FREE-TRANSLATOR.COM • More 'Importunity' Quotes from Famous Books

... father. The convent was burned by the enemy, and several nuns perished, among others this woman. I wrote to Mr. Neville, and on my return implored him to complete the disclosure. He refused, and, on my importunity, indignantly upbraided me with the favours he had already conferred. We parted in mutual displeasure. I renounced the name of Neville, and assumed that of Lovel. It was at this time, when residing with a friend in the north of England, that I became acquainted with Miss Wardour, and was romantic ...

— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VII • Various

... with me, Mrs. Price, a gentleman cannot refuse. I have reasons which will excuse my importunity," ...

— Girlhood and Womanhood - The Story of some Fortunes and Misfortunes • Sarah Tytler

... of Mrs. Amos's words to her, which were several; and though Mrs. Amos, half alarmed by her deafness, did not know but she might be witnessing something dreadful on deck, and spoke with some importunity. Eleanor was thinking she had not a minute to lose. Beyond the time of Mr. Rhys's talking to the other visitor on the schooner's deck, there could be but small interval before he would learn all about her being on board; two words ...

— The Old Helmet, Volume II • Susan Warner

... measure you would see carried out, but offering your opinion without heat, and supporting it temperately and modestly, so that if the prince or city follow it, they shall do so of their own good-will, and not seem to be dragged into it by your importunity. When you act thus, neither prince nor people can reasonably bear you a grudge in respect of the advice given by you, since that advice was not adopted contrary to the general opinion. For your danger lies in many having opposed you, who afterwards, ...

— Discourses on the First Decade of Titus Livius • Niccolo Machiavelli

... desire of pleasing to vitiate his integrity. It was his established maxim, that a promise is never to be broken; nor was it without long reluctance that he once suffered himself to be drawn away from a festal engagement by the importunity of ...

— The Young Gentleman and Lady's Monitor, and English Teacher's Assistant • John Hamilton Moore

... conversations, and I do not know why it in particular should survive its fellows. It happens so. He had come up to me after his coffee to consult me about a certain chalice which in a moment of splendour and under the importunity of a countess he had determined to give to a deserving church in the east-end. I, in a moment of even rasher generosity, had suggested Ewart as a possible artist. Ewart had produced at once an admirable sketch for the sacred vessel surrounded by a sort of wreath ...

— Tono Bungay • H. G. Wells

... father, when he hears the story, does not at all relish the idea of a visit from his son's ghost, and is, in fact, terrified at the prospect. He says nothing to the mother, who had moved the gods of the world above no less than those of the world below by the violence of her grief and the importunity of her prayers, but at once sends for a sorcerer. As soon as he arrives, the sorcerer is taken to the family tomb, which has its place in the city of the dead that stretches along the highway from the town gate. The magic spell ...

— Greek and Roman Ghost Stories • Lacy Collison-Morley

... attention to the recital of crime: then the keen grey eyes slid back to the glowing coals, and the longhand went by the board. It was evident that there was some extraneous matter soliciting his lordship's regard, and in some sort gaining the same because of its importunity. ...

— Anthony Lyveden • Dornford Yates

... a character of a totally different class. Deodat Lawson is first heard of in this country, according to Mr. Savage, at Martha's Vineyard in 1671. He took the freeman's oath at Boston in 1680, and continued to have his residence there. It was not until after much negotiation and considerable importunity, that he was prevailed upon to enter into an engagement to preach at the Village. He began his ministry early in 1684, as appears by the parish record of a meeting Feb. 22, 1684: "Voted that Joseph Herrick, Jonathan Putnam, and Goodman Cloyse are desired to take care for to get a boat for the removing ...

— Salem Witchcraft, Volumes I and II • Charles Upham

... but the words were pitiful. He was not a man exasperated by a woman's unseasonable importunity, but angry with the grim, hard, ...

— The Summons • A.E.W. Mason

... at my earnest importunity, has just given me leave to write, and to receive your letters—but fastened this condition upon the concession, that your's must be under cover to Mr. Hickman, [this is a view, I suppose, to give him consideration with me]; and upon this further consideration, that she is to see all we ...

— Clarissa, Volume 7 • Samuel Richardson

... now stand before thee and by whose continual importunity thou gavest thy signature for the arrest of thy servant Daniel, are wicked and deceitful men, and with lying words have they deceived thee, O king. Their secret devices are well known to thy servant. With mine own ears have I listened to their midnight plotting; and from their own lips have ...

— The Young Captives - A Story of Judah and Babylon • Erasmus W. Jones

... steel buckler, the centre of which was raised, and the border encrusted with diamonds and rubies. Shortly after our entrance the rajah proposed that we should retire from the heat and importunity of the crowd. We took our seats on the ground, according to Indian custom, and the rajah delivered a discourse, in which he said he was the vassal of the sovereign of Delhi, and that as Delhi was in the possession of the ...

— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part III. The Great Explorers of the Nineteenth Century • Jules Verne

... endeavoured, however, to obtain his consent to the departure of the troops by land—the only point then left in dispute. Don John, still clinging to his secret scheme, with which the sea voyage of the troops was so closely connected, refused to concede. He reproached the envoys, on the contrary, with their importunity in making a fresh demand, just as he had conceded the Ghent treaty, upon his entire responsibility and without instructions. Mentally resolving that this point should still be wrung from the Governor, but ...

— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... that period to the present time, I do not think there has been a single Congress at which all proper efforts were not made to obtain the action of that Body. Members were not annoyed with indecent importunity; nor were any powerful combinations of interested individuals resorted to, to force your Claim upon the consideration of Congress. This was not in accordance with your taste, or your means. I well remember, however, that you frequently visited ...

— Obed Hussey - Who, of All Inventors, Made Bread Cheap • Various

... some strong emotion. It sounded quite near, but not close. Isaacson stood still, listened, tried to locate it, but could not. The voices rose in the night, kept perpetually at a high, fierce pitch, like voices of men in a frenzy. Then abruptly they failed, as if the night, wearied with their importunity, had fallen upon the speakers and choked them. And the silence, broken only by the faint rustle of the doura, ...

— Bella Donna - A Novel • Robert Hichens

... Conscience, if, under the excitement of the moment, I complained of your honest and continued importunity. Be assured, there is no friend in the world, with whom I am so desirous of maintaining a good understanding as with yourself. And for your relief and satisfaction, I now give you my solemn pledge, that I will close up this branch of my business as soon as possible. Indeed, ...

— Select Temperance Tracts • American Tract Society

... scurvy trick, which ever afterwards put him on his guard. This prince went on his knees to Sendivogius, and entreated him in the most pressing terms to satisfy his curiosity by converting some quicksilver into gold before him. Sendivogius, wearied by his importunity, consented, upon a promise of inviolable secrecy. After his departure, the Prince called a German alchymist, named Muhlenfels, who resided in his house, and told him all that had been done. Muhlenfels entreated that ...

— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay

... frequent bulletins of the health of sick men who enjoyed offices in church or state; nor were instances wanting in which, for the present of a thousand crowns, they were said to have hastened a wealthy patient's death. Even the king was unable to give as he wished, and sought to escape the importunity of his favorites by falsely assuring them that he had already made promises to others. Thus only could they be kept at bay.[554] The Guises and Montmorency, to render their power more secure, courted the favor of the king's mistress. The Cardinal of Lorraine, in particular, ...

— The Rise of the Hugenots, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Henry Martyn Baird

... gospels rises up at length to give a just decision because justice comes daily knocking at his door: and at night time the friend, in whose heart there is no real friendship, yields at length to his friend "because of his importunity." There is no prison in any world into which love cannot force an entrance. If you did not understand that, you did not understand anything about ...

— Oscar Wilde, Volume 2 (of 2) - His Life and Confessions • Frank Harris

... thus addressed, the king still pressed them for giving him battle. The Rishis, however, continually soothed him and overlooked his importunity. King Dambhodbhava, still desirous of battle, repeatedly summoned those Rishis to fight. Nara, then, O Bharata, taking up a handful of grass-blades, said, "Desirous of battle as thou art, come, O Kshatriya, and fight! Take up all ...

— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 2 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli

... be dissuaded, my father gave a reluctant consent; and let me here record an instance of generous kindness on the part of the bishop. He went to London, and by dint of personal, persevering importunity, obtained in a few days a commission in the army, at a time when seven hundred applicants, many of them backed by strong interest, were waiting for the same boon. The suddenness of the thing was quite stunning; we calculated ...

— Personal Recollections • Charlotte Elizabeth

... dry bread in her hand. On Wednesday the same scene was renewed—the same fruitless casting about for food and shelter, the same disappointment, and the same despair. But parochial bounty can only go thus far, and no farther. Charity herself was worn out with the importunity of this persevering pauper, and on Thursday night the doors of the parish workhouse were finally and ...

— The trade, domestic and foreign • Henry Charles Carey

... that it may be restored to him again; who exacts continual signs of submission and respect; who desires, without ceasing, that men may reiterate their marks of respect for him; who wishes to be solicited; who bestows no grace unless it be accorded to importunity for the purpose of making it more valuable; and, above all, who allows himself to be appeased and propitiated by gifts from which his ministers derive the ...

— Letters to Eugenia - or, a Preservative Against Religious Prejudices • Baron d'Holbach

... Numidians;(707) in which, giving fresh proofs of his courage and abilities, his merit raised him to the command of the army which was to act in Spain. Hannibal, his son, at that time but nine years of age, begged with the utmost importunity to attend him on this occasion;(708) and for that purpose employed all the soothing arts so common to children of his age, and which have so much power over a tender father. Hamilcar could not refuse him; and after having made him swear upon the altars, that he would declare himself an enemy ...

— The Ancient History of the Egyptians, Carthaginians, Assyrians, • Charles Rollin

... ourselves happy if our feeble voice could be, if not counted, at least heard, among all those which, more imposing, more eloquent than ours, demand, with so just and so impatient an importunity, the complete, absolute adoption ...

— Mysteries of Paris, V3 • Eugene Sue

... me to-morrow night at this bridge, Sir Max. If you do not see fit to give me the promise, then I shall weary you no further with importunity, and you may go ...

— Yolanda: Maid of Burgundy • Charles Major

... brutality—while the very sight of a male suppliant renders him furious. The first half hour he walks about, surrounded by his fair cortege, and is tolerably civil; but at length, fatigued, I suppose by continual importunity, he loses his temper, departs, and throws all the petitions he has received ...

— A Residence in France During the Years 1792, 1793, 1794 and 1795, • An English Lady

... wouldst thou have had reason for, had she been prevailed upon by giddy or frail motives, for which one man, by importunity, might prevail, ...

— Clarissa, Volume 4 (of 9) - History Of A Young Lady • Samuel Richardson

... only speaking to God; it is listening to God. And as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are the words we hear greater than the words we speak. Let us not forget this. Let us not pauperize ourselves by our very importunity. Maybe we are vociferous when God is but waiting for a silence to fall in His earthly temples that He may have speech with His children. We talk about 'prevailing prayer,' and there is a great truth in the phrase. All prayer does not prevail. There is that among men which ...

— The Threshold Grace • Percy C. Ainsworth

... might quicken the baronet's eyes to the concealment of the other. Nor was this all; if Sir Miles was seriously bent upon seeing her settled in marriage before his death, the dismissal of Vernon might only expose her to the importunity of new candidates more difficult to deal with. Vernon himself she could use as the shield against the arrows of a host. Therefore, when Sir Miles repeated his question, she answered, with much gentleness and seeming modest sense, that Mr. Vernon had much that must prepossess in his ...

— Lucretia, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... more than once heard stories of pictures of the great masters being met with amongst the dust and trash of such shops as this. The dealer, perceiving he had probably nailed a customer, ceased his bustling importunity, resumed his station at the door, and recommenced his appeals to the passengers. He shouted, chattered, and pointed to his wares, but without success; then he had a long chat with an old-clothesman, whose establishment was on the opposite ...

— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 62, No. 384, October 1847 • Various

... for such extreme measures, however. Going upstairs to escape from my sister's importunity, I found the door of the hitherto locked room invitingly open. This intelligence being communicated to Julia, she came rushing upstairs, and dragged me unwillingly into Mrs Ragg's ...

— A Sheaf of Corn • Mary E. Mann

... never steel our hearts nor lock up our sensibilities against any suffering that it is within our power to stanch or to alleviate. Jesus Christ never grudged trouble, never thought of Himself, never was impatient of interruption, never repelled importunity, never sent away empty any outstretched hand. And if we live near Him, self- oblivious willingness to spend and be spent will mark our lives, and we shall not consider that we have the right of possession or of sole enjoyment of any of the blessings ...

— Expositions of Holy Scripture: The Acts • Alexander Maclaren

... intelligent and capable people among them degrade themselves so that they become quite an enigma to us. If we consider how essential to such a masterpiece is inoculation of belief in the tender age of childhood, the system of missions appears no longer merely as the height of human importunity, arrogance, and impertinence, but also of absurdity; in so far as it does not confine itself to people who are still in the stage of childhood, such as the Hottentots, Kaffirs, South Sea Islanders, ...

— Essays of Schopenhauer • Arthur Schopenhauer

... any other person you may prefer, might be summoned at the same time; for by the ordinary method this business will never be achieved. I hope that, in, consequence of my aversion to delays in military affairs, you will pardon the importunity which my confidence in you has inspired, in favour of a project of ...

— Memoirs, Correspondence and Manuscripts of General Lafayette • Lafayette

... the 12th of January, 1621, in order to take the opinion of the Superior on this singular affair; they let him have three monks to help him with their counsels. They all repaired to the house wherein Humbert continued his importunity; for nothing that he had requested had as yet been executed. A great number of those who lived near were assembled in the house. The master of it told Humbert to rap against the wall; he knocked very gently: then the master desired him to go and fetch a stone ...

— The Phantom World - or, The philosophy of spirits, apparitions, &c, &c. • Augustin Calmet

... and I believe to most mothers it is more valued in their children than in their own persons. I rejoice with you over our restored J——y. O that our covenant God may give the more important blessing of divine life. You had need to be importunate for this, after the importunity exercised for natural life. I thank God also for the alleviation of your own distress, for our dear D——'s restoration from complaints less alarming so far as they existed, but which might have been ...

— The Power of Faith - Exemplified In The Life And Writings Of The Late Mrs. Isabella Graham. • Isabella Graham

... father. He saw everyone, and many wasted his precious time. Governors, Senators, Congressmen, officers, clergymen, bankers, merchants—all classes approached him with familiarity. This incessant labor, the study of the great problems he had to decide, the worry of constant importunity, the quarrels of officers of the army, the care, anxiety, and responsibility of his position, wore upon ...

