"Marriageable" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Minnie a great deal, and came to the decision that in her the hopes of his life were centred. It might be that Minnie had no inkling of his intentions; she was so modest, so unlike the everyday girls who tittered and ogled with every marriageable man; on that very account he had made her his ideal. And Mrs. Clover would help him as a mother best knows how. The shock of learning that Mrs. Clover would do no such thing utterly confused his mind. He still longed for Minnie, yet seemed of a sudden hopelessly remote from her. He could not ...
— The Town Traveller • George Gissing
... these good folks were trying to amass as large a dowry as possible for their adored only child. Virginie was now of marriageable age, and the Poulains had already selected in their own minds the man they wished to see their son-in-law. He was owner of an hotel at Chantilly, and as he was young, healthy, and reputed kind and good-tempered, he had the right to expect a good dowry with ...
— The End of Her Honeymoon • Marie Belloc Lowndes
... Sheldon had fallen in love with her, instead of Annie Evalyn; for it began to be whispered in the upper circles that "Dr. Prague's pretty governess had captivated the fascinating Sheldon." Many ugly grimaces distorted the proper faces of marriageable daughters; and captious, ill-natured remarks were indulged in by disappointed maidens, who had beggared their fathers' pockets to purchase silks and satins, jewels and diamonds, to carry by storm the heart of ...
— Eventide - A Series of Tales and Poems • Effie Afton
... make his fortune in Paris, where he installed himself with his wife and his three daughters. And you can picture his bewilderment amidst those four women, terrible women ever busy with finery, receiving and paying visits, and running after marriageable men who flee away. It's ill-luck with a vengeance, the daily defeat of a poor devil of mediocre attainments, who imagined that his position as a deputy would facilitate money-making, and who is drowning himself in it all. And so how can Chaigneux have done otherwise than take money, he who ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... air, blending in so extraordinary a manner disdain and graciousness, Andre-Louis trembled for Aline. Here was a practised, irresistible wooer, whose bonnes fortunes were become a by-word, a man who had hitherto been the despair of dowagers with marriageable daughters, and the desolation of husbands ...
— Scaramouche - A Romance of the French Revolution • Rafael Sabatini
... that justice had to be done on earth as in heaven—that surely was an idea! They had their families and greater needs surely than that Indian: one had a mother to provide for, and what duty is more sacred than that of caring for a mother? Another had sisters, all of marriageable age; that other there had many little children who expected their daily bread and who, like fledglings in a nest, would surely die of hunger the day he was out of a job; even the very least of them had there, far away, ...
— The Reign of Greed - Complete English Version of 'El Filibusterismo' • Jose Rizal
... xlii. 9, etc., as quoted, or rather misquoted, in the Talmud), 'A daughter is a false treasure to her father: because of anxiety for her he cannot sleep at night; when she is young, for fear she should be seduced; in her virginity lest she play the harlot; in her marriageable age, lest she should not get married; and when married, lest she should be childless; and when grown old, ...
— Hebraic Literature; Translations from the Talmud, Midrashim and - Kabbala • Various
... are described as being the handsomest people in the world; the men being tall, sinewy and extraordinarily agile, while the women are slender and graceful, with perfectly modeled figures. The Nair girl is carefully chaperoned until she arrives at a marriageable age, say, fourteen or fifteen years, at which time some complaisant individual is selected, who goes through the marriage ceremony with her. As soon as the groom ties the tali, or marriage cord, about her neck, he is feasted and is then dismissed; the wife must never ...
— Religion and Lust - or, The Psychical Correlation of Religious Emotion and Sexual Desire • James Weir
... which he was subsequently invited. And somehow (that was the charm of him, or part or it), though he upset dinner-tables right and left, nobody really minded. Match-making London, which includes the larger part of that marriageable city, even when they were personally affronted and inconvenienced, smiled sympathetically when they heard what his movements on the night he ought to have dined with them had been. He did even worse than that; he had once, indeed, omitted to send the excuse of a subsequent ...
— Daisy's Aunt • E. F. (Edward Frederic) Benson
... sailed into a drawing-room that happened to possess a sprinkling of marriageable girls of various ages, from sixteen to—say sixty, he sailed into an ocean of smiles; but if Gerty were there, he appeared to notice no one else in the room. Whenever Sir Digby sailed out again, their tongues began to wag, both male and female ...
— As We Sweep Through The Deep • Gordon Stables
... and pure from the beginning of his days. He eschewed all licentiousness in word or deed while he was young; until he was of marriageable age, when he espoused the most noble lady, Lady Margaret, daughter of the King of Sicily, by whom he begat but one only son, the most noble and virtuous prince Edward; and with her and toward her he ...
— Henry the Sixth - A Reprint of John Blacman's Memoir with Translation and Notes • John Blacman
... itself! Even when, despite my efforts, something did transpire to excite an instant's question, she put it aside at once by giving an interpretation to it worthy of me. Now, what was I to do? Eudora had reached a marriageable age. She had seen but little of society, though by no means living a recluse. My cousin had watched carefully over her, and was to her, indeed, all a mother could be. I had remained perfectly tranquil, secure, as I supposed, in her affections. I thought I had but to wait till the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 7, Issue 41, March, 1861 • Various
... something very uncomfortable about the little boy!" Then would follow confidences as to the disastrous results of popish influences and Romanising tendencies; and an openly expressed conviction—more especially on the part of ladies blessed with daughters of marriageable age—that it would have been so very much better for many people if the late Sir Richard Calmady had looked nearer ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... with even moderate comfort. There was a way of ending it, obvious, I suppose, to everybody save myself, but seeming rather startling to my youthful mind. In six months now Victoria would be eighteen, and eighteen is a marriageable age. Victoria must be married; my mother and Hammerfeldt went husband-hunting. As soon as I heard of the scheme I was ready with brotherly sympathy, and even cherished the idea of interposing a ...
