"Black sheep" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... her boy: he may be a black sheep, but she wants him, and she shall have him, by—" whatever was each ...
— In a Little Town • Rupert Hughes
... not guilty and holding a fullblown waterlily, begins a long unintelligible speech. They would hear what counsel had to say in his stirring address to the grand jury. He was down and out but, though branded as a black sheep, if he might say so, he meant to reform, to retrieve the memory of the past in a purely sisterly way and return to nature as a purely domestic animal. A sevenmonths' child, he had been carefully brought up and nurtured by an aged bedridden parent. There might ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... Black Sheep came forth from the Fold II. How Alleyne Edricson came out into the World III. How Hordle John cozened the Fuller of Lymington IV. How the Bailiff of Southampton Slew the Two Masterless Men IV. How a Strange Company Gathered at the "Pied Merlin" VI. How Samkin Aylward Wagered his ...
— The White Company • Arthur Conan Doyle
... Moderates who do not represent that sentiment will. I do not agree. I do not know what the Moderates represent and I do not know what the Nationalists represent. I know that there are good sheep and black sheep amongst the Moderates. I know that there are good sheep and black sheep amongst the Nationalists. I know that many Moderates hold honestly the view that it is a sin to resort to non-co-operation. I respectfully agree to differ from ...
— Freedom's Battle - Being a Comprehensive Collection of Writings and Speeches on the Present Situation • Mahatma Gandhi
... One word more though: undoubting of thine amiability, friend that hast walked with me hitherto in peace, I will be tame as a purring cat, and sheathe my talons; therefore are you still unteased by divers sly speeches and sarcastic hints, of and concerning innumerable black sheep that crowd about a woolsack; especially of certain "highly respectables," whom the omnipotence of parliament (no less power presumably being competent) commands to be accounted "gentlemen." Should then my meagre sketches seem but little spiteful, accord me credit for tolerance ...
— The Complete Prose Works of Martin Farquhar Tupper • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... Baa, baa, black sheep, have you any wool? Yes, sir; yes, sir, three, bags full. One for my master, one for my dame, And one for the little boy ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 1 (of 4) • Various
... men would have much sooner given in, would indeed never have embarked on the strike, but the influence of the union being over them, they feared to be called "black sheep," and to be taunted with deserting the general cause, and so ...
— Facing Death - The Hero of the Vaughan Pit. A Tale of the Coal Mines • G. A. Henty
... tenderness for the pretty black sheep of the family, checked the sharp retort which trembled on her lips. Still, it was quite true that Rosamund had more than once been kept to lunch at The Trellis House, and that on the day of Nanna's accident Mrs. Crofton had issued a sort of general invitation to supper ...
— What Timmy Did • Marie Adelaide Belloc Lowndes
... lambs they are Who, when they're assailed by thirst, Keep well away from a public bar; For of all black sheep, or near, or far, The public ...
— Fables for the Frivolous • Guy Whitmore Carryl
... distasteful to them, while the white pigs, being deficient in smell and taste, eat it, and are killed. Analogous facts occur in several distinct families. White sheep are killed in the Tarentino by eating Hypericum Criscum, while black sheep escape: white rhinoceroses are said to perish from eating Euphorbia Candelabrum; and white horses are said to suffer from poisonous food, where colored ones escape. Now it is very improbable that a constitutional immunity from poisoning by so many distinct plants ...
— The Galaxy - Vol. 23, No. 1 • Various
... a while, of course, an exceptional "black sheep" may get in even among soldiers, and William had often been warned not to keep so much convertible wealth about his person. But William trusted his comrades and ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys as Sergeants - or, Handling Their First Real Commands • H. Irving Hancock
... it forgot, but I remember it as clear as pictures. The time it stood at was seven minutes after four o'clock, and I never saw it from that day till now. This very day of the month it was, the year of the black sheep having twins. ...
— Three Wonder Plays • Lady I. A. Gregory
... island, turning our faces northward, with Morris Island northwest of us, and looking directly north out into the channel, we saw a number of Union gun boats, like a flock of black sheep feeding on a plain of grass; while the men pacing their decks looked like faithful shepherds watching the flock. While we negroes remained upon Sullivan's Island, we watched every movement of the Union fleet, with hearts of joy to think ...
— My Life In The South • Jacob Stroyer
... there. I was born amongst the mountains. I looked after the cows, and slept in hay-cocks, and cut the trees in winter. They used to call me a 'black sheep,' ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... still unwarned by the discomfitures of the morning, he propounded some questions which his companions could not answer; among which was, "Why are there black sheep?" How he would have solved this difficult problem in natural history, I do not know. Mystification sat on all faces, when the individual who had before attacked Mr. Latham's misstatements, took up the defence of the ...
— The Englishwoman in America • Isabella Lucy Bird
... my Lord, I must go back and watch over my black sheep, if I would have them blue!" said Levy; and he retreated towards the threshold. But at that shout of "Avenel forever!" as if at a signal, various electors of the redoubted Hundred and Fifty rushed from the Blue hostelry, sweeping past Levy, ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... cold remoteness of the North are many of his kind—the black sheep, the undesirables, the discards of the pack. Their lips are sealed; their eyes are cold as glaciers, and often they drink deep. Oh, they are a mighty company, the men you don't enquire about; but it is the code of the ...
— The Trail of '98 - A Northland Romance • Robert W. Service
... their lot been cast in a higher rank of life. But, at the same time, the labourer is not always so innocent and free from guile—so lamblike as it suits the purpose of some to proclaim, in order that his rural simplicity may secure sympathy. There are very queer black sheep in the flock, and it rather unfortunately happens that these, in more ways than one, force themselves, sometimes most unpleasantly, upon the notice of the tenant-farmer and ...
— Hodge and His Masters • Richard Jefferies
... black sheep, Have you any wool? Yes, marry have I, Three bags full: One for my master, And one for my dame, But none for the little boy Who cries ...
