"Ruff" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... expanded and the ruff on the back of his neck began to rise. He uttered a low, reverberating bark. It was almost a growl and it sounded threatening. He dashed down ...
— Six Little Bunkers at Mammy June's • Laura Lee Hope
... so I vos jist a-chargin' agin ven a great he-fellow, in a ruff coat and partic'lar large viskers, accostes me (ciwilly I must say, ...
— The Sketches of Seymour (Illustrated), Complete • Robert Seymour
... within sight from Desdemona's cave when her time came. She leaped and snapped, and faced overwhelming odds without wavering, but her race was run when the wolfhound's great weight bore her to the earth and his massive jaw closed about her ruff as a ...
— Jan - A Dog and a Romance • A. J. Dawson
... to play wif Ruff!" said Trouble. "I play wif Slider in barn, and den hims hoots get tired, so I bringed him over to ride in ...
— The Curlytops and Their Pets - or Uncle Toby's Strange Collection • Howard R. Garis
... print by Vertue, of Queen Elizabeth going in a procession to Lord Hunsdon. This procession is led by Lady Hunsdon, who no doubt was the leader likewise of the fashion; but it is impossible, with our ideas of grace and comfort, not to commiserate this unfortunate lady; whose standing-up wire ruff, rising above her head; whose stays, or bodice, so long-waisted as to reach to her knees; and the circumference of her large hoop farthingale, which seems to enclose her in a capacious tub; mark her out as one of the most pitiable martyrs of ancient modes. The amorous Sir Walter ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli
... claim to the designation of tragedies have survived to us from the Interludes, neither of them of much interest. Cambyses (1561), by Thomas Preston, has all the qualities of an imperfect Interlude. There are the base fellows and the clowns, Huff, Ruff, Snuff, Hob and Lob; the abstractions, Diligence, Shame, Common's Complaint, Small Hability, and the like; the Vice, Ambidexter, who enters 'with an old capcase on his head, an old pail about his hips for harness, a scummer ...
— The Growth of English Drama • Arnold Wynne
... owl, curlew and crested hern, Kingfisher, mallard, water-rail and tern, Chaffinch and greenfinch, warbler, stonechat, ruff, Pied wagtail, robin, fly-catcher and chough, Missel-thrush, magpie, sparrow-hawk, and jay, Built, those far ages gone, in this year's way. And the first man who walked the cliffs of Rame, As I this year, looked down and saw the same Blotches of rusty red on ledge and cleft With grey-green ...
— Georgian Poetry 1918-19 • Various
... corpse is more corpse-like than the queerly foreshortened dead body in the picture on anatomy at The Hague. The warrior's head, supposed to be a portrait of his father, is an ancient copy and a capital one. Old dame Elizabeth Bas, with her coif, ruff, and folded hands, holding a handkerchief, is a picture you return to ...
— Promenades of an Impressionist • James Huneker
... damask. Change of apparel; one afore dinner, another at after: one of Spanish fashion, another of Turkey. And to be brief, never content with enough, but always devising new fashions and strange. Yea a ruffian will have more in his ruff and his hose than he should spend in a year. He which ought to go in a russet coat, spends as much on apparel for him and his wife, as his father would have kept a ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin
... the rich scarlet on their heads, their lemon-coloured necks, the satiny white of their backs, tinged with fawn, the black pinions of the wings, and their neck surrounded with a ruff of grey feathers, to be king-vultures. Those we had killed were full-grown, and were about the size of an ordinary goose. As I saw them perched on the branches, tearing away at huge masses of flesh, I must say that, notwithstanding their regal titles, they ...
— The Young Llanero - A Story of War and Wild Life in Venezuela • W.H.G. Kingston
... caught little. He was warmly clad in sealskin; around his neck was a white bearskin ruff, as warm as toast, and very pretty, too, as soft and fluffy as a lady's boa. On his feet were moccasins of walrus hide. He had been perhaps an hour watching the hole in the ice, and knelt there so still that he looked almost as though he were frozen. ...
— Kalitan, Our Little Alaskan Cousin • Mary F. Nixon-Roulet
... Marechal de Bassompierre; he had preserved with his white locks an air of youth and vivacity curious to see. His noble and polished manners showed a certain gallantry, antiquated like his costume—for he wore a ruff in the fashion of Henri IV, and the slashed sleeves fashionable in the former reign, an absurdity which was unpardonable in the eyes of the beaux of the court. This would not have appeared more singular than anything else at present; but it is admitted that in every ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... exactly such a one as Sir Robert says they would have admired; a picture probably in a tawdry frame, representing Queen Bess, just as queens were always painted then, bedizened with 'browches, pearls, and owches,' satin and ruff, and probably with crown on head and sceptre in hand, made up, as likely as not, expressly for the purpose for which it was used. In the name of all simplicity and honesty, I ask, why is Raleigh to be accused of saying that ...
