"Errant" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... letter—the inclination that he had always known she felt. It was just because it was a genuine impulse in her that he realized how strong was the calculation in her that had always been able to keep the errant ...
— The Innocent Adventuress • Mary Hastings Bradley
... over her forehead, placing a wisp of errant hair, and said, "I suppose, as an expert from Moscow, you'll be installing a whole set of ...
— Freedom • Dallas McCord Reynolds
... her glance To recall What bond-servants of Chance We are all. I but found her in that, going On my errant path unknowing, I did not out-skirt the spot That no spot on earth excels, —Where ...
— Wessex Poems and Other Verses • Thomas Hardy
... to England a sort of Yankee knight-errant to fight for his country. He had the wisdom to fight with his visor down, and quarter on the enemy. He took heavy tribute from Blackwood and others for his articles vindicating America, which came to be extravagantly quoted and read. His ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No 3, September, 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... Heliogabalus and a Simeon Stylites. So persuaded, I could join with the fervour of a neophyte in the Stoic's profession: "Good and evil are in choice alone, and there is no cause of sorrowing save in my own errant and wilful desires. When these shall have been overcome, I shall possess my soul in tranquillity, vexing myself in nowise if, in the world's illusive good, all men have the advantage over me. For all outward things I will bear with equal mind, even chains ...
— Apologia Diffidentis • W. Compton Leith
... Dean, or Patrick's down went, Like two arrand Deans, two Deans errant I meant; So that Christmas appears at Bellcampe like a Lent, Gives the gamesters of both houses great discontent. Our parsons agree here, as those did at Trent, Dan's forehead has got a most damnable dent, Besides a large hole in his Michaelmas rent. But your fancy on rhyming so ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift
... Do but survey this crowded house to-night:— Here's still encouragement for those that write. 30 Our author, to divert his friends to-day, Stocks with variety of fools his play; And that there may be something gay and new, Two ladies-errant has exposed to view: The first a damsel, travelled in romance; The t'other more refined; she comes from France: Rescue, like courteous knights, the nymph from danger; And kindly treat, like ...
— The Poetical Works of Addison; Gay's Fables; and Somerville's Chase • Joseph Addison, John Gay, William Sommerville
... Ungrateful too! That's well; You improve apace;—two changes in an instant, 490 And you are old in the World's ways already. But bear with me: indeed you'll find me useful Upon your pilgrimage. But come, pronounce Where shall we now be errant? ...
— The Works of Lord Byron - Poetry, Volume V. • Lord Byron
... of the founders of the Franciscans and of the Jesuits? Of the first he had nothing more to say than that he was 'at first only a well-minded but weak enthusiast, afterwards a mere hypocrite and impostor;' of the other he spoke with a certain compassion as 'that errant, shatter-brained, visionary fanatic.'[609] And the Methodist, he thought, had a ...
— The English Church in the Eighteenth Century • Charles J. Abbey and John H. Overton
... memories of more silent and happier hills; it all depends on what the chalk means to you: you may be unfamiliar with it and in that case you will not notice it; or you may have been born among those thyme-scented hills and yet have no errant fancies, so that you will not think of the hills that watched you as a child, but only keep your mind on the business in hand; that ...
— Tales of War • Lord Dunsany
... missionary to the Oregon tribes, and now come hither to the mountain market of 1835 as knight-errant of the Gospel, pulled up his horse at the edge of the encampment and gazed in sheer amazement. His party—except Whitman, who reined in his horse at his friend's side—passed on and joined the shouting throng. Apparently ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... that brake the eternal lamp and hid the eternal hill, A world's destruction loading, the word went onward still— The blaze of creeds passed into it, the hiss of horrid fires, The headlong spear, the scarlet cross, the hair-shirt and the briars, The cloistered brethren's thunderous chaunt, the errant champion's song, The shifting of the crowns and thrones, the ...
— Poems • G.K. Chesterton
... this self-avowed knight-errant in surprise. Handyside was a man of forty, whose dark hair was flecked with gray. He was quietly dressed, a wide-brimmed high-crowned hat of finely-plaited white straw providing the solo note of markedly American origin in his attire. ...
— Number Seventeen • Louis Tracy
... part Steve, seeing where some of his calves had invaded Temple property, followed the errant calves himself instead of sending one of his men. And as he rode he was apt to forget his strayed cattle as he watched through the trees for a ...
— Man to Man • Jackson Gregory
... as an Indian; it was hard for her to make admissions about her husband. But then—we were like two errant school-girls, who had been caught m an escapade! "I don't know what I'm going to do about him," she said, with a wry smile. "He really won't listen—I can't make any impression on ...
— Sylvia's Marriage • Upton Sinclair
... would not have been willing to confess this interest, but it prompted him secretly so that he was often reminding himself of the old days when Lois had been his daily companion and their mutual confidences had been their mutual pleasure. Just as a knight-errant of the old time might set out to seek his mistress, so did Alban go to Warsaw determined to succeed. He would find Lois in this whirling wonderland of delight, and, finding her, would return ...
— Aladdin of London - or Lodestar • Sir Max Pemberton
... the old army there existed certain unwritten laws of precedence as between various branches of the Service. If such customs still prevail it is certain that the very newest arm would take pride of place. The flying man has recaptured some of the glamour and romance which encircled the knight-errant of old. He breathes the very atmosphere of dangerous adventure. Life for him is a series of thrills, any one of which would be sufficient to last the ordinary humdrum citizen for a lifetime. Small wonder that the flying man has captured the interest and ...
— The Mastery of the Air • William J. Claxton
... have adventures?" asked Dick, recognizing in this description a rough sketch of the life of a modern knight-errant. ...
— Harding's luck • E. [Edith] Nesbit
... female side, is an ever-present source of trouble and unhappiness among the Natives. The length to which a jealous Native wife will go in winning back the affections of an errant husband is often extraordinary, though the ways and means she adopts differ but little from those practised by the superstitious and credulous peasantry in Europe less than ...
— The Black Man's Place in South Africa • Peter Nielsen
... appeared, with the penalties of the law. He had sold a "love-philtre" (pronounced infallible for recalling errant fiances to a sense of duty) to an amorous kitchen-maid who was seeking to rekindle the sacred flame in the bosom of an unresponsive policeman. The damozel had mingled the potion in a plate of beefsteak pudding, and had handed the same ...
— The Right Stuff - Some Episodes in the Career of a North Briton • Ian Hay
... Charles V. He was no knight-errant like his father, and his diplomatic gifts, tact, and patience made him much better fitted than John for outwitting his English enemies and for restoring order to France. Slowly but surely he grappled with the companies, ...
