"Artless" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... for us the curtain of the homely quadrangular interior, where we found twoscore or more of such simple folk as Fox might have preached to in just such a place. The only difference was that they now wore artless versions of the world's present fashions in dress, and not the drabs of out-dated cut which we associate with Quakerism. But this was right, for that dress is only the antiquated simplicity of the time when Quakerism began; and the people we now ...
— London Films • W.D. Howells
... unendurable, her heroism far more noble, than any which in more recent times have been so much pitied and so much applauded; but she was a simple missionary's wife, an American by birth, and she told her tale with an artless modesty—writing only what it became her to write, treating only of matters that became a woman. Her captivity, if so it can be called, was voluntarily endured. She of her own free will shared the sufferings of her husband, taking to herself no credit for anything she did; putting ...
— Lives of the Three Mrs. Judsons • Arabella W. Stuart
... of perfect health in her blood. Impulsive and ingenuous as she was, the girl had, at first, drawn near to her cousin, simply and naturally, obeying the law of attraction that draws the young toward the young. She had met his friendly advances with the immodesty of innocence, artless effrontery, the liberties taught by life in the country, the happy folly of a nature abounding in high spirits, and with all sorts of ignorant hardihood, unblushing ingenuousness and rustic coquetry, against which her cousin's vanity was without means of ...
— Germinie Lacerteux • Edmond and Jules de Goncourt
... little stool at her aunt's feet, turned an artless, inquiring face up to her. "What are the 'sights' of La Chance, Auntie?" ...
— The Bent Twig • Dorothy Canfield
... transparent that all men see him through. He is a man to make friends wherever on earth courage and integrity are esteemed,—the rarest of heroes, a pure idealist, with no by-ends of his own. Many of us have seen him, and everyone who has heard him speak has been impressed alike by his simple, artless goodness and his sublime courage. He joins that perfect Puritan faith which brought his ancestor to Plymouth Rock, with his grandfather's ardor in the Revolution. He believes in two articles—two instruments, shall I say?—the Golden Rule ...
— The Negro and the Nation - A History of American Slavery and Enfranchisement • George S. Merriam
... and the comprehensive amount of literature devoted to him, a really talented idealist, who on the one hand cannot be absolved from an amazing contempt for or indifference to the material demands of life, and on the other possessed a certain artless selfishness which gave him courage, whenever he wished to promote objects undoubtedly pure and noble, to deal arbitrarily with other lives, even where it could hardly redound to their advantage. I shall have more ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... would not be a success in town. It is not always easy to get a hearing, to procure an audience, but means could be found. Soon your name would be on every one's lips. Your art is fresh. The jaded world likes freshness. The cynical town runs to artless art as an antidote to its own poison. Most of the players are wrinkled and worn. A young face will seem like a ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham
... details came up for discussion, interrupted frequently by the outgushing of Mildred's artless confidences, to all of which Persis listened patiently. And when the girl took her departure, the impulse which had manifested itself on her arrival proved too strong to resist. She kissed Persis good-by, and ...
— Other People's Business - The Romantic Career of the Practical Miss Dale • Harriet L. Smith
... than her friend, with dark brown hair and clear complexion, and fine, sparkling eyes; many persons would have admired her the most. Having mixed in good society in Dublin, she had more the manners of the world than Norah, though in reality equally artless and unsophisticated; while she was able to take her part in conversation on any of the topics of the day, of which, naturally, Norah knew but little. She was amiable, lively, and right-principled, and altogether allowed to be a very charming girl, the pride ...
— The Missing Ship - The Log of the "Ouzel" Galley • W. H. G. Kingston
... receive from solitary study! It was in the hour of battle, or in the feast of victory, that the bards celebrated the glory of the heroes of ancient days, the ancestors of those warlike chieftains, who listened with transport to their artless but animated strains. The view of arms and of danger heightened the effect of the military song; and the passions which it tended to excite, the desire of fame, and the contempt of death, were the habitual sentiments of a German mind. ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 1 • Edward Gibbon
... L'Estrange? Is a rehearsal of the French Revolution to be performed in London? Do you really believe the poor child is doomed to behold your head carried past the windows on a pike? Was there meaning in the artless prattle of our Thomas just now when he condemned windows as ...
— April's Lady - A Novel • Margaret Wolfe Hungerford
... maid He comes! She waits, 'tween joy and fear, While on he glides, each stroke more near. Love gives him more than wonted strength, And on the beach he leaps at length. With trembling joy, with artless grace, She springs into his glad embrace. Within her brave young hero's arms Forgot are all her past alarms. One rapturous kiss with quick impress,— His burning hands her locks caress,— And then they gaze, at ...
— Indian Legends of Minnesota • Various
... And a courteous, versatile, and vivacious companion I found him. Rare tales he told me, too, of better days than these, and rarest of his own never-more-returning youth. He loved his childhood, talked on of it with an artless zeal, his eyes a nest of singing-birds. How contrite he was for spirit lost, and daring withheld, and hope discomfited! How simple and urbane concerning his present lowly demands on life, on love, and on futurity! All this, too, with such packed winks and mirth and mourning, that I truly ...
— Henry Brocken - His Travels and Adventures in the Rich, Strange, Scarce-Imaginable Regions of Romance • Walter J. de la Mare
... seen women more beautiful than you, or cleverer. Then you might tell me to my face that I lied. No, I have seen more beautiful women than you, and cleverer; but I have never seen such a darling, charming, artless little ...
— Plays • Alexander Ostrovsky
... This artless praise pleased Howard. When he was left alone he got out his papers; but he found himself restless in a pleasant way; he strolled through the garden. It was a singular place, of great extent; the lawn was carefully kept, but behind the screen of shrubs ...
— Watersprings • Arthur Christopher Benson
... a faithful circuit rider—though a slave in his youth; His artless earnest sermons were the simple tale of truth, How the Son of God who loved us, left a scepter, crown and throne, All the joys of highest heaven, to go, seek ...
— The Choctaw Freedmen - and The Story of Oak Hill Industrial Academy • Robert Elliott Flickinger
... then ever guess why her cheeks burned scarlet, and why she was so sorry when haying-time was over? She was sweet, innocent, artless, and their love was very natural, tender, innocent. It's a pity that all loves can not remain in just that idyllic, milkmaid stage, where the girls and boys awaken in the early morning with the birds, and hasten forth barefoot across the dewy fields to find the cows. But love ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 5 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard
... unacquainted with the word) over every piece of sewing put into my incapable fingers, which could not be trained to hold a needle. I imagined I was stolen by brigands, and became—by virtue and intelligence—spouse of a patriotic outlaw in a frontierless land. I asked artless questions which brought me into discredit with my teachers, as, for example, who 'massacred' St. Bartholomew. But vital facts, the great laws of propagation, were matters of but casual concern crowded out of my life and out of my companions' lives (in a convent boarding-school) ...
— Sex-education - A series of lectures concerning knowledge of sex in its - relation to human life • Maurice Alpheus Bigelow
... his own artless way, once proposed legislating against chuprassies, I am told. His plan was to include them among the criminal classes, and hand them over to Major Henderson, the Director-General of Thuggee and Dacoity; but this functionary, viewing the matter in ...
