"Virtuoso" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... vulgar feet have trod, But give the vigorous fancy room. For when, like stupid alchymists, you try To fix this nimble god, This volatile mercury, The subtile spirit all flies up in fume; Nor shall the bubbled virtuoso find More than fade insipid mixture left behind.[6] While thus I write, vast shoals of critics come, And on my verse pronounce their saucy doom; The Muse like some bright country virgin shows Fallen by mishap among a knot of beaux; ...
— The Poems of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Volume I (of 2) • Jonathan Swift
... who produced pastorals, and prayed Mr. Urban to print them. Q came in the corner of the page with a query. R arrogated to himself the right of reprehending every one, who differed from him. S sighed and sued in song. T told an old tale, and when he was wrong U used to set him right; V was a virtuoso. W warred against Warburton. X excelled in Algebra. Y yearned for immortality in rhyme, and Z in his zeal was always ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... by the last proprietor, Northmour's uncle, a silly and prodigal virtuoso—presented little signs of age. It was two stories in height, Italian in design, surrounded by a patch of garden in which nothing had prospered but a few coarse flowers; and looked, with its shuttered windows, ...
— The Lock And Key Library - Classic Mystery And Detective Stories, Modern English • Various
... in its shadings and minor attractions, it is adapted only for concerts and chamber music." This dissertation closes as follows: "In order to judge a virtuoso, one must listen to him while at the clavichord, not while at ...
— How the Piano Came to Be • Ellye Howell Glover
... room, ran across to us, and, kneeling down before the Baroness, begged her, as she took both her hands and clasped them to her bosom, "Oh, dear Baroness! darling Seraphina! now you must sing too." To this she replied, "Whatever are you thinking about, Adelheid? How could I dream of letting our virtuoso friend hear such poor singing as mine?" And she looked so lovely, as, like a shy good child, she cast down her eyes and blushed, timidly contending with the desire to sing. That I too added my entreaties ...
— Weird Tales. Vol. I • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... the affair. "Yes, sir, I did; and, if it's worth your care, Ask Mr. Such-a-one, he told it me. But, by the bye, 'twas two black crows—not three." Resolved to trace so wondrous an event, Whip, to the third, the virtuoso went; "Sir"—and so forth. "Why, yes; the thing is fact, Though, in regard to number, not exact; It was not two black crows—'twas only one; The truth of that you may depend upon; The gentleman himself told me the case." "Where may I find him?" "Why, in such a place." Away goes he, and, ...
— The Book of Humorous Verse • Various
... are still rich in; seals, gems, small figures of bronze, mediaeval carvings in ivory; things which had been obtained at little cost, yet might have borne no inconsiderable value in the museum of a virtuoso. ...
— The Marble Faun, Volume I. - The Romance of Monte Beni • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... present day he is underestimated. Great progress will have to be made in taste and in the appreciation of music before it will be possible for Chopin's work to become popular." Heine also wrote that his favorite pianist was Chopin, "who, however," he adds, "is more of a composer than a virtuoso. When Chopin is at the piano I forget all about the technical side of playing and become absorbed in the sweet profundity, the sad loveliness of his creations, which are as deep as they are elegant. Chopin is the great inspired tone-poet who properly should be named ...
— Chopin and Other Musical Essays • Henry T. Finck
... of tint and grouping, too often neglected by the dim grocers of those forgotten days. The wares were shown plainly, but shown not so much as an old grocer would have shown his stock, but rather as an educated virtuoso would have shown his treasures. The tea was stored in great blue and green vases, inscribed with the nine indispensable sayings of the wise men of China. Other vases of a confused orange and purple, less rigid and dominant, more humble and dreamy, stored symbolically the tea of India. A row ...
— The Napoleon of Notting Hill • Gilbert K. Chesterton
... in former days with Guy. A Parisian Castilian, more Parisian than Spanish, he spoke with exquisite finish the classic tongue, and with the free-and-easy manner of a frequenter of the boulevards, chatted in the slang of the pavement or of the greenroom; he was an eminent virtuoso and collector, an author when the desire seized him, but only in his own interest, liberal in his opinions, lavish in his disposition, attractive in his manners; an eager traveller, he had, at thirty years of age, seen all that was to be seen, he had visited India and Japan, drunk camel's ...
— His Excellency the Minister • Jules Claretie
... been built by the last proprietor, Northmour's uncle, a silly and prodigal virtuoso - presented little signs of age. It was two storeys in height, Italian in design, surrounded by a patch of garden in which nothing had prospered but a few coarse flowers; and looked, with its shuttered windows, not like a house that had been deserted, ...
