"Flighty" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... again, scandalized.] — Let you not be minding if it's flat or rounded she is; for she's a flighty, foolish woman, you'll hear when you're off a long way, and she making a great noise ...
— The Well of the Saints • J. M. Synge
... back to the kitchen, but her flighty thoughts were swinging corners in the quadrille with Jeb, and the fried potatoes were gracefully shot into the coal-scuttle as the pan was waved aloft in imitation of dancers she had envied in days ...
— Polly of Pebbly Pit • Lillian Elizabeth Roy
... of our English Newman Street apostles, and of M. de la M—, the mad priest, and his congregation of mad converts, should be a warning to such of us as are inclined to dabble in religious speculations; for, in them, as in all others, our flighty brains soon lose themselves, and we find our reason speedily lying prostrated at the mercy of our passions; and I think that Madame Sand's novel of Spiridion may do a vast deal of good, and bears a good moral with it; though not such an one, ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... as a desert coyote; also, he looked flighty. I was reaching for the canteen when I happened to think what pleasure it would be to Miss Sampson to minister to him, and I drew back. "Wait a little." Then with an effort I plunged. "Vaughn, listen. Miss ...
— The Rustlers of Pecos County • Zane Grey
... in the least. It is a matter of perfect unconcern to me how Mr Gerard behaves; but you are my sister. I am sorry to see you lowering your dignity, by being so silly, and flighty, and ridiculous! I am sure he must laugh at ...
— Betty Trevor • Mrs. G. de Horne Vaizey
... "The weemen are flighty and the lads are quate, and the hoose will no' be itsel' till ye will be moving about again, an' Miss Janet's lad will ...
— The McBrides - A Romance of Arran • John Sillars
... flighty manner was not at all congenial to Lady Dudleigh, and she treated him as the vigilant "keeper" always treats his flighty prisoner—that is, with silent patience and ...
— The Living Link • James De Mille
... hastened to the dressing-room. Clare Peters, a somewhat spoiled, flighty girl, accustomed to having her way in most things, stood before ...
— Blue Bonnet in Boston - or, Boarding-School Days at Miss North's • Caroline E. Jacobs
... it comes to harbouring geniuses in one's own house, it is quite beyond all reason. I sympathise so much with poor Mrs. Fred! If Maryllia would only marry Lord Roxmouth, all these flighty and fantastic notions of hers about music and faithful friends and honour and principle would disappear. I am sure they would!—and she would calm down and be just like ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli
... affection, going upstairs to the drawing-room, with their arms round each other's waists, and sitting there together hand in hand. Cynthia's whole manner was more quiet than it had been, when the weight of her unpleasant secret rested on her mind, and made her alternately despondent or flighty. ...
— Wives and Daughters • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... moment. Did you see anything in this man that could excite the suspicion that he was at all flighty or insane?" ...
— The Living Link • James De Mille
... fashionable now-a-days To give one's dwelling some fantastic name To recommend it to the stranger's gaze, Or afford it an imaginary claim To more gentility than others; 'tis the same In the metropolis, for folks arrange (Flighty mammas, perhaps, are more to blame) To call their homes "The Beeches" or "The Grange," For probably they think 'twill ...
— The Minstrel - A Collection of Poems • Lennox Amott
... Cilicia he sent Eumenes back, nominally to his own government, but really to observe Armenia where Neoptolemus was endeavouring to raise a revolt. Eumenes had frequent interviews with this man, who was of a flighty and vainglorious character, and tried to restrain him from any act of open rebellion. Perceiving also that the Macedonian phalanx was grown very strong, and gave itself most insolent airs, he determined ...
— Plutarch's Lives Volume III. • Plutarch
... mention a remark of his, as a specimen of the ignorance in which Americans usually remain during their flighty visits to these scenes, where they associate only with one another. And I do it the rather as this seemed a really thoughtful, intelligent man; no vain, vulgar trifler. He said, "The people seem only to be looking ...
— At Home And Abroad - Or, Things And Thoughts In America and Europe • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... her mistress's bedroom, and surveyed the world with eyes of stern disapproval. There was nothing of the smart lady's maid about Biddy. She abominated smart lady's maids. A flyaway French cap and an apron barely reaching to the knees were to her the very essence of flighty impropriety. There was just such a creature in attendance upon Lady Grace de Vigne who occupied the best suite of rooms in the hotel, and Biddy very strongly resented her existence. In her own mind she despised her as a shameless hussy wholly devoid of all ideas of "dacency." ...
— Greatheart • Ethel M. Dell
... her daughter. Not a bit of it! SHE had not finished her fling and never did madder chase ensue than the one which at length ended in effectually cornering the flighty one. ...
— Peggy Stewart: Navy Girl at Home • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... Chirpy Cricket would have been quite upset by the breaking up of his torchlight procession. But being naturally cheerful, he merely smiled and said that it was plain that the Fireflies were a very flighty family. ...
— The Tale of Freddie Firefly • Arthur Scott Bailey
... had the unfortunate man acquiesced in one thing and communicated Zoie's wish to the waiter, than the flighty young person found something else on the menu that she considered more tempting to her palate. Time and again the waiter had to be recalled and the order had to be given over until Jimmy felt himself laying up ...