— The King's Mirror • Anthony Hope
... unacquainted with the Orient, thus to speak of this girl—in years a mere child—as one speaks of a mature woman, would seem strange, if not unnatural. But in the East, of course, at the age of ten a girl is counted marriageable; at the age of fourteen she is not infrequently the ...
— The Green Eyes of Bast • Sax Rohmer
... Betty, twinkling, "it's mighty lucky for Frank that there aren't any young men of marriageable age on the horizon ...
— The Outdoor Girls at Bluff Point - Or a Wreck and a Rescue • Laura Lee Hope
... Stephen said, battling against hopelessness, is a necessary evil. He wrote the play in the months that followed his father's death. If you hold that he, a greying man with two marriageable daughters, with thirtyfive years of life, nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita, with fifty of experience, is the beardless undergraduate from Wittenberg then you must hold that his seventyyear old mother is the lustful queen. ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... midst of her own people, who are a little different sort of New-Englanders from those of Miss Wilkins. They began to flock into the car, young maidens and old, mothers and grandmothers, and nice boys and girls, with a very, very few farmer youth of marriageable age, and more rustic and seafaring elders long past it, all in the Sunday best which they had worn to the graduation exercises at the High School, where we took them mostly up. The womenkind were in a nervous twitter of ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... has set his affection on a young lady,—that is, his real affection,—he ought to stick to it,—or die." Mr. Littlebird, who was the happy father of three or four married and marriageable daughters, opened his eyes with surprise. The young men who had come after his young ladies had been pressing enough, but they had not died. "Or die!" repeated Tribbledale. "It is what I should have done. ...
— Marion Fay • Anthony Trollope
... is just the reverse; your children suffer. They are growing up. Wanda and Ingrid are almost young women. In a year or two they will be at a marriageable age. How much longer do you suppose you can keep them in ignorance? Perhaps they know things already. I have sometimes surprised a look in Wanda's eyes which suggested that she saw ...
— The Dangerous Age • Karin Michaelis
... usual method, if an uncle isn't a blood uncle," said Anna-Rose. "We happened to have a marriageable aunt, and he married her. So we ...
— Christopher and Columbus • Countess Elizabeth Von Arnim
... led the Vine To wed her Elm; she spoused, about him twines Her marriageable arms, and with her brings Her dower, the adopted clusters, to adorn His ...
— The plant-lore & garden-craft of Shakespeare • Henry Nicholson Ellacombe
... she could report to him evil designs or plots, he would speak to the King in such wise that His Highness should give her a great dower and any lord would marry her. Or he would advance her cousin so that he should become marriageable. ...
— The Fifth Queen • Ford Madox Ford
... atmosphere driven upon it by the Northers, soon replaces the familiar dingy hue. The battered face of the stone image, at the side of the deserted church, has received a few more bruises since I was last here; for the marriageable young misses still most religiously believe that a stone thrown by a fair hand that shall hit the image full in the face, will obtain for the thrower a husband, and an advantageous settlement for life. This is a small city, or the poor image could ...
— Mexico and its Religion • Robert A. Wilson
... Lady Hamilton had a daughter, Christian, who was noted for her rare beauty and high spirit. But, unfortunately, she was a girl of strong passion, which, added to her self-will, caused her, when she had barely arrived at a marriageable age, to engage herself to one James Nimmo, the son of an Edinburgh merchant. Before many weeks had elapsed, the young couple were married, and the handsome young wife was settled in her new home in Edinburgh. Time wore on, the novelty of marriage died away, and ...
— Strange Pages from Family Papers • T. F. Thiselton Dyer
... the cares of money free! No human storms break off at land his sleep, No loud alarms of nature on the deep. From all the cheats of law he lives secure, Nor does th' affronts of palaces endure. Sometimes the beauteous marriageable vine He to the lusty bridegroom elm does join; Sometimes he lops the barren trees around, And grafts new life into the fruitful wound; Sometimes he shears his flock, and sometimes he Stores up the golden treasures of the bee. He sees his lowing herds walk o'er ...
— Cowley's Essays • Abraham Cowley
... shedding tears for his dismissal, the latter was intoxicated with joy by his elevation to the Chancellorship. The defeated judge, however, was not the man to submit without a struggle to his fate. By his second wife he had a daughter: she had reached a marriageable age and was heiress to a princely fortune. Coke resolved that she should marry Sir John Villiers, the Duke of Buckingham's eldest brother. Sir John was very poor, and the Duke of Buckingham all powerful. The union ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 2, July, 1850. • Various
... marriages on that earth, they related that a daughter, when she approaches a marriageable age, is kept at home, nor is she allowed to go out till the day she is to be married; and that she is then conducted to a certain connubial house, where several other marriageable young women are also brought; that they are there placed behind a screen, which reaches ...
— Earths In Our Solar System Which Are Called Planets, and Earths In The Starry Heaven Their Inhabitants, And The Spirits And Angels There • Emanuel Swedenborg
... wondered whose eyesight had been strained over those marvellous carnations, but to-night she did not give them a thought. She looked with grave dissatisfaction at her pale, nondescript face and nondescript hair and eyes. She did not know that only women with marriageable daughters saw her as she ...