— Sir Walter Raleigh and his Time from - "Plays and Puritans and Other Historical Essays" • Charles Kingsley
... chancel was rebuilt, but the Fauconberg monuments in it were replaced. Sir William Belasyse, who received the Newburgh property from his uncle, the first owner, died in 1603, and his fine Jacobean tomb, painted in red, black and gold, shows him with a beard and ruff. His portrait hangs in one of the drawing-rooms of the Priory. The later monuments, adorned with great carved figures, are all interesting. They encroach so much on the space in the narrow chancel that ...
— Yorkshire Painted And Described • Gordon Home
... in the afternoon, Tom resignedly underwent the ordeal of being dressed for dinner. He found himself as finely clothed as before, but everything different, everything changed, from his ruff to his stockings. He was presently conducted with much state to a spacious and ornate apartment, where a table was already set for one. Its furniture was all of massy gold, and beautified with designs which well-nigh made it priceless, since they were the work of Benvenuto. The room was half-filled ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... prince's favourite, one admitted to his privacy (no uncommon word in Jeremy Taylor and Fuller), has quite disappeared; so too has 'quirpo' (cuerpo), the name given to a jacket fitting close to the body; 'quellio' (cuello), a ruff or neck-collar; and 'matachin', the title of a sword-dance; these are all frequent in our early dramatists; and 'flota' was the constant name of the treasure-fleet from the Indies. 'Intermess' is employed by Evelyn, and is the Spanish ...
— English Past and Present • Richard Chenevix Trench
... life told over to him by his secretaries, being himself the auditor, as he was also the hero, and probably the author, of the whole book. It must have been a great sight to have seen the ex-minister, as bolt upright as a starched ruff and laced cassock could make him, seated in state beneath his canopy, and listening to the recitation of his compilers, while, standing bare in his presence, they informed him gravely, "Thus said the duke—so did the duke infer—such were your grace's sentiments upon this ...
— Rob Roy, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... Thoughts slipped through his mind quite casually, whether Hamlet were behaving well outside, what the old lady did when she was tired of dusting, who the stone figure lying near him might be, a figure very fine with his ruff and his peaked beard, his arms folded, his toes pointing upwards, whether the body were inside the stone like a mummy, or underneath the ground some-where; how strangely different the nave looked now from its Sunday ...
— Jeremy • Hugh Walpole
... was left with his chief valet. The toilet was completed in solemn silence. Then, the count walked to the mirror to take another look at his adored person. He gave a complaisant stroke to his ruff of richest Alencon, smoothed the folds of his habit, carefully arranged the lace frills that fell over his white hands, and then turning to ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... those at home, he was unprepared for the surprising appearance and manners of the great people his friend named to him. The gravest Senators of the Republic went in prodigious striped trousers, short cloaks and feathered hats. One nobleman wore a ruff and doctor's gown, another a black velvet tunic slashed with rose-colour; while the President of the dreaded Council of Ten was a terrible strutting fellow with a rapier-like nose, a buff leather jerkin and a trailing scarlet cloak that the crowd ...
— The Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton, Part 2 (of 10) • Edith Wharton
... slipt in from the preceding description. I incline to believe it to be the Demoiselle, Anthropoides Virgo, which is frequently seen as far north as Lake Baikal. It has a tuft of pure white from the eye, and a beautiful black pendent ruff or collar; the ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... his usual custom, in very plain fashion. He wore a wide-leaved, loosely shaped hat of dark felt, with a silken cord round the crown,—such as had been worn by the Beggars in the early days of the revolt. A high ruff encircled his neck, from which also depended one of the Beggars' medals, with the motto, 'Fideles au roy jusqu'a la besace,' while a loose surcoat of gray frieze cloth, over a tawny leather doublet, with wide slashed underclothes completed his ...
— A Wanderer in Holland • E. V. Lucas
... have walked far, and at the end of my walk I found the little white-flowered wood-ruff. It grew in a copse of young ash. When I had looked long at the flower, I delighted myself with the grace of the slim trees about it—their shining smoothness, their olive hue. Hard by stood a bush of wych elm; its tettered ...
— The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft • George Gissing
... walked to and fro, with their hands in their pockets, to see a match played by some scholars and some gentlemen fam'd for their skill. I gaped also and stared as a man in his way would doe; but a country ruff gentleman, being like to lose, did swear, at such a rate that my heart did grieve that those fine young men should hear it, and know there was such a thing as swearing in the kingdom. Coming to my lodging, I charged my son never to go to such publick ...
— From a Cornish Window - A New Edition • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... have been a labourer in the fields of Switzerland and Holland, and have not disdained the humble profession of postillion and ploughman. I was a petit maitre at Paris, and an abbe at Rome. I put on, at Hamburg, the Lutheran ruff, and with a triple chin and a formal countenance I dealt about me the word of God so as to excite the envy of the clergy. My fate was similar to that of a guinea, which at one time is in the hands of a Queen, and at another is in the fob of ...
