"Humour" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... I have ever known whose talk is like his books. The prodigality of humour, intuition and searching thought that he puts into his pages he also puts into what he says. And he is the only man I ever met who can sing his stories as well as tell them. Like the rest of the Irish writers of to-day, what he ...
— Mary, Mary • James Stephens
... waist. Up till now he had been profoundly unhappy and ashamed, but something in the unconquerable obstinacy of her attitude appealed to the devil that lived in him, a devil of untimely and disastrous humour. The right thing, he felt, was not to appear as angry as he was. He sat up on his pillow, and began to talk to ...
— The Helpmate • May Sinclair
... death she was like a watch that had lost its mainspring." "Surely," flashed Lady Constance Leslie, "more like a vessel which had lost her auxiliary screw." The main characteristic of both Lady Cork and Lady Constance Leslie's humour was its lightning speed. It is superfluous to add, with these quick-witted ladies it was never necessary to EXPLAIN anything, as it is to the majority of English people; they understood before you had finished ...
— The Days Before Yesterday • Lord Frederick Hamilton
... great, ugly book, and for the few days that I have left off reading it, I find myself much worse. If your mother would let you stay with me a little while, you would see that I know how to get rid of my ill-humour. If you knew how hard it was to be in good humour, when left so long alone, and when you hear me singing and talking like a madman, you would not call this a great ...
— My Ten Years' Imprisonment • Silvio Pellico
... erudite volume "De Prestigiis Demonum," recounts the story which is celebrated in the following ballad. Something like it is to be found in the biography of every magician; for the household staff of a wizard was not complete without a famulus, who usually proved to be a fellow of considerable humour, but endowed with the meddling propensities of a monkey. Thus, Doctor Faustus of Wittenburg—not at all to be confounded with the illustrious printer—had a perfect jewel in the person of his attendant Wagner; and our English Friar Bacon ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 348 • Various
... whilst he justifies and applauds the use which Byron had made of his work. "This singular intellectual poet has taken my Faustus to himself, and extracted from it the strangest nourishment for his hypochondriac humour. He has made use of the impelling principles in his own way, for his own purposes, so that no one of them remains the same; and it is particularly on this account that I cannot enough admire his genius." Afterwards ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 4 • Lord Byron
... at Rachel now became inquisitive, calculating, It seemed to be saying: "One day I may be able to make use of this piece of goods." But there was a certain careless good-humour in it, too. What he saw was a naive young maid, with agreeable features, and a fine, fresh complexion, and rather reddish hair. (He did not approve of the colour of the hair.) He found pleasure in regarding her, and in the perception that he had abashed her. Yes, ...
— The Price of Love • Arnold Bennett
... seems to be something more noble in the success of a gallant resistance than of an attack, however brave. After failing in his attack on the fort, the French General visited the English Commander who had foiled him, and parted from him and his garrison in perfect politeness and good-humour. The English troops, Drinkwater says, gave him thundering cheers as he went away, and the French in return complimented us on our gallantry, and lauded the humanity of our people. If we are to go on murdering each other in the old-fashioned way, what a pity it is that our battles cannot end in ...
— Notes on a Journey from Cornhill to Grand Cairo • William Makepeace Thackeray
... and thorough sailor boy, stout, broad-shouldered, with a fair though somewhat sunburnt complexion, a row of teeth capable of grinding the hardest of biscuit, and a fine large joyous eye and pleasant mouth, exhibiting abundance of good humour and good nature, yet at the same time ...
— True Blue • W.H.G. Kingston
... person affected in this manner was not allowed, by the twelve tables, to have the management of his own affairs; therefore the words are not, if he is mad (insanus), but, if he begins to be raving (furiosus). For they looked upon madness to be an unsettled humour, that proceeded from not being of sound mind; yet such a person might perform his ordinary duties, and discharge the usual and customary requirements of life: but they considered one that was raving as afflicted with a total blindness of the mind, which, notwithstanding it ...
— The Academic Questions • M. T. Cicero
... the way out," said one, "and the way out of the world," said another: "but not the way to heaven," said one chap, most unlikely to know it: and thereupon they all fell wagging, like a bed of clover leaves in the morning, at their own choice humour. ...
— Lorna Doone - A Romance of Exmoor • R. D. Blackmore
... separate people? Simply from their usages, in the first place; but, secondly, still more from the fact that these usages, which with other peoples exist also in some representative shape, with them modify themselves, shift, alter, adapt themselves to the climate or to the humour or accidents of life amongst those amidst whom chance has thrown them; whereas amongst the Jews every custom, the most trivial, is also part of their legislation; and their legislation is also their religion. (Boulanger, by the way, is far from expressing that objection so clearly as I have ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. 1 (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey
... perennial passion of penitence. Ned Bratts may be described as a companion, but a contrasted piece. It is a story of sudden conversion and of penitence taking an immediate and highly effective form. The humour of the poem, which is excellent of its kind, resembles more the humour of Rowlandson than that of Hogarth. The Bedford Court House on the sweltering Midsummer Day, the Puritan recusants, reeking of piety and the cow-house conventicle, the ...
— Robert Browning • Edward Dowden
... round the blazing hearth, and listen to the minstrel's lays, and recite their oft-told tales of adventure and romance. Sometimes they indulge in asking each other riddles, and there exists at the present time an old collection of these early efforts of wit and humour which are not of a very high order. The book is called Demands Joyous, and was printed in A.D. 1511. I may extract the following riddles:—"What is it that never was and never will be? Answer: A mouse's nest in a cat's ear. ...
— Old English Sports • Peter Hampson Ditchfield
... two gentlemen took a priest as well as a doctor with them to the field of honour. Then Adam Ferris remembered his lonely house below the dark green pines and demanded with a sudden darkening of humour, "And how long ...
— Patsy • S. R. Crockett
... hat, and carried an old knapsack. She wished very much to get rid of him, and thought day and night how to manage it. Then it struck her that perhaps all his wonder-working power lay in the knapsack, and she pretended to be very fond of him, and when she had brought him into a good humour she said,—"Pray lay aside that ugly knapsack; it misbecomes you so much that I ...
