"Breach of promise" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... plain terms of hoping that his son was thinking of breaking off his engagement to Miss Wilkins, Ralph coolly asked him if he was aware that, in that case, he should lose all title to being a man of honour, and might have an action brought against him for breach of promise? ...
— A Dark Night's Work • Elizabeth Gaskell
... sprightlier Miss CAROWTHERS. Every night, at the same hour, does Miss CAROWTHERS discuss with her First Assistant, Mrs. PILLSBURY, the Inalienable Bights of Women; always making certain casual reference to a gentleman in the dim past, whom she was obliged to sue for breach of promise, and to whom, for that reason, Miss CAROWTHERS airily refers, with a toleration bred of the lapse of time, as ...
— Punchinello, Vol.1, No. 12 , June 18,1870 • Various
... rectitude; disgrace &c (disrepute) 874; fraud &c (deception) 545; lying &c 544; bad faith, Punic faith; mala fides [Lat.], Punica fides [Lat.]; infidelity; faithlessness &c adj.; Judas kiss, betrayal. breach of promise, breach of trust, breach of faith; prodition^, disloyalty, treason, high treason; apostasy &c (tergiversation) 607; nonobservance &c 773. shabbiness &c adj.; villainy, villany^; baseness &c adj.; abjection, debasement, turpitude, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... breach of promise trial once," related Avery, half closing his eyes in reminiscence, "and it was the funniest thing I ever listened to. 'Twas twenty years ago, and I'll bet that the people down there laugh yet when they see that fellow walk along the street. Them ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 5, June 1905 • Various
... rose and went to the place of rendezvous, where I waited two hours in vain, and was so exasperated against him for breaking his appointment, that I set out for the city by myself, in hope of finding the villain, and being revenged on him for his breach of promise. At length I found myself at the Navy Office, which I entered, and saw crowds of young fellows walking below, many of whom made no better appearance than myself. I consulted the physiognomy of each, and at last made up to one whose countenance I liked, and asked, ...
— The Adventures of Roderick Random • Tobias Smollett
... for money-making arts: In childhood feeble, he, for country air, Had long resided with a rustic pair; All round whose room were doleful ballads, songs, Of lovers' sufferings and of ladies' wrongs; Of peevish ghosts who came at dark midnight, For breach of promise, guilty men to fright; Love, marriage, murder, were the themes, with these, All that on idle, ardent spirits seize; Robbers at land and pirates on the main, Enchanters foil'd, spells broken, giants slain; Legends of love, with ...
— Tales • George Crabbe
... that if you like. It's a dirty word, but I'll stand for it, seein' it's you. Blackmail! What's a waiter's tip but blackmail for good service? What's a lawyer's fee from a corporation but money paid by men to keep them out of the jail? What's a breach of promise case? Blackmail—legal blackmail. I'm doin' nothin' less an' nothin' more than a million other men—but I'm not workin' with a lawyer. I'll turn the trick alone. What would you say if I told you that half of every dollar McGuire ...
— The Vagrant Duke • George Gibbs
... In a breach of promise case Scarlett appeared for the defendant, who was supposed to have been cajoled into the engagement by the plaintiff's mother, a titled lady. The mother, as a witness, completely baffled the defendant's clever counsel when under his cross-examination; but by one of his happiest ...
— Law and Laughter • George Alexander Morton
... followed this speech as is seldom heard even in a breach of promise case, where the most touching pathos often causes the greatest amusement to ...
— The Humourous Story of Farmer Bumpkin's Lawsuit • Richard Harris
... than in half the biographical novels ever written. He relates to us all the various steps by which his office-boy rose to be the "ruler of the queen's navee," and explains to us how the briefless barrister managed to become a great and good judge, "ready to try this breach of promise of marriage." It is in the petty details, not in the great results, that the ...
— Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow • Jerome K. Jerome
... prevailed in debt. It was settled that assumpsit would lie for a mere omission or nonfeasance. The cases which have been mentioned of the reign of Henry VI. were followed by others in the latter years of Henry VII., /3/ and it was never again doubted. An action for such a cause was clearly for a breach of promise, as had been recognized from the time of Edward III. If so, a consideration was necessary. /4/ Notwithstanding occasional vagaries, that also had been settled or taken for granted in many cases of Queen Elizabeth's time. But the ...
— The Common Law • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
... of those times, and the plaintiff, calling upon God to defend the right, charged upon the defendant with a charge which took away the breath of his adversary. This, of course, was only applicable to certain cases, and could not be used in trials for divorce, breach of promise, etc. ...
— Comic History of England • Bill Nye
... would be for any one else, but I'm so used to that now I don't mind. Whenever the telephone bell rings I expect to hear that Frank is sued for breach of promise, or arrested for burglary, or some little thing like that. If he were only a novelist he'd make our everlasting fortune. But I know why he started this story—he wants to head off my talk with you about the Haneys, and ...
— Money Magic - A Novel • Hamlin Garland
... Mandoux, overruled him, and compelled its publication, in spite of the Duc de Richelieu, the chief confidant of the mistress, and long the chief minister and promoter of the king's debaucheries, who insulted the cardinal with the grossest abuse for his breach of promise.[8] It may be doubted whether such a compromise with profligacy, and such a profanation of the most solemn rites of the Church by its ministers, were not the greatest scandal of all; but it was in too ...
— The Life of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France • Charles Duke Yonge
... most expressly do charge him to be exactly just, faithful, and veracious in all his words and deeds; who therefore should be ready to say with David, "I have sworn, and am steadfastly purposed to keep thy righteous judgments," to him every word hath the force of an oath; every lie, every breach of promise, every violation of faith doth involve perjury: for him to swear is false heraldry, an impertinent accumulation of one oath upon another; he of all men should disdain to allow that his words are not perfectly ...
— Sermons on Evil-Speaking • Isaac Barrow
... developed most effective powers of resistance to every blandishment that went beyond strictest propriety. His ardor cooled suddenly when Harris filed the papers in a suit for ten thousand dollars damages for breach of promise. ...
— Within the Law - From the Play of Bayard Veiller • Marvin Dana
... Messrs. Dodson & Fogg, solicitors, Mrs. Bardell brought an action for breach of promise of marriage against Mr. Pickwick, and the damages were laid at L1,500. February 14 was the day fixed for ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol III • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.
... loved. Would he understand? I wonder. He'll be human or you wouldn't fall in love with him; and always he'll be pondering and bedevilling himself with queer ideas—because he'll be human. Of course there's a loophole—you can sue me for breach of promise." ...
— The Drums Of Jeopardy • Harold MacGrath
... the unborn child of her deceased husband, insisted that she would marry no man until she was "delivered." In the meantime, William Farrar, named administrator of her deceased husband's estate, also pressed his suit and gained favor; whereupon, the cleric entered in the Court a suit for breach of promise. The contest over the widow finally was referred to the authorities in London, who declined to pass upon "so delicate a matter." Mr. Pooley, probably then finding his cause hopeless, withdrew his case in Court, and by 1625, the charming widow had ...
— Domestic Life in Virginia in the Seventeenth Century - Jamestown 350th Anniversary Historical Booklet Number 17 • Annie Lash Jester
... comes the world again: "In my travels I met with a handsome lad named Charles Balfour Esq., and from him I got ofers of marage—offers of marage, did I say? Nay plenty heard me." A fine scent for "breach of promise"! ...
— Stories of Childhood • Various
... laughed firmly, closed his lips tight, and scratched his head just below where he had pushed his wig back, for all the world like the gentleman-farmer for whom he loved to be taken. He was considered perhaps the leading man in breach of promise cases. ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... blue turtles in delirium tremens. But he was to write her love letters—the worst kind of love letters, such as your wife publishes after you are dead—every day. At the end of the month he was to drop her, and she would bring suit for $100,000 for breach of promise. ...
— Strictly Business • O. Henry
... Tregenza had little pity herself for unfortunate or mistaken women. Let a girl lose her character and Thomasin usually refused to hear any plea of mercy from any source. Only once did she find extenuating circumstances: in a case where a ruined farmer's daughter brought an action for breach of promise and won it, with heavy damages. But money acted in a peculiar way with this woman. It put her conscience and her judgment out of focus, softened the outlines of events, furnished excuses for unusual practices, gilded with a bright lining even ...
— Lying Prophets • Eden Phillpotts
... a long speech in his favor, but it was of no use. The evidence seemed all against him. The jury found him guilty of breach of promise of marriage, and sentenced him to pay ...
— Tales from Dickens • Charles Dickens and Hallie Erminie Rives
... woman faltered, "I was to ask if there had been any—any presents. But," she added hastily, to save herself from the wrath which she saw gathering on Mrs. Caldwell's face, "I am sure there were not. I'm sure you would never bring a breach of promise case—I'm sure it has all been a dreadful mistake. If Mr. Richardson wants anything of this kind done in future, he must do it ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand
... emitting a potent spirituous fume from the contents of the broken bottle of Kalydor. The paper was two or three years old, but contained an article of several columns, in which I soon grew wonderfully interested. It was the report of a trial for breach of promise of marriage, giving the testimony in full, with fervid extracts from both the gentleman's and lady's amatory correspondence. The deserted damsel had personally appeared in court, and had borne energetic evidence to her lover's perfidy and the strength of her blighted affections. On the ...
— Mosses from an Old Manse and Other Stories • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... of this elephant, Bolivar, had to go and see a girl that he met when the show was here last year, and settle a case of breach of promise before a justice of the peace, and the boss told pa to look after the elephant for an hour or so. So pa took a pole with a hook in it and sat down on a bale of hay to watch Bolivar. It was one of those hot days, and Bolivar stood drooping and perspiring, and wishing the show ...
— Peck's Bad Boy at the Circus • George W. Peck
... two later it was known throughout the town that Zaidee Hooker had sued Adoniram Hotchkiss for breach of promise, and that the damages were laid at five thousand dollars. As in those bucolic days the Western press was under the secure censorship of a revolver, a cautious tone of criticism prevailed, and any gossip was confined to personal expression, and even then at the ...
— The Best American Humorous Short Stories • Various |
