"Disport" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... that, not wishing to ascend to Heaven too soon, he partook of only half of the pill of immortality, dividing the other half among several of his admirers, and that he had at least two selves or personalities, one of which used to disport itself in a boat on a small lake in front of his house. The other self would receive his visitors, entertaining them with food and drink and instructive conversation. On one occasion this self said to them: "You are unable to ...
— Myths and Legends of China • E. T. C. Werner
... Brother," said he, "and for the better disport of the company, here is my fool. Hold up, Saxon Samson, the gates of ...
— Rewards and Fairies • Rudyard Kipling
... Bunny," she answered. "I'm not going to use your charms as a bait to lure this culinary Phyllis into the Arcadia in which you with your Strephonlike form disport yourself." ...
— Mrs. Raffles - Being the Adventures of an Amateur Crackswoman • John Kendrick Bangs
... leste. Hire overlipp wypede sche so clene, That in hire cupp was no ferthing sene Of grec, whan sche dronken hadde hire draughte. Ful semly after hir mete sche raughte, And sikerly sche was of gret disport,{26} And ful plesaunt, and amyable of port, And peynede hir to countrefet cheere Of court, and ben estatlich of manere, And to ben holden digne of reverence. But for to speken of hir conscience, Sche was so charitable and so pitous, Sche wold weepe if that sche saw a mous Caught in a ...
— Six Centuries of English Poetry - Tennyson to Chaucer • James Baldwin
... drawin' of weppings, drinkin' or swearin' in school hours. The conduct of certain members wore on teacher last term. I don't want to mention no names, but I want Handsome an' Happy to hear what I'm sayin'." And after a sweeping glance at his mates, who, already, had begun to disport themselves and jeer at the unfortunate pair, he wound up ...
— The Girl of the Golden West • David Belasco
... his lap. "You're a great philosopher, my dear; I wish I were as wise as you. You're so scornful, so dignified, so divinely egoistic. But you don't mind being worshipped, do you, Gioconda? Because you know it's your right, of course. There—she's actually condescending to purr! Now we'll come and disport ourselves under the trees, and you shall watch the birds from a safe distance. I know your wicked ways, and I must teach you how to treat your inferiors with proper ...
— Austin and His Friends • Frederic H. Balfour
... car. After Gouda's wonderful glass, they would have found the Haarlem church disappointing, had it not been for the two or three redeeming features left in the cold, bare structure; the beautiful screen of open brass-work, with its base of dark wood, on which brightly-painted, mystic beasts disport themselves among the coats-of-arms of divers ancient towns; ...
— The Chauffeur and the Chaperon • C. N. Williamson
... them in their nature specially mischievous, except indeed as they blurred the idea of divine care and government—just the country for bogill-baes and brownie-baes, boodies and water-kelpies to linger and disport themselves, long after they ...
— Salted With Fire • George MacDonald
... countries which are not your own. To such people there is something almost indecent in the thought that any one should deliberately wish to shed his own nationality and clothe himself in another. They form the unintelligent background against which the wild and lurid nationalists of every tribe disport themselves in frenzied movements of hate and antagonism. An irate old colonel (very gouty) said to me the other day: "A man who forgets his duties to his own country and settles in another is a damnable cur. So much for these dirty foreigners who ...
— Mountain Meditations - and some subjects of the day and the war • L. Lind-af-Hageby
... young lady still sits writing at the old mahogany desk, and smiling, perhaps, at her own fancies, and hiding them away with her papers at the sound of coming steps. Now, the modest papers, printed and reprinted, lie in every hand, the fancies disport themselves at their will in the wisest brains and ...
— A Book of Sibyls - Miss Barbauld, Miss Edgeworth, Mrs Opie, Miss Austen • Anne Thackeray (Mrs. Richmond Ritchie)
... knew Fuller Pilch. And when your side takes the field, where are you? Probably at long leg both ends, exposed to the public gaze as the worst fieldsman in London. How devastating are your emotions. Remorse, anger, mortification, fill your heart; above all, envy—envy of the lucky immortals who disport themselves on ...
— Not that it Matters • A. A. Milne
... No. 20 looks out on the narrow yard wherein ordinary captives are allowed to disport themselves for three half-hours daily. It is a very motley crowd. There are no Confederate soldiers here; all these are confined in the Old Capitol; but of every other class you may ...
— Border and Bastille • George A. Lawrence
... Tai-y's return home, he was left to his own self and felt very lonely. Neither would he go and disport himself with others; but with the daily return of dusk, he was wont ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... unlike her own hand, she thought. They were appended to a piece of facetiousness that would not have disgraced the abilities of Mr. John Raikes; but we know that very stiff young gentlemen betray monkey-minds when sweet young ladies compel them to disport. On the whole, it was not a lazy afternoon that the Countess passed, and it was not against her wish that others should ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... upon it! I was more like a prisoner gazing through the grating of his gaol upon the free world without—like a bird who sees through the wires of its cage the bright-green foliage, amidst which it would gladly disport itself. ...
— Ran Away to Sea • Mayne Reid
... laughter, convulse with laughter; set the table in a roar, be the death of one. recreate, solace, cheer, rejoice; please &c 829; interest; treat, regale. amuse oneself, game; play a game, play pranks, play tricks; sport, disport, toy, wanton, revel, junket, feast, carouse, banquet, make merry, drown care; drive dull care away; frolic, gambol, frisk, romp; caper; dance &c (leap) 309; keep up the ball; run a rig, sow one's wild oats, have one's fling, take one's pleasure; paint the ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... hand-toiler fit him easily. They are worn so often that they hang with the picturesque lines of the best tailor-made garments. That is why well-fed artists of pencil and pen find in the griefs of the common people their most striking models. But when the Philistine would disport himself, the grimness of Melpomene, herself, attends upon his capers. Therefore, Danny set his jaw hard at Easter, and took his ...
— Strictly Business • O. Henry
... apparently IRRATIONAL elements. The RATIONAL myths are those which represent the gods as beautiful and wise beings. The Artemis of the Odyssey "taking her pastime in the chase of boars and swift deer, while with her the wild wood-nymphs disport them, and high over them all she rears her brow, and is easily to be known where all are fair,"(1) is a perfectly RATIONAL mythic representation of a divine being. We feel, even now, that the conception of a "queen and goddess, chaste and fair," the abbess, ...
— Myth, Ritual, and Religion, Vol. 1 • Andrew Lang
... impelled toward the outer world, but whom one of the sudden downpours which seem an essential part of the opening of the Salon detained under the porch with its floor of hard-trodden gravel, like the entrance to the Circus where the lady-killers disport themselves. It was a curious, ...
— The Nabob, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Alphonse Daudet
... manners—but they've gone back to sheer barbarism in the frantic ugliness of their performances at hockey—and they've taken to the repulsive vices of Charles the Second's time in gambling and other immoralities. No, David! I don't take kindly to the 'ladies' who disport themselves under the benevolent dispensation of King ...
— The Treasure of Heaven - A Romance of Riches • Marie Corelli
... desires it, make up the bed for 'im," volunteers the military officer, towards eleven o'clock; and, as there isn't much going on, we say, "All right—we'll have it now;" and we disport ourselves in the corridor, while he works a sort of transformation in our Gladstone Bag compartment, which seems greatly to diminish its "containing" capacity. Indeed, if it were not for the floor, the ceiling, and the walls, ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 99, October 18, 1890 • Various
... fancy are to be seen on the shrine, although treated outwardly with Renaissance feeling. A realistic life-sized mouse may be seen in one place, just as if it had run out to inspect the work; and the numbers of little tipsy "putti" who disport themselves in all attitudes, in perilous positions on narrow ledges, are full ...
— Arts and Crafts in the Middle Ages • Julia De Wolf Addison
... would seem unlikely that any living thing should seek rest in such a place, or find it. Nevertheless, frail and delicate flowers bloom there, flowers of both the land and the sea; heavy, ungainly seals disport in the swelling waves, and find grateful retreats back in the inmost bores of its storm-lashed caverns; while in many a chink and hollow of the highest crags, not visible from beneath, a great variety of waterfowl make homes and ...
— Steep Trails • John Muir
... to abash folk of their mirth; prithee do not so; let us talk together for our disport of mighty kings ...
— The Story of the Volsungs, (Volsunga Saga) - With Excerpts from the Poetic Edda • Anonymous
... peli, forpeli. Dispensary kuracilejo. Dispense (to give out) disdoni. Disperse dispeli. Display vidajxo, montrajxo. Display (show, pomp) lukso. Displace transloki. Displease malplacxi. Displeasure malplacxo. Disport ludi. Dispose disponi. Disposable disponebla. Disposition inklino. Dispraise mallauxdi. Disproof refuto. Disprove refuti. Dispute disputo. Dispute (quarrel) malpaci. Disputatious disputa. [Error in book: Disputations] Disqualify malkapabligi. Disquiet maltrankviligi. ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes
... constitutes the glory of the poetry; since one of the noblest functions of its art is to describe the deeds and the subjects of stories, and adorned and delectable places with transparent waters in which the green recesses of their course can be seen as the waves disport themselves over meadows and fine pebbles, and the plants which are mingled with them, and the gliding fishes, and similar descriptions, which might just as well be made to a stone as to a man born blind, ...
— Thoughts on Art and Life • Leonardo da Vinci
... seen the sea. They be stay-at-homes and I would not affright them too sorely by the sight of mountains of water. Have no care for us save to bid some one supply us with food to take along. I know the way down to a smooth beach where we can disport ourselves." ...
— The Princess Pocahontas • Virginia Watson
... they were feeding, and covered them in the semblance of a dark-maned stallion. Twelve filly foals did they conceive and bear him, and these, as they sped over the rich plain, would go bounding on over the ripe ears of corn and not break them; or again when they would disport themselves on the broad back of Ocean they could gallop on the crest of a breaker. Erichthonius begat Tros, king of the Trojans, and Tros had three noble sons, Ilus, Assaracus, and Ganymede who was comeliest of mortal men; wherefore the gods carried him ...
— The Iliad • Homer
... this respect, however, it is an object of envy rather than otherwise, for myriads of fleas, larger than I would care to say, for fear of being accused of exaggeration, hold high revel on our devoted carcasses all the livelong night. From the swarms of these frisky insects that disport and kick their heels together in riotous revelry on and about my own person, I fancy, forsooth, they have discovered in me something to be made the most of, as a variety of food seldom coming within their province. But the complaining moans of "Ali-Akbar" ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens
... miniature ship for Prince Henry, eldest son of James I., he now proceeded to prepare a similar model for the Prince of Wales, the King's eldest son, afterwards Charles II. This model was presented to the Prince at St. James's, "who entertained it with great joy, being purposely made to disport himself withal." On the next visit of his Majesty to Woolwich, he inspected the progress made with the Leopard, a sloop-of-war built by Peter Pett. While in the hold of the vessel, the King called Phineas to one side, and told him of his resolution to have a great new ...
— Men of Invention and Industry • Samuel Smiles
... was made for something: as a horse, a vine. Why wonderest thou? The sun itself will say of itself, I was made for something; and so hath every god its proper function. What then were then made for? to disport and delight thyself? See how even common sense and reason cannot ...
— Meditations • Marcus Aurelius
... "Drink, drink, little peasants! Disport yourselves bravely!" 'Twas gay beyond measure. In each breast awakens A wondrous new feeling, As though from the depths Of a bottomless gulf On the crest of a wave, 180 They've been borne to the surface To find there awaits ...
— Who Can Be Happy And Free In Russia? • Nicholas Nekrassov
... recalled it his situation took on for him a somewhat different aspect. He experienced something of that temporary relief from personal responsibility that moments of religious sentiment often give to minds that are unaccustomed to religion. He had been free for the time to disport himself in something infinitely larger and wider than his little world, and he took up his duty at the point at which he had left it with something of this sense of ...
— What Necessity Knows • Lily Dougall
... He kept his eyes open upon the whole generation of girls whom he met with in society. When he went abroad during the long vacation (instead of going to Lakeside, as he was invited to do), he directed his steps rather to the fashionable resorts, where families disport themselves at the foot of the mountains, than to the Alpine heights where he had generally found a more robust amusement. And wherever he went he bent his attention on the fairer portion of the creation, the girls who ...
— The Marriage of Elinor • Margaret Oliphant
... do wrong to disport ourselves in this pleasaunce without our comrade Launfal. It is not well to slight a prince as brave as he is courteous, and of a lineage ...
— French Mediaeval Romances from the Lays of Marie de France • Marie de France
... Leander Yerby hearkened to this criticism intimated a persuasion that there were many obedient people in this world, but few who could so disport themselves in the intricacies of the English language; and Sudley, as he plodded homeward with his rifle on his shoulder, his dog running on in advance, and Leander pattering along behind, was often moved to add the weight of his admonition ...
— The Moonshiners At Hoho-Hebee Falls - 1895 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)
... Candians, Venetians, Sarmatians, with all sorts of excellent birds, eagles, gerfalcons, goshawks, falcons, sparrow-hawks, merlins, and other kinds of them, so gentle and perfectly well trained that, flying from the castle for their own disport, they would not fail to catch whatever they encountered. The venery was a little further ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VII (of X)—Continental Europe I • Various
... immediate entertaining the revel now began—no lesser word describes it. If, before the departure of his dinner guests, Brown had experienced a slight feeling of fatigue, it disappeared with the pleasure of seeing his present company disport themselves. They were not in the least afraid of him—how should they be, when he had spent months in the winning of their confidence and affection by every clever wile known to the genuine boy lover? That they respected him was plainly shown by ...
— The Brown Study • Grace S. Richmond
... not my Latin well this morning, cousin?" queried Francis. "Doth not my lady mother instruct me in the tent and cross-stitch each day? Besides doth not even the Queen's Majesty disport herself with the bow? 'Tis the fashion, good ...
— In Doublet and Hose - A Story for Girls • Lucy Foster Madison
... at once there was a strange hubbub in the forest; for it was midnight, and the spirits came from their hiding-places to prowl about and to disport themselves. Barbara beheld them all in great wonder and trepidation, for she had never before seen the spirits of the forest, although she had often heard of them. It was ...
— A Little Book of Profitable Tales • Eugene Field
... their battells, and also to besiege a town at thy best advantage, Philopomenes Prince of the Achayans, among other praises Writers give him, they say, that in time of peace, he thought not upon any thing so much as the practise of warre; and whensoever he was abroad in the field to disport himselfe with his friends, would often stand still, and discourse with them, in case the enemies were upon the top of that hill, and we here with our army, whether of us two should have the advantage, and how might we safely goe to find them, keeping still ...
— Machiavelli, Volume I - The Art of War; and The Prince • Niccolo Machiavelli
... delighted certainly to escape into the forest uplands. "Robert and I go out and lose ourselves in the woods and mountains, and sit by the waterfalls on the starry and moonlit nights," she wrote from their high perch above Lucca in 1849; but their adventures in this kind were on the whole like the noon-disport of the amphibian swimmer in Fifine,—they always admitted of an easy retreat to the terra firma ...
— Robert Browning • C. H. Herford
... their guardians with surprising rapidity, and followed them like dogs. These antelopes are not larger than a medium-sized sheep, and the young ones in particular look exceedingly pretty with their red tufts, and disport themselves like frisky kids. Miss Ellen and my sister soon had about them a whole menagerie of antelopes, monkeys, and parrots, trained to perform all sorts of tricks for the delectation of the children who ...
— Freeland - A Social Anticipation • Theodor Hertzka
... as one of the Chambers of "Rhetoric" in which the hard-handed but half-artistic mechanics and shopkeepers of the Netherlands loved to disport themselves was called, then exhibited upon an opposite scaffold a magnificent representation of Jupiter astride upon an eagle and banding down to the Stadholder as if from the clouds that same principality. Nothing could ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... was just possible that the Wonder might have slipped down that steep incline and injured himself. Possible, but very unlikely; the Wonder did not take the risks common to boys of his age, he did not disport himself on ...
— The Wonder • J. D. Beresford
... surging waters rinse them. Thou hast here a lovely village, Finest spot in all of Northland, In the lowlands sweet the verdure, in the uplands, fields of beauty, With the lake-shore near the hamlet, Near thy home the running water, Where the goslings swim and frolic, Water-birds disport in numbers." Thereupon the bride and bridegroom Were refreshed with richest viands, Given food and drink abundant, Fed on choicest bits of reindeer, On the sweetest loaves of barley, On the best of wheaten biscuits, On the richest beer of Northland. Many things were ...
— The Kalevala (complete) • John Martin Crawford, trans.
... diminnisshed by excessive huntyng within the same and likely to be destroied, without restreynt in the same be had in that behalf, we desire the Replenisshyng of our seid game, not only for our singler pleasure but also for the disport of other our servantes and subgettes of Wirshipp in theis parties. And therfor we wol and straitly charge you all & every of you that from hensforth ye suffre no manner of personne or personnes of what estate degree or condicion soever he or they ...
— The Evolution Of An English Town • Gordon Home
... were covered with short, stubby grass and here and there were big yellow patches of moss. At the foot of one hill a stream wends its way through the drooping boughs of the stunted shrubs that grow on its edges, and loses itself in a quiet pond where long-legged insects disport themselves on the leaves of the water-lilies. The sun beat down on us. The gnats rubbed their wings together and bent the slender ends of the reeds with the weight of their tiny bodies. We were alone in the tranquillity ...
— Over Strand and Field • Gustave Flaubert
... ago stood towards the statesman who is now proudly numbered in their ranks. When he presented himself to be sworn in, it was one of the jokes of the day that Sir Walter Barttelot expected he would approach the Table making "a cart-wheel" down the floor, as ragged little boys disport themselves along the pavement when a drag or omnibus passes. Sir Walter was genuinely surprised to find in the fearsome Birmingham Radical a quietly-dressed, well-mannered, almost boyish-looking man, who spoke in a clear, admirably pitched ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 28, April 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... culinaria—which will be necessary for my housekeeper to know. How would you, for instance, dress a dinner for the bishop if he happened to pay me a visit, as you may be certain he will? How would you make pies and puddings, and disport your fancy through all the varieties of roast and boil? How would you dress a fowl that it would stand upon a dish as if it was going to dance a hornpipe? How would you amalgamate the different genera of wine with boiling fluid and crystallized saccharine ...
— Going To Maynooth - Traits And Stories Of The Irish Peasantry, The Works of - William Carleton, Volume Three • William Carleton
... to direct and superintend our games with the strictness that some parents do the studies of their children. He was very particular that we should play the old English games according to their original form; and consulted old books for precedent and authority for every 'merrie disport;' yet I assure you there never was pedantry so delightful. It was the policy of the good old gentleman to make his children feel that home was the happiest place in the world; and I value this delicious home-feeling as one of the choicest gifts a ...
— Old Christmas From the Sketch Book of Washington Irving • Washington Irving
... thrown aside, or were kept by the noble mediaeval poets only on condition of their original meaning being completely defaced by wholesale admixture of the manners and adventures belonging to the Arthurian cycles. The paladins were forced to disport themselves in the same fairyland as the Knights of the Round Table; and many mediaeval poems the heroes of which, like Ogier of Denmark and Huon of Bordeaux, already existed in the Carolingian tales, are in reality, with their romantic loves, their useless adventures, ...
— Euphorion - Being Studies of the Antique and the Mediaeval in the - Renaissance - Vol. II • Vernon Lee
... old man," he went on volubly, "there were days when the loneliness in my office grew positively oppressive. You may remember that room I had in the old Adams and Harper Block? It gave upon a courtyard where the rats from a livery stable came to disport themselves on rainy days. I grew to be a dead shot with the flobert rifle; but lawsy, there's mighty little consideration for true merit in this world! Just because I winged a couple of cheap hack horses one day, when my nerves weren't steady, the livery ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VII. (of X.) • Various
... Kaiser-bagh when the success of Campbell's final operations became certain. I enter the great square enclosure of the Kaiser-bagh and stand in the desolation of what was once a gay garden where the King of Oude and his women were wont to disport themselves. The place stands much as Campbell's men left it after looting its multifarious rich treasures. The dainty little pavilions are empty and dilapidated, the statues are broken and tottering. Quitting ...
— Camps, Quarters, and Casual Places • Archibald Forbes
... clouds and wind so eagerly? If, like guilty spirits, they repair to some dread conference with powers like themselves, in what wild regions do the elements hold council, or where unbend in terrible disport? ...
— Life And Adventures Of Martin Chuzzlewit • Charles Dickens
... with an innocent laugh, "I think you ought to be. I had no end of trouble to find out where you were. It wasn't exactly the place for you to disport yourself in under the circumstances. If the general had caught you there making eyes at the goddess of the temple . . . oh, my word! . . . He hates to be bothered with complaints against his officers, you know. And it looked uncommonly ...
— A Set of Six • Joseph Conrad
... Mr. Taylor, and I shall never forget you, sir." And after a short silence, he added: "All I desire is a chance, for with it, I can make Louise happy. I need but little money, I should not know how to disport a large fortune, but I do desire a comfortable home with pictures and books. And I thank the Lord that I appreciate the refinements of this life." In silence he smoked, looking up at the rings. "Ah, but it was dark for me a short time ago, Mr. Taylor. They made me believe ...
— An Arkansas Planter • Opie Percival Read
... alive; and full surely I am mightier than Jack of the Tofts, both to uphold thee against him (wherein I shall not fail), and otherwise. But may God make me even as that young man if I be not mightier yet in a few days. But now do thou go and eat and drink and take thy disport; for thou hast served me well; and in a little while I shall make thee knight and lord, and do all I can ...
— Child Christopher • William Morris
... take this to be the famous Albert who died in 1500; and who, in Schedel's time, kept lions for his disport—at Munich: "qui sua magnificentia plures nutrit ...
— A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume Three • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... social even during the nesting season. Their nests are built among the branches of the fir trees, and there they disport themselves gaily, climbing nimbly, and assisting their movements, as parrots do, with their beaks. They will hang downward for minutes clinging to a twig or cone, seeming to enjoy this apparently uncomfortable position. They fly rapidly, but never to a great distance. "The pleasure ...
— Birds Illustrated by Color Photograph [April, 1897] - A Monthly Serial designed to Promote Knowledge of Bird-Life • Various
... Christ, Mahomet, and Luther only lent a different hue to the arena in which youthful nations disport themselves. ...
— Louis Lambert • Honore de Balzac
... You'll excuse me now, Lawrence, I can't talk long without getting fagged. Wretched state of things, isn't it? I'm a vile bad host but I can't help it. At the present moment for example I'm undergoing grinding torments and it doesn't amuse me to make conversation, so you two can cut along and disport yourselves in any way you like. Give Lawrence a drink, will you, my love? . . . . Oh no, thanks, you've done a lot but you can't do any more, no one can, I just have to grin and bear it. Laura, would you mind ringing for Barry? ...
— Nightfall • Anthony Pryde
... by day or by night. The Sarashas were heard to imitate the hooting of the owl, and goats imitated the cries, O Bharata, of jackals. Many birds appeared, impelled by Death, that were pale of complexion but that had legs red of hue. Pigeons were seen to always disport in the houses of the Vrishnis. Asses were born of kine, and elephants of mules. Cats were born of bitches, and mouse of the mongoose. The Vrishnis, committing sinful acts, were not seen to feel any shame. They showed disregard for Brahmanas and the Pitris and the deities, They insulted ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 4 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... the first pale primrose of the dawn showed beyond. A faint flush followed, and then it seemed as if the night sky slowly rolled itself up and was put away, leaving a floor of silver, deepening to lilac, for the first bright beam to disport itself upon. Then the sea smiled, and the weariness of it, back and forth, back and forth, passed into animation. Its smooth surface became diapered with light airs, and moved with a gentle roll. The ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand
... by one of our public streets. It consisted of two large wings, one for the boys and one for the girls, joined together by a dining hall used by the boys. There were also two pretty gardens in which the boys and girls could disport themselves separately. The large trees that surrounded the building have long since disappeared. The young girl spoken of as a pupil seems to have had her youthful mind captivated by the beauty of ...
— The Romantic Settlement of Lord Selkirk's Colonists - The Pioneers of Manitoba • George Bryce
... water from the sea, and snuff the odour of the last slow drop of blood! By day, by night, through the countless ages, he shall roam through fields eternal as the fancy takes him; shall leap with one great bound from Atlas to the Himalayas; shall course, in his insolent pride, from heaven to earth; disport himself by caracoling in the dust of crumbled empires; shall speed across the beds of dried-up oceans; shall bound o'er ruins of enormous cities; inhale the void with swelling chest, and roll and stretch ...
— Three short works - The Dance of Death, The Legend of Saint Julian the Hospitaller, A Simple Soul. • Gustave Flaubert
... on went the round hoods, old hats, red cloaks, and moccasins, and away trudged the four younger Bassetts, to disport themselves in the snow, and try the ice down by the old mill, where the great wheel turned and splashed so ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag VI - An Old-Fashioned Thanksgiving, Etc. • Louisa M. Alcott
... a mawker. The first small glass of it hadn't gone whistlin' down afore she begun to mawk me. 'Ezekiel!' says she, 'be merry; disport yourself—where's your game blood? Try a fall with ...
— Mr. Scraggs • Henry Wallace Phillips
... minuets have gone out of fashion, if they involved such a test of endurance as that in which Claude Duval and his fair captive now disport themselves with an amount of bodily exertion it seems real cruelty to encore. His concluding caper shakes the mask from his partner's face, and the young lady falls, with a shriek, into his arms, leaving the audience in that happy state of perplexity, which so ...
— M. or N. "Similia similibus curantur." • G.J. Whyte-Melville
... said that whether he wotted or not, it was the very day twelve months since he had come to that shore along with the Sea-eagle. So that folk stood and watched the skiff growing less and less upon the deep till they could scarce see her. Then they turned about and went into the wood to disport them, for the sun was growing hot. Nevertheless, there were some of them (and that damsel was one), who came back to the sea-shore from time to time all day long; and even when the sun was down they looked seaward under the rising moon, expecting to see Hallblithe's ...
— The Story of the Glittering Plain - or the Land of Living Men • William Morris
... even close-shaven turf: this clearing is surrounded by the usual rough growth of herbs and giant grasses. In such situations this habit of clearing the ground is eminently advantageous to them, as it affords them a comparatively safe spot to feed and disport themselves on, and over which they can fly to their burrows without meeting any obstruction, on the ...
— The Naturalist in La Plata • W. H. Hudson
... Highness, is a vision of the prince's own future, when, restored to health, he is able to disport himself with his playmates in the ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton
... the trade. There were plenty of purchasers, for the buccaneers were willing to buy everything which could be brought from Europe. They were fond of good wine, good groceries, good firearms, and ammunition, fine cutlasses, and very often good clothes, in which they could disport themselves when on shore. But they had peculiar customs and manners, and although they were willing to buy as much as the French traders had to sell, they could not be prevailed upon to pay their bills. A pirate is not the sort of a man who generally cares to pay his bills. When he gets ...
— Buccaneers and Pirates of Our Coasts • Frank Richard Stockton
... in Edmonton church, who is said to have beguiled the devell by policie for money; but the devell is deceit itselfe, and hardly deceived."—"Belike (says Weever) he was some ingenious, conceited gentleman, who did use some sleightie tricks for his own disport. He lived and died in the reign of Henry the Seventh, says the book of his merry pranks." The book Weever refers to is a pamphlet, now very scarce, called "The Life and Death of the Merry Devil of Edmonton, with the ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 578 - Vol. XX, No. 578. Saturday, December 1, 1832 • Various
... night, while Jimmie and Sir Lucius were dining at Morley's, Victor Nevill emerged from his rooms in Jermyn street, and walked briskly to Piccadilly Circus. He looked quite unlike the spruce young man of fashion who was wont to disport himself in the West End at this hour, for he wore tweeds, a soft hat, and a rather shabby overcoat. He took a cab in Coventry street, and gave the driver a northern address. As he rode through the Soho district he occasionally pressed one hand to his breast, and a bundle of bank notes, tucked snugly ...
— In Friendship's Guise • Wm. Murray Graydon
... goodly tale or two, On which he may disport him at night. His high prudence hath insight very To judge if it be well made or nay. Write him nothing that soweneth to vice. Look if find thou canst any treatise ...
— Henry of Monmouth, Volume 1 - Memoirs of Henry the Fifth • J. Endell Tyler
... sees a certain manly form coming up the garden-walk is wont to cry out in a miserable mockery of tenderness, "Oh, my darling! I'm so glad to see you!" and then smack his bill as near like a kiss as he can, and chuckle and laugh and turn somersaults, and otherwise disport himself as parrots do ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. July, 1878. • Various
... rainbow colours, such as Mexico is famous for, people these tropic southern lands of Vera Cruz. Along the shores and in the woods and groves, all teeming with prolific life, which the hot sun and frequent rains induce, the giant cranes and brilliant-plumaged herons disport themselves, and gorgeous butterflies almost outshine the feathered denizens. From the tangled boughs the pendant boa-constrictor coils himself, and hissing serpents, basking crocodiles, and prowling jaguars people the untrodden ...
— Mexico • Charles Reginald Enock
... salaam to these. This our hero flatly refused to do. In fact he became such a nuisance that he was promised that he would be given his pay regularly if he would only stay away from the palace. After this he spent his days in idleness and by night he used to go to the shore and disport ...
— Folklore of the Santal Parganas • Cecil Henry Bompas
... aspect, of some thirty winters by seeming, black-haired, hook-nosed and hawk-eyed, not so fair to look on as masterful and proud. She led a great grey ass betwixt two panniers, wherein she laded her marketings. But now she had done her chaffer, and was looking about her as if to note the folk for her disport; but when she came across a child, whether it were borne in arms or led by its kinswomen, or were going alone, as were some, she seemed more heedful of it, and eyed it more closely ...
— The Water of the Wondrous Isles • William Morris
... domains of love, this moment is like a waste land to be traversed, a land without a tree, alternatively damp and warm, full of scorching sand, traversed by marshes, which leads to smiling groves clad with roses, where Love and his retinue of pleasures disport themselves on carpets of soft verdure. Often the witty man finds himself afflicted with a foolish laugh which is his only answer to everything; his wit is, as it were, suffocated beneath the icy pressure of his desires. ...
— The Girl with the Golden Eyes • Honore de Balzac
... 'hairy quadrumanous ancestor' (Darwinian for the primaeval monkey, from whom we are presumably descended) used playfully to disport himself, as yet unconscious of his glorious destiny as the remote progenitor of Shakespeare, Milton, and the late Mr. Peace—in tropical woods, such acrid or pungent fruits and plants are particularly common, and correspondingly annoying. The fact is, our primitive forefather and all ...
— Falling in Love - With Other Essays on More Exact Branches of Science • Grant Allen
... (? wire) bowers, the aviaries, the porticoes, the frightful circular edifice (tondo e il ricco edificio), a masterpiece of Palladian stucco work, in which Armida and Rinaldo, Acrasia and her Knight, drearily disport themselves. What has become of Calypso's island? of the orchards of Alcinous? What would the noble knights and ladies of Ariosto and Spenser think of them? What would they say, these romantic, dainty creatures, were they to meet Nausicaa with the washed ...
— Euphorion - Being Studies of the Antique and the Mediaeval in the - Renaissance - Vol. I • Vernon Lee
... the cloister he stopped short with a deep sigh, and stood before the storks, and said: "Away, happy birds; you have leave. Disport yourselves, soaring very high in the sunny heavens, or take your rest on our roofs. I have appeased you with food; but to the hunger of my ...
— A Child's Book of Saints • William Canton
... of lions, elephants, leopards, and similar beasts of disport; he also kept for amusement fifteen or sixteen albinos; and so greedy was he of novelty, that even a cock of peculiar form or colour would have been forwarded by its owner to feed ...
— Inquiries into Human Faculty and Its Development • Francis Galton
... myself that if it was "only" a neurosis it was one with great possibilities. The fact that collapses are frequent among brain-workers was not easily dismissed from my mind. I feared insanity and began to picture how I would disport myself in a madhouse. It seemed that I could not carry out the medical advice to take vigorous exercise, as it gave me palpitation and made me fear that my heart would ...
— Confessions of a Neurasthenic • William Taylor Marrs
... only very occasionally, when Martin was in a propitious mood, that the horses were saddled for mere public amusement. Patty's heart was sore as she watched Priscilla and Conny, her two dearest friends, disport themselves regardless ...
— Just Patty • Jean Webster
... the Freshers' hockey match banished less important topics, for Hannah was on edge with anxiety to be at her best, and disport herself sufficiently well to be included in after-team practices, while Darsie was scarcely ...
— A College Girl • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... of modulated Sound From viewless Hybla brought, when Melodies Like Birds of Paradise on wings, that aye Disport in wild variety of hues, ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... on writers by the general feeling of readers has been constantly becoming more and more strict. At length even that class of works in which it was formerly thought that a voluptuous imagination was privileged to disport itself, love songs, comedies, novels, have become more decorous than the sermons of the seventeenth century. At this day foreigners, who dare not print a word reflecting on the government under which they live, ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 4 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... over the land of the free and the home of the brave, overwhelming its native simplicity with the virtues, tastes, and vices of the other nations against which our forefathers barred the door. Palaces in all but the name stand where the buffalo was wont to disport himself, and where the American eagle in human form once flapped his wings and screamed most viciously in contempt of the effete civilization of the older world. Sons and daughters of the pioneers who ...
— The Opinions of a Philosopher • Robert Grant
... boast that she could out-fence any boy at the school. She was an expert swimmer too, and there were rumours, that at summer bathing excursions she wore a somewhat similar garment to that of the gymnasium, instead of one of those long serge gowns reaching to the ankles that ladies were wont to disport themselves in amidst the surf—gowns in which it was impossible to do anything but bob up and down at the ...
— Secret Bread • F. Tennyson Jesse
... thicket of the park. Thus stands the case: you know our King, my brother, Is prisoner to the Bishop here, at whose hands He hath good usage and great liberty, And often, but attended with weak guard, Comes hunting this way to disport himself. I have advertis'd him by secret means That if about this hour he make this way, Under the colour of his usual game, He shall here find his friends, with horse and men, To set him free from ...
— King Henry VI, Third Part • William Shakespeare [Rolfe edition]
... and when spring cometh, the weather groweth fair, the wood bloometh, the grass groweth, and ships may glide betwixt land and land. So on a day the king says to his folk: "I will that ye come with us for our disport out into the woods, that we may look upon ...
— The Story Of Frithiof The Bold - 1875 • Anonymous
... termys short, Christ keep these birdis bright in bowers, Fra false lovers and their disport, Sic peril ...
— The Last Of The Barons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... that the canon, hearing the bells of St Maurice, the first patron of Notre Dame, ring for matins, he had gone out of reverence to the cathedral, where all the Chapter were to breakfast with the Bishop of Paris; upon which Chiquon replied: "Is his reverence the canon out of his senses thus to disport himself, to catch a cold, to get rheumatism? Does he wish to die? I'll light a big fire to warm him when he returns;" and the good shepherd ran into the room where the canon generally sat, and to his great astonishment beheld ...