— Household Stories by the Brothers Grimm • Jacob Grimm and Wilhelm Grimm
... political world in this country was, at the opening of the present year, one of great interest and excitement. The dismissal of the Melbourne ministry was received by the country with undisturbed composure and perfect good-humour; but this was viewed by its members and partisans with alarm and humiliation; and, conceiving that it betokened a relaxation of power in the springs to whose action they trusted for their speedy return to office, they resolved to leave no means untried to agitate ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... belonged to a pinched sour-looking female. Her character was stamped on her face as well as on her hand. If, however, I had said to her, "Yours is a flaccid repressed disposition you have a lack of imagination and a total absence of humour; your life is too narrow and self-centred to be of the least interest to anyone," she might not have liked it. You see, with even a slight knowledge of palmistry you soon find out when reading hands that it's no use telling people the truth. They want ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, April 7, 1920 • Various
... laws of the country are concerned. The more one becomes acquainted with the English people, the more one has to admire them. They are so different from the people of our own country. Hospitality, frankness, and good humour, are always to be found in an Englishman. After a ramble of three days about the lakes, we mounted the coach, bidding Miss Martineau farewell, and ...
— Three Years in Europe - Places I Have Seen and People I Have Met • William Wells Brown
... island of Madeira. But the winds were so contrary, that we had the mortification to be forty days on our passage to that island from St Helens, though it is often known to be done in ten or twelve. This delay was most unpleasant, and was productive of much discontent and ill humour among our people, of which these only can have an adequate idea who have experienced a similar situation: For, besides the peevishness and despondency, which foul and contrary winds, and a lingering voyage, never fail to produce on all occasions, we in particular had substantial ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 11 • Robert Kerr
... conspicuous to furnish targets both for the unscrupulous fiction-monger and the professional humourist. Sometimes when the fun is clever enough and true enough no one minds, the Village least of all; humour is their strong point. But they are quite subtle souls with all their child-like peculiarities; there is, in their acceptance of ridicule, a shrewd undercurrent suggestive of the "Virginian's" now classic warning: "When ...
— Greenwich Village • Anna Alice Chapin
... a golgotha for two murdered priests—proceedings such as these, and there have been many such during the last forty or fifty years, have been taken seriously to heart by the Far Eastern races, whether in China or Japan. All the time the Occidental Powers, with a total lack of any sense of humour, have persisted in sending missionaries to these people to inculcate doctrines which are the very antitheses of the practices of European nations to these people whom it is sought to convert. It would be, in my opinion, nothing more than the outcome of eternal justice if this ...
— The Empire of the East • H. B. Montgomery
... which the actors took greater pleasure than even the spectators themselves. These were specially the games of strength and skill as well as dancing, with a notice of which we shall conclude this chapter. There were, besides, the various games of chance and the games of fun and humour. Most of the bourgeois and the villagers played a variety of games of agility, many of which have descended to our times, and are still to be found at our schools and colleges. Wrestling, running races, the game of bars, high and wide jumping, ...
— Manners, Custom and Dress During the Middle Ages and During the Renaissance Period • Paul Lacroix
... of the 'pleasure-party'?" interrupted the lieutenant, with a laugh, as he put his disappointment and ill-humour away from him. "Oh, yes, I suppose so. At all events there will be no harm in making your preparations; the captain is pretty ...
— A Middy of the Slave Squadron - A West African Story • Harry Collingwood
... are acts of intellect and will alone. So man also often loves and hates, and does other acts that are synonymous with corresponding passions, and yet no passion is there. The man is working with his calm reason: his irrational soul is not stirred. To an author, when he is in the humour for it, it is a delight to be writing, but not a passionate delight. The will finds satisfaction in the act: the irrational soul is not affected by it. Or a penitent is sorry for his sin: he sincerely regrets it before God: ...
— Moral Philosophy • Joseph Rickaby, S. J.
... reproachfully, "Time is finished." Or, if the response to the bell for meals is not immediate, he will come and say sternly, "The bell has rung." But this does not mean that they see the value of punctuality. They look upon it as an English peculiarity which it is expedient to humour, and which the Englishman ought to uphold, but it does not make them punctual in their own ...
— India and the Indians • Edward F. Elwin
... pretend that I consider her to have made the most of her opportunity. There are at least two classic examples of her theme, Mr. ANSTEY'S Vice Versa and Mr. DE LA MARE'S Return. Mrs. PENROSE cannot approach either the charming humour of the one or the delicate beauty of the other. On a lower plane her story has its amusing moments, and there is a vein of real tenderness in her picture of the relations of her hero and his faithful lady—a happy relief after the monotonous ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, September 2nd, 1914 • Various
... was tall, with a slight stoop to his shoulders, and he wore the conventional double-breasted black coat, which reached to his knees, and square-toed congress boots. He had a Puritan beard, the hawk-like Vane nose, and a twinkling eye that spoke of a sense of humour and a knowledge of the world. In short, he was no man's fool, and on occasions had been more than a match for certain New York lawyers ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... after the funeral the detective sauntered slowly through the main street of the village. He was not in a very good humour, his answer to the greeting of those who passed him was short. The children avoided him, for with the keenness of their kind they recognised the fact that this usually gentle little man was not in possession of his habitual calm ...
— The Case of The Pool of Blood in the Pastor's Study • Grace Isabel Colbron and Augusta Groner
... council were against it, but king James obstinately resolved on it; being over-persuaded by Gondomar, the Spanish ambassador, whose facetious humour and lively repartees greatly delighted him. Gondomar persuaded him that the presence of the prince would not fail of accomplishing this union, and also the restitution of the electorate to his son-in-law the palatine. Add to this, the ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. II (of 3) - Edited, With Memoir And Notes, By His Son, The Earl Of Beaconsfield • Isaac D'Israeli
... first made acquaintance; we were both engaged on journalistic work, reporting, you know, on different papers—and we came across each other once or twice in that way. He was a saturnine, queer-tempered fellow, taciturn at times, and at other times possessed by a wry sense of humour which made him excellent company, though it kept one in a state of alert disquiet. He would say things with that particular twist to them which made one look up, startled, wondering whether his remark was really intended to be facetious or obscurely sinister. Thanks to this ambiguity he had gained ...
