"Brown study" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... on deck, and somehow when I was alone I too went into a brown study, and began wondering at Mr Preddle's curious ways, and thinking what a pity it was that a gentleman like Mr Denning, who was on a voyage for the sake of his health, should take such a dislike to Mr Frewen and Mr Preddle too. It hardly seemed to be like irritability, for after all he was as merry ...
— Sail Ho! - A Boy at Sea • George Manville Fenn
... detective had gone Mr. Marshall sat in a brown study for a few moments. Then he summoned his superintendent ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces at Work • Edith Van Dyne
... religious! So I said to mamma that, now we knew all about it, there could be no reason why we shouldn't see as much of each other as ever we liked, seeing Richard was our brother. But she paid no heed to me; she sat thinking and thinking; and I read in her face that she was not in a brown study, but trying to get at something. It was many minutes before she spoke, but she did at last, and what she told us is my secret, Barbara! But I'm not bound to keep it from you, for I know you would not hurt Richard, and you have a right to know ...
— There & Back • George MacDonald
... the puzzled look returned to his face many times that evening. He walked home in a brown study. Kilmeny's case certainly seemed a strange one, and the more he thought of it the stranger ...
— Kilmeny of the Orchard • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... cannot, in my views, be any of them the sort of people to enjoy happiness and longevity!" When his reflections reached this point, he felt the more dejected, and plainly betrayed a sad appearance, and all he did was to droop his head and to plunge in a brown study. ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... species of brown study all the way along Tudor Street; his companion also maintained silence in a fashion which showed that he was by nature and custom a man of few words. It was not until the two were climbing the old balustrated staircase of the house in ...
— The Middle Temple Murder • J.S. Fletcher
... in a brown study; sometimes sitting on the quarter-deck with arms folded, and head hanging upon his chest. Then he would rise, and gaze out to windward, as if he had suddenly discovered a friend. But looking disappointed, would retire slowly into his state-room, ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville
... about anything, cannot fail to admit that my sister ought either to be at the head of Tammany Hall or the army. She gave one look at Jimmie's suspiciously bland countenance, then gathered up her gloves, her veil and stick, and went slowly up-stairs, apparently in a brown study. ...
— Abroad with the Jimmies • Lilian Bell
... she and Bruce were alone in the room. He was sitting at Mother Jess's desk, in as deep a brown study as she had been. The girl's voice ...
— The Camerons of Highboro • Beth B. Gilchrist
... in a brown study. This is capital—I had no idea you would have so good a room as this, Nat. Did you ...
— The Bobbin Boy - or, How Nat Got His learning • William M. Thayer
... But in such a dilemma, I warn you, beware How you enter in haste such a dark thoroughfare; For all who have pass'd through the passage they say, Have terribly painted their coats by the way. Poor Bruin declared it was unbearable quite, And was in a brown study till day turn'd to night; The Axis turn'd round in his rage, and just then The Sloth look'd as black as the ink in my pen. The soft, silky, self-colour'd Puma felt pain, Pale as ashes with anger ...
— The Peacock 'At Home' AND The Butterfly's Ball AND The Fancy Fair • Catherine Ann Dorset
... but not at all green; and beyond, for a time, the country was still in a grim brown study, though it ought to have remembered that it was now laughing Provence. It gave us crumbling chateaux, high-perched ancient rock villages without stint, and even a house (in the strangely named village ...
— The Princess Passes • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson
... had something on his mind, but he said nothing more. Only Nan noticed his brown study. But when she asked him what it was about, he ...
— Nan Sherwood at Rose Ranch • Annie Roe Carr
... meditated advances, the partners parted. On entering his own room, Quirk, closing his door, stood for some time leaning against the side of the window, with his hands in his pockets, and his eyes instinctively resting on his banker's book, which lay on the table. He was in a very brown study, the subject on which his thoughts were busied, being the prudence or imprudence of leaving Titmouse thus in the hands of Gammon. It might be all very well for Quirk to assert his self-confidence when in Gammon's presence; but he did not ...
— Ten Thousand a-Year. Volume 1. • Samuel Warren
... and a rustic bridge—more for ornament than use, for a man with long legs could stride the stream well—was thrown over it. Val had reached thus far, when he saw someone standing on the bridge, his arms on the parapet, apparently in a brown study. ...
— Elster's Folly • Mrs. Henry Wood
... chiming to the Tune of Golden Tresses, yellow Locks, Milk, Marble, Ivory, Silver, Swan, Snow, Daisies, Doves, and the Lord knows what; which he is always sounding with so much Vehemence in my Ears, that he often puts me into a brown Study how to answer him; and I find that I am in a fair Way to be quite confounded, without your ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... brown study of his future plans to undo the mischief done by a woman's tongue. The poor fellow often glanced at Vaura in all her loveliness, and a pain came to his heart as he looked, for he thought of how he was leaving her, not knowing if she ...
— A Heart-Song of To-day • Annie Gregg Savigny
... and went into a brown study. Gustav waited patiently for several moments, then left to do the evening chores. Charley sat on an empty box beside the pump watching now the stream that flowed over the field and now Roger's half closed eyes. Finally he emptied ...
— The Forbidden Trail • Honore Willsie
... that men found irresistible as she reached for the basket, but the man sat with eyes brimming melancholy and fixed on the violet haze of the skyline until she noticed his abstraction and inquired: "What ails ye, Bas? Ye're in a brown study erbout somethin'." ...
— The Roof Tree • Charles Neville Buck
... had taken measurements for John's new tunic. She was embroidering it now with the Bearnais badge, and had spread Barboux's tunic on the gun-breach to give her the pattern. John, passing along the terrace in a brown study, while his eyes followed the evolutions of Sergeant Bedard's men at morning parade in the square below, did not catch sight of her until she called to him to come and ...
— Fort Amity • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... my boots just now in what the novelists call "a brown study." There was no urgent reason for putting on my boots. I was not going out, and my slippers were much more comfortable. But something had to be done. I wanted a subject for an article. Now if you are accustomed ...
— Pebbles on the Shore • Alpha of the Plough (Alfred George Gardiner)
... leetle patience, your honour, and all will be out as quick as directly—in the twinkling of a bed-post.—For three successive nights I sat up in a brown study, with a four-in-the-pound candle burning before me till almost cock-crow, composing a love-letter, a most elaborate affair, the pure overflowing of la belle passion, all about Venus, Cupids, bows and arrows, hearts, darts, and them things, which, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 12, No. 339, Saturday, November 8, 1828. • Various
... Tartarin was in his study, in a brown study himself, when he saw the commandant stride in, stern, wearing black gloves, ...
— Tartarin of Tarascon • Alphonse Daudet
... hope to be constables, but some of us is constables without ever runnin' for office! Well, well, well! I shouldn't be surprised if the end o' the world happens along now, any time," said Susanna, irrelevantly, and fell into such a brown study that Katy dared not interrupt her, and the rest of the way home ...
— The Brass Bound Box • Evelyn Raymond
... better go down now, then," Miss Ormiston said. "Mr. Forrester, would you come out of your brown study and let ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Vol. XV., No. 85. January, 1875. • Various
... no notice. He was puffing away at his pipe, long-drawn-out, solemn puffs, and gazing at the fire in a brown study. ...
— The Yeoman Adventurer • George W. Gough
... Zack, after vainly trying to rally him into talking, lit a cigar in despair, and the two walked on together silently—Mat having his hands in his pockets, keeping his eyes bent on the ground, and altogether burying himself, as it were, from the outer world, in the inner-most recesses of a deep brown study. ...
— Hide and Seek • Wilkie Collins
... I was left standing in a brown study till I heard Skipper John's voice calling me. As I descended the ladder he said: "We're so grateful you comed, Doctor. The poor old creatures won't last long. But thanks aren't dollars. I haven't a cent in the world now. The old ...
— A Labrador Doctor - The Autobiography of Wilfred Thomason Grenfell • Wilfred Thomason Grenfell
... a task for an offhand answer, and the suggestion was made that the aged one consult his minister. Again the negro fell into a brown study, and then he raised his head and his eyes twinkled merrily, and he said ...
— Toaster's Handbook - Jokes, Stories, and Quotations • Peggy Edmund & Harold W. Williams, compilers
... answer to this criticism. Perhaps he scarcely heard it, for he appeared lost in a brown study. Finally he said: "Will you permit my daughter to call upon your ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces in Society • Edith Van Dyne
... the perpendicular was from the insertion of a speaking-trumpet under his left arm, at right angles with his body. It had evidently seen much service, was battered, and the clack Japan worn off in most parts of it. As we said before, Mr Vanslyperken walked his quarter-deck. He was in a brown study, yet looked blue. Six strides brought him to the taffrail of the vessel, six more to the bows, such was the length of his tether—and ...
— Snarleyyow • Captain Frederick Marryat
... getting away at once, was crossing the compound, disappointed and worried. He had walked almost unwittingly into the straggling group of Zangiacomo's performers. It was a shock to him, on coming out of his brown study, to find the girl so near to him, as if one waking suddenly should see the figure of his dream turned into flesh and blood. She did not raise her shapely head, but her glance was no dream thing. It was real, the most real impression of ...
— Victory • Joseph Conrad
... a brown study. "The boys are going off some place to-night. I heard Ernest ask your mother if she had cleaned that spot off his Sunday suit, where somebody spilled ice cream on him at ...
— Chicken Little Jane on the Big John • Lily Munsell Ritchie
... out of humour with this, and naturally looked about for some one to find fault with. Friedrich was at hand, and so they fell upon him and reproached him for his want of sympathy with their vexation. The boy awoke from a brown study, and began to defend himself:—"He was very sorry," he said; "but he couldn't see the use of making such a great fuss about a few old ballads, that after all were nothing ...
— Melchior's Dream and Other Tales • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... of no avail. The half-dozen grooms who joined in feeble chorus did not pay the expense of the gas; and he found the Free-and-easy, without abettors, the most difficult thing in the world. So he gave it up, and fell into a brown study, which engrossed him for a month. He had visions of Whitecross Street before his eyes; and poor Mrs Bowley sighed again, and sighed in vain, after the remembrance of Sir Plumberry's kitchen, and its vanished joys. The only symptom of business was ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 427 - Volume 17, New Series, March 6, 1852 • Various
... together in this world, Mr Simple, when we wish to hold on, and that's a piece of philosophy worth all the twenty-six thousand and odd years of my friend the carpenter, which leads to nothing but a brown study, when he ought to ...
— Peter Simple and The Three Cutters, Vol. 1-2 • Frederick Marryat
... absorbed in reading, who rose and inquired my business, and upon my statement that I desired to see Mr BREAKWATER, Esq., on urgent business, courteously directed me up a marble staircase, at the top of which was a second attendant, also engaged in brown study—for the attendants appear to be laudably addicted to ...
— Baboo Jabberjee, B.A. • F. Anstey
... still in a brown study as he took the bundles from Izzy and dropped them on his bed. Izzy went out, and Gordon stood staring at the wall. Trench? Or the new Commissioner Crane? If Earth should win—and they had most of the power, after all—and Bruce Gordon had fought against Security, ...
— Police Your Planet • Lester del Rey
... had read the letter, young Barnes sat for some time in a brown study on the edge of his bed. The letter contained only one more repetition of counsels that had been dinned into his ears for months—almost ever since the financial crash which had followed his father's death, and the crash of another sort, concerning himself, which had come so quick upon it. His ...
— Marriage a la mode • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... and see how long you could keep it up—brown study as usual!" cried Charteris. "Why, I believe the beggar takes me for a ghost! Hal, old boy!" bending from the saddle he bestowed on Gerrard a most unghostly clap on the shoulder. "I'm come back to plague ...
— The Path to Honour • Sydney C. Grier
... moment it seemed as if he were about to speak. But instead, he stared hard at Maida, falling gradually into a brown study. From time to time he came out of it long enough to look sharply at her. The sparkle had all gone out of her face. She ...
— Maida's Little Shop • Inez Haynes Irwin
... me for having startled you so," he said, gently, then adding with a twinkle of amusement in his eyes. "You were surely in a very brown study." ...
— Virgie's Inheritance • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... stood at the door of the hospital tent looking after the Smithhurst, General Pepperell came along, alone, in a brown study, his brows knit and his face troubled. For though the French ship-of-war, "Vigilant" had been captured, Louisburg had not, and every day was adding to the list of soldiers in the hospitals. But when he saw her, he stopped, and his expression, at first ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Volume 3, No. 6 • Various
... talk to me when you don't fall into a brown study. Talk now, and talk your brightest and best,' said ...
— Under the Deodars • Rudyard Kipling
... of the day in a brown study. It was clear to me that some destiny had prearranged this meeting. Here was this man travelling prosperously as a first-class passenger with all the appurtenances of respectability. I alone had seen him ...
— Prester John • John Buchan
... "Come out of your brown study, Grace," called Hippy. "I want you to settle an argument that has arisen between Miss O'Malley and myself. Never before have we had an argument. Timid, gentle creature that she is, she has always deferred to my superior intellect, ...
— Grace Harlowe's Senior Year at High School - or The Parting of the Ways • Jessie Graham Flower
... Belgian throne was peacefully walking to and fro in a brown study, unconscious that the eyes of some hundreds of his future subjects were fixed upon his lightly-draped form. His deafness prevented him from hearing the noise outside the window, and rendered all warnings by means of sounds ineffectual. So the prince's chamberlain was aroused, and after some ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. July, 1878. • Various
... river," retorted Bobby. "Anyway, Miss, you didn't seem to be listening to a word I said. What were you thinking about in such a brown study?" ...
— Betty Gordon in Washington • Alice B. Emerson
... 'Pleasures of Hope'?" said Croker to Hook. "Which do you mean, the Scotch poet's or the Irish Chancellor's? the real or the ideal—Tommy's four thousand lines or Jocky's four thousand pounds a-year?" inquired Theodore. Croker has been in a brown study ever since. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, August 14, 1841 • Various
... shook his head, and then seemed to fall into a brown study, but suddenly, seeing that they were all waiting for the song, he cleared up his throat, and after several false starts ...
— Little Mr. Thimblefinger and His Queer Country • Joel Chandler Harris
... inconceivable to him. Nor was there much chance of his discovering it if she did. When not at work, he was constantly reading. Most people close a book without having gained from it a single germ of thought; Mr. Craig seldom opened one without falling directly into a brown study over something suggested by it. But I believe that, even when thus absorbed, Phemy was never far from his thought. At the same time, like many Scots, while she was his one joy, he seldom showed her sign of affection, ...
— Heather and Snow • George MacDonald
... Edward, looking at his little niece with interest as she sat in her big chair, her elbows supported by her knees, and her chin resting in her hands, "are you going into a brown study?" ...
— Probable Sons • Amy Le Feuvre
... Ned contrived to monopolize all the talents of the family," said a brother, found in a brown study after listening to one of Burke's speeches in Parliament; "but then I remember; when we were at play, he ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden
... christened Moggy, whom we shall soon have to introduce to our readers as a spinster of forty-seven; and second, Antony Alexander Witherington, Esquire, whom we just now have left in a very comfortable position, and in a very brown study. ...
— The Pirate and The Three Cutters • Frederick Marryat
... mind, must be cleansed with blood. A certain noble lord, of our country, when he was yet a commoner, on his travels, involved himself in a dilemma of this sort, at the court of Lorrain. He had been riding out, and strolling along a public walk, in a brown study, with his horse-whip in his hand, perceived a caterpillar crawling on the back of a marquis, who chanced to be before him. He never thought of the petit maitre; but lifting up his whip, in order to kill the insect, laid it across his shoulders with a crack, that alarmed ...