— Baby Mine • Margaret Mayo
... giving to their heroic poems both an intenser passion of expression and a more mysterious grace and charm. The Western Teutons in their heroic poetry seem, on the other hand, to have been steadier and less flighty. They took earlier to the line of reasonable and dignified narrative, reducing the lyrical element, perhaps increasing the gnomic or reflective proportions of their work. So they succeeded in their own way, with whatever success belongs to Beowulf, Waldere, ...
— Epic and Romance - Essays on Medieval Literature • W. P. Ker
... become acquainted with all its branches. This branch, however, she cultivated more assiduously than any other and was continually running in to confer with "Cousin Rose," whom she considered the wisest, dearest, kindest girl ever created. And Rose, finding that, in spite of her flighty head, Kitty had a good heart of her own, did her best to encourage all the new hopes and aspirations springing up in it under the warmth of the first genuine affection she ...
— Rose in Bloom - A Sequel to "Eight Cousins" • Louisa May Alcott
... had a tendency to be flighty in any illness," he said, speaking of Miss Hope's disorders. "Faith was a sister to whom she was greatly attached. A pretty girl who married and went away before I came here to practise. Miss Saunders told me once that from the time of her marriage to this, not ...
— Betty Gordon in the Land of Oil - The Farm That Was Worth a Fortune • Alice B. Emerson
... He hated women who flung texts or proverbs at you; and yet he did not hate her. She had a girl's flighty notions, born of crude contact with inferior ...
— Hope Mills - or Between Friend and Sweetheart • Amanda M. Douglas
... Spershott's account of a Chichester calamity:—"Jno. Page, Esq., native of this city, coming from London to Stand Candidate Here, a great number of voters went on Horseback to meet him. Among the rest Mr. Joshua Lover, a noted School Master, a sober man in the general but of flighty Passions. As he was setting out, one of his Scollers, Patty Smith (afterwards my Spouse) asked him for a Coppy, and in haste ...
— Highways & Byways in Sussex • E.V. Lucas
... perfectly satisfied with the turn that matters had taken, since his utmost vanity had never led him to entertain any matrimonial hopes with her, and he thought his fortune as likely to profit from the civility of her friends as of herself. For Morrice, however flighty, and wild, had always at heart the study of his own interest; and though from a giddy forwardness of disposition he often gave offence, his meaning and his serious attention was not the less directed to the advancement ...
— Cecilia vol. 2 - Memoirs of an Heiress • Frances (Fanny) Burney (Madame d'Arblay)
... what's more, when I told her you would send for the doctor, it was worse than about the rubbers. She talked all the rubbish you can think of. I'm sure she's flighty—said she never had a doctor, that she always got well, and even cried when I told ...
— Jewel - A Chapter In Her Life • Clara Louise Burnham
... "likes to back a flighty pony. You yourself, for instance, are always putting money, your own or some one else's, on horses that always run somewhere near form. Of course you have excuses ...
— The Penalty • Gouverneur Morris
... whole life had the mind of Sir Peter been so agitated as it was during and after the perusal of Kenelm's flighty composition. He had received it at the breakfast-table, and, opening it eagerly, ran his eye hastily over the contents, till he very soon arrived at sentences which appalled him. Lady Chillingly, who was fortunately busied at the tea-urn, ...
— Kenelm Chillingly, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... of doors to smell the sea, holding on to the walls as he went for support, and breathing hard and fast like a man on a steep mountain. He never particularly addressed me, and it is my belief he had as good as forgotten his confidences; but his temper was more flighty, and, allowing for his bodily weakness, more violent than ever. He had an alarming way now when he was drunk of drawing his cutlass and laying it bare before him on the table. But, with all that, he minded people less, and seemed shut up in his own thoughts and ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 6 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... put into the savings-bank, until it amounts to a sufficient sum to buy Luke off.' She then industriously resumed her work. It was some time before Mrs Damerel could comprehend the full intent and meaning of the sacrifice the girl proposed. At first she thought it was a mere flighty resolution, that would not hold long; and even when she was made to understand that it was unshaken, she looked at the achievement as impossible; for at that time the prices for lace-work were falling, in consequence of the recent ...
— Tales for Young and Old • Various
... "Don't get flighty, Patricia," admonished Beth. "This is a serious matter, and Louise is in earnest. If we're going to help her we mustn't talk rubbish. Now, it isn't a bad suggestion that we ought to look nearer home for the key to this mystery. There's ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces at Millville • Edith Van Dyne
... flighty young person who, when she has a moment or two to spare from the higher flirtation with the local policeman, puts in a little light work about the bedrooms). Oh, I say, this'll be one in the eye for Riggetts, pore little feller. ...
— Love Among the Chickens - A Story of the Haps and Mishaps on an English Chicken Farm • P. G. Wodehouse
... young peasant has loved and wooed Lola before entering military service. At his return he finds the flighty damsel married to the wealthy carrier Alfio, who glories in his pretty wife and treats her very well.—Turridu tries to console himself with another young peasant-girl, Santuzza, who loves him ardently, and to whom he has ...