— Cole's Funny Picture Book No. 1 • Edward William Cole
... nicest fellows I ever met, though sadly given, some of them, to the use of profane language. I asked a page or two back, what is a gentleman? I'll answer the question now: A Royal Naval officer is, in a general sort of way, though of course there may be a black sheep among them here and there. I fancy it is just the wide seas and the breath of God's winds that wash their hearts and blow the bitterness out of their minds and make them ...
— King Solomon's Mines • H. Rider Haggard
... eyes and stern shut mouth, an expression of righteous anger, helplessness and grief combined, the look of a man to whom obstacles had been nothing, at last confronted with crowning defeat. Hare realized that this son was Naab's first-born, best-loved, a thorn in his side, a black sheep. ...
— The Heritage of the Desert • Zane Grey
... let's admit that I'm a black sheep with a little black muzzle and a habit of butting all sorts of ash-cans; and let Phil go on his ...
— The Trail of the Hawk - A Comedy of the Seriousness of Life • Sinclair Lewis
... the passage appears, slowly feeling his may, the veterinarian GRUNERT. He is a small man in a coat of black sheep's fur, cap and tall boots. He taps with the handle of his whip against the door post in order to call ...
— The Dramatic Works of Gerhart Hauptmann - Volume II • Gerhart Hauptmann
... 'Message from the Sea,' Thomas?" asked Miss Van Tyck. Aunt Celia always knows the number of the unemployed in New York and Chicago, the date when North Carolina was admitted to the Union, why black sheep eat less than white ones, the height of the highest mountain and the length of the longest river in the world, when the first potato was dug from American soil, when the battle of Bull Run was fought, ...
— Penelope's Postscripts • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... the dark domain To meet me. Not in Tartarus' abyss, Sad shades of sin and never-ending pain, I dwell, but on the blest Elysian plain Join with the just in fellowship. Now heed: There the chaste Sibyl, if with victims slain, Black sheep, ye seek her, shall thy footsteps lead, And show thy ...
— The Aeneid of Virgil - Translated into English Verse by E. Fairfax Taylor • Virgil
... am sure she will not. And now all I've got to say, Mr. Robarts, is this: I hope you and Lufton have had enough to do with black sheep to last you your lives; for I must protest that your late friend Mr. Sowerby is a black sheep." In no possible way could Lady Lufton have alluded to the matter with greater kindness than in thus ...
— Framley Parsonage • Anthony Trollope
... they were asked to stay for a few days at a friend's house. There was to be a dance, and the hostess, being Lottie's godmother, pointedly included her in the invitation; so Mrs. Blake and Addie did what they could to improve their black sheep's appearance. ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, October, 1877, Vol. XX. No. 118 • Various
... Bonney—pious Brother Bonney—after a long pause, as if inquiring whether all the whites members had been served, and fully assuring himself on that important point, then raised his voice to an unnatural pitch, and looking to the corner where his black sheep seemed penned, beckoned with his hand, exclaiming, "Come forward, colored friends! come forward! You, too, have an interest in the blood of Christ. God is no respecter of persons. Come forward, and take this holy sacrament to your{275} comfort." ...
— My Bondage and My Freedom • Frederick Douglass
... very first. Hardly two years ago Peter Schermerhorn died at the age of ninety-eight. He was the black sheep of an otherwise respectable family, went off and spent his portion in riotous living, afterward bought a tract of ground above Harlem, turned hermit, raised geese and ducks and pigs, married and had three daughters and they in turn married, ...
— A Modern Cinderella • Amanda M. Douglas
... Lucy herself could say but little in defence of her old friend, who had lost all claim upon that friendship since the offer of the bribe had been made,—so that it was understood among them all that Lizzie was to be regarded as a black sheep;—but hitherto Lord Fawn himself had concealed his feelings before Lucy. Now unfortunately he spoke out, and in speaking was especially bitter against Frank. "Mr. Greystock has been most insolent," he said as they were all sitting together in the library after dinner. Lady ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope
... water, and sprinkle white meal thereon.... and promise thou wilt offer in thy halls(13) a barren heifer, the best thou hast, and fill the pyre with treasure, and wilt sacrifice apart to Teiresias alone a black sheep without spot, the fairest ...
— On The Structure of Greek Tribal Society: An Essay • Hugh E. Seebohm
... boy," said the old bachelor, as they sauntered through the Green Park, where many poor children were disporting happily, and errand-boys were playing at toss-halfpenny, and black sheep were grazing in the sunshine, and an actor was learning his part on a bench, and nursery-maids and their charges sauntered here and there, and several couples were walking in a leisurely manner; "yes, depend on it, my boy; for a poor man, there is nothing like having good acquaintances. ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray
... to um. Abuv all, don't assault a editer of this kind. It only gives him a notorosity, which is jist what he wants, and don't do you no more good than it would to jump into enny other mudpuddle. Editors are generally fine men, but there must be black sheep ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden
... No black sheep (or lamb) could we in any way imagine as a companion of Mary—gentle, affectionate, pure little Mary. All her associates must ...
— St. Nicholas, Vol. 5, No. 2, December, 1877 • Various
... to take a mother's place to the children. She was honest and faithful, but like all of her class, she liked routine and order, and she could make no allowances for the restlessness of her bright-minded charge. Rosa was her especial torment; the black sheep of the brood. Household tasks she despised, and study, as it was pursued in the successive schools to which her despairing father sent her, had no charms for her. Her best playmates were animals; the horses and dogs she saw in the streets and which she fearlessly accosted; the ...
— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 8 (of 8) • Various
... is all until you come. But hasten, my beloved! I am already aged with this long waiting for you. Do not ask me about father. He is a good shepherd, but I am a small black sheep determined not to be made white according to his plan. And he has come to that place where he would be ready to take even you as an under-shepherd of this factious ewe lamb. Besides, could we not make a providential offering of Jack, ...
— The Jessica Letters: An Editor's Romance • Paul Elmer More
... evident enough. "Of course, we do not always approve of being tired to death, but where our chief considers it necessary, we are content to obey him. In fact, it would not make much difference if we were not," he added whimsically. "There was, however, one instance of a black sheep, or rather wolf of the contemptible coyote species in sheep's clothing, whom I played a minor part in catching. But, naturally, you will not care ...
— Thurston of Orchard Valley • Harold Bindloss
... a large, fat, black wether. Old Joseph and one of the boys came to me one day, and said, that Joseph, junior, had discovered some very remarkable and valuable treasures, which could be procured only in one way. That way was as follows:—that a black sheep should be taken on the ground where the treasures were concealed; that, after cutting its throat, it should be led around a circle while bleeding; this being done, the wrath of the evil spirit would be ...
— Travels and Adventures of Monsieur Violet • Captain Marryat
... you suppose Rayner and the Riflers generally will regard your calling on their black sheep?" asked ...
— The Deserter • Charles King
... crowding themselves in among the godly. Thus the man without the wedding garment sought to enter in. He goes to the wedding, gets into the wedding chamber, sits close among the guests, and then, without doubt, concluded he should escape damnation. But, you know, one black sheep is soon seen, though it be among a hundred white ones. Why, even thus it fared with this poor man. "And when the king came in to see the guests, he saw there a man that had not on a wedding garment." He ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... was really deep down in his soul some moral obliquity that the acute master crook had detected and responded to. There had been clergymen and philanthropists among Archie's forebears, but never murderer or thief, and he was half-persuaded that he was the predestined black sheep that he had always heard gave a spot of ...
— Blacksheep! Blacksheep! • Meredith Nicholson
... purple cows. Billy doesn't care for it, but I do. And I adore the brilliant red of the roads. Billy says he'll take good brown earth and white flocks. He might be reconciled to black sheep but never to ...
— The Gay Cockade • Temple Bailey
... raised above all temptation. For neither his recollections of the gang gathered about the big rock nor the more recent light shed on such things by Johan had the slightest influence on his conception of himself as the sole black sheep in a flock of perhaps soiled ...
— The Soul of a Child • Edwin Bjorkman
... and so forth, which it became no man to drink or to pledge, far less one that is in point of office a servant of the public, I understand that he lost the music bells in Edinburgh, for playing "Ower the Water to Charlie," upon the tenth of June. He is a black sheep, and deserves ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott
... to-day the clergy is secular, with the exception of a few friars brought over in recent years from Spain and France. The majority of the priests are native Dominicans, graduated from the seminary in the capital. There are in the clerical body a number of black sheep, far too fond of the pleasures of the flesh. Of this stamp was a noted prelate, of whom I was told when I asked whether he was old: "Yes, quite old, his oldest son is over forty." As a general rule, however, the priests of Santo Domingo are earnest, ...
— Santo Domingo - A Country With A Future • Otto Schoenrich
... the people, have faithfully discharged their sacred obligations, if men be found, professing the religion of Christ and understanding its precepts, willing to enrol themselves as the hired bravoes of a "Black Sheep Society," and to butcher their neighbours for a petty reward? The Roman Catholic religion condemns murder as strongly as the Protestant religion; yet how happens it, that a whole community professing that faith winks at the crimes of the guilty? This total demoralization ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 55, No. 343, May 1844 • Various
... shunned. By the rabble they were hooted and pelted. Clowns in the circus made them the subjects of their jokes. Newspaper scribblers lampooned and libelled them. Politicians denounced them. By the Church they were regarded as very black sheep, and sometimes excluded from the fold. And this state of things lasted for years, during which they kept up a steady agitation with the help of platform lecturers, and regularly threw away their votes—so it was charged—in a "third party" movement that ...
— The Abolitionists - Together With Personal Memories Of The Struggle For Human Rights • John F. Hume
... Thorne—that he had been found out at the last moment, and had lost both wife and legacy in consequence. "No doubt it was hushed up on condition he should take himself off. The best thing they could do, but how sad for an old county family! Still, there will be black sheep, and what a mercy it was that Miss Langton was saved from him!" So people talked, and generally added that they could not tell why—just a feeling, you know—but they never had ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. July, 1878. • Various
... at the whole thing and said 'e didn't believe there was a tiger; but nobody minded wot 'e said, Bob Pretty being, as I've often told people, the black sheep o' Claybury, wot with poaching and, wot ...
— Lady of the Barge and Others, Entire Collection • W.W. Jacobs
... was off for a burglar they could not have looked worse over it, for in those days among the decent canny country folks it was mostly the black sheep that were herded by the sergeant. But, my word, those same black sheep did their country some rare service too. My mother put up her mittens to her eyes, and my father looked as ...
— The Great Shadow and Other Napoleonic Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... collecting money, bread-cake, butter, cheese, eggs, etc., etc., for the feast, repeating verses in honour of the solemnity, demanding preparations for the festival, in the name of St. Columb Kill, desiring them to lay aside the fatted calf, and to bring forth the black sheep. The good women are employed in making the griddle cake and candles; these last are sent from house to house in the vicinity, and are lighted up on the (Saman) next day, before which they pray, or are supposed to pray, for the departed ...
— Balder The Beautiful, Vol. I. • Sir James George Frazer
... meekly. When her aunt talked like that, and brought those tones into her voice, Margaret instantly lapsed back into her childhood. She was once more the little black sheep of Kingdom-come, the little black sheep who, at the death of her parents, had very quickly learned to fear rather than to love the various paternal relatives who had considered it their duty to bring her up in the way a Lampton ...
— There was a King in Egypt • Norma Lorimer
... coats, close white breeches and black gaiters, with straw hats bound with black. The countrymen from Saint Herbot were there in their black shaggy goat or sheepskin overcoats, the hair turned outwards (there are flocks of black sheep throughout Finistere), without sleeves, and the white breeches, black gaiters, and straw hats. The women of Huelgoat wear large white turnover collars and caps with ...
— Brittany & Its Byways • Fanny Bury Palliser
... her power to attract were only thrown into greater relief by a marked exception. Women seem to have eyes in their ribbons for such matters as these. Bathsheba, without looking within a right angle of him, was conscious of a black sheep ...
