"Embellish" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... able; and see what he is now: a gentleman, of course, but, to be frank, a very commonplace one: not what I had hoped of Dorothy's brother; not what I had dreamed of the heir of two families - Musgrave and Foster, child! Well, he may now meet Mr.Austin. He requires a Mr. Austin to embellish and correct his manners. (OPENING ANOTHER LETTER.) Why, Barbara, Mr. John Scrope and Miss Kate Dacre ...
— The Plays of W. E. Henley and R. L. Stevenson
... for fancy to convert the work-days into holidays, and the thick wilderness into the shining village, where the schoolhouse stood open all the week, and the sweet bells called them to church of a Sunday; easy work for that deceitful elf to make the chimney-corner snug and warm, and to embellish it with his mother in her easy-chair. When they parted that night, each young heart was trembling with the sweetest secret it had ever held; and it was perhaps a fortnight thereafter that the same secret took wing, and flew wildly ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 105, July 1866 • Various
... point, what little glimpse he obtains of a licentious amour is, as a court of justice will sometimes show him such a glimpse, simply to make intelligible the subsequent facts which depend upon it. Secondly, As to the conceit, that Catalina wished to embellish her memoirs, understand that no such practice then existed; certainly not in Spanish literature. Her memoirs are electrifying by their facts; else, in the manner of telling these facts, ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey
... and embellish the city of Mexico, which was again as well peopled by natives as ever it had been before the conquest. All of these were exempted from paying tribute to his majesty, till their houses were built, and till the causeways, bridges, public edifices, and ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. IV. • Robert Kerr
... backwoodsmen took in all 26 scalps, and one prisoner ("American Archives," 5th Series, I., 973). This is probably the origin of the "26 dead" story; the "over 40" being merely a flourish. Ramsey gives a story about Isaac Shelby rallying the whites to victory, and later writers of course follow and embellish this; but Shelby's MS. autobiography (see copy in Col. Durrett's library at Louisville) not only makes no mention of the battle, but states that Shelby was at this time in Kentucky; he came back in August or September, and so was hundreds of miles from the place when the battle ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume One - From the Alleghanies to the Mississippi, 1769-1776 • Theodore Roosevelt
... of rich spoil won by ruthless murder, and wild orgies on the shores of Grande Terre. But of all this there is little record, and the lives of these pirates yield us none of the scenes of picturesque wickedness and wholesale murder which embellish the stories of Blackbeard, Morgan, and other sea-rovers of old. Yet the career of the Lafittes has an historical interest which makes ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 2 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... self-sustained, and almost self-taught, he has conquered every obstacle, achieved his way to eminence, and, having become one of the ornaments of the nation, has turned the whole force of his talents and influence to advance and embellish ...
— The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. • Washington Irving
... "dog-hearted daughters." Sir Henry Holland once lost a bet of a guinea owing to his failure to find a dog kindly spoken of by Shakespeare. Milton for the most part sublimely passes them by, except to embellish his "portress at hell's gate" with a canine appendix. Goethe's aversion to them is well known. Old Dr. Watts is an authority on moral traits, and the best word he has for them is that "dogs delight to bark and bite, for 'tis ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, September, 1885 • Various
... and walls of ivory, and on the terraces may peacocks be as plentiful as sparrows are to the undeserving. May you live many centuries shining as you now shine; and at your setting may rivulets of ink dug by the pens of poets flow through meadows of paper in praise of the virtues that embellish you here on earth. Sing-tu-Che, a person of small note but devoted to your service, wishes these frivolous advantages to the Pearl of the West, ...
— It Is Never Too Late to Mend • Charles Reade
... Mr. S., Mrs. B., and I had a pleasant drive in Hyde Park, as I used to read of heroines of romance doing in the old novels. It is delightful to get into this fairyland of parks, so green and beautiful, which embellish the West End. ...
— Sunny Memories of Foreign Lands V2 • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... before, Greece had reached the summit of science and art. No country, in ancient or modern times, has surpassed the acumen of her philosophical writers and the aesthetic perfection of her poets and artists. Rome made use of her to embellish her cities, and inherited her taste for science and ...
— Irish Race in the Past and the Present • Aug. J. Thebaud
... much in common, was a doctor—had been to adopt the medical profession. Curiously enough, my brother also had a taste for caricaturing, and, like the illustrious John Leech in his medical student days, he was wont to embellish his notes in the hospital lecture-room with pictorial jeux d'esprit of a livelier cast than those for which scope is usually afforded by the discourses of the learned ...
— The Confessions of a Caricaturist, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Harry Furniss
... when they became known by the name of "the inseparables." The talents of the friends were different, but their studios were the same. Their days melted away together in drawing from the ancient statues and the basso-relievos, in studying in the galleries of paintings, or among the villas which embellish the environs of Rome. One roof sheltered them, and one table supplied their sober meal. Light were the slumbers which closed each day, each the pleasing image of the former. But this remarkable friendship was not a simple sentiment which limited ...
— Literary Character of Men of Genius - Drawn from Their Own Feelings and Confessions • Isaac D'Israeli
... manifested its beneficent consequences in respect to civilization here, as every where, was the introduction of Christianity, towards the end of the tenth century. Vladimir the Great, the first Christian monarch, founded the first schools; Greek artists were called from Constantinople to embellish the newly erected churches at Kief; and poetry found a patron and at the same time her hero in Vladimir. Vladimir and his knights are the Russian Charlemagne and his peers, king Arthur and his Round table. Their deeds and exploits have proved a rich source for the ...
— Historical View of the Languages and Literature of the Slavic - Nations • Therese Albertine Louise von Jacob Robinson
... I extend my thanks to the distinguished ladies who have had the kindness to honor and embellish our tables with their presence; and permit me to invite you to drink with them and with me, hoping that the national harmonizing of individual rights and just liberties, which is called the United States of America, may be perpetuated in its increasing moral and material ...
— Latin America and the United States - Addresses by Elihu Root • Elihu Root
... the city mouse, "I'll show What kind of fare I've brought you to:" On which he led the rustic mice Into a larder, snug and nice, Where ev'ry thing a mouse could relish, Did ev'ry shelf and nook embellish. ...
— Aesop, in Rhyme - Old Friends in a New Dress • Marmaduke Park
... of Salerno was founded and dedicated to St. Matthew in 1084 by Robert Guiscard, who plundered the temples of Paestum of their marbles and sculptures to embellish it. ...
— The Brochure Series of Architectural Illustration - Vol 1, No. 9 1895 • Various
... common council of Newcastle ordered a sweet stop to be added to the organ. This was after Avison became organist, his appointment to that post having been in 1736. So we know that he at least had a "trumpet stop" and a "sweet stop," with which to embellish ...
— Browning's England - A Study in English Influences in Browning • Helen Archibald Clarke
... fait gentille." She possessed also, considerable dramatic skill and tact, and would, I think, have proved a delightful acquisition to the stage, from the skill she displayed in those little playful scenes, with which the French delight to embellish life. ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, Issue 266, July 28, 1827 • Various
... home, and which can preserve them from the miseries of dissipation. Every sedentary occupation must be valuable to those who are to lead sedentary lives; and every art, however trifling in itself, which tends to enliven and embellish domestic life, must be advantageous, not only to the female sex, but to society in general. As far as accomplishments can contribute to all or any of these excellent purposes, they must be just objects of ...