— Love Romances of the Aristocracy • Thornton Hall
... else; that there man in the night-cap, with the red ruff round his neck, is Sail's fancy man, and he sometimes lets her have a cargo of fish for services done and performed, you understand—and so Sail she comes down this morning, and she finds Poll having a phililoo with him, that's all; but I wish ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... that a rook by wearing a pied feather, The cable hat-band, or the three-piled ruff, A yard of shoe-tie, or the Switzers knot On his French garters, should affect a humour! O, it is more ...
— The Poetaster - Or, His Arraignment • Ben Jonson
... everybody as the heir to Tilgate. And now the Colonel's difficulties gathered thicker around him. At last, in the fulness of time, the Admiral died, and slept with his fathers, whose Elizabethan ruff's were the honour and glory of the chancel at Tilgate; and then the day of reckoning was fairly upon him. How well he remembered that awful hour. He couldn't, he couldn't. He knew it was his duty to acknowledge his rightful sons and heirs, but he hadn't the courage. Things had ...
— What's Bred In the Bone • Grant Allen
... usual with him, was elegant, if not rich.[77] Oldys describes it, but mentions, that "he had a wrought nightcap under his hat;" this we have otherwise disposed of; he wore a ruff-band, a black wrought velvet night-gown over a hare-coloured satin doublet, and a black wrought waistcoat; black cut taffety ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli
... (and man's) neck is lost in a ruff, her sweeping locks, instead of parted on her brow, entwined with pearls or other gems to frame her face and make long lines down the length of her robe, are huddled under grotesque head-dresses, monstrous creations, rising and spreading until they ...
— Woman as Decoration • Emily Burbank
... over again, and taste the rapturous joy with which one killed that first nutcracker in the mountain gulley; the first wall-creeper which fluttered down from the precipice hung with icicles; the Temminck's stint—victim of a lucky shot, late in the evening, on the banks of the reservoir; the ruff, the grey-headed green woodpecker, the yellow-billed Alpine jackdaw, ...
— Alone • Norman Douglas
... collars as ever I seed. I lernt to twist shucks and weave chair bottoms. Then I lernt how to make white oak split chair bottoms. I made all kinds baskets. We had all sizes and kinds of baskets. When they git old they turn dark. Shuck bottom chairs last longer but they kinner ruff an' not so fancy. ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves: Volume II, Arkansas Narratives, Part 2 • Works Projects Administration
... all over sense. A skilful physiognomist would at a single glance have detected the sensible woman in the erect head, the compressed lips, square elbows, and firm, judicious step. Even her very garments seemed to partake of the prevailing character of their mistress. Her ruff always looked more sensible than any other body's; her shawl sat most sensibly on her shoulders; her walking-shoes were acknowledged to be very sensible, and she drew on her gloves with an air of sense, as if the one arm had been Seneca, the other ...
— The Wit of Women - Fourth Edition • Kate Sanborn
... well-known portrait of Henry III., King of France and Poland; a cap on his head, surmounting his long pale face and heavy eyes; a pointed beard, and a ruff round his neck. ...
— The Queen's Necklace • Alexandre Dumas pere
... field reaping wheat, their guns close at hand. Mr. Kilburn had trained his dog to scour the woods, and the faithful animal ever had his eyes and ears open, and was sniffing the wind if a wolf or bear was about. On this afternoon in August the dog came running in with his hair in a ruff, and growling. ...
— Harper's Young People, September 14, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... daily to Sir Walter. In return for the fruit, deeming himself much in her debt, he sent on shore a very courteous letter, and with it two ounces of ambergriece, an ounce of the essence of amber, a great glass of fine rose-water, an excellent picture of Mary Magdalen, and a cut-work ruff. Here he expected courtesies to stay, but the lady must positively have the last word, and as the English ships were starting her servants came on board with yet a letter, accompanying a basket of delicate white manchett bread, ...
— Raleigh • Edmund Gosse
... arrogant, impudent, insulting. She was in mourning, she had the most splendid black furs Mr. Britling had ever seen; her large triumphant profile came out of them like the head of a vulture out of its ruff; her elder brother was a wounded prisoner in Germany, her second was dead; it would seem that hers were the only sacrifices the war had yet extorted from any one. She spoke as though it gave her the sole right to criticise the war or ...
— Mr. Britling Sees It Through • H. G. Wells
... the faithless Ignacio, a grave and decorous figure was seated. His appearance was that of an elderly hidalgo, dressed in mourning, with mustaches of iron-gray carefully waxed and twisted around a pair of lantern-jaws. The monstrous hat and prodigious feather, the enormous ruff and exaggerated trunk-hose, contrasted with a frame shrivelled and wizened, all belonged to a century previous. Yet Father Jose was not astonished. His adventurous life and poetic imagination, continually on the lookout for the ...
