"Fritter" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... ter Arkansas by dem two Yankee mens, Mr. Van Vleet en Mr. Bill Bowman, whut I tole yo er bout, dat brung dat hundred head er folks de time us cum. Dey tole us dat in Arkansas dat de hogs jes layin' er roun already baked wid de knives en de forks stickin' in 'em ready fer ter be et, en dat dere wuz fritter ponds eberywhars wid de fritters er fryin' in dem ponds er grease, en dat dar wuz money trees whar all yo hed ter do wuz ter pik de money offen 'em lak pickin' cotton offen de stalk, en us wuz ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves - Arkansas Narratives Part 3 • Works Projects Administration
... frost or snow, but will put forth its golden blossoms in the dreariest days of February, and after the flowers have passed away the foliage will remain as an ornament. To put in single roots is useless; it is far better to plant a few large patches than to fritter away the flower in a number of ...
— The Culture of Vegetables and Flowers From Seeds and Roots, 16th Edition • Sutton and Sons
... seems to hang before the eyes of such as he; and it is a haze that makes the future seem dim and vast, even while it obscures all the sharp outlines of things. The child is not capable of reasoning coherently, and therefore its disposition to fritter away time must be regarded as only the result of defective organization; but the young man and young woman can reason, and yet we find them perpetually making excuses for eluding time and eternity. Look at the young fellows who ...
— The Ethics of Drink and Other Social Questions - Joints In Our Social Armour • James Runciman
... smiled at this curious specimen of Beauclerc's versatility, but said, "I fear he will fritter away his powers on a hundred different petty objects, and do nothing at last worthy of his abilities. He will scatter and divide the light of his genius, and show us every change of the prismatic colours—curious and beautiful to behold, ...
— Helen • Maria Edgeworth
... as a good action. That mocking she-devil, Gabrielle, too! Then the witch's spell of that d——d green-table! Luck against one-wait! double the capital ere you send the half. Luck with one—how balk the tide? how fritter the capital just at the turn of doubling? Soon it grew irksome even to think of you; yet still when I did, I said, 'Life is long, I shall win riches; he shall share them some day or other!'—Basta, basta!—what idle twaddle or hollow brag ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... waste the religious instinct and emotional vigour which are often so marked in adolescence, by allowing them to fritter themselves upon symbols which cannot stand against hostile criticism: for instance, some of, the more sentimental and anthropomorphic aspects of Christian devotion. Did we educate those instincts, show the growing creature their meaning, and give them an objective which did not ...
— The Life of the Spirit and the Life of To-day • Evelyn Underhill
... them sailed away to the East Indies, to try their fortunes in those waters, for our Captain Avary was of a high spirit, and had no mind to fritter away his time in the West Indies squeezed dry by buccaneer Morgan and others of lesser note. No, he would make a bold stroke for it at once, and make or lose ...
— Howard Pyle's Book of Pirates • Howard Pyle
... the report of Shortland and Magrath, we are wholly unable to reconcile the report of our Legislature with those which they assume as facts, and upon which the principles of their report were, in part, predicated. It exhibits to our view a disposition to fritter away the enormities of the British Government, and a determination to justify them in every act of barbarity, however unjustifiable in its circumstances, or ...
— A Journal of a Young Man of Massachusetts, 2nd ed. • Benjamin Waterhouse
... as can be successfully digested and enjoyed in a piano piece of moderate length. With the power to conceive, and the will and discipline of mind to execute, there is no reason why, with perhaps a diminished tendency to fritter away positive excellence at the shrine of effect, enduring proofs of the genius of our American pianist should not be ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 3, No. 1 January 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... I would have been put out somewhere and trained to make myself useful. And if I'd had any money that would have been on interest, so that I could have some security against want in my old age. Anyway, it isn't likely I should have been allowed to fritter away my time." ...