— Practical Education, Volume II • Maria Edgeworth
... injuries, pondering the means of a retaliation; there were no hours of manumission in the inn; the reed was still. And yet, to do him justice, there was even then the frank and suave exterior; no boorish awkward silence in his ancient gossips made him lose his jocularity; he continued to embellish his conversation with morals based on universal kindness ...
— Doom Castle • Neil Munro
... some public buildings in the name of others; for instance, his grandsons, his wife, and sister. Thus he built the portico and basilica of Lucius and Caius, and the porticos of Livia and Octavia [155], and the theatre of Marcellus [156]. He also often exhorted other persons of rank to embellish the city by new buildings, or repairing and improving the old, according to their means. In consequence of this recommendation, many were raised; such as the temple of Hercules and the Muses, by Marcius Philippus; a temple of Diana by Lucius Cornificius; the Court of Freedom ...
— The Lives Of The Twelve Caesars, Complete - To Which Are Added, His Lives Of The Grammarians, Rhetoricians, And Poets • C. Suetonius Tranquillus
... open all the streams of eloquence. If we have executed all other parts to advantage, here we take possession of the minds of the judges, and having escaped all rocks, may expand all our sails for a favorable gale; and as amplification makes a great part of the peroration, we then may raise and embellish our style with the choicest expressions and brightest thoughts. And, indeed, the conclusion of a speech should bear some resemblance to that of tragedy and comedy, wherein the actor courts the spectator's applause. In other ...
— The Training of a Public Speaker • Grenville Kleiser
... painter or engraver. Had his natural talents, which were strong and elastic, been cultivated in early life, he would, in all probability, have attained a considerable reputation. How he loved to embellish—almost to satiety—a favourite work, may be seen by consulting a subsequent page towards the end of this volume. He planned and published the Physiognomical Portraits, a performance not divested of interest—but failing in general success, from the prints being, in many instances, a repetition ...
— Bibliomania; or Book-Madness - A Bibliographical Romance • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... whole,—you have in this Character of Falstaff, not only a free Course of Humour, supported and embellish'd with admirable Wit; but this Humour is of a Species the most jovial and gay in all Nature.—Sir Jobn Falstaff possesses Generosity, Chearfulness, Alacrity, Invention, Frolic and Fancy superior ...
— An Essay towards Fixing the True Standards of Wit, Humour, Railery, Satire, and Ridicule (1744) • Corbyn Morris
... African prejudices. However well built the new Carthage might be, it could not pretend to compare with a city more than a thousand years old, which at all periods of its history had maintained the princely taste for building, and which a long line of emperors had never ceased to embellish. ...
— Saint Augustin • Louis Bertrand
... any means of such a nature as to suggest deliberate fabrication. An annalist who was also a courtier, applying himself to construct the story of his sovereign's ancestors, would naturally be disposed to embellish his pages with narratives of great exploits and brilliant achievements. Neither the Records nor the Chronicles can be said to display such a propensity in any marked degree. The Chronicles do, indeed, ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... expressions or words that follow are totally independent of the answer, and are only adapted to embellish or mystify the question as far as the audience is concerned. ...
— The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume II (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz
... contrary, words exact and truthful in themselves seem always too thrilling, too great for the subject; seem to embellish it unduly. I feel as if I were acting, for my own benefit, some wretchedly trivial and third-rate comedy; and whenever I try to consider my home in a serious spirit, the scoffing figure of M. Kangourou rises up before me, the matrimonial agent, to whom I ...
— Madame Chrysantheme • Pierre Loti
... more or less correspondence with your customers. By all means use your own letterheads, but do not let your printer embellish them with cuts of roosters, chickens, pigs, or the like. Not that we are ashamed of them; far be it from such. You do not, however, need to have a sheet of paper littered up with pictures of imaginary animals in order to convince your customer that ...
— How To Write Special Feature Articles • Willard Grosvenor Bleyer
... guillotine was erected upon the vacant spot between the gardens of the Tuileries and the Elysian Fields, then known as the Place de la Revolution. This spot is now called the Place de la Concorde. It is unsurpassed by any other place in Europe. Two marble fountains now embellish the spot. The blood-stained guillotine, from which crimson rivulets were ever flowing, then occupied the space upon which one of these fountains has been erected; and a clay statue to Liberty reared its hypocritical front where the ...
— Madame Roland, Makers of History • John S. C. Abbott
... pacification of his country by effecting a general disarmament, and he ordered that all weapons should be sent in to his capital at Hienyang. This "skillful disarming of the provinces added daily to the wealth and prosperity of the capital," which he proceeded to embellish. He built one palace within the walls, and the Hall of Audience was ornamented with twelve statues, each of which weighed twelve thousand pounds. But his principal residence named the Palace of Delight, was without the walls, and there he laid ...
— China • Demetrius Charles Boulger
... possessed of telling a plain story. It is no easy thing to tell a story plainly and distinctly by mouth; but to tell one on paper is difficult indeed, so many snares lie in the way. People are afraid to put down what is common on paper, they seek to embellish their narratives, as they think, by philosophic speculations and reflections; they are anxious to shine, and people who are anxious to shine can never tell a plain story. 'So I went with them to a music booth, where they ...
— The Life of George Borrow • Herbert Jenkins
... inhabitants of Eden. Yet many of these show that they study personal appearance quite as much as the most fashionable of Parisian belles; for they bestow much labour, time, and thought, and endure much actual suffering in the elaborate patterns with which they tattoo, and, as they vainly suppose, embellish their faces and persons. The ancient Britons, who painted themselves in various devices, also bore witness to the natural craving after personal adornment, which seems to be inherent in the whole ...
— Routledge's Manual of Etiquette • George Routledge
... hours and days in which Burns, even when the rain fell on his unhoused sheaves, did not wholly despair of himself: he laboured, nay sometimes he slaved on his farm; and at intervals of toil, sought to embellish his mind with such knowledge as might be useful, should chance, the goddess who ruled his lot, drop him upon some of the higher places of the land. He had, while he lived at Tarbolton, united with some half-dozen young men, all sons ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... literary ideas and methods which produced them are illustrated by the Sutralankara of Asvaghosha, a collection of edifying tales, many of which use the materials supplied by the Pali Nikayas and Vinaya but present them in a more effective and artistic form. It was thought a pious task to amplify and embellish the simple narratives handed down ...
— Hinduism And Buddhism, Volume II. (of 3) - An Historical Sketch • Charles Eliot
... go. We become thus, in some sense, a centre of beauty; we are provocative of beauty, much as a gentle and sincere character is provocative of sincerity and gentleness in others. And even where there is no harmony to be elicited by the quickest and most obedient of spirits, we may still embellish a place with some attraction of romance. We may learn to go far afield for associations, and handle them lightly when we have found them. Sometimes an old print comes to our aid; I have seen many a spot lit up at once with picturesque imaginations, by a reminiscence ...
— Essays of Travel • Robert Louis Stevenson
... romantic idea of our merits, and built such expectations of felicity upon our friendship, as we were sure that nothing human could possibly answer, I wrote to remind her that we were mortal, to recommend her not to think more highly of us than the subject would warrant, and intimating that when we embellish a creature with colours taken from our own fancy, and so adorned, admire and praise it beyond its real merits, we make it an idol, and have nothing to expect in the end but that it will deceive our hopes, and that ...
— Cowper • Goldwin Smith
... extremities of these sticks, and fix them so as to obtain a vault. All the prominences in the materials employed are turned towards the outside, so that the interior of the room may be smooth and the birds may not catch their plumage in it. This done, the little architects, to embellish their retreat, transport to it a number of conspicuous objects, such as very white stones from a neighbouring stream, shells, the bright feathers of the parroquet, whatever comes to their beak. All these treasures are arranged on the earth, before the two entries to the ...
