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Convivial   Listen
adjective
Convivial  adj.  Of or relating to a feast or entertainment, or to eating and drinking, with accompanying festivity; festive; social; gay; jovial. "Which feasts convivial meetings we did name."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Convivial" Quotes from Famous Books



... neither wrote nor threatened to do so. Something of cynicism appeared in his talk of public matters; politics amused him, and his social views lacked consistency, tending, however, to an indolent conservatism. Despite his convivial qualities, he had traits of the reserved, even of the unsociable, man: a slight awkwardness in bearing, a mute shyness with strangers, a hesitancy in ordinary talk, and occasional bluntness of assertion or contradiction, suggesting a contempt which possibly he did not intend. Hugh ...
— The Whirlpool • George Gissing

... announced that it was a mere flesh wound, and sat down as though nothing out of the ordinary had occurred to mar the festive occasion. Through the rest of the day, boats were passing between the ship and the sloop in a convivial reunion. Supper was to be cooked on the beach in great iron kettles and a frolic would follow the feast. The sloop had rum enough to sluice all the parched gullets ...
— Blackbeard: Buccaneer • Ralph D. Paine

... nightmare. Men have been hanged for more venial murders than some have been praised for who have choked out the immortal soul of the Psalms of David. We have, however, the consolation of thinking that the Devil's Psalter of convivial songs is quite ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 32, June, 1860 • Various

... remark, first: That we have three minutes to catch the train. Second: That, occupying the position we do in America,—you the member of a School Board and I the Honorary President of a Froebel Society,—we cannot be seen drinking lemonade from a bottle, in a public railway carriage; it would be too convivial. Third: You do not understand this gentleman. You have studied the language longer than I, but I have studied it more lately than you, and I am fresher, much fresher than you." (Here Salemina bridled obviously.) "The man is not saying ...
— Penelope's Postscripts • Kate Douglas Wiggin

... around with chastity; [110] corrupted by no seductive spectacles, [111] no convivial incitements. Men and women are alike unacquainted with clandestine correspondence. Adultery is extremely rare among so numerous a people. Its punishment is instant, and at the pleasure of the husband. He cuts off the hair [112] of the offender, ...
— The Germany and the Agricola of Tacitus • Tacitus

... act of raising his glass to his lips, and looked over the silent company as though seeking a convivial companion. His son was still staring out of the window. The little stockbroker, seated on the sofa beside his large wife, made a deprecating movement of his eyebrows, as though entreating not to be asked. Austin's cold glance roved to ...
— The Moon Rock • Arthur J. Rees

... John's convivial habits leads me to say, in all candour, that his failings in this regard were greatly exaggerated. There is no doubt that at one time—in an age when almost everybody drank wine freely—he was no exception to the general ...
— The Day of Sir John Macdonald - A Chronicle of the First Prime Minister of the Dominion • Joseph Pope

... where the low-appointment men burlesque the staid performances of college, and present the lowest scholar on the appointment-list with an immense spoon, handsomely carved from rosewood, and engraved with the convivial motto: ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No 3, September, 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various

... up to a recent date, I had not given Spiritualists—qua spiritualists—credit for being a cheerful or convivial people. Though there exist upon the tablets of my memory recollections of certain enjoyable dinners, cosy teas, and charming petits soupers, eaten at the mahogany of believers in the modern mystery, yet these were purely exceptional events, oases in the desert of spiritualistic experiences. ...
— Mystic London: - or, Phases of occult life in the metropolis • Charles Maurice Davies

... draughts; and sang a good song. His face was always smiling and joyous; his brow never wore the cloud of care, the pensive earnest expression of refined thought which was so apparent in his cousin. Godfrey made the room glad with his gay hearty laugh. He was the life and soul of the convivial board, and prince of good fellows. A woman must be happy with such a handsome good-natured husband, and the Captain hoped that his dear Julee would be the ...
— Mark Hurdlestone - Or, The Two Brothers • Susanna Moodie

... was indulging in these reflections, one of the young men observed him; and, as Jalaladdeen was withdrawing, he stepped forward hastily and invited him in a most friendly manner to remain with them during the day, and to pass it in a cheerful and convivial spirit. Jalaladdeen endeavoured to excuse himself by pointing to his mean garb, intimating his inability to mix in such society; but his objections were of no avail. He was conducted to the table ...
— Eastern Tales by Many Story Tellers • Various

... 1808, that myself and seven others resolved upon taking chambers in Staples' Inn. Our avowed object was to study, but we had in reality assembled together for the purposes of convivial enjoyment, and what were then designated "sprees." Our stock consisted of four hundred and twelve pounds, which we had drawn from our parents and guardians under the various pretences of paying fees and procuring books for the advancement ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, August 28, 1841 • Various

... accustomed to the best society, towards the authority of those who presumed to judge of modern manners, without having access to see those of the higher circles. The picture which it draws of the elegance of the convivial parties of the wits in that gay time has been quoted a few ...
— The Dramatic Works of John Dryden Vol. I. - With a Life of the Author • Sir Walter Scott

... the old Black Bull Inn at Jedburgh that the meeting took place. There had been a Head Court that forenoon to determine the list of voters for the year, and a large and already somewhat convivial company assembled afterwards in the dining-room of the Black Bull. Wine flowed, and as the evening waned, guest after guest prudently took himself off, till of the original party there were left but five—Sir Gilbert, Colonel Stewart, two ...
— Stories of the Border Marches • John Lang and Jean Lang

... whilst he is upon the stage, appears with a mild and peaceable demeanor a moment afterwards behind the scenes. A poet, in his inspired moments, repeats his own verses in his garret with all the emphasis and fervour of enthusiasm; but when he comes down to dine with a mixed convivial company, his poetic fury subsides, a new train of ideas takes place in his imagination. As long as he has sufficient command over himself to lay aside his enthusiasm in company, he is considered as a ...
— Practical Education, Volume II • Maria Edgeworth

... branches of which bore flaming candles, gaudy crackers, and little presents for everyone; the distribution of which caused infinite amusement. Thus the high festival of Midwinter was celebrated in the most convivial way, but that it was so reminiscent of a Christmas spent in England was partly, at any rate, due to those kind people who had anticipated the celebration by providing presents and other tokens of ...
— The Voyages of Captain Scott - Retold from 'The Voyage of the "Discovery"' and 'Scott's - Last Expedition' • Charles Turley

... nymphs and made to go the paces. Willoughby was inexhaustible in the happy similes he poured out to Miss Durham across the lines of Sir Roger de Coverley, and they were not forgotten, they procured him a reputation as a convivial sparkler. Rumour went the round that he intended to give Laetitia to Vernon for good, when he could decide to take Miss Durham to himself; his generosity was famous; but that decision, though the rope was in the form of a knot, seemed reluctant ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... snow found its way in through divers apertures, but the warmth of the central fire filled the hovel. Their hosts produced a decoction of honey, called mead, of which a little went a long way, and soon they were all quite convivial. ...
— The House of Walderne - A Tale of the Cloister and the Forest in the Days of the Barons' Wars • A. D. Crake

... asked to sacrifice herself on the altar of marriage to a man three times her age; one Jacques Letellier, who offered generously to take the young girl as payment for a debt owed by his convivial comrade, M. Dumont. Berene wept and begged piteously to be spared this horrible sacrifice of her young life, whereupon Pierre Dumont seized his razor and threatened suicide as the other alternative from the dishonour of debt, and Berene in terror yielded her word and ...
— An Ambitious Man • Ella Wheeler Wilcox

... add that the variety of dunks implied in his question was imaginary. Shank had only one flask, but in the exuberance of convivial generosity he quoted his own father—who was addicted to ...
— Charlie to the Rescue • R.M. Ballantyne

... thirty-fifth year he became addicted to convivial habits to an extent that injured his business, and began to cripple his resources. Unlike most of his race, however, he did not become wildly excited when ...
— Se-Quo-Yah; from Harper's New Monthly, V. 41, 1870 • Unknown

... on how Mrs. Gray had dealt with the matter, and on how long her husband had remained with his convivial friends, and on these two points Reggie had no knowledge. Yet much of the success which attended his efforts for Mr. Gray this morning, had their beginning in the fact that Mrs. Gray had received her husband late the night before, with no word of reproach, but had treated him with unusual ...
— The Girls of St. Olave's • Mabel Mackintosh

... in the room directly over my study, so that I was always being disturbed at my work, while below me was a music-teacher who was practising all night, so that I could hardly sleep. Worst of all, on the same floor with me was a miserable person of convivial tendencies, who always mistook my door for his when he came home after midnight, and who gave some quite estimable people two floors below to believe that it was I, and not he, who sang comic songs between three and four o'clock in the morning. There has ...
— The Idiot • John Kendrick Bangs

... nine-o'clock suppers, with a bright hour or two to clear up in afterwards. Now you cannot get tea before that hour, and then sit gaping, music bothered perhaps, till half-past twelve brings up the tray; and what you steal of convivial enjoyment after, is heavily paid for in the disquiet ...
— The Best Letters of Charles Lamb • Charles Lamb

... the life of this King, the Marquis of Lucchesini was frequently of his literary and convivial parties; but he was neither his friend nor his favourite, but his listener. It was first under Frederick William II. that he began his diplomatic career, with an appointment as Minister from Prussia to the late King of Poland. His first act in this ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton

... dressed officers and ladies were seen entering the doors, or standing inside at the open windows; while the sounds of the familiar greetings, lively sallies, and merry laughter of the assembled and assembling company, sufficiently indicated the convivial character of the scene about to be enacted within. Let us enter. Around a long and richly-furnished table, in the principal apartment, were just seated those who deemed themselves the elite of that boastful army. Its notorious chief, the weak and wise, vain-glorious ...
— The Rangers - [Subtitle: The Tory's Daughter] • D. P. Thompson

... cause alone could account for. The hours of enjoyment are important to human beings every where, and we every where find them preparing to make the most of them. Those who enjoy themselves only in society, whether intellectual or convivial, prepare themselves for it, and such make but a poor figure when forced to be content with the sweets of solitude: while, on the other hand, those to whom retirement affords the greatest pleasure, seldom give or receive much in society. Wherever the highest enjoyment is found by both sexes in ...
— Domestic Manners of the Americans • Fanny Trollope

... Joseph Travis, upon the Sunday just named, six slaves met at noon for what is called in the Northern States a picnic and in the Southern a barbecue. The bill of fare was to be simple: one brought a pig, and another some brandy, giving to the meeting an aspect so cheaply convivial that no one would have imagined it to be the final consummation of a conspiracy which had been for six months in preparation. In this plot four of the men had been already initiated,—Henry, Hark or Hercules, Nelson, and Sam. Two ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 8, No. 46, August, 1861 • Various

... surely neither ungraceful nor unamiable, led Addison into the two most serious faults which can with justice be imputed to him. He found that wine broke the spell which lay on his fine intellect, and was therefore too easily seduced into convivial excess. Such excess was in that age regarded, even by grave men, as the most venial of all peccadilloes, and was so far from being a mark of ill-breeding that it was almost essential to the character of a fine gentleman. But the smallest speck is seen on a white ground; and almost all the ...
— Critical and Historical Essays, Volume III (of 3) • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... Caesar and Napoleon, and capable, too, of loyalty to party and to men. He had great personal magnetism: young men, especially, he charmed and held as no other public man could, now Clay was dead. His habits were convivial, and the vicious indulgence of his strong and masculine appetites, the only relaxation he craved in the intervals of his fierce activities, had caused him frequent illnesses; but he was still a young man, even by American standards, for the eminence he had attained. At ...
— Stephen Arnold Douglas • William Garrott Brown

... round. An attack of illness; a convivial meeting.—'Bout ship, the brief order for ...
— The Sailor's Word-Book • William Henry Smyth

... after fulfilling his destiny as head butler in a great establishment, and earning golden opinions from all sorts and conditions of men, finally settled down to a quiet country life in a pretty cottage in our village, where he is the life and soul of every convivial gathering and beanfeast, carving a York ham or a sirloin with great nicety and judgment. He has seen much of men and manners in his day, and has a fund of information on all kinds of subjects. Having plenty of leisure, he is a capital hand at finding the whereabouts ...
— A Cotswold Village • J. Arthur Gibbs

... Russell of an evening!" said Carter, stretching his golfing brogues to the blaze. "Don't you love a good drenching, downpouring night? I do!" He was a burly full-blooded blond, extravagantly facetious in convivial moments, and a mournful brooder in solitude. King, better known as "The Goblin," was a dark, whimsical elf in thick spectacles, much loved in the 'varsity dramatic society for his brilliant impersonations. ...
— Kathleen • Christopher Morley

... in the houses the sizzling of the succulent sausage and other rare delicacies. As a rule, one or two studies would club together to brew, instead of preparing solitary banquets. This was found both more convivial and more economical. At Seymour's, studies numbers five, six, and seven had always combined from time immemorial, and Barry, on obtaining study six, had carried on the tradition. In study five were Drummond and his friend De Bertini. In study seven, which was a smaller room and ...
— The Gold Bat • P. G. Wodehouse

... one when we reached home, and now a meditative man might well have gone to bed. But no one thinks of sleeping on Sylvester Abend. So there followed bowls of punch in one friend's room, where English, French, and Germans blent together in convivial Babel; and flasks of old Montagner in another. Palmy, at this period, wore an archdeacon's hat, and smoked a churchwarden's pipe; and neither were his own, nor did he derive anything ecclesiastical or Anglican from the association. ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece • John Addington Symonds

... intellect to keep all those old laws;' and he swallowed the forbidden oyster in a fine spiritual glow, which somehow or other would not extend to bacon. That stuck more in his throat, and so was only taken in self-defence, to avoid the suspicions of a convivial company. ...
— Ghetto Comedies • Israel Zangwill

... late Earl of Beaconsfield, thus distinguishes between the Mimi and the Pantomimi of the Ancients. The Mimi were an impudent race of buffoons who excelled in mimicry, and like our domestic fools, were admitted into convivial parties to entertain the guests. Their powers enabled them to perform a more extraordinary office; for they appear to have been introduced into funerals to mimic the person, and even the language of the deceased. Suetonius describes an archimimus ...
— A History of Pantomime • R. J. Broadbent

... for killing a fellow-actor in a duel, and once for his part in the comedy of Eastward Hoe, which gave offense to King James. He lived down to the times of Charles I. (1635), and became the acknowledged arbiter of English letters and the center of convivial wit combats at the Mermaid, the Devil, and other ...
— Brief History of English and American Literature • Henry A. Beers

... of superintending the banquets of the gods. The priests, as well as the gods, were in fairness entitled to feast; new institutions, however, were not needed with that view, as every college applied itself with zeal and devotion to its convivial affairs. The clerical banquets were accompanied by the claim of clerical immunities. The priests even in times of grave embarrassment claimed the right of exemption from public burdens, and only after very ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen

... diminutive men, when under the influence of drink. Already he had tucked his sleeves up to fight a large German musician, who could have put him into the bell of his brass-horn and played him out, without much trouble. But the song pacified him; and, with a misty sense of his importance in a convivial point of view, on account of the manner in which he had acquitted himself in the chorus, he now essayed a higher flight, and treated the party to a new version of "The Pope," oddly condensed into ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 7, No. 40, February, 1861 • Various

... states; so, in an atmosphere of tobacco, beer, onions, wine, and braggadocio, and with the further delectable stimulus of seven-year-old McBrayer, the evening opened up congenially and gave great promise. The boys were convivial, if not boisterous. But Jim Woppit, wearing the big silver star of his exalted office on his coat-front, was present in the interests of peace and order, and the severest respect was shown to the newly elected representative of municipal dignity ...
— Second Book of Tales • Eugene Field

... of women, the very obvious and natural tendency is for the proportion of drunkenness to the alcohol consumed to be much lower than in the case of men. Drunkenness is commonly the result of convivial drinking. A company of men get together, and they help each other to get drunk. Women are not subjected to so many temptations in this respect. Their drinking is industrial drinking,—above all, at the supreme industry, which is the culture of the racial life. Like other industrial drinking, ...
— Woman and Womanhood - A Search for Principles • C. W. Saleeby

... shelter of timber for its growth, and is not to be found on the barren steppes over which they wander; so that they are obliged for the most part to buy it, at enormous prices, from the Russian traders. It may sound strangely to American ears, but the invitation which a convivial Korak extends to his passing friend is not, "Come in and have a drink," but, "Won't you come in and take a toadstool?" Not a very alluring proposal perhaps to a civilised toper, but one which has a magical effect upon a dissipated Korak. As the supply ...
— Tent Life in Siberia • George Kennan

... period. Soon, however, he left the bridge and river behind him, and, stepping on terra firma, turned hastily down one of the unpretending streets of the town, and entered a restaurant, out of the drinking saloon of which, several narrow passages led to small convivial apartments, or rather compartments, in which the landlord, or "mine host" professed to work culinary miracles, of every possible shade, in the interest of his patrons. The establishment, although not the most fashionable in the place, was still regarded as respectable, and ...
— Ridgeway - An Historical Romance of the Fenian Invasion of Canada • Scian Dubh

... been able to awaken in Miss Susan any enthusiasm for balladry. My worthy sister is of a serious turn of mind, and I have heard her say a thousand times that convivial songs (which is her name for balladry) are inspirations, if not actually compositions, of the devil. In her younger days Miss Susan performed upon the melodeon with much discretion, and at one time I indulged the delusive hope that eventually ...
— The Love Affairs of a Bibliomaniac • Eugene Field

... his heart, did of the army. He might have said at once, instead of making a parcel of wry faces over the matter, that Burns had written Tam o'Shanter, and that that alone was enough; that he could hardly have described the excesses of mad, hairbrained, roaring mirth and convivial indulgence, which are the soul of it, if he himself had not "drunk full ofter of the ton than of the well"—unless "the act and practique part of life had been the mistress of his theorique." Mr. Wordsworth might have quoted ...
— Lectures on the English Poets - Delivered at the Surrey Institution • William Hazlitt

... when they indulged in drunken festivities. Chastity was a virtue which was rigorously practiced. There were few cases of adultery among them, and the unfaithful wife was severely punished. Men and women, without seductive spectacles or convivial banquets, were fenced around with chastity, and bound together by family ties. Polygamy was unknown, and the marriage obligation was sacred. The wife brought no dowry to her husband, but received one from him, not frivolous presents, ...
— The Old Roman World • John Lord

... protege, could be brought from India. The young officers at once began to discuss their chances for promotion, and the number of decorations to be forthcoming from St. Petersburg. The social gatherings at Tashkend were more convivial than sociable. Acquaintances can eat and drink together with the greatest of good cheer, but there is very little sympathy in conversation. It was difficult for them to understand why we had come so far to see a country which to ...
— Across Asia on a Bicycle • Thomas Gaskell Allen and William Lewis Sachtleben

... present him with a copy.... I arrived half an hour before Lamb, and had time to learn something of his peculiarities. Some family circumstances have tended to depress him of late years, and unless excited by convivial intercourse, he never shows a trace of what he once was. He is excessively given to mystifying his friends, and is never so delighted as when he has persuaded some one into a belief in one of his grave inventions.... There was a rap at the door ...
— Little Memoirs of the Nineteenth Century • George Paston

... next our host, now came under his special protection. Laying before his guest one of the packages of fish, Marharvai opened it; and commended its contents to his particular regards. But my comrade was one of those who, on convivial occasions, can always take care of themselves. He ate an indefinite number of "Pee-hee Lee Lees" (small fish), his own and next neighbour's bread-fruit; and helped himself, to right and left, with all the ease of an ...
— Omoo: Adventures in the South Seas • Herman Melville

... laborers. Men passed him singly and silently, as if following some vague alcoholic dream, or moving through some Scotch mist of whiskey and water. Others clung unsteadily but as silently together, with no trace of convivial fellowship or hilarity in their dull fixed features and mechanically moving limbs. There was something weird in this mirthless companionship, and the appalling loneliness of those fixed or abstracted eyes. Suddenly he was aware of two men who were reeling toward ...
— A Protegee of Jack Hamlin's and Other Stories • Bret Harte

... seemed, indeed, singularly fond of his own company—or, as the PERSONNEL of the Advance expressed it, "grossly addicted to evil associations." But then it should be said in justice to the stranger that the PERSONNEL was himself of a too convivial disposition fairly to judge one differently gifted, and had, moreover, experienced a slight rebuff in an ...
— Can Such Things Be? • Ambrose Bierce

... body of strength which might have come at that developing age. Much of the next eighteen months she spent in bed. It was then decided that she consult a friend of her father's, a city physician. Unfortunately, this ambitious surgeon had been but a convivial friend. His professional development had reached only the "operation" stage. Surgery to him was a panacea, and the operation, which he promised to be her saving, was to be her tragedy. She did not know till two years later that she ...
— Our Nervous Friends - Illustrating the Mastery of Nervousness • Robert S. Carroll

... of another. Genealogies, in fact, are awkward things, and should be eschewed by gentlemen in familiar discourse, as tending much less towards edification than offence. Many people are absurdly jealous on the subject of their coffined sires; nor is it wise in convivial moments to strike up an ancestral ditty to the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 379, May, 1847 • Various

... things; although we have seen above, that, far from developing itself from its own resources, their literature was alternately ingrafted on a Latin, Italian, or French stock. Among the country gentry, and even at the convivial parties of the nobility, the custom of extemporizing songs, probably full of national reminiscences, continued even down to the beginning of our own century. Very little stress was naturally laid upon them; since the interest for all that is national, historical, ...
— Historical View of the Languages and Literature of the Slavic - Nations • Therese Albertine Louise von Jacob Robinson

... energies for the defeat of Mr. Sands. He invited large parties of men to dine in the shade of his trees, and supplied them with plenty of rum and brandy. If any poor fellow drowned his wits in the bowl, and, in the openness of his convivial heart, proclaimed that he did not mean to vote the Democratic ticket, he was shoved into the street ...
— Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl - Written by Herself • Harriet Jacobs (AKA Linda Brent)

... society of the city in general, by the dependents, or retinue, of a few of the richest and most respected houses. These proteges, half of them poor relatives, half bankrupt merchants, were not always invited, but were, on all important convivial occasions, designed to produce a deep impression, and their function then was to submit to what the Englishmen call practical jokes, during the second half of the banquet, the first half being, as a usual thing, conspicuous for the remarkably proper conduct of the company. When the time arrived ...
— The German Classics Of The Nineteenth And Twentieth Centuries, Volume 12 • Various

... so much said of Jack Wilkes, we should think more highly of his conversation. Jack has great variety of talk, Jack is a scholar, and Jack has the manners of a gentleman[513]. But after hearing his name sounded from pole to pole, as the phoenix of convivial felicity, we are disappointed in his company. He has always been at me: but I would do Jack a kindness, rather than not. The contest is ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 3 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill

... amiability, all counted against him. "He is," wrote Sedgwick, "a man of very affectionate disposition, of great simplicity of manners, and honest and honorable in all his conduct. He is attached to pleasures, with convivial habits strongly fixed. He is indolent therefore. He has a strong attachment to popularity but is indisposed to sacrifice to it his integrity; hence he is disposed on all popular subjects to feel the public pulse, and hence results ...
— John Marshall and the Constitution - A Chronicle of the Supreme Court, Volume 16 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Edward S. Corwin

... a general favorite in half a dozen villages, where he was the life of the loafers' bench. An energetic loafer can attend properly to one bench, but it takes genius as well as assiduity to do justice to six of them. His habits were decidedly convivial, and he spent a good deal of time at the general musters, drinking and carousing with the other ne'er-do-weels. You may be sure he was no favorite of Mrs. Todd's; and she represented to him all that is ...
— The Village Watch-Tower • (AKA Kate Douglas Riggs) Kate Douglas Wiggin

... stun Mr. Swenson, though, if he had known that gentleman more intimately and had been aware that he had the reputation of possessing the thickest head on the water-front, he would have realised the magnitude of the task. Friends of Mr. Swenson, in convivial moments, had frequently endeavoured to stun him with bottles, boots and bits of lead piping and had gone away depressed by failure. Sam, ignorant of this, attempted to do the job with clenched fist, which he brought down as smartly as possible ...
— The Girl on the Boat • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse

... ready laid, the chairs were drawn round the table, bottles, jugs, and glasses were arranged upon the sideboard, and everything betokened the approach of the most convivial period ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens

... Well, here's to her! With this nectar fit for the gods and goddesses of Olympus, let us drink to her," said old Sanders, with convivial dignity, his glass raised on high. "Here's wishing health and happiness to the dreamy-eyed Tuscan beauty, whom you love ...
— The Fifth String, The Conspirators • John Philip Sousa

... and held twice a-week, and often followed by a soiree dansante; so that, if they pleased, the aspirants to matrimonial happiness might become acquainted without gene. As he himself was a jolly, convivial fellow of much savoir vivre, it is astonishing how well he made these entertainments answer. Persons who had not seemed to take to each other in the first distant interview grew extremely enamoured when the corks ...
— Night and Morning, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... Catherine on a little pedestal, being very real and Venetian. There are, however, who deny Titian's authorship; Mr. Ricketts, for example, gives the picture to Francesco Vecellio, the painter's son. Tintoretto's "Last Supper," on the left of the high altar, is more convivial than is usual: there is plenty of food; a woman and children are coming in; a dog begs; Judas is noticeable. Opposite this picture is a rather interesting dark canvas blending seraphim and Italian ...
— A Wanderer in Venice • E.V. Lucas

... had a stern expression of countenance and impressed one right from the start as being a self-reliant business man of great natural ability, and such he turned out to be. He was good-hearted and of a convivial nature when business hours were over, but as honest as the day was long, and would tolerate nothing that savored of crookedness in any shape or form. As an executive he had but few equals and no superiors. ...
— A Ball Player's Career - Being the Personal Experiences and Reminiscensces of Adrian C. Anson • Adrian C. Anson

... wedging and squeezing and crowding into the little room. Nearly everyone was hungry, and eyes brightened at the sight of the pie and the ham and the convivial array of bottles. "Sit down everyone," cried Mr. Voules, "leaning against anything counts as sitting, and makes it easier to shake down ...
— The History of Mr. Polly • H. G. Wells

... a difficulty, lest it kick you harder than you bargained for. Difficulties, like thieves, often disappear at a glance. Have the courage to leave a convivial party at the proper hour for doing so, however great the sacrifice; and to stay away from one upon the slightest grounds for objection, however great the temptation to go. Have the courage to do without that which you ...
— The Jericho Road • W. Bion Adkins

... taciturn humor that nothing could overcome; he respected it scrupulously. I did not reply to his questions and he dropped the subject; he was satisfied that I had forgotten my mistress. Nevertheless, I went to the chase and appeared at the table and was as convivial as the best; ...
— The Confession of a Child of The Century • Alfred de Musset

... Fellatahs, who penetrate thither in small numbers; yet they have a great deal of popular poetry. Every great man has bands of singers of both sexes, who constantly attend him, and loudly celebrate his achievements in extemporary poems. The convivial meetings of the people, even their labours and journeys, are cheered by songs composed for the occasion, and chanted often with ...
— Lander's Travels - The Travels of Richard Lander into the Interior of Africa • Robert Huish

... of the hospitable festivities of Thomastown, the seat of Mr. Matthew (See Anecdotes of Conviviality), from his friend Dr. Sheridan, who had been often, a welcome guest, both on account of his convivial qualities, and as being the preceptor of the nephew of Mr. Matthew. He, at length, became desirous of ascertaining with his own eyes, the truth of a report, which he could not forbear considering as greatly exaggerated. On receiving an intimation of this from Sheridan, Mr. Matthew wrote ...
— Irish Wit and Humor - Anecdote Biography of Swift, Curran, O'Leary and O'Connell • Anonymous

... where he supported himself by teaching the piano. In 1797 he returned to his native country, and in a very few years he became famous as a writer of comedies, operas and vaudevilles, which were produced in rapid succession at the Thtre des Varits and the Vaudeville. He also wrote convivial and satirical songs, which, though different in character, can only worthily be compared with those of Branger. He was at one time president of the Caveau, a convivial society whose members were then chiefly ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 8, Slice 2 - "Demijohn" to "Destructor" • Various

... curious account of a less ceremonious and more convivial feast, also graced by the king's presence, was narrated by Sir Hugh Cholmely to a friend and gossip. This supper was given by Sir George Carteret, a man of pleasant humour, and moreover treasurer of the ...
— Royalty Restored - or, London under Charles II. • J. Fitzgerald Molloy

... very stress laid upon certain holidays and festivals, shews that they did not keep up the same Saturnalian licence and open house all the year round. They reserved themselves for great occasions, and made the best amends they could, for a year of abstinence and toil by a week of merriment and convivial indulgence. Persons in middle life at this day, who can afford a good dinner every day, do not look forward to it as any particular subject of exultation: the poor peasant, who can only contrive to treat himself to ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin

... turned us out rapidly, and as we left we continued to take in the town, strolling by pairs and drinking moderately as we went. Flood had returned in the mean time, and seemed rather convivial and quite willing to enjoy the enforced lay-over with us. While taking a drink in Yellowstone Bob's place, the foreman took occasion to call the attention of The Rebel to a cheap lithograph of General Grant ...
— The Log of a Cowboy - A Narrative of the Old Trail Days • Andy Adams

... vague notions of a little farewell feast which I would give to Heron, and, possibly, to one or two other friends. But from the reality of such convivial enterprise I shrank, when the time came, preferring to adopt, even to Heron, the attitude of a traveller who would presently return. And when, as the event proved, I found myself the guest of honour at a dinner presided ...
— The Record of Nicholas Freydon - An Autobiography • A. J. (Alec John) Dawson

... already said in the notes, concerning the teachers of rhetoric; but it will not be useless to cite one passage more from Petronius, who in literature, as well as convivial pleasure, may be allowed to be arbiter elegantiarum. The rhetoricians, he says, came originally from Asia; they were, however, neither known to Pindar, and the nine lyric poets, nor to Plato, ...
— A Dialogue Concerning Oratory, Or The Causes Of Corrupt Eloquence • Cornelius Tacitus

... the day. After the first and inevitable struggles of a poor author, had he possessed even half as much talent for business as capacity for intellectual effort, he might soon have obtained a competency by his pen; but, unfortunately, though he was not seriously addicted to intemperance, his convivial habits, and his attraction for the gaming table, soon scattered his hard-won earnings. His "knack of hoping," however, helped him through life. He died on the 4th April, 1774. His last words were sad indeed, in whatever ...
— An Illustrated History of Ireland from AD 400 to 1800 • Mary Frances Cusack

... her purpose, seeing that even so she could not win the old man to convivial mirth. Continuing with yet more lavish courtesy her efforts to soothe him, and to heap more honours on the guest, she bade a piper strike up, and started music to melt his unbending rage. For she wanted to unnerve his stubborn nature by means of cunning sounds. But the cajolery ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")

... bold as a soldier, adroit as a statesman, the king was, nevertheless, most fitted for the convivial role of host, and no part that he played in his varied repertoire afforded such opportunity for the nice display of his unusual talents. History hath sneered at his rhymes as flat, stale and unprofitable; upon the bloody field he had been defeated and subsequently imprisoned; ...
— Under the Rose • Frederic Stewart Isham

... against Hastings, on the charge of the Begums, Mr. Pitt said, "an abler speech was perhaps never delivered;" and Mr. Fox characterized it as "the greatest that had been delivered within the memory of man." But his convivial habits betrayed him into gross intemperance, and he became bankrupt in character and health, as well as in fortune, and died on the 7th of July, 1816, at the age of sixty-four, a melancholy example of brilliant talents sacrificed ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick

... not able to give parties in return," was not really the true one. He knew that she feared the temptation that would come to him, and he was by no means insensible to the perils that would beset him whenever he found himself in the midst of a convivial company, with the odor of wine heavy on the air and invitations to drink meeting ...
— Danger - or Wounded in the House of a Friend • T. S. Arthur

... sitting side by side, in spite of all, drinking from the same little cup—a battered zinc dipper which Sailor Ben had unslung from a strap round his waist. I think I never saw him without this dipper and a sheath-knife suspended just back of his hip, ready for any convivial occasion. ...
— The Story of a Bad Boy • Thomas Bailey Aldrich

... however, was hardly more than a frame of mind, which did not preclude my feeling myself in sympathy with what at that time was called broad thought (i.e., Liberalism). Although I was often indignant at the National Liberal and Scandinavian terrorism which obtained a hearing at both convivial and serious meetings in the Students' Union, my feelings in the matter of Denmark's foreign policy with regard to Sweden and Norway, as well as to Germany, were the same as those held by all the other students. I felt no intellectual debt ...
— Recollections Of My Childhood And Youth • George Brandes

... The very convivial gentleman left his club happy, but somewhat dazed. On his homeward journey, made tackingly, he ran against the vertical iron rods that formed a circle of protection for the trunk of a tree growing by the curb. He made a tour around the ...
— Jokes For All Occasions - Selected and Edited by One of America's Foremost Public Speakers • Anonymous

... Philadelphia, to enjoy himself, as he said, for the remainder of his days. He lived in what the sober Americans called a most luxurious and magnificent style. The best company in Philadelphia met at his house: and he delighted particularly in seeing those who had convivial talents, and who would supply him with wit and gaiety, in which he was naturally ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth

... fifty years), this honorable origin is still assigned to many heirlooms, to some probably correctly. Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes in his delightful lines, "On Lending a Punch Bowl," humorously claims for his convivial silver vessel a ...
— The Mayflower and Her Log, Complete • Azel Ames

... unattractive to an extent that fills the wretched man who takes it in to dinner with desperation. And then to think that one ounce of vanity might have leavened this lump, and converted it, as by magic, into a pleasant, palatable, convivial compound, good everywhere, but especially good at the dinner-table! For, where vanity exists at all, it can scarcely fail to influence the natural desire of one sex to please the other; and a woman must be singularly devoid of all charms, physical and mental, if she fails when she ...
— Modern Women and What is Said of Them - A Reprint of A Series of Articles in the Saturday Review (1868) • Anonymous

... possessed a great deal of wit and talent, if he did not attain to the measure of poetic genius. His principal power lay in low comedy—his chief fault lay in his systematic and avowed imitation of the rough and drunken manners of Ben Jonson. In the eye of Dryden—whose own habits were convivial, although not to the same extent—the real faults of his opponent were his popularity as a comic writer, and his politics. Shadwell was a zealous Protestant, and the bitterest of the many who replied to the "Medal." For this he became the hero of "MacFlecknoe"—a masterly satire, ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol I - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden

... was inhabited, as late as 1803, by Philip Dyot, Esq., a descendant of the gentleman from whom it takes its name. In 1710 there was a certain "Mendicant's Convivial Club" held at the "Welch's Head" in this street. The origin of this club dated as far back as 1660, when its meetings were held at the Three Crowns ...
— Notes & Queries 1850.02.09 • Various

... twelve years since the wife of Mr. Martin had united her hopes and affections with his. At that time he was esteemed by all—a strictly temperate man, although he would drink with a friend, or at a convivial party, whenever circumstances led him to do so. From this kind of indulgence the appetite for liquor was formed. Two years after his marriage, Martin had become so fond of drinking, that he took from two to three glasses every day, ...
— The Lights and Shadows of Real Life • T.S. Arthur

... arrived even yet. That would not come till the pipes were brought out, and the brandy was put on the table, and the whisky was there that made the people's hair stand on end. It was then that the floodgates of convivial eloquence would be unloosed. In the mean time it was necessary to sacrifice something to gentility, and therefore they ...
— Orley Farm • Anthony Trollope

... have been interred in this church. Among them, I shall particularize one only; but that one will long live in the memory of every convivial British seaman. Who has not heard the lay which records the defeat of ...
— Paris As It Was and As It Is • Francis W. Blagdon

... and convivial atmosphere were producing a most inspiriting effect on the lawyer. The delightful consciousness that the people with whom his son was supping were of the smartest set in town for the moment had banished ...
— Jane Cable • George Barr McCutcheon

... designate Beranger, who has created for himself a style of transcendent vigor and originality, and who has sung of war, love, and wine, in strains far excelling those of Blondel, Tyrtaeus, Pindar, and the Teian bard. He is now the genuine representative of Gallic poesy in her convivial, her amatory, her warlike and her philosophic mood; and the plenitude of the inspiration that dwelt successively in the souls of all the songsters of ancient France seems to have transmigrated into Beranger ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson

... give a party &c n.; be at home, see one's friends, hang out, keep open house, do the honors; receive, receive with open arms; welcome; give a warm reception &c n.. to kill the fatted calf. Adj. sociable, companionable, clubbable, conversable^, cosy, cosey^, chatty, conversational; homiletical. convivial; festive, festal; jovial, jolly, hospitable. welcome, welcome as the roses in May; feted, entertained. free and easy, hall fellow well met, familiar, on visiting terms, acquainted. social, neighborly; international; gregarious. Adv. en famille [Fr.], in the ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget

... the liberal party in the provinces, was also bidden to the feast. During the dinner, this prelate, although treated with marked respect by Egmont, was the object of much banter and coarse pleasantry by the ruder portion of the guests. Especially these convivial gentlemen took infinite pains to overload him with challenges to huge bumpers of wine; it being thought very desirable, if possible; to place the Archbishop under the table. This pleasantry was alternated with much rude ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... Ferguson Hedges, millionaire promoter, investor and man-about- New-York, turned his thoughts upon matters convivial, and word of it went "down the line," bouncers took a precautionary turn at the Indian clubs, waiters put ironstone china on his favourite tables, cab drivers crowded close to the curbstone in front of all-night cafes, and careful ...
— Whirligigs • O. Henry

... Prince,—I feel sure that you, as a sympathetic student of western politics and manners, must be impatient to hear about our first Parish Meeting in Troy; and so I am catching the earliest post to inform you that from a convivial point of view the whole proceedings were in the highest degree successful. And if Self-Government by the People can provide a success of the kind in that dull season when people as a rule are saving up for Christmas, I hardly think our Chairman stretched a point last night ...
— Wandering Heath • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... juventa, to write a song in praise of that comfortable creature—wine. The prudery of many Americans about the juice of the grape is a thing very astonishing to a temperate Briton. An admirable author, who wrote an account of the old convivial days of an American city, found that reputable magazines could not accept such a degrading historical record. There was no nonsense about Dr. Holmes. His poems were mainly "occasional" verses for friendly meetings; ...
— Adventures among Books • Andrew Lang

... moreover, left behind quite enough of renown, could he lay claim to none other, to be found in the following tribute from the pen of Lord Byron:—'I have met George Colman occasionally, and thought him extremely pleasant and convivial. Sheridan's humour, or rather wit, was always saturnine, and sometimes savage; he never laughed (at least that I saw and I have watched him), but Colman did. If I had to choose, and could not have both at a time, I should say, let me begin ...
— A Walk from London to Fulham • Thomas Crofton Croker

... kettle, growing mellow and musical, began to have irrepressible gurglings in its throat, and to indulge in short vocal snorts, which it checked in the bud, as if it hadn't quite made up its mind yet, to be good company. Now it was, that after two or three such vain attempts to stifle its convivial sentiments, it threw off all moroseness, all reserve, and burst into a stream of song so cosy and hilarious, as never maudlin nightingale yet formed ...
— The Cricket on the Hearth • Charles Dickens

... more instinct of concealment than if it were an occasional tendency to some slight convivial excess, he had resort to M'Munn, in ounce doses, whenever the world went wrong with him. If he had a headache or a toothache; if the weather depressed him; if he had a certain "stint" of work to do without the sense of native vigor ...
— The Opium Habit • Horace B. Day

... alehouse and the inn, Opening on the narrow street, Came the loud, convivial din, Singing and applause of feet, The laughing lays That in those days ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

... with me a taciturn humor that nothing could overcome; he respected it scrupulously. I did not reply to his questions and he dropped the subject; he was satisfied that I had forgotten my mistress. I went to the chase and appeared at the table, and was as convivial as the best; he ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet

... proportionally hated by those who had an interest in the fair Trade, as they called the pursuit of these contraband adventurers. This person was natural son to a gentleman of good family, owing to which circumstance, and to his being of a jolly convivial disposition, and singing a good song, he was admitted to the occasional society of the gentlemen of the country, and was a member of several of their clubs for practising athletic games, at which he was ...
— Guy Mannering • Sir Walter Scott

... admiration followed the graceful motions of the beautiful wife, and the whispered tribute went round the circle whenever she entered, Edward felt a pride beyond all that flattery, addressed to himself, had ever excited; and Augusta, when told of the convivial talents and powers of entertainment which distinguished her husband, could not resist the temptation of urging him into society even oftener than his own wishes would ...
— The May Flower, and Miscellaneous Writings • Harriet Beecher Stowe

... birth. He also states that the title was borne by his family before the Revolution of 1789. During his official life in Washington, Prince de Bearn married Miss Beatrice Winans, daughter of Ross Winans of Baltimore. Chevalier John George Hulsemann, the Austrian Minister, was a convivial old bachelor and was much esteemed at the Capital for his genial qualities. He lived on F Street, below Pennsylvania Avenue, and was stationed in ...
— As I Remember - Recollections of American Society during the Nineteenth Century • Marian Gouverneur

... him in all places and parties,—at Whitehall with the Melbournes, at the Marquis of Tavistock's, at Robins's the auctioneer's, at Sir Humphrey Davy's, at Sam Rogers's,—in short, in most kinds of company, and always found him very convivial ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. II - With His Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore

... Now one of them, now another, developed the habit of frequenting the monastery. Ostrov especially received an eager welcome there. He pleased, by his external piety, the older monks who were in authority. There were a number of convivial monks who were especially fond of Ostrov. The monks advised him to join the local union of the Black Hundred. They said that it would be pleasing to God. They engaged him in religious and patriotic conversations and invited him to ...
— The Created Legend • Feodor Sologub

... Burns's school-days is completed by the mention of a sojourn, probably in the summer of 1775, in his mother's parish of Kirkoswald. Hither he went to study mathematics and surveying under a teacher of local note, and, in spite of the convivial attractions of a smuggling village, seems to have made progress in his geometry till his head was turned by a girl who lived next door ...
— Robert Burns - How To Know Him • William Allan Neilson

... deterred the King from giving him an honor as high as he deserved. As Clerk of the Acts, Pepys was much in contact with him socially and officially. The famous diary teems with references, many of them convivial, others most unkind. He was faithful to the commonwealth as long as it was faithful to itself. Perceiving that it could not hold together after the death of Cromwell he joined with George Monk in bringing about ...
— The Tryal of William Penn and William Mead • various

... not want to attend. It would be another of those stiff, lonesome dinners he had suffered through before, but he had to learn to make friends on his own social level, and be easy and convivial with the kind of people he would be associating with the rest ...
— The Man Who Staked the Stars • Charles Dye

... covered with American leather and brass-headed nails. A few books lay upon one shelf, and on another stood a collection of cups, saucers, and plates, cracked, perhaps, and not all matching, but suggestive of convivial parties and good cheer. In one corner lay a cushion embroidered in woolwork with magenta roses, pea-green leaves, and orange-coloured daisies, all upon a background of ultramarine blue. Mollie thought it gave an effective touch to the somewhat scanty furnishing—in ...
— The Happy Adventurers • Lydia Miller Middleton

... gentle, unassuming mien. The later traditions brought together by Aubrey depict him as 'very good company, and of a very ready and pleasant smooth wit,' and there is much in other early posthumous references to suggest a genial, if not a convivial, temperament, linked to a quiet turn for good-humoured satire. But Bohemian ideals and modes of life had no genuine attraction for Shakespeare. His extant work attests his 'copious' and continuous industry, {278b} and with his literary power and sociability there ...
— A Life of William Shakespeare - with portraits and facsimiles • Sidney Lee

... 'Memoirs,' speaks highly of his 'old friend' Flexney, 'with whom I have passed many convivial and ...
— The Book-Hunter in London - Historical and Other Studies of Collectors and Collecting • William Roberts

