"Customer" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... bill. Ha! signed by A. C. Morley. I will see to that. Here, Mr. Morley!" called Mr. Harris; but the clerk was busily engaged in waiting on a customer at the opposite side of the store, bowing and smiling in ...
— Sanders' Union Fourth Reader • Charles W. Sanders
... over," he said, "and I b'lieve it's the best thing to be done. You've got a tough customer to deal with, and it may be some trouble to git all the property out of his hands. But when the heiress is married, her husband can act for her to better advantage. I guess I'll speak to Mr. Rook and have the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 11, September, 1858 • Various
... his mother. Then, as he turned toward the dining-room, "I've two letters to get out. Then I'm going down the street to see a customer. I'll be up at the Sulzberg-Stein department store at nine sharp. There's no use trying to see old Sulzberg before ten, but I'll be there, anyway, and so will Ed Meyers, or I'm no skirt salesman. I want you to meet me there. It will ...
— Americans All - Stories of American Life of To-Day • Various
... Years,' said Mr. Tugby, 'are like Christians in that respect. Some of 'em die hard; some of 'em die easy. This one hasn't many days to run, and is making a fight for it. I like him all the better. There's a customer, ...
— The Chimes • Charles Dickens
... the attention arguments selected in the preceding chapter, set down all the questions that you might ask as a possible customer if you had been attracted by ...
— Practical English Composition: Book II. - For the Second Year of the High School • Edwin L. Miller
... the training of salesmen and the necessary attributes to make them successful. All phases of the subject are considered: clothes, presence, ability to talk, persuasive powers, tact, helping and getting the customer ...
— An Iron Will • Orison Swett Marden
... again. "Now you talk sense. Mind, I don't believe he'll come. Roy's a tougher customer than he looks to the naked eye. But I'll have a shot at it to-night. If needs must, I'll tell him why. I can swallow half a regiment of his Dyans; but not—the other thing. I hope you find us ...
— Far to Seek - A Romance of England and India • Maud Diver
... customer at the Wattle Tree, and was in the back parlour drinking brandy and water and talking to old Twexby on the day that Pierre arrived. The dumb man came into the bar out of the dusty road, and, leaning over the counter, pushed a letter ...
— Madame Midas • Fergus Hume
... think the chap's honest enough,' answered the groom, with a patronising air; 'but he's a queer customer—a reg'lar Peter the wild boy, ...
— The Golden Calf • M. E. Braddon
... have bit me, But all creation sha'n't outwit me!" Thus to himself, while to and fro His fingers perseveres to go, And from his lips no accent flows But—"Here she goes, and there she goes!" The barber came—"Lord help him! what A queerish customer I've got; But we must do our best to save him,— So hold him, gemmen, while I shave him!" But here the doctors interpose,— "A woman ...
— The Universal Reciter - 81 Choice Pieces of Rare Poetical Gems • Various
... be sorry to sneer At his chance; he'll be there, if he goes at the rate He went at last year, when a customer queer, Johnny Higgerson, fancied him lock'd in the straight; I've heard that the old horse has never been fitter, I've heard all performances past he'll outvie; He may gallop a docker, and finish a splitter, But "credat ...
— Poems • Adam Lindsay Gordon
... was a sequel. I had warned the sheriff and the attorney, who had made up their differences, that the man they had got was a slippery customer to handle. However, they got him in the boat all right. When they got to New York I had a cable from the captain—a friend of mine. He said the prisoner had not only cleared off the ship by himself, but had carried away the hand-baggage of ...
— The Grell Mystery • Frank Froest
... "His principal customer. But, bless you, my dear St. Mirrens! Don't bother yourself any more about the committee. They are as respectable a set—on paper at least—as you would wish to see of a summer's morning, and the beauty of it is that they will give us no manner of trouble. ...
— Stories by English Authors: Scotland • Various
... on me. And when I want a book I want it quickly. I don't want to have to send down to the office for the key, and I don't want to have to manipulate any trick ball-bearings and open up a case as if I were getting cream-puffs out for a customer. I want a bookcase for books and not ...
— Love Conquers All • Robert C. Benchley
... customer as young Cowperwood went out, but again the boy struck him as being inexpressibly sound and deep-thinking on financial matters. "If that young fellow wanted a place, I'd give it ...
— The Financier • Theodore Dreiser
... the sherry and handed it to his customer, who hesitated and timidly remarked that sherry was improved by a raw egg. The amused deacon turned around and took from the egg-pile the identical one he had received. As the brother broke it into his glass he noticed it had an extra yolk. After enjoying his drink, he handed back the ...
— A Backward Glance at Eighty • Charles A. Murdock
... increase it. Besides, it is to be considered, that at present the retailer expects to be paid for the danger which he incurs by an unlawful trade, and will not trust his reputation or his purse to the mercy of his customer, without a profit proportioned to the hazard; but when once the restraint shall be taken away, he will sell for common gain; and it can hardly be imagined, that at present he subjects himself to informations and penalties for less than sixpence ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 11. - Parlimentary Debates II. • Samuel Johnson
... soft customer, you are; we've got it all out o' you, anyhow,' thought Mr. Weller, ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... the sort of place one expected to find in Alaska. Devinne himself was a queer customer, a man of good education and birth. That he chose to establish a trading-post on the upper reaches of the Yukon was a mystery to all who knew him. The real reason was a secret in the heart of Devinne, and had reference to a quarrel in a Parisian club in which a blow had been struck ...