— Droll Stories, Complete - Collected From The Abbeys Of Touraine • Honore de Balzac
... gambol, disport, frisk, skip, caper, romp, revel; wanton, dally, toy, twiddle; impersonate, personate, act; perform, execute; strum, thrum; gamble; simulate, pretend, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... do me harm to disport myself in the flowery mead with the butterflies? Should I feel a distaste for the bread earned by labour and pain after the honey ...
— Fifty-Two Stories For Girls • Various
... into bed. After all it was only polite to return Cayley's own solicitude earlier in the night. Politeness demanded that one should not disport oneself on the pond until one's ...
— The Red House Mystery • A. A. Milne
... forest and streamlet, where glisten'd Fair feet of the Naiads that skimm'd The shallows; where the Oreads listen'd, Rose-lipp'd, amber-hair'd, marble-limb'd, No lithe forms disport in the river, No sweet faces peer through the boughs, Elms and beeches wave silent for ever, Ever silent the bright ...
— Poems • Adam Lindsay Gordon
... require, attended for the security of the Lady Eveline's person. Without this military attendance they could not in safety move even so far as the mills, where honest Wilkln Flammock, his warlike deeds forgotten, was occupied with his mechanical labours. But if a farther disport was intended, and the Lady of the Garde Doloureuse proposed to hunt or hawk for a few hours, her safety was not confided to a guard so feeble as the garrison of the castle might afford. It was necessary that Raoul should announce her purpose to Damian by a special ...
— The Betrothed • Sir Walter Scott
... the Wind Veres oft, as oft so steers, and shifts her Saile; So varied hee, and of his tortuous Traine Curld many a wanton wreath in sight of Eve, To lure her Eye; shee busied heard the sound Of rusling Leaves, but minded not, as us'd To such disport before her through the Field, 520 From every Beast, more duteous at her call, Then at Circean call the Herd disguis'd. Hee boulder now, uncall'd before her stood; But as in gaze admiring: Oft he bowd His turret Crest, and sleek enamel'd Neck, Fawning, ...
— The Poetical Works of John Milton • John Milton
... college]. Twenty yards in front of my house, some pleasure gardens have been opened, bearing a signboard inscribed, 'The Pagoda.' Here, on Sunday afternoons, the lads and lasses from the neighboring farms come to disport themselves in country dances. To attract custom and push the sale of refreshments, the proprietor of the ball ends the Sunday hop with a tombola. Two hours beforehand, he has the prizes carried along the public ...
— The Life of the Fly - With Which are Interspersed Some Chapters of Autobiography • J. Henri Fabre
... fair sunny morning of spring, that Ralph sat alone on the toft by the rock-house, for Ursula had gone down the meadow to disport her and to bathe in the river. Ralph was fitting the blade of a dagger to a long ashen shaft, to make him a strong spear; for with the waxing spring the bears were often in the meadows again; and the day before they had come across a family of the beasts in the sandy bight under the ...
— The Well at the World's End • William Morris
... under the guise of a lone Fisherman he is regaled with sumptuous cheer and divers rejoicings, wherein he doth right merrily disport. ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson
... regard for your sanitary well-being, you will remain on deck, alike to saturate your lungs with torrents of oxygen and to let your weary eye and mind disport themselves like sea-gulls on the broad waters of the bay. What so fresh and cool and clean and still and sparkling and in perfect contrast to the stern and stony and resounding streets! As you lean over the taffrail, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, November 1885 • Various
... parallel life, as it were, to the vulgar one. I see no reason, in the analogies of the natural world, for supposing that the circumstances of human life are the only circumstances in which the spirit of life can disport itself. Even on this planet, there are sea-animals and air-animals, ephemeral beings and self-centred beings, as well as persons who can grow as old as Matthew Arnold, and be as fond as he was of classifying other people. And beyond this ...
— Winds Of Doctrine - Studies in Contemporary Opinion • George Santayana
... he was saying, smiting himself on the breast with his fist. "I disport myself in striped trunks for the sport of the sated mob! I have put out my torch, have hid my talent in the earth, like the slothful servant! But fo-ormerly!" he began to bray tragically, "Fo-ormerly-y-y! Ask in Novocherkassk, ask in Tvier, in Ustejne, in Zvenigorodok, ...
— Yama (The Pit) • Alexandra Kuprin
... moral heights, and so could set himself up for an impartial judge. He did not permit himself to be carried away by the sadness of the moment, though he did not remain indifferent to it, and his heart bled at the thought of his people's sufferings. In the human desert, in which he delighted to disport himself, he discovered noble characters, lofty sentiments, generous friendships, and, above all, lives devoted entirely to the pursuit of the ideal undeterred by ...
— The Renascence of Hebrew Literature (1743-1885) • Nahum Slouschz
... much like to think about them. Their household teaching under Mrs. Elsmere and her old servant Martha—as great an original as herself—was so irregular, their religious training so extraordinary, the clothes in which they were allowed to disport themselves so scandalous to the sober taste of the rector's wife, that Catherine involuntarily regarded the little cottage on the hill as a spot of misrule in the general order of the parish. She would go in, say, at eleven o'clock in the morning, find ...
— Robert Elsmere • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... very serious trouble to Helen that she was not to buy and disport herself in pretty frocks and hats. The desire to dress prettily and tastefully is born in most girls—just as surely as is the desire to breathe. And Helen ...
— The Girl from Sunset Ranch - Alone in a Great City • Amy Bell Marlowe
... has exerted a very marked and friendly influence upon them, since they so multiply in his society. The birds of California, it is said, were mostly silent till after its settlement, and I doubt if the Indians heard the wood thrush as we hear him. Where did the bobolink disport himself before there were meadows in the North and rice fields in the South? Was he the same lithe, merry-hearted beau then as now? And the sparrow, the lark, and the goldfinch, birds that seem so indigenous to the open fields and so adverse to the woods,—we cannot conceive ...
