"Demure" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... little procession of demure-looking little maidens brought our dinner over. They were grave and full of responsibility till some word from 'Bisop' would light up their faces ...
— Life of John Coleridge Patteson • Charlotte M. Yonge
... could formulate my next question, Lon McFane, I swear, was off to sleep. He always went to sleep that way—just crawled into the blankets, closed his eyes, and was off, a demure little heavy breathing rising on the air. ...
— Lost Face • Jack London
... have Wit enough to Chat, and make'em Giggle, and Sense enough to keep their Favours secret—But from Romantick Love, Good Heav'n defend me. A Moment's Joy's not worth an Age's Courtship; and when the Nymph's Demure, and Dull and Shy, and Foolish and Freakish, and Fickle, there are Billiards at the Smyrna, Bowles at Marybone, and Dice at the Groom-Porter's—Are ...
— The Fine Lady's Airs (1709) • Thomas Baker
... Lavinia, the full-blown voluptuous form not being that of the youthful maiden, who could not moreover have worn this sumptuous and fanciful costume except in the studio. In the strongest contrast to the conscious allurement of this showpiece is the demure simplicity of mien in the avowed portrait Lavinia as a Bride in the Dresden Gallery. In this last she wears a costume of warm white satin and a splendid necklace and earrings of pearls. Morelli has pointed out that the fan, in the form of a little flag which she holds, was only used in Venice by ...
— The Later works of Titian • Claude Phillips
... have noticed her presence but in following the lady's loving glance. She sat in a tiny rocking chair, nursing a little white rabbit on her lap. She was not a beautiful child—she was too diminutive and pale, with hazy blue eyes and faded yellow hair; yet her little face was so demure and sweet, so meek and loving, that it would haunt and soften you more than that of a beautiful child could. The child had been orphaned from her birth, and when but a few days old had been received ...
— The Missing Bride • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... too," said Ruth, with a demure look; "it curiously enough happened that I was following you at the time. You afterwards passed the same boy with ...
— The Young Trawler • R.M. Ballantyne
... black hair, her cheeks flushed from the jumping of fences and running of races that had been going on since she left the house, and that saucy twinkle in her eyes. Joy was always somewhat more demure, but she looked, too, that morning, as if she were quite as ready to have a good time ...
— Gypsy's Cousin Joy • Elizabeth Stuart Phelps
... table," on these underplots in the drama, much of the comedy, and some of the tragedy, of life depend. Under the unsuspected mask of stupidity this worthy mistress of our intriguing valet-de-chambre concealed the quick ears of a listener, and the demure eyes of a spy. Long, however, did she listen, and long did she spy in vain, till at last Mr. Champfort gave her notice in writing that his love would not last another week, unless she could within that time contrive to satisfy his curiosity; and that, ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. III - Belinda • Maria Edgeworth
... worth noticing; they are absorbed in their dance—children dance rather heavily—and only a few of them look outwards. There is no self-consciousness, no appeal to the spectator: they are immensely busy, and enjoy life to the full. Then we have a more demure type of childhood: they are shield-bearers on the Gattamelata monument, or occupy an analogous position on the lower part of the Cantoria. Others hold the cartel or epitaph as on the Coscia tomb. And again Donatello ...
— Donatello • David Lindsay, Earl of Crawford
... is a rather old-fashioned custom, and is appropriate only for a very young bride of a demure type; the tradition being that a maiden is too shy to face a congregation unveiled, and shows her face only when she is ...
— Etiquette • Emily Post
... her ascent of the steps, had remained standing at their head, gazing dreamily downward in her own demure manner and evidently considering that she ...
— Reels and Spindles - A Story of Mill Life • Evelyn Raymond
... false bear hunt there had been a notable absence of pranks. An ominous peace had settled over the whole young company, remarked by the astute Captain Lem as the "'ca'm before a storm.' 'Tain't in natur' for 'em to be so demure an' tractable. No siree. They've 'tended to their groomin' like reg'lar saints, an' they've learned to drill amazin' well. They don't shoot none to hurt, yet, 'ceptin' that Leslie himself. Sence he's waked up an' took an interest he's done fine. He's ...
— Dorothy on a Ranch • Evelyn Raymond
... in just as school was about to begin but the priest from College Point! Such order as he found! Bonaventure stood at his desk like a general on a high hill, his large hand-bell in his grasp, passed his eyes over the seventeen demure girls, with their large, brown-black, liquid eyes, their delicately pencilled brows, their dark, waveless hair, and sounded one tap! The sport outside ceased, the gaps at the shed's farther end were darkened ...
— Bonaventure - A Prose Pastoral of Acadian Louisiana • George Washington Cable
... down with a sensation akin to weakness, somewhat appalled by his discovery, considerably amazed at his previous stupidity. He had thought of Janet—when she had entered his mind at all—as unobtrusive, demure; now he recognized this demureness as repression. Her qualities needed illumination, and he, Claude Ditmar, had seen them struck with fire. He wondered whether any other man had been ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... to Pryer, and was surprised to find that this gentleman, though attentive to such members of his flock as were young and good-looking, was strongly in favour of the celibacy of the clergy, as indeed were the other demure young clerics to whom ...
— The Way of All Flesh • Samuel Butler
... still in Mme de Langeais' early womanhood, that it was possible to be loved without committing herself, without permission, without vouchsafing any satisfaction beyond the most meagre dues. There was more than one demure feminine hypocrite to instruct her in the art of playing such ...
— The Thirteen • Honore de Balzac
... store, that first day, had completely vanished; it was as if she had never been. In her place he discovered a girl all grace and loveliness, her slender figure ripening into gracious womanhood; a girl of mind and heart and understanding, all fire and tenderness; demure, intelligent, with a pretty pose of independence and sureness of herself moderated by modesty and reserve. Her travelling dress of sober colouring and severe lines became her bewitchingly. Beneath the brim of her dainty hat, with veil thrown back, her dark hair waved back, ...
— The Fortune Hunter • Louis Joseph Vance
... manager who thought nobody could Show him was sitting at his Desk. A Grass Widow floated in, and stood Smiling at him. She was a Blonde, and had a Gown that fit her as if she had been Packed into it by Hydraulic Pressure. She was just as Demure as Edna May ever tried to be, but the Business Manager was a Lightning Calculator, and he Surmised that the Bunk was about to be Handed to him. The Cold Chills went down his Spine when he caught a ...
— More Fables • George Ade
... of the evening had fallen to the young English girl who had played the amusing part of the demure governess, Miss Smith—pronounced by the others "Mees Smeeth." Enid was passionately fond of dramatic art, and belonged to an amateur club in London. Among those present were the author of the piece himself, a dark young man with smooth hair parted in the centre ...
— The Doctor of Pimlico - Being the Disclosure of a Great Crime • William Le Queux
... house, Keen marshal of the sun, or serious The cool gray light of morning 'gins to peer Ere yet the household stirs, or chanticlere Calls hinds to labour but hints not the glee Nor full-flood glory of the day to be When round about the hill the sun shall swim And burn a sea-path—so demure and slim Went Helen on her business with swift feet And light, yet recollected, and her sweet Secret held hid, that she was loved where need Called her to mate, and that she loved indeed— Ah, sacred calm of wedlock, passion white Of lovers knit in Here's ...
— Helen Redeemed and Other Poems • Maurice Hewlett
... cheeks were prettily tinged. Her dress was in the style of the last century, and she made no change in her fashions from year's end to year's end. On Sundays she walked primly to church, wearing a quaint deep bonnet from which her pretty face peeped archly, She reminded you of some demure chapter in an old-world book. After she had finished with her flowers in the mornings she would walk through the kitchen garden and thence into her orchard. Four or five tortoise-shell cats and two sleek ...
— The Romance of the Coast • James Runciman
... refused to countenance the idea of a church wedding. She was a quiet, demure little soul, who, aside from her work, detested publicity. It was Mrs. Gray's wish, however, to see the girl she had befriended married in the church which bore the memorial window to the other Anne, her daughter, who had died in her girlhood. So Anne had ...
— Grace Harlowe's Problem • Jessie Graham Flower
... Boy in Breeches?" he shouted before him, out to the sleeping porch; and found only a demure, brow-troubled Chinese woman of thirty, who smiled self-effacing embarrassment ...
— The Little Lady of the Big House • Jack London
... you with one of the Psalms of David, Miss Emory?" said Wilton, gaily. "One would think so from his solemn face, and the demure, thoughtful expression ...
— Home Lights and Shadows • T. S. Arthur
... solitary Saturn bore; His daughter she; in Saturn's reign Such mixture was not held a stain: Oft in glimmering bowers and glades He met her, and in secret shades Of woody Ida's inmost grove, Whilst yet there was no fear of Jove. Come, pensive nun, devout and pure, Sober, steadfast, and demure, All in a robe of darkest grain Flowing with majestic train, And sable stole of cypres lawn Over thy decent shoulders drawn: Come, but keep thy wonted state, With even step, and musing gait, And looks commercing with the skies, Thy rapt soul sitting in ...
— The Golden Treasury - Of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language • Various
... was absolutely hard. She seemed to have no emotions except those which she exhibited on the stage or the impish perversity which irritated so many of those about her. She was in reality a product of the gutter, able to assume a demure and modest air, but within coarse, vulgar, and careless of decency. Yet the words of Jules Janin, which have been quoted above, explain how she could ...
— Famous Affinities of History, Vol 1-4, Complete - The Romance of Devotion • Lyndon Orr
... unnecessary or ostentatious display of wealth; his gifts are simple and charming, while Cleon's are so grotesquely unsuited to a swain, that it is tempting to suppose that Drayton was quietly satirizing Marlowe's Passionate Shepherd. Lirope listens gravely to the swains in turn, and makes demure but provoking answers, raising each to the height of hope, and then casting them both down into the depths of despair; finally she refuses both, yet without altogether killing hope. Her first answer is a good specimen of her banter and ...
— Minor Poems of Michael Drayton • Michael Drayton
... when she passed cups and glasses, this demure-looking damsel heard much fine discourse, saw many famous beings, and improved her mind with surreptitious studies of the rich and great when on parade. But her best time was after supper, when, through the crack of the door of the little room where she was supposed to be clearing away ...
— Work: A Story of Experience • Louisa May Alcott
... elated my spirits, that despite the fatigue of outraged muscles and persecuted nerves, my exultant pride and delight paint my cheeks in becoming tints. How puzzled you look! You pretty, sober, solemn, demure blue-eyed Annunciation lily, is there such a thing among flowers? If I tripped in the metaphor, recollect that I am no adept in floriculture, only know which blossoms look best on a velvet bonnet or a chip hat, and which dainty leaves and petals laid upon my Lucretia locks make me most ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... Edith," saith Milly in a demure voice. "For it standeth with reason, as thou very well wist, that I shall never see mine elders to make no blunders of ...
— Joyce Morrell's Harvest - The Annals of Selwick Hall • Emily Sarah Holt
... wear his ring, and once we caught a diamond-sparkle from beneath the thick folds of lace which cover Helen's bosom; but, on the other hand, we fear his arm has been round the gypsy's graceful waist, and that she has learnt the secret of the private chamber. Is demure Manetho a flirt, or do his affections and his ambition run counter to each other? Helen would bring him the riches of this world,—but what should a clergyman care for such vanities?—while Salome, to our thinking, is far the prettier, livelier, and more attractive woman of the two. Brother ...
— Idolatry - A Romance • Julian Hawthorne
... new ballad ready on the Golden Dog, which I shall sing to-night—that is, if you will care to listen to me." Jean said this with a very demure air of mock modesty, knowing well that the reception of a new ballad from him would equal the furor for a new aria from the prima donna of the ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... one ally and sympathiser in the midst of that general union of disfavour that surrounded, watched, and waited on him in the house of Hermiston; but he had little comfort or society from that alliance, and the demure little maid (twelve on her last birthday) preserved her own counsel, and tripped on his service, brisk, dumbly responsive, but inexorably unconversational. For the others, they were beyond hope and ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XIX (of 25) - The Ebb-Tide; Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Dutch farmers from their own diminished resources gave bountifully to the sufferers. The ladies of the household worked warm stockings with the busy knitting-needle; the spinning-wheel was never idle; the fair Dutch damsels, demure and prudent, blushing with the rich complexions of Amsterdam, were never weary of their charitable toil; and many a poor prisoner was saved and strengthened by the gifts of his unknown friends. As the war advanced, too, the successes of the Americans seem to have convinced the royal chiefs that ...
— Harper's Young People, June 22, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... only he were free! He drove to the station to meet them. What taste Frenchwomen had! Madame Lamotte was in black with touches of lilac colour, Annette in greyish lilac linen, with cream coloured gloves and hat. Rather pale she looked and Londony; and her blue eyes were demure. Waiting for them to come down to lunch, Soames stood in the open french-window of the diningroom moved by that sensuous delight in sunshine and flowers and trees which only came to the full when youth and beauty were there to ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... southward. The Indians upon their "Shaganappi ponies," as they are called, like mounted guards protecting the men, women and children of the Colony who trudged wearily on foot. The Indians were kind to their charge, but the Redman loves a joke, and often indulges in "horse-play." The demure Highlander looked unmoved upon the Indian pranks. The Indians also hold everything they possess on a loose tenure. The Highlander who was forced to surrender the gun, which his father had carried at the battle of ...
— The Romantic Settlement of Lord Selkirk's Colonists - The Pioneers of Manitoba • George Bryce
... tavern, a large house built of stone. On entering it, the party was shown into a spacious apartment, crowded with boatmen and other persons, who had just arrived from St. John's in Canada. The man of the house was a judge; a sullen, demure old gentleman, who sate by the fire, with tattered clothes and dishevelled locks, reading a book, and was totally regardless of every ...
— Travels in North America, From Modern Writers • William Bingley
... my meal was over I relieved Bob, and he went below for his share of the good things; and though Miss Ella had been very demure with me, I soon discovered, by the peals of musical laughter which, mingled with Bob's gruffer cachinnations, floated up through the companion, that the two had completely ...
— For Treasure Bound • Harry Collingwood
... not remember a certain thin man, dressed in mourning, in whose house, in Shrewsbury, the Judge's lodgings used to be, until a scandal of ill-treating his wife came suddenly to light? A grocer with a demure look, a soft step, and a lean face as dark as mahogany, with a nose sharp and long, standing ever so little awry, and a pair of dark steady brown eyes under thinly-traced black brows—a man whose thin lips wore ...
— Green Tea; Mr. Justice Harbottle • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
... "confess, siss, who is the lord paramount, the beau par excellence, of the ball? I know, you demure puss! After all, it is ever the quiet cat that licks the cream. But to think that on your very first night you should have made such a conquest. So difficult, too, to please, they say, and all the great court ladies dying ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol. XXXII No. 2. February 1848 • Various
... the fire as though absorbed by its light. What did he see there? Visions perhaps? Did he see the Cathedral, the Precincts, the quiet circle of demure old houses, his own door, his own bedroom? Did he see his wife moving hurriedly about the room, opening drawers and shutting them, pausing for a moment to listen, then coming out, closing the door, listening again, then stepping downstairs, ...
— The Cathedral • Hugh Walpole
... Delight to play In their fairy town secure; Ev'ry frisker Flirts his whisker At a pink-eyed girl demure. Ev'ry maid In silk arrayed At her partner shyly glances, Paws are grasped, Waists are clasped As they whirl in giddy dances. Then together Through the heather 'Neath the moonlight soft they stroll; Each is very Blithe and merry, Gamboling with laughter droll. Life ...
— The Emerald City of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... mental vision—namely, the good-looking, long-legged, young, Irish soldier, Mr. Decies, of the 101st Lancers, flying along the attic passages of the Whitney bachelor's wing, in company with this immediately—so—demure and dutiful maiden and all the rest of that admittedly rather uproarious, holiday throng. Thereat a foolish lump rose in poor Richard's throat, for he too was, after all, but young. He choked the foolish lump down again. Yet it left his ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... broken-knee'd and spavined pony you were compelled to borrow—do pray tell us how he carried you?" interposed Frank, looking as demure ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 365, March, 1846 • Various
... opened his mouth to accept this demure invitation when Excalibur, rising from the hearthrug, stretched himself luxuriously and wagged his tail, thereby removing three pipes, an inkstand, a tobacco jar, and a half-completed sermon from the ...
— Scally - The Story of a Perfect Gentleman • Ian Hay
... eyes came out from behind the stack of vanes. They were parts of a little girl, and the little girl made him a demure ...
— Shavings • Joseph C. Lincoln
... always wanted to ask some clever person what environment meant. I asked Colonel MacLeod once, dad, and he said it was out of the new book on tactics, and he was thankful he had retired. Now Mr. Carmichael will make it plain," and Kate was very demure. ...
— Kate Carnegie and Those Ministers • Ian Maclaren
... thought that it should be carried out. When Peter complained of further indiscretion on the part of Linda, and pointed out that he was manifestly absolved from his contract by her continued misconduct, Herr Molk went to work with most demure diligence, collected all the evidence, examined all the parties, and explained to Peter that Linda had not misbehaved herself since the contract had last been ratified. "Peter, my friend," said the burgomaster, "you have no right to go back to anything,—to ...
— Linda Tressel • Anthony Trollope
... been born to Henry the Eighth by another wife named Jane Seymour; and this boy, who was christened Edward, succeeded his father on the throne of England. Elizabeth, who was noted for her demure bearing, was then thirteen years old and became a great favorite with her brother, the boy king, who called her "sweet sister Temperance," and gave many signs of his regard for her. But Edward the Sixth did not live very long. He had a serious disease that wasted ...
— A Treasury of Heroes and Heroines - A Record of High Endeavour and Strange Adventure from 500 B.C. to 1920 A.D. • Clayton Edwards
... very demure as a little Puritan, and really, Patricia's showy Spanish costume was becoming. There were many more guests, and all were in beautiful costumes. The room was alive with color, and when, later, they danced to merry music, it ...
— Dorothy Dainty's Gay Times • Amy Brooks
... to this promise; then Janie's demure voice was heard asking, "Is it to be a true story, aunt, about some of the foreign countries you have resided in? If so, I will bring the atlas." Here Millie broke in eagerly, "Oh dear, I hope it is to be a romantic story, full of murders, and caverns, ...
— The Grateful Indian - And other Stories • W.H.G. Kingston
... you, Mr. Hope, dearly, dearly, and I promise to be a pest to you all your days. Ah, here he comes at last." She made two eager steps to meet him, then she said, "Oh! I forgot," and came back again and looked prodigiously demure ...
— A Perilous Secret • Charles Reade
... great many priests about Julfa, and as I visited the place on a Sunday the people looked so very demure and sanctimonious—I am speaking of the Armenians—on their way out of church; taciturn and with head low or talking in a whisper, all toddling alongside the wall—as people from church generally do,—that I must confess I was glad when I left this place of oppressive sanctity and returned ...
— Across Coveted Lands - or a Journey from Flushing (Holland) to Calcutta Overland • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... and sew; she is as carefully looked after as if the world wished to steal her; she wears shoes and stockings and an embroidered kerchief and a hooded cloak; and she never steps outside the door alone. You meet her, pale and demure, plodding along to mass with her mother. The sisters will marry laborers and fishermen; Mariquinha will marry a small shop-keeper or the mate of a vessel, or else die single. It is not very pleasant for the poor girl in the mean time; she is neither healthy nor happy; ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 6, No. 37, November, 1860 • Various
... pouting and provokingly suggestive of kisses. The whole face was of the type which comes so near to the ideal that the least sentimentality of expression would have spoiled it. Happily the big eyes and the ripe, red mouth were both suggestive of demure humor. There was a mirthful air about the dimple which came and went in the left cheek like Cupid peeping mischievously from the folds of his mother's robe. A boa of long-haired black fur lay carelessly about her neck, pushed back so that ...
— The Puritans • Arlo Bates
... had evidently seen some service, and were plentifully begrimed with the dust of the workshop. Still he had a decent look, and decidedly the air of one well-to-do in the world. In stature, he was short and stumpy; in person, corpulent; and in countenance, sleek, snub-nosed, and demure. ...
— Jack Sheppard - A Romance • William Harrison Ainsworth
... out then," said Betty, half to herself, and with a demure satisfaction in her wild flower face. "I am glad of it, for I like him not. Thanks, good fellow, for your ...
— Prisoners of Hope - A Tale of Colonial Virginia • Mary Johnston
... Pomander had drawn his breath and realized this discovery, he darted upstairs, and with all the demure calmness he could assume, told Mr. Vane, whom he met descending, that he was happy to find his engagements permitted him to join the party in Bloomsbury Square. He then flung himself ...
— Peg Woffington • Charles Reade
... was no truth in it," Mrs. Portman said. "I always said so, my dear: and now it comes out that my demure gentleman has been engaged to a young lady—Miss Thompson, of Clapham Common, ever so long: and I am delighted for my part, and on Myra's account, too, for an unmarried curate is always objectionable about one's house: and of course ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray
... up to Town precise, Demure, yet fire in her Eyes; So did she look confounded civil; With Grace and Beauty like a Devil; But soon her Eyes drew in some Hearts, } And some Things else like Cupid's Darts, } Which gave her ...
— The Merry-Thought: or the Glass-Window and Bog-House Miscellany - Parts 2, 3 and 4 • Hurlo Thrumbo (pseudonym)
... tricks; when his mistress's back was turned, he would loll out his tongue, make mouths, and laugh at her, walking behind her like Harlequin, ridiculing her motions and gestures; but if his mistress looked about, he put on a grave, demure countenance, as if he had been in a fit of devotion; that he used often to trip up-stairs so smoothly that you could not hear him tread, and put all things out of order; that he would pinch the children and servants, when he met them in ...
— The History of John Bull • John Arbuthnot
... sharp, quick-witted, nimble, cunning—hat was what he wanted, and that was what he found, after regarding many different specimens of that tribe and rejecting them. The boy whom he selected was somewhat less ragged than his companions, with a demure face, which, however, to his scrutinizing eyes, did not conceal the precocious maturity of mind and fertility of resource which lay beneath. A few words sufficed to explain his wish, and the boy eagerly accepted the task. Gualtier then took ...
— The Cryptogram - A Novel • James De Mille
... Her voice was gentle and childish, her tread light and soft as that of a cat:—but her manners more frequently resembled those of a pretty playful kitten, that is now pert and roguish, now timid and demure, according to its own ...
— The Tenant of Wildfell Hall • Anne Bronte
... of us all? You are as demure as a fieldmouse, but I know those big eyes of yours have taken our measures by this time. Come, let us have it, "the whole truth," you know. Don't be Ananias and keep back part of the price. "Oh, wad some power the giftie gie us, to see oorsels as ithers ...
— A Princess in Calico • Edith Ferguson Black
... edifice would halt the carriages of Society, and its wives and daughters would alight, rustling with new silk petticoats and starched and perfumed linen, each one a picture, exquisitely gowned and bonneted and gloved, and carrying a demure little prayer-book. Behind them followed the patient men, all in new frock-coats and shiny silk hats; the men of Society were always newly washed and shaved, newly groomed and gloved, but now they seemed to be more so—they were full of ...
— The Metropolis • Upton Sinclair
... hand in hand With demure-eyed Conversion, fit sister and brother; And, covering with prisons and churches the land, All that won't go to one, we'll ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... Helen, with a charmingly demure glance at the enthusiastic physician, "you want to send Aunt Harriet and poor Me forward as a skirmish-line. There is no antidote in ...
— Free Joe and Other Georgian Sketches • Joel Chandler Harris
... Gourdain, the governor of Calais; but probably, added the shrewd-eyed man, that was just a piece of their dirty French pride. The crowd smiled ruefully; and a French officer of the boat who was standing by the gangway scowled savagely, as the lawyer passed on with a demure face. ...
— By What Authority? • Robert Hugh Benson
... ear of one or other of his sylph-like servitors, though they all appeared curiously unmoved by his choicely worded adulation. Now and then a pale, flickering blush or sudden smile brightened their faces, but for the most part they maintained a demure and serious demeanor, as though possessed by the very spirit of invincible reserve. With Sah-luma it was otherwise,—they hovered about him like butterflies round a rose,—a thousand wistful, passionate glances darted upon him, when he, unconscious or indifferent, ...
— Ardath - The Story of a Dead Self • Marie Corelli
... sway of her landau by looking around only when her head is swung forward, with a passive pride which forbids a resistance to the force of circumstance. Look at the pretty pout on the mouths of that family there, retaining no traces of being arranged beforehand, so well is it done. Look at the demure close of the little fists holding the parasols; the tiny alert thumb, sticking up erect against the ivory stem as knowing as can be, the satin of the parasol invariably matching the complexion of the face beneath it, yet seemingly by an accident, which makes the thing ...
— A Pair of Blue Eyes • Thomas Hardy
... minstrel be so rich that he can make presents to a Dauphin of France! Sing me a song, Master Homer the blind, and I will give you—let me see: no, not what you think—a silver livre!" But she did not wait for his music. Dropping him a little demure, mocking curtsy she turned and ran down the box-edged path, singing as she went, and the air she sang was Stephen La Mothe's "Heigh-ho! love is my life; Live I in loving and love I to live!" and the lilt of the music set Master ...
— The Justice of the King • Hamilton Drummond
... this crisis has redoubled them: here is one of his best. My Lord Chancellor is to be Earl of Clarendon—"Yes," said Selwyn, from the very summit of the whites of his demure eyes; "and I suppose he will get the title of Rochester for his son-in-law, my Lord Anson." Do you think he will ever lose the title of ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2 • Horace Walpole
... had left the passage, another knock was given at Eleanor's door, and Mrs. Grantly's very demure own maid, entering on tiptoe, wanted to know would Mrs. Bold be so kind as to speak to the archdeacon for two minutes in the archdeacon's study, if not disagreeable. The archdeacon's compliments, and he ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... off his great-coat and was standing with his back to the hearth. He loomed up very big in the demure room, a slender, boyish figure, still too slim for his shoulder-width and height, clad in a ragged uniform, a pistol bulging from one hip at his belt. He looked about him at the bright hangings, with a wandering gaze ...
— Four Days - The Story of a War Marriage • Hetty Hemenway
... at last arrived in the market-square, he was greeted by a procession of the prettiest maidens in Bergen who, in white frocks and with flower-wreathed hair, advanced to pay him the homage of demure eyes. But among them all, the loveliest girls of the city, Christian saw but one—a girl younger than almost any other, but so radiantly lovely that his eyes fixed themselves on her as if entranced, until her cheeks flamed a vivid crimson under the ...
— Love affairs of the Courts of Europe • Thornton Hall
... teeth that flashed when she smiled (and she smiled often), a pink and white complexion that the sun was bound to freckle if she was not careful, and a cheerful, demure expression of countenance that went a long way toward making her good to look upon, ...
— Janice Day, The Young Homemaker • Helen Beecher Long
... a minister,' he said, musingly. 'I can guess, then, what like she is—prim and demure, like a caricature by Cham. In that case she will be safe from me, for I could never bear an ugly woman. By the way, I wonder if ugly women think themselves pretty; their mirrors must lie most obligingly if they do. There was Adele, she was decidedly ...
— Madame Midas • Fergus Hume
... right sat a girl who might be his daughter; for not only was she, too, hall-marked American, but she was far too young to be the other's wife. A demure, old-fashioned type; well-poised but unassuming; fetchingly gowned and with sufficient individuality of taste but not conspicuously; a girl with soft brown hair and soft brown eyes; pretty, not extravagantly so when her face was in repose, but with a slow smile that rendered her little less ...
— The Lone Wolf - A Melodrama • Louis Joseph Vance
... our contraband sports, if we saw Deacon Abrams's sleek head dodging up from behind the top of the deacon's seat. Instantly all the apples, gingerbread, and handkerchiefs vanished, and we all sat with our hands folded, looking as demure as if we understood every word of the sermon, ...
— The May Flower, and Miscellaneous Writings • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... down on the chair facing him. She looked particularly small and demure this morning. She sat there meekly with downcast eyes whilst Mr. Whittington sorted and rustled amongst his papers. Finally he pushed them away, and leaned over ...
— The Secret Adversary • Agatha Christie
... set of chums was completed by Katherine Harding, a damsel whose demure looks belied her character. Katherine's innocent grey eyes and doll-like complexion were the vineyards that hide the volcano. She could always be relied upon to support any enterprising project or interesting hoax that was presented ...
— The Madcap of the School • Angela Brazil
... she had assumed a demure saintly air; and, resting on the cushions, she stretched herself out at full length, with her head on my shoulder, and her dress pulled up a little so as to show her red stockings, which the firelight made look still brighter. In a minute or two ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... A demure youth with well-brushed hair was standing at the door, in courteous language inviting passers-by to enter and ...
— A True Hero - A Story of the Days of William Penn • W.H.G. Kingston
... him about his expectations, and quizzed him about Rosalind. They laughed at his rustic simplicity, and amused themselves by putting him to the blush. They plied him with wine and cigars, and rallied him on his pure demure face. One or two toadies sidled up and professed a sympathy which was more offensive than ...
— Roger Ingleton, Minor • Talbot Baines Reed
... serious thought up to that moment, but now it came back to him with added cumulative force. He recollected that he had often wondered at the child's unconscious adaptation of mood to the clothes she happened to be wearing; he recalled how he had seen her demure and distant in misty, pastel-tinted party frocks or quaintly, infantilely dignified in soberer Sunday morning garb. But that Saturday morning he realized what the woman was to be like, when the hem of the velvet skirt no longer hung high above spindly black legs and the bobbed hair ...
— Then I'll Come Back to You • Larry Evans
... am I, indeed? Who is this demure young black-eyed witch that has come between us, this friend ...
— The Martian • George Du Maurier
... job, his air was so frank, his talk about baking so intelligent, that Gottlieb took kindly to him at once; and Minna, sitting demurely at her accounts in the little wire cage over which was a fine tin sign inscribed in golden letters with the word "Cashier," was mightily well pleased, in a demure and proper way, at sight of his ruddy cheeks and bushy shock of light-brown hair and little yellow mustache and honest blue eyes. When he told, in answer to Gottlieb's questions, that he was the grandson of the very baker in Nuernberg whose delicious lebkuchen Gottlieb had eaten when ...
— A Romance Of Tompkins Square - 1891 • Thomas A. Janvier
... and the skin had not been peeling off her nose with sunburn she would have looked very pretty. Next year, I suppose, her frocks will be down to her ankles and she will be taking care of her complexion. Then, no doubt, she will look very pretty. But she will not look any more demure ...
— Lady Bountiful - 1922 • George A. Birmingham
... later Gladys, looking extremely demure and proper, was rapping with a daintily gloved hand at the inquiry office in the great stone lobby of the Modern Sorcery Company's building ...
— The Sorcery Club • Elliott O'Donnell
... Now the married pair were coming! The bells were ringing, making the air shake. Ursula wondered if the trees and the flowers could feel the vibration, and what they thought of it, this strange motion in the air. The bride was quite demure on the arm of the bridegroom, who stared up into the sky before him, shutting and opening his eyes unconsciously, as if he were neither here nor there. He looked rather comical, blinking and trying to be in the scene, ...
— Women in Love • D. H. Lawrence
... and proved to be the attempt of a gentleman of fashion to compromise the honor of a lady of the Court whom he had mistaken for a courtesan. The audience laughed at every indelicate artifice of the libertine, and screamed when the demure maiden let fall certain remarks which bore a double significance. Finally, when the lady declared her interest in a cage of birds, and the gentleman drew from his pocket a purse of guineas, and, shaking them before her face, asked if those were the dicky-birds she wished ...
— The Shadow of a Crime - A Cumbrian Romance • Hall Caine
... hopeless to romancers like Scott, there never was such another explorer as Jane Austen. Her demure observation is marvelously keen; sometimes it is mischievous, or even a bit malicious, but always sparkling with wit or running over with good humor. Almost alone in that romantic age she had no story to tell, and needed none. She ...
— Outlines of English and American Literature • William J. Long
... bunting feels the musical tendency, and aspires to its expression, with the rest. Perched upon the topmost branch beside his mate or mates,—for he is quite a polygamist, and usually has two or three demure little ladies in faded black beside him,—generally in the early part of the day, he seems literally to vomit up his notes. Apparently with much labor and effort, they gurgle and blubber up out of him, falling on the ear with a peculiar subtile ring, as of turning ...
— Wake-Robin • John Burroughs
... she said holding up her hand. "I am having my hair done to match that quakery thin pale mousey dress with the tiny poke bonnet—and I want to try my face too. I must look sweet and demure. You mustn't really laugh when you wear a dress and hat like that. ...
— The Head of the House of Coombe • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... she entered the village street With book in hand and face demure; And soon she came, with sober feet, To a crying ...
— Eric - or, Under the Sea • Mrs. S. B. C. Samuels
... drift of most thoughts, however imperfectly expressed. He was vaguely conscious of defeat. He felt that he was nonplussed by a pair of soft round eyes like the eyes of a kitten, and the dignified repose of a pair of demure red lips. Both eyes and lips, as well as shoulders and golden hair, were strangely familiar and strangely strange ...
— The Slave Of The Lamp • Henry Seton Merriman
... but no one of them could catch me before Miss Mayo appeared on the playground and we all became demure as pussy cats. She ...
— Westways • S. Weir Mitchell
... enough to make one glad to quit playing tag in the yard, and retreat into the kitchen. We had begun to roll popcorn balls with syrup when we heard a knock at the back door, and Tony dropped her spoon and went to open it. A plump, fair-skinned girl was standing in the doorway. She looked demure and pretty, and made a graceful picture in her blue cashmere dress and little blue hat, with a plaid shawl drawn neatly about her shoulders and a clumsy ...
— My Antonia • Willa Sibert Cather
... preachers which remain in the air and help to form all the authorised moral conventions. Yes, I was surprised at her remorse. But lowering her glance unexpectedly till her dark eyelashes seemed to rest against her white cheeks she presented a perfectly demure aspect. It was so attractive that I could not help a faint smile. That Flora de Barral should ever, in any aspect, have the power to evoke a smile was the very last thing I should have believed. She went on after ...
— Chance - A Tale in Two Parts • Joseph Conrad
... put on that demure look, expand your right-hand fingers across the region where the courtesy of anatomy awards to politicians a heart, and talk about truth as a certain old lady with a paper lanthorn before her door may talk ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari. Vol. 1, July 31, 1841 • Various
... and humour which exhibited itself in the lad, and a liking for some of the old man's pursuits, the first of the twins was the grandfather's favourite and companion, and would laugh and talk out all his infantine heart to the old gentleman, to whom the younger had seldom a word to say. George was a demure, studious boy, and his senses seemed to brighten up in the library, where his brother was so gloomy. He knew the books before he could well-nigh carry them, and read in them long before he could understand them. Harry, on the other hand, was all alive in the stables or in the wood, eager for ...
— Boys and girls from Thackeray • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... she uttered it, was big with meaning. Uninvited, she seated herself in an arm-chair, a huge old thing, of shagreen leather, which would have held half a dozen of her. Demure in it she looked, like an agreeable reminiscence, alive, and a little up-to-date, of the women of long ago. Her dove grey eyes seemed to perceive so much more ...
— The Beetle - A Mystery • Richard Marsh
... not observed it?) I am altered of late!—I, that was ever light of heart, the very soul of gayety, brimfull of glee, am now demure as our old tabby—and not half as wise. Tabby had wit enough to keep her paws out of the coals, whereas poor I have—but no matter what. It will never come to pass, I see that. So many reasons for every thing! Such looking forward! Arthur, ...
— Arthur Mervyn - Or, Memoirs of the Year 1793 • Charles Brockden Brown
... floweriest passages to Mistress Stirton, who was the stupidest woman in the Free Kirk, and had once stuck in the "chief end of man." They never suspected the sonsy motherly woman, two pews behind Donald Menzies, with her face of demure interest and general air of country simplicity. It was as well for the probationers that they had not caught the glint ...
— Beside the Bonnie Brier Bush • Ian Maclaren
... this query, my dear, There in your frame Unmoved you still appear, You must be thinking the same, But keep that look demure Just to allure. ...
— Moments of Vision • Thomas Hardy
... about that time. In one of these newcomers, Terry, it appears, was somewhat interested, and Marie has often admitted that her philosophy of freedom is powerless to overcome her "fundamental emotions." Writing of Miss B—— she said: "She is a regular little Becky Sharp, very demure and quiet, and proper and distinguished. All the women hate her, and the men flock about her, for she is pretty and a free lover, of course. She comes once or twice a week to our salon, and then Terry is always present, and they get along famously. She talks of 'the ...
— An Anarchist Woman • Hutchins Hapgood
... the little reliance that can be put in locks, turning-boxes, and walls, whilst the will remains free; and the still less reason there is to trust the innocence and simplicity of youth, if its ear be exposed to the suggestions of your demure duenas, whose virtue consists in their long black gowns and their formal white hoods. Only I know not why it was that Leonora did not persist in exculpating herself, and explaining to her jealous husband how guiltless she had been in the whole of that unhappy business. But her extreme agitation ...
— The Exemplary Novels of Cervantes • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... fortune to discover my mistake. The figures seated and covered with grey clay had very much the resemblance of a grey species of kangaroo which we had often seen on the Bogan. I then went forward with him, and was received with the most demure inattention; that is to say, by the natives sitting cross-legged, with their eyes fixed on the ground, which it appeared was their formal mode of expressing respect or consideration for strangers when ...
— Three Expeditions into the Interior of Eastern Australia, Vol 1 (of 2) • Thomas Mitchell
... scarcely noticed his presence. Louise, indeed, noted that his eyes were fixed upon her more than once with thinly veiled admiration, and without a thought of disloyalty to Arthur, but acting upon the impulse of her coquettish nature, she responded with a demure smile of encouragement. Charlie Mershone was an adept at playing parts. He at first regarded Louise much as a hunter does the game he is stalking. Patsy Doyle was more jolly and Beth De Graf more beautiful than Miss ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces in Society • Edith Van Dyne
... considered curly hair "messy looking"; but Raymond's approval, for some reason, doesn't seem to count for as much as it used to, and, anyway, he is spending the summer in Michigan.) However, just below that too-demure parting, the eyes are such as surely to give her no regret. Twin morning-glories, we would call them-grey morning-glories!—opening expectant and shining to the Sun which always shines on enchanted seventeen. And, like other morning-glories, ...
— Missy • Dana Gatlin
... Eustace's amazement to behold his wife suddenly execute a series of capers round the room, which would not have disgraced a coryphee at a Christmas pantomime, but were hardly in keeping with the demure and highly respectable bearing of the wife ...
— Vera Nevill - Poor Wisdom's Chance • Mrs. H. Lovett Cameron
... Uncle Jack called her a poem. Edgar asserted openly that in the Christmas toilet he should like to have her modeled in wax and put in a glass case on his table; but Mrs. Bird and Tom Mills voted for the Quaker gray, in which she made herself inexpressibly demure by braiding her hair in two ...
— Polly Oliver's Problem • Kate Douglas Smith Wiggin
... his settee in a fit: his valet-de-chambre plied him with a smelling-bottle, one footman chafed his temples with Hungary water, another sprinkled the floor with spirits of lavender, a third pushed Morgan out of the cabin; who coming to the place where I was, sat down with a demure countenance and, according to his custom, when he received any indignity which he durst not revenge, began to sing ...
— The Adventures of Roderick Random • Tobias Smollett
... superbly tall, stately and self-possessed in her transforming costume, a woman of full stature, her countenance gravely demure yet reserving near the surface the playful dimples and mischievous smiles so characteristic of her more usual manner. A sudden mood of the varium et mutabile semper femina had led her to wear the dress, and the mood still ...
— Alice of Old Vincennes • Maurice Thompson
... will lay our heads together, and consult and contrive the best way of making the best girl in the world the fine Lady her brother wishes to see her; and believe me, Sarah, it is not so difficult a matter as one is sometimes apt to imagine. I have observed many a demure Lady, who passes muster admirably well, who, I think, we could easily learn to imitate in a week or two. We will talk of these things when we meet. In the mean time, I give you free license to be happy ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 5 • Edited by E. V. Lucas
... anyone. Allan Gerard considered that statement, not so much in bitterness as in a wonder that made all life uncertain. He recalled the fountain arcade of rose-colored columns and delicate lights, the sweetly demure girl who waited there for her brother, and her last brief glance of virginal candor and innocently unconscious confession. Flavia could not hurt anyone. Yet she had dismissed the man who loved her, without even granting him the poor alms of courteous sympathy, had left him to learn ...
— From the Car Behind • Eleanor M. Ingram
... minutes later, Billy and Mr. M. J. Arkwright were speeding toward Corey Hill. It was during a slight pause in the conversation that Billy turned to her companion with a demure: ...
— Miss Billy's Decision • Eleanor H. Porter
... desperate resolution to accept a devotion which offered her a way out of difficulties especially galling to one of her gentle but lofty spirit? Her expression when she caught my look of joy had little of the demure tenderness of a maiden blushing at her first involuntary avowal. There was shrinking in it, but it was the shrinking of a frightened woman, not of an abashed girl; and when I strove to follow her, the gesture with which she waved me back had that in ...
— Room Number 3 - and Other Detective Stories • Anna Katharine Green
... beginning with the largest, and winding up with the smallest. It was one of his rules that they should go directly home, without lingering to play round the door of the school-house, and they knew the Mede and Persian character of his laws too well to disobey them. When Mittie went out, making a demure curtsey at the door, she lingered a little longer than usual, supposing he would release Helen from her prison house; but Master Hightower was one of the most absent men in the world, and he had forgotten the little prisoner in ...
— Helen and Arthur - or, Miss Thusa's Spinning Wheel • Caroline Lee Hentz
... when they showed her, with the Baby, gossiping among a knot of sage old matrons, and affecting to be wondrous old and matronly herself, and leaning in a staid, demure old way upon her husband's arm, attempting—she! such a bud of a little woman—to convey the idea of having abjured the vanities of the world in general, and of being the sort of person to whom it was no novelty at all to be a mother; yet in the same breath, ...
— The Cricket on the Hearth • Charles Dickens
... wyfe in open sighte, or to ride with any woman behinde him: amongest them ware a wondre. Maried couples neuer dally together in the sighte of other, nor chide or falle out. But the menne beare alwaies towarde the women a manly discrete sobrenes, and the women, towarde them a demure womanlie reuerence. Greate menne, that cannot alwaie haue their wiues in their owne eye, appoincte redgelinges, or guelte menne to awaite vppon them. Whiche waite them in diede so narrowlye, that it ware impossible for any man beside the housebande ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries - Vol. II • Richard Hakluyt
... with demure lips, though the eyes above them were blazing and dancing at high tension, "I'm sure that the editor is attaching a husband, and a house having a well-ordered kitchen, and rather wide culinary experience to ...
— Her Father's Daughter • Gene Stratton-Porter
... she said candidly. "They looked as if they did. You see neither of them is my spiritual pastor and master, so they don't have to be shocked by me." She gave him a demure, sidelong glance. ...
— Kildares of Storm • Eleanor Mercein Kelly
... room, was amazed at the change in her. Warwick Hall had done its work. Already the little chameleon had taken on the colour of her surroundings. Hawkins, in all his years of London service, had never served a more demure, self-possessed little English maiden, or one who listened with greater deference to the conversation of ...
— The Little Colonel's Chum: Mary Ware • Annie Fellows Johnston
... grind them. The focus of the rivers became a rich milling centre, and was also a post for whaling-ships. The Otaheitan prince stepped from the deck of the whaler to court with gifts of shells the demure Quaker maidens of Wilmington, and Kanaka sailors were almost as familiar on its wharves as Indian chiefs. About the time of the Revolution the town became a well-known station for the export of quercitron bark, and all the while the clacking mills were busy along ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - April, 1873, Vol. XI, No. 25. • Various
... little girl in a shabby old frock which she had outgrown—a dear, affectionate little soul, with so few ideas on people and things, that she actually took me for one of the best and wisest of human beings. See how much vanity there is in it all! I come back, and find a demure, well-drilled, fashionable young lady. I might have known how it would be, but it gave me a sort of shock, I own—my little wild Madelon gone for ever and a day, and this proper ...
— My Little Lady • Eleanor Frances Poynter |
