair sex in Avignon, her character was as stainless as the first snow-flake which fell on the summit of the Estrelles. The connection between Petrarch and Laura seems to our modern ...
— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 7 of 8 • Charles F. (Charles Francis) Horne
... Inlets were surveyed. When near the shore, a number of Esquimaux came off to obtain some iron tools. The behaviour of one of the fair sex created considerable surprise. She had sold one boot, but obstinately retained the other. At length the suspicions of the seamen being aroused, she was seized and the buskin pulled off, when it proved to be a receptacle of stolen treasure. Besides ...
— Notable Voyagers - From Columbus to Nordenskiold • W.H.G. Kingston and Henry Frith
... to gather the change remaining from seventy dollars greenbacks swapped for six hundred and ninety miles of travel at ten cents a mile. I hastily stepped aside. A subtle fragrance and a rustle warned me that I was obstructing a representative of the fair sex. So did the smirk and smile ...
— Desert Dust • Edwin L. Sabin
... of the verandah there were many more lateral rooms, each with a special destination, some of which I have mentioned already. The largest of these rooms was called "vattan," and was used exclusively by the fair sex. Brahman women are not bound to spend their lives under veils, like Mussulman women, but still they have very little communication with men, and keep aloof. Women cook the men's food, but do not dine ...
— From the Caves and Jungles of Hindostan • Helena Pretrovna Blavatsky
... see you are not a lover of cigars. I confess smoking is my weakness—smoking and the fair sex. Not for the life of me can I remain indifferent to the fair sex. How about you? Which do you ...
— The Inspector-General • Nicolay Gogol
... honour, out of county Limerick, and it is thim as makes their husbands the tyrants that they are." This account made me wonder at two things—firstly, at the astounding power of lying and exaggeration displayed by my interlocutor; and secondly, where the old Irish gallantry towards the fair sex has gone to. It seems to have gone very far, for one hears now of ladies being shot at. But, although not impressed with the truth of the information vouchsafed to me, I expected to see at least an Irish version of Lady Macbeth, instead of the graceful, well-dressed, ...
— Disturbed Ireland - Being the Letters Written During the Winter of 1880-81. • Bernard H. Becker
... lately he was conscious that he had been rather foolish with different admiring friends of the fair sex; and though he was no prig, and knew most men took kisses and caressess when offered, and would have thought it a needless throwing away of good things to refuse, he yet felt a little irritated with himself and the givers without ...
— Winding Paths • Gertrude Page
... to Copulation, over much Heat of the Privities, &c. and by this means a Man will be hinder'd from knowing his Wife; but the larger it is, so as no way to prevent their mutual Embraces, the greater is the Pleasure, especially to the Female; and without this Part, the fair Sex would neither desire the Embraces of the Males, nor have any Pleasure in ...
— Tractus de Hermaphrodites • Giles Jacob
... upon the "Doctrine of the Mean," and Yasuaki on the Confucian "Analects," and after these learned discourses a Sarugaku play, or some other form of light entertainment, was organized. The shogun was a misogynist, and Yasuaki understood well that men who profess to hate women become the slave of the fair sex when their alleged repugnance is overcome. He therefore set himself to lead the shogun into licentious habits, and the lecture-meetings ultimately changed their complexion. Tsunayoshi, giving an ideograph from his name to Yasuaki, called him Yoshiyasu, ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... male sex, with respect to amours. But I am afraid they have stretched this indulgence too far, indeed far beyond what the oeconomy of nature requires, and much farther than is confident with public utility. I may likewise add, that the fair sex have been too remiss, that they have suffered themselves to be outwitted, and allowed the other sex to carry this inequality in their manners to too great a length. Nothing certainly appears more inconsistent, than that the same action which brings the greatest disgrace ...
— Critical Remarks on Sir Charles Grandison, Clarissa, and Pamela (1754) • Anonymous
... you've on," he said, admiringly. "I was wondering what you'd wear. I like short outing skirts for women, rather than trousers. The service sort of made the fair sex ...