— Wake-Robin • John Burroughs
... me not with flattery! Walk with me to the Battery, And see in glassy tanks the seals, The sturgeons, flounders, smelt and eels Disport themselves in ichthyic curves— And when it gets upon our nerves Then, while our wabbling taxi honks I'll tell you all about the Bronx, Where captive wild things mope and stare Through grills of steel that bar each lair Doomed to imprisonment for life— And you may go and take ...
— Police!!! • Robert W. Chambers
... they be colonies, have a prehistoric time—a dark period of mist and gloom, before the keen light of history dawns upon them. This period is the favourite playground of the myth-spirits, where they disport themselves freely, or lounge heavily and listlessly, according to their different natures. The Egyptian spirits were of the heavier and duller kind—not light and frolicsome, like the Greek and the Indo-Iranian. ...
— Ancient Egypt • George Rawlinson
... can reconcile me to my barbarous lot! The insect feels itself as happy in a drop of water as though that drop was a paradise: so happy, and so contented! till some one tells it of a world of water, where navies ride and whales disport themselves! But you wish to make me happy, say you? (After a pause, she advances towards LADY MILFORD, and asks her suddenly.) Are you happy, lady? (LADY MILFORD turns from her hastily, and overpowered. LOUISA follows her, and lays her hand upon her bosom.) ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... stream in which two extremely pretty girls were bathing. With the evening sun glinting on their brown bodies and their piquant, oval faces framed by the dusky torrents of their loosened hair, they looked like those bronze maidens which disport themselves in the fountain of the Piazza delle Terme in Rome, come to life. I felt certain that they would take to flight when Hawkinson unlimbered his motion-picture camera and trained it upon them, but they continued their joyous splashing without the slightest ...
— Where the Strange Trails Go Down • E. Alexander Powell
... and gentlemen—those who had fascinations to disport or were in the habit of disporting what they considered such, were probably still at home consulting the looking-glass until that oracle should announce the auspicious moment for ...
— Masterpieces Of American Wit And Humor • Thomas L. Masson (Editor)
... beneath his feet when he lands, and at certain places the streams sink into the earth as if by magic, to reappear where least expected. A thundering noise is heard, and a mist hovers in the air, in which thousands of birds disport themselves,— marking the position of the great cataracts of the Corentyn. The scene, however, is too vast to be beheld in its full grandeur from any single point of view. No waterfall in the ...
— The Western World - Picturesque Sketches of Nature and Natural History in North - and South America • W.H.G. Kingston
... whole brood, two old and four young, used to disport themselves on the quilt of an old bedridden woman on Otterbourne Hill. It is the popular belief that robins kill their fathers in October, and the widow of a woodman declared that her husband had seen deadly ...
— John Keble's Parishes • Charlotte M Yonge
... carriers, whose way it is to take their midday rest with their teams in places and spots where grass and water abound; and that where Don Quixote chanced to be suited the Yanguesans' purpose very well. It so happened, then, that Rocinante took a fancy to disport himself with their ladyships the ponies, and abandoning his usual gait and demeanour as he scented them, he, without asking leave of his master, got up a briskish little trot and hastened to make known his wishes to them; they, however, it seemed, preferred their pasture to ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... of elfs and fays: Who says that with the dreams of myth, These imps and elves disport themselves? Ah no, along the paths of song Do all the ...
— The Complete Poems of Paul Laurence Dunbar • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... crystal stream flows through this valley between two hills covered with giant redwood trees, and rare orchids of the most curious shape and colour toss wantonly in the breeze on the tree and hilltops. Birds and fishes and reptiles disport themselves in the sunshine, and giant butterflies of the most marvellous colours flutter so bravely among the ferns and flowers. There are no tents here in our camp, but we are covered with the fragrant branches of the spicy pines and nutmeg trees. It is a ...
— An Anarchist Woman • Hutchins Hapgood
... there are no fresh beasts here to give you, and it is best, to avoid doubts, that you should return as you came, only showing your powers if any should attempt to arrest you. So let us have done with these heavy matters, and disport us for a while. This servant of yours has made a common boast that he will outshoot any of our picked archers, and now we are ready to go forth and put him to the proof of the butts. Let him know, however, that, notwithstanding our words of yesterday, we shall not hold him to blame ...
— Red Eve • H. Rider Haggard
... threads in her golden hair. To turn to her sisters, they, in strange contrast, seemed to have lost some years since the investiture of the younger one. They had gone back to childhood. Like creatures longing to disport themselves in the light and air, the three rushed into the wood, making the silence that reigned there ring with their voices and innocent shouts of laughter. Virgen del Amporo! how they jumped! how they laughed! What impish tricks those little mad things ...
— The Grandee • Armando Palacio Valds
... a landscape seems to rise, Deck'd gorgeous by the lavish hand of Spring: Thin gilded clouds float light along the skies, And laughing Loves disport on fluttering wing. ...
— The Poetical Works of Beattie, Blair, and Falconer - With Lives, Critical Dissertations, and Explanatory Notes • Rev. George Gilfillan [Ed.]
... ottars[FN660] and gain great profit on them; till, Allah willing, I will make my capital an hundred thousand dirhams. Then I will purchase a fine house with white slaves and eunuchs and horses; and I will eat and drink and disport myself; nor will I leave a singing man or a singing woman in the city, but I will summon them to my palace and make them perform before me." All this he counted over in his mind, while the tray of glass ware,: worth an hundred dirhams, ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton
... resemble. They are unfelt, that is the explanation—unfelt aesthetically. They have not been through the oven. They are artistically insincere. Sentimentality makes strange bedfellows. Rousseau has slipped into the very hole wherein Mr. Frank Dixie and Sir Luke Fildes disport themselves; only, by betraying his vice in a picture that is, for the most part, so exquisitely sure in its simple, delicate expression of a frank and charming vision he gives us an impressive example of the danger, even to a good artist, of ...
— Since Cezanne • Clive Bell |
