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More "Prompter" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... said I, and hurried after him, leaving Farrell to limp down the hill-side in our wake. For once the dog recognised me as more intelligent or, at any rate, prompter than his master, and gave his whole attention to me. . . . I tumbled down the hill after him in a haste that fairly set my temples throbbing. Once sure of me, he played no more at backwards-and-forwards, but bounded down the ...
— Foe-Farrell • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... those days every gentleman took his pipe with him; and the fragrant clouds would be some consolation in the eyes, or rather in the noses, of some of us. But still,—almost six hours of tragedy! It is too much of a good thing for these degenerate days; and we must allow the prompter to use his pencil on the actors' copy of "Hamlet," though he strike out page upon page of ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 59, September, 1862 • Various
... hostess regarding the lions of the town, she would only acknowledge two,—Bastholm's library, and the English fire-engine. The curtain in the theatre represents an alley with a fountain, the jets of which are painted as if spouting out of the prompter's box; or is this, perhaps, the English fire-engine? I know not. The scene-decoration for towns represents the market-place of Slagelse itself, so that the pieces thus acquire a home-feeling. This is the modern history of the little ...
— O. T. - A Danish Romance • Hans Christian Andersen
... more spirit in here, checked ranting there, and ventured to object to the key in which Kate, as heroine, sang her song. He permitted "gagging" as a proof of presence of mind, provided the cue was forthcoming; but now his great soul was perturbed by the absence of a prompter. ...
— Bluebell - A Novel • Mrs. George Croft Huddleston
... hothouse on Parnassus, and flags of all nations made it very gay that night in honour of the guests who were coming, chief among them, Miss Cameron, who kept her promise faithfully. The orchestra tuned their instruments with unusual care, the scene-shifters set their stage with lavish elegance, the prompter heroically took his seat in the stifling nook provided for him, and the actors dressed with trembling hands that dropped the pins, and perspiring brows whereon the powder wouldn't stick. Beaumont and Fletcher were everywhere, feeling that their ...
— Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott
... fix my head-quarters until the prompter's whistle shall once more summon me to commence a new campaign at New York;—six weeks nearly, with nothing to do,—it will require some management to complete this ...
— Impressions of America - During the years 1833, 1834 and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Tyrone Power
... had been called together for final instructions. When all were gathered Wee laid down the law. The fairies were not to talk in the wings. All were to keep an eye on the prompter, and Blue Bonnet was especially informed that if the wind apparatus got on a rampage, as it did at the dress rehearsal, and drowned what she was saying at her first entrance, she was to raise her voice and compete with ...
— Blue Bonnet in Boston - or, Boarding-School Days at Miss North's • Caroline E. Jacobs
... obliged to you, sir, and prompter Captain Hunken could not have behaved. A nod, as they say, is as good as a wink to a blind horse; but Captain Hunken, being neither blind nor a horse, and anything so vulgar as winking out of the question, it may not altogether apply, though ...
— Hocken and Hunken • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... The Prompter; or a Commentary on Common Sayings and Subjects, which are full of Common Sense, the best Sense ...
— Translations of German Poetry in American Magazines 1741-1810 • Edward Ziegler Davis
... king's household wants a better manager; that there is no necessity for a wardrobe-keeper; that his majesty's company are a set of very bad actors; and he humbly moves that the king should discharge his prompter. Some time ago, the president of this society had a great constitutional point to decide; but not acquitting himself to the satisfaction of the ladies, this spirited female seized the chair of state, and with the crack of her fan opened the business ...
— A Lecture On Heads • Geo. Alex. Stevens
... experience as prompter at head-quarters, and no one has a better appreciation of the value of such services than myself; and it is particularly in a council of war that such a part is absurd. The greater the number and the higher ...
— The Art of War • Baron Henri de Jomini
... eager fingers and pulled the door toward her. It opened on a dumbwaiter shaft, empty and impressive. Patsy's expression would have scored a hit in farce comedy. Unfortunately there was no audience present to appreciate it here, and the prompter forgot to ring down the curtain just then, so that Patsy stood helpless, forced to go on hearing all that Marjorie and her leading man wished to improvise in the way ...
— Seven Miles to Arden • Ruth Sawyer
... from the chronicles of Brut and Arthur down to the royal Henries, which men hear eagerly; and a string of doleful tragedies, merry Italian tales, and Spanish voyages, which all the London 'prentices know. All the mass has been treated, with more or less skill, by every playwright, and the prompter has the soiled and tattered manuscripts. It is now no longer possible to say who wrote them first. They have been the property of the Theatre so long, and so many rising geniuses have enlarged or altered them, inserting a speech or a whole ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIII • John Lord
... ships to their contest, and in the depths of his malignant old soul was not unpleased to see how well his charms worked. There stood the grinning Man-in-the-Moon, his head just dodging into view over the rim of the sea:—Mephistopheles prompter of the stage. ...
— Israel Potter • Herman Melville
... of the present season. At rehearsal he is a fallen star, being extremely old and shaky, but at night his make-up is wonderful, and he draws large audiences, who witness his great scene of a detected thief in convulsions. The prompter is seated under a cupola in the centre of the stage near the footlights, as at the opera, and his duties are arduous. It devolves upon him to read over the part of each performer in a suppressed tone, and to direct ...
— The Pearl of the Antilles, or An Artist in Cuba • Walter Goodman
... my speech in my pocket, per imbres et ignes." Here the crowd crossed themselves devoutly. "Ay, just so; and he spoiled it for me entirely." At the earnest entreaty, however, of the crowd, Father Rush, with renewed caution to his unhappy prompter, again returned ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 2 (of 2) • Charles Lever
... unlikely to the onlookers, the cat being the wizard's property, and therefore, by all rule and prescription, his prompter and familiar. She was not of the received colour, however, her fur being of a rusty red. But as she raised her back, and spat at her master's visitors from under her chubbed tail, she looked demoniac enough for anything. And from the fashion in which, her anathema once launched, she sat down ...
— Julia And Her Romeo: A Chronicle Of Castle Barfield - From "Schwartz" by David Christie Murray • David Christie Murray
... to this day! I took the benefit of the Act—it was the only benefit I did take—and nobody was the better for it. But I don't repine—I realised my dream: that is more than all can say. Since then I have had many downs, and no ups. I have been a messenger, sir—a prompter, sir, in my own Exhibition, to which my own clown, having married into the tragic line, succeeded, sir, as proprietor; buying of me when I took the York, the theatre, scenery, and properties, sir, with the right still to call himself ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... a man in a blue jacket and gilt buttons entered from the left of the stage and whispered a few words into Schreiermeyer's ear. The manager looked grave at once, nodded and came forward to the prompter's box. The man had brought news of the accident, he said; a quantity of dynamite which was to have been used in subterranean blasting had exploded and had done great damage, no one yet knew how great. It was probable that many persons ...
— The Primadonna • F. Marion Crawford
... serious; "do I jest, Carlisle?" And turning to Mr. Cross, the prompter, who stood by, "Fetch me the St. ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... Rome concluded in this manner. 'Donec cantor vos "Plaudite" dicat,' says Horace. Who the 'cantor' was, is a matter of dispute. Madame Dacier thinks it was the whole chorus; others suppose it to have been a single actor; some the prompter, and some the composer. Before the word 'Plaudite' in all the old copies is an O which has also given rise to several learned conjectures. It is most probable, according to the notion of Madame Dacier, that this O, being the last letter of the Greek alphabet, was nothing more ...
— The Comedies of Terence - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Notes • Publius Terentius Afer, (AKA) Terence
... good-bye just yet," she said to them, as she tucked up her voluminous train. "Wouldn't you like to look on for a little while from the wings? You could have the prompter's chair, Lady Cunyngham, so that you could see the audience or the stage, just as you chose, if Miss Cunyngham wouldn't mind standing ...
— Prince Fortunatus • William Black
... Dazincourt, both of acknowledged good character, were selected to give lessons, the first in comic opera, of which the easier sorts were preferred, and the second in comedy. The office of hearer of rehearsals, prompter, and stage manager was given to my father-in-law. The Duc de Fronsac, first gentleman of the chamber, was much hurt at this. He thought himself called upon to make serious remonstrances upon the subject, and wrote to the Queen, who made him the following answer: ...
— Memoirs Of The Court Of Marie Antoinette, Queen Of France, Complete • Madame Campan
... 26th of May, 1899, on the eve of the Bloemfontein Conference, he writes to Mr. Fischer, prompter and organiser of the Conference, foreseeing the results of the policy ...
— Boer Politics • Yves Guyot
... is assembled. A stage has been erected. The court astrologer announces the play and Mephistopheles is installed in the prompter's box. All is in expectation and excitement. Then on the stage is seen rising from the ground the form of Faust attended by the tripod. He touches the tripod with the glowing key. A dense mist of incense arises, ...
— The Faust-Legend and Goethe's 'Faust' • H. B. Cotterill
... of the following act, when he was asked "Why did you not keep your children with you? they would have amused you in many a dreary hour," he turned to reply—and "for the space of about ten seconds, he paused as if waiting for the prompter to give him the word"—says Mr. Whitfield the actor, who was then with him upon the stage—"then put out his right hand, as if going to take hold of mine. It dropt, as if to support his fall, but it had no power; ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli
... I must have dropped it in here somewhere. (He begins to search for it, and in the ordinary course of things comes upon Isobel on the sofa. He puts his rifle down carefully on a table, with the muzzle pointing at the prompter rather than at the audience, and staggers back.) Merciful heavens! Isobel! Dead! (He falls on his knees beside the sofa.) My ...
— The Holiday Round • A. A. Milne
... says Dowries the Prompter, p. 22: "The tragedy of Romeo and Juliet was made some time after [1662] into a tragi-comedy, by Mr. James Howard, he preserving Romeo and Juliet alive; so that when the tragedy was revived again, 'twas played ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume V: Miscellaneous Pieces • Samuel Johnson
... hear the boy and Chad, awed by the stern, solemn face, withdrew and, without a word to anybody, climbed into the loft and went to bed. He could hear every stroke on the floor below, every call of the prompter, and the rude laughter and banter, but he gave little heed to it all. For he lay thinking of Caleb Hazel and listening again to the stories he and the cattle-dealer had told him about the wonderful settlements. "God's Country," ...
— The Little Shepherd of Kingdom Come • John Fox
... are not wholly able to explain. Dryden alleges "charity" as the single impulse of the appointment,—not the merit or aptitude of the candidate. But throughout life Dorset continued to countenance Nahum, serving as standing dedicatee of his works, and the prompter of several of them. We have remarked the want of judgment which Lord Dorset exhibited in his anxious patronage of the scholars and scribblers of his time,—a trait which stood the Blackmores, Bradys, and Tates ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 11, September, 1858 • Various
... worthy companion of Perronet's "Coronation"—if, indeed, it was not its original prompter—as King Robert's great litany was the mother song of Watts' "Come, Holy Spirit, heavenly Dove;" and the countless other sacred lyrics beginning with similar words. As the translation stands in the Church of England, there are six stanzas ...
— The Story of the Hymns and Tunes • Theron Brown and Hezekiah Butterworth
... opera this night. The next day it was announced that Mademoiselle —— would take her accustomed place in the performance. I went early to the theatre, and found, to my amazement, there had been some changes made in the orchestra; the prompter's box had been enlarged, and my newly-discovered niche had been rendered inaccessible and almost entirely filled in! In vain did I attempt to find some other position that might correspond to it. I only attracted the attention of the early comers to the theatre. ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 3 • Various
... see her—they were not acquainted. I had no trouble with him, for he was always glad to know pretty girls, and he had seen Rebecca. There never was a piece of match-making which succeeded better than that, and it delighted me to act as prompter of the play, while those two were the actors, and I was also ...
— John Gayther's Garden and the Stories Told Therein • Frank R. Stockton
... leave the prompter of Monday night on the table this morning," said Uncle Geoffrey, smiling in that manner which, to a certain degree, removed any feeling of obligation, by making it seem as if it was entirely for his own diversion. Nor could it be denied that ...
— Henrietta's Wish • Charlotte M. Yonge
... politics, and philosophy, we like each other uncommonly well. He is a great favorite with Sara. Energetic activity of mind and of heart, is his master feature. He is prompt to conceive, and still prompter to execute; but I think he is deficient in that patience of mind which can look intensely and frequently at the same subject. He believes and disbelieves with impassioned confidence. I wish to see ...
— Biographia Epistolaris, Volume 1. • Coleridge, ed. Turnbull
... the Old Room," the page answered rather resentfully, but resigned himself as he remembered that, however this curtailed his importance, it left open a prompter return to his game ...
— The Ward of King Canute • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz
... curtain was ready to go up again could nowhere be found. "Frederic! where is Frederic?" the distracted manager would cry. Frederic was down stairs in the cafe under the theatre playing games where the stakes were high, and almost always losing. "Monsieur Frederic, the curtain is up!" the prompter would rush in to say. "Ciel! What can I do?" the imperturbable actor would reply. "I can't leave here, my dear fellow: I must win back what I've lost." Poor Harel had to pay again. As the receipts of the theatre were large, he did not dare ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Volume 15, No. 89, May, 1875 • Various
... was incessant, till the tinkling of the prompter's bell, and the rising of the curtain, put an end to his remarks on persons, and turned them all on the piece. I cannot but own the author opened an ample field for the effluvia of critic gall. I know not whether Glibly might influence the ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... could this be done, and I fulfil One half my wish, and curb thee to my will, I were a prompter and a prouder man Than earth has known since light-foot lovers ran For Atalanta, lov'd of men and boys. I were a kaiser then, a king of joys, And fit to play with high-begotten pomps As children play with pebbles or ...
— A Lover's Litanies • Eric Mackay
... writer. Mr. Hutton and Mr. Booth were sitting in the latter's dressing room at Booth's Theater. Booth was, as usual, smoking his beloved pipe. When he heard his cue, he arose, and walked with Hutton to the prompter's entrance, where, giving his pipe to his friend, said: "Larry, will you keep the pipe going until I come off?" Booth entered on the scene; then came the big moment in the play when the nobles and the weak ...
— Defenders of Democracy • Militia of Mercy
... Kennedy made Caesar observe how decorative it was with its big arm-seat in the middle and its hood above, like a prompter's box. ...
— Caesar or Nothing • Pio Baroja Baroja
... of the Plays of Frederick and Basilea, and of the Deade Man's Fortune, the original papers which hung up by the side scenes in the playhouses, for the use of the prompter and the acter, earlier than the time of ...
— Bibliomania; or Book-Madness - A Bibliographical Romance • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... devotee, much in the same manner as the votaries of Romanism are driven for aid to the intermediate intercession of the Virgin and the Saints. If the devotion of women is to be maintained mainly by the presence and personal influences of a spiritual guide and prompter, the selection ought to be made in accordance with other principles. The substitution of the priest or preacher in the place of the husband or guardian, presupposes or foreshows a subversion more or less of the most essential relations of family life. The necessity of resorting ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 358, August 1845 • Various
... the transient reflections of wind-swept clouds on still, translucent water. Presently in the midst of his painful indecision, an answer suggested itself like a whispered hint from some invisible prompter: ...
— Ardath - The Story of a Dead Self • Marie Corelli
... prospered best were a good-natured, merry old dowager duchess, with whom they felt themselves in the altitude to which they were accustomed at Hurminster; a loud-voiced, eager old squire, who was bent on being Lord Northmoor's guide and prompter in county business; also an eager, gushing lady, the echoes of whose communications made Frank remark, after her departure, 'We must beware of encouraging gossip about ...
— That Stick • Charlotte M. Yonge
... with their system, and only compelled their converts to labor as much as was necessary to the success of the mission, the rest of the time being devoted to their spiritual edification; that is, they were employed in repeating Latin prayers and a Spanish catechism, after an old Indian who acted as prompter. Sometimes it was necessary to allow the Indians to go abroad for a time, but then their return was provided for by retaining the squaws and papooses as hostages, in the same manner as they provided for the return of the plantation ...
— Mexico and its Religion • Robert A. Wilson
... was concern'd with another gentleman in writing a paper called the Prompter; all those mark'd with a B. were his.—This was meant greatly for the service of the stage; and many of them have been regarded in the highest manner.—But, as there was not only instruction, but reproof, the bitter, with the sweet, by some could ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753),Vol. V. • Theophilus Cibber
... "You see that I thought if I could get anything to do at the theayter, I could work my way up, so I was glad to get scrubbin'. I asked the prompter, one morning, if he thought there was a chance for me to work up, and he said yes, I might scrub the galleries, and then I told him that I didn't want none of his lip, and I pretty soon left that place. ...
— Rudder Grange • Frank R. Stockton
... slave-dealing, notwithstanding his imprecations against the merchants of Ghadames for the same crime. He is from Mandara, and was kidnapped by the Tibboos. This is the captain of all the sham-fighters, and the leader and prompter of all other sports on the way. There is always one who assumes superiority over the rest, in every troop of human beings; so it was in the beginning, and so it will ever continue ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson
... his favorite partner. Sometimes, too, a lot of them pre-empted all the prettiest girls, and danced a special set with them. Thus were they delivered into the hands of the oppressed—the lads made treaty with the fiddlers and prompter to play fast and furious—to call figures that kept the oldsters wheeling and whirling. It was an endurance contest—but victory did not always perch with the youths. Plenty of pursy gentlemen were still light enough on their feet, clear enough ...
— Dishes & Beverages of the Old South • Martha McCulloch Williams
... conductor himself in the front of an orchestra is, from a purely artistic standpoint, highly anomalous. It is as if the prompter at the performance of a drama were to be seen taking the most conspicuous part and mixing among the actors upon the stage. If an orchestral piece be well played without the visible presence of a conductor, the sense of correct time reaches the audience naturally through the music itself; ...
— Twentieth Century Inventions - A Forecast • George Sutherland
... for nothing. Though he could see but little religion in many professing Christians, he nevertheless saw that the motley players, "made up of mimic laughter and tears, passing from the extremes of joy or woe at the prompter's call," were not so godless and impious as the world ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 11, Issue 67, May, 1863 • Various
... road; then to the strains of a bamboo fiddle, bamboo flute, bamboo drum, the melodrama was begun. The hero pranced into the open square to the tune of a minor dirge, not knowing a single sentence of his part; the prompter, kneeling down before a flaring candle, told him what to say; he repeated in parrot-like fashion, and then pranced off the square to slow dirge-like music. Now the heroine minced in from the opposite ...
— An Ohio Woman in the Philippines • Emily Bronson Conger
... done,—the curtain drops, Slow falling to the prompter's bell; A moment yet the actor stops, And looks around, to say farewell. It is an irksome word and task; And, when he's laughed and said his say, He shows, as he removes the mask, A ...
— The World's Best Poetry Volume IV. • Bliss Carman
... disappointment, not to find some change In look and air, from that new region brought, As if from Fairy-land. Much I questioned him; And every word he uttered, on my ears Fell flatter than a caged parrot's note, 100 That answers unexpectedly awry, And mocks the prompter's listening. Marvellous things Had vanity (quick Spirit that appears Almost as deeply seated and as strong In a Child's heart as fear itself) conceived 105 For my enjoyment. Would that I could now Recal what then I pictured to myself, ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. III • William Wordsworth
... this hour you are appointed assistant property man and assistant prompter for the Blackfriars, at sixteen shillings a week, with chance of promotion, ...
— Shakspere, Personal Recollections • John A. Joyce
... course," said I; "that's one of the landlord's properties: Miller, you must provide that, you know—send down for some cold tankards now; they will do very well for rehearsal." At last we got to work, and proceeded, with the prompter's assistance, pretty smoothly, and mutually applauding each other's performance, going twice over some of the more difficult scenes, and cutting out a good deal of love and sentiment. The play was fixed for the next Monday night, playbills ordered to ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 54, No. 338, December 1843 • Various
... 1771 the family move to Lochlea, and Burns went to the neighboring town of Irvine to learn flax-dressing. The only result of this experiment, however, was the formation of an acquaintance with a dissipated sailor, whom he afterward blamed as the prompter of his first licentious adventures. His father died in 1784, and with his brother Gilbert the poet rented the farm of Mossgiel; but this venture was as unsuccessful as the others. He had meantime formed ...
— Poems And Songs Of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... mice. Mercedes, of course, was leading lady; Monsieur and Madame Denis were the heavy parents; and a gentlemanlike young mouse named Leander was jeune premier. Then, in my leisure, they used to act the most tremendous plays. I was stage-manager, prompter, playwright, chorus, and audience, placing the theatre before a looking-glass, so that, though my duties kept me behind, I could peer round the edge, and watch the spectacle as from the front. I would invent the lines and ...
— Grey Roses • Henry Harland
... actors alone on the scene, and reciting, should prepare their parts so as to know them by heart and in every detail of place and time follow the music with all care as to time. It will not be a bad idea to have a prompter to aid the singers, ...
— Some Forerunners of Italian Opera • William James Henderson
... your part! Listen to the prompter!" hissed the tragedian, and he thrust his sword into ...
— The Schoolmistress and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... the goal for which we asked their help, and the race in which they promised to be our friendly rivals. [37] Remind them also that this day will test the worth of every man. With learners late in life, we cannot wonder if now and then a prompter should be needed: it is much to be thankful for if they show themselves good men and true with the help of a reminder. [38] Moreover, while you help them you will be putting your own powers to the test. He who can give another strength at such a crisis may well ...
— Cyropaedia - The Education Of Cyrus • Xenophon
... the unfortunate fiddler at the fair, who, coming to strike up the solo that was to ravish every ear, discovered that an enemy had maliciously soaped his bow; or rather, like poor Punch, as I once saw him, grimacing a soliloquy, of which his prompter had most indiscreetly neglected to administer the words." Such was the debut of "Stuttering Jack Curran," or "Orator Mum," as he was waggishly styled; but not many months elapsed ere the sun of his eloquence burst forth in ...
— Irish Wit and Humor - Anecdote Biography of Swift, Curran, O'Leary and O'Connell • Anonymous
... telephones, for example, which correspond with the foot-lights of the theater are more affected by the sounds of the large instnuments of the orchestra than those which occupy the middle of the foot-lights; but, as an offset to this, the latter are affected by the voice of the prompter. In order to equalize the effects as much as possible, Mr. Ader has arranged it so that the two transmitters of each series shall be placed under conditions that are diametrically opposite. Thus, the transmitter at the end ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 315, January 14, 1882 • Various
... you, it was my life To be the prompter every one forgets! (To Roxane): That night when 'neath your window Christian spoke —Under your balcony, you remember? Well! There was the allegory of my whole life: I, in the shadow, at the ladder's foot, While others lightly mount to Love and Fame! Just! very just! Here on the threshold drear ...
— Cyrano de Bergerac • Edmond Rostand
... has had planted and cultivated eight hundred and sixteen acres of cotton where four hundred and ninety-nine and one twelve-hundredth acres were cultivated last year,—a larger increase, however, than will generally be found in other districts, due mainly to prompter payments. The general superintendent of Port Royal Wand said to me,—"We have to restrain rather than to encourage the negroes to take land for cotton." The general superintendent of Hilton Head Island said, that on that island the negroes had, besides adequate corn, taken two, three, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XII. September, 1863, No. LXXI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... Mrs. Lora Rewbush was again heard from the wings; it sounded bloodthirsty. Penrod released his victim; and the Child King Arthur, somewhat disconcerted, extended his sceptre and, with the assistance of the enraged prompter, said: ...
— Penrod • Booth Tarkington
... could he be at once stationed at my shoulder and shut up in my closet? How could he stand near me and yet be invisible? But if Carwin's were the thrilling voice and the fiery visage which I had heard and seen, then was he the prompter of my brother, and the author of ...
— Wieland; or The Transformation - An American Tale • Charles Brockden Brown
... same time, the poor wretch was thoroughly courageous in the face of some physical and external dangers. The puniest man in camp could cow him with a look, yet none was prompter than he to face the grave perils of breaking a log-jam, and there was no cooler hand than his in the risky labors of stream-driving. Altogether he was a disagreeable problem to the lumbermen,—who resented ...
— Earth's Enigmas - A Volume of Stories • Charles G. D. Roberts
... huntest, the sin thou didst cries out, and its avengers still will follow. But here they may not come: nor those, who, tempting, track thy path. Wise counsel take. Within our hearts is all we seek: though in that search many need a prompter. Him I have found in blessed Alma. Then rove no more. Gain now, in flush of youth, that last wise thought, too often purchased, by a life of woe. Be wise: ...
— Mardi: and A Voyage Thither, Vol. II (of 2) • Herman Melville
... to occur to her—wall, palace, table—numbers—days of the week—repeating the pronunciation with the earnestness of a diligent young pupil, until she felt that her memory had all it could hold. And distrust, always ready now like a prompter in the box, suggested most upsettingly that perhaps he was not giving the right words. She ...
— The Palace of Darkened Windows • Mary Hastings Bradley
... said the young lady who had played the cat, with a wicked smile of intelligence. "Prompter, ring the curtain up. All you've got to do, Mr. Blinks, is ...
— The Three Brides, Love in a Cottage, and Other Tales • Francis A. Durivage
... had decided for natural sleep, urged thereto, perhaps, by that unseen playwright who had decreed another time for the curtain; or perhaps he was kept by Doctor Thayer's professional persuasions, in defiance of the prompter's signal. However the case, the heart slowly but surely began to take up its job like an honest force-pump, the face began to lose its death-like pallor, the breathing became more nearly normal. Doctor Thayer, with Mrs. Stoddard quiet and efficient at his elbow, worked ...
— The Stolen Singer • Martha Idell Fletcher Bellinger
... and hurled handfuls of flour at the prostrate, screaming Cuthbert. The stage was suddenly pandemonium. The other small actors promptly joined the battle. The prompter was too panic-stricken to lower the curtain. The air was white with clouds of flour. The victim scrambled to his feet and fled, a ghost-like figure, round ...
— More William • Richmal Crompton
... whereas, the French could convey but half of their force. Unfortunately, between Lord Raglan, the English Commander-in-Chief, and Marshal Saint Arnaud, the French commander, there was little concert or agreement. The French, whose arrangements were far better, and whose movements were prompter than our own, were always complaining of British procrastination; while the English General went quietly on his own way, and certainly tried sorely the patience of our allies. Even when the whole of the allied armies were embarked, nothing had ...
— Jack Archer • G. A. Henty
... an hour of high suspense. For this hour every man present had waited with a keen desire that had been his prompter and spur through all the long, wearying months of training. All the schooling in theory was now behind. Experience, that hard teacher, was now at the controls. The school of machine gunnery, where ...
— Aces Up • Covington Clarke
... sometimes we know a great deal more than we know we know," he answered. "That sounds like some nonsense game with words, but it's the best way to put it. Conscience seems to speak out of the silence. But there may be some one in the prompter's box—our ...
— A Spirit in Prison • Robert Hichens
... next few months. Dear, bustling, respectable Westville, she well knew, clung to its own idea of woman's sphere as to a thing divinely ordered, and to seek to leave which was scarcely less than rebellion against high God. In patriarchal days, when heaven's justice had been prompter, such a disobedient one would suddenly have found herself rebuked into a bit ...
— Counsel for the Defense • Leroy Scott
... dear, that you will be no longer safe where you are, than while the V. is in the country. Words are poor!—or how could I execrate him! I have hardly any doubt that he has sold himself for a time. Oh! may the time be short!—or may his infernal prompter no more keep covenant with him than he ...
— Clarissa, Volume 6 (of 9) - The History Of A Young Lady • Samuel Richardson
... 10,1865, the Duc de Morny died. He had been the moving spirit in the Mexican imbroglio, and it would be difficult to believe that the withdrawal of the prompter did not have a weakening effect upon the performance. His death, by removing one of the strongest influences in favor of the intervention, not only in the Corps Legislatif and at court, but in the financial world, was certainly one of the many untoward circumstances ...
— Maximilian in Mexico - A Woman's Reminiscences of the French Intervention 1862-1867 • Sara Yorke Stevenson
... which have been repressed, youthful courage which has been exalted, generous blindness; curiosity, the taste for change, the thirst for the unexpected, the sentiment which causes one to take pleasure in reading the posters for the new play, and love, the prompter's whistle, at the theatre; the vague hatreds, rancors, disappointments, every vanity which thinks that destiny has bankrupted it; discomfort, empty dreams, ambitious that are hedged about, whoever hopes for a downfall, some outcome, in short, at the very bottom, the rabble, that mud which ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... no applause, and half the boxes were empty, whilst those who were there seemed merely to occupy them from the effect of habit, and because this is the only evening amusement. The prompter spoke so loud, ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon De La Barca
... effects did not heighten their own. Hamlet had been known to be jealous of the ghost, and the success of his sepulchral bass. It was in fact a world of jostling jealousies, as hidden from the public as the prompter. In the Halls she was her own company and her own playwright and her own composer. She had her ...
— The Grey Wig: Stories and Novelettes • Israel Zangwill
... dealings with the Brescians, after the completion of the extensive decorations for the Palazzo Pubblico, was to have proof that Italian citizens were better judges of art than the King of Spain, and more grudging if prompter paymasters. They declared, not without some foundation in fact, that the canvases were not really from the hand of Titian, and refused to pay more than one thousand ducats for them. The negotiation was conducted—as were most others at that time—by the trusty Orazio, ...
— The Later works of Titian • Claude Phillips
... station at nightfall. What next? He turned and looked at the soldier, a figure out of Hogarth, which even dust and travel left unspoiled. It was certain that the two should meet where John Osgood, squatter and romancer, should be prompter, orchestra, and audience, ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... who played the part of prompter lost his place and skipped some paragraphs. The text returned to San Diego, and with a long series of exclamations and contrasts the father brought to a close the first ...
— An Eagle Flight - A Filipino Novel Adapted from Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... have taken place during interviews with the king, and in which her conduct might not have been considered, strictly speaking, quite correct. She obtained further notoriety after my departure, by kicking and cuffing a prompter, and calling the proprietor a d—d scoundrel, a d—d liar, and a d—d thief, for which she was committed for trial. I may as well mention here, that the theatre was well attended by ladies. This fact must satisfy ...
— Lands of the Slave and the Free - Cuba, The United States, and Canada • Henry A. Murray
... admitted a favoured few of the general public. To my dying day I shall remember one of these occasions. The debate, so celebrated, between the great Carolinian Hayne and our own Webster was the feature of the entertainment. Behind the curtain sat Professor Khayme, prompter and general manager. A boy with mighty lungs and violent gesticulation recited an ...
— Who Goes There? • Blackwood Ketcham Benson
... and Liberty! But that is not yet the definite formula, the general formula; what I will call, the dynamite formula. At best, Bakounine would become an incendiary, and burn down cities. And what is that, I ask you? Bah? A second-hand Rostopchin! He wants a prompter, and I offered to become his but he did ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume III (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant
... German with the tragical countenance had cropped up on a first night to occupy a side box all to himself when fashionable Paris filled the house,—if these could have seen the history played out upon the stage before the prompter's box, they would have found it far more interesting than the transformation scenes of The Devil's Betrothed, though indeed it was the two hundred thousandth representation of a sublime allegory performed aforetime ...
— Poor Relations • Honore de Balzac
... the hornet was truer than she anticipated: animamque in vulnere ponit. Internal evidence leads almost irresistibly to the conclusion that he was the author or prompter of "The Sentimental Mother: a Comedy in Five Acts. The Legacy of an Old Friend, and his 'Last Moral Lesson' to Mrs. Hester Lynch Thrale, now Mrs. Hester Lynch Piozzi. London: Printed for James Ridgeway, York Street, St. James's Square, 1789. Price ...
— Autobiography, Letters and Literary Remains of Mrs. Piozzi (Thrale) (2nd ed.) (2 vols.) • Mrs. Hester Lynch Piozzi
... we get hints leading to the supposition that an authorized state copy was prepared; that it was ordained that the whole poem should be recited at the Panathenaic Festivals by relays of Rhapsodoi; this state copy being in the hands of a prompter whose business it was to see there should be no transgression by the chanters.* The wandering songs of the old blind minstrel have become the familiar Sacred Book of the ...
— The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris
... but noble in your cruelty!" exclaimed Woodburn, with mingled disappointment and admiration. "I will forbear to press my suit for the present, but not forever. I will heed the lesson of patriotism you have given me, but only to remember my fair prompter with deeper devotion." ...
— The Rangers - [Subtitle: The Tory's Daughter] • D. P. Thompson
... Roger Ward the printer, in order to authenticate it: hence the connection of his name with the production, in the performance of which he may also have had a share, and he may thus have had access to the prompter's book. The Paul Bucke, who in 1578 was the author of a "prayer for Sir Humphrey Gilbert," was in ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VI • Robert Dodsley
... forced to be quiet, betook himself to literature for a relaxation, and composed his comedy, whereof the prompter's copy lieth in my walnut escritoire, sealed up and docketed, The Faithful Fool, a Comedy, as it was performed by her Majesty's servants. 'Twas a very sentimental piece; and Mr. Steele, who had more of that kind of sentiment than Mr. ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... has no curtain; and the orchestra is on the stage itself, behind the actors. There is no prompter and no call-boy. Stage footmen wait at the sides to carry in screens, small tables, and an odd chair or two, to represent houses, city walls, and so on, or hand cups of tea to the actors when their throats become dry from vociferous singing, ...
— The Civilization Of China • Herbert A. Giles
... nothing was done. On the night of representation, only four acts out of five were written, and even these had not been rehearsed, the principal performers, Siddons, Charles Kemble and Barrymore, having only just received their parts. Sheridan was up in the prompter's room actually writing the fifth act while the first was being performed, and every now and then appeared in the green-room with a fresh relay of dialogue, and setting all in good humour by his merry abuse of his own negligence. In spite ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 2 • Grace & Philip Wharton
... retreat, but the rude eyes and words followed her. Occasionally the voice of the prompter was heard: 'Now then, ladies, silence if you please; I can't hear what's being said on the stage.' No one listened to him, and, like animals in a fair, they continued to crush and to crowd in the passage between the wings and ...
— A Mummer's Wife • George Moore
... The worthy prompter supplied him with books, a benefit he derived from the following circumstance. In Bristol there is a lane or street occupied by venders of second-hand articles of various kinds. Thither he one day repaired to buy, if possible, a pair of cheap silk stockings:—poor ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 5, May 1810 • Various
... the audience for a given time from certain of their fellow-men who were to come forward and pretend those parts. The lights—the orchestra lights—came up a clumsy machinery. The first ring, and the second ring, was now but a trick of the prompter's bell—which had been, like the note of the cuckoo, a phantom of a voice; no hand seen or guessed at which ministered to its warning. The actors were men and women painted. I thought the fault was in them; but it was in myself, and the alteration which those many centuries—of six short twelvemonths—had ...
— A Book of the Play - Studies and Illustrations of Histrionic Story, Life, and Character • Dutton Cook
... London, that May was engrossed. It was with becoming a bond-slave to those ambitious players. She lent herself to the minutest details of their attempt, coached herself in them day and night, till she could coach everybody in turn, and figured behind backs as universal prompter, dresser, stage-manager—the girl who had been so lifeless and incapable of looking after herself when she first came among them that they had styled her the baby ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Sarah Tytler
... to have been matter of surprise to any body. For his apostasy he could not plead even the miserable excuse that he had been neglected. The ignominious services which he had formerly rendered to his party as a spy, a raiser of riots, a dispenser of bribes, a writer of libels, a prompter of false witnesses, had been rewarded only too prodigally for the honour of the new government. That he should hold any high office was of course impossible. But a sinecure place of five hundred a year had been created for him in the department of the Excise. He now had ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 3 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... least nervous of any of the household, and she gleaned more than a little amusement from the efforts of the others to reassure her. "You know I'll be right there with the book," said Aunt Abigail, who had accepted the important post of official prompter. "So it won't be a serious matter if you forget." The others had similar encouragement to offer, some of it mingled with good counsel. "Don't lose your head if you get tangled up," Peggy warned her. "Because the rest ...
— Peggy Raymond's Vacation - or Friendly Terrace Transplanted • Harriet L. (Harriet Lummis) Smith
... the leader "called out" the figures of the lancers and quadrilles. "Face your pardners," he called out as the square dance was begun. Several sets of four couples were formed ready for the first strains of the lancers music and the prompter. "Forward all," and all the couples advanced to the center. "Swing your pardners," "balance corners," the lady and gentleman faced to the right and took steps to the music. "Swing," and ...
— The Little Immigrant • Eva Stern
... lent a helping hand in fashioning the actors, she remembers; and but for his unfortunate person, he might have had some distinguished part in the scene to enact. As it was, he had the arduous task of prompter assigned to him; and his feeble voice was heard clear and distinct, repeating the text during the whole performance. She describes her recollection of the cast of characters, even now, with a relish. Martia, by the handsome Edgar Hickman, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 85, November, 1864 • Various
... coming soon (here it is usual for a lady to be removed from the gallery in strong hysterics), and keeps her word by letting her arm fall upon the bed-clothes and shutting her eyes, whereupon somebody says that she is dead, and the prompter whistles for the scene ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, August 21, 1841 • Various
... hearing suddenly failing as well as his memory, there was a dead stop. In vain the prompter, the scene-shifter, the candle-snuffer, as loud as they could, and much louder than they ought, reiterated ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. VII - Patronage • Maria Edgeworth
... peril was at my side, and as my blood-stained face looked as if my injuries were serious he invited me to his house, which was close by the scene of the accident. On the way we introduced ourselves to each other. His name was Hering, and he was the prompter at the theatre. When the doctor who had been sent to me had finished his task of sewing up the wound and left us, an elderly woman entered, whose rank in life was somewhat difficult to determine. She wore gay flowers in her bonnet, and a cloak made of silk and velvet, but her yellow ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... timorous edict was, after all, the true source of deliverance. Certainly the question remains, whether even the most sudden and ill-timed concession of rights, if only backed by energetic police action, is not a prompter, surer cure for public disorder than whole batteries of artillery without the concession of rights. I believe the most blundering effort for the prompt undoing of a grievous wrong is safer than the shrewdest or strongest effort for its continuance. Meanwhile, with what patience doth ...
— The Flower of the Chapdelaines • George W. Cable
... came a genius who profess'd To have a curious trick in store That never was perform'd before. Through all the town this soon got air, And the whole house was like a fair; But soon his entry as he made, Without a prompter or parade, 'Twas all expectance and suspense, And silence gagg'd the audience. He, stooping down and looking big, So wondrous well took off a pig, All swore 'twas serious, and no joke, For that, or underneath his cloak He had concealed some grunting elf, Or was a real hog himself. ...
— The Fables of Phdrus - Literally translated into English prose with notes • Phaedrus
... kind, to stand up and be seated, just as another thought proper to direct. I hated to be classed, cribbed, rebuked, and feruled at the pleasure of one who, as it seemed to me, knew no guide in his rewards but caprice, and no prompter in his ...
— Arthur Mervyn - Or, Memoirs of the Year 1793 • Charles Brockden Brown
... and second of these points, the Netherlanders needed no prompter. They had long ago settled the conditions without which they would make no treaty at all, and certainly it was not the States-General that had thus far ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... slowly revolving, and a dark form slipped out from behind it and went away down the street with light, soft footsteps. I rushed towards the stone figure; it stood as before, close to the wall. Almost without thinking, rather as if impelled by some inward prompter, I stealthily followed the figure. Just beside an image of the Virgin he turned round; the light of the street lamp standing exactly in front of the image fell full upon his ...
— Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... not attending to her part," remarked the manager. "Coralie is smitten with our friend here, all unsuspicious of his conquest, and Coralie will make a fiasco; she is missing her cues, this is the second time she had not heard the prompter. Pray, go into the corner, monsieur," he continued. "If Coralie is smitten with you, I will go and tell her that you have left ...
— A Distinguished Provincial at Paris • Honore de Balzac
... the men in the room—Baron, an honest, blundering fellow—started toward the window to see who the prompter was, but the host—of intuitive perception—saw that this might not be agreeable to their entertainer and said quietly: "Don't go to the window, Baron. See, Mrs. Detlor ...
— An Unpardonable Liar • Gilbert Parker
... ledge of the balcony there were fresh and real roses and carnations, so that every lady could take a bouquet away with her. Garlands of paper flowers hung the entire distance from the ceiling to the prompter's box. One wondered how they found hands enough in Berlin to make ...
— The Sunny Side of Diplomatic Life, 1875-1912 • Lillie DeHegermann-Lindencrone
... chronicles of Brut and Arthur, down to the royal Henries, which men hear eagerly; and a string of doleful tragedies, merry Italian tales, and Spanish voyages, which all the London prentices know. All the mass has been treated, with more or less skill, by every playwright, and the prompter has the soiled and tattered manuscripts. It is now no longer possible to say who wrote them first. They have been the property of the Theatre so long, and so many rising geniuses have enlarged or altered them, inserting a speech, or a whole Scene, or adding a song, that no man can any longer ...
— English Critical Essays - Nineteenth Century • Various
... to run at the least as dissolute a course as did those that were still bachelors. The young wife, being advised of this, could not keep silence upon it, so that she very often received payment after a different and a prompter fashion than she could have wished. For all that, she ceased not to persist in lamentation, and sometimes in railing as well; which so provoked the young man that he beat her even to bruises and blood. Thereupon she cried out yet more loudly than before; and in a like fashion ...
— The Tales Of The Heptameron, Vol. IV. (of V.) • Margaret, Queen Of Navarre
... attending to her part," remarked the manager. "Coralie is smitten with our friend here, all unsuspicious of his conquest, and Coralie will make a fiasco; she is missing her cues, this is the second time she had not heard the prompter. Pray, go into the corner, monsieur," he continued. "If Coralie is smitten with you, I will go and tell her that ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... opera the recitative commences, it means to them, "The Lord be praised, here is an end to that cursed tempo, which off and on compels us to a kind of rational rendering; we can now float about in all directions, dwell on any note we like until the prompter has supplied us with the next phrase; the conductor has now no power over us, and we can take revenge for his pretensions by commanding him to give us the beat when it suits us," etc. Although perhaps not all singers are conscious of this privilege of their ...
— Correspondence of Wagner and Liszt, Volume 1 • Francis Hueffer (translator)
... formerly, in defence of his monopolies, told the Iroquois that they might plunder the canoes of traders who had not a pass from him. The adverse faction now retorted by adding the permission of murder to the permission of pillage. Margry thinks that La Chesnaye was the prompter of this villany.] ...
— France and England in North America, a Series of Historical Narratives, Part Third • Francis Parkman
... help in redressing this terrible injury to our Mission. He informed me that he had already called his officers to account, but that all denied any connection with the articles or the picture. He had little doubt, all the same, that some one on board was the prompter, who gloried in the evil that was being done to the cause of Christ. He offered every possible assistance, by testimony or otherwise, to place all the facts before the Christian public and ...
— The Story of John G. Paton - Or Thirty Years Among South Sea Cannibals • James Paton
... value. We are here supposing, as we have supposed throughout, that the country has mines of its own, and no commercial intercourse with other countries; for, in a country having foreign trade, the coin which is rendered superfluous by an issue of paper is carried off by a much prompter method. ...
— Principles Of Political Economy • John Stuart Mill
... hand on the door-knob, felt herself obliged to decline this theme so tardily introduced—though the old man's tart tone promised great possibilities. She would have thanked David Marshall for a prompter contribution of conversational material; she felt that her own efforts during this interview had been out of all proportion to his. She made no response, and he stepped forward to conduct her through the outer office to her carriage. "You needn't go through all ...
— With the Procession • Henry B. Fuller
... just come back for my pocket-handkerchief. I must have dropped it in here somewhere. (He begins to search for it, and in the ordinary course of things comes upon Isobel on the sofa. He puts his rifle down carefully on a table, with the muzzle pointing at the prompter rather than at the audience, and staggers back.) Merciful heavens! Isobel! Dead! (He falls on his knees beside the sofa.) ...
— The Holiday Round • A. A. Milne
... in this world; but Zoe's good sense carried every vote. Her prompter, Severne, nodded approval. Fanny said, "Why, of course;" and Vizard, who it was feared might prove refractory, assented even more warmly than the others. "Yes," said he, "that will be the end of it. You ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade
... expedition to the head of the Horican. Though the return of Duncan was likely to remind them of his character, and the suspicious circumstances of his visit, it produced no visible sensation. So far, the terrible scene that had just occurred proved favorable to his views, and he required no other prompter than his own feelings to convince him of the expediency of profiting by so unexpected ...
— The Last of the Mohicans • James Fenimore Cooper
... de frolic with de fiddle or banjo or windjammer. Dey dances out on de grass, forty or fifty niggers, and dem big gals nineteen year old git out dere barefoot as de goose. It jes' de habit of de times, 'cause dey all have shoes. Sometimes dey call de jig dance and some of dem sho' dance it, too. De prompter call, 'All git ready.' Den he holler, 'All balance,' and den he sing out, 'Swing you pardner,' and dey does it. Den he say, 'First man head off to de right,' and dere dey goes. Or he say, 'All promenade,' and ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves. - Texas Narratives, Part 2 • Works Projects Administration
... respecting this extraordinary device, he merely replied, that it signified Candela bianca (A white candle), and, consequently, doubts were entertained of the eccentric gallant's sanity. At last, though love is proverbially blind, the lady—probably she had a prompter—discovered that the true meaning was Can de la Bianca (The dog of Bianca), and with her hand rewarded the ingenuity ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 444 - Volume 18, New Series, July 3, 1852 • Various
... Hold your hands Both you of my inclining, and the rest. Were it my Cue to fight, I should haue knowne it Without a Prompter. Whether will you that I goe To answere this your charge? Bra. To Prison, till fit time Of Law, and course of direct Session ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... Convention had identified with them, but who, even in the moments of the greatest excitement, had kept himself clear of their wickedness and crimes, was the only one of the whole body who completely eluded the rage of his enemies. The rest, with Madame Roland, the first prompter of deeds of blood, languished in their well-deserved prisons till the close of autumn, when they all perished on the same scaffold to which they ...
— The Life of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France • Charles Duke Yonge
... hour you are appointed assistant property man and assistant prompter for the Blackfriars, at sixteen shillings a week, with chance of promotion, ...
— Shakspere, Personal Recollections • John A. Joyce
... which could reconcile a young officer of high birth to desertion, aggravated by breach of trust and by gross falsehood? That Cornbury was not a man of brilliant parts or enterprising temper made the event more alarming. It was impossible to doubt that he had in some quarter a powerful and artful prompter. Who that prompter was soon became evident. In the meantime no man in the royal camp could feel assured that he was not surrounded by traitors. Political rank, military rank, the honour of a nobleman, the honour of a soldier, the strongest ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 2 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... to the representation." That Starkey lent a helping hand in fashioning the actors, she remembers; and but for his unfortunate person, he might have had some distinguished part in the scene to enact. As it was, he had the arduous task of prompter assigned to him; and his feeble voice was heard clear and distinct, repeating the text during the whole performance. She describes her recollection of the cast of characters, even now, with a relish. Martia, by the handsome Edgar Hickman, who afterwards went ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 85, November, 1864 • Various
... with that, and sing out, 'Silence!'" says the knowing boy, handing Wheelwright an iron bolt, and taking his place beside him, as prompter. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various
... time. The orchestra, really intoxicated, could not have gone on. The leader's baton is no longer anything but a broken stick on the prompter's box. The violin strings are broken, and their necks twisted. In his fury the drummer has burst his drum. The counter-bassist has perched on the top of his musical monster. The first clarionet has swallowed the reed of his instrument, and the second ...
— A Winter Amid the Ice - and Other Thrilling Stories • Jules Verne
... very serious; "do I jest, Carlisle?" And turning to Mr. Cross, the prompter, who stood by, "Fetch me the St. James's ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... so much, that, as Leigh Hunt says, he literally had intolerance for nothing. Though he could see but little religion in many professing Christians, he nevertheless saw that the motley players, "made up of mimic laughter and tears, passing from the extremes of joy or woe at the prompter's call," were not so godless and impious as the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 11, Issue 67, May, 1863 • Various
... He would catch for his word often, reiterating meanwhile the article, "the-a, the-a, the-a," his gaze meanwhile fixed upon the sky-light, and a nervously gyrating forefinger raised high and brightly illuminated. The thought suggested was that he had a prompter on the roof to whom he was distressfully appealing to supply the true phrase. For Professor Gray the truth was in the top rather than the bottom of the well. Though sometimes long in coming it was the right thing ...
— The Last Leaf - Observations, during Seventy-Five Years, of Men and Events in America - and Europe • James Kendall Hosmer
... Tollman gave the appearance of a man who, having suggested a stormy topic, is ready to relinquish it. In reality he was making Williams say everything which he wished to have said and was doing it by the simple device of setting up antagonism to play the prompter. "What put it into my head was perhaps nothing more tangible than their constant companionship. They are both young. He has a vital and fascinating personality. There is a touch of Pan and a touch of Bacchus in ...
— The Tyranny of Weakness • Charles Neville Buck
... play. It does not contain the Stage-Keeper, who speaks only once, the Servant whose single word is accompanied by the stage direction "This Servant is to be on from the beginning," nor the Romp (probably the Prompter, who speaks twice off-stage during the play). Hic and Haec Scriblerus, however, although he is listed in the cast of characters, speaks only once, and his entrance ...
— The Covent Garden Theatre, or Pasquin Turn'd Drawcansir • Charles Macklin
... half the boxes were empty, whilst those who were there seemed merely to occupy them from the effect of habit, and because this is the only evening amusement. The prompter spoke ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon de la Barca
... natural sleep, urged thereto, perhaps, by that unseen playwright who had decreed another time for the curtain; or perhaps he was kept by Doctor Thayer's professional persuasions, in defiance of the prompter's signal. However the case, the heart slowly but surely began to take up its job like an honest force-pump, the face began to lose its death-like pallor, the breathing became more nearly normal. Doctor Thayer, ...
— The Stolen Singer • Martha Idell Fletcher Bellinger
... have a number of plantains, and you want to take them across the river," whispered his invisible prompter from behind. ...
— Ismailia • Samuel W. Baker
... checking its light anJ giving the dim valley startling depth and blackness. Rain-drops struck the roof at intervals, a shower of apple-blossoms rustled against the window and drifted on, and below the muffled sound of music and shuffling feet was now and then pierced by the shrill calls of the prompter. There was something ominous in the persistent tread of feet and the steady flight of the gloomy clouds, and quivering with vague fears, Easter sank down from her chair to Clayton's feet, and burst into tears, as he put his arms ...
— A Mountain Europa • John Fox Jr.
... met him again and grew unaccountably nervous. It needed all her power of will and all the prompter's aid to enable her to retain the thread of her part. At times her mind would wander and she would forget the words. Yet, to judge by the applause with which she was rewarded, her ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 6, June, 1891 • Various
... stage were two doors for the players, and between them hung a painted cloth or arras behind which the prompter stood. Over these doors were two plastered rooms, twopenny private boxes for gentlefolk. In one of them were three young men and a beautiful girl, wonderfully dressed. The men were speaking to her, but she looked down at Nick instead. "What a pretty boy!" she said, and tossed ...
— Master Skylark • John Bennett
... and feel a heart-warm interest in all that concerns them. If the perusal of this volume has such an effect upon the reader's mind, it will accomplish all that its author desires; for right feeling is but the prompter to right action. ...
— Woman's Trials - or, Tales and Sketches from the Life around Us. • T. S. Arthur
... flame of considerable brightness, which blazed cheerfully, and this for about an hour. That flame signified the advent of some spirits of Mercury who, for penetration, thought, and speech, were prompter than those who preceded them. When they were come, they instantly ran over the things that were in my memory, but, owing to their promptness, I was unable to apperceive what they observed. Immediately afterwards, I heard them say that the matter was thus and thus. With regard ...
— Earths In Our Solar System Which Are Called Planets, and Earths In The Starry Heaven Their Inhabitants, And The Spirits And Angels There • Emanuel Swedenborg
... court is assembled. A stage has been erected. The court astrologer announces the play and Mephistopheles is installed in the prompter's box. All is in expectation and excitement. Then on the stage is seen rising from the ground the form of Faust attended by the tripod. He touches the tripod with the glowing key. A dense mist of incense arises, ...
— The Faust-Legend and Goethe's 'Faust' • H. B. Cotterill
... a favoured few of the general public. To my dying day I shall remember one of these occasions. The debate, so celebrated, between the great Carolinian Hayne and our own Webster was the feature of the entertainment. Behind the curtain sat Professor Khayme, prompter and general manager. A boy with mighty lungs and violent gesticulation recited an abridgment ...
— Who Goes There? • Blackwood Ketcham Benson
... Raglan, the English Commander-in-Chief, and Marshal Saint Arnaud, the French commander, there was little concert or agreement. The French, whose arrangements were far better, and whose movements were prompter than our own, were always complaining of British procrastination; while the English General went quietly on his own way, and certainly tried sorely the patience of our allies. Even when the whole of the allied armies were embarked, nothing had been settled beyond the fact that they were going ...
— Jack Archer • G. A. Henty
... Room," the page answered rather resentfully, but resigned himself as he remembered that, however this curtailed his importance, it left open a prompter return to his game of ...
— The Ward of King Canute • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz
... Mercedes, of course, was leading lady; Monsieur and Madame Denis were the heavy parents; and a gentlemanlike young mouse named Leander was jeune premier. Then, in my leisure, they used to act the most tremendous plays. I was stage-manager, prompter, playwright, chorus, and audience, placing the theatre before a looking-glass, so that, though my duties kept me behind, I could peer round the edge, and watch the spectacle as from the front. I would invent the lines and deliver them, ...
— Grey Roses • Henry Harland
... "The prompter's bell tingles and then tingles again. The bearded Germans of the orchestra hush their music, and the big field of green baize shoots ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe
... was followed by a new and original operetta, containing some very pretty music by Mr. PERCY REEVE, with the exquisitely droll title of The Crusader and the Craven. The one lady and two gentlemen who took part in this were, from a prompter's point of view, nearly perfect. Mr. R. HENDON as Sir Rupert de Malvoisie (the Crusader) suggested, by his accent and gestures, that he must have come from the East—how far East, it boots not to inquire. Miss FLORENCE DARLEY was a ...
— Punch, or, the London Charivari, Volume 98, March 8, 1890. • Various
... "weaken," Buntline would give me a fresh start, by asking some question. In this way I took up fifteen minutes, without once speaking a word of my part; nor did I speak a word of it during the whole evening. The prompter, who was standing between the wings, attempted to prompt me, but it did no good; for while I was on the stage I "chipped in" anything I ...
— The Life of Hon. William F. Cody - Known as Buffalo Bill The Famous Hunter, Scout and Guide • William F. Cody
... then to the strains of a bamboo fiddle, bamboo flute, bamboo drum, the melodrama was begun. The hero pranced into the open square to the tune of a minor dirge, not knowing a single sentence of his part; the prompter, kneeling down before a flaring candle, told him what to say; he repeated in parrot-like fashion, and then pranced off the square to slow dirge-like music. Now the heroine minced in from the opposite corner to slow music with her satin ...
— An Ohio Woman in the Philippines • Emily Bronson Conger
... in the Compter, Her pa, in a rage, Died (don't know his age), His daughter, she married the prompter, Grew bulky and quitted ...
— The Bab Ballads • W. S. Gilbert
... as told to me by the actor's friend, the late Laurence Hutton, the writer. Mr. Hutton and Mr. Booth were sitting in the latter's dressing room at Booth's Theater. Booth was, as usual, smoking his beloved pipe. When he heard his cue, he arose, and walked with Hutton to the prompter's entrance, where, giving his pipe to his friend, said: "Larry, will you keep the pipe going until I come off?" Booth entered on the scene; then came the big moment in the play when the nobles and the weak King had assembled to defy the power of the Cardinal; ...