— Colorado Jim • George Goodchild
... through the glass-door of his back-shop, hard at work upon one of his novels (the most extraordinary contrast that ever was presented between an author and his works), but not to let him come behind his counter lest he should want you to turn customer, nor to go upstairs with him, lest he should offer to read the first manuscript of Sir Charles Grandison, which was originally written in eight and twenty volumes octavo, or get out the letters of his female correspondents, to prove ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... said Harry; "the wise man has the same opinion as his customer. And where has the ...
— For Fortune and Glory - A Story of the Soudan War • Lewis Hough
... to a figure so low that Nealie worried considerably as to whether she would not be a party to a fraud if she took the goods at Mr. Callaghan's valuation, and was not even consoled when he whispered to her in a loud aside that Gil was quite sharp enough to make the next customer run up his ...
— The Adventurous Seven - Their Hazardous Undertaking • Bessie Marchant
... nastye squanderinge of tyme, wych doth breede nought (meseems) but ale-bibbing and ye disregarde of truth. Oure house, wych is but small as thou knowest, is all cluttered wyth his slimye tackle, and loe but yesterdaye I loste a customer fromm ye millinery shoppe, shee averring (and I trow ryghtly) that ye shoppe dyd stinke of fysshe. Ande soe if thys thyng do continue longer I shall ripp uppe and leave, for I thoght to wed a man and not a paddler of dytches. O howe I longe for those happy ...
— Mince Pie • Christopher Darlington Morley
... understand. At last word did come. The storekeeper was busy serving a customer when we went in, so he told Dad to "hold ...
— On Our Selection • Steele Rudd
... they never winked. From the pupils, which were very small, the little light-colored lines radiated across very large blue irises. There was something baleful and compelling in their glare, so that even Hallowell, cool customer as he was, forgot immediately all about the man's littleness and shabbiness and bent figure, and was conscious only of the cruel, clever, watchful, unrelenting, hostile spirit. As Jack dragged him forward, the others could ...
— The Sign at Six • Stewart Edward White
... hanged with her paramour by being about to give birth to a child, and was finally pardoned by the Chapterhouse. In 1492 a dressmaker was far less fortunate. She was unable to satisfy a lady as to the fit of her stays, and this angry customer, whose name was Marie Mansel, gave her so shrewd a blow with her fist that the poor little dressmaker died in a week. The canons apparently so sympathised with the annoyances of a badly fitting corset, that they gave Marie Mansel her freedom. But the episode has its ...
— The Story of Rouen • Sir Theodore Andrea Cook
... trying to beat the shop assistant down. He would only smile, hardly answer, and turn away. Such a thing is absurd, but in the East any article is worth just as much as it will fetch, and the merchant says at first an enormous price in the hope that his customer is ignorant and will give it him, but if the customer bargains he will slowly come down. It takes much time to shop in this way, and is not altogether satisfactory, for you really have to know what ...
— Round the Wonderful World • G. E. Mitton
... suburban and town gardens and in the country, where every householder is monarch of his own soil and can satisfy very many aesthetic and gustatory desires without reference to market dictum, that bane alike of the market gardener and his customer. ...
— Culinary Herbs: Their Cultivation Harvesting Curing and Uses • M. G. Kains
... customer had left and the bar was closed, Dick had nothing to do till evening, and he wandered outside and sat down on a stump, at first looking at the work going on in the valley, then so absorbed in his own thoughts that he noticed nothing, not even the driving mist which presently ...
— Among Malay Pirates - And Other Tales Of Adventure And Peril • G. A. Henty
... and laughed with the rest over the story of the poor tailor who promised a coat to a customer for one, two and three weeks, heaping up his promises one on the other until he had a perfect pyramid of them, only to topple about his ears. She heard with the rest the magnificent voice ...
— Four Girls at Chautauqua • Pansy
... Egerton took this letter from the post-office in Lansdale. He read it with a scowl on his brow. "Ah! I see your game, young man," he muttered with an oath, "but you'll find that you've got hold of the wrong customer. My reply shall be short and sweet, and quite ...
— Elsie's Girlhood • Martha Finley
... Mr Greenop's stock, and being told, proceeded to examine further. They came upon a charming squirrel with the bushiest tail possible, and while they were admiring it Mr Greenop was called to attend on a customer. ...
— A Pair of Clogs • Amy Walton
... "I hope you ain't fergot that it's Saturday mornin' an' you'd orter row the grocery man. He's a cortion, that's what he is, a-sendin' us Mis' Ivy's ribs, an' Mis' Logan's liver. It ain't a decent way to treat a old customer, an' he orter be told so. There never was a grocery man that was born into the world that didn't have to be rowed! They expect it, they look fer it, an' when they don't get it they ...
— A Romance of Billy-Goat Hill • Alice Hegan Rice
... referee. Interviews with everybody, and all were agreed that he was the most likely heavy since Jeffries. Corbett admitted that, while in his prime he could doubtless have bested the new wonder, he would have found him a tough customer. ...
— The Mucker • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... place on a shelf, and a gentle Chinese, clad, like himself, in satin brocade, dug into the contents of the keg with a ladle and withdrew from it a black, molasses-like substance, which ran slowly and gummily from the ladle into the small silver box which the customer had produced. The box finally filled, with some of the gummy, black contents running over the edges, our gentleman withdrew himself, having accomplished his purpose. Tucked into the security of his belt, it was impossible to detect the contraband as he again stepped ...