— The Industries of Animals • Frederic Houssay
... and if the Arabian Princess had recourse to genii, talismans, and monsters, to adorn her narratives, neither was Mrs. Dymock without her marvellous apparatus; for she had her ghosts, her good people, her dwarfs, and dreadful visions of second sight, wherewith to embellish her histories. There was a piety too, a reference in all she said to the pleasure and will of a reconciled God, which added great charms to her narratives, and rendered them peculiarly interesting to the little girl. Whilst ...
— Shanty the Blacksmith; A Tale of Other Times • Mrs. Sherwood [AKA: Mrs. Mary Martha Sherwood]
... correct or embellish it. So many books, trimmed up nicely and well-padded, go to their graves every year to be forgotten forever, that it has hardly seemed worth while to bedeck this one. I am not a believer in maquillage ...
— Youth and Egolatry • Pio Baroja
... am highly honoured. Ba-ath is favoured. Mrs. Dowler, you embellish the rooms. I congratulate ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... as yourself; for you are one that can be bought by the first-comer; and now you would cast a slur on her chastity. For shame! for shame! This is one of those rare women that adorn our whole sex, and embellish human nature; and, so long as you have the privilege of exchanging words with her, I shall stand here on the watch, to see that you treat her with due respect: ay, sir, with reverence; for I have measured ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 109, November, 1866 • Various
... and God had forgotten his own. The number of cases reported is very large, and the method in which the author has done his work is commendable. There is no rhetorical ambition. The narratives are embodied in plain language. The facts are left to make their own impression, without an attempt to embellish them by the aid of imagination. ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still
... in safety; another represented the zodiac, with spaces for each planet, according to the number of houses or mansions assigned by astrologers. The ingenuity did not end here: chess was made to illustrate dreams, and to embellish many amusing games and recreations. Odes and poems were written upon it, and the poets at times exhibited their skill in a play upon ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 429 - Volume 17, New Series, March 20, 1852 • Various
... lying is caused by their esthetic feelings. It is much easier for them to describe a situation as they feel it should have been than to describe it as it actually was. Many children "embellish the facts" without any trace of intent to deceive. Although we recognize that what they say is not strictly the truth, we must further recognize that it is their love of the beautiful or their ...
— Your Child: Today and Tomorrow • Sidonie Matzner Gruenberg
... skill. The lofty stature, the ample and resonant voice, the copious animal excitement, the fluent elocution and the vigorous, picturesque, and often melodramatic movements, gestures, and poses of Salvini united to animate and embellish a personality such as would naturally absorb attention and diffuse excitement. Every artist, however, moves within certain specific and positive limitations—spiritual, mental, and physical. No ...
— Shadows of the Stage • William Winter
... planet—the life of feeling and thought; whence it follows perhaps that all that inclines to weaken the ardour of feeling and thought is, in its essence, immoral. Our task let it be then to foster this ardour, to enhance and embellish it; let us constantly strive to acquire deeper faith in the greatness of man, in his strength and his destiny; or, we might equally say, in his bitterness, weakness, and wretchedness; for to be loftily wretched is no less soul-quickening than it is ...
— Wisdom and Destiny • Maurice Maeterlinck
... sharp flash in his eyes: "That patrician viper! Every where in everything—she spoils it all! But wait a while! I fancy she will soon be removed from our path, and then. . . . No, even now, at the present time, I will not allow that we should be deprived of what would embellish life, of doing a thing which may turn the scale in my favor in the day of judgment. The wishes of a dying man are sacred: So our fathers held it; and they were right. The old man's will must be done! Yes, yes, yes. It is settled. As soon as that hindrance is removed, we will keep house with ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... of all that is bizarre and outside the conventions and humdrum routine of everyday life. You have shown your relish for it by the enthusiasm which has prompted you to chronicle, and, if you will excuse my saying so, somewhat to embellish so many of ...
— Short Stories of Various Types • Various
... in which his lungs had full play, and stalwart limbs which never failed him even in the most difficult mountain ascents. His dark-blue jacket, fitting tightly at the waist, was adorned on the shoulders with epaulets, and in the back with designs in colored embroidery similar to those that embellish the vests of the Breton peasantry. His yellow breeches were fastened at the knee by large buckles. Upon his head he wore a broad-brimmed brown hat with a red-and-black band, and his legs were usually incased either in coarse cloth gaiters or in ...
— Ticket No. "9672" • Jules Verne
... that such linguistic phenomena are often observed in the case of children and uneducated people. Not long ago the writer was urged by a gardener to embellish his garden with a ruskit arch. When metathesis extends beyond one word we have what is known as a Spoonerism, the original type of which ...
— The Romance of Words (4th ed.) • Ernest Weekley
... Noah, his building the Ark, his embarking himself and all Nature's Stock for a new World on board it; the long Voyage they took, and the bad Weather they met with, tho' it would embellish this Work very well, and come in very much to the Purpose in this Place, yet as it does not belong to the Devil's Story, for I cannot prove what some suggest (viz.) that he was in the Ark among the Rest, I say, for that Reason ...
— The History of the Devil - As Well Ancient as Modern: In Two Parts • Daniel Defoe
... cabin-boy, were going to set off to the nearest sea-port; and the evening preceding their departure, they were to meet their rescuers, the fishermen, at a supper in the great servants' hall at the park. Edward and Robert were in great glory, bringing in huge branches of evergreens to embellish the clean, cold place; and Mr. and Mrs. Ashford and Grace were to come to see the entertainment, after having some coffee in ...
— The Heir of Redclyffe • Charlotte M. Yonge
... garden cross the ancient walls of the city, and underneath the boulevards afford a promenade almost as pleasant. It must be admitted that much more pains are taken in France to embellish provincial towns with shady walks and promenades than in England. The tiniest little town in Seine et Marne has its promenades, that is to say, an open green space and avenues with benches for the convenience ...
— Holidays in Eastern France • Matilda Betham-Edwards
... they represented in "John Bull."—But to the author of "John Bull," whose genius may be animated to still higher exertions in the pursuit of fame, it may be said—Leave the distortion of language to men who cannot embellish it like ...
— John Bull - The Englishman's Fireside: A Comedy, in Five Acts • George Colman
... intelligent eyes, who had sat by the side of Leonard in his garret. She was about the middle height, still slight but beautifully formed; that exquisite roundness of proportion, which conveys so well the idea of woman, in its undulating pliant grace—formed to embellish life, and soften away its rude angles—formed to embellish, not to protect. Her face might not have satisfied the critical eye of an artist—it was not without defects in regularity; but its expression was eminently gentle and prepossessing; ...
— The International Monthly Magazine - Volume V - No II • Various
... will ever keep her memory fresh. "In these 'gems of purest ray serene,' the peculiar genius of Mrs. Hemans breathes, and burns, and shines pre-eminent; for her forte lay in depicting whatever tends to beautify and embellish domestic life, the gentle overflowings of love and friendship, home-bred delights and heartfelt happiness, the associations of local attachment, and the influences of religious feelings over the soul, whether arising from the varied circumstances and situations of man, ...
— Excellent Women • Various
... who, himself deeply religious, would have all men free to worship God by the light of their own conscience; and to my wife, that dearer half of my soul, I would allow perfect freedom. I suffer from the lack of poetic phrases with which to embellish the plain reality of my love; but be sure, Angela, that you may travel far through the world, and receive many a flowery compliment to your beauty, yet meet none who will love you as faithfully as I have loved you for this year last past, and as I doubt I shall love you—happy or unfortunate ...
— London Pride - Or When the World Was Younger • M. E. Braddon
... compass vast, or in area limited, we have an endless variety, and, with a pouring out of God's harmonies in the creation, without a parallel, inviting every intelligent mind to study their features and character, in adapting them to his own uses, and, in so doing, to even embellish—if such a thing be possible—such exquisite objects with his own most ingenious handiwork. Indeed, it is a profanation to do otherwise; and when so to improve them requires no extraordinary application of skill, or any extravagant outlay in expense, ...
— Rural Architecture - Being a Complete Description of Farm Houses, Cottages, and Out Buildings • Lewis Falley Allen
... were to wash themselves, and to whom each of the non-chosen should furnish the least damaged articles of his own clothing, so as to put them in proper condition to go to the ball and keep up the honour of our flag before the belles of Orotava. We retired into a wood to proceed to draw lots and embellish the elect Fate did not favour me. I did not go to the ball, but my boots did, and our comrades came back full of admiration of all they ...
— Memoirs • Prince De Joinville
... was not to be realized, for greater triumphs still than those she had enjoyed in Italy awaited Bonaparte in Paris. The days of quietude, and the pleasures of home, which Josephine so much loved, and which she so well understood how to embellish with friendships and joys, were now forever past away. Placed at the side of a hero whose fame already filled all Europe, she could no longer calculate upon living in modest retirement, as she would have wished to do: it was her lot to share his burden of glory, ...
— The Empress Josephine • Louise Muhlbach
... are far from having exhausted the significance of the few symbols we use," also (2, b), above; "He could embellish the characters with new traits without violating probability;" "He could not help holding ...
— An English Grammar • W. M. Baskervill and J. W. Sewell
... a famous history; they have caught the fancy of poets and literary men who have sought in various ways to reproduce and embellish them. Among English-speaking peoples the poem of Tennyson on this subject is a prime favorite. But in Homer the Lotus-eaters are not an isolated fact, they are a link in the chain of a grand development; this inner connecting thought is the ...
— Homer's Odyssey - A Commentary • Denton J. Snider
... the governor was short, but decisive. The gaoler stated the case against him, adding to the facts here and there to embellish his story; and in a very short space of time he found himself manacled with heavy chains, which fastened him down to the floor of the damp cell into which he ...
— Heiress of Haddon • William E. Doubleday
... men to debase himself and drag out a miserable existence in obscurity—never! Shall I, forsooth, suspend the erection of the votive church which I began at the seat of my ancestors twelve years ago? Or shall I, discarding the masterpieces of a Thorwaldsen, embellish the sacred edifice with the rude productions of a stone-cutter? Would you have me say to the woman I adore, 'My dear, hitherto we have lived in two palaces; henceforth we must be content with one'? But most impossible of all would it be to confess my pecuniary embarrassments to my banker and ...
— Manasseh - A Romance of Transylvania • Maurus Jokai
... of Architecture, which is taken from the Inventers of the several Orders, and those that added the Ornaments to embellish them. For it's the common Opinion, that the first Fabrick that was made, according to any of the Orders, was the Temple that King Dorus built in Honour of Juno in the City Argos. And it obtained ...
— An Abridgment of the Architecture of Vitruvius - Containing a System of the Whole Works of that Author • Vitruvius
... one slight difference between Me and my epic brethren gone before, And here the advantage is my own, I ween (Not that I have not several merits more, But this will more peculiarly be seen); They so embellish, that 't is quite a bore Their labyrinth of fables to thread through, Whereas ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron
... specifications for "One Thousand and One Afternoons." The title, I believe, came later, along with details like the salary. Hang the salary! I doubt if Ben even heard the figure that was named. He merely said "Uh-huh!" and proceeded to embellish his dream—his dream of a department more brilliant, more artistic, truer (I think he said truer), broader and better than anything in the American press; a literary thriller, a knock-out ... ...
— A Thousand and One Afternoons in Chicago • Ben Hecht
... Farewell!—be it ours to embellish thy pillow With everything beauteous that grows in the deep; Each flower of the rock and each gem of the billow Shall sweeten thy bed and illumine ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 3 - Sorrow and Consolation • Various
... glace silk from Paris."—"Madame," said he, bowing, "I hope Paris may send me aught so good, or that I shall grace half so well." I smiled, "You shall not be single in your hopes, M. le Comte. The gift would be base that you did not embellish." He lifted his hands, French-fashion: "Madame, it is that I have received the gift."—"Indeed! M. le Comte."—"Even now from the Count de Saldar, your husband." I looked most innocently, "From ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... knew him, and even my partiality, heightened by my regret, cannot much exaggerate his merits. He was a brave officer, and an intelligent gentleman. His mind was practical, prompt, and energetic; and he united to the qualities of a strict disciplinarian, all the kind feelings that embellish the character of social benevolence. Peace to his ashes, and honour ...
— A Voyage Round the World, Vol. I (of ?) • James Holman
... did not embellish the proposal with that accessory; but there's another detail which may put you on the track of her. Madame de Godollo exhorted me, if I wished to push the matter, to go and see ...
— The Lesser Bourgeoisie • Honore de Balzac
... rich or the poor, whether his burying-place were an obscure or an illustrious spot: he was anxious for the salvation of his soul. Unhappily, mankind in general lavish all their cares upon the body, to embellish or preserve it, to pamper its appetites, or to minister to its artificial necessities: but what an infatuation is it, to provide for that which perishes, and to be careless of that which is immortal—to decorate the walls, ...
— Female Scripture Biographies, Vol. I • Francis Augustus Cox
... little knots of men too in the road beyond—evidently expecting something. Even this is in keeping with the poet's grave, which should not be sombre and melancholy, like other graves; and what could better embellish and enliven its aspect than young, blushing life clustering around it? We linger awhile among the boisterous children playing on the churchyard wall, and then we hear a confused sound of voices and music in ...
— A Tramp's Wallet - stored by an English goldsmith during his wanderings in Germany and France • William Duthie
... Franklin!" interrupted Caroline, mischievously, "you are steering right upon the rocks; and a gentleman who refuses all decoration to a lady's toilette, should not embellish his ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 1 January 1848 • Various
... and his pages before him laid neatly on a piece of plate glass. He wrote with a fine-pointed pen, and had by him several different colored inks, with which he would illuminate his capitals and embellish his manuscript. The first thing he did was his "Sharps and Flats" column, which occupied three or four hours, the task being usually finished by one o'clock. His other work he did in the afternoons and evenings, writing at odd hours, sometimes in the garden if the weather was pleasant. He was ...
— McClure's Magazine, January, 1896, Vol. VI. No. 2 • Various
... thanks to which we leave our original impress upon nature; let us work, in order to bring our humble contribution to the general harmony of things, by our painful and meritorious labour; in order that we may associate ourselves with God, share in His creation, and embellish and adorn the earth and fill ...
— Fabre, Poet of Science • Dr. G.V. (C.V.) Legros
... pitch her voice fairly into the room, gradually ceased. Gabriel recognised the prelude. It was that of an old song of Aunt Julia's—Arrayed for the Bridal. Her voice, strong and clear in tone, attacked with great spirit the runs which embellish the air and though she sang very rapidly she did not miss even the smallest of the grace notes. To follow the voice, without looking at the singer's face, was to feel and share the excitement of swift and secure flight. Gabriel applauded loudly with all ...