— Travels Through France and Italy • Tobias Smollett
... later, the room was empty and Muller, as the last of the group, walked slowly down the stairs. He was in such a brown study that he scarcely heard the commissioner's friendly "goodnight," nor did he notice that he was walking down the quiet street under a star-gilded sky. "Almost convicted—almost. Almost?" Muller's lips ...
— The Lamp That Went Out • Augusta Groner
... brown study, eating mechanically. The men began an eager and somewhat truculent discussion full of lawless and bloodthirsty suggestion. Some suggested the kidnapping and sequestration of Reed until the affair should ...
— The Riverman • Stewart Edward White
... the Circean similitude was not a little enhanced by the antique masonry,{2} and the expanse of sea which was visible from the eminence. He leaned over the gate, repeated aloud the lines of the Odyssey, and fell into a brown study, from which he was aroused by the approach of a young ...
— Gryll Grange • Thomas Love Peacock
... he do not come soon, I shall have finished my novel without a heroine. Well, I'm not the first person who has been foiled by a woman. (Continues to gnaw his pen in a brown study.) ...
— Olla Podrida • Frederick Marryat
... His brown study lasted only a moment. With a quick movement he walked to the blackboard, caught up a section of sheepskin, and began erasing the ...
— The Homesteaders - A Novel of the Canadian West • Robert J. C. Stead
... the night, and was sitting reading, when a low tap at the door roused him from a brown study. He gave the necessary ...
— Home as Found • James Fenimore Cooper
... came back from his walk, white and worn and haggard, and the woman was touched at his distress. As the evening wore on she muttered some expression of sorrow, something approaching to contrition. Boulte came out of a brown study and said, 'Oh, that! I wasn't thinking about that. By the way, what does Kurrell ...
— Under the Deodars • Rudyard Kipling
... am suddenly interrupted by loud and increasing chirpings. I look about me: my window is surrounded with sparrows picking up the crumbs of bread which in my brown study I had just scattered on the roof. At this sight a flash of light broke upon my saddened heart. I deceived myself just now, when I complained that I had nothing to give: thanks to me, the sparrows of this part of the town will ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... had not been in a brown study as he went into the Chequers to "sup his four-hours"—in modern phrase, to have his tea—and to give his horse a rest and feed before returning home, he would certainly have recognised two people who were seated ...
— All's Well - Alice's Victory • Emily Sarah Holt
... who was not allowed to stay on the water after nine o'clock? She had ceased to think of the young man, but the image of his sister haunted her. How stylish she was, yet how simple and quiet! "I wonder," thought Flossy to herself, "if I could ever become like her." The reflection threw her into a brown study in which she remained for weeks, and during which she refused the hand of a staid and respectable townsman, who, in her father's words, was ready to take her with all her follies. David Price was disappointed. He loved this independent daughter, and he had ...
— Unleavened Bread • Robert Grant
... two days, and the old town had begun to take on its remembered aspect as he wandered through the streets and along the river banks. On this second day he was going up Main street deep in a brown study when he heard his name called by a young man who was approaching him, and saw an ...
— The Strength of Gideon and Other Stories • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... and the lawyer departed after dinner to meet their special train at Perth. Lady Dunstable, with variable spirits, kept the evening going, sometimes in a brown study, sometimes as brilliant and pugnacious as ever. Doris slipped out of the drawing-room once or twice to go and gossip with Alice Wigram, who was lying under silken coverings, inclined to gentle moralising on the splendours ...
— A Great Success • Mrs Humphry Ward
... a brown study. "What? Who? Why, I suppose I ought to be—indeed, I am grateful," he asserted. "Certainly you saved ...
— The Black Bag • Louis Joseph Vance
... a sure cure for dirt," replied Madge, still in a brown study. Then she sprang to tier feet and almost ran out of the little park, nearly to the edge of the canal. Her friends followed her. There was no doubt that Madge ...
— Madge Morton, Captain of the Merry Maid • Amy D. V. Chalmers |