— Far from the Madding Crowd • Thomas Hardy
... so sure of that. Remember his fatal predilection for black sheep. What about his handing over Bala to Tika Singh, after he himself had exhausted all the resources of the English language in finding suitably opprobrious epithets for him? The Bala people hated him, too, whereas ...
— The Path to Honour • Sydney C. Grier
... most awfully oncomfortable book that ever was written. You know what the Lord says in it—or you ought to—about what we do for the least of these his brethren; that means such as you, only you're a sort of black sheep in the family; and if words have any sense at all, the Lord takes my givin' you a dinner the same as if I gave it to him. Now s'pose the Lord came to my house, as he did to Mary and Martha's, and I should git him up a slimpsy dinner of second-hand victuals, and ...
— A Knight Of The Nineteenth Century • E. P. Roe
... hanging down between the ears, and from beneath which the wild eyes of the animal glanced shyly at the different objects he passed, pretty much as did those of the rider from under his bushy and projecting eye-brows. The horseman was dressed in a loose jacket of black sheep-skin, the wool rubbed off in many places, fastened down the front by copper clasps and chains that had once boasted a gilding, and bound at edges with coarse crimson velvet, which, from time and dirt, had become as dark as the principal material of the garment. ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 364, February 1846 • Various
... and in 1827 word was brought to Jones County that Jesse Bunkley was dead. The rumor, for it seems to have been nothing more, was regarded by the family as true. At any rate, no attempt was made to investigate it. Jesse was the black sheep of the family; he had been away from home a good deal; his conduct when at home had not been such as to commend him to the affections of his people; and his mother had married a third husband, a man named Lowther: consequently the vague news of the young man's death was probably ...
— Stories Of Georgia - 1896 • Joel Chandler Harris
... friendlier. Indeed Temple now urged me forcibly to prevent my father from spending money and wearing his heart out in vain, by stopping the case in Dettermain and Newson's hands. They were respectable lawyers, he said, in a lawyer's ordinary tone when including such of his species as are not black sheep. He thought it possible that my father's personal influence overbore their judgment. In fact, nothing bound them to refuse to work for him, and he believed that they had submitted their views for ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... disreputable cuckoo, ornithologically speaking, let us not congratulate ourselves too hastily. We have his counterpart in a black sheep of featherdom which vies with his European rival in deeds of cunning and cruelty, and which has not even a song to recommend him—no vocal accomplishment which by the greatest of license could ...
— My Studio Neighbors • William Hamilton Gibson
... had formed the group near his berth, on his first visit to the deck. On the fourth day out, he saw one of these men talking cautiously to the second lieutenant. Following up this clew he satisfied himself that Mr. Galvinne was the black sheep in the officers' quarters. Corny came on deck that day, for the sea was comparatively smooth, and took a ...
— Stand By The Union - SERIES: The Blue and the Gray—Afloat • Oliver Optic
... it," said Rivers, "I will see him, but if he belongs to any flock, he is a black sheep of Grace's fold. Anything else, Mrs. Penhallow?" he asked ...
— Westways • S. Weir Mitchell
... their worn-out lands mortgaged to the Israelite, but good cavalrymen, withal, armored, and with dragonwings on their helmets; and among the Christians, adventurers of various tongues, soldiers of fortune out for plunder and booty in the name of the Cross —the "black sheep" of every Christian family. And they seized the great garden of Valencia, installed themselves in the Moorish palaces, called themselves counts and marquises, and with their swords held that privileged country for the King ...
— The Torrent - Entre Naranjos • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... Khulagu could not be overlooked by his ambitious successor. The whole course of the Tigris and Euphrates, from the mouth to the sources of those rivers, was reduced to his obedience; he entered Edessa; and the Turcomans of the black sheep were chastised for the sacrilegious pillage of a caravan of Mecca. In the mountains of Georgia the native Christians still braved the law and the sword of Mahomet; by three expeditions he obtained the merit of the gazie, or holy ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... seemed incredible, but it used to happen) that the book has given him his first intelligent respect for religious faith. There, a poor colored girl, inmate of a charitable institution, where she has figured as in deed and truth the black sheep, ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. VI., No. 6, May, 1896 • Various
... Hell had been a well-known figure in astronomical history. His celebrity was not, however, of such a kind as the Royal Astronomer of Austria that he was ought to enjoy. A not unimportant element in his fame was a suspicion of his being a black sheep in the astronomical flock. He got under this cloud through engaging in a trying and worthy enterprise. On June 3, 1769, an event occurred which had for generations been anticipated with the greatest interest by the whole astronomical world. This was a transit of Venus over the disk of the sun. Our ...
— Side-lights on Astronomy and Kindred Fields of Popular Science • Simon Newcomb
... in July is not to be despised; it will store no clover or linden honey for the "grand seignior and the ladies of his seraglio," but plenty of the rank and wholesome poor man's nectar, the sun-tanned product of the plebeian buckwheat. Buckwheat honey is the black sheep in this white flock, but there is spirit and character in it. It lays hold of the taste in no equivocal manner, especially when at a winter breakfast it meets its fellow, the russet buckwheat cake. Bread with honey to ...
— Locusts and Wild Honey • John Burroughs
... disappeared from Horsford and had been almost forgotten. Hesden, his mother, and Cousin Hetty still led their accustomed life at Red Wing. Detraction had worn itself out upon the former, for want of a new occasion. He was still made to feel, in the little society which he saw, that he was a black sheep in an otherwise spotless fold. He did not complain. He did not account himself "ostracized," nor wonder at this treatment. He saw how natural it was, how consistent with the training and development his neighbors had received. He simply said to himself, ...
— Bricks Without Straw • Albion W. Tourgee
... and pleased. He had not expected this warmth. A civil coldness had been the best he had looked for. He had been given to understand that in the Pett home he was regarded as the black sheep: and, while one may admit a black sheep into the fold, it does not follow that one must of ...
— Piccadilly Jim • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... bull and a black sheep, the symbols of day and night, were then brought, and their throats were cut on the edge of a ditch. When the latter was full of blood they dipped their arms into it. Then Narr' Havas spread out his hand upon Matho's breast, and Matho did the same to Narr' Havas. They repeated ...