— Dubliners • James Joyce
... and precious manuscripts, were confiscated at the time of the first suppression under Napoleon, in 1810; and whatever else could be carried off went in 1866, when the religious orders were suppressed by the Italian government, to embellish the museums. Still, the empty cloister, with Signorelli's and Sodoma's frescos on the walls, Fra Giovanni of Verona's intarsia-work in the church, and the solitary monastery itself, so silent after centuries of activity, have an inexpressible charm, and travellers who undertake ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, December, 1885 • Various
... will, the life—the soul. It was a plump body, well clad, well fed, a carcase that had absorbed much of its world. It cost labor and the pains of innumerable toilers to clothe it, nourish it, maintain it, guard, comfort, and embellish it. And an effort of ten minutes was enough to drain it of all save the fleshly, the mere bestial. The habit of his mind impelled him to sneer as he stood above it, to moralise in the tune of cynicism. ...
— The Second Class Passenger • Perceval Gibbon
... the corridors, and discontent sat glum or rustled uneasily in each stone cell. Some of the inmates brought pictures, busts and ornaments to embellish their rooms. Friends from the outside world sent presents; the cavalier who played the guitar beneath the window varied his entertainment by gifts; flowers filled the beautiful vases, and these blossoms were replaced ere they withered, ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 6 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Artists • Elbert Hubbard
... and set backward even a Walpole or a Chesterfield in any impression of gentility. In spite of this primitive regalia, however, Richard gave forth an idea of elevation, and as though his ancestors in their civilization had long ago climbed above a level where men put on gold to embellish their worth. What, then, did that casket of carved ...
— The President - A novel • Alfred Henry Lewis
... world," continued Dupin, "abounds with very strict analogies to the immaterial; and thus some color of truth has been given to the rhetorical dogma, that metaphor, or simile, may be made to strengthen an argument, as well as to embellish a description. The principle of the vis inertiae, for example, seems to be identical in physics and metaphysics. It is not more true in the former, that a large body is with more difficulty set in motion than a smaller one, and that its subsequent ...
— The Short-story • William Patterson Atkinson
... the plain and ordinary mode of speaking. Its object is greater effect. Figures originated, perhaps, in a limitation of vocabulary; and many words that are now regarded as plain were at first figurative. But the use of figures is natural, and at present they are used to embellish discourse and to give it greater vividness and force. To say with ...
— Elementary Guide to Literary Criticism • F. V. N. Painter
... always adding new details to his story, finding something to embellish it and heighten the effect, and now having succeeded in getting the false Iris into the house, he began already to devise schemes to get her ...
— In Luck at Last • Walter Besant
... their spring evenings, the white cottages, scattered over the islands, and but partially seen through the trees that surround them, assume often the appearance of little Grecian temples; and a vivid fancy may embellish the poor fisherman's hut with columns such as the pencil of a Claude might imitate. I had one favorite object of this kind in my walks, which the hospitality of its owner robbed me of, by asking me to visit him. He was a plain good ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... in this fanatical reign, it is almost impossible to obtain the name of every martyr, or to embellish the history of all with anecdotes and exemplifications of Christian conduct. Thanks be to Providence, our cruel task begins to draw towards a conclusion, with the end of the reign of Papal terror and bloodshed. ...
— Fox's Book of Martyrs - Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant - Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs • John Fox
... which she celebrates her birthplace. There are walks along the country pathways, long meditations at night, village weddings and fetes. All the poetry and all the picturesqueness of the country transform and embellish the story. ...
— George Sand, Some Aspects of Her Life and Writings • Rene Doumic
... service of some good-natured lady, who had no other fault than loving wine and men. In short, every one of them, struck with some particular circumstance relating to their own private affairs, had either alarmed or diverted their mistresses with the account, not failing, according to custom, to embellish the truth, in order to enhance ...
— The Memoirs of Count Grammont, Complete • Anthony Hamilton
... remarkable effect of the division of labor is not that it accentuates the distinction of functions already divided but that it makes them interdependent. Its role in every case is not simply to embellish or perfect existing societies but to make possible societies which, without it, would not exist. Should the division of labor between the sexes be diminished beyond a certain point, the family would cease to exist and only ephemeral sexual relations would remain. If the sexes had never ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park
... something to be hidden, demands any great powers of mind, I will not inquire: perhaps a sullen and surly spectator may think such performances rather the sport than the business of human reason. But it must be at least confessed that to embellish the form of Nature is an innocent amusement, and some praise must be allowed, by the most supercilious observer, to him who does best what such multitudes are contending ...
— Lives of the Poets: Gay, Thomson, Young, and Others • Samuel Johnson
... sometimes I amuse myself in contemplating their anxious motions, I receive the same pleasure which you do in observing those men who cultivate your land; for I reflect that the end of all their labours is to embellish the city which I inhabit, and to anticipate all my wants. If you contemplate with delight the fruits of your orchards, with all the rich promises of abundance, do you think I feel less in observing so many fleets that convey to me the ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli
... gimcrack, tinsel, spangle, clinquant[obs3], pinchbeck, paste; excess of ornament &c. (vulgarity) 851; gaud, pride. [ornamentation of text] illustration, illumination, vignette. fleuron[obs3]; head piece[Fr], tail piece[Fr]; cul-de-lampe[Fr]; flowers of rhetoric &c. 577; work of art. V. ornament, embellish, enrich, decorate, adorn, bead, beautify, adonize[obs3]. smarten, furbish, polish, gild, varnish, whitewash, enamel, japan, lacquer, paint, grain. garnish, trim, dizen[obs3], bedizen, prink[obs3], prank; trick out, fig out; deck, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... tea and some hot buttered toast which old M'Dermott had provided for me, sat nodding and dozing on one side of the fire. The old cobbler had fallen fast asleep on the other side while poring over a dictionary, noting down sonorous and impressive-sounding words with which to embellish the oration he intended to deliver ...
— A Girl Among the Anarchists • Isabel Meredith
... Gil Blas, and, in 1738, the two volumes of the Bachelier de Salamanque as a translation. Will it be said that Le Sage's other works prove him to have been capable of inventing Gil Blas? It will be still without foundation. All his critics agree, that, though well qualified to embellish the ideas of others, and master of a flowing and agreeable style, he was not an inventive or original writer. Such is the language of Voltaire, M. de la Martiniere, and of Chardin, and even of M. Neufchateau himself; and yet, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 55, No. 344, June, 1844 • Various
... its own strong ideas about the folly and frivolity of the stage, and no Puritan maiden in the sternest days of Cromwellian ascendency, no Calvinist daughter of the most rigorous Scottish household, could have been educated in a more austere ignorance of the arts that are supposed to embellish and that are intended to amuse existence. She went to playhouse after playhouse, alarmed at the crowds that thronged the streets to see her, but fascinated by the delights that awaited her within the walls. She attended ...
— A History of the Four Georges and of William IV, Volume III (of 4) • Justin McCarthy and Justin Huntly McCarthy
... it rather poor and wished to embellish it," Verdi replied, remembering the reception he had ...
— The World's Great Men of Music - Story-Lives of Master Musicians • Harriette Brower
... he gave a conspicuous instance in Mist's Journal in an account of the marvellous blowing up of the island of St. Vincent, which in circumstantial invention and force of description must be ranked among his master-pieces. But Defoe did more than embellish stories of strange events for his newspapers. He was a master of journalistic art in all its branches, and a fertile inventor and organizer of new devices. It is to him, Mr. Lee says, and his researches entitle him to authority, that ...