— The Tale Of Mr. Peter Brown - Chelsea Justice - From "The New Decameron", Volume III. • V. Sackville West
... the person applying for the nurse's situation? I recall that scene now with a laugh, but I frankly own that that moment was not the pleasantest in my life. True, it had its ludicrous side; but how is one to enjoy the humour of an amusing situation alone? and, to tell the truth, the six foot of plush and powder before me was somewhat alarming to my female timidity. I hear now the man's startled ...
— The Girl's Own Paper, Vol. VIII, No. 355, October 16, 1886 • Various
... and said something, interrogatively, to which he replied by a shake of the head. She was asking him, evidently, if he had ever played, and he was saying no. Old players have a fancy that when luck has turned her back on them they can put her into good-humour again by having their stakes placed by a novice. Our young man's physiognomy had seemed to his new acquaintance to express the perfection of inexperience, and, like a practical woman, she had determined to make him serve her turn. Unlike most of her neighbours, she ...
— Eugene Pickering • Henry James
... cultivated" construction, "this essential of his art." Some critics may think, that since so many of the best novels in the world "have no outline, or, if they have an outline, it is a demned outline," elaborate construction is not absolutely "essential." Really essential are character, "atmosphere," humour. ...
— The Puzzle of Dickens's Last Plot • Andrew Lang
... at his brotherly depreciation, and Gard, who had never regarded her as only a girl, and whose thoughts of her were very absorbing and uplifting, happening to catch her eye, laughed also, and so they went down towards the sea in pleasant enough humour and the nearest approach to good-fellowship ...
— A Maid of the Silver Sea • John Oxenham
... having had the refreshment of his sleep, was in a better humour. He was a little ...
— The Rival Campers Ashore - The Mystery of the Mill • Ruel Perley Smith
... time, as a Pattern for improving their Charms, let the Sex study the agreeable Statira. Her Features are enlivened with the Chearfulness of her Mind, and good Humour gives an Alacrity to her Eyes. She is Graceful without affecting an Air, and Unconcerned without appearing Careless. Her having no manner of Art in her Mind, makes her want none in ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... should adopt, in point of fact, A manager's profession. To that condition he should stoop (Despite a too fond mother), With eight or ten "stars" in his troupe, All jealous of each other! Oh, the man who can rule a theatrical crew, Each member a genius (and some of them two), And manage to humour them, little and great, ...
— The Complete Plays of Gilbert and Sullivan - The 14 Gilbert And Sullivan Plays • William Schwenk Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan
... you are the only man living with whom I can play the fool through a long letter and be sure that I shall be clearly understood at the end. To say that this privilege is cheerful is to say little, for it is the breath of life to a man of a certain humour. ...
— Representative Plays by American Dramatists: 1856-1911: Francesca da Rimini • George Henry Boker
... apples bulging out at the sides,—and away they hurry along the streets leading to the steam-packet wharfs, which are already plentifully sprinkled with parties bound for the same destination. Their good humour and delight know no bounds—for it is a delightful morning, all blue over head, and nothing like a cloud in the whole sky; and even the air of the river at London Bridge is something to them, shut up as they have been, all the week, in close streets and heated rooms. There ...
— Sunday Under Three Heads • Charles Dickens
... and too intense to be left quite to yourself, even in book-writing, much less in the ordinary affairs of life. I think you were born to collaborate, and to collaborate with me. You can give me everything I lack, and I can give you a little of the sense of humour, and act as ...
— The Collaborators - 1896 • Robert S. Hichens
... the Doctor, merrily, recovering his good humour in a moment. "That's an Irish story for a thousand pounds. There's nothing English ...
— The Recollections of Geoffrey Hamlyn • Henry Kingsley
... in no humour to talk to anybody or hear himself questioned as to his absence from lectures the day before. But it was difficult to repulse rudely a very good comrade with a smooth pink face and fair hair, bearing the nickname amongst his fellow-students of "Madcap Kostia." ...
— Under Western Eyes • Joseph Conrad
... appear to superficial observers, Cervantes bears a close analogy, in many particulars, to Homer. Circumstances, and an inherent turn for humour, made him throw his genius into an exquisite ridicule of the manners of chivalry; but the author of Don Quixote had in him the spirit of a great epic poet. His lesser pieces prove it; unequivocal traces of it are to be found in ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 57, No. 351, January 1845 • Various
... great diligence and application, would ensure the attention of a popular assembly, especially when united to a high character and great social position. This might be urged; but he would only shake his head, with a ray of humour twinkling in his piercing eyes, and say, in a half-drawling tone, 'If Mr. Canning were alive, he could do all this better than any of them, and be not ...
— Lord George Bentinck - A Political Biography • Benjamin Disraeli
... merry ditty which she knew from her old experience as a street singer would be sure to please. Palmer was delighted with both. The first he said brought tears to his eyes and the second put him in good humour. ...
— Madame Flirt - A Romance of 'The Beggar's Opera' • Charles E. Pearce
... was quite unmoved; there was even a hint of humour in his tone. "Your grandson is probably a man ...
— The Bars of Iron • Ethel May Dell
... to the bravery, the generosity, the good-humour, the kind-heartedness of sailors; and, as a class, they deserve his encomiums. His songs abound with just and noble sentiments, and manly virtues were never more constantly and strikingly enunciated by any author. We ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 425 - Volume 17, New Series, February 21, 1852 • Various
... Beaumont and Fletcher, at the "Mermaid," or going with them to the Globe Theatre to see two Warwickshire brothers, Edmund and Will Shakspeare, who are on the boards there,—the latter taking the part of Old Knowell, in Ben Jonson's play of "Every Man in his Humour." His friends say that ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, August, 1863, No. 70 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various
... of the Flying Cloud, was one of those unfortunate men who are always more or less in an ill humour. He was, like poor Mrs Gummidge, "contrairy," and so disputatious that it was almost impossible for anyone to make a statement that he would not either deny outright or strive to prove fallacious. He had a permanent ...
— The Missing Merchantman • Harry Collingwood
... my kind intercessor into the kitchen, where we all sat down to partake of mate and talk ourselves into good humour. ...
— The Purple Land • W. H. Hudson
... would run down to Cambridge himself, to consult with his manager, and on these occasions he would indulge his playful humour by going out at night and sitting on the pillows ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 99., December 13, 1890 • Various
... present I spend all the good humour I can command on my wife. I flatter her and take care of her as if she were a bride in her honeymoon. My reward is that I see her thrive; her bad illness is visibly getting better. She is recovering and will, I hope, become a little ...
— The Love Affairs of Great Musicians, Volume 2 • Rupert Hughes
... This is silly of him. As I point out, our soldiers have already earned a reputation abroad for gaiety and high spirits, and it is all to the good that the War Office should show that it has a sense of humour equally keen. When the invasion comes, and music-halls, cinemas and football matches are closed down, the amusement of the country (as the War Office has foreseen) will depend entirely upon us. Let us, then, obey rigidly the seven ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, December 9, 1914 • Various
... it involves competition with a perfect galaxy of distinguished authors. There is always room for more of it, however, and, if Mr. VERNON RENDALL disappoints us, it is not merely because the standard has been set unusually high. His style is smooth and assured, and, though somewhat lacking in humour, his touch is light and pleasing. He begins well and interests us in his principal character so that we look forward with zest to the adventures of a personality which is everything that this sort ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, June 20, 1917 • Various
... modest salutation, without any word, she turned about, obscured her face, as not seeming well contented; and in that humour, her husband with divers others, we all left her two or three hours repenting myself to have writ she could speak English. But not long after she began to talke, remembering me well what courtesies she had done: saying, 'You did promise Powhatan what was yours ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... that perhaps Miss Jane, who was in much grief at Sir Reginald's death, might have spoken more seriously to Sir Ralph than he liked. You know she does occasionally say things with which worldly people are not pleased, and perhaps that put him out of humour. She, however, asserts that she ought not to be ashamed of her principles, and that she merely reminded Sir Ralph that he was but a life tenant of Texford—that the time would come when he too would lie, as Sir Reginald does now, ...
— Won from the Waves • W.H.G. Kingston
... the recent Cretan crisis, as told in the A. B. C. Monthly Report, is not without humour. Till the 25th October Crete, as all our planet knows, was the sole surviving European repository of "autonomous institutions," "local self-government," and the rest of the archaic lumber devised in the past for the confusion of human affairs. She has lived practically ...
— Actions and Reactions • Rudyard Kipling
... themselves the cause of their being misrepresented; there is no country perhaps, in which the habit of deceiving for amusement, or what is termed hoaxing, is so common. Indeed this and the hyperbole constitute the major part of American humour. If they have the slightest suspicion that a foreigner is about to write a book, nothing appears to give them so much pleasure as to try to mislead him; this has constantly been practised upon me, and for all I know, they may in some instances have been successful; if they have, ...
— Diary in America, Series One • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)
... know. I have to ask you then to find what friends you can among this company; and if you have none, to make them. Let everybody hear the news. Tell it (if I may offer the suggestion) with humour: how Mr. Austin, somewhat upon the wane, but still filled with sufficiency, gloriously presumed and was most ingloriously set down by a young lady from the north: the lady's name a secret, which you will permit to be divined. The ...
— The Plays of W. E. Henley and R. L. Stevenson
... school of Russian Realism was Gogol. Filled with enthusiasm for Pushkin, he nevertheless took a different course, and became Russia's first great novelist. Furthermore, although a melancholy man, he is the only Russian humorist who has made the world laugh out loud. Humour is not a salient quality in Russian fiction. Then came the brilliant follower of Gogol, Ivan Turgenev. In him Russian literary art reached its climax, and the art of the modern novel as well. He ...
— Essays on Russian Novelists • William Lyon Phelps
... transposition are so many and varied, language affords so rich a continuity of themes and the comic is here capable of passing through so great a number of stages, from the most insipid buffoonery up to the loftiest forms of humour and irony, that we shall forego the attempt to make out a complete list. Having stated the rule, we will simply, here and ...
— Laughter: An Essay on the Meaning of the Comic • Henri Bergson
... you some account of my own renowned Hector, which I promised long ago. He was the son and immediate successor of the faithful old Sirrah; and though not nearly so valuable a dog as his father, he was a far more interesting one. He had three times more humour and whim about him; and though exceedingly docile, his bravest acts were mostly tinctured with a grain of stupidity, which showed his reasoning faculty to be ...
— Anecdotes of Dogs • Edward Jesse
... said Mr. Smith, remembering that he was speaking to a dignitary of the Church. It was well to humour such people, Mr. Smith thought. But the Christianity was to be done in the Sunday sermon, and was not ...
— Framley Parsonage • Anthony Trollope
... husband as the most willing and most natural butt for her caustic wit; she still was fond of aiming a shaft or two at him, and he was still equally ready to let the shaft glance harmlessly against the flawless shield of his own imperturbable good humour, but now, contrary to all precedent, to all usages and customs of London society, Marguerite seldom was seen at routs or at the opera without her husband; she accompanied him to all the races, and even one night—oh horror!—had danced the gavotte ...
— The Elusive Pimpernel • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... may be imagined, was in high good humour, and sat on the top of his great charger in a state of ebullient excitement worthy of a schoolboy on ...
— Dross • Henry Seton Merriman
... None without wit, nor with it numbers gain; To please is hard, but none shall please in vain As a coy mistress is the humoured town, Loth every lover with success to crown; He who would win must every effort try, Sail in the mode, and to the fashion fly; Must gay or grave to every humour dress, And watch the lucky Moment of Success; That caught, no more his eager hopes are crost; But vain are Wit and ...
— Crabbe, (George) - English Men of Letters Series • Alfred Ainger
... two years:—"He was brought up in the nursery with the children; and when admitted to my table, as was frequently the case, gave a proof of his taste by refusing to eat any fruit but mangosteens, or to drink any wine but champagne. The only time I ever knew him out of humour was on an occasion when no champagne was forthcoming. He was naturally of a playful and affectionate disposition, and it was never found necessary to chain or chastise him. It was usual for this bear, the cat, the ...
— Natural History of the Mammalia of India and Ceylon • Robert A. Sterndale
... is any real defect in this nosegay, it is, perhaps, that we do not see a little more of Lady Clitheroe, with her ever-delightful humour. But perhaps Mr. Garnett—or Mr. Patmore, looking over his shoulder—remembered Mr. Shandy's advice to my Uncle Toby, to eschew mirth while paying his addresses to Widow Wadman. We, however, are under no restraint in this respect, and recommend everybody who takes up ...
— The Contemporary Review, Volume 36, September 1879 • Various
... affair, and it was for him to dictate the lines on which it should be treated. If he elected to hide his pain under a bright smile and a laugh like that of a hyena with a more than usually keen sense of humour, our line was obviously to ...
— The Man with Two Left Feet - and Other Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... Well Hal, well: and in some sort it iumpes with my humour, as well as waiting in the Court, I ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... to lift their bows up when a wave meets them; and they groans and complains if the wind is too hard for them, just like a human being. When you goes to a new vessel you have got to learn her tricks and her ways and what she will do, and what she won't do, and just to humour her as you would a child. I don't say as I think she is actually alive; but every sailor will tell you that there is something about her that her builders ...
— By England's Aid or The Freeing of the Netherlands (1585-1604) • G.A. Henty
... course, and every fresh dish seemed to increase the good-humour of the Baron: but all efforts, to get him to express his opinion as to Uggug's cleverness, were in vain, until that interesting youth had left the room, and was seen from the open window, prowling about the lawn with a little basket, which he ...
— Sylvie and Bruno • Lewis Carroll
... head. It's bad enough to sit in the House and listen to this fellow frothing, without having to bring a quarter-bred savage into one's own family. However, he's really not a man to be ashamed of, so far as appearances go.... And I must humour her. Five thousand a year ...
— Rodman The Boatsteerer And Other Stories - 1898 • Louis Becke
... was in a pleasant and expansive humour that evening. The new cook was an unqualified success, and he was conscious of having dined exceedingly well. He sat in a comfortable easy-chair before a blazing wood fire, he had just lit one of his favourite brand of cigarettes, and his wife, ...
— The Zeppelin's Passenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... florid architecture of the ancients from the starved proportions of these days, or the rich and graceful style of the Essayists from the fabrications of little, self-conceited biographers. In short, the whole scene is dashed off in the first style of art; the subject and humour are all over English—true to nature, and so forcible as to seize on the attention of ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 12, No. 336 Saturday, October 18, 1828 • Various
... to be balked in well-conducted schemes by an insignificant notary; to be lamed by the sting of an insect whom he had offended unawares. "But," Tito said to himself, "the man's dislike to me can be nothing deeper than the ill-humour of a dinnerless dog; I shall conquer it if I can make him prosperous." And he had been very glad of an opportunity which had presented itself of providing the notary with a temporary post as an extra cancelliere ...
— Romola • George Eliot
... broken with age; he was already feeling the weight of isolation from the Royal Family; he was beginning to suffer the insults of the king. But, beneath all this, his gaiety still ran like a river under ice, and in the ageing of a poet, humour and physical decline combined make a good, ...
— Avril - Being Essays on the Poetry of the French Renaissance • H. Belloc
... its immediate surroundings, we must relate the story of an extraordinary ghost, somewhat lacking in good manners, yet not without a certain distorted sense of humour. Absolutely incredible though the tale may seem, yet it comes on very good authority. It was related to our informant, Mr. D., by a Mrs. C., whose daughter he had employed as governess. Mrs. C., who is described as "a woman of respectable position and ...
— True Irish Ghost Stories • St John D Seymour
... his hands upon the table and exclaimed, "Well, well, here I am sitting down for the first time out of Old England!" ... A cup of tea, or rather a kettle full, for our salt beef had kindled an insatiable thirst, put him in good humour again, and, but for a sort of sigh or a look or a jerk which proved Old England to be uppermost in his thoughts, he appeared quite satisfied. With some trouble Kitty secured the fly cap chambermaid and had taken possession of her room; having seen her safe, I descended ...
— Before and after Waterloo - Letters from Edward Stanley, sometime Bishop of Norwich (1802;1814;1814) • Edward Stanley
... considering whether it is in our power to fulfil their conditions. He had promised to be only her friend, and not to think of her as a mistress; and yet he could not deny that he was mortified and disgusted with the sight of any other visiter. His ill-humour was particularly excited by hearing her, in a jesting manner, enumerate the good or bad qualities of some favourite, and after having shown much good sense in pointing out his blemishes, neglect her friend, and prefer his ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 12, - Issue 332, September 20, 1828 • Various
... overthrowing Mameluke tyranny, to respect the Moslem faith: "Have we not destroyed the Pope, who bade men wage war on Moslems? Have we not destroyed the Knights of Malta, because those fools believed it to be God's will to war against Moslems?" The French soldiers were vastly amused by the humour of these proceedings, and the liberated people fully appreciated the menaces with which Bonaparte's proclamation closed, backed up as these were by ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... he started back and overturned two of the men, and did not easily recover his composure. This giant fared so well, that several others came to visit the ships, and one of them behaved with so much familiarity and good humour, that the Europeans were much pleased with him. This person shewed them one of the beasts in the skins of which they were cloathed, from which the foregoing description must have been taken.[3] Being desirous to make prisoners of some ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume X • Robert Kerr
... there are many such anomalies; in a great many occupations, the wages that the men at work are receiving amount to much less than the money they would obtain if they lost their jobs and were labelled unemployed. But they have stuck to their jobs, they are carrying on, with a patience and good humour that are beyond all praise. Yes, but that state of affairs is so anomalous, so contrary to our elementary sense of fairness that, as a permanent proposition it would prove intolerable. We cannot go on for ever with a system under which in many trades men receive much ...