— The Call of the Canyon • Zane Grey
... incidents as came within the range of her somewhat limited sphere of observation. Lord D—— was much engaged in public business (being lord-lieutenant of the county), and in carrying on some agricultural speculations by which he was much engrossed. There were two young Honourables of the fair sex, and an only son—then attending his studies at Oxford—children of the family. Phebe Fortune was now fifteen, and seemed to increase in loveliness, and the most kindly, intelligent expression of countenance, daily. Her eyes ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume III • Various
... recorded after his own. With him expired the chivalrous spirit which animated successively the bosoms of so many knights of the road; with him died away that passionate love of enterprise, that high spirit of devotion to the fair sex, which was first breathed upon the highway by the gay, gallant Claude Du-Val, the Bayard of the road—Le filou sans peur et sans reproche—but which was extinguished at last by the cord that tied the ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth
... Bolingbroke, Pope, Gay, Arbuthnot, and Congreve, and his readiness to assist those who needed his help, without thought of party or politics. Although, in some of his poems, Swift rather severely exposed the follies and frailties of the fair sex, as in "The Furniture of a Woman's Mind," and "The Journal of a Modern Lady," he loved the companionship of beautiful and accomplished women, amongst whom he could count some of his dearest and truest friends; but He loved to be bitter at A lady illiterate; and ...
— The Poems of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Volume I (of 2) • Jonathan Swift
... before separating. It is at such a time that one feels an impulse to bring together one's scattered impressions and communicate them to some sympathetic being. The abbe, then, would break the same lances as myself with my uncle and cousin. The chevalier, who was an ardent admirer of the fair sex, of which he had had but little experience, used to take upon himself, like a true French knight, to defend all the beauties that we were attacking so unmercifully. He would laughingly accuse the abbe of arguing about women as the fox in the fable argued about the grapes. For myself, I used to improve ...
— Mauprat • George Sand
... behaviour, and being desirous of transmitting it to posterity by the most durable monument, consecrated a statue to Modesty, on the very spot where Penelope had thrown the veil over her face; that after her it might be a universal symbol of delicacy among the fair sex. ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 14, No. 385, Saturday, August 15, 1829. • Various
... woman." In Elizabeth's time vocal music was held in the highest estimation, and to sing well was a necessary accomplishment for ladies and gentlemen. A writer of 1602 says to the ladies, "It shall be your first and finest praise to sing the note of every new fashion at first sight." That some of the fair sex may have carried their musical practice too far, like many who have lived since then, is perhaps indicated in some verses of that date which run in ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 6, No. 38, December, 1860 • Various
... his intelligence is but the coldness of a winter moon, whose beams can produce no fruit, whose solar light is not its own, but borrowed from the great dispenser of effulgent beauty. We have no disposition in the world to flatter the fair sex, we would raise them above those dastardly principles which only exist in little souls, contracted hearts, and a distracted brain. Often does she unfold herself in all her fascinating loveliness, presenting the most captivating charms; yet we find man ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... (though, as far as I can see, THAT was done in self- defence). Jasper confesses all; Tartar marries Rosa; Helena marries Crisparkle. Edwin is only twenty-one, and may easily find a consoler of the fair sex: indeed he is "ower ...
— The Puzzle of Dickens's Last Plot • Andrew Lang
... their own Families by their extravagant Finery, but their Country too, and all who dare endeavour to exert a little Industry in home Manufactures. Surely the Wearers of all Foreign Goods, and especially the Fair Sex, do not believe, or do not consider, that they deliberately starve their own poor Countrymen and their Families, by making them Work in vain. They shou'd in Pity, in Generosity, in Justice reflect, that since we are not allowed to Export our ...
— A Dialogue Between Dean Swift and Tho. Prior, Esq. • Anonymous
... one of Madame Bonaparte's women, lying in wait, and who had seen him through the window of a closet opening upon the corridor. The First Consul, after a vigorous outburst against the curiosity of the fair sex, sent me to the young scout from the enemy's camp to intimate to her his orders to hold her tongue, unless she wished to be discharged without hope of return. I do not know whether I added a milder argument to these threats to buy her silence; but, whether from fear or for compensation, she had the ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... governor, ma'am?" asked the commissioner, with a deferential manner he always used toward the fair sex. ...
— Roads of Destiny • O. Henry
... lady (a laugh). He alluded to his daughter (cheers). Several morals might be drawn from this little incident. The advantages of the sixpenny telegram and the even greater advantages of getting on the right side of the fair sex (cheers and laughter); these were two morals, but what he proposed to bring more particularly under their notice to-night was this: that if a respectable old chap like himself could enjoy himself so thoroughly as to forget his duty, there was hope even for the oldest of them (slight ...