— The Every-day Life of Abraham Lincoln • Francis Fisher Browne

... exerts, and to do this we should understand what it is as a psychological process. The reply to this is that prayer, in its psychological definition, is a form of Expectant Attention. It is always urged by religious teachers that it must be very earnest and continuous to be successful. "Importunity is of the essence of successful prayer," says Canon Liddon in a recent sermon. In the New Testament it is likened to a constant knocking at a door; and by a curious parity of thought the Chinese character for prayer is composed of the signs for a spirit ...

— The Religious Sentiment - Its Source and Aim: A Contribution to the Science and - Philosophy of Religion • Daniel G. Brinton

... surprised, confused, shamed, irritated in turn with every new importunity. But she remained sensible enough to be quite frank and truthful with Kathleen, except for an exciting secret engagement with Bunbury Gray which lasted for two weeks. And Kathleen was given strength sufficient for each case as it presented itself; and now the fag end of the season died out; ...

— The Danger Mark • Robert W. Chambers

... irreverence that prevented him from preaching. But a certain man named Nessan, who beheld how the just man's spirit was vexed, offered unto him a ram, which the saint bade him give to the bold importuner. This receiving, Dercardius returned to his companions, boasting that by his importunity he had penetrated the stony heart of Patrick, even as the continual dropping of water weareth out a stone. And they slay the ram, and dress and eat it. And while the meat was yet in their mouths the anger of God came on them, and suddenly avenged His servant; ...

— The Most Ancient Lives of Saint Patrick - Including the Life by Jocelin, Hitherto Unpublished in America, and His Extant Writings • Various

... every region of humanity, though there were neither friends nor fathers in the world. You have certainly from your father the highest claim of charity, though none of right; and therefore I would counsel you to omit no decent nor manly degree of importunity. Your debts in the whole are not large, and of the whole but a small part is troublesome. Small debts are like small shot; they are rattling on every side, and can scarcely be escaped without a wound: great debts are like cannon; of loud noise, ...

— Life of Johnson - Abridged and Edited, with an Introduction by Charles Grosvenor Osgood • James Boswell

... Spanish. This offer, however, they refused with disdain, saying that they cared for nothing written in the language of the Busne or Gentiles. They then persisted in their demand, to which I at last yielded, being unable to resist their importunity; whereupon they accompanied me to the inn, and received what they so ...

— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow

... distress exhibited in her countenance terrified him, and he anxiously enquired concerning it. She could answer him only with her tears, which she found it impossible to suppress; and gently disengaging herself, tottered to her closet. Hippolitus followed her to the door, but desisted from further importunity. He pressed her hand to his lips in tender silence, and withdrew, ...

— A Sicilian Romance • Ann Radcliffe

... accusations, took Jesus inside the palace to investigate them. This he did, no doubt, for the purpose of getting rid of the importunity of His accusers, which was extreme. And Jesus made no scruple, as they had done, about entering the palace. Shall we say that the Jews had rejected Him, and He was turning to the Gentiles—that the wall of partition had now fallen, and that He ...

— The Trial and Death of Jesus Christ - A Devotional History of our Lord's Passion • James Stalker

... long heard of that same chamber being closed; and that thy mother would not explain wherefore, I know well, for I have asked her, and have been denied. Nay, when, as in duty bound, I pressed the question, I found her reason was disordered by my importunity, and therefore I abandoned the attempt. Some heavy weight was on thy mother's mind, my son, yet would she never confess or trust it with me. Tell me, before she died, hadst ...

— The Phantom Ship • Captain Frederick Marryat

... much moved by the importunity of that weak, honest man, nevertheless withstood his entreaties, telling him that he was minded to depart forthwith from St Andrews, and make the best of his way back to Edinburgh, and so could embark ...

— Ringan Gilhaize - or The Covenanters • John Galt

... was still under the care of the governess he had provided. He had not even made any plans for her future, for he did not love her, though he indulged her as a selfish and easy means of fulfilling his paternal obligations. It was to get rid of her importunity that he began to take her to the houses of some of the married artists when she was only sixteen years old, though she looked at ...

— Casa Braccio, Volumes 1 and 2 (of 2) • F. Marion Crawford

... acted in the discharge of the trust reposed in you, and your ever having made use of the great powers with which you were vested as the means of doing good and charitable offices to such as ye found proper objects of compassion, will, I hope, excuse my importunity in endeavouring to approve myself not absolutely unworthy of that mercy and favour which your Excellency has so generously procured from his Majesty for others in my unfortunate circumstances. I am very sensible nothing can be alledged sufficient to excuse so great a crime as I have been guilty ...

— Rob Roy, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott

... there, thou never doubtedst that thou wouldst forthwith be received by the lady with open arms. Ah! the gay gallant! the honourable gentleman! he is now turned prowler by night, and breaks into gardens, and climbs trees! Dost thou think by sheer importunity to vanquish the virtue of this lady, that thou escaladest her windows at night by the trees? She dislikes thee of all things in the world, and yet thou must still persist. Well indeed hast thou laid my admonitions to heart, to say ...

— The Decameron, Volume I • Giovanni Boccaccio

... suppliant to his position, but events were marching too swiftly, and demands more urgent jostled aside the claims of an obscure lieutenant with a shady character. Buonaparte at once grasped the fact that he could win his cause only by patience or by importunity, and began to consider how he should arrange for a prolonged stay in the capital. His scanty resources were already exhausted, but he found Bourrienne, a former school-fellow at Brienne, in equal straits, waiting like himself for something to turn up. Over their meals in a cheap ...

— The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte - Vol. I. (of IV.) • William Milligan Sloane

... courageous mastiff was roaring for assistance. It was found to be the valet, who little expected such a reception. He tried to apologize for his intrusion, and to make the reasons which led him to take this step appear plausible; but the importunity of the dog, the time, the place, the manner of the valet, all raised the suspicions of his master, and he determined to refer the investigation of the business to a magistrate. The Italian at length confessed that it ...

— Anecdotes of Animals • Unknown

... on, through the importunity of friends, to interrupt the scheme I had begun in my last paper, by an Essay upon the Art of Political Lying. We are told, "the Devil is the father of lies, and was a liar from the beginning"; so that beyond contradiction, the ...

— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D. D., Volume IX; • Jonathan Swift

... opinion that those who had attacked her had ill-concerted their measures; for he thought it unnatural that she should neither be tempted by promises, nor gained by importunity: she, especially, who in all probability had not imbibed such severe precepts from the prudence of her mother, who had never tasted any thing more delicious than the plums and apricots of Saint Albans. Being resolved to try her himself, ...

— The Memoirs of Count Grammont, Complete • Anthony Hamilton

... straight, and take care of us, it will be a most culpable self-deception. In such a way it would be impossible for us to save ourselves, or reestablish our peace again. I who have been the innocent cause of it all, how am I ever to console myself? By my own importunity I prevailed on Charlotte to write to you to stay with us; and Ottilie followed in consequence. We have had no more control over what ensued out of this, but we have the power to make it innocuous; to guide the new circumstances to our own happiness. Can you turn away your eyes from the ...

— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. II • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke

... come to pass, in her knowledge. Only by ceaseless importunity had she constrained her mother to reveal the cause of an anguish which could no longer be disguised. The avowal had been made yesterday, not long before Dr. Derwent's ...

— The Crown of Life • George Gissing

... scare-crow. On the very day on which Wilford was thus writing to Walsingham, Philip the Second was writing to Alexander Farnese. "The English," he said, "with their troops having gained a footing in the islands (Holland and Zeeland) give me much anxiety. The English Catholics are imploring me with much importunity to relieve them from the persecution they are suffering. When you sent me a plan, with the coasts, soundings, quicksands, and ports of England, you said that the enterprise of invading that country should be deferred till we had reduced the isles; that, ...

— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... Sigurd, and jealousy of Gudrun, that form the motive of Brynhild. Gunnar's conduct is barely intelligible; there is no explanation of his compliance with Brynhild, except the mere strength of her importunity. Hogni is reluctant, and remembers the oaths sworn to Sigurd. Gothorm, their younger brother, is made their instrument,—he was "outside the oaths." The slaying of Sigurd by Gothorm, and Sigurd's dying ...

— Epic and Romance - Essays on Medieval Literature • W. P. Ker

... I dare try no more, for fear of disgusting one who has proved herself my great friend by my importunity. We must be content with knowing that some day your father will be recalled, and then all will ...

— In Honour's Cause - A Tale of the Days of George the First • George Manville Fenn

... to the Philippine Islands." The hardships and perils of the long voyage daunt many at the start, and he who is in charge of them must use great discretion in managing them. At the court, he cannot get his documents without much importunity, locomotion, and red tape, and long and tedious delays. The sum of money allowed for the traveling expenses of the missionaries to Sevilla is far too small; and, arriving there, they encounter more red tape and delays. Besides, the amount granted ...

— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XIV., 1606-1609 • Various

... supposed that no one else could save it from the Whigs. Like all the rest of his family, none of whom had made their military service a passport to the honors and emoluments of civil stations, he was averse to relinquish the attitude he occupied to enter on a party struggle. The importunity of friends prevailed; and he was elected to two successive terms in Congress, absolutely refusing to be a candidate a third time. He spoke seldom in Congress, but in two or three fine speeches which ...

— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 1 January 1848 • Various

... Roderick had found shelter in a herdsman's cabin. These were numerous on the neighboring mountains, and the storm had given fair warning of its approach. Miss Garland stood there very pale, saying nothing, but looking at him. He expected that she would check her cousin's importunity. "Could you find him?" she suddenly asked. "Would it ...

— Roderick Hudson • Henry James

... story, the wine was of the strongest description, so that on drinking it a man would become a beast. She plied the young man with two or three cups in succession of that fiery liquor, and I also bitterly swallowed half a cupfull at the importunity of the youth; at last, the shameless harlot likewise got beastly drunk, and took very unbecoming liberties with that vile youth; and the mean wretch also, in his intoxication, having become regardless, began to ...

— Bagh O Bahar, Or Tales of the Four Darweshes • Mir Amman of Dihli

... bark at me, a thousand bulls of Bashan rush upon me, as many lions war against my soul, and threaten me with destruction, I will reply no more, defended enough if only I feel Thee propitious. I will no more waste the time due to Thee, sacred to Thee, in mere trifles, or lose it in beating off the importunity of moths. Whatever extent of life it shall please Thee to appoint me still, I vow, I dedicate, all to Thee, all to Thy Church. So shall we be revenged on our enemies. Convert us all, Thou who only canst. Forgive ...

— The Life of John Milton, Volume 5 (of 7), 1654-1660 • David Masson

... considerable loss. The equitable regard, therefore, to his interest, requires that changes of this kind should never be introduced suddenly, but slowly, gradually, and after a very long warning. The legislature, were it possible that its deliberations could be always directed, not by the clamorous importunity of partial interests, but by an extensive view of the general good, ought, upon this very account, perhaps, to be particularly careful, neither to establish any new monopolies of this kind, nor to extend further ...

— An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations • Adam Smith

... regard for dynastic interests, and that she has the greatest horror of any step likely to bring about a civil war." Those high-souled expressions ought to have given definite pause to Regnier's importunity; but that busybody was indefatigable. A second letter to Madame Le Breton for the Empress simply elicited from the gentlemen of her suite the information that Her Majesty, having read his communications, had expressed the greatest horror of anything ...

— Camps, Quarters, and Casual Places • Archibald Forbes

... fully answered the expectations of its friends in securing competent and faithful public servants and in protecting the appointing officers of the Government from the pressure of personal importunity and from the labor of examining the claims and pretensions of rival candidates ...

— State of the Union Addresses of Chester A. Arthur • Chester A. Arthur

... up with Pao-y's importunity, felt compelled to rise. "Your object seems to be," she remarked, "not to let me have any rest. If it is, I'll run away from you." Saying which, she there and then was making her way out, when Pao-y protested with a face full ...

— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin

... discharge for all the trouble we have been at, to take his business out of our hands and give it to somebody else. It is impossible to collect money on that or any other claim here now; and although you know I am not a very petulant man, I declare I am almost out of patience with Mr. Everett's importunity. It seems like he not only writes all the letters he can himself, but gets everybody else in Louisville and vicinity to be constantly writing to us about his claim. I have always said that Mr. Everett is a very clever fellow, and I am very sorry he cannot be obliged; but it ...

— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln

... irresistibly imposed itself. I found myself at last believing her, pitying her more than I pitied the subject of her dreadful analysis. It was as if she had held her tongue for longer than she could bear, suffering more and more the importunity of the truth. It relieved her thus to drag that to the light, and still she kept up the high and most unholy sacrifice. "God in his mercy has let me see it in time, but his ways are strange that ...

— Louisa Pallant • Henry James

... bought the woman," said he, turning to an acquaintance, "but for the girl's importunity. I feared she would have the sulks if I didn't, and I want to keep her good-natured. I shall give the mother as a wedding-present to my daughter. But anybody may have the child, who will take ...

— Autographs for Freedom, Volume 2 (of 2) (1854) • Various

... the conspirators pressed around him as if to support the prayer of Tillius Cimber, who entreated the Dictator to recall his brother from banishment. When Caesar began to show displeasure at their importunity, Tillius seized him by his toga, which was the signal for attack. Casca struck the first blow, and the other conspirators bared their weapons. Caesar defended himself till he saw Brutus had drawn his sword, and then exclaiming, "And thou, too, Brutus!" he ...

— A Smaller History of Rome • William Smith and Eugene Lawrence

... land. A life-long advocate of total abstinence, her interest in the cause could not be restrained, and gently her Heavenly Father led her in this work, first to a little gathering of temperance women, at which, after much importunity, she conducted the exercises. Some months later she became the chosen leader of these women. It was from this consecrated band, over the signature of Mrs. Butler with others, that the call for the first state convention of ...

— Two Decades - A History of the First Twenty Years' Work of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union of the State of New York • Frances W. Graham and Georgeanna M. Gardenier

... in the inquiry into the deed of which you are accused and found guilty, an inquiry which has already been submitted to your Grace by Lord Buckhurst, and having delayed as long as it was in her power the execution of the sentence, she can no longer withstand the importunity of her subjects, who press her to carry it out, so great and loving is their fear for her. For this purpose we have come the bearers of a commission, and we beg very humbly, madam, that it may please ...

— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - MARY STUART—1587 • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE

... dare tell the truth of the matter, and say that ever since the morning when 'Lena rode to Woodlawn with Durward, Fleetfoot's fate had been decreed. Repeatedly had she urged the sale upon her husband, who, wearied with her importunity, at last consented, selling him to a neighboring planter, who had taken him away ...

— 'Lena Rivers • Mary J. Holmes

... back from Rome and entered his own country in safety, certain of our Brothers came to him and asked him once more to give permission for the consecration of the burial-ground, and he, yielding to the importunity of his friends, did freely grant their petition. So he issued his commands again and ordered the consecration of this place, for he loved it and paid no heed to the complaints of the adversaries, since he preferred ...

— The Chronicle of the Canons Regular of Mount St. Agnes • Thomas a Kempis

... interesting period. The situations of the principal powers of Europe are singular and portentous. Connected with some by treaties and with all by commerce, no important event there can be indifferent to us. Such circumstances call with peculiar importunity not less for a disposition to unite in all those measures on which the honor, safety, and prosperity of our country depend than for all the exertions of wisdom ...

— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 2 (of 4) of Volume 1: John Adams • Edited by James D. Richardson

... only a certain part of the Inquisition, in the hope of satisfying my inquiries in a general way. I urged him with earnestness; but he steadily resisted, and seemed offended, or, rather, agitated, by my importunity. I intimated to him plainly, that the only way to do justice to his own assertion and arguments regarding the present state of the Inquisition, was to show me the prisons and the captives. I should then describe only what I saw; but now the subject was left in awful obscurity. "Lead ...

— Life in the Grey Nunnery at Montreal • Sarah J Richardson

... showed a starry night. A man was coming from the house with loaves of bread in his hand which he gave to another man who eagerly received them. Underneath, in Latin, were the words from St. Luke: "Though he will not rise and give him because he is his friend, yet because of his importunity he will rise and give him as many as he needeth." A friend of Millet's, who saw these drawings thirty years after, said they were the work of a man who already knew the great significance of art, the effects it was capable of, ...

— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 8 (of 8) • Various

... not allowed to drop; the girls' curiosity led them to find numerous reasons why their cousin's correspondence should not pass without examination, and Miss Morley found she must either endure their importunity, or yield to it. She was driven to choose the part of the oppressor; and one day, when Clara had been tormenting her more than usual, she addressed Marian, who was folding up a letter. "I think," said she, speaking in a timid, deprecating tone—"I think, Marian, ...

— The Two Guardians • Charlotte Mary Yonge

... vpon his humble submission to your Maiesty, or vpon better examination of the matter of the displeasure conceiued against him, the offence might haue beene either remitted, or he thereof might haue cleared himselfe. And to that end we were not onely by his great importunity long sollicited, but by the intercession of some of our Nobility giuing credit to his owne defence, we were intreated on his behalfe to vse his seruice once againe into Russia as our messenger to your Maiestie, whereby he might haue opportunity ...

— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of The English Nation v. 4 • Richard Hakluyt

... of a surety," replied the other. "Did you think I would suffer you to die in the trap into which you had ventured for love of me? I have been consumed with anxiety, especially after the Grand Duke in answer to my importunity assured me that you left the Villa Medici months since and that he was ignorant of your whereabouts. I had quarrelled with the Queen when that news arrived, and she had ordered me to the Azores. I asked for an audience, but she would not receive ...

— Romance of Roman Villas - (The Renaissance) • Elizabeth W. (Elizbeth Williams) Champney

... to his brother's advantage. After George's presentation to his Royal Highness at Kensington, more persons than one, his friend General Lambert included, had told him that the Duke had inquired regarding him, and had asked why the young man did not come to his levee. Importunity so august could not but be satisfied. A day was appointed between Mr. Lambert and his young friend, and they went to pay their duty to his Royal Highness at his house ...

— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray

... the Presbyterian kirk, or Episcopal meeting-house?—Tros Tyriusve" a lawyer, you know, is of both religions, or rather I should say of both forms—or can I assist in passing the forenoon otherwise? You'll excuse my old-fashioned importunity—I was born in a time when a Scotchman was thought inhospitable if he left a guest alone a moment, except when he slept—but I trust you will tell me ...

— Guy Mannering • Sir Walter Scott

... many reenforcements as the dreadful importunity of his viceroy demanded. Fugitives, whom their country rejected, sought a new home on the ocean, and turned to the ships of their enemy to satisfy the cravings both of vengeance and of want. Naval heroes were now formed out of corsairs, and a marine collected out of piratical vessels: out ...

— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VIII (of X) - Continental Europe II. • Various

... machine by her nervous, feeble, diaphanous hands. Finding my scepticism invincible by these means, my friend implored me to think in my own mind a question, and see if Planchette would not answer it. I yielded at last to her all but hysterical importunity, and thought of an heraldic question concerning the crest on a ring which I wore, which I felt was quite beyond Planchette's penetration; but while we sat in quiet expectation of the reply, which of course did not come, my friend's mother—a sober, middle-aged lady, habitually behaving herself ...

— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble

... haven't drunk the perfect measure of one glass, yet. While for me, this must be my fourth or fifth, thanks to your importunity; not to speak of all I drank this morning, for old acquaintance' sake. Drink, ...

— The Confidence-Man • Herman Melville

... in sore distress admitted of no doubt, and the yeoman's natural humanity assisted the other's sad importunity and gentle voice. Swetman took him in, not without a suspicion that this man represented in some way Monmouth's cause, to which he was not unfriendly in his secret heart. At his earnest request the ...

— A Changed Man and Other Tales • Thomas Hardy

... so carried it to Mr. Beale for a dockett; but he was very angry, and unwilling to do it, because he said it was ill writ, (because I had got it writ by another hand, and not by him); but by much importunity I got Mr. Spong to go to his office and make an end of my patent; and in the mean time Mr. Beale to be preparing my dockett, which being done, I did give him two pieces, after which it was strange how civil and tractable he was to me. Met with ...

— The Diary of Samuel Pepys • Samuel Pepys

... well-to-do person in the village. This done, they climb a tree in the early morning before sunrise, and continue chanting his praises in a loud voice until he is sufficiently flattered by their eulogies or wearied by their importunity to throw down a present of a few pice under the tree, which the Harbola, descending, appropriates. The Basdewas of the northern Districts are now commonly engaged in the trade of buying and selling buffaloes. They take the young male calves ...

— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume II • R. V. Russell

... chiding; but I can never think (Sir Walter's nature hath a sweetness in it) That he would use a woman—an old woman— With such discourtesy; For old she was who beg'd an alms of him. Well, he refus'd her; Whether for importunity, I know not, Or that she came between his meditations. But better had he met a lion in the streets Than this old woman that night; For she was one who practis'd the black arts. And served the devil—being since ...

— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 5 • Edited by E. V. Lucas

... to confide herself to the care and devotion of one who, by God's help, would never forsake her. And then the tender matron, as beautiful in her Autumn, and as pure as virgins in their spring, with blushes of love and "eyes of meek surrender," yielded to my respectful importunity, and consented to share my home. Let the last words I write thank her, and bless ...

— The History of Henry Esmond, Esq. • W. M. Thackeray

... hindrance!) like looking out of purgatory into paradise—from Poussin's noble, mellow-looking landscapes to where Rubens hung out his gaudy banner, and down the glimmering vista to the rich jewels of Titian and the Italian school. At last, by much importunity, I was admitted, and lost not an instant in making use of my new privilege. It was un beau jour to me. I marched delighted through a quarter of a mile of the proudest efforts of the mind of man, a whole creation of genius, a universe of art! I ran the ...

— Table-Talk - Essays on Men and Manners • William Hazlitt

... they approached, beseeching them to restore the ancient ornaments of the Roman matrons. Even Flaccus wavered, but his colleague Cato was inexorable. Finally, the women carried the day. Worn out by their importunity, the two Tribunes withdrew their opposition, and the hated law was abolished by the ...

— A Smaller History of Rome • William Smith and Eugene Lawrence

... and he is followed, among other representative writers, by John of Salisbury, the secretary and champion of Thomas Becket, and by Pope Innocent III. To all three there is an instructive contrast between a power divinely conferred and one that has at the best been wrested from God by human importunity. ...

— The Church and the Empire - Being an Outline of the History of the Church - from A.D. 1003 to A.D. 1304 • D. J. Medley

... to set before him; [11:7]and he will answer from within, and say, Trouble me not, for the door is already shut, and my little children are with me in bed, I cannot arise and give you; [11:8]I tell you if he will not arise and give him on account of being his friend, yet, on account of his importunity, he will arise and give him as many as he needs. [11:9]And I tell you, Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be opened to you; [11:10]for every one that asks, receives; and he that seeks, finds; and to him that knocks, ...

— The New Testament • Various

... unwilling that he should proceed to San Domingo; partly, as is intimated, from his having some jealousy of his being employed in secret agency for the admiral, and partly from a desire to throw impediments in the way of his obtaining the required relief. At length, by daily importunity, he obtained permission to go to San Domingo, and await the arrival of certain ships which were expected, of which he proposed to purchase one on account of the admiral. He immediately set out on foot a distance of seventy leagues, part of ...

— The Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus (Vol. II) • Washington Irving

... too little. I drove him off in a huff, but he soon came back again with half the hongo I had paid to Kariwami, and said he must have some cloths or he would not have anything. As fortune decreed it, just then Sirhid dropped in, and stopped him importunity for the time by saying that if we had possessed cloths his men must have known it, for they had been travelling with us. No sooner, however, did Virembo turn tail than the Sirhid gave us a broad hint that he usually received a trifle from the Arabs ...

— The Discovery of the Source of the Nile • John Hanning Speke

... you so much trouble; but you must recollect that it was your own voluntary kindness, and not my importunity, that involves you in it. ...

— Memories of Hawthorne • Rose Hawthorne Lathrop

... themselves so that one can't make head or tail of them. If you consider how essential to such a masterpiece is inoculation in the tender age of childhood, the missionary system appears no longer only as the acme of human importunity, arrogance and impertinence, but also as an absurdity, if it doesn't confine itself to nations which are still in their infancy, like Caffirs, Hottentots, South Sea Islanders, etc. Amongst these races it is successful; but in India, the Brahmans ...

— The Essays of Arthur Schopenhauer; Religion, A Dialogue, Etc. • Arthur Schopenhauer

... between the Jew and Antonio the merchant; we turn'd o'er many books together; he is furnished with my opinion which, bettered with his own learning,—the greatness whereof I cannot enough commend,—comes with him at my importunity to fill up your Grace's request in my stead. I beseech you let his lack of years be no impediment to let him lack a reverend estimation, for I never knew so young a body with so old a head. I leave him to your gracious acceptance, ...

— The Merchant of Venice • William Shakespeare [Craig, Oxford edition]

... house. He replied that he was just then busy in writing an answer to an attack on him in the Tribune. She assured him that such a controversy was worse than useless—that another and higher duty rested on him. She pressed him with such importunity and enthusiasm, that he finally consented; but as a last effort to get rid of her, said he feared the military would interfere and attack the mob. She assured him they would not, and hurried off to the St. Nicholas to see Governor Seymour about it. She found the ante-room filled with officials ...

— The Great Riots of New York 1712 to 1873 • J.T. Headley

... she turned her thoughts to Morningside Park she perceived the tangled skein of life was now to be further complicated by his romantic importunity. ...

— Ann Veronica • H. G. Wells

... Governor Dudley and his council engaged him to present an humble petition in their behalf.[22] Winslow was a shrewd diplomat, but was so far from succeeding with his suit that upon his appearance before the lords commissioners in 1635 he was, through Laud's "vehement importunity," committed to Fleet Prison, where he lay ...

— England in America, 1580-1652 • Lyon Gardiner Tyler

... of undefined resentment and contempt. Considering, she thought, how improbable it was that she herself should die before Matilde Macomer, the latter had shown an absurd anxiety about the disposal of the fortune. If Veronica had yielded the point, she had done so in order to get rid of an importunity which wearied her perpetually. She was to marry, of course, in due time. God would give her children, and they would inherit her wealth. It was really ridiculous of her aunt to be so anxious lest it should all go to those distant relations in Sicily and Spain. Nevertheless, in order ...

— Taquisara • F. Marion Crawford

... and in actual possession of the command of the army. He was thus not merely the most eligible claimant, but the best able to support his claims. But the Emperor never, as we have seen, a man of much determination was now enfeebled by years and by a habit of giving way to importunity. ...

— The Fall of the Moghul Empire of Hindustan • H. G. Keene

... people who "thought you would like this or dislike that"—the kind givers of presents even—the little people who shop for one! The friends who invite one to their queer, soulless, thin entertainments, with their garish lights; the people who choose a book for one, who counsel one, even with importunity, to go to some play which they are "sure we shall like." "So long"—they are old friends, and yet they thought we should like that play or that book! "So long"—and yet they think one capable of certain ...

— My War Experiences in Two Continents • Sarah Macnaughtan

... OVER HER FALLEN SON.—Do you see yonder godly mother, weeping over her fallen son, and remonstrating with him in tones of a mother's tenderness and importunity? That very mother prevented that very son marrying the girl he dearly loved, because she was poor, and this interruption of his love was the direct and procuring cause of his ruin; for, if she had allowed him to ...

— Searchlights on Health: Light on Dark Corners • B.G. Jefferis

... could do, and he fell asleep again; but Mr. Lipscombe declared it was of no use to remain— nothing but madness; and they could not gainsay him. He left the two clergymen together, feeling himself to have done a very valiant and useless thing in the interests of justice, or at the importunity of a foolishly zealous ...

— The Three Brides • Charlotte M. Yonge

... the evils gain by the day in magnitude, daily force themselves with increasing importunity upon the consideration of everyone, demand speedy and radical help. But modern society stands bewildered before all these phenomena, just as certain animals are said to stand before a mountain;[175] it turns ...

— Woman under socialism • August Bebel

... witnesses while you sell our birthright of liberty, to save from a timely death an effete political organization? No, as we respect womanhood, we must protest against this desecration of the magna charta of American liberties; and with an importunity not to be repelled, our demand must ever be: "No compromise of human rights"—"No admission in the Constitution of inequality of rights, or disfranchisement on ...

— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage

... say something about that great number of poor, who, under the name of common beggars, infest our streets, and fill our ears with their continual cries, and craving importunity. This I shall venture to call an unnecessary evil, brought upon us for the gross neglect, and want of proper management, in those whose duty it is to prevent it. But before I proceed farther, let me humbly presume to vindicate the justice and mercy of God and ...

— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D. D., Volume IV: - Swift's Writings on Religion and the Church, Volume II • Jonathan Swift

... more than usual favor to that mixture of romantic gallantry with which she always loved to be addrest, and the earl had, in vanity, in ambition, or in both, thrown in more and more of that delicious ingredient, until his importunity became the language of ...

— The Best of the World's Classics, Vol. V (of X) - Great Britain and Ireland III • Various

... 1219, the aged regent was smitten with a mortal illness. His followers bore him up the Thames from London to his manor of Caversham, where his last hours were disturbed by the intrigues of Peter of Winchester for his succession, and the importunity of selfish clerks, clamouring for grants to their churches. He died on May 14, clad in the habit of the Knights of the Temple, in whose new church in London his body was buried, and where his effigy may still be seen. The landless younger son ...

— The History of England - From the Accession of Henry III. to the Death of Edward III. (1216-1377) • T.F. Tout

... natives had reached that part of the beach where the boat was lying, and were wading through the water towards us; but as we had no wish at present to communicate with them, for fear that, by refusing anything we had in the boat, for which their importunity would perhaps be very great, a quarrel might be occasioned, we pulled off into deeper water where we remained for five minutes parleying with them, during which they plainly expressed their disappointment and mortification at our want of confidence. ...

— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia] [Volume 2 of 2] • Phillip Parker King

... festivals to receive charity, though not to assist at the ceremonies. Those who could afford it gave a trifle to these men as they came out of the sacred stream, but in no case was it demanded, or even solicited with any appearance of importunity, as it commonly is at fairs and holy places on the Ganges. The first day, the people bathe below the rapid over which the river falls after it emerges from its peaceful abode among the marble rocks; on the second day, just above this rapid; and on the third day, two miles ...

— Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official • William Sleeman

... given of undue elections, in which of course his misery consists as far as that depends on himself; these causes are error, negligence, over-indulgence of free choice, obstinacy or bad habit, and the importunity of natural appetites; which last, it must in passing be remarked, belongs to the head of physical evil, and cannot be assumed in this discussion without begging the question. The great difficulty is then stated and ...

— The Fallen Star; and, A Dissertation on the Origin of Evil • E. L. Bulwer; and, Lord Brougham

... on the whole poor and contemptible. His ready belief of the charge brought by Artabanus against his brother, Darius, admits perhaps of excuse, owing to his extreme youth; but his surrender of Inarus to Amestris on account of her importunity, his readiness to condone the revolt of Megabyzus, and his subjection throughout almost the whole of his life to the evil influence of Amytis, his sister, and Amestris, his mother—both persons of ill-regulated lives—are indications of weakness ...

— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 5. (of 7): Persia • George Rawlinson

... Cecilia, "can never suppose his visit will make any change in me; I have been very explicit with him, and he seemed equally rational and well bred in forbearing any importunity ...

— Cecilia vol. 2 - Memoirs of an Heiress • Frances (Fanny) Burney (Madame d'Arblay)

... rather have died than have agreed to their proposals. What they wanted was that lots should be drawn, and that he who drew the shortest should be put to death, and the one next should be the executioner. The captain's wife was to be free. At last their importunity became so great that Mr Carr agreed that, should no sail appear at the end of another twenty-four hours, he would no longer oppose their wishes. Before that time, two of those who were most eager for the dreadful mode of ...

— Old Jack • W.H.G. Kingston

... the Spirit of God was there to talk to the hearts of sinners. Amy and Nell both felt His wooing presence with them, and yielded to the importunity of the good people about them, and took on themselves vows of loyalty and love to God. They were young, but really meant to be true, and came home to Austin with the ...

— The Hero of Hill House • Mable Hale

... require every farthing of the money to support herself, there would be nothing left to send home. It was a pitiable position; here was she, who had just refused a man worth thousands a year, quite unable to get out of the way of his importunity for the want of seventy-five pounds, paid quarterly. Well, the only thing to do was to face it out and take her chance. On one point she was, however, quite clear; she would not marry Owen Davies. She might be a fool for her pains, but she would not do ...

— Beatrice • H. Rider Haggard

... Lake Superior, via., Cumberland House, on English river. We were obliged by the shallowness of the stream, to drag along our canoes, walking on a bottom or beach of sand, where we began to feel the importunity of the mosquitoes. One of the hunters scoured the woods for game but without success. By-and-by we passed a small canoe turned bottom up and covered with a blanket. Soon after we came to a cabin or lodge, ...

— Narrative of a Voyage to the Northwest Coast of America in the years 1811, 1812, 1813, and 1814 or the First American Settlement on the Pacific • Gabriel Franchere

... the Dwarf, as if worn out by his importunity, "since thou hast not enough of woes of thine own, but must needs seek to burden thyself with those of a partner, seek her whom thou hast lost ...

— The Black Dwarf • Sir Walter Scott

... the Londoners, who presented her a petition for redressing certain rigorous laws of her father, and restoring those of Edward the Confessor. The Empress put them off for a time with excuses, but at last discovered some displeasure at their importunity. The citizens, who had with much difficulty been persuaded to receive her against their inclinations, which stood wholly for the King, were moved with indignation at her unreasonable refusal of their ...

— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, Vol. X. • Jonathan Swift

... occupy Galveston was less fortunate. This movement was ordered by Banks a few days after his arrival at New Orleans, apparently under the pressure of continued importunity from Andrew J. Hamilton, and in furtherance of the policy that had led the government to send him with the expedition, nominally as a brigadier-general, but under a special commission from the President that ...

— History of the Nineteenth Army Corps • Richard Biddle Irwin

... gathering way. The creditor who has once turned into the narrow path of commercial fears and precautions speedily takes a course of malignant meanness which puts him below the level of his debtor. He passes from specious civility to impatient rage, to the surly clamor of importunity, to bursts of disappointment, to the livid coldness of a mind made up to vengeance, and the scowling insolence of a summons before the courts. Braschon, the rich upholsterer of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, ...

— Rise and Fall of Cesar Birotteau • Honore de Balzac

... how much He truly honours your heroick vertues, The Senate on his importunity, Commend him ...

— The Laws of Candy - Beaumont & Fletcher's Works (3 of 10) • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher

... polish and enliven the theatrical taste, and be no less constant in such entertainments, than the most assiduous of his cotemporaries, but he was too much addicted to pleasure, and being impelled by no necessity, he neglected the stage, and never writ, till he was forced to it, by the importunity of his friends. In 1676, his last comedy called the Man of Mode, or Sir Fopling Flutter, came on the stage, with the most extravagant success; he was then a servant to the beautiful duchess of York, of whom Dryden has this very singular expression, 'that he does not think, that at the general ...

— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Vol. III • Theophilus Cibber

... himself disagreeable. He was offered snuff. He called again, pleasantly. He was offered snuff. He called again. The great Talleyrand laughed. He was always so happy to see Monsieur when he (Talleyrand) was not busy. He would give Monsieur a certificate of importunity. He had quite forgotten what Monsieur was talking about on former occasions. Oh, yes, a treaty. Well, suppose there was such ...

— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... Deity; and his principal instructor was Azonaces, the same person under a different title. He is spoken of as one greatly beloved by heaven: and it is mentioned of him, that he longed very much to see the Deity, which at his importunity was granted to him. This interview, however, was not effected by his own corporeal eyes, but by the mediation of an [1008]angel. Through this medium the vision was performed: and he obtained a view of the Deity surrounded ...

— A New System; or, an Analysis of Antient Mythology. Volume II. (of VI.) • Jacob Bryant

... officer, and his importance in this army, exists more in his imagination, than in reality. For it is a maxim with him, to leave no service of his own untold, nor to want anything, which is to be obtained by importunity.[1] ...

— George Washington • William Roscoe Thayer

... count, who wished to be generous and to avoid further importunity, saying that he would give a note of hand for eighty thousand rubles. Berg smiled meekly, kissed the count on the shoulder, and said that he was very grateful, but that it was impossible for him to arrange his new life without receiving ...

— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy

... is all right in the world Damnable propinquity Hugging the chain of denial to his bosom I have a good memory for forgetting Importunity with discretion was his motto It is good to live, isn't it? Know how bad are you, and doesn't mind Strike first and heal ...

— Quotations From Gilbert Parker • David Widger

... his name is Balthasar: I acquainted him with the cause in Controuersie, betweene the Iew and Anthonio the Merchant: We turn'd ore many Bookes together: hee is furnished with my opinion, which bettred with his owne learning, the greatnesse whereof I cannot enough commend, comes with him at my importunity, to fill vp your Graces request in my sted. I beseech you, let his lacke of years be no impediment to let him lacke a reuerend estimation: for I neuer knewe so yong a body, with so old a head. I leaue him to your gracious acceptance, whose ...

— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare

... ominous to King. He would have welcomed a Niagara of importunity and imprecations; he was bursting with impatience to express himself; it seemed as if he would die if he were silent an hour longer under that letter. Of course the usual American relief of irritability and impatience ...

— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... shop, where a young girl was tending. He made up a very sorrowful face, and in whining tones, told her that he was in trouble and needed help. She asked him to wait till the gentleman came; but he continued to beseech that she would take compassion on him. The girl began to be frightened by his importunity, and looked anxiously toward the door. At last, the man of the shop came in; and Friend Hopper said, "This young woman thinks she cannot help me out of my trouble; but I think she can. The fact is, we are going to have company, and so many of our ...

— Isaac T. Hopper • L. Maria Child

... at Khosrowa, in the province of Salmas, were shamefully oppressed; and when application was made for redress, Asker Khan not only refused to adjudicate the matter, but beat one of the complainants so severely that he was confined to his bed for weeks. Still later, after urgent importunity from Nestorians and nominal Papists, two very able and excellent men, Deacons Joseph and Siyad, were sent to labor in that distant province. On one occasion they entered the village of Khosrowa to purchase fuel, ...

— Woman And Her Saviour In Persia • A Returned Missionary

... "the hot and angry men" as would be likely to damage them in the Queen's favour. Queen Anne had not a little of the quiet tenacity and spitefulness of enfeebled constitutions, but in the end reason prevailed, resentment at importunity was overcome, and the hold of the High-Churchmen on ...

— Daniel Defoe • William Minto

... knife to a German monastery by a benevolent abbot was deemed a most illustrious act. About the same time a noble pilgrim succeeded, after great importunity and a lavish outlay of money, in obtaining trifling particles of the relics of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, which he enclosed in a priceless box and donated to the monastery of St. Gall. This gift was ...

— Three Thousand Years of Mental Healing • George Barton Cutten

... I was half dead with starvation; the rain was falling; the night was coming on. I begged—openly, loudly, as only a hungry child can beg. An old lady in a carriage at a shop door complained of my importunity. The policeman did his duty. The law gave me a supper and shelter at the station-house that night. I appeared at the police court, and, questioned by the magistrate, I told my story truly. It was the every-day story of thousands of children ...

— The New Magdalen • Wilkie Collins

... we find, that some armies already yielding and ready to fly, have been by women restored, through their inflexible importunity and entreaties, presenting their breasts, and showing their impending captivity; an evil to the Germans then by far most dreadful when it befalls their women. So that the spirit of such cities as amongst their hostages are enjoined to send their damsels of quality, is ...

— Tacitus on Germany • Tacitus

... arrived at Xaragua, in the west of Hispaniola, where the governor then was, who seemed rejoiced to see him, though he afterwards was extremely tedious in dispatching him, owing to the reasons already mentioned. After much importunity Mendez obtained permission to go to St Domingo, where he bought and fitted out a vessel from the private funds of the admiral, which was sent to Jamaica at the latter end of May 1504, and sailed thence for Spain by the admirals direction, ...

— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. III. • Robert Kerr

... used to act as he would have me that I made no difficulty of complying with his desire. Two days after this, I was very much surprised at perceiving such a melancholy in his countenance, and alteration in his behavior, as I could no way account for; but, by importunity, at last I got from him that cardinal Wolsey, for what reason he knew not, had peremptorily forbid him to think any more of me: and, when he urged that his father was not displeased with it, the ...

— From This World to the Next • Henry Fielding

... possess a fortune, and to want a wife; and therefore was frequently attended by these hymeneal solicitors, with whose importunity I was sometimes diverted, and sometimes perplexed; for they contended for me as vultures for a carcase; each employing all his eloquence, and all his artifices, to enforce and promote his own scheme, from ...

— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D, In Nine Volumes - Volume the Third: The Rambler, Vol. II • Samuel Johnson

... circumstance saved him a great deal of future trouble. When his former acquaintances observed that he was still conversible and innocently cheerful, and that he was immovable in his resolutions, they desisted from further importunity; and he has assured me, that instead of losing any one valuable friend by the change in his character, he found himself much more esteemed and regarded by many who could not persuade themselves to imitate ...

— The Life of Col. James Gardiner - Who Was Slain at the Battle of Prestonpans, September 21, 1745 • P. Doddridge

... have yielded to your importunity and granted you the satisfaction which under the same circumstances I would have denied myself. But it has not made me less hard toward you; indeed, the steel with which you say my heart is bound seems tightening about it, as if the momentary weakness ...

— The Circular Study • Anna Katharine Green

... Sir. What you have read is an imbecile embryo?'—'Your importunity, Mr. Trevor, and my desire to do you service have extorted an opinion from me. I must not shrink from the truth: in confirmation of what I have already said, I must add, that your composition is strong in language, ...

— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft

... Kariwami had been satisfied with too little. I drove him off in a huff, but he soon came back again with half the hongo I had paid to Kariwami, and said he must have some cloths or he would not have anything. As fortune decreed it, just then Sirhid dropped in, and stopped him importunity for the time by saying that if we had possessed cloths his men must have known it, for they had been travelling with us. No sooner, however, did Virembo turn tail than the Sirhid gave us a broad hint that he usually received a trifle from the Arabs before he made an attempt at arranging the ...

— The Discovery of the Source of the Nile • John Hanning Speke

... as if worn out by his importunity, "since thou hast not enough of woes of thine own, but must needs seek to burden thyself with those of a partner, seek her whom thou ...

— The Black Dwarf • Sir Walter Scott

... extremities, as that they offered many violences to the country, robbed and plundered, and killed cattle, and the like; and others, building huts and hovels by the roadside, begged, and that with an importunity next door to demanding relief: so that the country was very uneasy, and had been obliged to ...