— The Standard Operaglass - Detailed Plots of One Hundred and Fifty-one Celebrated Operas • Charles Annesley
... if the fencing party were kangaroos and Dave was trying to get a shot at them. The inspector, by-the-bye, had a habit of glancing now and then in the direction of his horse, as though under the impression that it was flighty and restless and inclined to bolt on opportunity. It was an anxious moment for all parties concerned—except the inspector. They didn't want HIM to be perturbed. And, just as Dave reached the foot of the tree, ...
— On the Track • Henry Lawson
... interfere with any of your arrangements," whispered the Rector, "but I think perhaps I ought to tell you that Mrs. Ramsay is no great housewife. She is a queer little flighty thing. She spends her time in trying to write plays and bothering managers. There's no harm in her, and he's very fond of her. But it is an untidy, dirty little house! And nothing ever happens at the right time. My sister ...
— Helena • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... done to de fold after he'd done come down on it wuz more'n aplenty. An' now, boy, you git on out of my kitchen an' go on 'bout yore business—ef you's got any business, w'ich I doubts. I ain't got no mo' time to waste on you den whut I is on dat flighty-haided Eldora Menifee, a-traipsin' round frum one back do' to 'nother with her talk 'bout ladies' auxiliaries an' gittin' yo rights fur a dollah down an' twenty cents ...
— Sundry Accounts • Irvin S. Cobb
... been dragged to death by that damned flighty horse of his," he said. "I found him in the brush this side of Granite Creek. Had his foot caught in the stirrup. I thought I'd best leave him there till ...
— The Quirt • B.M. Bower
... March, John and Charles Wesley called on them, and on the 6th, Charles Wesley came again, and "opened his heart" to them. The Diary calls him "an awakened but flighty man," who had come as Gov. Oglethorpe's secretary, and was now about to go to Frederica as pastor of that turbulent flock. From him Spangenberg learned of Oglethorpe's return from Altamaha, and accompanied by Nitschmann went with him to the ship, ...
— The Moravians in Georgia - 1735-1740 • Adelaide L. Fries
... precisely to the tale I have related, and not a man, woman, or child in the neighbourhood but knew it by heart. Some always pretended to doubt the reality of it, and insisted that Rip had been out of his head, and that this was one point on which he always remained flighty. The old Dutch inhabitants, however, almost universally gave it full credit. Even to this day they never hear a thunder-storm of a summer afternoon about the Kaatskill, but they say Hendrick Hudson and his crew are at their game of nine-pins; ...
— Legends That Every Child Should Know • Hamilton Wright Mabie
... continuing the practice before the old lady's face. Lady Milborough, who was the most affectionate old soul alive, and good-tempered with her friends to a fault, had never resented this, but had come to fear that Mrs. Trevelyan was perhaps a little flighty. She had never as yet allowed herself to say anything worse of her young friend's wife than that. And she would always add that that kind of thing would cure itself as the nursery became full. It must be understood therefore that Mrs. Trevelyan was ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope
... glad of it," concluded the bishop. "Because that maid, when I saw her, struck me as rather a flighty young person—the sort of girl who would take advantage of her mistress's absence to have a little flirtation with a policeman round the corner. I am glad the aunt could explain things so satisfactorily. I was wrong about that girl. Shows how careful one must be in judging of other ...
— South Wind • Norman Douglas
... an age when nobody can say she's flighty, I sh'd hope," continued Miss Peckham. "She's settled. And she's ...
— Janice Day, The Young Homemaker • Helen Beecher Long
... of all but modern independence and imprudent philanthropy was not easy to any one who did not understand her character, and though Lady Rotherwood said nothing more in the form of censure, it was evident that she was unconvinced that Gillian was not a fast and flighty girl, and that she did not desire more ...
— Beechcroft at Rockstone • Charlotte M. Yonge
... help. She hasn't such looks as you have, you know, but we've always thought her very fair-looking. What do you think we often call her? The Princess! That's part because of her name, Alice Maud, and part from a sort of way she's always had. Not a flighty way, but a sort of—well, I can't describe it. I do hope you'll ...
— Demos • George Gissing
... says Kennedy, "nothing flighty in his manner with me, and nothing which showed any ...
— My Recollections of Lord Byron • Teresa Guiccioli
... sing of the Almighty God be on you, holy father, and that He may reward and watch you from this present day. MARY — nudging Michael. — Did you see that, Michael Byrne? Didn't you hear me telling you she's flighty a while back since the change of the moon? With her ...
— The Tinker's Wedding • J. M. Synge
... way—"She would have made a good wife, and a still better mother. But an all-wise Providence has a remarkable habit—yes, I think we may call it quite a remarkable habit!—of persuading men generally to choose thriftless and flighty women for their wives, and to leave the capable ones single. That is so. Or in Miss Deane's case it may be an illustration of the statement that 'Mary hath chosen the better part.' Certainly when either men or women are happy in a state of single blessedness, ...
— The Treasure of Heaven - A Romance of Riches • Marie Corelli
... giantess,* as that she should be a paragon in any other character, before we began to love her. Esmond's mistress had a thousand faults beside her charms; he knew both perfectly well! She was imperious, she was light-minded, she was flighty, she was false, she had no reverence in her character; she was in everything, even in beauty, the contrast of her mother, who was the most devoted and the least selfish of women. Well, from the very first moment he saw her on the stairs ...
— The History of Henry Esmond, Esq. • W. M. Thackeray
... I, a fast-growing, hard-working youth of eighteen, who go every morning, four miles by street-car, to my office, and the same back at night, often so weary and faint as to be hardly able to sit, not to say stand, be obliged to give up my seat to any flighty, flashy girl who has come down-town to shop, or frolic, or do nothing? Isn't she as able to "swing corners" holding on to a strap as I? and to hold her own ...
— The Secret of a Happy Home (1896) • Marion Harland
... thought—still more discreditable to Daisy Medland. The injustice angered her: it would have angered her at any time; but her anger was forced to lie deeply hidden and secret, and the suppression made it more intense. Dick's flighty fancy caricatured the feeling with which she was struggling: the family attitude towards it faintly foreshadowed the consternation that the lightest hint of her unbanishable dream would raise. And, worst of all—so it seemed to her—what must Medland think? He ...
— Half a Hero - A Novel • Anthony Hope
... to be punished was an oldish man, short, apoplectic, overbearing, and irascible. Generally he was kind to most of the men in a way; but he was gross and mean, and that explained sufficiently his harsh treatment of young Gratmar, whom he could not understand, and his efforts to break that flighty young man's spirit. ...
— The Ape, the Idiot & Other People • W. C. Morrow
... surprised—or at your mistake. The fact is, the circumstances are peculiar. It's my sister's fault, really; she's such a flighty little thing—unpardonably careless. I must have warned her a hundred times, if once, never to leave valuables in that silly old tin safe. But she won't listen to reason—never would. And it's her house—her safe. I've got no right to install a better one. ...
— Nobody • Louis Joseph Vance
... vows, certainly. I never saw her before, but I believe she is rather a funny flighty person, and that Fulbert was afraid at one time that she would ...
— Modern Broods • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... he is, nor be certain that my Father wouldn't see fit to send me any afflictions; but I must say he has as lively a dread of sin as anybody I ever knew. There's no mistake about his being a good soul, and that's why I don't mind his notions; and, oh, I'm so glad he's got that flighty child under his wing. She'll never get any harm from his example, however queer his talk is. Edna Derwent, now, she sympathizes with him, and thinks she gets along a lot better since she's had his ideas to work on. So," Miss Lacey looked at her caller with a sudden ...
— The Opened Shutters • Clara Louise Burnham
... Maria Allen, daughter of Dr. Burney's second wife, therefore half-sister to the charming Burney girls. She was a young lady who could let herself go, in act as well as on paper, and withal, as Fanny judged her, "flighty, ridiculous, uncommon, lively, comical, entertaining, frank, and undisguised"—or because of it—she did contrive to unfold her panting and abounding young self more thoroughly than the many times more expert. You have her here in the pangs of a love-affair, of how long ...
— In a Green Shade - A Country Commentary • Maurice Hewlett
... partly created by the immense interest he takes in my success. But I greatly fear that his efforts will result in a serious reaction. His own grief, which at this moment he is repressing, has not in reality lost its sting. Have you not been struck by the rather flighty and mocking tone of his letters, some of which he has shown to me? That is not in his nature, for in his happiest days he was never turbulently gay; and I am sadly afraid that when this fictitious excitement about my election is over he may fall into utter prostration. He ...
— The Deputy of Arcis • Honore de Balzac
... rubbish, I have no doubt," was her aunt's reply; "only fit for flighty young girls, not for ...
— Fifty-Two Stories For Girls • Various
... able to judge, he is my favorite of the claimants. Du Brant and I have met frequently, and if I were a girl I would not want to marry him. Locker is too little for Miss Asher, and, besides, he is too flighty. Your young professor may be good enough, but from my limited conversation with him at the table I could not form much of an opinion as to him one way or another. I have an opinion of Hemphill, and a very good one. He is a first-class young man, a rising one with prospects, and, ...
— The Captain's Toll-Gate • Frank R. Stockton
... possible that proud old man has really fallen seriously in love with that yellow-haired, flighty child?" asked Mrs. Carl Walraven in angry surprise. "He was attentive at Washington, certainly; but I fancied his absurd old eyes were only caught for the moment. If it should prove serious, what a thing it will be for her! and these antediluvians, ...
— The Unseen Bridgegroom - or, Wedded For a Week • May Agnes Fleming
... Miss Patricia Doyle's pretty flat at 3708 Willing Square. In the small drawing room Patricia—or Patsy, as she preferred to be called—was seated at the piano softly playing the one "piece" the music teacher had succeeded in drilling into her flighty head by virtue of much patience and perseverance. In a thick cushioned morris-chair reclined the motionless form of Uncle John, a chubby little man in a gray suit, whose features were temporarily eclipsed by ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces Abroad • Edith Van Dyne
... successor Barbesieux. By Barbesieux the plan was perfected. The execution was entrusted to an officer named Grandval. Grandval was undoubtedly brave, and full of zeal for his country and his religion. He was indeed flighty and half witted, but not on that account the less dangerous. Indeed a flighty and half witted man is the very instrument generally preferred by cunning politicians when very hazardous work is to be done. No shrewd calculator would, for any bribe, however enormous, ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 4 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... of his employer's friend, Senator Roberts. The senator and Miss Roberts were frequently at the Ryder House and in course of time the aristocratic secretary and the daughter had become quite intimate. A flighty girl, with no other purpose in life beyond dress and amusement and having what she termed "a good time," Kate thought it excellent pastime to flirt with Mr. Bagley, and when she discovered that he was ...