— A Little Girl in Old Boston • Amanda Millie Douglas
... out their hearts to each other. I have a strange feeling at my task, for I am learning what I once was. However, it is most instructive of all to see how two people who mutually further their purposes par force, fritter away their time through inner over-activity and outer excitement and disturbance; so that there is, after all, no result fully worthy of their capacities, tendencies, aims. The effect will be extremely edifying; for every thoughtful ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. II • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... own brains we must allow men of ideas to get to us. We must not allow our minds to become stagnant. If we fail to get into daily contact with other people, we soon grow dull and uninteresting even to ourselves. Great men may have no time to fritter away but they have plenty of leisure for men worth while—the pushers ...
— Laugh and Live • Douglas Fairbanks
... a serious matter, your conduct towards women. Wherever you visit make it a principle not to fritter yourself away in a petty round of gallantry. A man of the last century who had great social success never paid attention to more than one woman of an evening, choosing the one who seemed the most neglected. That man, my dear child, controlled his epoch. He wisely ...
— The Lily of the Valley • Honore de Balzac
... lissome, with a small, round, sallow face and withdrawn, brooding yellow eyes under sulky black brows that slanted up to the outer corners. Nan had a good time socially and intellectually. She was clever and lazy; she would fritter away days and weeks in idle explorations into the humanities, or curled up in the sun in the country like a cat. Her worst fault was a cynical unkindness, against which she did not strive because investigating the less admirable traits of human beings amused her. She was infinitely amused ...
— Dangerous Ages • Rose Macaulay
... what this unknown person selects for them. Instead of going to the library and cultivating their own tastes, and pursuing some subject that will increase their mental vigor and add to their permanent stock of thought, they fritter away their time upon a hash of literature chopped up for them by a person possibly very unfit even to make good hash. The mere statement of this surrender of one's judgment of what shall be his intellectual life ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... question is, not merely whether these districts shall be represented, but whether we will keep the faith which we plighted to our countrymen. Let us be firm. Let us make no concession to those who, having in vain tried to throw the bill out, are now trying to fritter it away. An attempt has been made to induce the Irish members to vote against the government. It has been hinted that, perhaps, some of the seats taken from the metropolis may be given to Ireland. Our Irish friends will, I doubt not, remember that the very persons who offer this bribe ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 4 (of 4) - Lord Macaulay's Speeches • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... I been in Arkansas? Me? We landed at Marianna, Arkansas in 1889. They emigranted us here. They sure said they had fritter trees and a molasses pond. They said to just shake the tree and the fritters would fall in the pond. You know anybody that had any sense wouldn't believe that. Yes ma'am, they sure told that lie. 'Course there was times when you could make ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States from Interviews with Former Slaves, Arkansas Narratives, Part 4 • Works Projects Administration
... core apples and cut into slices; add sugar and lemon juice. Dip each slice in plain fritter batter. Fry to light brown in deep fat. Drain and sprinkle with ...
— The New Dr. Price Cookbook • Anonymous
... it with some herbs of a sour taste. Consequently, in the seasoning of their food they consume nothing, so that they save the cost of butter, oil, vinegar, and all spices. They are accustomed to make their puches [i.e., a sort of pap] and poleadas [i.e., a sort of fritter] from cocoanut milk and the honey made from sugarcane, which are their preserves and royal cakes. But such is at a great wedding or at a feast, where their desire for ostentation arouses their endeavors. Such were presented to me ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume 40 of 55 • Francisco Colin
... so chaste that had made her more fair With their sweetness, their perfume, and light, Were gone—and her bosom, now cheerless and bare, Grew cold in the dewy night. Thus they who, in youth, Mistake flirting for truth, And fritter their love but in play, Will behold, like the maid, All their brightest charms fade, And ...
— The Death of Saul and other Eisteddfod Prize Poems and Miscellaneous Verses • J. C. Manning
... turned to fierceness by despair. And he strikes out unerringly enough at the ministers of Rome's decline—at the poets who chatter and the rhetoricians who declaim on merely 'literary' topics; the rich who fritter away life on private luxuries and the pursuit of trivial aims; the debased Greek with his "smattering of encyclopaedic knowledge," but no devotion to the city in which he only hopes ...