— Defenders of Democracy • The Militia of Mercy
... the theater? The explanation is that in reality, for our generation of free artists, the theater is repugnant, with its cookery, its hobbles, its demand for immediate and brutal success, its army of collaborators, to which one must submit, from the imposing leading man down to the prompter. How much more independent are we in the novel! And that's why, when the glamor of the footlights makes the blood dance, we prefer to exercise it by keeping aloof and to remain the absolute masters of our works. ...
— How to Write a Play - Letters from Augier, Banville, Dennery, Dumas, Gondinet, - Labiche, Legouve, Pailleron, Sardou, Zola • Various
... with the inspirations of home. Every female should be an intellectual and moral guardian to some portion of the young around her. In bestowing of her substance, and especially of her personal attentions, on the sick and the poor, she will find all she has done of good at home an invaluable prompter and aid. For the sake, therefore, of others, as a social and responsible being, let the flame she would support on the public altar be kindled from the vestal fire of ...
— The Young Maiden • A. B. (Artemas Bowers) Muzzey
... vastly greater security, immensely more of the national viewpoint, much larger and prompter accomplishment where our divisions are along party lines, in the broader and loftier sense, than to divide geographically, or according to pursuits, or personal following. For a century and a third, parties have been ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... make sure of seeing Mary before she could see him. He decided that if she did not make her appearance by the time Mrs. Blythe arrived he would go back behind the scenes and look for her. Maybe Mrs. Blythe would station her there somewhere as prompter, for fear that she might forget her speech. If that were the case it would be a pity to distract the prompter's attention, but it was a greater pity that the few hours he had to spend with her should be wasted in ...
— Mary Ware's Promised Land • Annie Fellows Johnston
... on the scene, and reciting, should prepare their parts so as to know them by heart and in every detail of place and time follow the music with all care as to time. It will not be a bad idea to have a prompter to aid the ...
— Some Forerunners of Italian Opera • William James Henderson
... him, hoping in some way to get a kindly word, but the master was so absorbed that he did not see or hear the boy and Chad, awed by the stern, solemn face, withdrew and, without a word to anybody, climbed into the loft and went to bed. He could hear every stroke on the floor below, every call of the prompter, and the rude laughter and banter, but he gave little heed to it all. For he lay thinking of Caleb Hazel and listening again to the stories he and the cattle-dealer had told him about the wonderful settlements. "God's Country," the dealer always called ...
— The Little Shepherd of Kingdom Come • John Fox
... badly, nobody was word-perfect and a rasping prompter would not keep ahead as he ought to have done; the scenery and the make-ups were daubs, and I was filled with amazement that having quite wantonly undertaken to do this thing these people could then do it ...
— The Passionate Friends • Herbert George Wells
... bright," as Jimmie, the stage prompter, remarked in an aside to Strachan. "By the way, is it the Arcadians that we ...
— To Love • Margaret Peterson
... impatience which seemed seething in the very blood,—the provoking coolness of old play-goers,—the music that rather excited than soothed the fever of expectation,—the mystery of mimic life that throbbed behind the curtain,—the welcome tinkle of the prompter's bell,—the capricious swaying to and fro of that mighty painted scroll,—its slow uplift, revealing for an instant, perhaps, the twinkle of flying dancers' feet and the shuffle of belated buskins? And then, the unveiled wonders of that strange, new world of canvas ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 21, July, 1859 • Various
... went on pleasantly, though Mr. Wilkes Booth an observer of the audience, visited the stage and took note of the positions. His alleged associate, the stage carpenter, then received quiet orders to clear the passage by the wings from the prompter's post to the stage door. All this time, Mr. Lincoln, in his family circle, unconscious of the death that crowded fast upon him, watched the pleasantry and smiled and felt heartful ...
— The Life, Crime and Capture of John Wilkes Booth • George Alfred Townsend
... contributions to the press. Among the best known of his writings are a series of letters on practical agriculture and political economy, originally contributed to a Kingston newspaper, and subsequently republished in pamphlet form under the title of "The Prompter." The series of historical and topographical sketches forming the first half of the first volume of Gourlay's "Statistical Account of Upper Canada" are also from Mr. Bidwell's pen, and they are upon the whole the ...
— The Story of the Upper Canada Rebellion, Volume 1 • John Charles Dent
... of the letters was William Rufus Chetwood, later the prompter at Drury Lane Theatre, but then just commencing bookseller at the sign of Cato's Head, Covent Garden. He had already brought out for Mrs. Haywood the first effort of her genius, a romantic tale entitled ...
— The Life and Romances of Mrs. Eliza Haywood • George Frisbie Whicher
... with pink flowers round on her hand, "let me introduce M. Denoisel again. You have met him before in the old days—that sounds as though we were quite aged, doesn't it?—and he is our theatrical manager, our professor of elocution, our prompter—scene shifter—everything." ...
— Rene Mauperin • Edmond de Goncourt and Jules de Goncourt
... But the old prompter, grey and frail, They heard him murmur low, "It only could be Meg Coverdale, Died thirty ...
— The Haunted Hour - An Anthology • Various
... ever uttered: Land and Liberty! But that is not yet the definite formula, the general formula; what I will call, the dynamite formula. At best, Bakounine would become an incendiary, and burn down cities. And what is that, I ask you? Bah? A second-hand Rostopchin! He wants a prompter, and I offered to become his but he did not take me ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume III (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant
... Duncombe issued Kerr's "Ancient Legends or Simple and Romantic Tales," and at the Harvard Library, where there is a copy of this book, the catalogue gives Kerr's position in London at the time as Prompter of the Regency Theatre. He must have ventured, with a relative, into independent publishing, for there was issued, in 1826, by J. & H. Kerr, the former's freely translated melodramatic romance, "The Monster and Magician; or, The Fate of Frankenstein," taken from the French of J. T. Merle ...
— Representative Plays by American Dramatists: 1856-1911: Rip van - Winkle • Charles Burke
... of the guests who were coming, chief among them, Miss Cameron, who kept her promise faithfully. The orchestra tuned their instruments with unusual care, the scene-shifters set their stage with lavish elegance, the prompter heroically took his seat in the stifling nook provided for him, and the actors dressed with trembling hands that dropped the pins, and perspiring brows whereon the powder wouldn't stick. Beaumont and Fletcher ...
— Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott
... becoming a bond-slave to those ambitious players. She lent herself to the minutest details of their attempt, coached herself in them day and night, till she could coach everybody in turn, and figured behind backs as universal prompter, dresser, stage-manager—the girl who had been so lifeless and incapable of looking after herself when she first came among them that they had styled her the baby of ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Sarah Tytler
... drop-scene, which was down, and was in the act of commencing the tonsorial operation, when, horresco referens, the prompter's bell rang sharply, whether by accident or design I was never able to ascertain, but have grievous suspicions that Fred Gahagan knew something about it—up flew the drop-scene like a shot, and discovered the following tableau vivant to ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, December 18, 1841 • Various
... he was not already installed. Almost born in the purple [Note 2], he had climbed up from ecclesiastical dignity to dignity, till at last there was only one further height left for him to scale. It could surprise no one to see the vacant mitre set on the astute head of Gloucester's confessor and prompter. ...
— The White Rose of Langley - A Story of the Olden Time • Emily Sarah Holt
... prompter, close to her side, but she did not hear. Already she was moving forward with a steady grace, born of inspiration. She dawned upon the audience, handsome and proud, shifting, with the necessity of the situation, to a cold, white, helpless object, as the ...
— Sister Carrie • Theodore Dreiser
... the rest There came a genius who profess'd To have a curious trick in store That never was perform'd before. Through all the town this soon got air, And the whole house was like a fair; But soon his entry as he made, Without a prompter or parade, 'Twas all expectance and suspense, And silence gagg'd the audience. He, stooping down and looking big, So wondrous well took off a pig, All swore 'twas serious, and no joke, For that, or underneath his cloak He had concealed some grunting elf, Or was a real ...
— The Fables of Phdrus - Literally translated into English prose with notes • Phaedrus
... to quarrel with Stevens or anybody else, 'twouldn't be your pistols in my pocket that would make me set on, and 'twouldn't be the want of 'em that would make me stop. When it's my cue to fight, look you, I won't need any prompter, in the shape of friend or pistol. Now THAT speech is from one of your poets, pretty near, and ought to convince you that you may as well lend the puppies and say no more about it. If you don't you'll only compel me to carry my rifle, and that'll be something worse to an enemy, and something heavier ...
— Charlemont • W. Gilmore Simms
... performance. Caillot, a celebrated actor, who had long quitted the stage, and Dazincourt, both of acknowledged good character, were selected to give lessons, the first in comic opera, of which the easier sorts were preferred, and the second in comedy. The office of hearer of rehearsals, prompter, and stage manager was given to my father-in-law. The Duc de Fronsac, first gentleman of the chamber, was much hurt at this. He thought himself called upon to make serious remonstrances upon the subject, and wrote to the ...
— Memoirs Of The Court Of Marie Antoinette, Queen Of France, Complete • Madame Campan
... airs will not cost me much, for a M. Weber who is going there with me has copied them. He has a daughter who sings admirably, and has a lovely pure voice; she is only fifteen. [Footnote: Aloysia, second daughter of the prompter and theatrical copyist, Weber, a brother of Carl Maria von Weber's father.] She fails in nothing but in stage action; were it not for that, she might be the prima donna of any theatre. Her father is a downright honest German who brings up his children well, for which very ...
— The Letters of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, V.1. • Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
... must all pay it," returned Straws. "He acted as if he were dazed while the play was in progress and I could not but notice it, standing in the wings. The prompter spoke of it to me. 'I don't know what is the matter with Mr. Barnes,' he said, 'I have had to keep throwing him his lines.' Even Miss Carew rallied him gently between acts ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham
... Stage of Time You stand to bow your last adieu; A moment, and the prompter's chime Will ring the curtain down on you. Your mien is sad, your step is slow; You falter as a Sage in pain; Yet turn, Old Year, before you go, ...
— Rhymes of a Rolling Stone • Robert W. Service
... reprinted the earlier quarto impressions with a few changes, sometimes for the better and sometimes for the worse; and it is most probable that copies of those editions (whether surreptitious or not) had taken the place of the original prompter's books, as being more convenient and legible. Even in these cases it is not safe to conclude that all or even any of the variations were made by the hand of Shakspeare himself. And where the players printed from manuscript, is it likely ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 3, No. 16, February, 1859 • Various
... done, and I fulfil One half my wish, and curb thee to my will, I were a prompter and a prouder man Than earth has known since light-foot lovers ran For Atalanta, lov'd of men and boys. I were a kaiser then, a king of joys, And fit to play with high-begotten pomps As children play ...
— A Lover's Litanies • Eric Mackay
... by Mr. Webster at a gathering of his political friends, when he had to be prompted by a friend who sat just behind him, and gave him successively phrases and topics. The speech proceeded somewhat after this fashion: Prompter: "Tariff." Webster: "The tariff, gentlemen, is a subject requiring the profound attention of the statesman. American industry, gentlemen, must be ——" (nods a little). Prompter: "National Debt." Webster: "And, gentlemen, there's the national debt—it should ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore
... in the pageant which Iamblichos called "the indissoluble bonds of Necessity" was about to reappear in his appointed place in response to the call of the unseen Prompter. Hideous are the settings of that pageant to-day; for where in the glowing pages of Dumas we see D'Artagnan, the gallant Forty-five and many another good friend riding in through the romantic gates ...
