"Docile" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... "Very good." He lit up thoughtfully. "Well, you might say that the Cirgameski are schizophrenic. They've got the docile Javanese blood, plus the Arabian elan. The Javanese part is on top, but every once in a while you see a flash of arrogance.... You never know. I've been out here nine years and I'm still a stranger." He puffed on his cigar, studied Murphy with his careful eyes. "You work for Know Your Universe!, ...
— Sjambak • John Holbrook Vance
... have leant the following nations reside (viz) the Sosone or snake Indians, the Chopunnish, sokulks, Cutssahnims, Chymnapums, Ehelutes, Eneshuh & Chilluckkittequaws. all of whom enjoy the bennefit of that docile, generous and valuable anamal the horse, and all of them except the three last have immence numbers of them. Their horses appear to be of an excellent race; they are lofty eligantly formed active and durable; in short many of them look like the fine English coarsers ...
— The Journals of Lewis and Clark • Meriwether Lewis et al
... models of his patent screen, and banged off pistols at his magnetic target, which he had rigged tip on the mantelpiece. Nature has given him a constitution of steel, however, and he shook off his malady more quickly and more thoroughly than the most docile ...
— The Stark Munro Letters • J. Stark Munro
... Snell, like a docile clairvoyante, who would really not make a mistake if she could help it. After stretching the corners of his mouth and contracting his eyes, as if he were trying to see the ear-rings, he appeared to give up the effort, and said, ...
— Silas Marner - The Weaver of Raveloe • George Eliot
... path open in order that the sick might be brought along; but it was ever being invaded and obstructed, so that the carts and stretchers remained on the road, submerged and lost until a bearer freed them. Nevertheless, the great tramping was that of a docile flock, an innocent, lamb-like crowd; and it was only the involuntary pushing, the blind rolling towards the light of the candles that had to be contended against. No accident had ever happened there, notwithstanding the excitement, which gradually increased and threw the ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... and suddenly in school hours let him loose, to the great astonishment and anger of his teachers. He was condemned to a dungeon for eight days, and received a terrible reprimand. The effect of either the lecture or the imprisonment was decided. He became docile and obedient, and paid attention to his studies. For seven years he studied with unremitting attention, and during all that time took the first prizes of his class. He now went to Aix to study law, where his old habits returned to him, and ...
— Paris: With Pen and Pencil - Its People and Literature, Its Life and Business • David W. Bartlett
... should buy a little Chinese maiden to wait on the missus. Cheon knew of one in Darwin, going cheap, for ten pounds, his—COUSIN's child. "A real bargain!" he assured the Maluka, finding him lacking in enthusiasm; "docile, sweet, and attentive," and yes, Cheon was sure of that "devoted to the missus," and also a splendid pecuniary investment (Cheon always had an eye on the dollars). Being only ten years of age, for six years she could serve the missus, and would then bring at least eighty pounds ...
— We of the Never-Never • Jeanie "Mrs. Aeneas" Gunn
... versed in art are the great artists; we have guides then, and we have a way—the path they have trodden—and we have company, the gifted and docile men of to-day whom we see to be improving themselves; and, in so far as we are reasonable, a sense of proportion is ours, which we may improve; and it will help us to catch up better and yet better company until we enjoy the intimacy of the noblest, and know as we are known. Then: "May we not ...
— Albert Durer • T. Sturge Moore
... liquors up, they began to be more manageable; when their provisions ran short, and they were made to understand that they would not be allowed to plunder the fields and woods, or loot the villages for something to eat, they became almost exemplarily docile. At first they were disposed to show fight, and the principles of the Altrurians did not allow them to use violence in bringing them to subjection; but the men had counted without their hosts in supposing that they ...
— Through the Eye of the Needle - A Romance • W. D. Howells
... and then went to look at Charnock. He was asleep, of which she was rather glad, because there was something to be said and she was highly strung. She could not trust her temper yet and might go too far. Bob was generally docile, particularly when repentant; but it was possible to drive him into an obstinate mood when nothing could be done with him. She was angry, but her anger was mainly ...
— The Girl From Keller's - Sadie's Conquest • Harold Bindloss
... broils and contests of external life, but most attentive to the in-door business. All, did I say?—I err. Exception must be made in favour of my excellent good friend, Mr Robert Thompson. He has in him something of the spirit of his mother, and finds fault where his brethren are most docile. Catholic emancipation he regarded with horror—the Reform bill with indignation; and the onward movement of the present day he looks at with the feelings of an individual waiting for an earthquake. He is sure that the world is going round the other way, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 53, No. 331, May, 1843 • Various
... position of the observer,—were those contrarieties and changes not less startling, which his character so often exhibited, as compared with itself. He who, at one moment, was seen intrenched in the most absolute self-will, would, at the very next, be found all that was docile and amenable. To-day, storming the world in its strong-holds, as a misanthrope and satirist—to-morrow, learning, with implicit obedience, to fold a shawl, as a Cavaliere—the same man who had so obstinately refused to surrender, either to friendly ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. 6 (of 6) - With his Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... are ministers of the faith, and sons of the Catholic church, and any war waged for the introduction of the gospel is most important, and of the greatest profit, even though it be to acquire or to gain desert provinces. Besides the Filipinas have shown how docile are their natives, and how thoroughly they benefit by the example and company of the Spaniards—the tokens of the affection with which they have received the faith and aid the religious who are extending the ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XVI, 1609 • H.E. Blair
... of New York or Chicago or San Francisco is surprised to find how docile and domestic the German woman is—no foolish extravagance, but a real devotion to husband and home, a real mother to her many children. She matches that short epitaph of the Roman matron—"She spun wool; she ...
— Face to Face with Kaiserism • James W. Gerard
... tiresome visits; with these comes a detail of insipid matters of business. 'Tis wrong-headed men, punctiliously difficult, who are to be set right; heads too hot which must be restrained, idle fellows that must be urged, impatient men that must be rendered docile, plunderers to restrain within the bounds of equity, babblers to hear babbling, dumb people to keep in talk: in fine, one has to drink with those that like it, to eat with those that are hungry; one has to become a Jew with Jews, a Pagan ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XII. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... born Whose loss her parents could more justly mourn. Unspoiled and neat, obedient at all times, She seemed already versed in songs and rhymes, And with a highborn courtesy and art, Though but a babe, she played a maiden's part. Discreet and modest, sociable and free From jealous habits, docile, mannerly, She never thought to taste her morning fare Until she should have said her morning prayer; She never went to sleep at night until She had prayed God to save us all from ill. She used to run to meet her father ...
— Laments • Jan Kochanowski
... tribe will soon fulfil the great law of Providence which seems to enjoin and reward the union of races. It will mix with the Anglo-American, and be known no more as a jealous and separate people. Its present place will be occupied by the more mixed, more docile, and more serviceable race, which has long borne the yoke of sturdy industry in this island, which can submit to a master and obey the law. This is no longer a dream, for it is a fact now in progress, and every day ...
— The trade, domestic and foreign • Henry Charles Carey
... but as their teasing of her proceeded more from unchecked liveliness than real ill-nature, and as she was too gentle to retort upon them, their childish squabbles never amounted to serious disagreements, and they lived in perfect harmony together. She was too docile to be naughty, would seldom fail to learn the task that was given her, but never felt a desire ...
— The Flower Basket - A Fairy Tale • Unknown
... a week before I did, and I found my wife, agreeable to my instructions, had placed the axe in his hands, as his first task. For some time he was very awkward, but he was so docile, so willing, and grateful, as well as his wife, that I foresaw he would succeed. Agreeably to my promise, I put them all with different families, where they were well liked, and all parties were pleased. Andrew worked hard, lived well, grew fat, and ...
— Letters from an American Farmer • Hector St. John de Crevecoeur
... the cows in the barnyard. She took the path past the house and down to the corral, where she paused, her ear arrested by the steady drone of milking. A lantern sitting on the black earth, cast a little circle of light, and threw a docile cow in dreadful silhouette against the barn. And by that dim light Beulah discerned the bent form of her ...
— The Homesteaders - A Novel of the Canadian West • Robert J. C. Stead
... assure Elinor that it was high time she should have some just ideas on such subjects, and insisted on her listening to all his explanations, and doing her best to comprehend them. Elinor tried to be a docile pupil, and really acquired some useful information, which may appear singular to romantic young ladies, who set up for broken-hearted; as her only object, however, was to gratify her grandfather, we hope she will ...
— Elinor Wyllys - Vol. I • Susan Fenimore Cooper
... Hermenstein,—the last of her race—a race which, back to its earliest source, has been distinguished for its faithful allegiance to Mother-Church, and has moreover added largely to the Papal revenues—could be otherwise than our obedient and docile daughter? Per la Santissima Madonna!—if I thought she could turn against us her marriage ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli
... unauthorized idea might enter. Had she trusted too confidently to the fact that Virginia's father was a clergyman, and therefore spiritually armed for the defence and guidance of his daughter? Virginia, in spite of her gaiety, had been what Miss Priscilla called "a docile pupil," meaning one who deferentially submitted her opinions to her superiors, and to go through life perpetually submitting her opinions was, in the eyes of her parents and her teacher, the divinely appointed task of woman. Her education was founded ...
— Virginia • Ellen Glasgow
... danced in the Submarine Grill. She floated in his embrace with triumphant lightness. Her eyes, utilized as temporary lamps by a lighting-circuit of which she was quite unaware, beamed with happy lustre. The lay reader, always docile to the necessities of occasion, murmured delightful trifles. But his private thoughts were as aloof and shining and evasive as the goldfish that twinkled in the glass pool overhead. He picked up her scarf and her handkerchief when ...
— Where the Blue Begins • Christopher Morley
... tour through France, to Aristide a pilgrimage of unimaginable depression. They began with Chartres, continued with the Chateaux of the Loire, and began to work their way south. Nothing that Aristide could do roused them from their apathy. They were exasperatingly docile, made few complaints, got up, entrained, detrained, fed, excursioned, slept, just as they were bidden. But they looked at nothing, enjoyed nothing (save perhaps English newspapers and knitting), and uttered nothing by way of criticism or appreciation when Aristide attempted to review ...
— The Joyous Adventures of Aristide Pujol • William J. Locke
... the first time since their marriage he had quarrelled with his wife. Docile, sweet-tempered Ruth Curtis was aflame with mother wrath. She, like a great many Green Valley women, thought of Jim Tumley not as a man but as a voice, the voice of a lark on a summer morning. That other men's selfish strength ...
— Green Valley • Katharine Reynolds
... of a white regiment a few miles distant. The conduct of the black troops, however, at an extensive fire some two years ago, which destroyed a large district in the business part of the town, was an illustration of what seems a curious peculiarity of the African character, namely, that while docile and amenable to discipline in the highest degree in common, the negroes are apt in critical moments to break out into uncontrollable license. On this occasion, the black men, soldiers and all, ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No 3, September 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... throbbing, unconsciously human, as no other period has ever been, as in all probability none will ever be again. Generous, spendthrift, murderous when crossed, chivalrous, fearless, profane, yet fundamentally religious, inebriate, wilful and docile by turns, ceaselessly active, eternally discontented, seeking they knew not what, they were their own evil genius; as certainly as nature surrounded them with Heaven, they supplied their own Hell and, impartial, chose from each to weave the web of ...
— Where the Trail Divides • Will Lillibridge
... pensive eyes, obliging and intelligent; and the change from the dry, authoritative Miss Winter was so delightful, that unedifying contrasts were continually being drawn. Blanche struck up a great friendship for her at once; Mary, always docile, ceased to be piteous at her lessons, and Ethel moralised on the satisfaction of having sympathy needed instead of repelled, and did her utmost to make Miss Bracy feel at home—and like a ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... Boston and met Holmes at Fields's house. Holmes made an examination, which was anything but satisfactory to his own mind; in fact, he was appalled at the condition in which he found his former companion of the Saturday Club. "He was very gentle," Holmes says; "very willing to answer questions, very docile to such counsel as I offered him, but evidently had no hope of recovering his health. He spoke as if his work were done, and he should write no more." [Footnote: Atlantic Monthly, July, 1864.] The doctor, however, must have been mistaken in supposing that Hawthorne was suffering ...
— The Life and Genius of Nathaniel Hawthorne • Frank Preston Stearns
... pleasantly and agreeably as if she were a most charming young girl. Hardly any husband gets so much obedience from his wife by stern orders as he does by jests and cajolery. How could he fail to do so, after having induced a woman on the verge of old age, also by no means a docile character, and lastly most attentive to her business, to learn to play the cithern, the lute, the monochord and the recorders, and perform a daily prescribed exercise in this ...
— Erasmus and the Age of Reformation • Johan Huizinga
... him with whom she was closely and inseparably united in mind and affections, to move him so suddenly to change the course of the elements in order to satisfy her pious desire. By placing herself, as a docile scholar, continually at the feet of the Divine Majesty, who filled all the powers of her soul with the sweetness of his heavenly communications, she learned that sublime science of perfection in which she became a mistress to so many other chaste souls by this divine exercise. Her life ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler
... neighbours. This was, indeed, at first the programme only of extremists; the mass of the German people, like Bismarck, took little interest in colonies. But the extremists proved that they could win over the government to their view; the German people, most docile of nations, could be gradually indoctrinated with it. And because this was so, because the ugly spirit of domination and of unbridled aggressiveness was in these years gradually mastering the ruling forces of a very ...
— The Expansion of Europe - The Culmination of Modern History • Ramsay Muir
... believe that the Porto Ricans are a docile, orderly and kindly people, well prepared for a better government than they have ever enjoyed, but you must lose no opportunity to impress upon the United States that you are tolerant and ...
— Porto Rico - Its History, Products and Possibilities... • Arthur D. Hall
... had never been desperately in love with his mistress, spoke to her of these arrangements and found her as usual—submissive and apparently docile to his will. But the next day, when he returned home, he found that mother and child had flown. Finally, they were discovered in a wretched hut on the borders of the Forest of Rambouillet, with Irma's ...
— Artists' Wives • Alphonse Daudet
... only be learnt at the bench, and by years of patient practice and docile service; but it may be well to mention ...
— Stained Glass Work - A text-book for students and workers in glass • C. W. Whall
... (or three dollars) per week. If they have a family grown up until they are able to work at the mills, of course it adds materially to the income. Girls are more precious than boys, I have heard, as being more docile and easier kept in clothing. They can earn about half wages, or six shillings (one dollar and a half) per week. Rents are about two shillings (or half a dollar) per week. It takes one and sixpence for fuel. A young family would keep the parents busy to make ends meet in the best ...
— The Letters of "Norah" on her Tour Through Ireland • Margaret Dixon McDougall
... was growing tall and strong, was very much in earnest when he had promised to try to be docile and obedient. He did not forget that should he meet his dear mother and father in London they would ask him whether he had kept his word, and he would not have told them a falsehood even if he had been ever so naughty, for he was a truthful boy, and ...
— Naughty Miss Bunny - A Story for Little Children • Clara Mulholland
... an hour later, but not by the wish of the younger girl. She was always passive, however, always docile when Delia was, as she said, on the war-path, and though she had none of her sister's insistence she was courageous in suffering. She thought Delia whipped her up too much, but there was that in her which would have ...
— The Reverberator • Henry James
... than in this youth. At Otaheite he might have had any thing that was in their power to bestow; whereas here he was not in the least noticed. He was a youth of good parts, and, like most of his countrymen, of a docile, gentle, and humane disposition, but in a manner wholly ignorant of their religion, government, manners, customs, and traditions; consequently no material knowledge could have been gathered from him, had I brought him away. Indeed, he would have been a better ...
— A Voyage Towards the South Pole and Round the World, Volume 1 • James Cook
... who work from the motive of love, rather than the motive of gain, will not necessarily be sufferers in consequence, so far as this world goes. But it may be asked, 'Will not unprincipled masters or mistresses be likely to take advantage of this docile and unselfish spirit?' Perhaps, nay, doubtless, in many cases, they will. The Salvation Army has been taken advantage of all through its past history, and so have all the true saints of God, because they have submitted to wrong, and have not fought the injustice ...
— The Authoritative Life of General William Booth • George Scott Railton
... an armchair and put the docile Jim into it. Then she smiled at Nan Ainslee and told ...
— Green Valley • Katharine Reynolds
... stifle my cries. I beat myself, taxed myself with cowardice. My blood was on the boil, and I would have lacerated my body. On two occasions, I wanted to run away, to go straight before me, towards the sun; but my courage failed. They had turned me into a docile brute with their tame benevolence and sickly tenderness. Then I lied, I always lied. I remained there quite gentle, quite silent, dreaming ...
— Therese Raquin • Emile Zola
... been too hastily spirited away. Just as night fell there came a tap, and opening, I saw Robert literally "clothed and in his right mind." The Doctor had replaced the ragged suit with tidy garments, and no trace of that tempestuous night remained but deeper lines upon the forehead, and the docile look of a repentant child. He did not cross the threshold, did not offer me his hand,—only took off his cap, saying, with a traitorous falter in ...
— A Modern Cinderella - or The Little Old Show and Other Stories • Louisa May Alcott
... other" when I think Of how the Hun, docile and meek, Suffers his ravenous maw to shrink, And only strikes, say, once a week; If he for all these months has stood The sorry fare they feed the brute on, I hope that I can be as good A patriot as ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, May 9, 1917 • Various
... was reg'lar jim-dandy fer nerve, wa'n't he," said he finally in a little awestruck voice. "A reg'lar jim-dandy." He thoughtfully poked one of the docile hands with his foot. "I wonner where he got 'is stren'th from? I never seen a man do like that before. It was a funny thing. Well, he ...
— The Red Badge of Courage - An Episode of the American Civil War • Stephen Crane
... advantage, they are greatly superior in last, and possess extraordinary endurance and stamina. Brought up as if belonging to the family of their owners, their intelligence has been cultivated as has that of dogs. They are exceedingly docile and affectionate. Their pace is a very easy one, and Edgar was delighted indeed at the manner in which his new acquisition flew along without any apparent exertion, continuing the pace without a check until they reached the Arab encampment in an hour ...
— At Aboukir and Acre - A Story of Napoleon's Invasion of Egypt • George Alfred Henty
... especially of late, had Reverend Mother looked at her with anxious foreboding in her eyes. What would the future hold for this child of hers, endowed as she was with singular beauty and a wonderful voice? She was a docile child, sunny and sweet-tempered, and that very pliancy of nature was what caused the nun many a moment of uneasiness. What would become of her once she had left the shelter of her convent home and was exposed to the influence of ...
— The Alchemist's Secret • Isabel Cecilia Williams
... the parent loves to trace Resemblance in his children's face: And, as he forms their docile youth To walk the steady paths of truth, Observes them shooting into men, And lives in them life o'er ...
— Many Thoughts of Many Minds - A Treasury of Quotations from the Literature of Every Land and Every Age • Various
... originally secured for a housekeeper, bore him a girl, very much to his disgust, a girl named Patience, and great was Waitstill's delight at this addition to the dull household. The mother was a timid, colorless, docile creature, but Patience nevertheless was a sparkling, bright-eyed baby, who speedily became the very centre of the universe to the older child. So the months and years wore on, drearily enough, until, when Patience was nine, the third Mrs. Baxter succumbed after the manner of her predecessors, ...
— The Story Of Waitstill Baxter • By Kate Douglas Wiggin
... more populous. The Spanish and Portuguese states of America are mainly tropical, and therefore ill adapted to the health of a white race. Their population is divided between a white minority, among whom there are to be found strains of Indian blood, and a coloured majority, sometimes docile and industrious, sometimes mere savages. They inherited no machinery of self-government. Townships governed by close corporations, and all embedded in the despotic power of the crown, presented none of the elements out of which a commonwealth could be formed. It was inevitable ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... cruel use of whip and spur may have marked the education of the "trick-horse." But for a long time past the animal's fears have not been appealed to, but simply his love of food. Horses are very sagacious, and their natural timidity once appeased, they become exceedingly docile. An untrained horse has often shown himself equal to the ordinary requirements of the equestrian manager after only four ...
— A Book of the Play - Studies and Illustrations of Histrionic Story, Life, and Character • Dutton Cook
... bone and a foot or so sawed off its legs. They are like our Canadian general purpose breed, but much heavier. I have seen horses on almost every farm where my men were billeted that would weigh from 1,600 to 2,000 pounds. These horses are clean-limbed, close-coupled and wonderfully docile and obedient. They answer to the word "Gee," which seems to be an international phrase. A "jerk-line" on the collar does the rest. Most of the best horses are brought from Belgium. A thoroughbred three-year-old mare will cost three ...
— The Red Watch - With the First Canadian Division in Flanders • J. A. Currie
... inflamed Richard Baldwyn, the miller of Rough Lee, who made overtures of marriage to her. These were favourably entertained, but a slight quarrel occurring between them, the lover, in her own phrase, got "his jacket soundly dusted" by her, and declared off, taking to wife a more docile and light-handed maiden. As to Bess, though she had given this unmistakable proof of her ability to manage a husband, she did not receive a second offer, nor, as she had now attained the mature age of forty, did it seem likely she would ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... ladies, who were inclined to oppose him, yielded to the tearful advice of their more timid sisters, and one by one they began to unclasp necklaces and belts and hand them over to the dacoit together with bracelets, bangles and rings. The ruffian, finding them docile, did not hustle them in any way but stood leisurely receiving the spoil. Then he carefully folded all in a rich saree and was knotting the ends together when the train suddenly stopped, and an Englishman ...
— Bengal Dacoits and Tigers • Maharanee Sunity Devee
... manner. There were moments when his exotic little personality, standing out from all the rest like an infant Artful Dodger or a caricature of Beau Brummel, seemed to make him wholly alien to the group, yet he was docile and obedient, his only fault being a tendency to strong and highly colored language. To make the marching more effective and develope a better sense of time, I instituted a very simple and rudimentary form of ...
— The Girl and the Kingdom - Learning to Teach • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... of wisdom. It means caution, independence, honesty and veracity. Faith means negligence, serfdom, insincerity and deception. The man who never doubts never thinks. He is like a straw in the wind or a waif on the sea. He is one of the helpless, docile, unquestioning millions, who keep the world in a state of stagnation, and serve as a fulcrum for the lever of despotism. The stupidity of the people, says Whitman, is always inviting the insolence ...
— Flowers of Freethought - (First Series) • George W. Foote
... twice, but many times the Maid had to speak such words as these; but she never feared to speak them, and her courage and her purity of heart and life threw its spell over the rough men she had led, and they became docile in her hands like children, ready to worship the very ground ...
— A Heroine of France • Evelyn Everett-Green
... of uniformity, and an attempt is made to have a single mold of method of study and recitation, mental confusion and artificiality inevitably result. Originality is gradually destroyed, confidence in one's own quality of mental operation is undermined, and a docile subjection to the opinion of others is inculcated, or else ideas run wild. The harm is greater now than when the whole community was governed by customary beliefs, because the contrast between methods of learning in school and those relied upon outside the school is greater. That systematic ...
— Democracy and Education • John Dewey
... the team, and to apportion the strength of the cattle to the variations of the road, will have become a tradition. Perfect as mechanism was the discipline of a well-trained leader. He knew the road, and the duty expected of him. Docile and towardly during his seven- or nine-mile stage, he refused to perform more than his allotted task. Attached to his yoke-fellow, he resented the intrusion of a stranger into his harness: and a mere change of hands on the box would often convert the willing steed into a recusant ...
— Old Roads and New Roads • William Bodham Donne
... wolf, fox, bear, and monkey, By piping advice in one key— That his pipe should play a prelude To something heaven-tinged not hell-hued, Something not harsh but docile, ...
— Robert Browning • G. K. Chesterton
... a good hour, Mr. Brown, pacing up and down the garden-walk, took counsel with his own heart, and, we may hope, found it docile. ...
— Outpost • J.G. Austin
... seemed to succeed. The negroes who were rescued from the customs and were carried to the Spanish islands proved docile and useful. Portuguese and Spanish factories were established on the coast of Guinea. The black chiefs were glad to make money out of their wretched victims, and readily sold them. The transport over the Atlantic became a regular branch of ...
— English Seamen in the Sixteenth Century - Lectures Delivered at Oxford Easter Terms 1893-4 • James Anthony Froude
... eyes of Edward Malia Butler, and was slightly useful to him. Then the central political committee, with Butler in charge, decided that some nice, docile man who would at the same time be absolutely faithful was needed for city treasurer, and Stener was put on the ticket. He knew little of finance, but was an excellent bookkeeper; and, anyhow, was not corporation counsel Regan, another political tool of this great triumvirate, there to advise ...
— The Financier • Theodore Dreiser
... been brought up in the same freedom of thought. Therefore, although I have no doubt that they will respect your authority, I doubt whether, were I to put a Frenchman in command, they would prove so docile, while with the French there will be no difficulty. I might, of course, appoint John Harpen, who is ten years your senior, to the command; but John, though a good esquire, is bluff and rough in ...
— At Agincourt • G. A. Henty
... to Russian or to German wishes. Germany's friendship was not entirely disinterested, and had to be fostered with a railway or loan concession from time to time, until in 1899 the great object aimed at, the Bagdad railway, was conceded. Meanwhile, aided by docile instruments, the sultan had succeeded in reducing his ministers to the position of secretaries, and in concentrating the mhole administration of the country into his own hands at Yildiz. But internal dissension was not thereby lessened. Crete was constantly in turmoil, ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... and she proved if not an ardently loving, at least a docile and gentle mistress to Lionel. He was content. He could ask no more in reason at the moment, and he was buoyed up by every lover's confidence that given opportunity and time he could find the way ...
— The Sea-Hawk • Raphael Sabatini
... the area of the mother country, from which it is separated by ten thousand miles of sea, yet the sovereignty of Queen Wilhelmina is upheld among the cannibals of New Guinea, the head-hunters of Borneo, and the savages of Achin, no less than among the docile millions of Java, by less than ten thousand European soldiers. That a territory so vast and with so enormous a population, should be so admirably administered, everything considered, by so small a number of white men, is in itself ...
— Where the Strange Trails Go Down • E. Alexander Powell
... fierce and piercing that it was apparent even in the half darkness. He sported a moustache more aggressively terrible than that of Kaiser Bill himself and his demeanor was such as to make that of a roaring lion seem like a docile lamb by comparison. An Iron Cross depended from a heavy chain about his bull neck and his portly breast was so covered with the junk of rank and commemoration that it seemed like one of those boards from which street hawkers sell badges at ...
— Tom Slade Motorcycle Dispatch Bearer • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... Levee, or be precipitated into yonder first-floor, so as to damage the chest of a black man cleaning boots at the window? The black man is safe for me, thank goodness. But you see the little accident might have happened. It has happened; and if to a mule, why not to a more docile animal? On our journey up the Mississippi, I give you my honor we were on fire three times, and burned our cook-room down. The deck at night was a great firework—the chimney spouted myriads of stars, which fell blackening on ...
— Roundabout Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... with the loveliest red and yellow fruits. I sat and ate, the whole colony mounting guard until I had done. Then they brought up two of the largest of their elephants, and having placed them side by side, hooked their trunks and tied their tails together. The docile creatures could have untied their tails with a single shake, and unhooked their trunks by forgetting them; but tails and trunks remained as their little masters had arranged them, and it was clear the elephants understood that they must keep their bodies parallel. I got up, ...
— Lilith • George MacDonald
... never been a time when all her children could be docile under such a rule; and, among her champions of freedom, none have been braver than those who have sprung from the ranks of her ministry, as the fate of Roger Williams had already proved. In such a community, before the ecclesiastical power had been solidified by time, ...
— The Emancipation of Massachusetts • Brooks Adams
... that there is no heaven of everlasting bliss to which we are to be wafted after death. And I maintain this not only because I think that these religious beliefs are erroneous, but because I know that they are most potent to make men docile and submissive to the most degrading conditions imposed on them. I feel sure that the doctrine that obedience to rulers and contentment in poverty are according to the will of God, and the doctrine that the poor and the oppressed will be compensated in heaven are the chief causes of slums, prisons, ...
— Communism and Christianism - Analyzed and Contrasted from the Marxian and Darwinian Points of View • William Montgomery Brown
... one else should be found. She had no idea that Mrs. Rainham made no effort at all to discover any other successor to Miss Simpkins. Where, indeed, Mrs. Rainham demanded of herself, would she be likely to find anyone with such qualifications—young, docile, with every advantage of a modern education, speaking French like a native, and above and beyond all else, requiring no pay? It would be flying in the face of Providence to ignore such a chance. Wherefore Cecilia continued to lead her step-sisters and brother in the paths of learning, ...
— Back To Billabong • Mary Grant Bruce
... continued to paragraph him while he spent in absent-minded seclusion the ebb of that life which at the flood had so mightily advanced knowledge—Professor Wyvern was too much attached to his son, too docile in the hands of his loving wife, to gainsay any wish that Bill might urge and that Mrs. ...
— Once Aboard The Lugger • Arthur Stuart-Menteth Hutchinson
... herself obeying like a docile child. As she took a chair facing Mary's desk she realized that in just such a kind, practical fashion would Mary proceed to manage Steve, that the years of experience in the business world as an independent woman would give Mary quite a new-fashioned charm in his eyes. ...
— The Gorgeous Girl • Nalbro Bartley
... docile little 1840 wife! Don't you know the suffragists will get you if you talk meek like that? What do you want to know? Volts, ...
— The Squirrel-Cage • Dorothy Canfield
... widow, mourn your loss, and then sell the Devonshire estate and hand you the money, believing you to be her husband and rightly entitled to it. The terrible crime which the unfortunate woman had committed at your instigation had turned her brain, as you anticipated, and she, docile and half-witted, was entirely beneath your ...
— The Seven Secrets • William Le Queux
... let me tell you a secret, John. I was not always what you see me, a docile, hen-pecked man. Twenty-five years ago Philander Sharpe, young, good-looking, conceited, and rich, had ...
— Miss Caprice • St. George Rathborne
... close intimacy, she ventured to mount him. To the astonishment of every one he was perfectly docile, and moved away gently, but with an air of pride, as if conscious of the precious burden he bore. From that time forward no one was permitted to ride him but the lady, who visited him every day in his stall, and always carried him a loaf of bread or a cup of sugar, and never mounted ...
— The Memories of Fifty Years • William H. Sparks
... already there; the whole village would be at that spot presently, but she was first. On that morning no sooner had she heard that the funeral was going to take place than she gave herself a holiday from school and made her docile mother dress her in her daintiest clothes. She welcomed me with a glad face and put her wee hand in mine; then the villagers—all those not in the procession— began to arrive, and very soon we were in the middle of a throng; then, ...
— A Traveller in Little Things • W. H. Hudson
... Peck had consented to leave Idella with her Annie took the whole charge of the child, and grew into an intimacy with her that was very sweet. It was not necessary to this that Idella should be always tractable and docile, which she was not, but only that she should be affectionate and dependent; Annie found that she even liked her to be a little baddish; it gave her something to forgive; and she experienced a perverse pleasure ...
— Annie Kilburn - A Novel • W. D. Howells
... something in the speaker himself that had held the child's attention so fast all this while. Her eyes had never wandered from his face; she had stood in docile wise looking at him and answering his questions and listening, won by the commentary she read in his face on what her friend was saying. A strange light kindled in it as he spoke; there were lines of affection and tenderness that came in the play of lips ...
— The Old Helmet, Volume I • Susan Warner
... less than nothing in the headstrong passion which consumed him. No consideration for her peace and ultimate happiness affected him, though he was sensible of a certain remorseful pity when thinking of her gentle ways and docile yielding to his often impatient and impetuous humors; but, after all, she was only his sister,—she could not understand his present condition of mind. Then there was Gervase, whom he had for some years looked upon ...
— Ziska - The Problem of a Wicked Soul • Marie Corelli
... a Greek, by citizenship, an Austrian, and by occupation, a chemist; but his real metier, concealed under a most docile and law abiding exterior, was secret inquiry in behalf of the British government into all matters pertaining to its interests, either social, political, or military. He knew his Hungary from Odenburg to Kronstadt, from the Save to the Carpathians, and Renwick, while somewhat ...
— The Secret Witness • George Gibbs
... Succincte Narration, which sets forth his policy; the Testament, which embodies his counsel in statecraft—belong less to literature than to French history. But he honoured the literary art; he enjoyed the drama; he devised plots for plays, and found docile poets—his Society of five—to carry ...
— A History of French Literature - Short Histories of the Literatures of the World: II. • Edward Dowden
... "It was bought as beef," added the Cossack, "so that anyhow we have got the best of the bargain." There was nothing, therefore, for it but to fall to with knife and fork, and with as little repulsion as possible, upon the docile friend of man! ...
— From Paris to New York by Land • Harry de Windt
... in the history of all Administrations that there is never lacking a friend on their own side to keep them on the right path. RADCLIFFE COOKE suddenly developed tendency towards personally conducting the Government. Hitherto appeared as a docile follower. New state of affairs arose in connection with Breach of Privilege by Cambrian Railway Directors. HICKS-BEACH last night gave notice to take into consideration Special Report of Select Committee charging Directors with Breach of Privilege. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 102, April 16, 1892 • Various
... busy cropping sweet grasses and taking his ease, but he supposed there was some good reason for it; at any rate he submitted quietly to being saddled and merely nipped Weary's shoulder once and struck out twice with an ivory-white, daintily rounded hoof—and Weary was grateful for the docile mood he showed. ...
— The Lonesome Trail and Other Stories • B. M. Bower
... the thought of bearing her young into a life of bondage, she would have killed them mercifully, even while their blind baby mouths were groping for her breasts. But the watchful keeper forestalled her. Whelps of the great gray timber wolf, born in captivity, and therefore likely to be docile, were rare and precious. The four little sprawlers, helpless and hungrily whimpering, were given into the care of a foster-mother, a sorrowing brown spaniel bitch who had just been robbed ...
— Kings in Exile • Sir Charles George Douglas Roberts
... and blushed. The good vicar came to her, and there as he had rung the bell for mass he went through the service for her, and both freely discounted the joys of paradise. The good priest had it in his heart to thoroughly instruct her, and found his pupil very docile, as gentle in mind as soft in the flesh, a perfect jewel. Therefore was he much aggrieved at having so much abridged the lessons by giving it at Azay, seeing that he would have been quite willing to recommence it, like all of precentors who say the same thing over and over ...
— Droll Stories, Volume 1 • Honore de Balzac
... pass. A noose would then be thrown about the exhausted animal, which would be instantly mounted by an Indian and broken immediately to the saddle. Some of these wild horses were exceedingly swift, well-proportioned, and handsome in shape, but they seldom proved as docile as those born in captivity. When in a wild condition they would snort so loudly through the nostrils on descrying an enemy that they could be heard at a ...
— Pioneers in Canada • Sir Harry Johnston
... at the same time acquiring a promptitude of perception that was quite marvelous. Presently I shall have to speak of the service this rendered me in my experiment of second sight. After having thus made my hands supple and docile, I went on straight to sleight-of-hand, and I more especially devoted myself to the manipulation of ...
— The Lock and Key Library/Real Life #2 • Julian Hawthorne
... scraper, and had been obstinate on the question of changing his shirt on Wednesdays, holding that once a week was enough for a person not engaged in manual labor. Mrs. Pantin had won out on each issue, but it had not been an easy victory. Mr. Pantin had been docile so long now that she had expected no further trouble with him, therefore this outbreak was so unlooked for that her ...
— The Fighting Shepherdess • Caroline Lockhart
... was the "old doctor." A benign man, as old doctors—when they don't grow contrariwise, and become unspeakably gruff and crusty—are apt to be. A benign old doctor, a docile old horse, an old-fashioned two-wheeled chaise that springs to the motion like a bough at a bird flitting, and an indescribable June morning wherein to drive four miles and back—well! Faith couldn't help exulting in her heart ...
— Faith Gartney's Girlhood • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney
... kind enough to explain how those saurians happened to be in that sea in such a docile frame of mind, Tim?" asked Timberlake, with a ...
— Jack Wright and His Electric Stage; - or, Leagued Against the James Boys • "Noname"
... in the stocks? I always thought you were mild and docile as a lamb. It was for your docility that I most esteemed you. Benjamin! Benjamin! you have not only disgraced yourself, but your friends, by this shameless conduct, Bless me! bless me! Mr. Doolittle, he seems to have knocked your face all ...
— The Pioneers • James Fenimore Cooper
... "Such a docile animal as the horse can readily be trained to particular habits, and does not readily forget them, however disreputable. There is an odd story to ...
— Stories about the Instinct of Animals, Their Characters, and Habits • Thomas Bingley
... of Hertford, where Toby, as our Russian friend was christened, became equally sagacious with bipeds, in distinguishing strong ale from small beer. To the former beverage, Toby became freely attached; but when we saw him at the Gardens in the Regent's Park, he appeared too docile for his companions. ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 12, Issue 330, September 6, 1828 • Various
... cloisteral fidelity of his pet Catalina, must suddenly give way in one hour, like many other vanities in our own days of Spanish bonds and promises. After reaching her tenth year, Catalina became thoughtful, and not very docile. At times she was even headstrong and turbulent, so that the gentle sisterhood of St. Sebastian, who had no other pet or plaything in the world, began to weep in secret—fearing that they might have been rearing by mistake some future tigress—for as to infancy, ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey
... all the monkey family this Gibbon makes one of the most interesting pets. It is mild and most docile, and capable of great attachment. Even the adult male has been caught, and within the short space of a month so completely tamed that he would follow and come to a call. One I had for a time, some years ago, was a most engaging little creature. Nothing contented him so much as being allowed to sit ...
— Natural History of the Mammalia of India and Ceylon • Robert A. Sterndale
... very large and were mostly dark brown, with considerable length of hair. In like manner with the camels, they were carefully protected by thick and well stuffed packs, or saddles, and were accordingly free from sores. They appeared to be exceedingly docile and intelligent, and did not require the incessant belabouring to which the ass of other countries is the victim. Large droves of these animals, each laden with three heavy squared stones for building, picked their way through the narrow streets, and seemed to know exactly the ...
— Cyprus, as I Saw it in 1879 • Sir Samuel W. Baker
... been one; he only entered, rigid, authoritative, unsparing, into my consciousness at the third or fourth visit, widely separated by time, when he marshalled me the way that he was going with a flock of other docile tourists. I suppose it would be possible to see Westminster Abbey without a verger, but I do not know; and would it be safe? I imagine he was there at my first and second visits, but that my memory rejected him as ...
— London Films • W.D. Howells
... Leon, in the year 1689,[15] by command of the Vice-King of New Spain, took formal possession of Texas, in the name of His Most Catholic Majesty of Spain. Afterward a few military and missionary settlements were commenced, with indifferent success, as the Indians were of a less docile character than those of the southern provinces. They were ever restive under the yoke of spiritual taskmasters, so that the feeble missions and presidios had only a sickly existence down to the time of the breaking out of the ...
— Mexico and its Religion • Robert A. Wilson
... his business" (Philosophy of Manufactures, p. 330). This does not, however, prevent Dr. Ure from pointing out a little later the grave danger into which trade-union endeavours to raise wages drive a trade subject to the competition of "the more frugal and docile labour of the Continent and United States" (p. 363). Nor do Dr. Ure's statements regarding the high wages paid in cotton-mills, which he places at three times the agricultural wages, tally with the statistics given ...
— The Evolution of Modern Capitalism - A Study of Machine Production • John Atkinson Hobson
... discourse, and in continual contention for the superiority of understanding, and brought forth critics, pedants, or pretty good poets. As it is, I expect an offspring fit for the habitation of the city, town or country; creatures that are docile and tractable in whatever ...
— Isaac Bickerstaff • Richard Steele
... They gave him the opportunity of bending a sympathetic glance upon me and saying, "How graphic your countrymen are, Miss Wick." Cologne was only three days off, but Mr. Mafferton never departed from the proprieties in his form of address. He was in that respect quite the most docile and respectful person I have ever found it necessary to keep ...
— A Voyage of Consolation - (being in the nature of a sequel to the experiences of 'An - American girl in London') • Sara Jeannette Duncan
... thou art versed in the science of horses and art also skillful (in guiding them). Do thou speedily yoke those that thou thinkest to be able." Thereupon the skillful Nala yoked upon the car four excellent steeds of good breed that were, besides, docile and fleet. And after the steeds had been yoked, the king without loss of time mounted upon the car, when those best of horses fell down upon the ground on their knees. Then, O king, that foremost of men, the ...
— Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa Bk. 3 Pt. 1 • Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa
... this time of our great need?' Well, I reply, 'I told you something when speaking was of use; all I can say now is this, or nearly all, that a hundred years of crime against the negro in America, and a hundred years of crime against the docile natives of our Indian empire, are not to be washed away by the penitence and the suffering of ...
— Speeches on Questions of Public Policy, Volume 1 • John Bright
... form of a pedestal, on which they support themselves when lying down—they have 4 joints in their hind legs, and will travel 12 or 14 days without drinking, and carry a burthen of 1500 wt.—they are remarkably harmless and docile, and will lie down ...
— The Olden Time Series, Vol. 4: Quaint and Curious Advertisements • Henry M. Brooks
... of his name, the docile canine expressed gratitude and pleasure, and then sank exhausted at his new ...
— 1001 Questions and Answers on Orthography and Reading • B. A. Hathaway
... Islander is described as "a youth of good parts, and of a docile, gentle, and humane disposition," and as one who would have been—physically at least—a better specimen of the people than Omai. It is to be feared that he returned to his home, after his lengthened cruise with his English patrons, without ...
— Captain Cook - His Life, Voyages, and Discoveries • W.H.G. Kingston
... Thomas had spied adorable little Lucy separated from her mates by chance for a few minutes, picking wild flowers, and had seized her in forcible but loving arms and carried her home. Had Lucy not been such a silent, docile child, it could never have happened; but she was a mere little limp thing in the grasp of the over-loving, deprived mother who thought she had gotten back her ...
— The Copy-Cat and Other Stories • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... I had a great deal of conversation with Dona Mariana concerning the sugar-work, the cultivation of the cane, and the slaves, confirming what I had learnt at Affonsos. She also tells me, as I had heard before, that the Creole negroes are less docile and less active than the new negroes. I think both facts may be accounted for without having recourse to the influence of climate. The new negro has the education of the slave-ship and the market, the lash being administered to drill him; so ...
— Journal of a Voyage to Brazil - And Residence There During Part of the Years 1821, 1822, 1823 • Maria Graham
... presented them to Lady Gipps. Of those taken by Lieutenant Emery, he was so fortunate as to bring one alive to England, in 1841. It is still in his possession, and thrives remarkably well. In one of his last letters he writes to me as follows on the subject: "The Abrolhos lizard is very docile, and knows Mrs. Emery quite well, and will eat and drink out of her hand; but is timid with strangers. Its habits are rather torpid, but it becomes active when in the sun or before the fire. It eats so very little that a piece of sponge cake about the size ...
— Discoveries in Australia, Volume 2 • John Lort Stokes
... Mrs. Hamley through this attack; and for a day or two the squire's alarm and gratitude made him docile in Mr. Gibson's hands. Then he returned to the idea of its being a crisis through which his wife had passed; and that she was now on the way to recovery. But the day after the consultation with Dr Nicholls, Mr. ...
— Wives and Daughters • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... grieve to say that early in the new year, my master, who had of late seemed docile and obedient to the orders of the worshipful the Stationers' Company, fell once more into his evil practices of secret printing. I know not how or why it was, but more than once he was absent visiting the minister at Kingston; and once, that same ...
— Sir Ludar - A Story of the Days of the Great Queen Bess • Talbot Baines Reed
... Archie, who is very docile, withdrew. A guilty silence reigned for some moments. Then Dolly opened her eyes. "It was the suit," she said, with a shudder. "Oh, how it all ...
— Dolly Dialogues • Anthony Hope
... her not to go out alone after berries where these long-footed beasts now fed regularly. Sometimes we went there together, with our vessels of bark, and filled them slowly, as she hobbled along. Our little dog was now always with us, having become far more tamed and docile with us than is ever the case of an Indian dog in savagery. One day we wandered in a dense berry thicket, out of which rose here and there chokecherry trees, and we began to gather some of these sour ...
— The Way of a Man • Emerson Hough
... off to London town; Margery went to village school; Apt she was, and quick to learn, Docile to the simplest rule. ...
— On the Tree Top • Clara Doty Bates
... of the docile girl whom the ambitious princess had fully expected to use as a tool for her designs. Schooled by her skilled adviser, and perhaps sanctioned by Philip, who may have wished to get rid of his old favorite, Elizabeth at the start showed a grasp of the situation which she ...
— Historical Tales - The Romance of Reality - Volume VII • Charles Morris
... my sister," said Marguerite. "She is so docile and courageous that she does not need this discussion to make her resigned to our life of toil and privation; but it is best that she should see for herself how necessary ...
— The Alkahest • Honore de Balzac
... to feel and see. I have been saturated with English life all this time; it would be madness to lose, by a clumsy change of place, these imperishable sensations.' So he gathers together his luggage, and goes home again, resolving never to abandon the 'docile phantasmagoria of the brain' for the mere realities of the actual world. But his nervous malady, one of whose symptoms had driven him forth and brought him back so spasmodically, is on the increase. He is seized by hallucinations, haunted by sounds: the ...
— Figures of Several Centuries • Arthur Symons
... up-and-down, became a real "range-bred girl" with a real Stetson hat of her own, a green corduroy riding skirt, gray flannel shirt, brilliant neckerchief, boots and spurs. A third picture gave her further practice in riding a real horse,—albeit an extremely docile animal called Mouse with good reason. She became known on the lot as a real cattle-king's daughter, though she did not know the name of her father's brand and in all her life had seen no herd larger than the thirty head of tame cattle which were chased ...
— The Quirt • B.M. Bower
... his scanty prophecies of what science might effect he showed curiously little resource. The truth is that this had not much interest for him, and he did not see that scientific discoveries might transmute social conditions. The world of 2440, its intolerably docile and virtuous society, reflects two capital weaknesses in the speculation of the Encyclopaedist period: a failure to allow for the strength of human passions and interests, and a deficient appreciation of the meaning of liberty. Much as the reformers acclaimed and fought for toleration, they ...
— The Idea of Progress - An Inquiry Into Its Origin And Growth • J. B. Bury
... intimacy between them, so little of that camaraderie generally so noticeable between dwellers in the wilderness. Sometimes she fancied she caught a mocking light in Guy's eyes when they looked at Burke. He was always perfectly docile under his management, but was he always genuine? She could not tell. His recovery amazed her. He seemed to possess an almost boundless store of vitality. He cast his weakness from him with careless jesting, laughing down all her fears. ...
— The Top of the World • Ethel M. Dell
... the work of his pupils, and know that in their hands the marble—Pheidias himself worked mostly in gold and ivory—had become docile and obedient, to flow into whatever forms they designed for it. We know what strength, what beauty, what tremendous energy, are in those Elgin marbles. All the figures are real, but idealized: beautiful men and horses, ...
— The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris
... literal exactness; thus, in connection with a well-known passage in the sacred text, the Creator was shown as a tailor, seated, needle in hand, diligently sewing together skins of beasts into coats for Adam and Eve. Such representations presented no difficulties to the docile minds of the Middle Ages and the Reformation period; and in the same spirit, when the discovery of fossils began to provoke thought, these were declared to be "models of his works approved or rejected ...
— History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom • Andrew Dickson White
... what was passing in their departments, knew, that facts had been misrepresented. They persuaded themselves, that the melancholy picture of the situation of France, presented to them by M. Fouche, had been drawn up by order of the Emperor, with the view to alarm them, and render them more docile ...
— Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. II • Pierre Antoine Edouard Fleury de Chaboulon
... invading forces were huge, spherical shells equipped with short-range drives—and with nothing else. No accommodations, no facilities, no food, no water, not even any air. Each transport, when filled to the bursting-point with as-yet-docile cargo, darted away; swinging around to approach Clamer from some previously-assigned direction. It did not, however, approach the planet's surface. At about two thousand miles out, great ports opened and the load was dumped out into space, to fall the rest of ...
— The Galaxy Primes • Edward Elmer Smith
... The docile Backfisch says Jawohl, liebe Tante, and feels that this business of becoming civilised is full of pitfalls and surprises. Never in her life has she eaten poultry without the assistance of her fingers. When she gets to the dinner-party she is fortunate enough to sit next to her bosom ...