— Civilization - Tales of the Orient • Ellen Newbold La Motte
... for "boxing Harry" I went into the tap-room, from which I had heard the voice of Mr Pritchard proceeding during the whole of my conversation with his wife. Here I found the worthy landlord seated with a single customer; both were smoking. The customer instantly arrested my attention. He was a man, seemingly about forty years of age with a broad red face, with certain somethings, looking very much like incipient carbuncles, here and there, upon it. His eyes were grey and looked ...
— Wild Wales - Its People, Language and Scenery • George Borrow
... the merchant and his customer, respecting the style and value of the various articles under view. The lady was made to believe that this elegant display had been imported with great cost and difficulty from the manufacturing cities of Europe, and, in consequence of the immense and rapid demand for them, the obliging ...
— Tiger and Tom and Other Stories for Boys • Various
... confessed that Busby had returned from Watson's place furious with anger, and this testimony gave an entirely new direction to the suspicions of the jurors, several of whom knew Busby as a tough customer. ...
— They of the High Trails • Hamlin Garland
... finished this business, Mac. We'll put a deal right through if Warren's here," decided a third member of the party. He was a tough-looking customer of nearly fifty. From out of his leathery sun-and-wind beaten face, hard eyes looked without expression. "Bad Bill" Cranston he was called, and the man looked as if he had earned ...
— Crooked Trails and Straight • William MacLeod Raine
... The cashier had just stepped into her cage-like desk, and the waitresses were lined up in their immaculate white aprons and lace head-dresses. I was their first customer, apparently. The cashier, a pretty, amiable girl, suppressed any surprise she may have felt at my appearance, and greeted me with the same dazzling smile with which she greeted every familiar face. I explained to her what I wanted to do, apologizing for my slovenliness. ...
— The Long Day - The Story of a New York Working Girl As Told by Herself • Dorothy Richardson
... second I begun to see I'd woke up a pretty ugly customer, Peters. In less than ten seconds that comet was just a blazing cloud of red-hot canvas. It was piled up into the heavens clean out of sight—the old thing seemed to swell out and occupy all space; ...
— Captain Stormfield's Visit to Heaven • Mark Twain
... these mercantile records is of interest and full of suggestion, from the names of the negro slaves, who had accounts on the books, to the products brought for sale by one customer after another, by which they liquidated their accounts; from the "quart of rum" bought by so many with every "trading," to the Greek Testament and Latin Grammar bought by solid Thomas Taber, who wrote his name in real estate ...
— Quaker Hill - A Sociological Study • Warren H. Wilson
... surprised when, having gone into the shop to buy some trifle, Mr Mellis informed her, in all but a whisper, that his wife was very anxious to see her alone for a moment, and begged her to have the goodness to step up to the parlour. His customer gave a small snort, betraying her first impulse to resentment, but her nobler nature, which was never far from the ...
— Malcolm • George MacDonald
... from his startled customer, Dennis soon reached his mother's side. Mr. and Mrs. Bruder were sobbing at the foot of the bed, and the girls were pleading piteously on either side—"Oh, mother! ...
— Barriers Burned Away • E. P. Roe
... going to Malenco that day. He did not fully understand why the men should exchange glances of darksome intelligence when he made this statement. He fancied they were disappointed at losing a good customer; so ...
— The Silent Barrier • Louis Tracy
... his customer, said: "I know you are right about that part of it, Sam, and I'd like to back every rancher in this Basin if ...
— The Winning of Barbara Worth • Harold B Wright
... barrels of flour which will bring a higher price here than anywhere else in the West Indies. To be entirely frank with thee, I will tell thee that I was engaged in making a bargain for the sale of the greater part of my merchandise when the news of thy approach drove away my best customer." ...
— Howard Pyle's Book of Pirates • Howard Pyle
... is to begin, can foretell its issue without losing a stroke of the razor, and can explain the points of inferiority of all the players, as compared with better men that he has personally seen elsewhere, with the nicety of a professional. He can do all this, and then stuff the customer's mouth with a soap-brush, and leave him while he goes to the other end of the shop to make a side bet with one of the other barbers on the outcome of the Autumn Handicap. In the barber-shops they knew the ...
— Literary Lapses • Stephen Leacock
... without you. What is the news down town? Is the business extending? That dear little business—I think it's so brave of you! Couldn't I come to your office?—just for three minutes? I might pass for a customer—is that what you call them? I might come in to buy something—some shares or some railroad things. TELL ME WHAT YOU THINK OF THIS PLAN. I would carry a little reticule, like a ...
— Washington Square • Henry James
... poison, made of the dried entrails of a species of caterpillar, while the other flings his skin cloak over his head. The beast bolts away incontinently, but soon dies, howling and biting the ground in agony. In the dark, or at all hours when breeding, the lion is an ugly enough customer; but if a man will stay at home by night, and does not go out of his way to attack him, he runs less risk in Africa of being devoured by a lion than he does in our cities of being run over by ...
— Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa - Journeys and Researches in South Africa • David Livingstone
... phrase or a biblical passage. Thus to the first man, a red-haired fellow, he said: "Proneness to dispute lights a fire, and proneness to fight sheds blood;" to the second, a slow, fat man: "Go to the ant, thou sluggard, consider her ways and be wise;" to the third, a small, black-eyed, bold-looking customer: "A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush." The first maid received the motto: "If you have cattle, take care of them, and if they bring you profit, keep it;" and to the second he said: "Nothing's ever locked so tight but it will ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VII. • Various
... which, even more than his appearance, fascinated the populace. There is only one tailor in London, as distinguished from the ambitious mechanics who make coats and trousers, and Uncle Chris was his best customer. Similarly, London is full of young fellows trying to get along by the manufacture of foot-wear, but there is only one boot-maker in the true meaning of the word,—the one who supplied Uncle Chris. And, as for hats, while it is no doubt a fact that you can get at plenty of London shops some sort ...
— The Little Warrior - (U.K. Title: Jill the Reckless) • P. G. Wodehouse
... ship's steward, had perished with the Claverings. Stuart, it seemed, had caused tidings of the accident to be sent to the rector of Clavering and to Sir Hugh's bankers. At the bank they had ascertained that their late customer's cousin was in town, and their messenger had thereupon been sent, first to Bloomsbury Square, and from thence ...
— The Claverings • Anthony Trollope
... imitated me, and Boxall soon afterwards sat down beside us. We none of us felt much inclined to speak; yet we were afraid to go to sleep, when we recollected the creature we had seen,— which, though it might not be of extraordinary size, would, if it were a hyena, prove an ugly customer should it take us unawares. Otherwise, we had no reason to dread it. Such creatures, indeed, seldom attack human beings unless first assailed, as they five on carrion, and act a ...
— Saved from the Sea - The Loss of the Viper, and her Crew's Saharan Adventures • W.H.G. Kingston
... strong enough, I suppose; he's the toughest customer I ever got hold of, or seemed to have a good chance to get hold ...
— Through Forest and Fire - Wild-Woods Series No. 1 • Edward Ellis
... Nationalization of Health.) The growth of the State Medical Organization of Health is steady and continuous, and is constantly covering a larger field. The day of the private practitioner of medicine—who was treated, as Duclaux (L'Hygiene Sociale, p. 263) put it, "like a grocer, whose shop the customer may enter and leave as he pleases, and when he pleases"—will, doubtless, soon be over. It is now beginning to be felt that health is far too serious a matter, not only from the individual but also from the social point ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 6 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... these signatures so much that I know them as well as the bank cashier knows the autograph of his oldest customer. While I turn my back now, I beg that several persons will be so good as to pass their fingers through their hair, and then press them upon one of the panes of the window near the jury, and that among them the accused may set THEIR finger marks. Also, I beg that these experimenters, or others, will ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... and out, miss, now. He has not only his butler, who is a tough customer, to look after him, but he has Snakit, the ...
— Jack O' Judgment • Edgar Wallace
... operatic villain did with these plots, and who bought them, Cantercot never knew nor cared to know. Brains are cheap to-day, and Denzil was glad enough to find a customer. ...
— The Big Bow Mystery • I. Zangwill
... you represent principals who have asked you to interview me? In other words, before I talk business with you I want to know that you mean business. I shall waste no time discussing a possible trade unless you assure me that you have a customer in sight. I am weary of brokers. I've had forty of them after that vessel from time to time, ...
— Cappy Ricks • Peter B. Kyne
... complain". And yet he wrote it in a week at bits and starts, when he could steal an hour from his urgent affairs, as it is a hundred to one you may see further in the preface, to which he refers you, and for the rest to the bookseller. There you go as a customer, and make the same question, "He blesses his God the thing takes wonderful; he is just printing a second edition, and has but three left in his shop". You beat down the price; "Sir, we shall not differ", and in hopes of your custom another time, lets you have it as reasonable as you please; ...
— English Satires • Various
... lit the one light in the little place and groped about in an untidy heap of shoes of all kinds and sizes until he found several pairs that he thought might fit. These he brought out and put them in front of his customer. But in spite of his bleary eyes, the man caught sight of some patches on the uppers of one pair, and pushed ...
— The Lamp That Went Out • Augusta Groner
... customer for her?" Jerry queried shrewdly. "A fellow ought to be able to pick the Narcissus ...
— Cappy Ricks • Peter B. Kyne
... say, that the most of men who are concerned in a trade, will be more vigilant in dealing with a twelvepenny customer than they will be with Christ when He comes to make unto them, by the gospel, a tender of the incomparable grace of God. Hence they are called fools, because a price is put into their hands to get wisdom, and ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... same Mahomet Ali they sold at least twelve sovereign princes, called the Polygars. But to keep things even, the territory of Tinnevelly, belonging to their nabob, they would have sold to the Dutch; and to conclude the account of sales, their great customer, the Nabob of Arcot himself, and his lawful succession, has been sold to his second son, Amir ul Omrah, whose character, views, and conduct are in the accounts upon your table. It remains with you whether they shall finally perfect ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... counter must have no flesh and blood about him, no passions, no resentment; he must never be angry—no, not so much as seem to be so, if a customer tumbles him five hundred pounds' worth of goods, and scarce bids money for anything; nay, though they really come to his shop with no intent to buy, as many do, only to see what is to be sold, and though he knows they cannot be better pleased than they are at some other shop where they intend to ...
— Daniel Defoe • William Minto
... Mhtoon Pah sat inside his shop on a low divan and smoked cheroots, and only when a customer was of sufficient importance did he ever rise to conduct a sale himself. He was assisted by a thin, eager boy, a native Christian from Ootacamund, who had followed several trades before he became the shop assistant of Mhtoon ...
