"Housemaid" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... and clenched, weeping eyes began to see again, while the barber applied cooling lotions which made Penrod smell like a coloured housemaid's ideal. ...
— Penrod • Booth Tarkington
... to Saintes. The Signols, like everybody else in the country, could not afford to keep their only child at home; so they meant her to go out to service, in country phrase. The art of clear-starching is a part of every country housemaid's training; and so great was Mme. Prieur's reputation, that the Signols sent Henriette to her as apprentice, and paid for ...
— Eve and David • Honore de Balzac
... or five guests. On your at-home days, we shall put up little placards as they do outside the theatres, 'Drawing-room full,' 'Dining-room full,' 'Room in the Conservatory.' There are two good bedrooms, one large maid's room, and a lumber- room. One cook and one housemaid could run it beautifully. Rent 50 pounds on a three years' lease—with taxes, about 62 pounds. I think it was just built for us. Rupton Hale says that we must be careful not to brush against the walls, and that it would be safer to go outside to ...
— A Duet • A. Conan Doyle
... housemaid, not bad-looking, but very stout and snub-nosed; in a white dress, of which the bodice is short and ill-fitting. About her neck is a little red kerchief; her hair is very ...
— Plays • Alexander Ostrovsky
... south side are two sitting rooms, opening into a conservatory. There are six bedrooms, a dining-room, bath room, and housemaid's sink. ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 384, May 12, 1883 • Various
... much at home in the house, that when she found the housemaid on her knees cleaning the hall floor, she passed on unceremoniously to the dining-room, where she felt sure of finding some of the family. It was a spacious room, with a low ceiling where black beams crossed and recrossed each other; ...
— Cobwebs and Cables • Hesba Stretton
... children had a very fair daughter, Andreuola by name, who, being unmarried, chanced to fall in love with a neighbour, one Gabriotto, a man of low degree, but goodly of person and debonair, and endowed with all admirable qualities; and aided and abetted by the housemaid, the girl not only brought it to pass that Gabriotto knew that he was beloved of her, but that many a time to their mutual delight he came to see her in a fair garden belonging to her father. And that nought but death might avail to sever ...
— The Decameron, Volume I • Giovanni Boccaccio
... and sympathy! Oh, irony of circumstances, how were they answered? The housemaid entered the room, to announce the arrival of a discharged ...
— Blind Love • Wilkie Collins
... and the rear windows of the tenements. The Grand Leddy found a great deal there to interest her beside Bobby and the robin that chirped and picked up crumbs between the little dog's paws. Presently the gate was opened again and' a housemaid from some mansion in George Square came around the kirk. Trained by Mistress Jeanie, she was a neat and pretty and pleasant-mannered housemaid, in a black gown and white apron, and with a frilled cap on her crinkly, gold-brown hair that had had ...
— Greyfriars Bobby • Eleanor Atkinson
... Philipovna. "You are about as fit to understand me as the housemaid here, who bore witness against her lover in court the other day. She would understand ...
— The Idiot • (AKA Feodor Dostoevsky) Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... threw a swift glance over her shoulder, fearing her other guests, who were following, might have heard. "Hush, Jimmy," she said. "It sounds so bad. Never say that again, especially before the servants. The rector's housemaid is sister to my parlour-maid, and it would be sure to get round to him. Of course, I know you have been in wild places where there were no churches, and we understand, but others might not. And all our friends ...
— People of Position • Stanley Portal Hyatt
... child, punished like a child, dressed prettily and washed and combed like a child, excused for outbreaks like a child, forbidden to marry like a child, and called Tommy like a child. He has no real work to keep him from going mad except housemaid's work." ...
— Socialism As It Is - A Survey of The World-Wide Revolutionary Movement • William English Walling
... wish I had a cook, and laundress, and a housemaid. Oh, and a nursemaid, too! It is dreadful to ...
— An Australian Lassie • Lilian Turner
... out; and people began to think that topsy-turvy Louisa would amount to something after all, since she could do so well as housemaid, teacher, seamstress, and story-teller. ...
— Stories of Achievement, Volume IV (of 6) - Authors and Journalists • Various
... had a bit o' black for my shoes now—with your clothes I could get me a housemaid's job easy," Her muffler covered the fact that she had no shirtwaist. Then she added encouragingly: "You'd better get a job quick. There's only one blanket on these beds and clothes run down using ...
