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Festal   Listen
adjective
Festal  adj.  Of or pertaining to a holiday or a feast; joyous; festive. "You bless with choicer wine the festal day."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Festal" Quotes from Famous Books



... of these men Be hell's door shut, heaven's unclosed, Eternally opened the kingdom of angels, Joy without end, and their portion appointed Along with Mary, who takes into mind The one most dear of festal days Of ...
— Our Catholic Heritage in English Literature of Pre-Conquest Days • Emily Hickey

... sound of singing and of all sorts of music caught Aziel's ear. Looking through the casement, he saw a great procession of the priests and priestesses of El and Baaltis clad in their festal robes and accompanied by many dignitaries of the city, a multitude of people and bands of musicians, advancing across the square towards ...
— Elissa • H. Rider Haggard

... hundred different ways I arranged the little houses of painted wood around the church, with its pointed belfry and its red walls, where the seam of the bricks was marked by fine white lines. I set out my two dozen frizzed and painted trees, and saw with delight the charmingly outlandish and wildly festal air which these apple-green, pink, lilac, fawn-colored houses with their window-panes, their retreating gables, and their steep roofs, brilliant with red varnish, assumed, ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume V (of X) • Various

... advancing, First to the lively pipe his hand addressed: But soon he saw the brisk, awakening viol, Whose sweet entrancing voice he loved the best. They would have thought, who heard the strain, They saw, in Temp's vale, her native maids, Amidst the festal-sounding shades, To some unlearned minstrel dancing; While, as his flying fingers kissed the strings, Love framed with Mirth a gay fantastic round. Strike—till the last armed foe expires; Strike—for your altars and your fires; Strike—for ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick

... of speculation to the geologists of other days—it rushes madly among the standing trees of the woods, wreathing them to their summits in its wild embrace—they stand at night like lofty torches, or a park decked out with festal lamps for some grand gala. After this first burn, a fallow presents a blackened scene of desolation and confusion, and requires, indeed, a strong arm and a stout heart to undertake its clearance; the small branches and brush-wood alone have been burnt, but the large ...
— Sketches And Tales Illustrative Of Life In The Backwoods Of New Brunswick • Mrs. F. Beavan

... slung on the forked sticks above it singing and sputtering, emitting clouds of steam the while, "like an engine blowing off," as the porter observed; so, all their preparations having been already completed, the children carried out their original intention of having a festal tea in honour of "Pa's birthday," he being set in their midst and told to do nothing, being ...
— Teddy - The Story of a Little Pickle • J. C. Hutcheson

... through the crowds at this, right and left, with inexpressible emotion. Perhaps this accidental sort of quest was that which destiny had arranged for the solution of my life-problem. To light upon Mary Ashburleigh in these festal throngs, perhaps wanting assistance, perhaps calling upon my name even now through her velvet lips, was a chance the mere notion of ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Vol. XV., No. 85. January, 1875. • Various

... social eye whenever she was carrying Jake a basket of her excellent cookery or returning with the empty dishes. Other neighbors, it was true, contributed delicacies to his rudimentary housekeeping, though chiefly at festal times like Thanksgiving and Christmas; but Mariana was conscious that she had kept an especial charge over him since his sister died and left him alone. Yet this she was never willing to confess, and though she treasured what she had elected as her responsibility, ...
— Country Neighbors • Alice Brown

... salon were gathered many personages with whom the reader is familiar, all in festal attire—the Count of Monte-Cristo and his beloved wife Mercedes, their friends Maximilian and Valentine Morrel, Esperance, Mlle. Louise d' Armilly and M. and Madame Albert de Morcerf. Many noble relatives of the groom were also present, to say nothing of hosts ...
— Monte-Cristo's Daughter • Edmund Flagg

... four things: (1) the destruction of idolatry; (2) the rise of the synagogue; (3) a deepened respect for the law of Moses; (4) a longing for the Messiah. To these might be added or emphasized as being included in them: (1) a vital sense of repentance was created; (2) the change from the national, festal and ceremonial worship to a spiritual and individual religion; (3) a belief that Israel had been chosen and trained in order that through her Jehovah might ...
— The Bible Period by Period - A Manual for the Study of the Bible by Periods • Josiah Blake Tidwell

... church. As you enter upon a season of special religious activity, you also enter upon a season which society is wont to devote largely to pleasure. Ere another communion season shall have come round, the season for evening entertainments and festal gatherings, will be at its height. From the nature of circumstances you will be called upon to participate in these more or less; and it is at these points that the temptation to conformity to the world will be most likely ...
— Amusement: A Force in Christian Training • Rev. Marvin R. Vincent.

... in which his praise was sung, the procession of happy comrades, and the evening festival, when, as Pindar has it, "the lovely shining of the fair-faced moon beamed forth, and all the precinct sounded with songs of festal glee," [Footnote: Pindar, Ol. xi. 90.— Translated by Myers] or "beside Kastaly in the evening his name burnt bright, when the glad sounds of the Graces rose." [Footnote: Pindar, Nem. ...
— The Greek View of Life • Goldsworthy Lowes Dickinson

... and if there had been a chance he would have been accused, of dereliction. No doubt he pushed through the work of the theatre doggedly, but certainly not in a convivial spirit. The Norwegians are a hospitable and festal people, and there is no question that the manager of the theatre would have unusual opportunities of being jolly with his friends. But it does not appear that Ibsen made friends; if so, they were few, and they ...
— Henrik Ibsen • Edmund Gosse

... each. The windows of the principal story, the echinus moulding of which is handsome, have bold and enriched pediments, and the centre windows are honoured by massive balustrade balconies. In the centre, above the first floor, are the Company's arms, festal emblems, rich garlands, and trophies. The entrance door is a rich specimen of cast work. Altogether, though rather jammed up behind the Post-office, this building is worthy of the powerful and wealthy company who ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury

... to a tree. Now, I have a certain liking for donkeys, principally, I believe, because of the delightful things that Sterne has written of them. But this was not after the pattern of the ass at Lyons. He was of a white colour, that seemed to fit him rather for rare festal occasions than for constant drudgery. Besides, he was very small, and of the daintiest portions you can imagine in a donkey. And so, sure enough, you had only to look at him to see he had never worked. There was something too roguish and wanton in ...
— Essays of Travel • Robert Louis Stevenson

... Europe before Spain was conquered, and drew closer to his Russian ally. Difficulties that had been placed in the way of the Russian annexation of Roumania vanished. The Czar and the Emperor determined to display to all Europe the intimacy of their union by a festal meeting at Erfurt in the midst of their victims and their dependents. The whole tribe of vassal German sovereigns was summoned to the meeting-place; representatives attended from the Courts of Vienna and Berlin. On the 7th of October ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe

... Europe. A year of joy-living they planned that they might learn to know each other, with all the ministers of happiness in attendance. But the disagreements of two petted children made murky many a day of their prolonged festal journey, and beclouded for them both many days of the elaborate home-making after the home-coming. And the murkiness and cloudiness were not dissipated when parenthood was theirs. Neither had learned the first page in Life's ...
— Our Nervous Friends - Illustrating the Mastery of Nervousness • Robert S. Carroll

