"Droll" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Wallack used to give us some years ago, of Dick Dashall, very drunk, but very gentlemanly, was one of the most irresistibly comic things ever known. I have a mind to give you a translation of a German ballad on a tipsy man, which has been set to music, and is often sung in Germany; it is rather droll in the original, and perhaps it has not lost all of its humor in being overset, as they call it, ...
— The International Monthly Magazine - Volume V - No II • Various
... the event. Presents arrived from unexpected sources, so that invitations had to be sent afterwards to the givers. Women who had never crossed the Robinson threshold came now like Hindoo gift-bearers before some deity whom they wished to propitiate. Meeting there, they exchanged droll, half-deprecating glances. Mrs. Robinson's calls had formed the subject of much laughing comment; but weddings were not common in Marshfield, and the desire to be bidden to this one was universal; it spread ...
— Different Girls • Various
... the perfumers will be base enough to decline your paper," said Lousteau. "Stop, there is a superb engraving in the top drawer of the chest there, worth eighty francs, proof before letters and after letterpress, for I have written a pretty droll article upon it. There was something to lay hold of in Hippocrates refusing the Presents of Artaxerxes. A fine engraving, eh? Just the thing to suit all the doctors, who are refusing the extravagant gifts of Parisian satraps. You will find two or three dozen ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... Orestes—was—a madman!—a poor simpleton, of good family, who was so good-humored and harmless that he was allowed to go at large, and free scope given to his innocent freaks. He, however, possessed a kind of droll, pointed wit, which he sometimes brought to bear most effectively, sparing neither rank nor position. The half-biting, half-droll remarks of this Diogenes of Istria was all that now afforded enjoyment to the broken-down ...
— Queen Hortense - A Life Picture of the Napoleonic Era • L. Muhlbach
... How droll you are! The hill is not cloudy; even at this distance one can see something glisten beside the grove ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... conversational powers. On these occasions he would carry his hearers away with him, often against their better judgment, by his eloquence and verve; would send them into fits of hearty laughter by his sallies; his store of droll anecdotes, his jollity and gaiety; and would display his consummate gifts as a dramatic raconteur. Later in life, after he had raised the enmity of a large section of the writing world, and knew that there were many watching eagerly ...
— Honore de Balzac, His Life and Writings • Mary F. Sandars
... window was open, and they were perched on the top of the punkah, or on the iron crossbars supporting the roof, watching their opportunity to pounce down and carry off the bits left on our plates. They did not seem to mind the waiters a bit, and, with their heads cocked on one side, looked as droll and saucy as possible. People tell you all sorts of funny stories about them; but though they are very entertaining to watch, and apparently perfectly tame, it appears to be impossible to ...
— A Voyage in the 'Sunbeam' • Annie Allnut Brassey
... the bushy tail, the wise, inquisitive eyes, and the natty little feet. They intended to amuse themselves all summer by watching its nimble movements; its ingenious way of shelling nuts; and its droll play. They immediately put in order an old squirrel cage with a little green house and a wire-cylinder wheel. The little house, which had both doors and windows, the lady squirrel was to use as a dining room and ...
— The Wonderful Adventures of Nils • Selma Lagerlof
... recipe that was ever given for a married couple to live in peace. Though John and his wife frequently attempted to quarrel afterwards, they never could get their passions to a considerable height; for there was something so droll in thus carrying on the dispute, that, before they got to the end of the argument, they saw the absurdity of it, ...
— Young Folks Treasury, Volume 3 (of 12) - Classic Tales And Old-Fashioned Stories • Various
... the baron to his noble father the marquis, that night, "yet understand their joke; why should it be droll to wish that the man whose coat is of the best should also wear boots of the best? but as for what they call une promenade de gateau, I find it very enjoyable. I have met a Mlle. Bines to whom I shall at once pay my addresses. Unlike Mlle. Higbee, she has not ...
— The Spenders - A Tale of the Third Generation • Harry Leon Wilson
... quite cold out. Some of the gentlemen remarked that very few young ladies would have the courage to change pretty evening dresses for calico, after appearing to such advantage. Many would prefer wearing such dresses, however inappropriate, to the sugar-mill. With his droll gravity, Gibbes answered, "Oh, our girls don't want ...
— A Confederate Girl's Diary • Sarah Morgan Dawson
... it's droll. I know, all children have those desperate love affairs. But they seem to me pathetic. How did ...
— Grey Roses • Henry Harland
... You're a droll fellow, to expect the Empress to put out her head in the pouring rain and salute you. She has affairs of her own to ...
— Men, Women and Ghosts • Amy Lowell
... in with such a droll ring in them. But there, we ought not to be talking now, but getting ...
— The Peril Finders • George Manville Fenn
... with the slightly foreign accent which lent an added charm to her words, "I cannot help thinking it rather droll that a man of your mind and rare penetration should have thought you had an enemy ...
— The Lesser Bourgeoisie • Honore de Balzac
... have?" said Martin; "these people are made thus. Imagine all contradictions, all possible incompatibilities—you will find them in the government, in the law-courts, in the churches, in the public shows of this droll nation." ...
— Candide • Voltaire
... man came to supper last night, unexpectedly, and they talked interminably about some deal, lumbering, lines, surveys, deeds . . . till Toucle came in with the news of the accident. The man was from New Hampshire, with that droll, flat New Hampshire accent. You know how they talk, 'bahn' and ...
— The Brimming Cup • Dorothy Canfield Fisher
... after having demonstrated an entire social system, I shall revert to science in an Essay on the Human Powers. And around the base of my palatial structure, with boyish glee I shall trace the immense arabesque of my Hundred Droll Tales." ...
— Honor de Balzac • Albert Keim and Louis Lumet
... Nip gave to this was by winking first one eye and then the other, and making his cheeks rise and fall in a way so droll that I could not help laughing, at which Nip seemed to take offence, for without waiting for any farther questions he hopped out of the room, and I saw him, soon after, crawling softly up the hill, as if on the look out for some of the thieves ...