— Red Pottage • Mary Cholmondeley
... are apt to talk about the chances of his marrying again. Before Mrs. Bugbee had been dead a twelve-month, rumors were as plenty as blackberries that the Doctor had been seen, late on Sunday evenings, leaving this house, or that house, the dwelling-place of some marriageable lady; and if he had finally espoused all whom the gossips reported he was going to marry, he would have had as many wives as any Turkish pasha or Mormon elder. It was doubtless true that he called at certain places ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 1, Issue 2, December, 1857 • Various
... ... Comite ... Katanay, and a confident opinion is expressed in a note to the citation that the witness was Magnus, Earl of Caithness. Now, Earl John's daughter was taken as a hostage on August 1, 1214, and, if she was then marriageable and was married at once, her eldest child could have been born about May 1215, and would attain twenty-one about May 1236, but to suppose her son of the name of Magnus to have been the ward for whom the Earldom of Caithness was being kept till 7th July 1235 ...
— Sutherland and Caithness in Saga-Time - or, The Jarls and The Freskyns • James Gray
... they care not at all. Already the idea that love is the only safe foundation for the home is beginning to take root in Japan. This changing ideal is bringing marked social changes. In some churches an introduction committee is appointed whose special function is to introduce marriageable persons and to hold social meetings where the young people may become acquainted. Here an important evolution in the social order is taking place before our eyes, but not a few of the world's wise men are ...
— Evolution Of The Japanese, Social And Psychic • Sidney L. Gulick
... designate the young couples thus constituted. This method of sexual selection, half playful, half serious, flourished especially in the region between England, the Moselle, and the Tyrol. The essential part of the custom lay in the public choice of a fitting mate for marriageable girls. Sometimes the question of fitness resolved itself into one of good looks; occasionally the matter was settled by lot. There was no compulsion about these unions; they were often little more than a game, though at times they involved a degree of immorality which caused ...
— The Task of Social Hygiene • Havelock Ellis
... regulations. The General Council subsequently restored her to the matronship for 20 years. Public opinion was at this time vividly aroused against the superiors of the convents, who, it was alleged, made serious inroads on society by inveigling the marriageable young women into taking the veil and to live unnatural lives. The public demanded that there should be a fixed limit to the number of nuns admitted. An ecclesiastic of high degree made strenuous efforts to rescue three nuns who had just been admitted, but the abbess persistently refused to surrender ...
— The Philippine Islands • John Foreman
... in a position to judge; they could not very well call on me situated as I am, a young—well, I will say, a marriageable—man, known to be wealthy; but I have no doubt when I am married they will call ...
— Spring Days • George Moore
... father give a present to his daughter—either marriageable or a prostitute [unmarriageable]—and then die, then she is to receive a portion as a child from the paternal estate, and enjoy its usufruct so long as she lives. Her estate belongs ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1 • Various
... working on the case nor my nephew have ever told us the date of birth of our Emily Leonard. We can, of course, obtain that, if it is not already in my nephew's possession, but without it we can't be sure that our cousin was of marriageable ...
— Ethel Morton's Enterprise • Mabell S.C. Smith
... the kind of thing that happened to ladies in the days when true womanliness consisted in knowing nothing accurately, and always taking advice. Efforts to improve themselves in some such way were common enough among marriageable maidens, and their mothers helped them to the best of their ability with equally happy hints. Because small feet were a beauty, therefore feet already in perfect proportion must be squeezed to reduce their size till they were all deformed; and because slenderness was considered ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand
... of our men are killed every karkam. Their wives, if of marriageable age, are expected to marry again. Then, too, you know that most Kondalian men have several wives. No matter how many wives or husbands may be linked together in that way, it merely means that after death their spirits ...
— The Skylark of Space • Edward Elmer Smith and Lee Hawkins Garby
... of the town were all divided into companies, as they called them, from five or six years of age, till they became marriageable. How these companies first originated or what were their exact regulations, I cannot say; though I belonging to nine occasionally mixed with several, yet always as a stranger, notwithstanding that I spoke their current ...
— Woman's Life in Colonial Days • Carl Holliday
... physiological comparison of human races, the similarity of periodic changes, and the average duration of life, are points upon which we can very briefly touch. Dr Prichard considers the different ages at which women are said to be marriageable in different climates to be very much exaggerated. He states his reasons, which do not appear to us to be very conclusive. The exceptional cases from the normal physiology would be more interesting, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 347, September, 1844 • Various
... that the governor had filled it with the daughters of the labouring poor, who were here instructed in weaving and spinning, and were brought up in industry and cleanliness, remaining in the house until of a marriageable age, when a portion equal to ten pounds sterling was given with each on the day of her nuptials. This and the other expenses of the house were furnished by a fund produced from the labour of the young people, who appeared all in the same dress, plain ...
— An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales, Vol. 1 • David Collins
... extortion of large presents. "It very often happens that everything is amicably settled except the greed of the priest, and he manages to find out some disagreement between the horoscopes of the marriageable parties to vent his anger. This trick has been sufficiently exposed, and the educated portion of this ultra-literary caste have in most cases discarded horoscopes and planetary conjunctions altogether. Under these restrictions the ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume IV of IV - Kumhar-Yemkala • R.V. Russell
... young ladies bound to their friends in India, and a lady returning with her two marriageable daughters to rejoin her husband, who was a colonel in the Bengal army. They were all pleasant people, the young ladies very lively, and on the whole the cabin of the Surprise contained a very agreeable party; and soon after they left Madeira, they had fine weather, smooth water, and ...
— The Mission; or Scenes in Africa • Captain Frederick Marryat
... In various parts of India attempts had been made, with more or less success, to put a stop to this inhuman practice. But not much impression had been made in Oudh, in consequence of the inordinately large dowries demanded from the Rajput fathers of marriageable daughters. Two hundred Talukdars attended Lord Canning's last durbar, and, in reply to his feeling and telling speech, declared their firm determination to do their best to ...
— Forty-one years in India - From Subaltern To Commander-In-Chief • Frederick Sleigh Roberts
... a woman of the world: follow her course through the season; one asks how she can survive it? or if she tumbles into a sleep at the end of August, and lies torpid until the spring? She goes into the world every night, and sits watching her marriageable daughters dancing till long after dawn. She has a nursery of little ones, very likely, at home, to whom she administers example and affection; having an eye likewise to bread-and-milk, catechism, music and French, ...
— The History of Pendennis, Vol. 2 - His Fortunes and Misfortunes, His Friends and His Greatest Enemy • William Makepeace Thackeray
... age they be given mental and moral instruction and fitted for a worthy vocation; that wholesome social relations be established by means of playgrounds, clubs, and societies; that industrial conditions be properly supervised, and young people be able to earn not alone a living but a marriageable wage; and that some means of social insurance be provided sufficient to prevent suffering and want in sickness and old age. In such an environment there is opportunity to realize the value that will ...
— Society - Its Origin and Development • Henry Kalloch Rowe
... regard for the gratification of my other appetites, I confess that this same vanity is by far the most poignant of the whole. I therefore surrendered myself freely to the soft allurements thrown in my way by such matronly denizens of Glasgow as were possessed of stock in the shape of marriageable daughters; and walked the more readily into their toils because every party, though nominally for the purposes of tea, wound up with a hot supper, and something hotter still by way of assisting ...
— Stories by English Authors: Scotland • Various
... would take the saving influence of a pretty large sum to give her a marriageable merit in ...
— Heart-Histories and Life-Pictures • T. S. Arthur
... Beltis, was probably based on the desire of attracting strangers to the capital, who would either bring with them valuable commodities or purchase the productions of the country. The public auction of marriageable virgins had most likely a similar intention. If we may believe Curtius, strangers might at any time purchase the gratification of any passion they might feel, from the avarice ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 4. (of 7): Babylon • George Rawlinson
... who had nine daughters, and they were all marriageable, but the youngest was the most beautiful. The father was a were-wolf. One day it came into his head: 'What is the good of having to support so many girls?' so he determined to put them all ...
— The Book of Were-Wolves • Sabine Baring-Gould
... gave her a scant remaining year in which to make up her mind. All girls who ran true to pattern were either snugly married or serenely teaching by the time they were twenty-five, and the choice was not always their own. There had been more marriageable maidens than eligible youths in the set, and it was rather, Jane told herself grimly, like a game of Musical Chairs—a gay, excited scramble, and some one always left out. Now, with the exodus of a few and the marrying of many, it had narrowed down to three of them—herself, Martin Wetherby, ...
— Jane Journeys On • Ruth Comfort Mitchell
... very well. The concert that evening pleased me exceedingly. Thank heaven that so good a fashion has found entrance among us. In this way we have a perfect bazaar for the marriageable girls, for had not this concert taken place where would you two have found an opportunity to make each other's acquaintance? Where else could you have caught ...
— Armenian Literature • Anonymous
... d'Estrees' attention. The Ricci, who had noticed the restrained empressement of his reception, pounced on the young man, taming her ways and gestures to what she supposed to be his English prudery, and produced an immediate effect upon him. Lord Magellan, who was only dumb with English marriageable girls, allowed himself to be amused, and threw himself into a low chair by the actress—a capture apparently for ...
— The Marriage of William Ashe • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... excited. The truth was he had a Clara of his own at home—a dead sister's child—very pretty, just about marriageable, and a good deal resembling, as he told me afterwards, ...
— The Experiences of a Barrister, and Confessions of an Attorney • Samuel Warren
... that of all single marriageable ladies who reached Oregon last season, two-thirds were married before ...
— Scientific American magazine, Vol. 2 Issue 1 • Various
... parcel, disclosing a beautiful bit of jade; not too costly a gift for a friend to accept, yet really a defiance of the convention which forbids marriageable maidens to receive from their male admirers presents less perishable ...
— The Law-Breakers and Other Stories • Robert Grant
... is told of a certain great lady who visited at the court of a reigning monarch on a secret matrimonial mission. The monarch had three daughters; the emperor of her own country had a marriageable son. Before overtures were made for an alliance, the lady was to see the three princesses and decide which one should be honored by the proposal. It was her whim to rely upon "the carriage test." She watched the young princesses as they alighted from the royal carriage. The ...
— Mother's Remedies - Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remedies from Mothers - of the United States and Canada • T. J. Ritter
... eighth surviving child, could not have been born before 1470. Her reputed husband, Alexander of Kintail, was then close upon 70 years of age, having died in 1488, bordering upon 90, when his alleged wife would barely have reached a marriageable age, and when her reputed son, Kenneth a Bhlair, pretty well advanced in years, had already fought the famous battle of Park. John of Killin, her alleged grandson, was born about 1480, when at most ...
— History Of The Mackenzies • Alexander Mackenzie
... city have married Spanish women; and some of the others, native Indian women. There are fifteen Spanish widows; also eight or ten girls who are marriageable, and some others who are ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, V7, 1588-1591 • Emma Helen Blair
... marriageable daughters, is constantly on the lookout for unwary young men, ignoring the fact of their want of brains, lack of breeding, and wholly regardless of the fact that they have no "family" connections, but she spreads her net and perhaps ...