— What's the Matter with Ireland? • Ruth Russell
... the position of cook, housemaid and plough-hand while her little boys were made to hoe, carry wood and care for the small children ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States - From Interviews with Former Slaves: Indiana Narratives • Works Projects Administration
... His Highness rose at an unusually early hour, even before the scrub-women made their exit. In the corridors, in the parlors, everywhere blonde and dark percherons, cleaning away for dear life and courting housemaid's knee! ...
— Secret Memoirs: The Story of Louise, Crown Princess • Henry W. Fischer
... McCorkle, the second housemaid who deserves a paragraph herself. Annette Fletcherized large numbers of romantic novels which she obtained at a free public library branch (donated by one of the biggest caliphs in the business). She was Celia's side-kicker and chum, ...
— Strictly Business • O. Henry
... of a neighbour, one Francoise Louarne, a domestic servant, supports the idea that Helene resented the presence of Rosalie in the house. Helene said to this witness, "M. Bidard has gone into the country with his housemaid. Everything SHE does is perfect. They leave me here—to work if I want to, eat my bread dry: that's my reward. But the housemaid will go before I do. Although M. Bidard has given me my notice, he'll ...
— She Stands Accused • Victor MacClure
... would cast yourself at the feet of that terrific man, to appease him in favour of others. And all these and more were your virgin virtues, lost, gone, forgotten out of mind, by a world that dreams of no heavenly housemaid save in Lucca where you lived, and where they still keep your April festa, and lay their nosegays on ...
— Florence and Northern Tuscany with Genoa • Edward Hutton
... support him. The Liberals were at first much discouraged, but they have now taken heart again. One of their Canvassers, it seems, has succeeded in making himself a persona grata to a lady who occupies the position of under-housemaid in the establishment of the TUFFANS. Through her he obtained an empty pot of strawberry-jam, lately consumed by the TUFFAN family. This has been fixed upon a long pole, with a placard underneath it, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 103, July 9, 1892 • Various
... sir, the two maid-servants, Marie the housemaid and Louise the cook, and also Herve the butler; but Herve did not sleep in the chateau last night. He had asked the mistress's permission to go into the village, and she had given it to him on condition that he did not come ...
— Fantomas • Pierre Souvestre
... perform for her mother the various petty offices that lady demanded from her next of kin, and that her practical slavery was due by every consideration of filial affection. To Orde's occasional tentative suggestion that the service was of a sort better suited to a paid companion or even a housemaid, she answered quite seriously that it made mother nervous to have others about her, and that it was better to do these things than to throw her into a "spell." Orde chafed at first over seeing his precious opportunities thus filched from him; later he fretted because he perceived that ...
— The Riverman • Stewart Edward White
... went home happy and pleased with ourselves, not in the least depressed if we had drawn a blank, to jolly and delightful meals, without any formality at all. And if we were wet, there was a great drying-room off the kitchen premises where our clothes were dried by a housemaid who really understood the business. As for our tackle, we dried our own lines and pegged them under the verandah, and rewound them again in the morning, made up our own casts, and generally did everything for ourselves ...
— The Mystery of the Green Ray • William Le Queux
... PADI for some minutes without interruption, one woman takes a winnowing pan, a mat made in the shape of an English housemaid's dustpan, but rather larger than this article, and receives in it the pounded grain which the other throws out of the pit with ...
— The Pagan Tribes of Borneo • Charles Hose and William McDougall
... fiat: "They are froze Down about sixteen feet; If you want water ere July You must dig up the street." "Practical Plumber" now is he, As witnesseth his sign, And ready now to undertake Repairs in any line. One day a housemaid, as he sat At the receipt of biz, Came crying, "Ho, Sir Smith, Sir Smith, Sir Jones's pipes is friz." He girt his apron round his loins, His tools took from the shelf, And to the journeyman he said, "I'll see ...
— Humour of the North • Lawrence J. Burpee
... when the housemaid went into her room to kindle a fire, she was startled by the appearance of a muffled figure seated at the window, with the head leaning against the casement; the face was as white as the snow on the landscape. ...