— The Adventures of a Dog, and a Good Dog Too • Alfred Elwes
... do not know what arguments are in reference to any expression of a thought. I delight in telling what I think; but if you ask me how I dare say so, or why it is so, I am the most helpless of mortal men. I do not even see that either of these questions admits of an answer. So that in the present droll posture of my affairs, when I see myself suddenly raised to the importance of a heretic, I am very uneasy when I advert to the supposed duties of such a personage, who is to make good his thesis against all comers. I certainly shall do no such thing. I shall read what you and other ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... rogue we should desire to see; who cheats almost as divinely as those about him love, and whose thieving tricks the very gods seem to crown with thrift in reward of his wit. His self-raillery and droll soliloquizing give us the feeling that his sins are committed not so much for lucre as for fun.—The Poet was perhaps a little too fond of placing his characters in situations where they have to be false in order to be the truer; which ...
— Shakespeare: His Life, Art, And Characters, Volume I. • H. N. Hudson
... naval activity, during the Maori wars, dwelt in Sir George's memory by reason of its droll comedy. An officer, thoroughly tired out, went to his bunk, leaving directions that he should be called at a particular hour. It happened that the awakening of him, fell to a blithesome midshipman having the ...
— The Romance of a Pro-Consul - Being The Personal Life And Memoirs Of The Right Hon. Sir - George Grey, K.C.B. • James Milne
... eye on the stairway, watching like a lover for the appearance of Madame La Tour, the outer door again clanked, and Klussman stepped into the hall. His big presence had instant effect on Le Rossignol. Her music tinkled louder and faster. The playing sprite, sitting half on air, gamboled and made droll faces to catch his eye. Her vanity and self-satisfaction, her pliant gesture and skillful wild music, made her appear some soulless little being from the woods who mocked ...
— The Lady of Fort St. John • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... successful in spite of these latter being in no degree adapted to the profession which circumstances have induced him to adopt. In proof of this fact, comic actors are quite as often dull and solemn people, as droll ones, in private life. The most remarkable instance of a face being a fortune, in this respect, is our own Liston. If he had not possessed a comic countenance, nothing could have prevented him from being a tragic actor, or have ...
— The Mirror Of Literature, Amusement, And Instruction - Vol. X, No. 289., Saturday, December 22, 1827 • Various
... ball-room, where about a hundred and fifty of the tenants, servants, &c., with their wives and daughters, were assembled. Reels then began, which were danced with great energy, and also jigs—very droll. Prince Arthur danced like mad; and Princess Alice was 'weel ta'en out' by the gamekeeper. I stood in a corner talking with the Duke of Argyll, &c. At last the Prince came round, and conversed very courteously for ten minutes. He had heard I had been in Germany lately, so we ...
— Memoirs of the Life and Correspondence of Henry Reeve, C.B., D.C.L. - In Two Volumes. VOL. II. • John Knox Laughton
... crockery-ware, as to put me in a fright, and the comic look, with which he showed that he was aware of the mischief he had nearly done, amused me excessively. He was evidently a wag, and from the moment in which he discovered the congeniality of our feelings, when any droll incident occurred, he was sure to ...
— Notes of an Overland Journey Through France and Egypt to Bombay • Miss Emma Roberts
... his head to his foot, And his clothes were all tarnished with ashes and soot; A bundle of toys he had flung on his back, And he looked like a peddler just opening his pack, His eyes, how they twinkled! his dimples, how merry! His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry. His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow, And the beard on his chin was ...
— Cole's Funny Picture Book No. 1 • Edward William Cole
... said Charlie, after the laugh occasioned by one of Nels' droll stories had subsided. "It's nice to think of those old times. I'd hate to have been one of these kids that can't have any fun, Christmas or any ...
— The Children's Book of Christmas Stories • Various
... that you will consider this information a lie. That will be quite droll. However, I am, most respected Herr ...
— The Leader • William Fitzgerald Jenkins (AKA Murray Leinster)
... the children fairly danced in their delight at the comical strains, abrupt pauses, droll sentiment, and interlarded words of explanation. The more elderly guests were attracted, and the audience grew apace. Having finished her little musical comedy, Madge arose, and Mr. Arnault, aware of ...
— A Young Girl's Wooing • E. P. Roe
... Prince, in rather an injured tone, "you keep me waiting long enough, I hope, when I only came to teach you a droll trick." ...
— Prince Vance - The Story of a Prince with a Court in His Box • Eleanor Putnam
... state of well-being and quietude natural to a man with a good appetite who has dined satisfactorily. I was not at all astonished to see my grandfather there. In fact, I was vegetating just then, thinking of nothing in particular. Nevertheless, I said to myself:—"It is droll that the rays of the setting sun should pour gold and purple through the least folds of my grandfather's garments and face." In fact, the setting sun was red, and threw its last horizontal rays diagonally athwart the doorway. Grandfather ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 20, July, 1891 • Various
... parliament of Paris was still in force, to a house at Fleury. But the Friend of Men, to use his own account of himself, "bore letters as a plum-tree bears plums," and wrote to his guest with strange humoristic volubility and droll imperturbable temper, as one who knew his Jean Jacques. He exhorts him in many sheets to harden himself against excessive sensibility, to be less pusillanimous, to take society more lightly, as his own light estimate of its worth should lead him to do. ...
— Rousseau - Volumes I. and II. • John Morley
... lamp shall gleam As in old nights; the chaplets woven then— Withered, perhaps, by time—may grace us yet; The laurel faded is the laurel still, And some of us are heroes to ourselves. And amber wine shall flow; the blue smoke wreathe In droll disputes, with metaphysics mixed; Or float as lightly as the quick-spun verse, Threading the circle round from thought to thought, Sparkling and fresh as is the airy web Spread on the hedge at morn in silver dew. The scent of roses you remember well; In the green vases they shall bloom again. And ...
— Poems • Elizabeth Stoddard
... see, I did not go to join Kurtz there and then. I did not. I remained to dream the nightmare out to the end, and to show my loyalty to Kurtz once more. Destiny. My destiny! Droll thing life is—that mysterious arrangement of merciless logic for a futile purpose. The most you can hope from it is some knowledge of yourself—that comes too late—a crop of unextinguishable regrets. I have wrestled with death. It is the most unexciting contest ...
— Heart of Darkness • Joseph Conrad
... industrious, temperate, charitable, and always assist each other; but touch them on their religion, and they are almost idiots. They never go to mass nor confession—in fact, they are not christians, though the most worthy people in the world; and so droll: imagine those poor people, after working all the week, instead of enjoying the Sunday, and going to a fete or a ball to amuse themselves, meeting in each other's houses, and sometimes in the mountains, ...
— The Village in the Mountains; Conversion of Peter Bayssiere; and History of a Bible • Anonymous
... Andy stumbles on uttering a quaint pleasantry, for it is partly true as well as droll—the notion of a man gaining Paradise through a mistake. Our intentions too seldom lead us there, but rather tend the other way, for a certain place is said to be paved with "good" ones, and surely "bad" ...
— Handy Andy, Vol. 2 - A Tale of Irish Life • Samuel Lover
... "How droll you are, Miss Van Osdel!" Mrs. Lloyd Avalons was nothing, if not direct, in her personal comments. Then she answered Bobby. "Even if Mrs. Van Bleeker isn't really musical, it is a delight to work with her, she is so very charming and so business-like. Strange as it may seem, I actually take ...
— The Dominant Strain • Anna Chapin Ray
... of high degree—as, perhaps, most of us do. At one time he was infinitely flattered by the attentions of Count Dorsay, who, no doubt, considered him a personage. This odd combination was the cause of great amusement to his friends, who were, of course, on the look out for droll incidents. There was many a story in circulation. One was that Forster, expecting a promised visit from "the Count," received a sudden call from his printers. With all solemnity he impressed the situation on his man. "Now," he said, "you will tell the Count ...
— John Forster • Percy Hethrington Fitzgerald
... said he was lookin' forward to the day when he could afford to get as drunk as he sometimes thought he'd like to be. He was a droll sort of a cuss, Jake was. He claimed he'd been savin' up his appetite and his money for nearly three years so's he could see which would last the longest ...
— Anderson Crow, Detective • George Barr McCutcheon
... Trimble, and how completely had John Trimble hitherto obscured his light under a bushel. In his own proper person children avoided him, but they crowded about this Santa Claus, encircling his legs, gurgling with joy when they were lifted to his shoulder, their laughter ringing through the church at his droll antics. A sense of mystery grew when he opened a pack on the pulpit stairs, a pack unfamiliar in its outward aspect to the Committee on Entertainment. Every girl had a little doll dressed in fashionable attire, and ...
— The Romance of a Christmas Card • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... with which we reward our deliverers. [The picture taken off.] Among the number of exotics, calculated for this evening's entertainment, the head of an opera composer, or burletta projector, should have been exhibited, could I have been lucky enough to hit upon any droll visage for that exhibition: but, after many experiments, I was convinced that no head for that representation could be so truly ridiculous as my own, if this assembly do me the honour to accept it. [Takes up the ...
— A Lecture On Heads • Geo. Alex. Stevens
... clumsy pace, He stooped so low, to win at least a place, That Fortune, tempted by a mark so droll, Sprang in an kicked him ...
— Black Beetles in Amber • Ambrose Bierce
... statues.' Then Diogenes, hitherto half asleep on a mat in the corner, cries, 'Stop, Gorgias! You always profess justice, strict justice. Why don't you ask with whom of you the statues will prefer to stay?' A shout of laughter from his jolly companions makes Gorgias accede to this droll proposal. 'So be it!' cries he; and Diogenes draws aside the curtain, and holds up his lantern, which, with a strong French reflector, throws a powerful light on the upper part of the group, with a fine and startling ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I. February, 1862, No. II. - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... came from him stammeringly. 'I am no theologian; I never cared to puzzle my head about the mysteries which men much wiser than I declare to pass all human understanding. Ask Decius if he can defend the faith of Athanasius against that of the Arians; he will smile, and shake his head in that droll way he has. I believe,' he added after a brief hesitancy, 'in Christ and in the Saints. Does not ...
— Veranilda • George Gissing
... mamma, may I tell Louisa that droll story, which I read to you the other day, about the poor ...
— Domestic pleasures - or, the happy fire-side • F. B. Vaux
... cannot but think that we live in a bad age, O tempora, O mores! as 'tis in the adage. My foot was but just set out from my cathedral, When into my hands comes a letter from the droll. I can't pray in quiet for you and your verses; But now let us hear what the Muse from your car says. Hum—excellent good—your anger was stirr'd; Well, punners and rhymers must have the last word. But let me advise you, when next I hear from you, To leave off this passion which does ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift
... handsome, suave, of what the newspapers insist on calling distinguished bearing. He spoke English pleasantly but imperfectly. He possessed a capital fund of anecdote, and Warburton, being an Army man, loved a good droll story. It was a revelation to see the way he dipped the end of his cigar into his coffee, a stimulant which he drank with Balzacian frequency and relish. Besides these accomplishments, he played a very smooth hand at the great American game. While Mr. Robert's admiration was not aroused, it ...
— The Man on the Box • Harold MacGrath
... shouldn't complain," said she, glancing indicatively round. "One can still be out of doors, and yet not get the wetting one deserves. And the view is so fine, and these faded old frescoes are so droll." ...
— My Friend Prospero • Henry Harland
... droll enough; but not for everybody. They are rich sacristans, who pay the expenses. They don't look to money, provided the journal bites, tears, burns, pounds, exterminates and destroys. On my word of honor, I shall never have been in such a fury!" added Ninny Moulin, with a loud, hoarse laugh. ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue
... sort of individual temperament or consciousness at all. But I know that I have, and that you wrote me with pleasure and like me still. You think I have form, and that, if I am not very serious, I am sincere, and that somehow I represent a phase of our droll American civilization truly enough. I know you were vexed when some people said I did not go far enough, and insisted that the coast of Bohemia ought to have been the whole kingdom. As if I should have cared to be that! There are shady places inland where ...
— The Coast of Bohemia • William Dean Howells
... "How droll you are!" And she laughed with a little laugh, which made her throat rise up, and exposed ...
— Bouvard and Pecuchet - A Tragi-comic Novel of Bourgeois Life • Gustave Flaubert
... he said solemnly, laying his hand on Dumay's shoulder, and thinking to himself how droll it was to make a soldier of the empire tremble, "this young girl may be all in all to you, but to society at large what is she? nothing. At this moment the greatest mandarin in China may be yielding up the ...
— Modeste Mignon • Honore de Balzac
... woe, she found Elizabeth lying on the couch in the darkened study, suffering from a nerve-racking headache, and the preacher, looking very droll togged out in his little wife's kitchen-apron, was flying about serving up the scorched, unseasoned dinner for the forlorn family. He was too much concerned over the illness of the mistress and the unfinished condition of his next Sunday's sermon to sample his own cooking, ...
— The Lilac Lady • Ruth Alberta Brown
... afterwards characterized him appears to have shewn itself, for his father writing to some friends in England speaks of little Edward keeping the whole family in good spirits by his unfailing fun and droll speeches. The dramatic circumstances of the assassination of M. Fualdes, a magistrate at Rodez, in 1817, and the remarkable trial which followed, fastened themselves on FitzGerald's memory, and he was familiar with all the details which he ...
— Letters of Edward FitzGerald - in two volumes, Vol. 1 • Edward FitzGerald
... pp. 70 et seq. For a good discussion of Cosmas's ideas, see Santarem, Hist. de la Cosmographie, vol. ii, pp. 8 et seq., and for a very thorough discussion of its details, Kretschmer, as above. For still another theory, very droll, and thought out on similar principles, see Mungo Park, cited in De Morgan, Paradoxes, p. 309. For Cosmas's joyful summing up, see Montfaucon, Collectio Nova Patrum, vol. ii, p. 255. For the curious survival in the thirteenth century of the old idea of the "waters above the heavens," see the ...
— History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom • Andrew Dickson White
... to eat, my appetite was kindly tempted by dainties sent to me by friends, and which were placed under tin covers, on the top of a chest of drawers. The endeavours of my rodent companions to get at these were excessively droll; but as fast as they clambered an inch or two up the sides, the slippery metal caused them to slide down again; then they thought if they could but get to the top of the cover, they should succeed; so they mounted upon each others' shoulders, and accomplished ...
— Anecdotes of the Habits and Instinct of Animals • R. Lee
... right! You are becoming reasonable, I see. It is really droll that we should meet again after all these years in ...
— The Son of Monte Cristo • Jules Lermina
... eh! The man who calls himself by such a name as that ought to be a brave fellow, a veritable hero? Well, perhaps. But I know an Indian who is called Le Blanc; that means white. And a white man who is called Lenoir; that means black. It is very droll, this affair of the names. It is ...
— The Ruling Passion • Henry van Dyke
... Miss Fotheringay continued. "Kotzebue! He, he, what a droll name indeed, now; and the poor fellow killed by Sand, too! Did ye ever hear such a thing? I'll ask Bows ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray
... to know that Boswell was not merely a kind of animated note-book. He was a droll, vain, erring, bibulous, warm-hearted creature, a good deal of a Pepys, in fact, with all the Pepysian vices and virtues. Mr. A. Edward Newton's "Amenities of Book Collecting" makes Boswell very human to us. How jolly it is to learn that Jamie (like many lesser fry since) wrote press notices ...
— Mince Pie • Christopher Darlington Morley
... than Lemuel, apparently, but his swarthy, large- mouthed, droll eyed face affirmed the experience of a sage. He wore a blue flannel shirt, with loose trousers belted round his waist, and he crushed a soft felt hat between his hands; his hair was clipped close ...
— The Minister's Charge • William D. Howells
... the underwood, and seeing you through the leaves advancing with eager and rapid steps to the spot, conceals himself behind the entrance, and as you are just on the point of entering the hut, your foot just on the step, the droll sportsman puts his ugly head out of the window, as a yellow tortoise would his out of his shell, asking you, in most polite terms, what o'clock it is; or if it should chance to be raining a deluge at ...
— Le Morvan, [A District of France,] Its Wild Sports, Vineyards and Forests; with Legends, Antiquities, Rural and Local Sketches • Henri de Crignelle
... Swedish Parliament a university professor said in a tone of eloquent finality: "The woman suffrage movement has reached and passed its climax; the suffrage wave is now rapidly receding." With patronizing air, more droll than he could know, the gentleman added: "We have permitted this movement to come thus far but we shall allow it to go no farther." Thus another fly resting upon the proverbial wheel of progress commanded it to turn no more. This man engages our attention because he is a representative ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume VI • Various
... abounds in droll stories, some quite new, and some already given in his lectures and natural-history papers. He generally travelled with some curious collections in his pockets or in bottles; and, whether these were rats, vipers, snails, or frogs, by some strange fatality they were certain ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, September, 1885 • Various
... clerk attending on his vicar, who is about to perform a wedding service and make two people for ever happy. He christens the two officials "the joiners, no rough mechanics, but a portly full-blown vicar with his clerk, both rubicund, a peony paged by a pink. It made me smile to observe the droll clerical turn of the clerk's beaver, scrubbed into that fashion by his coat at ...
— The Parish Clerk (1907) • Peter Hampson Ditchfield
... called the "bull-wagon boss"; the teamsters were known as "bull-whackers"; and the whole train was denominated a "bull-outfit." Everything at that time was called an "outfit." The men of the plains were always full of droll humour and exciting stories of their own experiences, and many an hour I spent in listening to the recitals of thrilling adventures and ...
— The Great Salt Lake Trail • Colonel Henry Inman
... square, to wander in Himalayan passes and ride across the deserts of Africa. Baden-Powell is a nomad. The smart cavalry officer who can play any musical instrument, draw amusing pictures, tell delightfully droll stories, sing a good song, stage-manage theatricals—do everything, in short, that qualifies a man to take his ease in country houses, loves more than any other form of existence the loneliness and the wildness of the scout's. Often, ...
— The Story of Baden-Powell - 'The Wolf That Never Sleeps' • Harold Begbie
... extraordinary. If one, by cheating and roguery, gains a cruzado in the presence of another, the latter instantly says I cry halves, and if the first refuse he is instantly threatened with an information. The manner in which they cheat each other has, with all its infamy, occasionally something extremely droll and ludicrous. I was one day in the shop of a Swiri, or Jew of Mogadore, when a Jew from Gibraltar entered, with a Portuguese female, who held in her hand a mantle, richly embroidered ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow
... very little of—Grey Jerrold?" Mrs. Browne chimed in. "Well, I call that droll. Have you forgot how often he used to come home from school with you, and how he fished you out of the pond that time you fell in? Why, he was that free at our house, that he used always to ask for something to eat, and would often add ...
— Bessie's Fortune - A Novel • Mary J. Holmes
... he was so frightened and horrified that he wanted to run away, but his legs trembled and shook so badly that he couldn't. Then it struck him as a very funny thing for Jack to come to life, especially as the expression on his pumpkin face was so droll and comical it excited laughter on the instant. So, recovering from his first fear, Tip began to laugh; and the merry peals reached old Mombi's ears and made her hobble quickly to the hedge, where she seized Tip's collar and dragged him back to where she had ...
— The Marvelous Land of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... droll, it is what you call in England one grand spree, though of that you understand not the signification. But, my faith, it is at the same time barbarous, and ...
— Springhaven - A Tale of the Great War • R. D. Blackmore
... Hours evry Morning, but what is the Nature of this Farce of yours? have you any Smart, ridiculous, droll Fellows ...
— The Covent Garden Theatre, or Pasquin Turn'd Drawcansir • Charles Macklin
... language of the west migrates not unfrequently to the east. This idiomatic exchange is perceptibly on the increase. It arises from the travelling propensities of the Americans, and the constant intercourse mutually maintained by the inhabitants of the different States. A droll or an original expression is thus imported and adopted, and, though not indigenous, soon becomes engrafted on the general stock of the language of the ...
— The Attache - or, Sam Slick in England, Complete • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... sir," Addison replied, with a smile as droll as his own. "But I suppose it was all because of that rainbow in the morning that you told us to ...
— A Busy Year at the Old Squire's • Charles Asbury Stephens
... the opposite side; "it is all over. It was detestable. I, to suffer this humiliation! Do you know what I have done? I have promised to be his wife! His wife, I! Is it not droll?" There was a surprising absence of mirth in ...
— The Puppet Crown • Harold MacGrath
... providing it beforehand with an objection to the form. Can it be that this humor proceeds from a despair of finding a contemporary audience, and so the Prophet feels at liberty to utter his message in droll sounds. Did you not tell me, Mr. Thomas Carlyle, sitting upon one of your broad hills, that it was Jesus Christ built Dunscore Kirk yonder? If you love such sequences, then admit, as you will, that no poet is sent into the world before his ...
— The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, - 1834-1872, Vol. I • Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson
... people in the house; so he let them lie. "These things must keep the feet very warm," said he; "they are of such nice soft leather." Then he tried them on, and they fitted his feet exactly. "Now," said he, "how droll things are in this world! There's that man can lie down in his warm bed, but he does not do so. There he goes pacing up and down the room. He ought to be a happy man. He has neither wife nor children, and he goes out into company every evening. Oh, I wish I were he; ...
— Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen • Hans Christian Andersen
... applaud Mr. Wopsle; but they were too hopeless to be persisted in. Therefore we had sat, feeling keenly for him, but laughing, nevertheless, from ear to ear. I laughed in spite of myself all the time, the whole thing was so droll; and yet I had a latent impression that there was something decidedly fine in Mr. Wopsle's elocution,—not for old associations' sake, I am afraid, but because it was very slow, very dreary, very up-hill and down-hill, and very unlike any way in which any man in any natural circumstances of ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens
... always a victim of suggestion and flashes of passion. The polished brutality of his father and the mystic gentleness of his mother had been blended in him by a droll Fate and, later, confused and corrupted by ...
— A Son of the Hills • Harriet T. Comstock
... many of the secrets of low, and, now and then, of high life; they are redolent of the phraseology of the vulgar; they often tickle our fancies by their humour, and sometimes touch our sympathies by their pathos. As anecdotes of real life; daily catalogues of droll and dismal occurrences among our fellow-citizens; pictures of what is passing in the streets while we, who are sober sort of folks, are dreaming in our beds; sketches of manners, and records of ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, Issue 267, August 4, 1827 • Various
... pocket in the night could not have been more surprised. A few days afterwards I sent my mother a London evening paper with an article entitled 'An Auld Licht Community,' and they told me that when she saw the heading she laughed, because there was something droll to her in the sight of the words Auld Licht in print. For her, as for me, that newspaper was soon to have the face of a friend. To this day I never pass its placards in the street without shaking it by the hand, and she used to sew ...
— Margaret Ogilvy • James M. Barrie
... way," observed William Marion Reedy, "1601 is to Twain's whole works what the 'Droll Stories' are to Balzac's. It is better than the privately circulated ribaldry and vulgarity of Eugene Field; is, indeed, an essay in a sort of primordial humor such as we find in Rabelais, or in the plays of some of the lesser stars that drew their light from Shakespeare's urn. It ...
— 1601 - Conversation as it was by the Social Fireside in the Time of the Tudors • Mark Twain
... whole adventure was so droll, so full of little incidents which tickled his mirth and which prompted laughter, that it was as much as he could do to keep his big, healthy features steady. And, seeing that they were in a compartment by themselves, why not ...
— With Joffre at Verdun - A Story of the Western Front • F. S. Brereton
... the language of the plains, was called the "bull-wagon boss"; the teamsters were known as "bull-whackers"; and the whole train was denominated a "bull-outfit." Everything at that time was called an "outfit." The men of the plains were always full of droll humor and exciting stories of their own experiences, and many an hour I spent in listening to the recitals of thrilling ...
— The Life of Hon. William F. Cody - Known as Buffalo Bill The Famous Hunter, Scout and Guide • William F. Cody
... droll!" I remarked, smiling coldly. "It is not a temptation to marry when one knows that as a husband one must ...
— Vendetta - A Story of One Forgotten • Marie Corelli
... theater, ... and when I got there I was amused and amazed at its absurdly small proportions; it is a perfect doll's playhouse, and until I saw that my father really could stand upon the stage, I thought that I should fill it entirely by myself. How well I remember all the droll stories my mother used to tell about old King George III. and Queen Charlotte, who had a passion for Weymouth, and used to come to the funny little theater here constantly; and how the princesses used to dress her ...
