"Comely" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... tale and its scene gathered away, presently, inside my mind, and shook myself into a present association with surrounding things, and took my leave. I went away the more gratified that I had a chance of lifting my cap to a matron, dark-haired and comely (who, I was sure, at a glance, had once been the maiden of Benjie Westham's "troth-plight"), and receiving a handsome ...
— Little Classics, Volume 8 (of 18) - Mystery • Various
... him only. For now Gudruda was a maid of maids, most beautiful to see and sweet to hear. Her hair, like the hair of Eric, was golden, and she was white as the snow on Hecla; but her eyes were large and dark, and black lashes drooped above them. For the rest she was tall and strong and comely, merry of face, yet tender, and the most witty ...
— Eric Brighteyes • H. Rider Haggard
... came to an open country, where he descried a white tent and beside it a goodly steed, before which corn was poured out upon a white linen cloth. Yaroslav dismounted and led his horse to feed, and his horse drove the other way. Then Yaroslav entered the tent, where a comely youth lay fast asleep: he drew his sword, and was on the point of slaying him when he bethought himself that it would bring no honour to slay a sleeping man; so he lay down in the tent, on the other side, near Prince Ivan. ...
— The Russian Garland - being Russian Falk Tales • Various
... and son, to the latter of whom was consigned, for reasons which will appear presently, the sole management of the farm. Of him we will merely say, that, at the period of which we treat, he was a fine, strapping, dark curly-haired, white-teethed, red-lipped, broad-shouldered, and altogether comely and gentle tempered youth, of about twenty, who had, although unconsciously, monopolized the affections of almost every well favoured maiden of his class, for miles around him—advantages of nature, from which had resulted ...
— The Canadian Brothers - or The Prophecy Fulfilled • John Richardson
... requisite for the search. At the expiration of these, Kowsoter, called at his lodge, and informed him that he would bring his bride to him in the course of the afternoon. He kept his word. At the appointed time he approached, leading the bride, a comely copper-colored dame attired in her Indian finery. Her father, mother, brothers by the half dozen and cousins by the score, all followed on to grace the ceremony and greet ...
— The Adventures of Captain Bonneville - Digested From His Journal • Washington Irving
... on account of his descent from the last Saxon monarchs of England, was held in the highest respect by all the Saxon natives of the north of England. But with the blood of this ancient royal race, many of their infirmities had descended to Athelstane. He was comely in countenance, bulky and strong in person, and in the flower of his age—yet inanimate in expression, dull-eyed, heavy-browed, inactive and sluggish in all his motions, and so slow in resolution, that the soubriquet of one of his ancestors was conferred upon him, and he was very generally ...
— Ivanhoe - A Romance • Walter Scott
... dearest boy," he said to me. "I love you quite as dearly as I love him, or better, but he was sprung upon me so suddenly, and dazzled me with his comely debonair face, so full of youth, and health, and frankness. Did you see him, he would go straight to your heart, for he is wonderfully like you in spite of your taking so much ...
— Erewhon Revisited • Samuel Butler
... station, the son indulged his taste for wine and women; yet he supported, with credit, the character of a Christian [102] and a soldier. Without being conspicuous for any of the ambitious qualifications which excite the admiration and envy of mankind, the comely person of Jovian, his cheerful temper, and familiar wit, had gained the affection of his fellow-soldiers; and the generals of both parties acquiesced in a popular election, which had not been conducted by the arts of their enemies. The ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... a passage to a little drawing-room where a fair-haired lady, with a happy and tender expression on her comely face, was sitting in the midst of three children and helping them ...
— The Eight Strokes of the Clock • Maurice Leblanc
... Alps, in forest glade, And by the shore of its most famous lake; But fairer than that land is this fair maid; And brighter than its peaks at morn's awake; A Christian girl is she, whose heart God has renewed, And her fine, comely mind ...
— Gleams of Sunshine - Optimistic Poems • Joseph Horatio Chant
... preparations were being made for the marriage of the young maiden of low degree to a man in a much higher social position than she could ever have aspired to in the ordinary course of events. Pearl was a sweet, comely-looking damsel, who would have made a model wife to one of her own station in life, but who was utterly unsuited for the new dignity which would be thrust upon her as soon as she crossed the threshold of the wealthy ...
— Chinese Folk-Lore Tales • J. Macgowan
... Person, as a common Jesus, for all persons in their stead, even as for so many as shall come in to Him; for His victory I give to them, His righteousness I give to them, His merits I bestow on them, and look upon them holy, harmless, undefiled, and for ever comely in my eye, through the victory of the Captain of their salvation (1 ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... view of demerit produces anger and regret; but the idea of excelling and also of inferiority (in the sense of demerit) both destroyed, the desire to excel and also anger (on account of inferiority) are destroyed. Anger! how it changes the comely face, how it destroys the loveliness of beauty! Anger dulls the brightness of the eye, chokes all desire to hear the principles of truth, cuts and divides the principle of family affection, impoverishes and weakens every worldly aim. Therefore let anger be subdued, yield not to the ...
— Sacred Books of the East • Various
... wiped the death-stain with his flowing locks— Sinful purgation! Think you that you bear In those cold gifts atonement for her guilt? It is not possible. Wherefore let be. But take a ringlet from thy comely head, And this from mine, that lingers on my brow[3] Longing to shade his tomb. Ah, give it to him, All I can give, and this my maiden-zone, Not daintily adorned, as once erewhile. Then, humbly kneeling, pray that from the ground He would arise to help ...
— The Seven Plays in English Verse • Sophocles
... mound; he is not smaller in size than two of the men of this world. He has but one foot, and one eye, in the middle of his forehead. And he has a club of iron, and it is certain that there are no two men in the world, who would not find their burden in that club. And he is not a comely man, but on the contrary he is exceedingly ill favoured; and he is the woodward of that wood. And thou wilt see a thousand wild animals, grazing around him. Enquire of him the way out of the glade, and he ...
— The Mabinogion Vol. 1 (of 3) • Owen M. Edwards
... father, Pantagruel went to Paris to study. There his spirit among his books was like fire among heather, so indefatigable was it and ardent. One day as Pantagruel was taking a walk without the city he met a man of a comely stature and elegant in all the lineaments of his body, but most pitifully wounded, and clad ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VII • Various
... guarda costa to boot. The capitano, Don Ignacio Sanchez—wasn't that his name, doctor? Oh! you forget—all right! Off they started with a guide, on hired mules; but when they pulled up at their destination they found the Don wasn't there, though they were handsomely entertained by the senora—a comely, fat, and waspish body, with very few clothes on—who cursed her Don for sending people to see her, and the visitors too for coming. However, as her guests had not dined, she fed them bountifully on a supper of the nastiest jerked beef ...
— Captain Brand of the "Centipede" • H. A. (Henry Augustus) Wise
... shadows. So are afflictions good for our instruction, and adversities for our amendment. As for the article of death, shall I shun to meet what she who lay in my bosom hath passed through? And look you, fair damsel, thou whose body is sweet, and comely to behold—wherefore should I not rejoice to depart? When I see my house lying in ruins about me, I look down upon this ugly overgrown body of mine, the very foundations whereof crumble from beneath me, and I thank God it is but a tent, and no enduring house even like this house of Raglan, which ...
— St. George and St. Michael • George MacDonald
... of space, in jigs and reels and hornpipes. Above, on either side, there was a recess railed with iron, perhaps two feet wide and four long, which stood for orchestra and seats of honour. In the one balcony, five slatternly Irish lasses sat woven in a comely group. In the other was posted Orpheus, his body, which was convulsively in motion, forming an odd contrast to his somnolent, imperturbable Scots face. His brother, a dark man with a vehement, interested countenance, who made a god of the fiddler, sat by with open mouth, drinking in the general ...
— Essays of Travel • Robert Louis Stevenson
... converting a young squire. Perugino, or even Raphael, would have brought the scene quite otherwise before us. The Duke's consecration would of course have occupied a commanding place in the picture. But the episodes would have been composed of comely groups or animated portraits. Guercino, obedient to the religious spirit of the Counter-Reformation, compels sympathy with ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volumes 1 and 2 - The Catholic Reaction • John Addington Symonds
... Isis and Set, Ptah, Hapi and the Virgin Cow, or the many other actors of this drama. There, too, among a brown race of men, the light-god was deemed to be not of their own hue, but "light colored, white or yellow," of comely countenance, bright eyes and golden hair. Again, he is the one who invented the calendar, taught the arts, established the rituals, revealed the medical virtues of plants, recommended peace, and again was identified as one of the brothers ...
— American Hero-Myths - A Study in the Native Religions of the Western Continent • Daniel G. Brinton
... Montholieu, for one; Count, or whatever he styled himself; nailed to the gallows (in effigy) after he had fled. It is dangerous to have spoken kindly to the Crown-Prince, or almost to have been spoken to by him. Doris Ritter, a comely enough good girl, nothing of a beauty, but given to music, Potsdam CANTOR'S (Precentor's) daughter, has chanced to be standing in the door, perhaps to be singing within doors, once or twice, when the Prince passed that way: Prince inquired ...
— History of Friedrich II of Prussia V 7 • Thomas Carlyle
... self, Sudata's king Believed religion but a comely cloak To hide besetting sins from public view, And sought the master in his new retreat To talk religion and to act a part, And greetings ended, said in solemn wise: "Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown; But my poor kingdom now ...
— The Dawn and the Day • Henry Thayer Niles
... A comely form emerges from the door, and the face looks up at the morning sun. The woman walks out and on, lithe grace in every movement. Then the valley swims before him—for it is, it is, the woman he had loved. ...
— St. Cuthbert's • Robert E. Knowles
... top of the hill that hung over Barton, a spot which was forbidden ground, being locally held one of extreme danger. 'Oh! I daresay she will,' my Father then said, 'but you must guess who she is.' I guessed one or two of the less comely of the female 'saints', and, this embarrassing my Father,—since the second I mentioned was a married woman who kept a sweet-shop in the village,—he cut my inquiries short by saying, 'It ...
— Father and Son • Edmund Gosse
... Falmouth. She was comely as the roe; I see her still—her dove's eyes and her Smile! I was older than she; and I had a name for hardness, a hard and wicked man; but she loved me—my Hester!—and she took me as I was. O how I repaid her trust! Well, our child was born to us; and we named her after the brig I had built and ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume XV • Robert Louis Stevenson
... have laid it aside themselves, cannot with much modesty pretend to judge for those who have not; or, if they may, there is still a question how far it is right to lay it aside. The following lines are a sort of translation from Horace; and I submit it to the reader, whether it is comely for a Christian divine to be less reverent toward God, than a heathen poet; and whether the plural language here used, does not lack the reverence of ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... heroes and villains are as consistent in all their sayings and doings as the cardinal virtues and the deadly sins in an allegory. We should as soon expect a good action from giant Slay-good in Bunyan as from Dionysius; and a crime of Epaminondas would seem as incongruous as a faux-pas of the grave and comely damsel called Discretion, who answered the bell at the door of ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 1 (of 4) - Contibutions to Knight's Quarterly Magazine] • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... forgetting himself as to take the management of his great shop into his own hands, walk up and down and receive customers, and be seen working at his books in the glass office if he did not go behind the counter, he went and married for his second wife a farmer's daughter. She was an honest, sensible, comely young woman, but she had no pretensions to be a lady, and no more inclination to enter the society of the Redcross upper class than the upper class had a mind to receive her as an equal. Charles Robinson's first wife had been all very well, though she ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Sarah Tytler
... a little, and he glanced with interest at the comely picture she presented; her fresh face, brown hair, candid eyes, unpractised manner, country dress, pink hands, empty wicker-basket, and the ...
— The Romantic Adventures of a Milkmaid • Thomas Hardy
... once been comely enough, but she was aged and worn, as sailors' wives are apt to be, by many sorrows. Many a sad day had she had already; for although John Hawkins, port-admiral of Plymouth, and patriarch of British shipbuilders, was a faithful husband enough, and as ready to forgive as he was to quarrel, ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley
... common subjects: and conversing with persons belonging to trade and navigation from London, for the most part they are much civilized, and wear the best of clothes according to their station; nay, sometimes too good for their circumstances, being for the generality, comely handsome persons of good features and fine complexions (if they take care) of good ...