... the Low Archipelago, Eastern Polynesia—while suffering from injuries received in a boat accident one wild night. My host, the Rotoava trader, was a sociable old pirate, whose convivial soul would never let him drink alone. He was by trade a boat-builder, having had, in his early days, a shed at Miller's Point, in Sydney, where he made money and married a wife. But this latter event was poor Tom Oscott's undoing, and in the end he took ...
— By Reef and Palm • Louis Becke

... Tea was the convivial meal of the day. To this the girls invited outside friends and acquaintances, and, as a rule, they always took ...
— A Sweet Girl Graduate • Mrs. L.T. Meade

... bowers, That e'en her name shall dubious meaning bear;— Then, my lov'd Friends, who oft, in darker hours, Have shar'd with me a conflict more severe, O! let us lose in wine our sorrow's weight, And rise the masters of our future fate! This night we revel in convivial ease, To-morrow seek again the vast ...
— Original sonnets on various subjects; and odes paraphrased from Horace • Anna Seward

... yet, as we have seen, he thought it necessary to correct the technical term applied to this kind of practitioner, by calling him a Bibliothapte when he conceals books—a Bibliolyte when he destroys them. Dibdin warmed his convivial guests at a comfortable fire, fed by the woodcuts from which had been printed the impression of the Bibliographical Decameron. It was a quaint fancy, and deemed to be a pretty and appropriate form of hospitality, while it effectually ...
— The Book-Hunter - A New Edition, with a Memoir of the Author • John Hill Burton

... England. When she had arrived he made a sumptuous entertainment for King Vortigern, inviting also to it, of course, many other distinguished guests. In the midst of the feast, when the king was in the state of high excitement produced on such temperaments by wine and convivial pleasure, Rowena came in to offer him more wine. Vortigern was powerfully struck, as Hengist had anticipated, with her grace and beauty. Learning that she was Hengist's daughter, he demanded her ...
— King Alfred of England - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott

... one to make of Dickens, with his love of private theatricals, his florid waistcoats and watch-chains, his sentimental radicalism, his kindly, convivial, gregarious life? He, again, did his work in a rapture of solitary creation, and seemed to have no taste for discussing his ideas or methods. Then, too, Dickens's later desertion of his work in favour of public readings and money-making ...
— Escape and Other Essays • Arthur Christopher Benson

... committee does not discover. First, it has never yet hired haunted house in which the sights and sounds continued during the tenancy of the curious observers. {137} The most obvious inference is that the earlier observers who saw and heard abnormal things were unscientific, convivial, nervous, hysterical, or addicted to practical joking. This, however, is not the only possible explanation. As a celebrated prophet, by his own avowal had been 'known to be steady for weeks at a time,' so, even in a regular ...
— Cock Lane and Common-Sense • Andrew Lang

... "Commencements." Major Jackson attended these gatherings with unfailing regularity, but soon after his arrival he drew the line at dancing, and musical parties became the limit of his dissipation. He was anything but a convivial companion. He never smoked, he was a strict teetotaller, and he never touched a card. His diet, for reasons of health, was of a most sparing kind; nothing could tempt him to partake of food between his regular hours, and for many years he abstained from both tea and coffee. ...
— Stonewall Jackson And The American Civil War • G. F. R. Henderson

... man he assigned to "rope" Collins, "ingratiate yourself with him as quickly as possible. The subject is an easy mark for a convivial companion. You'll probably find him around the restaurants at night. Get an introduction and spend money freely. The gloom of tragedy doesn't cling long to a man like Collins, and even if it does, he'll try to dispel it with drink. Don't push him for information, but lead him on ...
— The Substitute Prisoner • Max Marcin

... soul of our entertainment: amongst his other virtues, he has the companionable and convivial ones to an immense degree, which I never had an opportunity of discovering so clearly before. He seemed charmed beyond words to see us all so happy: we staid till four o'clock in the morning, yet all complained to-day ...
— The History of Emily Montague • Frances Brooke

... the moderation, and the sense of justice which characterized his early years. He adopted the dress and the luxurious manners of the Persians. He lived in the palaces of the Persian kings, imitating all their state and splendor. He became very fond of convivial entertainments and of wine, and often drank to excess. He provided himself a seraglio of three hundred and sixty young females, in whose company he spent his time, giving himself up to every form ...
— Alexander the Great - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott

... had been head of the river and did not mind anything. Before we left the hall there were two men speaking at once at our table, it was a great chance to practise oratory. I have never been at a more convivial supper, and since we had not been given an opportunity of celebrating anything for ages it is no wonder that we made a tremendous noise. Some people may wag their heads at bump suppers and call them silly, or whatever they please, but they have forgotten ...
— Godfrey Marten, Undergraduate • Charles Turley

... common practice to order a jug from the grocer along with the food supply of the family. When a motion favouring prohibition was introduced in the Canadian parliament there were frequent references to the convivial habits of the members. The seconder of the motion was greeted with loud laughter. He good-naturedly said that he was well aware of the cause of hilarity, but that he was ready to sacrifice his pleasure to the general ...
— George Brown • John Lewis

... days before his death, he and Burr were guests at a dimmer given by the Cincinnati Society, of which both were members. Few persons were aware of what was pending, but it was observed that Hamilton "entered with glee into all the gayety of a convivial party, and even sang an old military song." Burr, upon the contrary, was "silent, gloomy, ...
— Something of Men I Have Known - With Some Papers of a General Nature, Political, Historical, and Retrospective • Adlai E. Stevenson

... head to heel. He was a storm centre of scandal; the entrance to his dingy stairway was in square view of the "National House," and the result is imaginable. How many of Joe's clients, especially those sorriest of the velvet gowns, were conjectured to ascend his stairs for reasons more convivial than legal! Yes, he lived with his own kind, and, so far as the rest of Canaan was concerned, might as well have worn the scarlet letter on his breast or branded ...
— The Conquest of Canaan • Booth Tarkington

... was our next victim, Mr. Purler, the Port Admiral of Mangerton-on-the-Mud, and the convivial host of the Metropolitan Inn. Wisely entering his house empty-handed, we left it with sheets, blankets, mattresses, pillows, table-cloths, napkins, knives, forks, spoons, crockery, a frying-pan, a gridiron, and a saucepan. When to these ...
— Rambles Beyond Railways; - or, Notes in Cornwall taken A-foot • Wilkie Collins

... the fantastic semblance. Still, this is a feast of gods; therefore let us enjoy it with glad hearts and swelling joy. For is it not our wedding feast, and are not all these gods and goddesses unwittingly solemnizing the hymeneal of our love? Rejoice then, my darling, rejoice and sing with the convivial, open your heart to the ravishing hour, drink into thy soul the delight and rapture of ...
— The Youth of the Great Elector • L. Muhlbach

... premise, it is true, that "all that is sweet is pleasant," it is true also, that "this is sweet," what is contrary to Right Reason is the bringing in this minor to the major i.e. the universal maxim, forbidding to taste. Thus, a man goes to a convivial meeting with the maxim in his mind "All excess is to be avoided," at a certain time his [Greek:——] tells him "This glass is excess." As a matter of mere reasoning, he cannot help receiving the conclusion ...
— Ethics • Aristotle