— Home Life in Germany • Mrs. Alfred Sidgwick
... proved to be a docile suburban thoroughfare, lined with comfortable villas and double houses, each standing a little back from the street with a small garden in front. A primrose-coloured afterglow lingered in the sky, and the gas lights along ...
— Kathleen • Christopher Morley
... that which pertains to a human virtue is in our power, since it is for things that are in our power that we are praised or blamed. Now it is not in our power to be docile, for this is befitting to some through their natural disposition. Therefore it is ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... gracefully to the company, seated themselves on the hearth rug, side by side. Mr. Leonard spoke to his dogs in French, in his usual low tone, and ordered one of them to walk, the other to lie down, to run, to gallop, to halt, to crouch, all of which they did as promptly and correctly as the most docile children. ...
— Minnie's Pet Dog • Madeline Leslie
... washing his thoroughbred mare in the bed of the ravine. She stood, without halter or tie-rope, as docile as a dog while he laved her fine limbs with a dampened cloth. His saddle lay about ten or fifteen yards away with his pistols in the holsters beside the horn. Four or five bandits were cooking their breakfast over the fire; and Three-Fingered Jack lay at a little distance, ...
— When the West Was Young • Frederick R. Bechdolt
... herds of elephants were now getting afraid of him, although could they only have made up their gentle, docile minds to attack him he would have come to his end ...
— Rataplan • Ellen Velvin
... not only serve as food, but work in the mines, hatcheries, and plantations, and do all kinds of work for the Nevians. Those so-called 'lesser deeps' were conquered first, of course, and all their races of fish are docile enough now. But the deep-sea breeds, who live in water so deep that the Nevians can hardly stand the pressure down there, were more intelligent to start with, and more stubborn besides. But the most valuable metals here are deep down—this planet ...
— Triplanetary • Edward Elmer Smith
... to push it into a chair, when, feeling my touch, it caught me, clasped me around the neck, and would have crushed me to death instantly had I not slipped from its powerful grasp. Thus I always had to be on my guard. I have provided the screw stopper with a spring catch, and ... usually docile when not hungry; slow and heavy in its movements, which are, of course, purely unconscious; any apparent excitement in movement being due to local irregularities in the blood-supply of the cerebellum, which, if I did not have it enclosed in a silver case that ...
— The Ape, the Idiot & Other People • W. C. Morrow
... small hand, I asked him a few questions about his studies. I found him intelligent, but grave beyond his years; very docile and obedient, and ere the end of the day we ...
— Strange Visitors • Henry J. Horn
... two parties is in harmony with her mother. And so far had Mrs. Gibson's thoughts wandered into futurity. She only wished that the happy chance had fallen to Cynthia's instead of to Molly's lot. But Molly was a docile, sweet creature, very pretty, and remarkably intelligent, as my lord had said. It was a pity that Cynthia preferred making millinery to reading; but perhaps that could be rectified. And there was Lord Cumnor coming to speak to ...
— Wives and Daughters • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... surround the village, sometimes extending for miles in different directions; but often they are simply small clearings scattered through the jungle. The cattle are always driven by the children of the village, and it is curious to see how docile these huge buffaloes are under the control of some diminutive native, while with Europeans they are obstinate, ungovernable, and ...
— Burma - Peeps at Many Lands • R.Talbot Kelly
... possible or the contrary till I had seen the girl. I myself should be very capable of falling desperately in love with a girl who hadn't an idea in her head, and didn't know her letters. All I should ask would be passion in return, and—well, yes, a pliant and docile character." ...
— The Unclassed • George Gissing
... pleadings which are assisted by these topics, but the same are useful in the separate parts of an orator; being partly peculiar and partly general. As in the opening of a speech, in which the orator must employ peculiar topics in order to render his hearers well disposed to him, and docile, and attentive. And also he must attend to his relations of facts, so that they may have a bearing on his object, that is to say, that they may be plain, and brief, and intelligible, and credible, and respectable, and dignified: for ...
— The Orations of Marcus Tullius Cicero, Volume 4 • Cicero
... worry if it takes a little time to win all the dogs over to your authority. Dogs are like children when they change masters. They will try to play it on you at first. Just be firm with them and soon you will have them tagging at your heels, docile as lambs." ...
— Walter and the Wireless • Sara Ware Bassett
... place, should a few isolated groups undertake to overthrow it, they are not in a condition to keep up the struggle: it is too strong. They are, indeed, not yet organized while it is fully so, owing to the docile set of officials inherited from the government overthrown. Under monarchy or republic the government clerk comes to his office regularly every morning to dispatch the orders transmitted to him.[1250] Under monarchy or republic the ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 3 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 2 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... though a sort of devil indeed, might yet by inflexible firmness, only tempered by that common decency of human recognition which is the meanest slave's right; thus treated, this Steelkilt had long been retained harmless and docile. At all events, he had proved so thus far; but Radney was doomed and made mad, and Steelkilt—but, ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville
... the Emperor Charles V. with having lent himself, as a docile instrument, to the intolerant devices of the clergy. Charles was never the sincere friend of the court of Rome. On the contrary, no Christian monarch ever treated that court with greater contumely, or ...
— Roman Catholicism in Spain • Anonymous
... three despatch-riders who reported that heavy fighting had taken place—somewhere; the authorities declined to tell us where. The Boers remained docile all day; the heat was oppressive, but their silence was more generally attributed to a tardy realisation of their position. The military were unusually alert and watchful. The public graciously ...
— The Siege of Kimberley • T. Phelan
... hoarse command, the busy humming din. When at a word, the tops are manned on high: Hark to the boatswain's call, the cheering cry! While through the seaman's hand the tackle glides, Or school-boy midshipman, that, standing by, Strains his shrill pipe, as good or ill betides, And well the docile crew ...
— The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper
... present, To protect him from the wildness Of my nature, made of me A fierce brute, a human wild-beast; So that I, who from my birth, From the noble blood that trickles Through my veins, my generous nature, And my liberal condition, Might have proved a docile child, And so grew, it was sufficient By so strange an education, By so wild a course of living, To have made my manners wild;— What a method to refine them! If to any man 'twas said, "It is fated that some wild-beast will destroy you," would it be Wise ...
— Life Is A Dream • Pedro Calderon de la Barca
... many species of the parrot are found; and of these the King Parrot is the most beautiful, and that called the Lowrie is perhaps the most docile." ...
— A Dictionary of Austral English • Edward Morris
... that Miss Rebecca Chattesworth ruled supreme at Belmont. With a docile old general and a niece so young, she had less resistance to encounter than, perhaps, her ardent soul would have relished. Fortunately for the general it was only now and then that Aunt Becky took a whim to command the Royal Irish Artillery. She had other hobbies ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... with them. They were immune to all schemes of discipline. Like the MYSTERIOUS NOISES they could not be controlled, and by general consent they were abolished. In place of the noisy and obstreperous boy came the docile, soft-voiced girl. ...
— The History of the Telephone • Herbert N. Casson |