— History of the Plague in London • Daniel Defoe

... unjust judge in the gospels rises up at length to give a just decision because justice comes daily knocking at his door: and at night time the friend, in whose heart there is no real friendship, yields at length to his friend "because of his importunity." There is no prison in any world into which love cannot force an entrance. If you did not understand that, you did not understand anything about ...

— Oscar Wilde, Volume 2 (of 2) - His Life and Confessions • Frank Harris

... the same ground again and again. He was angry, and finally left the house. He felt that he was an abused man, because he was ignored. He objected to giving bail for his wife simply to increase his own importance, and a little importunity would have won his consent. He was vexed because he had not even been asked a second ...

— Little Bobtail - or The Wreck of the Penobscot. • Oliver Optic

... Peter's knife to a German monastery by a benevolent abbot was deemed a most illustrious act. About the same time a noble pilgrim succeeded, after great importunity and a lavish outlay of money, in obtaining trifling particles of the relics of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, which he enclosed in a priceless box and donated to the monastery of St. Gall. This gift was considered the greatest event of the year, but when it is considered that this and ...

— Three Thousand Years of Mental Healing • George Barton Cutten

... respecting the country beyond the Athabasca Lake, which is the boundary of their peregrinations to the northward. Having been apprized of our coming, they had prepared an encampment for us; but we had witnessed too many proofs of their importunity to expect that we could pass the night near them in any comfort, whilst either spirits, tobacco, or sugar remained in our possession; and therefore preferred to go about two miles further along the river, and to encamp among a ...

— Narrative of a Journey to the Shores of the Polar Sea, in the Years 1819-20-21-22, Volume 1 • John Franklin

... him, and he anxiously enquired concerning it. She could answer him only with her tears, which she found it impossible to suppress; and gently disengaging herself, tottered to her closet. Hippolitus followed her to the door, but desisted from further importunity. He pressed her hand to his lips in tender silence, and ...

— A Sicilian Romance • Ann Radcliffe

... truly sorry if my importunity should defeat its own purpose, and, instead of interesting your Lordship on my behalf, should make you regret the indulgence you have already granted me; but I really feel as if I had staked every remaining hope on the ...

— The Works of Lord Byron: Letters and Journals, Volume 2. • Lord Byron

... her name. As she had not asked his, he would have blushed to show himself more curious and less discreet than she; and he was resolved to hope everything from her good-will and nothing from his own importunity. She seemed to appreciate the delicacy of his conduct, and to be pleased with it, for at each succeeding interview she showed him more confidence and sympathy. Although not a single word of love had been uttered between them, Franz had reason to believe that she knew his passion ...

— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 12, No. 32, November, 1873 • Various

... spot for legal consultation as to the arrangements of his will, the transference of mortgages, and that transaction with his uncle about the succession to Diplow, which the bait of ready money, adroitly dangled without importunity, had finally won him to agree upon. But another acceptable accompaniment of his being in town was the presentation of himself with the beautiful bride whom he had chosen to marry in spite of what other people might have expected of him. ...

— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot

... breathless instant while the combination of knobs, bolts, and locks defied her importunity so obstinately that Sally was ...

— Nobody • Louis Joseph Vance

... even that she found an equally well-paid post, she would require every farthing of the money to support herself, there would be nothing left to send home. It was a pitiable position; here was she, who had just refused a man worth thousands a year, quite unable to get out of the way of his importunity for the want of seventy-five pounds, paid quarterly. Well, the only thing to do was to face it out and take her chance. On one point she was, however, quite clear; she would not marry Owen Davies. She might be a fool for her pains, ...

— Beatrice • H. Rider Haggard

... us, which was typical of all our subsequent altercations. I had obviously gone too far in treating a woman who was not passionately in love with me, as if I had a real right over her; for, after all, she had merely yielded to my importunity, and in no way belonged to me. To add to my perplexity, Minna only needed to remind me that from a worldly point of view she had refused very good offers in order to give way to the impetuosity of a penniless young man, whose ...

— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner

... 2,000 men, with whom I offered to take the capital, but this was also declined. I then offered to undertake the capture of Lima with 1,000 men, but even this was refused, and the detachment under Colonel Miller was only given to me to get rid of my importunity. Of this detachment I however determined to make the ...

— Narrative of Services in the Liberation of Chili, Peru and Brazil, - from Spanish and Portuguese Domination, Volume 1 • Thomas Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald

... narrow path of commercial fears and precautions speedily takes a course of malignant meanness which puts him below the level of his debtor. He passes from specious civility to impatient rage, to the surly clamor of importunity, to bursts of disappointment, to the livid coldness of a mind made up to vengeance, and the scowling insolence of a summons before the courts. Braschon, the rich upholsterer of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, who was not invited to the ball, and was therefore stabbed in his self-love, ...

— Rise and Fall of Cesar Birotteau • Honore de Balzac

... man, by reason of this opportunity and importunity, inveigles his master's daughter, many a gallant loves a dowdy, many a gentleman runs after his wife's maids; many ladies dote upon their men, as the queen in Aristo did upon the dwarf, many matches are ...

— Primitive Love and Love-Stories • Henry Theophilus Finck

... which we fall into by the natural or habitual imperfection of our character is the effect of a principle of prudence or of some other virtue. Thus the Regent, who saw the Duke of Ormond because he could not resist the importunity of Olive Trant, and who gave hopes to the duke because he can refuse nobody, made himself believe that it was a great strain of policy to blow up the fire and to keep Britain embroiled. I am persuaded that I do ...

— Letters to Sir William Windham and Mr. Pope • Lord Bolingbroke

... l'aimable." Lit. "by a way or means" (bi-terikeh). It may be we should read bi [hatheti'll] terikeh, "by [this] means;" but the rendering in the text seems the more probable one, the Sultan meaning that he would thus get rid of Alaeddin's importunity by practice, without open ...

— Alaeddin and the Enchanted Lamp • John Payne

... health of sick men who enjoyed offices in church or state; nor were instances wanting in which, for the present of a thousand crowns, they were said to have hastened a wealthy patient's death. Even the king was unable to give as he wished, and sought to escape the importunity of his favorites by falsely assuring them that he had already made promises to others. Thus only could they be kept at bay.[554] The Guises and Montmorency, to render their power more secure, courted the favor of the king's mistress. The Cardinal of Lorraine, ...

— The Rise of the Hugenots, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Henry Martyn Baird

... subscribe it in the presence of the testator and of each other; and by their signature they testify to having witnessed the signature of the testator, he being in sound mind at the time. Wills made under any kind of coercion, or even importunity may become void, being contrary to the wishes of the testator. Fraud or imposition also renders a will void, and where two wills made by the same person happen to exist, neither of them dated, the maker of the wills is declared ...

— The Book of Household Management • Mrs. Isabella Beeton

... be so, Edward, for I am of your opinion. Clara came tome just now, and I had much trouble, and was compelled to be harsh, to get rid of her importunity." ...

— The Children of the New Forest • Captain Marryat

... tones, told her that he was in trouble and needed help. She asked him to wait till the gentleman came; but he continued to beseech that she would take compassion on him. The girl began to be frightened by his importunity, and looked anxiously toward the door. At last, the man of the shop came in; and Friend Hopper said, "This young woman thinks she cannot help me out of my trouble; but I think she can. The fact is, we are going to have company, and so many of our tumblers are broken, that I ...

— Isaac T. Hopper • L. Maria Child

... when he had come back from Rome and entered his own country in safety, certain of our Brothers came to him and asked him once more to give permission for the consecration of the burial-ground, and he, yielding to the importunity of his friends, did freely grant their petition. So he issued his commands again and ordered the consecration of this place, for he loved it and paid no heed to the complaints of the adversaries, since he preferred the honour of God ...

— The Chronicle of the Canons Regular of Mount St. Agnes • Thomas a Kempis

... uplifted fingers woo you for an assenting nod. Nowhere on this continent is the presence of Pat so immediately recognizable as in this good catholic city, where the office of Jarvey is nearly a monopoly amongst my poor countrymen, who appear to have left no tittle of their good-humour, eager importunity, and ...

— Impressions of America - During the years 1833, 1834 and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Tyrone Power

... perceive, and it must be distinctly understood between us that you need never intercede with me in favor of that scoundrel Charles. I won't have it. You wouldn't succeed, of course, but if I ever happen to get fond of you—I mean foolishly fond of you, of course—your importunity might be annoying. When you are once my wife, however, and keeping your own carriage, I confidently expect that you will behave as other people do in that station of life, and show no weakness in favor ...

— Lippincott's Magazine, December, 1885 • Various

... labouring warranted. He did not rudely repulse these latter representations, as has been circulated. On the contrary, he listened to them with kindness, and was not uninfluenced by them. Enfeebled by illness, he had nearly brought himself to a compliance with a request urged with affectionate importunity, but from which his reason and sense of duty held him aloof. After long and deep and painful pondering, when the hour arrived, he rose from his bed of sickness, walked into the House of Commons, and not only ...

— Lord George Bentinck - A Political Biography • Benjamin Disraeli

... act in a body or individually, such is the infirmity and selfishness of human nature, that we often surrender to importunity that which we refuse to the dictates of gratitude,—yielding for our own comfort, to the demands of turbulence, while quiet unpretending merit is overlooked and oppressed, until, roused by neglect, it demands, as a right, what policy ...

— The King's Own • Captain Frederick Marryat

... no reply, but he was clearly moved by the law clerk's earnestness and importunity. He hesitated a moment, and then ...

— The Cryptogram - A Story of Northwest Canada • William Murray Graydon

... do not know why it in particular should survive its fellows. It happens so. He had come up to me after his coffee to consult me about a certain chalice which in a moment of splendour and under the importunity of a countess he had determined to give to a deserving church in the east-end. I, in a moment of even rasher generosity, had suggested Ewart as a possible artist. Ewart had produced at once an admirable ...

— Tono Bungay • H. G. Wells

... scene on the broad piazza, all day long, was curious and interesting, forming a sort of open bazar, where every establishment in the place had a representative and samples of its goods. All tourists are presumed to have come to purchase, and importunity is a part of the natives' business. Photographs, models of the Taj, precious stones, sandal-wood boxes, mosaics, and swords, the variety is infinite, the patience of the dealers equally inexhaustible. Nothing ...

— Due West - or Round the World in Ten Months • Maturin Murray Ballou

... state of lethargic resignation, whereas an onward-driving resolution to win through, a powerful determination to seek and obtain the immediate protection and assistance of God, a standing before God, and a claiming of His help—these things are required of the soul: in fact that importunity is necessary of which Jesus spoke (Luke xi. 7-9): "And he from within shall answer and say, Trouble me not . . . I cannot rise and give thee. I say unto you he will not rise and give him because he is his friend, yet because of his importunity ...

— The Prodigal Returns • Lilian Staveley

... that their cattle thrived exceedingly, that they had plenty of milk, and fine poultry and eggs. He endeavored to dissuade them from moving; but, finding their dissatisfaction with their present situation to be so decided, he yielded to their importunity; ordered a town to be laid out; and gave his unhesitating consent that the new comers should be incorporated with them. He then set out for the Swiss settlement, where he arrived in the evening. He was received with the greatest demonstrations of joy, and took lodgings at the house ...

— Biographical Memorials of James Oglethorpe • Thaddeus Mason Harris

... upon a steel buckler, the centre of which was raised, and the border encrusted with diamonds and rubies. Shortly after our entrance the rajah proposed that we should retire from the heat and importunity of the crowd. We took our seats on the ground, according to Indian custom, and the rajah delivered a discourse, in which he said he was the vassal of the sovereign of Delhi, and that as Delhi was in the possession ...

— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part III. The Great Explorers of the Nineteenth Century • Jules Verne

... themselves, and mirth fit for clownes To be enjoyed while we are young and capable of these joys Tried the effect of my silence and not provoking her Trouble, and more money, to every Watch, to them to drink Uncertainty of beauty Without importunity or the contrary ...

— Widger's Quotations from The Diary of Samuel Pepys • David Widger

... under the Eusebian banner in the religious wars of the East. By their arguments and negotiations, they embarrassed, they confounded, they at last deceived, the honest simplicity of the Latin bishops; who suffered the palladium of the faith to be extorted from their hand by fraud and importunity, rather than by open violence. The council of Rimini was not allowed to separate, till the members had imprudently subscribed a captious creed, in which some expressions, susceptible of an heretical sense, were inserted in the room of the Homoousion. ...

— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon

... interests, and justice to individuals, requires this of me. General Conway's merit, then, as an officer, and his importance in this army, exists more in his imagination, than in reality. For it is a maxim with him, to leave no service of his own untold, nor to want anything, which is to be obtained by importunity.[1] ...

— George Washington • William Roscoe Thayer

... of this constant intercourse with Eugenia may easily be anticipated. I do not attempt to extenuate my fault—it was inexcusable, and has brought its punishment; but for poor, forlorn Eugenia I plead; her virtue fell before my importunity and my personal appearance. She fell a victim to those unhappy circumstances of which ...

— Frank Mildmay • Captain Frederick Marryat

... Geordie keep his word with his mother. He would tell neither her nor his sister anything about the child. They knew his temper and disposition, and gradually resigned an importunity which had the effect of making him more obstinate. At night, when the child's clothes were taken off, with a view to putting it to bed, Geordie got hold of them and carried them off, unknown to his mother. He locked them up in his chest, and, in the morning, when his ...

— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume VI • Various

... to Browne in 1648, the last year of Charles the First, "being so high and noble a piece of chemistry, invites me once more to request an experimental eviction of it from yourself; and I hope you will not chide my importunity in this petition, or be angry at my so frequent knockings at your door to obtain a grant of so great and admirable a [152] mystery." What the enthusiastic young student expected from Browne, so high and noble a piece of chemistry, ...

— Appreciations, with an Essay on Style • Walter Horatio Pater

... Polite without importunity, gallant without being offensive, attentive to the comfort of all; employing a well-regulated kindness, witty at the proper times, discreet, indulgent, generous, he exercises, in his sphere, a high degree of ...

— The Laws of Etiquette • A Gentleman

... soon supplant him in these fickle affections; "it being one of his Majesty's greatest infirmities, that he was apt to think too well of men at the first or second sight." Without the Chancellorship, he "would haunt the King's presence with the same importunity as a spy upon his pleasures, and a disturber of the jollity of his meetings; his Majesty would quickly be nauseated with his company, which for the present he liked in some seasons." If the King were happily married, and his revenue settled, they might have some hope of better ...