— New Arabian Nights • Robert Louis Stevenson
... and the next day their statuetts were on exhibition. Mr. Clay expressed his satisfaction for his own in an autograph letter. Another miniature in relief, full length, of Chief Justice Marshall, from a portrait by Waugh, was pronounced by Mr. Bullock, an English virtuoso, as equal to anything produced by Thorwaldsen. But being surrounded by medical men, who, like men of all professions, regard their own as more important than any other, Dr. Garlick was induced to turn his ...
— Cleveland Past and Present - Its Representative Men, etc. • Maurice Joblin
... satisfied with some of his foreign investments; and Sir Joseph's "dear Richard" was the very man to give him a little sound advice. The three laid their heads together in a corner. Launce (watching them) slyly pressed Natalie's hand. A renowned "virtuoso" had arrived, and was thundering on the piano. The attention of the guests generally was absorbed in the performance. A fairer chance of sending Launce for the fan could not possibly have offered itself. While the financial discussion was still proceeding, ...
— Miss or Mrs.? • Wilkie Collins
... his virtuoso's whim from his ancestors. His great-grandfather was certified by Johnson in his life of Addison to be a gentleman 'eminent for curiosity and literature,' and though his grandfather, the Commodore, who lives for ever in our history as the man ...
— In the Name of the Bodleian and Other Essays • Augustine Birrell
... "Yes, a shaving virtuoso; really a comical and strange character, and has oddities enough to compensate one for the debasement of talking with a ...
— Devereux, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... high-pitched, vacant little laugh, which she used to fill in gaps in conversation much as a distinguished virtuoso might interlude his own important efforts with selections ...
— The Wheel of Life • Ellen Anderson Gholson Glasgow
... bravura pieces, the author limits himself only by the range of the virtuoso, which by definition far transcends the modesty of nature. If my Russians seem more Muscovite than any Russian, and my English people more insular than any Briton, I will not plead, as I honestly ...
— Great Catherine • George Bernard Shaw
... who was loyal, ardent, and hostile to all subtleties. He painted some fine works, like the Buveur d'absinthe and the Vieux musicien. They show the influence of Courbet, but already the blacks and the greys have an original and superb quality; they announce a virtuoso of ...
— The French Impressionists (1860-1900) • Camille Mauclair
... but birds' last notes was to be heard. It was strange and sweet. I thought of you in a sea-breeze with felicity. At about eight I heard little feet racing along the Larch Path, and Baby came to view. She read aloud to me some of your "Virtuoso's Collection," and then to bed, celestial.—A letter came from Mr. Bennoch. He wails like Jeremiah over our war, and longs for a letter from you. He sends cartes de visite of himself and his wife. He looks uncommonly dumpy, with a pair of winged whiskers of astounding effect, and the expression of ...
— Memories of Hawthorne • Rose Hawthorne Lathrop
... under my good friend's care is very pleasant. It is placed among meadows, washed by a clear trout-stream, and flanked on both sides with downs. His house, indeed, would not much attract the admiration of the virtuoso. He built it himself, and it is remarkable only for its plainness; with which the furniture so well agrees, that there is no one thing in it that may not be absolutely necessary, except books, and the prints of Mr. Hogarth, whom he calls a ...
— Amelia (Complete) • Henry Fielding
... It's going like lightning! Woman has got to be a virtuoso in her job. So must we all, each in his job, if life isn't to turn to ...
— Erdgeist (Earth-Spirit) - A Tragedy in Four Acts • Frank Wedekind
... to see progress. He was like a musical person beginning to learn an instrument; for, just as surely as there are scales to be run upon the piano before your virtuoso can weave music, binding the gallery gods with delicious meshes of sound, so in prose-writing there must be scales run, fingerings worked out, and harmonies mastered. For in a page of lo bello stile you will ...
— IT and Other Stories • Gouverneur Morris
... Eleanor Savelli, the self-willed, temperamental daughter of an Italian violin virtuoso, furnished much of the interest of the book. The efforts of Grace and her chums to create in this girl a healthy, wholesome enjoyment for High School life, and her repudiation of their friendship, and subsequent attempts to revenge herself for ...
— Grace Harlowe's Senior Year at High School - or The Parting of the Ways • Jessie Graham Flower
... of Oratorio, Orchestra, Chamber Music, etc., where the end has been more to get at the intrinsic worth and beauty of the music, than to go into fashionable raptures about some new-come singer or solo-playing virtuoso. Yet virtuosodom and the Italian opera come in to reap an annual harvest here too, and have and long will have their zealous party of admirers. Were Opera an organized home industry among us, as much as other forms of music,—were there some meaning in the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I, No. 1, Nov. 1857 • Various
... eye-glasses and hair tucked behind his ears, was the well-known, all-round musician, Wenby Simmons—otherwise known as "Pussy Me-ow" —a name associated in some way with the strings of his violin. This virtuoso played in the orchestra at the Winter Garden, and occupied the ...
— The Fortunes of Oliver Horn • F. Hopkinson Smith
... poetic home was built upon all the philistine virtues. Mrs Jameson laughed at their "miraculous prudence and economy"; and Mrs Browning herself laughed, a little, at her husband's punctilious rigour in paying his debts,—his "horror of owing five shillings for five days"; Browning, a born virtuoso in whatever he undertook, abhorring a neglected bill as he did an easy rhyme, and all other symbols of that slovenly Bohemia which came nearest, on the whole, to his conception of absolute evil. They lived at first in much seclusion, seeking no society, and unknown alike ...
— Robert Browning • C. H. Herford
... one and the same moment. Possibly Fortune was kinder to us than we dreamed. The mouth-organ then remained the sole music machine in all that immense area. I did not feel equal to the position of organist but Steward boldly took up the study, and practised so faithfully that he became a real virtuoso. ...
— A Canyon Voyage • Frederick S. Dellenbaugh
... was afforded of this gentleman did not lessen my interest in him; increased it rather; it also served to make the extraordinary didoes of which he had been the virtuoso and I the audience more than ever profoundly inexplicable. My glimpse of him in the lighted doorway had given me the vaguest impression of his appearance, but one afternoon—a few days after my interview with Miss Apperthwaite—I was starting for the office and met him ...
— Beasley's Christmas Party • Booth Tarkington
... have portraits of Delphine by Chopin himself, not drawn with pencil or crayon, or painted with brush, but her face as his soul saw it and transformed it into music. Listen to a great virtuoso play his two concertos. Ask yourself which of the six movements is the most beautiful. Surely your choice will fall on the slow movement of the second—dedicated to the Countess Delphine Potocka, and one of the composer's most tender and exquisite productions; or play over ...
— The Loves of Great Composers • Gustav Kobb
... slightingly of his accomplishment in oil-painting and to seem to prefer his drawings and pastels to his pictures. We have seen that he was a supremely able technician in his pot-boiling days and that the color and handling of his early pictures were greatly admired by so brilliant a virtuoso as Diaz. But this "flowery manner" would not lend itself to the expression of his new aims and he had to invent another. He did so stumblingly at first, and the earliest pictures of his grand style have a certain harshness and ruggedness of surface and heaviness of ...
— Artist and Public - And Other Essays On Art Subjects • Kenyon Cox
... absolute necessity; but it is craftsmanship which is not only acquired by practice, but which is actually there from the first, just as Mozart, as a child of eight, could play passages which would tax the skill of the most accomplished virtuoso. It was not learnt by practice, that swift correspondence of eye and hand, any more than the little swallow learns to fly; it knows it all already, and is merely finding ...
— Joyous Gard • Arthur Christopher Benson
... three of the principal collections, the Barberini, the Sacchetti, and Ottoboni: the latter belonged to the cardinal who died in the conclave. I must give you an instance of his generosity, or rather ostentation. When Lord Carlisle was here last year, who is a great virtuoso, he asked leave to see the cardinal's collection of cameos and intaglios. Ottoboni gave leave, and ordered the person who showed them to observe which my lord admired most. My lord admired many: they were all sent him the next morning. He sent the cardinal back a fine gold repeater; ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole
... the first time over my great isolation, in a place where everybody was a stranger to me, and did not even understand my speech, at once all thought of the great man, the violin-virtuoso, the first eminence, the P. C., the heroic lover, disappeared from within me; I leaned my head against the wall, and would have wept could I ...
— Debts of Honor • Maurus Jokai
... virtuoso, author of "Anastasius, or the Memoirs of a Modern Greek," which Byron was proud to have fathered on him, and of a posthumous essay on the "Origin and Prospects of Man," was famous as having suggested to Carlyle one of the ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... true original style is never achieved for its own sake: a man may pay from a shilling to a guinea, according to his means, to see, hear, or read another man's act of genius; but he will not pay with his whole life and soul to become a mere virtuoso in literature, exhibiting an accomplishment which will not even make money for him, like fiddle playing. Effectiveness of assertion is the Alpha and Omega of style. He who has nothing to assert has no ...
— Man And Superman • George Bernard Shaw
... pawned. It lay exposed for purchase on Fox's shelf for some months, until, in December, 1895, a tailor named James Dooly visited the shop to redeem a silver watch. Being, at the same time, in funds, and able to satisfy his taste as a virtuoso, he felt the need of and bought a violin for ten dollars, but, Fox urging upon him the desirability of getting a good one while he was about it, was finally persuaded to purchase the Bott violin for twenty ...
— True Stories of Crime From the District Attorney's Office • Arthur Train
... in a musical atmosphere. A picturesque, old German virtuoso consents to take for his pupil a handsome youth who proves to have an aptitude for technique, but not the soul of an artist. The youth cannot express the love, the passion and the tragedies of life as can the master. But a girl comes ...
— The Wall Street Girl • Frederick Orin Bartlett
... had; daily evening Concert, though from himself there is no fluting now. One of his Berlin Concert people who had been sent for was Fasch, a virtuoso on I know not what instrument,—but a man given to take note of things about him. Fasch was painfully surprised to see his King so altered in the interim past: "bent now, sunk into himself, grown old; to whom these five years of war-tumult and anxiety, of sorrow and hard toil, had given a ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XX. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... sum and totality, and the world-decree is that he is an artist, and an admirable one. He plays upon his instrument with all power and grace. But he is no mere virtuoso. There is something in him beyond the executant. Of Malibran, Alfred de Musset says, most beautifully, that she had that "voice of the heart which alone has power to reach the heart." Here, also, behind the skilful player on language, the deft manipulator of rhyme ...
— A Romance of Youth, Complete • Francois Coppee
... who burned Corinth, and committed the curious statues to the captain of a ship, assuring him, 'that if any were lost or broken, he should procure others to be made in their stead,' by which it should seem (whatever may be pretended) that Mummius was no virtuoso.-P. W. ...
— Poetical Works of Pope, Vol. II • Alexander Pope
... a state of extravagant delight. Most men have a secret treasure somewhere. The miser has his golden hoard; the virtuoso his pet ring; the student his rare book; the poet his favourite haunt; the lover his secret drawer; but Cosmo had a mirror with a lovely lady in it. And now that he knew by the skeleton, that she was affected ...
— Phantastes - A Faerie Romance for Men and Women • George MacDonald
... Fortunato—although in other regards he was a man to be respected and even feared. He prided himself on his connoisseurship in wine. Few Italians have the true virtuoso spirit. For the most part their enthusiasm is adopted to suit the time and opportunity—to practise imposture upon the British and Austrian millionaires. In painting and gemmary, Fortunato, like his countrymen, was a quack—but in the matter of old ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 2 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... little bit of tin and horn; I'm a byword, I'm a plaything, I'm a jest; The virtuoso looks on me with scorn; But there's times when I am better than the best. Ask the stoker and the sailor of the sea; Ask the mucker and the hewer of the pine; Ask the herder of the plain, ask the gleaner ...
— Ballads of a Cheechako • Robert W. Service
... the time.—What do you laugh at, Charlotte?—Why this poor man, or, as I should rather say, this lord and master of mine, has just left me. He has been making me both a compliment, and a present. And what do you think the compliment is? Why, if I please, he will give away to a virtuoso friend, his collection of moths and butterflies: I once, he remembered, rallied him upon them. And by what study, thought I, wilt thou, honest man, supply their place? If thou hast a talent this way, pursue it; since perhaps thou wilt not shine in any other. And the best any thing, ...
— The History of Sir Charles Grandison, Volume 4 (of 7) • Samuel Richardson
... faintly the battle-hymns of the War of Liberation. For the great liberal movement of the thirties and forties he had neither sympathy nor comprehension.—FRIEDRICH RUeCKERT (1788-1866), endowed with a fatal facility of lyric expression, a virtuoso for whom no tour-de-force was too difficult, lived most of his life aloof from the political and social movements of his time. In his youth his Sonnets in Armor had done sturdy service in the national awakening against Napoleon, but his maturer years were devoted to domestic ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VII. • Various
... teacher, though he could no longer play. And I was already a concertizing artist when I met him. He was a very great man, the grandeur of whose tradition lives in the whole 'romantic school' of violin playing. Look at his seven concertos—of course they are written with an eye to effect, from the virtuoso's standpoint, yet how firmly and solidly they are built up! How interesting is their working-out: and the orchestral score is far more than a mere accompaniment. As regards virtuose effect only Paganini's music compares with his, and Paganini, of course, did not play it as it is ...
— Violin Mastery - Talks with Master Violinists and Teachers • Frederick H. Martens
... establish or conserve associations in which the genius should rule, the genius in the way of the old prophets or in the sense of Plato, or in the sense of a union of prophecy and philosophy. In the Gnostic conflict, at least at its close, the judicial priest fought with the virtuoso and overcame him.] ...
— History of Dogma, Volume 1 (of 7) • Adolph Harnack
... and Switzerland were written during the two years with which he prefaced his quarter-century of labor as composer, director, and virtuoso. They relate much to Italian painting, the music of Passion Week, Swiss scenery, his stay with Goethe, and his brilliant reception in England on his return. They disclose a youth ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 87, January, 1865 • Various
... six-year-old virtuoso astonished the court by his brilliant talents. The future Queen of France, Marie Antoinette, was particularly delighted with him, and the little Mozart naively said he would like to marry her, for ...
— The Great German Composers • George T. Ferris
... Another Virtuoso of my Acquaintance will not allow the Cat-call to be older than Thespis, and is apt to think it appeared in the World soon after the antient Comedy; for which reason it has still a place in our Dramatick Entertainments: Nor must I here omit what a very curious Gentleman, who is lately returned ...
— The Spectator, Volume 2. • Addison and Steele
... understand financial and diplomatic movements; briefly, as far as was then possible, to be an incarnate blue-book. He was to study literature and appreciate art, though he was carefully to avoid the excess which makes the pedant or the virtuoso. He was to cultivate a good style in writing and speaking, and even to learn German. Chesterfield's prophecy of a revolution in France (though, I fancy, a little overpraised) shows at least that he was a serious observer of political phenomena. But besides ...
— English Literature and Society in the Eighteenth Century • Leslie Stephen
... life at Brook Farm had proved as barren as the years on Long Wharf. He had contributed one story, "A Virtuoso's Collection," to "The Boston Miscellany" for May, 1842, and had added one more to his little books, "Biographical Stories [Footnote: Biographical Stories for Children. Benjamin West, Sir Isaac Newton, ...
— Nathaniel Hawthorne • George E. Woodberry
... complete incarnation of the genius of the family. The fresh blood which he has derived from his English mother has postponed the doom of the race and enabled him to repeat, in a modified form, the excesses of his ancestors. He first distinguishes himself as a virtuoso in swearing. The magnificent redundance and originality of his oaths make him famous in the army, which he chooses as the first field of his exploits. Later he roams aimlessly about the world, merely to satisfy a wild need of adventure. On his return to his native town he signalizes himself by his ...
— Essays on Scandinavian Literature • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... Dennis, (says the virtuoso Gregoire,) where the National Club justly struck at the tyrants even in their tombs, that of Turenne ought to have been spared; yet strokes of the sword are still visible on it."—He likewise complains, that at the Botanic Garden the bust of Linnaeus had been destroyed, ...
— A Residence in France During the Years 1792, 1793, 1794 and 1795, • An English Lady
... visibly angry the other morning when I took to her the early mail and she discovered that Mrs. Van Varick Shadd had got ahead of her in the matter of Jockobinski, the monkey virtuoso. Society had been very much interested in the reported arrival in America of this wonderfully talented simian who could play the violin as well as Ysaye, and who as a performer on the piano was vastly the superior of Paderewski, because, ...
— Mrs. Raffles - Being the Adventures of an Amateur Crackswoman • John Kendrick Bangs
... hand, was of a much more intensely organized musical temperament. His genius was of the greatest possible character. As a virtuoso he not only played upon the organ, the clavecin, and the violin better than most of his contemporaries, and upon the organ probably better than any; he also created works in these three departments which held the attention of his own time to an astonishing degree, considering the ...
— The Masters and their Music - A series of illustrative programs with biographical, - esthetical, and critical annotations • W. S. B. Mathews
... 83, a character of a virtuoso is given which in many ways suits Walpole:—'It is never without grief that I find a man capable of ratiocination or invention enlisting himself in this secondary class of learning; for when he has once discovered a method of gratifying his desire of eminence by expense rather than by labour, ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 4 (of 6) • Boswell
... Said of code and designs which exhibit both complexity and a virtuoso flair. Has connotations similar to {hairy} but is more positive in tone. Often in the emphatic 'most studly' or as noun-form 'studliness'. "Smail 3.0's configuration parser is ...
— The Jargon File, Version 4.0.0
... she only, a famous fair one, counts lovers in her train. And indeed, even by her kindest friends, Edinburgh is not considered in a similar sense. These like her for many reasons, not any one of which is satisfactory in itself. They like her whimsically, if you will, and somewhat as a virtuoso dotes upon his cabinet. Her attraction is romantic in the narrowest meaning of the term. Beautiful as she is, she is not so much beautiful as interesting. She is pre-eminently Gothic, and all the ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Dissenting minister of the place. He began rather early to display a taste for poetry and verse-writing; and, in April 1737, we find in the Gentleman's Magazine a set of stanzas, entitled, "The Virtuoso, in imitation of Spenser's style and stanza," prefaced by a letter signed Marcus, in which the author, while requesting the insertion of his piece, pleads the apology of his extreme youth. One may see something of the future political ...
— Poetical Works of Akenside - [Edited by George Gilfillan] • Mark Akenside
... fat, fairly pretty, she strummed her guitar and sang, rolling her eyes fiercely, like a virtuoso executing feats of difficulty. She lowered her head, stuck her chin into her neck, in order to draw deeper notes from the furthermost recesses of her body; and succeeded in bringing forth a great ...