— Helen and Arthur - or, Miss Thusa's Spinning Wheel • Caroline Lee Hentz
... expressed himself on every theme that interests mankind, except perhaps "housemaid's knee." He has written more letters to the newspapers than "Old Subscriber," "Fiat Justitia," "Indignant Reader" and "Veritas" combined. His opinions have carried much weight and directed attention into necessary lines; but perhaps his success ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 1 of 14 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Good Men and Great • Elbert Hubbard
... make the details as gruesome as he liked. But there was no need to shock the sensitive when he made his choice of the circumstances in which the poet, Stephen Byrne, inadvertently throttles his housemaid. It is a fault, too, that his scheme only interests him so far as it concerns Stephen and his society, and that the horror of the tragedy from what one may loosely call the victim's point of view does not seem to affect him at all. Otherwise, even for the sake of brevity, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 159, November 10, 1920 • Various
... or firewood or whatever their work may be—heedless of protection. The safeguard was for a class: the average exposure of young womanhood was far greater than with us. So in London, while you rarely see a young lady alone in the streets, the housemaid is sent on errands at any hour of the evening with a freedom at which our city domestics would quite rebel; and one has to stay but a short time in Paris to see how entirely limited to a class is the alleged restraint under which young French girls ...
— Women and the Alphabet • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... was duly executed, and it was witnessed by the nurse, his confidential clerk, and the housemaid. ...
— The Monikins • J. Fenimore Cooper
... the house when any girl was ordered to bed with a cold was, in the first place, that she should not put her arms outside the bedclothes—for if you were allowed to read and amuse yourself in bed you might as well be up; that the housemaid should visit the patient in the early morning with a cup of senna-tea, and at long and regular intervals throughout the day with beef-tea and gruel; and that no one should come to see and talk with her, unless, indeed, it were ...
— Marcella • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... sight to behold. As Mary the cook said to Jane the housemaid, "If they'd been born kings and queens, Mrs. Lee couldn't have laid herself out more; it's grand, so it is,—just you go and see;" which Jane proceeded to do, and forthwith thereafter ...
— What Answer? • Anna E. Dickinson
... for my purpose at present," Mrs. Conway replied. "Thirty will do very well for the age of a housemaid at the Hall. I should imagine the Miss Penfolds would prefer a woman of that age to a young girl; beside, you see, I must be an upper housemaid in order to have charge of the part of the house I want to examine. As to knowing me, in the first place the ...
— One of the 28th • G. A. Henty
... toward the close of his work, when he begins to show signs of fatigue and exhaustion. Nay, it is to be feared that we are still suffering from the outrage committed on Victorian literature by Mr. Mill's incendiary housemaid. We may yet note marks of arson in the restored volume. At the same time, there are large parts of his work which are as true historically as they are poetically brilliant. Part I.—"The Bastille"—is almost perfect. The whole description of Versailles, ...
— Studies in Early Victorian Literature • Frederic Harrison
... woman of economies, keeping vigilant watch over all expenditures, great and small, and employing one servant only, who was cook, housemaid, and laundress all in one, and expected to give every moment of her time to the service of her mistress, and be content with smaller wages than many who ...
— Grandmother Elsie • Martha Finley
... the purchase-money bought a team of brown horses and a little carriage in which he drove about to stay with the squires. But as the horses were a deal of trouble and money was required for oats, Anton Prokofievitch bartered them for a violin and a housemaid, with twenty-five paper rubles to boot. Afterwards Anton Prokofievitch sold the violin, and exchanged the girl for a morocco and gold tobacco-pouch; now he has such a tobacco-pouch as no one else has. As a result of this luxury, he can no longer ...
— Taras Bulba and Other Tales • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... upon this when a frightened housemaid brought the news that Gaffer Bedshaw had that very morning, not more than an hour back, gone violently insane, and was strapped down at home, in the huntsman's lodge, where he raved of a battle with a ferocious ...
— Moon-Face and Other Stories • Jack London
... to Baton Rouge soon after dat and works as de housemaid. Us stay dere two year and I gits some little jobs and den I goes to work for de railroad in Sedalia, up in Missouri, and dere I works as section hand for de Katy railroad for twenty year. Den I gits ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves. - Texas Narratives, Part 2 • Works Projects Administration
... You broke that woman's heart. I don't suppose you know that she died last month. You never noticed it, eh? Her precious coachman is living like a lord on the money you and he took from her. Old Burkenday's housemaid has bought a little home in Edgewater—but not from her wages. The two jobs you now have on hand never will be pulled off. The girl in the Banker Watts case has been cornered and has confessed. She is ready to appear against you. McLennan's wife has had the courage ...