— The History of England - From the Accession of Henry III. to the Death of Edward III. (1216-1377) • T.F. Tout
... he enlisted the stalworth Paddy Moran, with the information conveyed to that surprised reveller, that he was to sleep at 'Mrs. Nutter's house' that night; and so, at a brisk pace, the clerical knight, his squire, and demoiselle-errant, proceeded to the Mills. ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... transactions of life. Thus in the Golden Age, there was something very comical in human creatures eating acorns, like pigs. The Augustan Age was comical enough, if we may trust some of Horace's satires. Much comicality was displayed in the Middle Ages, in the proceedings of the knights errant, the doings in Palestine, and the mode adopted by the priests of inculcating religion on the minds of the people. In the Elizabethan Age several comic incidents occurred at court; particularly when any of the courtiers were guilty of personal impertinence to their virgin queen. It ...
— The Comic Latin Grammar - A new and facetious introduction to the Latin tongue • Percival Leigh
... of crossing the sea at the head of faithful paladins; of landing after the perils and adventures of an unexpected voyage, in a country of knights-errant; of eluding, by a thousand disguises, the vigilance of the watchful enemies through whom she had to pass; of wandering, a devoted mother and banished queen, from hamlet to hamlet, and chateau to chateau; of testing humanity, ...
— Louis Philippe - Makers of History Series • John S. C. (John Stevens Cabot) Abbott
... of introductions goes on duly, a small staff of energetic professional gentlemen, styled M.C.'s (which in London, you know, stands for Master of the Ceremonies), flit ever hither and thither amongst the throng, now catching a wildly errant waltzing couple in politely resolute arms and sending them back into the regular ring, now getting up sets for Lancers and quadrilles, and at all points doing their best to keep the ball a-rolling. Useful members of ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 12, No. 32, November, 1873 • Various
... at the Bellevue when they got back there; but they neither of them felt the want of other company. They had a very merry little dinner-party all to themselves, and Angus was able to look at the damsel errant he had rescued. Her beauty came upon him with a shock of surprise. He had seen many beautiful women in his time, but never anything so enchanting as the droop of her mouth, or the lovely curves of her throat, or the transparent candour of her ...
— Fifty-Two Stories For Girls • Various
... fancy by some of the ladies' maids tripping about in neat morning dresses. After seeing for a long time little but rusticity, their lively manner, and gay inviting appearance, pleased me so much, that I thought, for the moment, I could have been a knight-errant for them. [Footnote: On reflection, at the distance of several years, I wonder that my venerable fellow-traveller should have read this passage without ...
— The Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides with Samuel Johnson, LL.D. • James Boswell
... the delight of all classes of readers. Every school-boy thumbs to pieces the most wretched translations of his romance, and knows the lantern jaws of the Knight Errant, and the broad cheeks of the Squire, as well as the faces of his own playfellows. The most experienced and fastidious judges are amazed at the perfection of that art which extracts inextinguishable laughter from the greatest of human calamities without once violating ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 2 (of 4) - Contributions To The Edinburgh Review • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... Geraint Beheld her first in field, awaiting him, He felt, were she the prize of bodily force, Himself beyond the rest pushing could move The chair of Idris. Yniol's rusted arms Were on his princely person, but thro' these Princelike his bearing shone; and errant knights And ladies came, and by and by the town Flow'd in, and settling circled all the lists. And there they fixt the forks into the ground, And over these they placed the silver wand, And over that the golden sparrow-hawk Then Yniol's nephew, after trumpet blown, Spake to the lady with ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 5 • Charles Sylvester
... the paper the names in a brief item arrested his errant glance. It disclosed that Mr. Percival Bines had left New York the day before with a party of guests on his special car, to shoot quail in North Carolina. Mr. Milbrey glanced at the two shells of the orange which the butler ...
— The Spenders - A Tale of the Third Generation • Harry Leon Wilson
... Charles Dickens The Angel's Story Echoes A False Genius My Picture Judge Not Friend Sorrow One by One True Honours A Woman's Question The Three Rulers A Dead Past A Doubting Heart A Student A Knight Errant Linger, oh, gentle Time Homeward Bound Life and Death Now Cleansing Fires The Voice of the Wind Treasures Shining Stars Waiting The Cradle Song of the Poor Be strong God's Gifts A Tomb in Ghent The Angel ...
— Legends and Lyrics: First Series • Adelaide Anne Procter
... the opposite fence, he passed them with gravely uplifted hat and a serious, preoccupied air. But in that single, seemingly conventional glance, Mr. Hamlin had seen that they were both pretty, and that one had the short upper lip of his errant little guide. A hundred yards farther on he halted, as if irresolutely, gazed doubtfully ahead of him, and then turned back. An expression of innocent—almost childlike—concern was clouding the rascal's face. It was ...
— A Sappho of Green Springs • Bret Harte
... fall in with the proper track by inclining somewhat to the right; and I had so much faith also in True's sagacity that I had hopes he would find it. However, I gave him more credit than he deserved. He was always happy in the woods, like a knight-errant in search of adventures, plenty of which he was indeed likely ...
— On the Banks of the Amazon • W.H.G. Kingston
... very different from those which affected Dr. Cyrus Pym. All Arthur's instincts were on the side of privacy and polite settlement; he was very English and would often endure wrongs rather than right them by scenes and serious rhetoric. To play at once the buffoon and the knight-errant, like his Irish friend, would have been absolute torture to him; but even the semi-official part he had played that afternoon was very painful. He was not likely to be reluctant if any one could convince him that his duty was to let sleeping ...
— Manalive • G. K. Chesterton
... a quiet spot in the wood, and lived in a camp of his own making, where he read tales of war and knights-errant, and in his enthusiasm fought imaginary enemies. At last he could bear dreaming no longer, and started off again to roam the world in ...
— The Story of Pocahontas and Captain John Smith • E. Boyd Smith
... unapproachably heroic element in the soldier's work seems to be—that he is paid little for it—and regularly: while you traffickers, and exchangers, and others occupied in presumably benevolent business, like to be paid much for it—and by chance. I never can make out how it is that a knight-errant does not expect to be paid for his trouble, but a pedlar-errant always does;—that people are willing to take hard knocks for nothing, but never to sell ribands cheap;—that they are ready to go on fervent crusades to recover the tomb of a ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin
... a portentous gravity as he assigned the desserts for each table. What an ordeal it was for shy freshmen to rise and walk the length of the dining-room! How many tables were kept waiting for the next course while errant students surveyed the sunset through the kitchen windows! Some of us remember the tragic moments when, coming in hot and tired from crew practice, we found on the bulletin-board by the dining-room the fateful words, 'strawberries for dinner', and we knew it was our lot ...
