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Busy   Listen
adjective
Busy  adj.  
1.
Engaged in some business; hard at work (either habitually or only for the time being); occupied with serious affairs; not idle nor at leisure; as, a busy merchant. "Sir, my mistress sends you word That she is busy, and she can not come."
2.
Constantly at work; diligent; active. "Busy hammers closing rivets up." "Religious motives... are so busy in the heart."
3.
Crowded with business or activities; said of places and times; as, a busy street. "To-morrow is a busy day."
4.
Officious; meddling; foolish active. "On meddling monkey, or on busy ape."
5.
Careful; anxious. (Obs.)
Synonyms: Diligent; industrious; assiduous; active; occupied; engaged.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Busy" Quotes from Famous Books



... her, innocent of evil, trusting, wistful. "He spoke about your coming, and said he'd want the use of the parlor this evening, for the wedding. I had an idea you was coming on the six-twenty train. Maybe he thought so, too. I never heard you come in—I was busy frying doughnuts in the kitchen—and I just happened to come in here after something. You'd oughta rapped on that door. Then I'd 'a' known you was here. I'll go and have my old man hunt him up. He must be around town ...
— Lonesome Land • B. M. Bower

... thyme and mignonette. She pleases me most, your Gertrude, although you foretold I should prefer the husband; with her thin white face, a Memling Madonna finished by some Tuscan sculptor, and her long, delicate white hands ever busy, like those of a mediaeval lady, with some delicate piece of work; and the strange blue, more limpid than the sky and deeper than the sea, of ...
— Hauntings • Vernon Lee

... freshening gale soon rattled us past the town of Simoda, and into the great bay of Yedo, with the volcano of Vries at its entrance. Hundreds of queer-shaped junks and smaller craft, laden with the produce of the busy nation, glide across the rolling seas with duck-like motions, on their peaceful ...
— In Eastern Seas - The Commission of H.M.S. 'Iron Duke,' flag-ship in China, 1878-83 • J. J. Smith

... with you and see you into the place. I should have to come back the same night—I'm so tremendously busy just now—what with the paper and ...
— Hilda Lessways • Arnold Bennett

... rapid change of scenery, during which Chick was again obliged to change his position, and for a time he lost sight of Cervera in the stir and confusion of the busy stage. ...
— With Links of Steel • Nicholas Carter

... very slight sketch of the history of lace. Venice being its birthplace, and likewise the busy scene of its rehabilitation, I have lingered over its school, and left but little space for the discussion of those of Spain, Flanders, Belgium, and France. But these have been thoroughly investigated, and their individual merits are well appreciated, both ...
— Needlework As Art • Marian Alford

... was ordered to hold the fort, but I little supposed that he was so hard pressed. However, I hope we shall be in time to relieve him. You see these fine fellows?" and he pointed to the men. "I have been busy for some months, while you were away, raising and drilling them; and though I cannot say much for the uniformity of their appearance, I am pretty sure that, if well led—as I flatter myself they will be—they will do good service ...
— In New Granada - Heroes and Patriots • W.H.G. Kingston

... the children soon forgot everything in the twelfth-cakes which adorned the pastry-cooks' windows, till the sixpence, which was tightly clasped in each little hand, recalled them to their errand, and they joined the busy crowd in the toy-shop. Who does not know what it is to take a child into these abodes of Noah's arks, cats, dogs, mice, and dolls, and all that is so charming? How each toy is seized on in its turn, to be relinquished in ...
— Adventures of a Sixpence in Guernsey by A Native • Anonymous

... illustration. In these vessels they remain a couple of minutes, when they are taken out, disemboweled with a sharp knife, if they haven't already thrown up their stomachs, and then taken to great bamboo sheds containing still larger boilers. In these latter is water seasoned with mimosa bark. A busy scene now ensues; all is bustle, noise, and activity. The bubbling of the great caldrons, the incessant chatter of those engaged in the work, the dumping of fresh loads of sea-cucumbers into the vessels, and the removal of others ...
— Harper's Young People, November 25, 1879 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various

... are not writing, for I have not had a word from you this century; nay, nor you from me. In truth, we have had a busy month, and many grumbles of a state-quake; but the session has however ended very triumphantly for the great Earl. I mean, we are adjourned for the holidays for above a month, after two divisions of one hundred and sixty-six ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole Volume 3 • Horace Walpole

... capable-looking head in the manner of the Prussian who would like to make the Turks believe he loves them. Rustum Khan cursed with keen attention to detail at sight of him. The man who had entered with him became busy in the shadows trying to find room to stall their horses, but Von Quedlinburg gave his reins to an attendant, and stood alone, akimbo, with the firelight displaying him ...
— The Eye of Zeitoon • Talbot Mundy

... not notice it. "Captain Heath, my husband," she went on, carelessly rising and smoothing her skirts. The captain, who had risen too, bowed vaguely at the introduction, but Barker extended his hand frankly. "I found Stacy busy," he said in answer to his wife, "but he is coming ...
— The Three Partners • Bret Harte

... of antiquity, when the face of the country, now busy and fertile, was one dense forest, with here and there a settlement of dwellers in huts, tillers of the land, herdsmen, or hunters, there lived near the spot now occupied by the thriving town of Evesham a swineherd named Eoves. One day, we are told, a favourite sow was missing, and her ...
— Evesham • Edmund H. New

... un with us when we're finished here. I reckon yeou'm busy. We'll bide here an'—'tis washin' day with yeou, simly," said Stalky. "We'm no company to make all vitty for. Never yeou mind us. ...
— Stalky & Co. • Rudyard Kipling

... of the Far East by the maintenance of strict neutrality, but the action of Germany has at length compelled Great Britain, our ally, to open hostilities against that country, and Germany is at Kiao-chau, its leased territory in China, busy with warlike preparations, while her armed vessels, cruising the seas of eastern Asia, are threatening our commerce and that of our ally. The peace of the Far East is ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume III (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various

... the good folk in new uniforms, seated in the official arm-chairs of the Hotel de Ville, will be sure to busy themselves in heaping up obstacles. They will talk of giving compensation to the landlords, of preparing statistics, and drawing up long reports. Yes, they would be capable of drawing up reports long enough to outlast ...
— The Conquest of Bread • Peter Kropotkin

... source wrought itself into innumerable songs and sonnets, which Gerald managed to write clandestinely, when some new frolic drew away the attention of his brothers and sisters, and left him in the enjoyment of a peaceful hour and a quiet corner. During these intervals of busy writing he was insensibly acquiring that light and graceful style, by the gentle charm of which the most sober strain of serious thought became the most acceptable kind of agreeable reading. Though still ...
— Donahoe's Magazine, Volume 15, No. 1, January 1886 • Various