— Madame Chrysantheme • Pierre Loti
... Cock, the famous salesman of the Piazzas—the George Robins of his day—is brought on the stage as Mr. Auctioneer Hen (a part taken by Mrs. Charke). His wares, "collected by the indefatigable Pains of that celebrated Virtuoso, Peter Humdrum, Esq.," include such desirable items as "curious Remnants of Political Honesty," "delicate Pieces of Patriotism," Modesty (which does not obtain a bid), Courage, Wit, and "a very neat ...
— Fielding - (English Men of Letters Series) • Austin Dobson
... there seems to be as little reason to suppose that Tradescant's stuffed specimen was a fabrication. He used to preserve his own specimens; and there could be no motive at that period for a fabrication. I had hoped to have found some notice of it in the Diary of that worthy virtuoso Zacharias Conrad von Uffenbach, who visited the Ashmolean Museum in 1710; but though he notices other natural curiosities, there is no mention of it. This worthy remarks on the slovenly condition and inadequate superintendence of our museums, and especially of that of Gresham College; ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 22., Saturday, March 30, 1850 • Various
... Richard Owen Cambridge, a scholar and man of fortune, who, in his residence at Twickenham, surrounded by friends of congenial tastes, enjoyed a life of literary ease. The Scribleriad is an attack on pseudo-science, the hero being a virtuoso of the most Quixotic kind, who travels far to discover rarities, loves a lady with the plica Polonica, waits three years at Naples to see the eruption of Vesuvius; and plays all kinds of fantastic tricks, as if in continual ridicule of The Philosophical Transactions, ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli
... fashionable baronet who talks French and Italian fluently, cannot write a line in his own language without some sin against orthography; the other, who is represented as a most respectable specimen of the young aristocracy, and something of a virtuoso, is described as spelling pretty well for a lord. On the whole, the Earl of Bute might fairly be called a man of cultivated mind. He was also a man of undoubted honor. But his understanding was narrow, and his manners cold and haughty. His qualifications for the part of a statesman were ...
— Critical and Historical Essays, Volume III (of 3) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... of writing it is most excellent[18]. But the irreconcilable difference in their taste soon after broke out in less seemly terms; for Shadwell permitted himself to use some very irreverent expressions towards Dryden's play of "Aureng-Zebe," in the Prologue and Epilogue to his comedy of the "Virtuoso;" and in the Preface to the same piece he plainly intimated, that he wanted nothing but a pension to enable him to write as well as the poet-laureate.[19] This attack was the more intolerable, as Dryden, in the Preface to that very ...
— The Dramatic Works of John Dryden Vol. I. - With a Life of the Author • Sir Walter Scott
... thought it would be immense; at least, so they said. The Little 'Un himself fairly chuckled with glee at the prospects of being an amateur virtuoso of the fiddle, even for one night only. The remainder of the programme was quickly made up. One or two brief sketches and a rather rough and tumble arrangement for the close, which the enterprising managers designated as "The ...
— A Pirate of Parts • Richard Neville
... Bunyan two or three much more direct links with some of Hawthorne's work. When Christiana at the Palace Beautiful is shown one of the apples that Eve ate of, and Jacob's ladder with some angels ascending upon it, it incites one to turn to that marvellously complete "Virtuoso's Collection," [Footnote: Mosses from an Old Manse, Vol. II.] where Hawthorne has preserved Shelley's skylark and the steed Rosinante, with Hebe's cup and many another impalpable marvel, in the warden-ship of the Wandering Jew. So, too, when we read Great-Heart's ...
— A Study Of Hawthorne • George Parsons Lathrop
... Your virtuoso looks with artistical delight on the figure of some nymph painted on an Etruscan vase, engaged in pouring out the juice of the grape from her classic urn. And the parson felt as harmless, if not as elegant a pleasure, in contemplating Widow Fairfield brimming ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... should go to Donegal. The place is silent as the tomb, and if they would learn to do nothing they will there find many eminent professors of the science, who, having devoted to it the study of a lifetime, have attained a virtuoso proficiency. ...
— Ireland as It Is - And as It Would be Under Home Rule • Robert John Buckley (AKA R.J.B.)
... known as the concerto is going out of fashion. The only sort of concerto destined to keep our favor is, I imagine, that of the Schumann or Brahms type, which depends for its effect not at all on display, but on sound musicianship alone. The virtuoso is destined soon to leave the circus business and bid a long farewell to his late colleagues, the sword-swallower, the trapeze artist, the strong man, the fat lady, the contortionist, and the gentleman who conducts the shell-and-pea game. ...
— The Joyful Heart • Robert Haven Schauffler
... deserves to be specially emphasised. A striking characteristic of Goethe's writings is the knowledge they display of the whole range of the manual arts, and this knowledge he owed to the circumstances of his home. His father, a virtuoso with the means of gratifying his tastes, freely employed artists of all kinds to execute designs of his own conception; and, as part of his son's education, entrusted him with the superintendence of his commissions. Thus, in accordance with modern ideas, were combined in Goethe's training ...
— The Youth of Goethe • Peter Hume Brown
... justly, "If you were to write a fable about little fishes, doctor, you would make the little fishes talk like whales." No man surely ever had so little talent for personation as Johnson. Whether he wrote in the character of a disappointed legacy-hunter or an empty town fop, of a crazy virtuoso or a flippant coquette, he wrote in the same pompous and unbending style. His speech, like Sir Piercy Shafton's Euphuistic eloquence, bewrayed him under every disguise. Euphelia and Rhodoclea talk as finely as Imlac the poet or Seged, Emperor of Ethiopia. The gay Cornelia describes her ...
— The Bed-Book of Happiness • Harold Begbie
... on the other hand, praises his son's skill on the flute most highly and admits, that Prince Ferdinand will as a ruler in all probability become as great a virtuoso, as he has proved himself ...
— The Standard Operaglass - Detailed Plots of One Hundred and Fifty-one Celebrated Operas • Charles Annesley
... taste that the natural or English school of landscape gardening now began to displace the French and Dutch fashion of clipped hedges, regular parterres, etc., and that Gothic architecture came into repute. Horace Walpole was a virtuoso in Gothic art, and in his castle, at Strawberry Hill, he made a collection of ancient armor, illuminated MSS., and bric-a-brac of all kinds. Gray had been Walpole's traveling companion in France and Italy, and the two had quarreled and separated, but were afterward reconciled. From Walpole's ...
— Brief History of English and American Literature • Henry A. Beers
... time she became his wife, loved him jealously and sincerely, and thought to confine him within the narrow world of domestic life. But his affections became restive, and he lost his heart to a Spanish actress (it was always an actress, a virtuoso, or a part) and left poor Ophelia, and went off with Marie Recio, the Ines of Favorite, the page of Comte Ory—a practical, hardheaded woman, an indifferent singer with a mania for singing. The ...
— Musicians of To-Day • Romain Rolland
... some slight answer, that the spider was a sort of pet of an old virtuoso to whom he owed many obligations in his boyhood; and the conversation turned from this subject to others suggested by topics of the day and place. His Lordship was affable, and Redclyffe could not, it must be confessed, see anything to justify ...
— Doctor Grimshawe's Secret - A Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... with a high forehead, and a bright, visionary eye. He seemed to take a fancy to me, as I certainly did to him, and we soon became intimate, I visited him occasionally, at his apartments, in the wing of an old palace, looking toward Mount AEtna. He was an antiquary, a virtuoso, and a connoisseur. His rooms were decorated with mutilated statues, dug up from Grecian and Roman ruins; old vases, lachrymals, and sepulchral lamps. He had astronomical and chemical instruments, and black-letter ...
— Wolfert's Roost and Miscellanies • Washington Irving
... Margaret," he exclaimed. "She takes no interest in such matters. She is not, if I may use the word, a virtuoso. She did it solely ...
— Witness For The Defense • A.E.W. Mason
... variations, from the direction of the drawing room. It was sweet and tender, graceful and expressive, according to the character of the variations; and, when the last variation began with a crispness and delicacy that made me wonder what great virtuoso was at my pianoforte without my knowing it, I hurried to the drawing room and, entering it—found my fourteen year old daughter seated at a pianola. The instrument had arrived only a short time before from the house ...
— The Pianolist - A Guide for Pianola Players • Gustav Kobb
... Jesuit's powder, but more effectual. The virtues of it are strange and various; it makes justice deaf as well as blind, and takes out spots of the deepest treason more cleverly than castle-soap does common stains; it alters a man's constitution in two or three days, more than the virtuoso's transfusion of blood can do in seven years. 'Tis a great alexiopharmick, and helps poisonous principles of rebellion, and those that use them. It miraculously exalts and purifies the eyesight, and makes traitors ...
— A Book of Scoundrels • Charles Whibley
... extant as one of the greatest poets within the whole range of French literature; Verlaine, extremely unequal, often detestable and contemptible, but suddenly charming and touching or revealing a religious feeling that suggests a clerk of the Middle Ages; Catulle Mendes, purely romantic, wholly virtuoso, but an astonishingly dexterous versifier. To these poets some highly curious literary dandies set themselves in opposition, being desirous of renovating the poetic art by ascribing more value to the sound of ...
— Initiation into Literature • Emile Faguet
... he neglect the other resources of a skilful virtuoso. Every auction afforded some picture, in which, though it had been overlooked by the ignorance of the times, he recognised the style of a great master, and made a merit of recommending it to some noble friend. This commerce he likewise extended ...
— The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom, Complete • Tobias Smollett
... Folly, and with an industrious as well as expensive idleness running thro' tedious systems of impertinence, would have split the sides of Heraclitus, had it been his Fortune to have been a Spectator. It's very easie to decide which of these impertinents is the most signal: the Virtuoso is manifestly without a Competitor. For our follies are not to be measured by the Degree of Ignorance that appears in 'em, but by the study, labour and expence they cost us to finish ...
— The Present State of Wit (1711) - In A Letter To A Friend In The Country • John Gay
... day, having a leisure hour at my disposal, I stepped into a new museum, to which my notice was casually drawn by a small and unobtrusive sign: "TO BE SEEN HERE, A VIRTUOSO'S COLLECTION." Such was the simple yet not altogether unpromising announcement that turned my steps aside for a little while from the sunny sidewalk of our principal thoroughfare. Mounting a sombre staircase, I pushed open a door at its summit, ...
— A Virtuoso's Collection (From "Mosses From An Old Manse") • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... of Persia" seemed peculiarly affected by his master's song, which he accompanied by a long-drawn howl of woe; and, before the imperial virtuoso had concluded, a discordant cry sounded for a short time from the street, in imitation of the squeaking of young pigs. It arose from the crowd who were waiting round the Serapeum to see Caesar drive to the Circus; and Caracalla must have noticed it, for, when it waxed louder, ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... years; and, having no heir to his treasures, he had previously conveyed them, by deed of gift, to Elias Ashmole, who seems to have contrived to make himself agreeable to him by his pursuits as a virtuoso, and by his alchemical and astrological fancies. When Dr. Hamel was in England, I had the pleasure of indicating to him the site of "Tradescant's Ark" in South Lambeth. It was situate on the east side of the road leading from Vauxhall to Stockwell, nearly opposite to what was formerly ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 81, May 17, 1851 • Various
... Lanczhid, the Budapest virtuoso, will be the soloist at the concert this evening of the Philharmonic Society. He will play the Tschaikovsky Violin Concerto, Opus 35, and the remainder of the program will consist of Dvorak's Symphony, Aus der Neuen Welt, and the ...
— Elkan Lubliner, American • Montague Glass
... nature, not as the result of a compact, and from this natural feeling for good and evil exercise develops a cultivated moral taste or tact. And when, further, the reason, by means of this faculty of judgment, gains control over the passions, man becomes an ethical artist, a moral virtuoso. ...
— History Of Modern Philosophy - From Nicolas of Cusa to the Present Time • Richard Falckenberg
... by the stronger pull of music and the cacoethes scribendi. (Grandpa John Huneker had been a composer of church music, and organist at St. Mary's.) In the year mentioned he set out for Paris to see Liszt; his aim was to make himself a piano virtuoso. His name does not appear on his own exhaustive list of Liszt pupils, but he managed to quaff of the Pierian spring at second-hand, for he had lessons from Theodore Ritter (ne Bennet), a genuine pupil of the old walrus, and he was also taught by the ...
— A Book of Prefaces • H. L. Mencken
... as she had gone, Lady Windermere returned to the picture- gallery, where a celebrated political economist was solemnly explaining the scientific theory of music to an indignant virtuoso from Hungary, and began to talk to the Duchess of Paisley. She looked wonderfully beautiful with her grand ivory throat, her large blue forget-me-not eyes, and her heavy coils of golden hair. Or pur they ...
— Lord Arthur Savile's Crime and Other Stories • Oscar Wilde
... training, and who practiced medicine partly in the clinical wards, partly in the experimental laboratories. Boyle, of course, did not have either degree, but he did have a status as the leading virtuoso of his day. ...
— Medical Investigation in Seventeenth Century England - Papers Read at a Clark Library Seminar, October 14, 1967 • Charles W. Bodemer
... But what he left will endure; the fame of an English gentleman who was honest, surrounded by intrigue; unambitious of honours and titles, a royalist who had the friendship of kings whom courtiers flattered; a virtuoso of learning hardly equalled in his time, a diarist whose jottings, never meant for printing, are a classic; a pious, honourable, shrewd, country squire of deep family affections, and set in a niche of his own by ...
— Highways and Byways in Surrey • Eric Parker
... his hat with a courtly sweep to more than one Duchess. There, too, was Theo Marzials, poet and eccentric, and Charles Colnaghi, the hero of a hundred tea-fights, and young Brookfield, the comedian, and many another good fellow. My Lord of Dudley, the virtuoso, came there, leaning for support upon the arm of his fair young wife. Disraeli, with his lustreless eyes and face like some seamed Hebraic parchment, came also, and whispered behind his hand to the faithful Corry. And Walter Sickert spread the latest mot of 'the Master,' who, ...
— The Works of Max Beerbohm • Max Beerbohm |