— The Story of Wellesley • Florence Converse
... the small remains of the colony left by Ojeda at St. Sebastian. He heard the story of their misfortunes and the departure of their commander, but nothing daunted, the worthy gentleman of the robe assumed the courageous bearing of a knight errant, and determined to pursue the adventures on which he had embarked. Having heard of a great sepulchre not far in the interior, where the natives were said to be buried with all their ornaments of gold, he determined at once to pounce on so valuable a mine. ...
— The American Quarterly Review, No. 17, March 1831 • Various
... calligraphy. But learning accidentally that the scroll had been pawned to the merchant from whom he had obtained it, he instituted inquiries as to its owner, and ultimately restored the scroll to him with the addition of five gold ryo. The owner was a knight-errant (ronin) named Imagawa Motome, who thereafter entered Masamune's service and ultimately rose to be a general of infantry (ashigaru). The sympathy which taught Masamune to estimate the pain with which the owner of the scroll must have parted with it was ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... breathing in the cool freshness of the dewy lawns, he felt himself assailed by all the passionate expectancy that transforms the soul of youth into the incoherent canvas of an unfinished romance of love. Long ago he had known such evenings, those evenings of errant fancy, when he had allowed his caprice to roam through imaginary adventures, and he was astonished to feel a return of sensations that did not now ...
— Strong as Death • Guy de Maupassant
... had parted from his fellows at the Castle of Vagon, he rode many days through the forest without adventure, till he chanced upon a knight close by a little hermitage in the wood. Immediately, as was the wont of errant knights, they prepared to joust, and Launcelot, whom none before had overthrown, was borne down, man and horse, by the stranger knight. Thereupon a nun, who dwelt in the hermitage, cried: "God be with thee, best knight in all this world," for she knew the victor for ...
— Heroes Every Child Should Know • Hamilton Wright Mabie
... little satisfied sigh as she selected an ortolan, "is a very satisfactory place to be carried off to. And you," she added, leaning across the table and touching his fingers for a moment tenderly, "are a very delightful knight-errant." ...
— The Yellow Crayon • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... qualified black specialists would be assigned to some white units.[14-106] At the same time Gray was not prepared to admit that the incident demonstrated how open his plan was to evasion, just as he refused to admit that his rescinding of the errant message represented a change in policy. He would continue, in effect, the plan approved by the Secretary of Defense on 30 ...
— Integration of the Armed Forces, 1940-1965 • Morris J. MacGregor Jr.
... At length the supper, which had long been dight, Nor yet was touched, enjoys each hungry guest; Nor any further news of errant knight Them, seated at the festive board, molest; All, saving Bradamant, enjoy, whose sprite, As wont, is still afflicted and opprest. For that suspicious fear, that doubt unjust, Which racked her ...
— Orlando Furioso • Lodovico Ariosto
... (Vol. vii., p. 261.).—Your correspondent will find an account of the Wandering Jew prefixed to "Le Juif errant," the 3ieme livraison of Chants et Chansons ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 186, May 21, 1853 • Various
... peace of his mind was at an end, and his only study was how to gain the affections of the peerless daughter of Van Tassel. In this enterprise, however, he had more real difficulties than generally fell to the lot of a knight-errant of yore, who seldom had anything but giants, enchanters, fiery dragons, and such like easily conquered adversaries, to contend with and had to make his way merely through gates of iron and brass, and walls of adamant to the castle keep, where the lady of his heart was confined; all which he achieved ...
— The Legend of Sleepy Hollow • Washington Irving
... "Since to your home A destined errant-knight I come, 475 Announced by prophet sooth and old, Doomed, doubtless, for achievement bold, I'll lightly front each high emprise, For one kind glance of those bright eyes. Permit me, first, the task to guide 480 Your fairy frigate o'er the tide." The maid with smile suppressed ...
— Lady of the Lake • Sir Walter Scott
... Orion (Or, it may be, Charles his Wain) Tempts the tiny elves to try on All their little tricks again; When the earth is calmly breathing Draughts of slumber undefiled, And the sire, unused to teething, Seeks for errant ...
— Green Bays. Verses and Parodies • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... could endure for a moment. Only his father made much of him. For all his great wealth, he was very stingy and greedy; he even lent money at usury to his best friends. Our amusing little friend Maksi was this man's son. The slender, fanciful damsel, Henrietta, who appeared in that family like an errant angel specially sent there to be tormented for the sins of her whole race, was the orphan daughter of another son of old Lapussa, who had lost father and mother at the same time in the most tragical manner; they had both been drowned by the capsizing of a small boat on the Danube. Henrietta ...
— The Poor Plutocrats • Maurus Jokai
... rather shaped (perhaps cramped) than developed: but genius was present, without a doubt, under whatsoever artificial trappings; and Ben Jonson spoke but truth when he said, 'My son Cartwright writes all like a man.' It is impossible to open a page of 'The Lady Errant,' 'The Royal Slave,' 'The Ordinary,' or 'Love's Convert,' without feeling at once that we have to do with a man of a very different stamp from any (Massinger perhaps alone excepted) who was writing between 1630 and 1640. ...
— Plays and Puritans - from "Plays and Puritans and Other Historical Essays" • Charles Kingsley
... to Madame Bernard's, and Juliet's knight-errant was weary, after an exhausting day in town. He paused outside the gate long enough to clean the dust from his shoes with the most soiled of his two handkerchiefs, then went boldly up the steps and ...
— Old Rose and Silver • Myrtle Reed
... you go forth as a knight-errant, Micah,' said Reuben, laughing. 'You might chance to get your own skin beaten and your own ...
— Micah Clarke - His Statement as made to his three Grandchildren Joseph, - Gervas and Reuben During the Hard Winter of 1734 • Arthur Conan Doyle
... eager errant knight? All London by this time knew, and it is time that we should learn. Indeed, while the youthful wayfarers were speeding away on their mad and merry ride, the privy councillors of England were on their knees before King James, half beside ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 4 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... a wonderful people. You seek adventures with as much gusto as a knight-errant of the olden times. If I had a dozen such as you two under my charge, I'd soon free this neighborhood ...
— The Gold Hunter's Adventures - Or, Life in Australia • William H. Thomes
... it's the kind of place for a hermit," said Monica. "He could have had a little cell and told his beads without being disturbed by anybody, except an occasional knight-errant who would blow a horn from the opposite bank. I wonder ...
— The Manor House School • Angela Brazil
... written, they were never intended for public inspection; and now they are far from being thought correct, or more authentic than the general turn of epistolary correspondence admits. The author would sooner have burnt them than have taken the trouble to correct such errant trifles, which are here presented to the reader, with scarce any variation or omissions, but what private friendships and private history, or the great haste with which the letters were written, made indispensably necessary, ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole
... the exertion Kellup Cobb come into our house of a errant, and I asked him if he was goin' to the exertion; and he said he would like ...
— Little Masterpieces of American Wit and Humor - Volume I • Various
... for her; he collected a heap of dried leaves, laid his cloak upon them, and picked up Isoult to lay her upon the cloak. His arms about her woke her up. Scarce knowing what she did, dreaming possibly of her mother, she put up her face towards his; but if Prosper noticed it, no errant mercy from him sent her to bed comforted. He put her down, covered her about with the cloak, and patted her shoulder with an easy—"Good-night, my lass." This was cold cheer to the poor girl, who had to be content with his ministry of the cloak. It was too dark to tell if he was looking ...
— The Forest Lovers • Maurice Hewlett
... me round the country, with the first knight- errant that starts up?' said the girl, in an aggrieved voice. 'And if I ...
— Wych Hazel • Susan and Anna Warner
... demi-god, the Hercules who labours and conquers before he receives his heavenly crown. That idea, with continual mystery and modification, has continued behind all romantic tales; the demi-god became the hero of paganism; the hero of paganism became the knight-errant of Christianity; the knight-errant who wandered and was foiled before he triumphed became the hero of the later prose romance, the romance in which the hero had to fight a duel with the villain but always survived, in which the hero drove desperate horses through the night in order to ...
— Appreciations and Criticisms of the Works of Charles Dickens • G. K. Chesterton
... man manliest;—not puny resolve, not crude determination, not errant purpose, but that strong and indefatigable will which treads down difficulties and danger as a boy treads down the heaving frost-lands of winter,—which kindles his eye and brain with a proud pulse-beat toward the unattainable. Will ...
— Dream Life - A Fable Of The Seasons • Donald G. Mitchell
... I can see myself in your eye, Boy. I can really." For a moment she stared at the reflection. "I don't think I look very nice," she added gravely. "However..." She kissed me abstractedly and started to fix the tress errant. "If Jonah asks you, don't say it's too short. It's not good for him. I'll have ...
— Jonah and Co. • Dornford Yates
... boon, ha!" said the Constable,—"I am no knight-errant, to bind myself by promise to grant it ere I know its import; but do thou come to my pavilion to-morrow, and thou wilt not find me unwilling to ...
— The Betrothed • Sir Walter Scott
... Polyphemus in antro Lanigeras claudit pecudes, atque ubera pressat, Centum alii curva hæc habitant ad littora vulgo Infandi Cyclopes, et altis montibus errant.” Æn. ...
— Rambles in the Islands of Corsica and Sardinia - with Notices of their History, Antiquities, and Present Condition. • Thomas Forester
... sorry a Creature, thou wilt endure any thing for the lucre of her Fortune; 'tis that thou hast a Passion for: not that thou carest for Money, but to sacrifice to thy Leudness, to purchase a Mistress, to purchase the Reputation of as errant a Fool as ever arriv'd at the Honour of keeping; to purchase a little Grandeur, as you call it; that is, to make every one look at thee, and consider what a Fool thou art, who else might pass unregarded amongst the ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. III • Aphra Behn
... that one is prepared for the fact that much of it is founded on actual happenings; but Mr. Dixon has, as before, a deeper purpose—he has aimed to show that the original formers of the Ku Klux Klan were modern knights errant taking the only means at hand to right ...
— Desert Conquest - or, Precious Waters • A. M. Chisholm
... as we had and must hereafter upon the merchant marine to man whatever additional vessels we should require, and upon the bold and hardy Yankee sailor, when he could no longer get freight for his craft, to receive a proper armament, and go forth like a knight errant of the sea in quest of adventure against the enemies ...
— Speeches of the Honorable Jefferson Davis 1858 • Hon. Jefferson Davis
... vice. One conduces to the poet's aim (the completing of his work), which he is driving on, labouring, and hastening in every line; the other slackens his pace, diverts him from his way, and locks him up like a knight-errant in an enchanted castle when he should be pursuing his first adventure. Statius (as Bossu has well observed) was ambitions of trying his strength with his master, Virgil, as Virgil had before tried his with Homer. The Grecian gave the two Romans an example in the games which ...
— Discourses on Satire and Epic Poetry • John Dryden
... come to Court!" she shrilled into sudden tinkling laughter; "there be ladies there more worthy of your ardour than a poor errant maiden such ...
— The Black Douglas • S. R. Crockett
... been granted and his barren honours thus made sweet to him. But his generation mourned him with idle tears, and succeeding generations have, possibly, done him scanty justice. Yet one, a master-mind in English Literature, has raised an eternal testimony to his worth—"Another true knight errant of those days," proclaims Thackeray, "was Cuthbert Collingwood, and I think, since Heaven made gentlemen, there is no record of a better one than that. Of brighter deeds, I grant you, we may read performed by others; but where of a nobler, kinder, more beautiful life of duty, of ...
— The Letter-Bag of Lady Elizabeth Spencer-Stanhope v. I. • A. M. W. Stirling (compiler)
... hear a melancholy old barrel-organ in the courtyard, go to the window and give a penny to the poor errant [Footnote: Errant: wandering.] musician—perhaps it is Don Gaetano! If you find that his organ disturbs you, try if you like it, better by making him stand a little farther off, but don't send him away with harshness! ...
— Short Stories and Selections for Use in the Secondary Schools • Emilie Kip Baker
... corrected his nonsense by saying, "I think we mustn't be too romantic. You will become a knight-errant, I suppose. You have the characteristics ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... like a knight-errant the impulse that had called him to the war. He wanted to fight for the liberty of all oppressed nations, for the resurrection of all forgotten nationalities,—Poles, Czechs, Jugo-Slavs.... And very simply, as though he were saying something ...
— Mare Nostrum (Our Sea) - A Novel • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... late to play the knight-errant. The "ladye faire" had not needed my help; she neither saw nor heard me; and by the time I arrived upon the ground, she had passed out of sight, and Ijurra ...
— The War Trail - The Hunt of the Wild Horse • Mayne Reid
... winds that wake ere darkness' death Sigh through the woods and all the valley wide: The rushes by the water answering sighed: Sighed all the river from its reedy throat. And like a winged creature went the boat, Over the errant water wandering free, As some lone seabird ...
— The Poems of William Watson • William Watson
... all truth, the little gray broncho deserved all of Paddy's praise. Scarred from muzzle to pastern by errant bullets, limping slightly on one fore leg, she still had borne her master bravely over weary miles of veldt, into many a skirmish and through the kicking, squealing throngs of her kindred which crowded the Lindley kraal. Long since, Weldon had discovered that the thoroughbred Nig was ...
— On the Firing Line • Anna Chapin Ray and Hamilton Brock Fuller
... man my dream-boy would be, Blow back his tears when he wakes up to see His knight errant gone ...
— The Court of Boyville • William Allen White
... somewhere in the world was a woman meant for him—a woman with a mind and soul, as well as flesh. If the waiting seemed long—why should he not be content, since she was waiting, too? He would know her instantly. The slightest errant fancy of doubt would be enough to assure him that she was not ...
— Fate Knocks at the Door - A Novel • Will Levington Comfort
... table, made the most congenial refuge conceivable. His thoughts were in exact harmony with everything there, from the Venetian blinds to the portrait of his great-grandmother. The only discordant element was the presence of a few errant bread-crumbs, and happily they were under ...
— The Prodigal Father • J. Storer Clouston
... their knack of submerging earlier and less dramatic passages in the lives of those whom Fate drags into their sweeping currents. Lest, therefore, the strangely contrived meeting between Sylvia and her knight errant should be neglected by the chronicler, it is well to return to those two young people at the moment when Sylvia was declaring her unimpaired power ...
— The Strange Case of Mortimer Fenley • Louis Tracy
... they abode, exercising themselves in all feats of arms. So when spring returned they set forth, as knights errant, ...
— English Fairy Tales • Flora Annie Steel
... thistle-heads, which the rustic maiden names after her lovers, in connection with which there are many old rhymes. Beans have not lost their popularity; and the leaves of the laurel still reveal the hidden fortune, having been also burnt in olden times by girls to win back their errant lovers. ...
— The Folk-lore of Plants • T. F. Thiselton-Dyer
... in a roar fit to split the air as the hero of the day was recognized. And the Dalesmen gave a pace forward spontaneously as the gray knight-errant stole ...
— Bob, Son of Battle • Alfred Ollivant
... ordinary creature, and is only remembered as the instrument chosen by chance to inspire 'Epipsychidion'. Finally there appeared, in January 1822, the truest-hearted and the most lovable of all Shelley's friends. Edward John Trelawny, a cadet of a Cornish family, "with his knight-errant aspect, dark, handsome, and moustachioed," was the true buccaneer of romance, but of honest English grain, and without a trace of pose. The devotion with which, though he only knew Shelley for a few months, he fed in memory on their friendship to the last day of his life, brings ...
— Shelley • Sydney Waterlow
... her downfall. America is wise, and will shake off the galling yoke before it be rivetted on them; they will be drove to it, and who can blame them? Who can blame a galley-slave for making his escape?—Britain will miscarry in her vile projects, her knight errant, her Don Quixote schemes in America: America will resist; they are not easily to be subdued (nay, 'tis impossible); Britain will find it a harder task than to conquer France and Spain united, and will cost 'em more blood and treasure than a twice Seven Years' War with those European powers; ...
— The Fall of British Tyranny - American Liberty Triumphant • John Leacock
... that there was none amongst them woorthie or meet to giue iudgement vpon so noble a prince as king Richard was, whom they had taken for their souereigne and liege lord, by the space of two & twentie yeares and more; "And I assure you (said he) there is not so ranke a traitor, nor so errant a thef, nor yet so cruell a murtherer apprehended or deteined in prison for his offense, but he shall be brought before the iustice to heare his iudgement; and will ye proced to the iudgement of an anointed king, hearing neither his answer nor excuse? I say, ...
— Chronicles (3 of 6): Historie of England (1 of 9) - Henrie IV • Raphael Holinshed
... said Henri; "this is the last time I shall play the knight-errant for any one against his will;" and, reentering the wood as the carriage dashed off at full speed, he proceeded by narrow paths toward the castle, followed at a short distance by Grandchamp ...
— Cinq Mars, Complete • Alfred de Vigny
... some few hours after battle, "Our enemy has encountered the fate of Phaethon, and the foundation-stone of our city on the Neva is at length grimly laid." The Swedish army had been crushed, and the Swedish hero-king was a mere knight-errant unable to return to his own land. The Cossacks who had tried to assert their independence of Russia under the Hetman Mazeppa, an ally of Charles XII, failed in their opposition to the mighty Tsar. Augustus ...
— Heroes of Modern Europe • Alice Birkhead
... definite beginning, middle and end, from the half-crazed preaching of Peter down to the Fall of Jerusalem. Those leaders! It would take a second Homer to do them justice. Godfrey the perfect soldier and leader, Bohemund the unscrupulous and formidable, Tancred the ideal knight errant, Robert of Normandy the half-mad hero! Here is material so rich that one feels one is not worthy to handle it. What richest imagination could ever evolve anything more marvellous and thrilling than the actual ...
— Through the Magic Door • Arthur Conan Doyle
... moment on this matter. I do not believe that Raymond had ever thought, in seriousness, of any such gift. It must have been at best an errant fancy, and if concerned with commemorating anybody concerned with commemorating himself. But I will say this for him: he never was disposed to try getting things out of people, for he hated attempts at trickery almost as ...
— On the Stairs • Henry B. Fuller
... you see me without bruise or scratch. Only Yorick and I got tangled up with a herd of buffaloes on the Kajiar Road. In his fright, the little fool slipped half over the khud, and if a knight-errant had not fallen from heaven, in the nick of time, we should both be lying somewhere in the valley by now, 'spoiling a patch ...
— The Great Amulet • Maud Diver
... have declared myself upon the forefront of this very book, I have never said in my heart, THERE IS NO GOD; but much and loudly have maintained the affirmative. And although I have been sadly, wickedly, detestably errant from His way, there is one divine precept which I have never failed to keep, and that is, LOVE ONE ANOTHER. All other affections, additions, accidents, accessories of men, however, from the lowest, which is Money, to the highest, which is Polite Education, I have been able to discard without ...
— The Fool Errant • Maurice Hewlett
... said Sir Dagonet, "I pick Wales, since Kinkenadon is the nearer to Ireland. My fool's head still fancies that we shall have need to turn there ere we shall find this errant knight." ...
— In the Court of King Arthur • Samuel Lowe
... France that a little peasant boy whose name was destined to become famous in the annals of his country led his father's sheep, that they might crop the scanty pasture. Vincent was a homely little boy, but he had the soul of a knight-errant, and the grace of God shone from eyes that were never to lose their merry gleam ...
— Life of St. Vincent de Paul • F.A. [Frances Alice] Forbes
... had a kind of errant love for the improvident and adventurous Esaus of the Earth. I think they smell a wilder fragrance than I do, and taste sweeter things, and I have thought, therefore, of beginning a kind of fragrant autobiography, a chronicle of all the good odours and flavours that ever I ...
— Great Possessions • David Grayson
... urchins; and when they would have won him to himself with honied whispers of American Rails, he answered but with babble of green fields. He is back in his wonted corner now: quite cured, apparently, and tractable. And yet — let the sun shine too wantonly in Throgmorton Street, let an errant zephyr, quick with the warm South, fan but his cheek too wooingly on his way to the station; and will he not once more snap his chain and away? Ay, truly: and next time he will not ...
— Pagan Papers • Kenneth Grahame
... Belsaye town burn down Duke Ivo's gibbet, who hath sworn to cut Duke Ivo into gobbets, look you, and feed him to the dogs; which is well, for I love not Duke Ivo. All this have I heard and much beside, idle tales mayhap, yet would I seek out this errant Mars and prove him, for mine own behoof, ...
— Beltane The Smith • Jeffery Farnol
... bless the discussion in the conversion "of these poor wandering souls, who have said in their hearts that there is no God, to a saving faith in Him and in the blood of Christ." I expected that some resentment would be displayed when the wandering souls found themselves treated like errant sheep, but to my surprise they listened with perfect silence; and when he had said "Amen," there were great clappings of hands, and cries of "Bravo." They evidently considered the prayer merely as an elocutionary show-piece. The preacher was ...
— Mark Rutherford's Deliverance • Mark Rutherford
... was left for a knight-errant in the Spain of to-day, ruling by steel and shot and flame and gold? It must be rather awful, the listener reflected, to see your own country go rotten like that in a generation. Yet there was no bitterness in the old hidalgo's tranquil eyes. "I have been a fool," he said smiling, "but ...
— Days of the Discoverers • L. Lamprey
... the more purely intellectual side of mysticism comes out more strongly than the exstatic—so dominant in these societies of the fourteenth—and we have Cardinal Nicolas of Cusa, with Giordano Bruno, the martyred knight-errant of philosophy, and Paracelsus, the much slandered scientist, who drew his knowledge directly from the original eastern fountain, instead of through ...
— Esoteric Christianity, or The Lesser Mysteries • Annie Besant
... a tendency to subtract from my vocation as a missionary. I was no longer a knight-errant, prepared on all occasions by dint of arms to vindicate the cause of every principle that was unjustly handled, and every character that was wrongfully assailed. Meanwhile I returned to the field, occasionally and uncertainly. ...
— Thoughts on Man - His Nature, Productions and Discoveries, Interspersed with - Some Particulars Respecting the Author • William Godwin
... "Dear Knight Errant," he read, in the same desperate handwriting. "Do you remember once years ago coming to the rescue of a lady in distress who was chased by a bull? The lady has never forgotten it. Will you do the same again for the same lady to-day, and earn her undying ...
— The Swindler and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... capture one very small Ute pappoose. At the thought of it, the builder of the trap was astounded. He laughed aloud at the absurdity. In silence he threw off the rock and lid and seated himself on the edge of the open trap. Captor and captive then gazed at each other with gravity. The errant infant's attire consisted of a calico shirt of gaudy hues, a pair of little moccasins, much frayed, and a red flannel string. This last was tied about his straggling hair, which fell over his forehead like the shaggy mane of a bronco colt and veiled, but could not obscure, the ...
— Our Boys - Entertaining Stories by Popular Authors • Various
... similar circumstances. It did not occur to him to toss up, nor was he aware of the value of turning round three times with his eyes closed and then marching straight before him. Had he been an errant knight, of course his horse would have settled the question; but as it was, he was not a knight and had not a horse. He had a dog, though. He had found Julius in possession of the caretaker at his guardian's house, and had begged her to let him ...
— A Dog with a Bad Name • Talbot Baines Reed
... code in the Middle Ages the challenge and the single combat were recognized institutions; and they say that knights-errant used to go riding through the country seeking worthy opponents. And according to the cow-boy code in southeastern Arizona during the early eighties among the outlaws, a champion must be ready to try conclusions in very much ...
— When the West Was Young • Frederick R. Bechdolt
... Nance Olden, there was another reason. There are other tiger trusts. Are you going to set up as a lady-errant and right all syndicate wrongs? No, there was another, a bigger reason, Nance. I'm going to tell it ...
— In the Bishop's Carriage • Miriam Michelson
... knots, by the conflux of meeting sap, Infect the sound Pine and divert his grain Tortive and errant from his ...
— The plant-lore & garden-craft of Shakespeare • Henry Nicholson Ellacombe
... months' gallant work there, with gallant men (for there are High Churchmen there who are an honour to England), brought him to death's door. The doctors commanded some soft western air. Frank, as chivalrous as a knight-errant of old, would fain have died at his post, but his mother interfered; and he could do no less than obey her. So he had taken this remote west country curacy; all the more willingly because he knew that nine-tenths of the people were Dissenters. To recover ...
— Two Years Ago, Volume I • Charles Kingsley
... Errant thoughts, light as summer fleece, drifted across her mind. Often, in such moments, she strove to realise that she was now mistress of ...
— The Danger Mark • Robert W. Chambers
... been directed to the office-boy-in-charge, who had quietly suppressed it. No one is a hero to one's own office-boy, and he evidently considered that a quarter of a million was an unwarrantable outlay for such a doubtfully advantageous object as the repatriation of an errant newspaper staff. So he drew the editorial and other salaries, forged what signatures were necessary, engaged new reporters, did what sub-editing he could, and made as much use as possible of the large accumulation of special articles that was held in reserve for emergencies. The articles ...
— Beasts and Super-Beasts • Saki
... to attempt the passage of that strait, and to explore the unknown regions beyond. The door yielded to my hand, with all that facility with which the portals of enchanted castles yield to the adventurous knight-errant. I found myself in a spacious chamber, surrounded with great cases of venerable books. Above the cases, and just under the cornice, were arranged a great number of black-looking portraits of ancient authors. About the room were placed long tables, with stands for reading and writing, ...
— The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. • Washington Irving
... while Molly suddenly whirled down the street and pounced on the errant collie. Seeing this, Constable McSherry turned to continue ...
— Grey Town - An Australian Story • Gerald Baldwin
... dimness of early morning when errant bats flitted home to cling to the ridge-pole, squeaking and fussy flutterings denoted unwonted disturbance. Daylight revealed a half concealed, sleeping snake, which seemed to be afflicted with twin tumours. A long stick dislodged the intruder, which scarce had reached ...
— My Tropic Isle • E J Banfield
... for racing about Europe in charge of a disreputable parent. I could picture her settled equably on a garden seat with a lapdog and needlework, blinking happily over green lawns and mildly rating an errant gardener. I could fancy her sitting in a summer parlour, very orderly and dainty, writing lengthy epistles to a tribe of nieces. I could see her marshalling a household in the family pew, or riding serenely in the family ...
— The Moon Endureth—Tales and Fancies • John Buchan
... Andres) their Boccaccio in Martorell; whose fiction of "Tirante el Blanco" is honored by the commendation of the curate in Don Quixote, as "the best book in the world of the kind, since the knights- errant in it eat, drink, sleep, and die quietly in their beds, like other folk, and very unlike most heroes of romance." The productions of these, and some other of their distinguished contemporaries, obtained a general circulation very early by means of the recently invented ...
— History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella V1 • William H. Prescott
... conversation with her. He forgot the foolishness of his action, forgot the wrong he was doing to the girl by filling her mind with thoughts about himself—for he could see that she was attracted by him. To her he seemed some knight-errant like those she had read about in the stories which her stepmother had forbidden her to read. His mode of speech, his appearance, his sunny laugh, all made her realise that there was a world hitherto unknown to her, but which she ...
— The Day of Judgment • Joseph Hocking
... him from the external circumstances which environ him here below, and leads him forward through illimitable regions where vast arrays of facts become abstractions, where the greatest works of Nature are but images, then woe betide him if a sudden noise strikes sharply on his senses and calls his errant soul back to its prison-house of flesh and bones. The shock of the reunion of these two powers, body and mind,—one of which partakes of the unseen qualities of a thunderbolt, while the other shares with sentient nature that soft resistant force which deifies destruction,—this shock, ...
— Seraphita • Honore de Balzac
... stairs their blasphemies did ring: "Come forth, O Williams, wherefore thus supine Remain within thy chambers after nine? Come forth, suffer thyself to be admired, And blush not so, coy dean, to be desired." The captive churchman chafes with empty rage, Till some knight-errant free him from his cage. Pale fear and anger sit upon yon face Erst full of love and piety and grace, But not pale fear nor anger will undo The iron might of gimlet and of screw. Grin at the window, Williams, all is vain; The carpenter will come and let thee out again. Contrast ...
— Samuel Butler's Cambridge Pieces • Samuel Butler
... as much dignity as possible, and then recognizing me as the person who picked up the contents of aunt Celia's bag, she said, dimpling in the most distracting manner (that's another thing there ought to be a law against), "Thank you again; you seem to be a sort of knight-errant!" ...
— A Cathedral Courtship • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... and remarked, "It is but fair that one should be assisted who loses his character in playing knight errant for all those who need, or fancy they need, his good services: but, Louis, you are very wrong to give up so much of your time to others; your time does not belong to yourself; your father did not send you here to assist Dr. Wilkinson—or, ...
— Louis' School Days - A Story for Boys • E. J. May
... the western Saracens at Granada and the rise of the Turks in the East, the rise of Russia, the downfall of the last vestige of the ancient empire of Rome, the last expiring effort of feudalism in Charles the Bold, and of errant knighthood in Maximilian; the beginning of modern statecraft in Louis XI of France, Henry VII of England, and Ferdinand the Wise of Spain; the spread of printing and with it the spread of thought and knowledge among the masses; and, sometimes ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 8 - The Later Renaissance: From Gutenberg To The Reformation • Editor-in-Chief: Rossiter Johnson
... I protested that it was, he laughed genially, and, turning to the landlord, said: "He does not look like a knight-errant who flies to the rescue of maids, and Tory maids at that, does he? But see here, youngster, since you have brought this little traitress into my household, you will have to do your share in converting her to the true principles of liberty ...
— The Tory Maid • Herbert Baird Stimpson
... last, my dear Octavio, you left me pursuing, like a knight-errant, a beauty enchanted within some invisible tree, or castle, or lake, or any thing inaccessible, or rather wandering in a dream after some glorious disappearing phantom: and for some time indeed I knew not whether I slept or waked. I saw daily the good old Count of Clarinau, ...
— Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister • Aphra Behn
... unfortunate expedition for both of them. He was as little like a knight-errant as she was to a sea captain's wife. When she had devoured all the romances in the lending library, she lapsed into a sickly dreaminess, from which she aroused herself only to lament and bewail her fate; and it was this which ...
— Skipper Worse • Alexander Lange Kielland
... piracy, Drake resolved to become a pirate. But he assuredly did not conceive himself to be a pirate; nor were his motives the same; and his methods were utterly unstained by the blood-thirstiness and cruelty inseparably associated with the title. He was rather an Ocean knight-errant, smiting and spoiling, and incidentally enriching himself, but in knightly fashion and for a great cause: not a miscellaneous robber, but a scourge of the enemies of his country and ...
— England Under the Tudors • Arthur D. Innes
... of William Tell. Wherever there were chains to rend and yokes to break, you were seen to hasten. Like the warriors Hugo exalts in his Legende des Siecles, you have been the champion of justice, the knight-errant of liberty. You appear to us victorious in a distant vision, as in the realm of legend. For the glory of our age in which heroes are wanting, it befits you to remain that which you are. Continue afar off, so that you may continue great. It is not that your glory ...
— Paris under the Commune • John Leighton
... toward the bottled grape My errant fancy fondly turns, Remember, leering jackanape, I err in company ...
— The Book of Humorous Verse • Various
... glance took in the disreputable younger, his once handsome face marred—one doesn't foregather with swine in the sty without acquiring marks of the association—his clothing in rags. Thus errant youth, that was youth no longer, came back from that far country. Under such circumstances one generally has to walk most of the way. He had often heard the chimes at midnight, sleeping coldly in the straw stack of the fields, and the dust of the road clung to his person. ...
— A Little Book for Christmas • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... ring; one can imagine an early Stoic as its author. It was spoken by Benjamin Franklin, and no saying better expresses the spirit of eighteenth century humanity. "Where is not Liberty, there is mine." The answer is Thomas Paine's. It is the watchword of the knight errant, the marching music that sent Lafayette to America, and Byron to Greece, the motto of every man who prizes striving above enjoyment, honours comradeship above patriotism, and follows an idea that no frontier can arrest. Paine was indeed of no century, and no ...
— Shelley, Godwin and Their Circle • H. N. Brailsford
... and abbot to Mount Alban's peer A goodly welcome in their house accord; Who asked, but not before with savoury cheer He amply had his wearied strength restored, If in that tract, by errant cavalier, Often adventurous quest might be explored, In which a man might prove, by dangerous deed, If blame or glory ...
— Orlando Furioso • Lodovico Ariosto
... returned to his domains in Novgorod, and under the protection of the throne he rivaled the monarch in splendor and power. Constantin established his capital at Vladimir, about one hundred and fifty miles west of Moscow. The warlike Mstislaf, greedy of renown, with the chivalry of a knight-errant, sought to have a hand in every quarrel then raging far or near. Southern Russia continued in a state of incessant embroilments; and the princes of the provinces, but nominally in subjection to the crown, lived in a state of interminable war. Occasionally ...
— The Empire of Russia • John S. C. Abbott
... up as a test, through appreciation or failure to appreciate, of a reader's ability to follow another's feelings, to understand far-away hints and allusions, to follow the tracks of an irregular and errant wit. ...
— Laurence Sterne in Germany • Harvey Waterman Thayer
... of Poppies, and the skies are very blue, By the Temple in the coppice, I wait, Beloved, for you. The level land is sunny, and the errant air is gay, With scent of rose and honey; will you come to ...
— India's Love Lyrics • Adela Florence Cory Nicolson (AKA Laurence Hope), et al.
... said not a word of him, and Warkworth's jealousy had died for lack of fuel. In relation to Julie, Delafield had been surely the mere shadow and agent of his little cousin the Duchess—a friendly, knight-errant sort of person, with a liking for the distressed. What! the heir-presumptive of Chudleigh Abbey, and one of the most famous of English dukedoms, when even he, the struggling, penurious officer, would never have dreamed ...
— Lady Rose's Daughter • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... You seem to wonder and ask yourselves who is this modern Quixote. What mean this costume of by-gone centuries—this golden chariot—these richly caparisoned steeds? What is the name and purpose of this curious knight-errant? Gentlemen, I will condescend to answer your queries. I am Monsieur Mangin, the great charlatan of France! Yes, gentlemen, I am a charlatan—a mountebank; it is my profession, not from choice, but from necessity. You, gentlemen, created that necessity! You would ...
— The Humbugs of the World • P. T. Barnum
... that when my orders are disobeyed I have power to enforce them! Where I am not respected I am feared. I refused my consent to the loan by aid of which Great Britain's enemies had designed to prosecute a war against her. None of those theatrical displays with which sometimes I have impressed the errant vulgar were necessary. The greatest name in European finance was refused to the transaction—and the Great War died in the ...
— The Sins of Severac Bablon • Sax Rohmer
... apart rather self-consciously. Bean felt himself a scoundrel—"leading on" a young thing like that who was engaged to another. It was flirting of the most reprehensible sort. But there was his dual nature; a strain of the errant Corsican had ...
— Bunker Bean • Harry Leon Wilson
... advisability of so far-reaching a measure. Thus, on 4th July 1798, Hatsell, Clerk of the House of Commons, wrote to Auckland that of all possible plans a Union was the worst, "full of difficulties, to be brought about by errant jobs; and, when done, not answering the purpose. You must take out the teeth, or give the Catholics sops to eat. One or other; but the half-measure won't do." Better balanced was the judgement of the Earl of ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose
... of that river and south of the lakes, intact, which shows how the common consent of nations accorded to French valor in exploration the bulk of the North American continent. Essentially chivalrous, the French explorer proved the knight-errant among American discoverers. By the treaty of 1803, Napoleon ceded 1,171,931 square miles to the United States, a tract eight times as large as France itself. France, by rights acquired by discoveries, owned ...
— A Hero and Some Other Folks • William A. Quayle
... Hermann Kirchner,[54] we have a group of instructions sprung from German soil all characterized by an exalted mood and soaring style. They have in common the tendency to rationalize the activities of man, which was so marked a feature of the Renaissance. The simple errant impulse that Chaucer noted as belonging with the songs of birds and coming of spring, is dignified into a philosophy ...
— English Travellers of the Renaissance • Clare Howard
... courtesy and the honour of the social organism man builds for his own habitation? The idea of knighthood still stirs us and the deeds of chivalry and the courtesy and the honour of the social Knights of the Round Table, Crusaders and knights errant, the quest of the Holy Grail, rescue and adventure, the fighting with paynims and powers of evil, still stir our blood and arouse in our minds strange contrasts and antinomies. Princes and fair chatelaines in their wide domains with castle ...
— Towards the Great Peace • Ralph Adams Cram
... friend; it seemed to Sybil that he could be her only friend. The disposition of Lord Marney was not opposed to the habits of his wife. Men, when they are married, often shrink from the glare and bustle of those social multitudes which are entered by bachelors with the excitement of knights-errant in a fairy wilderness, because they are supposed to be rife with adventures, and, perhaps, fruitful of a heroine. The adventure sometimes turns out to be a catastrophe, and the heroine a copy instead of an ...
— Tancred - Or, The New Crusade • Benjamin Disraeli
... he said; "so you are off again, like a veritable knight-errant of romance, in search ...
— Saint Bartholomew's Eve - A Tale of the Huguenot WarS • G. A. Henty
... knight-errant or so came along, and the sight of them fired the king's martial spirit every time. He would have forgotten himself, sure, and said something to them in a style a suspicious shade or so above his ostensible degree, and so I always got him well out of the road ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... of the press who has just arrived on the Delectable Mountains, comes rushing in, looks over my shoulder, and says, "A deuced expensive thing a Viceroy." This little errant knight would take the thunder at a quarter of the price, and keep the Empire paralytic with change and fear of change as if the great Thirty-thousand-pounder himself were on ...
— Twenty-One Days in India; and, the Teapot Series • George Robert Aberigh-Mackay
... Elizabeth was alive Philip would not willingly sanction the landing of a Spanish army on English shores. Thus, among the more ardent Catholics, especially the refugees at the Seminary at Rheims, a crown in heaven was held out to any spiritual knight-errant who would remove the obstacle. The enterprise itself was not a difficult one. Elizabeth was aware of her danger, but she was personally fearless. She refused to distrust the Catholics. Her household was full of them. She admitted anyone to her presence who ...
— English Seamen in the Sixteenth Century - Lectures Delivered at Oxford Easter Terms 1893-4 • James Anthony Froude
... a very rising young man, and so feeling, said Mrs. Ledwich to Mary while this was going on. 'In fact, he is a perfect knight-errant on this subject. He is gone to London this morning to see what can be done by means of the press. I tell Matilda it is quite a romance of modern life; and indeed, the sweet girl is very romantic still—very young, even after all she ...
— The Trial - or, More Links of the Daisy Chain • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Genius Learning and the Poetical Art? For want of the latter, our Author has sometimes made gross Mistakes in the Characters which he has drawn from History, against the Equality and Conveniency of Manners of his Dramatical Persons. Witness Menenius in the following Tragedy, whom he has made an errant Buffoon, which is a great Absurdity. For he might as well have imagin'd a grave majestick Jack-Pudding, as a Buffoon in a Roman Senator. Aufidius the General of the Volscians is shewn a base and a ...
— Eighteenth Century Essays on Shakespeare • D. Nichol Smith
... terrestrial sphere; than to define the nature of the Indians, and their customs and vices. This is a memorandum-book in which I have employed myself for forty years, and I shall only say: Quadraginta annis proximus fui generationi huic, et dixi semper hi errant corde; [88] and I believe that Solomon himself would place this point of knowledge after the four things impossible to his understanding which he gives in chapter XXX, verse 18 of Proverbs. Only can they ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume 40 of 55 • Francisco Colin |