— The Orchard of Tears • Sax Rohmer
... of the prompter's bell! The curtain is about to fall. I cannot stay in the gloom alone with that man!—Good by ...
— Continental Monthly, Volume 5, Issue 4 • Various
... to sway his decision. But, like his more distinguished colleagues, he had to rely upon counsel from outside, and in his case, as in theirs, the official adviser was not always identical with the real prompter. He, too, as we saw, set aside the findings of the commissions when they disagreed with his own. In a word, Mr. Wilson's fatal stumble was to have sacrificed essentials in order to score on issues of secondary moment; for while success enabled him to obtain his paper ...
— The Inside Story Of The Peace Conference • Emile Joseph Dillon
... organisation advances to a larger scale and a more extensive specialisation, with increasing divergence among individual interests and individual fortunes; and intercourse over larger distances grows easier and makes a larger grouping practicable; which enables a larger, prompter and more effective mobilisation of forces with which to defend or assert any joint claims. But by the same move it also follows, or at least it appears uniformly to have followed in the European case, that the accumulation of property and the rights of ownership have progressively ...
— An Inquiry Into The Nature Of Peace And The Terms Of Its Perpetuation • Thorstein Veblen
... the very same words he had made use of at first. He employed this natural advantage with so much readiness, that he not only recollected whatever he had written or premeditated himself, but remembered every thing that had been said by his opponents, without the help of a prompter. He was likewise inflamed with such a passionate fondness for the profession, that I never saw any one, who took more pains to improve himself; for he would not suffer a day to elapse, without either speaking in the Forum, or composing something at home; and very often ...
— Cicero's Brutus or History of Famous Orators; also His Orator, or Accomplished Speaker. • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... up again could nowhere be found. "Frederic! where is Frederic?" the distracted manager would cry. Frederic was down stairs in the cafe under the theatre playing games where the stakes were high, and almost always losing. "Monsieur Frederic, the curtain is up!" the prompter would rush in to say. "Ciel! What can I do?" the imperturbable actor would reply. "I can't leave here, my dear fellow: I must win back what I've lost." Poor Harel had to pay again. As the receipts ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Volume 15, No. 89, May, 1875 • Various
... every gentleman took his pipe with him; and the fragrant clouds would be some consolation in the eyes, or rather in the noses, of some of us. But still,—almost six hours of tragedy! It is too much of a good thing for these degenerate days; and we must allow the prompter to use his pencil on the actors' copy of "Hamlet," though he strike out page upon ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 59, September, 1862 • Various
... said to have taken place during interviews with the king, and in which her conduct might not have been considered, strictly speaking, quite correct. She obtained further notoriety after my departure, by kicking and cuffing a prompter, and calling the proprietor a d—d scoundrel, a d—d liar, and a d—d thief, for which she was committed for trial. I may as well mention here, that the theatre was well attended by ladies. This fact must satisfy every unprejudiced mind how utterly ...
— Lands of the Slave and the Free - Cuba, The United States, and Canada • Henry A. Murray
... "spectacle" piece is all the rage; And there, in the midst of some "property" storm, While the sheet-iron thunder is rattling its best, And the rosin lightning, and all the rest Of the elements are, for some tragedy-reason, Making the "awfullest gale of the season—" See, at the sound of the prompter's tap, The fiend come up through the "Vampyre trap;" Take a mental photograph then, and there, Of that imp, with his "fixins" all complete— The elfish grin, the tangled hair, The dragon wings and the scaly feet— And you'll ...
— Nothing to Say - A Slight Slap at Mobocratic Snobbery, Which Has 'Nothing - to Do' with 'Nothing to Wear' • QK Philander Doesticks
... beauty ne'er enjoys: So well-bred spaniels civilly delight In mumbling of the game they dare not bite. Eternal smiles his emptiness betray, As shallow streams run dimpling all the way. Whether in florid impotence he speaks, And, as the prompter breathes, the puppet squeaks Or at the ear of Eve, familiar toad, Half froth, half venom, spits himself abroad, In puns, or politics, or tales, or lies, Or spite, or smut, or rhymes, or blasphemies. His wit all see-saw, between that ...
— English Satires • Various
... slow and serious air, sung by them all. We got up, and went forward to see them; and though we must have been strange objects to them, they continued their dance, without paying the least attention to us. They seemed to be directed by a man who served as a prompter, and mentioned each motion they were to make. But they never changed the spot, as we do in dancing, and though their feet were not at rest, this exercise consisted more in moving the fingers very nimbly, at the same time holding the hands in a prone position near the face, and ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 15 (of 18) • Robert Kerr
... were there, both players and spectators, did fall into such an exorbitant temptation of lust, that there was not angel, man, devil, nor deviless upon the place who would not then have bricollitched it with all their heart and soul. The prompter forsook his copy, he who played Michael's part came down to rights, the devils issued out of hell and carried along with them most of the pretty little girls that were there; yea, Lucifer got out of his fetters; in a word, seeing the huge ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... be quiet, betook himself to literature for a relaxation, and composed his comedy, whereof the prompter's copy lieth in my walnut escritoire, sealed up and docketed, The Faithful Fool, a Comedy, as it was performed by her Majesty's servants. 'Twas a very sentimental piece; and Mr. Steele, who had more ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... ain't got any charge to make against anybody for what was due to your own personal awkwardness, have you?" suggested the blue-coated prompter. ...
— The Thunders of Silence • Irvin Shrewsbury Cobb
... roasted a white man, by way of sweet-smelling sacrifice. Since the red men have been exterminated by you white savages, I amuse myself by presiding at the persecutions of Quakers and Anabaptists; I am the great patron and prompter of slave-dealers and the ...
— The Great English Short-Story Writers, Vol. 1 • Various
... was always the general factotum at public entertainments, and had won a title as "the politest negro in the world." Music of a lively sort he scraped from the fiddle or beat upon the triangle. He was head usher at meetings, chief cook at picnics, a stentorian prompter at dances, and ...
— The Story of Cooperstown • Ralph Birdsall
... to prove the words false. Along with the passionate desire for vengeance which possessed him had arisen the keen sense that his power of achieving the vengeance was doubtful. It was as if Tito had been helped by some diabolical prompter, who had whispered Baldassarre's saddest secret in the traitor's ear. He was not mad; for he carried within him that piteous stamp of sanity, the clear consciousness of shattered faculties; he measured his own feebleness. With the first ...
— Romola • George Eliot
... him to his jealousy of his successful performance of Harlequin, and opens some of the secret history of Hill, by which it appears that early in life he trod the theatrical boards. He tells us of the extraordinary pains the prompter had taken with Hill, in the part of Oroonoko; though, "if he had not quite forgotten it, to very little purpose." He reminds Hill of a dramatic anecdote, which he no doubt had forgotten. It seems he once belonged to a strolling company at May-fair, where, in ...
— Calamities and Quarrels of Authors • Isaac D'Israeli
... for the exiled minister in his extremity, "when I lost you I lost my leading man—the star of my enterprise. During your absence the prompter's box has been empty, and I don't know what to do. The world is against me—even France. I see but one thing left. Do you think I could restore confidence by divorcing Marie-Louise and remarrying Josephine? It strikes me that an ...
— Mr. Bonaparte of Corsica • John Kendrick Bangs
... there was but one such bough, in a spacious and shady grove."—Bacon cor. "Now the absurdity of this latter supposition will go a great way towards making a man easy."—Collier cor. "This is true of mathematics, with which taste has but little to do."—Todd cor. "To stand prompter to a pausing yet ready comprehension."—Rush cor. "Such an obedience as the yoked and tortured negro is compelled to yield to the whip of the overseer."—Chalmers cor. "For the gratification of a momentary and unholy desire."—Wayland cor. "The body ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... priest—a Jesuit—one Father Checkley, at that time an inmate of the hall; for Sir Piers, though he afterwards abjured it, at that time professed the Catholic faith, and this Checkley officiated as his confessor and counsellor; as the partner of his pleasures, and the prompter of his iniquities. He ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth
... surface of foliage and flowers. In the centre of all was repeated the silver Star within the golden band; the emblem from which the Order derives its name, and in which it embodies its deepest symbolism. Following again the direction of my unseen prompter, I repeated words which may be roughly translated ...
— Across the Zodiac • Percy Greg
... my blood-stained face looked as if my injuries were serious he invited me to his house, which was close by the scene of the accident. On the way we introduced ourselves to each other. His name was Hering, and he was the prompter at the theatre. When the doctor who had been sent to me had finished his task of sewing up the wound and left us, an elderly woman entered, whose rank in life was somewhat difficult to determine. She wore gay flowers ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... my remembrance of events were not confused. How could he be at once stationed at my shoulder and shut up in my closet? How could he stand near me and yet be invisible? But if Carwin's were the thrilling voice and the fiery visage which I had heard and seen, then was he the prompter of my brother, and the author ...
— Wieland; or The Transformation - An American Tale • Charles Brockden Brown
... it less out of curiosity than as a prompter gives a cue; for he had come to a full stop. She was wondering how Lady Caroline could injure him, being so ...
— Lady Good-for-Nothing • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... adventurous life. He was at different times actor in a travelling company, prompter, and writer. In his poems he shows a native gift of expression that made him a ...
— French Lyrics • Arthur Graves Canfield
... well guano might answer at the South, it was of no use in the hard soil and cold climate of New England. This is a fallacy which will soon be cured by knowledge, and self-interest is a very strong prompter towards the acquisition of the knowledge, that guano is the best, cheapest, most suitable, convenient and productive manure ever used by a New England farmer, and just as suitable for that climate and soil as it is for Virginia. We assert, without fear of successful contradiction, ...
— Guano - A Treatise of Practical Information for Farmers • Solon Robinson
... incessant, till the tinkling of the prompter's bell, and the rising of the curtain, put an end to his remarks on persons, and turned them all on the piece. I cannot but own the author opened an ample field for the effluvia of critic gall. I know not whether ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... things to set in order as usual; for it is only in books and on the stage that folks make a graceful exit, clearing up the little mystery, forgiving the wrongs, boasting with feeble voice of the good they have done—with lowering tone and soft music slowly working together to the prompter's bell. It is not in real life that dying men find much time to prattle about their own souls. They usually want all their breath for those they leave behind. And who knows! Perhaps those waiting on the other ...
— The Grey Lady • Henry Seton Merriman
... partner. Sometimes, too, a lot of them pre-empted all the prettiest girls, and danced a special set with them. Thus were they delivered into the hands of the oppressed—the lads made treaty with the fiddlers and prompter to play fast and furious—to call figures that kept the oldsters wheeling and whirling. It was an endurance contest—but victory did not always perch with the youths. Plenty of pursy gentlemen were still light enough ...
— Dishes & Beverages of the Old South • Martha McCulloch Williams
... few fair Parisians among the audience wondered how that German with the tragical countenance had cropped up on a first night to occupy a side box all to himself when fashionable Paris filled the house,—if these could have seen the history played out upon the stage before the prompter's box, they would have found it far more interesting than the transformation scenes of The Devil's Betrothed, though indeed it was the two hundred thousandth representation of a sublime allegory performed aforetime in Mesopotamia three thousand ...