— Bohemian Society • Lydia Leavitt
... man, "for my wife being dead and my daughter marriageable, she keeps house for me; and having a sweetheart betrothed a year ago she hath been laying aside plenishing gear and women's dainty gewgaws. So these I took one by one, beginning with a mirror of polished brass, and made as if I would dash them in pieces if she discovered not where the chain ...
— Red Axe • Samuel Rutherford Crockett
... So many marriageable young women were among the guests, it was very probable they would all leave as brides; for even the melancholy Magdalene a suitor waited there—the rich Berezowski. Father Peter sighed deeply—if he could only see her, just ...
— Peter the Priest • Mr Jkai
... She was wanting in distinction, but, as Isabel had said, she was brave: she went into cages, she flourished lashes, like a spangled lion-tamer. He had not supposed her to be capable of vulgar arts, but these last words struck him as a false note. When a marriageable young woman urges matrimony on an unencumbered young man the most obvious explanation of her conduct is not ...
— The Portrait of a Lady - Volume 1 (of 2) • Henry James
... being considered the marriageable age for a man, it is not usual for persons below that age to adopt an heir; yet an infant at the point of death may adopt a person older than himself, that the family line ...
— Tales of Old Japan • Algernon Bertram Freeman-Mitford
... he had brought up a ton or two of virgin gold. Every remark he made delighted his hearers and compelled their applause; he overheard people say he was exceedingly bright—they were chiefly mammas and marriageable young ladies. He found that some of his good things were being repeated about the town. Whenever he heard of an instance of this kind, he would keep that particular remark in mind and analyze it at home in private. At first he could not ...
— The Gilded Age, Part 4. • Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) and Charles Dudley Warner
... course, much curiosity in Adams concerning him, and the curiosity was not, generally speaking, of a complimentary tendency. Some young and marriageable girls esteemed him very handsome, but the majority of the people said that he was odd and stuck up, as his mother had been before him. He led a quiet life with his books, and he had a room on the ground-floor fitted up as a studio. In there he made things of clay and plaster, as the Adams people ...
— Quaint Courtships • Howells & Alden, Editors
... thoughtlessness on the part of the husband. This is partly due to defective education during childhood in regard to the sexes. The training of boys and girls in this matter is very different. Knowledge pertaining to the sexual life is talked over very freely among boys, so that by the time the boy is of a marriageable age he is pretty well posted. With girls it is quite different. It would be considered very immodest for a girl to discuss such matters. She does not feel free even to talk with her mother or other adviser, and so she goes to the altar ignorant ...
— Herself - Talks with Women Concerning Themselves • E. B. Lowry
... positive declaration, she often wondered. She knew that she was attractive to most people; babies and old men and women, servants and her associates in the office, strangers on ferryboats and sick people in hospitals alike responded to her friendliness and gaiety. But none of these was marriageable, of course, and the moment Susan met a person who was, a subtle change crept over her whole personality, veiled the bright charm, made the friendliness stiff, the gaiety forced. Susan, like all other girls, was not herself with the young unmarried men of her acquaintance; she was too ...
— Saturday's Child • Kathleen Norris
... the play. There is no proof there that Shylock is old, but a single line, 'Bassanic and old Shylock, both stand forth,'—which does not imply that he is infirm with age—and the circumstance that he has a daughter marriageable, which does not imply that he is old at all. It would be too much to say that his body should be made crooked and deformed to answer to his mind, which is bowed down and warped with prejudices and passion. That he has but one idea, is not true; he has more ideas than ...
— Characters of Shakespeare's Plays • William Hazlitt
... considering her,—became the richest heiress of her day, in the New World. Not improbably, this circumstance wrought a very material change in the public estimation; and, had the mother and child remained here, little Pearl, at a marriageable period of life, might have mingled her wild blood with the lineage of the devoutest Puritan among them all. But, in no long time after the physician's death, the wearer of the scarlet letter disappeared, and Pearl along with her. For many years, though a vague report would now and ...
— The Scarlet Letter • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... Poles were enrolled in the armies by force; and every town and village in Posnania was taxed at a stated number of marriageable girls, who were sent to stock the districts of the Prussian dominions depopulated by the long wars. Each girl's portion was to be a bed, two pigs, a cow, and three ducats of gold. It is said that one town alone was obliged ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, v. 13 • Various
... beauty and a wit, was a great favourite at Court, and writers of the day declared her to be the cleverest woman in all England. Think of what golden fortunes fell to the three Warren girls, who were now of marriageable age! ...
— Greenwich Village • Anna Alice Chapin
... this prophecy, he appointed, that all the men of the house and family of David, who were marriageable, and not married, should bring their several ...
— The Forbidden Gospels and Epistles, Complete • Archbishop Wake
... her father, who seems a rather bad type of adventurer, gave free access to her acquaintance to any man who might turn out to be marriageable. He introduced me to her as soon as he saw I had been attracted by her looks, and I used to talk to her a good deal. Her mother, it seems, died in her childhood; and she was put to school at a convent, where she remained until ...
— A Beautiful Alien • Julia Magruder
... time, had been dissipated; his family had grown larger and was a constant drain upon his meagre resources, while his income appeared to diminish as his expenses increased. Besides, Itzig had a daughter who was now of a marriageable age, and he was obliged to toil and save to provide a dowry. Beile was unattractive and uninteresting, and Itzig did not conceal from himself the fact that without a dowry it might prove difficult to bring ...
— Rabbi and Priest - A Story • Milton Goldsmith
... had come to Paris in search of a husband. How ever could that little, thin, insipidly fair girl, with her weak hands, her light, vacant eyes, and her clear silly voice, who was exactly like a hundred thousand marriageable dolls, have picked up that intelligent, clever young fellow? Can anyone understand these things? No doubt he had hoped for happiness, simple, quiet and long-enduring happiness, in the arms of a good, tender and faithful woman; he ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Vol. 1 (of 8) - Boule de Suif and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant
... deserted. Among those that died of the pest were the marshal, his lady, and his son, besides brothers and nephews and kinsfolk in great number; whereby of his entire household there were left only one of his daughters, now marriageable, and a few servants, among them Perrot. Now Perrot being a man of such notable prowess, the damsel, soon after the pestilence had spent itself, took him, with the approval and by the advice of the few ...
— The Decameron, Volume I • Giovanni Boccaccio
... servants of Arthur, that is now King of the Britons, come to ask for my daughter as his wife. That you are Duke of Logreus you tell me, and I concede a duke is all very well: but I expect you in return to concede a king takes precedence, with any man whose daughter is marriageable. But to-morrow or the next day it may be, you and I will talk over your reward more privately. Meanwhile it is very queer and very frightened you are looking, to be the champion ...
— Jurgen - A Comedy of Justice • James Branch Cabell
... matrimonial guarantee. Had it been feasible, Mr. Farmiloe would have brought a wife with him from the town where he had lived for the past few years, but he was in the difficult position of knowing not a single marriageable female to whom he could address himself with hope or with self-respect. Natural shyness had always held him aloof from reputable women; he felt that he could not recommend himself to them—he who had such an unlucky aptitude for saying the wrong word or keeping silence when speech ...
— The House of Cobwebs and Other Stories • George Gissing
... schoolmaster designed to remain only a lord of the ferrule, or casting the insignia of his office behind him, to seek higher things, he was never slow in adopting it. Among his scholars, there were generally half-a-dozen or more young women—marriageable daughters of substantial men; and from this number he selected, courted, and espoused, some healthy, buxom girl, the heiress of a considerable plantation or a quantity of "wild land." He always sought these two requisites combined—for he was equally fond of a fine person and handsome estate. Upon ...
— Western Characters - or Types of Border Life in the Western States • J. L. McConnel
... The choice of the bride and the nuptial ceremonies are most rudimentary. When a wife and her husband have decided upon the marriage of a son, the brother who possesses the right of choice, pays a visit to a neighboring family in which there is a marriageable daughter. ...
— The Unknown Life of Jesus Christ - The Original Text of Nicolas Notovitch's 1887 Discovery • Nicolas Notovitch
... the little Princess Olva thirteen. They would be marriageable in six years. As far as anybody could tell, they were both quite happy about the marriage which had been arranged for ...
— Ministry of Disturbance • Henry Beam Piper
... habitation, his sphere of action, nay, the very nature and quality of that action. He ceased to be a free agent; it might almost be said, that it relieved him of personal responsibility. Even his marriage was determined for him; from time to time all the men and women who had attained marriageable age were summoned to the great squares of their respective towns, and the hands of the couples joined by the presiding magistrate. The consent of parents was required, and the preference of the parties was supposed to be consulted, but owing to the barriers imposed by the prescribed age of ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol XII. - Modern History • Arthur Mee
... congregational prayers, and as they were wealthy and prosperous they found favour in the eyes of their poorer neighbours. Thus it happened that when Haji Ali let it be known that he desired to find a wife, there was a bustle in the villages among the parents with marriageable daughters, and, though he was a man well past middle life, Haji Ali found a wide range ...
— In Court and Kampong - Being Tales and Sketches of Native Life in the Malay Peninsula • Hugh Clifford
... ye hold me yet for child, Hear yet once more the story of the child. For, mother, there was once a King, like ours. The prince his heir, when tall and marriageable, Asked for a bride; and thereupon the King Set two before him. One was fair, strong, armed— But to be won by force—and many men Desired her; one good lack, no man desired. And these were the conditions of the King: That save he won the first by force, ...
— Idylls of the King • Alfred, Lord Tennyson
... felt it his bounden duty to pay her some attention. He was interested to find her so young a wife, and so pretty, though it was only a respectful interest. There was nothing of the dashing lady's man about him. He had respect for the married state, and thought only of some pretty marriageable girls ...
— Sister Carrie • Theodore Dreiser
... returned home, I found myself, quite unexpectedly, a lion. All the neighbors flocked in to see the young man who'd been to college, and in the evening a dozen young ladies—marriageable young ladies—called on me. I tried to have a pleasant time; and should have had, if I had n't been pulled and pushed, and made a puppet-show of; made to go through all my college exercises, to please the pride of my immediate relatives, and minister to the ...
— Town and Country, or, Life at Home and Abroad • John S. Adams
... of their wish took the maidens' breath away. They looked from one to the other without a word; and the Bishop, in more courtly language, explained that amid all these contending parties he could not but judge it wiser to put the King's two marriageable sisters out of reach, either of a violent abduction, or of being the cause of a savage contest, in either case ending in demands that would be either impossible or mischievous for the Crown to grant, and ...
— Two Penniless Princesses • Charlotte M. Yonge
... circles, where there is much time for idle gossip, the most intimate secrets of an important household are often bandied about when the black coffee is being served. The marriageable young men of Morovenia had learned of the calamity in Count Malagaski's family. They knew that Kalora weighed less than one hundred and twenty pounds. She was tall, lithe, slender, sinuous, willowy, hideous. The fact that poor old Count Malagaski had made many ...