— Legends and Tales • Bret Harte
... point of its tail, and lives principally in trees, although it can run very swiftly along the ground: when not provoked or disturbed it moves quietly about, with its frill lying back in plaits upon the body: but it is very irascible and, directly it is frightened, elevates the frill or ruff and makes for a tree; where if overtaken it throws itself upon its stern, raising its head and chest as high as it can upon the forelegs, then doubling its tail underneath the body and displaying a very formidable set of teeth. From the concavity of its large ...
— Journals Of Two Expeditions Of Discovery In North-West And Western Australia, Vol. 1 (of 2) • George Grey
... doors opening to the gardens at the end, and trees in full leaf. The proportions of this room are excellent, and everything but the ceiling, which is too plain. The busts of Bacon and Newton excellent; but that of Bacon looks more like a courtier than a philosopher: his ruff is elegantly plaited in white marble. By Cipriani's painted window, with its glorious anachronisms, we were much amused; and I regret that it is not recorded in Irish Bulls. It represents the presentation of Sir Isaac Newton ...
— The Life And Letters Of Maria Edgeworth, Vol. 1 • Maria Edgeworth
... world was kicking about at pleasure,—your gentlest smile might prove a blow. She seldom spoke unless she were spoken to, and fell into long reveries, with her eyes on the window or the coals. She wore a horrible sort of ruff,—"illusion," I think Allis called it,—which, of all contrivances that she could have chosen to encircle her sallow neck, was exactly the most unbecoming. She was always knitting blue stockings,—I never discovered for what or whom; and she wore her lifeless hair in the shape ...
— Men, Women, and Ghosts • Elizabeth Stuart Phelps
... hide, and, crouched as she was upon her hands and knees, half-hidden, moreover, by a tuft of dry grass, the man took her to be a wild dog or a jackal, and the hair which stood out round her head for the ruff ...
— Swallow • H. Rider Haggard
... git a slice I mus' not cease to try, But keep a-movin' fas' es life To hol' my piece ub pie. Dis ruff ol' worl' has little use Fur dem dat chance to fall, An' while youze gittin' up ag'in 'Twill ...
— Twentieth Century Negro Literature - Or, A Cyclopedia of Thought on the Vital Topics Relating - to the American Negro • Various
... of the throng and looked about her. Close at hand a tall, swaggering fellow was loafing about. He was dressed in yellow from head to foot, save where his doublet and hose were slashed with dirty red at elbows, shoulders, and hips. A dirty ruff was around his neck, and on his head he wore a great shapeless hat peaked up ...
— The Panchronicon • Harold Steele Mackaye
... lock step and retiring for the night to his donjon cell with a set of shiny and rather modern-looking leg irons on his ankles; Mary Queen of Scots and Catharine de' Medici in costumes strikingly similar; Oliver Goldsmith in Sir Walter Raleigh's neck ruff and Captain ...
— Sundry Accounts • Irvin S. Cobb
... aroused to a recognition of their beauty all at once. What contour there was in the turn of arm and shoulder under the close-fitting purple cloth! He was artistically thankful that there was no other trimming of the straight bodice than the line of buttons that descended from the full white ruff of swansdown at her throat, to her delicate, trim waist. Her unconscious stateliness of girlish form, and the conscious shyness of her manner, were the ...
— Theo - A Sprightly Love Story • Mrs. Frances Hodgson Burnett
... he told me not to do so no more, an' said suthin' to himself about devourin' widders. So I didn't darst to go up agin, he looked so kind o' furce an' sharp, till, last night, I reck'n'd the snow would sift in through the old ruff, an' I went up to offer him a comf'table for his bed. I knocked; but he didn't make no answer, so I pushed the door open an' went in. It was a good while sence I'd seen the inside o' the room,—for when he heerd me comin' up, he'd open the door a crack an' peek ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 25, November, 1859 • Various
... down on the kitchen table and showed the children how, in this position, it looked like a jungfrau; and recited a long German rhyme which told how Spain was the maiden's head, the Pyrenees her lace ruff, Germany her heart and bosom, England and Italy were two arms, and Russia, though it looked so big, was only a hoopskirt. This rhyme would probably be condemned as ...
— One of Ours • Willa Cather
... own constitution and manner of his living, and circumstances of his being infected, may direct his own medicines out of the ordinary drugs and preparations. Only that', says he, 'some recommend one thing as most sovereign, and some another. Some', says he, 'think that pill. ruff., which is called itself the anti-pestilential pill is the best preparation that can be made; others think that Venice treacle is sufficient of itself to resist the contagion; and I', says he, 'think as both these ...
— A Journal of the Plague Year • Daniel Defoe
... a chamber of the Tremont of the brick edifice, opposite, on the other side of Beacon Street. At one of the lower windows, a woman at work; at one above, a lady hemming a ruff or some such ladylike thing. She is pretty, young, and married; for a little boy comes to her knees, and she parts his hair, and caresses him in a motherly way. A note on colored paper is brought her; and she reads it, and puts it in her bosom. At another window, at some depth within the apartment, ...
