"Gentlefolks" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... "English gentlefolks of the eighteenth century preserved in Virginian amber. What a curious survival! 'Gentlemen of a period of manners, morals.' Remarkably interesting! Delightful types of a society as extinct as the dodo," he was saying ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, September, 1885 • Various
... say, of all my Virginian acquaintance, Madam Esmond was the most consistent. Our gentlefolks had come in numbers to Williamsburg; and a great number of them proposed to treat her Excellency, the Governor's lady, to a ball, when the news reached us of the Boston Port Bill. Straightway the House of Burgesses adopts an indignant protest against ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... away. "She was poor till she was nearly fifty; then a comfortable fortune was left her, and she knew just how to use it. That house was given her, but instead of living in it all alone, she filled it with poor gentlefolks who needed neat, respectable homes, but could n't get anything comfortable for their little money. I 'm one of them, and I know the worth of what she does for me. Two old widow ladies live below me, several students overhead, ...
— An Old-fashioned Girl • Louisa May Alcott
... shoes—she and Mr. Godwin first, her maids next, carrying her train, and the Don and I closing the procession, very stately. In the churchyard stand two rows of village maids with baskets to strew rosemary and sweet herbs in our path, and within the church a brave show of gentlefolks, friends and neighbours, ...
— A Set of Rogues • Frank Barrett
... living is without pretension, and without expenditure for mere appearances; and I feel certain that appearances, and not the positive and necessary comforts of life, such as sufficient firing and food, are the heaviest expenses of gentlefolks.... If the life is more than meat or raiment, which I quite agree to, meat and raiment are more than platters and trimmings; and it is the style that half the ...
— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble
... money. Money may, indeed, procure servants to do their business for them, but it is not in the power of all the riches in the world to purchase the love and esteem of anyone. What a sad thing then it is, when gentlefolks behave so as to make themselves despised; and that will ever be the case with all those who, like (excuse me, ladies, you insisted upon my telling you what I said) Miss Betsy, and Miss Rachael, and Master James, show such ...
— The Life and Perambulations of a Mouse • Dorothy Kilner
... chimney-piece of his study; first, because living in a cave, he had no study; secondly, because he had no chimney-piece; thirdly, because clocks were not yet invented. Let us put these things right. Put them right. O gentlefolks, who listen to me, if any one tells you that a lizard will be born in your head if you smell the herb valerian; that the rotting carcase of the ox changes into bees, and that of the horse into hornets; that a man weighs more when dead ...
— The Man Who Laughs • Victor Hugo
... the common people at that time were extremely poor. This family were small gentlefolks after a fashion, and looked down upon the tradesmen by whom they were surrounded as greatly their inferiors: yet they dwelt in two rooms, one above the other, with a ladder as the only means of communication. ...
— One Snowy Night - Long ago at Oxford • Emily Sarah Holt
... daily. A Duke, without dukedom—a matter uncommon— And Bowes, the delight, the enchantment of woman. This house has a Tennent, but ask for the rent of it, He'd laugh at, and send you to Brussels or Ghent for it. Of the animals properly call'd so, a sample We'll give to you gentlefolks now, for example:— There are bores beyond count, of all ages and sizes, Yet only one Hogg, who both learned and wise is. There's a Buck and a Roebuck, the latter a wicked one, Whom few like to play with—he makes such ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari. Vol. 1, July 31, 1841 • Various
... you've just hit it, Temple," cut in the skipper. "That's just what I thought when I was listenin' to you two fellers talkin' at breakfast-time. Says I to myself: 'Now, here's two chaps with the speech and manners of gentlefolks, chaps as can hold their own with anybody when it comes to talkin', and yet they're sailors too—at least one of 'em is; and if you, Eph Brown, what have never had no more eddication than what you could pick up, ...
— Turned Adrift • Harry Collingwood
... India, have a custom of perpetually keeping in the mouth a certain leaf called Tembul, to gratify a certain habit and desire they have, continually chewing it and spitting out the saliva that it excites. The Lords and gentlefolks and the King have these leaves prepared with camphor and other aromatic spices, and also mixt with quicklime. And this practice was said to be very good for the health.[NOTE 4] If any one desires to offer a gross insult to another, ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo, Volume 2 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... to the office this morning. It's another man's turn to be chosen—and the secretary will recommend him. If my husband could only send his testimonials by the same post—with just a word in your name, Miss—it might turn the scale, as they say. A private recommendation between gentlefolks goes so far.' She stopped again, and sighed again, and looked down at the carpet, as if she had some private reason for feeling a ...
