"Feigning" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... had to wait until to-morrow evening, at any rate; this might serve as well as anything else to bridge the dreary hours. The country was the very place for me: and walking is an excellent sedative for the nerves. Remembering poor Rowley, feigning a cold in our lodgings and immediately under the guns of the formidable and now doubtful Bethiah, I asked if I might bring my servant. 'Poor devil! it is dull for ...
— St Ives • Robert Louis Stevenson
... stunned, heard this decree with thankfulness. The bandits obviously thought him more hurt than he was, and if only they would leave him lying here, he would soon pick himself up and renew his attempt to go to Esther. He did not move, feigning unconsciousness, even though he felt rather than saw that hideous Rateau stooping over him, heard his stertorous breathing, the wheezing ...
— The League of the Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... Magnus with oars approached th' accursed land, When in their little boat the murderous crew Drew nigh, and feigning from th' Egyptian court A ready welcome, blamed the double tides Broken by shallows, and their scanty beach Unfit for fleets; and bade him to their craft Leaving his loftier ship. Had not the fates' Eternal and unalterable laws Called for their victim ...
— Pharsalia; Dramatic Episodes of the Civil Wars • Lucan
... Still feigning interest in the chunk of gold in his hand, he listened intently and he heard the breathing of the thing behind him. His eyes searched the ground in front of him for a weapon, but they saw only the ...
— Brown Wolf and Other Jack London Stories - Chosen and Edited By Franklin K. Mathiews • Jack London
... have it; though I think to any other it must be writ large upon my countenance." She rose and paced the floor impetuously. "Is it possible," she began again, "you do not yet perceive the sense of that execrable scene? Or do you think, by feigning ignorance, to prolong my humiliation? Oh," she said, pausing before him, her breast in a tumult, her eyes alight, "it was I who persuaded my father of your discretion and prudence, it was through my influence that he opened ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton
... if, as now it seems, your vision rests With any pleasure on me, do not bid 100 Old Apollonius—from him keep me hid." Lycius, perplex'd at words so blind and blank, Made close inquiry; from whose touch she shrank, Feigning a sleep; and he to the dull shade Of deep sleep ...
— Keats: Poems Published in 1820 • John Keats
... latter example, note that it is unnecessary to complete the identification of the person with the thing in order to ensure a comic effect. It is sufficient for us to start in this direction by feigning, for instance, to confuse the person with the function he exercises. I will only quote a sentence spoken by a village mayor in one of About's novels: "The prefect, who has always shown us the same kindness, though he has been changed ...
— Laughter: An Essay on the Meaning of the Comic • Henri Bergson
... project with eyes shut, still feigning sleep; and my extreme quiescence had, as I hoped, the effect of throwing them off their guard. Jules, like all in the same employment, was always ready for forty winks, and I saw that he was sound and snoring just ...
— The Passenger from Calais • Arthur Griffiths
... and looked for their wings, they could not find those belonging to the youngest, Macaya. At last the two goddesses put on their wings and flew up to heaven, leaving behind them Macaya, who wept bitterly, since without her wings she could not go home. Then Magboloto, feigning to have come from a distance, met her and asked: "Why ...
— Philippine Folk-Tales • Clara Kern Bayliss, Berton L. Maxfield, W. H. Millington,
... we crossed to the other side of the Hudson in flat boats, with our horses. But on that night it was the same, I feigning sleep when it came time for the Siwanois to relieve the man on guard. And once again, after he had silently inspected us all, the Sagamore stole away into leafy depths, but halted as before within earshot still. And once again some nascent sense ...
— The Hidden Children • Robert W. Chambers
... Manners," said the old man. "I make no doubt at all that he hath promised to assist him against them all—against Mr. John his father, it may be, or Mr. Bassett, or God knows whom! And yet still feigning to be true! And that is ...
— Come Rack! Come Rope! • Robert Hugh Benson
... resentment, sick from disillusionment, she finally crept into bed, leaving one electric candle burning upon her dressing-table. Although she knew she could not sleep, she determined to postpone a scene with Bob by feigning slumber. ...
— The Auction Block • Rex Beach
... comparison of the passages in "King Lear" spoken by Edgar when feigning madness, with those in Harsnet's book which seem to have suggested them, will furnish as vivid a picture as it is possible to give of the state of contemporary belief upon the subject of possession. It is impossible not to notice that nearly all the allusions in the play ...
— Elizabethan Demonology • Thomas Alfred Spalding
... my fondly feigning mind And frantick phansie, in my Mistris eye Should I a thousand fluttering Cupids find Bathing their busie wings? How oft espie Under the shadow of her eye-brows fair Ten thousand ...
— Democritus Platonissans • Henry More
... tone of voice, mindful of sudden wakings of former Sahibs, sticks, and consequent sore backs, then piu forte, "Sahib!" crescendo, "Sahib, Sahib!" and then at last, in a burst of harmony, "Sahib purana Baira kutch bukshish mil jawe?"[33] and the miserable doolie traveller, who has been, probably, feigning sleep in sulky savageness for the last ten minutes, makes a sudden dive through the curtains with a stick, an exclamation is heard very like swearing, only in a foreign language, and the troop of applicants ...
— Diary of a Pedestrian in Cashmere and Thibet • by William Henry Knight
... with pleasure and with pride; thus exhibiting a sort of independence in the very act of submission. These peoples are miserable, but they are not degraded. There is a great difference between doing what one does not approve, and feigning to approve what one does; the one is the necessary case of a weak person, the other befits ...
— American Institutions and Their Influence • Alexis de Tocqueville et al
... continued and resumed, and sometimes mingled with taunts; late into the night the prisoners, tantalised by the noises of the festival, renewed their efforts to escape. But all was vain; right across the door lay that god-fearing householder, Paaaeua, feigning sleep; and my friends had to forego their junketing. In this incident, so delightfully European, we thought we could detect three strands of sentiment. In the first place, Paaaeua had a charge of souls: ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 18 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... janitress. She decided from her official as well as her personal appearance that she might be trusted, as least provisionally. It had been going through her mind there at the windows what a fool she was to refuse to let Mr. Ludlow come to meet her with that friend of his, and she had been helplessly feigning that she had not refused, and that he was really coming, but was a little late. She was in the act of accepting his apology for the delay when the janitress spoke to her, and she said: "I don't know whether I'd better wait any longer. ...
— The Coast of Bohemia • William Dean Howells
... therefore be carefully watched; for while sometimes, as with the Hebrew prophets, religion gives dramatic expression to actual social forces and helps to intensify moral feeling, it often, as in mystics of all creeds and ages, deadens the consciousness of real ties by feigning ties which are purely imaginary. This self-deception is the more frequent because there float before men who live in the spirit ideals which they look to with the respect naturally rendered to whatever is true, beautiful, or good; and the symbolic ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana
... drifted about, planning many things, executing nothing. The last time I saw him was exquisitely painful; we met by appointment, and I could see that he had tried to screw himself up for the interview by stimulants. The ghastly feigning of cheerfulness, the bloated face, the trembling hands, told the sad tale. And now that it is all over, the shame and the decay, the horror of his having died by his own act is a purely conventional one. One talks pompously about the selfishness of it, but it is one of the most unselfish ...
