"Dally" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... dissipates upon the afternoon under the blue dome of heaven; and the sun lies warm upon your feet, and the cool air visits your neck and turns aside your open shirt. If you are not happy, you must have an evil conscience. You may dally as long as you like by the roadside. It is almost as if the millennium were arrived, when we shall throw our clocks and watches over the housetop, and remember time and seasons no more. Not to keep hours for a lifetime is, I was going to say, to live for ever. You have no idea, unless you ...
— Virginibus Puerisque • Robert Louis Stevenson
... triflers and deceivers rare, Tender of heart, but little tied by vows, Deliciously we dally 'neath the boughs, And playfully the lovers ...
— Poems of Paul Verlaine • Paul Verlaine
... p'tater-patch wed by noon;" he watched the departure of his tormentor, and went straight to the potato-patch, duty and fear leading him by either hand. The weeds had no safety of their lives that day; he was in too great a hurry to dally, as he loved to do, over the bigger stalks of pigweed, the giants which he, with his trusty sword—only it was a hoe—would presently dash to the earth and behead, and tear in pieces. Even the sprawling ...
— Nautilus • Laura E. Richards
... indicate that the Romans pronounced the sibilant distinctly,—yet not too emphatically, for Quintilian says, 'the master of his art (of speaking) will not fondly prolong or dally with ...
— The Roman Pronunciation of Latin • Frances E. Lord
... all, communicated any lasting warmth; so that ever afterward I used none but cold water. Now to live in a cold bath in our climate, and in my own state of preternatural sensibility to cold, was not an idea to dally with. I wish to mention, however, for the information of other sufferers in the same way, one change in the mode of applying the water which led to a considerable and a sudden improvement in the condition of my feelings. ...
— The Opium Habit • Horace B. Day
... it loose. Thar, I see Cipo now. Watch me!". Wrinkle spat on the ground, wiped his mouth with his hand, and puckered up his lips and whistled keenly. "He's comin'; watch 'im hop; he knows better than to dally when I give that sound. He's slow, though; walks like he had lumbago or locomotive attachment. Say, Cipo!" as the tall, elderly negro arrived, holding his tattered hat in his hand, "this is Mr. Alfred Henley, an' this is his ...
— Dixie Hart • Will N. Harben
... am bid to take another one of ye, am I?" he snarled. "As though ye caused me not trouble enow; and this one a cub, looking a very boor in carriage and breeding. Mayhap the Earl thinketh I am to train boys to his dilly-dally household service as well as ...
— Men of Iron • Ernie Howard Pyle
... At the wooden bridge he met Caruthers, and halted to speak to him. It was the first time that the lawyer had ever received the great man's attention, but knowing the cause of the interest now manifested, he was determined to dally with it as a ...
— Old Ebenezer • Opie Read
... well-attired woodbine, With cowslips wan that hang the pensive head, And every flower that sad embroidery wears. Bid Amaranthus all his beauty shed, And daffodillies fill their cups with tears, To strew the laureat hearse where Lycid lies, For so to interpose a little ease, Let our frail thoughts dally with false surmise. Ay me! whilst thee the shores and sounding seas Wash far away where'er thy bones are hurled, Whether beyond the stormy Hebrides, Where thou perhaps under the whelming tide Visit'st ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 3 - Sorrow and Consolation • Various
... praised a costume in the milliner's window; and when she reached the lime-tree walk, with its high, umbrageous arches and stir of passers-by in the dim alleys, she took her place upon a bench and began to dally with the pleasures of the hour. It was cold, but she did not feel it, being warm within; her thoughts, in that dark corner, shone like the gold and rubies at the jewellers; her ears, which heard the brushing of so many footfalls, transposed it ...
— Prince Otto • Robert Louis Stevenson
... women came out on the road to see him off. He did not dally, jumped on to the front of the cart ...
— Waysiders • Seumas O'Kelly
... eat their meat. Turkey gentlewomen, that are perpetual prisoners, still mewed up according to the custom of the place, have little else beside their household business, or to play with their children to drive away time, but to dally with their cats, which they have in delitiis, as many of our ladies and gentlewomen use monkeys and little dogs. The ordinary recreations which we have in winter, and in most solitary times busy our minds with, are cards, ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior
... upon me. Dally not, Pembrooke; I am bent to fight And that with thee for the best blood ...
— A Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. III • Various
... way or another, must bring the weary question to a close. If the pope meant well, he would welcome a resolution which made further procrastination impossible; if he did not mean well, he could not be permitted to dally further with the interests of the English nation. Within a few days, therefore, of Bonner's return from Bologna, he took the final step from which there was no retreat, and "somewhere about St. Paul's ...
— The Reign of Henry the Eighth, Volume 1 (of 3) • James Anthony Froude
... great age and dignity of certain groves—these are but ingredients, they are not the secret of the philtre. The place is sanative; the air, the light, the perfumes, and the shapes of things concord in happy harmony. The artist may be idle and not fear the "blues." He may dally with his life. Mirth, lyric mirth, and a vivacious classical contentment are of the very essence of the better kind of art; and these, in that most smiling forest, he has the chance to learn or to remember. Even on the plain ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 16 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... said, "if you'll always remember to stand inside of that circle, when you take 'em off and put 'em on, there won't be any more trouble. And take 'em off as soon as you shut the doors. If you dilly-dally a minute—" ...
— The Garden of the Plynck • Karle Wilson Baker
... doubt of it, child. Therefore it behooves us to be silent respecting the matter. But, by my life, girl! we dally too long. Away! and set a guard upon thy lips. If thou canst carry so weighty a matter sub silentio then will I deem thee better than the most ...
— In Doublet and Hose - A Story for Girls • Lucy Foster Madison
... a very distressing effect on Howard. It is one thing to dally with a thought, however seriously, in one's own mind, and something quite different to have it presented in black and white through the frank conjecture of another. He put a severe constraint upon himself and said, "Do you know, Frank, the same thought had occurred to me—I ...
— Watersprings • Arthur Christopher Benson
... what she knows. He seems, so far as I could judge, to be a manly, right-minded young man. He told me that he shot three tigers in India, and I observed that he took scarcely any wine at dinner. It won't do though, Virginia, to dilly-dally, for I am given to understand that he leaves in a fortnight for California, to explore the West. But he is coming back to spend several months next winter, and if you do not throw cold water on him now, he may feel disposed to run on to Boston, in spite of the efforts ...
— A Romantic Young Lady • Robert Grant
... Come, for the third, Laertes: you but dally; I pray you, pass with your best violence; I am afeard you make a wanton ...
— Shakespearean Tragedy - Lectures on Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth • A. C. Bradley
... will make the time thirty hours. Your posts can perform the distance in that time, and take care that they do not dally on the way." ...
— The Three Admirals • W.H.G. Kingston
... seizing Tom's suit-case. "We won't dally here in Tolopah. We must get to the ranch before it gets too hot." And he led the way to where four bronchos ...
— Comrades of the Saddle - The Young Rough Riders of the Plains • Frank V. Webster
... took it. Now, Marion, while I blame myself as no other person ever can, I still blame others. I was never taught as I should have been about the sacredness of human loves, and the awfulness of human vows and pledges. I was never taught that for girls to dally with such pledges, to flirt with them, before they knew anything about life or about their own hearts was a sin in the sight of God. I ought ...
— The Chautauqua Girls At Home • Pansy, AKA Isabella M. Alden
... dally with it myself, having been brought up on cistern water, but I find in traveling that I entertain a more kindly feeling for you strange foreign people when I carry a medium-sized headlight. Come along, now. Don't compel me ...
— The Slim Princess • George Ade
... Love had come, late, but with tremendous fury. He gained no sleep that night. The star of his desire shone like a mocking mirage before his mind's eye. It was all impossible, hopeless, but to love and lose were better than to live in ignorance of life's strongest passion. To dally with the impossible were sheer madness, he knew that. But what was to be done but obey the yearnings of his heart, though it brought its ...
— Colorado Jim • George Goodchild
... at length to consider myself as it were at home in this singular country of Aheer—without, however, experiencing any desire to dally here longer than the force of circumstances absolutely requires. It must be confessed, as I have already hinted, that the town of Tintalous,[1] in front of which we are encamped, does not at all answer the idea which our too active imagination had ...
— Narrative of a Mission to Central Africa Performed in the Years 1850-51, Volume 2 • James Richardson
... accomplished about all the great things of the world? How many young men falter, faint, and dally with their purpose because they have no capital to start with, and wait and wait for some good luck to give them a lift. But success is the child of drudgery and perseverance. It cannot be coaxed or bribed; pay the price, and it is yours. A constant ...
— An Iron Will • Orison Swett Marden
... said I, "oh caddy boy, and tell me how it haps You cling so fast unto these links; not like the other chaps, Who like to dally on the streets and play the game ...
— Cobwebs from a Library Corner • John Kendrick Bangs
... must come— The wind is off shore blowing; You only change your prison dull For one that's splendid, glowing! His Highness doats on milky cheeks, So do not make us dally"— We, eighty strong, who send along The dreaded ...
— Poems • Victor Hugo
... for that little confidence; but I must not dally. What arms have you in the house, ...
— The Phantom Ship • Frederick Marryat
... first giddy rapture of returning life, and was sure that I was steady on my feet, I dared to dally with the subject. I asked if bad news had come for Freule Menela, expressed devout relief that it had not, and piped regret at ...
— The Chauffeur and the Chaperon • C. N. Williamson
... more poor SALLY's tricks With glee fill girl or boy full; No mug of beer her soul can cheer, Nor glass of O-be-joyful! We yet may see some Chimpanzee With Drink's temptations dally, To WILFRID's woe; but no, ah! no! It won't be ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101. October 17, 1891 • Various
... "this is no time to dally; on every side I see a pitfall. Let every man look to himself. If I must play in my last trump, ...
— The Diamond Coterie • Lawrence L. Lynch
... Governor of Massachusetts. These are idle speculations, and yet, when we reflect that Oliver Cromwell was on the point of embarking for America when he was prevented by the king's officers, we may, for the nonce, "let our frail thoughts dally with false surmise," and fancy by how narrow a chance Paradise Lost missed being written in Boston. But, as a rule, the members of the literary guild are not quick to emigrate. They like the feeling of an old and rich ...
— Brief History of English and American Literature • Henry A. Beers
... the seats beneath the great trees commanded the wild heights opposite. Forty of the finest horses in the country were in General Schuyler's stables, and many carriages. There was a constant stream of distinguished guests. But Hamilton, who could dally pleasurably for a short time, had no real affinity for anything but work. There being no immediate prospect of fighting, he retired again to the library and began that series of papers called The Continentalist, which ...
— The Conqueror • Gertrude Franklin Atherton
... circumstances, Hannah had dallied—thus far I had rejoiced that she dallied, with the main burden of the wo; but now there remained nothing to dally with any longer—and she rushed along in her narrative, hurrying to tell—I hurrying to hear. A second, a third examination had ensued, then a final committal—all this within a week. By that time all the world was agitated with the case; literally not the ...
— The Uncollected Writings of Thomas de Quincey, Vol. 2 - With a Preface and Annotations by James Hogg • Thomas de Quincey
... a widow must not dally, He must make hay while the sun doth shine; He must not stand with her, Shall I, Shall I? But boldly say, Widow, ...
— Old Christmas From the Sketch Book of Washington Irving • Washington Irving
... and pretty kind of dogges, called the Spaniel gentle or the comforter," and further said: "These dogges are little, pretty, proper, and fyne, and sought for to satisfie the delicatenesse of daintie dames and wanton women's wills, instruments of folly for them to play and dally withall, to tryfle away the treasure of time, to withdraw their mindes from their commendable exercises. These puppies the smaller they be, the more pleasure they provoke as more meete playfellowes for minsing ...
— Dogs and All About Them • Robert Leighton
... to the throne raised considerable discussion. Elizabeth was still without a husband, and for reasons probably best known to herself she refused to allow her Parliament to drive her into marriage, although partly through vanity, partly through motives of policy she was not unwilling to dally with the advances of several suitors both native and foreign. In the eyes of Catholics Elizabeth was illegitimate, and except for her father's will and the parliamentary confirmation of that will, as an illegitimate she had no ...
— History of the Catholic Church from the Renaissance • Rev. James MacCaffrey
... had overslept herself now! She hoped not, with all her heart, for she had heard Kjersti Hoel say that she did not like girls to lie abed late and dally in the morning. How mortifying it would be for her not to be on the spot as early as the others to-day, ...
— Lisbeth Longfrock • Hans Aanrud
... work an' ne'er be danted, Think yer behint an' there's no time to dally, For na is the time yor assistance is wanted I' makkin yor ...
— Th' History o' Haworth Railway - fra' th' beginnin' to th' end, wi' an ackaant o' th' oppnin' serrimony • Bill o'th' Hoylus End
... capitalist organization is called the National Economic League. It likewise manifests the frankness of men who do not dilly-dally with terms, but who say what they mean, and who mean to settle down to a long, hard fight. Their letter of invitation to prospective members opens boldly. "We beg to inform you that the National Economic League will render its services in an impartial educational movement to ...
— War of the Classes • Jack London
... not dally. He quietly slipped through the open door, and darting swiftly along a stone passage, found his way to the entrance, which was blocked by two constables with ...
— The Sorcery Club • Elliott O'Donnell
... it be out of season. With the recollection of last night still so fresh, even the serious things of life seem trifles, far more its small conventionalities. Mr. Lyndsay, your friend has made his choice, but you are dallying between belief and unbelief. Oh, do not dally long! We need no spirit from the dead to tell us life is short. Do we not feel it passing quicker and quicker every year? The one thing that is serious in all its shows and delusions is the question it puts to each one of us, and which ...
— Cecilia de Noel • Lanoe Falconer
... their natures that they are no more constant to usage in their sentiments than they are in their way of living. Good Lord, to think she has caught old Mountclere! She is sure to have him if she does not dally with him so long ...
— The Hand of Ethelberta • Thomas Hardy
... often, and he succeeded in giving dramatic interest to the least emotional of philosophies. In Realidad and Mariucha is found the most explicit setting forth of that theory of life which enables an oppressed spirit to rise above its conditioning circumstances.[9] At times Galds appeared to dally with Buddhism: at least some critics have so explained the reincarnation of doa Juana in Casandra, novela. Another tenet of Buddhism, or, as some would have it, of Krausism, was often in Galds' thought, and is emphasized particularly in Los ...
— Heath's Modern Language Series: Mariucha • Benito Perez Galdos
... his folly now, his madness, in allowing himself to dally with a baseless hope, which, while never daring to own its own existence, had yet so mingled its enervating poison with every vein that he had now no strength left to endure the disappointment so certain and so near. At the very gate of his father's house he paused. A powerful impulse ...
— Dr. Heidenhoff's Process • Edward Bellamy
... captiuity of our nation, and would neuer yeeld to the like, hauing the Portugals and Spaniards in generall hatred euer since, and conceiueth much better of our countrey, and vs, then these our enemies report of. [Sidenote: Port Dally the chief place of trade.] For which I yeelded them hearty thanks, assuring them they should finde great difference betweene the loyalty of the one and disloyalty of the other; and so payed their dueties: and for that it was the chiefe place of trade, ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of - The English Nation, Vol. 11 • Richard Hakluyt
... side of Fort Street, from the Brown Jug corner east. The wooden building next is a photograph gallery owned by Fred. Dally. He with R. Maynard were the only ones in the business at that time, I think. Next is Dr. Powell's residence and surgery; the house is not visible, being set back from the street. Alexander McLean's ...
— Some Reminiscences of old Victoria • Edgar Fawcett
... the third, Laertes: You do but dally; I pray you, pass with your best violence; I am afeard you make ...
— Hamlet • William Shakespeare
... men! Come," taking Maurice by the arm; "come, they may be seeking us. To the frontier. Every hour is precious. To a telegraph office! We shall see if I dally with peasant girls, if I ...
— The Puppet Crown • Harold MacGrath
... winds sally Upon every Valley, And many times dally And wantonly sport, About the fields tracing, Each other in chasing, And often ...
— Pastoral Poetry and Pastoral Drama - A Literary Inquiry, with Special Reference to the Pre-Restoration - Stage in England • Walter W. Greg
... I will na harm ye,' he said. 'Only I reckon what 'tis a special turn o' Providence, meetin' wi' ye oop here. I reckon what ye'll hev t' give me a square answer noo. Ye canna dilly-dally everlastingly.' ...
— Victorian Short Stories • Various
... said Aunt Cynthia, aggravatingly. "But no woman ever does really think so, you know. I imagine that pretty Anne Shirley, who is visiting Ella Kimball, doesn't. I saw her and Dr. Irving out walking this afternoon, looking very well satisfied with themselves. If you dilly-dally much longer, Sue, you will let Max slip through your ...
— Further Chronicles of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... Grace intend to be present at the coronation, he may dally here no longer. . . Say you not so, Dacre?" as the ...
— Beatrix of Clare • John Reed Scott
... gent's got to keep ridin'; he's not allowed to pause an' dally with the gander an' delay the game. To see to this a brace of brawny sharps is stationed by each pole with clubs in their willin' hands to reemonstrate with any hoss or gent who slows down or stops as he goes ...
— Wolfville Nights • Alfred Lewis
... speculating on what he would do next. At the moment he was paralyzed and imbecile with terror, and I had a strong inclination to dispatch him then and there; but the same odd impulse that I had noticed on the last occasion constrained me to dally with him. Again I was possessed by a strange, savage playfulness like that which impels a cat or leopard to toy daintily and tenderly with its prey for a while before the ...
— The Uttermost Farthing - A Savant's Vendetta • R. Austin Freeman
... this day go about the compass it did the first day, so his life is but a new conversion still. When he is now settled on Jesus for salvation, he must yet be put by(470) the command. It discovers his dally sins, and so he is put to Jesus, the open Fountain for all sin and uncleanness. And the command comes out in perfection, and discovers his shortcoming and inability, and therefore he is put to Jesus for strength. And this ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning
... a man accustomed to command. I have no time to play with conventions... I cannot dally and plead. But I love you. I cannot live without you! And I will shake the foundations of ...
— Prince Hagen • Upton Sinclair
... compromis were mistakes. The real pluck was the sporting spirit that stood to its guns, even if it cost a big and wearisome effort. She would not dally. She would answer to her own Best, and try to go on ...
— Winding Paths • Gertrude Page
... dally with my passion? Insolent devil! But have a care,—provoke me not; for, by the eternal fire, you shall not 'scape my vengeance. Calm villain! How unconcerned he stands, confessing treachery and ingratitude! ...
— The Comedies of William Congreve - Volume 1 [of 2] • William Congreve
... woman—nay, a dame of highest rank— To lose my purity? to walk a path Whose slightest slip may fill my ear with sounds That hiss me out to infamy and death? Have I no secret pangs, no self-respect, No husband's look to bear? O! worse than these, I must endure his loathsome touch; be kind When he would dally with his wife, and smile To see him play thy part. Pah! sickening thought! From that thou art exempt. Thou shalt not go! Thou dost not ...
— Representative Plays by American Dramatists: 1856-1911: Francesca da Rimini • George Henry Boker
... the river of ruin They dally—the thoughtless ones, They dance and they dream By the side of the stream, As long ...
— The Complete Poems of Paul Laurence Dunbar • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... Street to Piccadilly Circus was performed every evening. In Piccadilly she found the 'bus that took her to Hammersmith. It was a pleasurable little journey; she looked forward to it. It amused her to dally on the way, stopping to look in the shop windows. The bright lights lifted her spirits. After a time she had become acquainted with the prints that hung in the print-seller's windows in Garrick Street; they always stayed there long enough to grow familiar. ...
— Sally Bishop - A Romance • E. Temple Thurston
... Courtiers gay and gallant knights, With the wanton damsels dally, But the modest ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... that these Persons of a mix'd Nature call'd Hermaphrodites, have had generally more Prudence and Conduct than to marry under such Incapacities, which would prevent an agreeable Consummation in the amorous Embrace, (however they may sport and dally with each other) as they must expect nothing but the greatest Resentment and highest Indignation from the Persons they have presumptuously espous'd, and must inevitably tend to their being expos'd to the World, as Prodigies and Monsters; and they have ...
— Tractus de Hermaphrodites • Giles Jacob
... had she told the priest so howbeit he would never agree to it, and on one occasion:—"Gossip Gemmata," quoth he, "trouble not thyself about me; I am well lodged; for, when I am so minded, I turn the mare into a fine lass and dally with her, and then, when I would, I turn her back into a mare; wherefore I could ill brook to part from her." The young woman, wondering but believing, told her husband what the priest had said, adding:—"If he is even such a friend as thou sayst, why dost thou not get him to teach thee the enchantment, ...
— The Decameron, Vol. II. • Giovanni Boccaccio
... first time she heard in his voice both bitterness and passion, and at that moment the man himself seemed curiously to come alive and to compel.... But Joanna was not going to dally with temptation in the unaccustomed shape of Arthur Alce. She ...
— Joanna Godden • Sheila Kaye-Smith
... We must dally there awhile before climbing, so I will go and bring back Ramure in extremis, who is waiting for me. But Joseph clings to me, and then I notice a movement of men about the spot where I left the dying man. I can guess what ...
— Under Fire - The Story of a Squad • Henri Barbusse
... I have no sort of intention of writing a paper in the Journal Asiatique, nor I suppose E. B. C. neither. G. de Tassy is very civil to me however. How much I might say about your Letter to me! you will hardly comprehend how it is I almost turn my Eyes from it in this Answer, and dally with other matter. You make me sad with old Memories; yet, I don't mean quite disagreeably sad, but enough to make me shrink recurring to them. I don't know whether to be comforted or not when you talk of India as a ...
— Letters of Edward FitzGerald - in two volumes, Vol. 1 • Edward FitzGerald
... precipitate flouts Is not his fashion. The Anti-Slavery zeal, with him a passion, He knows less warmly shared by other traders; But soi-disant Crusaders Caught paltering with the Infidels, like traitors, And hot enthusiast Emancipators Who the grim Slavery-demon gently tackle, Wink at the scourge, and dally with the shackle, Such, though they vaunt their zeal and orthodoxy, Seem—for ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 99, Sept. 27, 1890 • Various
... ther, in the open strete or abrode: is so straunge, and so vnwonte a thing, that in a whole yere it skante happeneth ones. For a man to sitte with his wyfe in open sighte, or to ride with any woman behinde him: amongest them ware a wondre. Maried couples neuer dally together in the sighte of other, nor chide or falle out. But the menne beare alwaies towarde the women a manly discrete sobrenes, and the women, towarde them a demure womanlie reuerence. Greate menne, that cannot alwaie haue their ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries - Vol. II • Richard Hakluyt
... to rescue him from destruction, he stood before him as one sent to tear up his unbelief by the roots not to dally with it. ...
— Gladys, the Reaper • Anne Beale
... wot it is, Nelly Blyth," said the man, in a somewhat stern tone of voice; "it won't suit me to dilly-dally in this here fashion any longer. You've kept me hanging off and on until I have lost my chance of gettin' to be mate of a Noocastle collier; an' here I am now, with nothin' to do, yawin' about like a Dutchman in a heavy swell, ...
— The Battle and the Breeze • R.M. Ballantyne
... can find any day. They lean against lamp-posts in platoons, they crowd the saloons, they stand about railway stations all day long to see trains go by. They dally on the lounges of fashionable clubs. They may be had tied in bundles by the employers of menial labor. Their women work at the wash-tubs, and crowd the sweat shops of great cities; or, idle rich, they may dawdle in the various ways in which men and ...
— The Call of the Twentieth Century • David Starr Jordan
... "That or immediate confession to your husband, with me by to substantiate your story. No slippery woman's tricks will go down with me. Fix the date here and now and I promise to stand back and await the result in total silence. Dally with it by so much as an hour, and I am at your gates with a story that all must hear." Is it a matter of wonder that the stricken woman, without counsel and prohibited, from the very nature of her secret, from seeking counsel uttered the first one that ...
— The Millionaire Baby • Anna Katharine Green
... will be safe enough. Do not attempt to help these lads should they be set upon, and it will be hard luck if I am not in command again before midnight. Keep close to this shore, but if they order you into the middle of the river, or across it, dally, my good Blumenfels, dally, until you are stopped by the chain for the ...
— The Sword Maker • Robert Barr
... scorn of my entrusted power, When with my mortal foes you tamely dally'd, By hardy rebels braved, you poorly sought A servile pause, and begg'd a shameful truce. Should Essex thus, so meanly compromise, And lose the harvest of a plenteous glory, In ...
— The Earl of Essex • Henry Jones
... henceforth be my motto. I have not now, it is true, any digested proposition to present to the council; but I soon will have one, unless others are offered; for, in this emergency, it is little short of a crime to dally any longer." ...
— The Rangers - [Subtitle: The Tory's Daughter] • D. P. Thompson
... heart, that he at last Must needs express his love's excess With words of unmeant bitterness. Perhaps 'tis pretty to force together Thoughts so all unlike each other; To mutter and mock a broken charm, To dally with wrong that does no harm Perhaps 'tis tender too, and pretty, At each wild word to feel within A sweet recoil of love and pity. And what if in a world of sin (O sorrow and shame should this be true!) Such giddiness of heart and brain Comes seldom ...
— Early Reviews of English Poets • John Louis Haney
... experience many housen full of those Damosels, euen as our schooles are full of children in France to learne to reade. Moreouer, the misrule and riot that they keepe in those houses is very great, for very wantonly they sport and dally togither, shewing whatsoever God hath sent them. They are no men of great labour. They digge their grounds with certaine peeces of wood, as bigge as halfe a sword, on which ground groweth their corne, which they call Offici: it is as bigge as our small ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries of - the English Nation. Vol. XIII. America. Part II. • Richard Hakluyt
... buy it: he had not the money; but he would gladly dally with the notion of being its possessor. To part with it, the moment after having held it in his hand and gloated over it for the first time, would be too keen a pain! It was unreasonable to have to part with it at all! He ought ...
— The Elect Lady • George MacDonald
... me what a loathsome agony 2875 Is that when selfishness mocks love's delight, Foul as in dream's most fearful imagery, To dally with the mowing dead—that night All torture, fear, or horror made seem light Which the soul dreams or knows, and when the day 2880 Shone on her awful frenzy, from the sight Where like a Spirit in fleshly chains she lay Struggling, aghast and pale ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... pompous aspect which the tyrannical nature assumes to the beholder, but let him be one who has a clear insight. May I suppose that the judgment is given in the hearing of us all by one who is able to judge, and has dwelt in the same place with him, and been present at his dally life and known him in his family relations, where he may be seen stripped of his tragedy attire, and again in the hour of public danger—he shall tell us about the happiness and misery of the tyrant when compared ...
— The Republic • Plato
... aching limbs appear incapable of supporting the weight on them. Difficulties loom appallingly large in the faint creeping light, courage fails, and the will grows feeble. Wyllard and his companions felt all this, but it was clear to them that they could not dally, with their provisions out, and staggering out of camp after a very scanty meal they hauled the sled through the slush for an hour or so. Then they had stopped, gasping, and the Indian slipped out of ...
— Masters of the Wheat-Lands • Harold Bindloss
... far guided the pen, to dally with a subject all the dearer because so generally disregarded, will now gladly yield it to the control of a fresher fancy, ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 4, October, 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... I dally with my subject because, to myself, the remembrance of these times is profoundly interesting. But my reader shall not have any further cause to complain, for I now hasten to its close. In the road between Slough and ...
— Confessions of an English Opium-Eater • Thomas De Quincey
... breakfast and gone forth, Mother Carey should wait lingering in the dining-room to cherish some delicate hot morceau and cup of coffee, till the tardy, soft-falling feet came down the stairs, and then sit patiently as long as he chose to dally with his meal, telling how little he had slept. Babie had tried her tongue on both, but Allen, when she shouted at his door that breakfast was ready, came forth no sooner, and when he did so, told his mother that he could not have children screaming at his door at all hours of the morning. ...
— Magnum Bonum • Charlotte M. Yonge
... resolution, than to defect of physical force and energy. The many bad colds of which he speaks were warnings of the end, which came in the form of consumption. This lurking malady it was that made him wait, and dally with his talent. He hit on the idea of translating some of Bossuet's orations for a Scotch theological publisher. Alas! the publisher did not anticipate a demand, among Scotch ministers, for the Eagle of ...
— Robert F. Murray - his poems with a memoir by Andrew Lang • Robert F. Murray
... will ye dally, with your music and your wine? Up! it is Jehovah's rally; God's own arm hath need of thine; Hark! the onset! will ye fold your faith-clad arms in lazy lock? Up! O up, thou drowsy soldier! Worlds ...
— Poems with Power to Strengthen the Soul • Various
... words and windiness, On smiles, and signs, and bladders light as air; Saying, thou fain wouldst comfort his distress, But dar'st not, canst not: nay, dear lady fair, All things are possible beneath the stress Of will, that flames above the soul's despair! Dally no longer: up, set to thy hand; Or see his love ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Second Series • John Addington Symonds
... girls,—young ladies, for those who prefer that more dignified and less attractive expression,—all in the flush of youth, all in vigorous health; every muscle taught its duty; each rower alert, not to be a tenth of a second out of time, or let her oar dally with the water so as to lose an ounce of its propelling virtue; every eye kindling with the hope of victory. Each of the boats was cheered as it came in sight, but the cheers for the Atalanta were naturally the loudest, as the ...
— A Mortal Antipathy • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... rather braced Amuel when the time was come and he would step out bolder upon the day that he feared than he had perhaps for weeks. He longed on that day for a letter for the last house in the lane, there he would dally and talk awhile and look on church-going faces before his last tramp over the lonely wold to end at the dreaded door of the queer ...
— Tales of Three Hemispheres • Lord Dunsany
... soft warmth of spiritual authority; his friendship with Hurrell Froude did the rest. All that was weakest in him hurried him onward, and all that was strongest in him too. His curious and vaulting imagination began to construct vast philosophical fabrics out of the writings of ancient monks, and to dally with visions of angelic visitations and the efficacy of the oil of St Walburga; his emotional nature became absorbed in the partisan passions of a University clique; and his subtle intellect concerned itself more and more exclusively with the dialectical splitting of ...
— Eminent Victorians • Lytton Strachey
... be loaded, my tail shall be eas'd; For since you have publish'd my shame and disgrace, And have made me a jest to the heavenly race; I'll be impudent now, and whenever I meet, My dear favourite Mars, tho' it be in the street; If a bulk be but near, I will never more dally, He shall, if it pleases him, ay marry shall he; Thus all you shall get by your open detection, Of one silly error in female affection, Is a wife that will cuckold you worse out of spite, Now she's catch'd, than before she e're did for delight; ...
— The Power of Mesmerism - A Highly Erotic Narrative of Voluptuous Facts and Fancies • Anonymous
... those who are Christians and not Pagans, who believe that death is not an eternal sleep, who wrest from life its uses and gather from life its beauty,—why they should dally along the road, and cling frantically to the old landmarks, and shrink fearfully from the approaching future, I cannot tell. You are getting into years. True. But you are getting out again. The bowed frame, the tottering step, the unsteady hand, the failing eye, ...
— Gala-days • Gail Hamilton
... the orang; but he adds that at no period of development do their brains perfectly agree; nor could perfect agreement be expected, for otherwise their mental powers would have been the same. Vulpian (2. 'Lec. sur la Phys.' 1866, page 890, as quoted by M. Dally, 'L'Ordre des Primates et le Transformisme,' 1868, page 29.), remarks: "Les differences reelles qui existent entre l'encephale de l'homme et celui des singes superieurs, sont bien minimes. Il ne faut pas se faire ...
— The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex • Charles Darwin
... day, and he didn't have time to dally long in talk. So he went off, and Durland sent Tom Binns, who was acting as his orderly for the day, to ...
— The Boy Scout Automobilists - or, Jack Danby in the Woods • Robert Maitland
... description of the thing which soon found its way into his paper and was then copied into hers. The public grew uneasy. It would swallow any story it was told about the Heir Apparent, for instance and a Russian Grand Duke—is it not the sublime prerogative of American women to dally with such small game as those gentlemen— but it kicked against the probability of such an actual fact as the hammock already described which seemed too ridiculous a whim to possess any real existence. However, the tongues of the fashionable callers, the professional ...
— Crowded Out! and Other Sketches • Susie F. Harrison
... available; nobody seemed to know why. The last group that I talked with said that the vanguard of the German cavalry was only about fifteen miles out of town and would be in this morning. They were all tremendously excited and did not dally by the wayside to chat about the situation with me. I can't say that I blame them, particularly in view of what ...
— A Journal From Our Legation in Belgium • Hugh Gibson
... board the frigate had been hoisted, and he hastened on board to put on his uniform and obey this order. He received his despatches from the captain of the frigate, with orders to proceed to sea immediately. Mr Vanslyperken, under the eye of his superior officer, could not dally or delay: he hove short, hoisted his mainsail, and fired a gun as a signal for sailing; anxiously looking out for Ramsay's boat with his letters, and afraid to go without them; but no boat made its appearance, and Mr Vanslyperken was forced to heave up his anchor. Still he did not like to make sail, ...
— Snarleyyow • Captain Frederick Marryat
... the excited grandam. "But why so dead-alive? Once more the luck is yours! Play your knave! play Irby! He's just been here! He will return! He will propose this evening if you allow him! Let him do it! Let him! Mobile may fall any day! If you dilly-dally till those accursed Callenders get back, asking, for instance, for their—ha, ha!—their totally evaporated chest of plate—gr-r-r! Take him! He has just shown me his uncle's will—as he calls it: a staring forgery, but ...
— Kincaid's Battery • George W. Cable
... not concentrate her recollections, dared not dally with such distant delight,—twisted and tossed her hair into its coils, and once more opened the letter. Ray had not lived for three years under converging influences, years which are glowing wax beneath the seal of fresh impressions, years when one puts off or takes ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 75, January, 1864 • Various
... Socialists saw Church and State united against them, and both were therefore regarded with a common hatred. But no sooner does a serious difference arise between Church and State, than a portion of the Socialists begin immediately to dally with the former. [Footnote: 'Geschichte des Materialismus,' 2e Auflage, vol. ii. p. 538.] The experience of the last German elections illustrates Lange's position. Far nobler and truer to my mind than this fear of promoting Socialism by a scientific theory which the best and soberest heads ...
— Fragments of science, V. 1-2 • John Tyndall
... reinforced the stranger's trencher with what remained of the bacon and eggs, and saw him swallow a mouthful or two with apparent relish; but presently after began to dally with his knife and fork, like one whose appetite was satiated; and then took a long draught of the black jack, and handed his platter to the large mastiff dog, who, attracted by the smell of the dinner, had sat down before him for some time, licking his chops, and following with his ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott
... now was searching for the shot That laid MAGNANO on the spot, 630 Beheld the sturdy Squire aforesaid Preparing to climb up his horse side. He left his cure, and laying hold Upon his arms, with courage bold, Cry'd out, 'Tis now no time to dally, 635 The enemy begin to rally: Let us, that are unhurt and whole, Fall on, and happy man ...
— Hudibras • Samuel Butler
... stretch by bridge and road, radiating her lavish favors in every direction; look at the spreading suburbs that crowd beyond her gates, more beautiful than the parks and pleasure grounds of her less favored sisters. See where she sits, small but precious, her pretty feet in the blue waters that love to dally about them; her pretty head, in its brave gilt cap, as near the clouds as she could manage to get it: her arms full of whatever is rarest and dearest and best. For doesn't she hold the "Autocrat of the Breakfast Table" and Bunker Hill, Faneuil Hall, ...
— Donahoe's Magazine, Volume 15, No. 2, February 1886 • Various
... and arts, But left the business to the ladies' hearts, And when he found them in a proper train He thought all else superfluous and vain: But in that training he was deeply taught, And rarely fail'd of gaining all he sought; He knew how far directly on to go, How to recede and dally to and fro; How to make all the passions his allies, And, when he saw them in contention rise, To watch the wrought-up heart, and conquer by surprise. Our heroine fear'd him not; it was her part To make ...
— The Borough • George Crabbe |