— The Haunted Hotel - A Mystery of Modern Venice • Wilkie Collins
... gentility, carriages, servants, wines, and grouse-moors, whither, ever since it had become plain to her that David could, if he chose, easily place her there, it had been her constant craving to go. Other people came to be gentlefolks and lord it over the land—why not they? It made her mad, as she had said to Dora, to see their money—their very own money—chucked away to other people, and they getting no good of it, and remaining mere working ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... fun to see The gentlefolks run after we. Squire's lady stopped I in the lane, "Oh," says she, "goin' to town again? You'll not mind calling into Bings To fetch my cakes and buns and things? I've got a party comin' on, And nought to eat . . . so, ...
— The Verse-Book Of A Homely Woman • Elizabeth Rebecca Ward, AKA Fay Inchfawn
... would laugh both at Blindas and his warrant, constable and witch-finder to boot," said old Dame Crank, the Papist laundress; "Wayland Smith's flesh would mind Pinniewinks' awl no more than a cambric ruff minds a hot piccadilloe-needle. But tell me, gentlefolks, if the devil ever had such a hand among ye, as to snatch away your smiths and your artists from under your nose, when the good Abbots of Abingdon had their own? By Our Lady, no!—they had their hallowed tapers; and their holy water, and their relics, and what ...
— Kenilworth • Sir Walter Scott
... that pride is the real evil of poverty—of gentlefolks' poverty. I could not promise for my own part, to cast pride behind me: but then, you know, it has pleased God to give me something to be proud of, far different from rank and money. I could go to jail or the workhouse ...
— Deerbrook • Harriet Martineau
... mother to church, carrying a huge prayer-book and a cane, and dressed in the livery of one of our own fine footmen from Clarges Street, which, as Tim was a bandy-shanked little fellow, did not exactly become him. But, though poor, we were gentlefolks, and not to be sneered out of these becoming appendages to our rank; and so would march up the aisle to our pew with as much state and gravity as the Lord Lieutenant's lady and son might do. When there, ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... Maxwell's own handwriting, that he would be back sometime in the week before Advent Sunday. Reminiscences were exchanged of the glorious day when the old knight came of age, over forty years ago; of the sports on the green, of the quintain-tilting for the gentlefolks, and the archery in the meadow behind the church for the vulgar; of the high mass and the dinner that followed it. It was rumoured that Mr. Hubert and Mr. Piers had already selected the ox that was to be roasted whole, and that materials for the bonfire were in process of collection ...
— By What Authority? • Robert Hugh Benson
... and keep up appearances? Such things always give one tone. I have heard that they are keeping a carriage, even as Russian gentlefolks ought to do. When abroad, our Russian people always cut a dash. ...
— The Gambler • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... and wham refuse, At strife thir carlins fell; For some had gentlefolks to please, ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... the best of. He had to mind what was told him, do what was set him, be careful never to break anything nor hurt anything. Particularly he must not go treading on things or jostling against things or jumping about. He had to salute the gentlefolks respectful and be grateful for the food and clothing they spared him out of their riches. And he learnt all these things submissively, being by nature and habit a teachable creature and only by food and ...
— The Food of the Gods and How It Came to Earth • H.G. Wells
... am a bard of no regard Wi' gentlefolks, and a' that; But Homer-like, the glowrin' byke, [staring crowd] Frae town ...
— Robert Burns - How To Know Him • William Allan Neilson
... dear, kind father to hell just because he can't talk like the gentlefolks! Don't you believe it of Him, Master Paul. ...
— Paul Kelver • Jerome Klapka, AKA Jerome K. Jerome
... boy; "but let me first go tell Jim Bates, there, who maybe will be returning to Paulus Hook, and I'll just bid him wait for me over yonder in the tan-yard until you gentlefolks ...
— An Unwilling Maid • Jeanie Gould Lincoln
... Buffoonery, Banter, Satire, Drollery, Ridicule, and Irony, even in the Treatise to which your Letter is subjoined, and against that Person whom you would have punish'd for that Method: When he says to him, [42] "Religion then, it seems, must be left to the Scholars and Gentlefolks, and to them 'tis to be of no other use, but as a Subject of Disputation to improve their Parts and Learning; but methinks the Vulgar might be indulged a little of it now and then, upon Sundays and Holidays, instead of Bull-baiting and Foot-ball." And this insipid Piece of Drollery ...
— A Discourse Concerning Ridicule and Irony in Writing (1729) • Anthony Collins
... delightful, incalculable, impossible companion she had always known him. He would marry her—and decline to come under her roof. He would, perhaps, pitch his tent in her paddock; he would sit at her table in sweater and flannels, sandals on his feet, while she and her guests were in the ordinary garb of—gentlefolks. Gentlefolks! Yes. But the maddening and baffling thought was a conviction that he would be the greatest gentleman there. She knew that. Lord of his mind, lord of his acts, easy in his will, and refusing to bow to any necessity but that, he would be the superior ...
— Rest Harrow - A Comedy of Resolution • Maurice Hewlett
... maundered on, "It is all very well for gentlefolks, but now it had all got quiet again, 'tis mortal hard it should be stirred up afresh, and a poor soul marched off, he don't know where, to fight with he don't know who, for he don't ...
— The Pigeon Pie • Charlotte M. Yonge
... wore on. The servants at Windygates, airing themselves in the grounds—in the absence of their mistress and her guests—were disturbed, for the moment, by the unexpected return of one of "the gentlefolks." Mr. Geoffrey Delamayn reappeared at the house alone; went straight to the smoking-room; and calling for another supply of the old ale, settled himself in an arm-chair with the ...
— Man and Wife • Wilkie Collins
... flit about it at midnight."—Have you seen them? "No, Sir, but I knows those that have, and I'm sure its true." Seeing a labouring man at a distance, I enquired what he knew of the haunted house, when he told me, with a face full of faith, that "he knew gentlefolks laughed at such things, but seeing was believing—that, passing the house one night, he was quite sartain he had seen a light in one of the rooms, and had heard groans—-that he got home as well as he could, but all the world should not induce him ...
— A Morning's Walk from London to Kew • Richard Phillips
... ma'am, if you will favour me." Mrs. MacCandlish bustled about, and proceeded in her duties with her best grace, explaining that she had a very nice parlour, and everything agreeable for gentlefolks; but it was bespoke to-night for a gentleman and his daughter, that were going to leave this ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VII • Various
... whined out the boy. "My grandmother is dead now, and only the gentlefolks give me anything; for they don't seem afraid of me, though they look as if they didn't like me, and wanted me gone. All I can, I get to eat in the woods, and I beg out of the village. But I dare not go far, because I don't know when ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 11 • Various
... they either took no notice of what she said, or were very angry with her; and she had therefore resolved, the next time she found any boys ill-treating the old woman, to put her threat into execution. 'Yes, sir, and that I must do, even though some be gentlefolks' sons; one be your son, sir, and sorry I have to speak it. It's that young Master William of yours, and he is the most daring and outrageous of the lot,' she added. 'It's a shame, sir, I'm sure you'll allow, that they should go on so; for a more harmless sorrow-stricken soul I have never met in ...
— Mountain Moggy - The Stoning of the Witch • William H. G. Kingston
... lodgings—unfurnished rooms—with some of their old furniture and household things round them. Their father, though unsuccessful in business, had been ambitious in an old-fashioned way for his children, and they had been brought up 'as gentlefolks'—that is to say ...
— Missing • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... learns absolutely nothing of the history or the political organization of his own country. His general impression is, that everything of much importance happened a very long while ago; and that the Queen and the gentlefolks govern the country much after the fashion of King David and the elders and nobles of Israel—his sole models. Will you give a man with this much information a vote? In easy times he sells it for a pot of beer. Why should he not? It is of about as much use ...
— Lay Sermons, Addresses and Reviews • Thomas Henry Huxley
... about whom little Harry Esmond at that time knew scarce anything. It was assizes at Hexton, and there was a great meeting of the gentry at the "Bell"; and my lord's people had their new liveries on, and Harry a little suit of blue and silver, which he wore upon occasions of state; and the gentlefolks came round and talked to my lord; and a judge in a red gown, who seemed a very great personage, especially complimented him and my lady, who was mighty grand. Harry remembers her train borne up by her ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... us all went along home, all on us tryin' to remember what us knowed about home-brewin'. An' if you gentlefolks doan't get your washin' done praperly this wik 'tis along o' the tubs ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, August 1, 1917. • Various
... a stage-coachman, if such a one be here amongst ye, gentlefolks, and nobody else," cried the sailor, producing a parcel, wrapped ...
— Tales And Novels, Volume 1 • Maria Edgeworth
... along, some ladies saw him across the street, and seeing, were moved with pity, and pitying, spoke such soft words that he was tempted to accept their invitation and rest awhile beneath their hospitable roof. The mansion was old, as the dwellings of gentlefolks should be; the ladies were some of them young, and all were full of kindness; there were gentle cares, and unasked luxuries, and pleasant talk, and music-sprinklings from the piano, with a sweet voice to keep them company,—and all this after ...
— Pages From an Old Volume of Life - A Collection Of Essays • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... Carmel, and there were orange-trees and cypresses there, and among these the doves lived all the winter. They had broods early in the year, and towards the end of March, or the beginning of April, they set off like great gentlefolks, to spend "the season" near London. All last winter a young English musician, who was very pale and thin, lived with the monks in the monastery on Mount Carmel. He went to Syria because when a child he had loved so to hear his mother ...
— The Pearl Story Book - A Collection of Tales, Original and Selected • Mrs. Colman
... dear," cried Trotty; "and they'd be very fond of any one of us that did know 'em all. He'd grow fat upon the work he'd get, that man, and be popular with the gentlefolks in his ...
— A Budget of Christmas Tales by Charles Dickens and Others • Various
... Gentlefolks in general have a very awkward rock ahead in life—the rock ahead of their own idleness. Their lives being, for the most part, passed in looking about them for something to do, it is curious to see—especially when their tastes are of what is called the intellectual ...
— The Moonstone • Wilkie Collins
... idleness are continually knitting woollen girdles. These they place upon the altar of St. Barsamo during the service, and when they go begging about the province (like the Brethren of the Holy Spirit) they present them to their friends and to the gentlefolks, for they are excellent things to remove bodily pain; wherefore every one is devoutly eager to possess ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... I am engaged to, according to the best of my ability.' 'Mrs. Gamp' she says, in answer, 'if ever there was a sober creetur to be got at eighteen-pence a day for working people, and three-and-six for gentlefolks,—night-watching being a extra charge,—you are that inwallable person. Never did I think, till I know'd you, as any woman could sick-nurse and monthly likeways, on the little that you takes to drink.' 'Mrs. ...
— Charles Dickens as a Reader • Charles Kent
... at her.] I think you might have brought me up as a gentleman's daughter, ma'am; it would have suited me better. [Tosses her head.] But pooh—what does it matter! [With a bitter side glance at the corked bottle.] I may come to drink champagne with gentlefolks yet. ...
— Ghosts • Henrik Ibsen
... wanderings ashore; our importance as members of society, and how kind every one was to us both. By and by the Deephaven warehouses will fall and be used for firewood by the fisher-people, and the wharves will be worn away by the tides. The few old gentlefolks who still linger will be dead then; and I wonder if some day Kate Lancaster and I will go down to Deephaven for the sake of old times, and read the epitaphs in the burying-ground, look out to sea, and talk quietly about the girls who were so happy there one summer long before. I should ...
— Deephaven and Selected Stories & Sketches • Sarah Orne Jewett
... Anne, if I haven't brought you home little Hetty a second time out of trouble. Found her on the road I did, with her ankle sprained. We'll take her in for the present, and I'll go to the Hall and tell the gentlefolks." ...
— Hetty Gray - Nobody's Bairn • Rosa Mulholland
... forsooth," she said, "her house was Liberty Hall; and so should every publican's be. What was it to her what gentlefolks ate or drank, providing they paid for it honestly? There were many honest gentlemen, whose stomachs could not abide bacon, grease, or dripping, especially on a Friday; and what was that to her, or any one in her line, so gentlefolks paid honestly for the ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott
... of rain-water from a roof, or they were banked up with mud into a little pond like a large dirt- pie. At the doors and windows some men and women lounged or prowled about, and took little notice of us except to laugh to one another or to say something as we passed about gentlefolks minding their own business and not troubling their heads and muddying their shoes with coming to look ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... thought you knowed as much as I knowed. I'd no particular call to be grateful to you, not before the fire at the Castle t'other night. But I am grateful to you for that. I'm not grateful to folks in a general way, p'r'aps, because the things as gentlefolks have give have a'most allus been the very things I didn't want. They've give me soup, and tracks, and flannel, and coals; but, Lord, they've made such a precious noise about it that I'd have been to send ...
— Lady Audley's Secret • Mary Elizabeth Braddon
... and venders of marsh calamus, and "Hot corn, sah, smokin' hot," and "Pepperpot, bery nice," and sellers of horse-radish and snapping-turtles, and of doughnuts dear to grammar-school lads. Within the market was a crowd of gentlefolks, followed by their black servants with baskets—the elderly men in white or gray stockings, with knee-buckles, the younger in very tight nankeen breeches and pumps, frilled shirts and ample cravats and long blue swallow-tailed coats with brass buttons. ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - Vol. XVII, No. 102. June, 1876. • Various
... more than the babe unborn, and it's wearing me to death, that's what it's doing. When I looks round on my small family, it's all I can do not to cry out loud. What's to become of my children, Mr. May? Yours, sir, they'll never want friends, and a hundred or so here or there, that don't ruin gentlefolks; but without selling up the business, how am I ever to get a hundred pounds? It ain't equal, sir, I swear it ain't. You gets the money, and you takes it easy, and don't hold your head not a bit lower; but me as has ...
— Phoebe, Junior • Mrs [Margaret] Oliphant
... interested in all he saw and heard, and he had seen and heard much in the little market town that day. Cattle and pigs and sheep and shepherds and sheepdogs; farmers, shopkeepers, dealers, publicans, tramps, and gentlefolks in carriages and on horseback; shops, too, with beautiful new things in the windows; millinery, agricultural implements, flowers and fruit and vegetables; toys and books and sweeties of all colours. And ...
— Afoot in England • W.H. Hudson
... parted with that one article at a sacrifice, I wouldn't have swopped her away in exchange for any other woman in England. Not that I ever did swop her away, for we lived together till she died, and that was thirteen year. Now, my lords and ladies and gentlefolks all, I'll let you into a secret, though you won't believe it. Thirteen year of temper in a Palace would try the worst of you, but thirteen year of temper in a Cart would try the best of you. You are kept so very close to it in a cart, you see. There's thousands of couples among ...
— Doctor Marigold • Charles Dickens
... you would have your spoke in my cart! you would advise me to entertain ladies and gentlemen! Because you can marshal your pack-needles, horse-combs, hobby-horses, and wall-candlesticks in your warehouse better than I, therefore you can tell how to entertain ladies and gentlefolks better ...
— The Poetaster - Or, His Arraignment • Ben Jonson
... call it) of the Blessed Trinity, there are great conjurors or chemists. Now the said conjurors or chemists not only do possess the faculty of making the precious metals out of old books and parchments, but out of the skulls of young lordlings and gentlefolks, which verily promise less. And this they bring about by certain gold wires fastened at the top of certain caps. Of said metals, thus devilishly converted, do they make a vain and sumptuous use; so that, finally, they are afraid of cutting their lips with glass. But indeed it is high ...
— Imaginary Conversations and Poems - A Selection • Walter Savage Landor
... man;—we say the king Is wise and virtuous; and his noble queen Well struck in years, fair, and not jealous;— We say that Shore's wife hath a pretty foot, A cherry lip, a bonny eye, a passing pleasing tongue; And that the queen's kindred are made gentlefolks: How say you, sir? ...
— The Life and Death of King Richard III • William Shakespeare [Collins edition]
... of age, and to turn more resolutely than ever to the companionship of duty and serious books. She was more serious and given to routine than her elders themselves, as sometimes happened when the daughters of New England gentlefolks were brought up wholly in the society of their elders. At thirty-five she had more reluctance than her mother to face an unforeseen occasion, certainly more than her grandmother, who had preserved some cheerful inheritance of gayety and worldliness ...
— The Queen's Twin and Other Stories • Sarah Orne Jewett
... she blurted out, 'It isn't only that. I don't want her to come here; can't you see why not? They don't know what my people are. Oh, they know we're manufacturers; but that's nothing to be ashamed of. Lots of manufacturers are gentlemen, but we are not gentlefolks, and they—they don't guess it from me,' she ...
— Sarah's School Friend • May Baldwin
... master going out in all this rain!' said Theresa. 'No, he shall not stir a step. Dear! dear! to see how gentlefolks can afford to throw away their happiness! Now, if you were poor people, there would be none of this. To talk of unworthiness, and not caring about one another, when I know there are not such a kind-hearted lady and gentleman in the whole province, nor any that love one another half ...
— The Mysteries of Udolpho • Ann Radcliffe
... that light. We paid our tailors' bills on the Sunday morning if we had the money, or ordered new garments if we had credit; and I believe it is a practice more generally prevalent even in England than gentlefolks are apt to imagine. ...
— A Tramp's Wallet - stored by an English goldsmith during his wanderings in Germany and France • William Duthie
... gentlemen, that there Abbey is in the true roman style, and was built by a man they call——, but that's neither here nor there, I forget the name, however, its a fine place, and universally allowed to be very old. I frequently rows gentlefolks there, and picks up a great ...
— The Stranger in France • John Carr
... at parting to give you one piece of advice, Natalie; be on your guard with Sobol, and with your assistants generally, and don't trust them blindly. I don't say they are not honest, but they are not gentlefolks; they are people with no ideas, no ideals, no faith, with no aim in life, no definite principles, and the whole object of their life is comprised in the rouble. Rouble, rouble, rouble!" I sighed. "They are fond of getting money easily, for nothing, and in that respect ...
— The Wife and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... Country, and in the Black People's peculiar love of the excitement attendant on great personal hazard, which they looked on at, but in which they did not participate? Light is much wanted in the Black Country. O we are all agreed on that. But, we must not quite forget the crowds of gentlefolks who set the shamefully dangerous fashion, either. We must not quite forget the enterprising Directors of an Institution vaunting mighty educational pretences, who made the low sensation as strong as they possibly could make it, by hanging the Blondin rope as high as they possibly ...
— The Uncommercial Traveller • Charles Dickens
... care about my children, for I didn't know them; but now I've other thoughts, Tom. I don't think your mother so bad, after all; to be sure, she looks down upon me 'cause I'm not genteel; but I suppose I aren't, and she has been used to the company of gentlefolks; besides she works hard, and now that I don't annoy her by getting tipsy, as I used to do, at all events she's civil; and then I never knew what it was to have children until I came here, and found ...
— Poor Jack • Frederick Marryat
... clothes, such clothes as I never thought of wearing myself, and—would you believe it?—he signed an execution on my very goods, bought with the money I worked so hard to get; and they came and took my bed from under me, before I heard a word of the matter. Aye, madam, these are misfortunes that you gentlefolks know nothing of,—but sorrow is sorrow, let it come which ...
— Posthumous Works - of the Author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman • Mary Wollstonecraft
... he always got up early, eat his small breakfast, stood at his desk reading or writing all the morning, eat his dinner of vegetables and pudding, walked with his Skye terrier, and then often finished the day by spending the evening with us or the Bartons. He did not visit with the neighbouring gentlefolks, as he hated a ...
— Letters of Edward FitzGerald - in two volumes, Vol. 1 • Edward FitzGerald
... one to look after things for us," said Varvara. "Tut, tut.... You ought to ask someone of the gentlefolks, they would write to the head officials.... At least they might let him out on bail! Why wear ...
— The Witch and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... coffee-room. This latter, however, proved to be comfortable enough; and we enjoyed it the more that it was divided into two compartments, one of which was allotted to the humbler classes of travellers, while the other, which commanded a view of the square, was assigned to gentlefolks. Moreover there occurred two circumstances, which, by furnishing us with objects of contemplation, contributed to make the evening pass lightly away. First, we saw from our window the completion of a ceremony similar to that which at Eisenhammer we had so cruelly interrupted by our fishing. A whole ...
— Germany, Bohemia, and Hungary, Visited in 1837. Vol. II • G. R. Gleig
... house was a short mile from the manse itself; and by a bit of good fortune for Little Bel it happened that just as she was growing into girlhood there came a new minister to the manse,—a young man from Halifax, with a young bride, the daughter of an officer in the Halifax garrison,—gentlefolks, both of them, but single-hearted and full of fervor in their work for the souls of the plain farming-people given into their charge. And both Mr. Allan and Mrs. Allan had caught sight of Little Bel's face on their first Sunday in church, and Mrs. Allan had traced to her a ...
— Between Whiles • Helen Hunt Jackson
... "these are great gentlefolks that you are talking about; they are very rich, and have a right to do what they please with their own; it is the duty of us poor folks to labour hard, take what we can get, and thank the great and wise God that our ...
— The History of Sandford and Merton • Thomas Day
... upon a pair at last, urged and coaxed to them by the dealer. They were a good deal too large, and his feet slipped about in them uncomfortably; but the man assured him that was how everybody, even gentlefolks, bought them, to leave room for growing. There was an awkward, uneven patch under one of the soles, and the other heel was worn down at the side; but at least they covered his feet well. He shambled away in them slowly and toilsomely, hardly knowing how to lift one ...
— Alone In London • Hesba Stretton
... very sure they were not, she must have been coming to some person in England, who will doubtless be on the look-out for her. So you must not set your heart on keeping the little maiden, for as her friends are sure to be rich gentlefolks she would be better off ...
— Won from the Waves • W.H.G. Kingston
... which she regarded her rejected lover, and the influence over her which her father had exercised. Always mindful of his own interests, the miller knew that he would be the person blamed if he allowed his daughter to marry me. "They will say I did it, with an eye to my son-in-law's money; and gentlefolks may ruin a man who lives by selling flour." That was how he expressed himself in a letter ...
— The Guilty River • Wilkie Collins
... answered the other, "that he is, the most handsomest man I ever saw in my life. Yes, to be sure, that he is, and, as your ladyship says, I don't know why I should be ashamed of loving him, though he is my betters. To be sure, gentlefolks are but flesh and blood no more than us servants. Besides, as for Mr Jones, thof Squire Allworthy hath made a gentleman of him, he was not so good as myself by birth: for thof I am a poor body, I am an honest person's child, and my father ...
— The History of Tom Jones, a foundling • Henry Fielding
... a country body, because it is a fashion for gentlefolks to die in London; it li's the bon ton now to die; one can't show one's face without being a death's-head. Mrs. Bethel and I are come strangely into fashion; but true critics in mode object to our having underjaws, and maintain that we are not dead comme il faut. The ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2 • Horace Walpole
... this, and said gentlefolks were to be pitied. "Why, if it was the likes of me, you and I should have ...
— White Lies • Charles Reade
... it matter? Rose would probably spend her life in New France. If it was never proven that she came of gentlefolks, Laurent Giffard would hardly consent to his wife's mothering her. He had a good deal of ...
— A Little Girl in Old Quebec • Amanda Millie Douglas
... 'King's Arms' gave way before the Plush Royal, the aristocracy of the Brentford nation bent down and truckled before Gorgius, and proclaimed him the first gentleman in Europe. And it's a wonder to think what is the gentlefolks' opinion of a gentleman, when they gave Gorgius such ...
— The Book of Snobs • William Makepeace Thackeray
... in the principal courts of Europe; knew what a handful of gentlefolks call "the World"; had experienced the honeyed words of courtiers, the misty nothings of diplomatists, and the innocent prattle ...
— Christie Johnstone • Charles Reade
... G. R. Clark to Jonathan Clark, April 20,178.] In Kentucky, while much land was taken up under Treasury warrants, much was also allotted to the officers of the Continental army; and the retired officers of the Continental line were the best of all possible immigrants. A class of gentlefolks soon sprang up in the land, whose members were not so separated from other citizens as to be in any way alien to them, and who yet stood sufficiently above the mass to be recognized as the natural ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume Three - The Founding of the Trans-Alleghany Commonwealths, 1784-1790 • Theodore Roosevelt
... powers desirable, employing labourers and seeming to know what she intended them to do—was a thing not easy to get over, or be come accustomed to. But there she was, as easy and well mannered as you please—and with gentlefolks' ways, though, as an American, such finish could scarcely be expected from her. She knew each man's name, it was revealed gradually, and, what was more, knew what he stood for in the village, what ...
— The Shuttle • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... gentlefolks, here ye may view An exact and natural representation (Like Siburn's Model of Waterloo[1]) Of the Lords and Commons ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... you see, at first I was a little baby, and didn't know anything at all. But by and by I began to grow big, and then Daddy Captain said to himself, 'Here's a child,' he says, 'and a child of gentlefolks, and she mustn't grow up in ignorance, and me doing my duty by her poor pa and ma,' he says. So he rows over to the town, and he goes to the minister (the same minister who came over here before), and he says, 'Good morning, Minister!' and the minister ...
— Captain January • Laura E. Richards
... forgotten to be balmy, and Meynell, who was an ardent sun-lover, shivered as he walked along, buttoning a much-worn parson's coat against the sharp air. Before him lay the long, straggling street, with its cottages and small shops, its post-office, and public-houses, and its occasional gentlefolks' dwellings, now with a Georgian front plumb on the street, and now hidden behind walls and trees. It was evidently a large village, almost a country town, with a considerable variety of life. At this hour of the evening most of the houses were dark, for the labourers ...
— The Case of Richard Meynell • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... Gladys were with her, and as she was continually sleeping, no one else was admitted. Mr and Mrs Jonathan left early, after having made friends with Minette, who confided to them that she liked them better than grandpapa and grandmamma, because they were gentlefolks. She didn't know why there was no carpet in the hall, and didn't like stones to her feet. She promised to go and see them when her mamma was better. The worthy couple took to her as they ...
— Gladys, the Reaper • Anne Beale
... springy, considering his weight,' said Mr. Macey, 'and he stamps uncommon well. But Mr. Lammeter beats 'em all for shapes; you see he holds his head like a sodger, and he isn't so cushiony as most o' the oldish gentlefolks,—they ran fat in gineral;—and he's got a fine leg. The parson's nimble enough, but he hasn't got much of a leg: it's a bit too thick downward, and his knees might be a bit nearer without damage; but he might do worse, he might do worse. Though he hasn't that grand way o' waving his hand ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 108, October, 1866 • Various
... supply. And this continued to be so even after her fright and determination to return to the work that had been allotted to her. No doubt, could she have come down to the hearts and lives of the neighbours who visited Lady Randolph on the externally equal footing which society pretends to allot to all gentlefolks, she would have found several of them who would have been glad to free her from her money; but then she could not see into their hearts. She did not know what a difficult thing it was for Mr. Routledge of Newby to pay the ...
— Sir Tom • Mrs. Oliphant
... children than forsaking their own. But one of them might have had reason for being ashamed of her child, and, dreading the severity of her family, might have abandoned it, with the intention of repossessing herself of it, and passing it off as the child of gentlefolks she had picked up. I don't know their habits and ways sufficiently; but, from what I have heard, that seems possible. However, it is not so easy as it might have been once to succeed in such an attempt. If we should fail in finding ...
— The Vicar's Daughter • George MacDonald
... gentlefolks' way," said Joan bitterly, "but if I wur i' yo're place, Liz, I would na hate th' choild. It has na done yo' as much harm as yo' ...
— That Lass O' Lowrie's - 1877 • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... bidding a servant to take up that on the table, left the room with no pleasant countenance, muttering to herself that, "had she known the litter which was to have been made, she would not have taken such pains to wash her house that morning. If this was gentility, much good may it do such gentlefolks; for her part she had no notion of it." From these murmurs I received two hints. The one, that it was not from a mistake of our inclination that the good woman had starved us, but from wisely consulting her own ...
— Journal of A Voyage to Lisbon • Henry Fielding
... dance, as the squire says, for a wedding occasion; as it sets all the world jigging in couples; hand in hand, and makes every eye and every heart dance merrily to the music. According to frank old usage, the gentlefolks of the Hall mingled, for a time, in the dance of the peasantry, who had a great tent erected for a ball-room; and I think I never saw Master Simon more in his element than when figuring about among his rustic admirers, ...
— Bracebridge Hall • Washington Irving
... never been in gentlefolks' rooms but when the carpets were all up, and the curtains down, and the furniture huddled together under a cloth, and the pictures covered with aprons and dusters; and he had often enough wondered ...
— Journeys Through Bookland V2 • Charles H. Sylvester
... Yellowplush saw the gentlefolks away, and then, parting his legs, and putting his thumbs into his waistcoat pockets, delivered himself thus: "Well, old girl, am I to give you my harm round to the kitchen, or do you ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade
... isn't spared," said Lizzie; "even in the servants' hall the best tea and everything." She was fond of the young ladies, but at such an opportunity not to give them a gentle blow in passing was beyond the power of woman; for not even in the drawing-room did the gentlefolks at the ...
— A Country Gentleman and his Family • Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant
... is vulgar and belongs to servants. Gentlefolks use the person's name instead. You should have said, ...
— Divided Skates • Evelyn Raymond
... better, young man. Pay your bill and be off. All my rooms is wanted for gentlefolks, and not ...
— The Christmas Books • William Makepeace Thackeray
... gentility. I've lived forty years in gentlemen's families, up an' down, Martha, and I think I'd ought to know somethink about the 'abits and manners of the aristocracy. Pore ain't in the question at all, it ain't, as far as breedin' goes: and if they're pore, and got to be gentlefolks too all the same'—John spoke of this last serious disability in a tone of unfeigned pity—'why, Martha, wot I says is, we'd ought to do the very best we can for 'em any ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen
... going to give us some books, and Ritchie will print some alphabets. We told a great many of the, people, and they are so glad. Old Granny Hall said, 'Well, I never!' and told the girls they must be as good as gold now the gentlefolks was coming to teach them. Mr. Wilmot is coming with us every Friday as long as the ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... honor only just escaped being broken for that gypsy-girl, whom he had bought in her sixth year from encamping gypsies for two dollars and a sucking pig, now, ten years later, did not belong any more to the household, but presided at table when gentlefolk came to dinner. But she still bore that heathen name, which she had received in the reedy thicket. She was ...
— Debts of Honor • Maurus Jokai
... Monksland—there was little of startling interest in the diary. It recorded descriptions of the wild moorland scenery, of birds, and ferns, and flowers. Also there were sketches of the peasantry and of the gentlefolk with whom the writer came in contact; very shrewd and clever, some of them, but with this peculiarity—that they were absolutely free from unkindness of thought or words, though sometimes their author allowed herself the license of a mitigated satire. Such things, with notes of domestic and parish ...
— Stella Fregelius • H. Rider Haggard |