— Passages From The American Notebooks, Volume 1 • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... more of your shoulders behind," he said very gravely. "You might as well wear a standing ruff as such ...
— The American • Henry James
... They wore a cloak, which only reached as far as the hips, and was always much ornamented; they carried a smooth or ribbed cap on one side of the head, and a small upright collar adorned the coat. This collar was replaced, after the first half of the sixteenth century, by the high, starched ruff, which was kept out by wires; ladies wore it still larger, when it had somewhat the appearance of an open fan at the ...
— Manners, Custom and Dress During the Middle Ages and During the Renaissance Period • Paul Lacroix
... the foe, but, with the true instinct of sporting blood, he would take no unfair advantage by stealthy advance on the preoccupied scratcher. He straddled, shook out his glossy ruff, and ...
— The Skipper and the Skipped - Being the Shore Log of Cap'n Aaron Sproul • Holman Day
... on that bench, smoking tobacco from long silver pipes; and by them are Fenton and Wishington, who have both tried to follow Drake's path around the world, and failed, though by no fault of their own. The short, prim man, in the huge yellow ruff, is Richard Hawkins, ...
— Ten Great Events in History • James Johonnot
... above your ruff, In the Holbein yonder? My deed ensures you! For the flame like a fencer shall give rebuff To your blades that blunder, you ...
— Ride to the Lady • Helen Gray Cone
... walking-stick and his hat, which he had removed, and the other hung heavily by his side. A quantity of grizzled hair descended in long tresses from his head, and rested upon the plaits of a stiff ruff, which effectually concealed his neck. So far all was well; but the face!—all the flesh of the face was coloured with the bluish leaden hue, which is sometimes produced by metallic medicines, administered in excessive quantities; the eyes showed an undue proportion of muddy ...
— J. S. Le Fanu's Ghostly Tales, Volume 1 • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
... Reykjavik. It is a moderate-sized, unpretending place, capable of holding three or four hundred persons, erected in very ancient times, but lately restored. The Icelanders are of the Lutheran religion, and a Lutheran clergyman, in a black gown, etc., with a ruff round his neck, such as our bishops are painted in about the time of James the First, was preaching a sermon. It was the first time I had heard Icelandic spoken continuously, and it struck me as a singularly sweet caressing language, ...
— Letters From High Latitudes • The Marquess of Dufferin (Lord Dufferin)
... brilliant in the billowy silken skirts, puffed sleeves, tight bodice, and wide ruff of Queen Elizabeth, and carried off well the character of that hot-tempered majesty, making no effort to disguise the fact that she was deeply wounded and ...
— Nobody • Louis Joseph Vance
... forehead. Our women have made themselves into wicked Faustinas and vulgar Anonymas long enough with their frizzes and short curls and "banging," as the square-cut straight lock on the forehead is called. Let us see the Madonna brow once more. The high ruff, the sleeve to the elbow, the dress cut to show the figure, all bring-back the days of our great-grandmothers: the opera is filled with Copley's portraits. The bonnets, too, are delightfully large, with long ...
— Lippincott's Magazine. Vol. XII, No. 33. December, 1873. • Various
... Sir Lionel did not pass on to the tea-tables as did the Finesses and the Longspades. He remained close at Miss Todd's elbow, as though his friendship was of a more enduring kind than that of others, as though he were more to Miss Todd than Mrs. Fuzzybell, nearer than Miss Ruff who had just been assured at her entrance that the decks should be made ready for action almost at once. A lion-hearted old warrior was Miss Ruff,—one who could not stand with patience the modern ...
— The Bertrams • Anthony Trollope
... Josiah went on. "One o' them pesky barn doors got loose in the night, and it's beat itself 'most off the hinges, I guess. I must see and get it fixed afore Mis' Starlin's round, or she'll be hoppin'. The wind was enough to take the ruff off, but how it could lift that 'ere heavy latch, ...
— Diana • Susan Warner
... by keeping his men in perfect order. He sent a present of gloves to the Governor's wife, a lady of the Stafford family. She returned fruit, sugar, and rusks. Not to be outdone he rejoined with ambergris, rosewater, a cut-work ruff, and a picture of the Magdalen. He was in the habit of taking pictures with him on his voyages. This interchange of courtesies was the one gleam of human kindness which lighted up for Ralegh his dismal journey. He dwells upon it gratefully in the journal ...
— Sir Walter Ralegh - A Biography • William Stebbing
... hallway a young woman of charming appearance had halted. Her glance was troubled, her manner ill at ease. To herself she kept repeating: "Did I tell Hudson to be here at a quarter to eleven, or a quarter past? Will she get the telephone message to bring the ruff? Without the ruff it would be absurd to be photographed. Without her ruff Mary Queen of Scots ...
— The Red Cross Girl • Richard Harding Davis
... Another, a small, brown bird, with modest plumage, surprised and delighted me, by a clear, full whistle, that sounded not unlike that of our own robin redbreast. We also saw numbers of a species of pigeon with black bills, slate-coloured bodies, and a ruff of white feathers about the neck. One of these Johnny brought down with his bow, besides wounding very seriously, (as he alleged), a considerable number of others. The woodpeckers and whistlers enjoyed a temporary immunity from his formidable shafts, reluctantly granted them ...
— The Island Home • Richard Archer
... lady, which the villagers point out as "old Fiddle o' God and his wife"—Fiddle o' God being his customary exclamation when angry, which tradition says was not seldom. The figures are kneeling—he in ruff and jerkin, she in black gown and hood, with tan-leather gloves extending up her arms. These figures, being highly colored, as was the fashion in the olden time, have a ludicrous appearance. We are told that when these monuments came from London they were the ...
— England, Picturesque and Descriptive - A Reminiscence of Foreign Travel • Joel Cook
... declension will have been completed, and his foolish battles and treaties will have given place to other foolish battles and treaties and oblivion will have swallowed this glistening bluebottle, plumes and fine lace and stately ruff and all. Why, he is but an adviser to the queen of half an island, whereas my Tamburlaine was lord of all the golden ancient East: and what does my Tamburlaine matter now, save that he gave Kit Marlowe the ...
— O Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1919 • Various
... understand, once and for all," he said, "that I will not be made love to, and that I can treat you only as a working; companion. My name will be Peter Ruff, and yours Miss Brown. You will have to dress like a secretary, and behave like one. Sometimes there will be plenty of work for you, and sometimes there will be none at all. Sometimes you will be bored to death, and sometimes there will be excitement. I do not wish ...
— Peter Ruff and the Double Four • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... that was to come off that night. The two young ladies attired themselves with much care, each with a view to effect. Margaret looked particularly to the assumption of a certain dignity, and her costume for the evening had been chosen with that end in view. A ruff, and her grand-mother's rich silk brocade, did give to her tall person all the dignity she ...
— Home Lights and Shadows • T. S. Arthur
... everything, had their eyes centered on a masked woman, a woman whom no one else could identify. They, and certain habitual frequenters of the opera balls, could alone recognize under the long shroud of the black domino, the hood and falling ruff which make the wearer unrecognizable, the rounded form, the individuality of figure and gait, the sway of the waist, the carriage of the head—the most intangible trifles to ordinary eyes, but to them the easiest ...
— Scenes from a Courtesan's Life • Honore de Balzac
... some particulars of the career of Mr. Payne. John Payne was born in 1842 of a Devonshire family, descended from that breezy old sea-dog, Sir John Hawkins. Mr. Payne, indeed, resembles Hawkins in appearance. He is an Elizabethan transferred bodily into the 19th and 20th centuries, his ruff lost in transit. Yet he not infrequently has a ruff even—a live one, for it is no uncommon event to see his favourite Angora leap on to his shoulders and coil himself half round his master's neck, looking not unlike a lady's boa—and its name, Parthenopaeus, ...
— The Life of Sir Richard Burton • Thomas Wright
... unaffected dignity, to which the thick, blue-black hair, the foreign beard, and the aquiline features lent an added touch of distinction. One was reminded of those dangerously mild and rather sad faces of Spanish soldiers which look at one from Velasquez's canvases. This man might wear a ruff and a velvet doublet, or, better yet, a coat of mail, she reflected, instead of the well-cut but rather worn gray ...
— The Purple Heights • Marie Conway Oemler
... northern cove, where the diver's little boat was housed. There he found Nicholas the fish, spread out in all his glory, like a polypod awash, or a basking turtle, or a well-fed calf of Proteus. Laid on his back, where the wavelets broke, and beaded a silver fringe upon the golden ruff of sand, he gave his body to soft lullaby, and his mind to perfect holiday. His breadth, and the spring of fresh air inside it, kept him gently up and down; and his calm enjoyment was enriched by the baffled wrath of his enemies. For flies, of innumerable sorts ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore
... with a train, of silver brocade covered with gold bees; her shoulders were bare, but on her arms were tight sleeves embroidered with gold, the upper part adorned, with diamonds, and fastened to them was a lace ruff worked with gold which rose behind half up her head. The tight-fitting dress had no waist, after the fashion of the time, but she wore a gold ribbon as a girdle, set with thirty-nine pink gems. Her bracelets, ear-rings, and necklace were formed of precious ...
— The Court of the Empress Josephine • Imbert de Saint-Amand
... was laid a pillow, and in the coffin lay Philip the Fourth, with his head on the pillow, upon it a white beaver hat, his head combed, his beard trimmed, his face and hands painted. He was clothed in a musk colour silk suit, embroidered with gold, a golilla (or ruff) about his neck, cuffs on his hands, which were clasped on his breast, holding a globe and a cross on it therein; his cloak was of the same, with his sword by his side; stockings, garters, and shoe- strings of the same, and a pair of white ...
— Memoirs of Lady Fanshawe • Lady Fanshawe
... means, Master Paradise," I said courteously. "I desire your company and that of the gentleman from Lima. You will go with me to bring up the rest of my party. The three gentlemen of the broken head, the bushy ruff, which I protest is vastly becoming, and the ...
— Modern Prose And Poetry; For Secondary Schools - Edited With Notes, Study Helps, And Reading Lists • Various
... dressed peculiarly; she wore when I first remember her, a short black skirt and waist; a little cape of red woolen cloth hung over her shoulders, about her neck was a white ruff which set off her peaked face and made it look even more withered and yellow; her hair was short, and over a silk skull cap was drawn a black reboso, the ends of which were embroidered in colour with odd designs. Her whole person was the perfection of neatness, and she was welcome from ...
— The Beautiful Eyes of Ysidria • Charles A. Gunnison
... Rubens, in a Spanish costume, with a little ruff round his neck, a sword by his side, and a stately manner. The General's lady was Madame Rubens, in black velvet made high round the neck, exceedingly warm, and with a mill-stone round her neck in ...
— Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen • Hans Christian Andersen
... "Mortimer bet? That's rich. We call him 'Old Solemnity' in the bank; but he doesn't mean any harm by it—he just can't help it, that's all. If he had a stiff ruff about his neck, you could pose him for a picture of one ...
— Thoroughbreds • W. A. Fraser
... night arrived. I was favoured with a seat in an advantageous box, between the author and his friend M——. G. sate cheerful and confident. In his friend M.'s looks, who had perused the manuscript, I read some terror. Antonio in the person of John Philip Kemble at length appeared, starched out in a ruff which no one could dispute, and in most irreproachable mustachios. John always dressed most provokingly correct on these occasions. The first act swept by, solemn and silent. It went off, as G. assured M., exactly as ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb
... tell me things about my looks. "You'd be like one of those distinguished gentlemen of Vandyke's if you'd wear a ruff and leave ...
— The Gay Cockade • Temple Bailey
... one bit nasty!" flamed Dick, burying the grubby fingers of his right hand protectively in the fluffy mass of the puppy's half-grown ruff. "She's the dandiest ...
— Bruce • Albert Payson Terhune
... pale-yellow, in the manner of a corselet with wide, up-and-down stripes, a stiff ruff and buttons of topaz. There is a narrow frilled stripe on the edge of the collar, and also on the close-fitting sleeves. The trunks are short, wide-slashed, and of a dead-green color with pale purple in the slashes. The hose ...
— Mogens and Other Stories - Mogens; The Plague At Bergamo; There Should Have Been Roses; Mrs. Fonss • Jens Peter Jacobsen
... ain't hongry, nohow. An' w'edder de professor am right dat dese yer earthquakes ain't shockin', I kin tell yo' right now dat it shocked me! Nor I ain't gwine ter gib it no secon' chance ter tumble dat ruff down on ma ...
— On a Torn-Away World • Roy Rockwood
... paramount In all affairs of boot and spur and hose; In matters of the robe and cap supreme; In ruff disputes, my lord, there's no ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama, Vol 1 - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook • The Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D.
... her manner bright and intelligent, I should have recoiled before the yellow tusks of eye-teeth, and the blackened stumps and shrunken gums revealed to me every time she spoke. She wore a print dress made neatly enough which was very clean, and a black crape ruff round her sallow neck. The shop was small but clean and at the back I saw, a kind of little sitting room. Into this I went while she ran up-stairs to prepare the room for my inspection. The carpet was the usual horribly ingenious affair of red squares inside ...
— Crowded Out! and Other Sketches • Susie F. Harrison
... mapped out to start. Call 'em 'The Trouble-hunter Twins, Ruff and Reddy.' If they catch on, the artist and me can keep 'em ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... going about carrying food conspicuously in the mouth, then pretending to visit a far-off spot and returning without it; but he always ended by mounting the oak brush, ruffling up his neck feathers till they stood out like a ruff, and uttering his cry; it can hardly be called of distress, it became so evidently perfunctory. His mate never tried deception, but relied upon skulking to and fro, unseen among ...
— Upon The Tree-Tops • Olive Thorne Miller
... intending to turn Chalfont into a besieged Garrison, is laying in Stock of Sope, Candles, Cheese, Butter, Salt, Sugar, Raisins, Pease, and Bacon; besides Resin, Sulphur, and Benjamin, agaynst the Infection; and Pill Ruff, and Venice Treacle, in Case ...
— Mary Powell & Deborah's Diary • Anne Manning
... escutcheon was the figure of a woman, standing. It was an enchanting vision. She was tall and slim, and wore a robe of brocade which fell in ample folds about her feet, a ruff of many pleats and a necklace of large gems. On her head was an enormous and superb turban of blond hair on which rested a crown of filigree that was not round, and that followed all the undulations of the hair. The face, although somewhat too round and large, was exquisite. The eyes were those of ...
— The Memoirs of Victor Hugo • Victor Hugo
... however necessary it may be, it may be turnd to the Disadvantage of his Character, which if I am not flatterd, he has hitherto kept unsullied. In this virtuous & important Struggle, he will remember that all of us must ruff it as well as we can.——The medical Committee inform me that it is the Duty of the State Cloathier to furnish him without the intervention of the Commander in Chiefe ...
— The Original Writings of Samuel Adams, Volume 4 • Samuel Adams
... Captain be affronted by a starch'd Ruff and Beard, a Coward in querpo, a walking Bunch of Garlick, a pickl'd Pilchard! abuse the noble Captain, and bear it off in State, like a Christmas Sweet-heart; these things must not be whilst Nicholas Fetherfool ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. I (of 6) • Aphra Behn
... knowledge of that was comforting, as though it guaranteed the genuineness of his sacrifice. He lingered a little in the rooms below, to pack all the cigars he had, some papers, a crush hat, a silver cigarette box, a Ruff's Guide. Then, mixing himself a stiff whisky and soda, and lighting a cigarette, he stood hesitating before a photograph of his two girls, in a silver frame. It belonged to Winifred. 'Never mind,' he thought; 'she can get another taken, and I can't!' He slipped it into the valise. ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... church, but this we did not find. The papal guards, in the strangest antique and antic costume that was ever seen,—a party-colored dress, striped with blue, red, and yellow, white and black, with a doublet and ruff, and trunk-breeches, and armed with halberds,—were on duty at the gateways, but suffered us to pass without question. Finally, we reached a large court, where some cardinals' red equipages and other carriages were drawn up, but were still at a loss as to the whereabouts of the chapel. ...
— Passages From the French and Italian Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... worse than that; those very powers and supremacies that he had thought were his protection—were they not, also, a part of the Snare? His culture and his artistry, his visions and his exaltations—what had they been but a lure for the female? The iris of the burnished dove, the ruff about the grouse's neck, the gold and purple of the butterfly's wing! Even his genius, his miraculous, ineffable genius—that had been the plume of the partridge, the crowning glory before which his mate ...
— Love's Pilgrimage • Upton Sinclair
... up above the elbow, from which descended a close sleeve of pearl-coloured satin, puffed out, and buttoned at the wrist; her bosom being covered with a fine flowered linen, gathered close at the neck like a ruff. Her hair, which was of a dark brown colour, was parted from the middle of the forehead; on her head was a plain coifure, surmounted by a gold lace, covered with a small, black, silk cap. In her right hand, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 14, No. 384, Saturday, August 8, 1829. • Various
... it's rather amusing to watch them at it, too. Xanthippe with her Greek clothes finds it rather difficult; but for rare sport you ought to see Queen Elizabeth trying to keep her eye on the ball over her ruff! It really is one of the finest spectacles ...
— The Enchanted Typewriter • John Kendrick Bangs
... found not merely in La Mole, but in others of those transitorily happy ones whose desiccated hearts did or did not distend the pockets of her farthingale as live Persian kittens do those of their merchants. To be a lover you must have "a stocking void of holes, a ruff, a sword, a plume, and a knowledge how to talk." This last point is illustrated in these miniature romances after a fashion on which one of the differences of opinion above hinted at may arise. It is not, as in the later "Heroics," shown merely in lengthy harangues, ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 - From the Beginning to 1800 • George Saintsbury
... The beagles then approached him so near, that he was under the necessity of taking the road for Llandu; and leaving those covers on the left, he returned much fatigued, near to the place where he was first started. He then went through a large cover called Cowman's Ruff, and back to Llanymynech hill; and in a lime quarry there, he stopped for his little pursuers, who, having run him in view under that hill, opposite the village of Llanymynech, he ascended a craggy rock, and got into a subterraneous passage of great length formerly worked, it ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 5, May 1810 • Various
... success, he looked round for Lady Delacour, from whom he expected the honours of his triumph. She had left the room, but soon she returned, dressed in the character of Queen Elizabeth, in which she had once appeared at a masquerade, with a large ruff, and all the costume ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. III - Belinda • Maria Edgeworth
... thrust his hand into the ruff of shaggy hair about the neck of one of the collies beside him. There was a low growl from the other dog, who rose and rested his pointed ...
— The Story of Wool • Sara Ware Bassett
... rude fort of posts and poles saved from ruined lodges, which the Iroquois had built for themselves, adding a ruff of freshly chopped trees, the two white men sat down in a ring of glowering savages. Six packs of beaver skins were piled ready for the oration; and the orator rose and ...
— Heroes of the Middle West - The French • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... from midst the depth of woods Heard the love-signal of the grouse, that wears A sable ruff around his mottled neck; Partridge they call him by our northern streams, And pheasant by the Delaware. He beat 'Gainst his barred sides his speckled wings, and made A sound like distant thunder; slow the strokes At first, then fast and faster, till at length They ...
— Poems • William Cullen Bryant |