— From a Cornish Window - A New Edition • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... you were mere questions of right or wrong? You had a world of light and frivolous women to choose from, your own kind of women who could dance and fritter life away in following fads that make for license—but you must come into the household of a man who has tried to fight God's battles; standing against these encroachments of Satan which you advocate—and ...
— The Tyranny of Weakness • Charles Neville Buck
... continued in the house of my parents, passing my time in much the same manner as I have already described, principally in philological pursuits. But I was now sixteen, and it was highly necessary that I should adopt some profession, unless I intended to fritter away my existence, and to be a useless burden to those who had given me birth. But what profession was I to choose? there being none in the wide world perhaps for which I was suited; nor was there any one ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow
... the election turned on the size of mesh proper to be used in the drift-net fishery. We wore favours of red, white and blue, symbolising our hatred of the mesh favoured by Mr. Gladstone; and carried our man. Had other constituencies as sternly declined to fritter away their voting strength upon side issues, Lord Salisbury would now be in power with a solid majority at ...
— The Delectable Duchy • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... knew you had come with a purpose of true service, after full preparation of yourself and your selling plans to interest him. Though he does not realize it yet, you will neither pester him nor fritter away his ...
— Certain Success • Norval A. Hawkins
... Where there is a task to be performed, lose no time. Work does not grow easier by delay. Do not fritter away strength in trifles; begin at once upon the duties which call for instant obedience. We do not read that Abraham asked Sarah's advice, the command was plain. She might not have been willing. Never ask advice from those whom God does ...
— Broken Bread - from an Evangelist's Wallet • Thomas Champness
... suffer yourself to acquire such a morbid appetite for the exciting subjects discussed in them, as to tempt you to break in upon your systematic course of reading. Newspapers and periodicals contain much trash; and you may fritter away all your leisure upon them, to the great injury of your mind and heart. Your chief object in reading them should be, to preserve in your mind the history of your own times; and to understand the subjects which interest the public mind; as well as to observe the signs of the times, in relation ...
— A Practical Directory for Young Christian Females - Being a Series of Letters from a Brother to a Younger Sister • Harvey Newcomb
... much news of the war, beyond the fact that the Huguenots were besieging Poictiers, a piece of information that I was sorry to hear, since it seemed to me they would fritter away their strength for nothing. The Admiral, however, doubtless possessed good reasons for his actions, and in any case it was not for me ...
— For The Admiral • W.J. Marx
... AWAY AFFECTIONS.—Young men commence courting long before they think of marrying, and where they entertain no thoughts of marriage. They fritter away their own affections, and pride themselves on their conquests over the female heart; triumphing in having so nicely fooled them. They pursue this sinful course so far as to drive their pitiable victims, one after another, from respectable society, ...
— Searchlights on Health: Light on Dark Corners • B.G. Jefferis
... then be slave or wife Than fritter now blank life away: Then night had holiness of night, And ...
— Poems • Christina G. Rossetti
... would do likewise, there would be plenty of workers and of resources for Christ's service, which now sorely lacks both. How many of such 'lay up treasure for themselves, and are not rich toward God'! How many fritter away their leisure in vanities, having time for any amusement or folly, but ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... defensive. To that end he demands the divisions and war material which were being collected about Aleppo for Yilderim. The natural result of granting this request will be that true safety will never be attained on the Sinai Front by a pure defensive, and that the Irak undertaking will certainly fritter away owing to want of driving ...
— How Jerusalem Was Won - Being the Record of Allenby's Campaign in Palestine • W.T. Massey
... him, unconscious of his presence. She was full grown at last, in woman's virgin prime, her mind, her soul, her body, all full and strong with pure thoughts, natural instincts and human passions. Her very sadness gave her depths of feeling that never come to those who titter and fritter youth away. Her very ignoring of the love-instincts in her, absorbed as her thoughts were in other things, only gave those instincts the untrammelled freedom that alone gives vigorous growth. She was barbarian, as her thoughts had been beside the dying baby: the barbarian ...