— Jane Cable • George Barr McCutcheon
... relation to typhoid," said the Doctor, eyeing the other with solemnity, "as housemaid's ...
— The Clarion • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... with the Earlscourt green grocer's daughter. It had led her to seek the society of her mother's class; and that class simply would not have her, because she was much poorer than the greengrocer, and, far from being able to afford a maid, could not afford even a housemaid, and had to scrape along at home with an illiberally treated general servant. Under such circumstances nothing could give her an air of being a genuine product of Largelady Park. And yet its tradition made her regard a marriage with anyone ...
— Pygmalion • George Bernard Shaw
... if he would not, and in absolute perplexity whither to turn himself, went awkwardly to the door. Elfride followed lingeringly behind him. Before he had receded two yards from the doorstep, Unity and Ann the housemaid came home from their ...
— A Pair of Blue Eyes • Thomas Hardy
... own room and packed a single box with necessary things. Then she called the housemaid and informed her that she had been summoned to return suddenly to England; she must reach Brussels at least that evening. The woman brought a porter who carried her box to the station; and Iris left Louvain—and her ...
— Blind Love • Wilkie Collins
... they ride their ponies, but oftener they drive in the little dog-cart; and I dare say a young person will come to give you lessons, but the master has not made any arrangement yet. You're to sleep in the room next to mine; and Prudence Briggs, the under housemaid, will wait upon you. But the first thing you must do, my dear Miss Agnes, is to get well, and strong, and rosy. ...
— Little Folks (July 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various
... upon going below, had called the housemaid and confided to her that, for good reasons, she had locked Violet in her room and she charged the maid not to let ...
— His Heart's Queen • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... to the Place to morn: Bess housemaid told me. Lord and Lady——: dash My wigs! I can't think on. But there's a mash O' comp'ny and fine ladies; fit to torn The heads of these young chaps. Why now I'd lay This here gun to an empty ...
— The Germ - Thoughts towards Nature in Poetry, Literature and Art • Various
... A housemaid in Upper Grosvenor Street, London, going to the cellar for a draught of ale, after the family had retired to bed, glided silently in without a candle. As she was feeling about for the cask, she put her ...
— The Book of Three Hundred Anecdotes - Historical, Literary, and Humorous—A New Selection • Various
... a nurse, too, so that partly accounted for it. Meg, the eldest, was only sixteen, and could not be expected to be much of a disciplinarian, and the slatternly but good-natured girl, who was supposed to combine the duties of nursery-maid and housemaid, had so much to do in her second capacity that the first suffered considerably. She used to lay the nursery meals when none of the little girls could be found to help her, and bundle on the clothes of the ...
— Seven Little Australians • Ethel Sybil Turner
... just four miles out on the other side of Elbury, where Susan Congleton went to live that was housemaid at the Grange. She says it's such a nice place, and such beautiful organ and singing at church! And what did you say you ...
— Friarswood Post-Office • Charlotte M. Yonge
... real lady's maid: one realised that at once. She had been a housemaid for some years in the house in Grosvenor Street, and Pamela, when her own most superior maid flatly refused to accompany her on this expedition, had asked Mawson to be her maid, and Mawson had gladly accepted the offer. She was a middle-aged woman with ...
— Penny Plain • Anna Buchan (writing as O. Douglas)
... to Father O'Connor the priest, and urged on him the pernicious effect which was thus produced on my patient's mind, I found him as fully imbued with the spirit of credulity as the most hysterical housemaid of them all. He solemnly declared to me that he had himself repeatedly seen the pale lady sitting at the fatal window, when on his way to and from his home beyond the hills; and moreover, that on the death of Lady Collingham, which occurred at her daughter's birth, he had heard the ...