— Twenty-One Days in India; and, the Teapot Series • George Robert Aberigh-Mackay
... in seeking information of the early childhood of Rupert Ray, Archibald Pennybet, and Edgar Gray Doe. Not without misgiving do I offer the result of these researches, for I fear all the time lest my self-conscious hand should profane Rupert's artless narrative. ...
— Tell England - A Study in a Generation • Ernest Raymond
... was one of the first to enlist himself among her adorers. Squire Savage, the fox-hunter, who, like Hippolitus of old, chased the wily fox and timid hare, and had never yet acknowledged the empire of beauty, was subdued by the artless sweetness of Delia. Nay, it has been reported, that the incomparable lord Martin, a peer of ten thousand pounds a year, had made advances to her father. It is true, his lordship was scarcely four feet three inches in stature, his ...
— Damon and Delia - A Tale • William Godwin
... to feel his helplessness. Christ's first beatitude is to the poor in spirit. The condition of entrance into the spiritual kingdom is to possess the child-spirit—that state of mind combining at once the profoundest helplessness with the most artless feeling of ...
— Beautiful Thoughts • Henry Drummond
... Christ, coloured, if at all, by local and temporal backgrounds, by the experience of the earlier German mystics who helped them to interpret their own simple and sincere experiences. They are as naive and artless as little children, and they expect, as all enthusiasts do in their youth, that they have only to announce their wonderful truths and to proclaim their "openings" in order to bring the world to the light! They go to the full length of the implications ...
— Spiritual Reformers in the 16th & 17th Centuries • Rufus M. Jones
... gladdens her by a bunch of heath-flowers. But hardly have they enjoyed their meeting, when the prince is announced, who desires to have a look at the countess' portrait. The rustic pair are hastily hidden behind the easel, and Lorle receives his Royal Highness with artless gracefullness, presenting him with the flowers she has just received. Her husband is on thorns, but the prince affably accepts the gift and invites her to a festival, which is to take place in the evening. Then he looks at the picture, ...
— The Standard Operaglass - Detailed Plots of One Hundred and Fifty-one Celebrated Operas • Charles Annesley
... heresy means," answered Dona Leonor, in an artless tone. "My dear father taught me what I know about the loving Jesus— that He is the only friend in whom human beings can really trust. It was the sure knowledge of this which comforted him through his ...
— The Last Look - A Tale of the Spanish Inquisition • W.H.G. Kingston
... representatives become childish; far from it, they had to be men of courage, fortitude, and force; but He would have them become childlike. The distinction is important. Those who belong to Christ must become like children in obedience, truthfulness, trustfulness, purity, humility and faith. The child is an artless, natural, trusting believer; the childish one is careless, foolish, and neglectful. In contrasting these characteristics, note the counsel of Paul: "Brethren, be not children in understanding: howbeit in malice be ye children, ...
— Jesus the Christ - A Study of the Messiah and His Mission According to Holy - Scriptures Both Ancient and Modern • James Edward Talmage
... everything—where she went, what she did, even what she thought—in simple, artless language that made me know her better, in the thorough workings of her nature, than during those long months of ...
— She and I, Volume 2 - A Love Story. A Life History. • John Conroy Hutcheson
... virtue claim a short delay, Or beauty charm the spectre from his prey. Thou still had'st liv'd, to bless my aching sight, Thy comrade's honour, and thy friend's delight: Though low thy lot, since in a cottage born, No titles did thy humble name adorn, To me, far dearer, was thy artless love, Than all the joys, wealth, fame, and friends could prove. For thee alone I liv'd, or wish'd to live, (Oh God! if impious, this rash word forgive) Heart broken now, I wait an equal doom, Content to join thee in thy turf-clad tomb; Where this frail form compos'd in endless ...
— Fugitive Pieces • George Gordon Noel Byron
... perfectly the general argument, which was very simple; and also my surprise at its nature. All this sounds a very old story now! And yet it is not such a long time ago. I must conclude that I had still preserved much of my pristine innocence in the year 1907. It seems to me now that even an artless person might have foreseen that some criticisms would be based on the ground of sordid surroundings and the moral squalor ...
— Notes on My Books • Joseph Conrad
... not merely the exterior form, but the noble spirit of European chivalry, with the gorgeousness and effeminate luxury of the east. They are brief, seizing single situations of the highest poetic interest, and striking the eye of the reader with a brilliancy of execution, so artless in appearance withal as to seem rather the effect of accident than study. We are transported to the gay seat of Moorish power, and witness the animating bustle, its pomp and its revelry, prolonged to the last hour of its existence. The bull-fight of the ...
— The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella The Catholic, V2 • William H. Prescott
... and some afforded encouraging hopes, that they had found forgiveness of sins in the blood of Christ, by which their souls were filled with peace in believing. Out of the abundance of the heart their mouths spake of the love and power of Jesus. Their artless but energetic declarations impressed the rest of the inhabitants. They began to feel the necessity of true conversion; and in a short time all the adults appeared earnestly to seek peace with God. Even several of the children were awakened. The missionaries were daily visited by people, who ...
— Dangers on the Ice Off the Coast of Labrador • Anonymous
... It is perhaps not by mere chance that this speech is wanting in the parallel version, and that there is added in place of it a formal act of recognition which Saul pays at the end to his destined successor. As for the story of Goliath, it is also quite artless, but its religious colouring is much more marked. The speech with which David goes to meet the giant is characteristic on this side (xvii. 4 seq.): "Thou comest to me with a sword and with a spear, but I come unto thee in the name of Jehovah of hosts, whom thou hast defied. ...
— Prolegomena to the History of Israel • Julius Wellhausen
... burglars, as well as some affecting pieces of poetry, and she knew that no burglar will ever hurt a little girl if he meets her when burgling. Indeed, in all the cases Jane had read of, his burglarishness was almost at once forgotten in the interest he felt in the little girl's artless prattle. So if Jane hesitated for a moment before addressing the burglar, it was only because she could not at once think of any remark sufficiently prattling and artless to make a beginning with. In the stories and the affecting poetry the child could never ...
— The Phoenix and the Carpet • E. Nesbit
... of th' unhonour'd dead, Dost in those lines their artless tale relate; If chance, by lonely Contemplation led, Some kindred spirit shall ...
— The Golden Treasury - Of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language • Various
... plainly audible in the adjoining room. Teresa involuntarily covered Fanny's head, which was hidden in her breast, as if she feared that this artless tale would win her credence, and so deceive her youthful mind, for young girls are so very credulous. Why, they even inquire of the flowers, "Does he love me, or does he not love me?" What will they not do, then, if any one ...
— A Hungarian Nabob • Maurus Jokai
... dear fellow. They are the best women in the world—gentle, good, artless, and as ...
— Famous Affinities of History, Vol 1-4, Complete - The Romance of Devotion • Lyndon Orr
... The truth was, that his admiration was divided between Myrtle, who seemed to him divine and adorable, but distant, and Susan, who listened to his frequent poems, whom he was in the habit of seeing in artless domestic costumes, and whose attractions had been gaining upon him of late in the enforced absence ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 117, July, 1867. • Various
... the girl's artless stare of admiration, she threw a friendly glance at her before she turned away to try on a monstrous white Leghorn hat decorated around the crown with a trellis of pink roses. Unless she happened to be in a particularly bad humour—and this was not often the case—Florrie ...
— Life and Gabriella - The Story of a Woman's Courage • Ellen Glasgow
... sought for a question: a natural, artless question, that would neutralize the hideous suggestion conveyed by this remark, but it eluded him. He sat and gazed in growing ...
— Deep Waters, The Entire Collection • W.W. Jacobs
... she laughingly said, 'Come in, Shelley, its only our friend Tre just arrived.' Swiftly gliding in, blushing like a girl, a tall, thin stripling held out both his hands; and although I could hardly believe, as I looked at his flushed, feminine, and artless face, that it could be the poet, I returned his warm pressure. After the ordinary greetings and courtesies he sat down and listened. I was silent from astonishment: was it possible this mild-looking, beardless boy, could be the veritable monster at war with all the world?—excommunicated by the ...
— Percy Bysshe Shelley • John Addington Symonds
... domestic tragedy is laid at the Bell Inn, in Wood-street, and the heroine may possibly be daughter to the poor old clergyman who is reading the direction of a letter close to the York waggon, from which vehicle she has just alighted. In attire—neat, plain, unadorned; in demeanor—artless, modest, diffident: in the bloom of youth, and more distinguished by native innocence than elegant symmetry; her conscious blush, and downcast eyes, attract the attention of a female fiend, who panders to the vices of the opulent and libidinous. Coming out of the door of the inn, ...
— The Works of William Hogarth: In a Series of Engravings - With Descriptions, and a Comment on Their Moral Tendency • John Trusler
... balloon-voyagers tell us they see from their hanging-baskets through the translucent waters which the keenest eye of such as sail over them in ships might strive to pierce in vain? Why has the child trusted me with such artless confessions,—self-revelations, which might be whispered by trembling lips, under the veil of twilight, in sacred confessionals, but which I cannot look at in the light of day without a feeling of wronging a ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various
... in his inexperience. And this was surely the wife a man should desire, modest, guileless, dutiful, pure in heart as in person? The gentle dumbness which often held her did not trouble him. It was a pretty pastime to try to win her confidence and open the doors of her artless speech. ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... has engaged himself," said one mother, "dear innocent boy; his greatest ambition is that he may one day creep into a clergyman's ear. That is a very artless and loveable wish; and being engaged will keep him steady. What ...
— Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen • Hans Christian Andersen
... was admirably adapted to the business she had chosen. She was rather small in stature for one of her age, but she was very well formed, and her movements were agile and graceful. Her face was not as pretty as it might have been, but her expression was artless and winning. Her light brown hair hung in curls upon her shoulders, and contributed not a little to make up the deficiency in what the painters and sculptors would call a ...
— Poor and Proud - or The Fortunes of Katy Redburn • Oliver Optic
... fate of artless maid, Sweet floweret of the rural shade! By love's simplicity betrayed, And guileless trust, Till she, like thee, all soiled, is laid ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 7 • Charles H. Sylvester
... of bargains in politics, marm," he stated, dryly, "that takes more'n two to put 'em through when the pinch comes." He enjoyed the discomfiture that her artless confession brought to the Duke. The old man looked him up and down. That this Niles whom he himself had helped into office, who had been taking private toll from the liquor interests of the county as his predecessors had before him, a procedure condoned by the party leaders of whom ...
— The Ramrodders - A Novel • Holman Day
... in the little offices of the table. Chancing to raise her eyes as the elder lady was regarding her, she playfully put back her hair, which was simply braided on her forehead; and threw into her beaming look, such an expression of affection and artless loveliness, that blessed spirits might have smiled to look ...
— Oliver Twist • Charles Dickens
... the GIPSIES' ADVOCATE, the author knows that a poor, aged, industrious woman, with whom he has been long acquainted, had her donkey taken from her, and that a man with four witnesses swore that it was his property. The poor woman told a simple, artless tale to the magistrates, and was not fully committed. She was allowed two days to bring forward the person of whom she bought it. Conscious of her innocence, she was willing to risk a prison if she could recover ...
— The Gipsies' Advocate - or, Observations on the Origin, Character, Manners, and Habits of - The English Gipsies • James Crabb
... cast his oblique rays on the heights of Colombe, on the other side of the Seine. As Fleur-de-Marie drew near the banks of the river, her pale cheeks became slightly colored; she inhaled with delight the sharp, pure air of the country, and cried, in a burst of artless joy, "Oh! there in the middle of the river, do you see that pretty little island covered with willows and poplars, with the white house on the shore? How charming this habitation must be in summer, when all the trees are covered ...
— The Mysteries of Paris V2 • Eugene Sue
... and his wife gave thanks to God with overflowing hearts. While the little flock were appeasing their hunger with the nice new bread and milk, the father repaired to the house where I was an inmate, and told his artless tale with streaming eyes, and it is unnecessary to say, that he returned to his home that night with a basket heavily laden, and a heart full of ...
— The Wonders of Prayer - A Record of Well Authenticated and Wonderful Answers to Prayer • Various
... was recovered before the news was conveyed to the mother. As the young companions surrounded it in the abandon of grief that tender and artless youth alone feels, had I not known that not a tie of consanguinity existed between them, I might have thought them a band of sisters mourning their broken number. It was a scene I never expect and sincerely hope never to witness again. It made the deeper ...
— Mizora: A Prophecy - A MSS. Found Among the Private Papers of the Princess Vera Zarovitch • Mary E. Bradley
... cannot come, Here Pomp is out of place, And fawning Flattery finds no home With Simper and Grimace, But Nature, in her artless dress, (A greenwood nymph is she,) With eyes so wild and flowing ...
— The Knight of the Golden Melice - A Historical Romance • John Turvill Adams
... have seen that I did. Sometimes, indeed, I have thought you were half suspecting me of pleading poor Martin's cause, which was never the case; but, from all my observations, I am convinced of her being an artless, amiable girl, with very good notions, very seriously good principles, and placing her happiness in the affections and utility of domestic life.—Much of this, I have no doubt, she ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... at first, she found her new path very pleasant to her feet, and was encouraged to persevere by the artless comments made by her children on ...
— Prairie Farmer, Vol. 56: No. 4, January 26, 1884 - A Weekly Journal for the Farm, Orchard and Fireside • Various
... high romances blent: Yet do I sometimes feel a languishment For skies Italian, and an inward groan To sit upon an Alp as on a throne, And half forget what world or worldling meant. Happy is England, sweet her artless daughters; Enough their simple loveliness for me, Enough their whitest arms in silence clinging: Yet do I often warmly burn to see Beauties of deeper glance, and hear their singing, And float with ...
— Poems 1817 • John Keats
... founded on the testimony of those who were incapable of knowingly perverting the truth in any particular, and tends to prove and illustrate, by its artless statements, the true disinterested loyalty and Christian patriotism of those who adhered to British connection in the American revolution; their cruel treatment from the professed friends of liberty; their privations, sufferings, ...
— The Loyalists of America and Their Times, Vol. 2 of 2 - From 1620-1816 • Edgerton Ryerson
... opinions and beliefs spring full-armed from the head and front of her great Jove Intuition. Logic, says the ancient platitude, hangs by the end of a philosopher's beard; and an American woman would as soon grow hair on her face as admit reason to her soul. Therein, doubtless, lies her charm, her artless allurements, her enigmatic manner, ...
— Aliens • William McFee
... my own on the family of Her Highness, I shall leave her to pursue her beautiful and artless narrative of her parentage, early sorrows, and ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... bewitching way, which always seemed irresistible; but he only gave her a genial smile, called me "a brave little girl," and bade me "God speed." "I wish Richard Clyde were here," said she, in her own artless, half-childish manner, "I am sure he would be on my side. I wish brother Ernest would come home, he would decide the question. Oh, Gabriella, if you only knew ...
— Ernest Linwood - or, The Inner Life of the Author • Caroline Lee Hentz
... beggar-boy," and the scene in which Angelo brings to Theophilus the basket of fruits and flowers which Dorothea has plucked in Paradise, are inexpressibly beautiful in their exquisite subtlety of imagination and artless elevation of sentiment. It is difficult to understand how a writer capable of such refinements as these should have left no drama which is a part of the classical literature of ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 122, December, 1867 • Various
... is parodied by him in a simpler and more useful device. By alleging a moral purpose he is enabled to gratify the prurience of his public and to raise them in their own muddy conceit at one and the same time. The plea serves well with those artless readers who have been accustomed to consider the moral of a story as something separable from imagination, expression, and style—a quality, it may be, inherent in the plot, or a kind of appendix, exercising a retrospective power of jurisdiction and absolution over the extravagances ...
— Style • Walter Raleigh
... little parlor, and before the eyes of friends who loved her once for herself alone, savored so strongly of weak pride and vanity, that I could not look upon her with any of my old feelings. It was Delia Floyd no longer. Already, the pure, sweet, artless maiden, had changed into a woman of the world, dressed up for show. Ah, my husband! if this is the effect of city life, let me ...
— The Allen House - or Twenty Years Ago and Now • T. S. Arthur
... has a rare gift for composing stories for children. With a light, yet forcible touch, she paints sweet and artless, yet natural ...
— Miss Ashton's New Pupil - A School Girl's Story • Mrs. S. S. Robbins
... resumed his inspection. The Twins, who were entirely unused to this sort of thing, were too taken aback to proceed to their second move—the utterance of some trivial and artless remark, delivered by both simultaneously, and thereby calculated to throw the victim into a state of uncertainty as to which he should answer first. Instead, they stood wide-eyed ...
— The Right Stuff - Some Episodes in the Career of a North Briton • Ian Hay
... chosen by lot, they would make these hundred, who had previously for one year received instruction in their sacred language, write each a translation of the simple code engraved upon the bronze tablets. It was invariably discovered that these artless compositions varied only according to the ability of the lads to construe, and that some considerable proportion of them did accurately show forth in the vernacular of the time the meaning of those ancestral laws. They had further ...
— On Something • H. Belloc
... seize these, reaching out thy arms. The unrighteous destroyed through the just is gloomy in soul. Thus thinks the unrighteous: Mithra, the artless, does not see all these ...
— Ten Great Religions - An Essay in Comparative Theology • James Freeman Clarke
... heard the story. It came disjointedly from each in turn, but most fluently, most picturesquely, most convincingly, from the lips of Augustus Adolphus Schmidtt and the fair Josephine. When they had finished their artless recital, Miss Clarkson sought Fraulein von Hoffman. That afternoon, beside the big open fire in the children's winter play-room, Fraulein von Hoffman addressed her young charges in words brief but pointed, and as she talked the mission of Ivan at Locust Hall took on a new significance, clear ...
— Many Kingdoms • Elizabeth Jordan
... in one of them, with her coat still huddled about her, she looked around with artless curiosity, and watched as in a dream, while the Major put his hand on ...
— Little Miss By-The-Day • Lucille Van Slyke
... at intervals by Margaret Macaulay, some extracts from which have here been arranged in the form of a continuous narrative, affords a pleasant and faithful picture of her brother's home-life during the years 1831 and 1832. With an artless candour, from which his reputation will not suffer, she relates the alternations of hope and disappointment through which the young people passed when it began to be a question whether or not he would be asked to join ...
— Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay • George Otto Trevelyan
... story of Goethe and Frederika, how the great poet, then a student at the Strasburg University, was taken by a comrade to the simple parsonage of Sesenheim, how the artless daughter of the house with her sweet Alsatian songs, enchanted the brilliant youth, how he found himself, as he tells us in his autobiography, suddenly in the immortal family of the Vicar of Wakefield. "And here comes Moses too!" cried Goethe, as Frederika's brother appeared. That accidental visit ...
— East of Paris - Sketches in the Gatinais, Bourbonnais, and Champagne • Matilda Betham-Edwards
... night and the hour of Rhoda's spectral encounter, and Brook felt like a guilty thing. The artless disclosure startled her; she did not reason on the freaks of coincidence; and all the scenery of that ghastly night returned with double vividness ...
— Wessex Tales • Thomas Hardy
... "Facheux," a comedy in three acts, which was to be put on the stage by Poquelin de Moliere, as D'Artagnan called him, or Coquelin de Voliere, as Porthos styled him. Loret, with all the charming innocence of a gazetteer,—the gazetteers of all ages have always been so artless!—Loret was composing an account of the fetes at Vaux, before those fetes had taken place. La Fontaine sauntered about from one to the other, a peripatetic, absent-minded, boring, unbearable dreamer, who kept buzzing and humming at everybody's ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... Creed, prayers and hymns, and some Latin should be taught. In the second, the Latin grammar, Latin authors, and religion. In the third, completion of the grammar, difficult Latin authors, rhetoric, and logic. Williams calls this "Melanchthon's somewhat artless ideas of a proper school system," which he excuses as being "marked possibly by the crudity of a first effort at organization, but more probably controlled in form by the fewness of teachers in the schools ...
— History of Education • Levi Seeley
... Well-meant but artless simulation! Captain Hunken had once in his life purchased a picture; it represented Vesuvius by night, in eruption, and he had yielded to the importunity of the Neapolitan artist—or, rather, had excused himself for yielding—on the ground that after all you couldn't mistake ...
— Hocken and Hunken • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... tenderness, Ah, Monsieur, he said, had you but beheld her as I did with these eyes at that affecting instant with her dainty tucker and her new coquette cap (a gift for her feastday as she told me prettily) in such an artless disorder, of so melting a tenderness, 'pon my conscience, even you, Monsieur, had been impelled by generous nature to deliver yourself wholly into the hands of such an enemy or to quit the field for ever. I declare, ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... Rambaud entered, displaying an expansive countenance like that of a country notary. His forty-five years had already silvered his hair, but his large blue eyes retained a wondering, artless, gentle expression, akin ...
— A Love Episode • Emile Zola
... by the unfaltering gravity with which my fair young friend spoke of Dr. Primrose, of Sophia and her sister, of Squire Thornhill, &c., as real and probably living personages, who could sue and be sued. It appeared that this artless young rustic, who had never heard of novels and romances as a bare possibility amongst all the shameless devices of London swindlers, had read with religious fidelity every word of this tale, so thoroughly life-like, surrendering ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey
... the singing of the birds, the beauty of the waving grass, the wild flowers, and the thousand exquisite scents and sounds that floated in the air, sunk into their breasts, and made them very glad. The child had repeated her artless prayers once that morning, more earnestly, perhaps, than she had ever done in her life; but as she felt all this, they rose to her lips again. The old man took off his hat—he had no memory for the words—but he said Amen, and that ...
— Ten Girls from Dickens • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... of th' unhonour'd dead Dost in these lines their artless tale relate." —Union Poems, ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... turned his head quickly toward his companion, studied his artless, hopeful countenance for a moment, and then ...
— One of Ours • Willa Cather
... nature from her birth By fairy tutelage; and that was mirth. For fairy natures are compounded all Of whimsies and of freaks fantastical, And what the best of fairies loves the best (Except pure kindness) is an artless jest. And so wise men have argued, on the whole, That the misguided creatures have no soul; But as for me, if the bright fairy elf Has none, I'll get along without, myself! These fairies laughed and danced and sang sweet songs, And did all ...
— Gawayne And The Green Knight - A Fairy Tale • Charlton Miner Lewis
... cell Where the blameless Pixies dwell: 90 But thou, Sweet Nymph! proclaim'd our Faery Queen, With what obeisance meet Thy presence shall we greet? For lo! attendant on thy steps are seen Graceful Ease in artless stole, 95 And white-robed Purity of soul, With Honour's softer mien; Mirth of the loosely-flowing hair, And meek-eyed Pity eloquently fair, Whose tearful cheeks are lovely to the view, 100 As snow-drop ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... little hand, as it were. He knows that she is thinking of him, and longing for him far away in Dublin yonder. He takes her letters from under his pillow and talks to them, familiarly, paternally, with fond epithets and pretty caresses—as he would to the sweet and artless creature who loved him. "Stay," he writes one morning—it is the 14th of December, 1710—"Stay, I will answer some of your letter this morning in bed. Let me see. Come and appear, little letter! Here ...
— Harvard Classics Volume 28 - Essays English and American • Various
... himself upon his father's neck, he broke into convulsive sobs, kissing him again and again, and giving way to the most passionate grief. The scene was affecting beyond description. All hearts were melted by the child's artless exhibition of filial love and sorrow. He loved his father with a devotion that knew no bounds, as he had reason to love him. Without this paternal friend, life would lose its charm to him, and he "would never be glad any more." So it seemed to him when he first was made conscious that his ...
— From Farm House to the White House • William M. Thayer
... mother expressed an ardent desire to hear my viva voce corroboration of this statement, informing me that she was but a poor weak widow-woman, but that, if it should appear that I was merely the giddy trifler of her daughter's young, artless affections, it would be her dolesome duty to summon instantaneously every male able-bodied inmate of her establishment, and request them to inflict deserved corporal chastisement upon ...
— Baboo Jabberjee, B.A. • F. Anstey
... it lit up his nature, and woke his spirit; it threw all sorts of queer lights and shadows over his dun face, and into his violet-azure eyes (he used to say that his black hair and blue eyes were "une de ses beautes"). There was a relish in his anger; it was artless, earnest, quite unreasonable, but never hypocritical. I uttered no disclaimer then of the complacency he attributed to me; I merely asked where the English examination came in—whether at the commencement ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte
... room to room and thought everything queer and some few objects interesting; Mr. Wendover said it would be a very good place to find a thing you couldn't find anywhere else—it illustrated the prudent virtue of keeping. They took note of the sarcophagi and pagodas, the artless old maps and medals. They admired the fine Hogarths; there were uncanny, unexpected objects that Laura edged away from, that she would have preferred not to be in the room with. They had been there half an hour—it had grown much darker—when they heard a tremendous ...
— A London Life; The Patagonia; The Liar; Mrs. Temperly • Henry James
... folly, or our fate, That few but such as cannot write, translate. But what in them is want of art or voice, In thee is either modesty or choice. While this great piece, restored by thee, doth stand Free from the blemish of an artless hand, Secure of fame, thou justly dost esteem Less honour to create than to redeem. Nor ought a genius less than his that writ 9 Attempt translation; for transplanted wit All the defects of air and soil doth share, And colder ...
— Poetical Works of Edmund Waller and Sir John Denham • Edmund Waller; John Denham
... not be alarmed; I have been so for many days." Artless as she was, the young girl knew that this was an opportunity to leave, and besides, Madame de Villefort came to her assistance. "Retire, Valentine," said she; "you are really suffering, and these ...
— The Count of Monte Cristo • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... following my friend Sperver, deep in thought, who had now resumed his walk down the corridor. The portrait of Hedwige, in all its artless simplicity, mingled in my mind with the ...
— The Man-Wolf and Other Tales • Emile Erckmann and Alexandre Chatrian
... The artless Aide-de-camp was mute; the gilded Staff were still, As, dumb with pent-up mirth, they booked that message from the hill; For clear as summer lightning-flare, the husband's warning ran:— "Don't dance or ride with ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... He owns four, and was kind enough, the other day, to lend me one: but it's a trifle too artless even for ...
— Foe-Farrell • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... back. The gardens are laid out with great simplicity, indicating love for flowers by people comparatively poor, rather than deliberate efforts of the rich for showy artistic effects. They are like the pet gardens of children, about as artless and humble, and harmonize with the low dwellings to which they belong. In almost every one you find daisies, and mint, and lilac bushes, and rows of plain English tulips. Lilacs and tulips are the most characteristic ...
— Steep Trails • John Muir
... of himself, the sombre, brooding man felt interest and sympathy in the dejection that was evident in Frank's voice and countenance. "Another dupe to affection," thought he, as if in apology to himself,—"of course, a dupe; he is honest and artless—at present." He pressed kindly on the arm which he had involuntarily twined within his own. "I conceive how you now grieve, my young friend," said he; "but you will congratulate yourself hereafter on what this day ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... wait to entrap men for the money. Some of these gentry assume the character of officers, others of Serjeants, drummers, and recruits, without the least shadow of commission among them. They have many ways of inveigling the artless and unthinking. One or two of these kidnappers, dressed as countrymen, go five or six miles out of town to meet the waggons and stages, and enquire if John Such-a-one is come up, which is answered in the negative, no ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... the instruction of Patience, however, the cure succeeded no better than the monks. The young peasant, endowed though he was with herculean strength and a great desire for knowledge, displayed an unconquerable aversion for every kind of work, whether physical or mental. He professed a sort of artless philosophy which the cure found it very difficult to argue against. There was, he said, no need for a man to work as long as he did not want money; and he was in no need of money as long as his wants were moderate. Patience practised what ...
— Mauprat • George Sand
... a boat to sail! These children had such a brave and haughty beauty, and their dress being of purple and fine linen, I supposed their name must be Berkeley or Clarendon, but was grieved to learn from the artless darlings that it was Muggins! However, their kisses were unexceptionable, whatever their origin may ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 3, No. 1 January 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... think I have been more witty than I ought of late, that at present I wholly forbear any Attempt towards it: I am of Opinion that I ought sometimes to lay before the World the plain Letters of my Correspondents in the artless Dress in which they hastily send them, that the Reader may see I am not Accuser and Judge my self, but that the Indictment is properly and fairly laid, before ...
— The Spectator, Volume 2. • Addison and Steele
... accustomed to the common religious phraseology. He is such a babe in such things, that his expressions are sometimes strikingly artless. At one time I was speaking of his sufferings, he looked up with a smile, and hesitating how to express the ...
— 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
... filing his nails, talking about his chiefs, groaning over the slowness of promotion, cooking a potato or a sausage in the stove for his luncheon, reading the newspaper down to the editor's signature, and advertisements in which some country cure expresses his artless gratitude at being cured at last of an obstinate disease. In recompense for this daily captivity, M. Violette received, at the end of the month, a sum exactly sufficient to secure his household soup and beef, with a ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... into the grandeur of all these things, which may, perhaps, escape the eyes of those who work them, Calyste gratified at Les Touches the taste for the glorious, powerful at his age, and that artless admiration, the first love of adolescence, which is always irritated by criticism. It is so natural that flame should rise! He listened to that charming Parisian raillery, that graceful satire which revealed to him French wit and the qualities of the French mind, and awakened ...
— Beatrix • Honore de Balzac
... the music is not operatic, and the boys do not clasp their hands, and shake their shoulders, and sing passionately, as women do in a theater. Heaven forbid they should! If this world is all passion, there is another which is all peace; and these boys' sweet, artless tones are the nearest thing we shall get in this world to the unimpassioned voices of the angels. They are fit instruments for pious words set by composers, who, however obscure they may be, were men ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade
... their artless story through, And said, "I think, dear sirs, there must be few Blest with such wondrous eyes as those you wear: There's no such tablet or inscription there! There was one, it is true; 't was moved away And placed within ...
— McGuffey's Fourth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... characters. They, while submitting implicitly to his influence, never acknowledged, because they never reflected on, his superiority; they were quite tractable, therefore, without running the smallest danger of being servile; and their unthinking, easy, artless insensibility was as acceptable, because as convenient, to Mr. Yorke as that of the chair he sat on, or of the floor ...
— Shirley • Charlotte Bronte
... have violet eyes and velvet lips, (and sometimes the heroes also have the latter!) and all of them should wear key-holes at their ear-rings. Indeed, here is our quarrel with Mr. Reade. The conception of an artless woman is impossible with him. Plenty of beautiful ideals he creates, but with the actual woman he is almost unacquainted: Lucy Fountain, of all his feminine characters, is the only one whose counterpart we have ever met; Julia, the most perfect type of his fancy, impetuous, sparkling, ...
— Atlantic Monthly,Volume 14, No. 82, August, 1864 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... and beholding the comely youth in all the bravery of glossy broadcloth, a lavish shirt-bosom, miraculous tie, primrose gloves, varnished shoes, and curls and moustache anointed and perfumed in the most exquisite style. He would bow and say 'Bon soir,' then stand to be admired, with the artless satisfaction of a child; after which he would smile complacently, wave his crush hat, and depart with ...
— Shawl-Straps - A Second Series of Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag • Louisa M. Alcott
... alone, but, if I may be allowed the expression, of ourselves, find a void of so many years in our lives, which has silently brought us from youth to maturity, from mature age to the very verge of life! Still, however, I shall not regret having composed, though in rude and artless language, a memorial of past servitude, and a ...
— The Germany and the Agricola of Tacitus • Tacitus
... nature," she observed, and seated herself upon the divan; "and you, dear Mr. Erwyn, who know women so thoroughly, will overlook the agitation of an artless girl placed in quite unaccustomed circumstances. Nay, I myself was ...
— Gallantry - Dizain des Fetes Galantes • James Branch Cabell
... my more than friend, To whom these artless lines I send, Once more thy wonted candor bring, And hear the muse you taught to sing; The muse that strives to win your ear, By themes your soul delights to hear, And loves like you, in sober mood, To meditate of ...
— The Philadelphia Magazines and their Contributors 1741-1850 • Albert Smyth
... by this artless account of fidelity and gratitude, and as she walked on in attentive silence, Rene ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... might even be misguided enough to imagine that chiffon-draped cushions were meant for use, not ornament. Flowers were tastefully arrayed in every available position; the tea-table lacked only the presence of pot and kettle; Jill had arranged the little curl on her forehead at its most artless and captivating angle—in a ...
— Betty Trevor • Mrs. G. de Horne Vaizey
... can obey the commands of both, and draw from herself a genuine nobleness of conduct, which secondhand prudence, and wealth, and titles, would but render less touching. Her filial affection, her angelic attachment to her lover, her sublime and artless piety, are beautifully contrasted with the bleakness of her external circumstances: she appears before us like the 'one rose of the wilderness left on its stalk,' and we grieve to see it crushed and trodden down ...
— The Life of Friedrich Schiller - Comprehending an Examination of His Works • Thomas Carlyle
... he planned a new design, which he put into execution with great success. Dressing himself up in a chequered shirt, jacket, and trowsers, he went upon Exeter quay, and, with the rough but artless air and behaviour of a sailor, inquired for some of the king's officers, whom he informed that he belonged to a vessel lately come from France, which had landed a large quantity of run goods, but the captain was a rascal, ...
— The Surprising Adventures of Bampfylde Moore Carew • Unknown
... difficult to the ablest to stand, and from which even the most' faultless are so rarely acquitted, Miss Belfield sustained with honour. Cecilia found her artless, ingenuous, and affectionate; her understanding was good, though no pains had been taken to improve it; her disposition though ardent was soft, and her mind ...
— Cecilia vol. 2 - Memoirs of an Heiress • Frances (Fanny) Burney (Madame d'Arblay)
... why he should not rhyme as well as he, for the author had no more school-craft than himself. Writing of this song a few years later, he called it puerile and silly; and his verdict as a poetical one was correct. Still, considered as a song, this artless effusion possessed one merit of which he himself was probably not conscious: it was inspired by his feeling and not by his reading, by the warmth and purity of his love of Nelly Kilpatrick, and not by ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 7 • Various
... heroic poetry. One knows—at least every schoolboy has known—that a passage of Homer, rolling along in the hexameter or trumped out by Pope, will give one a hot glow of pleasure and raise a finer throb in the pulse; one knows that Homer is the easiest, most artless, most diverting of all poets; that the fiftieth reading rouses the spirit even more than the first—and yet we find ourselves (we are all alike) painfully pshaw-ing over some new and uncut barley sugar in rime, which a man in the street asked us if we had read, or ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VI (of X)—Great Britain and Ireland IV • Various
... all winter. Did n't your grandmother ever write you? I've thought about looking you up lots of times. But we've all heard what a studious young man you've got to be, and I felt bashful. I did n't know whether you'd be glad to see me." She laughed her mellow, easy laugh, that was either very artless or very comprehending, one never quite knew which. "You seem the same, though,—except you're a young man, now, of course. Do ...
— My Antonia • Willa Sibert Cather
... of the poor man thus torn up as it were by the roots was so artless, it showed so plainly the purity of his ways and his ignorance of the things of life, that Madame de Listomere and Mademoiselle de Salomon talked to him and consoled him in the tone which mothers take when they promise a plaything to ...
— The Vicar of Tours • Honore de Balzac
... was surrounded by boatmen offering their services. Spence led the way down to the quay, and after much tumult a boat was selected and a bargain struck, the original demand made by the artless sailors being of course five times as much as was ever paid for the transit. They rowed out through the cluster of little craft, then hoisted a sail, and glided ...
— The Emancipated • George Gissing
... "eloquucion, the third part of Rhetoric," as the dressing up of thought. Rhetoric to him had not in theory become style, but style is the only part which he finds interesting enough to treat. His schemes and tropes are of course the rhetorical figures; but let him explain them in his own artless way. "A scheme is the fashion of a word, sayyng or sentence, otherwyse wrytten or spoken then after the vulgar and comon usage. A trope is a movynge and changynge of a worde or sentence, from thyr owne significacion into another which may agree with it by a similitude." Henry Peacham's ...
— Rhetoric and Poetry in the Renaissance - A Study of Rhetorical Terms in English Renaissance Literary Criticism • Donald Lemen Clark
... "Madonna," she still preserved all her child's feeling for the painter's wife. However playful her manner might often be with Valentine, it invariably changed when she was in Mrs. Blyth's presence; always displaying, at such times, the same anxious tenderness, the same artless admiration, and the same watchful and loving sympathy. There was something secret and superstitious in the girl's fondness for Mrs. Blyth. She appeared unwilling to let others know what this affection really was in all its depth and fullness: it seemed to be intuitively preserved by ...
— Hide and Seek • Wilkie Collins
... one of the most interesting and engaging persons that Albinia had ever met, and she listened earnestly to her artless history, and pretty enthusiasms, and the story which she could not tell without tears, of her father's care, when the reward of her good behaviour had been the reading one verse in the quaint black letter of the ...
— The Young Step-Mother • Charlotte M. Yonge
... her plaintive song. It was not long before a small bird of beautiful plumage flew upon the tree, beneath which she usually sat, and, with its sweet and artless notes, seemed to respond to her voice. It was a bird of strange character, such as she had never seen before. It came every day and sang to her, remaining until it became dark. Her fond imagination soon led her to ...
— Traditions of the North American Indians, Vol. 1 (of 3) • James Athearn Jones
... nonsense verses in the two famous Alice books are supreme among their kind; but are they not sometimes just a shade too ingenious, or too adult in wit? Probably Stevenson, in those seemingly artless poems in A Child's Book of Verse, comes nearest to a level perfection. Who has ever approached him in his power to understand and express the small child's world, desires and delights, without a trace of the grown-up's condescension ...
— The Healthy Life, Vol. V, Nos. 24-28 - The Independent Health Magazine • Various
... philosophy. This point was not without its drawbacks. It led free-thinking historians to a ridiculous exaggeration of Jeanne's intellectual faculties, to the absurdity of attributing military talent to her and to the substitution of a kind of polytechnic phenomenon for the fifteenth century's artless marvel. The Catholic historians of the present day when they make a saint of the Maid are much nearer to nature and to truth. Unfortunately the Church's idea of saintliness has grown insipid since the Council of Trent, and orthodox historians are disinclined to study ...
— The Life of Joan of Arc, Vol. 1 and 2 (of 2) • Anatole France
... his hand"— poem, essay, play, story, history, natural science. Even when satirical, he was good-natured; and his Retaliation is the friendliest and pleasantest of satires. In his poetry, his words seem artless, but are indeed delicately chosen with that consummate art which conceals and effaces itself: where he seems most simple and easy, there he has taken most ...
— A Brief History of the English Language and Literature, Vol. 2 (of 2) • John Miller Dow Meiklejohn
... thoughts. If Mr. Jenks wouldn't sell her father anything to drink, "there would be no more trouble." How simple, how direct the remedy! She would go to Mr. Jenks, and ask him not to let her father have any more liquor, and then all would be well again. Artless, innocent child! And ...
— After a Shadow, and Other Stories • T. S. Arthur
... must have gone wrong, terribly wrong, it was clear! They were coming towards him; he had meant to avoid them at first, but now his curiosity would not allow this, and he threw himself in their way, affecting an artless surprise and pleasure at being the first to welcome them back. Mark did not appear at all disconcerted to see him, and Mabel could not be frigid to anybody just then in the flush of happy expectation, which she did not try to conceal; ...
— The Giant's Robe • F. Anstey
... honest Sir Joseph Raikes took his seat in his carriage; and tried, by artless blandishments, by humility, and by simple conversation, to coax his wife into good humor; but all his efforts were unavailing. She would not speak a word during the journey to London; and when she reached home, rushed up to the nursery and instantly burst into tears upon the ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 2, January, 1851 • Various
... Jeanne; and it struck him that her words were strangely like those which Eileen might have spoken had she been there, only an artless comradeship replaced what would have been Miss Brokaw's tone of intimacy. She added, with genuine sympathy in her face and voice: "You must be exhausted, M'sieur Philip. If you were Pierre I should insist upon going ashore for ...
— Flower of the North • James Oliver Curwood
... point? Well, then, in return for my attentions, she takes a very sisterly interest in my future wife, and has adroitly managed to let me know of her niece, a certain Anna Ruthven, who, inasmuch as I am tired of city belles, will undoubtedly suit my fancy, said Anna being very fresh, very artless, and very beautiful withal. She is also niece to Mrs. Meredith, whose only brother married very far beneath him, when he took to wife the daughter of a certain old-fashioned Captain Humphreys, a pillar, no doubt, ...
— The Rector of St. Mark's • Mary J. Holmes
... for dollars on a corner of the counter. The attraction of dice for all these people was, indeed, extraordinary: at a certain club where I once dined in the character of "my partner, Mr. Dodd," the dice-box came on the table with the wine, an artless substitute for after-dinner wit. ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 13 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... head. "It isn't at all what I mean. Now cut out the artless prattle and let me find some sense in this history stuff—if ...
— Left Guard Gilbert • Ralph Henry Barbour
... beautiful reverence for the unknown, the worship of heroism, a vital sympathy with the various manifestations of Nature. Without the fire of the French chansons, the sonorous grace of the Tuscan stornelli, these artless ditties, with their exclusive reliance on true feeling, possess ...
— The Great German Composers • George T. Ferris
... to what was passing before his face, but that he was fast getting to have eyes only for her. By this time she filled not only his waking, but many of his sleeping thoughts; and when she was not actually before him, charming him with her beauty, enlivening him with her artless gayety, and inspiring him with her innocent humor, he fancied she was there, imagination, perhaps, heightening all those advantages which we have enumerated. When a man is thoroughly in love, he is quite apt to be fit for very little else but to urge his suit. Such, in ...
— Oak Openings • James Fenimore Cooper
... eyes still fixed intent upon the ground, I saw but her, whose artless innocence, Triumphant took possession ...
— The Poems of Giacomo Leopardi • Giacomo Leopardi
... Edward, that I was wrong to give the reins to my fancy, as I did just now," said Kitty, in her sweet, artless way. "I should have remembered that He who made the world governs the wide ocean—the tides and currents move at His command, and He it is who bids the waters be at rest, or sends the whirlwind sweeping over them. I feel that it is wrong, even in poetry, to ...
— Charley Laurel - A Story of Adventure by Sea and Land • W. H. G. Kingston
... kangaroos, and also those of the native dog. Here still was our own race amongst other animals all new and strange to Europeans. The prints of the foot of man alone were familiar to us. But here he was living in common with other animals, simply on the bounty of nature; artless, and apparently as much afraid of us, and as shy, as other animals of the forest. It seemed strange, that in a climate the most resembling that of Milton's paradise, the circumstances of man's existence should be the most degrading. Latitude of our camp, 29 deg. 19' ...
— Journal of an Expedition into the Interior of Tropical Australia • Thomas Mitchell
... an Awful Baby, And bawled o' bed-time, I said "Maybe It is not best to spank or scold her: Suppose a fairy-tale were told her?" And gave you then, to my undoing, The wolf Red Riding-Hood pursuing; Sang Mother Goose her artless rhyming; Showed Jack the Magic Beanstalk climbing; Three Little Pigs were so appealing, You set up sympathetic squealing! Then, Bitsybet, you had your mother— You ...
— A Woman Named Smith • Marie Conway Oemler
... too, and short of breath; but that was not much. Flora, whom he had left a lily, had become a peony; but that was not much. Flora, who had seemed enchanting in all she said and thought, was diffuse and silly. That was much. Flora, who had been spoiled and artless long ago, was determined to be spoiled and artless now. That was ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... but where there is a will there is always a way, and soon it was evident that each had found "a little chore" to do for sweet charity's sake. Not a word was said at the weekly meetings, but the artless faces betrayed all shades of hope, discouragement, pride, and doubt, as their various attempts seemed likely to succeed or fail. Much curiosity was felt, and a few accidental words, hints, or meetings ...
— A Garland for Girls • Louisa May Alcott
... that had been hitherto wanting to this particular development of his art had been the woman. In Audrey Craven he had found the indispensable thing—intimacy without love, or even, as he understood the word, friendship. She was the type he had long desired, the feminine creature artless in perpetual artifice, for ever revealing herself in a succession ...
— Audrey Craven • May Sinclair
... Avice recognized him, and with the artless candour of her race and years explained the situation, though that was rather his duty ...
— The Well-Beloved • Thomas Hardy
... harp, strung to every wind of heaven. His genius flows over all living and lifeless things with a sympathy that finds nothing mean or insignificant. An uprooted daisy becomes in his pages an enduring emblem of the fate of artless maid and simple bard. He disturbs a mouse's nest and finds in the "tim'rous beastie" a fellow-mortal doomed like himself to "thole the winter's sleety dribble," and draws his oft-repeated moral. He walks abroad and, in a verse that glints with ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various
... charming. Her ingenuous trepidation and her pretty wiles, as Fidele, in the cave, were finely harmonious with the character and arose from it like odour from a flower. The innocence, the glee, the feminine desire to please, the pensive grace, the fear, the weakness, and the artless simplicity made up a state of gracious fascination. It was, however, in the revolt against Iachimo's perfidy, in the fall before Pisanio's fatal disclosure, and in the frenzy over the supposed death of Leonatus that the actress put forth electrical power and showed how strong emotion, acting ...
— Shadows of the Stage • William Winter
... me and my mother for some years before my elopement: after my mother's death, my residence in the bishop's family being known, I sent for her up to town and hired her. Her artless affection made her my confidante; my situation required it; and, when she heard the bishop's letter read, the kind creature with honest anger instantly went ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... (and strange to remember now) that she would carry the child to the Deil's Hags, sit with him on the Praying Weaver's Stone, and talk of the Covenanters till their tears ran down. Her view of history was wholly artless, a design in snow and ink; upon the one side, tender innocents with psalms upon their lips; upon the other, the persecutors, booted, bloody-minded, flushed with wine: a suffering Christ, a raging Beelzebub. Persecutor was a word that knocked upon the woman's ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XIX (of 25) - The Ebb-Tide; Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... was welcome to "some verses by 'Little Lizzie,'" written in her peculiar and fairy-like hand, (for when very young, her writing was remarkable for its extreme smallness and finish.) given with childlike simplicity, and artless ignorance of the worth of what she bestowed with ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 60, October 1862 • Various
... that she might be fighting for her life, set out to tell her story. She proved at her best and spoke well. She kept her temper and chose her words. The things that she had thought to speak, indeed, escaped her, but her artless and direct narrative did not ...
— The Spinners • Eden Phillpotts
... the Tartars are frank and artless, forming a marked contrast to the formal reception of strangers among the Chinese. 'On entering, you give the word of peace, amor or mendon, to the company generally. You then seat yourself on the right of the head ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 451 - Volume 18, New Series, August 21, 1852 • Various
... as it should be, and let no one fear to prosecute his researches, for out of this merciless dissection comes life. But we need not be surprised at the feverish heat which, after these orgies of dialectics, can only be calmed by the kisses of the artless creature in whom nature lives and smiles. Woman restores us to communication with the eternal spring in which God reflects Himself. The candour of a child, unconscious of its own beauty and seeing God clear as the daylight, is the great revelation of the ideal, ...
— Recollections of My Youth • Ernest Renan
... of artless jealousy is guilt, It spills itself in fearing to be spilt. 856 SHAKS.: ...
— Handy Dictionary of Poetical Quotations • Various
... modestly proud. It used to be a study, I am told, to watch my face when a cake had turned out as it ought. Gratified vanity at the lavish encomiums bestowed on it, and horrified dismay at the rapidity with which a good sized cake disappeared down the throats of the company, warred together in the most artless fashion. The reflection would arise that it was almost a pity it should be eaten up so very fast; yet was it not a fine thing to be able to make such a cake! and oh, would the next be ...
— Station Amusements • Lady Barker
... speaking of our Saxon ancestors, to whom we must, I suppose, go for that Teutonic original which he so strongly recommends, he observes that, "their speech having been always cursory and extemporaneous, must have been artless and unconnected, without any modes of transition or involution of clauses, which abruptness and inconnection may be found even in their later writings." Of the additions which have been made to this our original poverty, who shall say what ought to be rejected, ...
— Lives of the English Poets - From Johnson to Kirke White, Designed as a Continuation of - Johnson's Lives • Henry Francis Cary
... knew that his love was genuine. Daphne seemed the very incarnation of desirable, artless, heart-refreshing womanliness, but his memory could not dwell with her long; anxiety concerning Chello's report only too quickly interrupted it, as soon as ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... felt that it would be so in those of others, by the desertion of such a lover, for she had sense enough to discern the superiority of Lionel over all her other admirers. She could appreciate his worth, but she could not controul her own too long indulged inclinations, and was still too artless to conceal the wrong bias they had taken. The disappointment had a visible effect upon her temper: she grew peevish, and dissatisfied with every thing about her. She resolved to leave no means untried to ...
— The Flower Basket - A Fairy Tale • Unknown
... would tell me the names; and her eyes, her nose, and her chin, and so on; and then I would touch her lips, and say, 'What's them?' And she'd say. 'Bhileau?' And then I'd kiss her, and say, 'What's that?' And she'd say. 'Pog.' But she was so artless, and so was I; we didn't know that's not usual unless people are courtin; for we hadn't seen ...
— Nature and Human Nature • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... visual image of Jennie that remains as a sense of the implacable tragedy that engulfs her. The book is full of artistic passion. It lives and glows. It awakens recognition and feeling. Its lucid ideational structure, even more than the artless gusto of "Sister Carrie," produces a penetrating and powerful effect. Jennie is no mere individual; she is a type of the national character, almost the archetype of the muddled, aspiring, tragic, fate-flogged mass. ...
— A Book of Prefaces • H. L. Mencken |