— The Slim Princess • George Ade
... who lived on his income at Vouvray (Touraine), about 1821; a cunning countryman, father of a marriageable daughter named Claire; was challenged by Felix Gaudissart in 1831, for having played a practical joke on that illustrious traveling merchant, and fought a bloodless ...
— Repertory Of The Comedie Humaine, Complete, A — Z • Anatole Cerfberr and Jules Franois Christophe
... what had happened, since he had egotistically kept away from his relatives for his own peace's sake. But he was more particularly won over by his grandniece Andree, now a delicious young girl well-nigh eighteen years of age, and therefore marriageable. She alone sufficed to attract him to the house, and he was greatly distressed by the dangerous state of abandonment in which ...
— Fruitfulness - Fecondite • Emile Zola
... mothers with marriageable daughters display their wares. But of all the number, and many of them were passing fair, Mr. James Thornton cast longing eyes on only one, and that was Nancy Warren. Frankly, he wanted to get married, settle down, perhaps go into politics when he had time; he wanted a ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905 • Various
... only of herself. Deb was getting old, and she deserved to suffer anyway; but what had Frances done to be deprived of her birth-right, of all her chances of success in life? Eighteen, and no coming out—beautiful, and nobody to see it—marriageable, and out of the track of all the eligible men, amongst whom she might have had her pick and choice. She had reason for her passionate rebelliousness against this state of things; for, while a pretty face is theoretically its own fortune anywhere, we ...
— Sisters • Ada Cambridge
... of them," replied his aunt. "My cousin has a daughter who is just of the marriageable age, and as nice a girl as you could wish. Her people would be only too glad to secure ...
— The Hungry Stones And Other Stories • Rabindranath Tagore
... Whitsunday, the seventh Sunday after Easter; but it is called Trinity Sunday, and the next day is "the Day of Spirits," or Pentecost. On this Pentecost Day a curious sight was formerly to be seen in St. Petersburg. Mothers belonging to the merchant class arrayed their marriageable daughters in their best attire; hung about their necks not only all the jewels which formed a part of their dowries, but also, it is said, the silver ladles, forks, and spoons; and took them to the Summer ...
— Russian Rambles • Isabel F. Hapgood
... "Lady of the Mercians,'' the eldest child of Alfred the Great, was educated with her brother Edward at her father's court. As soon as she was of marriageable age (probably about A.D. 886), she was married to AEthelred, earl of Mercia to whom Alfred entrusted the control of Mercia. On the accession of her brother Edward, AEthelflaed and her husband continued to hold Mercia. In 907 they fortified Chester, and in 909 and 910 ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... French were driven forth of Sicily there dwelt at Palermo one of our Florentines, that was an apothecary, Bernardo Puccini by name, a man of great wealth, that by his lady had an only and exceeding fair daughter, then of marriageable age. Now King Pedro of Arragon, being instated in the sovereignty of the island, did at Palermo make with his barons marvellous celebration thereof; during which, as he tilted after the Catalan fashion, it befell that Bernardo's daughter, Lisa by name, being with other ladies at a window, did ...
— The Decameron, Vol. II. • Giovanni Boccaccio
... nine-days' sensation and then people forgot all about it. Society mothers with marriageable daughters said that it was scandalous for a man of wealth and position to throw himself away on a penniless nobody, and malicious tongues freely predicted that before long the railroad man would regret the ...
— Bought and Paid For - From the Play of George Broadhurst • Arthur Hornblow
... the son and grandson of a chief, but he could not claim any credit for the deeds of his forbears. He had not only to guard their good name but achieve one for himself. This he had set out to do, and he did well. He was now of marriageable age with a war record, and admitted to the council, yet he did not seem to trouble himself at all about a wife. His was strictly a bachelor career. Meanwhile, as is apt to be the case, his parents had thought much ...
— Indian Heroes and Great Chieftains • [AKA Ohiyesa], Charles A. Eastman
... coveted, ached for, angled for, wept for, had by her judicious management become subdued to her purpose; and in addition to the pleasure of marrying the man she loved, Laura had the joy of feeling herself hated by the mothers of all the marriageable ...
— A Changed Man and Other Tales • Thomas Hardy
... have the run of their boudoirs and drawing-rooms, much as if he were a little lion-dog; they counted him quite "safe." He made love to the married women, to be sure; but he was quite certain not to run away with the marriageable daughters. ...
— Under Two Flags • Ouida [Louise de la Ramee]
... been accustomed to regard her as a sister; and she has become marriageable, without there having been any opportunity for your regarding her as so peculiarly sacred, Dick!" returned Sir Gervaise, half suppressing a smile as he threw a quiet glance at ...
— The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper
... it is the unceasing object of the department charged with its administration to extend its efficiency. There is no class of labourers or servants, but all who are required to assist or control the machinery are found in the children, from the time they leave the care of their mothers to the marriageable age, which they place at sixteen for the Gy-ei (the females), twenty for the Ana (the males). These children are formed into bands and sections under their own chiefs, each following the pursuits in which he is most pleased, ...
— The Coming Race • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... will be her pride to have cut into a brilliant under her own eye, and to show the world for its admiration and her own reflected glory. Mrs. Clymer Ketchum had taken the entire inventory of Myrtle's natural endowments before the interview was over. She had no marriageable children, and she was thinking what a killing bait Myrtle would be at one ...
— The Guardian Angel • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... from the State Department. Respect for rank is the last infirmity even of noble republican minds, and it oils the wheels of the progress of those who possess it. An American widow of my later acquaintance, a lady of two marriageable daughters and small social pretensions in her own country, toured Europe with success and distinction, getting all the best accommodations and profoundest obeisances by the simple device of placing the word "Lady" before her modest signature in the hotel registers. She was a lady, of course, and ...
— Hawthorne and His Circle • Julian Hawthorne
... Colonel, who lived at some distance, near the Military School, and who, as the weather was fine, wished to walk home and avoid the expense of a cab, left with his three marriageable daughters, and Amedee in his turn took ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... at a pretentious reception in the Walled City, current events were being commented upon. There were present a lot of old women and maidens of marriageable age, the wives and daughters of government employees, dressed in loose gowns, fanning themselves and yawning. Among the men, who, like the women, showed in their faces their education and origin, was an ...
— The Social Cancer - A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... buggy. He lived in Oklahoma, Indian Territory, at the time of his story. Billy was married to a woman who must have had some attractiveness, for a journeying pedler, who periodically passed through the region, formed a liaison with her. There was at that time a daughter, who had just reached marriageable age. The pedler was wont practically to put Billy out of his own house during his sojourns, and usurped his place as master of the household. At one time he secured Billy's conviction on some minor offense, and had him jailed for six months. ...
— The Subterranean Brotherhood • Julian Hawthorne
... cultivated the gift by diligent practice. As the sight of a tendrilled vine suggests the need and fitness of a trellis, and a stray glove invariably brings to mind the thought of its absent fellow, so every disengaged spinster of marriageable age was an appeal—pathetic and sure—to the dear woman's helpful sympathy, and her whole soul went out in compassion over such "nice" and an appropriated bachelors as crossed her orbit, like blind and ...
— At Last • Marion Harland
... recently given her regarding a certain very wealthy man named George Sherrard, an eligible bachelor who lived in one of the most expensive flats in Park Lane, and who was being generally sought after by mothers with marriageable daughters. In many cases mothers—and especially young, good-looking widows with daughters "on their hands"—are too prone to try and get rid of them "because my daughter makes me look so old," as they whisper to their intimates of their ...
— Mademoiselle of Monte Carlo • William Le Queux
... Tigara in the simple art of cooking. At first the girls viewed it in the line of a novelty, but when they noticed the eligible young men picking out the cooks for their wives, it was astonishing to see what zeal all the marriageable girls suddenly developed. As soon as they had learned to turn a slapjack, or to make a cup of coffee, they would, on returning to their homes in the evening, pass around among the young men, bragging of what good cooks they were; or if a whale ...
— Short Sketches from Oldest America • John Driggs
... themselves, that he to whom the lot should fall should have Helen to his wife, but should be obliged to assist in procuring another for his friend. The lot fell upon Theseus, who conveyed her to Aphidnae, not being yet marriageable, and delivered her to one of his allies, called Aphidnus, and, having sent his mother Aethra after to take care of her, desired him to keep them so secretly, that none might know where they were; ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... who witnesses their marriage. The same course is followed as regards separating, only that the Commissary, after freeing the unhappy pair, inscribes the man afresh on the celibate list and the woman on the register of marriageable persons, notifying each of the obligation to find another partner within six months. In case children have been born from their union, they are either delivered to the custody of the particular parent desiring them or else divided between ...
— The Red Conspiracy • Joseph J. Mereto
... thinking fast. Laddie was a big man. Men were strong on purpose so they could bear things. He loved the Princess so, and he didn't know whether she loved him or not; and every marriageable man in three counties was just aching for the chance to court her, and I didn't feel that he ...
— Laddie • Gene Stratton Porter
... make me think that you did voluntarily—what you did. You lied to me. I thought so then. I know it now. You were flattered and bullied, cajoled and coerced—a girl scarcely older than my sister Edith, whom we consider a child, whose father is distressed to even think of her as marriageable. It is time to stop feeling repentance for sins you never committed, and to look at yourself sanely and happily—if you must be introspective at all. No braver, lovelier, purer woman ever lived, or one more ...
— The Old Gray Homestead • Frances Parkinson Keyes
... are also coming to be thought a convenient place for rich fathers to dump their incorrigible sons and marriageable daughters for a few years. And in some sections these rich fathers are increasing in numbers at an alarming rate. The presence of all such people (they can not be called students) in various classes is a drag, and the wheels ...
— On the Firing Line in Education • Adoniram Judson Ladd
... crime at the North, which are exhibited by the census, will help to explain the seeming mystery that the South multiplies by natural increase faster than the North. In 1845, according to her statistical report, Massachusetts had seven-eighths of her marriageable young women working in factories under male overseers. The census of 1840 shows that, with fewer adults, Virginia had one hundred thousand more children than Massachusetts. In the census of 1850 the proportion in favor of Virginia is ...
— Cotton is King and The Pro-Slavery Arguments • Various
... Seffy and Sally had grown to a marriageable age without anything happening. Seffy had become inordinately shy, while the coquettish Sally had accepted the attentions of Sam Pritz, the clerk at the store, as an antagonist more worthy of her, and in a ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume II. (of X.) • Various
... midway between France and England in its care for its womenfolk. French parents consider marriage the proper career for a woman, and with logical good sense set themselves from the day of a girl's birth to provide a dowry for her. When she is of a marriageable age they provide the husband. They will make great sacrifices to establish a daughter in prosperity, and they leave nothing to chance. We leave everything to chance, and the idea of marriage made by bargain ...
— Home Life in Germany • Mrs. Alfred Sidgwick |