— Daniel Defoe • William Minto
... Thornton, "are heavy in their proportions, bad in detail, both in taste and execution, fantastic in decoration, and destitute of genius. Their cities are not decorated with public monuments, whose object is to enliven or to embellish." Their religion forbids them every sort of painting, sculpture, or engraving; thus the fine arts cannot exist among them. They have no music but vocal; and know of no accompaniment except a bass of one note like that of the bagpipe. Their singing ...
— Historical Sketches, Volume I (of 3) • John Henry Newman
... waterfalls; valleys and plateaus that spring into life when pricked by the harrow of the husbandman; forests of big trees, perpetually green, to adorn and protect; the greatest of oceans to temper with its breezes; inland seas and azure lakes to embellish and attract—such are a few of the elements that make the State of Washington and provide beauteous homes for ...
— The Beauties of the State of Washington - A Book for Tourists • Harry F. Giles
... Chapman in his picture of Bussy's quarrels and encounters-at-arms was deviating little, except in details of names and dates, from the actual facts of history. Bussy's career was so romantic that it was impossible for even the most inventive dramatist to embellish it. This was especially true of its closing episode, which occupies the later acts of Chapman's drama—the intrigue with the Countess of Montsoreau and the tragic fate which it involved. It is somewhat singular that the earliest narratives ...
— Bussy D'Ambois and The Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois • George Chapman
... is generally felt to know something of the lives of men who have consecrated their genius to embellish noble feelings through works of art, through which they shine like brilliant meteors in the eyes of the surprised and delighted crowd. The admiration and sympathy awakened by the compositions of such men, attach immediately to their ...
— Life of Chopin • Franz Liszt
... been related by himself. It is a disadvantage in Lavengro and Romany Rye that we cannot with certainty separate fact from fiction, for he avowed in talk that, like Goethe, he had assumed the right in the interests of his autobiographical narrative to embellish it in places; but the main outline, and larger part of the details, are the genuine record of what he had seen and done, and I can testify that some of his minor personages who were known to me in my boyhood ...
— George Borrow and His Circle - Wherein May Be Found Many Hitherto Unpublished Letters Of - Borrow And His Friends • Clement King Shorter
... willingly be rid. And being then asked why he did not discharge them, declared that they were bailiffs, who had introduced themselves with an execution, and whom, since he could not send them away, he had thought it convenient to embellish with liveries, that they might do him credit while they stayed. His friends were diverted with the expedient, and by paying the debt discharged their attendants, having obliged Sir Richard to promise that they should never again find him graced ...
— The Palmy Days of Nance Oldfield • Edward Robins
... sighed to think that approaching winter had demanded that her new best black should be made of thick materials. She hated black, too, and grimaced at her sombre frills, which the mourning brooch and chain of jet beads could only embellish, never lighten. But she would as soon have thought of jumping out of the window as of discarding her mourning a day before the traditions of the Marsh decreed. She decided not to wear her brooch and chain—the chain might swing and catch in the beasts' horns as she inspected ...
— Joanna Godden • Sheila Kaye-Smith
... Strasburg and Frankfort, Friendly Mannheim, too, that is cheerful and evenly builded. He that has once beheld cities so cleanly and large, never after Ceases his own native city, though small it may be, to embellish. Do not the strangers who come here commend the repairs in our gateway, Notice our whitewashed tower, and the church we have newly rebuilded? Are not all praising our pavement? the covered canals full of water, Laid with ...
— Hermann and Dorothea • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
... 1723, and had a district assigned to it. It was entirely rearranged and restored in 1868, and has lately been repainted. It is a most peculiar-looking church, with a spire cased in zinc. Small figures of angels embellish some points of vantage, and the symbols of the four Evangelists appear in niches. The windows are round-headed, with tracery of a peculiarly ugly type; but the interior is better than the exterior, and has lately ...
— Holborn and Bloomsbury - The Fascination of London • Sir Walter Besant
... beauteous Goddess, staying there my steps, 380 I call'd aloud; she heard me, and at once Issuing, threw her splendid portals wide, And bade me in. I follow'd, heart-distress'd. Leading me by the hand to a bright throne With argent studs embellish'd, and beneath Footstool'd magnificent, she made me sit. Then mingling for me in a golden cup My bev'rage, she infused a drug, intent On mischief; but when I had drunk the draught Unchanged, she smote me with her wand, and said. 390 Hence—seek the sty. There ...
— The Odyssey of Homer • Homer
... when a little excited, the words tumbled out with headlong velocity or flowed like molten brass into the mould of the founder, and, to carry the simile farther, some would sputter over. He had in his storehouse of language, many queer phrases and sayings that he brought out to embellish his conversation, some of which were only used as a corps de reserve, or brought into action when all others failed ...
— Brook Farm • John Thomas Codman
... touch of beauty to their aspect. In some cases, where the shelving of the rock will admit of it, there are chimneys, in nearly all windows; and it not unfrequently happens, especially higher up the road near Tours, where art has condescended to embellish the facades still more elaborately, that these house-caves present an appearance of elegance which is almost impossible to reconcile with the absolute penury of their inhabitants. The interiors, too, although generally speaking naked enough, are sometimes tolerably well furnished, having an air ...
— Castles and Cave Dwellings of Europe • Sabine Baring-Gould
... and romance did thus in ancient times with the scenery of nature, it did also on the field of history. Men explored that field not at all to learn sober and actual realities, but to find something that they might embellish and adorn, and animate with supernatural and marvelous life. What the sober realities might have actually been, was of no interest or moment to them whatever. There were no scholars then as now, living in the midst of libraries, and finding constant ...
— Romulus, Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... the vast theatre of ancient Ephesus,—the stone-benched amphitheatre I mean—and had our picture taken. We looked as proper there as we would look any where, I suppose. We do not embellish the general desolation of a desert much. We add what dignity we can to a stately ruin with our green umbrellas and jackasses, but it is little. ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... Time's opening scenes, and Truth's unerring word: There shall broad streets their stately walls extend, The circus widen, and the crescent bend; There, ray'd from cities o'er the cultur'd land, Shall bright canals and solid roads expand. Embellish'd villas crown the landscape scene, Farms wave with gold, and orchards blush between; While with each breeze approaching vessels glide, And northern treasures dance on every tide!" Then ceas'd the nymph: tumultuous ...
— The History of Tasmania, Volume I (of 2) • John West
... glory. Moveable scenery of the most costly and splendid kind was lavished on the Masque; the most celebrated masters were employed on the songs and dances; and all that the kingdom afforded of vocal and instrumental excellence was employed to embellish the exhibition.[8] Thus magnificently constructed, the Masque was not committed to ordinary performers. It was composed, as Lord Bacon says, for princes, and by princes it was played.[9] Of these Masques, the skill with which their ornaments were designed, and the ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli
... you that this causes me great embarrassment, and indeed often makes me feel very sad; the more so that, owing to various urgent causes, I am unable to send you as yet the new symphony dedicated to you. First, because I wish to alter and embellish the last movement, which is too feeble when compared with the first. I felt this conviction myself quite as much as the public, when it was performed for the first time last Friday; notwithstanding which, it made the most profound impression on the audience. The second reason ...
— Haydn • J. Cuthbert Hadden
... to this here Elixir of Long Life, I might embellish it with a great many high-sounding epithets; but I disdain to follow the example of every illiterate vagabond, that, from idleness, turns quack, and advertises his nostrum in the public papers. I am neither a felonious drysalter ...
