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Grand tour   /grænd tʊr/   Listen
Grand tour

noun
1.
An extended cultural tour of Europe taken by wealthy young Englishmen (especially in the 18th century) as part of their education.
2.
A sightseeing tour of a building or institution.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Grand tour" Quotes from Famous Books



... Ormond; and France and Italy, which he had been so eager to visit, faded from his imagination. Sir Herbert and Lady Annaly, who had understood from Dr. Cambray that Ormond was going to commence his grand tour immediately, and who heard him make a number of preparatory inquiries when he had been first at Annaly, naturally turned the conversation often to the subject. They had looked out maps and prints, and they had taken down from their shelves the different books of travels, which might ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. IX - [Contents: Harrington; Thoughts on Bores; Ormond] • Maria Edgeworth

... he had not the remotest idea to what accident he was indebted for such an evolution, although he seemed fully prepared to quarrel with any one who chose to acknowledge any participation in the deed; but the cause of it was, all the time, finding fresh customers, and, making the grand tour of the square with such velocity, I began to fear that I should soon be on his list also, if I did not take shelter in the nearest house, a measure no sooner thought of than executed. I, therefore, opened ...
— Adventures in the Rifle Brigade, in the Peninsula, France, and the Netherlands - from 1809 to 1815 • Captain J. Kincaid

... 1783 having opened the continent to the curiosity of the British traveller, Jackson curtly announced to his friends, that 'he was going to take a walk.' His poverty allowed him no other mode of locomotion; so off he set on the grand tour, carrying with him a map of France, a bundle of clothes, and a scanty supply of money. Crossing the channel, he reached Calais, a place which Horace Walpole, writing from Rome, declared had astonished him more than anything ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 420, New Series, Jan. 17, 1852 • Various

... restrictions scorned the case of a foreigner and a Jewess—crossed the Polish frontier with his mules and tools, and drove his little covered cart through Austria. And here he lit upon, and helped in some predicament of the road, a spirited young Englishman undergoing the miseries of the grand tour, the son and heir of Philip Yordas. Duncan was large and crooked of thought—as every true Yordas must be—and finding a mind in advance of his own by several years of such sallyings, and not yet even swerving toward the turning ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore

... after the example—to gather all he had together and take his journey into a far country." In other words, "I propose to make the parable a peg whereon to hang a few observations on (what does the reader suppose?) the practice of sending young men upon the Grand Tour, accompanied by a 'bear-leader,' and herein of the various kinds of bear-leaders, and the services which they do, and do not, render to their charges; with a few words on society in Continental cities, ...
— Sterne • H.D. Traill

... was out of my native country,' said the Doctor. 'I once, indeed, was about making the grand tour with a pupil of mine at Oxford, but circumstances interfered which changed his plans, and so I ...
— Venetia • Benjamin Disraeli

... a Hand-book for Spain. From what we have written above it will have been seen that we are not altogether unacquainted with the country; indeed we plead guilty to having performed the grand tour of Spain more than once; but why do we say guilty—it is scarcely a thing to be ashamed of; the country is a magnificent one, and the people are a highly curious people, and we are by no means sorry that we have ...
— A Supplementary Chapter to the Bible in Spain • George Borrow

... he engaged as companion and amanuensis. Jocelyn was a man of talent, but of irregular life, and was no doubt an accomplice in many of Temple's excesses. In 1743 they both undertook the so-called "grand tour," and though it was not his first visit, it was then probably that Temple first felt the fascination of pagan Italy,—a fascination which increased with every ...
— The Lost Stradivarius • John Meade Falkner

... the ancient voyagers, having ventured too near the sun, met his end by a distressing casualty, it is certain, that, when the reader loses sight of this modern family-excursion in the metaphysical ether, both parties are pushing vigorously on, wings in capital condition, wind never better, and the grand tour of the universe in process of most happy accomplishment. And let it here be mentioned that the senior of the gentlemen whose names are given upon the title-page is understood to resemble the classical artificer ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 88, February, 1865 • Various

... Gerald Mertoun saw some pretty service and much change of scene, making the "grand tour," as it were, under circumstances more exciting and of more moment to the world at large than is usually the case when a gentleman makes it. He so acquitted himself on several occasions that England heard of him and prophesied that if my Lord Marlborough's ...
— His Grace of Osmonde • Frances Hodgson Burnett

... and a good deal of a local antiquary. I showed him the plantations, going first round the terrace, then to the lake, then came down by the Rhymer's Glen, and took carriage at Huntly Burn, almost the grand tour, only we did not walk from Huntly Burn. The Fergusons ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott

... those days, the time arrived when Rapin was required to make "the grand tour" with his pupil and friend, Lord Woodstock. This was considered the complement of English education amongst the highest classes. It was thought necessary that young noblemen should come in contact with foreigners, and ...
— The Huguenots in France • Samuel Smiles

... "Tinker Dave" Beattie, who never gave quarter to Confederate soldier or Southern sympathizer. He knew that if he fell into their hands they would pickle him with his own salt. So this old man sadly yet wisely resolved to follow the fortunes of Morgan. He made the grand tour, was hurried along day after day through battle and ambush, dragged night after night on the remorseless march, ferried over the broad Ohio under fire of the militia and gunboats, and lodged at last in a "loathsome dungeon." On one occasion, in Ohio, when the home guards were ...
— Famous Adventures And Prison Escapes of the Civil War • Various

... became head-master of the once celebrated school for Catholic boys at Twyford, near Winchester. From there he went for a short time to Lisbon as professor of philosophy in the English College. Subsequently he travelled with various Peers making "the grand tour." After that he retired to Paris, where he was elected a member of the Academie des Sciences. He was the first director of the Imperial Academy in Brussels; a canon, first of Dendermonde and afterward of Soignies. He ...
— Science and Morals and Other Essays • Bertram Coghill Alan Windle

... your very kind, I might say your letter tout court, of Christmas-day. By this time I trust you are quite out of pain about me. My fit has been as regular as possible; only, as if the bootikins were post-horses, it made the grand tour of all my limbs in three weeks. If it will always use the same expedition, I m content it should take the journey once in two years. You must not mind my breast: it was always the weakest part of a very weak system ; yet did not suffer ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole, V4 • Horace Walpole

... hills. That is the real deliverance from the monotony of things. The man who is weary of life is the man who has not seen it. The man who is tied to his desk sometimes thinks everything would be right if only he could travel. But many a man has done the Grand Tour and come back no better contented. You cannot fool your soul with Mont Blanc or even the Himalayas. So many thousand feet, did you say?—but what is that to infinity! The cure for the fretful soul is not to go round the world; it ...
— The Threshold Grace • Percy C. Ainsworth

... displeased father, he manages to escape, finds his lady entertaining another gallant, and in despair becomes a regular vagabond. Just as he is about to leave England, his father discovers him and sends him to make the grand tour ...
— The Life and Romances of Mrs. Eliza Haywood • George Frisbie Whicher

... foreign travels which gave rise to this volume were of a novel and perhaps unprecedented kind. Two young American girls started for "the grand tour" with the father of one of them, and he being compelled to return home from London they were courageous enough to continue their journeyings alone. They spent two years in travel,—going as far north as the North Cape and south to the Nile, and including ...
— The Standard Oratorios - Their Stories, Their Music, And Their Composers • George P. Upton

... following years had varying experiences, their friendship had in no way lessened. Addison had been a fellow of his college, had gained the patronage of Charles Montague and Lord Somers, had made the grand tour, and published an account of his travels; had gained popularity by his poem "The Campaign," written in celebration of the victory at Blenheim; had been made an Under-Secretary of State, and finally (in December 1708) had been appointed ...
— The Tatler, Volume 1, 1899 • George A. Aitken

... rolling ground-swell, and the smell of fish, and is somewhat sleepy also, between early rising and incoherent sermons; wherefore, if he takes good advice, he will stay and recruit himself at Ilfracombe, before he proceeds further with his self-elected cicerone on the grand tour of North Devon. Believe me, Claude, you will not stir from the place for a month at least. For be sure, if you are sea- sick, or heart-sick, or pocket-sick either, there is no pleasanter or cheaper place of cure (to indulge in a puff ...
— Prose Idylls • Charles Kingsley

... been a great while journeying through countries covered with frost and snow; and they were longing to reach those tropical isles—famed for their spices and their loveliness—which were to be the next stage in their grand tour round ...
— Bruin - The Grand Bear Hunt • Mayne Reid

... and characters were still of farther use to our hero, for by their means he had a better opportunity of seeing the world, and knowing mankind, than most of our youths who make the grand tour; for, as he had none of those petty amusements and raree-shows, which so much divert our young gentlemen abroad, to engage his attention, it was wholly applied to the study of mankind, their various passions ...
— The Surprising Adventures of Bampfylde Moore Carew • Unknown



Words linked to "Grand tour" :   tour, circuit



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