... bridegroom, blessing them, and expressing a hope that the union might be a fruitful one. The rest, after the usual presents had been given to the bride's relatives, was simply a matter of feasting everyone. The stranger lamas were invited to join; but Frank refused and dragged away the convivial Tashi, who was anxious to accept the invitation. Wargrave with difficulty led him aside and was so occupied in arguing with his discontented guide that he did not notice that Muriel had ...
— The Jungle Girl • Gordon Casserly

... veritable Don Juan, passes through most remarkable adventures.[51] The introductory Makama, describing life with his mistress in the solitude of a forest, is delicious. Tired of his monotonous life, he joins a company of convivial fellows, who pass their time in carousal. While with them, he receives an enigmatic love letter signed by an unknown woman, and he sets out to find her. On his wanderings, oppressed by love's doubts, he chances into a harem, and is threatened with death by its master. It turns ...
— Jewish Literature and Other Essays • Gustav Karpeles

... knives; that grating sound did not at all tend to tranquillize poor Dough-Boy. How could he forget that in his Island days, Queequeg, for one, must certainly have been guilty of some murderous, convivial indiscretions. Alas! Dough-Boy! hard fares the white waiter who waits upon cannibals. Not a napkin should he carry on his arm, but a buckler. in good time, though, to his great delight, the three ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville

... ascetic. Christ dined with publicans and sinners; and a man must unbend somewhere, or he loses the elasticity of his mind, and becomes a formula or a mechanism. The convivial enjoyments of Luther enabled him to bear his burden. Had Thomas a Becket shown the same humanity as archbishop that he did as chancellor, he might not have quarrelled with his royal master. So Chrysostom might have retained his favor with the court and his see until he died, had he been ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume IV • John Lord

... constable watched him with the air of a proprietor, and Mrs. Cooper's remark that "her husband had had his eye upon him for a long time, and that he had better be careful for the future," was faithfully retailed to him within half an hour of its utterance. Convivial friends counted his cups for him; teetotal friends more than hinted that Cooper was in the employ of ...
— Odd Craft, Complete • W.W. Jacobs

... calling Johnson forth to talk, and exercise his wit, though I should myself be the object of it, I resolutely ventured to undertake the defence of convivial indulgence in wine, though he was not to-night in the most genial humour. After urging the common plausible topicks, I at last had recourse to the maxim, in vino veritas, a man who is well warmed with wine ...
— Life of Johnson - Abridged and Edited, with an Introduction by Charles Grosvenor Osgood • James Boswell

... carry out these objects a small fund was raised, to which every one contributed; and thence was derived the name of the association: "gildan," in Saxon, signifying to pay. With a view to becoming better acquainted with one another, and to draw more closely the bands of friendship, convivial meetings were held at fixed periods, when a vast quantity of beer was quaffed in honour of the living, and to the memory of the dead. In after-times this truly Saxon institution assumed greater proportions, and embraced both ecclesiastical and secular gilds. Of the ...
— The Corporation of London: Its Rights and Privileges • William Ferneley Allen

... in which the most remarkable points were a violent declaration against O'Connell, that is, against Irish agitation, and strong expressions of amity with France. It is comical to compare the language of the very silly old gentleman who wears the crown, in his convivial moments, and in the openness of his heart, with that which his Ministers cram into his mouth, each sentiment being uttered with equal energy and apparent sincerity. Lord Grey is said to have made a very good speech on the Address. The House of Commons has commenced ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. III • Charles C. F. Greville

... doggedly courting, and butterfly Lane had taken to seeing too much convivial company in Heydon Hey and Castle Barfield, and there was a fear in Bertha's mind that if her influence had not been permanent, it had at least started the young man on a track likely to prove disastrous. These emotional people, quick to feel and quick to forget, ...
— Bulldog And Butterfly - From "Schwartz" by David Christie Murray • David Christie Murray

... English chapel, and were well pleased with the decent manner in which the service was performed. The Rev. Robert Synge is chaplain, a man of cheerful convivial manners, yet exceedingly attentive both as chaplain, and as guardian of his poorer countrymen. The chapel and clergymen are supported by the contribution fund, as are also the hospital for English sailors and others, and its surgeon, Mr. Dundas: both the hospital and chapel are ...
— Journal of a Voyage to Brazil - And Residence There During Part of the Years 1821, 1822, 1823 • Maria Graham

... there is some ideal aim in the mixed motive. Out of six gay young men who drive and drink together, only one cares for the meat and the bottle. With the rest this feasting gallantly on the best, regardless of expense, is part of a system. It is in good style, is convivial. For these green-horns of society to live together, to be convivae, is not to think and labor together, as wise men use, but to laugh ...
— The Atlantic Monthly , Volume 2, No. 14, December 1858 • Various

... sister, accompanied by their hostess and her brother, Colonel Denslow, seized the first favorable opportunity to call at the rooms of Mr. Quentin. They found him the next morning sitting up in a comfortable chair, the picture of desolation, notwithstanding the mighty efforts of Dickey Savage and the convivial millionaire. The arrival of the party put new life into the situation, and it was not long before Phil found ...
— Castle Craneycrow • George Barr McCutcheon

... just as dearly as ever. It was incredible, it was shocking; but it was true. For the first time in my life, I tried to take refuge from my sense of my own degradation in drink. I went to my club, and joined a convivial party at a supper table, and poured glass after glass of champagne down my throat, without feeling the slightest sense of exhilaration, without losing for an instant the consciousness of my own contemptible conduct. I went to my bed in despair; and through the wakeful night I weakly cursed ...
— The Two Destinies • Wilkie Collins

... party became more convivial, the mirth began to assume a broader form. Tom Durfy drew out Moriarty on the subject of his services, that the mock colonel might throw every new achievement into the shade; and this he did in the most barefaced manner, but mixing ...
— Handy Andy, Vol. 2 - A Tale of Irish Life • Samuel Lover

... those who met him in such hours are quite sufficient to prove that he did not leave the impression of a Prussian arrogance. If he was silent, his silence must have been more friendly, I had almost said more convivial, than many men's conversation. But on the larger platform of the European War, this quiet but unique gift of open-mindedness and intellectual hospitality was destined to do two very decisive things, which ...
— Lord Kitchener • G. K. Chesterton

... does not advertise your intention of camping out to every curious passer-by. This is a huge point. If a camp is not secret, it is but a troubled resting-place; you become a public character; the convivial rustic visits your bedside after an early supper; and you must sleep with one eye open, and be up before the day. I decided on a sleeping-sack; and after repeated visits to Le Puy, and a deal of high living for myself and my advisers, a sleeping-sack ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... was a man of great spiritual earnestness, and his whole life was consecrated to duty and the fear of God, In many ways he was remarkable, being in some things before his time. In his boyhood he had seen the evil effects of convivial habits in his immediate circle, and in order to fortify others by his example he became a strict teetotaler, suffering not a little ridicule and opposition from the firmness with which he carried out his ...
— The Personal Life Of David Livingstone • William Garden Blaikie

... was Vice-Admiral to Lord Thomas Howard, and lay off the Azores with the English squadron in 1591. He was a noted tyrant to his crew: a dark, bullying fellow apparently; and it is related of him that he would chew and swallow wine-glasses, by way of convivial levity, till the blood ran out of his mouth. When the Spanish fleet of fifty sail came within sight of the English, his ship, the Revenge, was the last to weigh anchor, and was so far circumvented by the ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 2 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... of a week of glory. The farewell dinner became a series. At the close of one convivial session Artemus went to a concert-hall, the "Melodeon," blacked his face, and delivered a speech. He got away from Virginia about ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine



Words linked to "Convivial" :   good-time, conviviality, sociable



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