— A Stable for Nightmares - or Weird Tales • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... once perceived that the hall-door was open, and Mrs. Carbuncle, as she crossed the pavement, saw that there were two policemen in the hall. The footman had been with them to the theatre, but the cook and housemaid, and Mrs. Carbuncle's own maid, were with the policemen in the passage. She gave a little scream, and then Lizzie, who had followed her, seized her by the arm. She turned round and saw by the gas-light that Lizzie's face was white as a sheet, and that all the lines of her countenance ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope
... mine, a few inches above the lock, is a little chalk-mark which some sportive boy in passing has probably scratched on the pillar. The door-steps, the lock, handle, and so forth, are kept decently enough; but this chalk-mark, I suppose some three inches out of the housemaid's beat, has already been on the door for more than a fortnight, and I wonder whether it will be there whilst this paper is being written, whilst it is at the printer's, and, in fine, until the month passes over? I wonder whether the servants in that house will read these ...
— Roundabout Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... returning from a visit, brought a gift to each of her mother's colored servants. It was the "day out" for Lily, the housemaid, so Annette distributed her gifts, reserving for ...
— More Toasts • Marion Dix Mosher
... if the end should come sooner than our most sanguine hopes have led us to expect, we will not quarrel with the handiwork of fate. Now leave me. I see a petticoat yonder amongst the trees. It belongs to some housemaid from the castle, I dare say; and I must see if my eloquence as a wandering merchant cannot win me admission within the walls which I dare ...
— Run to Earth - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... the letter with the housemaid, went to the office, and spent the day in reading proofs, superintending the execution of orders, and looking after the affairs of the printing-house. He said not a word to David. While youth bears a child's heart, it is capable of sublime reticence. ...
— Two Poets - Lost Illusions Part I • Honore de Balzac
... Susan the housemaid, who had just come in, giggled, and put her hand over her mouth, and I felt as if my ears had rims of fire. Would they never have done with their personal allusions? Mentally I cursed Job and Bill and Topper very heartily, and as ...
— Humphrey Bold - A Story of the Times of Benbow • Herbert Strang
... first field—" His blue eyes smiled down upon the little stranger lady. "And you mustn't spy upon her. But if you're really in difficulties, come to me. We'll make out, somehow. And now, she'll be here in a few minutes. Would you like to stay here—or shall I ring for the housemaid to show you ...
— Helena • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... but without your consent. You are in the position of the lady of a house whose servants have shut the door of the kitchen in her face that they may carry on their business after their own fashion, leaving only the housemaid and coachman at her command. It may be humiliating, perhaps, to be thus only partially mistress at home; but what can you do, my little demi-queen? I will tell you: make up your mind to govern the subjects under ...
— The History of a Mouthful of Bread - And its effect on the organization of men and animals • Jean Mace
... parcel slip lower down on his arm, with one finger crooked through the string that tied it together. He was about to fling it into the gloom of a brownstone step shadow when the door above opened and a housemaid in cap and apron thrust a plaintively meowing cat from the portico into the street. Trotter quickened his steps, tingling, abashed, shaken with an inordinate and ridiculous sense of guilt. He felt that he wanted to keep ...
— Stories from Everybody's Magazine • 1910 issues of Everybody's Magazine
... through Holborough High Street, where there was the faint stir and bustle of early morning, windows opening, a housemaid kneeling on a doorstep here and there, an occasional tradesman taking down his shutters. They drove past the fringe of prim little villas on the outskirts of the town, and away along a country road towards Arden; and once more Clarissa saw the things ...
— The Lovels of Arden • M. E. Braddon
... game arranged especially for their entertainment. The quadroon sat for hours before Edna's palette, patient as a savage, while the house-maid took charge of the children, and the drawing-room went undusted. But the housemaid, too, served her term as model when Edna perceived that the young woman's back and shoulders were molded on classic lines, and that her hair, loosened from its confining cap, became an inspiration. ...
— The Awakening and Selected Short Stories • Kate Chopin
... great lyre's golden echoes rolled away! Forth tripped another claimant of the bay. Trim, tittivated, tintinnabulant, His bosom aped the true Parnassian pant, As may a housemaid's leathern bellows mock The rock—whelmed Titan's breathings. He no shock Of bard-like shagginess shook to the breeze. A modern Cambrian Minstrel hopes to please By undishevelled dandy-daintiness, Whether of lays or locks, of rhymes ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 103, October 22, 1892 • Various
... attending to some duty before going to bed, caught sight of him cleaning his stirrups: from that moment she took upon herself the silent and unsuspected supervision of the harness-room, where, when she found any part of the riding-equipments neglected, she would draw a pair of housemaid's gloves on her pretty hands, and polish away ...
— Mary Marston • George MacDonald
... However gifted, she was in no wise abnormal, and she galloped on Moses, her black pony, through the Herefordshire lanes, and offered pagan sacrifices to some imaginary Athene, "with a bundle of sticks from the kitchen fire and a match begged from an indulgent housemaid." In a letter to Richard Hengist Home, under date of October 5, 1843, in reply to a request of his for data for a biographical sketch of her for "The New Spirit of the ...
— The Brownings - Their Life and Art • Lilian Whiting
... possessed a fine barytone. The butler could "do a little bass," which is to say that, while the other parts soared to higher regions, he could stay on the bottom note if carefully placed there, and told to remain. The head housemaid sang what she called "seconds"; in other words, she followed along, slightly behind the trebles as regarded time, and a major third below them as regarded pitch. The housekeeper, a large, dark person with a fringe on her upper lip, unshaven and ...
— The Rosary • Florence L. Barclay
... were admitted by a housemaid who happened to be busy in the hall, and whose red cheeks and general breathlessness bore witness to the energy of the storm of preparation now sweeping ...
— Robert Elsmere • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... Portsmouth, full of beautiful and romantic houses. In one of the best of them Governor Wentworth invited his friends to a party and flabbergasted them all by turning the "party" into a wedding. He married his housemaid—but she was a beauty! But of all the pleasant things of Portsmouth the Thomas Bailey Aldrich house is the best. This lovely old house is kept exactly as he left it. His spirit seems to pervade the place as a fragrance lingers after ...
— The Lightning Conductor Discovers America • C. N. (Charles Norris) Williamson and A. M. (Alice Muriel)
... chilblains and chapped hands. They like to make a fuss about themselves. And to make their employer pay a substitute to do their work. They're all like that. It was just the same before I married. Yes, every housemaid I employ. Contracts these swollen kneeses. They only do it to annoy. Because they know ...
— If Winter Don't - A B C D E F Notsomuchinson • Barry Pain
... has not been introduced there to lessen the rabbit evil, we do not know. Mr. Seton declares that the rabbits of his park were "subject to all the ills of the flesh, except possibly writer's paralysis and housemaid's knee." ...
— Our Vanishing Wild Life - Its Extermination and Preservation • William T. Hornaday
... the afternoon of the twelfth of October the Hamilton house was very still. Mrs. Hamilton had gone into town, the housemaid was taking her "afternoon out," and the cook, who had been kept awake by toothache the night before, was ...
— Glenloch Girls • Grace M. Remick
... mansion sufficiently commodious to allow of their hospitalities. This made it impossible for them to keep any servant save a little girl who washed the dishes, and consequently Grisell acted as cook, housekeeper, housemaid, washerwoman, laundress, dressmaker, and tailoress. Twice a week she sat up at night to do the family accounts. Daily she rose before six, went to the market and to the mill to see their own corn ground, and—in the words of her daughter, who proudly tells the tale—"dressed ...
— Stories of the Border Marches • John Lang and Jean Lang
... to enter that room save the housemaid in the morning, and my valet, or my wife's maid, during the rest of the day. They are both trusty servants who have been with us for some time. Besides, neither of them could possibly have known that there was anything more valuable than the ordinary departmental papers ...
— The Return of Sherlock Holmes - Magazine Edition • Arthur Conan Doyle
... there was nothing to be done now but make a retreat, and he went into the hall where Eliza Jane, the doctor's housemaid, was whisking a feather-brush about, over picture-frames, and ornaments, curiosities from different parts of the world, and polishing the hall table. From this she flew to the stand and caught up ...
— The Weathercock - Being the Adventures of a Boy with a Bias • George Manville Fenn
... running of the house, and after that sweet lady's death she had been its manager in all regards. In the simple economies of the house she had indeed been all things for these past few years—housekeeper, cook, housemaid, even seamstress, for in addition to being a poetess with a cook-stove she was a wizard ...