— The Altar Fire • Arthur Christopher Benson
... Duke of Omnium, there was nothing to hinder her for a moment. And then came a smile over her face,—but the saddest smile,—as she thought of one with whom it might be pleasant to look at the colour of Italian skies and feel the softness of Italian breezes. In feigning to like to do this with an old man, in acting the raptures of love on behalf of a worn-out duke who at the best would scarce believe in her acting, there would not be much delight for her. She had never yet known what it was to have anything of the pleasure of love. ...
— Phineas Finn - The Irish Member • Anthony Trollope
... imprudent not only as to make it too evident in his poetry that he was the lover of Leonora, but also to signify (not very obscurely) that his love was returned, he much perplexed the Duke of Ferrara, who, with great discretion, suggested to him the necessity of feigning madness. The lady's honour required it from a brother; and a true lover, to convince the world, would embrace the project with alacrity. But there was no reason why the seclusion should be in a dungeon, or why exercise and air should be interdicted. This cruelty, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... had had his opportunity at the kitchen door before the start, but still he lingered, feigning professional interest in the condition of the sleek mules that were to haul the Concord over fifty miles of rugged road, up hill and down dale before the setting of the sun. Then, while the officers and ...
— An Apache Princess - A Tale of the Indian Frontier • Charles King
... The Captain Brett, who went with your train bands To fight with Wyatt, had gone over to him With all his men, the Queen in that distress Sent Cornwallis and Hastings to the traitor, Feigning to treat with him about her marriage— ...
— Queen Mary and Harold • Alfred Lord Tennyson
... opens in a public square of Seville at night. Don Giovanni and Leporello appear before the house of Donna Elvira, where Zerlina is concealed. Leporello, disguised in his master's cloak, and assuming his voice, lures Donna Elvira out, and feigning repentance for his conduct induces her to leave with him. Don Giovanni then proceeds to enter the house and seize Zerlina; but before he can accomplish his purpose, Masetto and his friends appear, ...
— The Standard Operas (12th edition) • George P. Upton
... of escape, therefore, was to hoodwink them, if he could, by feigning to be dead; for it is a characteristic of the hyena to reject flesh that is not putrid. He threw himself down again, and remained motionless, hoping the beasts would think him, though dead, yet unfit for food. It was an off-chance, and he well knew it; but ...
— Adventures in Many Lands • Various
... was the vulgarizing of the act of maternity. Woman spiteful, woman suing man at the law for evading her fatuous companionship, woman incoherent, woman abandoned without restraint to violence and temper, woman feigning sensibility—in none of these ignominies is woman so common and so foolish for Dickens as she is ...
— Essays • Alice Meynell
... the immensity of the waters. The sympathetic and slandered monkey only has the importance of a first cousin who has failed to make a career for himself, of an unfortunate and absurd relative whom one leaves outside the door, feigning ignorance of his family name, denying him a welcome. The mollusk is the venerable grandfather, the chief of the house, the creator of the dynasty, the ancestor crowned with a nobility of millions of centuries. These thoughts came back to Febrer's mind ...
— The Dead Command - From the Spanish Los Muertos Mandan • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... Feigning to recollect herself, Mrs. Hamilton, in the blandest tones, said, "Perhaps, dear Maggie, you would prefer ...
— Homestead on the Hillside • Mary Jane Holmes
... poetry is the most feigning," and, when one recalls the true significance and influence of great sculptured monuments through the history of the civilised world, Milton's poetic argument can only be accepted in what Sir Thomas Browne called ...
— Shakespeare and the Modern Stage - with Other Essays • Sir Sidney Lee
... not whether "things outside are fact or feigning." And he heeds little, for in either ...
— Browning as a Philosophical and Religious Teacher • Henry Jones
... nearly night when Maud Leonardo reappeared, expressing profound surprise at what had occurred, and feigning well-assumed grief and regret, so honestly, too, as to deceive all parties who observed her. But her secret chagrin could hardly be expressed. Indeed, her father, who knew her better than any one else, saw ...
— The Sea-Witch - or, The African Quadroon A Story of the Slave Coast • Maturin Murray
... descended to dissimulation, and in that "ugly but necessary virtue"[2] made rapid progress. Up to the time of Richelieu's death she had played a double game—made partisans in secret, with the object of subverting the Cardinal's power, whilst feigning the semblance of friendship towards him, and did not scruple to humiliate herself on occasions, in order to carry her point. After that great man's decease, through rare patience, great caution, and a persistent line of conduct, she ultimately attained that for which she had been willing to ...
— Political Women (Vol. 1 of 2) • Sutherland Menzies
... timidity and reserve which characterised them.—"Fool that I am," cried he, when alone, "I wish to know what kind of wife my father destined for me, and do I not know it, since I can call to mind the image of my mother whom he so tenderly loved? What do I want more? Why deceive myself in feigning ignorance of what would be his sentiments now, were it in my power to consult his will?" It was, however, a terrible task for Oswald to return to Corinne, after what had passed the evening before, without saying something in confirmation of the sentiments which he had expressed. ...
— Corinne, Volume 1 (of 2) - Or Italy • Mme de Stael
... beast down to the settlement," Blake remarked with a dubious smile, feeling strongly annoyed with himself for not taking more precautions. With the cunning which the lust for drink breeds in its victims Benson had outwitted him by feigning acquiescence. "Anyhow," he added, "I'll have to go after him. We must have the horse, for one thing, but I suppose we'll lose four days. ...
— Blake's Burden • Harold Bindloss
... Prince family at all, and though Miss Prince had never mentioned the unhappy fact until the day or two before her guest was expected, her young cavalier had behaved with most excellent discretion, and feigning neither surprise nor dismay, accepted the announcement in a way that had endeared him ...
— A Country Doctor and Selected Stories and Sketches • Sarah Orne Jewett
... with a few men while the bulk of his force fell back on an old roadblock of felled trees dating from the second Manassas campaign, he held off the enemy until he was sure his ambuscade was set, then, by feigning headlong flight, led them into a trap and chased the survivors for five or six miles. Wyndham and Stoughton had found Mosby an annoying nuisance; their successors were finding ...
— Rebel Raider • H. Beam Piper
... indeed, matter of interesting observation for one curious in the study of human nature to note how completely the girl's innocence and simplicity of character had extended itself over every act of the young man that was any way connected with her; preventing his even feigning that religion which he certainly did not feel, and the want of which was the sole obstacle to the union he had now solicited for near a twelvemonth, and which, of all others, was the object by far the ...