— The Workingman's Paradise - An Australian Labour Novel • John Miller
... festival. The scene has a strange gypsy wildness. From the round point of Atocha to where Cybele, throned among spouting waters, drives southward her spanking team of marble lions, the park is filled with the merry roysterers. At short intervals are the busy groups of fritter merchants; over the crackling fire a great caldron of boiling oil; beside it a mighty bowl of dough. The bunolero, with the swift precision of machinery, dips his hand into the bowl and makes a delicate ring of the tough dough, which he throws into the ...
— Castilian Days • John Hay
... commercial ambitions of Great Britain had a traditional inclination, fostered by some military men and statesmen, who foresaw the break-up of the Spanish colonial system. "Above all, I hope we shall have no buccaneering expeditions. Such services fritter away our troops and ships, when they are so much wanted for more important occasions, and are of no use beyond enriching a few individuals. I know not, if these sentiments coincide with yours; but as glory, and not money, has through life been your pursuit, I should rather think ...
— The Life of Nelson, Vol. II. (of 2) - The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain • A. T. (Alfred Thayer) Mahan
... this or throws it, however temporarily, into the background, is held to be unwise, because it leads to the most dangerous of results in warfare—the dissipation of forces, which, if united, would win the desired success, but if disunited will probably fail. Thus we are told that we must not fritter away our energies in enterprises which, however important in themselves, are not comparable with the one unique preoccupation of our minds—the conquest of Germany ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 5, August, 1915 • Various
... naturally, like buckwheat dat is trashed in de field—takes two or tree waters, and salt is better dan fresh, cause you see fresh water make him sick. Well, now, Massa, de question is, what will you ab; clam soup, clam sweetbread, clam pie, clam fritter, or ...
— Nature and Human Nature • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... which I took for the decision, and which I still think was the right area to give the decision, was the United Kingdom. If any other were adopted, you might very soon fritter away the whole United Kingdom. Again, if we are to make a great financial present, as the Irish claim we must do, from the taxpayer of the centre to the detached fragments of the circumference, the process becomes a tragedy. If Ireland may go at the wish of her electors, ...
— The Adventure of Living • John St. Loe Strachey
... rakes for pleasure roam, In foreign lands their fortune fritter; But love's pure joys be mine at home, Wi' my dear ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel , Volume I. - The Songs of Scotland of the past half century • Various
... you do anything but caper about the meadow and dance." And then Mrs. Ladybug began to knit furiously, as if to show Freddie Firefly that she was never idle, even if she did spend a good deal of time away from home. "Do you intend always to fritter your nights away as you do now?" ...
— The Tale of Freddie Firefly • Arthur Scott Bailey
... play. Invited out to a party, but did not go;—right. Refused to go to Lady * *'s on Monday;—right again. If I must fritter away my life, I would rather do it alone. I was much tempted;—C * * looked so Turkish with her red Turban, and her regular, dark, and clear features. Not that she and I ever were, or could be, any thing; but I ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. II - With His Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... wan, dree dawnings Since then, with fritter of flowers— Day wearies me with its ...
— Look! We Have Come Through! • D. H. Lawrence
... of the entire earth's substance, is kept aquiver by the energy which it receives, or has received, directly or indirectly, from the sun. Left to itself, each molecule would wear out its energy and fritter it off into the space about it, ultimately running completely down, as surely as any human-made machine whose power is not from time to time restored. If, then, it shall come to pass in some future ...
— A History of Science, Volume 3(of 5) • Henry Smith Williams
... pedagogues, who, not being required by the public to properly inform themselves with a full knowledge of these important studies, are perhaps in some measure excused for their shortcomings. Instead of the inculcation of these useful and more vital lessons of life, they are required to fritter away time and health over a French grammar, or other equally foolish study, which cannot, in a vast majority of cases, be of the least service to them. They had much better be at home making mud-pies (which, by the way, are about the only ones that ...
— Minnesota; Its Character and Climate • Ledyard Bill
... neglected dinners to make up for, you know. The sky never did look one-half so bright to me as this morning, after I learned the great news. It would seem cheery even if black clouds sailed over, and the snow began to fritter down; because my heart is as light as a feather right now, and there's no place for ...
— Jack Winters' Gridiron Chums • Mark Overton
... rush a forced sale of cattle," he said, lifting his shoulders. "He wants two thousand dollars in a hurry. God knows what for. He is going to fritter his property away just ...
— The Short Cut • Jackson Gregory
... moved; he had seemed to comply with the emperor's request to save Ratisbon, but had seemed only, and had not set a man in motion to reinforce John of Werth. He refused, in fact, to fritter away his army. Had he sent Gallas with 12,000 men to join John of Werth, and had their united forces been, as was probable, attacked and defeated by the Swedes, Wallenstein would have been too weak to save the empire. Keeping his army strong ...
— The Lion of the North • G.A. Henty
... habits—sometimes apart, sometimes in conjunction. Nowadays we seat the body to work the intellect, even in its lower form of mechanical labor: it is your clod that toddles about laboring. The Peripatetics did not endure: their method was not suited to man's microcosm. Bodily movements fritter mental attention. We sit at the feet of Gamaliel, or, as some call him, Tyndal; and we sit to Bacon and Adam Smith. But, when we are standing or walking, we love to take brains easy. If this delightful chatterbox had been ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade
... that is estranged from Nature, in which art is the only beauty and regularity the only grace? No, in my heart of hearts, I feel that our love was not meant for the stages of life through which I have already passed; it would have made us miserable to see it fritter itself away, and to remember what it once was. Better as it is! better to mourn over the green bough than to look upon the sapless stem. You who now glance over these pages, are you a mother? If so, answer me one question: Would you not rather that the child whom you have cherished with your ...
— Devereux, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... Lady Glencora had looked up, catching Alice's eye, and Alice had well known what she had meant. "You see," the glance had said, "Plantagenet is beginning to take an interest in his cousin, and you know why. The man who is to be the father of the future dukes must not be allowed to fritter away his time in obscurity. Had I that cradle up-stairs Jeffrey might be as idle as he pleased." Alice ...
— Can You Forgive Her? • Anthony Trollope
... cold roast chicken. Make a fritter batter, stir the pieces in. Drop by spoonfuls into boiling fat. Lemon juice added to the seasoning is ...
— 365 Luncheon Dishes - A Luncheon Dish for Every Day in the Year • Anonymous
... boys whose daddies tormented them with: "Well, we Il see—" that's so exasperating!—or, "I wish you wouldn't tease, when you know we can't spare the money just at present." A perfectly foolish answer, that last. They had money to fritter away at the grocery, and the butcher-shop, and the dry-goods store, but when it came to a necessity of life, such as going to the circus, they let on they couldn't afford it. ...
— Back Home • Eugene Wood
... the state of mind in which Stella's stream of gossip had left her, with the elevating, stimulating tendency of her conversations with Mary on subjects more worthy of immortal beings. They seemed mutually to draw each other on to a sphere far above the petty frivolities on which so many fritter away powers given for higher ends. Even when they did not touch on topics directly religious, they seemed to be far nearer the Light that is "inaccessible and full of glory," when discussing the working of God's laws and providence in nature and history, than if their ...
— Lucy Raymond - Or, The Children's Watchword • Agnes Maule Machar
... be lured from his emotional excesses and debaucheries, not by moralizings, but by showing him just how these things fritter his ...