— Essays in Liberalism - Being the Lectures and Papers Which Were Delivered at the - Liberal Summer School at Oxford, 1922 • Various
... remarks led the Bengalees to form a very exaggerated estimate of the personal part played by Lord Curzon in the question of Partition, and they not unnaturally concluded that, if the Secretary of State had merely sanctioned the Partition in order to humour the Viceroy, he might easily be induced to reconsider the matter when once Lord Curzon had been got out of the way. Their hopes in that quarter were, it is true, very soon dashed, but only to be strung ...
— Indian Unrest • Valentine Chirol
... forme and quantity; which is very conformable to reason, if we consider, that every Aliment be it never so simple, begets, and produceth in the liver, foure humours, not onely differing in temper, but also in substance; and begets more or lesse of that humour, according as that Aliment hath more or fewer parts corresponding to the substance of that humour, which is most ingendred. And so in cold diseases, we give warme nourishment; and cold nourishment, ...
— Chocolate: or, An Indian Drinke • Antonio Colmenero de Ledesma
... fish were not in the humour to take; I therefore shot one with a rifle as it came to the surface to blow, and, the water in this spot being shallow, we brought it to shore; it was a species of carp, between thirty and forty pounds; the scales were rather larger than a ...
— The Nile Tributaries of Abyssinia • Samuel W. Baker
... indecision."—Todd's Student's Manual, p. 60. "And you groan the more deeply, as you reflect that there is no shaking it off."—Ib., p. 47. "I know of nothing that can justify the having recourse to a Latin translation of a Greek writer."—Coleridge's Introduction, p. 16. "Humour is the making others act or talk absurdly."—Hazlitt's Lectures. "There are remarkable instances of their not affecting each other."—Butler's Analogy, p. 150. "The leaving Caesar out of the commission was not from any slight."—Life of Cicero, ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... I should, for they be the only things I have got except these duds," answered Bill, giving way to a propensity for humour, which, unknown to himself, he possessed, though ...
— Sunshine Bill • W H G Kingston
... cruel master's caprice. We know, too, that when a master was arraigned on a criminal charge, the first thing done to prove his guilt was to torture his slaves. But just as in America the popular figure of the oily, lazy, jocular negro, brimming over with grotesque good-humour and screening himself in the weakness of an indulgent master, merely served to brighten a picture of which the horrible plantation system was the dark background; so at Rome no instances of individual indulgence were a set-off against the monstrous ...
— The Gracchi Marius and Sulla - Epochs Of Ancient History • A.H. Beesley
... glue and the eggs are as tough as leather, are observed. Instead, songs, roars of laughter, and boisterous jests are the order of the day. For example, this sort of thing,' added Sam, doing a rapid back-flap and landing with a thump on Bill's head. As Bill was unprepared for this act of boisterous humour, his face was pushed into the Puddin' with great violence, and the gravy was ...
— The Magic Pudding • Norman Lindsay
... of the country party," said the King. "I am much minded to secure the lad for an elfin page," he added aside to Killigrew. "There's a fund of excellent humour and drollery in those queer eyes of his! So, Sir Hobgoblin, if you are proof against cold steel, I know not what is to be done with you. Get you back, and devise some other mode of finding your ...
— A Reputed Changeling • Charlotte M. Yonge
... as the question was, Gaspard indulged his humour by hinting to his associates that, in certain contingencies, there might be work for their hands. He would not be more explicit, for he was distrustful of them; but this vague hint was quite enough to cause some perturbation. The bookseller's assistant turned ...
— Half a Hero - A Novel • Anthony Hope
... billiard-room, too: but that didn't work so well. I could never bring her up to my standard of play, not within forty in a hundred, by reason that she'd use the rest for almost every stroke. She had a sense of humour, had Maria: you'd have got along with her, Mr. Collingwood, and she'd have got along with you. You'd have struck sparks. One evening I asked her, 'Maria, why are you so fond of the jigger?' 'Because of my figger,' says she, pat as you please. Now, wasn't that humorous, ...
— Foe-Farrell • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... HAD a thought, a dainty thought, A quaint and cunning fancy, I said, "A theme with humour fraught Within my grasp I can see. This thought will work into a set Of verses fit for singing." A voice rasped, "Oh, a deal o' wet!" And off that ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 102, April 9th, 1892 • Various
... the overseer by refusing him. I stood responsible for everybody's good behaviour, and had no forfeits to pay. And enjoyment reigned, during those days, in the barn; a gay enjoyment, full of talk and of singing as well as of feasting; full of laughter and jokes, and full of utmost good-humour and kindness from one to another. Again, most unlike a party of Celtic origin. It was enjoyment to me too; very great; though dashed continually by the thought how rare and strange it was to those around me. Only for my ...
— Daisy • Elizabeth Wetherell
... noble tone of classical enthusiasm. While in Germany he wrote his Dialogues on Medals, which, however, were not published till after his death. These have much liveliness of style and something of the gay humour which the author was afterwards to exhibit more strongly; but they show little either of antiquarian learning or of critical ingenuity. In tracing out parallels between passages of the Roman poets and figures or scenes which appear in ancient sculptures, Addison ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... disembarked about eleven o'clock in the morning, and found that the entire population had apparently gone to a Decoration Day ball-game, leaving post-office, telegraph station, fruit store, bakery, all closed—even this failure to meet our expectations did not put us out of humour with the universe, or call forth rude words on ...
— Days Off - And Other Digressions • Henry Van Dyke
... led to a lively discussion on the subject of the Church, between him and two fellow-travellers, to whom I had been introduced at starting, as Waldenses. I observed that, although he appeared to come off but second best in the controversy, he bore all with unruffled humour, as if not unwilling to be beaten. At length, after a ride of twenty miles over the plain, in which the husbandman, with plough as old in its form as the Georgics, was turning up a soil rich, black, and glossy as the ...
— Pilgrimage from the Alps to the Tiber - Or The Influence of Romanism on Trade, Justice, and Knowledge • James Aitken Wylie
... was? his Countenance was much altered; nor could he say, who 'twas. But the Court began to think, that he then step'd aside, only that by the assistance of the Black Man, he might put on his Invisibility, and in that Fascinating Mist, gratifie his own Jealous Humour, to hear what they said of him. Which trick of rendring themselves Invisible, our Witches do in their Confessions pretend, that they sometimes are Masters of; and it is the more credible, because ...
— The Wonders of the Invisible World • Cotton Mather
... front of the fire, his great spiked club between his knees. At Charming's entry he turned round, gave a start of surprise, bent forward eagerly a moment, and then leant back chuckling. Like most overgrown men he was naturally kind-hearted and had a simple humour, but he could be stubborn when he liked. The original affair of the tortoise seems to have shown him both at his ...
— The Holiday Round • A. A. Milne
... there before me, With his white paw, nothing loth, Sat, by way of entertainment, Lapping off the shining froth; And, in not the gentlest humour At the loss of such a treat, I confess I rather rudely Thrust him ...
— Cole's Funny Picture Book No. 1 • Edward William Cole
... accordant with theologic modes of reasoning in science. This was the theory of the learned Tollius, who in 1649 told the world that these chipped or smoothed stones were "generated in the sky by a fulgurous exhalation conglobed in a cloud by the circumposed humour." ...
— History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom • Andrew Dickson White
... theoretically possible, and militates against sudden surprise. The structural characteristic also imposes certain important conditions in military training. It takes a definite period of time to create a machine-gunner who will humour the wonderful mechanism which he serves. He must know the different jambs, and simple repairs. He must be trained. The same remarks apply to any other structurally intricate appliance, such as the tank. In other words, this characteristic is a distinct check on any ...
— by Victor LeFebure • J. Walker McSpadden
... Grotius places him in a more amiable or respectable point of view, than his constant attempts to put Catholics and Protestants into good humour with each other, and to put both ...
— The Life of Hugo Grotius • Charles Butler
... and from time to time snorting in a proud manner, was quite unlike my own. This horse had all the strength of the horses of Normandy, all the lightness, grace, and subtlety of the horses of Barbary, all the conscious value of the horses that race for rich men, all the humour of old horses that have seen the world and will be disturbed by nothing, and all the valour of young horses who have their troubles before them, and race round in paddocks attempting to defeat the passing trains. I say all these things were in the horse, and expressed by various ...
— On Nothing & Kindred Subjects • Hilaire Belloc
... ain't this 'un," answered the other, his good humour quite restored. "This is a young man and tremendous big. I ain't so small myself, but he tops me by a head and shoulders and so he does most hereabouts. Strong, too, with it, there ain't so many would care to stand up against him, I can tell you. Why, they do ...
— The Bittermeads Mystery • E. R. Punshon
... day. Her leap of sixty feet from the battlements of Beaurevoir stunned but did not long incapacitate her. Hunger, bonds, and the protracted weariness of months of cross-examination produced an illness but left her intellect as keen, her courage as unabated, her humour as vivacious, her memory as minutely accurate as ever. There never was a more sane and healthy human being. We never hear that, in the moments of her strange experiences, she was 'entranced,' or even dissociated from the actual occurrences ...
— The Valet's Tragedy and Other Stories • Andrew Lang
... has been exceeded. It ought to have been a matter of course that this supplementary estimate should have been agreed to by the Tories, seeing that it was money necessary to carry out the programme passed by their own friends in the previous administration. But the Tories were in no humour to listen to such trifles as these, and carried on lengthy discussions. Mr. Morley, having no responsibility for the policy which rendered such a vote necessary, was away in his room, attending to the duties of his laborious department. Mr. T.W. Russell ...
— Sketches In The House (1893) • T. P. O'Connor
... indication how her affections stood. I don't think Phil took any pains to appear in a better light than usual. It was his habit to be always himself, sincere, gentle, considerate, and never thrusting forward. He had acquired with his growth a playful humour with which to trim his conversation, but which never went to tiresome lengths. This was all the more taking for his quiet manner, which held one where noise and effort failed. But I exerted myself to be mighty ...
— Philip Winwood • Robert Neilson Stephens
... Gentle Shepherd. It is true that the tongue of the muse had at no time been wholly silent; that now and then a burst of sublime woe, like the song of "Mary, weep no more for me," and of lasting merriment and humour, like that of "Tibbie Fowler," proved that the fire of natural poesie smouldered, if it did not blaze; while the social strains of the unfortunate Fergusson revived in the city, if not in the field, ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... settlements there. One such story, however, is recorded from the Island of Kimolos, one of the Cyclades, but without the human captivity in Elfland, without the acts of charity, and without the gratitude. The Nereids of the Kimoliote caves are of a grimmer humour than the kindly-natured underground folk of Celtic and Teutonic lands, or than the heroine of Palermo. The payment to their human help is no subject of jest to them. A woman whom they once called in was roundly told: "If it ...
— The Science of Fairy Tales - An Inquiry into Fairy Mythology • Edwin Sidney Hartland
... "Wrens and Robins," her "Rainbow Verses" and "Brownie, Brownie, let down your milk, White as swansdown, smooth as silk." There are many others, and a recent charming addition to our stock is "Chimneys and Fairies," by Rose Fyleman. One thing we should not neglect, and that is the child's sense of humour. For the very young this is probably satisfied by the cow that jumps over the moon, the dish that runs after the spoon, Jill tumbling after Jack, and Miss Muffet running away from the spider. But older children much ...
— The Child Under Eight • E.R. Murray and Henrietta Brown Smith
... looked up at him quickly, chilled already by his humour. Clare thought that the woman's voice shook a little, as she pronounced the name. Brook did not turn his ...
— Adam Johnstone's Son • F. Marion Crawford
... caught and saddled, accepting with characteristic good-humour his confidential hint that to figure in his show was not so much a consequence as a cause of immortality. From Mrs. Wimbush to the last "representative" who called to ascertain his twelve favourite ...
— The Death of the Lion • Henry James
... doubtless more learned on the violin than either of the rival performers [Ole Bull and Artot], but there is a vitreous clearness and precision in his notes that would make them more germane to the humour of before breakfast than to the warm abandon of vespertide. His sister travels with him (a pretty blonde, very unlike him), and accompanies ...
— Famous Violinists of To-day and Yesterday • Henry C. Lahee
... public good. Our countryman, inferior to Bonaparte in invention, was far superior to him in wisdom. The French Emperor is among conquerors what Voltaire is among writers, a miraculous child. His splendid genius was frequently clouded by fits of humour as absurdly perverse as those of the pet of the nursery, who quarrels with his food, and dashes his playthings to pieces. Cromwell was emphatically a man. He possessed, in an eminent degree, that masculine and full-grown robustness of mind, that ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... was one of those spare and hard Englishmen whom no amount of business cares will induce to neglect the exercise of his body, the obligation at all times to keep "fit"; square-rigged, as it were, with a lean face and a wide moustache accentuating a square chin. Occasionally a gleam of humour, a ray of idealism, lighted his practical grey eyes. Each of these two had managed rather marvellously to triumph over early training by self-education: the labour leader, who had had his first lessons in life from injustices and hard knocks; and the ship-builder, who had overcome ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... up above entirely, reading a good deal, and strumming upon an old harp which he had bought at a sale, saying when in a bitter humour that he might have to get his living by it in the streets some day. But he soon preferred to read human nature by taking his meals downstairs in the general dining-kitchen, with the dairyman and his wife, and the maids and ...
— Tess of the d'Urbervilles - A Pure Woman • Thomas Hardy
... of the Boer is always in evidence, although the Englishman must perforce humour it. It would be interesting to learn, for instance, how many thousands of pounds are sewn up in mattresses all over the country because the owners are chary concerning the integrity of bank-managers. ...
— The Boer in Peace and War • Arthur M. Mann
... regarded, not without reason, as a madman. Flaxman called for classic taste to appreciate him; and the fame of English art would have suffered both at home and abroad if a simple, manly lad had not quitted a Scotch manse and sailed from Leith to London, bringing with him indelible memories of the humour and the pathos of peasant life, and reproducing them with such graphic fidelity, power, and tenderness that the whole world has ...
— Life of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen V.1. • Sarah Tytler
... and whom she heard laughing. She could not endure being at home any longer; She took up her straw hat and sunshade and hurried into the street. There she felt somewhat better. In her room she had been unhappy; in the street she was no more than out of humour. ...
— Bertha Garlan • Arthur Schnitzler
... unmingled with humour, beamed from Mrs Roby's twinkling black eyes as she gazed steadily in the seaman's face, but she made no other acknowledgment of his speech than a slight inclination of her head, which caused her tall cap to quiver. Captain Wopper, regarding this ...
— Rivers of Ice • R.M. Ballantyne
... humour for complete solitude and uninterrupted meditation this autumn, I have taken a lodging for six weeks in the most unfrequented part of England—in a ...
— The Uncommercial Traveller • Charles Dickens
... outright at their clumsy assurance. The man who rode on Madonna's right turned in his saddle and put up his hand as if to beckon Stefano. I was regaling him with one of the choicest of Messer Sacchetti's paradoxes, gurgling, myself, at the humour of the thing I told. I paid no heed to the sign. I continued to expound my quip, as though we had the night before us in which to make its elusive humour clear. But out of the tail of my eye I watched my good friend Stefano, and I saw his right hand steal round to the region ...
— The Shame of Motley • Raphael Sabatini
... horseback in the boundless sultry deserts of Western Africa! The temperature of the place is exceedingly damp and chill. Jugurtha himself, when stripped of his clothes by the executioners, and let down into it from the hole in the roof, exclaimed with grim humour, "By Hercules, how cold your bath is!" A more hideous and heart-breaking dungeon it is impossible to imagine. Not a ray of light can penetrate the profound darkness of this living tomb. Sallust spoke of the appearance of it in his day, from the filth, the gloom, and ...
— Roman Mosaics - Or, Studies in Rome and Its Neighbourhood • Hugh Macmillan
... the canoes to pieces. His Indian guides were obstinate, ignorant, and timid. Mackenzie relates some of his difficulties in graphic language: "Throughout the whole of this day the men had been in a state of extreme ill-humour, and as they did not choose to vent it openly upon me, they disputed and quarrelled among themselves. About sunset the canoe struck upon the stump of a tree, which broke a large hole in her bottom, a circumstance that gave them an opportunity to let loose their discontents without ...
— A Book of Discovery - The History of the World's Exploration, From the Earliest - Times to the Finding of the South Pole • Margaret Bertha (M. B.) Synge
... then he had only surmised imperfectly—the declared liaison of his wife with La Rochefoucauld. He had been greatly irritated at it, and Conde's enemies, with De Retz at their head, carefully fostered his ill humour, and his daughter, Marie d'Orleans, afterwards Duchess de Nemours, seconded them to ...
— Political Women (Vol. 1 of 2) • Sutherland Menzies
... laughed Ambrose, good humour spreading all over his face, "you-all had better git outa my way, an' stay ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1920 • Various
... was by no means wanting in abilities or humour. He had ill-formed legs; and having projected one of them in company, which was noticed with a laugh, he offered to lay a wager that there was a worse in company; and it being accepted, he put forward his other leg, which was indeed more ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 578 - Vol. XX, No. 578. Saturday, December 1, 1832 • Various
... Captain Geoffrey would say, suddenly ashamed of his elephantine humour, "there's nothing to cry about. I would be proud to be a Japanese. They are jolly brave people. They gave the Russians a ...
— Kimono • John Paris
... claims just to sell them to these patient people! As we descended from the mountains we naturally came upon more and more worked-out claims. Some had evidently been abandoned in disgust by men with little stamina; but, sometimes, with a considerable humour. An effigy clad in regulation gambler's rig, including the white shirt, swayed and swung slowly above the merest surface diggings. Across the shirt front these ...
— Gold • Stewart White |