— The Pointing Man - A Burmese Mystery • Marjorie Douie
... some resemblance of that omnipresent, lasting, universal, irresistible principle, which every where, and at some time or other, exerts its power over all things. Death is a mighty abstraction, like Night, or Space, or Time. He is an ugly customer, who will not be invited to supper, or to sit for his picture. He is with us and about us, but we do not see him. He stalks on before us, and we do not mind him: he follows us close behind, and we do not turn ...
— Lectures on the English Poets - Delivered at the Surrey Institution • William Hazlitt
... up who wanted an Evening Echo. The Echo was a halfpenny paper. He gave Bet a penny, who returned him a halfpenny change. When this customer had departed the black-eyed girl burst into a ...
— A Girl of the People • L. T. Meade
... treatise on physiognomy laid on a desk before them, they call out to this man that he has an ill-omened forehead, and to that man that the space between his nose and his lips is unlucky. Their tongues wag like flowing water until the passers-by are attracted to their stalls. If the seer finds a customer, he closes his eyes, and, lifting the divining-sticks reverently to his forehead, mutters incantations between his teeth. Then, suddenly parting the sticks in two bundles, he prophesies good or evil, according to ...
— Tales of Old Japan • Algernon Bertram Freeman-Mitford
... about it. She has been keeping way easily with us," observed the seaman. "I'd sooner that craft, Mr Lloyd, were a hundred miles away, or a thousand, for that matter, than where she is: we none of us likes her looks, and she'll prove a rummish customer if she gets ...
— Ronald Morton, or the Fire Ships - A Story of the Last Naval War • W.H.G. Kingston
... cried. "You supper customer! I'll brain you! I had rather parted with my shoes at a dolly shop and gone gadding the hoof, without a doss to sleep on—a town pauper, done on the vag—than to have been made scurvy in the sight of that child and deserve ...
— Short Story Classics (American) Vol. 2 • Various
... was to go to extremes with an old, regular customer, she yet had been obliged this evening to give him to understand that whatever he required in future must be paid for in cash. His bill had now, after all the years he had enjoyed credit in the tap-room, ...
— One of Life's Slaves • Jonas Lauritz Idemil Lie
... my Box and Co. pass-book to COX AND CO., giving them a brief and touching resume of my sad story of wrong and oppression, and bidding them do their damnedest in their turn. They wrote to Box and Co.: "Our customer, your customer, we may say THE customer, Second-Lieutenant, Brevet-Lieutenant, Temporary Captain, Acting Major, Local Colonel, Aspiring General (entered in your books as plain Mister) Henry Neplusultra, informs us that, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, February 25th, 1920 • Various
... go to serve a customer. Madge made pretence of pricking her ears and followed into ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... search of a meal enters a restaurant, he says to the waitress, 'Barishna, kakajectyeh bifstek, pozhalysta,' which means 'An order of beefsteak, lady, please: You see, you always say to a woman 'barishna' and she is always addressed in that manner. She will answer the hungry customer with, 'Yah ochen sojalaylu, shto unaus nyet yestnik prepasov siechas' (a simple home cure for lockjaw), meaning, "I am very sorry, but we are right out of food today.' He will try several other places, ...
— The History of the American Expedition Fighting the Bolsheviki - Campaigning in North Russia 1918-1919 • Joel R. Moore
... a man to resist the salesmanship of a telepath who knows exactly what his customer wants and, ...
— Fifty Per Cent Prophet • Gordon Randall Garrett
... him? Very likely Forteune was tired with walking, and five dollars per shot made the game not worth the candle. Again, perhaps the black diplomatist feared to overstock the market with Njinas, or to offend some regular customer for the sake of an "interloper." In these African lands they waste over a monkey's skin or a bottle of rum as much intrigue as is devoted to ...
— Two Trips to Gorilla Land and the Cataracts of the Congo Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton
... all right," said the old man, as he got up to wait on a customer. "Here, try a glass of my cider," and he handed the boy a dirty glass half filled with cider which the boy drank, and then looked queer at the ...
— Peck's Bad Boy With the Cowboys • Hon. Geo. W. Peck
... his friend Boots, though aware that the lawyer could 'carry his liquor like Old Nick'. with whose social demeanour Boots seemed to be particularly well acquainted, nevertheless thought it might be as well to see so good a customer in safety to his own door, and walked quietly behind his elbow out of the inn-yard. Dempster, however, soon became aware of him, stopped short, and, turning slowly round upon him, recognized the well-known drab waistcoat sleeves, ...
— Scenes of Clerical Life • George Eliot
... than marrying Elam Hunt, or than eating other people's bread. Then she began to build castles in the air, as her custom was. She fancied herself a milliner's apprentice, working away at bonnets and caps, among a group of other girls,—sometimes rising to attend upon a customer, or peeping out between the folds of a curtain at people in the front shop. She wondered whether Cornelia and Helen would be ashamed of knowing a milliner's apprentice, if they should chance ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I., No. 3, January 1858 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various
... peaceful, idle, rather trivial time of sojourn among congenial people. He danced, he strolled, he wrote verses to little Miss Emily; in short, he enjoyed himself as a youngish man may, whether the muse is waiting for him, or some less high-flown customer. "I wish I could give you a good account of my literary labors," he wrote his sister after several months in Dresden, "but I have nothing to report. I am merely seeing, and hearing, and my mind seems in too crowded and confused a state to produce anything. I am getting very familiar ...