— Records of a Girlhood • Frances Anne Kemble
... series I have seen among the thousands I have examined. The York Cries, Tom Hickethrift, Jack the Giant Killer, and many kindred cuts, are evidently from the collection of John White, the early printer, and are as quaint, as funny and droll in crudity of execution, as any of Thomas Gent's, the unique York ...
— Banbury Chap Books - And Nursery Toy Book Literature • Edwin Pearson
... sulkily—for I was mightily hungry—there came out on to the doorstep a very queer-looking old person, short of figure, round as a ball, his head sunk between very high and rounded shoulders, and with short stumpy legs. He was curiously attired in a whole-coloured suit of gray; a droll-shaped jacket the great collar of which reached far up the back of his head, surmounted a pair of voluminous breeches which suddenly tightened at the knee. I imagined him to be the butler in morning dishabille; and when he accosted me good-naturedly, asking to whom the dogcart ...
— Camps, Quarters, and Casual Places • Archibald Forbes
... Cauldron seems only a natural outgrowth from such a character. It consisted of twelve members, all artists, goldsmiths, or musicians, each of whom was allowed to bring four friends to the supper, and bound to provide a dish. Any two members bringing similar dishes were fined, but the droll part of it was that the suppers were eaten in a huge cauldron large enough to put table and chairs into; the handle served as an arched chandelier, the table was on a lift, and when one course was finished ...
— Fra Bartolommeo • Leader Scott (Re-Edited By Horace Shipp And Flora Kendrick)
... Finding prices too much alike in Custom-house street they turned into Burgundy. From Burgundy they passed into Du Maine. As they went, notwithstanding disappointments, their mood grew gay and gayer. Everything that met the eye was quaint and droll to them: men, women, things, places,—all were more or less outlandish. The grotesqueness of the African, and especially the French-tongued African, was to Mrs. Richling particularly irresistible. Multiplying ...
— Dr. Sevier • George W. Cable
... bring the good couple content. This done, he went off at once to pay a visit to the Queen of the Fairies, since he felt that the little people would best be able to carry out his promise. And, sure enough, the droll fancy of a mannikin no bigger than his father's thumb tickled the Fairy Queen also, and she set about the ...
— English Fairy Tales • Flora Annie Steel
... flaggon of ale and apples, drunk out of a wood cup, as a Christmas draught, which made all merry; and they full of admiration at my plate. Mr. Lowther a pretty gentleman, too good for Peg. Sir W. Pen was much troubled to hear the song I sung, "The New Droll," ...
— The Diary of Samuel Pepys • Samuel Pepys
... arrived at last, and we turned, with our last spark of courage, to the bedroom. We had improved the entrance, but it was still a kind of rope-walking; and it would have been droll to see us mounting, one after another, by candle-light, ...
— The Silverado Squatters • Robert Louis Stevenson
... were like roses, his nose like a cherry; His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow, And the beard on his chin was ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 10 - The Guide • Charles Herbert Sylvester
... droll thing is history,' said Fakredeen. 'Ah! if I were only acquainted with it, my education would be complete. Should ...
— Tancred - Or, The New Crusade • Benjamin Disraeli
... difficulty occurred. So-and-so, Esq., either was not there, or would not speak. Amidst deafening noise again, the president rose, and said it had been moved and seconded that John Brough, Esq., be requested to address the meeting. "Ay"—"No;" but the "Ayes" had it. "Now, John Brough," said a droll-looking Irishman, apparently a hod-carrier, who was ...
— American Scenes, and Christian Slavery - A Recent Tour of Four Thousand Miles in the United States • Ebenezer Davies
... the precipice of a witticism. It is not broad and unctuous; it is aerial and sprite-like, a momentary resting-place between his poetry and his wit. In the "Reisebilder" he runs through the whole gamut of his powers, and gives us every hue of thought, from the wildly droll and fantastic to the sombre and the terrible. Here is a passage almost ...
— The Essays of "George Eliot" - Complete • George Eliot
... he said, concluding a reminiscence, "but I think he's the man that used to be so popular in the House cloak-room, telling stories which were said to be extremely droll." ...
— The Iron Game - A Tale of the War • Henry Francis Keenan
... from log to log and disappeared under the wood-pile. The children went down to see what he would do. They were so astonished at his droll appearance that they forgot ...
— Little Mr. Thimblefinger and His Queer Country • Joel Chandler Harris
... my customary levee. The Governor of the place asked my permission to enter my luxuriously furnished apartments, to show me an amusing set of irons that had been discovered in one of the cells used during the last two hundred years for the storage of fire-wood. The droll things were called the "Little Ease," and seemingly, were intended to create merriment. One of the officers was complacent enough to assume them, and caused great diversion by his eccentric gestures. My levee was not quite so successful, as is generally the case, as that tedious ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 99, Sept. 27, 1890 • Various
... the parks, the people had various other sources of public amusement; amongst these puppet-shows, exhibitions of strength and agility, bear-baiting, cock-fighting, and dancing obtained. Until the restoration, puppet-shows had not been seen for years; for these droll dolls, being regarded as direct agents of Satan, were discountenanced by the puritans. With the coming of his majesty they returned in vast numbers, and were hailed with great delight by the people. One of these exhibitions ...
— Royalty Restored - or, London under Charles II. • J. Fitzgerald Molloy
... business-like and professional as to be quite amusing. He talked of the Duke, said he was a good man to do business with, quick and intelligent, and 'how well he managed that little correspondence with Huskisson,' which was droll enough, for Huskisson dined there and ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William - IV, Volume 1 (of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville
... detail, Clovelly is built in what was once a torrent-bed, and the village tumbles down from the top of the cliff to the very edge of Hartland Bay. The droll, Italian-like cottages cling to the hillside, or seem to grow directly out of the gray rock. At first, the street descends rather gradually and straight, but after a short distance, it zigzags first to left and then to right, twists and turns, ...
— John and Betty's History Visit • Margaret Williamson
... a forced laugh because Hugo appeared droll, and when he appeared droll it was the proper thing to laugh. Besides, in the best humor there is a grain of truth, whether you see it or not. This time a number saw ...
