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Playfully   /plˈeɪfəli/   Listen
Playfully

adverb
1.
In a playful manner.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Playfully" Quotes from Famous Books



... wind now blew strongly from W.S.W., and the Iris tore furiously along, revelling with her favourite breeze, three points on the quarter; and, bounding from wave to wave, she seemed to dally with their soft white crests, which curved half playfully, half reluctantly, as her proud bows met and kissed them lightly, then threw them, hissing, in ...
— A Yacht Voyage to Norway, Denmark, and Sweden - 2nd edition • W. A. Ross

... part,' continued Vetranio, drawing Camilla towards him, and playfully tapping her little dimpled hand, 'I am in anxious expectation of the Goths, for I have designed a statue of Minerva, for which I can find no model so fit as a woman of that troublesome nation. I am informed upon good ...
— Antonina • Wilkie Collins

... affectionate note, chiding him for deserting them in their trouble. She assured him that the news was greatly exaggerated, the embarrassment was only temporary, such things were always happening in the Street. "You know," she said, playfully, "it is our American way to be up in a minute when we seem to be down." She asked him to call, for she had something that was important to tell him, and, besides, she needed his counsel as a friend of the house. The note was ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... playfully patting his cheek, her glance alighted on the solitary lock of gray hair in the center of his forehead. Toying with ...
— The Mask - A Story of Love and Adventure • Arthur Hornblow

... exuberant vitality asserted itself all over her, from head to foot. Her figure—taller than her sister's, taller than the average of woman's height; instinct with such a seductive, serpentine suppleness, so lightly and playfully graceful, that its movements suggested, not unnaturally, the movements of a young cat—her figure was so perfectly developed already that no one who saw her could have supposed that she was only eighteen. She bloomed in the full physical ...
— No Name • Wilkie Collins

... by your wife! Your poor, wise wife in whom you would not confide!" She tapped him playfully on his fat ...
— Unleavened Bread • Robert Grant

... Garie left the room, playfully shaking her finger at them as she went out, exclaiming, "Not a word, ...
— The Garies and Their Friends • Frank J. Webb

... of a pair of brown-thrashers that were flitting from bush to bush along an old stone row in a remote field. Presently I saw what it was that excited them—three large red weasels, or ermines coming along the stone wall, and leisurely and half playfully exploring every tree that stood near it. They had probably robbed the thrashers. They would go up the trees with great ease, and glide serpent-like out upon the main branches. When they descended the tree they were unable to come straight down, like a squirrel, but went around it ...
— Birds and Bees, Sharp Eyes and, Other Papers • John Burroughs

... of the auld kirk tower Is the broad-leaved dock and the bright brae flower; And the adders hiss o'er the lime-bound stones, And playfully writhe round mouldering bones: The bat clingeth close to the binewood's root, Where its gnarled boughs up the belfry shoot, As, hiding the handworks of ruthless time, It garlands in grandeur and green sublime The hoary height, where the rust sae fell Bends, as ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume VI - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various

... Elaine, Aunt Tabby and the dog got out. There, waiting for them, was "Uncle" Joshua, as Elaine playfully called him, a former gardener of the Dodges, now a plain, honest countryman on whom the city was fast encroaching, a jolly old ...
— The Romance of Elaine • Arthur B. Reeve

... noon and in the afternoon. A flock of Bobolinks can be heard singing almost all day long. The song is full of high notes and low, soft notes and loud, all sung rapidly. It is as gay and bright as the birds themselves, who flit about playfully as they sing. You will feel like laughing as merrily as they sing when ...
— Birds Illustrated by Color Photograph [March 1897] - A Monthly Serial designed to Promote Knowledge of Bird-Life • Various

... beauty in childhood that Josephus says, when he was carried along the road, people stopped to gaze at him, and workmen would leave their work to admire him. When the king playfully put his crown upon this boy, he threw it off indignantly, and put his foot on it. The king, fearing that this might be a sign that the child might yet take down his crown, applied another test. According to the Jewish legend, the king ordered two bowls to ...
— The Wedding Ring - A Series of Discourses for Husbands and Wives and Those - Contemplating Matrimony • T. De Witt Talmage

... get it up, and indeed always takes the lead in the house,' said Mrs Todgers, playfully. ...
— Life And Adventures Of Martin Chuzzlewit • Charles Dickens

... not long held in suspense; a volley of inelegant phrases saluted his ears, while the thong of a hunting-whip twisted playfully about his leg. Finding the play unequal, he wisely gave up the game—by dropping his bird on one side, and himself on the other; at the same time reluctantly leaving a portion of his nether garment ...
— The Sketches of Seymour (Illustrated), Complete • Robert Seymour

... to look up just then and she saw him. She beckoned to him playfully, guardedly, like a schoolgirl. Smiling, he shook his ...
— The Calling Of Dan Matthews • Harold Bell Wright

... laid his hands playfully on her slender waist, and looked at her. "You may as well ask me to take a journey to the moon. It is past nine, and I have not been to the office ...
— East Lynne • Mrs. Henry Wood

... Massachusetts Bay were ordered to keep a lookout for him and have a gun double shotted for action. One fisherman emptied the contents of a ducking gun into the serpent's head, as he supposed, but the creature playfully wriggled a few fathoms of its tail and made off. John Josselyn, gentleman, reports that when he stirred about this neighborhood in 1638 an enormous reptile was seen "quoiled up on a rock at Cape Ann." He would have fired at him but for the earnest dissuasion of his ...
— Myths And Legends Of Our Own Land, Complete • Charles M. Skinner

... spared himself the trouble of inditing this indignant note and throwing out this useless suggestion had he known that Bracciolini forged the Annals, and playfully interspersed his fabrication occasionally with fanciful characters and fictitious events. The picture of Marcus Hortalus, who had received from Augustus the munificent gift of a million sesterces, being in the days of Tiberius once more poor, married, with children, and seeking aid from the State ...
— Tacitus and Bracciolini - The Annals Forged in the XVth Century • John Wilson Ross

... that her guests were in danger of "moping," Lady Hurstmonceux proposed a game of whist, saying playfully that it was very seldom she was so fortunate as to have the right number of evening visitors to ...
— Self-Raised • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth

... disgrace which he meant to throw upon the character of the Dean.' The Life of Doctor Swift, Swift's Works, ed. 1803, ii. 200. There is a passage in the Lives of the Poets (Works, viii. 43) in which Johnson might be supposed playfully to have anticipated this attack. He is giving an account of Blackmore's imaginary Literary Club of Lay Monks, of which the hero was 'one Mr. Johnson.' 'The rest of the Lay Monks,' he writes, 'seem to be but feeble mortals, in comparison with the gigantick Johnson.' ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell

... very quickly. The barber's shop was somewhat removed from the more populous parts of the town. But when the customers did come, Jasmin treated them playfully and humorously. He was as lively as any Figaro; and he became such a favourite, that when his customers were shaved or had their hair dressed, they invariably returned, as well as recommended others to patronize ...
— Jasmin: Barber, Poet, Philanthropist • Samuel Smiles

... his last remark, Ruth playfully reminded her of her newly-formed resolution to rise at an earlier hour than heretofore, and told her to be sure and call her when breakfast was ready, for she was so sleepy she did not know when she should waken. Agnes good-naturedly ...
— 'Our guy' - or, The elder brother • Mrs. E. E. Boyd

... stone fountain, out of which a jet of water rose playfully, falling with a splash of water-drops into the sculptured basin. While the furnace was raging in the village this fountain played and reflected the glare of crimson light in its bubbling jet. The children of many generations had dabbled their hands in its basin. Pretty girls ...
— The Soul of the War • Philip Gibbs

... exclaimed M'Allister, touching him playfully on the shoulder, "the Professor had you all right that time, I'm thinking!" John blushed up to the eyes, ...
— To Mars via The Moon - An Astronomical Story • Mark Wicks

... but you requested me to tell him that you found him too young. He has laboured conscientiously since then to correct that fault." Then playfully pinching her cheeks, he added: "You are a great girl for objections. Soon you will be twenty-five years old, and you have refused five eligible offers. Have you taken a vow to ...
— Samuel Brohl & Company • Victor Cherbuliez

... constantly attacking Count Gamba, sometimes, indeed, playfully, but more often with the bitterest satire, for having purchased for the use of his family, while in Greece, 500 dollars' worth of cloth. This he used to mention as an instance of the Count's imprudence and extravagance. ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. 6 (of 6) - With his Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore

... thing to tear a hole in the middle of the tight-stretched old carpet on her big bed. She got to work at once, pleased to think that she had remembered this little matter in good time, and was distinctly disappointed when the Master came and sat beside her on the edge of the bed and playfully held her paws, after gently lowering her into a lying position. Still, it was good to have him sit there and chat, as he did for some little time, rubbing the backs of her ears, and being generally sociable. He was the only human creature, with the exception of the Mistress of the Kennels, who ...
— Finn The Wolfhound • A. J. Dawson

... to watch the little pugnose careering playfully round me. How she danced round me, without any attempt to conceal the fact that I took her fancy; and ...
— Debts of Honor • Maurus Jokai

... playfully to this item of intelligence; said he was exceedingly happy to hear it, as he trusted now that a suit, in which he was greatly interested, would speedily come to an end. I heard a little by-conversation between Mr. Dickens and a gentleman of the bar, who sat opposite me, in which the ...
— Speeches: Literary and Social • Charles Dickens

... heavens seemed to be ablaze from horizon to zenith, not as with the lurid fires of a great conflagration, which might suggest only the idea of universal devastation, but with the tender sheen of varied half-tints, playfully shooting athwart and intermingling with brighter curtains of ...
— The Crew of the Water Wagtail • R.M. Ballantyne

... to this statement and Eleanor drew on her stockings and then sought for her shoes which she had playfully aimed at Anne Stewart the night previous. One was found by the bureau and the other was seen under the window. She ran over to pick up the one ...
— Polly of Pebbly Pit • Lillian Elizabeth Roy

... mamma," added Christy playfully, as he rose from the sofa. "I have not been butchered, and I haven't anything but a little bullet-hole through the fleshy part of my left arm. Don't make a baby of me; for a commander in the Confederate ...
— A Victorious Union - SERIES: The Blue and the Gray—Afloat • Oliver Optic

... reading of the poem as in that at the Court of Urbino when Cardinal Bembo, distraught by his own rhapsody on love, stood silent as one transported, and the lady Emilia to recall him to himself shook him playfully, crying, "Have a care, Pietro, lest in this mood your soul should ...
— Romance of Roman Villas - (The Renaissance) • Elizabeth W. (Elizbeth Williams) Champney

... to make a dress and caps, adding, playfully, "As my dear grandma is gone, you must let me adopt you and do all I can for you. There are four of us girls always looking round for somebody to help. You can call on us ...
— An Arrow in a Sunbeam - and Other Tales • Various

... 992, most of the men whose names are honoured in Scotland's capital, and many of whom the fame and the memory are revered in far places of the earth. That he might smoke in the hall of the Speculative, in the very stronghold of University authority, he playfully professes to have been his chief pleasure in the thing; but other men, to whom his earnest face, his eagerness in debate, made one of the pleasures of its meetings, tell another story, and it was commonly said in those days that there would always ...
— Robert Louis Stevenson • Margaret Moyes Black

... Thorpe, and we'll never mention her again if I can help it. I must say, though, that our skeletons are uncommonly attractive, aren't they, Anne? No dry, rattling bones in our closets, are there?" He squeezed her arm playfully, and was amazed when ...
— From the Housetops • George Barr McCutcheon

... all know 'er! She's one o' them Cachuca girls with droopy, Spanish eyes! Oh, ask the boys about 'er!" And with that she started to leave the room, stopping on her way to clap both Trinidad and Sonora playfully on the back. "Yes, ask the boys about 'er, they'll tell you!" And so saying she fled from the room, followed by the men she was ...
— The Girl of the Golden West • David Belasco

... of the great West—"the poor man's paradise"—"the stoneless land of plenty"; of its delightful climate, of the ease with which the farmer prospered on its rich soil. Uncle Peabody spoke playfully of going West, after that, but Aunt Deel made no answer and concealed her opinion on that subject for a long time. As for myself, the reading had deepened my interest in east and west and north and south and in the skies above them. How mysterious ...
— The Light in the Clearing • Irving Bacheller

... Aunt Jessica!" cried Amy in a voice that rang like a small silver bell, "I haven't seen you for two whole nights and three whole days!" Placing her hands on Mrs. Falconer's shoulders, she kissed her once on each cheek and twice playfully on the pearly tip of the chin; and then she looked into her eyes as innocently as a perfect tulip might look at a ...
— The Choir Invisible • James Lane Allen

... of the chief butcher, placed the cord under his arms, and drew him up till the ends of his toes scarcely touched the ground. I then secured the rope, and for some moments kept running playfully round him, and tickling his sides, which made him laugh with delight. At length, tired of his posture, he desired me to release him; but I refused, saying, "My dear chief, I have not yet finished my amusement;" after which I tore the clothes from his back, as if in ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments vol. 4 • Anon.

... indicated and saw a doe and a spotted fawn wading into the shallow water. The mother stood motionless a moment, with head erect and long ears extended. Then she drooped her graceful head and drank thirstily of the cool water. The fawn splashed playfully round while its mother was drinking. It would dash a few paces into the stream and then look back to see if its mother approved. Evidently she did not, for she would stop her drinking and call the fawn back to her side with a soft, crooning noise. Suddenly ...
— Betty Zane • Zane Grey

... husband playfully, "no wonder you cried, with such a heavy burden on your soul; but confess your ...
— How It All Came Round • L. T. Meade

... the professor, shaking his fist playfully at his old school-fellow. "Well, I feel ten years younger than I did half an hour ago, and this ...
— In the Mahdi's Grasp • George Manville Fenn

... believe I do not care to know her, and I am thirsting for the hour to come when I shall study her. Is not this to have the poison of a bite in one's blood? The wrath of Venus is not a fable. I was a hard reader and I despised the sex in my youth, before the family estates fell to me; since when I have playfully admired the sex; I have dallied with a passion, and not read at all, save for diversion: her anger is not a fable. You may interpret many a mythic tale by the facts which lie in your own blood. My emotions have lain altogether dormant in sentimental ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... return to remembrance in the covert of still hours, like truants they playfully reveal things she had kept secret ...
— The Fugitive • Rabindranath Tagore

... minutes and he was notified that the President-elect was in the Blue Room awaiting his arrival. Alone, unaided, grasping his old blackthorn stick, the faithful companion of many months, his "third leg," as he playfully called it, slowly he made his way to the elevator and in a few seconds he was standing in the Blue Room meeting the President-elect and greeting him in the most gracious way. No evidence of the trial of pain he was undergoing in striving to play a modest part in the ...
— Woodrow Wilson as I Know Him • Joseph P. Tumulty

... that Gideon will ever forget the Langham Hotel. No Count Tarnow was one thing; no John Dickson and no Ezra Thomas, quite another. How, why, and what next, danced in his bewildered brain; from every centre of what we playfully call the human intellect incongruous messages were telegraphed; and before the hubbub of dismay had quite subsided, the barrister found himself driving furiously for his chambers. There was at least a cave of refuge; it was at least a ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 7 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... louder, and presently an object apparently travelling like a thunderbolt came out of the shadow. It was, notwithstanding the speed it made, gambolling playfully, with head tossed sideways and tail in the air, and when Miss Deringham fancied it must turn aside for a tangled brake, went smashing straight through it. As it emerged with an exultant flourish of head and tail two other objects became visible behind it, and Seaforth pushed forward when the mounted ...
— Alton of Somasco • Harold Bindloss

... head playfully at his servant's grumbling. "Gossip Tristan," he asked, "do you know why I have come to this hovel to-night? I do not walk abroad like a king-errant in mere idleness of mind. I have come to learn what company my lord the Grand Constable keeps." Tristan's ...
— If I Were King • Justin Huntly McCarthy

... playfully, "I'm afraid you're not a good provider. Here we are, hungry as wolves, and you haven't brought us a mite of anything to eat. You've moved everything but the provisions, ...
— The Big Brother - A Story of Indian War • George Cary Eggleston

... the study and examination of the Scriptures. Mr. Flanders himself had charge of this class, and was regarded by all the young ladies (myself excepted) as a 'dear, good man.' When one of us was particularly apt in answering a question or finding a passage, he would playfully chuck the good scholar under the chin, in token of his commendation; and sometimes, even, he would bestow a fatherly kiss upon the fair ...
— City Crimes - or Life in New York and Boston • Greenhorn

... said playfully and coquettishly, but in a way to make me feel how near folly would have been to depriving me of a treasure, had the heart I so much prized been less ingenuous and pure. I drew the dear creature to my bosom, ...
— The Monikins • J. Fenimore Cooper

... of you—there's my puppy dog!" she cried, as a fat retriever puppy gambolled down the path and flung itself playfully upon her. ...
— The Gap in the Fence • Frederica J. Turle

... playfully patting her cheek. "There is no tumult. Our Boston mobs are satisfied with what mischief they have already done. The king's friends ...
— Journeys Through Bookland - Volume Four • Charles H. Sylvester

... obedience to her husband had been accepted by her in full. When disposed to run counter to the ladies at Manor Cross, she always had declared to herself that they bore no authority delegated from "George," and that she would obey "George," and no one but George. She had told him more than once, half-playfully, that if he wanted anything done, he must tell her himself. And this, though he understood it to contain rebellion against the Germains generally, had a pleasant flavour with him as acknowledging so completely his ...
— Is He Popenjoy? • Anthony Trollope

... mythologists, Thor, or Donar, is the son of Joerd (Erda) and of Odin, but others state that his mother was Frigga, queen of the gods. This child was very remarkable for his great size and strength, and very soon after his birth amazed the assembled gods by playfully lifting and throwing about ten great bales of bear skins. Although generally good-tempered, Thor would occasionally fly into a terrible rage, and as he was very dangerous at these times, his mother, unable to control him, sent him away from home and entrusted him to ...
— Myths of the Norsemen - From the Eddas and Sagas • H. A. Guerber

... a chicken-hearted little body," returned Arthur, playfully; then speaking more gravely, he continued: "Well, Guly, it is not, after all, so much my fault. I am of an age to wish to enjoy myself. I have been accustomed to having every comfort and happiness around me; the fond love and refined ...
— The Brother Clerks - A Tale of New-Orleans • Xariffa

... bending the wet leaves over, so as not to miss any, when a voice at the window above said, timidly and playfully, ...
— A Kentucky Cardinal • James Lane Allen

... sighed comfortably, "of course it's an emotional time, dear! Leaving the home nest—" Mrs. Lancaster eyed her keenly, but Susan did not speak. "Remember, Auntie is to know the first of all!" she said playfully. Adding, after a moment's somber thought, "If Georgie had told Mama, things would ...
— Saturday's Child • Kathleen Norris

... bent over the cat in her lap, stared absently into its green eyes where it lay playfully patting the rags that ...
— The Dark Star • Robert W. Chambers

... one comes, we're all going to celebrate by being ill; is that what you mean, papa?" Louise asked playfully, as she shook her head at Grant, who was stretching up, to peer curiously at the top of Mrs. Pennypoker's head, where a pale crescent was gradually appearing and waxing wider. "When's ...
— In Blue Creek Canon • Anna Chapin Ray

... began to rise. She opened every one of the drawers, and poured out the glittering jewels. Of course Fly was on the spot in a twinkling; but Prudy caught her, and playfully pinned her little arms down to her sides; so her prying fingers had no ...
— Prudy Keeping House • Sophie May

... are in the habit of saying ma'am to their superiors: it is required of them," remarked Mrs. Perkin. But, although her tone was one of rebuke, she said the words lightly, tossed the last of them off, indeed, almost playfully, as if the lesson was meant for one who could hardly have been expected to know better. "And what place did you apply for in the house?" she ...
— Mary Marston • George MacDonald

... altogether a mistake. The secret of printing must have been discovered many thousands of times before it was used, or could be used. The inventive powers of man are divine; and also his stupidity is divine—as Cowper so playfully illustrates in the slow development of the sofa through successive generations of immortal dulness. It took centuries of blockheads to raise a joint stool into a chair; and it required something like a miracle ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 57, No. 356, June, 1845 • Various

... is come, expects no difficulty with Neisse. A "paltry hamlet (BICOQUE)" he playfully calls it; and, except this, Silesia is now his. Neisse got (which would be the desirable thing), or put under "mask" as Glogau is, and as Brieg is being, Austria possesses not an inch of land within these ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XII. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle

... cried playfully to Winifred. "How could you desert us with your charming voice? Dear Mrs. Gray, you really should chastise your daughter—you really should!" And she shook the false curls ...
— The First Soprano • Mary Hitchcock

... here a few minutes, James," said his father, playfully. "Then we must go below the Falls and explore the ice-bridge. I see it is yet in perfect condition. You are fortunate, my boy, to be able to see it. There are some winters that never bring an ice-bridge. Then sometimes it thaws in March, so we are ...
— The Shagganappi • E. Pauline Johnson

... glee squeezed round to him and smote him playfully with her large, fat hand, and then, being somewhat out of breath with the exertion, sat down to enjoy the ...
— At Sunwich Port, Complete • W.W. Jacobs

... shrubby hawthorns, I gathered the small red apples, and from beneath the maples, picked by their slim golden stems the notched and gorgeous leaves. The wind fingered playfully my hair, and clouds of birds went whirring through the tree-tops; but no sight nor sound could divide my thoughts from her whose voice had so often filled ...
— Friends and Neighbors - or Two Ways of Living in the World • Anonymous

... Kin it be? That necktie! them familiar coat-buttons! that paper-dicky! You are—you are my long-lost Convick Son, 'ome from Portland! Come to these legs! (He embraces ALF, and smothers him with kisses.) Oh, you've been and rubbed off some of your cheek on my complexion—you dirty boy! (He playfully "bashes" ALF's hat in.) Now show the comp'ny how pretty you can sing. (ALF attempts a Music-hall ditty, in which he, not unnaturally, breaks down.) It ain't my son's fault, Ladies and Gentlemen, it's all ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 103, August 6, 1892 • Various

... quickly up and down the deserted room, sipping his seventh tumbler of brandy, as he walked. It was his invariable custom to drink seven tumblers of neat brandy every night to steady himself, and his College career had, in consequence, been quite unexceptionable up to the present moment. He used playfully to remind his Dean of PORSON's drunken epigram, and the good man always accepted this as an excuse for any false quantities in GEORGE's Greek Iambics. But to-night, as I have said, GEORGE was nervous with a strange nervousness, ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 99., December 13, 1890 • Various

... or give any sign that he heard. Billy Louise had no thought of coquetry. Her heart ached with pity and a longing to help him. She slid one hand up and pinched his ear, just as she would playfully tweak the ear ...
— The Ranch at the Wolverine • B. M. Bower

... the row with you, old boy," said Montagu, playfully shaking Eric by the shoulder, "you're as silent as Zimmerman on Solitude, and as doleful as Harvey on the Tombs. I expect you've been going through a select course of Blair's Grave, Young's Night Thoughts, and Drelincourt ...
— Eric • Frederic William Farrar

... window at the boy crossing the street in the dim pre-dawn light, with a cat and three half-grown kittens gamboling about him. Occasionally Arlo Junior would shake something out of a paper to the ground and the cats would immediately roll and frolic and slap playfully at one another, acting as the girl had never seen cats ...
— Janice Day, The Young Homemaker • Helen Beecher Long

... then decided to relieve herself of shawl and bonnet. The heat in the drawing-room was intense, and Monsieur Letellier hastened to open a window, at which he remained standing, struck by the sight of a lilac bush which was already budding. Pauline, meantime, had begun playfully running after Lucien behind the chairs and couches, left ...
— A Love Episode • Emile Zola

... Kelton for his check, the latter actually made him feel ashamed of himself for calling and sent him away with one-half of the sum now overdue! This perturbed Matt somewhat, but when he showed some slight indication of it Kelton playfully picked up a glass paper weight and threatened to destroy him if he did not get out of the office at once; so, because it is difficult to be serious with a man who declines to take one seriously, Matt forced a grin and ...
— Cappy Ricks • Peter B. Kyne

... Chaldea, who both love you," she mocked. "Let them all fight out their troubles alone. I have had enough suffering; so have you. So there's no more to be said. Now, sir," she added playfully, "wilt thou take this woman to ...
— Red Money • Fergus Hume

... had taken up his abode in Wilhelmine's house at Schaffhausen, made matters worse by what he conceived to be witty and subtle pleasantries. He was never done with his allusions to 'mon cher futur beau frere a Vienne,' and he playfully called ...
— A German Pompadour - Being the Extraordinary History of Wilhelmine van Graevenitz, - Landhofmeisterin of Wirtemberg • Marie Hay

... find me bewitching, father, for I want as much of your society as you will give me during this visit." She tried to speak playfully and naturally, but tears were gathering in her eyes, for his expression of perplexity was singularly pathetic and full of the keenest reproach. "O God," she murmured, "what have I been that he should be speechless ...
— A Face Illumined • E. P. Roe

... lady, she was so extremely juvenile in her appearance; and her lameness, by giving her an air of childish dependence, added to the illusion caused by her fair, clustering ringlets and infantine rosiness of complexion. She wanted to bring me forward;—she coaxed, caressed, and playfully threatened, nor desisted till her mother said, ...
— Ernest Linwood - or, The Inner Life of the Author • Caroline Lee Hentz

... aristocratic sister Jane, his unaristocratic sister little Fanny, and Herbert Allen—a young lieutenant, by the way, and, by the way, the red-hot flame of my harem-scarem sister—would all four honor Dough-nut Hall, the name we had playfully given our old homestead, with ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 6 June 1848 • Various

... explained to me the use of a garment when I had made a mistake. She hurriedly arranged my hair, and this done, held up before me a little pocket-mirror of Venetian crystal, rimmed with silver filigree-work, and playfully asked: 'How dost find thyself now? Wilt engage me for thy ...
— Clarimonde • Theophile Gautier

... attend to the lessons first," warned the teacher, shaking her finger playfully at the ...
— Tabitha at Ivy Hall • Ruth Alberta Brown

... gluttony? I was standing at the horse's head, and you were sitting in your buggy, there at the carriage steps, and I said I wished you would horsewhip me, instead of treating me so kindly. I remember you reached over and tickled my neck with the lash playfully, and told me there was no use in thrashing a fellow who was all broken up, anyway, ...
— Stories Worth Rereading • Various

... house, which we reached at half-past twelve o'clock. We were shown upstairs, passing many fine family pictures, and were ushered into the neat library, where Mr. Beckford was waiting to receive us. I confess I did at first feel somewhat embarrassed, but a lovely spaniel ran playfully towards us, licking our hands in the most affectionate and hospitable manner; "You are welcome" was the silent language. I assure you I judge much, and often truly, of the character of individuals from the deportment of their favourite dogs. I often find them exactly ...
— Recollections of the late William Beckford - of Fonthill, Wilts and Lansdown, Bath • Henry Venn Lansdown

... It sounded like the tiny knuckles of a fairy's hand, knocking lightly and playfully on the ...
— The Elson Readers, Book 5 • William H. Elson and Christine M. Keck

... the week, the governor, as Heaton had styled Mark, and as Bridget had begun playfully to term him, gave the opinion that it was necessary for them to tear themselves away from their paradise. Never before, most certainly, had the Reef appeared to the young husband a spot as delightful as he now found it, and it did seem to him very possible for one to pass a whole life ...
— The Crater • James Fenimore Cooper

... it. Her last words brought up the memory of the occasion when she had playfully uttered the like, one night in August, with the added inquiry, "What if you had to choose between us?" Were things drifting to such an issue? Would she at last force upon him that hard choice? He flung ...
— The Iron Furrow • George C. Shedd

... For Delfina was playfully constraining her mother to remain upon her knees. She hung with all her weight round Donna Maria's neck, ...
— The Child of Pleasure • Gabriele D'Annunzio

... and sallied out—just in time to see Elizabeth playfully pulling William by the beard. 'You get them whiskers orf—narsty, rarspin' things,' ...
— Our Elizabeth - A Humour Novel • Florence A. Kilpatrick

... preserved vegetables was served up—"surrogate of the primeurs," as the General expressed himself; then partridges in aspic and a poulet au riz, followed by young cabbages with baked eels, which, the Captain said playfully, had only gone into his net for my sake. As plat doux, we had a pudding with the wonderful sauce Francis had been called into the kitchen to make; and to wind up, a complete dessert. It was difficult for me to reconcile ...
— Major Frank • A. L. G. Bosboom-Toussaint

... now did Julian pour his thoughts that way; if only hoping to forget murder in another strong excitement. Julian listened to his mother's counsels; and that silly, cheated woman playfully would lean upon his arm, like a huge, coy confidante, and fill his greedy ears (that heard her gladly for very holiday's sake from fearful apprehensions), with lover's hopes, lover's themes, his Emily's perfection. Delighted mother—how proud and pleased was she! quite in her ...
— The Complete Prose Works of Martin Farquhar Tupper • Martin Farquhar Tupper

... violin case on the table in the room. She went to it and tapped the top playfully; then suddenly said: "I am going to look at your violin, Angelo," and before he could interfere, she had taken the silken coverlet off and was examining the instrument closely. "Sure enough, it has ...
— The Fifth String, The Conspirators • John Philip Sousa

... evidently been running wild in the park for some time; each white coat is stained with mud, and burrs stick tenaciously to their long tails. An attendant at the farm is rubbing them down, talking to them, and making them generally presentable. He is evidently on good terms with his charges, for one playfully nibbles his broad back, whilst the other tries to steal his red pocket-handkerchief. "Flora" and "Alma" were presented to Her Majesty by the late King Victor Emanuel of Italy. They are about fourteen hands high, tremendously powerful, ...
— The Idler Magazine, Volume III, April 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various

... his prosperity, and a stumbling-block in the way of his success. It had occurred to her that he would have married earlier in life if she had not been, as it were, in his way; and she had threatened him playfully,—for she could be playful,—that she would leave him if he did not soon bring a mistress to Plaistow Hall. 'I will go to uncle Robert,' she had said. Now uncle Robert was the clergyman in Lincolnshire of whom mention has been made, and he was among those two or three who ...
— The Belton Estate • Anthony Trollope

... not what to say. He could not understand why they could have any special interest in the girl, or care to know what he, a perfect stranger, thought of her. He avoided a direct reply, however, by playfully wondering how Mrs. Bradley could subject her husband to ...
— A Phyllis of the Sierras • Bret Harte

... were in the Southern armies many soldiers in their teens, but here at one of the guns labored a boy who was, as I guessed from his size, not more than twelve years old. It was his part to fire the gun by pulling the lanyard, and as often as he did it he playfully rolled over backward. "Boys will be boys" even in the peril of battle. In the meantime Jeb Stuart, temporarily assigned to the command of Jackson's corps, came riding into the field, and in a spirit not unlike that of the boy was singing, "Old Joe Hooker, won't you ...
— Reminiscences of a Rebel • Wayland Fuller Dunaway

... Merveldt to London, and on 13th February unfolded his plan to Pitt, Grenville, and Dundas. The Duke of York had preceded him by two days, but was absent from this conference. It became piquant when Pitt "playfully" remarked to Mack that a great general had recently arrived at London whose appointment to the command of the British force in Flanders would doubtless meet with his warm approval. After a little more fencing, Pitt ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose

... trees in July. We all know that apple trees won't grow when planted in July, so my father, knowing him well, called to him and said, "Mr. Bryant, what are you doing there? They won't grow." Mr. Bryant paused a moment and looked at us, and then said half playfully: "Conwell, drive on, you have no part nor lot in this matter. I do not expect these trees to grow; I am setting them out because I want to live over again the days when my father used to set trees when they would grow. I want to renew that memory." He was wise, for in his work on "The Transmigration ...
— Russell H. Conwell • Agnes Rush Burr

... gift by his famous "sedulous aping" of stylists before him is a debated question: but one quite unnecessary to touch here. It is sufficient to say that he never aped anyone in his letters, unless playfully and in a sort of concert with his correspondent. Indeed he possessed, quintessentially, that "naturalness" of matter and form on which so much stress has been laid. He had a disposition equally favourable to the business—if business ...
— A Letter Book - Selected with an Introduction on the History and Art of Letter-Writing • George Saintsbury

... robust host, for the herald of the powerful Indra, their ancient greatness! O ye strong-voiced Maruts, you heroes, prove your powers on your march, as with a torch, as with a sword! Like parents bringing a dainty to their own son, the wild Maruts play playfully at the sacrifices. The Rudras reach the worshipper with their protection, strong in themselves, they do not fail the sacrificer. For him to whom the immortal guardians have given fulness of wealth, and who is himself a giver of oblations, the Maruts, who gladden men with the milk of rain, pour out, ...
— Sacred Books of the East • Various

... old form of joke. The child shook her dark curls with a half-annoyed gesture, but still swung on her cousin as he moved into the house. Wilfrid passed his arm about her playfully. ...
— A Life's Morning • George Gissing

... playfully. "Then give me the cup which is suspended at your side—that one on which is engraved a picture of some dogs ...
— Happy Days for Boys and Girls • Various



Words linked to "Playfully" :   playful



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