— Washington Irving • Henry W. Boynton
... steps before the door to trim thatched roof, I marvelled at its air of prosperity; for here it stood, so far removed from road and bye-road, so apparently away from all habitation, and so lost and hid by trees (it standing within a little copse) that it was great wonder any customer should ever find ...
— Black Bartlemy's Treasure • Jeffrey Farnol
... later a lady, Madame Picardet, who was a customer of ours, brought in a good cheque for three hundred pounds, signed by a first-rate name, and asked us to pay it in on her behalf to Darby, Drummond, and Rothenberg's, and to open a London account with them for her. We did so, and received ...
— An African Millionaire - Episodes in the Life of the Illustrious Colonel Clay • Grant Allen
... intended to make brewing his staff and painting merely his cane; but good nature and a terrible thirst were too much for him. From brewing he descended to keeping a tavern, "in which occupation," to quote Ireland, "he was himself his best customer". After a while, having exhausted his cellar, he took seriously to painting in order to renew it, paying for his liquor with his brush. Thus "for a long time his works were to be found only in the hands of dealers in wine". Who, after ...
— A Wanderer in Holland • E. V. Lucas
... confessed Uncle John. "There was plenty of money in his pocket-book and he has a valuable watch, but no other jewelry. His clothes were made by a Los Angeles tailor, but when they called him up by telephone he knew nothing about his customer except that he had ordered his suit and paid for it in advance. He called for it three days ago, and carried it away with him, so we have no clue to ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces Out West • Edith Van Dyne
... it important; and she determined eagerly on going, without wanting to go; and it was neither from a sense of duty nor in a spirit of contrariety that she went. Nevertheless, with her heart in hand, her movements are traceably as rational as a soldier's before the enemy or a trader's matching his customer. ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... pheasant into the customer's bosom with such vigour that, fearing a personal assault, she retreated to the door. There she came to a full stop, turned about, raised her right hand savagely, exclaimed "You're another!" let her fingers go off ...
— Post Haste • R.M. Ballantyne
... convenient match; and when they are informed of your age and fortune, offer a partner for life with the same readiness, and the same indifference, as a salesman, when he has taken measure by his eye, fits his customer with ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D, In Nine Volumes - Volume the Third: The Rambler, Vol. II • Samuel Johnson
... satisfied himself that the brisk young person who talked about "doing business" and his small acquaintance of the Albany cellar were one and the same; and by this time, drink as slowly as he could, the lemonade was exhausted. So, bound to be a valuable customer, he tried again. ...
— Three People • Pansy
... alighted before a dingy-looking barber's shop and inquired for Mr. Harding—an assistant who was at that moment shaving a customer of the working class. It was a house where one could be shaved for a penny, but where the toilet ...
— The Seven Secrets • William Le Queux
... He had done so, feeling that he should be paid from the hospital funds, and flattering himself that a man with fourteen children, and money wherewithal to clothe them, could not but be an excellent customer. As soon as the second rumour reached him, he applied for his ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... attention was drawn away from him by the coming of another customer, leaving him ...
— The Day of Judgment • Joseph Hocking
... and is increased by more farmers forcing their way in from the rear, where are their horses or traps—by farmers eagerly inquiring for dealers or friends, and by messengers from the shops loaded with parcels to place in the customer's vehicle. ...
— Hodge and His Masters • Richard Jefferies
... mischief comes from themselves. The misfortune they meet has not been lying in wait for them; they selected it for their own. With them, as with all men, events are posted along the course of their years, like goods in a bazaar that stand ready for the customer who shall buy them. No one deceives them; they merely deceive themselves. They are in no wise persecuted; but their unconscious soul fails to perform its duty. Is it less adroit than the others: is it less ...
— The Buried Temple • Maurice Maeterlinck
... was raised, the old fellow who kept the store had a cheat-ledger. When somebody traded stale eggs and garden-truck for good groceries, and the storekeeper saw he couldn't make trouble about it without losing a customer, he said nothing but scored it down against the man. Sometimes he had to wait a long while, but sooner or later he squared the account. Now that's my plan with Don ...
— Brandon of the Engineers • Harold Bindloss
... what with the city, the State, and the national taxes, I am obliged to raise my rents, and I take the liberty to notify you that houses are scarce; and although I regret to disturb an old tenant and customer, I must add another hundred to the rent of the house you occupy. Houses are in demand; few dare to build while materials are so dear. And there are the Shoddies, who would take mine ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 103, May, 1866 • Various
... ten-knot breeze," he conjectured, "and if we didn't have that ugly customer in the rear to tow along, we'd make it in less than an hour. But even as it is, we'll surely do it in an ...
— The Rushton Boys at Treasure Cove - Or, The Missing Chest of Gold • Spencer Davenport
... a copy of the paper. He was a frequent customer here, and as he entered the shopkeeper greeted ...