— The Adventures of Sir Launcelot Greaves • Tobias Smollett
... and glory. Movable scenery of the most costly and splendid kind was lavished on the Masque; the most celebrated masters were employed on the songs and dances; and all that the kingdom afforded of vocal and instrumental excellence was employed to embellish the exhibition. Thus, magnificently constructed, was composed, as Lord Bacon says, for princes, and by princes it was played. Of these Masques, the skill with which their ornaments were designed, and the inexpressible grace with which they were executed appear to have left a vivid impression ...
— A History of Pantomime • R. J. Broadbent
... agreed with his methods, and Gen. Peter Horry wrote to him: "I requested you would (if necessary) so far alter the work as to make it read grammatically, and I gave you leave to embellish the work, but entertained not the least idea of what has happened . . . You have carved and mutilated it with so many erroneous statements your embellishments, observation and remarks, must necessarily be erroneous ...
— The Life of General Francis Marion • Mason Locke Weems
... scientist to be the sponsor. It became a question of faith rather than knowledge; and man's instinctive struggle against the risk of extinction impelled him to cling to this larger hope of salvation, and to embellish it with an ethical and moral significance which at first was lacking in the eternal search ...
— The Evolution of the Dragon • G. Elliot Smith
... which we are accustomed. Every hundred years, and especially a century like the last, marked by an extraordinary advance in wealth, luxury, and refinement of taste, as well as in the mechanical arts which embellish our houses, must produce a great change in their aspect. These changes are always at work; they are going on now, but so silently that we take no note of them. Men soon forget the small objects which they leave behind them as they drift ...
— Memoir of Jane Austen • James Edward Austen-Leigh
... mind which receives this, not only is content with the exaggeration of the first mind, but its own report adds its own effect of endeavours to embellish, and so by this action, and by the deception which it also receives from the goodwill generated in it, good report is made more ample than it should be; either with the consent or the dissent of the conscience; even as ...
— The Banquet (Il Convito) • Dante Alighieri
... who was a cashier, ruined his bank by stealing money to enable him, for a while, to live in an elegant house and support servants, equipages, silks and diamonds galore. For a time he was the idol of the town, while he gave costly dinners and showered his ill-gotten gains to embellish his favorite temple, and to build a tower upon it to look down in contempt upon all the ...
— The Gentleman from Everywhere • James Henry Foss
... duty was to punish the oppressor and redress the wronged, and they thus fixed in the wild elements of unsettled opinion a recognised standard of generosity and of justice. Their deeds became the theme of the poets, who sought to embellish their virtues and extenuate their offences. Thus, certain models, not indeed wholly pure or excellent, but bright with many of those qualities which ennoble a national character, were set before the emulation of the aspiring and the young:—and the ...
— Athens: Its Rise and Fall, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... Alexander died, however, before he had an opportunity to get back from the East; but, as the old historian says, it is entertaining and relaxing to the mind to digress from weightier considerations and to embellish historical study with variety, and he decides that if the great Eastern conqueror had marched against Rome, he would have been defeated. While Livy was probably influenced in this decision by that desire to magnify the prowess of his country which is plainly ...
— The Story of Rome From the Earliest Times to the End of the Republic • Arthur Gilman
... again in her own place, and listening to her dear step running up and down the no longer silent house, there were notes of disquiet which could not be mistaken. She was not unhappy, the mother thought; her eyes could not be so bright, nor her colour so fair unless she was happy. Trouble does not embellish, and Elinor was embellished. But yet—there were notes of disquiet in ...
— The Marriage of Elinor • Margaret Oliphant
... Catherine de' Medici, wife of King Henry II of France, he removed to Paris. He established a workshop in the vicinity of the royal Palace of the Tuileries, and was thereafter known as "Bernard of the Tuileries." He was employed by the king and queen and some of the greatest nobles of France to embellish their palaces and gardens with the products of his ...
— Eclectic School Readings: Stories from Life • Orison Swett Marden
... filled the air with a species of purple light, that cast a warm and soft radiance even on the glowing face of Anneke, as she pointed out to me the magical effect. I know no flower that does so much to embellish a place, as the lilac, on a large scale, common as it is, and familiar as we have become with its hues and ...
— Satanstoe • James Fenimore Cooper
... persons of the drama are God, Satan, Job and his wife, his three friends, and Elihu. Wherefore it is, says Grotius, a real fact, but poetically handled.[42] Poetry was certainly a very ancient manner of writing, and poets were wont to embellish true histories in their own way, as we see in the most ancient among the Greeks and Romans. And among the Hebrews likewise, long after the time above-mentioned, Ezechiel comprised the history of the departure out of Egypt in a dramatic poem; upon ...
— Medica Sacra - or a Commentary on on the Most Remarkable Diseases Mentioned - in the Holy Scriptures • Richard Mead
... and the Venetian painters, and knew the principles by which they produced those pleasing effects which at the first glance prepossess us so much in their favour; but he took only as much from each as would embellish, but not overpower, that manly strength and energy of style, which ...
— Seven Discourses on Art • Joshua Reynolds
... publish a daily newspaper to be written on large sheets of paper and to be read each evening to the group. It was called The Teuton Tonic; Mr. Doubleday was appointed publisher and advertising manager; Mr. Lockwood Kipling was made art editor to embellish the news; Rudyard Kipling was the star reporter, and ...
— The Americanization of Edward Bok - The Autobiography of a Dutch Boy Fifty Years After • Edward William Bok
... excavations under the patronage of the government, and closer inspection shows that these are actually the lower seats of the theatre in the time of the emperor Hadrian, whose favorite residence was Athens, and who did so much to embellish the city. The front seats consist of massive stone chairs, each inscribed with the name of its occupant, generally the priestess of some one of the numerous gods worshiped by that people so given to idolatry. In the centre of the second row is an elevated throne inscribed ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, No. 23, February, 1873, Vol. XI. • Various
... appearance never failed to create. Motionless and unmoved she appeared, amongst the flowery shrubs and verdant foliage of the garden, like some statue of chaste and classical beauty, placed to embellish and ...
— Gomez Arias - The Moors of the Alpujarras, A Spanish Historical Romance. • Joaquin Telesforo de Trueba y Cosio
... delicate child, with the soft smile and intelligent eyes, who had sat by the side of Leonard in his garret. She was about the middle height, still slight, but beautifully formed; that exquisite roundness of proportion which conveys so well the idea of woman, in its undulating, pliant grace,—formed to embellish life, and soften away its rude angles; formed to embellish, not to protect. Her face might not have satisfied the critical eye of an artist,—it was not without defects in regularity; but its expression ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... 1. To prevaricate or to embellish the truth beyond any reasonable recognition. In German the term is (mythically) 'gonken'; in Spanish the verb becomes 'gonkar'. "You're gonking me. That story you just told me is a bunch of gonk." In German, for example, "Du gonkst mir" ...
— The Jargon File, Version 4.0.0
... most manifest that his purpose is, and ever has been, to embroil us with our neighbours of England and Scotland in new dissensions, as it must be evident to every one of you that his pretended accusations against me are but colors and shadows to embellish and to shroud his own desire for war, his appetite for vengeance, and his hatred not only to me but to yourselves, and as his determination is, in the words of Escovedo, to chastise some of us by means of the rest, and to excite the jealousy of one portion of the country against ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... Harmonial Philosophy," of which Reason is the final umpire. Revelation no longer speaks to them in tones of authority. From the Bible, it is claimed, "the seal of infallibility must be broken away, before a new light and beauty can enliven and embellish the mystical disclosures of any seer, prophet, or evangelist." So writes Andrew Jackson Davis, the Poughkeepsie seer, one of the leaders of this new school, who complains that "owing to the dogmatism of infallibility, the Bible is taught now-a-days as it was nearly four ...
— A Brief Commentary on the Apocalypse • Sylvester Bliss
... other men whose business is the making of books. There can be no necessity for it; the author is quite sure to have added the illustrations that are requisite for the volume. It is only books that were published without illustrations that we are justified in attempting to embellish. Illustrations in a book are invariably a question of the author's and publisher's tastes; the cost of their production is not usually an all-important item: it is the setting up of the type, the paper, and the binding that count—not ...
— The Book-Hunter at Home • P. B. M. Allan
... part."—Murray's Gram., 8vo, p. 120. "We should continually have the goal in view, which would direct us in the race."—Murray's Key, 8vo, p. 172. "But [Addison's figures] seem to rise of their own accord from the subject, and constantly embellish it."—Blair's Rhet., p. 150; Jamieson's, 157. "As far as persons and other animals and things that we can see go, it is very easy to distinguish Nouns."—Cobbett's Gram., 14. "Dissyllables ending in y, e mute, or accented on the last syllable, may be sometimes compared like monosyllables."—Frost's ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... upper part of her head she wore a thin fillet of black velvet, restraining the luxuriance of her shady hair, in a way which added much to this class of majesty by irregularly clouding her forehead. "Nothing can embellish a beautiful face more than a narrow band drawn over the brow," says Richter. Some of the neighbouring girls wore coloured ribbon for the same purpose, and sported metallic ornaments elsewhere; but if anyone suggested coloured ribbon and metallic ornaments to Eustacia Vye she laughed ...
— The Return of the Native • Thomas Hardy
... laid in Rome in the year 1532 under Pope Clement VII, and comprises the events of three days, Monday before Shrove-tide, Shrove-Tuesday and Ash-Wednesday.—Benvenuto Cellini, the Tuscan goldsmith has been called to Rome by the Pope, in order to embellish the city with his {27} masterpieces. He loves Teresa, the daughter of the old papal treasurer Balducci, and the love is mutual.—At the same time another suitor, Fieramosca, the Pope's sculptor, is favored by her father. Old ...
— The Standard Operaglass - Detailed Plots of One Hundred and Fifty-one Celebrated Operas • Charles Annesley
... the fact that if he was not of the twentieth century the volume obviously was; seized pen and paper, and began to make notes with the speed of lightning. Being also something of a draughtsman he was able to embellish his notes with sketches from the engravings with which "Past Dictates of Fashion" was copiously furnished. These sketches appear with the ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 30, June 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... numbers of what were deemed miracles may be explained by natural causes, by figurative modes of expression which were common in Oriental nations, by the tendency of the human mind to embellish or exaggerate surprising facts, or invent supernatural causes for what it is unable to explain, by the retrospective imagination which seeks to dignify the distant past with a supernatural halo. ...
— Historical and Political Essays • William Edward Hartpole Lecky
... Musagetes. Mathias Corvin favored Jean de Monroyal, the ornament of mathematics. Now, 'tis an ill way to protect letters to hang men of letters. What a stain on Alexander if he had hung Aristoteles! This act would not be a little patch on the face of his reputation to embellish it, but a very malignant ulcer to disfigure it. Sire! I made a very proper epithalamium for Mademoiselle of Flanders and Monseigneur the very august Dauphin. That is not a firebrand of rebellion. Your majesty sees that I am not a scribbler of no reputation, that I have studied excellently well, ...
— Notre-Dame de Paris - The Hunchback of Notre Dame • Victor Hugo
... the same as the slips, when planted at the same season in a shady place, and well watered. The common thyme is in universal use as a pot-herb for various culinary purposes; it may also be employed in assemblage with other small plants, to embellish the fronts of flower-borders, shrubbery clumps, small and sloping banks, &c. placing the plants detached or singly, to form little bushy tufts, and in which the variegated sorts, and the silver thyme and lemon ...
— The Cook and Housekeeper's Complete and Universal Dictionary; Including a System of Modern Cookery, in all Its Various Branches, • Mary Eaton
... literature in a most agreeable and desultory manner; to-day a tourist, to-morrow a novelist; the next day surprising his public by an excursion into the regions of historical romance, amongst the well-beaten highways and byways of which he still manages to discover an untrodden path, or to embellish a familiar one by the sparkle of his wit and industry of his researches. The majority of his books convey the idea of being written currente calamo, and with little trouble to himself; and these ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 55, No. 340, February, 1844 • Various
... know how common the glow-worm* (* Lampyris italica, L. noctiluca.) is in Italy and in all the south of Europe, but the picturesque effect it produces cannot be compared to those innumerable, scattered, and moving lights, which embellish the nights of the torrid zone, and seem to repeat on the earth, along the vast extent of the savannahs, the brilliancy of the starry vault ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America • Alexander von Humboldt
... own gratitude and munificence. His first idea was to imitate the equestrian and colossal statue which he had seen in the Forum of Trajan; but when he had maturely weighed the difficulties of the execution, [42] he chose rather to embellish the capital by the gift of an Egyptian obelisk. In a remote but polished age, which seems to have preceded the invention of alphabetical writing, a great number of these obelisks had been erected, in the cities of Thebes and Heliopolis, by the ancient sovereigns ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... have contended, that to render the human body and mind more perfect, chastity must more universally prevail, and that chastity will never be respected in the male world till the person of a woman is not, as it were, idolized when little virtue or sense embellish it with the grand traces of mental beauty, or the interesting ...
— A Vindication of the Rights of Woman - Title: Vindication of the Rights of Women • Mary Wollstonecraft [Godwin]
... surpassed. We look at a red-cheeked apple or purple cluster of grapes hesitatingly, and are loth to mar the exquisite shadings and perfect outlines of the vessel in which the rich juices are served. Therefore, in stocking the acre with fruit, the proprietor has not ceased to embellish it; and should he decide that fruit-trees must predominate over those grown for shade and ornament only, he can combine almost as much beauty as utility ...
— The Home Acre • E. P. Roe
... abandoned that study and devoted himself exclusively to painting. For years he struggled desperately against the discouragements of poverty in himself and ignorance in his neighbors, but found his reward at last in this engagement to embellish the walls ...
— The English Governess At The Siamese Court • Anna Harriette Leonowens
... would lean back dretful well-feelin', and thinkin' in his heart that it wuz his good looks that wuz wanted to embellish the room, and I kep on a wonderin' inside of myself what made Mr. Freeman so oncommon good to us, till one day he told us sunthin' that made it plainer to us, and Josiah Allen's pride had a fall (which, if his pride hadn't been composed of materials more ...
— Samantha at the World's Fair • Marietta Holley
... the effects of this art were never perceived. It had done nothing more than embellish nature; it served in her, only to make the charm more lasting. Every instant increased the delight she inspired; every instant rendered her more interesting. Such is the impression she had left in India; such is the impression she made in Europe. Eliza, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 486 - Vol. 17, No. 486., Saturday, April 23, 1831 • Various
... nausea you promise it a plethora of good things In the arrogance of success, had put on the manner of the master Live coals are more readily held in men's mouths than a secret Putting as good a face upon the matter as I could Rumor but grows in the telling and strives to embellish Something in the way of hope at which to nibble Stained by the lifeblood of the God of Wine To follow all paths; but a road can discover by none Whatever you talk of at home will fly forth in ...
— The Satyricon, Complete • Petronius Arbiter |
