"Billet-doux" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... of gauze and silver spangles. The most glittering appearance is given to every thing, to paste, pomatum, billet-doux, and patches. Airs, languid airs, breathe around;—the atmosphere is perfumed with affectation. A toilette is described with the solemnity of an altar raised to the Goddess of vanity, and the history of a silver bodkin ...
— Lectures on the English Poets - Delivered at the Surrey Institution • William Hazlitt
... abounds in proofs that, to use his own language, he was 'no enemy to the tender passion.' Indeed, while the elections for the States-General were going on, he appears to have been almost as much interested in finding out the fair author of an anonymous billet-doux as in unravelling the politics of the day. He was not so much scandalised by the immorality as appalled by the lawlessness of the French capital. He foresaw the failure of the Revolution from the outset. A week before the States-General met in April, 1789, he wrote to General Washington: ...
— France and the Republic - A Record of Things Seen and Learned in the French Provinces - During the 'Centennial' Year 1889 • William Henry Hurlbert
... am grown very lazy since I married; for the future, I shall make Fitzgerald write all my letters, except billet-doux, in which ...
— The History of Emily Montague • Frances Brooke
... husband in such a manner, that he wishes himself in his grave, or rid of the termagant, who has destroyed the peace of his life.—The climax is reached on his discovery among the accounts, all giving proof of his wife's reckless extravagance, a billet-doux, pleading for a clandestine meeting in his own garden. Malatesta is summoned and cannot help feeling remorse on beholding the wan and haggard appearance of his friend. He recommends prudence, advises Don Pasquale to assist, himself unseen, at the proposed interview, and then ...
— The Standard Operaglass - Detailed Plots of One Hundred and Fifty-one Celebrated Operas • Charles Annesley
... fixing patches, the towers of hair built by the modish coiffeur—children trooping in, in hoops and uniforms, to kiss their mother's hand, the fine gentleman choosing a waistcoat and ogling the pretty embroideress, the pert young maidservant slipping a billet-doux into a beauty's hand under her husband's nose, the old beau toying with a fan, or the discreet abbe taking snuff over the morning gazette. The grand ladies of Longhi's day pay visits in hoop and farthingale, the beaux make "a leg," and the lacqueys hand chocolate. The beautiful ...
— The Venetian School of Painting • Evelyn March Phillipps
... Remember what a bad husband Lady Lyndon had, and don't be astonished that she, on her side, should be indifferent. Nor has she, I will dare to wager, ever passed beyond the bounds of harmless gallantry, or sinned beyond the composing of a sonnet or a billet-doux.' ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... a salary and set him on the midnight track of the Duke with a poisoned dagger. He also created an Irish coachman with a rich brogue and placed him in the service of the society-young-lady with an ulterior mission to carry billet-doux to the Duke. ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain |
