"Sew" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... as well prepared for my lifework as Carl was for his. Instead of just waiting in sweet, sighing idleness I took courses in domestic science, studied dietetics, mastered double-entry and learned to sew. I also began reading up on economics. The latter amused the family, for they thought the higher education of women quite unwomanly and had refused to let me go ...
— How To Write Special Feature Articles • Willard Grosvenor Bleyer
... her shoes with her own hands. It is no jest, my king and husband, I really often did so, and I never felt humiliated. Never did I consider it a disgrace to do sometimes what thousands of the most virtuous and amiable women are always doing. When I used to sew my shoes, I was poor, for I did not yet know you; but now, although I have repaired my dress, I am rich, for I have you—I have my children—I am the wife of a man who suffers because he values his honor higher ...
— Napoleon and the Queen of Prussia • L. Muhlbach
... to rakel to renden his cloe[gh], Mot efte sitte with more vn-sounde to sewe hem togeder. For he that is too rash to rend his clothes, Must afterwards sit with more unsound (worse ones) to sew them together. (p.104.) ...
— Early English Alliterative Poems - in the West-Midland Dialect of the Fourteenth Century • Various
... open a sash. I felt the cool air on the back of my neck. Breck came back and stood looking down at me quizzically. I kept on taking stitches. "Keep right at it, industrious little one," he smiled. "Sew as long as you want to. I don't mind. I don't have to go out again to get home tonight. I'm satisfied. Stitch away, dear little Busy Bee." He took out a cigarette and lit it; then suddenly sat down on the sofa beside me, leaned back luxuriously, ...
— The Fifth Wheel - A Novel • Olive Higgins Prouty
... doesn't seem to me that she will ever grow up; she is such a little puss, always absent-minded, with a book in her hand. And she can't mend or sew or even make cake or clear up a room neatly. We spoil her, mother and I, as much as she spoils her kitten, Pusheen. Did you know that pusheen is Irish for puss? Mr. Holmes told us. I ...
— Miss Prudence - A Story of Two Girls' Lives. • Jennie Maria (Drinkwater) Conklin
... tradition was gradually formed concerning woman's place in industry, or rather three traditions were formed. The working woman of the lower classes was to be the housekeeper, which meant that she was to care for food, cook, spin, weave, sew and mend, scrub and wash, bear children and nurse and tend them. If she were of the middle class, she was to be a mother, to supervise this range of work, look after dependents, conserve social conditions and be the lady bountiful of her district. The second ideal was the ...
— Woman in Modern Society • Earl Barnes
... makes a still more curious nest: it actually sews, using its long, slender bill as a needle. Birds that fly, birds that run, birds that swim, and birds that sing are by no means rare; but birds that sew, seem like the wonderful birds in the fairy-tales. Yet they really exist, and make their odd nests with great care and skill. They pick out a leaf large enough for their nest, and pierce rows of holes along the edges with their sharp bill; then, with the fibers of a ...
— Reading Made Easy for Foreigners - Third Reader • John L. Huelshof
... space with the following force-meat: half a pint of fine bread-crumbs, an ounce and a half of butter, a small boiled onion chopped, and a dozen oysters cut into small pieces; a saltspoonful of salt, a pinch of pepper; bind together with an egg, sew up the fowl, and truss for roasting. Make a nice batter, as for fine fritters, and when the fowl has been in the oven half an hour, pour part of the batter over it; when dry and beginning to brown, pour more, until it is thickly coated and a nice brown; baste often; cut up the ...
— Choice Cookery • Catherine Owen
... came to a strange country; and she said to the captain to leave her on land. And she went up to a big house, where some great man lived, and she asked for employment as a sewing-maid. And they said: "You may sew one of those dresses that is for the master's daughter that is going to be married to-morrow. And mind you do it well," ...
— Poets and Dreamers - Studies and translations from the Irish • Lady Augusta Gregory and Others
... morning, I went to buy the Oclawaha tickets, while Rectus staid home to pack up our handbags, and, I believe, to sew some buttons on his clothes. He could sew buttons on so strongly that they would never come off again without bringing the ...
— A Jolly Fellowship • Frank R. Stockton
... monarch. 'Her Majesty be hanged. Am I not Autocrat of Paflagonia? Have I not blocks, ropes, axes, hangmen—ha? Runs not a river by my palace wall? Have I not sacks to sew up wives withal? Say but the word, that thou wilt be mine own,—your mistress straightway in a sack is sewn, and thou the sharer ...
— The Rose and the Ring • William Makepeace Thackeray
... the bronzes and alabaster ornaments on the chimney-piece and etagere gleamed through the dim light in a ghostly way. Katy thought it very dismal. She couldn't imagine anybody sitting down there to read or sew, or do any thing pleasant, and probably it was not intended that any one should do so; for Mrs. Page soon showed them out, and led the way into a smaller room at the back of ...
— What Katy Did At School • Susan Coolidge
... words as I put my hands under the warm body and helped to lift its weight on to the stretcher. Yes, some of the shell wounds were rather big. One could hardly sew a man together again with bits of cotton... It was only afterwards, when I had helped to put the stretcher in a separate room on the other side of the courtyard, that a curious trembling took possession of me for a moment... The horror of it all! Were the virtues ...
— The Soul of the War • Philip Gibbs
... his eyes and composed his limbs," said Bianchon. "When the certificate has been officially registered at the Mayor's office, we will sew him in his winding-sheet and bury him somewhere. What do you ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VII (of X)—Continental Europe I • Various
... listened with an air of joyous admiration. "Bessie," said he, "this is inspiration. I don't want to see their old town; and I shall ask nothing better than to spend the day with you here at our own fireside. You can sew, and I—I'll read to you, Bessie!" This was a little too gross; even Mrs. Kenton laughed at this, the act of reading being so abhorrent to Colonel Kenton's active temperament that he was notorious for his avoidance of all literature except newspapers. In about ten minutes, passed ...
— A Fearful Responsibility and Other Stories • William D. Howells
... the center of the enlargement, clean to the bottom, splitting it wide open. Clean it out with peroxide of hydrogen, after which saturate absorbent cotton with tincture iodine, pack in tight and sew the skin to hold it in place. Remove the dressing in 48 hours and wash with sheep dip (tablespoon to 1 quart of warm water) twice daily. This may be tubercular, or the ...
— One Thousand Questions in California Agriculture Answered • E.J. Wickson
... up rightly. Of all types of young ladies' education, there is nothing so splendid as that of the younger daughters of Pandareos. They have literally the four greatest goddesses for their governesses. Athena teaches them domestic accomplishments, how to weave, and sew, and the like; Artemis teaches them to hold themselves up straight; Hera, how to behave proudly and oppressively to company; and Aphrodite, delightful governess, feeds them with cakes and honey all day long. All ...
— The Queen of the Air • John Ruskin
... Daniel an agreeable servant. He was noiseless, ubiquitous. He could make an omelette or sew on a button with woman's skill. His small, well-kept hands knew no fatigue, and his master often watched them, almost transparent, fragile and aristocratic, as they shaved his rotund oily face. Daniel was admirable in his management of the musical library, ...
— Melomaniacs • James Huneker
... on. She was now tremendously interested in this beautiful woman whose coming, she believed, meant that she would no longer be Karl's model. "You see, I know all the things that go on here; I look out for the artist's laundry and sew his buttons on; and ...
— The Devil - A Tragedy of the Heart and Conscience • Joseph O'Brien
... more, Agnes went down stairs, and told Martha to see if Miss Smithers was at home, and if so to tell her to come right away, but not to sew. "Then leave this note with one of the ...
— 'Our guy' - or, The elder brother • Mrs. E. E. Boyd
... young lady, my mother, with Fanny Ellsworth, afterward Mrs. Wood, and Mary Hillhouse, daughter of the Senator, established a school to teach young colored children to read and sew. The colored people in New Haven were in a sad condition in those days. The law of the State made it a penal offence to teach a colored child to read. These girls violated the law. The public authorities interfered and threatened them with prosecution. But the young women were resolute. ...
— Autobiography of Seventy Years, Vol. 1-2 • George Hoar
... chiefly when she was not at school was to help with the housework so her mother would be free to sew. That was the important thing. Ma must not roughen her hands or the silks she worked with would be spoiled. So Mary cooked and scrubbed like a real little housewife; took care of the younger children and kept them quiet so they would ...
— Carl and the Cotton Gin • Sara Ware Bassett
... to me by your faith and your honor that you will carry out my instructions. First, when I am dead, do not bury me on shore—a Mussulman does not require Christian burial, so bury me like a sailor; sew me up in a piece of sail-cloth, fasten at my head and feet a heavy stone, then sink me where the Danube is deepest. Do this, my son, and when it is done, steer steadily for Komorn, and take care ...
— Timar's Two Worlds • Mr Jkai
... Brown—fat, good-natured and adoring—was all acquiescence, and by the time Norah was eleven she knew more of cooking and general housekeeping than many girls grown up and fancying themselves ready to undertake houses of their own. Moreover, she could sew rather well, though she frankly detested the accomplishment. The one form of work she cared for was knitting, and it was her boast that her father wore only the socks she ...
— A Little Bush Maid • Mary Grant Bruce
... woolen rose had come loose on Rose's left shoe, and Barefoot had just knelt down to sew it on carefully, when Rose said, half ashamed of her own behavior, ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VIII • Various
... relaxed that personal surveillance that is ever so intolerable to the proud and delicate-minded, and those suggestions that, however well intended, had been so irritating to me from such a source. She no longer urged me to read, or sew, or eat, or take exercise; but, retiring into her own work (whence she could observe me at her pleasure, for her door was always set wide open, and her face turned in my direction), she employed or feigned to employ herself in her inexhaustible stocking-basket ...
— Miriam Monfort - A Novel • Catherine A. Warfield
... used to let them do it; they came to get their coats mended and have their buttons sewed on. Sometimes it seemed to the long-suffering, smiling woman who sewed them on, as if they just ripped them off so she could sew them on again; if so, she did not mind. They came to mourn when they received no word from home; and when the mail came in and they were fortunate they came first to the hut waving their letter to tell of their good ...
— The War Romance of the Salvation Army • Evangeline Booth and Grace Livingston Hill
... plans at every spare moment, in the manufacture of knitted socks and cravats for his benefit. But their great achievement was a quilted dressing-gown which Dora contrived to cut out, and May, in spite of her bad sewing, to help to sew together, that in his convalescence he might sit up in bed ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Sarah Tytler
... francs for Pierrette's clothes. During the first week her time was wholly taken up, and Pierrette's too, by frocks to order and try on, chemises and petticoats to cut out and have made by a seamstress who went out by the day. Pierrette did not know how to sew. ...
— Pierrette • Honore de Balzac
... with my head low, working out my shame, Eyes burning dry and my heart like a flame; For I hate you then—I hate you, Jim of Tellico, And grip my needle tighter, every stitch a sin, The hate growing bigger till the thing I sew Seems a shroud I'm glad a-making just ...
— Path Flower and Other Verses • Olive T. Dargan
... little house, which consisted of a sitting room "with bedroom off," and a kitchen whose floor was sand scoured; the few pieces of tinware could be used as mirrors. Miss Rhody seated herself by the open window and began to ply her needle. She did not sew swiftly and smoothly, in feminine fashion, but drew her long-threaded needle through the fabric in abrupt and forceful jerks. A light breeze fluttered in through the window, but it could not ruffle the wisp-locked ...
— David Dunne - A Romance of the Middle West • Belle Kanaris Maniates
... all, half dazed with all the wealth of color and splendor, and wondering if "I be I." Was it a fairy tale, or was all this for Edith Darrell?—Edith Darrell, who such a brief while gone, used to sweep and dust, sew and darn, in dull, unlovely Sandypoint, and get a new merino dress twice a year? No, it could not be—such transformation scenes never look place out of a Christmas pantomime or a burlesque Arabian Night—it was all a dream—a ...
— A Terrible Secret • May Agnes Fleming
... fat, a little butter should be put in. The fillet is good baked, the bone should be cut out, and the place filled with a dressing, made of bread soaked soft in cold water, a little salt, pepper, a couple of eggs, and a table spoonful of melted butter put in—then sew it up, put it in your bake pan, with about a pint of water, cover the top of the meat with some of the dressing. When baked sufficiently, take it up, thicken the gravy with a little flour and water well mixed, put in a small ...
— The American Housewife • Anonymous
... were boarders and most of them were girls. The girls were encouraged to learn to sew that at Christmas they might be the wearers of a new calico dress made with their ...
— The Choctaw Freedmen - and The Story of Oak Hill Industrial Academy • Robert Elliott Flickinger
... a little of this left. It is for you. My mother has much skill to make garments. Let us sew for you the blouse." ...
— The Eye of Dread • Payne Erskine
... pause, "I am going out for a time. You will find books on the table, and can amuse yourself by reading; I won't make you sew, as Peg did," he ...
— Timothy Crump's Ward - A Story of American Life • Horatio Alger
... never wished then To play—oh, indeed! They learnt to sew and needlework, Or else to write ...
— Marigold Garden • Kate Greenaway
... the poem had been read she jumped up and cried, "Look at the Devil's needles. They're come to sew my eyes ...
— The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow
... up. Forgive me Not answering your knock. I can no more Let people in than I can keep them out. I'm getting too old for my size, I tell them. My fingers are about all I've the use of So's to take any comfort. I can sew: I help out with this beadwork what I can." "That's a smart pair of pumps you're beading there. Who are they for?" "You mean?—oh, for some miss. I can't keep track of other people's daughters. Lord, if I were to dream of everyone Whose shoes I primped to dance in!" "And where's John?" ...
— North of Boston • Robert Frost
... a moment from her pinnings and speaking more gravely. "My father died then, and I went to work. I hadn't time to sew after that—I bought ready-made things. So when I was married—that was a long seven years afterwards—I did have such lovely times buying organdies and laces and things and cutting them out and making them! That was the summer Allan ...
— The Wishing-Ring Man • Margaret Widdemer
... arteries, and blood clots, wash, stuff and sew. Sprinkle with salt, pepper, roll in flour and brown richly in hot dripping. Place in Dutch oven or in one of the small vessels in fireless cooker. Half cover with boiling water, surround with six slices carrot, one stalk celery, broken in ...
— Stevenson Memorial Cook Book • Various
... of work from a basket, she placed herself near Wych Hazel and began to sew. It was a pretty home picture, such as Wych Hazel—in her school life and ward life— had seen few. Just why it made her feel quiet she could not have told. Yet the brown eyes went somewhat gravely from ...
— Wych Hazel • Susan and Anna Warner
... is a great chief, and Canondah owes him her life. She will cook his venison, and sew his hunting shirts, and follow him with a light heart. Let the white Rose listen to the words of her sister. Soon will El Sol visit the wigwam of the Oconees, and then will Canondah whisper softly in his ear. He is a great warrior, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 367, May 1846 • Various
... servant maid, Thy jeers at me why dost thou throw? Thou needst not fear or blame or sneer From me, however thou may'st sew. ...
— Hafbur and Signe - a ballad • Thomas J. Wise
... I adopt when I wish to send spikes that have several blooms open, without injury to the flowers. I take a half bushel market basket, line it with waxed paper, sprinkle damp moss in the bottom, and then "string" the basket—that is, sew strong cords across it with a sail needle, three in each end at the top, about three inches apart, and three others below these, an inch or two above the bottom of the basket. The flowers are then put in slantwise, beginning at the ends of the basket, ...
— The Gladiolus - A Practical Treatise on the Culture of the Gladiolus (2nd Edition) • Matthew Crawford
... detail is worked out. And you have unconsciously done the same: that's the suit you wore that morning at Cray under the ash-tree—the nicest suit I ever saw. Here is a spot of ink on your sleeve as real as can be (bravo!). And this button is coming off—quite right; I will sew it on with a dream needle, and dream thread, and a ...
— Peter Ibbetson • George du Marier et al
... persons find employment in this gigantic establishment. Of these about three hundred are girls, and twenty or thirty boys. The girls feed the presses, sew the books, apply gold-leaf to the covers ready for tooling, etc. About a dozen little girls are employed in the press-room in laying the sheets, of the best description of Bibles, between glazed boards, and so preparing them for being placed in the hydraulic presses. Every day there are six thousand ...
— The Secrets Of The Great City • Edward Winslow Martin
... not expect anything like this," she said. "I thought I should have to make some plain, little things myself, suited to its station," with a wry smile. "They would have been very ugly. I don't know how to sew in the least. You forget that you were not buying things for a prince or a princess, but ...
— Emily Fox-Seton - Being The Making of a Marchioness and The Methods of Lady Walderhurst • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... are most exposed; for the latter, thick woollen mittens or gloves are best; the sting is generally left when thrust into a leather glove. For the face procure one and a half yards of thin muslin or calico, sew the ends together, the upper end gathered on a string small enough to prevent it slipping over the head when put on. An arm-hole is to be cut out on each side; below is another string to gather it close to the body. As I do not expect you to work ...
— Mysteries of Bee-keeping Explained • M. Quinby
... creatures which circle about candles at night may be engags or envoys—wicked people having the power of transformation, or even zombis "sent" by witches or wizards to do harm. "There was a woman at Tricolore," Cyrillia says, "who used to sew a great deal at night; and a big beetle used to come into her room and fly about the candle, and and bother her very much. One night she managed to get hold of it, and she singed its head in the candle. Next ...
— Two Years in the French West Indies • Lafcadio Hearn
... be thy woman, Negore's woman, the brave man's woman. And thou shalt hunt meat for me and Old Kinoos, and I shall cook thy food, and sew thee warm parkas and strong, and make thee moccasins after the way of my people, which is a better way than thy people's way. And as I say, I shall be thy woman, Negore, always thy woman. And I shall make thy life glad for thee, so that all thy days will be a song ...
— Love of Life - and Other Stories • Jack London
... made them, either, although Bud said he could sew, and insisted upon trying. He cut up several yards of cloth, and at the end of the week, when we saw the product of his needle, he narrowly escaped lynching. If Lilian had not interceded for Uncle Bud, of whom she is very fond, I'm afraid we'd have no little Buddy now. No, we sent ...
— Ted Strong's Motor Car • Edward C. Taylor
... or Jenny either, presume to meddle with my private matters?" (Mr. Oldbuck hated puttting to rights as much as Dr. Orkborne, or any other professed student.) "Go, sew your sampler, you monkey, and do not let me find you here again, as you value your ears.I assure you, Mr. Lovel, that the last inroad of these pretended friends to cleanliness was almost as fatal to my collection as Hudibras's visit to ...
— The Antiquary, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... Till the brain begins to swim; Work! work! work! Till the eyes are heavy and dim! Seam, and gusset, and band, Band, and gusset, and seam, Till over the buttons I fall asleep, And sew ...
— McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... sofa, a box of chocolates by her side, her work-basket frothing over, like a great dish of oeufs a la neige, with lawn or mull or what-not, and (I verily believe to complete her content) my ungainly figure and hatchet-face within her purview. She would eat and sew industriously. Sometimes she would press too hard on a sweetmeat and with a little cry would hold up a sticky finger ...
— The Morals of Marcus Ordeyne • William J. Locke
... if we so chose, on a Sunday; at least, I suppose we might, for my lady and Mr. Mountford used to do so often when I first went. But we must neither play cards, nor read, nor sew on the fifth of November and on the thirtieth of January, but must go to church, and meditate all the rest of the day—and very hard work meditating was. I would far rather have scoured a room. That was the reason, I suppose, ...
— My Lady Ludlow • Elizabeth Gaskell
... personal matther," he declared. "'Twas settled satisfacthory. I'll not die, an' I'll talk to no man but Misther Daney. Sew me up an' plug me lung, an' be quick ...
— Kindred of the Dust • Peter B. Kyne
... is ten years old her education properly begins and she is systematically inducted into the mysteries of housekeeping. At fifteen she has completed her curriculum and can cook, bake, sew, dye, spin and weave and is, indeed, graduated in all the accomplishments of the finished Moqui maiden. She now does up her hair in two large coils or whorls, one on each side of the head, which is ...
— Arizona Sketches • Joseph A. Munk
... evenings in our little town are filled with intimate, human, neighborly sounds. After the heat of the day it is pleasant to relax in the cool comfort of the front porch, with the life of the town eddying about us. We sew and read out there until it grows dusk. We call across lots to our next-door neighbor. The men water the lawns and the flower boxes and get together in little, quiet groups to discuss the new street paving. I have even known Mrs. Hines to bring her cherries ...
— One Basket • Edna Ferber
... Fielding, Esq.," and bore the motto from Horace, seldom so justly applied, of "Mores hominum multorum vidit." The advertisement also ingenuously stated that as it was "impossible to get Sets bound fast enough to answer the Demand for them, such Gentlemen and Ladies as pleased, might have them sew'd in Blue Paper and Boards at the Price of 16s a Set." The date of issue sufficiently disposes of the statement of Cunningham and others, that the book was written at Bow Street. Little more than the ...
— Fielding - (English Men of Letters Series) • Austin Dobson
... mother sewed," Burr went on, "she used a little bone to push the thread through the skins. One day she found a little bone with a hole in it and took it home. She put her thread through the hole, wondering how it would do, and began to sew. Soon there was a crowd of women round her, pointing and saying, 'Oh, oh!' while the little ...
— The Cave Boy of the Age of Stone • Margaret A. McIntyre
... did not address themselves to him. He never listened to what he did not understand: but he was very quick at hearing whatever was within the limits of his comprehension. He heard of the tailor-bird, that uses its long bill as a needle, to sew the dead and the living leaf together, of which it makes its light nest, lined with feathers and gossamer: of the fish called the 'old soldier,' that looks out for the empty shell of some dead animal, and fits this armour upon himself: of the Jamaica spider, ...
— Tales And Novels, Volume 1 • Maria Edgeworth
... broke out in the gathers of my stock; the fair fille de chambre, without saying a word, took out her little housewife, threaded a small needle, and sew'd it up.—I foresaw it would hazard the glory of the day; and, as she pass'd her hand in silence across and across my neck in the manoeuvre, I felt the laurels shake which fancy had ...
— A Sentimental Journey • Laurence Sterne
... met one yet that hadn't more sense than to go after a girl like you. If you were any good for any mortal thing a man might be content to marry you in spite of your face; but the way you are, not fit to darn your own stockings, let alone sew for a man, or cook the way he could eat what you put before him, it would be a queer one that would walk the same side of the street with you, pink blouse or ...
— Our Casualty And Other Stories - 1918 • James Owen Hannay, AKA George A. Birmingham
... some little boy would get me into the corner of the window and squeeze me all up tight with his fum." Dickie cast a rueful look at his own guilty thumb as he thought this. "I wouldn't like that! But I'd like very much indeed to buzz and tickle Mally's nose when she was twying to sew. She'd slap and slap, and not hit me, and I'd buzz and tickle. How I'd laugh! But perhaps flies don't know how to ...
— Nine Little Goslings • Susan Coolidge
... good refuge in trouble, but though he may sew up a ragged tear in a child's throat ever so neatly, it doesn't necessarily follow that it will ...
— The Great Hunger • Johan Bojer
... said he, after a thoughtful pause, and in a tone of considerable compassion, "I understand: you sew your money in your mattress. My poor, poor lad, you can do better than that! ...
— Lucretia, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... that will help us guess what we are to do with them," said Grandmother, and she adjusted her glasses. "Let's see what it says." She read off the first one, "'This is the way Mary Jane learns to sew.' Shall we open this first, Mary Jane?" she asked, "or shall we read what the other ...
— Mary Jane—Her Visit • Clara Ingram Judson
... a little afraid that we might eclipse you? And it is not pleasant to be beaten by a woman, is it? And then you profess to think that we ought to be all housewives and cooks, and knitters of stockings, and sewers-on of our husbands' buttons; but what if we have no husbands, no buttons to sew? And is it not a little selfish, my dear male sycophant, to wish to keep us all to yourself? to attend upon the wants of the lords of creation, who often distinguish themselves so much ...
— The Romance of Mathematics • P. Hampson
... a flash of lightning fell one night near the camp, and struck a tree near to the post of a centinel, who was much hurt by it; the tree was greatly rent, and there being at the foot of it a pen in which were a sew pigs and sheep, they were all killed. Towards the latter end of the month the weather was more settled, little thunder, lightning, or rain, and the thermometer from 65 deg. ...
— An Historical Journal of the Transactions at Port Jackson and Norfolk Island • John Hunter
... small, I own, And yet needs care, if truth were known. We have no maid; so I attend to cooking, sweeping, Knit, sew, do every thing, in fact; And mother, in all branches of housekeeping, Is so exact! Not that she need be tied so very closely down; We might stand higher than some others, rather; A nice estate was left us by my father, A house and garden not far out of town. Yet, after all, my life ...
— Faust • Goethe
... workroom is managed by a committee of ladies, some of whom are in attendance every day. The young women are employed upon plain sewing. They have two days' work a week, at one shilling a day, and the Relief Committee adds sixpence to this 2s. in each case. Most of them are merely learning to sew. Many of them prove to be wholly untrained to this simple domestic accomplishment. The work is not remunerative, nor is it expected to be so; but the benefit which may grow out of the teaching which these young women get here—and the evil their employment ...
— Home-Life of the Lancashire Factory Folk during the Cotton Famine • Edwin Waugh
... of ennui; the bride and bridegroom at the altar or before the mayor putting on their already heavy-ruffled garments the sacred ruffle of law or religion; the babe brought to church by his mother and kindred to have the priest-tailor sew on his new garment the ruffle of baptism; the soldier in his gaudy uniform; the king in his ermine with a crown and sceptre appended; the Nabob of Ind in his gorgeous and multi-colored robes; and the Papuan with horns in his nostrils and rings ...
— The Book of Khalid • Ameen Rihani
... rather hard to have to sit there all day, he explained to the doctor, but they were getting along. Mrs. Mulhaus had got a job of cleaning that day; that would be fifty cents. Ally—she was twelve—was learning to sew. That was her afternoon to go to the College Settlement. Jimmy, fourteen, had got a place in a store, and ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... them quite in half, It is a bitter cup; They give a sour sardonic laugh And sew the pieces up; They sew them up and wind away With seeming unconcern, But oh, be careful! one fine day I ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 159, December 1, 1920 • Various
... drifting about in a boat known to belong to his son, it would create terrible suspicion as to the manner of his death. At one time in the evening, Ellis had thought of persuading Owen to let him bury the Squire in a sailor's grave; or, in other words, to sew him up in a spare sail, and weighting it well, sink it for ever. He had not broached the subject, from a certain fear of Owen's passionate repugnance to the plan; otherwise, if he had consented, they might have returned to Penmorfa, and passively ...
— The Doom of the Griffiths • Elizabeth Gaskell
... active proceedings of Surgeon Sawyer, who was now threading a needle to sew up the overlapping of the stump, the young gentlemen had not scrupled to turn away their attention altogether from ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... fall apart. When a book of this kind comes to have a permanent binding, all the leaves and plates have to be pared at the back and made up into sections with guards—a troublesome and expensive business. The custom with binders is to overcast the backs of the leaves in sections, and to sew through the overcasting thread, but this, though an easy and quick process, makes a hopelessly stiff back, and no book ...
— Bookbinding, and the Care of Books - A handbook for Amateurs, Bookbinders & Librarians • Douglas Cockerell
... belief sits lightly on both men and women. Certainly it has nothing to do with the way they spend Sunday, and if they go to church in the morning they are as likely as not to go to the theatre in the afternoon. They sew, they dance, they fiddle, they act, they travel on the day of rest, more on that day than on any other, and when they come to England there is nothing in our national life they find so tedious and unprofitable as our Sundays. ...
— Home Life in Germany • Mrs. Alfred Sidgwick
... you know better. You know you never sew a stitch but you lie awake half the night after ...
— Gypsy's Cousin Joy • Elizabeth Stuart Phelps
... you do it," sez I. "Your head's about as far turned now as your neck'll stand, an' what you ought to do is to learn how to cook an' sew." ...
— Happy Hawkins • Robert Alexander Wason
... ploughman to drive her over to Wolgast to-day to buy the stuff. Wherefore I think that the just God, who hateth the proud and showeth mercy on the humble, did rightly chastise me for such pride. For I myself felt a sinful pleasure when she came back with two women who were to help her to sew, and laid the stuff before me. Next day she set to work at sunrise to sew, and I composed my carmen the while. I had not got very far in it when the young Lord Ruediger of Nienkerken came riding up, in order, as he said, to inquire whether his Majesty were indeed ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V2 • William Mienhold
... on wooden pegs, are dainty dresses; stiff, curiously embroidered gowns they are, that came from across the sea, sent, perhaps, by John Adams when he went to France, and left Abigail here to farm and sew and weave and teach the children. June examined the dresses carefully, and said the embroidery was handmade, and must have taken months and months to complete. On a high shelf of the closet are bandboxes, in which are bonnets, astonishing bonnets, with prodigious flaring ...
— Little Journeys To the Homes of the Great, Volume 3 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard
... overtake her husband, and she should be thrown on her own slender resources? She is driven, to seek employment of some kind,—to attend in a shop, (for somehow that is considered rather more genteel than, most other occupations,) or to sew, or to fold books, or do something else. But she knows nothing of these several arts; and employers want skilled labor, not novices. She once boasted that she had never been obliged to work, and now she realizes how much such absurd boasting is worth. What then? Why, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 89, March, 1865 • Various
... many of the comforts of home and a mother's care, it did not take the boys long, under the tutelage of the older ones, to attend to their own wants. Roswell and Frank soon learned how to sew on a button and do the mending which their garments occasionally required. They washed their clothing and kept themselves in better form than do many men when ...
— Klondike Nuggets - and How Two Boys Secured Them • E. S. Ellis
... French, she swears every few minutes; and if that is the way she was brought up, may-be she isn't accountable. I think we can't be too charitable for people that a'n't privileged as we are. Miss Vernon's Polly told me she had seen her sew Sundays,—sew Sabbath-day! She came into her room sudden, and she was working on her embroidery there; and she never winked nor blushed, nor offered to put it away, but sat there just as easy! Polly said she never was so beat in all her life; she felt kind o' scared, every ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various
... important; for in heaven we will all have angels to play with, but here we only have each other, and it is right lonesome when they won't come out and play! But I tell you things have changed for the better since the war, and now we knit and sew together, and forgive each other for being Methodists and Presbyterians; and, do you know? I made a speech one night, right out loud so everybody could hear me, in a Red Cross meeting, and that is what I thought that I could never do. But I got feeling so anxious about the prisoners ...
— The Next of Kin - Those who Wait and Wonder • Nellie L. McClung
... out, Dr. White was asked to tie the Medium, and Mrs. Lippincott to sew the ends of the ribbon and tape with which ...
— Preliminary Report of the Commission Appointed by the University • The Seybert Commission
... next step is to sew the sheets on to cords or twine, set vertically at proper distances in a frame, called a "sewing bench," for this purpose. No book can be thoroughly well bound if the sewing is slighted in any degree. Insist upon strong, honest linen thread—if ...
— A Book for All Readers • Ainsworth Rand Spofford
... and threes of cousins. The debilitated cousin, more debilitated by the dreariness of the place, gets into a fearful state of depression, groaning under penitential sofa-pillows in his gunless hours and protesting that such fernal old jail's—nough t'sew fler up—frever. ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... as the breakfast things were done and the men folks had gone to the cloth-factory, Mrs. Martineau would marshal her daughters in the sitting-room to sew. And there they sewed for four hours every forenoon for more than four years; and as they sewed some one would often read aloud to them, for Mrs. Martineau believed in ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 2 of 14 - Little Journeys To the Homes of Famous Women • Elbert Hubbard
... regard to little daughters, much more can be done in this way than many would imagine. The writer, blessed with the example of a most ingenious and industrious mother, had not only learned before the age of twelve to make dolls, of various sorts and sizes, but to cut and fit and sew every article that belongs to a doll's wardrobe. This, which was done by the child for mere amusement, secured such a facility in mechanical pursuits, that, ever afterward, the cutting and fitting of any article ...
— The American Woman's Home • Catherine E. Beecher and Harriet Beecher Stowe
... and harnessed for him. This saves time, and enables the crop to be taken off the more quickly. Of course, the farmer in a small way will do his own work, requiring only a little assistance at harvest time, someone to sew up and stack the bags. As there is always a rush at harvest time, the bags of grain are often left lying in the paddocks in small heaps until the crop is all off, when they are carted to the railway or mill. Some farmers do their own carting, but the majority pay the regular carriers ...
— Wheat Growing in Australia • Australia Department of External Affairs
... meet on Saturday afternoons, and make bags and needle-cases and collars and many other things to sell; and I know my father will be delighted to have us put a box, with these things, in his store. Then, while we sew, I propose that one reads aloud from some interesting book or paper about missions and benevolent societies, and thus we shall all become interested in the intelligence, and be more willing to work ...
— Self-Denial - or, Alice Wood, and Her Missionary Society • American Sunday-School Union
... walk so prettily, and look so pretty! Mon Dieu! I was not ten years old yet! And afterward it was only for that that I went into society. What should girls go into society for otherwise but to meet their brun or their blond? Do you think it is amusing, to economize and economize, and sew and sew, just to go to a party to dance? No! I assure you, I went into society only for that; and I do not believe what girls say—they go into society only for ...
— Balcony Stories • Grace E. King
... observations as to the Countess, in particular, I consider to have been an example of sustained invective such as one rarely encounters in this degenerate age. Well, her next essay in creative composition is my supper, which will be an equally spirited impromptu. To-morrow she will darn and sew me an epic; and her desserts will continue to be in the richest lyric vein. Such, sir, are the poems of Lisa, all addressed to me, who came so near ...
— Jurgen - A Comedy of Justice • James Branch Cabell
... doubtingly. "I can't sew with two hands, and my tongue thrown in. I do not see how she manipulates anything so ...
— The House of the Misty Star - A Romance of Youth and Hope and Love in Old Japan • Fannie Caldwell Macaulay
... great fratricidal war, she started a sewing-school in Rivington Street, which eventually merged into the Harper and Fiske Industrial School in Ludlow Street, which met every Saturday. Gathering together from seventy-five to one hundred children, she taught them to sew, and endeavored to lead them to Him who said, "Suffer the little children to come unto me, and forbid them not, for of such is the kingdom ...
— Gathering Jewels - The Secret of a Beautiful Life: In Memoriam of Mr. & Mrs. James Knowles. Selected from Their Diaries. • James Knowles and Matilda Darroch Knowles
... if a vulgar error saves a man from Davy Jones's locker, ar'n't it just as well to sew it up in the waistband ...
— Jacob Faithful • Captain Frederick Marryat
... in the city," she cried. "They've taken my father to defend the breastworks and he's near seventy. If you can sew or wash or cook, there'll be work enough for ...
— The Battle Ground • Ellen Glasgow
... could make you a new suit," said the Rag Doll. "I can sew a little, and if I had some cloth I might at least put a patch over the burned places if I shouldn't have time for a ...
— The Story of a Bold Tin Soldier • Laura Lee Hope
... it comes about, whether from illness, anxiety, or prolonged physical effort, the woman grows pale and thin, eats little, or if she eats does not profit by it. Everything wearies her,—to sew, to write, to read, to walk,—and by and by the sofa or the bed is her only comfort. Every effort is paid for dearly, and she describes herself as aching and sore, as sleeping ill and awaking unrefreshed, and as needing constant stimulus and endless tonics. ...
— Fat and Blood - An Essay on the Treatment of Certain Forms of Neurasthenia and Hysteria • S. Weir Mitchell
... but that's a good place to look, for various things. And there's a great variety of things there,—if a body had time to read 'em all, which I haven't. I used to read like a scribe when I was young—till my eyes got bad; but a body can't do much without eyes, especially when they have to sew all the time, as I do. I always did think it was one indemnification for being a man, that a body wouldn't have to sew. Nor do much of anything else—for 'man works from sun to sun, but a woman's work is never done.' And I always think the work after sundown comes hardest—it does to me, because ...
— Say and Seal, Volume I • Susan Warner
... out.—There were several small rents in the lining—but one in particular had obviously been cut open with scissars. The shopboy, who thought I was pointing out the rents to disparage my purchase, assured me that any woman, clever at her needle, would with half-a-dozen stitches sew all up, and make the muff as good again as new. Jacob desired the boy to show him some old seals, rings, and trinkets, fit for a pedlar to carry into the country; Jacob was, for this purpose, sent to the most respectable place at the counter, and promoted to the honour of dealing face to face ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. IX - [Contents: Harrington; Thoughts on Bores; Ormond] • Maria Edgeworth
... you," I asked with some impatience, remembering Hiram's description—"did you sew beads on velvet and ...
— On the Church Steps • Sarah C. Hallowell
... She took the pillow case, and unpicked a few stitches, which clearly indicated that the needle had been taking giant strides. "Just hem that last inch or two again, and see if you can't make it look nice. I believe the needle only stuck into your finger because you were making it sew so badly. Have you got a handkerchief?—but, of course, you haven't." She polished the fat, tear-stained cheek with her own. "Now run and sit ...
— Back To Billabong • Mary Grant Bruce
... (Begins to sew, then lays her hand down on the table, then begins to sew again.) ...
— Three Comedies • Bjornstjerne M. Bjornson
... have finished that other apron, you shall sew no more to-day. You can pump a fresh bucket of water, and then run out into the ...
— Beulah • Augusta J. Evans
... may be. None of us are, Tom. I wonder at you more than I do at Dan, for you have had more advantages. As for me, I am only a girl; there's nothing for girls but to sit and sew, and prepare meals for men to eat, and wait until some one comes and chooses to marry them. Then they go off and do the same ...
— The Inn at the Red Oak • Latta Griswold
... husband, Gracie spends every spare moment piecing quilts. He said they use to go fishing and that Gracie always took her quilt pieces along and if the fish were not biting she would sew. She showed me twenty-two finished quilt tops, each of a different design and several of the same design, or about thirty quilts in all. Two were entirely of silk, two of applique design which called "laid work". They were folded up in a trunk and as she took them ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States - Volume II. Arkansas Narratives. Part I • Work Projects Administration
... down to her piano, resolutely, till tea came; playing on and on with a spirit only half present, the other half of her wandering in the Town, seeking for Miltoun. After tea she tried first to read, then to sew, and once more came back to her piano. The clock struck six; and as if its last stroke had broken the armour of her mind, she felt suddenly sick with anxiety. Why was he so long? But she kept on playing, turning the pages ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... and the like, are arts which have never been practised in the Indian tribes generally. After the revolutionary war, I learned to sew, so that I could make my own clothing after a poor fashion; but the other domestic arts I have been wholly ignorant of the application of, since my captivity. In the season of hunting, it was our business, ...
— A Narrative of the Life of Mrs. Mary Jemison • James E. Seaver
... mule," announced the lad. "There are no bones broken, but I'll warrant he aches all over from the shaking up he has had. I shall have to sew up that gash on his side when ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in Alaska - The Gold Diggers of Taku Pass • Frank Gee Patchin
... return'd from the well-foughten field, And bore home Sir Frovin's corse, laid on a shield; Sad sight for the maid! but she still was alert, And sew'd round the body ...
— Romantic Ballads - translated from the Danish; and Miscellaneous Pieces • George Borrow
... long and a hard voyage they had, and the leak gained on the ship, and men began to be exceeding worn with toil. The young wife of the mate was wont to sew from Grettir's hands, and much would the crew mock him therefor; but Haflidi went up to where Grettir ...
— The Story of Grettir The Strong • Translated by Eirikr Magnusson and William Morris
... said, after a pause. "You have been kind enough to take an interest in Margaret Brown, and I know you will like to help her through the summer. The warm weather is telling on her strength; she has not been able to sew as steadily as usual, and she needs an entire rest. Do you think you could, between you, advance her a small sum of money? She will repay you with her work ...
— The Old Stone House • Anne March
... school last spring I had my secretary look in upon the New York board of health and see what demands that city makes upon its boys and girls before allowing them to drive its machinery, to run its elevators, to match its colors, to sew on its buttons, to set its type, to carry its checks to the bank. The officer at the door of the room where the children were being examined, greeted her as follows: "You must bring your child with you; bring his birth certificate or swear that he ...
— Civics and Health • William H. Allen
... models. It is a curious imitative instinct, a slavery of the brain, to remain hypnotised by some point in the past, instead of trying to follow Proteus in his course—the life of change. One picks up the old skin which the young snake has thrown off long ago, and tries to sew it together again. These pedantic admirers of old revolutions believe that those of the future will be made on the same lines. They will not see that the new liberty must have a gait of its own, and will overleap barriers before which its grandmother of ninety-three stopped, ...
— Clerambault - The Story Of An Independent Spirit During The War • Rolland, Romain
... "intended's" vacation. Then, the foreman thought, he'd have to get a wife himself, if he could find anybody to have him. And she wouldn't have to work, either—not on your tintype! She would live at home with his mother, and darn his socks and sew on his buttons, and she'd have no washing or ironing to do, as he got his all done for nothing in the "Pearl." That perquisite went along with the eighteen dollars a week. Oh, she'd have things as nice as any hard-working young fellow could ...
— The Long Day - The Story of a New York Working Girl As Told by Herself • Dorothy Richardson
... cause of fatigue with women is the useless strain in sewing. "I get so tired in the back of my neck" is a frequent complaint. "It is because you sew with the back of your neck" is generally the correct explanation. And it is because you sew with the muscles of your waist that they feel so strangely fatigued, and the same with the muscles of your legs or your chest. Wherever the tired feeling comes it is because ...
— Power Through Repose • Annie Payson Call
... great many perplexities—how to make trousers for four boys out of the one old pair the minister's wife had given her; how to make the memory of the rice-pudding they had on Sunday last all the week; how to work all day and sew at night, and still be brave and patient; how to make little Danny and Bugsey forget they were cold and hungry. Yes, Mrs. Watson had her problems; but they were not the kind that Dr. Ernestus Parker had dealt with ...
— Sowing Seeds in Danny • Nellie L. McClung
... "Come into old Spurling's shop; he will sew it up in a trice. He always mends our things; and I ...
— Saved from the Sea - The Loss of the Viper, and her Crew's Saharan Adventures • W.H.G. Kingston
... on the land—to cut, to fashion, and to sew. Perhaps, too, your talent at a masquerade dress may be taxed, from time ...
— The Red Rover • James Fenimore Cooper
... off according to his kind Custom towards his Courtiers. The rest of them have allowance from that King, and follow Husbandry, Trading about the Countrey, Stilling Rack, keeping Taverns; the Women sew Womens Wastcoats, the Men sew Mens Doublets ...
— An Historical Relation Of The Island Ceylon In The East Indies • Robert Knox
... make an incision with a sharp knife and fill with chopped onions, bread-crumbs, a lump of butter, sage, thyme, salt and pepper. Sew up and let boil until nearly done. Remove the skin. Then stick cloves all over the tongue, and let cook until tender. Add 2 tablespoonfuls of vinegar and 1 tablespoonful of butter. Serve, garnished with sliced beets, olives and ...
— 365 Foreign Dishes • Unknown
... Doratei too; and the big dark convent, with the great garden behind, is the first thing I ever remember. The good sisters were very kind to us. They taught all the older girls to read and write, and sew and knit, not only plain sewing, but fine stitching, and open-work, and fine darning, and button-holes, and lace-work, and so on. They also taught them to make beds, and sweep, and dust, and cook a little,—that is, how to make broth, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, September, 1885 • Various
... concentrated all her affection, while she treated her deformed child with contempt and unkindness. The latter would often come, weeping, to Frances, on this account, who tried to console her, and in the long evenings amused her by teaching her to read and sew. Accustomed to pity her by their mother's example, instead of imitating other children, who always taunted and sometimes even beat her, Agricola and Gabriel liked her, and used to protect ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue
... tone just then made Gypsy feel worse than she felt to see her sew. She was silent a minute, turning away ...
— Gypsy's Cousin Joy • Elizabeth Stuart Phelps
... accompany her. The tailor presently consented for greed of gain, so tying a kerchief tightly over his eyes she led him by the hand to the house wherein lay the dead body of her master. Then, taking off the bandage in the darkened room she bade him sew together the quarters of the corpse, limb to its limb; and, casting a cloth upon the body, said to the tailor "Make haste and sew a shroud according to the size of this dead man and I will give ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... got the young fellow to sew up his old man's money in Altacoola land," he chuckled, "reckon Senator William H. Langdon won't see anything wrong with that same noble tract of universe when he comes to vote for the naval base. Senator ...
— A Gentleman from Mississippi • Thomas A. Wise
... mother of a human baby, however, is not born with the instinct which enables her to care for her baby equally as well as the cat cares for her kitten. She must be educated or taught to care for it. She can then care for it better than the cat cares for the kitten, and she can be taught to bake, to sew, to read; to play on the piano, which a cat cannot be taught. So while a baby may be the most helpless living thing at one stage of its career it has in it—in the faculty of reasoning—the ability to become ...
— The Eugenic Marriage, Vol 2 (of 4) - A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better Babies • W. Grant Hague
... never anything to do evenin's but to walk in the Common, or go to the movies, if we had the dime to blow in, or just stay in our room. Well, our room wasn't very pleasant. It was hot in summer, and cold in winter, and the gas-jet was so measly and so flickery that we couldn't sew or read, even if we hadn't been too fagged out to do either—which we 'most generally was. Besides, over our heads was a squeaky board that some one was always rockin' on, and under us was a feller that ...
— Pollyanna Grows Up • Eleanor H. Porter
... saw poor Pitt bleeding profusely from his right hand. Having sent for the Doctor and some ice, I got hold of the wrist, and bound it up as best I could until the Doctor appeared, who then proceeded with his instruments to tie the arteries properly and to sew up the wounds. While opening some soda-water for the children one of the bottles burst in the poor man's hand, cutting five arteries and nearly blowing off the top of his second finger. It was a ghastly business altogether, and although he bore it bravely he could not help crying ...
— The Last Voyage - to India and Australia, in the 'Sunbeam' • Lady (Annie Allnutt) Brassey
... don't object to walk, And are not given to fainting; Because you have not learned to talk Of flowers, and Poonah-painting; Because I think you'd scarce refuse To sew one on a button; Because I know you sometimes choose To dine ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 2 (of 4) • Various
... after poor Jack dies, he is prepared for his deep-sea grave by his messmates, who, with the assistance of the sailmaker, and in the presence of the master-at-arms, sew him up in his hammock, and, having placed a couple of cannon-shot at his feet, they rest the body (which now not a little resembles an Egyptian mummy) on a spare grating. Some portion of the bedding ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 17, No. - 488, May 7, 1831 • Various
... often, and one day before the two armies, that ceased their combat to witness, I slew three of their great fighters, for which the Emperor did allow me to bear arms containing Three Turks' Heads—that is, as if one of thy kinsmen should sew upon his robe three scalps of enemies he had killed. But soon after that was I taken prisoner by these Turks and sold into captivity ...
— The Princess Pocahontas • Virginia Watson
... every cent I've got is yours and the child's, and you know it, Mary Carew," and the good-hearted chorus-lady, with a reproachful backward glance at her room-mate, flounced out the door, leaving the re-assured Mary to sew, by the light of an ill-smelling lamp, until her return ...
— The Angel of the Tenement • George Madden Martin
... see that it is impossible for us to employ your husband. Isn't there something I can do for you yourself, though? Mrs. Greymer tells me you sew ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. October, 1878. • Various
... They meant to give her a dose of morphia, and, as soon as she became unconscious, they were going perhaps to take some terrible precaution—" Hanaud paused for a second. "I only say perhaps as to that. But certainly they were going to sew her up in that sack, row her well out across the lake, fix a weight to her feet, and drop her quietly overboard. She was to wear everything which she had brought with her to the house. Mlle. Celie would have disappeared ...
— At the Villa Rose • A. E. W. Mason
... established a library, coffee-room, class-room, weekly lectures, and a system of industrial training. The latter has been established for females, of whom he employs a great many. This class of girls generally go to the mills without any knowledge of household duties; they are taught in the schools to sew, ...
— Thoughts on Educational Topics and Institutions • George S. Boutwell
... new beaded bag to show you," said White Cloud. "I shall put my doll's best clothes in it and hang it over her bed. Are you learning to sew, Flying Squirrel?" ...
— Two Indian Children of Long Ago • Frances Taylor
... girls, who had enough to eat and drink and wear, a good many comforts and pleasures, kind friends and parents who loved them dearly, and yet they were not contented." (Here the listeners stole sly looks at one another, and began to sew diligently.) "These girls were anxious to be good and made many excellent resolutions, but they did not keep them very well, and were constantly saying, 'If only we had this,' or 'If we could only do that,' quite forgetting how much ...
— Little Women • Louisa May Alcott
... eaten you as he always declared. He was in the habit of saying many pleasant things about it, your lordship, for he is very amusing. And it is a fact that you are much mourned in Clarides. You were such a promising child. I shall remember to my dying day how you once asked me for a needle to sew with, and as I refused, for you were not of an age to use it without danger, you replied you would go to the woods and pick beautiful green pine needles. That is what you said, and it still makes me ...
— Honey-Bee - 1911 • Anatole France
... the kind in London. 'I have often thought of it, 'he says,' as one of the most barbarous customs in the world that we deny the advantages of learning to women. Their youth is spent to teach them to stitch and sew, or make baubles. They are taught to read, indeed, and perhaps to write their names or so, and that is the height of a woman's education. And I would but ask any who slight the sex for their understanding, "What is a man (a gentleman I mean) good ...
— Reviews • Oscar Wilde
... said, dully, as though he spoke from the midst of some absorbing thought; then he got up and walked away. "You better go in and light the lamp if you want to sew," he ...
— Shapes that Haunt the Dusk • Various
... lived at Trenby Hall, Isobel had contrived to make herself almost indispensable to Roger. If a "damned button" flew off his coat, she was always at hand with needle and thread, and a quaint carved ivory thimble crowning one small finger, to sew it on again. Or should his dress tie decline to adorn his collar in precisely the proper manner, those nimble, claw-like little fingers could always produce a well-tied bow in next to no time. It was Isobel who found all the things which, manlike, ...
— The Moon out of Reach • Margaret Pedler
... that it vill be all for ze Church," she has said to me. And the priest has taught her all she knows, how to sew and embroider, and cook and read, though he never lets her read anything but works on religion. Religion, always religion! He has brought her up like a nun, crushed the life out of her. Until I found her out, found my jewel out. It is Tennyson who says that. But his ...
— Crowded Out! and Other Sketches • Susie F. Harrison
... ingrain carpet was indeed very warm, beautiful, and comforting to the eye, and the sisters were suitably grateful to Providence, and devoutly thankful to themselves, that they had been enabled to buy, sew, and lay so many yards of it. But as they stood looking at their completed task, it was cruelly true that there was ...
— Homespun Tales • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... funny to withhold. Among the groceries ordered from Boston was a piece of extra fine cheese. A connoisseur in cheese had advised me to try it. It recommended itself so strongly that I placed it carefully under glass, in a place all by itself. It was strong—strong enough to sew buttons on, strong as Sampson, strong enough to walk away alone. One warm morning it seemed to have gained during the night. Its penetrating, permeating power was something, almost supernatural. I carried it from one place to another, each time ...
— Adopting An Abandoned Farm • Kate Sanborn
... rode ore blew awl thyme new ate lief cell dew sell won praise high prays hie be inn ail road rowed by blue tier so all two time knew ate leaf one due sew tear buy lone hare night clime sight tolled site knights maid cede beech waste bred piece sum plum e'er cent son weight tier rein weigh heart wood paws through fur fare main pare beech meet wrest led bow seen earn plate wear rote peel you berry flew know ...
— The Art Of Writing & Speaking The English Language - Word-Study and Composition & Rhetoric • Sherwin Cody
... see your cousin, Allie," she said. "I know he's going to be great fun, only I'm afraid he'll think we are hopeless tomboys. Probably he's been used to girls that sit in the parlor and sew embroidery, instead of skating and riding bronchos bareback, and playing hare and ...
— In Blue Creek Canon • Anna Chapin Ray
... sewing machines, even though all the rest were done by hand—it would be natural and almost necessary to have one class of workers to prepare the uppers, another to prepare the soles, and a third to sew them together by aid of the machine. When the several stages of the process are thus given over to different classes of workers, the situation is ripe for the application of more machines, and inventors readily devise apparatus that will perform one ...
— Essentials of Economic Theory - As Applied to Modern Problems of Industry and Public Policy • John Bates Clark
... fingering the strap affectionately, as though he was going to lift it off my head, "you let me take it away with me. I've got men in this ship, who can mend a cut leather strap as neat as you've no idea of. They'd sew up a cut like them so as you'd hardly ...
— Martin Hyde, The Duke's Messenger • John Masefield
... be patient and cheerful in spite of pain and no play. You can amuse Teddy for me, wind cotton, read to me when I sew, and do many things without hurting your foot, which will make the days pass quickly, and not be ...
— Little Men - Life at Plumfield With Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott
... thoroughly in cold water every morning. Do not read or sew at twilight, or by too dazzling a light. If far-sighted, read with rather less light, and with the book somewhat nearer to the eye, than you desire. If nearsighted, read with a book as far off as possible. Both these imperfections may be diminished ...
— The American Frugal Housewife • Lydia M. Child
... also made that the little girls from ten years old should attend and be taught to sew. Many a little dress was selected at headquarters for them to make over ...
— A Story of the Red Cross - Glimpses of Field Work • Clara Barton
... can go round the garden and look at the fountains, or into the grove, but not outside the wall, or you will have Miss Magin tagging after you, to see that nothing happens to you. After dinner, you will have to practise and sew, and in the evening play backgammon with mother, or talk to the visitors who ...
— The Magician's Show Box and Other Stories • Lydia Maria Child
... by my door, darkening my whole front, besides making an awful clatter. But she did not seem to mind this, and I took little notice of her, till one of the other lodgers—a woman with a busy tongue—began to ask why this strange woman, who was so very dark and plain, went out only at night? Did she sew or write for a living? If not, what did she do ...
— The Mystery of the Hasty Arrow • Anna Katharine Green
... calling their strange mountain calls; and the people went quite mad. Even the English taxidermist who had taken the trouble to sew and roughly stuff that mangled tiger-skin for the mahouts—even he shouted with them. Every time Neela Deo put that little quirk into his trunk and slanted his head in that absurd angle—Neela Deo, whose smooth dignity had never shown a ...
— Son of Power • Will Levington Comfort and Zamin Ki Dost
... a good lad, he shall stay with us, he may become a clever glovemaker, like you. Look what delicate fingers he has got; Madonna intended him for a glovemaker." So the boy stayed with them, and the woman herself taught him to sew; and he ate well, and slept well, and became very merry. But at last he began to tease Bellissima, as the little dog was called. This made the woman angry, and she scolded him and threatened him, which made him very unhappy, and he went and sat in his own room full of sad thoughts. This ...
— Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen • Hans Christian Andersen
... four children, and have to sew for a living!"—this was the burden of her song; and it had become familiar to her neighbours since David Means had begun to "fail up," as ...
— "Some Say" - Neighbours in Cyrus • Laura Elizabeth Howe Richards
... one day is an account of all. In the morning, from nine o'clock till half-past twelve, I instruct my sisters, and draw; then we walk till dinner-time. After dinner I sew till tea-time, and after tea I either write, read, or do a little fancywork, or draw, as I please. Thus, in one delightful though somewhat monotonous course, my life is passed. I have been out only twice to tea since I came home. We are expecting company this afternoon, ...
— Stories of Achievement, Volume IV (of 6) - Authors and Journalists • Various
... has already benefitted her. She breathes regularly, and the action of her heart is better. Sit down, my man,—you look ghastly. Mitchell, give him some brandy, and sew up that gash in his cheek, while I write ...
— Vashti - or, Until Death Us Do Part • Augusta J. Evans Wilson
... so practical. When I go to her with some beautiful thought I have found in a book or poem she is quite likely to say, "Yes, yes, but I noticed this morning that the braid was loose on your skirt, Beatrice. Better go and sew it on before you forget again. 'A ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1905 to 1906 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... "Some should sew sacks to hold wheat. And you who have wool weave it fast, Spin it speedily, spare not your fingers Unless it be a holy day or holy eve. Look out your linen and work on it quickly, The needy and the naked take care how they live, And cast on them clothes for the cold, for ...
— English Literature For Boys And Girls • H.E. Marshall
... idea, one thought, or one affection! Their lives do not know the thousand distractions which at once disturb and console men; and any idea that takes hold upon them easily becomes fixed. They dwell upon it in the crowd and in solitude; when they read and while they sew; in their dreams and in their prayers. In it they ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... home, Margaret like a queen, Like a blush-rose, like the moon In her heavenly sheen, Fragrant-breathed as milky cow Or field of blossoming bean, Graceful as an ivy bough Born to cling and lean; Thus she sat to sing and sew. ...
— Poems • Christina G. Rossetti |