— Psychology and Achievement • Warren Hilton
... crowded out on to the rear platform as Percival helped Miss Milbrey up the steps. Uncle Peter had evidently been chatting with Shepler, for as they came out the old man was saying, "'Get action' is my motto. Do things. Don't fritter. Be something and be it good and hard. Get action early ...
— The Spenders - A Tale of the Third Generation • Harry Leon Wilson
... bestowal which impressed him rather than the size of the pourboire itself, for he examined it with lively marks of interest and appreciation and then told me, with rather a waggish air, I thought, that he did not intend to fritter it away upon riotous living but would take it home and show it to his little ones. To which I responded in all seriousness that I was glad he did not contemplate expending it upon strong drink, such as grog or rum. As though instantly sobered ...
— Fibble, D. D. • Irvin Shrewsbury Cobb
... hope that it will not require many of your ships. The fisheries will, for a season, be a regular and fixed object of attention. Though I feel that your number of ships is small, it is difficult for me to increase it. I hate to fritter away our men and naval strength on a multitude of brigs and ...
— The Life of Thomas, Lord Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald, Vol. II • Thomas Lord Cochrane
... sound hickory stick. When next day came, however, and she went out to milk, the youngster would shamble up to greet her with such amiable trust in his eyes that her wrath would be, for the moment, disarmed, and her fell purpose would fritter out in a futile "Scat, you brute!" Then she would condone her weakness by thinking of what she would do to the animal ...
— The House in the Water - A Book of Animal Stories • Charles G. D. Roberts
... sham,—that I am going to church, and saying solemn words, and being wrought up by solemn music, and uttering most solemn vows and prayers, all to no purpose; and then I come away and look at my life, all resolving itself into a fritter about dress, and sewing-silk, cord, braid, and buttons,—the next fashion of bonnets,—how to make my old dresses answer instead of new,—how to keep the air of the world, while in my heart I am cherishing something higher and better. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 102, April, 1866 • Various
... unimportant in my story. You may possibly have observed that in those passionate natures which reserve their force, and do not fritter away their feelings in scattered flirtations or trivial love-affairs, there is a velocity and momentum, when the movement of passion is once excited, greatly transcending all that is ever felt by expansive and ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.
... struggle. He begged that they might be told that his last breath was spent in advising that they should make one great, combined, and final effort for the total overthrow of republicanism in France, and not fritter away their strength in prolonged contests with an enemy so infinitely their superior in numbers. Agatha promised faithfully to be a true messenger of these last injunctions, and then she saw the Vendean chief expire in perfect tranquillity, happy in an assured ...
— La Vendee • Anthony Trollope
... priestly purposes, nor is he merely a hypothesis to account for facts, but he has been forced upon us in order that we may be able to deal with them. Unless we act as though there were an enemy to be resisted and chained, if we fritter away differences of kind into differences of degree, we shall make poor work of life. Spinoza himself assumes that other commands than God's may be given to us, but that we are unhesitatingly to obey His and His only. "Ad fidem ...
— Pages from a Journal with Other Papers • Mark Rutherford
... Wood,' &c., published about 1610. 'Let any thing come in the shape of fodder or eating-stuffe, it is wellcome, whether it be Sawsedge, or Custard, or Eg-pye, or Cheese-cake, or Flawne, or Foole, or Froyze,[*] or Tanzy, or Pancake, or Fritter, or Flap iacke,[**] or Posset, or Galleymawfrey, Mackeroone, Kickshaw, ...
— Early English Meals and Manners • Various
... Cauliflora of Linnaeus. This fruit in shape somewhat resembles a kidney; it is about three inches long, and the outside is very rough: It is seldom eaten raw, but fried with batter it makes a good fritter. ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 13 • Robert Kerr
... must not fritter away her time writing plays; she must study Butler's Analogy. She must also read Baxter's Saints Rest, than which, says Mrs. Stowe, "no book ever affected me more powerfully. As I walked the pavements I wished that they might ...
— Daughters of the Puritans - A Group of Brief Biographies • Seth Curtis Beach |