... the recital of their preparations with his usual absent interest in everything not turning upon Art, politics, or social intrigue. He said, 'Yes, good, good,' at the proper intervals, and walked down the riva to look at the busy boat, said to Nevil, 'You are a sailor; I confide my family to you,' and prudently counselled Renee to put on the dresses she could toss to the deep without regrets. Mrs. Culling he thanked ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... boy into their midst and made much of him, and he found something very charming in the innocent companionship of these simple-hearted girls. Never having known mother or sisters, he was quick to feel the influences they brought about him, and their busy, lively ways made him ashamed of the indolent life he led. He was tired of books, and found people so interesting now that Mr. Brooke was obliged to make very unsatisfactory reports, for Laurie was always playing truant and ...
— Little Women • Louisa May Alcott

... and to the office, where busy all the morning, at noon home, and there to dinner with my clerks and Mr. Pelting, and had a very good dinner, among others a haunch of venison boiled, and merry we were, and I rose soon from dinner, and with my wife and girle to the King's house, and there saw "The Mad Couple," ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys

... on the hot plates near, and the glowing range in the background, innumerable pans were simmering and steaming. Here was a table covered with stewed fruits; there another laden with round vegetable pies just out of the oven—while a heap of tomatoes on a third lent their scarlet to the busy picture. Some rays of wintry sun had slipped in through the high windows, and were contending with the steam of the pies and the smoke from the cooking. And in front of all on an upturned box sat a pair of Lancashire lasses, peeling apples ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... fire, the smoke of which had been hidden by the snow-spray, a cot was drawn up before the fire, and a big, fair young man in tweeds whose face, rosy, sensitive, and quiet, was bent over the figure on the cot. A pair of large, white hands were carefully busy. ...
— The Branding Iron • Katharine Newlin Burt

... I can't give you any advice whatever, Rene, it is certainly horribly unpleasant being obliged to fight in a cause you detest, but I don't think there will be a very great deal of fighting till an assault is made on the city, and when that begins, I should say the Communists will be too busy to look ...
— A Girl of the Commune • George Alfred Henty

... plain; and in her manner, even when she sat as still as she did then, there was an indefinable something which appeared to be in kindred with her scrupulously unpretending dress. She had sat, at first looking anxiously towards the bed; but seeing that the patient remained quiet, and was busy with his writing, she had softly moved her chair into its present place; partly, as it seemed, from an instinctive consciousness that he desired to avoid observation; and partly that she might, unseen by him, give some vent to the natural feelings ...
— Life And Adventures Of Martin Chuzzlewit • Charles Dickens

... street came the busy sound of day: at other times how insufferable he had found it! and now how joyous it seemed that men should bestir themselves, and turn to all sorts of occupations! There was a sound of crumbling snow: and how nice to have a house and a blaze upon the hearth! "And ...
— Christian Gellert's Last Christmas - From "German Tales" Published by the American Publishers' Corporation • Berthold Auerbach

... preparations for the wedding went on rapidly, the bride-elect, and those who were to be her attendants, being particularly interested in regard to their attire for the great occasion, and keeping the dressmakers very busy ...
— Elsie at Home • Martha Finley

... to the south-west of the island Hispaniola. When they reached Cape Tiburon, where there is a good anchorage, they brought aboard a store of oranges, to save them from the scurvy. While the men were busy in the orange groves Henry Morgan "gave letters patent, or commissions," to all his captains, "to act all manner of hostility against the Spanish nation." For this act he had the sealed authority of the Council of Jamaica. He was no longer a pirate or buccaneer, but an admiral ...
— On the Spanish Main - Or, Some English forays on the Isthmus of Darien. • John Masefield

... the Goldfields.—Below, on the flats, the scene was a busy one. Thousands upon thousands of holes covered the earth, where men emerged and disappeared like ants, each bearing a bag of sand which he either threw on a wheelbarrow or slung over his shoulder, and then carried forward, running ...
— History of Australia and New Zealand - From 1606 to 1890 • Alexander Sutherland

... mood of the forest. I tell you this, child, that you may not be misled by my example (which has a reason of its own and, I trust, an excuse) into shunning your destiny though it lead and keep you in cities and among crowds; for we have it on the word of no less busy a man than the Emperor Marcus Aurelius that to seek out private retiring-rooms for the soul such as country villages, the sea-shore, mountains, is but a mistaken simplicity, seeing that at what time soever a man will it is in his power ...
— Sir John Constantine • Prosper Paleologus Constantine

... her up. I want this picture for the Weekly. Get busy, you, there!" We all joined in to help things; the orchestra hit the rough spots, and we went highfalutin' down the centre, to show the English race how our joy pained us, and that life in the Klondyke had ...
— Pardners • Rex Beach

... Hamilton, who had been minister since 1765, thus found himself suddenly converted from a dilettante and sportsman, lounging through life, into a busy diplomat, at the centre of affairs of critical moment. At sixty-two the change could scarcely have been welcome to him, but to his beautiful and ambitious wife the access of importance was sweet, for it led to a close friendship with the Queen, already disposed to affect her, even ...
— The Life of Nelson, Vol. I (of 2) - The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain • A. T. (Alfred Thayer) Mahan

... was not romantic, but the situation was, and Emily found that pie ambrosial food eaten with the man she loved, whose eyes talked more eloquently than the tongue just then busy with a doughnut. Ruth kept away, but glanced at them as she served her company, and her own happy experience helped her to see that all was going well in that quarter. Saul and Sophie emerged from the back entry with shining countenances, but carefully avoided each other for the rest of the evening. ...
— Kitty's Class Day And Other Stories • Louisa M. Alcott

... Rosalie carelessly, "only let me tell you this, if you see Aunt Zenobie in the yard or at the door you had better not come in. She doesn't want to see you here. If you come it is better to come in the evening, then she ... she is busy." ...
— Nobody's Girl - (En Famille) • Hector Malot

... left the room, Prince Duncan threw himself back in his chair and reflected. His thoughts were busy with the man who had just left him, and he tried to arrange some method of throwing the guilt upon Denton. Yet, perhaps, even that would not be necessary. So far as Mr. Duncan knew, there was no record in Mr. Armstrong's possession of the numbers ...
— Struggling Upward - or Luke Larkin's Luck • Horatio Alger

... the market. The attendance of farmers, maltsters, and corn buyers was so large that the whole of the open space of the Market Hill was covered by crowds of buyers and sellers of farm produce, presenting a busy scene more worthy of the past traditions of the market than anything seen now. {109} The market beginning then in good time, by mid-day most of the business was finished, and, regularly at one o'clock there came out of an upper window of the Green Man, the well-known form and features ...
— Fragments of Two Centuries - Glimpses of Country Life when George III. was King • Alfred Kingston

... took the occasion to seek some private conversation with Jeanie Deans. She gave him the opportunity he sought, by leaving the room, as if in prosecution of some part of her morning labour. Butler followed her in a few minutes, leaving Deans so closely engaged by his busy visitor, that there was little chance of his ...
— The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott

... Busy with this always fresh problem, I had come to a side street leading to the market from which two or three small groceries draw their supplies, and stopped for a moment to look at the flabby, half-decayed vegetables, the coarse beef and measly-looking ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, September 1880 • Various

... day an enormous herd of buffalo came near to the village, and a great many were killed. The women were busy cutting up and drying the meat. At one camp was more meat than at any other. The woman was hanging meat upon a long tent pole, when the pole broke in two and she was obliged to hold the meat up with another pole, just as the young man ...
— Myths and Legends of the Sioux • Marie L. McLaughlin

... Livingstone had "Jesu dulcis memoria"—the Latin of it—ringing in his head as he travelled in unexplored Africa. Men who did such work—work that lasts and is recognized again and again to be genuine by others busy in the same field—cannot have been random, light-hearted creatures. They were, in fact, men tested in life, men of experience of wide and deep experience—men with a gift for living, developed in heart as well as ...
— The Jesus of History • T. R. Glover

... sympathetic tone which characterizes the egotist when the subject is himself. Miss Severence listened without comment; indeed, he was not sure that she was listening, so conventional was her expression. But, though she was careful to keep her face a blank, her mind was busy. Surely not since the gay women of Barras's court laughed at the megalomaniac ravings of a noisy, badly dressed, dirty young lieutenant named Buonaparte, had there been a vanity so candid, so voluble, so obstreperous. ...
— The Fashionable Adventures of Joshua Craig • David Graham Phillips

... picture. He would stop with an exclamation and stand gazing, self-forgetful, for incredible periods, and she would watch him, filled with a curious sense of the limitations of an appreciation she had thought complete. Where during his busy life had he got this thing which others had sought in many voyages ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... city, are 10,000 sheep. Forty miles west of the same city is San Miguel, on which are 2,000 sheep. Each one of these ranches has a sailing vessel to carry freight, etc., to and fro between the islands and the mainland, and they are kept busy the greater part ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 417 • Various

... with thoughts of making friends with John Hardy. When he came into the room with the wood in his arms, she pretended to be busy with her studies but watched him eagerly. When he had put the wood in the box and turned to go out, she put down her head and blushed. She tried to make talk but could say nothing, and after he had gone she was angry ...
— Winesburg, Ohio • Sherwood Anderson

... woman with a good big heart, and I thought about this time that I'd jolly her a little and get my dinner. One day I came up from the cellar carrying a hod of coal in each hand, and going into the kitchen I tried in every way to attract her attention, but she was busy broiling a steak and never looked around. Finally I got tired and said, "Cook, where will I put this coal?" Well, well, I'll never forget that moment in years! She turned and looked at me and began, "I want ...
— Dave Ranney • Dave Ranney

... his terrors, the very silence of the place appeared a source of peril, and a thing to strike and freeze the passer-by; and he would step more boldly, and bustle aloud among the contents of the shop, and imitate, with elaborate bravado, the movements of a busy man at ease in ...
— English Prose - A Series of Related Essays for the Discussion and Practice • Frederick William Roe (edit. and select.)

... and again the watch was set. This time our efforts were rewarded; the scout saw the farmer shoot and throw the rifle down. He reported to the officer and we went over. The horny-handed son of toil was very busy at the plow as he saw us coming. He couldn't speak English. The officer sent to the nearest French battery and presently a French soldier came who interpreted the officer's questions and the man's replies. He knew nothing, whatever, he said, about the rifle shots ...
— S.O.S. Stand to! • Reginald Grant

... for the soldier's intellectual and social needs. The piano and the phonograph, the billiard tables, draughts and chess boards, tables for games, library, and reading room keep him busy; and the concerts, stimulating lectures, moving pictures, educational classes, and debating societies provide him with recreational and ...
— With Our Soldiers in France • Sherwood Eddy

... to his noble and highly valued friend, Lafayette, "I have become a private citizen on the banks of the Potomac; and under the shadow of my own vine, and my own fig tree, free from the bustle of a camp, and the busy scenes of public life, I am solacing myself with those tranquil enjoyments, of which the soldier who is ever in pursuit of fame—the statesman whose watchful days and sleepless nights are spent in devising schemes to promote ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 4 (of 5) • John Marshall

... of any description, on account of the uncertainty of the times, and the poverty which pervaded the land; I therefore felt much dispirited. This incident, however, admonished me not to be cast down when things look gloomiest, as the hand of the Lord is generally then most busy; that men may learn to perceive, that whatever good is accomplished is not their ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow

... never thought so before, which is some comfort however. Arrive at the fatal place by twelve. Burnt brandy, women, and sabbath-breaking, repented of. Some few penitential drops fall under the gallows. Sheriffs' men, parson, pickpockets, criminals, all very busy. The last concluding peremptory psalm struck up. Show over by one."—In this sportive strain does this misguided wit think proper to play with a subject so serious, which yet he would hardly have done if he had not known that there existed a predisposition ...
— The Works of Charles Lamb in Four Volumes, Volume 4 • Charles Lamb

... water, joins it, descending through a gorge so narrow that the track, which at all times is blasted on the face of the precipice, is occasionally scaffolded. A very extensive rock-slip had carried away the path and rendered several fords necessary, and before I reached it rumour was busy with the peril. It was true that the day before several mules had been carried away and drowned, that many loads had been sacrificed, and that one native traveller had lost his life. So I started my caravan at daybreak, to get the water at its lowest, and ascended the ...
— Among the Tibetans • Isabella L. Bird (Mrs Bishop)

... very busy in their kib-va. Every member was shelling corn of the different colors as if on a wager. Each man made a figure of moist clay, about four or five inches across the base. Some of these were in the form of two mammae, ...
— Archeological Expedition to Arizona in 1895 • Jesse Walter Fewkes

... her own affairs, did not make her forgetful of those of the Harrels: and the morning after the busy day which was last recorded, as soon as she quitted the breakfast- room, she began a note to Mr Monckton, but was interrupted with information that he was already ...
— Cecilia Volume 1 • Frances Burney

... but it won't be convenient this time. What would you want to go for, anyhow? I'm going to be too busy to be ...
— More Toasts • Marion Dix Mosher

... hear a great many who were ready prepared to speak to him, but went away, at which I was well pleased, for indeed I began to lose all patience, and was extremely fatigued with staying so long. But there is no harm done; I will go again to-morrow; perhaps the sultan may not be so busy." ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments vol. 3 • Anon.

... of gray mist accented with poster-bedizened kiosks and regularly recurring horse-chestnut trees; elegantes at prayer, in somewhat distracted mood, on prie-dieus in the vacant and vapid Paris churches; seated at cafe tables on the busy, leisurely boulevards, or posing tout bonnement for the reproduction of the most fascinating feminine ensemble in the world—owe their charm (I may say again their "fetchingness") to the faithfulness with which their portraitist has studied, ...
— French Art - Classic and Contemporary Painting and Sculpture • W. C. Brownell

... dead and wounded did they relinquish the contest. They took away the wounded, but left the dead where they lay, and in the night the garrison had the gruesome task of carrying the bodies to the edge of the cliff and casting them into the sea. For some time Dr. Smith was kept busy in attending to the wounded among his own party, and next day one of the stokers, struck by a poisoned arrow, succumbed to blood-poisoning, and his comrades, at dead of night, ...
— Round the World in Seven Days • Herbert Strang

... less than thirty miles in length, gives a passage to vessels of 500 tons. As I have before said, 60,000,000 bushels of breadstuff were thus pushed through Buffalo in the open months of the year 1861. These open months run from the middle of April to the middle of November; but the busy period is that of the last two months—the time, that is, which intervenes between the full ripening of the corn and the coming of ...
— Volume 1 • Anthony Trollope

... has come in, eccellenza. He—he brought a lady with him. She seemed faint and ill, and I sent for the gardener's wife to come and look after her. I have given her the blue room, and the housekeeper is with her now. She was busy with the dinner when she first came." The old butler rubbed his ...
— Olive in Italy • Moray Dalton

... with the crowd, frequented, was a primitive Coney Island. Bear pits, cockfights, theatrical attractions, side-shows, innumerable hotels and small restaurants, saloons, races, hammer-striking, throwing balls at negroes' heads, and a hundred other attractions kept the crowds busy and generally good-natured. If a fight arose, "it was," as the Irishman says, "considered a private fight," and nobody else could get in it. Such things were considered matters for the ...
— The Forty-Niners - A Chronicle of the California Trail and El Dorado • Stewart Edward White

... over the busy, anxious household, and poor Eyebright—though her words were still courageous—was losing heart, and had begun to feel that a cold, dreadful wave of sorrow was poising itself a little way off, and might presently ...
— Eyebright - A Story • Susan Coolidge

... house, we found dinner ready. Dona Maria, during our absence, had been busy superintending its preparation; and if the table did not groan with delicacies, the feast was as good a one as we could have desired to eat. Mr Laffan, Hugh, and I showed, at all events, that we enjoyed it, though Juan was unusually silent, and ate but little. There was something ...
— In New Granada - Heroes and Patriots • W.H.G. Kingston

... and everybody called on the bride afterwards. Next morning, however, some of the realities of life commenced. We were late to breakfast, and, to my dismay, the breakfast was over. I glanced at my husband, who seemed a little embarrassed. But a cordial greeting from his mother, who was busy in the adjoining room "ridding up," and an affectionate kiss from his sister (Mrs. Wahrendorff), who immediately advanced upon our entrance into the room, made things a little more pleasant. We sat down together, ...
— A Biographical Sketch of the Life and Character of Joseph Charless - In a Series of Letters to his Grandchildren • Charlotte Taylor Blow Charless

... very busy in London," answered Thelma. "He knows where I am going. Do not be at all anxious, Friedhof,—I shall make the journey very well and I am not afraid of ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli

... like," said she, and Lee, whistling softly, turned on his heel and began to busy himself with ...
— Many Cargoes • W.W. Jacobs

... being so busy, there may have been another reason why he never would tell any one why he was named Sandy. Jimmy Rabbit was the first to suggest that perhaps Sandy ...
— The Tale of Sandy Chipmunk • Arthur Scott Bailey

... Louhi's daughter, sat upon a rainbow in the heavens, and was clad in the most splendid dress of gold and silver. She was busy weaving golden webs of wonderful beauty, using a shuttle of ...
— Finnish Legends for English Children • R. Eivind

... beside the bed carried a few medicine bottles, some toast and water, and an empty glass. Every now and then the lank man's lips fell apart, to indicate a word he could not articulate. But the woman did not notice that he wanted anything, because she was busy turning out papers from an old-fashioned bureau in the opposite corner of the room. At first the picture was very vivid indeed, but as the green dawn behind it grew brighter and brighter, so it became fainter and more and ...
— The Country of the Blind, And Other Stories • H. G. Wells

... and the forum was crowded alike with the busy and the idle. As at Paris at this day, so at that time in the cities of Italy, men lived almost wholly out of doors: the public buildings, the forum, the porticoes, the baths, the temples themselves, ...
— The Last Days of Pompeii • Edward George Bulwer-Lytton

... his business, now commemorating the virtues of that cluster of scholars and churchmen with whose friendship he was favoured in youth, and teaching his young brother-in-law, Thomas Ken, to walk in their saintly footsteps,—now busy with his rod and line, or walking and talking with a friend, staying now and then to quaff an honest glass at a wayside ale-house—leading a simple, ...
— Waltoniana - Inedited Remains in Verse and Prose of Izaak Walton • Isaak Walton

... which he hoped to serve in like manner. Then he expected to post armed vessels outside Currituck Inlet, distress the people of the coast country, and thus keep the people of eastern Carolina so busy defending their own homes that they would not be able to send men to interfere with the ...
— In Ancient Albemarle • Catherine Albertson

... asked lightly, being too intellectually busy clearing his pipe to see where the leading counsel ...
— Westways • S. Weir Mitchell

... "lessons." I remember that the present Mr. Lund, of Malsis Hall, was one of my father's principal pupils. Some very good "talent" was turned out in the way of glee parties particularly, and just before Christmas my father used to be very busy training singers for carolling. I often wrote a little doggerel-rhyme to please those who came to the classes. One of my earliest efforts was a few verses anent my first pair of britches, which I, in common, I suppose, with other juveniles, regarded ...
— Adventures and Recollections • Bill o'th' Hoylus End

... instruction became general wherever missionary stations were established. Not only the children, but adults became scholars. During the hours of instruction other engagements were suspended, and the various scenes of busy ...
— Captain Cook - His Life, Voyages, and Discoveries • W.H.G. Kingston

... I'd rather not see any one longer to-night." She took off her coat almost hurriedly. "It's a busy time for me now before the holidays; and with father as he is—That's why I came away so early, you know. ...
— The Dominant Dollar • Will Lillibridge

... then; not even those among us who had long learned the deceit of Indian nature could unroll the shadowing veil of that morrow and reveal the forthcoming tragedy of those silent plains. I remember that, doubtful as I felt about the future, I could look on with interest at the busy scene, and that more than once a smile lay upon my lips. What an odd variety of figures that congested place disclosed! what strange life-histories were having their culmination there! I saw Ensign Ronan, young, slender, smooth of face, appearing scarce more than a boy, his short fatigue-jacket buttoned ...
— When Wilderness Was King - A Tale of the Illinois Country • Randall Parrish

... place of muster for the colony was the city of Glasgow. There the Earl of Selkirk's representative was Captain Roderick M'Donald. Many Highlanders had gone to Glasgow, that busy hive of industry, in search of work. To the clerks in the shops and to the labourers in the yards or at the loom, M'Donald described the glories of Assiniboia. Many were impressed by his words, but objected to the low wages offered for their {38} services. ...
— The Red River Colony - A Chronicle of the Beginnings of Manitoba • Louis Aubrey Wood

... service men were busy and astute, preventing filibustering plots and mail robberies. There was a constant feeling of uneasiness. San Francisco still housed ...
— Port O' Gold • Louis John Stellman

... exclaimed my uncle Ro, as we stopped on the draw of the bridge to look at the busy scene in the basin, where literally hundreds of canal-boats were either lying to discharge or to load, or were coming and going, to say nothing of other craft; "dear, good old Albany! you are a town to which I ever return with ...
— The Redskins; or, Indian and Injin, Volume 1. - Being the Conclusion of the Littlepage Manuscripts • James Fenimore Cooper

... to a blunder. The conflict of opinion resulted in the usual compromise. A new commission was to be despatched with a more strongly worded message from the senate; but, as rumour had apparently been busy with the adventures of the "three young men" whom Jugurtha had turned back, it was deemed advisable to select the present envoys from men whose age, birth and ample honours might give weight to a mission that was meant to avert a war.[912] The ...
— A History of Rome, Vol 1 - During the late Republic and early Principate • A H.J. Greenidge

... back and hide in the hedge only to hear your footsteps as you went homewards—I may henceforth admire you at my leisure, see you busy, moving, smiling, prattling! An endless joy! You cannot imagine all the gladness it is to me to see you going and coming; only a man can know that deep delight. Your least movement gives me greater pleasure than a mother even can feel as she sees her child asleep or at play. I love you with every ...
— Louis Lambert • Honore de Balzac

... upon to follow the lead of Constantinople. The males of these wild tribespeople were remarkable fighters, subject to no control, hating the English sway, and so independent of roads and transport that they could keep busy an even larger force of less mobile troops. Their chief weakness was their lack of cohesion and the impossibility of any ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume III (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various

... further conversation. Dunstable's brain was working fast. He had an idea, and was busy developing it. ...
— The Politeness of Princes - and Other School Stories • P. G. Wodehouse

... the nearest town (thirty miles away), as originally proposed. Gerty's mother, who lived in town, was coming to see her over her trouble; Job had made arrangements with the town doctor, but prompt attendance could hardly be expected of a doctor who was very busy, who was too fat to ride, and ...
— Joe Wilson and His Mates • Henry Lawson

... Boland, old socks!" said Thompson. "Our young friend is right, you know. You are not practical. You are booky. You are a dreamer. Get into the game. Get busy! Get into business. Get a wad. Get! Found ...
— Copper Streak Trail • Eugene Manlove Rhodes

... glad hill, or through the shady dale, They hunt the fearful hare, and now they flush With busy dog, sagacious of the trail, Wild pheasant from the stubble-field or bush. Now where green junipers perfume the gale, Suspend the snare, or lime the fluttering thrush: And casting now for fish, with net or book, Disturb their secret haunts ...
— Orlando Furioso • Lodovico Ariosto

... the sunshine the strangers disappeared. Nowhere all that day were there any but our own town's people to be seen. Some of these, however, I knew afterwards, were very busy. I remember seeing Conlow and Mapleson and Dodd sauntering carelessly about in different parts of the town, especially upon Cliff Street, which was unusual for them. Just at nightfall the town was filled with strangers again. Yeager and his ...
— The Price of the Prairie - A Story of Kansas • Margaret Hill McCarter

... At anchorage. The ship's company busy with preparations for the return voyage, bringing ballast, wood, and water from the shore, etc., the ship having no lading for the return. This day died, on shore, Mistress Elizabeth Winslow, wife of Master Winslow. Many still sick. More on the ship ...
— The Mayflower and Her Log, Complete • Azel Ames

... lazy ages, lost in sleep and ease, No action leave to busy chronicles: Such, whose supine felicity but makes In story chasms, in epoch's mistakes; O'er whom Time gently shakes his wings of down, Till, with his silent sickle, they are mown. 110 Such is not Charles' too, too active age, Which, govern'd ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol I - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden

... while the rest during their absences piled treasure on the beach. Two of the bars, slung in a rope's end, made a good load for a grown man—one that he was glad to walk slowly with. For my part, as I was not much use at carrying, I was kept busy all day in the cave packing the minted money ...
— Treasure Island • Robert Louis Stevenson

... onsoucht, mem. It's only 'at he's busy cleanin' oot yer puir horse' hivs 'at hedisna p'y his respec's to ye. But he'll be ...
— Warlock o' Glenwarlock • George MacDonald

... is an atmosphere of charm and interest which the traveller encounters in Mexican life, especially if he has recently arrived from among the prosaic surroundings of Mexico's great northern neighbour, the United States. Indeed, the transition from the busy Anglo-Saxon world which hurries and bustles in strenuous life northward from the Rio Grande, to that pastoral and primitive land of Spanish-America is as marked as that between Britain and the Orient. Yet it is only divided by ...
— Mexico • Charles Reginald Enock

... says Molly, in a tragic tone, stretching out her arms to her sister-in-law, who has been busy pacifying her youngest hope. As he has at last, however, declared himself content with five lumps of sugar and eight sweet biscuits, she finds time to look up and smile ...
— Molly Bawn • Margaret Wolfe Hamilton

... his tea, Mr. Tebrick said: "I shall not require you upstairs. Pack your own things and tell James to have the waggonette ready for you by seven o'clock to-morrow morning to take you to the station. I am busy now, but I will see you again ...
— Lady Into Fox • David Garnett

... evening, Arthur found himself too busy, getting the new study into what he termed ship-shape order, to be able to adopt his friend's suggestion about the lines. His idea of ship- shape did not in every particular correspond with the ordinary ...
— The Master of the Shell • Talbot Baines Reed

... for all those awful things you have said to me and about me, Jessie Sanderson," Marjorie threatened, good-naturedly. "I'd do it now, only I'm too busy trying to think ...
— Lucile Triumphant • Elizabeth M. Duffield

... that showed what he had lost. In these latter years he was busy enough in an incoherent, visionary fashion, and did even write and publish (though in characteristically fragmentary form) a work that made a great impression on young men in the second quarter of the century, his "Aids to Reflection"; but his activity ...
— Coleridge's Ancient Mariner and Select Poems • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... ring at the office entrance, was speechless from tears. Though usually hard as iron, he sobbed as if his heart would break. I asked to speak with Barbara—with my housekeeper. He told me I could not—that she was "busy laying out the body." I was answered. That dreadful word told me all—I had no more questions to ask. I cared not who survived, or what became of the survivors. And as I turned sickening away, to bend my steps homewards, I ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXVI. October, 1843. Vol. LIV. • Various

... do not get, often for weeks after the trout season is, legislatively, "open." Jonathan is "busy." I am "busy." We know that, if April passes, there is still May and June, and so, if at the end of April, or early May, we do at last pick up our rods,—all new-bedight with red silk windings, and shiny with fresh varnish,—it is not alone the call of the trout that decides us, but another call ...
— More Jonathan Papers • Elisabeth Woodbridge

... him her big boy.... He tramped out to Bone Stillman's shack, impatient for the hand-clasp of the pioneer, and grew eloquent, for the first time since his home-coming, as he described Professor Frazer and the delights of poesy. A busy week Carl had in Joralemon. Adelaide Benner gave a porch-supper for him. They sat under the trees, laughing, while in the dimly lighted street bicycles whirred, and box-elders he had always known whispered that this guest of honor was Carl ...
— The Trail of the Hawk - A Comedy of the Seriousness of Life • Sinclair Lewis

... however, had been found, and there it lay, tied but totally unguarded, in the canvas verandah of Rose Budd's habitation. Jack Tier passed and repassed it with apparent indifference, as he went to and fro, between his pantry and kitchen, busy as a bee in preparing his noontide meal for the day. This man seemed to have the islet all to himself, however, no one else being visible on any part of it. He sang his song, in a cracked, contre alto voice, and appeared to be happy in his solitude. Occasionally he talked to himself aloud, ...
— Jack Tier or The Florida Reef • James Fenimore Cooper

... rapid progress, the land being undermined by the steady and stealthy encroachments of the Jesuits. Lord Burghley sent many copies of his pamphlet, in Latin, French, and Italian, against the Seminaries, to Gebhard Truchsess; and the deposed archbishop made himself busy in translating that wholesome production into German, and in dispersing it "all Germany over." The work, setting duly forth "that the executions of priests in England were not for religion but for treason," was ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... Scotchman like his master, and just of the same kidney, with white kid gloves, red hair frizzled, a patch of paint on his face, and his hands covered with rings. This very fellow, I must tell you, was one of those most busy in endeavouring to get me turned out of the servants' club in Park Lane, because I happened to serve a literary man; so he sat down, and in a kind of affected tone cried out, 'Landlord, bring me a glass of cold negus.' The landlord, ...
— The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow

... one of the young rascals took it into his head to repeat the well-known irritating verse—not exactly singing out loud, but only barely moving his lips. The idea was soon caught up by his comrades, and wherever the unhappy Mr. Samuelsen turned his head he could read the couplet on the busy lips, ...
— Garman and Worse - A Norwegian Novel • Alexander Lange Kielland

... was busy peopling the quaint little town with the friends of her fancy, and sat smiling serenely as ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand

... lifts, and shows the snowy summits of the 'mountains of God,' the nearer lower ranges, which we thought the highest, dwindle indeed, but gain in sublimity and meaning by the loftier peaks to which they lead up. Unless men and women live for eternity, they are 'merely players,' and all their busy days 'like a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.' How absurd, how monotonous, how trivial it all is, all this fret and fume, all these dying joys and only less fleeting pains, all this mill-horse round of ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers • Alexander Maclaren

... better pleased than ever before. Florence seems so cheerful and busy, after ruined Rome, I feel as if I could forget the disasters of the day, for a while, in looking on the treasures ...
— Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli, Vol. II • Margaret Fuller Ossoli

... impracticable day-dream, unfit for everyday life and the common round of duties. "It is," so it is said, "all very well for ministers, and class leaders, and superintendents of Sunday-schools, and people who are not very busy in life to get sanctification, but it will not stand the strain and tension to which it would be subjected in some lives." But "God is no respecter of persons," and what He will do for one of His children He will do for all. And then, if we only knew it, sanctification is just ...
— The Heart-Cry of Jesus • Byron J. Rees

... And grating laugh, in murder's rolling eye, On death, corruption, on the hoary tomb, Or the fresh earth-mould of a new-made grave, On gaping wounds, on strife,—the pantomime Of lying lips, and pale, deceitful faces— Ay! searching every scene of rank pollution, In each foul corner busy as at play, With new horror gilding vice, disease, decay, Boast not, pale moon! to me thy ...
— Cromwell • Alfred B. Richards

... time, all Paris was busy with preparations for the marriage. The Louvre is upon one side of the River Seine, its principal front being toward the river, with a broad street between. There are no buildings, but only a parapet wall on the river side of the street, so that there is a fine view ...
— Mary Queen of Scots, Makers of History • Jacob Abbott

... ground as though felled by a lightning stroke. At supper-time, his wife finding that he did not come out from his closet where he was shut in, knocked at the door, and received no answer; knowing that her husband was wont to busy himself with dark and mysterious matters, she feared some disaster had occurred. She called her servants, who broke in the door. Then she found Sainte-Croix stretched out beside the furnace, the broken glass lying by his side. It was impossible to deceive ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - THE MARQUISE DE BRINVILLIERS • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE

... told of another doctor who claimed to be able to cure stammering. When I called to see him, he had me wait in his reception room for nearly two hours, for the purpose, I presume, of giving me the impression that he was a very busy man. Then he called me into his private consultation room, where he apparently had all of the modern and up-to-date surgical instruments. He put me through a thorough examination, after which he said that ...
— Stammering, Its Cause and Cure • Benjamin Nathaniel Bogue

... "I know you're awfully busy, Mr. Martin, and I want to help you all I can. So leave that matter ...
— Patty's Butterfly Days • Carolyn Wells

... turn the true impartial side! How will your eyes contain their tears, When all the sad reverse appears! This cave within its womb confines The last result of all designs: Here lie deposited the spoils Of busy mortals' endless toils: Here, with an easy search, we find The foul corruptions of mankind. The wretched purchase here behold Of traitors, who their country sold. This gulf insatiate imbibes The lawyer's fees, the statesman's bribes. Here, in their proper shape and mien, Fraud, ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift

... been a busy morning, and a well-spent one, but so far there had been no definite rejoicing in her heart, though the manifold riches and ground for joy of all Christians ...
— When the Holy Ghost is Come • Col. S. L. Brengle

... next day, and went directly to an upper room, at some distance from those usually occupied by the family, from whence came the busy ...
— Elsie's Motherhood • Martha Finley

... back again. "Then I suppose I mustn't refuse. And I should like going—after school hours. Madame de Vaux, who is the bride of a French officer, will join us, I think, for she and I are friends, and besides, she has had no chance to see things yet. She has been busy settling in her quarters—and I have ...
— The Golden Silence • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson

... a village at every league, inhabited by rich fishermen, and wealthy ship-builders, and found all these artificers busy enough in their professions; in some places, there were an hundred men dragging in, by bodily strength, the Saine; at others, still more surprising, ships of two hundred tons were building on the dry land, where ...
— A Year's Journey through France and Part of Spain, 1777 - Volume 1 (of 2) • Philip Thicknesse

... back at the surface all right, Perry," I cried; "but where, I don't know. I haven't opened her up yet. Been too busy reviving you. Lord, man, but you ...
— At the Earth's Core • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... already busy with preparations for our start to the interior. Mr. Gagliuffi has written to Ghat to-day for Hateetah and his escort of Tuaricks. Excitement protects us, perhaps, from the deadly influence of the climate of Mourzuk. Mr. Gagliuffi is recovering from a severe ...
— Narrative of a Mission to Central Africa Performed in the Years 1850-51, Volume 1 • James Richardson

... type of man whom hostesses have to "draw out"; he never talks either on himself, the army or any other subject. To "do his job" better than anybody else in the world could do it is enough for French; chatter about it he leaves to less busy people. ...
— Sir John French - An Authentic Biography • Cecil Chisholm

... summons to "get in," and Kitty got into the musty old cab beside her aunt, and they were started on the last stage of their journey through rain-washed busy streets, where the people were hurrying along under umbrellas, or in omnibuses and cabs. Now and then a cab laden with luggage would lumber past them on its way to the station, and Kitty's mind would follow the people inside it through a whole long ...
— Kitty Trenire • Mabel Quiller-Couch

... most beautiful hair in all the world, of course," said Barnabas. She was already busy twisting it into a shining rope, but here she paused to look up at him from under this bright nimbus, and with ...
— The Amateur Gentleman • Jeffery Farnol et al

... because activity is a pleasure to you. All this care and trouble is a pleasant stimulant, keeps you busy. If Markushka came to you, you would receive him in ...
— The Precipice • Ivan Goncharov

... weal, for other's woe, Let me have smiles and tears to give; And all my busy care bestow, In some fond ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XVII. No. 473., Saturday, January 29, 1831 • Various

... The pilot was busy with his work in handling the ship and therefore debarred from turning his head to look at his companion but at least he could put the astonishment ...
— Eagles of the Sky - With Jack Ralston Along the Air Lanes • Ambrose Newcomb

... the zealous observance of [their rules by] all the orders in those islands; the zeal with which they busy themselves in their ministries; the new conversions that are made daily in certain portions of the islands; and because if the religious are forced to that subjection [to the diocesan authorities] they will surely fall into laxity, and consequently, ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume XXXVI, 1649-1666 • Various

... thread and began to cross-stitch the mammoth cavern, never dreaming of the momentous resolve she was interrupting in my heart, "it is not so bad this year, because Lovey has got so nice and steady on his feet and doesn't put things in his mouth any more. Now he is so busy hunting and doctoring his 'squirms' as he calls them, that I have lots of free time to mend and darn and work. Of course, it is hard to have him keep them in his apron pocket and always carrying them in his hand when he hasn't a bottle that smells bad to carry. Just yesterday ...
— Phyllis • Maria Thompson Daviess

... of us are getting too busy or too lazy to smile. I see some, who were looking pretty solemn before I made the remark whose faces look a little brighter now—and some have already broken into a most gladsome smile. I'm glad of it. Smiles, they say are the least expensive things we can give ...
— Crayon and Character: Truth Made Clear Through Eye and Ear - Or, Ten-Minute Talks with Colored Chalks • B.J. Griswold

... straight to breakfast in the kitchen of the hotel. He found the staff greatly concerned about the trouble which was likely to befall him for borrowing the motor-car. It seemed that on finding it gone, its owner, a M. Cognier, had displayed a wrath of the most terrible. Of course an Argus-eyed busy-body had seen Tinker depart in it; and M. Cognier, an Anglophobe, had declared his intention of punishing this insolence of Perfidious Albion by handing him over to the police. Tinker heard all their prophecies of evil with ...
— The Admirable Tinker - Child of the World • Edgar Jepson

... sunny room of the Ainslee house Grandma Wentworth looked reproachfully at a flushed, busy girl who was laughing and singing snatches of droll ditties the while she emptied closets and dresser drawers and tucked things into four trunks, ...
— Green Valley • Katharine Reynolds

... it?" inquired the captain, who was busy folding the flag and getting it ready to be run up to the masthead. "Don't the fish-hawk get her living from the water, and aint I going to get mine ...
— True To His Colors • Harry Castlemon

... strong boxes had been bedded in sheet iron was just behind the little sanctum, where the cashier was busy. Doubtless he was balancing his books. The open front gave a glimpse of a safe of hammered iron, so enormously heavy (thanks to the science of the modern inventor) that burglars could not carry it away. The door only opened at the pleasure of those who knew its password. The letter-lock ...
— Library of the World's Best Mystery and Detective Stories • Edited by Julian Hawthorne

... and then leaned forward to give a stir to whatever was in it, making each time quite a spasmodic effort to do so without quitting her hold of the long handle. Ellen drew near and looked on with great curiosity, and not a little appetite, but Miss Fortune was far too busy to give her more than a passing glance. At length the hissing pan was brought to the hearth for some new arrangement of its contents, and Ellen seized the moment of peace and quiet to say, "Good morning, ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Susan Warner

... contribution was handed him and straightway had found a hammer and a nail and up it went beside its fellows. He never made objection: the more the merrier. The ice wind would soon blow across the Maas from Papendrecht, the tall grasses in the marshes turn pale with fright, and the lace-frost with busy fingers pattern the tiny panes, and then Johann would pack the kits one after another, and the last good-byes take place. But the sketches would remain. Oh! yes, the sketches would remain and tell the story of the summer ...
— The Veiled Lady - and Other Men and Women • F. Hopkinson Smith

... think. What brings you here? Is it curiosity? In that case I am paying dearly for a little fleeting pleasure. Have you fallen passionately in love already with a woman whom you have never seen, a woman with whose name slander has, of course, been busy? If so, your motive in making this visit is based on disrespect, on an error which accident brought ...
— The Deserted Woman • Honore de Balzac

... little of him, and was too busy to think about him or note whether he came or not, having so many anxieties on her mind just then, of which the heaviest was the girl-wife Annie in the next cabin. Since the semi-crisis in her illness, over which Katrine had helped her, there seemed to be little change in her condition ...
— A Girl of the Klondike • Victoria Cross

... calmly revolving these things, such pursuits seem far more noble objects of ambition than any upon which the vulgar herd of busy men lavish prodigal their restless exertions. To diffuse useful information, to further intellectual refinement, sure forerunner of moral improvement,—to hasten the coming of the bright day when the dawn of general knowledge shall chase ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick

... this forgetfulness, and there was the Dane gazing into the flames, and seeming heedless of all that was going on. Nor do I think that I had ever seen one look so sad as looked that homeless man, as he forgot the busy talk and movement around him in some thoughts ...
— Wulfric the Weapon Thane • Charles W. Whistler

... occupying, we see before us what an Irishman might call a triangular square—a sort of “Trivium,” where three ways meet, and where men not seldom congregate for trivial converse, although on market days it is the scene of busy barter, and at mart, or fair, transactions in horse, and other, flesh are negotiated with dealers of many kindreds, peoples, and tongues; but more of this anon. On the far side of this open space, “the Red Lion” bravely faces us, lashing its tail in rivalry. In the ...
— Records of Woodhall Spa and Neighbourhood - Historical, Anecdotal, Physiographical, and Archaeological, with Other Matter • J. Conway Walter

... descend to sweep imposingly along the meadows, trailing its draggled fringes through the pines, fondling the waving spires with infinite gentleness, or, gliding behind a grove or a single tree, bringing it into striking relief, as it bowed and waved in solemn rhythm. Sometimes, as the busy clouds drooped and condensed or dissolved to misty gauze, half of the Valley would be suddenly veiled, leaving here and there some lofty headland cut off from all visible connection with the walls, ...
— The Yosemite • John Muir

... years traveling up and down and back and forth through England on horseback, covering more than two hundred and fifty thousand miles, preaching everywhere more than forty thousand times, writing, translating, editing two hundred works. When death ended his busy life there were in his newly formed brotherhood one hundred and thirty-five thousand members, with five hundred and fifty itinerants who were following his example with incessant preaching and Bible exposition. It was the old Wiclif-Lollard movement over again. And here was the other Wesley, Charles, ...
— The Greatest English Classic A Study of the King James Version of • Cleland Boyd McAfee

... Narrative," chap. xiii.) describes as a "little hairy bee, a little smaller than the honey-bee of the north of Europe." Captain Hall found the same near Tampico; and a hive-full was sent to the blind but ingenious Francis Huber of Geneva, who died in 1831. This seems to be the case with the busy hymenopter generally in the highlands of Africa; the lowland swarms have been the terror of travellers from Mungo Park's day to that of the first ...
— Two Trips to Gorilla Land and the Cataracts of the Congo Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton

... Church. We can never dismiss from memory the sadness with which we once listened to the confession of a certain foreign professor: "I used to be concerned about religion," he said in substance, "but religion is a great subject. I was very busy; there was little time to settle it for myself. A protestant, my attention was called to the Roman Catholic religion. It suited my case. And instead of dabbling in religion for myself I put myself ...
— Natural Law in the Spiritual World • Henry Drummond

... gay, The mist has left the mountain grey. Springlets in the dawn are steaming, Diamonds on the lake are gleaming; And foresters have busy been, To track the buck in thicket green: Now we come to chaunt our lay, "Waken lords ...
— Bibliomania; or Book-Madness - A Bibliographical Romance • Thomas Frognall Dibdin

... insolent message, which so angered Hunding that he immediately set out in pursuit of the bold young prince, whom he followed to the dwelling of Hagal. Helgi would then have been secured but that meanwhile he had disguised himself as a servant-maid, and was busy grinding corn as if this were his wonted occupation. The invaders marvelled somewhat at the maid's tall stature and brawny arms, nevertheless they departed without suspecting that they had been so near ...
— Myths of the Norsemen - From the Eddas and Sagas • H. A. Guerber

... groschen a day, 10,000 more. Friedrioh Wilhelm would have gladly taken the whole; "but George II. took a certain number," say the Prussian Books (George II., or pious Trustees instead of him), "and settled them at Ebenezer in Virginia,"—read, Ebenezer IN GEORGIA, where General Oglethorpe was busy founding a Colony. [Petition to Parliament, 10th (21st) May, 1733, by Oglethorpe and his Trustees, for 10,000 pounds to carry over these Salzburgers; which was granted; Tindal's RAPIN (London, 1769), xx. 184.] There at Ebenezer I calculate they might go ahead, too, after the ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. IX. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle

... had seen her mother go down to the pond to fetch a pail of water, and it came into her head that she would fetch the water in her own little can, to fill the kettle for tea. So when her mother was busy at work, she got on a chair, and took her can off the shelf, and away she ran down to the pond, ...
— Pretty Tales for the Nursery • Isabel Thompson

... glance at some of the more striking changes in equipment and methods of operation. In the road bed, new standards of solidity have been set, grades cut down and curves straightened at a cost of uncounted millions, busy stretches double-tracked, steel bridges built in place of wooden trestles. The greatest single advance was the substitution, in the eighties chiefly, of steel for iron rails, making construction cheaper and ...
— The Railway Builders - A Chronicle of Overland Highways • Oscar D. Skelton



Words linked to "Busy" :   potter, busy bee, overbusy, work, employed, active, busybodied, labouring, occupied, interfering, laboring, busyness, toiling, in use, fussy, occupy, putter, meddling, smatter, play around, fancy, tied up, dabble, intrusive, engaged, up to, at work, meddlesome, idle



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