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Elder   Listen
noun
Elder  n.  
1.
One who is older; a superior in age; a senior.
2.
An aged person; one who lived at an earlier period; a predecessor. "Carry your head as your elders have done."
3.
A person who, on account of his age, occupies the office of ruler or judge; hence, a person occupying any office appropriate to such as have the experience and dignity which age confers; as, the elders of Israel; the elders of the synagogue; the elders in the apostolic church. Note: In the modern Presbyterian churches, elders are lay officers who, with the minister, compose the church session, with authority to inspect and regulate matters of religion and discipline. In some churches, pastors or clergymen are called elders, or presbyters.
4.
(M. E. Ch.) A clergyman authorized to administer all the sacraments; as, a traveling elder.
Presiding elder (Meth. Ch.), an elder commissioned by a bishop to have the oversight of the churches and preachers in a certain district.
Ruling elder, a lay presbyter or member of a Presbyterian church session.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Elder" Quotes from Famous Books



... reasons into which I do not care to enter, John Haddon was familiar with this house, and with our grounds. He was well known to my servants, and, unfortunately, popular with them, for he is an openhanded spendthrift. The estate of his elder brother, Lord Steffenham, adjoins my own to the west, and Lord Steffenham's house is three miles from where we sit. On the night of the fifth a ball was given in the mansion of Lord Steffenham, to which, ...
— The Triumphs of Eugene Valmont • Robert Barr

... the best judge of his own, and as he did assure her, with a most persuasive smile, that neither he nor Julia had ever had a serious thought of each other, she could only renew her former caution as to the elder sister, entreat him not to risk his tranquillity by too much admiration there, and then gladly take her share in anything that brought cheerfulness to the young people in general, and that did so particularly promote the pleasure of the ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen

... word. The right arm of Mr Jonas—the elder sister sat upon his right—may have been sensible of some tumultuous throbbing which was not within itself; but nothing else apprised him that his words had had ...
— Life And Adventures Of Martin Chuzzlewit • Charles Dickens

... waggoner, who knows it. I carry a letter to the farmer from his brother, who is the parish priest of Trecate, and a good man. He says that his brother, too, is a good man, and will show us kindness for his sake, because the farm once belonged to my friend, as the elder, until he gave it up to follow God. The pair have not met since twenty years; for Trecate lies not far from Milan, and the farm is deep in the mountains, above a village called Domodossola, where the folk are no travellers. . ...
— Sir John Constantine • Prosper Paleologus Constantine

... was not general—confined chiefly to Mr. Edgerton the elder and myself. Mrs. Edgerton remained awhile after the cloth had been withdrawn, joining occasionally in what was said, and finally left us, though with still a lingering, and a last look toward her son, which clearly told where her heart was. William Edgerton followed her, after a brief ...
— Confession • W. Gilmore Simms

... primitive happened in a regular fight, he might have mourned and poured reproof into Bug's ear when he got him back in his corner at the end of the round; but he would not have experienced this feeling of helpless horror—the sort of horror an elder of the church might feel if he saw his favourite bishop yielding in public to the fascination of jazz. It was the fact that Bugs Butler was lowering himself to extend his powers against a sparring-partner that shocked Mr. Burrowes. There ...
— The Adventures of Sally • P. G. Wodehouse

... man a philosopher. When I hear of these portents of learning and their imposing erudition, I sometimes say to myself: Ah, how little they must have had to think about, to have been able to read so much! And when I actually find it reported of the elder Pliny that he was continually reading or being read to, at table, on a journey, or in his bath, the question forces itself upon my mind, whether the man was so very lacking in thought of his own that he had to have alien ...
— The Art of Literature • Arthur Schopenhauer

... pensive and almost melancholy, as she listened to his narration of his dealings with a refractory tenant, and at the same time watched a noble-looking child of seven or eight years old, who, mounted on an old war-horse, was led round the court by a youth, his elder by some ten or ...
— The Lances of Lynwood • Charlotte M. Yonge

... escape from the mob by a back-door. Pope refers to the Square as a fashionable place of resort. Among the names of famous residents we have Sir Richard Steele, Richard Baxter, the Nonconformist divine, Dr. Akenside, and Sir Hans Sloane. The elder D'Israeli, who compiled "Curiosities of Literature," lived in No. 6; he came here in 1818, when his famous son was ...
— Holborn and Bloomsbury - The Fascination of London • Sir Walter Besant

... male and not its real parent. He even goes further, and says that it is conceivable, by successive impregnations effected by him, that the influence may be increased, and if so the younger children begotten by him, rather than the elder, might be expected, ceteris paribus, to bear their father's image. And as regards the mother, he suggests the question, whether there is not something in the popular notion that in the course of ...
— The Four Epochs of Woman's Life • Anna M. Galbraith

... preparations for the day's work; the horses and mules feeding eagerly; the fires blazing cheerily and the blue smoke streaming straight up in the still air. Yes, and I see the two Englishmen, the old and the young one, sitting at breakfast in their tents. The elder man is tall and thin, with black hair touched here and there with grey, and a close-clipped moustache. He is dressed in dark-grey woollen clothing, and wears brown boots reaching to the knee. He is glancing through a little book ...
— Harry Escombe - A Tale of Adventure in Peru • Harry Collingwood

... not an entire success. For convenience and economy we had laid it in a continuous stretch on the floor, with some hay beneath. There being not enough mattresses for all, I had built an extension of hay for the elder members of the family. It was the best hay, but I had used it too sparingly. I suppose I had not realized how, with adjustment, it would pack and separate. I know it had hardened considerably by the time I had made one or two turns as a necessary preparation for sleep. I remarked each time ...
— Dwellers in Arcady - The Story of an Abandoned Farm • Albert Bigelow Paine

... the falling dew, And seek a shelter from the storm: When man these elder brothers knew He found the mother nature warm, A hearth fire blazing through it all, A ...
— By Still Waters - Lyrical Poems Old and New • George William Russell

... the visitors seemed impressed by the statement of their guide. The elder laughed a ...
— The Exploits of Juve - Being the Second of the Series of the "Fantmas" Detective Tales • mile Souvestre and Marcel Allain

... hat and a long frock-coat which hung loosely about his big chest and stomach. He had managed to force the price of beef up to thirty cents a pound, causing all the retailers and consumers to rebel, and this was what made him so conspicuous. He used to come to the brokerage end of the elder Cowperwood's bank, with as much as one hundred thousand or two hundred thousand dollars, in twelve months—post-notes of the United States Bank in denominations of one thousand, five thousand, and ten thousand dollars. These he would cash at from ten to ...
— The Financier • Theodore Dreiser

... her silently, saying nothing. Under her look Elfrida's expression changed a little, grew uncomfortable. The elder girl felt the chill, the seriousness with which she received the card upstairs, return upon her suddenly, and she became aware that she could not, with self-respect, fight ...
— A Daughter of To-Day • Sara Jeannette Duncan (aka Mrs. Everard Cotes)

... from the rising generation, however, that the greatest merriment arose. These, paired off in ever changing couples, whirled from one end of the room to the other, and then, without a pause, returned again, heedless alike of the gratulations of their elder friends as they passed them by, and of the indifferent gaze of those who were not their friends who looked at them ...
— Heiress of Haddon • William E. Doubleday

... his meal, "I understand quite well what you mean. Some such philosophy sent my elder brother and me over here from New York—the wild hogs trampling through Belgium—the ferocious herds from the Rhine defacing, defiling, rending, obliterating all that civilized man has reverenced for centuries.... That's the idea—the ...
— Barbarians • Robert W. Chambers

... looking for an officer who promised to aid us in finding our friends in the hospital—or at least in getting news from them," said the elder of the two,—a fine-looking, though distressed ...
— The Drummer Boy • John Trowbridge

... year, Leaning o'er black Mocattam's rubied brow, Proceeded slow, majestic, and serene, Now seemed not further than the nearest cliff, And crimson light struck soft the phosphor wave. Then Gebir spake to Tamar in these words: "Tamar! I am thy elder and thy king, But am thy brother too, nor ever said, 'Give me thy secret and become my slave:' But haste thee not away; I will myself Await the nymph, disguised in thy attire." Then starting from attention Tamar cried: "Brother! in sacred truth it cannot be! My life is yours, my ...
— Gebir • Walter Savage Landor

... added no little to the enjoyment of the hour. The evening lights were charming, the hills wound in and out, the Schoharie rippled merrily over the cobble stones or slate rocks forming its bed, and the clematis and elder bushes gently waved their treasures of white blossoms, silky seeds, or deepening berries, in the soft summer air. By and by the slate cliffs rose precipitously from the river shore, leaving only room sufficient ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 5, No. 6, June, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... Malesherbes lay but three leagues from Fontainebleau, on the edge of the forest. This placed the king's imprudence in a stronger light, for he had scarcely in France a more dangerous enemy than her brother Auvergne; nor had the immense sums which he had settled on the elder sister satisfied the mean avarice or conciliated the brutish hostility of ...
— Stories By English Authors: France • Various

... a few other young gentlemen remained for a time with the young ladies—under the strict surveillance of the elder ones. But little by little they also were swallowed up in the gray cloud which indicated the way ...
— Norse Tales and Sketches • Alexander Lange Kielland

... from the pavement to scan the sky, or note the effect of his new arrangement in scarves. Planted against his door is the butcher, Henders Todd, white-aproned, and with a knife in his hand, gazing interestedly at the draper, for a mere man may look at an elder. The tinsmith brings out his steps, and, mounting them, stealthily removes the saucepans and pepper-pots that dangle on a wire above his sign-board. Pulling to his door he shuts out the foggy light that showed in his solder-strewn workshop. ...
— Auld Licht Idylls • J. M. Barrie

... subjects of the Imperial Fatherland, e.g., in spite of the most laudable intentions and the best endeavour, are, by failure of this experience, unable to comprehend either the ground of opposition to their well-meaning projects of dominion or the futility of trying to convert these their elder brothers to their own prescriptive acceptation of what is worth while. In time, and with experience, this retarded division of Christendom may come to the same perspective on matters of national usage and ideals as has been enforced on the ...
— An Inquiry Into The Nature Of Peace And The Terms Of Its Perpetuation • Thorstein Veblen

... pale, and the lines of the physiognomy were already more sharpened than is usual at years so young. Her head, however, was now bent down over a large book which lay upon her knees, and from which she appeared to have been reading aloud to the elder woman; and, as she sat, a tear dropped into its pages, which she hastily brushed away ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 363, January, 1846 • Various

... Gunsberg, the elder of the two (slightly it is feared on the wane though still champion of many columns) and Lasker twenty-four years of age, still at his height, are both wonderful performers, and enjoy a vast popularity among their race, and in certain circles, but in the ...
— Chess History and Reminiscences • H. E. Bird

... answers. Susie always chose the most unsuitable moments for displays of temper, and Mrs. Beauchamp sighed as she looked at the firm little mouth and eager blue eyes. She felt so very, very sorry to be leaving Dick the elder in London—so intolerably selfish. Her voice ...
— Troublesome Comforts - A Story for Children • Geraldine Glasgow

... disorder had carried off my mother and sisters, and my poor father was left alone in his old age—not alone, for Julia was still with him. I forgot to say before, that she was the orphan daughter of his elder brother. Julia, at sixteen, was beautiful. I will not attempt to describe her, although every feature, every expression of her lovely countenance, is vividly pictured in my heart. She was its light, its pride, its hope. Alas! alas! she had grown up ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume VI • Various

... upon the words 'right owner.' 'The right owner of this estate is a young lady of the highest merit, whose maiden name was Harris, and who some time since was married to an idle fellow, one Lieutenant Booth; and the best historians assure us that letters from the elder sister of this lady, which manifestly prove the forgery and clear up the whole affair, are in the hands of an ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol IV. • Editors: Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton

... he is filled with disgust and orders her away. His real pupils, the four lovely daughters of the Marquis now enter and while the lesson goes on, Miton hands a billet-doux from some lover to each of them. The two elder, Agatha and Chimene, are just in the act of reading theirs, when they hear a serenade outside, and shortly afterwards the two lovers are standing in the room, having taken their way through the window. The Marquis ...
— The Standard Operaglass - Detailed Plots of One Hundred and Fifty-one Celebrated Operas • Charles Annesley

... Brilliana had seated herself, observing her vehement shes with amusement. She turned a face of assumed gravity upon the elder. ...
— The Lady of Loyalty House - A Novel • Justin Huntly McCarthy

... satisfactory braces must keep his strength up. He wanted a good deal here below, and he wanted it warm and well cooked. It was, therefore, not immediately that his dinner with Rollo became a feast of reason and a flow of soul. Indeed, the two revellers had lighted their cigars before the elder gave forth any remark ...
— The Man Upstairs and Other Stories • P. G. Wodehouse

... most of them were blessed with; for children are a blessing, a gift and heritage that cometh of the Lord, even when they cluster round a cold hearth and a scanty board. But Gray had only two sons, the elder of whom, Tom, we have seen at Zoe's christening, and who had been at work four years, having managed at twelve to scramble into the fifth standard, and at once left school triumphantly, and now can neither read nor write, having clean forgotten ...
— Zoe • Evelyn Whitaker

... toward him with the freedom of an elder brother, and, in a low, earnest tone, said: "Did nothing else occur during my visit, which could have changed my ...
— Tempest and Sunshine • Mary J. Holmes

... loss of the closing chapters of Tacitus' Annals. Nero, it is true, is a far less complex character than Tiberius; and there can be no question that Tacitus' sketch of Nero is less elaborate than his study of the elder tyrant. Indeed, no historical figure stands out for all time with features of such hideous vividness as Tacitus' portrait of Tiberius; nowhere do we find emphasised with such terrible earnestness, the stoical poet's ...
— Old English Plays, Vol. I - A Collection of Old English Plays • Various

... a minute nothing happened at all, except that from the intentness of the elder man there seemed once more to radiate out that curious air of silence that Laurie was beginning to know so well—that silence that seemed impenetrable to the common sounds of the world and to exist altogether independent ...
— The Necromancers • Robert Hugh Benson

... Kit promptly. "Do you suppose, when Aunt Priscilla was young, she would have deserted—let us say—Mr. Desmond the elder, at the beck and call of any one? She has too much spirit, to do her credit. Though I must say her spirit is rather out of place ...
— Rossmoyne • Unknown

... kind-hearted, had often, in the privacy of his own thought, wondered what hidden ancestral influences there might have been at work in giving a man so peaceable and inoffensive as himself two daughters of such strongly defined individuality. There was Augusta, the elder, who was what Arnfinn called "indiscriminately reformatory," and had a universal desire to improve everything, from the Government down to agricultural implements and preserve jars. As long as she was content to expend the surplus energy, which seemed ...
— Tales From Two Hemispheres • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen

... explorers were not idle, and in 1892 a large expedition, equipped by that public-spirited colonist, Sir Thomas Elder—now alas! dead—was fitted out and put under the leadership of David Lindsay. Sir Thomas was determined to finish what he had so well begun, viz., the investigation of the interior, for by him not only had Giles and Warburton been equipped, but several other travellers in South and Central Australia. ...
— Spinifex and Sand - Five Years' Pioneering and Exploration in Western Australia • David W Carnegie

... The elder man was possessed by a fixed idea and his prejudices were strong, but he was, nevertheless, a judge of character, and the rancher's manner impressed him. ...
— Prescott of Saskatchewan • Harold Bindloss

... fact, there is a strong didactic streak in both father and daughter. Louisa May seldom misses a chance to bring out the moral of a homely virtue. The power of repetition was to them a natural means of illustration. It is said that the elder Alcott, while teaching school, would frequently whip himself when the scholars misbehaved, to show that the Divine Teacher-God-was pained when his children of the earth were bad. Quite often the ...
— Essays Before a Sonata • Charles Ives

... least, after a season. But Ferrars had not to wait. His father, who watched his career with the passionate interest with which a Newmarket man watches the development of some gifted yearling, took care that all the odds should be in his favour in the race of life. An old colleague of the elder Mr. Ferrars, a worthy peer with many boroughs, placed a seat at the disposal of the youthful hero, the moment he was prepared to accept it, and he might be said to have left the University only to ...
— Endymion • Benjamin Disraeli

... meanwhile, and for a brief holiday, let us laugh and be as pleasant as we can. And you elder folks—a little joking and dancing and fooling will do even you no harm. The author wishes you a Merry Christmas, and welcomes you to the Fireside ...
— A Mother's List of Books for Children • Gertrude Weld Arnold

... the common Elder," says Gerard, "groweth everywhere; and it is planted about cony burrows, for the shadow of the conies." Formerly it was much [165] cultivated near our English cottages, because supposed to afford protection ...
— Herbal Simples Approved for Modern Uses of Cure • William Thomas Fernie

... returned to the Centropolis at noon, we found Mrs. Trescott and her daughter chatting with my wife. The elder woman was ill-groomed, as are all women of her class in comparison with their town sisters, and angular. I knew the type so well that I could read the traces of farm cares in her face and form. The serving of gangs of harvesters and threshers, the ever-recurring ...
— Aladdin & Co. - A Romance of Yankee Magic • Herbert Quick

... temple of ANAITIS. Mr. M'Queen had laid stress on the name given to the place by the country people,—Ainnit; and added, 'I knew not what to make of this piece of antiquity, till I met with the Anaitidis delubrum in Lydia, mentioned by Pausanias and the elder Pliny.' Dr. Johnson, with his usual acuteness, examined Mr. M'Queen as to the meaning of the word Ainnit, in Erse; and it proved to be a water-place, or a place near water, 'which,' said Mr. M'Queen, 'agrees with all the descriptions of the temples of that goddess, which were situated ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 5 • Boswell

... some gentlemen charged to find the dead body of M. de Bois-Dauphin the elder, who had been killed in the battle; they asked me to go with them to the camp, to pick him out, if we could, among the dead; but it was not possible to recognize him, the bodies being all far gone in corruption, and their faces changed. We saw more than half a league round us the earth all covered ...
— The Harvard Classics Volume 38 - Scientific Papers (Physiology, Medicine, Surgery, Geology) • Various

... home. On the further side of the stream stood a little detached pavilion, kept exclusively for guests, after the fashion of all Dutch houses in the East. This annexe is generally considered the house of the elder son, but it is more usually built and used for the accommodation of guests; an excellent arrangement in a country where both entertainers and entertained wish occasionally to repose in attire, whose lightness is best suited to the climate. A rustic bridge connected the two buildings, ...
— From Jungle to Java - The Trivial Impressions of a Short Excursion to Netherlands India • Arthur Keyser

... meeting on the moor between Learn and Edgar, Mr. Dundas drove to the Hill, carrying Fina with him. Leam had a fit of shyness and refused to go: thus Sebastian had the child to himself, and was not sorry to be without his elder and less congenial daughter. He owned to himself that she was good, very good indeed, and a great deal better than he ever expected she would be; yet for all that, with her more than Oriental gravity and reserve, and that look of tragedy haunting her face, she was not an amusing companion, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - February, 1876, Vol. XVII, No. 98. • Various

... to accumulate and keep made the rule of his life. You may imagine what a serious trouble this unhappy disposition of her son was to Mrs. Sidney, who felt perhaps the more from contrasting his character with that of an elder brother, who had died from a lingering illness about two years previously, and who had been equally distinguished for a generous nature, which had sometimes led him to the opposite extreme ...
— The Young Lord and Other Tales - to which is added Victorine Durocher • Camilla Toulmin

... Rosebank to amuse mother. She likes it as much as any of us, though she doesn't see very well, poor dear, nor hear either. But we must always consider that the old have not many amusements," said the elder Miss Hill. ...
— The Marriage of Elinor • Margaret Oliphant

... Gridley people Dick's father, Eben Prescott, was accounted the best educated man in town. The elder Prescott had taken high honors at college; he had afterwards graduated in law, and, for a while, had tried to build up a practice. Eben Prescott was not lazy, but he was a student, much given to dreaming. He had finally been driven to opening ...
— The High School Freshmen - Dick & Co.'s First Year Pranks and Sports • H. Irving Hancock

... The garrison was a small one, and had not been reinforced. A few of them were killed, and the remainder taken; with a loss, to the assailants, of only twenty-four men and officers. A Portuguese regiment, commanded by Colonel Elder, then set to work; and these—in spite of a heavy fire, kept up all night by the French forts—completed a parallel, 600 yards ...
— Under Wellington's Command - A Tale of the Peninsular War • G. A. Henty

... return, before it was possible for me to receive my promised letter, I was surprised by a visit from Mr. Ablewhite the elder, and was informed that Mr. Godfrey had got his dismissal—AND HAD ACCEPTED ...
— The Moonstone • Wilkie Collins

... given body to the new ideals when Masaccio began his brief career, and in the education, the awakening, of the younger artist the example of the elder must have been of incalculable force. But a type gains vastly in significance by being presented in some action along with other individuals of the same type; and here Donatello was apt, rather than to draw his meed of ...
— The Florentine Painters of the Renaissance - With An Index To Their Works • Bernhard Berenson

... her charge home, and when dusk came on rocked him to sleep, and snugly folded the covering of his crib over the little throbbing heart, whose hours of trial were yet veiled by the impenetrable curtain of futurity. Mrs. Martin and her elder children had gone to a concert, and, of course, the nurse was to remain with Johnny until his mother's return. Standing beside the crib, and gazing down at the rosy cheeks and curling locks, nestled against the pillow, Beulah's thoughts ...
— Beulah • Augusta J. Evans

... and it made a great effort to extend them. Delighted at the discovery of companions in her solitude, companions, too, whose language she could understand, Piccolissima was eager to make their acquaintance; so she offered them her stick of candy. One of the flies—it was the elder—having fixed upon the little prodigy one of the thousand faces of his brown, sparkling eyes, surrounded with golden eyelashes, he then placed, one by one, his little black feet upon the stick of sugar candy, stretched forth his trunk, and began ...
— Piccolissima • Eliza Lee Follen

... Ernestine line), Saxe-Coburg, Saxe-Meiningen, Saxe-Hildburghausen, Mecklenburg-Strelitz, Holstein-Oldenburg, Anhalt-Dessau, Anhalt- Bernburg, Anhalt-Kothen, Schwarzburg-Sondershausen, Schwarzburg- Rudolstadt, Hohenzollern-Hechingen, Lichtenstein, Hohenzollern- Sigmaringen, Waldeck, Reuss the elder, and Reuss the younger branch,[8] Schaumburg-Lippe, Lippe-Detmold, Hesse-Homburg: finally, the free towns, Lubeck, Frankfort on the Maine, Bremen, and Hamburg.[9] At Frankfort on the Maine a permanent diet, consisting of plenipotentiaries from the thirty-nine ...
— Germany from the Earliest Period Vol. 4 • Wolfgang Menzel, Trans. Mrs. George Horrocks

... pity of colonization," the elder engineer sighed. "It builds new lands at the expense of the old, taking all their strongest, most adventurous and most imaginative. Soon the original country or continent or planet is peopled only by ...
— Man of Many Minds • E. Everett Evans

... exclaimed the elder man at length, "d—d bad luck! In this country the less you find, the less you see, the less you understand, the simpler is your existence. Those Nihilists, with their mysterious ways and their reprehensible love of explosives, ...
— The Sowers • Henry Seton Merriman

... steaming, and an appetizing odor reminds them that they are hungry. The basket and the cart are hastily dropped, but not the doll, and they all run to the doorstep. The brother is placed in the middle and the sisters seat themselves on either side. The elder girl still holds her doll with maternal solicitude; the other two children clasp hands, and the sister's arm is put around ...
— Jean Francois Millet • Estelle M. Hurll

... Ignaz Moscheles first comprehended Chopin and his methods of execution. The German pianist had found his music harsh and dilettantish in modulation, but Chopin's originality of performance—"he glides lightly over the keys in a fairy-like way with his delicate fingers"—quite reconciled the elder man to this ...
— Chopin: The Man and His Music • James Huneker

... on the character and achievements of George and Robert Stephenson. These for the most part speak for themselves. Both were emphatically true men, exhibiting in their lives many sterling qualities. No beginning could have been less promising than that of the elder Stephenson. Born in a poor condition, yet rich in spirit, he was from the first compelled to rely upon himself; and every step of advance which he made was conquered by patient labour. Whether working as a brakesman or an engineer, his mind was always ...
— Lives of the Engineers - The Locomotive. George and Robert Stephenson • Samuel Smiles

... plays in which such persons are baffled, exposed, covered with derision, and insulted by triumphant husbands. Such is the fate of Falstaff, with all his wit and knowledge of the world. Such is the fate of Brisac in Fletcher's Elder Brother, and of Ricardo and Ubaldo in Massinger's Picture. Sometimes, as in the Fatal Dowry and Love's Cruelty, the outraged honour of families is repaired by a bloody revenge. If now and then the lover is represented as an accomplished ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... followed Uncle John into the tatter's room and smoked one of the newly-discovered cigars while the elder man lay back in an easy chair ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces • Edith Van Dyne

... divided into two classes. The first, containing the five elder scholars, went to sit at the feet of Mr. Welsby himself; while the second remained behind in what was known as the schoolroom, and received instruction ...
— The Triple Alliance • Harold Avery

... pertains to material wealth, there existed the undeveloped capacity of 100 embryo states of an imperial confederacy of republics, the future abode of intelligent millions, unrevealed as yet to the "earnest" but unconscious "expectation" of the elder families of man, darkly hidden by the impenetrable veil of waters. There is, to my mind, says Everett, an overwhelming sadness in this long insulation of America from the brotherhood of humanity, not inappropriately reflected in the ...
— Christopher Columbus and His Monument Columbia • Various

... was said at that time. They saw a good deal of both brothers during the next few weeks. But they saw nothing for a good while that inclined either Violet or Davie to change their opinion of the elder one. ...
— The Inglises - How the Way Opened • Margaret Murray Robertson

... indeed, for the alarm of the elder, for he had checked himself on the edge of a ravine or canyon fully a thousand feet deep. One step further and he would have ...
— Two Boys in Wyoming - A Tale of Adventure (Northwest Series, No. 3) • Edward S. Ellis

... Elizabeth. His contemporary, De Thou, borrowed much from Buchanan. Camden reproaches him with this, partly because in Scotland men preached atrocious principles with regard to the authority of the people and their right of keeping their kings in order. The elder Cecil had invited him to write the history of the Queen, and had communicated to him numerous documents for this purpose, which were either in his own possession or belonged to the national archives. Camden set cautiously ...
— A History of England Principally in the Seventeenth Century, Volume I (of 6) • Leopold von Ranke

... your relationship in itself is of no consequence,' continued the elder, 'but just look at this. You have forced on the marriage by unscrupulous means, your object being only too clearly to live out of ...
— A Laodicean • Thomas Hardy

... are resorted to to prevent the attacks, as to sponge the skin with a decoction of walnut or elder leaves, of tobacco, to dust with Persian insect powder, to keep a light blanket or fly net on the horse, to close doors and windows with fine screens and destroy by pyrethrum any flies that have gained admission, to remove all manure heaps that ...
— Special Report on Diseases of the Horse • United States Department of Agriculture

... He told us that he came nearly being the Godfather of young Sothern, and that he was to have been called "Edwin" after himself; but the reason why his name was changed to "Edward," he explained, was as follows: When young Sothern was born in New Orleans, the elder Sothern telegraphed Booth, asking him to stand as Godfather to his boy, but Booth did not wish to take the responsibility, doubtless for reasons of his own, and so his name was changed to "Edward"; but he confessed that it was a matter he greatly regretted. ...
— Defenders of Democracy • Militia of Mercy

... balm, bilberry, cabbage, carrot, elder, eringoes, figs, flax, hawthorn, oak, pear, plums, prunes, ...
— The plant-lore & garden-craft of Shakespeare • Henry Nicholson Ellacombe

... Carker the Manager. Mr Carker the Junior, Walter's friend, was his brother; two or three years older than he, but widely removed in station. The younger brother's post was on the top of the official ladder; the elder brother's at the bottom. The elder brother never gained a stave, or raised his foot to mount one. Young men passed above his head, and rose and rose; but he was always at the bottom. He was quite resigned to occupy that low condition: never complained ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens

... but I say 't is true. The elder of them, being put to nurse, Was by a beggar-woman stolen away, And, ignorant of his birth and parentage, Became a bricklayer when he came to age. His son am I; deny it, if ...
— King Henry VI, Second Part • William Shakespeare [Rolfe edition]

... and his brother, while the younger was carried off by Theseus, and came to Naxos after he deserted her; and a nurse called Korkyne came with her, whose tomb they point out. Then Naxians also says that this Ariadne died there, and is honoured, but not so much as the elder; for at the feast in honour of the elder, there are merriment and revelry, but at that of the younger gloomy ...
— Plutarch's Lives, Volume I (of 4) • Plutarch

... be called who, having no guide, might have failed to walk straightforward; but since this man had a guide, his error and his fault can rise higher; and therefore he is to be called, not vile, but most vile. And likewise he who, by his father or by some elder of his race is ennobled, and does not continue in a noble course, not only is he vile, but he is most vile, and deserving of as much contempt and infamy as any other villain, if not of more. And because a man may preserve ...
— The Banquet (Il Convito) • Dante Alighieri

... to his task amid the bitterness of party strife. His brother Aristobulus, belonging to the party of the Sadducees, and who had taken Damascus, was popular with the people, and compelled his elder brother to abdicate in his favor, and an end came ...
— Ancient States and Empires • John Lord

... or December, came he gave his two daughters in marriage, one to the king and one to the minister. Immediately after the marriage the Brahman said good-bye to his daughters, and did not see them again for twelve years. Then he visited the elder one, who had married the king. She gave him a wooden stand on which to sit while eating, and water in which to wash his feet, and then said, "Papa, papa, there is pudding to eat, there is water to drink." But the Brahman said, "Before I eat ...
— Deccan Nursery Tales - or, Fairy Tales from the South • Charles Augustus Kincaid

... La Fayette. Brissot overpowered Orleans; Barere and Robespierre, and their faction, mastered them both, and cut off their heads. All who were not Royalists have been listed in some or other of these divisions. If it were of any use to settle a precedence, the elder ought to have his rank. The first authors, plotters, and contrivers of this monstrous scheme seem to me entitled to the first place in our distrust and abhorrence. I have seen some of those who are thought the best amongst the ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. IV. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... and son of Sir John Temple (died 1704), Solicitor and Attorney-General, and Speaker of the Irish House of Commons. "Jack" Temple acquired the estate of Moor Park, Surrey, by his marriage with Elizabeth, granddaughter of Sir William Temple, and elder daughter of John Temple, who committed suicide in 1689. As late as 1706 Swift received an invitation to ...
— The Journal to Stella • Jonathan Swift

... for, of course, only one or two can take principal parts, and therefore some of the children must be content to take the smaller ones. It is a good plan to take it in turns to play the best parts, and if the elder children are kind and thoughtful, they will try to make some easy little parts, so that their younger brothers and sisters may also join in the fun. Here we give you a very simple charade, the words of which you may learn, and then act, after which you will very likely be able to make up charades ...
— My Book of Indoor Games • Clarence Squareman

... under date of January 9, 1841, was a fresh step in his career. In 1839 both his sisters married, and both married doctors. Dr. Cooke, the husband of the elder sister, who was settled in Coventry, had begun to give him some instruction in the principles of medicine as early as the preceding June. It was now arranged that he should go as assistant to Mr. Chandler, of Rotherhithe, ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 1 • Leonard Huxley

... the old country, and one of them had somehow come into the possession of John Thacher's grandfather when grafted fruit was a thing to be treasured and jealously guarded. It had been told that when the elder Thacher had given away cuttings he had always stolen to the orchards in the night afterward and ruined them. However, when the family had grown more generous in later years it had seemed to be without avail, for, on their neighbors' trees or their ...
— A Country Doctor and Selected Stories and Sketches • Sarah Orne Jewett

... catch her here?' asked the elder man, evidently annoyed. 'Didn't he find the money on this table in an envelope addressed to her? Didn't he have two witnesses with him? Or is all ...
— The Primadonna • F. Marion Crawford

... of selling something to the passengers, and to sit on the rocks in the sun and dream as maidens do. I fancy it would be better for Josephine and for all the rest if there were no station and no passing trains. The elder women were uniformly ugly, but not repulsive like the Mojaves; the place swarmed with children, and the babies, aged women, and pleasing young girls grouped most ...
— Our Italy • Charles Dudley Warner

... The elder clerk had some clerks under him at Quebec, who after hearing of the contents of Dolu's letter, were prepared to resist any curtailment of their rights. Champlain appeased them, and assured them that they would be allowed freedom of trading at least until the arrival of Guillaume de Caen, the extent ...
— The Makers of Canada: Champlain • N. E. Dionne

... that he was beginning to put his palace in a fit state for defence. [2] Therefore, with much trepidation, he began to collect his own forces, and at the same time he sent his younger son Sabaris into the hills with the women, his own wife, and the wife of his elder son and his daughters, taking the best of their ornaments and furniture with them and an escort to be their guide. Meanwhile he despatched a party to discover what Cyrus was doing, and organised ...
— Cyropaedia - The Education Of Cyrus • Xenophon

... condition of the peasant, their general opinion of his lot is not unfavorable. Voltaire thinks him well off on the whole. Rousseau is constantly vaunting not only the morality but the happiness of rural life. Mirabeau the elder says that gayety is disappearing, perhaps because the people are too rich, and argues that France is not decrepit but vigorous.[Footnote: La Bruyere, Caracteres, ii. 61 (de l'homme). Voltaire, passim, xxxi. 481, Dict. philos. (Population). ...
— The Eve of the French Revolution • Edward J. Lowell

... this wise: The shell, S, is removed. Then a disk of steatite affixed to an insulating handle is rubbed for a few instants with a fox's "brush," and held near J until a spark occurs. Then the apparatus is grasped by the support, F, and an elder-pith ball suspended by a flaxen thread from a good conducting support is brought near J. The ball will be quickly repelled, and care must be taken that it does not come into contact with J. After this the apparatus is placed upon a table, the shell, S, is taken by its ...
— Scientific American Supplement, Vol. XXI., No. 531, March 6, 1886 • Various

... see thee trauerse, to see thee heere, to see thee there, to see thee passe thy puncto, thy stock, thy reuerse, thy distance, thy montant: Is he dead, my Ethiopian? Is he dead, my Francisco? ha Bully? what saies my Esculapius? my Galien? my heart of Elder? ha? is he dead bully-Stale? is he dead? Cai. By gar, he is de Coward-Iack-Priest of de vorld: he is not show ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare

... conversation less than the previous one, because the lesser ones were asleep, or walking out, and the elder ones having learnt that a new week was to be begun steadily with lessons, thought it advisable to bring themselves as little into notice as possible; but fate was sure to pursue them sooner or later, for Rachel had come down resolved on testing their acquirements, and ...
— The Clever Woman of the Family • Charlotte M. Yonge

... his father-in-law and persuaded him to take up his cause. "Your master," said Louis to the ambassadors of the father, "is king no longer. Here stands the king of the English." These words were the signal for a general attack on the elder king. Headed by Louis, his neighbours and discontented subjects took arms against him, and it was not till September that he prevailed over them. In July the great English barons of the north and centre rose in insurrection, and William the Lion, king of the ...
— A Student's History of England, v. 1 (of 3) - From the earliest times to the Death of King Edward VII • Samuel Rawson Gardiner

... rooms. This furring should be done with light studs, secured to the floor timbers above and below, having no connection with the stone walls, the inside of which may be left quite rough, whatever the "builders in the elder days of art" might say to such negligence. For greater permanence and security against fire, instead of wood furrings you may build a lining of brick, leaving an air space of several inches between it and ...
— Homes And How To Make Them • Eugene Gardner

... On which all the rest depended For support, were play and women. What a base on which to rest me! Here my tongue would not be able To acquaint you 'in extenso' With my actions: a brief abstract May, however, be attempted. I, to outrage a young maiden, Stabbed to death a noble elder, Her own father: for the sake Of his wife, a most respected Cavalier I slew, as he Lay beside her in the helpless State of sleep, his honour bathing In his blood, the bed presenting A sad theatre of crimes, Murder and adultery blended. Thus the father and the husband Life for honour's ...
— The Purgatory of St. Patrick • Pedro Calderon de la Barca

... lay the brothers, alike in form, alike even in feature. But in heart they bore no mark of the resemblance of kindred. Envy of the elder-born early possessed the soul of Robert, like a base fiend; first had it driven thence ...
— Autumn Leaves - Original Pieces in Prose and Verse • Various

... are fled, the herbage now returns to the fields, and the leaves to the trees. The earth changes its appearance, and the decreasing rivers glide along their banks: the elder Grace, together with the Nymphs, and her two sisters, ventures naked to lead off the dance. That you are not to expect things permanent, the year, and the hour that hurries away the agreeable day, admonish us. The colds are mitigated by the zephyrs: the summer follows close upon ...
— The Works of Horace • Horace

... are even," said Henri, laughing; "but really, without joking, I feel confident that the white flag is floating at this moment on the castle at Nantes; but it is not of that, Charles, that I wish to speak now. You have always been an elder brother to me. We have always been like brothers, have ...
— La Vendee • Anthony Trollope

... concave mirror of three gracious dames, with his back somewhat difficultly bent, as if under ordinary circumstances he would be as upright as any Briton who owes not a penny, with very wholesome cheeks and lips which move in and out as he forms his well-rounded periods, is, of course, Mr. Athel the elder; he plays with his watch-guard, and is clearly in hearty mood, not at all disliking the things that are being said about a certain member of the legislature. The other is as emphatically an Englishman, but of a different type; his ...
— A Life's Morning • George Gissing

... the Sentence of deposition, past by the Presbytery of Stirling against Mr. James Forsyth Elder late Incumbent at St. Ninians, for Celebrating an ...
— The Acts Of The General Assemblies of the Church of Scotland

... of which shrub in later years always brought back the scene before him; overhead, among the boughs of a lime-tree, a thrush fluted now cheerfully, now pathetically, like one who was testing a gift of lyrical improvisation. The elder man, wearied by a hard term's work, displayed a certain irritability of argument. Hugh held tenaciously to his points; and at last, after a silence, his friend turned to him and said, "Well, after all, it reduces itself to this; have you an ...
— Beside Still Waters • Arthur Christopher Benson

... born at Bel Air, Maryland, November 12, 1833. He was named Edwin, after his father's friend, Edwin Forrest, and Thomas, after Thomas Flynn, the actor, whom the elder Booth had known intimately in London. His son dropped the name of Thomas, later in life, and was only known to the public by the name of Edwin Booth. Owing to his father's wandering life Edwin had few advantages of education, but he made the most of his opportunities, and indeed ...
— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 8 (of 8) • Various

... their age in. Venerable's not a nice word to use about anything except a cathedral. You can call the Abbey a venerable edifice or the sacred fane, but it would look nicer if you call the old buffers "the Elder Statesmen." Good phrase that! Hasn't been used much, either. Get it done quickly, will you?" He turned to John. "You might have made us miss the Home Edition with your desire ...
— The Foolish Lovers • St. John G. Ervine

... adhered to, and the two elder brothers reached the ages of fifty-five and fifty-six, without altering their condition. In the mean time, Frederick married a young woman of rank and fortune; the fruits of their union being the two young candidates for the hand ...
— Precaution • James Fenimore Cooper

... too the alliance with Spain was very useful to the King of England. Ferdinand had married his elder daughter Juana to Maximilian's son the Archduke Philip: Philip could not possibly uphold the Yorkist interests so zealously as his father or his grandmother. It was an event of importance that at Whitsuntide 1500 ...
— A History of England Principally in the Seventeenth Century, Volume I (of 6) • Leopold von Ranke

... still be seen "Dorothy Vernon's Door," whence the heiress of Haddon stole out one moonlight night to join her lover. The story generally told is that, while her elder sister, the affianced bride of Sir Thomas Stanley, second son of the Earl of Derby, was made much of in her recognised attachment, Dorothy, on the other hand, was not only kept in the background, but every obstacle was thrown in her way against a connection she had formed with John ...
— Strange Pages from Family Papers • T. F. Thiselton Dyer

... weasel-faced infant, with nerves of steel tempered in fire-water, and agile as a squirrel. He drove a landau with a skill never yet at fault in London or Paris. He had a lizard's eye, as sharp as my own, and he could mount a horse like the elder Franconi. With the rosy cheeks and yellow hair of one of Rubens' Madonnas he was double-faced as a prince, and as knowing as an old attorney; in short, at the age of ten he was nothing more nor less than a blossom of depravity, ...
— The Firm of Nucingen • Honore de Balzac

... around the core ideological objective of eventual unification of Korea under Pyongyang's control. KIM's son, the current ruler KIM Jong Il, was officially designated as his father's successor in 1980, assuming a growing political and managerial role until the elder KIM's death in 1994. After decades of economic mismanagement and resource misallocation, the DPRK since the mid-1990s has relied heavily on international aid to feed its population while continuing to expend resources to maintain an army of approximately ...
— The 2008 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.

... be greatest just outside of the spectrum. Yet that is the infirmity of the seneschals, who do not know their sovereign when he appears. The theory of society supposes the existence and sovereignty of these. It divines afar off their coming. It says with the elder gods,— ...
— Essays, Second Series • Ralph Waldo Emerson

... Northern Indians were much excited and encouraged by the defeat of St. Clair, coming as it did so close upon the defeat of Harmar. The double disaster to the American arms made the young braves very bold, and it became impossible for the elder men to restrain them. [Footnote: American State Papers, IV., pp. 263, 439, etc.] The Creeks harassed the frontiers of Georgia somewhat, but devoted their main attention to the Tennesseeans, and especially to the isolated settlements on the Cumberland. The Chickamauga towns were right ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume Four - Louisiana and the Northwest, 1791-1807 • Theodore Roosevelt

... A year afterward his elder brother married one of his cousins, the Countess Claude Beauharnais, and the sight of this youthful happy love excited envy in the heart of the young lieutenant of seventeen years, and awoke in him ...
— The Empress Josephine • Louise Muhlbach

... with regard to whom the worthy speech is preserved, that he said it was like the Tuscans for son to beat father, and he hoped, in God's name, that Giovanni or Gian would outstrip him, and Gentile, the elder, outstrip both. The brothers worked together and were true and affectionate brothers, ...
— The Old Masters and Their Pictures - For the Use of Schools and Learners in Art • Sarah Tytler

... Thou readest not Valtare Scott, thou!" cries the master. "I was recounting to Monsieur Newcome thy history and my misfortunes. Go seek coffee for us, nigaud." And as the two gentlemen partake of that exhilarating liquor, the elder confides gaily to his guest the reason why he prefers taking coffee at the hotel to the coffee at the great Cafe of the Redoute, with a duris urgens in rebus egestass! pronounced in the ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray

... orderly-room voice, which is almost as musical as his singing one, he tongue-lashed those lads in such sort as was a privilege and a revelation to listen to. Till then they had known him almost as a relative—we were all brevet, deputy, or acting uncles to The Infant's friends' brood—a sympathetic elder brother, sound on finance. They had never met Colonel A.L. Corkran in the Chair of Justice. And while he flayed and rent and blistered, and wiped the floor with them, and while they looked for hiding-places and found none on that floor, I remembered (1) the up-ending of 'Dolly' Macshane ...
— A Diversity of Creatures • Rudyard Kipling

... Sydney," said a pleading voice, as a pair of childish blue eyes were lifted up to the face of the elder boy, "I do want to see the water-mill! I won't ...
— Laugh and Play - A Collection of Original stories • Various

... inquiry was addressed to the governess, as the most learned person present. Miss Minerva referred to her elder pupil with an encouraging smile. "Maria will inform you," she said. "Her studies in natural history have made her well acquainted with the ...
— Heart and Science - A Story of the Present Time • Wilkie Collins

... down then on the hard boards of a bed, and the grey man kindled a fire, and he threw logs of elder-wood on it, till they went near being smothered with the smoke. They saw a hag in the house then having three heads on her lean neck; and there was on the other side a man without a head, having one eye, and it in his breast. "Rise up, you that are in the house, and make music for the King of the ...
— Gods and Fighting Men • Lady I. A. Gregory

... appropriate expression for the religious hopes and moods which moved the nations of Graeco-Roman Empire from the second to the fifth centuries, the ecclesiastical dogmatic which was developed in the same period, may appear as a younger sister of Neoplatonism which was fostered by the elder one, but which fought and finally conquered her. The Neoplatonists themselves described the ecclesiastical theologians as intruders who appropriated Greek philosophy, but mixed it with foreign fables. Hence Porphyry said of Origen (in Euseb., H. E. VI. 19): "The outer life ...
— History of Dogma, Volume 1 (of 7) • Adolph Harnack

... the church was papered and painted by Elder B. A. Carlan at a cost of less than $1,000. New cushions, carpets, etc., brought ...
— The Kirk on Rutgers Farm • Frederick Bruckbauer

... who is dead, tapping the last on which he was making the bast shoe, and two little girls, running out from the hot house carrying in their skirts plums they had plucked from the trees there, came upon Prince Andrew. On seeing the young master, the elder one with frightened look clutched her younger companion by the hand and hid with her behind a birch tree, not stopping to pick up some green ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy



Words linked to "Elder" :   doyen, black elderberry, adult, danewort, European red elder, California box elder, elder hand, elderberry bush, bush, blue elder, burweed marsh elder, marsh elder, Strauss the Elder, Sambucus, genus Sambucus, Pieter Brueghel the Elder, red-berried elder, box elder, dwarf elder, Agrippina the Elder, doyenne, common elder, Sambucus caerulea, church officer, Sambucus ebulus, elderberry, black elder, Pitt the Elder, American red elder, elder statesman, grownup, Edward the Elder, Cosimo the Elder, Sambucus racemosa, Breughel the Elder, European elder, blue elderberry, Sambucus pubens, Scipio the Elder, stinking elder, eldership, Pliny the Elder, Holbein the Elder, sr., Sambucus nigra, bourtree, Dionysius the Elder



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