— The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists • Robert Tressell
... how deceitful outside appearances are as to the internal resources or comforts of a tropical town. Those dingy shops may hold excellent though miscellaneous goods in their dark recesses, and would be absolutely unbearable to either owner or customer if they were lighted with staring plate-glass windows. Nor would it be possible to array tempting articles in gallant order behind so hot and glaring a screen, for no shade or canvas would prevent everything from bleaching white in a few hours. ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. October, 1878. • Various
... the Pope's standing sponsor for the young Prince of Portugal is a sign of complete reconciliation with the See of Rome. It is a very awkward thing for a Roman Catholic Government to be at variance with the Pope. He is still a very ugly customer. ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume 1 (of 3), 1837-1843) • Queen Victoria
... four o'clock, Mad. de Rosier found it more difficult to obtain civil answers to her inquiries, for almost all the tradesmen were at dinner, and when they came to the door, looked out of humour, at being interrupted, and disappointed at not meeting with a customer. She walked on, her mind still indefatigable:—she heard a clock in the neighbourhood strike five—her strength was not equal to the energy of her mind—and the repeated answers of, "We know of no such person"—"No such ...
— Tales And Novels, Volume 1 • Maria Edgeworth
... Main Street over night as usual picking up their commissions, and until they reached the Bend o' the Brae it was unlikely that any business should arrest them now. Gourlay hoped that it might be so; and he had his desire, for, with the exception of Miss Toddle, no customer appeared. The teams went slowly down the steep side of the Square in an unbroken line, and slowly down the street leading from its near corner. On the slope the horses were unable to go fast—being forced to stell themselves back against the heavy propulsion of the carts behind; and thus the procession ...
— The House with the Green Shutters • George Douglas Brown
... booth, and here sundry itinerant vendors of old clothes, and—of all improbable commodities to be found at a horse-fair—wall-paper. Neither has much success. The old-clothes woman casts down a heap of singularly repellant rags before a disparaging customer; she beats them with her fists, presumably to show their soundness in wind and limb: a ...
— All on the Irish Shore - Irish Sketches • E. Somerville and Martin Ross
... towered in the ring, his huge form dilating, and his black features convulsed with excitement. The Westminster bravoes eyed the Gypsy askance; but the comparison, if they made any, seemed by no means favourable to themselves. 'Gypsy! rum chap. - Ugly customer, - always in training.' Such were the exclamations which I heard, some of which at that period of my ...
— The Zincali - An Account of the Gypsies of Spain • George Borrow
... The foreign customer, therefore, applied to him for the execution of orders, and regularly made his appearance twice a year; and though this mode of business is not totally extinguished, yet a very different ...
— An History of Birmingham (1783) • William Hutton
... he of the apostolic claim, "I'm an undertaker—but times is dull. I was an undertaker ten year in Lockerby, but I left there lang syne. I had ae fine customer, the bailie; he had eleven o' a family. But I lost his trade. The bailie was sick—an' my laddie, wee Sandy, was aye plaguin' me for a sled. I tell't him I'd get him ane when I had mair siller. Weel, wee Sandy was aye rinnin' ...
— St. Cuthbert's • Robert E. Knowles
... Governor on to him. When that chap opened his sample case he wouldn't talk weather and politics, and then sidle up to business. Not much! He'd give them Brown's Axle Oil, Brown's Baking Powder, or anything else of Brown's he was showing, till his customer would see nothing but Brown's Axle Oil and Brown's Baking Powder all over his shop, and he'd be reaching for the whole ...
— The Prospector - A Tale of the Crow's Nest Pass • Ralph Connor
... a customer," Chester muttered to himself. Aloud, he said: "Well, I was just giving you a word of warning. You can't tell about these fellows. They're ...
— The Boy Allies At Verdun • Clair W. Hayes
... position seems to have been taken suddenly, for Mr. Chippindale, who had been sub-manager for some years, and was now placed at the head of the Birmingham branch, did not know of it until he was informed of his appointment by a customer of the bank. This gentleman, who was a merchant in the town, tells me that he "was the first to tell him of it. He said it was not true, and he must go out and contradict it. I told him I knew it was true, but even then he was incredulous." Mr. Chippindale has recently ...
— Personal Recollections of Birmingham and Birmingham Men • E. Edwards
... blew upon Maggie's forehead seemed suddenly to make of the Chapel a dim, incredible phantom; faintly from behind the closed door came the echo of the hymn. The street was absolutely still—no human being was in sight, only an old cab stationed close at hand waiting for a possible customer; into this they got. The pale, almost white, evening sky, with stars in sheets and squares and pools of fire, shone with the clear radiance of glass above them. Maggie could see the stars through the ...
— The Captives • Hugh Walpole
... transactions with an antique dealer in Pennsylvania. I think I was said to be the only living woman who had ever gotten the best of a bargain with him, so I was unanimously elected by the family as the one to open negotiations. A customer actually appeared. We gradually approached a price by the usual stages, I dwelling on his advantage in having the calf and trying not to let him see my carking fear that we might be the unwilling godparents of it if ...
— The Smiling Hill-Top - And Other California Sketches • Julia M. Sloane
... were slackening their pace as they saw Felix at the carriage- door of a lady customer; and Lance said gravely, 'I'll see to Mother Goldie; but now, Bear, that you are out of this scrape, I give you fair warning, that if I find you grubbing your nose into that sort of thing again, I'll put a stop to it, one way ...
— The Pillars of the House, V1 • Charlotte M. Yonge
... little drygoods-store across the street, Felicidad, the dusky-eyed proprietress, has gone to sleep while waiting for a customer. She has discarded her chinelas and her pina yoke. Her brown arms resting on the table pillow her unconscious head. Her listless fingers clasp ...
— The Great White Tribe in Filipinia • Paul T. Gilbert
... himself off, as though the dust on his clothes bothered him more than any slight bruises he may have received in his ugly fall. Frank made up his mind when he saw this that the other was certainly nonchalant, or, as Frank himself expressed it, "a cool customer." ...