— The Prodigal Father • J. Storer Clouston
... The particular attention of such of the fair sex, as are more apt to read for the same of amusement than instruction, is requested to this letter of ...
— Clarissa, Volume 3 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... chiefly in the stoutness of their draught oxen, that these peasants vie with each other. It is likewise by activity and manly actions, and by other qualities that render a man fit for the married state, and the rearing of a family, that the youth chiefly obtain the esteem of the fair sex.... A plain close cap and a coarse cotton gown, virtue and good housewifery, are looked upon by the fair sex as sufficient ornaments for their persons; a flirting disposition, coquetry and paint would have very little effect in making conquests of young ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 1 (of 6) - From the Foundation of Cape Colony to the Boer Ultimatum - of 9th Oct. 1899 • Louis Creswicke
... innocent mischief of young ladies, who made me join their games, and would offer me their cheeks to kiss through the back of a chair, or invite me to blow out a candle which they would lift suddenly above the range of my breath. But until that moment no person of the fair sex had ever subjected me to such a whimsical piece of familiarity as that of tickling my nose with my own feather pen. Happily I remembered the maxim of my late grandfather, who was accustomed to say that ...
— The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard • Anatole France
... caught a glimpse of the widow's cap: you know his dry sarcastic humour and tenacious memory, and perhaps I ought to add, my inquisitive disposition. From him I gleaned a sketch of the widow's history, adorned with a few comments, which gallantry to the fair sex will not allow me to repeat. She had just joined conversation with the Marquis of H——, who was attended by Jackson, the pugilist; an illustrious personage and a noble earl were on her left; while behind the jolie dame, at a respectful distance, paced ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle
... assurance gracefully because he was so used to it. Admiration from the fair sex was no new thing to him. And Missy knew this. Perhaps that was one reason she'd been so modestly pleased that he had wished to bestow his gallantries upon her. She realized that Raymond Bonner was much handsomer and richer; and that Kitty Allen's cousin Jim from Macon City, in his uniform ...
— Missy • Dana Gatlin
... royal Irish constabulary, were making frank use of their handkerchiefs and it is safe to say that there was not a dry eye in that record assemblage. A most romantic incident occurred when a handsome young Oxford graduate, noted for his chivalry towards the fair sex, stepped forward and, presenting his visiting card, bankbook and genealogical tree, solicited the hand of the hapless young lady, requesting her to name the day, and was accepted on the spot. Every ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... a crotchet, call it a foolish fancy, or what you will, Antonio," rejoined Salvator,—"at any rate I love the fair sex; but there is not one, not even she on whom I foolishly dote, for whom I would gladly die, but what excites in my heart, so soon as I think of a union with her such as marriage is, a suspicion that makes me tremble with a most unpleasant feeling of awe. That which is inscrutable ...
— Weird Tales. Vol. I • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... adulation, is fiery and capricious. His opinions of men and things are variable. He is rather prone to personal abuse, but makes ample amends to those who will put up with it. Towards such his resentments are not lasting. He is a passionate admirer of the fair sex, but jealous to excess. He is fond of waltzing, and is a very quick, but not a very graceful dancer. His mind is of the most active description. When not more stirringly employed, he is always reading, dictating letters, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 366 - Vol. XIII, No. 366., Saturday, April 18, 1829 • Various
... fair sex. It contains so much useful advice for every woman likely to become a mother, that married men would do well to provide ...
— The Maternal Management of Children, in Health and Disease. • Thomas Bull, M.D.
... Quixote said, in answer to the matter-of-fact remonstrances of Sancho, that Dulcinea del Toboso answered the purpose of signalising his valour just as well as the 'fairest princess under sky,' so any of the fair sex will serve them to write about just as well as another. They take some awkward thing and dress her up in fine words, as children dress up a wooden doll in fine clothes. Perhaps a fine head of hair, a taper waist, or some other circumstance strikes them, and they ...
— Table-Talk - Essays on Men and Manners • William Hazlitt
... views of immortality, the future state of the fair sex, and the application of transcendental analysis to matrimony, all changed about the ...