— Tobacco; Its History, Varieties, Culture, Manufacture and Commerce • E. R. Billings
... explanation or clue could be obtained from the patient, who continued to apostrophise the portrait in disconnected phrase, and to utter howls of agony and lamentation. At last his existence terminated in one last horrible paroxysm. His corpse was frightful to behold; of his once comely form, a yellow shrivelled skeleton was all that remained. A few thousand rubles were the sole residue of his wealth; and his disappointed heirs, beholding numerous drawers and closets full of torn fragments that had once composed noble pictures, understood and cursed the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 62, No. 384, October 1847 • Various
... come to the throne, a grand, and great, and mighty king, Solomon, the most comely of the sons of David. The fierce fightings of David, the man of war, were over. The glittering crown of Israel had been placed upon the head of Solomon the Peaceable; and the people hoped great things, and celebrated his accession with loud and hearty rejoicings. The dominion of Israel extended, ...
— Little Folks (July 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various
... several times the fatal mistake of undervaluing their enemy, as well as clinging to impracticable formations and tactics. The English officers did not conceal their contempt for the "provincial" troops, who were not, indeed, comely to look at from the conventional military standpoint, but who bore the brunt of the fighting, won most of the successes, and were entirely capable of resenting the slights to which they were unjustly subjected. What was quite as important, bearing in mind what ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne
... influenced by the Pre-Raphaelite school. He might, had he wished, have been their portrait painter—and indeed, the picture of the comely Mrs. Hughes, a kind, motherly creature, with a background of distant fields, minutely painted, is quite on the lines of ...
— Watts (1817-1904) • William Loftus Hare
... her to Nance, caught hold of the leafy frame in which the man was encased, and pulled him from under it. But he began to think he had unkennelled the wrong fox, for the man, though a tall fellow, bore no resemblance to Jem Device; while, when the crone's mask was plucked off, she was found to be a comely young woman. Meanwhile, all around was in an uproar, and amidst a hurricane of hisses, yells, and other indications of displeasure from the spectators, several of the mummers demanded the meaning of such ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... was as little comely as need be, she was still a woman, and a woman Passepoil had never seen before, and, sidling towards her, he endeavored to enter into amicable conversation, which was received but indifferently well. By this time Cocardasse ...
— The Duke's Motto - A Melodrama • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... large piece of scarlet cloth, ornamented with bits of gold lace stitched on different parts of it. In the bow of the canoe were three or four little boys of equal size, who were clad with neatness and propriety; and in the stern sat a number of comely looking musicians, consisting of several drummers and a trumpeter, whilst the young men, who had the management of the boat, were not inferior to their companions either in decency of ...
— Lander's Travels - The Travels of Richard Lander into the Interior of Africa • Robert Huish
... having delivered himself of his effective assent: 'Yes. The convict,' and I, far from indulging in a reminiscent excursion into the past, remained sufficiently in the present to muse in a vague, absent-minded way on the respectable proportions and on the (upon the whole) comely shape of his great pedestrian's calves, for he had thrown one leg over his knee, carelessly, to conceal the trouble of his mind by an air of ease. But all the same the knowledge was in me, the awakened resonance of which I spoke just now; I was aware of it on that beautiful day, so fresh, so ...
— Chance - A Tale in Two Parts • Joseph Conrad
... on the down-bent head with its masses of dark-brown hair, upon the white and shapely arms from which the sleeves were rolled back,—Georgiana had been busy in the kitchen when the expressman came,—upon the whole comely young figure in its blue-print morning dress. "They never have need of the pieces, I should ...
— Under the Country Sky • Grace S. Richmond
... at her. "Great heaven!" thought I, "can such a face hide a selfish and intriguing heart?" and in a flash I summoned up in comparison before me the plain, honest, and reliable countenance of Mrs. Couldock and that of the comely and unpretending Miss Dawes, and knew ...
— The Old Stone House and Other Stories • Anna Katharine Green
... pity; for, really, he was a very good-looking chap, and I am sure my sister Jenny, though she wouldn't confess it, would have been sorry if anything had occurred to mar his comely face. ...
— Young Tom Bowling - The Boys of the British Navy • J.C. Hutcheson
... peculiar gallery, so beautiful is the drawing, and so warm and so eloquent the colouring. Take, then, this portrait of one of the daughters of the Scottish Covenant. "She was a woman of great worth, whom I therefore passionately loved and inwardly honoured. A stately, beautiful, and comely personage; truly pious and fearing the Lord. Of an evenly temper, patient in our common tribulations and under her personal distresses. A woman of bright natural parts, and of an uncommon stock of prudence; of a quick and lively apprehension in things she applied herself ...
— Bunyan Characters (Second Series) • Alexander Whyte
... an excellent body,' continued Bob; 'that can truly be said—a real charmer, you know—a nice good comely young woman, a miracle of genteel breeding, you know, and all that. She can throw her hair into the nicest curls, and she's got splendid gowns and headclothes. In short, you might call her a land mermaid. She'll make such a first-rate ...
— The Trumpet-Major • Thomas Hardy
... back from the sight of a pair of lips that were quite ultra, in the way of pouting, which used often to salute him twenty years before—"Upon my word, Mrs. Bess, you improve in beauty, everytime I see you. Old age and you seem to be total strangers to each other. How do you manage to remain so comely and ...
— Wyandotte • James Fenimore Cooper
... Bretagne a baron, comely in his person, wise, courteous, adored by his neighbours, much beloved by his sovereign, and married to a noble and beautiful lady, for whom he felt the warmest affection, which she appeared to return. But she had ...
— The Lay of Marie • Matilda Betham
... little confidence commended me in dumb show to the landlady of the Inn, a Mrs. Nature, if I understood him aright. This person was still comely, though of uncertain age, wore cherry ribbons, smiled rather vacantly from vague, wonderful, indescribable eyes that seemed to change colour, like the chameleon, according ...
— Henry Brocken - His Travels and Adventures in the Rich, Strange, Scarce-Imaginable Regions of Romance • Walter J. de la Mare
... a family that give the tone and place to it. One glance at his aunt and cousins satisfied Julius. Mrs. Sandal was stately and comely, and had the quiet manners of a high-bred woman. Sophia, in white mull, with a large hat covered with white drooping feathers, and a glimmer of gold at her throat and wrists, was at least picturesque. Of Charlotte, he saw nothing in the first moments of their meeting but a pair of bright blue ...
— The Squire of Sandal-Side - A Pastoral Romance • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... From comely Conway unto Clyde Under tyldes[4] them to hide A better shepherd on no side No earthly man may have For with walking weary I have methought Beside thee such my sheep I sought My long-tail'd tups are in my thought Them to save ...
— Everyman and Other Old Religious Plays, with an Introduction • Anonymous
... would say: if I have known her, You'll say she did embrace me as a husband, And so extenuate theforehand sin: No, Leonato, I never tempted her with word too large; But, as a brother to his sister, show'd Bashful sincerity and comely love. ...
— Much Ado About Nothing • William Shakespeare [Craig, Oxford edition]
... who took rank among princes and princesses? What father, or what husband, could be insensible to prospects of such honor? What priest would not readily absolve such sin? Therefore one might have observed more than one comely dark-eyed woman, brilliant as some tropical bird in the colors of her peasant dress, who cast coquettish glances toward high places, not unacknowledged by patronizing nods in return, while mothers and fathers looked on in triumph. These were the days for the upper classes: the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 52, February, 1862 • Various
... it is to be presumed, will find some method of setting such matters right. In fine, when the negro patriarch's strong sable sons supported their decrepit sire homeward, with their wives, "black, but comely," bearing the glistening, satin-skinned babies on their backs, and their other little ebony responsibilities trudging in the rear, there must have been a dismal wail; for there was the ancestral tree, its foliage shrivelled with fire, stretching out its desolate ...
— Journal of an African Cruiser • Horatio Bridge
... the most comely thing you ever saw. I've talked to quite a number of people who knew him in those days, white men, and they all agree that the first time you saw him his beauty just took your breath away. They called him Red on account of his flaming hair. It had a natural wave and he wore it long. ...
— The Trembling of a Leaf - Little Stories of the South Sea Islands • William Somerset Maugham
... written in elegant Latin, but for the convenience of all it was necessary to translate it, although the word comely is feeble beside that of formosa, which signifies beautiful in shape. The Duke of Burgundy, called the Fearless, in whom previous to his death the Sire d'Hocquetonville confided the troubles cemented with lime and ...
— Droll Stories, Complete - Collected From The Abbeys Of Touraine • Honore de Balzac
... the side of it, besides the usual driver and his mate, strode a sturdy, fresh-looking Englishman, whose cheeks had not yet been burnt by the hot sun of Australia, and two young boys; while on the top of the dray sat his wife—a comely looking woman—a girl of thirteen, and three smaller children. Dick Boyce, the bullock driver, pointed out the master to the new chum he had brought up from the chief port of the colony. The latter ...
— Taking Tales - Instructive and Entertaining Reading • W.H.G. Kingston
... And, as he spoke, an inch of Helenar's tongue shot momentarily into view as she turned her comely face, overflowing with merriment, ...
— Such is Life • Joseph Furphy
... Lorraine' behind the bars. No, we won't burn him: we will carry him to the Egyptians, and sell him. We will exchange him away for money, yea, for silver and gold, and for beef and for liquors, and for tobacco and for raiment. This youth will fetch some price in the market; for he is a comely lad, though not over strong; but we will fatten him up, and give him the bath, and curl his hair, and we will sell him for a hundred piastres to Bacon or to Bungay. The rubbish is salable enough, sir; and my advice to you is this: the next time you go home ...
— The History of Pendennis, Vol. 2 - His Fortunes and Misfortunes, His Friends and His Greatest Enemy • William Makepeace Thackeray
... golden bark of the Strozzi—the argosy that bore such precious freight. At last they neared it, and Eugene could see the little white hand, holding a bouquet of roses from between the crimson hangings of the pavilion. His eyes brightened, and his whole being seemed transfigured. Gallant and comely he looked—a knight worthy ...
— Prince Eugene and His Times • L. Muhlbach
... radically intolerant. A moment of pique might send her to his side, but the position was unnatural and could not be maintained. Even now Lewis was in her thoughts. Fragments of his odd romantic speech clove to her memory. His figure—for he showed to perfection in his own surroundings—was so comely and gallant, so bright with the glamour of adventurous youth, that for a moment this prosaic young woman was a convert to the coloured side of life and had ...
— The Half-Hearted • John Buchan
... for this hour, and with the Spouse in the Canticles besought the Lord to show her His face, and to let her hear His voice— that face so comely, and that voice so sweet. Now at last, possession had replaced hope, so now she might entone the canticle of triumph, "I found him whom my soul loveth: I hold him: and I will not let him go. My beloved to me, and I to him who feedeth among the lilies. Till the "glorious dawn of eternity" ...
— The Life of the Venerable Mother Mary of the Incarnation • "A Religious of the Ursuline Community"
... cousin in without me; but she soon returned with a creature that might have sat to a sculptor for the image of Welcome. It was the youngest of the Gladmans; who, by marriage with a Bruton, had become mistress of the old mansion. A comely brood are the Brutons. Six of them, females, were noted as the handsomest young women in the county. But this adopted Bruton, in my mind, was better than they all—more comely. She was born too late to have remembered me. She just recollected in early life to have had her cousin Bridget ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb
... peasant girls who thronged about and stood in groups, blushing furiously under my glance, which Arcolano vainly bade me lower. A score of times did it seem to me that one of these brown-legged, lithe, comely creatures was my little Luisina; and more than once I was on the point of addressing one or another, to discover my mistake and be admonished for my astounding frivolousness ...