— The Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon V2 • Henry Craik

... show how accomplished she was and a bundle of letters to prove how deeply the young man had compromised himself. A week later Fraulein Hedwig with radiant smiles announced that the lieutenant of her affections was coming to Heidelberg with his father and mother. Exhausted by the importunity of their son and touched by the dowry which Fraulein Hedwig's father offered, the lieutenant's parents had consented to pass through Heidelberg to make the young woman's acquaintance. The interview was satisfactory ...

— Of Human Bondage • W. Somerset Maugham

... back to the glowing coals, and the longhand went by the board. It was evident that there was some extraneous matter soliciting his lordship's regard, and in some sort gaining the same because of its importunity. ...

— Anthony Lyveden • Dornford Yates

... called to obtain his cooeperation, with apparent cordiality, and gave his full consent to their preaching in all the dioceses. He told them that his letter from Mosul, forbidding preaching and schools, was written through the importunity of Mr. Rassam. He spent a month at Seir, where he had much friendly intercourse with the missionaries. He even invited Dr. Perkins to preach in his tent, and Messrs. Wright and Stoddard led in prayer, before and after the sermon, while the Patriarch ...

— History Of The Missions Of The American Board Of Commissioners For Foreign Missions To The Oriental Churches, Volume I. • Rufus Anderson

... packman as the general newsmonger of a neighbourhood. Who does not remember the description of foreign beggars in the 'Sentimental Journey'? Many of us have witnessed the loathsome appearance and humorous importunity of Irish mendicants. A century ago England rivalled both France and Ireland in the number of its professional beggars. In the days when travelling was mostly performed on horseback, the foot of the hills—the point where the rider drew bridle—was the station ...

— Old Roads and New Roads • William Bodham Donne

... deserved to be. There was another alternative, besides that of two ladies to be weighed in the balance. Byron was longing to go abroad again, and he would have preferred that to marrying; but the importunity of his friends decided him for marriage. In a short time, and for a short time, Miss Milbanke's influence was too strong for his wayward nature and his pernicious friends to resist. His heart was touched, his mind ...

— Atlantic Monthly Volume 7, No. 40, February, 1861 • Various

... attention to the needy slaves around him. He urged upon his parishioners the duty of having a meeting expressly for them every Sunday, with a sermon adapted to their comprehension. After much argument and importunity, it was finally agreed that they might occupy the gallery of the church on Sunday evenings. Many colored people, hitherto unaccustomed to attend church, now gladly went to hear the gospel preached. The sermons were simple, and they understood them. Moreover, it was the first ...

— Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl - Written by Herself • Harriet Jacobs (AKA Linda Brent)

... agree with him. If one prima donna is good, she argued, why would not two be better? So she never desisted from her importunity until she was permitted to become a pupil of Professor Coccherani, vocal instructor at the Lycee. At this time she had committed to memory more than a dozen grand opera roles, and at the end of six months the professor ...

— Caruso and Tetrazzini on the Art of Singing • Enrico Caruso and Luisa Tetrazzini

... impatient to be put on shore. It was in vain that I exhorted them to persevere; they would not listen to argument, and expressed their wish rather to meet with immediate death on shore, than to be starved to death in the boats. Yielding to their importunity, I at length determined to land them on the north-west extremity of the island of Ceram, from whence they might travel to Amboyna in two or three days. Being off that part of the island on the ninth of June, Mr. Robson volunteered to land a portion of the people ...

— Thrilling Narratives of Mutiny, Murder and Piracy • Anonymous

... of by Buckingham, who observed to the citizens that the prince was ignorant of the whole design. At last he was persuaded to step forth, but he still kept at some distance; and he asked the meaning of their intrusion and importunity. Buckingham told him that the nation was resolved to have him for king: the protector declared his purpose of maintaining his loyalty to the present sovereign, and exhorted them to adhere to the same resolution. He was told that the people had determined ...

— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part B. - From Henry III. to Richard III. • David Hume

... as possible, to express his immediate wants, and it was not until the fourth day after my early visit, the particulars of which I have just detailed, that it was thought expedient that I should see him, and then only because it appeared that his extreme importunity and impatience were likely to retard his recovery more than the mere exhaustion attendant upon a short conversation could possibly do; perhaps, too, my friend entertained some hope that if by holy confession his patient's bosom were eased of the perilous stuff, which no doubt, oppressed it, his ...

— J. S. Le Fanu's Ghostly Tales, Volume 4 • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu

... the way," he expresses himself as follows: "The afflicted people vehemently accused several persons, in several places, that the spectres which afflicted them, did exactly resemble them; until the importunity of the accusations did provoke the Magistrates to examine them. When many of the accused came upon their examination, it was found, that the demons, then a thousand ways abusing of the poor afflicted people, ...

— Salem Witchcraft and Cotton Mather - A Reply • Charles W. Upham

... married. She brought him not only some ready money, but also goods to a pretty large value. Young being not a bit mended by his misfortunes, squandered away the first in a very short time, and turned the last into ready money. However, these supplies were of not very long continuance, and with much importunity his friends, in order, if it were possible, to keep him honest, got him in a small place in the Revenue, and he was put in as one of the officers to survey candles. In this post he continued for about ...

— Lives Of The Most Remarkable Criminals Who have been Condemned and Executed for Murder, the Highway, Housebreaking, Street Robberies, Coining or other offences • Arthur L. Hayward

... getting more and more self-indulgent; and Mary herself was by no means anxious to go, but Mark's father had been particularly pressing on the subject, more so than Mrs Franklin could exactly understand, so she yielded to the joint importunity of father and son, though with much reluctance. Mary had seen Mark occasionally since the night of the 6th of January, and still liked him, without a thought of going beyond this; but she was grieved to see how strongly her mother felt against him, and ...

— Nearly Lost but Dearly Won • Theodore P. Wilson

... go near to be a perfect Christian if I were always a visitor, as I have sometimes been, at the house of some hospitable friend. I can show a great deal of self-denial where the best of everything is urged upon me with kindly importunity. It is not so very hard to turn the other cheek for a kiss. And when I meditate upon the pains taken for our entertainment in this life, on the endless variety of seasons, of human character and fortune, on the costliness of the hangings and furniture of our dwelling here, I sometimes ...

— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell

... did not exhale in words. It was said that Coleridge's talk was worth so many guineas a sheet. Charles Lamb talked but sparingly. He put forth only so much as had complete flavor. I know that high pay and frequent importunity failed to induce him to squander his strength in careless essays: he waited until he could give them their full share of meaning ...

— Charles Lamb • Barry Cornwall

... knees to me on that Proossian rug before the sofa, mum. I was standin' behind the sofa, havin' just come in to tell him as how you'd be down shortly. He was standin' before the lookin'-glass lookin' at himself, an' when I come in he turns around and goes down on his knees and says such an importunity may not occur again, mum; I've loved you very long; and then he recited some pottery, mum, and said would I ...

— The Bicyclers and Three Other Farces • John Kendrick Bangs

... manner thrown away on the purchasers who crowded towards the Ghetto. It stood her in better stead than the most manifest anxiety could have done; it placed her apart from that detestable crowd. I observed many persons stop and make purchases of her on whom all importunity would have been thrown away. There was not one of the buyers who did not look back with hurried gaze at that pale and glorious face, which did not even glow with the least tinge of animation at the admiration which she excited. She sold her stock in trade, changed her money, with the same entire ...

— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 3, February, 1851 • Various

... greatly disappointed in their hope of treasure, which the Aztecs had so effectively hidden that only a small part of the expected riches was ever discovered. It is a blot upon the history of the war that Cortes, yielding to the importunity of his soldiers, permitted Guatemozin to be tortured, in order to gain information regarding the treasure. But no information of value could be wrung from him, and ...

— The World's Greatest Books, Vol XII. - Modern History • Arthur Mee

... immediate belongings into a bag and left the house. She had decided to go to Mrs. Earle's lodgings where she would be certain to find shelter and sympathy. Were she to go to her aunt's she would be exposed to importunity on her husband's behalf from Mrs. Farley, who was partial to Lewis. Her mind was entirely made up that there could be no question of reconciliation. Her duty was plain; and she would be doing herself an injustice were she to ...

— Unleavened Bread • Robert Grant

... descent to the cruel Commodus. It became the honorable appellation of the sons of Severus, was bestowed on young Diadumenianus, and at length prostituted to the infamy of the high priest of Emesa. Alexander, though pressed by the studied, and, perhaps, sincere importunity of the senate, nobly refused the borrowed lustre of a name; whilst in his whole conduct he labored to restore the glories and felicity of the age of the genuine ...

— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 1 • Edward Gibbon

... my watch two knives and a considerable quantity of beads for a small inferior sea Otter's skin which I did not much want, he immediately conceived it of great value, and refused to barter except I would double the quantity of beads; the next day with a great deal of importunity on his part I received the skin in exchange for a few strans of the same beads he had refused the day before. I therefore believe this trait in their character proceeds from an avaricious all grasping disposition. in this rispect they differ from all ...

— The Journals of Lewis and Clark • Meriwether Lewis et al

... joined palms and great importunity thus begged of me my discus, myself, O bull of Bharata's race, from desire of gladdening him, told him these words: "Gods, Danavas, Gandharvas, men, birds and snakes, assembled together, are not equal to even a hundredth part of my energy. I have this bow, this dart, this discus, and this ...

— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown

... thing has happened to him as to your princess. The king his father would have married him against his will; but, after much importunity, he frankly told him he would have nothing to do with a wife. For this reason he is at this moment imprisoned in an old tower which I make my residence, and whence I came but just now ...

— Fairy Tales From The Arabian Nights • E. Dixon

... very greatly regrets she should be disturbed when so weary, but as it is of importance to Monseigneur he trusts she will excuse Monsieur d'Argenton's importunity." ...

— The Justice of the King • Hamilton Drummond

... caused. Encouraged by the landlord, we introduced ourselves to the dog at Cama, and found him to be a most sweet person, with no sense whatever of self-respect, and shrinking from no ignominy in his importunity for bits of bread. When we put the bread into his mouth and felt his teeth, he would not take it till he had looked in our eyes and said as plainly as though in words, "Are you quite sure that my teeth are not painful to you? Do you really think I may now close my teeth upon the bread ...

— Alps and Sanctuaries of Piedmont and the Canton Ticino • Samuel Butler

... Will, of a surety," replied the other. "Did you think I would suffer you to die in the trap into which you had ventured for love of me? I have been consumed with anxiety, especially after the Grand Duke in answer to my importunity assured me that you left the Villa Medici months since and that he was ignorant of your whereabouts. I had quarrelled with the Queen when that news arrived, and she had ordered me to the Azores. I asked for an audience, but ...

— Romance of Roman Villas - (The Renaissance) • Elizabeth W. (Elizbeth Williams) Champney

... all others who resort to deeds of violence. "They that take the sword shall perish with the sword," is a saying of wide application, and had it been so in this case; had this brave and self-possessed man been moved from his high purpose by the importunity of friends, and when slain by his enemy, had been found armed in like manner with the murderer himself, what a stain would it have been upon his name and honor? And how would our whole country have been disgraced in the eyes of the civilized ...

— Personal Reminiscences of Early Days in California with Other Sketches; To Which Is Added the Story of His Attempted Assassination by a Former Associate on the Supreme Bench of the State • Stephen Field; George C. Gorham

... not a patient," said Mark, with a smile. "I was on my way home from Sir Wilford's, when I saw her in a motor-car just by the corner of Golfney Place. She insisted that I should go in with her, and because of her importunity I consented." ...

— Enter Bridget • Thomas Cobb

... to his Pilgrim's Progress. The young Pharisee, who entered Hackleton with such hate in his heart to dissenters that he would have destroyed their meeting-place, who practised "lying, swearing, and other sins," gradually yielded so far to his brother apprentice's importunity as to leave these off, to try to pray sometimes when alone, to attend church three times a day, and to visit the dissenting prayer-meeting. Like the zealot who thought to do God service by keeping the whole law, Carey ...

— The Life of William Carey • George Smith

... it might be by importunity, but it was worth achieving, even at the risk of being vexatious. Lord Martindale could hardly believe his eyes when he saw his wife on her way to the carriage, and Theodora was equally astonished when ...

— Heartsease - or Brother's Wife • Charlotte M. Yonge

... close my bosom against the feelings of humanity; but I would calmly and well consider by what conduct of life they may enter it with the least importunity and violence. A consciousness that we have promoted the happiness of others, to the uttermost of our power, is certain not only to meet them at the threshold, but to bring them along with us, and to render ...

— Imaginary Conversations and Poems - A Selection • Walter Savage Landor

... lay down to sleep on a cold bank beside the gate, determining to enter early in the morning. It was long before he slept, but at last weary nature demanded her privilege with importunity, and gentle sleep floated over him like a dark dewy cloud, and the sun was high in heaven before ...

— Eric, or Little by Little • Frederic W. Farrar

... interior—even threatened to march upon Maranham and enforce their demand, although they had rendered no assistance. The Junta, alarmed at this demonstration, now forwarded to me a request that I would appropriate some portion of the captured property to satisfy the importunity of the mutinous troops. ...

— Narrative of Services in the Liberation of Chili, Peru and Brazil, - from Spanish and Portuguese Domination, Volume 2 • Thomas Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald

... was coming in, and therefore it would be insane to add to their expenses. Rosa persisted, and at last worried Staines with her importunity. He began to give rather short answers. Then she quoted Miss Lucas against him. He treated the authority with marked contempt; and then Rosa fired up a little. Then Staines held his peace; but did not buy a carriage to ...

— A Simpleton • Charles Reade

... to relieve him, showed the heart felt all the pangs which it supposed him to feel. But, notwithstanding the almost general contempt, he raised very considerable contributions; for, as some tossed him money out of pride, others to get rid of his importunity, and a few, as above, out of a good heart, it amounted to no small sum by the end of ...

— The Surprising Adventures of Bampfylde Moore Carew • Unknown

... Darius is scarce worth notice, save that Iniquity with his wooden dagger has a leading part in the action. He, together with Importunity and Partiality, has several contests with Equity, Charity, and Constancy: for a while he has the better of them; but at last they catch him alone, each in turn threatens him with sore visitings, and then follows the direction, "Here somebody ...

— Shakespeare: His Life, Art, And Characters, Volume I. • H. N. Hudson

... constant in such entertainments, than the most assiduous of his cotemporaries, but he was too much addicted to pleasure, and being impelled by no necessity, he neglected the stage, and never writ, till he was forced to it, by the importunity of his friends. In 1676, his last comedy called the Man of Mode, or Sir Fopling Flutter, came on the stage, with the most extravagant success; he was then a servant to the beautiful duchess of York, of whom Dryden has this very singular expression, 'that he does not think, that at the ...

— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Vol. III • Theophilus Cibber

... degrade themselves so that one can't make head or tail of them. If you consider how essential to such a masterpiece is inoculation in the tender age of childhood, the missionary system appears no longer only as the acme of human importunity, arrogance and impertinence, but also as an absurdity, if it doesn't confine itself to nations which are still in their infancy, like Caffirs, Hottentots, South Sea Islanders, etc. Amongst these races it is successful; but in India, the Brahmans treat the discourses of the missionaries with contemptuous ...

— The Essays of Arthur Schopenhauer; Religion, A Dialogue, Etc. • Arthur Schopenhauer

... didn't suppose you would take the trouble to do it again. And if you had, I should have only loved you the more. I thought you would most likely be rather amused, rather touched, by my importunity. I thought you would take a listless advantage, make a plaything of me—the diversion of a few idle hours in summer, and then, when you had tired of me, would cast me aside, forget me, break my heart. I desired nothing better than that. That is ...

— Zuleika Dobson - or, An Oxford Love Story • Max Beerbohm

... much grief upon her spirit about her miserable condition, being so near her time, she would be often asking the Indians to let her go home; they not being willing to that, and yet vexed with her importunity, gathered a great company together about her and stripped her naked, and set her in the midst of them, and when they had sung and danced about her (in their hellish manner) as long as they pleased they knocked her on head, and the child in her arms with her. When they had ...

— Captivity and Restoration • Mrs. Mary Rowlandson

... into the possession of the public. You are robbed of your privacy and friends, and scarce any hour of your life you can call your own. Those, who envy your fortune, if they wanted not good-nature, might more justly pity it; and when they see you watched by a crowd of suitors, whose importunity it is impossible to avoid, would conclude, with reason, that you have lost much more in true content, than you have gained by dignity; and that a private gentleman is better attended by a single servant, than your lordship ...

— The Works of John Dryden, Volume 5 (of 18) - Amboyna; The state of Innocence; Aureng-Zebe; All for Love • John Dryden

... observes, "be certain that the names on a subscription list have been put down by sufficient authority; or, should that be ascertained, it still remains to be known whether they were not extorted by some over-zealous friend's importunity; whether the subscriber had not yielded his name merely from want of courage to say no! and with the intention of dropping the work as soon as possible." Thus out of a hundred patrons who had been obtained for ...

— English Men of Letters: Coleridge • H. D. Traill

... seven-tenths of the first volume, I was prevailed upon by the extreme importunity of an old and intimate friend to allow him the perusal of my manuscript. On the second day he returned it with a note to this purpose: "I return you your manuscript, because I promised to do so. If I had obeyed ...

— Caleb Williams - Things As They Are • William Godwin

... Barne-Elms, a very fine day, and all the way sang; and Mrs. Manuel sings very finely, and is a mighty discreet, sober-carriaged woman, that both my wife and I are mightily taken with her, and sings well, and without importunity or the contrary. At Barne-Elms we walked round, and then to the barge again, and had much merry talk, and good singing; and come before it was dark to the New Exchange stairs, and there landed, and walked ...

— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys

... solid rock, Though all to shivers dash't, the assault renew, Vain battry, and in froth or bubbles end: 20 So Satan, whom repulse upon repulse Met ever; and to shameful silence brought, Yet gives not o're though desperate of success, And his vain importunity pursues. He brought our Saviour to the western side Of that high mountain, whence he might behold Another plain, long but in bredth not wide; Wash'd by the Southern Sea, and on the North To equal length back'd with a ridge of hills That screen'd the fruits of ...

— The Poetical Works of John Milton • John Milton

... such treatment. His presence would have been embarrassing. Nevertheless, encouraged by Narbonne, he resolved on making his appearance. When his arrival was announced to the emperor, the latter grew angry, and at first refused to see him:—"What did this prince want of him? Was not the constant importunity of his letters, and his continual solicitations sufficient? Why did he come again to persecute him with his presence? What need had he of him?" But Duroc insisted; he reminded Napoleon of the want that he would experience of Prussia, in a war with Russia; and the doors ...

— History of the Expedition to Russia - Undertaken by the Emperor Napoleon in the Year 1812 • Count Philip de Segur

... think, is found in the power of prayer. What moved the judge to grant the widow's request? It was her importunity. But he did this only to get rid of her. It, however, shows what earnestness will do even with an unfeeling man. Here the comparison comes in. If an unfeeling man, who has no reverence for God and no regard for the welfare of others, ...

— Life and Labors of Elder John Kline, the Martyr Missionary - Collated from his Diary by Benjamin Funk • John Kline

... the importunity of friends, to interrupt the scheme I had begun in my last paper, by an Essay upon the Art of Political Lying. We are told, "the Devil is the father of lies, and was a liar from the beginning"; so that beyond contradiction, the invention is old: And which is more, his first essay of it was purely ...

— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D. D., Volume IX; • Jonathan Swift

... be so chosen, I should indeed consider as a high and enviable honour; but I should think it no honour to be returned to Parliament by persons who, thinking me destitute of the requisite qualifications, had yet been wrought upon by cajolery and importunity to poll for me in despite of ...

— Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay • George Otto Trevelyan

... was full of her subject, and we were full of curiosity. We implored her to give us some idea of a scene, of which all Europe was thinking and talking. She required no importunity, but told her tale with the majesty of a Clairon. It was at first all exclamation. "O my king!—O my unhappy but noble queen!—O my beloved but noble France! O Richard! O mon Roi!—Le monde vous abandonne!" She again wept, and we ...

— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine—Vol. 54, No. 333, July 1843 • Various

... illegitimate son of Richard III., he swore he was nothing of the kind; but his admirers declared that in that case he could only be Richard of York, who had somehow been saved from sharing his brother's fate in the Tower. Perkin found himself unable to resist such importunity, accepted the dignity thrust upon him, and set himself to learn his part. The partisans of the White Rose had shown in the case of Lambert Simnel their preference for even a palpable impostor bearing their badge, as compared with the objectionable Tudor; and ...

— England Under the Tudors • Arthur D. Innes

... proposal at first was scathing, and little less her scorn of a parent who could urge it. "It's to save me from want, and from worse than want," he whimpered. Finally, ere many days had passed, wearied by her father's importunity, ...

— Stories of the Border Marches • John Lang and Jean Lang

... restored to him again; who exacts continual signs of submission and respect; who desires, without ceasing, that men may reiterate their marks of respect for him; who wishes to be solicited; who bestows no grace unless it be accorded to importunity for the purpose of making it more valuable; and, above all, who allows himself to be appeased and propitiated by gifts from which his ...

— Letters to Eugenia - or, a Preservative Against Religious Prejudices • Baron d'Holbach

... fastidiousness, conquered reserve, thrust pride from me: I asked, I persevered, I remonstrated, I dunned. It is so that openings are forced into the guarded circle where Fortune sits dealing favours round. My perseverance made me known; my importunity made me remarked. I was inquired about; my former pupils' parents, gathering the reports of their children, heard me spoken of as talented, and they echoed the word: the sound, bandied about at random, came at last to ears which, but for its universality, it might never ...

— The Professor • (AKA Charlotte Bronte) Currer Bell

... in asserting his innocence, though he admitted he had made the above-mentioned confession; which he however endeavoured to account for, by protesting that he was forced into it by the continued importunity she used: who vowed, that, as she was sure of his guilt, she would never leave tormenting him till he had owned it; and faithfully promised, that, in such case, she would never mention it to him more. Hence, he said, he had been induced falsely to confess himself guilty, though he was innocent; ...

— The History of Tom Jones, a foundling • Henry Fielding

... whose face had some irrecoverable association for him. Why should a sickly fanatic, worn with fasting, have looked at him in particular, and where in all his travels could he remember encountering that face before? Folly! such vague memories hang about the mind like cobwebs, with tickling importunity—best to sweep them away at a dash: and Tito had pleasanter occupation for his thoughts. By the time he was turning out of the Corso degli Adimari into a side-street he was caring only that the sun was high, and that the ...

— Romola • George Eliot

... that he himself changed his practice in regard to the aspirate. He had been accustomed to sound it only with vowels, and to follow the fathers, who never used it with a consonant; but at length, yielding to the importunity of his ear, he conceded the right of usage to the people, and 'kept his learning ...

— The Roman Pronunciation of Latin • Frances E. Lord

... in the village. This done, they climb a tree in the early morning before sunrise, and continue chanting his praises in a loud voice until he is sufficiently flattered by their eulogies or wearied by their importunity to throw down a present of a few pice under the tree, which the Harbola, descending, appropriates. The Basdewas of the northern Districts are now commonly engaged in the trade of buying and selling ...

— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume II • R. V. Russell

... . . . Gregg wants me to dun Charles. He lost last night 800 pounds, as Brooks told me to-day. He receives money from More the Attorney. He forestalls all he is to receive, and unless the importunity begins with you, mine will avail nothing. Besides, I fairly own that I cannot keep my temper. My ideas, education, and former experience, or inexperience, of these things, make me see some things in the most horrible ...

— George Selwyn: His Letters and His Life • E. S. Roscoe and Helen Clergue

... lover. The Norwegian sailors in terror hurry below, the girls beat a hasty retreat, and silence descends once more upon the two vessels. Senta issues from Daland's house, followed by Erik. In spite of his importunity, her steadfast purpose remains unmoved; but the Dutchman overhears Erik's passionate appeal and, believing Senta to be untrue to himself, rushes on board his ship and hastily puts out to sea. Senta's courage rises to the occasion. Though the Dutchman ...

— The Opera - A Sketch of the Development of Opera. With full Descriptions - of all Works in the Modern Repertory • R.A. Streatfeild

... lepers that were cleansed, but of one that returned thanks: we are more ready to receive mercys than we are to acknowledg them: men can use great importunity when they are in distresses, and show great ingratitude after their successes; but he that ordereth his conversation aright, will glorifie him that heard him in the day of ...

— Anne Bradstreet and Her Time • Helen Campbell

... too cautious to use importunity, busied herself about in the lodge for a short time, then withdrew to another, near at hand. Meantime, the bright eyes continued peering through the opening, until they had watched their object fairly out of sight; then a low voice, the voice of a ...

— Wau-bun - The Early Day in the Northwest • Juliette Augusta Magill Kinzie

... zeal, so to praise us as rather to draw their own likeness than ours, he was yet unwilling that the world should remain always ignorant of compositions that do him so much honour; and especially because he has other friends, who have, with much importunity, solicited their publication. Aware that excessive commendation awakens envy, he would with both hands thrust it from him, preferring just so much of that dangerous tribute as may of right belong to him; but at the same time he ...

— Poemata (William Cowper, trans.) • John Milton

... said I, "you shall have the apartment you have solicited with so much importunity, and an hour after you come in I shall be on my way ...

— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt

... by a mere resemblance. Forgive me for my importunity—let me thank you most sincerely for your great kindness." He rose ...

— The Witch of Prague • F. Marion Crawford

... passionate life from life. That sacrifice, she had said, would be the test of her love for Hugh Brodrick. And now, this thing so difficult, so dangerous, so impossible, had accomplished itself without effort and without pain. Her genius had ceased from violence and importunity; it had let go its hold; it no ...

— The Creators - A Comedy • May Sinclair

... "to debate the late unhappy differences sprung up amongst us touching Church-government (disputed at large by Master Herle, Doctor Steward, Master Rutherford, Master Edwards, Master Durey, Master Goodwin, Master Nye, Master Sympson, and others), ... I have (at the importunity of some Reverend friends) digested my subitane apprehensions of these distracting controversies into the ensuing considerable Questions." Accordingly, the Tract consists of 12 Queries propounded for consideration, ...

— The Life of John Milton Vol. 3 1643-1649 • David Masson

... from January 14 to March 11, 1862, insisted on a more minute specification than the ministry had given of the use to be made of the moneys to be appropriated. The king at length, wearied with their importunity, dissolved the House, upon which a new election followed in the next month. The excitement was great. The Government seems to have hoped for a favorable result, at least for a diminution of the Liberal majority. ...

— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 4, October, 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... to say, when the children come to them with any request or proposal, they answer at once with a refusal more or less decided, and then allow themselves to be led into a long discussion on the subject, if discussion that may be called which consists chiefly of simple persistence and importunity on one side, and a gradually relaxing resistance on the other, until a reluctant ...

— Gentle Measures in the Management and Training of the Young • Jacob Abbott

... stand by them, not abandon them to their enemies, but employ in his service their lives and persons, which would not cease to be his so long as they had breath; so urgent was their zealous and universal importunity. And one obscure and private soldier, after he had drawn his sword, addressed himself to Otho: "By this, Caesar, judge our fidelity; there is not a man amongst us but would strike thus to serve you;" and so stabbed ...

— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough

... another by clapping his hand to the hilt of his sword, he was to be assomme according to the ordinance; which may either mean knocked down, or soundly mauled—or the two together. If two men came to blows, they were both assomme. A still more serious breach of politeness, however, was the importunity of petitioners. ...

— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume 3 • Various

... is mention made of them! How lightly they are esteemed! Kindly concessions to the exacting temper of our neighbour, gentle tolerance of his imperfections, loving endurance of cross looks, peevish gestures, cheerfulness under contempt and small injustices, endurance of affronts, patience with importunity, doing menial actions which our social position impels us to regard as beneath us; replying amiably to some one who has given us an undeserved and sharp reproof, falling down and then bearing good humouredly ...

— The Spirit of St. Francis de Sales • Jean Pierre Camus

... me much by so well representing my own case, and by describing what I have so often felt, but never could so well express. When I hear fine music I am haunted with passages therefrom night and day; and especially at first waking, which, by their importunity, give me more uneasiness than pleasure: elegant lessons still tease my imagination, and recur irresistibly to my recollection at seasons, and even when I am desirous of thinking of more ...

— The Natural History of Selborne • Gilbert White

... remained motionless; but now he gathered up in his hands his wooden begging-bowl, and held it forth, crying, "Ram, Ram," in the plaintive whine of his profession. But there was none to pay heed to his untimely importunity. Indeed, the Bombay merchant, when the cry smote his ears, started uneasily, and in descending the steps gave the lean, ash-bedaubed figure of the ...