— Cousin Pons • Honore de Balzac
... a worthy companion of Perronet's "Coronation"—if, indeed, it was not its original prompter—as King Robert's great litany was the mother song of Watts' "Come, Holy Spirit, heavenly Dove;" and the countless other sacred lyrics beginning with similar words. As the translation stands in the Church of England, there ...
— The Story of the Hymns and Tunes • Theron Brown and Hezekiah Butterworth
... had seen its short-lived race Flit past the scenes and others take their place; Yet the old prompter watched his accents still, His name still flaunted on the evening's bill. Heroes, the monarchs of the scenic floor, Had died in earnest and were heard no more; Beauties, whose cheeks such roseate bloom ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... by this means, I the less remember the injuries I have received; insomuch that, as the ancient said,—[Cicero, Pro Ligar. c. 12.]—I should have a register of injuries, or a prompter, as Darius, who, that he might not forget the offence he had received from those of Athens, so oft as he sat down to dinner, ordered one of his pages three times to repeat in his ear, "Sir, remember the Athenians";—[Herod., v. 105.]—and then, again, the places which I revisit, ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne
... He was a prompter, but got disgusted and gave it up; for about fifteen years he did not go to the theatre; then he went and saw a play, cried with emotion, felt sad, and, when his wife asked him on his return how he liked the theatre, he answered: ...
— Note-Book of Anton Chekhov • Anton Pavlovich Chekhov
... is again lowered. The MANAGER turns toward the audience, and resting one hand on the prompter's box, addresses them: ...
— Chantecler - Play in Four Acts • Edmond Rostand
... greater value? Those regularly ordered and careful procedures which most economize the blood of the soldier may, by their inevitable delays, seriously imperil the objects of the campaign as a whole; or they may even, while less sanguinary, entail indirectly a greater loss of men than do prompter measures. In such doubtful matters Nelson's judgment was usually sound; and his instinct, which ever inclined to instant and vigorous action, was commonly by itself alone an accurate guide, in a profession whose prizes are bestowed upon quick resolve ...
— The Life of Nelson, Vol. I (of 2) - The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain • A. T. (Alfred Thayer) Mahan
... Lora Rewbush was again heard from the wings; it sounded bloodthirsty. Penrod released his victim; and the Child King Arthur, somewhat disconcerted, extended his sceptre and, with the assistance of the enraged prompter, said: ...
— Penrod • Booth Tarkington
... out" the figures of the lancers and quadrilles. "Face your pardners," he called out as the square dance was begun. Several sets of four couples were formed ready for the first strains of the lancers music and the prompter. "Forward all," and all the couples advanced to the center. "Swing your pardners," "balance corners," the lady and gentleman faced to the right and took steps to the music. "Swing," ...
— The Little Immigrant • Eva Stern
... were also open, and through them they heard the scream of the jiggered and tortured violin, and the pump, pump of the oboe, and saw the moving shapes of men and women in quick transition, and heard the prompter's drawl. ...
— The Gilded Age, Part 2. • Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) and Charles Dudley Warner
... multiplies the chances of some mistake. Another fable, not much less absurd, represents Shakspeare as having from the very first been borne upon the establishment of the theatre, and so far contradicts the other fable, but originally in the very humble character of call-boy or deputy prompter, whose business it was to summon each performer according to his order of coming upon the stage. This story, however, quite as much as the other, is irreconcileable with the discovery recently made ...
— Biographical Essays • Thomas de Quincey
... great relief, had I found a moderate participation of office in the hands of the majority. I would gladly have left to time and accident to raise them to their just share. But their total exclusion calls for prompter corrections. I shall correct the procedure: but that done, return with joy to that state of things, when the only questions concerning a candidate shall be, Is he honest? Is he capable? Is he faithful to ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... beauty ne'er enjoys: So well-bred spaniels civilly delight In mumbling of the game they dare not bite: Eternal smiles his emptiness betray, As shallow streams run dimpling all the way. Whether in florid impotence he speaks And, as the prompter breathes, the puppet squeaks; Or at the ear of Eve, familiar toad, Half froth, half venom, spits himself abroad, In puns, or politics, or tales, or lies, Or spite, or smut, or rhymes, or blasphemies. His wit all see-saw, between that and ...
— Essay on Man - Moral Essays and Satires • Alexander Pope
... dead. He scented danger. Twenty yards ahead a wren was perched on the topmost twig of a thorn-bush, chattering and scolding furiously. Now, there is no bird which gives prompter warning of an intruder than the wren. Whether the intruder be two-legged, man or boy, or four-legged, stoat, weasel, or pole-cat, the plucky little wren always gives the enemy a piece ...
— The Wolf Patrol - A Tale of Baden-Powell's Boy Scouts • John Finnemore
... monk who played the part of prompter lost his place and skipped some paragraphs. The text returned to San Diego, and with a long series of exclamations and contrasts the father brought to a close the first part of ...
— An Eagle Flight - A Filipino Novel Adapted from Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... then, began his first visits to Sloane Street. There, the actors in this little play went through their parts—well trained, well rehearsed. There was never a note of the prompter's voice to reach the ears of Traill from the wings. He listened quietly, sympathetically to her tardy admission of the state of affairs. Three times he went to Sloane Street in the afternoon before he was placed in possession of all the subtle details and ...
— Sally Bishop - A Romance • E. Temple Thurston
... grudgingly withheld from human beings, stubbornly tenacious of a set of political dogmas to which he was ready to sacrifice his dearest friends, morbidly sensitive to the faintest suggestion of a personal slight, and prompter than the serpent to vent against the aggressor the bitterness of his poison, he plays the role of Ishmael among the men of letters in his day. The violence of his retorts when he felt himself injured and his capacity for giving offence even when he was not directly provoked, ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... is done; the curtain drops, Slow falling to the prompter's bell; A moment yet the actor stops And looks around to say farewell. It is an irksome word and task; And, when he's laughed and said his say, He shows, as he removes the mask, A face that's anything ...
— In The Yule-Log Glow, Vol. IV (of IV) • Harrison S. Morris
... Canobia. Riding on a mule, clad in a coarse brown woollen dress, in Italy or Spain we should esteem him a simple Capuchin, but in truth he is a prelate, and a prelate of great power; Bishop Nicodemus, to wit, prime councillor of the patriarch, and chief prompter of those measures that occasioned the civil war of 1841. A single sacristan walks behind him, his only retinue, and befitting his limited resources; but the Maronite prelate is recompensed by universal respect; ...
— Tancred - Or, The New Crusade • Benjamin Disraeli
... poem by Mr. John Davis, in 1781. The last Latin syllogisms were in 1792, on the subjects, "Materia cogitare non potest," and "Nil nisi ignis natura est fluidum." The first year in which the performers spoke without a prompter was 1837. There were no Master's exercises for the first time in 1844. To prevent improprieties, in the year 1760, "the duty of inspecting the performances on the day," says Quincy, "and expunging all exceptionable parts, was assigned to the President; ...
— A Collection of College Words and Customs • Benjamin Homer Hall
... little atrocities they do certainly report. Not but we have seen better in the Nenagh paper, so far as Ireland is concerned. But the pet little joke was in La Vendee. Miss Famine, who is the girl for our money, raises the question—whether any of them can tell the name of the leader and prompter to these high jinks of hell—if so, ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey
... persons; there were three courses of ten, fifteen, and fifteen, and a sumptuous dessert: a great saloon illuminated, odours, and violins-and, who do you think were the invited?-the Visconti, Giuletta, the Galli, Amorevoli, Monticelli, Vanneschi and his wife, Weedemans the hautboy, the prompter, etc. The bouquet was given to the Guiletta, who is barely handsome. How can one love magnificence and low company at the same instant! We are making great parties for the Barberina and the Auretti, a charming French ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole
... scenery went the actor 'like mad.' Planks and canvas came tumbling down; the manager called his assistants; the house was delirious with joy. The manager rushed on the stage; the actor kicked him over into the orchestra, and seizing the prompter's box, hurled it ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol I, Issue I, January 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... thirteen plantations, and on these has had planted and cultivated eight hundred and sixteen acres of cotton where four hundred and ninety-nine and one twelve-hundredth acres were cultivated last year,—a larger increase, however, than will generally be found in other districts, due mainly to prompter payments. The general superintendent of Port Royal Wand said to me,—"We have to restrain rather than to encourage the negroes to take land for cotton." The general superintendent of Hilton Head Island said, that on that island the negroes had, besides adequate corn, taken two, three, and in a ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XII. September, 1863, No. LXXI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... ex-Chancellor's title than his appearance, and in a disastrous endeavor to be affable inquired, with an affectation of interest, "How long has your lordship been in town?" The peer's surprise and chagrin were great until the monarch, having received further instruction from the courtly prompter at his elbow, frankly apologized in bad English and with noisy laughter. "Had Lord Hardwicke," says Campbell, "worn such a uniform as that invented by George IV. for ex-Chancellors (very much like a Field ...
— A Book About Lawyers • John Cordy Jeaffreson
... night. The next day it was announced that Mademoiselle —— would take her accustomed place in the performance. I went early to the theatre, and found, to my amazement, there had been some changes made in the orchestra; the prompter's box had been enlarged, and my newly-discovered niche had been rendered inaccessible and almost entirely filled in! In vain did I attempt to find some other position that might correspond to it. I only attracted the attention ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 3 • Various
... a much over-praised Creator. Women, it would seem, actually have smaller brains than men, though perhaps not in proportion to weight. Their nervous responses, if anything, are a bit duller than those of men; their muscular coordinations are surely no prompter. One finds quite as many obvious botches among them; they have as many bodily blemishes; they are infested by the same microscopic parasites; their senses are as obtuse; their ears stand out as absurdly. Even assuming that their special malaises are wholly offset by the effects of alcoholism in ...
— In Defense of Women • H. L. Mencken
... is due to his wit and his valour. There are through the course of the work very many incidents which were written by unknown correspondents. Of this kind is the tale in the second Tatler, and the epistle from Mr. Downes the prompter,[47] with others which were very well received by the public. But I have only one gentleman,[48] who will be nameless, to thank for any frequent assistance to me, which indeed it would have been barbarous in him to have denied to one with whom he has lived in an intimacy from childhood, ...
— The Tatler, Volume 1, 1899 • George A. Aitken
... love nor hate. The bright, grey eyes were clear and steady, and the pinched and pitiful lips did not quiver. And as I gazed on her I felt that nothing ever would be the same again. Love could no more be the radiant spirit of old, the prompter of impassioned words, the painter of bewitching scenes. Never again could we feel the world recede from us as we poised on bright wings of fancy; never again compare our joy with that of the heaven-born; never ...
— The Trail of '98 - A Northland Romance • Robert W. Service
... hands, Both you of my inclining, and the rest; Were it my cue to fight, I should have known it Without a prompter." ...
— The Man Shakespeare • Frank Harris
... 1735 he was concern'd with another gentleman in writing a paper called the Prompter; all those mark'd with a B. were his.—This was meant greatly for the service of the stage; and many of them have been regarded in the highest manner.—But, as there was not only instruction, but reproof, the bitter, with the sweet, by some could ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753),Vol. V. • Theophilus Cibber
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