— Mr. Isaacs • F. Marion Crawford
... know; de fair sex am so captious 'bout us gemmen; but Vic is up dar, and you can ask her, she knows all 'bout de 'prieties. Smart gal, dat Vic, I tell you; loves Miss Elsie, ...
— A Noble Woman • Ann S. Stephens
... it is useful to know. "That are the dishes whom you must be and to abstain"; while the meaning of "This girl have a beauty edge" is scarcely clear unless it relates to the preternatural acuteness of the fair sex in these days of board schools and ...
— English as she is spoke - or, A jest in sober earnest • Jose da Fonseca
... much beyond my expectation that I at first feared treachery. However, treachery or not, I thought that while I was there I had better see and learn as much as I could. Women and men formed a ring round us, and the fair sex seemed less shy than the stronger in answering questions. I was particularly struck, not only in this encampment but in all the others, by the small number of women to be seen in Tibet. This is not because they are kept in ...
— In the Forbidden Land • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... Mrs. Gore, for instance, where Edith was going this evening, was all that money could make it; and in passing it may be noted that Boston clubs are seldom of constitutions sufficiently vigorous to endure unpleasant surroundings. The fair sex predominates at all these gatherings, and over them hangs an air of expectant solemnity, as if the celebration of some sacred mystery were forward. Conversation is carried on in subdued tones; even the laughter is softened, and when the reader takes his seat, there ...
— The Philistines • Arlo Bates
... only the lady remained erect and rigid in her corner. "And now," he said with simulated hesitation, "we come to the last and to us the most painful suspension of our rules. On these very rare occasions, when we have been honored with the presence of the fair sex, it has been our invariable custom not only to leave them in the undisturbed possession of their property, but even of their privacy as well. It is with deep regret that on this occasion we are obliged to make an exception. ...
— In a Hollow of the Hills • Bret Harte
... amuse all cricketers, and while from the male point of view it may serve as a good illustration of the fickleness of woman and the impossibility of forecasting what course she will take, the fair sex will find in it an equally shining proof of ...
— A Wodehouse Miscellany - Articles & Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... thirty-eight years, of a frank and open countenance, and of an inexhaustible gayety and good humor. Always ready to engage with all comers, at table, at play, or at arms, and that without malice or bitterness; much run after by the fair sex, and much beloved by the regent, who had named him his captain of the guards, and who, during the ten years in which he had admitted him into his intimacy, had found him his rival sometimes, but his faithful servant always. Thus the prince, who had the habit of giving nicknames ...
— The Conspirators - The Chevalier d'Harmental • Alexandre Dumas (Pere)
... the ladies he addressed with all that remained of the powers of vision, exclaiming, with his hand on his heart,—"How sweet they a-r-e!" combining a recommendation of his bulls'-eyes with a compliment to the fair sex. ...
— Life in the Clearings versus the Bush • Susanna Moodie
... a very manly strain, set forth the wickedness of attempting a woman of virtue and character. He said, that men had generally too many advantages from the weakness, credulity, and inexperience of the fair sex: that their early learning, which chiefly consisted in inflaming novels, and idle and improbable romances, contributed to enervate and weaken their minds: that his cousin, however, he was sure, was above the reach of ...
— Clarissa, Or The History Of A Young Lady, Volume 8 • Samuel Richardson
... unpopular as in some other countries, and it is increasing in favor. In all the primary schools, and in most of the high schools, boys and girls study in the same class-room, and girls are admitted as students even in some colleges and universities. This principle of admitting the fair sex to equal educational privileges is slowly but surely being recognized everywhere. In some universities the authorities have gone half-way; lectures are given to the girl students in separate rooms, or separate buildings, or halls, are provided for the girl students. With regard to the teaching staff, ...
— America Through the Spectacles of an Oriental Diplomat • Wu Tingfang
... simplicity, inexperience, and boyish thoughtlessness still existed in that half-polished mind. The Polish Sovereign, tall, strong, and handsome, an adept in all physical exercises, a great hunter, a hard drinker, and an indefatigable admirer of the fair sex, in whose person debauch of every kind took royal proportions, delighted the Czar and somewhat overawed him. He was more than inclined to think him a genius, and was quite ready to bind up his fortunes with his friend's. At the end of four days of uninterrupted ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 12 • Editor-In-Chief Rossiter Johnson
... disappointed, to whose eyes the beauty of Delia, however unrivalled, was familiar, the disappointment and envy of the fair sex upon the loss of Damon, whose external and natural recommendations had beside the grace of novelty, were inexpressible. The daughter of Mr. Griskin, an eminent butcher in Clare-market, who had indeed from nature, the grace of being cross-eyed, now looked in ten thousand more various ...
— Damon and Delia - A Tale • William Godwin
... the White House grounds thought it a very interesting sight to observe the President of the United States standing with one foot on the step of an automobile talking with a member of the fair sex. They got the impression from the animated character of the conversation that Mrs. Galt was disappointed because the President was not going to accompany her to Continental Hall, and that she was trying to persuade him to abandon his plan of ...
— News Writing - The Gathering , Handling and Writing of News Stories • M. Lyle Spencer
... conjecture of "F.C.B.," however ingenious (No. 21. p. 339.), I am tempted to offer a note on the business or calling of a shipster. It had, I believe, no connection with nautical concerns; it did not designate a skipper (in the Dutch use of the word) of the fair sex. That rare volume, Caxton's Boke for Travellers, a treasury of archaisms, supplies the best definition of her calling:—"Mabyll the shepster cheuissheth her right well; she maketh surplys, shertes, breches, keuerchiffs, and all that may be wrought of lynnen cloth." The French term given, as corresponding ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 22., Saturday, March 30, 1850 • Various
... reach half down to their feet. I found nothing very remarkable in the dress of the peasants. As far as strength and beauty were concerned, I thought these peasants were neither more nor less gifted than those of Austria. As regards the beauty of the fair sex, I should certainly give the preference to the Austrians. Fair hair ...
— Visit to Iceland - and the Scandinavian North • Ida Pfeiffer
... love of the fair sex Beats that of friends and relatives: In love, although its tempests vex, Our liberty at least survives: Agreed! but then the whirl of fashion, The natural fickleness of passion, The torrent of opinion, And the fair sex as light as down! Besides the hobbies of a spouse Should ...
— Eugene Oneguine [Onegin] - A Romance of Russian Life in Verse • Aleksandr Sergeevich Pushkin
... fortnight's leave, to be taken a month hence for urgent private affairs in the country, and a present in money; he promised himself that he would spend both in a little town in Switzerland, studying the fair sex. ...
— Cousin Betty • Honore de Balzac
... more cultivated parts; but, despite this, the dreary mantle of winter threw a cold churlishness over everything. The boat I shall describe hereafter, when I have seen more of them, for their general features are the same; but there was a specimen of the fair sex on board, to whom I must introduce you, as I may never see her ...
— Lands of the Slave and the Free - Cuba, The United States, and Canada • Henry A. Murray
... say I have much experience in regard to the hands of the fair sex, but I'm willing to bet there are none like yours ...
— William Adolphus Turnpike • William Banks
... the ladies, and thinks that the man would be happy who could have his choice of them. He also informs us they were to build a "Ladies' Gate," where there should be a prison in which all who gave offence to the fair sex should be confined at their pleasure. Of a surety, New Ross must have been the paradise of ladies in those days. We have not ascertained whether its fair citizens retain the same potent ...
— An Illustrated History of Ireland from AD 400 to 1800 • Mary Frances Cusack
... discussion had taken place on this point some nights before the soiree, on which occasion the bashful Poker opposed the motion "that invitations should be issued to ladies," on the ground that, being himself of a susceptible nature, the presence of the fair sex would tend to distract his attention from the business on hand. Big Jack also opposed it, as he thought it wasn't fair to the fair sex to invite them to a meeting of boys, but Big Jack was immediately called to order, and reminded that ...
— Post Haste • R.M. Ballantyne
... at thinking how easily the very youngest of the fair sex deceives us, but I took care not to let Harry ...
— The Romance of Lust - A classic Victorian erotic novel • Anonymous
... in question was addressed to Lady Montfort. Unscrupulously violating the sacred confidence of his master, the treacherous wretch, after accusing her, in language little more consistent with the respect due to the fair sex than that which he had addressed to Sophy, of all the desolation that the perfidious nuptials of Caroline Lyndsay had brought upon Guy Darrell, declared that the least Lady Montfort could do to repair ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... But if the fair sex in Lugano are diligent in frequenting the churches, they by no means scorn the cafes. After sunset the little tables that are all over the great square are surrounded by an entire population of men and women. How gay and amusing those ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Vol VIII - Italy and Greece, Part Two • Various
... 1649 published the elegant collection of amorous and other poems entitled Lucasta, was an amiable and accomplished gentleman: by the men of his time (the time of the civil wars) respected for his moral worth and literary ability; by the fair sex, almost idolized for the elegance of his person and the sweetness of his manners. An ardent loyalist, the people of Kent appointed him to present to the House of Commons their petition for the restoration of Charles and the settlement of the government. The petition gave offence, ...
— Books and Authors - Curious Facts and Characteristic Sketches • Anonymous
... the presence-chamber with the Earl of Rochester, leaving the ladies seated, and their husbands still kneeling. We shall not dwell upon what took place after the departure of the king; one thing is certain, that the fair sex are very merciful, and as their husbands promised them that in future they should have their own way, dress as they pleased, receive whom they pleased, and spend what money they pleased, the ladies very kindly and magnanimously ...
— Olla Podrida • Frederick Marryat
... more of England than it knew of me. Men and manners were equally strange to me, except those on board the different men-of-war I had served in, and they were not the most polished. In the society of the fair sex I was exceedingly shy, and my feelings were sometimes painful when I had to run the gauntlet through rows of well-dressed women, some looking as demure as a noddy at the masthead. I was now in my twenty-third year, ...
— A Sailor of King George • Frederick Hoffman
... handsome men? or are they at all the proportions found in beautiful women? Nobody will say that they are; yet both sexes are undoubtedly capable of beauty, and the female of the greatest; which advantage I believe will hardly be attributed to the superior exactness of proportion in the fair sex. Let us rest a moment on this point; and consider how much difference there is between the measures that prevail in many similar parts of the body, in the two sexes of this single species only. If you assign any determinate proportions ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. I. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... considered themselves justified in pestering the committee for tickets. To say nothing of ladies. As the committee desired to be present themselves, nine-tenths of the applications for admission had to be refused, as is usual on these occasions. The committee agreed among themselves to exclude the fair sex altogether as the only way of disposing of their womankind who were making speeches as long as Mr. Gladstone's. Each committeeman told his sisters, female cousins and aunts that the other committeemen had insisted on divesting the function of all grace; ...
— The Big Bow Mystery • I. Zangwill
... young and thoughtless of the fair sex, this Tale of Truth is designed; and I could wish my fair readers to consider it as not merely the effusion of Fancy, but as a reality. The circumstances on which I have founded this novel were related to ...
— Charlotte Temple • Susanna Rowson
... between them and the productions of Durfey. There are marks of a fine understanding in the most unfinished piece of Mrs. Behn, and the very worst of this lady's compositions are preferable to Durfey's bell. It is unpleasing to have the merit of any of the Fair Sex lessened. Mrs. Behn suffered enough at the hands of supercilious prudes, who had the barbarity to construe her sprightliness into lewdness; and because she had wit and beauty, she must likewise be ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Vol. III • Theophilus Cibber
... any man who eats bread at any very cheap place in the capital take warning, if his stomach goes against the idea of a rechauffe of bread from the dust-hole. Fabrice, notwithstanding some extravagances with the fair sex, became a millionaire; and the greatest glory of his life was—that he lived to eclipse ...
— Paris: With Pen and Pencil - Its People and Literature, Its Life and Business • David W. Bartlett
... the arrival of Beauchamp. The ladies were curious to see him. The gentlemen, not anticipating extreme amusement, were calm: for it is an axiom in the world of buckskins and billiard-cues, that one man is very like another; and so true is it with them, that they can in time teach it to the fair sex. Friends of Cecil Baskelett predominated, and the absence of so sprightly a fellow was regretted seriously; but he was shooting with his uncle at Holdesbury, and they did ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... had told me that Mr. Calvert was quite indifferent to the fair sex," says Mr. Morris, laughing, and speaking to Mr. Jefferson, but with a side glance at the young man. "If so, he takes a strange way of proving it. He will be the most-talked-of, and therefore the most envied, man in Paris to-morrow," and he ...