— The Last Shot • Frederick Palmer
... look down upon me with contempt since, instead of being able to mould and cast splendid statues, and such like, all I can do is to hoop casks and tubs." Reinhold burst out laughing, and cried, "Now that I call droll. I shall look down upon you—eh? because you are a cooper; why man, that's what I am; I'm nothing but a cooper." Frederick opened his eyes wide in astonishment; he did not know what to make of it, for Reinhold's dress was in keeping with anything ...
— Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... never taking his hints in earnest; he would know better some day, that was all; but she had no idea of any deeply-laid plan against their happiness. She felt as though some one had struck her hard; she had received a blow that set all her nerves tingling. It was very funny, what he said; it was so droll that it almost made her laugh; and yet her eyes smarted, and her cheeks ...
— Not Like Other Girls • Rosa N. Carey
... and lyric poetry flourished in Scotland. The poetical chroniclers Barbour, Henry the Minstrel, and Wyntoun, are familiar names, as are likewise the poets Henryson, Dunbar, Gavin Douglas, and Sir David Lyndsay. But the authors of the songs of the people have been forgotten. In a droll poem entitled "Cockelby's Sow," ascribed to the reign of James I., is enumerated a considerable catalogue of contemporary lyrics. In the prologue to Gavin Douglas' translation of the AEneid of Virgil, ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume VI - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... briny depths form their ideas of the beauty of the human countenance from the casual glimpses thus afforded of our features, would it be possible for the most susceptible of them to fall in love with us? The idea was so droll that I was almost convulsed with laughter; but, not wishing to attract attention by laughing aloud at my own thoughts, I merely clung to the bulwarks and doubled myself up, trying to avoid the appearance of eccentricity. At or about the same moment, the ...
— The Land of Thor • J. Ross Browne
... foot, And his clothes were all tarnished with ashes and soot; A bundle of toys he had flung on his back, And he looked like a pedlar just opening his pack. His eyes—how they twinkled! His dimples, how merry! His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry; His droll little mouth was drawn up in a bow, And the beard on his chin was as white ...
— Dear Santa Claus • Various
... was fairly started with this droll narrative the strain of the situation was relieved. We were all laughing as much at his deliberate way of narration as at ...
— Eben Holden - A Tale of the North Country • Irving Bacheller
... with a droll smile and a shrug,—I think I can see it now,—"the dukkerin [prediction] was all right, but I pet the right dukkerins ...
— The Gypsies • Charles G. Leland
... possible. This last is one of the chief useful reasons for expletives. However, even then they are a vicious habit, for stronger and stronger expressions are required to win the same subjective effects. Old expressions lose force. Slang is the new coinage. The mintage is often graphic and droll; it is also often stupid and vulgar. A selection goes on. Some of it is rejected and some enters into the language. Expletives also go out of fashion. The strain for effect can be satisfied only by constantly greater and greater excess. It becomes a bad personal habit to use ...
— Folkways - A Study of the Sociological Importance of Usages, Manners, Customs, Mores, and Morals • William Graham Sumner
... wording and droll errors of these old psalm-books can, after the lapse of centuries, be pointed out and must be smiled at, there is after all something so pathetic in the thought of those good, scholarly old New England saints, hampered by poverty, in dread of attack of Indians, burdened ...
— Sabbath in Puritan New England • Alice Morse Earle
... lack of impudence in the perpetration of these outrages. The police agents made merry. Some of these droll fellows jested. At Mazas the under-jailors jeered at Thiers, Nadaud reprimanded them severely. The Sieur Hubaut (the younger) awoke General Bedeau. "General, you are a prisoner."—"My person is inviolable."—"Unless you are caught ...
— The History of a Crime - The Testimony of an Eye-Witness • Victor Hugo
... a hardy courage and earnest patriotism under a phlegmatic and droll exterior, "while we're discussin' that question, I reckon we may as well have breakfast. This is as good a place as any,—we can take turns keeping a ...
— Cudjo's Cave • J. T. Trowbridge
... stories and sang songs. Edith Overman had a keen sense of humor and she told some anecdotes that were exceedingly droll. Ethel and Edna Whitely vied in asking conundrums. Kate Hollister then related her capital story, "The Legend of ...
— How Ethel Hollister Became a Campfire Girl • Irene Elliott Benson
... her back grew stiff, something like Mrs. Ridge's; and when she saw Uncle Stanley in the outer office a few minutes later and he smiled without looking at her—smiled and shook his head to himself as though he were thinking of something droll—Mary went back to her room in a hurry, and stayed there until she felt ...
— Mary Minds Her Business • George Weston
... friend Mr. Langton, to whom I am under innumerable obligations in the course of my Johnsonian History, has furnished me with a droll illustration about this question. An honest carpenter, after giving some anecdote in his presence of the ill-treatment which he had received from a clergyman's wife, who was a noted termagant, and whom he accused of unjust dealing in some ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell
... recurrence of some words in a quaint and queer connection, which gives a grotesque and somewhat repulsive mannerism to many sentences. Of these the commonest offender is 'quite;' which appears in almost every page, and gives at first a droll kind of emphasis; but soon becomes wearisome. 'Nay,' 'manifold,' 'cunning enough significance,' 'faculty' (meaning a man's rational or moral power), 'special,' 'not without,' haunt the reader as if in some uneasy dream which does not rise to the dignity of nightmare. Some of these strange mannerisms ...
— The Life of John Sterling • Thomas Carlyle
... "Wherefore droll?" asked Joliet, with a huge surprise, which lasted him all through his next sentence. "I come here to marry my daughter. Everything is ready; we count on your presence at the wedding; the lawyer has drawn up the contract; and the breakfast is now cooking ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Vol. XV., No. 85. January, 1875. • Various
... enforcing and restating obvious points till the reader feels as if his own intelligence were somewhat underrated. He is over-conscientious in giving us full measure, and once profoundly absorbed in the sound of his own voice, he knows not when to stop. If he feel himself flagging, he has a droll way of keeping the floor, as it were, by asking himself a series of questions sometimes not needing, and often incapable of answer. There are three stanzas of such near the close of the First Part of "Peter Bell," where Peter first catches a glimpse of the dead body in the water, ...