— Salammbo • Gustave Flaubert
... was telling me the other day of a certain "black sheep" who had run into difficulty; how his family after a great deal of trouble managed to raise L200 between them, and sent him off to America with the money to start afresh in a new country. In a month's time ...
— Lazy Thoughts of a Lazy Girl - Sister of that "Idle Fellow." • Jenny Wren
... was the black sheep of the family; so the Devons left all their great fortune to Barbara and put Laurie in her care. That infuriated him, of course, for he is a high-spirited youngster. He promptly took on an extra shade of blackness. He was ...
— The Girl in the Mirror • Elizabeth Garver Jordan
... explain fully to the English people that while in England educated society keeps pretty well to itself, there are in America no hurdles—or none that a lively animal may not easily leap—to keep the black sheep away from the white, or the white from straying off anywhere among the black, so that a large part of the English people has imbibed the notion that there are really no refined or cultured circles in ...
— The Twentieth Century American - Being a Comparative Study of the Peoples of the Two Great - Anglo-Saxon Nations • H. Perry Robinson
... dog is Dashwood, he is a perfect gentleman," and this is what all Boston terriers should be. Of course, I am speaking of the well bred, properly trained, blue blooded dog, not the mongrel that so often masquerades under his name. Still, as there are black sheep in every family, a dog showing an ugly, snapping, quarrelsome disposition will occasionally be met with which, to the shame of the owner, is not mercifully put out of the way and buried so deep that he can not be scratched up, but is allowed to perpetuate his or ...
— The Boston Terrier and All About It - A Practical, Scientific, and Up to Date Guide to the Breeding of the American Dog • Edward Axtell
... her own methods in everything. If, at dinner, her husband were worried with thoughts of the black sheep in his battery, and would keep introducing such topics at their comfortable board, then she would snub him quite severely. But when he came to her with his real doubts and anxieties she was ever ready to comfort and advise him. She knew all about his plan of testing himself for a ...
— 'Jena' or 'Sedan'? • Franz Beyerlein
... twinges of disappointment, there could hardly have been surprise, when the black sheep directed his choice without a look elsewhere to Hetty. She stood up, smiling but rather pale, and he rushed her to the head of the room, securing the most conspicuous place before his rival, who with his partner took the place ...
— In Exile and Other Stories • Mary Hallock Foote
... made. Few novels are written in which there is nothing more than a story. Nearly all contain some teaching; and it is a safe conclusion that the authors have taught "on purpose." In "Baa, Baa, Black Sheep," Kipling has shown the imperative necessity of a "real, live, lovely mamma;" in "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow," Irving has placed before us a charming picture of rural life in a dreamy Dutch village on the Hudson; and ...
— English: Composition and Literature • W. F. (William Franklin) Webster
... being for years the black sheep of the ancient family, that he should come into possession of Osbaldistone Tower and Manor touched ...
— Border Ghost Stories • Howard Pease
... think so?" she said. "I am afraid you are paying me a very bad compliment. Uncle Anthony was always considered the black sheep ...
— The Captain of the Pole-Star and Other Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... benefit. For the virtues of the father are the wealth of the children, and the sanctity of the Abbot illuminates every cell. Paphnutius, our father, has given a new spouse to Jesus Christ. By his wondrous art, he has changed a black sheep into a white sheep. And now, behold, he has returned to us, laden with fresh merits. Like unto the bee of the Arsinoetid, heavy with the nectar of flowers. Even as the ram of Nubia, which could hardly bear the weight of its abundant wool. Let us celebrate ...
— Thais • Anatole France
... spit, you miserable creature, if you spit into the sheath of my knife, or if you run between my legs, I shall change you into a black sheep.' ...
— The Red Fairy Book • Various
... and sub-species, some of which are well marked, and all of which we do not as yet know much about. These as described are the common sheep of the Rocky Mountains (Ovis canadensis); the white sheep of Alaska (Ovis dalli), and its near relative, O. dalli kenaiensis; the so-called black sheep of northern British Columbia (O. stonei), described by Dr. Allen; Nelson's sheep of the southwest (O. nelsoni) and O. mexicanus, both described by Dr. Merriam. Besides these, Mr. Hornaday has described Ovis fannini of Yukon Territory, ...
— American Big Game in Its Haunts • Various
... shot a quick glance at her. She did not wish her sister's sympathy to be enlisted on the black sheep's behalf. ...
— Prescott of Saskatchewan • Harold Bindloss
... Roman Catholics making for church and chapel, to which half a dozen tinkly bells invited them. The weather had finally cleared up, and a goodly number of people waded past him through the mire. Among them, in seemly Sabbath dress, went Ocock, with his two black sheep at heel. The old man was a rigid Methodist, and at a recent prayer-meeting had been moved to bear public witness to his salvation. This was no doubt one reason why the young scapegrace Tom's almost simultaneous misconduct had been so bitter a pill for him to swallow: ...
— Australia Felix • Henry Handel Richardson
... C-, the next in age and wisdom of our band, he had broken loose from the unyielding rigidity of his family, solidly rooted, if I remember rightly, in a well-to-do London suburb. On their respectable authority he introduced himself meekly to strangers as a "black sheep." I have never seen a more guileless ...
— The Mirror of the Sea • Joseph Conrad
... Jeffries, the son, was a black sheep. He had been mixed up in all kinds of scandals before. His own father had turned him out of doors, and he was married to a woman whose father died in prison. Could a better combination of circumstances for a newspaper be ...
— The Third Degree - A Narrative of Metropolitan Life • Charles Klein and Arthur Hornblow
... from head to foot, looked like a big black sheep, Newstyle was thrown upon his own experimental heap; "That weather-glass," said Oldstyle, "canna be in proper fettle, Or it might as well a tow'd us there was thunder in ...
— Grain and Chaff from an English Manor • Arthur H. Savory
... courtesy lords of high descent, but burdened with numerous offspring; together with a riding-master who wrote novels, and an elderly clergyman appointed by the Bishop of Gibraltar. I dare say there may have been a few black sheep in the colony; but the picture which Mrs. Annie Edwardes gave of it in her novel, "Susan Fielding," was exaggerated, though there was truth in the incidents which she introduced into another of her works, "Ought We to Visit Her?" On the whole, ...
— My Days of Adventure - The Fall of France, 1870-71 • Ernest Alfred Vizetelly
... tale-bearer deserves. The tales at last reached the ears of the masters, but in so indefinite a form that they could take no notice of them, much less report them to the Doctor; but they had the bad effect of making them look upon poor Ellis as a black sheep, and of inducing them to treat him with suspicion. Wrong motives were assigned to all he did, and, with one exception, no one spoke kindly or encouragingly to him. The exception was Monsieur Malin. Ellis's clever contrivance with the ...
— Ernest Bracebridge - School Days • William H. G. Kingston
... 1400. Then it was taken by Timur, from whom the sultan Ahmed Ben Avis fled, and, finding refuge with the Greek emperor, contrived later to repossess himself of the city, whence he was finally expelled by Kara Yusuf of the Kara-Kuyunli ("Black Sheep") Mongols in 1417. About 1468 the descendants of the latter were driven out by Uzun Hasan or Cassim of the Ak-Kuyunli ("White Sheep") Mongols. He and his descendants reigned in Bagdad until Shah Ismail I., the founder of the Safawid royal house of ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 2 - "Baconthorpe" to "Bankruptcy" • Various
... Black Sheep," quoth Trooper Punch Peerson one tea-time to Troopers Bear, Little, Goate, Nemo, Burke, Jones, and Matthewson, "I suppose none of you answers to the ...
— Snake and Sword - A Novel • Percival Christopher Wren
... Of course there are black sheep in the Romish fold as elsewhere; perhaps even the simplicity, learning and devotion to duty of the individual I here write of, are rare. Yet one cannot help feeling how much more money the Government would have at command with which to remunerate good workers ...
— East of Paris - Sketches in the Gatinais, Bourbonnais, and Champagne • Matilda Betham-Edwards
... with child to him in Biggar, and seemingly deserted her; she was hanged on the Castle Hill for infanticide, June 1614; and Martin, elder in Dalkeith, eternally disgraced the name by signing witness in a witch trial, 1661. These are two of our black sheep. {3a} Under the Restoration, one Stevenson was a bailie in Edinburgh, and another the lessee of the Canonmills. There were at the same period two physicians of the name in Edinburgh, one of whom, Dr. ...
— Records of a Family of Engineers • Robert Louis Stevenson
... a family that has been aristocratic for several generations, and one that has been singularly free from black sheep. She appears to strangers somewhat reserved and stately, but when you become better acquainted you find she has a warm, kind heart. But she has a perfect horror of vulgarity. If she had seen this Sibley take more wine than he ought and make a spectacle of himself at ...
— A Face Illumined • E. P. Roe
... brothers and sisters could tell me. My father had refused to pain them by going into particulars, not only at the time of his brother's disappearance, but afterward, whenever the subject was mentioned. George had always been the black sheep of the flock, and he must have been conscious of his own baseness, or he would certainly have written to ...
— The Queen of Hearts • Wilkie Collins
... chiefly to prove to myself that I was not such a black sheep as some persons declared me to be, that I made up my mind to follow you and bring you back," said Percival, with his old liveliness of tone. "You see I had been more selfish than anybody knew. ...
— Under False Pretences - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... better be weepin' fur them black sheep o' his congregation an' fur Lee-yander's short-comin's, fur ez fur ez I kin hear he air about ez black a sheep ez most pastors want ter wrestle with fur the turnin' away from thar sins. Yes'm, Sister ...
— The Moonshiners At Hoho-Hebee Falls - 1895 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)
... when he crowded me down in the price of my goods, and robbed me of a living profit, in order that he might secure a double gain? I think not. There is not even the live and let live principle in that. No—no, sir. If he has joined the church, my word for it, there is a black sheep in the fold; or, I might say, without abuse of language, a wolf therein disguised ...
— All's for the Best • T. S. Arthur
... a black sheep wins, no matter what the score is. Otherwise the scorer of the greatest number of marks is the winner. In "Railway Whist" it is necessary for the players to be on different sides ...
— What Shall We Do Now?: Five Hundred Games and Pastimes • Dorothy Canfield Fisher
... made me mad. So yistidday an' to-day I watched, an' finally I plugged this black thief. Yes, he's got a glossy coat; but he's a bad un fer all his fine looks. These black foxes are bigger, stronger an' cunniner than red ones. In every litter you'll find a dark one, the black sheep of the family. Because he grows so much faster, an' steals all the food from the others, the mother jest takes him by the nape of the neck an' chucks him out in the world to shift fer hisself. ...
— The Spirit of the Border - A Romance of the Early Settlers in the Ohio Valley • Zane Grey
... front. This is continued until all the players are taken by Jacky Lingo, who then runs off around the ground with them. The owner goes after them, faces Jacky Lingo, and says, "Have you seen anything of my black sheep?" ...
— Games for the Playground, Home, School and Gymnasium • Jessie H. Bancroft
... Gracie, the black sheep, having been sent to school at the close of the Christmas holidays, and Jeanie being confined to the house with a severe cold. Olive, having become more and more her father's constant companion, disdained shopping expeditions. The two elder boys and Pat were all at a neighbouring school as ...
— The Bars of Iron • Ethel May Dell
... have spoken to me?" asked Donovan, laughing. "Then I am very glad it didn't occur to you. But about that you may be quite easy; nothing could make them think much worse of me than they do already. I began life as the black sheep of the neighborhood, and it is easier for the Ethiopian to change his skin than for a man to live down the past in public opinion. I shall be, at any rate, the dusky gray sheep of the place to the ...
— We Two • Edna Lyall
... had placed her more than ever on Vivian's bad list. The monitress considered that it completely cancelled the bathing episode, and regarded "that wild Irish girl" as the black sheep of the house, ready to lead astray such innocent lambs as Lettice Talbot who were impressionable enough to be influenced by her example. Miss Maitland, though grieved at such a relapse from the marked improvement that Honor had shown, was fortunately a better judge of character. She knew ...
— The New Girl at St. Chad's - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil
... poor wretches, as you calls them, is worse fighters than they was afore, and slaving skippers like Huggins collects their schooners' crews together and drives the black mutineers before 'em like a flock o' Baa, baa, black sheep, kills a lot and frightens a lot more to death, and then things goes on just ...
— Hunting the Skipper - The Cruise of the "Seafowl" Sloop • George Manville Fenn
... the Hopkins household were slight compared with the records against "the black sheep" of the colony, the family of Billingtons from London. The mother, Helen or Ellen, did not seem to redeem the reputation of husband and sons; traditionally she was called "the scold." After her husband had been executed in 1630, for the first ...
— The Women Who Came in the Mayflower • Annie Russell Marble
... you all I feel at liberty to.... You seem to have a pretty good line on mademoiselle, and I've told you what I know about de Lorgnes. As for the skipper, he's the black sheep of a good old New England family. Ran away to sea as a boy, and was disowned, and grew up in a rough school. It would take all night to name half the jobs he's had a hand in, mostly of a shady nature, in every quarter of the seven seas: gun running, pearl poaching, ...
— Alias The Lone Wolf • Louis Joseph Vance
... inhabitants of Koolfu are professedly Mahommedans; the rest are pagans, who once a year, in common with the other people of Nyffee, repair to a high hill in one of the southern provinces, on which they sacrifice a black bull, a black sheep, and a black dog. On their fetish houses are sculptured, as in Youriba, the lizard, the crocodile, the tortoise, and the boa, with sometimes human figures. Their language is a dialect of the Youribanee, but the Houssa ...
— Lander's Travels - The Travels of Richard Lander into the Interior of Africa • Robert Huish
... unsuspected quarter the voice of one cavilling in the wilderness, who contradicts your every story and finds with keen discriminating sight, "Black's not so black nor white so very white." Mr. Thompson-Seton makes declaration, "The silver-fox is but a phase or freak of a common-fox, exactly as a black sheep is, but with a difference—!" Yes, there's that fatal and fascinating difference. As we must have salmon-hatcheries, so Nature demands intelligent fox-farms, and beaver-farms, and skunk-farms. Forty acres under fur promises greater interest ...
— The New North • Agnes Deans Cameron
... regiments is of comparatively rare occurrence. Even when the 3rd West India Regiment was in existence, there was less in the three negro regiments than in one of the Line; while drunkenness is confined to the few black sheep who will be found in every body of men. Riots or disturbances between West India soldiers and the inhabitants of the towns in which they are quartered are unheard of, and in every garrison they receive the highest praise for their unvarying good and quiet behaviour. In fact they are merry, ...
— The History of the First West India Regiment • A. B. Ellis
... have it in my own way. You have two other daughters, mother—Violet and Lucy. Unless they change, they are exactly what you would have them. Be satisfied. Devote your energies to them and count me a black sheep. You can make me a little allowance, if you like—a hundred a year or so—but whether I have it or not, I am either going to make bows in Mademoiselle Rignaut's workshop, or I am going to be secretary to a very delightful lady—a Mrs. Christophor, or something ...
— The Mischief Maker • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... follow. Upon this route the crowd which one meets is certainly not aristocratic, but it is none the less Athenian. Here goes a drover, clad in skins, his legs wound with woolen bands in lieu of stockings; before him and his wolf-like dog shambles a flock of black sheep or less manageable goats, bleating and baaing as they are propelled toward market. After him there may come an unkempt, long-bearded farmer flogging on a pack ass or a mule attached to a clumsy cart with solid wheels, and laden with all kinds ...
— A Day In Old Athens • William Stearns Davis
... draw nearer to it, seemed to change in character, and I found at length that it came from some one leading flocks afield to the note of a rural horn. The narrow street of Lestampes stood full of sheep, from wall to wall—black sheep and white, bleating with one accord like the birds in spring, and each one accompanying himself upon the sheep-bell round his neck. It made a pathetic concert, all in treble. A little higher, and I passed a pair of men in a tree with pruning-hooks, and one of them was singing the music ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... now, for before the ministers abolished hell a man knew, when he was begetting a child, that he was begetting a soul that had only one chance in a hundred of escaping the eternal fires of damnation. He knew that in all probability that child would be brought to damnation—one of the ninety-nine black sheep. But since hell has been abolished death has become more welcome. I wrote a fairy story once. It was published somewhere. I don't remember just what it was now, but the substance of it was that a fairy gave a man the customary ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... black sheep. Look where he stands. As he grows weary, he grasps the straps on either side to steady him. His attitude is a cunningly devised mode of tormenting his fellow-passengers. Either elbow of our nondescript just reaches the hat of your opposite ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 6, May 7, 1870 • Various
... it was wrong when I commenced. I only know now that it is a little more wrong. Why should I give up my fun on that account? I might as well die for an old black sheep as a speckled lamb." ...
— From Jest to Earnest • E. P. Roe
... ninety-three—died in the harness, even while gingerly and thriftily knuckling along a weight into the eighth notch of the bar of the scoop scales—Ivory had come back as sole heir to store, stock and stand, a seventy-two-year-old black sheep bringing a most amazing tail behind him—no less than a band chariot, a half dozen animal cages, a tent loaded on a great cart, and various impedimenta of "Buck's Leviathan ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 5, June 1905 • Various
... Benedict, and Father Mortimer. The case was talked over, and it was agreed that Sister Roberga should be transferred to Shuldham where, as is reported, the Prioress is very strict, and knows how to hold her curb. This is practically a sentence of expulsion. We four all agreed that she was the black sheep in the Abbey, and that several of the younger Sisters—in especial Sister Philippa—would conduct themselves far better if she were removed. Sister Ismania was sent to tell her the sentence. She tossed ...
— In Convent Walls - The Story of the Despensers • Emily Sarah Holt
... A blue-and-black sheep-dog, shaggy as a bear, and as big, leashed to the wheel of the buggy, began to whimper and to whine with furious ecstasy. The big dog's big soul seemed to burst within him as the Angel of the Keys drew near. He had no tail to wag, so he wagged his whole body, putting ...
— Boy Woodburn - A Story of the Sussex Downs • Alfred Ollivant
... Master spake Blew down the mount the dust of pattering feet, White goats and black sheep winding slow their way With many a lingering nibble at the tufts, And wanderings from the path, where water gleamed Or wild figs hung. But always as they strayed The herdsman cried, or slung his sling, and kept The silly crowd still moving to the plain. A ewe ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 2 • Charles Dudley Warner
... which every one kneels together, from the grandee to the beggar. In the suburbs there are many woods of evergreen oak, vineyards, olive plantations, and orchards of mulberry, plum, and almond trees; and the flocks of black sheep and goats, grazing in the country ...
— The World's Fair • Anonymous
... to thee, Gregory Goole? I know his likes as well as thou—and it likes him not to let this poor boy starve, I'll warrant. Go, fetch the pasty and the cake that are in the buttery, with a glass of cordial,—the Certosa cordial,—and that in the shaking of a black sheep's tail, or I will tell my father what thou wottest of." And she looked the very picture ...
— Master Skylark • John Bennett
... from Mrs Arabin. Mr Harding was very anxious. "Firstly," as he said, "for the welfare of the poor man, of whom I cannot bring myself to think ill; and then for the honour of the cloth in Barchester." "We are as liable to have black sheep here as elsewhere," the archdeacon replied. "But, my dear, I do not think that the sheep is black; and we never have had black sheep in Barchester." "Haven't we though?" said the archdeacon, thinking, however, of sheep ...
— The Last Chronicle of Barset • Anthony Trollope
... general tendency on the part of the other guests to agree with their hostess, but one black sheep in the flock objected. He quite agreed, of course, with the general principle that liberality with small means was beautiful to behold as well as desirable to possess—the liberality, not the small means—and that, on the ...
— Dusty Diamonds Cut and Polished - A Tale of City Arab Life and Adventure • R.M. Ballantyne
... counted, they say, Rather a bad stick anyway, Splintered all over with dodges and tricks, Known as "the worst of the Deacon's six"; I, the truant, saucy and bold, The one black sheep in my father's fold, "Once on a time," as the stories say, Went over the hill on a winter's day— Over the hill to ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For, Book Two • Various
... better than mine, better than anybody's in the community, I suppose, for he is the one friend of the black sheep of the camp—Flint Buckner—and the only man Flint ever talks with or allows to talk with him. He says he knows Flint's history, and that it is trouble that has made him what he is, and so one ought to be as charitable toward him as one can. Now none but a pretty large heart could ...
— A Double Barrelled Detective Story • Mark Twain
... that you have had time, which no other country has had, to perfect your social system. Let the Radicals and the uninformed of other lands rail as they will, your English aristocracy is the finest body of thinkers and livers in the world. One hears ever of the black sheep, the few luridly glaring failures, but never of the hundreds of great and noble lives which ...
— The Reason Why • Elinor Glyn
... employed in this unlooked-for emergency, St. Peter hastily withdrew to take counsel's opinion; and during his absence Mr. Flaw firmly established himself in the realms of bliss, where he remains to this day the black sheep of the ...
— A Book About Lawyers • John Cordy Jeaffreson
... she's the daughter of some black sheep who has gone down a peg, and our Father has sent her here for you to help her back again," said her husband with an adorable look at his helper. "If anyone can do ...
— Exit Betty • Grace Livingston Hill
... disapprovingly) that she had been to see poor Ellen, who was staying with old Mrs. Mingott. Archer entirely approved of family solidarity, and one of the qualities he most admired in the Mingotts was their resolute championship of the few black sheep that their blameless stock had produced. There was nothing mean or ungenerous in the young man's heart, and he was glad that his future wife should not be restrained by false prudery from being kind (in private) to her ...
— The Age of Innocence • Edith Wharton
... any rate.' At this Mrs. Ponto looked at Miss Wirt. After their eyes had met and they had wagged their heads at each other. They looked up to the ceiling. So did the young ladies. They thrilled. It was evident I had said something terrible. Another black sheep in the Church? thought I with a little sorrow; for I don't care to own that I have a respect for the cloth. 'I—hope there's ...
— The Book of Snobs • William Makepeace Thackeray
... on venturing forth to her own cabin, was met by the sight of Mrs. Stanislaw dragging all her possessions into the corridor. It appeared that even for the few remaining days at sea the tigress could not lie down with the black sheep! A sweet and sympathetic soul, who also lived down the same alley and had the same horror of contaminating influence, had therefore offered to take her in. The picturesque incident was being witnessed ...
— Blue Aloes - Stories of South Africa • Cynthia Stockley
... real name was probably Abu Said, was the emir of the Kara-koyunla dynasty, or black sheep tribe of the Turkmans, who had risen to independence after the death of Timor, and who had long contended with the prince of the white sheep tribe for ascendancy. These two tribes derived their distinctive appellations of the black and white weathers, from some ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. II • Robert Kerr
... with the inventory of Sergeant Beresford's equipment as a future husband. Fond, but, alas! fickle. A family black sheep, or if not black, at least striped. Likely not to plague you long, if he's sent on many more jobs like the last. Said to be good-tempered, but not docile. Kind, as men go, but a ne'er-do-well, a prodigal, ...
— Man Size • William MacLeod Raine
... of out-of-the-way but amiable monster. Now, one seldom meets with man, woman, or child, who does not know a hawk from a handsaw, or even, to adopt the more learned reading, from a heron-shew; a black swan is no longer erroneously considered a rara avis any more than a black sheep; while the Glasgow Gander himself, no longer apocryphal, has taken his place in the national creed, belief in his existence being merely blended with wonder at his magnitude, and some surprise perhaps among the scientific that he should be as ...
— Recreations of Christopher North, Volume 2 • John Wilson |