— The Wing-and-Wing - Le Feu-Follet • J. Fenimore Cooper
... reference to insanity is found in the book of Deuteronomy. Another reference is in Samuel where it speaks concerning David's cunning and successful feigning of insanity. "And he changed his behavior before them and feigned himself mad in their hands, and scrabbled on the door-posts of the gate, and let his spittle fall down upon his beard," Feigning insanity under distressing circumstances has been one of man's achievements throughout the centuries. ...
— Mother's Remedies - Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remedies from Mothers - of the United States and Canada • T. J. Ritter
... have excused herself from accompanying her father by feigning some slight indisposition, but two considerations made her fear to act thus: the first was the fear of making the general anxious, and perhaps of making him remain at home himself, which would make the removal of the corpse more difficult; the ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - VANINKA • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... firing in the neighborhood of the trench, he believed it to come from the muskets of his own men, and quickly sounded an attack. The demons, who had been feigning to retreat, now turned and met their pursuers, and a hand-to-hand ...
— The Nameless Castle • Maurus Jokai
... therefore without guilt or punishment. Most of the sleep activities of our patient were performed originally in a state of apparent sleep, that is actually practiced in the conscious state until later they were carried out quite unconsciously. She would never then betray what when feigning sleep she had to conceal as causes. Finally the directly precipitating causes in her erotic nature for the sleep walking and moon walking seem especially to have been light and the shining of the moon, her ...
— Sleep Walking and Moon Walking - A Medico-Literary Study • Isidor Isaak Sadger
... the chimney-corner, eyeing the landlord as with a roguish look he held the cover in his hand, and feigning that his doing so was needful to the welfare of the cookery, suffered the delightful steam to tickle the nostrils of his guest. The glow of the fire was upon the landlord's bald head, and upon his twinkling eye, and upon his watering mouth, and upon his pimpled face, and ...
— The Ontario Readers - Third Book • Ontario Ministry of Education
... No. 8 at nine o'clock she found her friend already in bed, and feigning sleep with such persistence that she evidently did not wish to be disturbed. Always tactful and thoughtful, Janie drew the curtain again without attempting any conversation. She knew that Honor's heart must be too full for speech, and that the truest kindness ...
— The New Girl at St. Chad's - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil
... guard at the mouth of the harbor, scarce half a league distant from the other ships. Having spied the fleet in this posture, the pirates presently pulled down their sails and rowed along the coast, feigning to be a Spanish vessel from Nombre de Dios. So hugging the shore, they came boldly within the harbor, upon the opposite side of which you might see the fortress a ...
— Howard Pyle's Book of Pirates • Howard I. Pyle
... early callousness. Sharlee wore a suit of black-and-gray pin-checks, and it was very excellently tailored; for if she purchased but two suits a year, she invariably paid money to have them made by one who knew how. Her hat was of the kind that other girls study with cool diligence, while feigning engrossment in the conversation; and, repairing to their milliners, give orders for accurate copies of it. From it floated a silky-looking veil of gray-white, which gave her face that airy, cloud-like setting that photographers of the baser ...
— Queed • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... think my head's a hunk of quartz? Fer a plugged peso I'd strew yu all over th' scenery!" shouted Billy, feigning ...
— Hopalong Cassidy's Rustler Round-Up - Bar-20 • Clarence Edward Mulford
... the house with the colonnade, feigning carelessness, as if I were returning to my military quarters in the faubourg. The Porte St. Honore was still open, although the time set ...
— An Enemy To The King • Robert Neilson Stephens
... their lures I must keep guarded: They are crocodiles, but feigning Human speech, so but to drag me ...
— The Two Lovers of Heaven: Chrysanthus and Daria - A Drama of Early Christian Rome • Pedro Calderon de la Barca
... had an entertaining trick Of feigning he was dead; Then, with a reassuring kick, Would stand ...
— Davy and The Goblin - What Followed Reading 'Alice's Adventures in Wonderland' • Charles E. Carryl
... in, feigning distress. Little joined, and the supposedly drunken sailor was hauled away from his fallen adversary. A rapid exchange of crisp sentences passed between the host and Little, and the former nodded. He busied himself with Leyden and his vociferous friends, had the damaged man taken to ...
— Gold Out of Celebes • Aylward Edward Dingle
... fellows. Since then honor and shame have become the strongest motives and have incited men to that which is called virtue, i.e., to actions which apparently imply the sacrifice of selfish inclinations for the good of society, while they are really done out of pride and self-love. By constantly feigning noble sentiments before others man comes, finally, to deceive himself, believing himself a being whose happiness consists in the renunciation of self and all that is earthly, and in the thought of his moral excellence.—The crass assumptions in Mandeville's reasoning are ...
— History Of Modern Philosophy - From Nicolas of Cusa to the Present Time • Richard Falckenberg
... thought, she furiously drove, passing Gondremark at the entrance to the Palace avenue, but feigning not to observe him; and as Kleinbrunn was seven good miles away, and in the bottom of a narrow dell, she passed the night without any rumour of the outbreak reaching her; and the glow of the conflagration was concealed by intervening hills. Frau von ...
— Prince Otto • Robert Louis Stevenson
... several others had staggered to their feet and were shouting to the driver to stop the train, but the man was too far away to comprehend what was said. The Peruvians in the last truck, feigning to believe there was a mutiny of the prisoners, and glad of any excuse for cruelty, began to fire into the huddled mass of Chilians, the bullets doing fearful execution at such short range. The officer next in line to Jim fell dead with a bullet through ...
— Under the Chilian Flag - A Tale of War between Chili and Peru • Harry Collingwood
... what he had said. "Posthumous honours, after all, are the wish of ordinary men. I, who am a priest, ought not to entertain such thoughts, or to want money; so pray pay no attention to what I have said;" and the badger, feigning assent to what the priest had impressed upon it, returned to the hills ...
— Folk Tales Every Child Should Know • Various
... the moment they had passed by, stuck his thumbs into the corners of his vest, and humming a tune, and holding his head high, as if he were in the best of humours, strolled from one end of the large assembly room to the other, feigning ignorance of the fact that the whispering and tittering that resounded on every side was so much scorn and ridicule directed ...
— A Hungarian Nabob • Maurus Jokai
... happy-tempered humourist, and withal so wise, and of such a true judgment, that he well knew how to feign a passionate and furious deportment, when his spirits were so calm that himself could have laughed merrily at his own angry feigning, for his natural temper was careless and easy; the boisterous airs he assumed when he became the husband of Katharine being but in sport, or more properly speaking, affected by his excellent discernment, as the only means to overcome, ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb
... is true, we had all better be careful how we breathe much this afternoon," Addison observed, feigning ...