— Tales of Destiny • Edmund Mitchell

... towards the Londoners, who presented her a petition for redressing certain rigorous laws of her father, and restoring those of Edward the Confessor. The Empress put them off for a time with excuses, but at last discovered some displeasure at their importunity. The citizens, who had with much difficulty been persuaded to receive her against their inclinations, which stood wholly for the King, were moved with indignation at her unreasonable refusal of their just demands, and entered into a conspiracy to seize her person. But she had timely notice ...

— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, Vol. X. • Jonathan Swift

... then suggested to Nicetes, the father of Herod, and brother of Dalce, to entreat the governor not to give his body, 'Lest,' said he, 'leaving the crucified One they should begin to worship this man [Greek: sebein];' and this they said at the suggestion and importunity of the Jews, who also watched us when we would take the body from the fire. This they did, not knowing that we can never either leave Christ, who suffered for the salvation of all who will be saved in all the world, or worship any other." [The Paris translation adds "ut Deum."] "For ...

— Primitive Christian Worship • James Endell Tyler

... love where there was none, and then gets it for his pains. For importunity in love, like importunity at Court, first creates its own interest and then pursues ...

— The Comedies of William Congreve - Volume 1 [of 2] • William Congreve

... thereafter for years on the generous kindness of unrelated friends, he yet for conscience' sake refused to take orders when a good living was offered him; and it was only after prolonged thought that he yielded to the importunity of King James, who was so convinced of his surpassing fitness for the church that he would speed him towards no other goal. When at length he dared hope that God might have called him to the high office, never man gave himself ...

— England's Antiphon • George MacDonald

... "without variableness or shadow of turning"; most people, moreover, would acknowledge that it is better that these laws should be stable and capable of being learned and depended upon than that the Divine will should be incalculable—ondoyant et divers—a matter of moods on His side and of importunity on ours. Tennyson's familiar lines represent the typically modern outlook with the utmost accuracy ...

— Problems of Immanence - Studies Critical and Constructive • J. Warschauer

... diligent search in this world of stone, some valuable species of marble might be discovered. But neither philosophical curiosity, nor commercial industry, have yet fixed their abode here, where the importunity of immediate want supplied but for the day, and craving on the morrow, has left little room for excursive knowledge or the ...

— A Journey to the Western Isles of Scotland • Samuel Johnson

... health is the chief; and I believe to most mothers it is more valued in their children than in their own persons. I rejoice with you over our restored J——y. O that our covenant God may give the more important blessing of divine life. You had need to be importunate for this, after the importunity exercised for natural life. I thank God also for the alleviation of your own distress, for our dear D——'s restoration from complaints less alarming so far as they existed, but which might have been ...

— The Power of Faith - Exemplified In The Life And Writings Of The Late Mrs. Isabella Graham. • Isabella Graham

... a man of the world par excellence, not of the too formal and too numerous world, but of the intimate world, of the salons of twenty persons, of the hour when the crowd goes away and the habitues crowd round the artist to wrest from him by amiable importunity his purest inspiration. It was then only that he exhibited all his genius and all his talent. It was then also that after having plunged his audience into a profound recueillement or into a painful sadness, for his music sometimes discouraged one's soul terribly, ...

— Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician - Volume 1-2, Complete • Frederick Niecks

... seek clemency for a prisoner-of-war, Florence Kearney. But pardon for a state prisoner was also included in his application—that being Ruperto Rivas. Of all this the ladies were well aware, since it was at their instigation, and through their importunity, he had acted. It was only, therefore, by the urgency of a despairing effort, as a dernier ressort, these had now sought the presence as petitioners, and naturally they dreaded denial. Noting the Condesa's backwardness—a ...

— The Free Lances - A Romance of the Mexican Valley • Mayne Reid

... bluster'd at her door, Been very impudent and saucy, Sir, Leud, ruffling, mad; courted at all hours and seasons; Let her not rest, nor eat, nor sleep, nor visit. Believe me, Charles, Women love Importunity. Watch her close, watch her like a Witch, Boy, Till she ...

— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. II • Aphra Behn

... importunity a licence can be procured for me to go on mule-back, I will try to leave for the Court after January, and I will even go without this licence. But haste must be made that the loss of the Indies, which is now imminent, may not take place. ...

— Christopher Columbus, Complete • Filson Young

... interest, requires that changes of this kind should never be introduced suddenly, but slowly, gradually, and after a very long warning. The legislature, were it possible that its deliberations could be always directed, not by the clamorous importunity of partial interests, but by an extensive view of the general good, ought, upon this very account, perhaps, to be particularly careful, neither to establish any new monopolies of this kind, nor to extend further those which are already established. Every ...

— An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations • Adam Smith

... preaching." [Footnote: Sewall's Diary. Mass. Hist. Coll. fifth series, v. 487.] And in this the patriarch spoke the truth; for if there was anything he loved more than money it was the incense of adulation which steamed up to his nostrils from a great congregation. Of course he declined; and yet this importunity pained the good man, not because there was any conflict in his mind between his duty to a cause he held sacred and his own interest, but because it was "a thing contrary to the faith marvellously wrought into my soul, that God will give me an opportunity to serve and glorify Christ ...

— The Emancipation of Massachusetts • Brooks Adams

... numbers of men, and some such as by the world were called good offers, soon got them the name of jilts; and by that means they were freed from any farther importunity, and for some years enjoyed that peace and quiet they had long wished. Their aunt, from being their mother and their guardian, was now become their friend. For, as she endeavoured not in the least to force their inclinations, they never ...

— The Governess - The Little Female Academy • Sarah Fielding

... woman will be my undoing, one of these days; I yielded to her importunity and gave it to her before I had used it myself, Metro dear, but to her it was a godsend—, now she takes it and gives it to some one who ought not to have it. I bid a long farewell to such a friend as she; let her look out for another friend instead of me. As for Nossis, Adrasteia ...

— The Satyricon, Complete • Petronius Arbiter

... her a fixed idea, a positive question of salvation. The poor old soul has not the smallest doubt, that this bit of stick will open for her the gates of Paradise. She has made her request to a priest, who will transmit it to a Monsignore, who will forward it to a Cardinal. Her importunity and her simplicity will, doubtless, move somebody. She will get the precious bough, and she is convinced that when she arrives at home with it, all the devotees in the province will burst ...

— The Roman Question • Edmond About

... the public service, and, what was more important to him, he could not induce one recruit for his continental wars. William continued to remain indifferent to all complaints of hardships and petitions of redress, unless when he showed himself irritated by the importunity of the suppliants, and hurt at being obliged to evade what it was impossible for him, with the least semblance of justice to refuse. The feeling against William long continued in Scotland. As late as November 5, 1788, when it was proposed that a monument ...

— An Historical Account of the Settlements of Scotch Highlanders in America • J. P. MacLean

... gleaming over the way Rush had all but hugged him, said to her, "You home to stay, too, Miss Mary?" her father's hand which clasped her arm revealed the thrilling interest with which he awaited her answer to that question. The importunity of the red-cap with the luggage relieved her of the necessity for answering but the answer in her heart just ...

— Mary Wollaston • Henry Kitchell Webster

... that should be considered sufficiently satisfactory to relieve me from importunity on ...

— Self-Raised • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth

... her in a state of feverish craving for a love she knew she could never win. She would have gladly been his servant on the mere chance and hope that possibly in some moment of abandonment he might have yielded to the importunity of her tenderness; Adonis himself in all the freshness of his youth never exercised a more potent spell upon enamoured Venus than this plain, big bearded man over the lonely, untutored Californian girl with ...

— The Secret Power • Marie Corelli

... administration, had little really to do with Monsieur Baudoyer's appointment. Such petty intrigues die in the upper sphere of great self-interests. If a few words in favor of Baudoyer were obtained by the importunity of the curate of Saint-Paul's and the Abbe Gaudron, they would have been withdrawn immediately at a suggestion from the minister. The occult power of the Congregation of Jesus (admissible certainly as confronting the bold society of the "Doctrine," ...

— Bureaucracy • Honore de Balzac

... fear to be in Print, or because they think they know not enough to make a Volume, or for not being prompted to, or earnestly solicited for it, neglect to do it; others delay to do it so long till they have forgotten what they intended. Such as these Importunity would prevail upon to disclose their knowledge, if fitting Persons were found to Discourse and ask them Questions, and to Compile the Answers into a History. Of this kind was lately produc'd in High Dutch a History of Greenland, by Dr. Fogelius ...

— An Historical Relation Of The Island Ceylon In The East Indies • Robert Knox

... would do honour to patronage: he is a poor and modest man; claims which from their very silence have the more forcible power on the generous heart. Alas, for pity! that from the indolence of those who have the good things of this life in their gift, too often does brazen-fronted importunity snatch that boon, the rightful due of retiring, humble want! Of all the qualities we assign to the author and director of nature, by far the most enviable is—to be able "to wipe away all tears from all eyes." O what insignificant, ...

— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham

... November 16, was a solemn one to myself and sons. We spent the time alone; I entreating them to yield their hearts unto God, they in listening to the words of their mother as though they felt and understood their import. I begged them not to be wearied with my importunity, and wearied they had been had they not cared for the things belonging to their everlasting peace. I knew not how to part with them that night until they should yield themselves, body, soul and spirit, to Whom they had been invited often to go." After this, Joseph's disease rapidly advanced, ...

— Mrs Whittelsey's Magazine for Mothers and Daughters - Volume 3 • Various

... conversation with any persons but those sent by the secretary. The Lord Chancellor, duke of Norfolk, and Mr. Cromwel paid him frequent visits, and pressed: him to take the oath, which he still refused. About a year after his commitment to the tower, by the importunity of Queen Ann, he was arraign'd at the King's Bench Bar, for obstinately refusing, the oath of supremacy, and wilfully and obstinately opposing the King's second marriage. He went to the court leaning on his staff, because he had been ...

— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Volume I. • Theophilus Cibber

... constantly expecting that her wanderings would cease, and she would return to her own home. Perhaps he guessed partly at the reason for her keeping at a distance, and would not hurry her by any premature importunity. And, perhapsfor some men are sohe was willing that she should run to the end of her line, see all that she cared to see, and find, if she could find, anything that she liked better than him. It might have been patiently ...

— The Gold of Chickaree • Susan Warner

... murderer had screened himself and his accomplices by sharing the plunder with his master. The widow cried for redress in vain. The ears of magistrates were stopped against her, and she was too poor to pay her way; but still she went from one court to another, until her importunity irritated the judges, who, to intimidate her, seized her eldest son, on some monstrous pretext, and cast him into prison. This double cruelty completed the despair of the unhappy mother. She came to me fairly frenzied, and "commanded" me to go at once into the presence ...

— The English Governess At The Siamese Court • Anna Harriette Leonowens

... continued by his majesty now reigning, unto this day; who both by his expedition for relief of Rochel in France, and his strict confederacy with the prince of Orange, and the states general, notwithstanding all the importunity of Spain to the contrary, hath set to his seal that all that had been done by his royal ancestors, in maintainance of those who had so engaged and combined themselves, ...

— The Covenants And The Covenanters - Covenants, Sermons, and Documents of the Covenanted Reformation • Various

... receive a kind and constant remembrance in the benedictions of a recluse who has still the ambition to live in your regard by the good which he would excite you to perform. At all events forgive this very unexpected intrusion and importunity from the old and long sequestered admirer of your ...

— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose

... make any repetition of my visit very distasteful to you. I was conscious of nothing in my literary life that could justly offend you—and at this day I can say the same—but I shrank from the appearance of importunity, and for some months I was deeply distressed by the fear that what I most desired in life had become unattainable. My means were very slight; I had no choice but to take such work as offered, and mere chance had put me into a position which ...

— New Grub Street • George Gissing

... "do not ask it; I will not give even this evidence of a doubt which I never can feel again. Go yourself, and see her alone. Learn, if possible, by what evil influence she has been wiled from her home. If she has fled to escape the importunity of my love, tell her to fear it no more; I will leave the country—do anything rather than stand in the way of her ...

— Mabel's Mistake • Ann S. Stephens

... be greater, if he had made the manuscript in his heart's blood, like a compact with the devil? Do you really fancy you should be more beholden to your correspondent, if he had been damning you all the while for your importunity? Pleasures are more beneficial than duties because, like the quality of mercy, they are not strained, and they are twice blest. There must always be two to a kiss, and there may be a score in a jest; but wherever there is an element ...

— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 2 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... would rather have died than have agreed to their proposals. What they wanted was that lots should be drawn, and that he who drew the shortest should be put to death, and the one next should be the executioner. The captain's wife was to be free. At last their importunity became so great that Mr Carr agreed that, should no sail appear at the end of another twenty-four hours, he would no longer oppose their wishes. Before that time, two of those who were most eager for the dreadful mode of sustaining life, or most fearful of death, were summoned away. ...

— Old Jack • W.H.G. Kingston

... obtain his consent to the departure of the troops by land—the only point then left in dispute. Don John, still clinging to his secret scheme, with which the sea voyage of the troops was so closely connected, refused to concede. He reproached the envoys, on the contrary, with their importunity in making a fresh demand, just as he had conceded the Ghent treaty, upon his entire responsibility and without instructions. Mentally resolving that this point should still be wrung from the Governor, but not suspecting his secret motives for resisting it so strenuously, the deputies took an amicable ...

— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... not my father. The convent was burned by the enemy, and several nuns perished, among others this woman. I wrote to Mr. Neville, and on my return implored him to complete the disclosure. He refused, and, on my importunity, indignantly upbraided me with the favours he had already conferred. We parted in mutual displeasure. I renounced the name of Neville, and assumed that of Lovel. It was at this time, when residing with a friend in the north of England, that I became acquainted with Miss Wardour, and was romantic ...

— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VII • Various

... his sobs, 'Oh, mamma, slavery is the most cursed thing in the world!' From that time the story can less be said to have been composed by her than imposed upon her. Scenes, incidents, conversations rushed upon her with a vividness and importunity that would not be denied. The book insisted upon getting itself into being, and would ...

— The Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, 1995, Memorial Issue • Various

... desire to see Rodney sickened her with its importunity. Each time she beat it back, in an instant, to its burrow below the threshold, and it hid there, it ran underground. There were ways below the threshold by which desire could get at him. Therefore, one night—Tuesday of the fourth week—she cut him off. She refused to ...

— The Flaw in the Crystal • May Sinclair