— The Lion and The Mouse - A Story Of American Life • Charles Klein
... you'd like?" the other asked me. "Dr. Bell has plenty of life, but he's gentle. The black mare's a little bit flighty at first, but if you can ride her she soon finds it out and ...
— American Adventures - A Second Trip 'Abroad at home' • Julian Street
... very clearly recognised the simple candour with which she responded to my kindly and solicitous attentions. They could not fail to see that the link existing between us was not to be compared to any ordinary liaison, and we had the satisfaction of seeing the flighty young lady who had so openly angled for me fall into a fit over ...
— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner
... the tale he told me—the disappearance of that old man. Nobody about here can recognize him from my descriptions. He walked toward the old mill down the Newark road, and the next time I looked up he was gone. The people in the house there think I am flighty in my mind for insisting upon his appearance ...
— Tales of the Chesapeake • George Alfred Townsend
... says Miss Priscilla, slowly, "that you are not aware of the position your arms have taken. It is most unbecoming." Mrs. Reilly's arms dropped to her sides. "And as for this girl you speak of, I hear she is, as I say, very flighty." ...
— Rossmoyne • Unknown
... the age of twenty-four, Mr. Adams was present, in this town, on the argument before the supreme court respecting Writs of Assistance, and heard the celebrated and patriotic speech of James Otis. Unquestionably, that was a masterly performance. No flighty declamation about liberty, no superficial discussion of popular topics, it was a learned, penetrating, convincing, constitutional argument, expressed in a strain of high and resolute patriotism. He grasped the question ...
— Thomas Jefferson • Edward S. Ellis et. al.
... allusion,' and we may be sure, in spite of his reticence, that his own case was present at the time to his mind. His distressed father enlisted the interest of Lord Hailes, who requested Dr Jortin, Prebendary of St Paul's, to take in hand the flighty youth, and to persuade him to renounce the errors of the Church of Rome for those of the Church of England, for it was plain that Boswell had broken loose from his old moorings, and some middle course might, it was hoped, prove to be possible. ...
— James Boswell - Famous Scots Series • William Keith Leask
... is a little too literal can spoil the talk of a whole tableful of men of esprit.— "Yes," you say, "but who wants to hear fanciful people's nonsense? Put the facts to it, and then see where it is!"—Certainly, if a man is too fond of paradox,—if he is flighty and empty,—if, instead of striking those fifths and sevenths, those harmonious discords, often so much better than the twinned octaves, in the music of thought,—if, instead of striking these, he jangles the chords, stick a fact into him like a stiletto. But remember that talking ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I., No. 3, January 1858 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various
... triumph. Experience forbids her to count upon this man as a positive lover, but he is an admirer. They have a disagreeable habit of going so far and then taking wing. Marriage seems an event rather difficult of accomplishment, for with all Marcia's flighty romance she shrinks from encountering actual poverty, but it might be this man's admiration is sufficiently strong to lead him beyond the debatable land. She hesitates just a little, then solaces ...
— Floyd Grandon's Honor • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... disturbed for the remainder of the twenty-four hours. Not that he was absolutely idle, or averse to business, then; far from it. The difficulty was, he was apt to be altogether too energetic. There was a strange, inflamed, flurried, flighty recklessness of activity about him. He would be incautious in dipping his pen into his inkstand. All his blots upon my documents were dropped there after twelve o'clock, meridian. Indeed, not only would he be reckless, and sadly given to making blots ...
— The Piazza Tales • Herman Melville
... "The flighty and skittish wife of Ingild longs to observe the fashions of the Teutons; she prepares the orgy and ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... that if you are quiet and kind, and not flighty, he will forget all that, and be glad to let you ...
— The Trial - or, More Links of the Daisy Chain • Charlotte M. Yonge
... continued in a state of distracted and flighty tribulation, not knowing what to make of it, nor, indeed, knowing the worst; for the neighbours did not tell her half they might, nor drop a hint of the dreadful suspicion that ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... I've often wished and prayed his wife would be. And I like to have her near us, for she understands my sighs And I see my brave boy smiling when I look into her eyes." Now the presence of his sweetheart seems to fill our home with joy. She's no longer young and flighty—she's the girl who ...
— Over Here • Edgar A. Guest
... above all, whether you are with people of much higher rank than yourself. If it be true that the Baroness [Waldstaedten] did the same, still it is quite another thing, because she is a passee elderly woman (who cannot possibly any longer charm), and is always rather flighty. I hope, my dear friend, that you will never lead a life like hers, even should you resolve never to become my wife. But the thing is past, and a candid avowal of your heedless conduct would have made me at once overlook ...
— The Love Affairs of Great Musicians, Volume 1 • Rupert Hughes
... to be flighty, are otherwise dull creatures," he said. "May I ask what paper you are ...
— The Silent Barrier • Louis Tracy
... these flighty geniuses are not to be measured by doings of other men. Perhaps he hath gone to teach the singing girls at ...
— The Yoke - A Romance of the Days when the Lord Redeemed the Children - of Israel from the Bondage of Egypt • Elizabeth Miller
... was the youngest of all the sons' wives, as her husband was the latest born. She was quite a girl to some of them. Grandma had never more than half approved of her. Dorcas was high-strung and flighty, she said. She had her doubts about living happily with her. But Atherton was anxious for this division of the property, and he was her youngest darling, so she gave in. She felt lonely, and out of her element, when everything was arranged, she established in the southwest ...
— The Adventures of Ann - Stories of Colonial Times • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... said the friar,—"bold baron, old baron, sturdy baron, wordy baron, long baron, strong baron, mighty baron, flighty baron, mazed baron, crazed baron, hacked baron, thwacked baron; cracked, cracked, cracked baron; ...
— Maid Marian • Thomas Love Peacock
... When I begin to do the things I am going to do, with the aid of your practical advice, if I have your approval, the people will be at first rather afraid of me. They will privately suspect I am mad. It will, also, not seem at all unlikely that an American should be of unreasoningly extravagant and flighty mind. Stornham, having long slumbered in remote peace through lack of railroad convenience, still regards America as almost of the character of wild rumour. Rosy was their one American, and she disappeared from their ...
— The Shuttle • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... wandering; frantic, raving, stark staring mad, stark raving mad, wild-eyed, berserk; delusional, hallucinatory. [behavior somewhat resembling insanity] corybantic[obs3], dithyrambic; rabid, giddy, vertiginous, wild; haggard, mazed; flighty; distracted, distraught; depressed; agitated, hyped up; bewildered &c. (uncertain) 475. mad as a March hare, mad as a hatter; of unsound mind &c. n.; touched in one's head, wrong in one's head, not right in one's head, not in one's right ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... our lesson to the KAISER, Self-anointed Lord of Earth, Left that furious monarch wiser Re our troops' intrinsic worth, Frankly, I had thought you flighty, Callous to the very core; ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, September 30, 1914 • Various
... his brow as he followed her into her boudoir, where they frequently spent hours together. He questioned her concerning her aunt and her relations generally, but Lillian knew little more than that her aunt resided in Toronto, and was generally considered to be what is called "flighty." ...
— The Mysteries of Montreal - Being Recollections of a Female Physician • Charlotte Fuhrer
... at once infuriated; "as if it were possible," to quote from Isidore Geoffroy St. Hilaire, whose defence of Lamarck is one of the best things in his book, {235b} "that so great labour on the part of so great a naturalist should have led him to 'a fantastic conclusion' only—to 'a flighty error,' and, as has been often said, though not written, to 'one absurdity the more.' Such was the language which Lamarck heard during his protracted old age, saddened alike by the weight of years and blindness; this was what people did not hesitate to utter over his grave, yet barely ...
— Luck or Cunning? • Samuel Butler
... hall which seemed to share the mobile facilities of Aladdin's palace. This hall was ubiquitous, whether the action of the piece lay in Germany, Italy, France, or England, Mary Queen of Scots sobbed in this hall; Wallenstein in Schiller's tragedy ranted in it; Rigoletto reproved his flighty daughter in it. It seemed curious that personages so widely different should all have selected the same firm of upholsterers to fit ...
— The Days Before Yesterday • Lord Frederick Hamilton
... were published in a month's time. Some accounted it unseemly haste, after the other banns which had come to naught, and some said 'twas better so, and they blamed not Parson Fair for placing such a flighty and jilting maid safe within the pale of wedlock—and they guessed he was thankful enough to find a husband for her, even if 'twas ...
— Madelon - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... the Book written by his little Sister Wilhelmina, when she grew to size and knowledge of good and evil; [Memoires de Frederique Sophie Wilhelmine de Prusse, Margrave de Bareith (Brunswick, Paris et Londres, l8l2), 2 vols. 8vo.]—and this, of what flighty uncertain nature it is, the world partly knows. A human Book, however, not a pedant one: there is a most shrill female soul busy with intense earnestness here; looking, and teaching us to look. We find it a VERACIOUS ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Volume IV. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—Friedrich's Apprenticeship, First Stage—1713-1728 • Thomas Carlyle
... scored by his father for his flighty notions, his habit of shirking and general unreliability. "Hard work never killed anybody," the old ...
— More Toasts • Marion Dix Mosher
... any woman can be to see you back again," she said heartily, "though it's more than I hoped for so soon, and—Yes, the doctor says she's a little better, thank God! And your name has been on her lips more than once—poor dear!—since she has been flighty, and all the thanks I feel to you for bringing Lavina right along I can never tell you; for it seems a month since I saw a woman last. I just can't count the squaw! And do you want to come in and look at our poor little girl now? ...
— That Girl Montana • Marah Ellis Ryan
... taken sick. He had begun boarding at the hotel, and that night did not come to supper. I went over to his rooms to see what the trouble was. I found him on the bed in a high fever. His talk was rambling and flighty. It was a good deal about his daughter Florence, whom he had told me of before. Then ...
— Track's End • Hayden Carruth
... creature,] how can you for a moment suppose I should have any serious thoughts of that trifling, gay, flighty coquette, ...
— The Contrast • Royall Tyler
... Positive philosopher in cast-iron health and with no thunder shower approaching would undauntedly deny a Deity!) but if any resident of Bumsteadville should happen to be caught near the country editor's last home after dark, he would get over that part of his road in a curiously agile and flighty manner;—(just the same as a Positive philosopher with a sore throat, or at an uncommonly showy bit of lightning, would repeat "Now I lay me down to sleep," with surprising devotion.) So, although no one in all Bumsteadville was in the least afraid of the pauper burial-ground ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 19, August 6, 1870 • Various
... Jane Humphreys had during her father's lifetime had her ambitions, but she was a clever woman and adapted herself to her circumstances. If, as the sergeant-major's daughter, she had given herself airs, and had thrown herself in the way of the young officers, and had been light and flighty in her manner, all this was changed as soon as she was married, and even the most censorious were obliged to admit that she made Sergeant Humphreys a better wife than they had expected. His home was ...
— The Dash for Khartoum - A Tale of Nile Expedition • George Alfred Henty
... a great deal, and wished Emlyn would go instead, but Mrs. Elmwood would not have hired that flighty damsel on any account, and Emlyn was sure it would be but mopish work to live under a starched old Puritan. Mrs. Lightfoot was therefore applied to, to find a service for Emlyn Gaythorn, and she presently discovered one Mistress Sloggett, a haberdasher's wife of wealth ...
— Under the Storm - Steadfast's Charge • Charlotte M. Yonge
... opinion (to the Admiralty, I believe) in favour of procuring for the Cape Observatory a Transit Circle similar to that at Greenwich.—I had much correspondence about sending Pierce Morton (formerly a pupil of mine at Cambridge, a clever gentlemanly man, and a high wrangler, but somewhat flighty) as Magnetic Assistant to the Cape Observatory: he was with me from May to October, and arrived at the Cape on Nov. 27th.—I was much engaged with the clock with conical motion of pendulum, for uniform movement of the Chronographic ...
— Autobiography of Sir George Biddell Airy • George Biddell Airy
... but the year was lost; nor had greater results been brought about in Italy or on the Rhine. The spirits of the allies were only sustained by the romantic exploits of Lord Peterborough in Spain. Profligate, unprincipled, flighty as he was, Peterborough had a genius for war, and his seizure of Barcelona with a handful of men, a step followed by his recognition of the old liberties of Aragon, roused that province to support the cause of the second ...
— History of the English People, Volume VII (of 8) - The Revolution, 1683-1760; Modern England, 1760-1767 • John Richard Green
... in his broken way, replied that then he (the herb-doctor) was the person he sought—the person spoken of by the other person as yet unknown. He then, with flighty eagerness, wanted to know who this last person was, and where he was, and whether he could be trusted with money to ...
— The Confidence-Man • Herman Melville
... woman whom he has married is a beauty, and so of course, will be too full of dress and society to have any interest in little Rose. If John has chosen to wed a flighty beauty, he should at ...
— Princess Polly At Play • Amy Brooks
... Belcovitch's head cutter, betrothed himself to Fanny Fersht, the prettiest of the machinists, the Ghetto blessed the match, always excepting Sugarman the Shadchan (whom love matches shocked), and Goldenberg's relatives (who considered Fanny flighty and ...
— Ghetto Comedies • Israel Zangwill
... grey "belody" camels from the Delta; tall, wayward Somalis; massive, heavy-limbed Maghrabis—magnificent creatures; a sprinkling of russet-brown Indian camels; and, lest the female element be neglected, a company of flighty "nitties," very full of their own importance. The native drivers were of as many shades as the camels they led, from the pale brown of the town-bred Egyptian to the coal-black Nubian or Donglawi. Twenty-five thousand camels carrying water! The first relays were filing stolidly ...
— With Our Army in Palestine • Antony Bluett
... distinction is strongly maintained by pretty high authority; but we are ourselves inclined to adopt the Larig, not only because it appeared to us to contain a greater volume of water, but because it is more in the line of the glen, and, though rough enough, is not so desperately flighty as the Garchary, and does not join it in those great leaps which, however surprising and worthy of admiration they may be in themselves, are not quite consistent with the calm dignity of a river destined to pass close to two universities. Following then the Larig over ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, No. 382, October 1847 • Various
... disappointed, and it took her some time to rally sufficiently to convince the doctor that she was not flighty, as he termed it; but composing herself at last, she answered all his questions, and then, as he saw her eyes wandering toward the bouquet, he suddenly remembered that it was not yet presented, and placing it in her hands, ...
— Aikenside • Mary J. Holmes
... should at any rate think. Let him set apart times to ponder over these matters: and for this, I say that to be a lofty and noble nation, we must all borrow the rational observance of the Sabbath, not as a day merely of rest and still less of flighty recreation, but a necessary period devoted to man's thought upon ...
— The Young Seigneur - Or, Nation-Making • Wilfrid Chateauclair
... eat them," replied the fool. "And I have often marvelled wherefor the flighty butterfly wears such gay and painted wings, while every creature that creeps and grubs is grey or ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... but I want to see. He knows me, I know. I got my hand on him once when he was a boy—about my age, and he ain't forgot that, I know. He was a blusterer; but he did n 't have real grit. He won't say nothin' to my face. But I must go alone. You all are too flighty.' ...
— The Spectre In The Cart - 1908 • Thomas Nelson Page
... Petersburg, and that Lady was then there." [Sherlock, ii. 27.] Whereupon Sherlock hops his ways again; leaving us considerably uncertain. But, by a curious accident, here, at first-hand, is confirmation of the flighty creature;—a Letter from Excellency Elliot himself having ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XXI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... would be too impertinent, yet as you knew one another when children, and so forth, it was best to be plain with you at once, because, though such ridiculous nonsense was quite impossible, I hear on all hands you are a bold and flighty young gentleman, and that you have no ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... he sank down again and grew flighty of speech. One of our people was at last penetrated with something vaguely akin to compassion, may be, for he looked out through the gratings at the guardian officer, pacing to ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... Humayun, was not qualified by nature to perform the task which Babar had been obliged to neglect. His character, flighty and unstable, and his abilities, wanting in the constructive faculty, alike unfitted him for the duty. He ruled eight years in India without contributing a single stone to the foundation of an empire that was to remain. When, at ...
— Rulers of India: Akbar • George Bruce Malleson
... I knew enough to be convinced that she had the merit of a saint, and the purity of an angel: and was proceeding, when she said, No flighty compliments! ...
— Clarissa, Volume 7 • Samuel Richardson
... on the natural origin of animal organism, of which the fair countess spoke enthusiastically. The painter observed this change in her tastes with surprise and envy. No more music, nor verses, nor plastic arts which had formerly occupied her flighty attention, that was attracted by everything that shines or makes a noise. Now she looked on the arts as pretty, insignificant toys that were fit to amuse only the childhood of the human race. Times were changing, people must be serious. Science, nothing but science; she was ...
— Woman Triumphant - (La Maja Desnuda) • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... eyes, her finely shaded feathers, and certain saucy dashing ways that she had, which seemed greatly to take his fancy. But old Mrs. Scratchard, living in the neighboring yard, assured all the neighborhood that Gray Cock was a fool for thinking so much of that flighty young thing—that she had not the smallest notion how to get on in life, and thought of nothing in the world but her own pretty feathers. "Wait till she comes to have chickens," said Mrs. Scratchard. "Then you will see. I have brought up ten broods myself—as likely ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf (Vol 2 of 17) - Folk-Lore, Fables, And Fairy Tales • Various
... to read the comedy; after fifteen or twenty minutes Mrs. Vervain opened her eyes and said, "But before you commence, Florida, I wish you'd play a little, to get me quieted down. I feel so very flighty. I suppose it's this sirocco. And I believe I'll lie down in the ...
— A Foregone Conclusion • W. D. Howells
... you.' A third time I asked, and he laughed. I rushed out of the tent, but it was too late — he ordered two soldiers to catch and stake me. I begged by all the saints in heaven he would let me off; but it would not do, — when the general laughs he spares neither mad man nor sound." The poor flighty gentleman looked quite dolorous, at the very recollection of the staking. This is a very severe punishment; four posts are driven into the ground, and the man is extended by his arms and legs horizontally, ...
— The Voyage of the Beagle • Charles Darwin
... little basket phaeton behind, Miss Gordon, watching her charges, wondered what foolish thoughts were passing through Lizzie's flighty little head. It could not even approach her consciousness that the child's very soul ...
— 'Lizbeth of the Dale • Marian Keith
... have made him a byword, not only in his own country but all over Europe; and his belief in sheer militarism and Jingo imperialism has made him a menace. The Kaiser has only made things worse. Vain and flighty to a degree, and, like most vain people, rather shallow, Wilhelm II has supposed himself to be a second and greater Bismarck, destined by Providence to create the said Teutonic world-empire. It is simply to fight these powers of ...
— The Healing of Nations and the Hidden Sources of Their Strife • Edward Carpenter
... continued Dora, "to have you to help me to keep my flighty progenitors in order. Now ...
— From One Generation to Another • Henry Seton Merriman
... older than Sanchia, had married a Captain Sinclair, who was stationed at Aldershot. She had been the romp of former days and, when the storm had burst, hotly on the culprit's side. But Vicky had been flighty, and marriage changes one. Sanchia's eyes grew wistful as she sat, her letters on the wing, ...
— Rest Harrow - A Comedy of Resolution • Maurice Hewlett
... He had great abilities, a genial temper, and no vices; but he had one defect,—he could not speak in the tone of the people. There was some paralysis on his will, that, when he met men on common terms, he spoke weakly, and from the point, like a flighty girl. His consciousness of the fault made it worse. He envied every daysman and drover in the tavern their manly speech. He coveted Mirabeau's don terrible de la familiarite, believing that he whose sympathy goes lowest is the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 1, Issue 2, December, 1857 • Various |