... Phoebus twain For sacrifice, we build; and I for thee Two beakers yearly of fresh milk afoam, And of rich olive-oil two bowls, will set; And of the wine-god's bounty above all, If cold, before the hearth, or in the shade At harvest-time, to glad the festal hour, From flasks of Ariusian grape will pour Sweet nectar. Therewithal at my behest Shall Lyctian Aegon and Damoetas sing, And Alphesiboeus emulate in dance The dancing Satyrs. This, thy service due, Shalt thou ...
— The Bucolics and Eclogues • Virgil

... soul With more unrest, and Hebe-like, the bowl Of festal comfort for a moment raise To my poor lips, and then avert thy gaze? Wouldst make me mad beyond the daily curse Of thy displeasure, and in wrath disperse That halcyon draught, that nectar of the mind, Which is the theme I yearn to in ...
— A Lover's Litanies • Eric Mackay

... be the sole regent of the babe's destiny. It was she who took it to its baptism;—not the festal ceremony which had pleased Sybilla's childish fancy with visions of christening robes and cakes, but the beautiful and simple "naming" of Elspie's own church. She stood before the minister, holding the ...
— Olive - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik, (AKA Dinah Maria Mulock)

... they found a great throng of lords and ladies, and because Sir Gwydion had no lady with him he could not sit at the feast. But Balin was well received and brought to a chamber, and they unarmed him. The squires brought him a festal robe to his pleasure, but he would not suffer them to ...
— King Arthur's Knights - The Tales Re-told for Boys & Girls • Henry Gilbert

... timber, staff of life; bread, bread and cheese. comestibles, eatables, victuals, edibles, ingesta; grub, grubstake, prog[obs3], meat; bread, bread stuffs; cerealia[obs3]; cereals; viands, cates[obs3], delicacy, dainty, creature comforts, contents of the larder, fleshpots; festal board; ambrosia; good cheer, good living. beef, bisquit[obs3], bun; cornstarch [U.S.]; cookie, cooky [U.S.]; cracker, doughnut; fatling[obs3]; hardtack, hoecake [U.S.], hominy [U.S.]; mutton, pilot bread; pork; roti[obs3], rusk, ship biscuit; veal; joint, piece de ...
— Roget's Thesaurus • Peter Mark Roget

... glass dish full of canned peaches, on the other by a similar one of floating island, while all the available remaining space was occupied by pies,—apple-pies, custard, berry-pies, cream-pies. To have a variety of pies on a festal occasion was the ambition of every housewife, seven different kinds of pies and three kinds of cake being not uncommon. If a map of the region where pie prevails is ever drawn up and printed, this section of the country will be shaded unusually dark. To have ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, September, 1885 • Various

... her exceeding loveliness on Saturday evening, when she had been arrayed in the festal robe which she herself was to wear at the ball, and the ...
— Mona • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon

... marble floor, and the streaks of pale sunshine that lay upon its black and white, at the lofty walls painted with a dim superb architecture, at the crowded ceiling, the gorgeous candelabra. With its costly decoration, the great room suggested a rich and festal life; thronging groups below answering to the Tiepolo groups above; beauties patched and masked; gallants in brocaded coats; splendid senators, robed like William ...
— The Marriage of William Ashe • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... inevitable. Before night the street Unter den Linden, from the Brandenburger Thor to the Schlossbrucke, was packed with men overflowing with intense excitement. Without any preconceived arrangement, all the inhabitants decorated their windows with banners and lights, and the streets assumed the festal appearance of rejoicings over a victory. The crowd looked upon this spectacle not as an undecided beginning, but a glorious conclusion. There was no fear in any face, no question as to the future in any eye, but the certainty of triumph in all; as if they ...
— The Malady of the Century • Max Nordau

... the city for several hours, but it was the darkness of a southern night and of a city in festal mood. The stars seemed to stand out from the blue-gray vault above, as if reaching down to the earth—whether in pity or anger, she could not tell. Around the city itself hung the luminous aura of its lights; the cries of revellers sounded from the neighbouring streets,—even the rush of feet,—while, ...
— The Lion's Brood • Duffield Osborne

... through the hotel grounds; while laughs and little shrieks, uttered by the children as their pursuing nurses caught them up for bed, mingled not unpleasantly with the silvery hum arising from the fashionable crowd and the festal clang of ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 92, June, 1865 • Various

... the breathless Hall the Minstrel sate. And Emont's murmur mingled with the Song.— The words of ancient time I thus translate, A festal Strain that hath been ...
— Poems In Two Volumes, Vol. 2 • William Wordsworth

... of May On this our festal day! Gay flowers we'll bring, Sweet blossoms of spring, To crown our ...
— Harper's Young People, May 4, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various

... the semicircular arcade of the main entrance are two reclining figures. On the right is Bacchus, with his grapes and wineskin,—a magnificently "pickled" Bacchus! On the left a woman is listening to the strains of festal music. (p. 32.) Each of the pedestals before the false windows at the ends of the arcade supports a figure of Flora with garlands of flowers. On the ground below the two Floras are two of the most delightful pieces of ...
— The Jewel City • Ben Macomber

... that first brilliant day when Pepita had gone forth in her first festal dress. She remembered it all as she dressed herself on this other morning. The same day seemed to have come again; the same sunshine and deep blue sky. There were the same flowers nodding their heads; Jovita was grumbling a little in her haste, just as she had done then; and ...
— The Pretty Sister Of Jose - 1889 • Frances Hodgson Burnett

... summer residences of Greek and Armenian merchants. Many of these are large and stately houses, surrounded with handsome gardens. The streets are shaded with sycamores, and the number of coffee-houses shows that the place is much frequented on festal days. A company of drunken Greeks were singing in violation of all metre and harmony—a discord the more remarkable, since nothing could be more affectionate than their conduct towards each other. Nearly everybody was in Frank costume, and ...
— The Lands of the Saracen - Pictures of Palestine, Asia Minor, Sicily, and Spain • Bayard Taylor

... magnificence. The panelled wainscot is covered with dingy paint and acquires a duskier hue from the deep shadow into which the Province House is thrown by the brick block that shuts it in from Washington street. A ray of sunshine never visits this apartment any more than the glare of the festal torches which have been extinguished from the era of the Revolution. The most venerable and ornamental object is a chimney-piece set round with Dutch tiles of blue-figured china, representing scenes ...
— Twice Told Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... of embarkation drew clustering crowds upon the bridge and the adjoining river banks. There were the usual waterside rejoicings, as the firing of guns, streaming flags, and hearty cheers; and the water procession had all the festal gaiety with which we have been wont to associate it in the past. The scene was very animating, the river being thickly covered with boats of various descriptions, as well as with no less than seven state barges, filled ...
— Dickens' London • Francis Miltoun

... distress — All these but now within the house we heard: O Death, wast thou too deaf to hear the bird? . . . . . "Nay, Bird; my grief gainsays the Lord's best right. The Lord was fain, at some late festal time, That Keats should set all heaven's woods in rhyme, And Thou in bird-notes. Lo, this tearful night Methinks I see thee, fresh from Death's despite, Perched in a palm-grove, wild with pantomime O'er blissful companies couched in ...
— Bird Neighbors • Neltje Blanchan

... cold eyes and the bad smile she hated, despite his almost dandified meticulous attire and the festal note of his white flower, which she hated with the rest—he was, perhaps, not lying to her. Perhaps for the sake of her mother he had chosen to save her—and, being the man he was, he had been able to make use of ...
— The Head of the House of Coombe • Frances Hodgson Burnett

... procession—men, women, and children—on their way to the flames, to the sound of music, and in festal array, carrying the gold and silver vessels, the roll of the law, the perpetual lamp and the seven branched silver candle-stick of the synagogue. The crowd hoot and jeer ...
— The Poems of Emma Lazarus - Vol. I (of II.), Narrative, Lyric, and Dramatic • Emma Lazarus

... text brings with it all festal ideas of light, society, gladness, and the like, on which I need not dwell. But let me just remind you of one contrast. The ministry of Christ, when He was a servant here upon earth, was symbolised by His washing His disciples' feet, an act which ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren

... untrodden of the sun's feet glimmer, The star-unstricken pavements of the night; Do the lights burn inside? the lights wax dimmer On festal faces ...
— Songs before Sunrise • Algernon Charles Swinburne

... on the next Sunday afternoon alone, gazing at her shadow by the way, she started to see another shadow fall beside it. In spite of his festal midsummer attire of white linen, a sidelong glance assured her that it was Luigi; yet she did not raise her eyes. He continued by ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 84, October, 1864 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... made prisoner a maiden named Iole, in Lydia, after gaining a great victory. Landing in the island of Euboea, he was going to make a great sacrifice to Jupiter, and sent home to Deianira for a festal garment to wear at it. She was afraid he was falling in love with Iole, and steeped the garment in the preparation she had made from Nessus's blood. No sooner did Hercules put it on, than his veins were filled with agony, which nothing could assuage. He tried to tear off the robe, but ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 5 of 8 • Various

... Peter of Oldenburg, the Prince of Saxe-Weimar, Lieutenant-General Sir Harry Smith (the hero of Aliwal), the Bishop of Oxford, and nearly all the gentry of the eastern counties. Cambridge had probably never witnessed such a festal occasion, and never before did her majesty seem so much to enjoy herself. It was generally observed that her fondness for the prince was carried to excess, and that her enjoyment was mainly derived from the honour ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan

... twilight blew, And vast and deep the mountain-shadows grew; When many a fire-fly, shooting thro' the glade, Spangled the locks of many a lovely maid, Who now danc'd forth to strew His path with flowers. And hymn His welcome to celestial bowers. [Footnote 1] There od'rous lamps adorn'd the festal rite, And guavas blush'd as in the vales of light, [Footnote 2] —There silent sat many an unbidden Guest, [Footnote 3] Whose stedfast looks a secret dread impress'd; Not there forgot the sacred fruit that fed At nightly feasts the Spirits of the ...
— Poems • Samuel Rogers

... streets are darkened now that once were ringing Through all the lamp-lit hours with festal fuss, And songs are changed, and so's the time for singing, But I'd be greatly pleased to hear you, Gus, Out in the road there, watched by Anns and Maries, Op'ning your throttle to the mid-day light; Fate gave it you to prove that Tipperary's A ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, November 11, 1914 • Various

... heart-beat, One whom I can love without fear of wound or disenchantment. The mountain clefts have no unkind words, no fault-finding, no ridicule, no rash judgments for the sons of men. They offer clear springs, fresh fruits, and festal flowers, peace ...
— Continental Monthly, Volume 5, Issue 4 • Various

... them to balls or to the opera. The same hour which tolled curfew for our convent, which extinguished each lamp, and dropped the curtain round each couch, rang for the gay city about us the summons to festal enjoyment. Of this contrast I thought not, however: gay instincts my nature had few; ball or opera I had never seen; and though often I had heard them described, and even wished to see them, it was not the wish of one who hopes to partake a pleasure ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte

... there remain twenty-five townships, most of them quite unknown, doubtless made up partly of those seventeen non-voting communities—most of which perhaps were just the oldest subsequently disqualified members of the Alban festal league—partly of a number of other decayed or ejected members of the league, to which latter class above all the ancient presiding township of Alba, also ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen

... long before that, Christmas, in a fur cap and great-coat had swept up the driveway with a jingle of sleigh-bells, behind old Polly, the Doctor's mare, his sleigh packed high with bundles. By the light of a late moon, flinging festal silver on the snow, it might be seen that Christmas resembled a somewhat guilty looking old gentleman ...
— When the Yule Log Burns - A Christmas Story • Leona Dalrymple

... mediaval king; but the general effect was rich and good, whenever the misty English atmosphere supplied sunshine bright enough to pervade it. Tapestry, too, from antique looms, faded, but still gorgeous, was hung upon the walls. Some suits of armor, that hung beneath the festal gallery, were polished till the old battered helmets and pierced breastplates sent a gleam like that with which they had flashed across the battle-fields ...
— Doctor Grimshawe's Secret - A Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... name. But men everywhere commit excesses in this respect, if they have it in their power. With the Roman nobles it was almost a necessity to do so. Could any popular man evade the necessity of keeping a splendid dinner-table? And is there one man in a thousand who can sit at a festal board laden with all the delicacies of remotest climates, and continue to practise an abstinence for which he is not sure of any reward? All his abstinence may be defeated by a premature fate, and in the meantime he is told, with some show of reason, that ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. II (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey

... extraordinary activity in the pantry, the shining cleanliness which imparted such a new and festal guise to certain articles in the salon and drawing-room which I had long known as anything but resplendent, and the arrival of some musicians whom Prince Ivan would certainly not have sent for nothing, no small amount of company was to be expected ...
— Childhood • Leo Tolstoy

... should one of the boys find it he may make a present to his best girl. And in the bargain he gets to kiss Susan. She made some objection about this and said that part of the game didn't go, but I reckon the lucky young man will decide that for hisself. And now to the festal board." ...
— Betty Zane • Zane Grey

... on more wood![356-1]—the wind is chill; But let it whistle as it will, We'll keep our Christmas merry still. Each age has deem'd the new-born year The fittest time for festal cheer:[356-2] And well our Christian sires of old Loved when the year its course had roll'd, And brought blithe Christmas back again, With all his hospitable train.[356-3] Domestic and religious rite[356-4] ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 6 • Charles H. Sylvester

... has marched away proud in the possession of its diplomas, the minds of all concerned turn naturally towards the old institution, the school picnic. On this occasion parents join the teachers and pupils for a summer day's outing in the woods. Great are the preparations for the festal day, and great the rejoicings thereon. For these few brief hours old men and women lay aside their cares and their dignity and become boys and girls again. Those who have known sorrow—and who has not?—take to themselves a day of forgetfulness. Great baskets are loaded ...
— The Uncalled - A Novel • Paul Laurence Dunbar

... the complexion of water in variable weather. He was a bit of a dandy in his way, too. His clothes showed his slim and elastic figure to the best advantage, and a bright-coloured neckerchief with loose flying ends helped out a certain air of festal rural opera which ...
— Bulldog And Butterfly - From "Schwartz" by David Christie Murray • David Christie Murray

... process of einfuehlung. For in art, ideas, like feelings, are objectified in sensation. Only sensations are given; out of the mind come ideas through which the former are interpreted and made into the semblance of things. Consider, for example, Rembrandt's "Night-Watch." A festal mood is there in the golds and reds, and gloom in the blacks; but there also are the men and drums and arms. If we wished to push the analogy with einfuehlung, we might coin a corresponding term—einmeinung, "inmeaning." In all the ...
— The Principles Of Aesthetics • Dewitt H. Parker

... ahead of Raleigh himself. As Raleigh returned to sleep on board the 'War Sprite,' the town of Cadiz was all ablaze with lamps, tapers, and tar barrels, while there came faintly out to the ears of the English sailors a murmur of wild festal music. ...
— Raleigh • Edmund Gosse

... which we find in the very summit of our most exquisite enjoyments, and feel it a charm beyond all the gayety through which it keeps breathing its undertone. In the present case, it was worth a heavier sigh, to reflect that such a festal achievement,—the production of so much art, skill, fancy, invention, and perfect taste,—the growth of all the ages, which appeared to have been ripening for this hour, since man first began to eat and to moisten his food with wine,—must lavish its happiness upon so brief a moment, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, August, 1863, No. 70 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various

... one hero challenged another to drink, wishing him victory and success, and his words rang round the hollow dome. Innumerable candles, tall as spears, illuminated the scene. The eyes of the heroes sparkled, and their faces, white and ruddy, beamed with festal mirth and mutual affection. Their yellow hair shone. Their banqueting attire, white and scarlet, glowed against the outer gloom. Their round brooches and mantle-pins of gold, or silver, or golden bronze, their ...
— The Coming of Cuculain • Standish O'Grady

... and his court were blithe and gay In high-towered Camelot, on Christmas day, For all the Table Round were back again, At peace with God and with their fellow-men. Their shields hung idly on the pictured wall; Their blood-stained banners decked the festal hall Light footsteps, rustling on the rush-strewn floors, And laughter, rippling down long corridors, Attested minds at ease and hearts at play,— Rude Mars unharnessed for love's holiday. In the great hall the Christmas feast was done. The level sunbeams from the setting sun Stretched through ...
— Gawayne And The Green Knight - A Fairy Tale • Charlton Miner Lewis

... Peruvia, for thy favour'd clime The virtues rose, unsullied, and sublime: There melting charity, with ardor warm, Spread her wide mantle o'er th' unshelter'd form; Cheer'd with the festal song, her lib'ral toils, 45 While in the lap of age[D] she pour'd the spoils. Simplicity in every vale was found, The meek nymph smil'd, with reeds, and rushes crown'd; And innocence in light, transparent vest, Mild visitant! the gentle region blest: 50 As from her lip enchanting ...
— Poems (1786), Volume I. • Helen Maria Williams

... comport themselves thus in presence of the subtlest mysteries of faith, the Sceptic cannot be without his peculiar reflections. He, of course, knows that the festal observance of this season is far more ancient than Christianity; but he naturally wonders how people, who imagine it to be a unique feature of their sublimely spiritual creed, remain contented with its extremely sensual character. They profess to believe that the fate of the whole ...
— Arrows of Freethought • George W. Foote

... patriot blood; O'er which, dejected, injur'd Freedom bends, And sighs indignant o'er all Europe sends, Behold a Corsican! In better days Eager I sought my country's fame to raise. Now when I'm exiled from my native land I come to join this classic festal band; To soothe my soul on Avon's sacred stream, And from your joy to catch a ...
— James Boswell - Famous Scots Series • William Keith Leask

... and read it at the tea," advised Anne; "there's something so spirited about it. Is Charity going to decorate the study for the festal occasion? We ought to have something sort of different, ...
— Kit of Greenacre Farm • Izola Forrester

... their lives would moments so full of sweetness and splendor come to them. They were all the sweeter because blended with the homely duties that fell to Antonia's hands. As she went about ordering the breakfast, and giving to the table a festal air, Dare thought of the old Homeric heroes, and the daughters of the kings who ministered to their wants. The bravest of them had done no greater deeds of personal valor than had been done by the little band of American pioneers and hunters with whom he ...
— Remember the Alamo • Amelia E. Barr

... of us, in the interim, partook of a frugal repast; for in this festal day we had to be contented with cold meat. But, on the other hand, the best and oldest wine had been brought out of all the family-cellars, so that in this respect at least we celebrated the ancient festival ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VIII (of X) - Continental Europe II. • Various

... fourteen-foot American flag. Flags of other nations, in smaller bits of bunting, trailed off on either side. The piano stood before the center of the stage, down on the floor. Grouped near were the music stands and chairs for other members of the orchestra on this festal day ...
— The Grammar School Boys in Summer Athletics • H. Irving Hancock

... had even tried to turn it into Latin verse. In Peblis to the Play, the fun is not less nimble although it is a whit more restrained; there is an infectious spirit of spring-time and gaiety in the strain that sings of the festal gathering at Beltane, when burgesses and country folks fared forth 'be firth and forest,' all 'graithed full gay' to take part in the sports. 'All the wenches of the west' were up and stirring by cock-crow, selecting, ...
— The Balladists - Famous Scots Series • John Geddie

... story—that she was always, for her beneficent dragon, under arms; living up, every hour, but especially at festal hours, to the "value" Mrs. Lowder had attached to her. High and fixed, this estimate ruled on each occasion at Lancaster Gate the social scene; so that he now recognised in it something like the artistic idea, the plastic substance, imposed by tradition, by genius, by criticism, ...
— The Wings of the Dove, Volume II • Henry James

... a scene both simple and tragical—of that order in which in society the most horrible incidents occur without a sound, without a gesture, amid phrases of conventionality and in a festal framework! Two of the spectators, at least, besides Julien, understood its importance-Ardea and Hafner. For neither the one nor the other had failed to notice the relations between Madame Steno and Maitland, much less her position with regard to Gorka. The ...
— Cosmopolis, Complete • Paul Bourget

... I ask you to listen to me while I describe briefly an incident which falls outside the story of this Embassy. When Philip took Olynthus he celebrated Olympian games, and gathered together all the artists to the sacrifice and the festal gathering. {193} And while he was entertaining them at a banquet, and crowning the victors, he asked Satyrus, the well-known comic actor, why he alone requested no favour of him. Did he see any meanness in him, or any dislike towards himself? Satyrus answered ...
— The Public Orations of Demosthenes, volume 1 • Demosthenes

... figure first heard early in the first number of this suite, Legend, appears. The thumping accents of the festal dance are now heard again, softly, and soon we hear the opening tune. The wild excitement begins to return, growing to a frenzy in which a reminiscence of the first theme of the Legend may be noticed. Soon the music sinks down again, but never losing its strongly-marked accents, ...
— Edward MacDowell • John F. Porte

... the body's need, Or lamb foredoomed upon some festal day In offering to the guardian gods to bleed, Or kidling which the wolf ...
— Horace • Theodore Martin

... many a crest, Raising my rampired deg. walls of gold as transparent as glass, deg.19 Eager to do and die, yield each his place to the rest: 20 For higher still and higher (as a runner tips with fire, When a great illumination surprises a festal night— Outlining round and round Rome's dome deg. from space to spire) deg.23 Up, the pinnacled glory reached, and the pride of my soul was ...
— Browning's Shorter Poems • Robert Browning

... special tales and let fall on our pages a bit of winter sunshine from the South, the story of a Christmas festival in the land of the rose and magnolia? It is a story which has been repeated so many successive seasons in the life of the South that it has grown to be a part of its being, the joyous festal period in the workday world of the year. The writer once spent Christmas as a guest in the manor house of old Major Delmar, "away down South," and feels like halting to tell the tale of genial merrymaking and free-hearted enjoyment on that ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 2 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris

... colors, High o'er wagon, coach, and horseman; All the people congregated To do homage to th' occasion. Doctors Craig and Cross were speakers, Also Caperton of Richmond. Grand this gala day of feasting, Loud the triumph and rejoicing. But the Whigs were sore defeated, Vain their festal acclamations. ...
— The Song of Lancaster, Kentucky - to the statesmen, soldiers, and citizens of Garrard County. • Eugenia Dunlap Potts

... sat on the steps of his store in French Village in the glory of a stiff white shirt and a festal red vest. The store was closed, of course, in honour of the day. In a few minutes he would put on his black coat, in his official capacity of trustee of the church, and march solemnly over to ring the ...
— The Shepherd of the North • Richard Aumerle Maher

... Bids sound the festal trumpet's call; He rises at the banquet board, And cries, 'mid the drunken revellers all, "Now bring me ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

... pandemic celebration, as in the Saturnalia and other similar festivals. We have certainly no right to regard these celebrations—of either kind—as insincere. They were, at any rate in their inception, genuinely religious or genuinely social and festal; and from either point of view they were far better than the secrecy of private indulgence which characterizes our modern world in these matters. The thorough and shameless commercialism of Sex has alas! been reserved for what ...
— Pagan & Christian Creeds - Their Origin and Meaning • Edward Carpenter

... quite possibly, like the fabled dragon's teeth, spring up into a harvest of armed men to hurl him from his throne. With a sigh of resignation, therefore, he summoned Arima, and, resigning himself into that functionary's hands, submitted to be conducted to the bath, and afterwards attired in the festal garments prepared for the occasion. The bath of warm, delicately perfumed water he found to be so wonderfully refreshing that upon emerging from it all sensation of fatigue had vanished; and by the time that he was completely ...
— Harry Escombe - A Tale of Adventure in Peru • Harry Collingwood

... when he plucked up the courage to return to his palace, he might himself have been amazed at the effusion of infamous loyalty and venal acclamation with which he was received. All Rome poured itself forth to meet him; the Senate appeared in festal robes with their wives and girls and boys in long array; seats and scaffoldings were built up along the road by which he had to pass, as though the populace had gone forth to see a triumph. With haughty mein, the victor of a nation of slaves, he ascended ...
— Seekers after God • Frederic William Farrar

... of Christmas, and the festal celebration of the New Year, beneath a cloudless sky, and with the thermometer at 90, concluded our first visit to Swan River. We left our anchorage in Gage's Road on Thursday, January 4th, devoting several hours to sounding between Rottnest and the main. We bore away ...
— Discoveries in Australia, Volume 1. • J Lort Stokes

... returns thanks for the bride and for himself. The health of the bride's parents is then proposed, and is followed by those of the principal personages present, the toast of the bridesmaids being generally one of the pleasantest features of the festal ceremony. After about two hours, the principal bridesmaid leads the bride out of the room as quietly as possible, so as not to disturb the party or attract attention. Shortly after—it may be in about ten minutes—the absence of the bride ...
— Routledge's Manual of Etiquette • George Routledge

... before entering the house. They must bathe and have their clothes washed before these are again used. When a married man dies his widow breaks her glass bangles and wears only metal bracelets, and so long as she remains a widow she takes no part in any festal celebrations. Every morning for three days after a death rice is cooked and laid in the veranda for dogs to eat. No other food is cooked in the house of death, the family being supplied by their friends. During these three days prayers ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India—Volume I (of IV) • R.V. Russell

... many a saddle of golden red, dainty shields and lordly armor to the feasting on the Rhine. Many a wounded man was seen full merry since. Even those who lay abed in stress of wounds, must needs forget the bitterness of death. Men ceased to mourn for the weak and sick and joyed in prospect of the festal day, and how well they would fare at the feasting of the king. Pleasure without stint and overabundance of joy pervaded all the folk which there were seen. Therefore great rejoicing arose throughout ...
— The Nibelungenlied • Unknown

... march; capricious too his humor; but he is neither "sullen" nor "sad." No brighter skies than his, whether the sun with rays of mitigated warmth but of intenser light, sparkles o'er boundless fields of snow, or whether the moon, a faded sun, leading her festal train of stars, listens to the merry sleigh-bells and the laugh of girls and boys, ever glorified a land. What though sometimes his trumpet sounds tremendous and frowns o'erspread his face! Transient is his anger, and even then from his white beard he shakes a blessing, ...
— The Lost Hunter - A Tale of Early Times • John Turvill Adams

... never been known even in this festal environment. The richest of the land vied with one another in making the affair a vast financial success. The ever gallant Tommy Dare left the scene twenty times for the mere privilege of paying his way in and out that many times over at ten dollars each way. The doll which Senator Defew ...
— Mrs. Raffles - Being the Adventures of an Amateur Crackswoman • John Kendrick Bangs

... "former" of her child. As Henry Ward Beecher has well said, "the mother's heart is the child's school-room." Well might the Egyptian mother-goddess say (167. 261): "I am the mother who shaped thy beauties, who suckled thee with milk; I give thee with my milk festal things, that penetrate thy limbs with life, strength, and youth; I make thee to become the—great ruler of Egypt, lord of the space which the sun circles round." In the land of the Pharaohs they knew in some dim ...
— The Child and Childhood in Folk-Thought • Alexander F. Chamberlain

... Littlefield commenced operations with a hatchet and a chisel. Progress was slow, as that evening he had been invited to attend a festal gathering. On Friday the janitor, before resuming work, acquainted two of the Professors of the college with his proposed investigation, and received their sanction. As Webster, however, was going constantly in and out of his rooms, he could make little ...
— A Book of Remarkable Criminals • H. B. Irving

... when our story properly opens, Mr. and Mrs. Burton Jerrold and their son Grey, a well grown lad of fourteen, left their home on Beacon street, and with crowds of other city people took the train for the country, to keep the festal day. ...
— Bessie's Fortune - A Novel • Mary J. Holmes

... a king here, Or what is a boor? Here all starve together, All dwarfed and poor; Here Death's hand knocketh At door after door, 30 He thins the dancers From the festal floor. ...
— Goblin Market, The Prince's Progress, and Other Poems • Christina Rossetti

... angularity and its rending thrust, but as a weapon contrived by man's wit and driven home by his muscle. The cup appeals to him not only by its shape, and by the rush of the foaming wine, but as fashioned by the potter's wheel, and flashing at the festal board. His delight in complex technicalities, in the tangled issues of the law-courts, and the intertwining harmonies of Bach, sprang from his joy in the play of mind as well as from his joy in mere intricacy as such. His mountains are gashed and cleft and carved not only because their intricacy ...
— Robert Browning • C. H. Herford

... apparent on the second night after taking possession of the new house, when it was "declared open" in state, on which occasion it was lit up by no less than two of the ship's lanterns as a sort of house warming in honour of the event. Snowball was also allowed by Mr Meldrum to spread the festal board with as luxurious a feast as their scanty supplies permitted, a bottle of wine being subsequently produced for the ladies and grog served out ...
— The Wreck of the Nancy Bell - Cast Away on Kerguelen Land • J. C. Hutcheson

... champetre was gay and brilliant, as such festal scenes are at Paris. A lovely night in the midst of May, lamps below and stars above; the society mixed, of course. Evidently, when Graham has singled out Frederic Lemercier from all his acquaintances at Paris to conjoin with the official aid of M. Renard in search of the mysterious ...
— The Parisians, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... the one with the heartiest expressions of gratitude, the other with a hurried inclination of her veiled head. Thence he drove on to the Three Crowns, where he designed to lie. The streets were still crowded with holiday-makers and decked out with festal hangings. Tapestries and silken draperies adorned the balconies of the houses, innumerable tiny lamps framed the doors and windows, and the street-shrines were dressed with a profusion of flowers; ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton

... array of Matrons and Girls in festal robes, as worn in the rites of the Furies, now called Eumenides or 'Gentle Goddesses' [thus spectacular effect with which Aeschylus loved to conclude]. They, with Athene, chanting the Ritual hymn, file down into the Orchestra, ...
— Story of Orestes - A Condensation of the Trilogy • Richard G. Moulton

... The[h] festal Blazes, the triumphal Show, The ravish'd Standard, and the captive Foe, The Senate's Thanks, the Gazette's pompous Tale, With Force resistless o'er the Brave prevail. Such Bribes the rapid Greek o'er Asia whirl'd, For such the steady Romans ...
— The Vanity of Human Wishes (1749) and Two Rambler papers (1750) • Samuel Johnson

... On gala and festal occasions the Fijians were wonderfully and fantastically dressed up, their huge heads of hair thickly covered with a red or yellow powder, and they themselves wearing large skirts or "sulus" of coloured "tapa" and pandanus ribbons and necklaces of coloured seeds, shells, and pigs'-tusks. ...
— Wanderings Among South Sea Savages And in Borneo and the Philippines • H. Wilfrid Walker

... like to," she murmured, faintly, "but it would be a ghastly sight—a poor blind girl sitting at the festal board with the gay guests. Oh! why did God put such a terrible affliction upon me?" throwing out her little white hands and beating the air as she sobbed aloud in her agony. "Why can I not enter into his joys, and share them with him as others do? Oh, Katy! will I not make but a sorry wife for ...
— Pretty Madcap Dorothy - How She Won a Lover • Laura Jean Libbey

... and sing and play, Not a cloud is in the skies; This is going to be my day. See the tiny dew-drop glisten In my glancing golden ray; See the shadows dancing, listen To the lark so blithe and gay. Up, children, dance and play, This is my own festal day. ...
— A Student in Arms - Second Series • Donald Hankey

... at length one Sabbath morning—deep-voiced church-bells shook the air— While in festal garb the church-folk wandered to their house of prayer, Reached their ears a hollow thunder from the glaciers overhead, And huge blocks of ice came crashing downward to the river's bed, And in silence, Wrathful silence, Down the seething ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - April, 1873, Vol. XI, No. 25. • Various

... loitered on the spot, It seemed as Ellen marked him not; But when he turned him to the glade, One courteous parting sign she made; And after, oft the knight would say, That not when prize of festal day Was dealt him by the brightest fair Who e'er wore jewel in her hair, So highly did his bosom swell As at that simple mute farewell. Now with a trusty mountain-guide, And his dark stag-hounds by his side, He parts,—the maid, unconscious still, Watched ...
— The Lady of the Lake • Sir Walter Scott

... watch'd o'er Numida, And brings him safe from far Hispania's shore. Now, returning, he bestows On each, dear comrade all the love he can; But to Lamia most he owes, By whose sweet side he grew from boy to man. Note we in our calendar This festal day with whitest mark from Crete: Let it flow, the old wine-jar, And ply to Salian time your restless feet. Damalis tosses off her wine, But Bassus sure must prove her match to-night. Give us roses all to twine, And parsley green, ...
— Odes and Carmen Saeculare of Horace • Horace

... By the lanes, and woods, and waters, And brought music, mirth, and gladness, That the monarch heard the gay notes, And removed his sombre garments, And his frowns and dismal broodings, Donning in their stead right gladly His accustomed festal garments, And his manner bright and cheerful. Three great princes had Nimaera, Who held each a post of honor In the ruling of the kingdom, In the keeping of the subjects. Wisdom had they, and were vested Much in favor, ...
— A Leaf from the Old Forest • J. D. Cossar

... prince of the Jaloofs, arrived at Arguin, as a suppliant for foreign aid, in recovering his dominions from a more powerful competitor or usurper. He was received with open arms, and conveyed to Lisbon, where he experienced a brilliant reception, his visit being celebrated by all the festal exhibitions peculiar to that age, bull-fights, puppet-shows, and even feats of dogs. On that occasion, Bemoy made a display of the agility of his native attendants, who on foot, kept pace with the swift horses, mounting and alighting from these animals at full gallop After being ...
— Lander's Travels - The Travels of Richard Lander into the Interior of Africa • Robert Huish

... protest. We need not complain very loudly that while remonstrating against the restless intrepidity of the rationalists of his generation, he passed over the central truth, namely that the full and ever festal life is found in active freedom of curiosity and search taking significance, motive, force, from a warm inner pulse of human love and sympathy. It was not given to Rousseau to see all this, but it was given to him to see the side of it for ...
— Rousseau - Volumes I. and II. • John Morley

... for festal dainties spread, Like my bowl of milk and bread,— Pewter spoon and bowl of wood, On the door-stone, gray and rude! O'er me, like a regal tent, Cloudy-ribbed, the sunset bent, Purple-curtained, fringed with gold. Looped ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For • Various

... the arrival of the Anne all Plymouth put on festal gear and merry faces. Good cheer abounded in place of famine, for the new-comers were well stored with provision, and although this was not turned into the common stock, those who had promising crops—and since the Fast Day there had been no stint of rain, and the corn promised marvelously ...
— Standish of Standish - A story of the Pilgrims • Jane G. Austin

... nine o'clock of a Saturday morning. That Saturday was some sort of a festal day for the Chinese, and at the hour mentioned, a dragon a block long, consisting of a hundred Celestials covered with papier-mache, was twisting and ...
— Owen Clancy's Happy Trail - or, The Motor Wizard in California • Burt L. Standish

... came the inauguration, with Lyons's eloquent address. Selma, of course, had special privileges—a reserved gallery in the State House, to which she issued cards of admission to friends of her own selection. Occupying in festal attire the centre of this conspicuous group, she felt that she was the cynosure of every eye. She perceived that she was constantly pointed out as the second personage of the occasion. To the few legislators on the floor whom she already knew she took pains to bow from ...
— Unleavened Bread • Robert Grant

... to look at him for the greater part of block, when, their progress bringing them in sight of Miss Amy Rennsdale's place of residence their attention was directed to a group of men bearing festal burdens—encased violins, a shrouded harp and other beckoning shapes. There were signs, too, that most of "those invited" intended to miss no moment of this party; guests already indoors watched from the windows the ...
— Penrod and Sam • Booth Tarkington

... landed again, and found their new friends on the same spot, to the number of eighty or more, seated under a shelter of boughs, in festal attire of smoke-tanned deer-skins, painted in many colors. The party then rowed up the river, the Indians following them along the shore. As they advanced, coasting the borders of a great marsh that lay upon their left, the St. John's spread before them in vast ...
— Pioneers Of France In The New World • Francis Parkman, Jr.

... beauty of the dresses and the amount of blue and white silk, the room had a festal rather than a funereal look. When all the guests had arrived, tea and sweetmeats were passed round; incense was burned profusely; litanies were mumbled, and the bustle of moving to the grave began, during which I secured a place near the gate of the ...
— Unbeaten Tracks in Japan • Isabella L. Bird

... and Mrs. Bright, wife of the Superintendent of Police, was specially noted for her hospitality in this respect. The brief intervals spent at home by her husband between his rounds of inspection or inquiry in his District were always celebrated by herself and her daughter as festal occasions; and their friends were gathered together at short notice to eat, not the "fatted calf," as that would have offended the religious susceptibilities of the Hindus who held the animal sacred, but one of the fattened geese kept available for ...
— Banked Fires • E. W. (Ethel Winifred) Savi

... festal morning, and the monarch left his hall, Bhishma and the pious Kripa with the lords and ...
— Maha-bharata - The Epic of Ancient India Condensed into English Verse • Anonymous

... of a bunch of cabins branded Crabtown, and became, in popular superstition at least, the yearly rendezvous of the voodoos. Then all at once in latter days it bloomed out in electrical, horticultural, festal, pyrotechnical splendor as "Spanish Fort," and the carriages ...
— Strange True Stories of Louisiana • George Washington Cable

... of this home shows us a festal scene. A dinner was given in honor of Jesus. It was only a few days before his death. Here, again, the sisters appear, each true to her own character. Martha is serving, as she always is; and again Mary ...
— Personal Friendships of Jesus • J. R. Miller

... dim hosts that narrow and recede Dear unforgotten eyes salute us still, Look back a moment, make our pulses thrill With the old music, though the festal weed Of Spring be cypress-girt, oblivion ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, June 9, 1920 • Various

... found in ancient British sites. These primitive appliances preceded the circular rotatory querns in evolution, and as the monuments prove were used in ancient Egypt. I cannot say whether, amongst the Euahlayi, there was a recognised licence as to exchange of wives on these festal occasions, or at boorahs. If the custom existed, I was not told of it by the blacks; but it is quite possible that, unless I made inquiries on the subject, I ...
— The Euahlayi Tribe - A Study of Aboriginal Life in Australia • K. Langloh Parker

... mirth and morals blend, Let not your heroes doff their robes of red To talk low language in a homely shed, Nor, in their fear of crawling, mount too high, Catching at clouds and aiming at the sky. Melpomene, when bidden to be gay, Like matron dancing on a festal day, Deals not in idle banter, nor consorts Without reserve ...
— The Satires, Epistles, and Art of Poetry • Horace

... historian, Johann Busch (1400-1477), told of his meeting a woman, the wife or daughter of a soldier, on some public festal occasion at Halle in Prussian Saxony. Observing that she wore a little bag suspended from her neck, he asked her what it contained. Thereupon the woman showed him a bit of parchment bearing divers mystic inscriptions, and the statement ...
— Primitive Psycho-Therapy and Quackery • Robert Means Lawrence

... the probable fate of poor Daniel Robson; he had a warm sympathy with the miserable distress of the wife and daughter; but still at the back of his mind his spirits danced as if this was to them a festal occasion. He had even taken unconscious pleasure in Phoebe's suspicious looks and tones, as he had hurried and superintended her in her operations. A fire blazed cheerily in the parlour, almost dazzling to the travellers brought in from the darkness and the rain; candles burned—two ...
— Sylvia's Lovers, Vol. II • Elizabeth Gaskell

... for a walk. You cross the meadow as far as the little river, bordered with willows, then the chapel is reached by a hollow lane hedged with quicksets. The sweet month of May had begun. Three evenings a week the little nave was in festal dress, and filled with light, and ...
— The Grip of Desire • Hector France

... KHUR-UM, King of Tyre, Movers says, first performed this ceremony. These facts we learn from Josephus, Servius on the Æneid, and the Dionysiacs of Nonnus; and through a coincidence that cannot be fortuitous, the same day was at Rome the Dies Natalis Solis Invicti, the festal day of the invincible Sun. Under this title, HERCULES, HAR-acles, was worshipped at Tsūr. Thus, while the temple was being erected, the death and resurrection of a Sun-God was annually represented at Tsūr, by Solomon's ally, at the winter solstice, by the pyre of MAL-KARTH, ...
— Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry • Albert Pike

... of later years, I care not for; I know not why, But from them ever distant fly: Here in my native place, As if of alien race, My spring of life I like a hermit pass. This day, that to the evening now gives way, Is in our town an ancient holiday. Hark, through the air, that voice of festal bell, While rustic guns in frequent thunders sound, Reverberated from the hills around. In festal robes arrayed, The neighboring youth, Their houses leaving, o'er the roads are spread; They pleasant looks exchange, and in their hearts Rejoice. I, lonely, in this distant spot, ...
— The Poems of Giacomo Leopardi • Giacomo Leopardi

... read or write, without ability to project themselves into the future, or to compare themselves with the past, or even to range their experience with the experience of other communities, gathered in festal mood, and by loud song, perfect rhythm and energetic dance, expressing their feelings over an event of quite local origin, present appeal and common interest. Here, in point of evolution, is the human basis of poetry, the ...
— A Study of Poetry • Bliss Perry

... wear his sword Beside the strange king's festal board Where feasted many a knight and lord In seemliness of fair accord: And Balen asked of one beside, "Is there not in this court, if fame Keep faith, a knight that hath to name Garlon?" and saying that word of shame, He ...
— The Tale of Balen • Algernon Charles Swinburne

... uncertain footsteps were coaxed forth by a lure, and cheered onward like a triumphal progress by admiring brothers and sisters. It was the morning of New-Year's day, which had always been held as a high festival in the family, as it is in many families of New England, all the merriment and festal observance elsewhere bestowed upon Christmas having been transferred by Puritan preferences to ...
— Mrs Whittelsey's Magazine for Mothers and Daughters - Volume 3 • Various

... Of features or of form, but mind and habits; Count Sigismund was proud, but gay and free,— A warrior and a reveller; he dwelt not 20 With books and solitude, nor made the night A gloomy vigil, but a festal time, Merrier than day; he did not walk the rocks And forests like a wolf, nor turn aside From men and ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 4 • Lord Byron

... left us on the veldt-side, but we felt we couldn't stop, On this, our England's crowning festal day; We're the men of Magersfontein, we're the men of Spion Kop, Colenso,—we're the men who had to pay. We're the men who paid the blood-price. Shall the grave be all our gain? You owe us. Long and heavy is the score. Then cheer us for our glory now, and cheer us for our pain, And cheer ...
— Songs of a Sourdough • Robert W. Service

... his Highness. Upon which the beautiful maiden in her bridal robes, and the myrtle wreath on her hair, stepped in. At which sight his Grace, who was reclining on a couch, started up, took her hand smiling, and asked—"For the love of Heaven, what brought her hither upon her festal-day?" ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V2 • William Mienhold

... January the Casino was in an uproar. A number of mechanics, painters, and florists were busy transforming the rooms and corridors, even the veranda, with its adjoining conservatory, into a suite of daintily decorated festal halls. Numerous booths and tents were being erected, and all other preparations were made worthily to receive Prince Carnival, whose coming was timed for the first ...
— A Little Garrison - A Realistic Novel of German Army Life of To-day • Fritz von der Kyrburg

... life and energy into him, and as a result his works became quickly known all over Europe. His mind was literally teeming with original themes, which crowded each other, struggling to be expressed. First there was the "Mass in E flat," a beautiful, original work; then a festal Cantata, "Nature and Love," written to celebrate the Queen of Saxony's birthday. After this the "Jubilee Cantata," composed to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the reign of Augustus, of Saxony. The Italian faction prevented a performance of the whole ...
— The World's Great Men of Music - Story-Lives of Master Musicians • Harriette Brower

... end,—partly warlike and partly monastic, describing the adventures of knights and monks. It deals with wizards, harpers, dwarfs, priests, warriors, and noble dames. It sings of love and wassailings, of gentle ladies' tears, of castles and festal halls, of pennons ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIII • John Lord

... an old Englishman who, loyal to his king and country, denounced as rebels the followers of Washington. Against these, however, he would not raise his hand, for among them were many long-tried friends who had gathered with him around the festal board; so he chose the only remaining alternative, and went back to his native country, cherishing the hope that he should one day return to the home he loved so well, and listen again to the musical flow of the brook, which could be distinctly heard from ...
— Maggie Miller • Mary J. Holmes

... accident to my team that I'm forced to intrude at a time like this," she apologized to Nicola. He was an old man, gaunt and bowed, and his festal trappings seemed rather ...
— Joan of Arc of the North Woods • Holman Day

... Before him, with its plains expanding vast, Peopled with visions, and enrich'd with dreams; Dim cities, ancient forests, winding streams, Places resounding in the famous past, A kingdom ready to his hand! How like a bride Life seems to stand In welcome, and with festal robes array'd! He feels her loveliness pervade And pierce him with inexplicable sweetness; And, in her smiles delighting, and the fires Of his own pulses, passionate soul! Measures his strength by his desires, And the wide future by their fleetness, As his thought ...
— Primavera - Poems by Four Authors • Stephen Phillips, Laurence Binyon, Manmohan Ghose and Arthur Shearly Cripps

... are that languish on this festal day Damned and impounded for lese-majeste; We, William, in Our plentitude of grace, Propose to pardon every hundredth case; And though their sentence was no more than just We offer each a copy of Our bust, ...
— The Battle of the Bays • Owen Seaman

... really is, than as it sometimes appears. The danger of intemperance is when it assumes this very garb of respectability, and sits in the radiant circle of fashion attended by wit and beauty and social delight. Let us see the Tempter, not as he seems when he throws out his earliest lures, in festal garments and with roses around his brow; but as he looks when fairly engaged in his work, showing his genuine expression. Let us see this vice of intemperance in its results, as they teem and darken here in the midst of our city life. Lay bare its channel—let ...
— Humanity in the City • E. H. Chapin

... has been wasted in Manila and in the outside presidios in firing salutes to the persons who govern the provinces, and on festal days, as appears by the different accounts of the administration of the royal estate, is considerable; and inasmuch as this cannot be regulated with certainty, it is diminished by eight hundred pesos per year, for according to the revision, powder ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 • Various

... baby might easily have escaped. I dare say as we get more civilized out there, we shall build ourselves handsome prisons and penitentiaries; but in those early days a story was current of a certain jailor who let all his captives out on some festal occasion, using the tremendous threat, that whoever had not returned by eight o'clock should ...
— Station Amusements • Lady Barker

... which consisted of a principal salon and adjoining rooms with bare flagstone floors, and ceilings of beams and painted wooden paneling. The walls of the rooms were whitewashed, and only in the wealthiest houses were they covered with tapestries, and in these only on festal occasions. In the fifteenth century the walls of few houses were adorned with pictures, and these usually consisted of only a few family portraits. If Vannozza decorated her salon with any likenesses, that ...
— Lucretia Borgia - According to Original Documents and Correspondence of Her Day • Ferdinand Gregorovius

... is beautiful, Mona," she said, suddenly bringing her attention from her own raiment to the festal preparation. ...
— Patty's Social Season • Carolyn Wells

... courage of our hearts, Our bodies should fall faint. We heard without, Already ere the morning light was full, The din of preparation, and the hum Of voices gathering in the upper tiers; Yet had we seen so often in our thoughts The picture of this strange and cruel death, Its festal horror, and its bloody pomp, The nearness scarcely moved us, and our hands Met in ...
— Alcyone • Archibald Lampman

... shelter of the noisy music,—the common, tedious, tippler's quarrel. It rose higher and higher. The fiddler looked askance at it over his fiddle. Chirac cautiously observed it. Instead of attending to the music, the festal company attended to the quarrel. Three waiters in a group watched it with an impartial sporting interest. The English ...
— The Old Wives' Tale • Arnold Bennett

... warfare of the week. The loveliness of nature on the Ionian shores, and in the isles that crown the AEgean deep, was soon embellished by the genius of art. Stately processions, hymns chanted in honor of the gods, graceful dances before the altars, statues, and shrines, assemblies for festal or solemn purposes in the open air under the soft sky of Ionia, or within the halls of princes and nobles—these fill up the moments of the new and dazzling existence which the excitable Hellenic race are invited here and ...
— Mosaics of Grecian History • Marcius Willson and Robert Pierpont Willson

... little white bride is left alone With him, her lord; the guests have gone; The festal hall is dim. No jesting now, nor answering mirth. The hush of sleep falls on the earth And leaves ...
— Songs, Merry and Sad • John Charles McNeill

... were in the nature of dramatic entertainments. There were often many persons present, and ladies as conspicuous as at bull fights. There is no more objections offered to photographing an execution than a cock fight, which is the sport about which the Filipinos are crazily absorbed. It is the festal character to the Spaniard of the rebel shooting that permits the actualities to be reproduced, and hence these strange ...
— The Story of the Philippines and Our New Possessions, • Murat Halstead

... end,—partly warlike and partly monastic, describing the adventures of knights and monks. It deals with wizards, harpers, dwarfs, priests, warriors, and noble dames. It sings of love and wassailings, of gentle ladies' tears, of castles and festal halls, ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIII • John Lord

... are commonly insisted upon by the reapers as customary things, and a part of their due for the toils of the harvest, and complied with by their masters perhaps more through regards of interest than inclination; for should they refuse them the pleasures of this much-expected time, this festal night, the youth especially, of both sexes would decline serving them for the future, and employ their labors for others, who would promise them the rustic joys of the harvest-supper, mirth and music, dance and song. These feasts appear to be the relics of Pagan ...
— Eugene Aram, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... recognize as himself. He was not sated, he was not cheerless, he was not unamiable. He was all a-quiver with youth and enthusiasm and the joy of great living. He had left behind him friends whom he knew were not "the flatterers of the festal hour"—friends whom he returned to mourn and nobly celebrate. Byron was not Harold, but Harold was an ideal Byron, the creature and avenger of his pride, which haunted and pursued its presumptuous creator ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 2 • George Gordon Byron



Words linked to "Festal" :   merry, joyous, festive, gay



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