"Seriousness" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... best he knew, ought yet to have been held guiltless of evil accomplished. In his younger days he had been an overseer, but in his later years had risen to the dignity of a landowner and the possession of one or two slaves. He wrestled with the mysteries of the printed page with a sad seriousness which made one regret his inability to remember what was at the top until he had arrived at the bottom. Writing was a still more solemn business with him, but he was a brave man and would cheerfully undertake to transcribe a list ...
— Bricks Without Straw • Albion W. Tourgee
... in all seriousness I shall tell you what I mean by a "plant-hunter." I mean a person who devotes all his time and labour to the collection of rare plants and flowers—in short, one who makes this occupation his profession. These ...
— The Plant Hunters - Adventures Among the Himalaya Mountains • Mayne Reid
... way," I continued, "of showing that this experience of the race about which so much is said without the least attempt to show in what way it may, or does, become the experience of the individual, is in sober seriousness the experience of one single being only, who repeats on a great many different occasions, and in slightly different ways, certain performances with which he has ...
— Luck or Cunning? • Samuel Butler
... for several weeks. I myself had been, of late, less to the flat in the English Prospect, but I knew that he had taken my advice that he should be kind to Nicholas Markovitch with due British seriousness, and that he had been trying to bring some kind of relationship about. He had even asked Markovitch to dine alone with him, and Markovitch, although he declined the invitation was, I ...
— The Secret City • Hugh Walpole
... touch of seriousness and flippancy, this appeared to me exactly the sort of letter that McMurtrie would expect me to write. I couldn't resist putting in the bit about his "amiable" friend, for the recollection of Savaroff's manner towards ...
— A Rogue by Compulsion • Victor Bridges
... I always speak modestly, and under correction, when I touch upon matters of the kind too high for me; and besides, I never intend to speak otherwise than respectfully of sewing;—though you always seem to think I am laughing at you. In all seriousness, illustrations from sewing are those which Neith likes me best to use; and which young ladies ought to like everybody to use. What do you think the beautiful ...
— The Ethics of the Dust • John Ruskin
... and Fals-semblaunt of the French courtly allegories than of Bunyan's Mr. Worldly Wiseman, and even of such Puritan names as Praise-God Barebones, and Zeal-of-the-land Busy. The poem is full of English moral seriousness, of shrewd humor, the hatred of a lie, the homely English love for reality. It has little unity of plan, but is rather a series of episodes, discourses, parables, and scenes. It is all astir with the actual life of the time. We see the gossips gathered ...
— Brief History of English and American Literature • Henry A. Beers
... playing horse. One boy is horse, and the other driver. As they draw near, they check the play a little, to be more decorous in passing by the stranger. He stops to look at them with a pleased expression of countenance, and then says, addressing the driver, with a face of much seriousness, "That's a first-rate horse of yours. Would you like to sell him? He seems to be very spirited." The horse immediately begins to prance and caper. "You must have paid a high price for him. You must ...
— Gentle Measures in the Management and Training of the Young • Jacob Abbott
... valuable services to the advancement of science. Most of his writings, which are very voluminous, are naturally of a technical character and therefore do not properly belong to literature; but his Occasional Reflections on Several Subjects (1665), a strange mixture of triviality and seriousness, was germinal in this sense that it led to two celebrated jeux d'esprit, namely, Butler's Occasional Reflection on Dr. Charlton's feeling a Dog's Pulse at Gresham College and Swift's Pious Meditation upon a Broomstick, in the Style of the Honourable ...
— The Glories of Ireland • Edited by Joseph Dunn and P.J. Lennox
... Christianity, they heard of it as a quarrel amongst this people about some articles of their own superstition. Despising, therefore, as they did, the whole system, it was not probable that they would enter, with any degree of seriousness or attention, into the detail of its disputes or the merits of either side. How little they knew, and with what carelessness they judged of these matters, appears, I think, pretty plainly from an example of no ...
— Evidences of Christianity • William Paley
... The dead seriousness of the scheme has a peculiar sophomore quality. There were Steinheil, Trimolet, Daumier, Daubigny, Deschaumaes and Meissonier, all aged about twenty, strong, sturdy, sincere and innocently ignorant—all ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 4 (of 14) - Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Painters • Elbert Hubbard
... population, often approaching European standards, whereas minority groups suffer the poverty and unemployment typical of the poorer nations of the African continent. The outbreak of severe rioting in February 1991 illustrates the seriousness of socioeconomic tensions. The economic well-being of Reunion depends heavily on continued financial assistance ...
— The 2002 CIA World Factbook • US Government
... to an undertaker's! Good Heaven! what a woman is this! She went into the back shop, and talked with the master of it about half an hour, and came from him with great serenity; he waiting upon her to her chair with a respectful countenance, but full of curiosity and seriousness. ...
— Clarissa, Or The History Of A Young Lady, Volume 8 • Samuel Richardson
... or as I dance—that I may amuse myself, and invigorate myself, and raise my natural spirits, and laugh dull care away. True, there must be ideas, as in all amusements worthy of the name there is a certain seriousness impossible to define; only they must be kept ...
— Conversation - What to Say and How to Say it • Mary Greer Conklin
... privileged to have what are called "humours," and certainly he sometimes had them. It was necessary—or so Mrs. Sorrel thought—to deal with him delicately and cautiously—neither with too much levity, nor with an overweighted seriousness. One's plan of conduct with a multi-millionaire required to be thought out with sedulous care, and entered upon with circumspection. And Mrs Sorrel did not attempt even as much as a youthful giggle at Helmsley's half-sarcastically implied ...
— The Treasure of Heaven - A Romance of Riches • Marie Corelli
... if you require it. But you ought to believe my word, sir. I am square as a die in all matters not connected—well, not connected with my profession," he smiled in a burst of that whimsical humour, which not even the seriousness of ...
— Initials Only • Anna Katharine Green
... prepared for this downright plunge into an embarrassing discussion, she managed to evade a direct answer. "There was more than a suggestion of that in her words last night," she said. "Perhaps she thought so in all seriousness. You seem to have undeceived her to-day, and I am sure you must have dealt with her kindly, or she would not have acknowledged her mistake in such frank terms to me. There, now! That is the end of a very disagreeable episode. Shall we say ...
— The Silent Barrier • Louis Tracy
... returned to his face. The securing of that girl's debut was certainly not a high price to pay for all the influence of Duvillard's millions. Monferrand therefore turned towards Fonsegue as if to consult him. The other, who fully understood the importance of the affair, was meditating in all seriousness: "A senator is the proper man for Public Instruction," said he. "But I can think of none, none at all, such as would be wanted. A man of broad mind, a real Parisian, and yet one whose presence at the head of the University wouldn't cause too much astonishment—there's ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... since he met her, he had thought of little else, and to-night he wanted nothing else, but impulsive and passionate as he was, he came of a race of hard-headed Scots. He had no mind for a love affair of tragic seriousness, even while his quickened imagination ...
— The Conqueror • Gertrude Franklin Atherton
... in selecting servants among the Indians for the inside of the house, to see that they be the sons of caciques or chiefs. They must be shown neither love nor familiarity. They must indeed always be treated well, but with uprightness and seriousness of face. It must be considered that in proportion as they are better caressed and clothed, the worse and more insolent they will become. This is the teaching of the Holy Spirit in Proverbs xxiv, 21: Qui delicate a pueritia nutrit ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume 40 of 55 • Francisco Colin
... very much terrified by the electric cars. I said: "I suppose they are like the labor reformers. They see contrivances for doing without their labor, and they get very angry and manifest displeasure." Mr. Sherman pondered for a moment or two, and then said with great seriousness: "Mr. Hoar, the horse is a very intelligent animal, but it really does not seem to me that he can reason as far as that." I told the General of it afterward, who was full of fun, and asked him if he really believed his brother thought I made the remark seriously; ...
— Autobiography of Seventy Years, Vol. 1-2 • George Hoar
... to reveal the seriousness of this mistake. It was far more important to strike at Paris through Brittany than to occupy even the richest of the French West Indies. For a triumphant advance of the Bretons and Vendeans must not only ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose
... turned out as they did, that I had not whispered a word to the others. But that would have been difficult, and, besides, I had no idea of the seriousness of the affair. Nevertheless, I determined to stay out of it, so that the laugh should not be on me at any rate. Accordingly when the others entered the car I stayed outside, and when Stonewall called me I ...
— A Columbus of Space • Garrett P. Serviss
... boiled and seethed in her breast, but before retiring she only said briefly, with a seriousness which ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... two and sixpence a piece. There, Pope, there's half-a-crown for you; and there's another for you, Sir; for I won't save any thing by you, I am determined." This was all said and done with his usual seriousness on such occasions; and in spite of every thing we could say to the contrary, he actually obliged us ...
— Irish Wit and Humor - Anecdote Biography of Swift, Curran, O'Leary and O'Connell • Anonymous
... Shakespeare's best men. And almost all of them, again, are amusing and charming as well as pathetic; comical in their mingled acuteness and naivete, charming in their confidence in themselves and the world, and in the seriousness with which they receive the jocosity of their elders, who commonly address them as strong men, great warriors, ...
— Shakespearean Tragedy - Lectures on Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth • A. C. Bradley
... skin, this being eighteen inches in diameter, and using hydrogen as a lifting factor. Few people saw any possibilities in aerostation, in spite of the adventures of the duck and sheep and cock; voyages to the moon were talked and written, and there was more of levity than seriousness over ballooning as a rule. The classic retort of Benjamin Franklin stands as an exception to the general rule: asked what was the use of ballooning—'What's the use of a baby?' he countered, and the spirit of that reply brought both the dirigible ...
— A History of Aeronautics • E. Charles Vivian
... Realizing the seriousness of the situation, and determining to settle once for all the vexed question, he pored over his books in an exhaustive search for symptoms. It was then that he rushed into the presence of his wife one morning, his face ...
— The Tangled Threads • Eleanor H. Porter
... nor can it be with justice said that the bulk of the people are inconsistent in their conduct, though formality and insincerity are sadly frequent enough, and in late years a decadence in seriousness and an increase of frivolity instead have marked the present epoch, especially among those who are exposed to the pernicious influences and contaminations incidental to town life. The old Free Stater mentioned before expressed the expectation that the present ...
— Origin of the Anglo-Boer War Revealed (2nd ed.) - The Conspiracy of the 19th Century Unmasked • C. H. Thomas
... was well aware of what was in contemplation. It produced consternation and caused a panic among the Republican leaders in the Senate. Hurried and excited conferences were being held while the subject was being debated. For the seriousness of the situation was recognized. Mr. Blaine's defection meant the defeat of the Morton motion should it be made, and the adoption of the Blaine motion by the solid vote of the Democrats, to which would be added a small minority of the Republicans. This division ...
— The Facts of Reconstruction • John R. Lynch
... republic, they seldom spoke of the civic questions stirring the towns of the East; the commercial and industrial problems which vex modern society were unknown to them. Religion was their chief interest and the seriousness which they had inherited from their Presbyterian, Methodist, Lutheran, and Moravian ancestry was expressed in their orderly and diligent lives; but the general prosperity had so far relaxed the stringency of their several creeds that their distinctive public rite had come ...
— The Leatherwood God • William Dean Howells
... his desire. No one suspected the deep seriousness that he concealed under this idle play. No one dreamed that this gay, smiling prince, on whose lips there was always a witty jest or bon mot; who proposed a concert every evening, in which he himself took part; ...
— Frederick the Great and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... Judge Sewall had expressed his disapproval of the excesses at dinners, the wine-drinking and conviviality, and had set Friday for commencement so that there would be less time for frolicking. The war, with its long train of economies, and the greater seriousness of life in general, had tempered all things, but there was gayety enough now, with dinners given to the prize winners and ...
— A Little Girl in Old Boston • Amanda Millie Douglas
... and Gertrude looked at Janet; but though there was great seriousness and awe in their faces, there was no fear. Gertrude had gone through so much already within the walls of her home that she had no fear greater than that of remaining in helpless idleness there, alone ...
— The Sign Of The Red Cross • Evelyn Everett-Green
... this morning and far away somehow. Never had he seen her so utterly lovely. The mood of tender seriousness made her more beautiful than ever. If he only dared to crush her in his arms and laugh the smiles back ...
— The Victim - A romance of the Real Jefferson Davis • Thomas Dixon
... and strongly guarded by the police against any possible attack of the rioters. Hop Sing admitted me through a barred grating with his usual imperturbable calm, but, as it seemed to me, with more than his usual seriousness. Without a word, he took my hand, and led me to the rear of the room, and thence down stairs into the basement. It was dimly lighted; but there was something lying on the floor covered by a shawl. As I approached he drew the shawl away with a sudden gesture, and revealed Wan Lee, the ...
— Tales of the Argonauts • Bret Harte
... all behind the fire, and turning with a rueful seriousness to the sacred repository of genius, she drew forth several daubs that were meant for landscapes, the contemplation of which would have provoked the most indifferent person to mirth; but it was no laughing matter to examine them while a being so odd as Miss Carr was regarding ...
— Flora Lyndsay - or, Passages in an Eventful Life • Susan Moodie
... theologians,—"for any one in the cloisters of the schools to indulge himself in idle speculations on the merit of works to justify men; but when he comes into the presence of God, he must bid farewell to these amusements, for there the business is transacted with seriousness. To this point must our attention be directed, if we wish to make any useful inquiry concerning true righteousness: How we can answer the celestial Judge when He shall call us to an account? Let us place that Judge before our eyes, not according to the inadequate imaginations of ...
— Sermons to the Natural Man • William G.T. Shedd
... Prudy.' Compared with her, all other book-children are cold creations of literature; she alone is the real thing. All the quaintness of children, its originality, its tenderness and its teasing, is infinite uncommon drollery, the serious earnestness of its fun, the fun of its seriousness, the naturalness of its plays, and the delicious oddity of its progress, all these united for dear Little Prudy to ...
— Dotty Dimple Out West • Sophie May
... Charles had become almost naturalized in one of our great commercial towns, was a member of a British church, and the head of a British household; but when the conversation happened to turn on sporting matters round his own fireside, he related in perfect seriousness the following wild and legend-like story of his ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 5, No. 3, March, 1852 • Various
... hospitality, seriousness and mirth in the family circle,—these characteristics of border life, when it is good, had all been transplanted into the western wilderness by these colonists. That day among the dwellers of the plain; that fine old lady; those handsome, fearless, warm-hearted, ...
— Woman on the American Frontier • William Worthington Fowler
... a long pause she told me with seriousness, as if speaking of a thing that surprised herself, and should surprise me, that she was ...
— The Aran Islands • John M. Synge
... "Abstract of Mr Fielding's Enquiry"; and in the following month the Magazine again noticed the book, by printing a long anonymous letter in which Fielding is attacked as a 'trading author' and a 'trading justice,' and in which the writer shows his intellectual grasp by advocating in all seriousness a law prohibiting the ...
— Henry Fielding: A Memoir • G. M. Godden
... Berchtold replied that he understood perfectly well the seriousness of the situation and the advantages of a frank explanation with ...
— The New York Times Current History of the European War, Vol. 1, January 9, 1915 - What Americans Say to Europe • Various
... women who have obtained proper place and power in the community, which shall enable them to infuse their love, their moral perceptions, their sense of justice into the governments of the world. We believe the moment has now come to show our country the seriousness and extent of our movement and its determination to gain political equality for women in every civilized land. With the greatest appreciation we see among our visitors many high officials, who have not hesitated to answer our invitation favorably and to give us through their ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume VI • Various
... sort of grave, sweet seriousness came over her. She liked to sit in the study and have him read poetry to her while she sewed. She had never loved sewing, but now she had taken a fancy to it. Dainty little lacey things, with the softest of muslins, treasures that had come from India. For there were ...
— A Little Girl in Old Salem • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... She forgot to ask after his baby; but she asked whether it would not be possible to get his leave extended. When he said "No"—he had had more than his share already—she commended him for his sense of duty, and in her seriousness was more enchanting than ...
— Sisters • Ada Cambridge
... barn-doors were full of the picturesque and of the racy. A farmer with a gun and a brace of rabbits and a dog leaping up at them, while two young women talked to or at the farmer from a distance; a fat little German girl in a Scotch frock, cleaning outside windows with the absorbed seriousness of a grandmother; a group of boys dividing their attention between her and the train; an old woman driving a cart, and a negro gesticulating and running after the cart; and all of them, save the nigger, wearing gloves—presumably as a protection against ...
— Your United States - Impressions of a first visit • Arnold Bennett
... young lady, you are very complimentary; but, Dolly, no more of this banter. My boat is waiting, and I have but a few minutes to ask you to give me your answer. In all seriousness remember that my future depends upon it. Will you marry me? Will you try to love me? May I go away with the hope that you will look forward to my ...
— Foster's Letter Of Marque - A Tale Of Old Sydney - 1901 • Louis Becke
... the Oxford movement was thought of, or had any definite shape, a number of its characteristic principles and ideas had taken strong hold of the mind of a man of great ability and great seriousness, who, after a brilliant career at Oxford as student and tutor, had exchanged the University for a humble country cure. John Keble, by some years the senior, but the college friend and intimate of Arnold, was the son of a Gloucestershire ...
— The Oxford Movement - Twelve Years, 1833-1845 • R.W. Church
... whatever the real worth of your present work, there is that within you which demands utterance, you will modestly accept this early adulation as prophetic of the true fame to come, and will go about your writing in all humility and seriousness, with that careful, plodding application ...
— Short Story Writing - A Practical Treatise on the Art of The Short Story • Charles Raymond Barrett
... a bit oftener to London," said Mr. Bryany, laughing too. Then, with extreme and convincing seriousness, "You're the very man for a thing of that ...
— The Regent • E. Arnold Bennett
... over the features of the pretty Julia Monson as she answered her friend, with a seriousness to show that she was now in earnest, and with a propriety that proved she had great good sense at bottom, as well as strong ...
— Autobiography of a Pocket-Hankerchief • James Fenimore Cooper
... crest-tossing Hector thus addressed: "O Polydamas, thou dost not say things agreeable to me: besides, thou knowest how to devise other counsel better than this. If, however, thou really speakest this with seriousness, then truly have the gods destroyed thy judgment from thee, who advisest me to be forgetful of the counsels of lofty-thundering Jove, which he hath himself undertaken for me, and confirmed. And thou exhortest me to obey the wing-expanding ...
— The Iliad of Homer (1873) • Homer
... the doorway and looked in at him. Two weeks had set their mark on her also. She seemed older, quieter in her ways; there were shadows in her eyes and a new seriousness in the set of her mouth. She had had her burdens, and she had borne them with more patience than many an older woman would have done, but what she thought of those burdens she ...
— Sawtooth Ranch • B. M. Bower
... eminent scientist and poet in one, a serious combination; and he took my remarks with seriousness at once scientific ...
— Prose Fancies (Second Series) • Richard Le Gallienne
... like the artificial conventional society one meets at ordinary dinner-parties, it must not be supposed that he was in any way gloomy. His friend, Prebendary Barnes, says about him: "The seriousness of Gordon's temper did not prevent him from being a bright and agreeable companion, especially when those with whom he talked could join him in smoking a cigarette. He had a keen sense of humour, and on every matter ...
— General Gordon - A Christian Hero • Seton Churchill
... attitude to the seriousness of life, animated Sir George Grey, even as he spoke. Affairs in England seemed critical, and he would stay on to watch them, since any hint might be of import. In London there beat the heart of the Empire, and he would keep his ear to it. He heard most clearly through that ...
— The Romance of a Pro-Consul - Being The Personal Life And Memoirs Of The Right Hon. Sir - George Grey, K.C.B. • James Milne
... turn her to the seriousness of her misdemeanour. "For the sake of your good name, you had no right admitting him. You know what Vernock is like for gossip. You know the construction likely to be ...
— The Spoilers of the Valley • Robert Watson
... there wasn't any boy, I s'pose." Eddy gazed resentfully and admiringly at the man. "Say," he said, without the slightest sarcasm, rather with affection and perfect seriousness, "you are ...
— The Debtor - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... rally her, tease her, but her reticence was not all embarrassment. The lightest contact, the slightest caress from him, added a seriousness to her face, making it very lovely under its heightened color, ...
— Between Friends • Robert W. Chambers
... in his University career, he fell to reading for the profession to which worldly prudence rather than inclination called him, and was perfectly bewildered in theological controversy. In the course of his reading (which was neither pursued with that seriousness or that devout mind which such a study requires) the youth found himself at the end of one month a Papist, and was about to proclaim his faith; the next month a Protestant, with Chillingworth; and the third a sceptic, with Hobbes and Bayle. Whereas honest Tom Tusher never permitted his mind ...
— The History of Henry Esmond, Esq. • W. M. Thackeray
... decisive. To Revelation therefore we must appeal; and as it might be to trespass on the reader's patience fully to discuss this most important subject, we must refer him to the sacred Writings themselves for complete satisfaction. We would earnestly recommend it to him to weigh with the utmost seriousness those passages of Scripture wherein the peculiar doctrines of Christianity are expressly mentioned; and farther, to attend with due regard to the illustration and confirmation, which the conclusions resulting from those passages receive incidentally from ...
— A Practical View of the Prevailing Religious System of Professed Christians, in the Middle and Higher Classes in this Country, Contrasted with Real Christianity. • William Wilberforce
... rejoice," she added, with increasing seriousness, "that we are thought worthy of being so early taken from a world in which we have ...
— The Little Savage • Captain Marryat
... officiating Burgomaster waved his hand, the Attorney of the Royal Treasury and the Bookseller again bent all the elastic steel springs of their faces as if setting a trap, and the Burgomaster continued to read, although with enforced seriousness. ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IV • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... to have said, when he heard of it, that "Friar Martin was a man of genius, and that he did not wish to have him molested." Some of the cardinals, however, saw the real character of the movement, which gradually assumed a seriousness evident even to the Pope; and Luther received a summons to appear at Rome, and answer for his theses (1518). Once again in Rome, it is unlikely he would ever have been allowed to return. His university ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 3 of 8 • Various
... Quiller-Couch has, in one of his essays, expressed the opinion that of all the English poets "the one who, but for a stroke of madness, would have become our English Horace was William Cowper. He had the wit," he added, "with the underlying moral seriousness." As for the wit, I doubt it. Cowper had not the wit that inevitably hardens into "jewels five words long." Laboriously as he sought after perfection in his verse, he was never a master of the Horatian phrase. Such phrases ...
— The Art of Letters • Robert Lynd
... you, sire, not to maintain toward me that terrible seriousness of manner which reveals your majesty's just anger. I feel I have offended you, sire; but I wish to explain to you how it was that I have not offended ...
— The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Or Ten Years Later being the completion of "The Three - Musketeers" And "Twenty Years After" • Alexandre Dumas
... said it just that way," she answered with equal seriousness. "No, that would be bad—very bad. In our land women are only different from men. They know they are ...
— The Girl in the Golden Atom • Raymond King Cummings
... encampment, with the seriousness of one who had been unexpectedly charged with matters of a gravity, exceeding any of the ordinary occurrences of his irregular existence. His sons however, who had so often found occasions to prove the inexorable severity of their father's character, saw, in his sullen mien and ...
— The Prairie • J. Fenimore Cooper
... spoke with the seriousness and dignity that age seldom fails to communicate even to less striking sentiments, his auditors were deeply attentive, and as silent as the grave. Indeed, the trapper was left to renew the dialogue himself, which he soon did by asking a question, in the indirect manner so ...
— The Prairie • J. Fenimore Cooper
... seldom found time for the sport, was a famous fisherman. He shook his head; and then, leaning an arm on the table, gazed at me with sudden seriousness. ...
— Old Fires and Profitable Ghosts • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... of Germany and one King of England outside them places—an' they're on thrones. All the masters of the world have felt their power an' folks have laughed at 'em—at first." Ham spoke with desperate seriousness that made his eyes glow steadily and forcefully. "And yet the big things have been done by those men, and from the first they knew that they were different. You say I've been braggin'. Did you ever hear me say one ...
— Destiny • Charles Neville Buck
... each performed with as intense a seriousness and deliberate nicety as if the welfare of the entire Djowf depended on it, he takes a smaller coffee-pot in hand, fills it more than half with hot water from the larger vessel, and then shaking the pounded ...
— All About Coffee • William H. Ukers
... Kalonay, had been less considerate. But his attitude toward her was always that of a fellow-worker in the common cause. He treated her with a gratitude for the help she meant to give his people which much embarrassed her. His seriousness pleased her with him, seeing, as she did, that it was not his nature to be serious, and his enthusiasm and love for his half-civilized countrymen increased her interest in them, and her liking for ...
— The King's Jackal • Richard Harding Davis
... unencumbered as we were, we covered the country rapidly. I had somewhat doubted the old matchmaker's sincerity in making this match, but as we rode along he told me of his own marriage to Mary Bryan, and the one happy year of life which it brought him, mellowing into a mood of seriousness which dispelled all doubts. It was almost sunset when we sighted in the distance the ranch buildings at Las Palomas, and half an hour later as we galloped up to assist the herd which was nearing the corrals, the old man stood in his stirrups and, waving his hat, shouted to his outfit: ...
— A Texas Matchmaker • Andy Adams
... to remember that it is expressly subtitled "Romans Goguenards," thereby preparing the reader for the reverse of seriousness. That reverse, especially in young hands, is a difficult thing to manage. "Guffaw" and "yawn" are two words which have actually two letters in common; y and g are notoriously interchangeable in some dialects and circumstances, while n and u ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 2 - To the Close of the 19th Century • George Saintsbury
... Jonas, trying in vain to speak with some seriousness and veneration, "I come to ax your consent to marry one of your flock—the best lamb you've got ...
— The End Of The World - A Love Story • Edward Eggleston
... evening. Immediately the same female who before brought the carpet, again spread it, with great civility, for me to kneel upon; and again I offered up a solemn prayer for the salvation of these lost and perishing mortals. The greatest seriousness and awe rested upon the assembly. Surely the prayer was registered in heaven, and shall, in time not far distant, be answered.—Come, and take these heathens for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession.—When I proposed to take leave of my swarthy flock, it was ...
— The Gipsies' Advocate - or, Observations on the Origin, Character, Manners, and Habits of - The English Gipsies • James Crabb
... Lamh Laudher, with a firm seriousness of manner, "you have brought me into danger. I doubt, without knowin' it. For my own part, I don't care so much. Her unlucky aunt met me comin' here this evenin', and threatened both our family and yours. I know she would sink us into the earth if she could. Either she ...
— The Dead Boxer - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton
... was striking. Up to this moment Lady Tatham had been, so to speak, the aggressor, venturing audaciously on ground which she knew to be hostile—from bravado?—or for some hidden reason? But she spoke now with seriousness—even with ...
— The Mating of Lydia • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... deal to him of the power of God, His omnipotence, His aversion to sin, His being a consuming fire to the workers of iniquity; how, as He had made us all, He could destroy us and all the world in a moment; and he listened with great seriousness to me all the while. After this I had been telling him how the devil was God's enemy in the hearts of men, and used all his malice and skill to defeat the good designs of Providence, and to ruin the kingdom of Christ ...
— Robinson Crusoe • Daniel Defoe
... stimulated and nourished qualities of supreme worth in individual and social life. With the young the struggle against greed and falsehood and pride and cowardice is a very real one, and situations in which these homely, fundamental traits are involved are full of interest and seriousness. Again, to mature people the reward of well-doing and the punishment of evil conduct portrayed in these stories are apt to seem too realistic, too much also on the cut-and-dried pattern; but it is far different ...
— The Tales of Mother Goose - As First Collected by Charles Perrault in 1696 • Charles Perrault
... am showing an unusual amount of common-sense," I rejoined, "for I have in all seriousness just awakened to a sense of my shortcomings towards humanity in general, and am longing for an object on which to expend my superfluous energies. You, Milly, have your charges, Bill and Jim, whom you have rescued from lives of shame and crime, and ...
— Uncle Rutherford's Nieces - A Story for Girls • Joanna H. Mathews
... activity were not a tribute but a menace, a standing danger, not only to his power but to his fascination, his sense of himself as a still young, still brilliant and effective personality. (Horace inherited his mother's deplorable lack of seriousness.) And it was in Mrs. Levitt's society that Mr. Waddington was most conscious of his youth, his brilliance and effect. With an agreeable sense of anticipation he climbed up the slopes of Sheep Street and Park Street, and so ...
— Mr. Waddington of Wyck • May Sinclair
... a death peculiarly solemn, and the effect of it remains upon the crew for some time. There is more kindness shown by the officers to the crew, and by the crew to one another. There is more quietness and seriousness. The oath and the loud laugh are gone. The officers are more watchful, and the crew go more carefully aloft. The lost man is seldom mentioned, or is dismissed with a sailor's rude eulogy,— "Well, poor George is gone! His cruise is up soon! He knew his work, and did his duty, ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... working class repeat again the spectacle of assemblies whose enjoyment consists in giving themselves over to long purposeless speeches and applauding them? The seriousness and the energy of the German working class will know how to protect it from ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. X. • Kuno Francke
... King Karl dispatched a large army against Guerin, and would have waged bloody war against him had not the peers interposed and counselled otherwise. They represented to the emperor the seriousness of beginning civil war when the Moors were daily threatening invasion from the south, and finally succeeded in getting his consent to a settlement of the quarrel with ...
— With Spurs of Gold - Heroes of Chivalry and their Deeds • Frances Nimmo Greene
... developing themselves around the boy, and their seriousness made him a man before the age of manhood. Napoleon weighed upon Germany like another Sennacherib. Staps had tried to play the part of Mutius Scaevola, and had died a martyr. Sand was at Hof at that time, ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - KARL-LUDWIG SAND—1819 • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... was a little above the middle size, light and elegant; her features beautiful, with an expression of seriousness, arising probably from speaking little and reflecting much. Yet she possessed a mind ardent and enthusiastic, which often bore her away in animated discourse, until the eye of admiration fixed upon her, would suddenly ...
— Newton Forster - The Merchant Service • Captain Frederick Marryat
... of our assistant Naval Attaches, went with him to England on account of the seriousness of his condition, and I was very glad to hear from his father that he had arrived ...
— My Four Years in Germany • James W. Gerard
... half reality, the husband, was overreached by the puppetry—or the thin thing (Lady Teazle's reputation) was persuaded it was dying of a plethory? The fortunes of Othello and Desdemona were not concerned in it. Poor Jack has passed from the stage in good time, that he did not live to this our age of seriousness. The pleasant old Teazle King, too, is gone in good time. His manner would scarce have passed current in our day. We must love or hate—acquit or condemn—censure or pity—exert our detestable coxcombry of moral judgment upon everything. Joseph ...
— English literary criticism • Various
... those who chose went out, after which the elders went to the doors to call them back. "Member, member, what you keep de church waitin' for?" and again the church was filled, floor and gallery,—I never saw such a sight,—but the minister's earnestness and the general seriousness of the people made it unlike a spectacle, and a serious, most interesting occasion. Then there was a collection taken up in the elders' hats, the people making change while old Robert would attempt to persuade them ...
— Letters from Port Royal - Written at the Time of the Civil War (1862-1868) • Various
... review as this, sir, you will, I am quite sure, see the need of seriousness. I assure you that the thought of meeting you in eternity, and before the dread tribunal of God, with a complaint in my mouth against you, is to me of most weighty and solemn character. And you will see that ...
— The Fugitive Blacksmith - or, Events in the History of James W. C. Pennington • James W. C. Pennington
... taste for ordinary enthusiasm, he had still less for downright madness, and he hastily begged his friend to defer the volcanic question until after luncheon. Merton's language surprised him, it seemed so wildly irrational, and uttered with so much seriousness. In his appearance also there were signs of degeneracy: he was thin and pale and rather shabbily dressed, and wore a broad-brimmed rusty black felt hat, which he frequently pulled off only to twist it into some new disreputable shape and thrust ...
— Fan • Henry Harford
... him while he laughed, with profound gravity, without the slightest inclination to join in his merriment, which is a thing which has a very uncomfortable effect. She waited till he was done, with a mixture of wonder and disapproval in her seriousness, looking at his laughter as if at some phenomenon which she did not understand. "I have often heard gentlemen," she said, "talk about widows as if it were a sort of laughable name, and as if they might make their jokes as they pleased. But I did not think you would have done ...
— Sir Tom • Mrs. Oliphant
... use (and should at times) the whole side or corner of a room, and so practise composition on the large scale, or you can make a small group on a table. That you are using furniture and drapery or vases, flowers, and books, instead of men and women, does not affect the seriousness and usefulness of the problem; for the principles of composition and color do not have to do with the materials which you use to bring about the ...
— The Painter in Oil - A complete treatise on the principles and technique - necessary to the painting of pictures in oil colors • Daniel Burleigh Parkhurst
... is one fundamental question—a question which will appear somewhat strange to anyone not in touch with Irish life—which I must, with a view to a general agreement on essentials, submit to some of my co-religionists. In all seriousness I would ask, whether in their opinion the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland is to be tolerated. If the answer be in the negative, I can only reply that any efforts to stamp out the Roman Catholic faith would fail as they did in the past; and the practical minds among those ...
— Ireland In The New Century • Horace Plunkett
... to look at him. He had not caught a glance from her yet. How vividly he remembered the first moment his eyes had ever beheld her, standing as she did now on these very altar steps, with uplifted eyes and a sweet seriousness on her young face! It was only a poor village church, but it was the most sacred spot in the whole world to him; for there he had met Felicita and received her image into his inmost heart. His ambition as well as his ...
— Cobwebs and Cables • Hesba Stretton
... Roddy invited the girl to sympathize with his effort to conceal the seriousness of their undertaking, but she regarded him doubtfully, and frowned. In his heart Roddy felt sorry for her. It hurt him to think that any one so charming could not accept his theory, that the only way to treat ...
— The White Mice • Richard Harding Davis
... I met him first as a subaltern in India, when he was very raw and troubled by a seriousness he has since grown out of, but I thought he would ...
— Blake's Burden • Harold Bindloss |