— Among My Books • James Russell Lowell
... rolled a droll, twinkling eye at Bissell and the whole gathering burst into a great guffaw at his expense. This was all the more effective since Bissell had decorated the outside of his vest with the nickel-plated star ...
— The Free Range • Francis William Sullivan
... Dec. 19.-Interministerium. Droll cause in Westminster Hall. The Duke of Cumberland and Edward Bright. Sir ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2 • Horace Walpole
... precisely, that this was what Mrs. Rance, artfully biding her time, WOULD do. The special shade of apprehension on the part of the Miss Lutches might indeed have suggested the vision of an energy supremely asserted. It was droll, in truth, if one came to that, the position of the Miss Lutches: they had themselves brought, they had guilelessly introduced Mrs. Rance, strong in the fact of Mr. Rance's having been literally beheld of them; and it was now for them, positively, as if their handful ...
— The Golden Bowl • Henry James
... if they didn't hold their tongues, or give a more distinct account of the port. This menace cowed them down like so many bullies, and they fell into a moody but vindictive silence, their looks discovering the internal oaths of revenge. It was really droll, if the words used allow the expression, to hear how the captain blended Italian, Maltese, and Arabic oaths and abuse in his rage. Now "Santo Dio!" now "Scomunicat!" Sacrament! now "Allah!" "Imshe," "Kelb," "Andat," "per Bacco!" &c. At length, when a ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson
... cried the stranger in spectacles, "prithee, tell us thy thoughts on the subject: dost thou know the author of this droll periodical?" ...
— Devereux, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... friendly walls darkness and death and emptiness... It is not the wind that howls without, not the rain streaming in floods; without, Chaos wails and moans, his sightless eyes are weeping. But with us all is peaceful and light and warm and welcoming; something droll, something of childish innocence, like a butterfly—isn't it so?—flutters about us. We nestle close to one another, we lean our heads together and both read a favourite book. I feel the delicate vein beating in thy soft forehead; I hear ...
— The Jew And Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... what boisterous peace! Ho! ho! It is thy fancy's finger-tip That dints the dimple now, and kinks the lip That scarce may sing in all this glad increase Of merriment! So, pray thee, do not cease To cheer me thus, for underneath the quip Of thy droll sorcery the wrangling fret Of all distress is still. No syllable Of sorrow vexeth me, no tear drops wet My teeming lids, save those that leap to tell Thee thou'st a guest that overweepeth yet Only because ...
— Nye and Riley's Wit and Humor (Poems and Yarns) • Bill Nye
... they really are. You are welcome to come and see me in my night-cap, when the spirit moves me. When I'm not out walking, I'm always at home. Busy at work, too?" she continued, putting a tiny cap upon her fist. "That looks droll, and tells tales." ...
— Flora Lyndsay - or, Passages in an Eventful Life • Susan Moodie
... was very familiar, that of a private soldier in the King of Prussia's guard. I had a grotesque mask made, with an immense nose and moustaches, talked a jumble of broken English and German, in which the latter greatly predominated; and had crowds round me laughing at my droll accent, and whose curiosity was increased by a knowledge of my previous history. Miss Kiljoy was attired as an antique princess, with little Bullingdon as a page of the times of chivalry; his hair was in powder, his doublet rose-colour, and ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... delightfully droll story-books that it is possible to conceive of. Brimful of quaint and wonderful notions, and teeming with ...
— In the Mist of the Mountains • Ethel Turner
... maid—plump radiant Bea Sorenson from Scandia Crossing. Bea was droll in her attempt to be at once a respectful servant and a bosom friend. They laughed together over the fact that the stove did not draw, over the slipperiness of ...
— Main Street • Sinclair Lewis
... is droll and thoroughly genuine, and Colonel Johnston is one of its prophets. The Widow Guthrie is admirably drawn. She would have delighted Thackeray. The story which bears her name is one of the best studies of Southern ...
— A Voyage of Consolation - (being in the nature of a sequel to the experiences of 'An - American girl in London') • Sara Jeannette Duncan
... as Carter put it, that he was "not simply a George Moore"; but that his amazing writings bore witness throughout to a high and devoted ethical purpose. It is even conjecturable that Carter may have said puribus omnia pura; but if he did so, it was with so droll an accent that his audience laughed again. At all events his reading was punctuated with cheery applause, and at the conclusion the Scorpions renewed their acquaintance with those historic affinities whiskey and soda. ...
— Kathleen • Christopher Morley
... performance: it is a kind of novel, called "The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy;"[2] the great humour of which consists in the whole narration always going backwards. I can conceive a man saying that it would be droll to write a book in that manner, but have no notion of his persevering in executing it. It makes one smile two or three times at the beginning, but in recompense makes one yawn for two hours. The characters are tolerably kept up, but the humour is for ever attempted and missed. ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole - Volume I • Horace Walpole
... Chisholm possessed a leisurely gift of fun; she was droll, whether she quite meant to be or not. Everybody laughed. Mrs. Tolley became tearful ...
— Poor, Dear Margaret Kirby and Other Stories • Kathleen Norris
... indeed, that at one period of his career he had all but toppled over into the cesspool of Rome; a poet and also a polemical writer, a great pet in the common rooms at Oxford, an eloquent clergyman, a droll, odd, humorous, energetic, conscientious man, and, as the archdeacon had boasted of him, a thorough gentleman. As he will hereafter be brought more closely to our notice, it is now only necessary to add, that he had just been presented to the vicarage of St Ewold by Dr Grantly, ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... in his ninety-fifth year, hale, hearty, a great joker and droll storyteller, as an own cousin of Abraham Lincoln should be, says: In the spring of 1840, when a youth, I came north from Albany, Illinois, with some cattle buyers and a drove of eighty cattle, for the lumberjacks in the ...
— Old Rail Fence Corners - The A. B. C's. of Minnesota History • Various
... pair too. But they're often away at school, and Sir Francis is a thorough gentleman. They're not his boys, but her ladyship's, and she has spoiled 'em, I suppose. Let 'em grow wild, Grant. I say, my lad," he continued, looking at me with a droll twinkle in his eye, "they want us to train them, and prune them, and take off some of their straggling growths, eh? I think we could make a ...
— Brownsmith's Boy - A Romance in a Garden • George Manville Fenn |