— The Outdoor Chums at Cabin Point - or The Golden Cup Mystery • Quincy Allen
... etc.,—that spoke for itself. I stepped inside the door, but he was occupied with an account book, and when at last he looked up there was no speculation in his eyes. Possibly he had sold something the day before, and knew that no second customer could be expected so soon. We exchanged the time of day,—not a very valuable commodity hereabout,—and I asked him a question or two touching the hollow, and especially "the village," of which I had heard a rumor ...
— The Foot-path Way • Bradford Torrey
... before him and milks them at his customer's door. This is the favorite method, because the milk is then sure to ...
— A Little Journey to Puerto Rico - For Intermediate and Upper Grades • Marian M. George
... raising his cap with one hand, and pointing to his shop with the other. Chichikov entered, and in a trice the proprietor had dived beneath the counter, and appeared on the other side of it, with his back to his wares and his face towards the customer. Leaning forward on the tips of his fingers, and indicating his merchandise with just the suspicion of a nod, he requested the gentleman to specify exactly the species of cloth ...
— Dead Souls • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... of the wedding under consideration was Mr. Phillipeus, a Russian gentleman engaged in the fur trade. The father of the brides was his customer, and doubtless the cost of the wedding was made up in subsequent dealings. As the party emerged from the house and moved toward the church, I could see that Phillipeus was the central figure. He had a bride on each arm, and each bride was clinging to her prospective husband. The women were in white ...
— Overland through Asia; Pictures of Siberian, Chinese, and Tartar - Life • Thomas Wallace Knox
... annoyed because his customer kept him waiting for nearly half-an-hour. He was exceedingly crabbed and disagreeable as they set out to look at the flat which was to be the Bingle home, provided the rent was paid regularly ...
— Mr. Bingle • George Barr McCutcheon
... the time I made his acquaintance, what an important person Kelmar was. But the Jew store-keepers of California, profiting at once by the needs and habits of the people, have made themselves in too many cases the tyrants of the rural population. Credit is offered, is pressed on the new customer, and when once he is beyond his depth, the tune changes, and he is from thenceforth a white slave. I believe, even from the little I saw, that Kelmar, if he chose to put on the screw, could send half the settlers packing in a radius of seven or eight miles round Calistoga. These are continually ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 2 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... so useful, is pre-eminently so to the business man. It must be both retentive and quick. By proper training this faculty may be so cultivated that names, dates and events to a surprising number may be readily recalled. The ability to greet a customer by calling him by name is considered very valuable in any class of business. It makes a very agreeable impression when a man who has not seen us but once or twice, and who is not expecting us, meets us promptly as we enter his store, with, "Why, Mr. ——, how do you do? Glad to see you. ...
— Burroughs' Encyclopaedia of Astounding Facts and Useful Information, 1889 • Barkham Burroughs
... are, madam, we do not know this girl," said the detective, doubtfully. "You are a customer whom the store is glad to serve. This girl is quite unknown to us. I have no doubt but ...
— Nan Sherwood's Winter Holidays • Annie Roe Carr
... The immediate customer was Tavatini (Many Pieces of Tattooing), a rich man of Taaoa, in his fifties. His face was grilled with ama ink. One streak of the natural skin alone remained. Beside him on the counter sat a commanding-looking man, whose eyes, shining from a blue background of ...
— White Shadows in the South Seas • Frederick O'Brien
... work. One day Bill Hahn found that proceedings had been started to turn him out of his home, upon which he had not been able to keep up his payments, and at the same time the merchant, of whom he had been a respected customer for years, refused to ...
— The Friendly Road - New Adventures in Contentment • (AKA David Grayson) Ray Stannard Baker
... a customer of Marmot's, and that gave him the right to sit and smoke and yarn on the verandah of the store when he was in the township. He never passed his tobacco round, and rarely took an active part in the yarning, save to put in a few curt, cutting ...
— Colonial Born - A tale of the Queensland bush • G. Firth Scott
... Jane Callender," he asked, rubbing his hands for all the world like a clothing dealer over a good customer. ...
— The heart of happy hollow - A collection of stories • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... establishment with as good a grace as he could, turning over in his mind how he should accomplish his object. He had not to wait long. The drunken cottager who had formerly supplied Frank with spirits, was of course not best pleased to lose so good a customer, for he had taken care to make a very handsome profit on the liquors which he had supplied. It so happened that this man lighted on Juniper one day near his master's house, and a very few minutes' conversation made the groom acquainted ...
— Frank Oldfield - Lost and Found • T.P. Wilson
... peasant woman came down the street, calling out: "Good jam to sell! good jam to sell!" This sounded sweetly in the Tailor's ears; he put his little head out of the window and shouted: "Up here, my good woman, and you'll find a willing customer!" The woman climbed up the three flights of stairs with her heavy basket to the tailor's room, and he made her spread out the pots in a row before him. He examined them all, lifted them up and smelt them, and said at last: "This jam seems good; weigh me four ounces of it, my good ...
— The Junior Classics, Volume 1 • Willam Patten
... wait. The paper boy and the customer were still patiently arguing as he climbed into his car and drove away. He drove slowly with his foot ...
— Unthinkable • Roger Phillips Graham
... men, astonished to hear Madame Desvarennes speak of her son-in-law as she would of a customer, ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet |
