Free Translator Free Translator
Translators Dictionaries Courses Other
Home
English Dictionary      examples: 'day', 'get rid of', 'New York Bay'




Levee   Listen
verb
Levee  v. t.  To keep within a channel by means of levees; as, to levee a river. (U. S.)






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








Advanced search
     Find words:
Starting with
Ending with
Containing
Matching a pattern  

Synonyms
Antonyms
Quotes
Words linked to  

only single words



Share |





"Levee" Quotes from Famous Books



... wintry appearance when our travelers left Chicago. It was a genial spring day when they landed at St. Louis; the birds were singing, the blossoms of peach trees in city garden plots, made the air sweet, and in the roar and tumult on the long river levee they found an excitement that accorded with their ...
— The Gilded Age, Complete • Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner

... King's Bench walks in the Temple. There I shall have all the privacy of a house without the encumbrance, and shall be able to lock my friends out as often as I desire to hold free converse with my immortal mind; for my present lodgings resemble a minister's levee, I have so increased my acquaintance (as they call 'em), since I have resided in town. Like the country mouse, that had tasted a little of urban manners, I long to be nibbling my own cheese by my dear self without mouse-traps and time-traps. By my new plan, ...
— Charles Lamb • Walter Jerrold

... he said, at length, with not a little stiffness in his manner, while Charles had no less awkwardness in receiving him; "you have been holding a levee this morning; I thought I should never get to see you. Sit you down; let us both sit down, and let me at last have a word or ...
— Loss and Gain - The Story of a Convert • John Henry Newman

... opinion 'much the dullest'), that Fielding found his wife. Doubtless his six years about town, as hackney author, with his good birth, his brilliant wit, and his scanty means, had made him well acquainted with every phase of society, "from the Minister at his Levee, to the Bailiff at his spunging-house; from the Duchess at her drum, to the Landlady behind her bar"; but it was in the rural seclusion of an old cathedral town that he wooed and won the beautiful Miss Cradock. Indeed it is impossible to conceive of Sophia as for ever domiciled in streets. ...
— Henry Fielding: A Memoir • G. M. Godden

... said he, "of weekly receptions, when all the people were at liberty to partake of the good cheer of the President's house, there had been substituted one cold, stiff, formal, and ceremonious assembly on the first day of every year. At this annual levee, notwithstanding its pomp and pageantry, no expense whatever is incurred by the President personally. No fruits, cake, wine, coffee, hard cider, or other refreshments of any kind are tendered to his guests. ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore

... protected by a dyke, behind which sharpshooters were thought to be lurking. Commander Macomb ordered the marines of the squadron to land, and under command of Acting Ensign Fesset, of the Wyalusing, to move along the bank, behind the levee, and look out for the enemy. They soon found the rebel pickets and skirmished with them, the rebels being driven back towards the point. Soon a large body of rebels was found, and a brisk little action took place. A prisoner being captured by Sergeant Kane, ...
— Reminiscences of Two Years in the United States Navy • John M. Batten

... laughing at it then (though Sandy held a levee in the evening), they were all so stricken with amazement. By one movement they swung round to see what had fascinated Cathro, and the other classes doing likewise, Tommy became suddenly the centre of observation. Big tears were slinking down his ...
— Sentimental Tommy - The Story of His Boyhood • J. M. Barrie

... on M. de Marboeuf. Signor Buttafoco introduced me to him, and I presented him the letter of recommendation from Paoli. He gave me a most polite reception. The brilliancy of his levee pleased me; it was a scene so different from those which I had been for some time accustomed to see. It was like passing at once from a rude and early age to a polished modern age; from the mountains of Corsica to the ...
— Boswell's Correspondence with the Honourable Andrew Erskine, and His Journal of a Tour to Corsica • James Boswell

... ten years according to some calculations, or ten eternities,—the heart and the almanac never agree about time,—but one morning old Champigny (they used to call him Champignon) was walking along his levee front, calculating how soon the water would come over, and drown him out, as the Louisianians say. It was before a seven-o'clock breakfast, cold, wet, rainy, and discouraging. The road was knee-deep in mud, and so broken up with hauling, that it was like walking upon waves to get over it. A shower ...
— Balcony Stories • Grace E. King

... almost every hour. For let me ask, to a man of an ingenuous and liberal mind, who knows the relish of elegant enjoyments, what can yield such true delight, as a concourse of the most respectable characters crowding to his levee? How must it enhance his pleasure, when he reflects, that the visit is not paid to him because he is rich, and wants an heir [a], or is in possession of a public office, but purely as a compliment to ...
— A Dialogue Concerning Oratory, Or The Causes Of Corrupt Eloquence • Cornelius Tacitus

... collectors whose acquaintance he had lately made in lounging about the Redwood Library. But the fact was, his Newport season would have been ruined had he left the volumes in town. The books were spread out on his table, where they held a sort of levee; every book-fancier in all Newport had to call and pay his respects to the rare volumes and to ...
— The Faith Doctor - A Story of New York • Edward Eggleston

... voices took up the cry, and a howling mob, mostly of soldiers, were at his heels. He hoped to reach the river, where among the immense piles of stores heaped along the levee, or among the shipping, he might secrete himself, but a patrol guard suddenly appeared a block away, and his retreat was cut off. He gave himself up for lost, and reached for a small pistol which he carried, with the intention of putting a bullet through his own heart; "for," thought ...
— Raiding with Morgan • Byron A. Dunn

... Melisselda, rapt in heavenly joy, now confidently expecting the miracle that would crown the miracle of his career, prepared to set out for Constantinople to take the Crown from the Sultan's head to the sound of music. He held a last solemn levee at Smyrna, and there, surrounded by his faithful followers, with Melisselda radiantly enthroned at his side, he proceeded to parcel out the world ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill

... conversation—duels, duels, and once again duels. The company consisted principally of Halle students, and Halle formed, in consequence, the nucleus of their discourse. The window-panes of Court-Councilor Schuetz were exegetically illuminated. Then it was mentioned that the King of Cyprus' last levee had been very brilliant; that the monarch had chosen a natural son; that he had married with the left hand a princess of the house of Lichtenstein; that the State-mistress had been forced to resign, and that the entire ministry, greatly moved, had wept according to rule. I ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VI. • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke

... crowns, and camps, and churches, and cabinets, as if they were the titular dignitaries of the chessboard! Amid all these changes, he stood immutable as adamant. It mattered little whether in the field, or in the drawing-room; with the mob, or the levee; wearing the Jacobin bonnet, or the iron crown; banishing a Braganza, or espousing a Hapsburg; dictating peace on a raft to the Czar of Russia, or contemplating defeat at the gallows of Leipsic he was still the same ...
— McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey

... day and evening, summer though it was and the levee and sugar sheds and cotton-yards virtually empty, I was kept by unexpected business and could not go near St. Peter Street. Both my partners were away on their vacations. But on the third afternoon our office regained its summer quiet and I was driving my pen through the last ...
— Strong Hearts • George W. Cable

... rustic lodge, of which Haliburton has given a charming description. 'Twas on the 11th of August the youthful colonel, with his fine regiment, landed in the Lower Town; on the 12th was held in his honour, at the Chateau St. Louis, a levee, whereat attended the authorities, civil, military and clerical, together with the gentry. In the afternoon "the ladies were presented to the Prince in the Chateau." Who, then, attended this levee? Did he dance? If so, ...
— Picturesque Quebec • James MacPherson Le Moine

... titles were: "The Lioness's Ball," "The Lobster's Voyage to the Brazils," "The Cat's Concert," "The Fishes' Grand Gala," "Madame Grimalkin's Party," "The Jackdaw's Home," "The Lion's Parliament," "The Water King's Levee;" and in 1809, by which time, naturally enough, the idea seems to have become quite threshed out and exhausted, the last of the Series was published; this was entitled, "The Three Wishes, or Think ...
— The Butterfly's Ball and the Grasshopper's Feast • Mr. Roscoe

... the night of a levee at the White House. The East Room was crowded with smartly dressed men and women of the capital, quaintly simple legislators from remote States in bygone fashions, officers in uniform, and the diplomatic circle blazing with orders. The invoker of this brilliant assembly stood ...
— Tales of Trail and Town • Bret Harte

... Creek there are about twenty acres of overflowed land which could easily be reclaimed by dyking. Along Canoe Passage there is a considerably larger tract of tide-land, probably 150 acres, which from two to three feet of levee would protect from overflow. Proceeding northward there is no open country until Deleatlay* is reached, where there are about 900 acres of level land, about one-half of which is subject to overflow at high tides. This produces an abundant growth ...
— Official report of the exploration of the Queen Charlotte Islands - for the government of British Columbia • Newton H. Chittenden

... rounded the corner by an old hop-house and kept on down the levee. Now that the presence of the others was withdrawn, the two looked about them differently and began themselves to give off an influence instead of being pressed upon by overpowering personalities. Frogs were chorusing in the near swamp, ...
— Miss Lulu Bett • Zona Gale

... couple of hours later, when Captain Blood, as spruce and cool as if he had just come from a levee, stepped upon the quarter-deck of the Victoriense, to confront M. de Rivarol, still in bedgown ...
— Captain Blood • Rafael Sabatini

... tobacco, whose broke to home, and so on. Then go to the park, and see what's a goin' on there; whether those pretty critturs, the rads are a holdin' a prime minister 'parsonally responsible,' by shootin' at him; or whether there is a levee, or the Queen is ridin' out, or what not; take a look at the world, make a visit or two to kill time, when all at once it's dark. Home then, smoke a cigar, dress for dinner, and arrive ...
— The Attache - or, Sam Slick in England, Complete • Thomas Chandler Haliburton

... and cleaning the shoes of John the footman; who, being drest himself, applies his hands to the same labours for Mr Second-hand, the squire's gentleman; the gentleman in the like manner, a little later in the day, attends the squire; the squire is no sooner equipped than he attends the levee of my lord; which is no sooner over than my lord himself is seen at the levee of the favourite, who, after the hour of homage is at an end, appears himself to pay homage to the levee of his sovereign. Nor is there, perhaps, in ...
— Joseph Andrews Vol. 1 • Henry Fielding

... hang-dog ruffian, scouring the ventilator? So, that's Rowland, of the navy, is it! Well, this is a tumble. Wasn't he broken for conduct unbecoming an officer? Got roaring drunk at the President's levee, didn't he? I think I read ...
— The Wreck of the Titan - or, Futility • Morgan Robertson

... set them on foot for the benefice of the poorer classes, or work people; and Dane has imported them. He receives the employes of the mills,' said Prudentia, chuckling,—'whoever will come and pay a penny; his own workmen and the others. The levee is held on Saturday nights; and Dane lays himself out to amuse them with reading to them and singing. Fancy it! Fancy Dane reading all sorts of things to those audiences! and the evenings are so interesting, I am told, that they do not disperse ...
— Wych Hazel • Susan and Anna Warner

... Mtesa, the King of Uganda, sent his pages to announce a levee at the palace in my honour. I prepared for my presentation at court in my best, but cut a sorry figure in comparison with the dressy Waganda. The preliminary ceremonies were so dilatory, that I allowed five minutes to the court to ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume 19 - Travel and Adventure • Various

... occasional rupture, in case of which the rush of the waters through the breach is more destructive than the natural flow of the highest inundation. [Footnote: To secure the city of Sacramento, in California, from the inundations to which it is subject, a dike or levee was built upon the bank of the river and raised to an elevation above that of the highest known floods, and it was connected, below the town, with grounds lying considerably above the river. On one occasion a breach in the dike occurred above ...
— The Earth as Modified by Human Action • George P. Marsh

... the signora was in her pride. She was dressed in her brightest of morning dresses, and had quite a levee round her couch. It was a beautifully bright October afternoon; all the gentlemen of the neighbourhood were in Barchester, and those who had the entry of Dr Stanhope's house were in the signora's back drawing-room. Charlotte and Mrs ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope

... feed. Ha'n't been daown on his straw. Must ha' been took aout somewhere abaout ten 'r 'levee o'clock. I know that 'ere critter's ways. The fellah's had him aout nights afore; b't I never thought nothin' o' no mischief. He 's a kin' o' haalf Injin. What is 't the chap's been a-doin' on? Tell ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)

... some batches Of political despatches, And foreign politicians circumvent; Then, if business isn't heavy, We may hold a Royal levee, Or ratify some Acts of Parliament. Then we probably review the household troops— With the usual "Shalloo humps!" and "Shalloo hoops!" Or receive with ceremonial and state An interesting Eastern potentate. After ...
— The Complete Plays of Gilbert and Sullivan - The 14 Gilbert And Sullivan Plays • William Schwenk Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan

... back of the trinket you may discover, perhaps, the very information you seem to desire. It is now, to be sure, growing rather dark—but you can examine it at your leisure in the morning. In the meantime, you shall be my escort home to-night. My friends are about holding a little musical levee. I can promise you, too, some good singing. We French are not nearly so punctilious as you Americans, and I shall have no difficulty in smuggling you in, in the character of ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 3 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe

... wished to see her, she took up her embroidery. This kind of visit, at a person's rising, is customary abroad; and it had been so long so at the court of France, that certain classes of persons were understood to have a right to visit the queen at the hour of her levee, as it was called. These persons were the physicians and surgeons of the court; any messengers from the king; the queen's secretary and others; so that there were often, besides the ladies in waiting, ten or a dozen persons visiting the queen as she sat ...
— The Peasant and the Prince • Harriet Martineau

... and far more brilliant than koh-i-noors, swept the pavement with their long trains; martial music floated on the gentle breeze from the barracks or some festive hall, and a thousand gas-lights along the levee and in the city, doubling their number by reflection from the river, betokened ...
— The Andes and the Amazon - Across the Continent of South America • James Orton

... care to keep himself well concealed, and, as usual, was lustily responded to by all the interested parties. Which little demonstration being over, Pontifex announced that the meeting was over, and that "captain's levee" would be held on that ...
— Follow My leader - The Boys of Templeton • Talbot Baines Reed

... continuance, had been silenced by a farewell address declaring his intention to retire. The pattern of two terms which he set no President has ever dared attempt to exceed. The opponents of his administration, those who had foreseen the coming royal reception in the simple levee which marked his social life, or who objected to the growing custom of celebrating his birthday as if he were a monarch, were compelled to cease their evil prophecies when he attended, as a spectator, the ...
— The United States of America Part I • Ediwn Erle Sparks

... fat,—his waistcoat gay, When strained upon a levee day, Scarce meets across his princely paunch; And pantaloons are like half-moons Upon each brawny ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley

... learning to pick up cigar stumps and smoke them, to pass hours of their time gambling with pennies and dice and cigarette cards; they were learning the location of all the houses of prostitution on the "Levee," and the names of the "madames" who kept them, and the days when they gave their state banquets, which the police captains and the big politicians all attended. If a visiting "country customer" were to ask them, they could show him which was ...
— The Jungle • Upton Sinclair

... adventurer in quest of wealth or happiness. I have since travelled among the Chickasaws, the Cherokees, the Creeks, and the Shawanos, besides the nondescripts who figure in the drunken riots which daily occur on the Levee of the city of New Orleans. And my frequent visits to the scenes of my childhood, and renewal of acquaintance with the red associates of my youth, have served to keep alive and vivid the recollections of the period which may be said to have afforded me almost as many opportunities of studying their ...
— Traditions of the North American Indians, Vol. 1 (of 3) • James Athearn Jones

... stream; a little of it penetrates to the farther side of the plains, which often have a width of ten miles or more. The result is that a broad elevation is constructed, a sort of natural mole or levee, in a measure damming the flood waters, which can now only enter the "back swamps" through the channels of the tributary streams. Each of these back swamps normally discharges into the main stream through a little ...
— Outlines of the Earth's History - A Popular Study in Physiography • Nathaniel Southgate Shaler

... was much in his mind that afternoon as he trudged along the county road at the base of the levee, on his way, all un-prescient, to meet this signal, potential moment. Outside, he knew that the water was standing higher than his head, rippling against the thick turf of Bermuda grass with which the ...
— The Crucial Moment - 1911 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)

... this remark was told to the pope at his levee, and caused him to remark, Laetamini, gentes, quoniam surrexit Dominus. A quotation which the old cardinals abominated as a profanation of sacred texts. Seeing which, the pope reprimanded them severely, and took occasion to lecture them, telling them ...
— Droll Stories, Complete - Collected From The Abbeys Of Touraine • Honore de Balzac

... won't buy shoes fr'm us an' ar-re chasin' th' missionaries out iv their cozy villas an' not even givin' thim a chance to carry away their piannies or their silverware. There's th' divvle to pay all along th' levee fr'm Manchurya to Madagascar, accordin' to Hogan. I begin to feel onaisy. Th' first thing we know all th' other subjick races will be up. Th' horses will kick an' bite, the dogs will fly at our throats whin we lick thim, th' fishes will refuse to be caught, th' cattle an' pigs will set fire to ...
— Mr. Dooley Says • Finley Dunne

... assault or battery, Or friend beguile with lies and flattery? O'er plains they ramble unconfined, No politics disturb their mind; They eat their meals, and take their sport Nor know who's in or out at court. They never to the levee go To treat, as dearest friend, a foe: They never importune his grace, Nor ever cringe to men in place: Nor undertake a dirty job, Nor draw the quill to write for Bob.[1] Fraught with invective, ...
— The Poems of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Volume I (of 2) • Jonathan Swift

... the display of luxury and down-right extravagance. Brissot de Warville, for example, writing in 1788, declared: "If there is a town on the American continent where English luxury displays its follies, it is New York." And James Pintard, after attending a New Year levee, given by Mrs. Washington, wrote his sister: "You will see no such formal bows at the Court of St. James." If we may judge by the dress of ladies attending such gatherings, as one described in the New York Gazette of May 15, 1789, ...
— Woman's Life in Colonial Days • Carl Holliday

... all to dislike me: I meditate whether it is fit or not fit that I should seek out his residence, and leave my card too, before I go? Probably not; for the man is political, seemingly altogether; has been at the Queen's levee, &c., &c.: it is simply as a mastiff-mouthed man that he is interesting to me, and not ...
— The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, - 1834-1872, Vol. I • Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson

... about the dreadful part," urged Betty. "Think of the funny things Mrs. Brown told, of the time the levee broke at Shawneetown. The table all set for supper, and the water pouring in until the table floated up to the ceiling, and went bobbing around ...
— The Little Colonel's Hero • Annie Fellows Johnston

... pleases me is, there is no place where women are of such importance: not one of the sex, who has the least share of attractions, is without a levee of beaux interceding for the honor of attending her on some party, of which every ...
— The History of Emily Montague • Frances Brooke

... you doing?" said he, in a sort of grave tone which did not however mean gravity. "Holding a levee?—and do you receive your courtiers at different hours according to their ages? in that case. I have come at the ...
— Say and Seal, Volume I • Susan Warner

... and Pauthier identify Cachar Modun with Tchakiri Mondou, or Moudon, which appears in D'Anville's atlas as the title of a "Levee de terre naturelle," in the extreme east of Manchuria, and in lat. 44 deg., between the Khinga Lake and the sea. This position is out of the question. It is more than 900 miles, in a straight line from Peking, and the mere journey ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa

... must tell you a great piece of refinement(44) of Harley. He charged me to come to him often: I told him I was loth to trouble him in so much business as he had, and desired I might have leave to come at his levee; which he immediately refused, and said, that was not a place for friends to come to. 'Tis now but morning; and I have got a foolish trick, I must say something to MD when I wake, and wish them a good-morrow; for this is not a shaving-day, Sunday, so I have time enough: but get you ...
— The Journal to Stella • Jonathan Swift

... strengthen his house and was lying at home, refusing to show himself, placed a different and more serious aspect on the mystery. Before noon next day M. de Clan, whose interference surprised me not a little, was with me to support his son's petition; and at the King's LEVEE next day St. Germain accused his enemy to the King's face, and caused an angry and indecent scene in ...
— From the Memoirs of a Minister of France • Stanley Weyman

... Halifax, in his character of Charles II., has exhibited a trait in the royal character of a good-natured monarch; that trait, is sauntering. I transcribe this curious observation, which introduces us into a levee. ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli

... After his levee, that is to say, giving directions about the labors of the next day, and seeing all the peasants who had business with him, Levin went back to his study and sat ...
— Anna Karenina • Leo Tolstoy

... repeat. The potent forces that produced night, the powers potenter still that routed it, they regarded as beings whose moods genuflexions could affect. In perhaps the same spirit that Frenchmen assisted at a lever du roi, and Englishmen attend a prince's levee, the Aryan breakfasted on song and sacrifice. It was an homage ...
— The Lords of the Ghostland - A History of the Ideal • Edgar Saltus

... on very sweetly together, and are in a high strain. I am sorry I burnt one of his Letters, wherein he assured me he would in the Versailles Antechamber itself speak of me to the King, and that my name had actually been mentioned at the King's Levee. It certainly is not my ambition to choose this illustrious mortal to publish my renown; on the contrary, I should think it soiled by such a mouth, and prostituted if he were the publisher. But enough of the Crochet: ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. IX. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle

... be found all the appliances and facilities necessary for the conduct of so extensive a commerce. These, especially the work-shops and factories, and the innumerable river and bayou steamers that thronged the levee, were destined to prove of the greatest military value, at first to the Confederacy, and later to the forces of the Union. For food and fuel, however, New Orleans was largely dependent upon the North and West. Finally, beside her importance as the guardian of the ...
— History of the Nineteenth Army Corps • Richard Biddle Irwin

... the King has had his levee, which was crowded beyond all precedent. He was very civil to the people, particularly to Sefton, who had quarrelled ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. II • Charles C. F. Greville

... this, one evening when the queen was holding a sort of levee in a brilliant saloon, surrounded by her Portuguese ladies, and receiving English ladies, as they were one after another presented to her by the king, the company were astonished at seeing Lady Castlemaine ...
— History of King Charles II of England • Jacob Abbott

... Babu aside, and told him in a whisper: "Thakur Dada, I was at the Levee yesterday, and the Chota Lord happened to mention the Babes of Nayanjore. I told him that Kailas Balm had come to town. Do you know, he was terribly hurt because you hadn't called. He told me he was going to put etiquette on one side, and ...
— The Hungry Stones And Other Stories • Rabindranath Tagore

... off some batches Of political dispatches, And foreign politicians circumvent; Then, if business isn't heavy, We may hold a Royal levee, Or ratify some acts of Parliament; Then we probably review the household troops— With the usual "Shalloo humps!" and "Shalloo hoops!" Or receive with ceremonial and state An interesting Eastern ...
— Bab Ballads and Savoy Songs • W. S. Gilbert

... proposed park was the talk of the town. Dunlap's Creek flowed in a circle, skirting three sides of the bottom land. Levees three feet high were thrown up along the banks of the creek, a rope stretched along the west side. An opening in the levee admitted the water. Two feet of water covered the bottom. The weather turned cold, ice formed, the park was opened, and three-fourths of the public walked in free. Alfred felt that Spaff was about right in ...
— Watch Yourself Go By • Al. G. Field

... Fosdick?" hailed Dick from his cell. "I'm holdin' a little levee down here. Did you receive my card ...
— Fame and Fortune - or, The Progress of Richard Hunter • Horatio Alger, Jr.

... a few moments brought him to the levee of the river,—a favored district, where his counting-house, with many others, was conveniently situated. In these early days only a few of these buildings could be said to be permanent,—fire and flood perpetually threatened them. They were merely temporary structures of wood, ...
— Openings in the Old Trail • Bret Harte

... admirable reflection in Terence, where it is said of a parasite, "Hic homines ex stultis facit insanos." "This fellow," says he, "has an art of converting fools into madmen." When I was in France, the region of complaisance and vanity, I have often observed that a great man who has entered a levee of flatterers humble and temperate has grown so insensibly heated by the court which was paid him on all sides, that he has been quite distracted before he could get ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. IV (of X)—Great Britain and Ireland II • Various

... being, but even all those whose memory has come down to us. He has more unaffected dignity than I could conceive in man. His address is the gentlest and most prepossessing you can conceive, which is seconded by the greatest fund of levee conversation that I suppose any person ever possessed. He speaks deliberately, but very fluently, with particular emphasis, and in a rather low tone of voice. While he speaks, his features are still more expressive than ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose

... regarded its ability to do so with incredulity. The Governor would take the General's arm and be piloted safely between the hay-wagons and the sprinkling-cart to the other side of the street. Proceeding to the post-office in the care of his friend, the esteemed statesmen would there hold an informal levee among the citizens who were come for their morning mail. Here, gathering two or three prominent in law, politics, or family, the pageant would make a stately progress along the Avenue, stopping at ...
— Roads of Destiny • O. Henry

... not light, but she hardly felt it as she moved swiftly through the deserted, moonlit streets toward the river. The wharf boat for the Cincinnati and Louisville mail steamers was anchored at the foot of Pine Street. On the levee before it were piled the boxes, bags, cases, crates, barrels to be loaded upon the "up boat." She was descending the gentle slope toward this mass of freight when her blood tingled at a deep, hoarse, mournful whistle from ...
— Susan Lenox: Her Fall and Rise • David Graham Phillips

... Mr. Gubb. "Everything is arranged satisfactory. I'm to be on the old house-boat by the wharf-house on the levee at nine, with it." He glanced at the night man's back and lowered his voice. "And Mr. Critz ...
— Philo Gubb Correspondence-School Detective • Ellis Parker Butler

... at first for no one but Madame Bonaparte (since coming to live at the Tuileries she was no longer called Citizeness Bonaparte), whom I had not yet seen, this being my first levee, and of whom I had heard almost as much as of the First Consul. I had heard that she was not faultlessly beautiful, but of great charm, and I could see at once that this was true. I do not know why she was not perfectly beautiful—perhaps her features were a little heavy, her nose a ...
— The Rose of Old St. Louis • Mary Dillon

... upon the levee, and sat upon a great, prostrate beam. The air was pungent with the dust of commerce. The great river slipped yellowly past. Across it Algiers lay, a longitudinous black bulk against a vibrant electric haze sprinkled ...
— Whirligigs • O. Henry

... day ordered for our entertainment ashore, on Point Venus, and on our landing we were preceded by a band of music, and led to where the king and his levee were in waiting to receive us. The course was soon cleared by the chiefs, and the entertainment began by two men, who vied with each other in filthy lascivious attitudes, and frightful distortions of their mouths. These having performed their part, two ladies, pretty fancifully ...
— Voyage of H.M.S. Pandora - Despatched to Arrest the Mutineers of the 'Bounty' in the - South Seas, 1790-1791 • Edward Edwards

... his father, as well as the roan colt and a goodly supply of hay and grain that had been provided for him, were on the levee waiting for the Mollie Able when she turned in for the landing, and Rodney did not fail to notice that in the crowd of lookers-on there was one young fellow who made it a point to keep pretty close to him, although he did not ...
— Rodney The Partisan • Harry Castlemon

... to catch the sea-breeze, and most of the huts have open gables, a practice strongly to be recommended. Le Roi would not expose himself to the damp air; the consul was not so particular. His majesty's levee took place in the verandah of a poor bamboo hut, one of the dozen which compose his capital. Seated in a chair and ready for business, he was surrounded by a crowd of courtiers, who listened attentively to every word, especially when he affected to whisper; and some pretty women collected ...
— Two Trips to Gorilla Land and the Cataracts of the Congo Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton

... were of almost as much account as its politics and culture. There was no room for great distinctions. Hair-dressers and tailors found as much consideration as philosophers and statesmen at a lady's levee. People were delighted with their own occupations, their whole lives; and whatever people delight in, that they will have represented in art. The love for pictures was by no means dead in Venice, and Longhi painted for the picture-loving Venetians their own ...
— The Venetian Painters of the Renaissance - Third Edition • Bernhard Berenson

... like that of the ocean, which extends for miles and as far as the eye can reach, save that occasionally there is to be found a sharp projection of rocks. The overlooking bench rises from the water's edge about eight feet, forming a bank of sand or natural levee, which serves to prevent the overflow of the land adjoining, which, when the lake is receiving the water from the mountain streams that empty into it while the snows are melting, is several feet below the surface of the lake. On the shore ...
— The Discovery of Yellowstone Park • Nathaniel Pitt Langford

... the levee has done wondering at the smoke, his eye is caught by the new wire suspension bridge, which springs out from the summit of the broad, steep levee to a lofty tower (two hundred feet high) near the water's edge, and then, at one leap, clears the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 118, August, 1867 • Various

... packet Frank Steele, a new boat about the size of the War Eagle. The Captain is Letter A, No. 1, and I think I shall go with him. If not, I have two or three good offers for coming season on the levee, besides my present berth, which is ...
— How to Write Letters (Formerly The Book of Letters) - A Complete Guide to Correct Business and Personal Correspondence • Mary Owens Crowther

... for trouble when we reached Independence the next day. There was a bigger crowd than usual on the levee, but when it was seen that my Yankee friends had their Spencer carbines with them all was quiet. As we pulled out the old ...
— An Autobiography of Buffalo Bill (Colonel W. F. Cody) • Buffalo Bill (William Frederick Cody)

... predicted, Mrs. Royer and Anne alone were left in charge of the nursling while every one went to morning Mass. Then followed breakfast and the levee of his Royal Highness, lasting as on the previous day till dinner-time; and the afternoon was as before, except that the day was fine enough for the child to be carried out with all his attendants behind him to take the air ...
— A Reputed Changeling • Charlotte M. Yonge

... River began rising Monday afternoon at the rate of six inches an hour and continued to rise throughout the night. The first break in the levee at Dayton came at four o'clock Tuesday morning at Stratford Avenue. This was followed by other breaks at East Second Street ...
— The True Story of Our National Calamity of Flood, Fire and Tornado • Logan Marshall

... Lord Loughborough. Radnor's further remark, that Fox, having on a former occasion sought to trespass on the royal just prerogative, had now completed his attack on the Constitution, in denying the rights of Lords and Commons, is worthy observation. Talbot, who made one of my morning's levee, told me that at White's last night, all was hurra! and triumph. Charles Sturt and other youngsters took part at the bar, to echo the "Hear, hear," from Fitzpatrick and Burke, of Fox's doctrine; yet the "Hear, hear," was but little caught or repeated, though ...
— Memoirs of the Court and Cabinets of George the Third, Volume 2 (of 2) - From the Original Family Documents • The Duke of Buckingham

... regard, the queen having particularly commanded that every attention should be lavished on him; and indeed, until his death warrant was signed, the prisoner had been permitted a free intercourse with his friends and relatives. Thus his prison bore rather the resemblance of a levee of a person in power, than the visits of despairing friends to one in the last stage of mortality. All his friends and companions in arms had been assiduous in these mournful visits, and he appeared greatly pleased with this ...
— Gomez Arias - The Moors of the Alpujarras, A Spanish Historical Romance. • Joaquin Telesforo de Trueba y Cosio

... called on the Mayor to talk over the exhibition. Persons who had not seen them, still more naturally dropped in just to learn what was really Mr. Mayor's private opinion. The little parlour was thronged by a regular levee There was the proprietor of a dismal building, still called "The Theatre," which was seldom let except at election time, when it was hired by the popular candidate for the delivery of those harangues upon liberty and conscience, tyranny ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... coons in th' polis coort, an' now an' thin bein' mintioned among th' scatthrin' in raypublican county con-vintions, an' thin he dhropped out iv sight. 'Twas years befure I see him again. Wan day I was walkin' up th' levee smokin' a good tin cint seegar whin a coon wearin' a suit iv clothes that looked like a stained glass window in th' house iv a Dutch brewer an' a pop bottle in th' fr-ront iv his shirt, steps up to me an' he says: 'How dy'e do, Mistah Dooley,' says he. 'Don't ...
— Mr. Dooley's Philosophy • Finley Peter Dunne

... implacable foe of republican institutions in France, at a dinner-party, at the town mansion of the Count d'Artois. Lord Grenville gave a magnificent entertainment in their honor, on the 1st of March, 1800; and the next Sunday the exiles were presented to his majesty George III. at a levee ...
— Louis Philippe - Makers of History Series • John S. C. (John Stevens Cabot) Abbott

... the matter before his majesty's return, at the usual hour in the afternoon, from the levee. The Spanish minister had hurried off instantly to Windsor, and was in waiting, at Lady Charlotte Finch's, to be ready to assure her majesty of the king's safety, in case ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 1 • Madame D'Arblay

... superb picture, or abstraction of the Roman pomps and power, when ascending to their utmost altitude, confront the following representative sketch of a great English levee on some high solemnity, suppose the king's birthday: "Amongst the presentations to his majesty, we noticed Lord O. S., the governor general of India, on his departure for Bengal; Mr. U. Z., with an address from the Upper and Lower Canadas; Sir L. V., on his appointment ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey

... the International Board of Consulting Engineers, restated his views and convictions as opposed to the lock-canal type and in favor of the sea-level project. The last witness, Mr. B.M. Harrod, an engineer of large experience, for many years connected with levee construction and familiar with the flood problems of the Mississippi River, submitted a statement in which he restated his views in favor ...
— The American Type of Isthmian Canal - Speech by Hon. John Fairfield Dryden in the Senate of the - United States, June 14, 1906 • John Fairfield Dryden

... on his breath. Though never prime minister, Farinelli's political advice had such weight with Ferdinand, that generals, secretaries, ambassadors, and other high officials consulted with him, and attended his levee, as being the power behind the throne. Farinelli acquired great wealth, but no malicious pen has ever ascribed to him any of the corrupt arts by which royal favorites are wont to accumulate the spoils of office. In his prosperity he never forgot prudence, modesty, and moderation. Hearing ...
— Great Singers, First Series - Faustina Bordoni To Henrietta Sontag • George T. Ferris

... drove into the busy and bustling town of Leavenworth, one bright autumnal morning. All along the way they had picked up much information about the movement of steamers, and they were delighted to find that the steamboat "New Lucy" was lying at the levee, ready to sail on the afternoon of the very day they would be in Leavenworth. They camped, for the last time, in the outskirts of the town, a good-natured border-State man affording them shelter in his hay-barn, where they slept ...
— The Boy Settlers - A Story of Early Times in Kansas • Noah Brooks

... sight, but he heard the sound of a steamer's bell, followed by the hoarse commands of the mate, and when he reached the door, he found the whole yard lighted up by a torch which the steamer had placed in her bow. The boat was made fast to the levee when he got there, and her crew were making ready to carry on her load of wood, but Tom paid no attention to them. More than half asleep, he made his way on deck and into the saloon, which he found deserted by all save a party of men who were engaged in playing cards. They ...
— Elam Storm, The Wolfer - The Lost Nugget • Harry Castlemon

... eastern quarter the sky was still grey. I said to myself, "You have started far too soon," But horses and coaches already thronged the road. High and low the riders' torches bobbed; Muffled or loud, the watchman's drum beat. Riders, when I see you prick To your early levee, pity fills my heart. When the sun rises and the hot dust flies And the creatures of earth resume their great strife, You, with your striving, what shall you each seek? Profit and fame, for that is all your care. But I, ...
— More Translations from the Chinese • Various

... was presented to King William IV. at the levee held on the 9th of May; and congratulations poured in from all quarters as soon as the good news was published. But he could not, even in the first moments of rejoicing, forget that the cause of congratulation was only a pardon for an offence ...
— The Life of Thomas, Lord Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald, Vol. II • Thomas Lord Cochrane

... the news of his voyage. George III., who had broken off an important state conference to peep through his telescope at the wonderful balloon, afterwards allowed the young Italian to kiss his hand at a brilliant levee. Military honours were bestowed upon him, and with fewer obstacles in his way ...
— Chatterbox, 1905. • Various

... the company's levee," the Captain continued, calmly. "The revenue officers have 'em by now, Mr. Aiken. Some parties said they weren't sewing-machines at all. They said you were acting ...
— Captain Macklin • Richard Harding Davis

... tittle tattle about neighbors and lively scandals; exchange of commiserations on the insupportable humor of masters and the fatigue of service; cessation of laughing, kissing and shouting, the day being ended; quick change of scene to a levee of washing mallets; one of the women steals a trinket from another, and a general riot ensues, after which there is a reconciliation as the sun goes down and the women disperse with embraces, tender ...
— Some Forerunners of Italian Opera • William James Henderson

... whose company he happened to be. "Was your Leedyship in the Pork to-dee?" he would demand of his daughter. "I looked for your equipage in veen:—the poor old man was not gratified by the soight of his daughter's choriot. Sir Chorlus, I saw your neem at the Levee; many's the Levee at the Castle at Dublin that poor old Jack Costigan has attended in his time. Did the Juke look pretty well? Bedad, I'll call at Apsley House and lave me cyard upon 'um. I thank ye, James, a little ...
— The History of Pendennis, Vol. 2 - His Fortunes and Misfortunes, His Friends and His Greatest Enemy • William Makepeace Thackeray

... far at least as the vice-regal entertainments go, in the ball given here on St. Patrick's Day (March 17). On such occasions it is de rigueur to wear a court-dress. Even those who venture to appear in the regulation trowsers admissible at a levee at St. James's are seriously cautioned "not ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 11, - No. 22, January, 1873 • Various

... A large gasoline torch flared into the night, defying the efforts of the storm to extinguish it, and by the light of this torch, scores of men were working busily, almost crazily, repairing a cave-in that threatened every moment to make a new break in the levee. ...
— The Boy with the U. S. Weather Men • Francis William Rolt-Wheeler

... "La lune s'est levee. Elle perce mal les feuillages denses des pruniers et le cantonnement immobile reste sombre. Ca et la, seulement, elle fait des taches jaunes sur l'herbe et sur les croupes des chevaux qui dorment debout. Le camarade avec qui je partage cette ...
— Three French Moralists and The Gallantry of France • Edmund Gosse

... the rubicund Mr. Danckwerts, but no Bishop—in fact, there is no one of public interest to be seen; probably they have not come, as to-day is to be a half-holiday. It is now one o'clock, and the Bishops rise to go to the Levee. I pounce upon Francis Jeune, Q.C., and gasp, "Where, oh, where is the Bishop of Lincoln? Quick! I want to sketch him before he leaves." "Oh, he's not here—never comes near ...
— The Confessions of a Caricaturist, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Harry Furniss

... for his endeavours to support and strengthen the interest of the administration; and faithfully promised to lay hold on the first opportunity to express the sense he had of his zeal and attachment; desiring to see him often at his levee, that, in the multiplicity of business, he might not be in danger of ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett

... time for a stranger to visit Calcutta is during holiday week, for then the social season is inaugurated by a levee given by the viceroy, a "drawing-room" by the vice-queen and a grand state ball. The annual races are held that week, also, including the great sporting event of the year, which is a contest for a cup offered by the viceroy, and a military ...
— Modern India • William Eleroy Curtis

... Cornell colleague Goldwin Smith, the former Oxford professor and historian, who expressed his surprise and delight at the perfect order and decorum of the crowd, numbering nearly five thousand persons, at the presidential levee the night before. In order to understand what an American crowd was like, instead of going into the White House by the easier way, as he was entitled by his invitation to do, he had taken his place in the long procession far outside the gate and ...
— Volume I • Andrew Dickson White

... we have quoted but few points of his personal character. This has been so well drawn, and so recently too, that we are induced to adopt the following traits from a contemporary Magazine.[5] The paper whence these are extracted, purports to be a description of the Lord Chancellor's first levee:— ...
— The Mirror Of Literature, Amusement, And Instruction, No. 496 - Vol. 17, No. 496, June 27, 1831 • Various

... woman in China would hold it disgraceful to expose her face to a strange man. Queen Victoria, sober, sage matron and pink of propriety as she is reputed, would not consider a lady properly dressed for her levee—where the more strange men to gaze the better—who did not expose her face and neck and shoulders to full view. Education, my boy, education! all things right and all things wrong within a very wide range of ...
— Round the World • Andrew Carnegie

... a direct insult to himself, for in all the parts assigned her, she would be brought on the stage in company with him, and frequently obliged to hold single converse. If this opinion needed further confirmation it was added, when she appeared at the Scholars' Levee, held on the evening of the exhibition, in elegant dress and dashing spirits, with ...
— Eventide - A Series of Tales and Poems • Effie Afton

... pompous geese, who were not the first fools whose solemn air has deceived a few old females, that as soon as they perceived them in the train of the horseman they also trotted up to pay their respects at his levee. ...
— Vivian Grey • The Earl of Beaconsfield

... possible need we shall have for them. And we want to be sure that in the possible event of an invasion the Government will have the decision to give every man in the country a military status by at once resorting to the levee en masse. Given a recognized local organization and some advice—it would not take a week of Gen. Baden-Powell's time, for example, to produce a special training book for us—we could set to work upon our own local drill, ...
— New York Times, Current History, Vol 1, Issue 1 - From the Beginning to March, 1915 With Index • Various

... of the town is the "levee," as it is called, or the long river beach up to which the steamers are brought with their bows to the shore. It is an esplanade looking on to the river, not built with quays or wharves, as would be the case with us, but with a sloping bank ...
— Volume 2 • Anthony Trollope

... large relief maps of New Orleans and the levee system of the Mississippi River, which were the work of Miss Jennie Wilde, of New Orleans, and, while they rank low in the final prize award, attracted a great deal of attention and admiration. Comparatively speaking, I think this work much more ambitious ...
— Final Report of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission • Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission

... eloquent when confronting thee wax dumb; but thou art the looser of the veil."[FN141] Then she clung to him and cried, "Stand;" so he stood and said to her, "Who art thou and what is thy need?" She raised a corner of the veil, and behold she was a damsel as she were the full moon rising or the levee glancing, with two side-locks of hair which fell down to her anklets. She kissed his hand and said to him, "O my lord, know that I have been in these quarters some five months, during which I have withheld myself from sale till thou shouldst be present and see me; and yonder slave-dealer ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton

... for that period. She was not only a skilled performer upon the piano and harp, but also a linguist of considerable proficiency, while her grace of manner and brilliant powers of repartee added greatly to her social charms. On one occasion during Polk's administration she attended a levee at the White House, and as she passed down the line with the other guests she received an enthusiastic welcome and was soon so completely surrounded by an admiring throng that for a while Mrs. Polk was left very much to herself. It was Mrs. Scott who wrote in the album of a friend the ...
— As I Remember - Recollections of American Society during the Nineteenth Century • Marian Gouverneur

... riddle. Wherever he went these "lost adventurers" walked the streets with him, gliding between the Princes of the Church in the ceremonies of Saint Peter's and the Lateran, or mingling in the company that ascended the state staircase at some cardinal's levee. ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton

... arranged, and I measured Mrs. Lincoln, took the dress with me, a bright rose-colored moire-antique, and returned the next day to fit it on her. A number of ladies were in the room, all making preparations for the levee to come off on Friday night. These ladies, I learned, were relatives of Mrs. L.'s,—Mrs. Edwards and Mrs. Kellogg, her own sisters, and Elizabeth Edwards and Julia Baker, her nieces. Mrs. Lincoln this morning was dressed in ...
— Behind the Scenes - or, Thirty years a slave, and Four Years in the White House • Elizabeth Keckley

... instructions to their agents amongst the populace. An agitation of the same sort prevailed at the Louvre; the king, too, was deliberating with his advisers as to what he should do on the morrow: Guise would undoubtedly present himself at his morning levee; should he at once rid himself of him by the poniards of the five and forty bravoes which the Duke of Epernon had enrolled in Gascony for his service? Or would it be best to summon to Paris some troops, French and Swiss, to crush the Parisian rebels and the adventurers ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume IV. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot

... smooth and glittering was the surface, overlaid with the varnish of polished manners and universal friendship. All the world interchanged visits; so that in the houses of quality it was necessary to admit the persons presenting themselves every morning for the levee in a certain order fixed by the master or occasionally by the attendant in waiting, and to give audience only to the more notable one by one, while the rest were more summarily admitted partly in groups, ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen

... not, he often said, his ways, and he seemed to lack the capacity to easily adapt himself to new grooves. Unconventional he certainly was, and never in London even would he wear a tall hat or a tail coat; nor could he ever be persuaded to attend a levee or any State function whatever. He usually dressed in roughish tweeds, with trousers unfashionably wide, and a flaming necktie competing with his bright red cheeks, which contrasted strongly with his dark hair and beard. He was, however, a strong manly fellow, with ...
— Fifty Years of Railway Life in England, Scotland and Ireland • Joseph Tatlow

... for stress of passion: but he hid behind the tree so that he saw without being seen. Presently they swam out to the middle of the basin leaving their clothes on the bank. Hereupon he sprang to his feet, and running like the darting levee to the basin's brink, snatched up the feather-vest of the youngest damsel, her on whom his heart was set and whose name was Shamsah the Sun-maiden. At this the girls turned and seeing him, were affrighted and veiled their shame from him in the water. Then they swam near the shore and ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton

... to fifteen feet below high water in the Mississippi River. The only protection to the city from the river is the levee. In May, 1883, a small break was observed in the levee, and the water was running through. A few bags of sand or loads of dirt would have stopped the water at first; but it was neglected for a few hours, and the current became so strong that all efforts to stop it were fruitless. ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden

... neighbour prosecute, Bring action for assault and battery, Or friend beguile with lies and flattery? O'er plains they ramble unconfined, No politics disturb their mind; They eat their meals, and take their sport, Nor know who's in or out at court. They never to the levee go To treat as dearest friend a foe; They never importune his grace, Nor ever cringe to men in place; Nor undertake a dirty job, Nor draw the quill to write for Bob. Fraught with invective they ne'er go To folks at ...
— The Battle of the Books - and Other Short Pieces • Jonathan Swift

... recommended by Celsus in my perilous case, to answer with the most perfect sincerity every question which you can put to me upon that subject." So saying, he called upon a monk who had attended at his levee, and giving him a large key, whispered something in his ear. The cup which the monk brought was of such capacity as proved Celsus's draught required to be administered in considerable quantity, and a strong ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott

... Countess Metternich ended thus: "I have not seen the Queen of Holland again, because she is ill. Hence I have nothing positive to tell you concerning the matter in question; but if I wanted to tell you all the honors that have been showered upon me, I should not stop so soon. At the last levee I played with the Emperor; you may imagine that it was a serious matter for me, but I managed to come off with glory. He began by praising my diamond headband, and that everlasting gold dress, then he asked me a number of questions about my family and all my relatives; he insisted, ...
— The Happy Days of the Empress Marie Louise • Imbert De Saint-Amand

... carried up-stairs proudly, by Mrs. Tod, all the boys following. Quite a levee was held round the bed, where, laid close beside her, her weak hands being guided over the tiny face and form, Muriel first "saw" her little sister. She was greatly pleased. With a grave elder-sisterly air she ...
— John Halifax, Gentleman • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik

... difficulty he got rid of even when I retired to bed the night before, introduced the whole of the nuns in rotation, beginning with the elder, and ending with those who last took the vow of chastity. I felt little interest, I must confess, at the commencement of my levee; but as it came near to a close, many beautiful countenances attracted my attention, and I gave the kiss of peace with more zest than prudence would have justified. The last of the sisterhood came forward, and was introduced as Soeur Marie. Gracious Heaven! it was ...
— The Pacha of Many Tales • Frederick Marryat

... friends were his, my purse was his, and even my bed was his. I went further; I did all those things which touch most sensibly people who have been used to pomp. I made my court to him, and haunted his levee with assiduity. In return to this behaviour—which was the pure effect of my goodwill, and which no duty that I owed his Grace, no obligation that I had to him, imposed upon me—I have great reason to suspect ...
— Letters to Sir William Windham and Mr. Pope • Lord Bolingbroke

... next day, the general held his first levee in his tent, and all the officers called to pay their respects. He was a heavy-set, red-faced man of some sixty years, with long, straight nose, aggressive, pointed chin, and firm-set lips, and though he greeted us civilly enough, there was a touch ...
— A Soldier of Virginia • Burton Egbert Stevenson

... he might be. Swift talked about the prospects of ending the strike. He regarded it as a reportorial feast, and had natural regrets that such good material for lurid paragraphs was to be cut off. As they passed through the Levee, he nodded to the proprietors of the "places," with ostentatious familiarity. From the Levee they took an electric car, which was crowded with officers and deputies bound for the stock yards. The long thoroughfare lined with rotting wooden houses and squalid brick saloons ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick

... three children, who were sleeping in one of the rooms. This made me very uneasy, and increased Tempe's terror to such an extent that she became almost unmanageable. During the next day I actually became accustomed to the noise and danger, and "with a heart for any fate" passed the day. At night my levee was larger than before; among them I had the satisfaction of seeing and supplying some Alabama, South Carolina, and Tennessee soldiers. That night the bombardment was terrific. Anxiety for my husband, combined with a shuddering ...
— Memories - A Record of Personal Experience and Adventure During Four Years of War • Fannie A. (Mrs.) Beers

... the Auto-car," she replied; adding; "be sure to come to the levee to-night. Already the maidens of Krovitch have heard of you, sir. One at least, desires ...
— Trusia - A Princess of Krovitch • Davis Brinton

... and was lost and swept finally into silence. After supper Grant retired to a book from the Sea-side Library, borrowed of Mr. Brotherton from stock—"Sesame and Lilies" was its title. Jasper plunged into his bookkeeping studies and by the wood stove in the sitting-room Rhoda Kollander held her levee until ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White

... heard the clang and turmoil of human labor, the din of congregated thousands; and where the great river rolls down through the forest, in lonely grandeur, he saw the waters lashed into foam beneath the prows of panting steamboats, flocking to the broad levee." ...
— The Old Northwest - A Chronicle of the Ohio Valley and Beyond, Volume 19 In - The Chronicles Of America Series • Frederic Austin Ogg

... pile, ridge, dike, heap, drift, embankment, brink, shore, rivage, rim, brim, marge, strand; shallow, shoal, bar; levee; terreplein. ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming

... her chair and embroider, like a demoiselle bien elevee, instead of a wild maiden of the civil wars. However, my mother spent most of her day in waiting on the Queen of England, who was very fond of her, and liked to have her at her levee, so that we really saw very ...
— Stray Pearls • Charlotte M. Yonge

... there was quite a levee of visitors, who came over to hear of the particulars, and to offer their congratulations. All the outlying settlers were particularly pleased, as it was considered certain that the Indians would not visit that neighborhood ...
— On the Pampas • G. A. Henty

... and the great fresh waters of the world. Possibly steamboats may be utilized on short stretches of rivers, but even on these they will have to compete with railroads having wide-reaching connections which they do not possess. The money expended to levee the Mississippi may be lost by the United States, but the planters will receive some benefit from it in the protection given to their crops. The steamboats in interior waters will be exchanged for ...
— Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet - An Autobiography. • John Sherman

... puffing up alongside the Typhoon. It was ridiculously small and conceited, compared with our stately ship. I speculated as to what it was going to do. In a few minutes we were lashed to the little monster, which gave a snort and a shriek, and commenced backing us out from the levee (wharf) with the ...
— The Story of a Bad Boy • Thomas Bailey Aldrich

... satisfied she would approve, I accept. Whatever may result or happen, I shall go on following the course that he has set for me. So help me, God!" Sir Colin stood up, and I must say a more martial figure I never saw. He was in full uniform, for he was going on to the King's levee after our business. He drew his sword from the scabbard and laid it naked on the table before ...
— The Lady of the Shroud • Bram Stoker

... upon the Secretary of State (Marquis Wellesley), to ascertain when it would be His Majesty's pleasure to receive it. Upon which the Noble Secretary informed them, that he would take His Majesty's pleasure upon the subject; and at the following levee he let them know, that it was His Majesty's pleasure that it should be presented through the Secretary ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 2 • Henry Hunt

... sufficient if the Duke of Norfolk merely sent his card with Mr Montefiore's to the Lord Chancellor's office, but he would enquire further of the Duke. Mr Montefiore, however, differed from him, and did not wish to be introduced at the levee in that way, unless Mr Blount was so convinced of its propriety as to be introduced in the same ...
— Diaries of Sir Moses and Lady Montefiore, Volume I • Sir Moses Montefiore

... impropriety Talleyrand was well aware; but audacity on one side, and endurance and submission on the other, had so often disregarded these considerations before, that he saw no indelicacy or impertinence in the proposal. His master had, however, the gratification to see at his levee, and in his wife's drawing-room, the Ambassadors of Spain, Naples, Portugal, and Bavaria, who laid at the Imperial and royal feet the Order decorations of their own Princes, to the nor little entertainment of His Imperial and Royal Majesty, and to the great edification of his dutiful subjects ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre

... went to the palace at noon, with guns, and found the king holding a levee, the first since the new moon, with all heads shaved in the manner I have mentioned. Soon rising, he showed the way through the palace to a pond, which is described as his bathing N'yanza, his women attending, and pages leading the way with ...
— The Discovery of the Source of the Nile • John Hanning Speke

... the attempt was made upon the life of George III., by Margaret Nicholson, who attempted to stab him as he was going to St. James's to hold a levee, a council was ordered to be held as soon as the levee was over. The Marquess del Campo, the Spanish ambassador, being apprised of that circumstance, and knowing that the council would detain the king in town three or four hours beyond the usual time, took post horses, and set off for Windsor. ...
— The Book of Three Hundred Anecdotes - Historical, Literary, and Humorous—A New Selection • Various

... a levee at the White House which he attended. The crowd were very eager to see him, and he was persuaded to mount a sofa, which he did blushing, so that they might have a glimpse of him, but he could not be prevailed on to make a speech. On parting that evening with the ...
— The Life of Abraham Lincoln • Henry Ketcham

... himself between not a dozen specimens, but a dozen types, all strange, and each differing from the other in dress, complexion, manner, and even language. As soon as it becomes known that the new saheb from England is in need of a Boy, the levee begins. First you are waited upon by a personage of imposing appearance. His broad and dignified face is ornamented with grey, well-trimmed whiskers. There is no lack of gold thread on his turban, an ample cumberbund envelopes his portly figure, and he wears canvas shoes. ...
— Behind the Bungalow • EHA

... time in speaking them as the most formal, deliberate, or pompous prig of an orator would employ upon them? Why will not actors condescend to speak "like the folks of this world," particularly as they pretend to imitate them? We never were at a royal levee—but we have been at the pains to ask several persons who have been, whether any king, or prince, or peer spoke there, as Mr. Kemble or as Mr. Holman, or Mr. Pope after him, speak in Hamlet, Richard, Macbeth, &c. and the uniform answer has been that ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 4, April 1810 • Various

... it? [cries of "Wilkinson, Wilkinson!"]. He said to the Kentucky planters, 'Give your tobacco to me, and I will sell it.' He put it in barges, he floated down the river, and, as became a man of such distinction, he was met by Governor-general Miro on the levee at New Orleans. Where is that tobacco now, gentlemen?" Colonel Clark was here interrupted by such roars and stamping that he paused a moment, and during this interval Mr. Wharton leaned over and whispered quietly in ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... he pondered. "I am very glad you have brought good news, though Schmidt's death is a heavy price to pay for the victory. His Majesty will no doubt wish to see you, but not today. I thank you! You must have a rest. Be at the levee tomorrow after the parade. However, I ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy

... after him to reach the bayou levee. The quarry was already in midstream, wielding an efficient canoe paddle. On impulse Val shouted after him, but he never turned. A rifle lay across his knees and there were some rusty traps in the ...
— Ralestone Luck • Andre Norton

... armed when he received strangers, and he caused even women to be searched for concealed weapons. He was surrounded by so many spies and so artful, that of a thousand, no two ever told the same tale. At the levee, on his right sat his relations, the Brahmans, and men of distinguished birth. The other castes were on the left, and close to him stood the ministers and those whom he delighted to consult. Afar in front gathered the bards chanting the praises of the gods ...
— Vikram and the Vampire • Sir Richard F. Burton

... him in for the last brevet. It is true every one had a word for poor Clifford. "Such a fine fellow! what a shame!" But this did not help him on. At the Horse Guards, too, his services were freely acknowledged. The Military Secretary had always a smile for him at his levee, and an assurance that "he had his eye on him" The Commander in Chief, too, the last time he had inspected the regiment, attracted by his Waterloo badge, and Portuguese cross, had stopped as he passed ...
— A Love Story • A Bushman



Words linked to "Levee" :   reception, embankment, wharf, pier, dock, wharfage



Copyright © 2024 Free-Translator.com