— The Strolling Saint • Raphael Sabatini
... nothing like! the slim, dimpled girl who had stood on the porch steps and watched her husband drive away that morning fifteen years ago. She was stout and comely; the auburn hair was darker and arched away from her face in smooth, shining waves instead of the old-time curls. Her face was unlined and fresh-coloured, but no woman could live in subjection to her own unbending will for so ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to 1901 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... in some respects peculiar. It is not a poor one, for it is comfortable and clean. Neither is it a rich one, for there are few ornaments, and no luxuries about it. Over the fire stoops a comely young woman, as well as one can judge, at least, from the rather faint light that enters through a small window facing a brick wall. The wall is only five feet from the window, and some previous occupant of the rooms had painted on it a rough landscape, with three very green trees ...
— Dusty Diamonds Cut and Polished - A Tale of City Arab Life and Adventure • R.M. Ballantyne
... character of ambassadors came to the Admiral and informed him, in the best manner they were able, that the king would visit him, if he might be assured of coming in safety. Being satisfied on this point, a numerous company soon appeared, in front of which was a very comely person bearing a kind of sceptre, on which hung two crowns, and three chains of great length. The chains were of bones, and the crowns of network, curiously wrought with ...
— In the Footprints of the Padres • Charles Warren Stoddard
... succeeds: A comely band Of youths and maidens, bounding hand-in-hand; The maids in soft cymars of linen drest; The youths all graceful in ...
— The Pirate of the Mediterranean - A Tale of the Sea • W.H.G. Kingston
... Lane with Mr. James Anderson and Miss Vandenhoff as the principal personages. The interest centers not so much in the barbarian Ingomar as in his enchantress, Parthenia, of whom Miss Mary Anderson, an American artist of fine renown, proves a comely and efficient representative. In summing up the qualifications of an actress the Transatlantic critics never fail to take into account her personal charms—a fascinating factor. Borne on the wings of an enthusiastic press, the fame of Miss Anderson's loveliness had reached our shores long before ...
— Mary Anderson • J. M. Farrar
... so," said the man; "been out all night?" and he hurried them into a warm and cheerful room, bright with a blazing fire, where was a comely, busy matron, who turned ...
— Bart Ridgeley - A Story of Northern Ohio • A. G. Riddle
... boy his sister's secret guessed, Since only kindness dwells within his breast Toward his ancestral foe. By friendly signs, Each comely youth the other's thought divines; Then suddenly exclaims the dauntless Sioux, "Listen, my friend! I must return with you To ask and win this maiden for my wife!" "Return with us! not if you prize your life—" The ...
— Indian Legends of Minnesota • Various
... words with lines, and lines with Scenes consent, To raise an Act to full astonishment; Here melting numbers, words of power to move Young men to swoone, and Maides to dye for love. Love lyes a bleeding here, Evadne there Swells with brave rage, yet comely every where, Here's a mad lover, there that high designe Of King and no King (and the rare Plot thine) So that when 'ere wee circumvolve our Eyes, Such rich, such fresh, such sweet varietyes, Ravish our ...
— The Works of Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher in Ten Volumes - Volume I. • Beaumont and Fletcher
... service of the table upon the knee, and the women only stand about him, leaning against the wall. The room below his half-pace hath tables on the sides for the guests that are bidden; who are served with great and comely order; and towards the end of dinner (which in the greatest feasts with them lasteth never above an hour and a half) there is an hymn sung, varied according to the invention of him that composeth it (for they have excellent poesy), but the subject of it ...
— Ideal Commonwealths • Various
... marked by winding streams of pure spring water, centering around great roomy houses, with huge outside chimneys, and broad piazzas, and with a train of humble negro cabins in the rear. The horses were proud stepping thoroughbreds, the women comely and spirited, the men dignified and athletic, and all seemed well-fed and comfortable. The names of the places along the route recalled to Harry's memory all he had ever read of the desperate battles and massacres and single-handed encounters of Daniel Boone and his associates, ...
— The Red Acorn • John McElroy
... my darling, You were a doorway to me; You let me out of the confines Into this strange countrie, Where people are crowded like thistles, Yet are shapely and comely to see. ...
— Amores - Poems • D. H. Lawrence
... in glass houses dare not, my dear. I doubt your interest in this young person, Mr Pendle. She is one who tires her head and paints her face, lying in wait for comely youths that she ...
— The Bishop's Secret • Fergus Hume
... No; I have no curiosity in that quarter. And, to tell you the truth, I am much too busy about the Present to be raking into that heap of rubbish we call the Past. I fancy that both your good grandmother and that comely old curate of Brook-Green know everything about Lady Vargrave; and, as they esteem her so much, I take it for granted she ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... love-tale of the fair and sweet Ann Rutledge, so untimely taken away, is somewhat attenuated by the fact that only some fifteen months rolled by after she was laid in the ground before Lincoln was again intent upon matrimony. In the autumn of 1836 Miss Mary Owens, of Kentucky, appeared in New Salem,—a comely lass, with "large blue eyes," "fine trimmings," and a long and varied list of attractions. Lincoln immediately began to pay court to her, but in an ungainly and morbid fashion. It is impossible to avoid feeling that his mind was not yet in a natural ...
— Abraham Lincoln, Vol. I. • John T. Morse
... families, at least, endowed for life with a ship's kettle. Come, this was no misspent Sunday. The absence of the kettles told its own story: our Jews said nothing about them; but, on the other hand, they said many kind and comely things about the people they had met. The two women, in particular, had been charmed out of themselves by the sight of a young girl surrounded by her admirers; all evening, it appeared, they had been triumphing ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 2 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... who had lived with Miss Betty, as he called her, since she was a young woman, and was devoted to her, opened the door for them, a broad grin on his comely face. ...
— Kristy's Rainy Day Picnic • Olive Thorne Miller
... family were ever invited. There was a comfortable fire burning, the roses which had come from him a few hours before were everywhere displayed, and Jane herself, in a soft brown velvet gown, rose to her feet, comely and graceful, to ...
— Nobody's Man • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... qualities, men and women, the lean and the stout, the plain and the fairly pretty. Sure, if people at all understood the power of beauty, there would be no prayers addressed except to Venus; and the mere privilege of beholding a comely woman is worth paying for. Our visitors, upon the whole, were not much to boast of; and yet, sitting in a corner and very much ashamed of myself and my absurd appearance, I have again and again tasted the finest, the rarest, and the most ethereal ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 20 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... long time, but old Jake Woods had objected, and so they had run away, and were going to Poker Flat to be married, and here they were. And they were tired out, and how lucky it was they had found a place to camp and company. All this the Innocent delivered rapidly, while Piney, a stout, comely damsel of fifteen, emerged from behind the pine tree, where she had been blushing unseen, and rode to ...
— Selected Stories • Bret Harte
... that freezes sae, Nor blawing snaw's inclemencie, 'Tis not sic cauld, that makes me cry, But my love's heart grown cauld to me. Whan we came in by Glasgow town, We were a comely sight to see, My love was clad in black velvet, ...
— Lectures on the English Poets - Delivered at the Surrey Institution • William Hazlitt
... big, comely woman, and she walked as one who had no misfortunes and no misgivings. When she saw the Philosopher sitting by the well she halted a moment in surprise and then came forward with ...
— The Crock of Gold • James Stephens
... he, as they rose from the table and the old man went for his pipe, "'twas long ago, an' I had then the rose o' youth upon me, a man was tempted o' the devil an' stole money—a large sum—an' made off with it. These hands o' mine used to serve him those days, an' I remember he was a man comely an' well set up, an', I think, he had honour an' ...
— Darrel of the Blessed Isles • Irving Bacheller
... prithee tell us a tale which shall beguile our watching through the dark hours." She replied:—With love and gladness.[FN259] It hath reached me, O magnificent King, that whilome there was in the city of Baghdad, a comely youth and a well bred, fair of favour, tall of stature, and slender of shape. His name was Ala al-Din and he was of the chiefs of the sons of the merchants and had a shop wherein he sold and bought. One day, as he sat in his shop, there passed by ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... that she was his mother, but should question her as to it. Now the youth, reflecting on this, observed that his brothers and sisters were all as ugly as evil beasts and no better behaved, while he himself was comely and good. Then he asked her what this might mean. And she replied, laughing, "Because they were all begotten (or born) in the night-time, but you are a child of the day and of light." [Footnote: There is probably ...
— The Algonquin Legends of New England • Charles Godfrey Leland
... the poet himself was constantly the victim of some fair enslaver, although, being jealous of those richer than himself, he was not aspiring in his loves. But while there was hardly a comely maiden in Tarbolton to whom he did not address a song, we are not to imagine that he was frittering his heart away amongst them all. A poet may sing lyrics of love to many while his heart is true to one. The one at this time to Robert ...
— Robert Burns - Famous Scots Series • Gabriel Setoun
... of ordinary height, and was well made; his face was a happy medium between the length of his father's and the roundness of his mother's face, so that with a certain roundness it seemed to be of a very comely length, his beard being like his father's, of a rather tawny colour, and of moderate length. He was rather bald, so that in the middle of his forehead he had two small neat curls, twisted towards the right; the crown ...
— St. Gregory and the Gregorian Music • E. G. P. Wyatt
... with a silken fringe of hair. His type was that of the modern Arabian Slughi, who is the direct and unaltered descendant of the ancient hound. The glorious King Solomon referred to him (Proverbs xxx. 31) as being one of the four things which "go well and are comely in going—a lion, which is strongest among beasts, and turneth not away from any; a Greyhound; an he goat also; and a king against whom there ...
— Dogs and All About Them • Robert Leighton
... "Land!" again. Then, with an unexpected whirl of her big, comely person, she had her hands on the boy-girls' shoulders and was gently pushing her toward a ...
— Judith Lynn - A Story of the Sea • Annie Hamilton Donnell
... broad-faced, fresh-coloured, with small grey eyes and a wonderfully placid, comely face, on which a faint shadow seemed printed, sat beside him with the younger baby, a real hairless one, as could be seen when its white knitted cap slipped. The elder baby, perhaps two years old, began whimpering a little. He ...
— Tatterdemalion • John Galsworthy
... of purest Saxon-Norman blood, had the vigorous and comely physique of that race. Nowhere else in the land were the generality of white men and women so fine-looking. Easy circumstances had enabled them to become gracious as well, with the dignified and pleasing manners characterizing Southern ...
— History of the United States, Volume 5 • E. Benjamin Andrews
... to Lucian: 'tis an elegant thing which cheareth up the mind, exerciseth the body, delights the spectators, which teacheth many comely gestures, equally affecting the ears, eyes and ...
— Vice Versa - or A Lesson to Fathers • F. Anstey
... A-la-mauresque. The ladies of Mequinas are so extremely handsome, 118 that I cannot say I saw one plain young woman, although I visited several families; nay, I can say, without offense to truth, that I did not see one that was not comely and handsome. I was most hospitably entertained wherever I went. On the 18th June, at eight o'clock A.M. we started for Fas; when we had approached the latter city, we met a messenger, with the prince Muley Abdsalam's secretary, from the emperor to his ...
— An Account of Timbuctoo and Housa Territories in the Interior of Africa • Abd Salam Shabeeny
... Master Gookin," whispered she, "hath a comely maiden to his daughter. And hark ye, my pet. Thou hast a fair outside and a pretty wit enough of thine own. Yea, a pretty wit enough! Thou wilt think better of it when thou hast seen more of other people's wits. Now with ...
— Short Stories of Various Types • Various
... comely widow, who breakfasted in black moire, with a diadem of glossy braids on her sleek head, and many jet ornaments rattling and glistening about her person, informed them, with voluble affability, ...
— Shawl-Straps - A Second Series of Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag • Louisa M. Alcott
... the young lady, too—her that the oud countess is o'er fond of; but the young 'un is a right comely lass, an' the oud 'un might ...
— The Old Countess; or, The Two Proposals • Ann S. Stephens
... regard this work of cleansing and beautifying the domains of Mount Zion as that preparatory to the visitation of the Most High, is something which speaks to the heart and says: 'Dost thou appear as beautiful, as clean, and as comely in the sight of God as do these elements of an unthinking world? Is thine heart also prepared to be searched with the candles of him from whom no unclean thing ...
— The Communistic Societies of the United States • Charles Nordhoff
... men salute those women that they have visited, or that have visited them, I have at times made my objection against it; and when they have answered, that it was but a piece of civility, I have told them, it is not a comely sight. Some indeed have urged the holy kiss; but then I have asked why they made baulks? why they did salute the most handsome, and let the ill-favoured go? Thus, how laudable soever such things have been in the eyes of others, they have been ...
— Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners • John Bunyan
... miles off: they reached it in less than six hours. There was Uncle Fountain on the hall steps to receive her, and the comely housekeeper, Mrs. Brown, ducking and smiling in the background. While the servants were unpacking the carriage, Mr. Fountain took Lucy to her bedroom. Mrs. Brown had gone on before to see for the third time whether all was comfortable. There was a huge fire, all red; ...
— Love Me Little, Love Me Long • Charles Reade
... cream and butter rolls, which the moss-covered stone shelves far down the well held securely from possible taint. Back of the house ran the babbling brook and emptied into "the ditch," which was often broad and deep enough to merit a more comely name, and was the favorite resort of the young in winter for skating and sledding. But this ancestral home, with all its charms, had passed from view, like man others, leaving but ...
— Annals and Reminiscences of Jamaica Plain • Harriet Manning Whitcomb
... preceded our hero, opened a door, and introduced him into a long low apartment, where sat, round a table spread with pipes and liquor, some ten or a dozen men, while at the top of the table, in an armchair, presided Gentleman George. That dignitary was a portly and comely gentleman, with a knowing look, and a Welsh wig, worn, as the "Morning Chronicle" says of his Majesty's hat, "in a degage manner, on one side." Being afflicted with the gout, his left foot reclined on a stool; and the ...
— Paul Clifford, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... "This comely volume is intended to open the eyes of Englishmen to the Romanising influence of the High Church, and to the wiles of the Jesuits, who are using the Establishment to their own ends."—Rev. C. H. Spurgeon in "Sword ...
— Gipsy Life - being an account of our Gipsies and their children • George Smith
... Why plague our comely Marathus? Thy chaste severity Let wrinkled wooers feel,—but not, not such a youth ...
— The Elegies of Tibullus • Tibullus
... most desperate love to her who is now my Wife, d'ye mind me?—but you, being a Man of an exact Judgment, to her great grief, gave her to me, who best deserv'd her, both for my civil Behaviour, and comely Personage, d'ye understand me? but now this Carlos, by his Father's death, being made Governor, d'ye see? is to marry me your other daughter Clara, and to exasperate me, wou'd never let me be ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. III • Aphra Behn
... Mul-tal-la, or Spink and Jiggers, had to admit the truth of the assertion heard many times; he was the most prepossessing young warrior upon whom any of them had ever looked. Neither among the Blackfeet nor any of their neighboring tribes had so comely a youth been seen. And this being the fact, many were more unwilling than before to believe he was so powerful, so active, so fleet of foot and so athletic as had been claimed. This doubt was not lessened by the ...
— Deerfoot in The Mountains • Edward S. Ellis
... swarm of houseless women that found a precarious footing in the houses of their relations—women with raucous voices, whose husbands had grown tired of life and fled; ladies who were vaguely supposed to be widows; comely young women cast on a cold world with a pitiful tale and a handbag. And she fed them till they were plump and vicious again, when they invariably disappeared, taking everything of value they could lay hands on. When Jonah, exasperated by these petty thefts, begged her to come and live with them, ...
— Jonah • Louis Stone
... matrons should be introduced into his presence? There was, in fact, a reason for his action. It was simply that Pao-yue had come to learn that Fu Shih had a sister, Ch'iu-fang by name, a girl as comely as a magnificent gem, and perfection itself, the report of outside people went, as much in intellect as in beauty. He had, it is true, not yet seen anything of her with his own eyes, but the sentiments, which made him think of her and cherish her, from a distance, were characterised ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... A comely woman, with a pretty rosebud of a daughter, came to select a gravestone for a twin-daughter, who had died a month before. I was impressed with the different nature of their feelings for the dead; the mother was calm and wofully resigned, fully conscious of her loss, ...
— Chippings With A Chisel (From "Twice Told Tales") • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... deep-bosomed and comely, a rich flush on her cheeks under the clear brown skin thanks to a kitchen fire which didn't burn and righteous anger which did, Mary Fisher, the upper housemaid, set a tea-tray upon the garden table ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... sight, cleansed him in the cisterns from the soil and impurities with which the rocks and waves had covered all his body, and clothing himself with befitting raiment, which the princess's attendants had given him, he presented himself in more worthy shape to Nausicaa. She admired to see what a comely personage he was, now he was dressed in all parts; she thought him some king or hero: and secretly wished that the gods would be pleased to ...
— THE ADVENTURES OF ULYSSES • CHARLES LAMB
... comely handsome fellow, perfectly well made, with straight strong limbs, not too large, tall, and well shaped; and, as I reckon, about twenty-six years of age. He had a very good countenance, not a fierce and surly aspect, but seemed to have something very manly in his face; and yet he ...
— The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe Of York, Mariner, Vol. 1 • Daniel Defoe
... acquaintances as they stood planted on either side of him; while the ladies in the vehicle regarded the scene with an expression of terror. One of them was an old woman, and the other a damsel of about sixteen. A mass of golden hair fell daintily from a small head, and the oval of her comely face was as shapely as an egg, and white with the transparent whiteness seen when the hands of a housewife hold a new-laid egg to the light to let the sun's rays filter through its shell. The same tint marked the maiden's ears where they glowed in the sunshine, and, in short, what ...
— Dead Souls • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... from the frying-pan directly on to her plate, and with them all the black rich juice that had exuded in the process of cooking—particularly rich, owing to its having several times caught fire and blazed triumphantly. On sitting down and squaring her comely frame to work, the first thing Clem did was to take a long draught out of the beer-jug; refreshed thus, she poured the remaining liquor into a glass. Ready at hand was mustard, made in a tea-cup; having taken a certain quantity of this condiment on to her knife, she proceeded ...