— When Life Was Young - At the Old Farm in Maine • C. A. Stephens
... towards me: for I have the ambassadors of the king of Egypt with me, and I desire that they should see the might of my army." This letter Nadan sent to me, and I began to make preparations as it commanded me. Thereafter Nadan took the first letter, feigning to have found it in my chamber, and brought it to king Esarhaddon. And when the king had read it, he was very angry and said, "O ye gods! what have I done to Ahikar that he should seek to betray me thus?" Nadan said, "Perhaps, ...
— Old Testament Legends - being stories out of some of the less-known apochryphal - books of the old testament • M. R. James
... and had fitted it for that purpose. Ammunition and some provisions of rice and fish were providedfor the two ships, and it remained only to man them with sailors and soldiers who were to go out in them. Of such there was little supply; the sailors were hiding and feigning sickness, and one and all showed little desire to undertake an affair of more risk and peril than of personal profit. The captains and private soldiers of the city, who were receiving neither pay nor rations from the king, ...
— History of the Philippine Islands Vols 1 and 2 • Antonio de Morga
... LXVIII. "Feigning mock orgies, round the town she led Troy's dames, with shrieks that rent the midnight air, And, armed with blazing cresset, at their head Bright from the watch-tower made the signal flare, That called the Danaan foemen from their lair. I, sunk in sleep, the fatal couch had pressed, ...
— The Aeneid of Virgil - Translated into English Verse by E. Fairfax Taylor • Virgil
... any man by the most splendid achievements gain for himself so great a name for wisdom and prudence as is justly due to Junius Brutus for feigning to be a fool. And although Titus Livius mentions one cause only as having led him to assume this part, namely, that he might live more securely and look after his patrimony; yet on considering his behavior we may believe that in counterfeiting folly it was also his object to escape notice, and so ...
— Discourses on the First Decade of Titus Livius • Niccolo Machiavelli
... short, as in 1793 he solicited the influence of David to save him from the general conscription; which was done by naming him a member of the Revolutionary tribunal. By taking refuge in his studio and feigning illness, he avoided the exercise of his judicial functions; and the storm passing away, he exhibited in 1795 a picture of Belisarius ...
— McClure's Magazine, January, 1896, Vol. VI. No. 2 • Various
... dance a hornpipe, whistling his own music in sharp staccato notes, as from a piccolo. He could likewise "present arms" with a little straw musket which I had provided for him; besides feigning to be dead, and allowing you to take him up by the legs, his head hanging down, apparently lifeless, the while, without stirring—although he would sometimes, if you kept him too long in this position, open one of his beady black eyes, and seem to give you a sly wink, as if to say, "A joke is a ...
— She and I, Volume 1 • John Conroy Hutcheson
... it is true that not one consul of them was at home! Their doors were opened by vacant old women, in whom a vague intelligence feebly guttered, like the wick of an expiring candle, and who, after feigning to throw floods of light on the object of my search, successively flickered out, and left me ...
— Italian Journeys • William Dean Howells
... sexes as he came, the father wholly absorbed in not spilling the glass of claret punch which he carried in one hand, and not falling down on the slippery floor with the plate of salad which he bore in the other. She had thoughts of feigning unconsciousness; she would have had no scruple in practising this or any other social stratagem, for though she kept a conscience in regard to certain matters—what she considered essentials— she lived a thousand little lies every day, and taught her daughter ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... Leaver stole down to the boat, and disposed themselves under the awning, Mrs. Leaver reclining her head upon Mr. Leaver's shoulder, and Mr. Leaver grasping her hand with great fervour, and looking in her face from time to time with a melancholy and sympathetic aspect. The widow sat apart, feigning to be occupied with a book, but stealthily observing them from behind her fan; and the two firemen-watermen, smoking their pipes on the bank hard by, nudged each other, and grinned in enjoyment of the joke. Very few of the party missed ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... But during the doctor's subsequent absence, whilst the two lovers are, as they suppose, securely entertaining their mistresses, the father is suddenly heard to return. For the moment they evade him by feigning to be figures in a rich tapestry (their masquing habits aiding the trick), which Scaramouch declares he has just purchased. But this sham being discovered, Scaramouch runs off with the candles and all slip away in the darkness and confusion, leaving him to return in his shirt as newly ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. III • Aphra Behn
... office—of her commands for Venice for the galley that was to sail on the morrow. But meanwhile the vision of horror rose before him of that which he had seen with his own eyes; and lest, watching him so closely she should learn too much, he dropped his gaze, feigning to seek for some items on the tablet he held in his hand. How should he tell her the story of this plot to influence an uprising, to wrest the stronghold of Cerines for Carlotta, the rival claimant ...
— The Royal Pawn of Venice - A Romance of Cyprus • Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull
... their talents under the protection of their charms. And one should have seen the painter play his part as a candidate, shaking hands most lavishly, saying to one visitor: 'Your picture this year is so pretty, it pleases me so much!' then feigning astonishment with another: 'What! you haven't had a medal yet?' and repeating to all of them: 'Ah! If I belonged to the committee, I'd make them walk straight.' He sent every one away delighted, closed the door behind each visitor with an air of extreme amiability, through ...
— His Masterpiece • Emile Zola
... was missing as the ship dropped anchor that night in the dark harbor. It was feared by the "second looie" and worried old sergeant that the man was trying to make an escape. When they found him feigning slumber under a life boat on a forbidden deck they chose opposite sides of the life boat and kicked him fervently, first from one side then the other till he was submissive. The name of the man at that ...
— The History of the American Expedition Fighting the Bolsheviki - Campaigning in North Russia 1918-1919 • Joel R. Moore
... chair creaking," my brother answered, feigning an indifference which he scarcely felt. "Certain parts of the wicker-work seem to be in accord with musical notes and respond to them; let us continue ...
— The Lost Stradivarius • John Meade Falkner
... He can give us more. [They whisper with Terentius. Lep. I'll ne'er believe, but Caesar hath some scent Of bold Sejanus' footing. These cross points Of varying letters, and opposing consuls, Mingling his honours and his punishments, Feigning now ill, now well, raising Sejanus, And then depressing him, as now of late In all reports we have it, cannot be Empty of practice: 'tis Tiberius' art. For having found his favourite grown too great, And with his greatness strong; that all the soldiers Are, with ...
— Sejanus: His Fall • Ben Jonson
... tried a more robust physique than his. She set herself to interest and cheer him, and, at first, was in a measure successful; for Thorne—always fond of Norma, observed her efforts and exerted himself to a responsive cheerfulness, often feigning an interest he was far from feeling, in order to avoid disappointing her. But as he grew accustomed to her ministrations, the effort relaxed and he fell into gloom ...
— Princess • Mary Greenway McClelland
... the sounds of the approach, lights flashed before the window, and the two men, feigning to play, ...