— Calvert of Strathore • Carter Goodloe
... [222] THE FAIR SEX IN THE ALPS.—The farmers In the Upper Alps, though by no means wealthy, live like lords in their houses, while the heaviest portion of agricultural labors devolves on the wife. It is no uncommon thing to see a woman yoked ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... that I am a handsome man—universally agreeable as such to the fair sex? Is it a criminal offense to be accessible to the amiable weakness of love? I ask again, Who is to blame? Clearly, nature. Not the beautiful lady—not ...
— The Lock And Key Library - Classic Mystery And Detective Stories, Modern English • Various
... returned Allison, lightly, "she wouldn't get me. Not that I'm any prize to be wrangled over by the fair sex, individually or collectively, but you and I stand together, Dad, ...
— Old Rose and Silver • Myrtle Reed
... the unanimous consent of rhetoricians, there is but one sex the sex, the fair sex, the unfair sex, the gentle sex, the barbaric sex. We men do not form a sex, we do not even form a sect. We are your mere hangers-on, camp-followers, satellites—your things, your playthings—we are the mere shuttlecocks which you toss ...
— The Cardinal's Snuff-Box • Henry Harland
... gentlemen, it was always manners for them to wait till the fair sex was served, besides, all hands would be wanted to clear out the barn for a frolic after supper. Moreover, uncle Nat modestly hinted that something a little stronger than cider might be depended on for the young men, ...
— The Old Homestead • Ann S. Stephens
... an eye, and whether black or blue, Is no great matter, so 'tis in request. 'Tis nonsense to dispute about a hue, The kindest may be taken as a test. The fair sex should be always fair; and no man Till thirty, should perceive there's ...
— What Great Men Have Said About Women - Ten Cent Pocket Series No. 77 • Various
... the ladies. Well, really, you've put me in an awkward position, Miss Banborough. One can't be uncomplimentary to the fair sex, you know." ...
— His Lordship's Leopard - A Truthful Narration of Some Impossible Facts • David Dwight Wells
... the Conversation of Women, I meant no other than what the Laws both human and divine admit of. And that as Solitude only serves to augment your Grief, the entertaining Wit and Sprightliness of the Fair Sex, in their Conversations, was the only Antidote against your growing Affliction, in ...
— The Amours of Zeokinizul, King of the Kofirans - Translated from the Arabic of the famous Traveller Krinelbol • Claude Prosper Jolyot de Crbillon
... great trial in the House of Lords, and Sacheverell's most able defence, often attributed to his friend Atterbury. This speech, which Boyer calls "studied, artful, and pathetic," deeply affected the fair sex, and even drew tears from some of the tender-hearted; but a certain lady to whom, before he preached the sermon, Sacheverell had explained the allusions in it to William III., the Ministry, and Lord Godolphin, was so astonished ...
— Books Condemned to be Burnt • James Anson Farrer
... shilling or to do a good action, but was of a pleasant, sly, laughing mood, and would cut his joke and drink his glass with a tenant and sell him up the next day; or have his laugh with the poacher he was transporting with equal good humour. His politeness for the fair sex has already been hinted at by Miss Rebecca Sharp—in a word, the whole baronetage, peerage, commonage of England, did not contain a more cunning, mean, selfish, foolish, disreputable old man. That blood-red hand of Sir Pitt Crawley's would be in anybody's pocket except his own; and it is ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... Kings, after dinner, went in domino to the redoubt [RIDOTTO, what we now call ROUT or evening party]. August had a mind to take an opportunity, and try whether the reports of Friedrich Wilhelm's indifference to the fair sex were correct or not. To this end, he had had a young damsel (JUNGE PERSON) of extraordinary beauty introduced into some side-room; where they now entered. She was lying on a bed, in a loose gauzy undress; and though ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. VI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... comely, and dress well, and scarce any of them have distorted shapes. Tinctured with a Dutch education, they manage their families with becoming parsimony, good providence, and singular neatness. The practice of extravagant gaming, common to the fashionable part of the fair sex in some places, is a vice with which my countrywomen cannot justly be charged. There is nothing they so generally neglect as reading, and indeed all the arts for the improvement of the mind; in which, I confess, we have set them the example. They are modest, temperate, and charitable; naturally ...
— Choice Specimens of American Literature, And Literary Reader - Being Selections from the Chief American Writers • Benj. N. Martin
... college at West Point. He distinguished himself at the battles of Corinth and Murfreesborough, and now commands the 2d corps d'armee of Bragg's army. He is a widower, and has the character of being a great admirer of the fair sex. During the Kentucky campaign last year he was in the habit of availing himself of the privilege of his rank and years, and insisted upon kissing the wives and daughters of all the Kentuckian farmers. And although ...
— Three Months in the Southern States, April-June 1863 • Arthur J. L. (Lieut.-Col.) Fremantle
... melancholy—school ushers railing at the cookery of cheap eating-houses, tipplers maundering contentedly to one another, enchanted at the profundity of their own wisdom, schemers planning to make a fortune, politicians arguing, amateurs of the fair sex telling highly-spiced anecdotes of love and women—and amongst ...
— The Aspirations of Jean Servien • Anatole France
... c'est charmant!" cried some of the fair sex, who, as well as the men, had been attracted by, and were listening to the dispute. "Que Monsieur l'Anglais est drole: et voyez Moustache, comme il a l'air content—vraiment c'est un ...
— The King's Own • Captain Frederick Marryat
... gallant the gentlemen—especially those of the old school—may be towards the fair sex, neither feminine amiability nor the most recherche dessert has power to stop them for long on their way to the smoking-room. And soon the first faint aroma of cigars, so great a luxury to smokers, announced the beginning of that process which has obtained for our ...
— Norse Tales and Sketches • Alexander Lange Kielland
... III), "which deceives Nature. This vice, which bashfulness and timidity find so convenient, has, moreover, a great attraction for lively imaginations, for it enables them to do what they will, so to speak, with the whole fair sex, and to enjoy at pleasure the beauty who attracts them, without having ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 1 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... heart and manner of really kind girls where a lover is in the case, or even where a common-place dangling sort of flirtation is going forward; this depreciating ill nature, one of the other, is not confined by any means to the fair sex. Young men pick each other to pieces with even more fierceness, but less ingenuity; they deal in a cut-and-hack sort of sarcasm, and do not hesitate to use terms and insinuations of the harshest kind, when a lady is in the case. Mary (to ...
— Turns of Fortune - And Other Tales • Mrs. S. C. Hall
... only add to her beauty, but gave her a thousand little privileges, which otherwise would have been denied to women, though in a country of much freedom. Every day she appeared in the Tour, she failed not to make a conquest on some unguarded heart of the fair sex: not was it long ere she received billets-doux from many of the most accomplished who could speak and write French. This gave them a pleasure in the midst of her unlucky exile, and she failed not to boast ...
— Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister • Aphra Behn
... when they congregate together, is generally dedicated to one of two subjects: politics or women. In the present instance the party was not political; and it was the fair sex, and particularly the most charming portion of it, in the good metropolis of England, that were subject to the poignant criticism or the profound speculation of these practical philosophers. There was scarcely a celebrated beauty ...
— Henrietta Temple - A Love Story • Benjamin Disraeli
... the observations of the ladies; or detail their exclamations, fears, and general behavior. Like all members of the fair sex, they made a virtue of necessity, and assumed the most winning expressions of timidity and reliance on their cavaliers; and even Miss Lavinia reposed upon a settee, and exclaimed that it was ...
— The Last of the Foresters • John Esten Cooke
... made him a little less frequent with his cigars than he would otherwise have been, but of that I cannot be sure, and it certainly caused my aunt a considerable amount of vexation after he had read Napoleon and the Fair Sex, because for a time that roused him to a sense of a side of life he had in his commercial preoccupations very largely forgotten. Suggestion plays so great a part in this field. My uncle took the next opportunity and ...
— Tono Bungay • H. G. Wells
... of the "most susceptible Chancellor" is justified by the way in which the present occupant of the Woolsack and his predecessors vie with one another in the endeavour to secure the favour of the fair sex. Today it was Lord HALDANE'S turn to oblige, and he brought in a Bill to enable Scotswomen to become Advocates and Law Agents. Lord HALSBURY'S contribution to the work of feminine emancipation has not yet been announced. The rumour that a deputation of ladies recently approached ...
— Punch, Volume 156, 26 March 1919 • Various |