— The Nether World • George Gissing
... a comely, athletic lad, with a nature far removed from that of the other Devitts; he had seemed to be in the nature of a reversion to the type of gentleman, who, it was said, had imprudently married an ancestress ...
— Sparrows - The Story of an Unprotected Girl • Horace W. C. Newte
... except in a single instance, and that not of commendation, but neutrality. This exception, she said, occurred in the Book of Proverbs, where the greyhound is named, along with the lion and the goat, as 'comely in going,' yet merely in praise of his external beauty. But her difficulty was relieved by the reply, that in Isaiah lvi. 10, the "dog" is really used in a good sense as applied to the spiritual watchmen of the Lord's flock. For the unfaithful shepherds, being there ...
— Heads and Tales • Various
... Time, in eight-and-forty years, has whitened his hair, though it has left the color of health on his cheek, and the fire of intelligence in his eye. With a well-built frame and figure, and a comely countenance, there is a buoyancy of step, an energy of manner about him, that agree with what he has written of his life and aspirations. Such are the men that England is now, ever and anon, in every nook and corner of the island, producing. She produces them because they are ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 4, September, 1850 • Various
... to the occasion. Somewhat small in stature, nature had nevertheless endowed her with a remarkably well turned figure, well shaped arms, comely features, a singularly clear complexion, and blue eyes full of light and vivacity. Dressing with considerable taste and elegance—utterly shameless—without principle or character, with nothing to lose—everything to gain, the woman was ...
— English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the Nineteenth Century. - How they Illustrated and Interpreted their Times. • Graham Everitt
... in whose breast the brand Of love and pity kindled had the flame, While others softly whispered underhand, Before the duke with comely boldness came: "Brother and lord," quoth he, "too long you stand In your first purpose, yet vouchsafe to frame Your thoughts to ours, and lend this virgin aid: Thanks are half lost when ...
— Jerusalem Delivered • Torquato Tasso
... of thirty-six, fair of face and comely in form, to own a beautiful home and have an income greater than you can spend, and still not enough ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great - Volume 12 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Scientists • Elbert Hubbard
... somewhat of the blackest; great rowling Eyes, turning them and looking every way, alwayes moving them: a brisk bold look, a great swelling Belly, and very lively in his actions and behaviour, somewhat bald, not having much hair upon his head, and that gray, a large comely Beard, with great Whiskers; in conclusion, a very comely man. He bears his years well, being between Seventy and Eighty years of age; and tho an Old man, yet appears not to be like one, neither in countenance nor action. His Apparel is very strange and wonderful, not after his own Countrey-fashion, ...
— An Historical Relation Of The Island Ceylon In The East Indies • Robert Knox
... the bells next morning,—a Sunday morning, may be. There they go,—he sees them from the window,—the two comely damsels, picking their way through the light, fresh-fallen snow of March. Going possibly to teach the catechism; he sneers at this thought, for he is awake now. Has the world no richer gift in store for him? That ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 102, April, 1866 • Various
... pleasant air of patronage, the Dean as nearly cocks his quaint hat as a Dean in good spirits may, and directs his comely gaiters towards the ruddy dining-room of the snug old red-brick house where he is at present, 'in residence' with Mrs. Dean ...
— The Mystery of Edwin Drood • Charles Dickens
... at Delphi there dwelt a fair youth, whose name was Ion. Tall he was and comely, like to the son of a King, but of his birth no man knew anything; for he had been laid, being yet a babe, at the door of the temple, and the priestess had brought him up for her son. So he had served the God from a child, being fed from the altar and from the ...
— Stories from the Greek Tragedians • Alfred Church
... so early sown in little Ellen's mind, and so carefully tended by sundry hands, grew in course of time to all the fair structure and comely perfection it had bid fair to reach: storms and winds that had visited it, did but cause the root to take deeper hold; and at the point of its young maturity it happily fell again into those hands that had of all been most ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Elizabeth Wetherell
... over his kindly eyes; a sturdy, thick-set personage, active in movement and genial in conversation. It was James T. Fields who usually made the trips to England; but on this occasion Fields got no farther than the wharf, where the last object visible was his comely and smiling countenance as he waved his adieux. Conspicuous among the group on the after-deck, as we glided out of the smooth harbor of Boston, was an urbane and dignified gentleman of perhaps sixty years of age, with a clean-shaven mouth and chin, finely moulded, and with what Tennyson ...
— Hawthorne and His Circle • Julian Hawthorne
... income. He now began to think of making himself a home. Among those who followed in the train of Edward's queen, Philippa, when she came to England, were a certain knight of Hainault, called Roet, and his two little daughters. These children were now grown up into very comely young women. One, Catherine, had married an English gentleman, named Swynford. The other, Philippa, was maid of honor to the queen. According to Fanny Burney, a maid of honor has quite enough to do in the labors of dressing her mistress and herself; yet this ...
— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 7 of 8 • Charles F. (Charles Francis) Horne
... with Spence to Santa Lucia, and went on board the Capri boat. There were few passengers, a handful of Germans and an English family—father, mother, two daughters, and two sons Sitting apart, Miriam cast many glances at her country people, and not without envy. They were comely folk, in the best English health, refined in bearing, full of enjoyment. Now and then a few words of their talk fell upon her ears, and it was merry, kindly, intimate talk, the fruit of a lifetime of domestic happiness. It made her think again of what her own home-life ...
— The Emancipated • George Gissing
... Mitthis Beaton," says the small boy to a white-haired but fresh-looking and comely old dame; "I'se not going to bed till Mummy hath tolded ...
— Snake and Sword - A Novel • Percival Christopher Wren
... professional people, who walked rapidly up and down, with jokes and laughter of their kind, while the wind blew the girl's hair in loose gold about her fresh face, and twisted her blue drapery tight about her comely shape. When they got out of breath they sat down beside a large American lady, with a great deal of gold filling in her front teeth, and presently rose again and ran races to and from the bow. Mr. Arbuton turned away in displeasure. At the stern ...
— A Chance Acquaintance • W. D. Howells |