— The Tavern Knight • Rafael Sabatini
... the said pistol, returned to the house and, again without disturbing any one, replaced it in its case in a favorable position to be found by the officers of the law; that he then withdrew and spent the rest of the day in hiding—with a large motor-car; and that he turned up, feigning ignorance of the whole affair, ...
— The Woman in Black • Edmund Clerihew Bentley
... girl, feigning astonishment. Her ears were too keen not to have caught Rufe's voice in the whispering ...
— The Pirate Woman • Aylward Edward Dingle
... so to speak, exhibiting himself to me, inquisitive, perplexed, suspicious, enraged by turns, as he flirted wings and tail, lifted and lowered his crest, glancing down with bright, wild eyes. What a beautiful hypocrisy and delightful power this is which enables us, sitting or lying motionless, feigning sleep perhaps, thus to fool this wild, elusive creature, and bring all its cunning to naught! He is so much smaller and keener-sighted, able to fly, to perch far up above me, to shift his position every minute or two, masking his small figure ...
— Birds in Town and Village • W. H. Hudson
... French malingre (mistakenly derived above), stands for old French mal-heingre (maliciously or falsely ill, feigning sickness), which is from Latin male aeger, with an ...
— English Past and Present • Richard Chenevix Trench
... discordant keys, and with such a variety of impatient and exasperated intonation, that the whole room was full of laughter. His daughter not appearing nor answering, he next instituted a make-believe search for her, feigning to go into the kitchen, the buttery, her bedroom. Not finding her, and making a great deal of amusement for the spectators by the way, he at last comes back and asks in a deploring tone, 'Where ...
— Wych Hazel • Susan and Anna Warner
... passionately glad in the week that followed that Fate, prodigal in her gifts to him, had made him too an actor with a genius for convincing. For he had to go on digging dots, feigning wild excitement when his heart was cold within him. He hated spades. He hated dirt. He almost hated Hughie, who went from dot to dot upon the chart with unflagging zeal and system. Kenny himself dug anywhere at any time and moodily escaped when he could to write letters. He was getting ...
— Kenny • Leona Dalrymple
... feigning to be asleep, he had managed to overhear a small portion of what had passed between Thady, Joe Reynolds, and the rest; but what he had overheard had reference solely to Keegan; for when they began to speak of Ussher, everything had been said in so low a voice, that he had been ...
— The Macdermots of Ballycloran • Anthony Trollope
... flowers, signifying that it consisted in the cutting off and keeping low of the nobility and grandees. Ad placitum, are the characters real before mentioned, and words: although some have been willing by curious inquiry, or rather by apt feigning, to have derived imposition of names from reason and intendment; a speculation elegant, and, by reason it searcheth into antiquity, reverent, but sparingly mixed with truth, and of small fruit. This portion of knowledge touching the notes of things ...
— The Advancement of Learning • Francis Bacon
... say," said Martha, feigning coyness. "But this much I will confess, that some folks which shall be nameless, considers me so. ...
— Martha By-the-Day • Julie M. Lippmann
... the wells of Aisou, saw a Tuarick coming up to the place, and, two others slowly following, all three mounted on tall maharees. They spoke to the one who arrived first, and inquired if many were behind. To this they received a laconic answer, "Yes." One of them accordingly, feigning to retire, left his servant hid behind a rock to watch what took place, and ran after us to communicate the unwelcome intelligence, that we might expect an attack. We marched the whole day with our weapons in ...
— Narrative of a Mission to Central Africa Performed in the Years 1850-51, Volume 1 • James Richardson
... haste to accost Miss Jenrys at the very entrance, and possibly in the face of one or more of my ever-present brethren of the watchful eye, and so, while she waited unhurried upon one side of the bridge, I stopped also, looking down upon the little stream and feigning interest in the white-robed canoeist paddling, and doubtless perspiring, in the mild June air. The procession was not a long one, and was formed of boys, half-grown, and wholly effervescent, wearing what was evidently an extemporized uniform, and carrying a banner which informed me that it was ...
— Against Odds - A Detective Story • Lawrence L. Lynch
... gaze from the magnetism of hers, he frowned and bit his lip. Was she feigning madness, or under the terrible nervous ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... ev'n for thy soul, to thwart me further! None of your arts, your feigning, and your foolery; Your dainty squeamish coying it to me; Go—to your lord, your paramour, be gone! Lisp in his ear, hang wanton on his neck, And play your monkey gambols o'er to him. You know my purpose, look that you pursue ...
— Jane Shore - A Tragedy • Nicholas Rowe
... you want my old moccasins so badly," Vance rejoined, feigning to be hurt by the other's lack of faith, "why, you can ...
— A Daughter of the Snows • Jack London
... have not come yet!" exclaimed Napoleon's veteran, civilly feigning concern. "I am not surprised at that. It is some time since I have seen 'them' here. It is the middle of the month, you see. Those fine fellows only turn up on pay ...
— A Distinguished Provincial at Paris • Honore de Balzac
... pitcher had his foot in contact with the rubber plate last season, all of them invariably placing their back foot a few inches in front of the plate. Not one pitcher in ten, after feigning to throw to a base, resumed his position, as required by the rule, after making the feint. Not one in ten held the ball "firmly in front of his body," as the rule requires. Not one in ten faced the batsman, as required by Rule 30. As for the balk rule it was as openly violated last ...
— Spalding's Baseball Guide and Official League Book for 1895 • Edited by Henry Chadwick
... gave him the 4,000 warriors and 100 ships. When they were ready Aoui Ditchou sailed toward Samoudra, feigning that the ships were bent on commerce up to the very moment when they reached the end of the voyage. Then he caused it to be said that he was an ambassador of the King Chehr-en-Naoui, and the King of Samoudra sent some ...
— Malayan Literature • Various Authors
... starting for a sabbath, go out through the open door or window; she would pass through the keyhole or up the chimney. While they were gone, inferior demons assumed their shape, and lay in their beds, feigning illness. Assembled on the Brocken, the Devil, as a double-headed goat, took his seat on the throne. His subjects paid their respects to him, kissing his posterior face. With a master of ceremonies appointed for the occasion, he made a personal examination of all the wizards and witches, ...
— The Necessity of Atheism • Dr. D.M. Brooks
... Waters had called the doctor, who had just gone away. There was nothing else that he could do for her. She dropped her eyes, and in everything but words dismissed him. She would not even remain with him till he could decently get himself out of the house. She left Imogene to receive his adieux, feigning that ...
— Indian Summer • William D. Howells
... policeman, feigning astonishment. 'Surely not. You are too light a sleeper for any one to take your things without ...
— Chatterbox, 1906 • Various
... to tell him all and seek his counsel: but I would not. Still, I would answer him, and so feigning ...
— A Thane of Wessex • Charles W. Whistler
... incivility obtained for him a reputation for honesty, and his prices were soon accepted without a murmur. He talked to nobody unless he was obliged to do so, and by his moroseness he came to be respected. I managed to draw him into conversation once by feigning to be much impressed by the comeliness and amiable nature of his dog, and he then told me that he had been wandering ever since he was a boy in Languedoc and Guyenne, stopping in a village as long as there was work to do and then moving on to another. Wherever people wore boots or ...
— Two Summers in Guyenne • Edward Harrison Barker
... point. Everybody in the house was put through a course of lobelia with a heavy sweat, sometimes to cure a slight indisposition, but more often as an experiment. My only escape from the drudgery of the workshop was in feigning sickness and undergoing the Professor's panacea. This confined me to the bed for a day and gave me another day for recovery, when I could be about and enjoy myself. These sweatings and retchings took the color out of my cheeks so ...
— Confessions of Boyhood • John Albee
... too feigned; I am sad That I shall die here without feigning thus; And without feigning I ...
— Chastelard, a Tragedy • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... fate he must seal was keeping pace with him quietly, step by step. If he could only have a few moments to himself, he might clear his distracted thoughts. He paused before some other picture, feigning to examine it, but Lord Blandamer paused also, and looked at him. He knew Lord Blandamer's eye was upon him, though he refused to return the look. It seemed a mere act of courtesy on Lord Blandamer's part ...
— The Nebuly Coat • John Meade Falkner
... to examine how far the philosophers, who attribute to aqueous solution the origin of stony substances, have proceeded in the same inductive manner of reasoning from effect to cause, as they ought to do in physical subjects, and not by feigning causes, or following a false analogy; in the mean time, I am to answer the objections which have been made to the ...
— Theory of the Earth, Volume 1 (of 4) • James Hutton
... all these bursts of praise with the slightly constrained air of one who is yet uncertain whether his interlocutor is not feigning an enthusiasm more ardent than he actually feels, in order to provoke a confidence naturally cautious to utter itself. Can-daules at last said to him in a tone of disappointment: 'I see, Gyges, that you do not believe me. You think I am boasting, or have allowed myself to be fascinated like some ...
— King Candaules • Theophile Gautier
... and sullenly, trying to avoid the sight of the crowd, and feigning not to hear the angry exclamations showered upon them from all sides. Three workmen carrying a big iron bar happened to come in front of them, and thrusting the bar against ...
— Mother • Maxim Gorky
... have no need of feigning a tranquillity he could not feel; of coining common-place courtesy when his heart was gushing with rapture; this was a great relief to Coningsby, though gained by ...
— Coningsby • Benjamin Disraeli
... Voltaire has remarked, bears great resemblance to that of the Miser of Moliere. Two brothers are rivals for the bride of their father, who cunningly extorts from her the name of her favoured lover, by feigning a wish to renounce in his favour. The confusion of both sons, when they learn that their father, whom they had believed dead, is still alive, and will speedily make his appearance, is in reality exceedingly comic. The one calls out: Qu'avons nous fait? This is just ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel
... parent was chiefly supported by her industry: and, in the midst of trying circumstances, her temper was gay and cheerful, and her health excellent. That she had never seen Mr K—— we were sure; and of her probity and incapacity for feigning we had every reason to be convinced. With our request, conveyed to her through one of the ladies of our family, for whom she had conceived a warm affection, she complied without hesitation. Not being of a nervous, though of ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 57, No. 352, February 1845 • Various
... "Celestial" Gambler, Feigning Ignorance of Euchre, Tricks Francis Bret Harte and "Bill" Nye into Heavy Losses—Solons to Probe ...
— Something Else Again • Franklin P. Adams
... atmosphere in which they live and fight. I have often found great instruction in noting the hypocritical antics of a certain watery rascal, whose trick it is to lie in one snug corner of the globule, feigning repose, indifference, or sleep. Nothing disturbs him, until some weak, innocent animalcule ventures unsuspiciously within his reach, and then with one muscular exertion, the monster darts, gripes, gulps him down—goes to his sleep or prayers again, and waits a fresh arrival. ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 337, November, 1843 • Various
... man be great. To grow great near or far is the one way to be hers, and to pile up great work for her sake is perhaps the best way to love her. She could never be his wife, but she might still be his muse, resolved Theophil, feigning in that reflection for the moment a more human comfort than, alas! ...
— The Romance of Zion Chapel [3d ed.] • Richard Le Gallienne
... of his devotions. And just as he had finished, and was about to recommence, there were the two women in front of his hut saluting him, and you may fancy that the old lady hurried through her narration; whereupon the good man made the sign of the cross, and feigning great surprise, said, ...
— One Hundred Merrie And Delightsome Stories - Les Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles • Various
... and strongly put together, but on trying to remove it, it all came to pieces. When the bird saw me examining the nest it fluttered to within a couple of feet of me, twittering in a most vehement manner, feigning a broken wing to try and draw me away. The nest contained only two ...
— The Nests and Eggs of Indian Birds, Volume 1 • Allan O. Hume
... defeat was such that a law was passed forbidding, upon pain of death, any proposition for the renewal of the enterprise. Indignant at this pusillanimous policy, Solon devised a plan for rousing his countrymen to action. Having some poetical talent, he composed a poem on the loss of Salamis, and, feigning madness in order to evade the penalty of the law, he rushed into the market-place. PLUTARCH says, "A great number of people flocking about him there, he got up on the herald's stone, and sang the elegy ...
— Mosaics of Grecian History • Marcius Willson and Robert Pierpont Willson
... speech; and, to render me the more assured of his unalterable love, he named me Fiammetta, and himself Panfilo. Woe is me! How often, when warmed with love and wine, did we tell tales, in the presence of our dearest friends, of Fiammetta and Panfilo, feigning that they were Greeks of the days of old, I at one time, he at another; and the tales were all of ourselves; how we were first caught in the snares of Love, and of what tribulations we were long the victims, giving suitable names ...
— La Fiammetta • Giovanni Boccaccio
... peasantry. He described men as lying in bed for want of food; turning thieves in order to be sent to jail; lying on rotten straw in mud cabins, with scarcely any covering; feeding on unripe potatoes and yellow weed, and feigning sickness, in order to get into hospitals. He continued:—"This is the condition of a country blest by nature with fertility, but barren from the want of cultivation, and whose inhabitants stalk through the land enduring the extremity ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... had last seen her. I made my search in an ever-widening circle, and at length espied some dry grass spears in a tuft right at my feet; then the little prospective mother flitted from her nest and went trailing on the ground, feigning to ...
— Birds of the Rockies • Leander Sylvester Keyser
... reached me, O auspicious King, that the Chamberlain Eunuch cried to the old woman, "I know neither slave girl nor anyone else; and none shall enter here without my searching him according to the King's commands." Then quoth she, feigning to be angry, "I thought thee a man of sense and good breeding; but, if thou be changed, I will let the Princess know of it and tell her how thou hinderest her slave girl;" and she cried out to Taj al-Muluk, saying, "Pass on, O damsel!" So he passed on into the vestibule as ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... minister returned, with an assumption of cosiness in his tone which he did not feel, and feigning to make himself easy in the hard kitchen chair which he pulled up to the door of Hilbrook's room, "let's see if we can't put ...
— A Pair of Patient Lovers • William Dean Howells
... should beware of receiving a good thing in an evil way . . . For if he be 'chastised' who does 'not discern,' i.e. distinguish, the body of the Lord from other meats, how must he be 'condemned' who, feigning himself a friend, comes to His table a foe?" But (Judas) did not receive our Lord's body with the dipped morsel; thus Augustine commenting on John 13:26, "When He had dipped the bread, He gave it to Judas, the son of Simon the Iscariot [Vulg.: 'to Judas Iscariot, the son of ...
— Summa Theologica, Part III (Tertia Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas
... in the habit of feigning to be asleep shortly before prayer time, and would gratefully hear my father tell my mother that it was a shame to wake us; whereon he would carry us up to bed in a state apparently of the profoundest slumber when we were ...
— Selections from Previous Works - and Remarks on Romanes' Mental Evolution in Animals • Samuel Butler
... illustrations of the development of folkways. They are not free from the admixture of superstition and vanity, but the element of expediency predominates in them. It is reported of the natives of New South Wales that a man will lie on a rock with a piece of fish in his hand, feigning sleep. A hawk or crow darts at the fish, but is caught by the man. It is also reported of Australians that a man swims under water, breathing through a reed, approaches ducks, pulls one under water by the legs, wrings its neck, and so ...
— Folkways - A Study of the Sociological Importance of Usages, Manners, Customs, Mores, and Morals • William Graham Sumner
... reported that Caesar was coming in his litter: for he determined not to stay in the Senate all that day (because he was afraid of the unlucky signs of the sacrifices) but to adjourn matters of importance unto the next session and council holden, feigning himself not to be well at ease. When Caesar came out of his litter: Popilius Laenas, that had talked before with Brutus and Cassius, and had prayed the gods they might bring this enterprise to pass: went unto Caesar, and kept him a long time with a talk. Caesar gave ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to prose. Volume I (of X) - Greece • Various
... was not feigning. She entertained no doubt that with proper care he would get well. And she was providing the care. Hence a confidence which she did not allow any of those chilly creepy fears which come at about ...
— Aurora the Magnificent • Gertrude Hall
... on each house possessed of thirty pence a year. This imposition being afterwards levied on all England, was commonly denominated Peter's Pence [h]: and though conferred at first as a gift, was afterwards claimed as a tribute by the Roman pontiff. Carrying his hypocrisy still farther, Offa, feigning to be directed by a vision from heaven, discovered at Verulam the relics of St. Alban, the martyr, and endowed a magnificent monastery in that place [i]. Moved by all these acts of piety, Malmesbury, one of the best of the old English historians, ...
— The History of England, Volume I • David Hume
... escape, a servant woman was brought by one of the castle boats from the shore with a bundle of clothes for Mary. Mary, whose health and strength had been impaired by her confinement and sufferings, was often in her bed. She was so at this time, though perhaps she was feigning now more feebleness than she really felt. The servant woman came into her apartment and undressed herself, while Mary rose, took the dress which she laid aside, and put it on as a disguise. The woman took Mary's ...
— Mary Queen of Scots, Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... city unless a Constitution was granted. The King, without waiting for morning, published an edict declaring that a Constitution should be drawn up within eight days; immediately afterwards he appointed a new Ministry, and, feigning illness, committed the exercise of royal authority to his son, the Duke ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe
... it on all sides, and seldom departing from the senate-house till the assembly was dismissed by the consul. 29. But he was daily mortified with accounts of the enormities of his colleague; being repeatedly assured of his vanity and extravagance. 30. However, feigning himself ignorant of these excesses, he judged marriage to be the best method of reclaiming him; and, therefore, sent him his daughter Lucil'la, a woman of great beauty, whom Ve'rus married at Antioch. 31. But even this was found ineffectual, for Lucil'la ...
— Pinnock's Improved Edition of Dr. Goldsmith's History of Rome • Oliver Goldsmith
... was snoring loudly, but Humphrey felt uncertain whether he was feigning sleep, or had really resumed his broken slumber. He therefore bid the boy follow him upstairs, first replacing bolt and bar, to make all secure ...
— Penshurst Castle - In the Days of Sir Philip Sidney • Emma Marshall
... to school," she said, feigning severity. "You will find him too much for you, Winsleigh, in ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... Harris and Snelling were placed under keepers, who amused themselves by tormenting their unhappy prisoners in various ways; such as pricking them with their knives, cutting off small pieces of their ears and fingers, and pulling out clumps of their hair. Before the close of the day, the captives feigning sleep, the Indians left them for a moment and went to the spring for water. Thereupon the young men burst their bands and escaped into the bushes. Crawling upon the other side of the rock, and being hotly pursued, it is supposed ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, February 1844 - Volume 23, Number 2 • Various
... instant with gradations of size and brightness scarcely possible for any Figure within the scope of my experience. The thought flashed across me that I might have before me a burglar or cut-throat, some monstrous Irregular Isosceles, who, by feigning the voice of a Circle, had obtained admission somehow into the house, and was now preparing to stab me with his ...
— Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions (Illustrated) • Edwin A. Abbott
... stark naked, and crow like a cock. This was a signal for the tented host to spring to arms. Occasionally he would visit the hospital, pretending that he was a physician, and would prescribe medicine for those whom he thought sick, and scourgings for those whom he imagined to be feigning sickness. Sometimes he would turn all the patients out of the doors, sick and well, saying that it was not permitted for the soldiers of Suwarrow to be sick. He was as merciless to himself as he was to his soldiers. Hunger, cold, fatigue, seemed to him to be pleasures. Hardships which to ...
— The Empire of Russia • John S. C. Abbott
... chair. But he did not, on this account, allow himself any recreation, or cease to eat fish alone during Lent and fast days. It might be more accurately said that he but seldom ate at all, so great was his abstinence—which he, moreover, sought to conceal, feigning, with much dissimulation, that he ate of everything, when in reality it was a mere pretense of eating. He was very contrite; severe toward himself, but gentle to others; most exact in obedience, but very reserved and cautious in command; courteous and honorable in his dealings; ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XII, 1601-1604 • Edited by Blair and Robertson
... successful method of passive defence is the feigning of death, or "playing 'possum" met with in several animals, such as the red fox, the opossum, occasionally the elephant, and several of the snakes. On many occasions I have been 'possum hunting in the South and found my dog barking at an apparently dead 'possum. As soon as these animals are ...
— The Human Side of Animals • Royal Dixon
... This cunning feigning of death when wounded or captured is not confined to wolves. There are several other animals that often try to play "possum" ...
— Three Boys in the Wild North Land • Egerton Ryerson Young
... Sunday afternoon. They were elaborate affairs of four stranded 'turks-heads' and double rose knots, and showed several distinct varieties of 'coach whipping.' One that was finished was being passed round an admiring circle of shipmates, and Hicks, working at the other, was feigning a great indifference to ...
— The Brassbounder - A Tale of the Sea • David W. Bone
... Hospital of Incurables had been held out by the medical students against the royalists, and when the latter took it, they sent both sane and insane to prison, where some of the madmen were detained on suspicion of feigning lunacy. "One of these poor wretches was the cause of a most disastrous scene, which we witnessed. Having struck one of the royal officers on the face, the latter called out, 'to arms!' and as soon as he was surrounded by his followers, he rushed furiously ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCLXXVI. February, 1847. Vol. LXI. • Various
... surprise he found himself confronted by Villon, who feigning intoxication barred his passage with an air of great hilarity. "You walk abroad late, honest ...
— If I Were King • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... two friends sought to make known their true estate to Philoclea and Pamela. So Dorus, feigning a love in attendance on Pamela, told her, in the presence of her mistress, the story of the two friends, Pyrocles and Musidorus, but in such words that Pamela understood who it was that was speaking, and carried to Philoclea the news that her Dorus had fallen out to be none other than the Prince ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VIII • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.
... bolder, barked louder and ventured as far as their cruppers, feigning to be about to bite them. They began to grow uneasy, and the nervous twitching of their skin, to get rid of the flies, became ...
— Strong as Death • Guy de Maupassant
... befell, that once upon a day. This Sompnour, waiting ever on his prey, Rode forth to summon a widow, an old ribibe, Feigning a cause, for he would have a bribe. And happen'd that he saw before him ride A gay yeoman under a forest side: A bow he bare, and arrows bright and keen, He had upon a courtepy* of green, *short doublet A hat upon his head with fringes blake.* ...
— The Canterbury Tales and Other Poems • Geoffrey Chaucer
... Still feigning unconsciousness of the approaching peril, Percy proceeded, whistling blithely. Through a gap between two buildings he had caught sight of a barn standing alone, some distance ahead and well to one side of the main street; ...
— Jim Spurling, Fisherman - or Making Good • Albert Walter Tolman
... only beset during the day, and that at night each withdrew to his own dwelling, he advanced at the dawn to the heights, as if designing openly and by day to force his way through the defile. The day then being passed in feigning a different attempt from that which was in preparation, when they had fortified the camp in the same place where they had halted, as soon as he perceived that the mountaineers had descended from the heights, ...
— The History of Rome; Books Nine to Twenty-Six • Titus Livius
... and, when the wine ran out, he beat his head and cried aloud, as if he knew not which one to turn to first. But the sentinels, seeing wine flow, ran with vessels and caught it, thinking it their gain,—whereupon, the man, feigning anger, railed against them. But the sentinels soothed and pacified him, and at last he set the skins to rights again. More conversation passed; the sentinels joked with him and moved him to laughter, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 30, April, 1860 • Various
... the trapeze of the mind; a little mimicry goes with it; in fact there is always, morally speaking, something of the comedian in a poet. There is a vast difference between expressing sentiments we do not feel, though we may imagine all their variations, and feigning to feel them when bidding for success on the theatre of private life. And yet, though the necessary hypocrisy of a man of the world may have gangrened a poet, he ends by carrying the faculties of his talent into the expression of any required sentiment, just as a great man doomed ...
— Modeste Mignon • Honore de Balzac
... who possessed brains, personal dignity, and ability to perform the duties of the Executive. Stanton was the martyr-candidate of the contractors, an unscrupulous man of action and decision, bold, audacious, and unshrinking; and the Western Reserve brought forward bluff Ben Wade, feigning fanaticism and stoical virtue, but a mere mouther of strong words and profane epithets. A few spoke of a fifth Ohio candidate for the nomination in General Sheridan, but, "like a little man," he promptly sat down on every demonstration in his behalf. It soon became evident that ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore
... allay the heat of such a love but possession; and easily deluded with every fancy that flattered his love, mad, stark-mad, by any way to obtain the last blessing with Sylvia, he consults with Antonet how to get one of Octavio's letters out of her lady's cabinet, and feigning many frivolous reasons, which deluded the amorous maid, he persuaded her to get him one, which she did in half an hour after; for by this time Sylvia being in as much tranquillity as it was possible a lover could be ...
— Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister • Aphra Behn
... consolation, one reward, one satisfaction: the success of the revolution. Night and day he must have but one thought, but one aim—implacable destruction." ... "For this end of implacable destruction a revolutionist can and often must live in the midst of society, feigning to be altogether different from what he really is. A revolutionist must penetrate everywhere: into high society as well as into the middle class, into the shops, into the church, into the palaces of the ...
— Violence and the Labor Movement • Robert Hunter
... man," said Metem, feigning amazement. "Well, Issachar, I will do most things for good money, but to shift that bandage would be but murder, and this I cannot work even for the gold ...
— Elissa • H. Rider Haggard
... manner of one who prayed for patience. "Well! at any rate," said the boy, "straight is straight, and crooked is crooked, and that is all I know about it." It was evident from the teacher's manner that he was half inclined to think the boy was endeavoring to impose upon him by feigning ignorance; and he dismissed him to his seat for the time being, thinking, no doubt, that he had met with a case out of the common order of school experience. It seems that the boy had never before attended school with punctuality, and it ...
— Stories and Sketches • Harriet S. Caswell
... with him. "You bantling! Who would have dreamed you to that degree artful? Are you certain your craft will bear you out? I would not have you suffer their anger. Are you capable of so much feigning?" ...
— The Ward of King Canute • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz
... between the fear and the wretchedness; till I caught a glimpse of the little maid, whose beauty and whose kindliness had made me yearn to be with her. And then I knew that for her sake I was bound to be brave and hide myself. She was lying beneath a rock, thirty or forty yards from me, feigning to be fast asleep, with her dress spread beautifully, and her hair drawn ...
— Lorna Doone - A Romance of Exmoor • R. D. Blackmore
... from the end of the causeway (our most important station), straightway hurried to the point of danger, with wrath in his soul. But the sergeant of the squad came out to meet him, imploring silence, and explaining that they had seen or suspected a boat hovering near, and were feigning sleep in order to lure and capture those who ...
— Army Life in a Black Regiment • Thomas Wentworth Higginson |