— From Place to Place • Irvin S. Cobb
... escape from domestic tyranny offered her by a marriage with her cousin; and, liking him better than any one in the world except her uncle (who was at this time at sea) she went off one morning and was married to him; her only bridesmaid being the housemaid at her aunt's. The consequence was, that Frank and his wife went into lodgings, and Mrs. Wilson refused to see them, and turned away Norah, the warm-hearted housemaid; whom they accordingly took into their service. When Captain Wilson returned from ...
— A House to Let • Charles Dickens
... bedroom to fetch his pipe. It was occupied by a housemaid, and he made a polite apology for disturbing ...
— The Red House Mystery • A. A. Milne
... made of the basket, the grate, and the carpet surrounding the fireplace, but nothing beyond the smell of the burnt papers could be discovered, so the instructor and pupil put out the gas, shut the door, and retired to the servants'-hall, where Hopkins, the cook, the housemaid, and a small maid-of-all-work awaited their arrival—supper being already ...
— Fighting the Flames • R.M. Ballantyne
... He advised her to consider her items, and soon saw she was more bewildered than helpless. He knew no more than Arthur on the knotty point of the number of maids, but he was able to pronounce her plan sensible, and her eyes brightened, as she spoke of a housemaid of mamma's who wanted to better herself, and get out of the way of the little ones, 'who were ...
— Heartsease - or Brother's Wife • Charlotte M. Yonge
... house, general provider, hired-man, stable-boy, head-gardener, coach-man, night-watchman and everything else of the male persuasion on the place; whilst I was cook, laundress, nurse, housekeeper, manicure, stenographer, and general housemaid, as well as the mother of the family—a situation that even though it involved us in no end of hard work, had its compensations. Living off in suburbs as we did, you can have no idea of what a comfort it was to us not to be at the mercy of a cook who would threaten to leave ...
— The Autobiography of Methuselah • John Kendrick Bangs
... difference between a bantam cock, and a dirty housemaid? One is a domestic foul and ...
— Cole's Funny Picture Book No. 1 • Edward William Cole
... school-room was in a hubbub. Probably the army of hoydenish maidens were not anxious the conflict should cease—it was far more entertaining than maxims, arithmetic and working texts on samples—and Miss Pinwell seeing this, summoned Bridget, the brawny housemaid, who with a canvas apron finally caught and squashed the ...
— Madame Flirt - A Romance of 'The Beggar's Opera' • Charles E. Pearce
... Every English housemaid knows, if every housekeeper does not, that shavings make a most valuable fuel; for lighting fires they are preferable to those faggots, small bundles of which fetch in London, and large provincial ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 19, No. 533, Saturday, February 11, 1832. • Various
... seriously what she should do. The lack of a housemaid she had made up quite comfortably with her own two busy hands; Mrs. Copley at least had been in particular comfort, whenever she did not get a fit of fretting on Dolly's account; and Dolly herself had been happy, though unquestionably the ...
— The End of a Coil • Susan Warner
... from kitchen to kirmess, from the faro table to the Queen's drawing-room, from the canvas trousers of the miner to Poole's creations, from the calico frock of the housemaid to Worth's dazzling masterpieces, from making omelets to sneering at operas, the great ...
— The Little Lady of Lagunitas • Richard Henry Savage
... expenses." "I hope it didn't cost George much," said Alice. "It did, though; nearly all he had got. But what matters? Money's nothing to him, except for its uses. My own little mite is my own now, and he shall have every farthing of it for the next election, even though I should go out as a housemaid the next day." There must have been something great about George Vavasor, or he would not have been so idolized by such a girl as ...
— Can You Forgive Her? • Anthony Trollope
... crossed at regular intervals by smaller joists, richly carved, and retaining some traces of gilding. The spaces between had been originally of a deep blue tint, almost lost now under the thick coating of dust and spiders' webs that no housemaid's mop ever invaded. Above the grand old chimney-piece was a noble stag's head, with huge, spreading antlers, and on the walls hung rows of ancient family portraits, so faded and mouldy now that most of the faces had a ghastly hue, and at night, by the dim, ...
— Captain Fracasse • Theophile Gautier
... this way, in our own little home. There's a hat-rack here under the stairway," she continued, as Russell, murmuring some response, came into the hall. "I'm afraid you'll think it's almost TOO informal, my coming to the door, but unfortunately our housemaid's just had a little accident—oh, nothing to mention! I just thought we better not keep you waiting any longer. Will you ...
— Alice Adams • Booth Tarkington
... served by a nice-looking housemaid and a page-boy, who had their work cut out for them in keeping every one supplied. For these ladies and gentlemen, whatever else may be said of them, had ...
— Boycotted - And Other Stories • Talbot Baines Reed
... I am upper housemaid to the family that live at No. 27 Limehouse Road, Pultneyville. I have been requested by Mr. Wilkey Collings, which I takes the liberty of here stating is a gentleman born and bred, and has some consideration for the feelings of servants, and is not above rewarding ...
— The Luck of Roaring Camp and Other Tales • Bret Harte
... "Questionings like these Sound gauche and gushing. Better far to freeze To the right social zero, Than stoop to zeal and frank display of zest, Notes of the vulgar glories that invest The housemaid-novel's hero. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 98 February 15, 1890 • Various
... was up and off to the kitchen. The hours passed on, and the vision of the night kept constantly recurring to my thoughts. After a while I heard the voices of two women in the entry. In one of them I recognized the housemaid. The other said to her, "Did you know Linda Brent's children was sold to the speculator yesterday. They say ole massa Flint was mighty glad to see 'em drove out of town; but they say they've come back agin. I 'spect it's ...
— Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl - Written by Herself • Harriet Jacobs (AKA Linda Brent)
... big house of which she became mistress she had her difficulties at first. The other servants, especially the butler and the upper housemaid, resented her promotion and sought new situations. Bridie replaced them, replaced the whole staff with ...
— Lady Bountiful - 1922 • George A. Birmingham
... letter from Allenby." Allenby was the ex-sergeant. "He seems in a condition of trembling joy at the prospect of being our butler; and, what is more to the point, he says he has a niece whom he can recommend as a housemaid. So I have told him to instal her before we get to Homewood on Thursday. Hawkins has written a three-volume list of things he will require for the farm, but I haven't had time to study it yet. And Norah ...
— Captain Jim • Mary Grant Bruce
... the pockets unnoticed by the impertinent inquisitor or Andy, to whom he returned the book when he had gratified his senseless curiosity. Andy withdrew, Furlong retired to rest; and as it was in the grey of an autumnal morning he dressed himself, the paper still remained unobserved: so that the housemaid, on setting the room to rights, found it, and fancying Miss Augusta was the proper person to confide Mr. Furlong's stray papers to, she handed that young lady the manuscript which bore ...
— Handy Andy, Vol. 2 - A Tale of Irish Life • Samuel Lover
... an ardent book-lover Hares in Italy Hebrews of military age, their enviable immunity from conscription Henderson, Dr., an old tippler Heredity, speculations on Hermits in Italy Hippocrates Hohentwiel, mountain Homer Horace Housemaid, a ...
— Alone • Norman Douglas
... elapsed without any result from his espionage. He came to know by sight the various tenants, the two Chinese servants, and the solitary Irish housemaid, but as yet had no glimpse of the housekeeper. She evidently led a secluded life among her duties; it occurred to him that perhaps she went out, possibly to market, earlier than he came, or later, after he had left the office. In this ...
— Openings in the Old Trail • Bret Harte
... little plump things, With golden bodies and golden wings,— Mere fins for such solidities— Two cupids, in short, Of the regular sort, But the housemaid ...
— The Poetical Works of Thomas Hood • Thomas Hood
... form, and, so far as that was concerned, I might live for years. Cholera I had, with severe complications; and diphtheria I seemed to have been born with. I plodded conscientiously through the twenty-six letters, and the only malady I could conclude I had not got was housemaid's knee. ...
— Three Men in a Boa • Jerome K. Jerome
... course, the unjust effect of my original exaggeration of their length and breadth. The troops that I saw marching through the streets where we first lodged were fine, large men. I myself saw no choice in the different bodies, but the little housemaid much preferred the grenadier guards to the Scotch guards; perhaps there was one grenadier guard who lent beauty and grandeur to the rest. I think Scotch caps are much gayer than those busbies which the grenadiers ...
— London Films • W.D. Howells
... is no common housemaid, but a girl my mother brought up, who for love of me consents to do such work in the household as my ...
— Room Number 3 - and Other Detective Stories • Anna Katharine Green |
