"Disport" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... to take its own way, with very little regard for the rule of the road. The American who drives, whatever may be his social station, admires the courage of the woman who rides, but he is firmly convinced that she does not understand horses, and gives her all the space available wherein to disport herself. ...
— In the Riding-School; Chats With Esmeralda • Theo. Stephenson Browne
... we had a good view of a daily Havana spectacle, the washing of the horses. This being by far the easiest and most expeditious way of cleaning the animals, they are driven daily to the sea in great numbers, those of one party being tied together; they disport themselves in the surge and their wet backs glisten in the sun. Their drivers, nearly naked, plunge in with them, and bring them safely back ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various
... modulated Sound From viewless Hybla brought, when Melodies Like Birds of Paradise on wings, that aye Disport in wild variety of hues, Murmur around ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... the city gates to be opened, went himself to meet King Marcobrun, took him by his white hands, led him into the marble palace, seated him at an oaken table spread with checkered tablecloths and sweetmeats, and they fell to eating and drinking and disport. ...
— The Russian Garland - being Russian Falk Tales • Various
... nod it the futile way peculiar to flowers. There was no earthly reason why Dick should not disport himself as he chose, except that he was called by Providence, which was Maisie, to assist Maisie in her work. And her work was the preparation of pictures that went sometimes to English provincial ...
— The Light That Failed • Rudyard Kipling
... strains should exist is an ultimate datum; justification cannot be required of them, but must be offered to each of them in turn by all that enters its particular orbit. There is no will but might find a world to disport itself in and to call good, and thereupon boast to have created that in which it found itself expressed. But such satisfaction has been denied to the majority; the equilibrium of things has at least postponed their day. Yet they are not ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana
... the year 1377, made by the citizens for the disport of the young prince Richard, son to the Black Prince, in the feast of Christmas, in this manner:—On the Sunday before Candlemas, in the night, one hundred and thirty citizens, disguised and well horsed, ...
— A Righte Merrie Christmasse - The Story of Christ-Tide • John Ashton
... doth also report that you did give to the daughter of the publican at whose house you do now abide, a ring of fine gold, and did also write to her a sonnet in praise of her eyebrows and her lips, and did otherwise wickedly disport ...
— Shakespeare's Insomnia, And the Causes Thereof • Franklin H. Head
... a grand procession that was not accompanied, or, rather, in great measure made up of, followers and onlookers. So in this life parade of ours, with its ever varying pageant and brilliant display, there are comparatively few who carry banners, who disport the epaulette, and the gold lace. And sometimes, we who help swell the ranks of those who watch and wait, grow discouraged, almost thinking that life is a failure because it holds no gala-day for us, nothing but sober tints and quiet duties. What chance for any one, ...
— A String of Amber Beads • Martha Everts Holden
... said he, "and for the better disport of the company, here is my fool. Hold up, Saxon Samson, the gates of ...
— Rewards and Fairies • Rudyard Kipling
... consulting his map, calculated that they were passing over the Uzaramo* country. The soil was thickly studded with cocoa-nut, papaw, and cotton-wood trees, above which the balloon seemed to disport itself like a bird. Joe found this splendid vegetation a matter of course, seeing that they were in Africa. Kennedy descried some hares and quails that asked nothing better than to get a good shot from his fowling-piece, but it would have been powder ...
— Five Weeks in a Balloon • Jules Verne
... soul, that often required to emerge from its deep reflections, unbend itself, and alternately disport or repose in utter self-abandonment. It dismissed thought, as it were, in order to become a child again; to deliver itself over to all the caprices of those myriad changeful fugitive impressions that course through the ...
— My Recollections of Lord Byron • Teresa Guiccioli
... create laughter, occasion laughter, raise laughter, excite laughter, produce laughter, convulse with laughter; set the table in a roar, be the death of one. recreate, solace, cheer, rejoice; please &c 829; interest; treat, regale. amuse oneself, game; play a game, play pranks, play tricks; sport, disport, toy, wanton, revel, junket, feast, carouse, banquet, make merry, drown care; drive dull care away; frolic, gambol, frisk, romp; caper; dance &c (leap) 309; keep up the ball; run a rig, sow one's wild oats, have one's fling, take one's pleasure; paint the town red [Slang]; see life; desipere ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... rough sleds, on went the round hoods, old hats, red cloaks, and moccasins, and away trudged the four younger Bassetts, to disport themselves in the snow, and try the ice down by the old mill, where the great wheel turned and splashed so merrily ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag VI - An Old-Fashioned Thanksgiving, Etc. • Louisa M. Alcott
... that these matters, with her household and secretarial work, filled up her days; he knew too well that whist accounted for her evenings. He did not know if there was any margin, any dim intellectual region, out of time, out of space, where Miss Tancred's soul was permitted to disport itself in freedom; she seemed to exist merely in order to supply certain deficiencies in the Colonel's nature. Mrs. Fazakerly had once remarked that Frida was "her father's right hand." It would have been truer to have said that she was right hand and left hand, and legs and ...
— The Return of the Prodigal • May Sinclair
... young noblemen had been tossed, much to the amusement of the queen and her ladies, the king cast his eyes on two young Florentine nobles who had lately arrived at Naples. They were with their tutor, and all three had been laughing heartily at the disport of the ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... name taken from the invented verb Asolare, "to disport in the open air") was published on the day of Browning's death. He died in Venice, and his body was brought to England, and buried in Westminster Abbey on the last day of the year. The Abbey was invisible in the fog, and, inside, dim yellow fog filled all the roof, ...
— An Introduction to the Study of Browning • Arthur Symons
... them, and particularly for attracting the boys with fruits and other little presents, they must draw them into their own vices. This is particularly so as these boys actually go upon the bank in the district of the infidel Sangleys, and there disport, and enjoy themselves; and they are usually naked, or, if dressed, they are almost the same as naked. It is very noticeable with these Sangley people that they intermix with any other people who are here, in a very singular fashion; for at once they intermarry with the women of ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, - Volume XIII., 1604-1605 • Ed. by Blair and Robertson
... Lady Eveline's person. Without this military attendance they could not in safety move even so far as the mills, where honest Wilkln Flammock, his warlike deeds forgotten, was occupied with his mechanical labours. But if a farther disport was intended, and the Lady of the Garde Doloureuse proposed to hunt or hawk for a few hours, her safety was not confided to a guard so feeble as the garrison of the castle might afford. It was ...
— The Betrothed • Sir Walter Scott
... she answered, looking up to smile absently at him. And she began to play a rakish little air which, composed by some rattle-brain at a cafe table, had lately skipped out of the Moulin Rouge to disport itself over Paris. She played it slowly, in the minor, with elfish pathos; while he leaned upon the piano, his eyes fixed upon her fingers, which bore few rings, none, he observed with an unreasonable pleasure, upon the third ...
— The Conquest of Canaan • Booth Tarkington
... Stadacona, on the spot where now is Quebec, must have noted the wide gap in the mountains which makes the Malbaie valley. Not far from Malbaie, he saw the so-called "porpoises," or white whales, (beluga, French, marsouin) that still disport themselves in great numbers in these waters, come puffing to the surface and writhe their whole length into view like miniature sea-serpents. They have heads, Cartier says, with no very great accuracy, "of the style of a greyhound," they are of spotless white and are found, he was told (incorrectly) ...
— A Canadian Manor and Its Seigneurs - The Story of a Hundred Years, 1761-1861 • George M. Wrong
... drafts, and at the end I'll have hoarded enough to buy an interest, or a ranch of my own. That's the theory. Actually, I shall probably take an amazing thirst into Bulgaroo about once a month, buy vile champagne at the Queen's Arms, and otherwise disport myself like a true sheepherder. The finis will not ...
— Shorty McCabe on the Job • Sewell Ford
... pictures are quite as truly part of the Human Comedy: because they represent man giving play to his soul—exercising his highest faculties. Nor does the realistic novelist in such efforts have the air of one who has left his true business in order to disport himself for once in an alien element. On the contrary, he seems absolutely at home: for the time, this is his only affair, ...
— Masters of the English Novel - A Study Of Principles And Personalities • Richard Burton
... experiences. The Highlands and Islands of Scotland are, of course, visited every summer by a great host of excursionists, who go thither to fish, play golf, lounge, climb hills, and otherwise picturesquely disport themselves. A few earnest devotees of science spend their holidays botanising in the glens, scanning the geological strata, looking for fossils, measuring the outlines of brochs and prehistoric forts, or collecting relics of Culdee churches. My journeys were undertaken ...
— Literary Tours in The Highlands and Islands of Scotland • Daniel Turner Holmes
... him with no occupation, and to deprive him of healthy exercise, so that no wonder he had grown lazy and selfish; but his native spirit was not entirely extinguished, and he assured me that a bare bone to growl over, and a little comfortable rain and mud to disport himself in like a dog, were still the greatest treats that could be offered to him. His temper had been farther soured by the spite and envy of dogs around him, who, less petted themselves, and not aware how little his petting contributed to his comfort, grudged him every thing that he possessed, ...
— Cat and Dog - Memoirs of Puss and the Captain • Julia Charlotte Maitland
... charms of a spangled fan against those of one that was merely painted—before he suddenly awoke to the realization that he was looking for something for Uncle Harold, and that Uncle Harold did not wear side combs, nor disport himself ...
— The Tangled Threads • Eleanor H. Porter
... it! What can be expected beyond the letter of their service from one who so neglects his duties? Did you not disport yourself with lewd women in the camp before my very eyes, setting at naught the well-known rules? Hands off the prisoner! This is your last day as praetorian and in Alexandria. As soon as the harbor is opened—to-morrow, ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... less interest than his friend in the study of steam, but usually accompanied him when he went over after school to disport himself in the engine-house, interview the stoker, or see if there was anything new in ...
— Jack and Jill • Louisa May Alcott
... soundness in the faith of the candidates before them. On this score, however, few indulged serious anxiety. Once the Hebraic shoals and snags were safely passed, both examiner and examined could disport themselves with a jaunty self-confidence born of a thorough acquaintance with the Shorter Catechism received during ...
— The Doctor - A Tale Of The Rockies • Ralph Connor
... introduction! The situation and gardens are good; it contains among other luxuries a drawing-room, with a delightful swimming-bath for ladies, and another for gentlemen. A mountain stream is turned into two large square reservoirs, where you can disport yourself under the shade of bananas and palm trees, while orange trees, daturas, poinsettias, and other plants, in full bloom, drop their fragrant flowers into the crystal water. There is also a nice little bathing-house, with a douche outside; and the general arrangements ...
— A Voyage in the 'Sunbeam' • Annie Allnut Brassey
... Horace; all these have been swept away to be replaced by the carefully constructed (? wire) bowers, the aviaries, the porticoes, the frightful circular edifice (tondo e il ricco edificio), a masterpiece of Palladian stucco work, in which Armida and Rinaldo, Acrasia and her Knight, drearily disport themselves. What has become of Calypso's island? of the orchards of Alcinous? What would the noble knights and ladies of Ariosto and Spenser think of them? What would they say, these romantic, dainty creatures, were ...
— Euphorion - Being Studies of the Antique and the Mediaeval in the - Renaissance - Vol. I • Vernon Lee
... officiating one term as justice of the peace, while by assiduous bootlicking we may, like Rienzi Miltiades Johnsing, obtain a lieutenant-colonelcy—or even a gigadier-brindleship—on the gilded staff of some 2 x 4 governor, and disport in all the glorious pomp and circumstance of war at inaugural balls or on mimic ...
— Volume 1 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann
... with an innocent laugh, "I think you ought to be. I had no end of trouble to find out where you were. It wasn't exactly the place for you to disport yourself in under the circumstances. If the general had caught you there making eyes at the goddess of the temple.... Oh, my word!... He hates to be bothered with complaints against his officers, you know. And it looked uncommonly ...
— The Point Of Honor - A Military Tale • Joseph Conrad
... interposed Bodlevski, "a propos! I expect to be a member of the Yacht Club this summer. Let me recommend to you a new field of action. They will disport themselves on the green water, and we on the green cloth! By the way, I forgot to speak of it—I bought a boat the other day, a mere rowboat. It is on the Fontauka Canal, at the Simeonovski bridge. We must come for ...
— The Continental Classics, Volume XVIII., Mystery Tales • Various
... were gigantic, but fear performed the miracle of adding a cubit to their stature. When the coward hears that 'there is a lion without,'—that is, in the open country,—he immediately concludes, 'I shall be slain in the streets,' where it is not usual for lions to disport themselves. ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers • Alexander Maclaren
... of vanity comes this way: They dance! they are mad women. Like madness is the glory of this life, As this pomp shows to a little oil and root. We make ourselves fools to disport ourselves; And spend our flatteries to drink those men Upon whose age we void it up again, With poisonous spite and envy. Who lives that's not depraved or depraves? Who dies that bears not one spurn ...
— The Life of Timon of Athens • William Shakespeare [Craig edition]
... fruit for those that are half domesticated; orchards abounding in old trees with knotholes, admirably fitted for summer homes; elms on which to hang the graceful pensile nests—"castles in air," as Burroughs calls them; meadows in which the lark, vesper sparrow, and bobolink can disport; and forests stretching up into the mountains, wherein the shyest birds can enjoy all the seclusion they desire, content to sing unheard, as the flowers around them bloom unseen, except by those who love them well enough to seek them ...
— Nature's Serial Story • E. P. Roe
... are we fallen? Save that it is more vulgar, it might be Nice, or the Riviera, or Interkalken, or any other of those towns of carnival whither the bad taste of the whole world comes to disport itself in the so-called fashionable seasons. But in these quarters, on the other hand, which belong to the foreigners and to the Egyptians rallied to the civilisation of the West, all is clean and dry, well cared for and well ...
— Egypt (La Mort De Philae) • Pierre Loti
... me go to my own house," bellowed Mr. Buxton, "and these gentlemen can have the empty house to disport themselves in till doomsday—or till her Grace looks into the matter"; and he made a motion to run down the steps, but his heart sank. Mr. Graves put out a deprecating hand and touched his arm; and Mr. Buxton very readily turned at ...
— By What Authority? • Robert Hugh Benson
... summer passes by, the winter days go by; the young lady still sits writing at the old mahogany desk, and smiling, perhaps, at her own fancies, and hiding them away with her papers at the sound of coming steps. Now, the modest papers, printed and reprinted, lie in every hand, the fancies disport themselves at their will in the wisest brains ...
— A Book of Sibyls - Miss Barbauld, Miss Edgeworth, Mrs Opie, Miss Austen • Anne Thackeray (Mrs. Richmond Ritchie)
... and bey, and a pure crystal stream flows through this valley between two hills covered with giant redwood trees, and rare orchids of the most curious shape and colour toss wantonly in the breeze on the tree and hilltops. Birds and fishes and reptiles disport themselves in the sunshine, and giant butterflies of the most marvellous colours flutter so bravely among the ferns and flowers. There are no tents here in our camp, but we are covered with the fragrant branches of the spicy pines and nutmeg trees. It is a ...
— An Anarchist Woman • Hutchins Hapgood
... disport ourselves in this pleasaunce without our comrade Launfal. It is not well to slight a prince as brave as he is courteous, and of a lineage prouder ...
— French Mediaeval Romances from the Lays of Marie de France • Marie de France
... hook-nosed and hawk-eyed, not so fair to look on as masterful and proud. She led a great grey ass betwixt two panniers, wherein she laded her marketings. But now she had done her chaffer, and was looking about her as if to note the folk for her disport; but when she came across a child, whether it were borne in arms or led by its kinswomen, or were going alone, as were some, she seemed more heedful of it, and eyed it more closely than ...
— The Water of the Wondrous Isles • William Morris
... new-fangled thinker don't inspire it with that fear, loathing, and disgust which the burgesses instinctively feel towards them. It is a sort of Red Indian Reservation planted in the midst of a vast horde of Poor Whites—colonials at that. Within its boundaries wild men disport themselves—often, it must be admitted, a little grossly, a little too flamboyantly; and when kindred spirits are born outside the pale it offers them some sort of refuge from the hatred which the Poor Whites, en ...
— Crome Yellow • Aldous Huxley
... his own immediate entertaining the revel now began—no lesser word describes it. If, before the departure of his dinner guests, Brown had experienced a slight feeling of fatigue, it disappeared with the pleasure of seeing his present company disport themselves. They were not in the least afraid of him—how should they be, when he had spent months in the winning of their confidence and affection by every clever wile known to the genuine boy lover? That they respected him was plainly shown by the fact ...
— The Brown Study • Grace S. Richmond
... caves I dwell not buried still From sight of Heaven. but often I resort To tops of Lebanon or Carmel hill, And there in liquid air myself disport, There Mars and Venus I behold at will! As bare as erst when Vulcan took them short, And how the rest roll, glide and move, I see, How their ...
— Jerusalem Delivered • Torquato Tasso
... has been a favorite field for cranks to disport themselves upon. Ritson's particular vanity was the past participle of verbs ending in e; e.g., perceiveed. Cf. Landor's notions of a ...
— A History of English Romanticism in the Eighteenth Century • Henry A. Beers
... and last extreme; Ordaining that thy small stock find no breach, Or to exceed thy tether's reach; But to live round, and close, and wisely true To thine own self, and known to few. Thus let thy rural sanctuary be Elysium to thy wife and thee; There to disport your selves with golden measure; For seldom use commends the pleasure. Live, and live blest; thrice happy pair; let breath, But lost to one, be th' other's death: And as there is one love, one faith, one troth, Be so one death, one grave to both; Till when, in such assurance live, ye may Nor ...
— A Selection From The Lyrical Poems Of Robert Herrick • Robert Herrick
... my Latin well this morning, cousin?" queried Francis. "Doth not my lady mother instruct me in the tent and cross-stitch each day? Besides doth not even the Queen's Majesty disport herself with the bow? 'Tis the fashion, ...
— In Doublet and Hose - A Story for Girls • Lucy Foster Madison
... longest to disport thyself on a long bridge and art prepared for the dance, but that fearest the trembling legs of the bridgelet builded on re-used shavings, lest supine it may lie stretched in the hollow swamp; may a good bridge take ...
— The Carmina of Caius Valerius Catullus • Caius Valerius Catullus
... but a blanket to hold her. It was only very occasionally, when Martin was in a propitious mood, that the horses were saddled for mere public amusement. Patty's heart was sore as she watched Priscilla and Conny, her two dearest friends, disport themselves regardless of ...
— Just Patty • Jean Webster
... the "carriage ladies and gentlemen" who disport themselves in Newport during the summer months, yachting and dancing through the short season, then flitting away to fresh fields and pastures new, realize that their daintily shod feet have been treading historic ...
— Worldly Ways and Byways • Eliot Gregory
... to ten her new breasts arise * And like diver's pearl with fair neck she hies: The damsel of twenty defies compare * 'Tis she whose disport we desire and prize: She of thirty hath healing on cheeks of her; * She's a pleasure, a plant whose sap never dries: If on her in the forties thou happily hap * She's best of her sex, hail to him with her lies! She of fifty (pray Allah ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... drop ne fille upon hire breste. In curteisie was set ful moche hire leste. Hire overlipp wypede sche so clene, That in hire cupp was no ferthing sene Of grec, whan sche dronken hadde hire draughte. Ful semly after hir mete sche raughte, And sikerly sche was of gret disport,{26} And ful plesaunt, and amyable of port, And peynede hir to countrefet cheere Of court, and ben estatlich of manere, And to ben holden digne of reverence. But for to speken of hir conscience, Sche was so charitable and so pitous, ...
— Six Centuries of English Poetry - Tennyson to Chaucer • James Baldwin
... barke, that had ben tossed with the waues of pensife and sorowfull cogitacions. His father had many kingdomes and Prouinces innumerable vnder his Empire. At whose handes Antiochus craued licence to visite some of them for his disport and recreation, of purpose to proue if he could auoide that vnseasonable loue, wherewith his hart was suppressed. But he was no soner out of his father's house, but his harte was vexed with greater tormentes then before, being depriued from ...
— The Palace of Pleasure, Volume 1 • William Painter
... to condemn, speak against, or "innocently to accuse the best and pleasantest thing (so [5154]Lucian calls it) that belongs to mortal men." You misinterpret, I condemn it not; I hold it notwithstanding an honest disport, a lawful recreation, if it be opportune, moderately and soberly used: I am of Plutarch's mind, [5155]"that which respects pleasure alone, honest recreation, or bodily exercise, ought not to be rejected and contemned:" I subscribe to [5156]Lucian, ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior
... festivals. He used to direct and superintend our games with the strictness that some parents do the studies of their children. He was very particular that we should play the old English games according to their original form; and consulted old books for precedent and authority for every 'merrie disport;' yet I assure you there never was pedantry so delightful. It was the policy of the good old gentleman to make his children feel that home was the happiest place in the world; and I value this delicious home-feeling as one of the choicest ...
— Old Christmas From the Sketch Book of Washington Irving • Washington Irving
... cafe or 'uitspanning.' This word means literally a place where the horse is taken out of the shafts, but it is also a restaurant with a garden attached to it, in which there are swings and seesaws, upon which the guests disport themselves during the afternoon, while in the evening a large hall in the building is arranged for the ball, for that is the conclusion of every 'Boeren bruiloft.' Very often the ball lasts till the cock-crowing, and then, if the 'Bruiloft houers' are Roman Catholics, it is no uncommon ...
— Dutch Life in Town and Country • P. M. Hough
... the delicious drippings from the new dam which has been built higher up to catch the water, and they smell the chickweed and the long grass that is growing up beside it; and absolutely refuse to disport themselves on the baked mud or to pretend to seek for worms where no worms are. And they leave the ancient mother quacking beside her pond and set out to seek for new pastures—perhaps to lose themselves upon ...
— Woman and Labour • Olive Schreiner
... would not put it into his head. No doubt you would take very good care of him, but I doubt whether your father would like the Bishop to hear of him—under the circumstances—going to disport himself at the dragoon mess. Besides, I don't think he will be well enough before Lent, and then of course ...
— The Three Brides • Charlotte M. Yonge
... blushing brows. Round their fair forms their mingling arms they fling, Meet with warm lip, and clasp with rustling wing.— —Hence plastic Nature, as Oblivion whelms 60 Her fading forms, repeoples all her realms; Soft Joys disport on purple plumes unfurl'd, And Love and Beauty rule the ...
— The Botanic Garden - A Poem in Two Parts. Part 1: The Economy of Vegetation • Erasmus Darwin
... of these books remind one of "a merry disport," which formerly took place in the hall of the Inner Temple. "At the conclusion of the ceremony, a huntsman came into the hall bearing a fox, a pursenet, and a cat, both bound at the end of a staff, attended by nine or ten couples ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 223, February 4, 1854 • Various
... be necessary to bring under review the minor luminaries of this period. Alfonso de Baena, a converted Jew, secretary of John the Second, compiled the fugitive pieces of more than fifty of these ancient troubadours into a cancionero, "for the disport and divertisement of his highness the king, when he should find himself too sorely oppressed with cares of state," a case we may imagine of no rare occurrence. The original manuscript of Baena, transcribed ...
— History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella V1 • William H. Prescott
... whetted to great curiosity, for 'twas whispered among them that after a short evening with the ladies, there were to appear a bevy of London-town dancing girls, who would give them a highly flavoured entertainment; and, as if Bacchus had prematurely begun to disport himself in brain and leg of each beau, he set about to ogle and sigh and wish and—pull a stray curl upon some maiden's forehead or touch her glowing cheek with cold fingers, and some began to illustrate the modus operandi of taking certain game, while ...
— Mistress Penwick • Dutton Payne
... people these tropic southern lands of Vera Cruz. Along the shores and in the woods and groves, all teeming with prolific life, which the hot sun and frequent rains induce, the giant cranes and brilliant-plumaged herons disport themselves, and gorgeous butterflies almost outshine the feathered denizens. From the tangled boughs the pendant boa-constrictor coils himself, and hissing serpents, basking crocodiles, and prowling jaguars people the untrodden wilds of jungle and lagoon. ...
— Mexico • Charles Reginald Enock
... roll of time, and burn More brightly fed with noble deeds. For souls Obedient to divine impulse, who urge Their force in steadfastness until the rocks Be hewn of their obstruction, till the swamp's Insatiability be choked and bound A hardened road for traffic and disport, Tall giant arches stride across the flood, Till tortured earth release its mysteries Which straight become slaves pliant unto man, Till labours at the desk at length result In law: who pondering on the stars ...
— My Beautiful Lady. Nelly Dale • Thomas Woolner
... the yard. Then catching those that could be caught, and driving those that had to be driven, they laid hold of a few of the green-headed ducks, variegated marsh-birds and coloured mandarin-ducks, and tying their wings they let them loose in the court to disport themselves. Closing the court Hsi Jen and her playmates stood together under the verandah and enjoyed the fun. Pao-y therefore found the entrance shut. He gave a rap at the door. But as every one inside was bent upon ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... great high seas. She is deep-bosomed and broad of thigh and stands as though storms and monsters had no terrors, as one accustomed to breast and conquer the waves. Water creatures supplement her, but she seems made on too goddess-like a scale to disport herself with them. It is interesting to contrast this nymph of the fathomless trough of the sea with the arch and playful Water Sprites of the froth and ripple, on the columns within the Court of Ages. ...
— The Sculpture and Mural Decorations of the Exposition • Stella G. S. Perry
... the words of Volsung e'en so must the matter be, And Siggeir the Goth and Signy on the morn shall sail the sea. But the feast sped on the fairer, and the more they waxed in disport And the glee that all men love, as they knew that the hours were short. Yet a boding heart bare Sigmund amid his singing and laughter; And somewhat Signy wotted of the deeds that were coming after; For the wisest ...
— The Story of Sigurd the Volsung and the Fall of the Niblungs • William Morris
... feats," said the maiden, "and I wish that I could thus disport myself." "I can do yet greater things," said Merlin, "and no one can devise anything which I cannot do, and I can also make it to endure forever." "Indeed," said the girl, "I would always love you if you could show me some such ...
— Tales of the Enchanted Islands of the Atlantic • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... compact engine for the furtherance of his own coarse ambitions, and who allowed his supporters such a measure of license as was needed to make their support continuing. A shameless new quarter suddenly obtruded itself with an ugly emphasis; unclassifiables, male and female, began to assert and disport themselves more daringly than dreamt of heretofore; and many good citizens who would crowd the town forward to a population of a million and to a status undeniably metropolitan came to stroll these tawdry, noisy new streets with a curiosity ...
— On the Stairs • Henry B. Fuller
... of living; his generalized truth saturates a medium of passion and of beauty. In the Prologue to Fifine at the Fair he compares the joy of poetry to a swimmer's joy in the sea: the vigour that such disport in sun and sea communicates is the vigour of joyous play; afterwards, if we please, we can ascertain the constituents of sea-water by a chemical analysis; but the analysis will not convey to us the sensations of the sunshine and the dancing brine. ...
— Robert Browning • Edward Dowden
... stay-at-homes and I would not affright them too sorely by the sight of mountains of water. Have no care for us save to bid some one supply us with food to take along. I know the way down to a smooth beach where we can disport ourselves." ...
— The Princess Pocahontas • Virginia Watson
... respects different from that customary with lords. Though he had only one leg of the flesh, and one of wood, he did not tumble down, though he brandished in the air the stick with which he was accustomed to disport himself. A lord would, I think, have got himself taken to bed. But the Sergeant did not appear to have any such intention. He had come out on to the road from the yard into which the back-door of the house ...
— An Old Man's Love • Anthony Trollope
... plenty of room for his imagination—the more space he has in which to disport himself, the more impressive he becomes. His strange poem, How I Walked Alone in the Jungles of Heaven, has the vasty sweep congenial to his powers. Simon Legree is as accurate an interpretation of the negro's conception ...
— The Advance of English Poetry in the Twentieth Century • William Lyon Phelps
... gown about his shoulders made him feel somewhat embarrassed as to the carriage of his arms, he stepped into a shop on the way and purchased a light cane, which he considered would greatly add to the effect of the cap and gown. Armed with this weapon, he proceeded to disport himself in the Christ Church meadows, and promenaded up and ...
— The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green • Cuthbert Bede
... Yet for disport we fawn and flatter both, To pass the time when nothing else can please, And train them to our lure with subtle oath, Till, weary of their wiles, ourselves we ease; And then we say when we their fancy try, To play with fools, O what ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 2 (of 4) • Various
... and daring not say aught to her brothers, she determined to go to the place appointed and see if the thing were true, as it had appeared to her in the dream. Accordingly, having leave to go somedele without the city for her disport, she betook herself thither,[241] as quickliest she might, in company of one who had been with them[242] otherwhiles and knew all her affairs; and there, clearing away the dead leaves from the place, she dug whereas herseemed the earth was less hard. She had not dug long before she ...
— The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio • Giovanni Boccaccio
... sage, Before a spirit, by his bidding brought, Waits his command in likeness of a page: He, by the magic writ constrained and taught, Hastes where the warriors face to face engage, In the cool shade — but not in cool disport — And steps between, and stops ...
— Orlando Furioso • Lodovico Ariosto
... wish to make this description, which if complete would fill a volume, any longer. In the middle ages, believe me, Dante would occupy the sacred heights: at the feet of the singer of Paradise all Italy would be spread out like a garden; Boccaccio and Ariosto would there disport themselves, and Tasso would find again the orange groves of Sorrento. Usually a corner would be reserved for each of the various nations, but the authors would take delight in leaving it, and in ...
— Literary and Philosophical Essays • Various
... patches of moss. At the foot of one hill a stream wends its way through the drooping boughs of the stunted shrubs that grow on its edges, and loses itself in a quiet pond where long-legged insects disport themselves on the leaves of the water-lilies. The sun beat down on us. The gnats rubbed their wings together and bent the slender ends of the reeds with the weight of their tiny bodies. We were alone in the tranquillity of ...
— Over Strand and Field • Gustave Flaubert
... hockey match banished less important topics, for Hannah was on edge with anxiety to be at her best, and disport herself sufficiently well to be included in after-team practices, while Darsie was scarcely less eager ...
— A College Girl • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... wasn't a white child, Miss P'tricia, I'd shore say you was onery. I's going be 'bliged to disport you to your pa, ...
— Patricia • Emilia Elliott
... down the car. After Gouda's wonderful glass, they would have found the Haarlem church disappointing, had it not been for the two or three redeeming features left in the cold, bare structure; the beautiful screen of open brass-work, with its base of dark wood, on which brightly-painted, mystic beasts disport themselves among the coats-of-arms of divers ancient towns; and ...
— The Chauffeur and the Chaperon • C. N. Williamson
... gotten her breath again, she asked him what next she should do for his disport. And he bade tell him of how she lived with those two women, her aunts, and what she did from day to day. So she sat down as on the other day, with her legs hanging down over the grisly flood, and told him full sweetly of her joys and her work and her troubles. And some of the tale was piteous ...
— The Sundering Flood • William Morris
... whole brood, two old and four young, used to disport themselves on the quilt of an old bedridden woman on Otterbourne Hill. It is the popular belief that robins kill their fathers in October, and the widow of a woodman declared that her husband had seen deadly battles, also that he had seen a white robin, ...
— John Keble's Parishes • Charlotte M Yonge
... from the tumult of the town [of Carpentras where Fabre was a master at the college]. Twenty yards in front of my house, some pleasure gardens have been opened, bearing a signboard inscribed, 'The Pagoda.' Here, on Sunday afternoons, the lads and lasses from the neighboring farms come to disport themselves in country dances. To attract custom and push the sale of refreshments, the proprietor of the ball ends the Sunday hop with a tombola. Two hours beforehand, he has the prizes carried along the public roads, preceded by fifes and drums. From a beribboned pole, borne ...
— The Life of the Fly - With Which are Interspersed Some Chapters of Autobiography • J. Henri Fabre
... a large menagerie of lions, elephants, leopards, and similar beasts of disport; he also kept for amusement fifteen or sixteen albinos; and so greedy was he of novelty, that even a cock of peculiar form or colour would have been forwarded by its ...
— Inquiries into Human Faculty and Its Development • Francis Galton
... scene shifts back to Kauai, and one stands with the poet looking down on a piece of ocean where the people are wont to disport themselves. (Maka-iwa, not far from Ka-ipu-ha'a, is said to be such a place.) Verses 12 to 19 in the Hawaiian (13 to 21 in the translation) describe ...
— Unwritten Literature of Hawaii - The Sacred Songs of the Hula • Nathaniel Bright Emerson
... this ship sail away from the island, he ordered the women out of the way, dressed up those young men who were still beardless in their clothes, headdresses, and shoes, gave them daggers, and ordered them to dance and disport themselves near the seashore until the enemy landed, and their ship was certain to be captured. So the Megarians, imagining them to be women, fell upon them, struggling which should first seize them, but they were cut off to a man by the Athenians, who at once sailed ...
— Plutarch's Lives, Volume I (of 4) • Plutarch
... may play and sing and dance in honour of our master's guest." So he did her bidding and the twain went into the room, the lad playing and the lass following. Then, making a low conge, they asked leave to perform and disport and play; and Ali Baba gave permission, saying, "Dance now and do your best that this our guest may be mirthful and merry." Quoth Khwajah Hasan, "O my lord, thou dost indeed provide much pleasant entertainment." Then the slave-boy Abdullah standing by began to strike the tambourine ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... came up spluttering. Netta, with a very little help from Gwen, got on much better, for she had been to the baths before, and had had some practice. Several of the girls were already good swimmers, and after showing their prowess, were allowed to disport themselves ...
— The Youngest Girl in the Fifth - A School Story • Angela Brazil
... suspicions have been aroused, let me set them at rest. The marriage was genuine. It was performed in good faith by a genuine alderman. The groom and the great Mr. Cullinan even went so far as to disport genuine and generous white boutonnieres. Daisy cried a little; the words that she had to say seemed so wonderful to her, a new revelation, as it were, of the kingdom and glory of love. But when she was promising ...
— IT and Other Stories • Gouverneur Morris
... to her new home, access would be denied them; for Professor Seeley, that stern custodian, has his answer ready for all such seekers. 'If you want recreation, you must find it in Poetry, particularly Lyrical Poetry. Try Shelley. We can no longer allow you to disport yourselves in the Fields of History as if they were a ...
— Obiter Dicta - Second Series • Augustine Birrell
... "Ill to abash folk of their mirth; prithee do not so; let us talk together for our disport of mighty kings ...
— The Story of the Volsungs, (Volsunga Saga) - With Excerpts from the Poetic Edda • Anonymous
... Disport yourselves bravely!" 'Twas gay beyond measure. In each breast awakens A wondrous new feeling, As though from the depths Of a bottomless gulf On the crest of a wave, 180 They've been borne to the surface To find there awaits them A feast ...
— Who Can Be Happy And Free In Russia? • Nicholas Nekrassov
... state wig, which had again come into the possession of the perruquier after the death of his lordship. The wig had been graciously lent by the barber to one Lawrence, belonging to the legal profession, but also an amateur actor. In this wig, we are told, he proposed to disport himself in the character of Shylock. The plaintiff could not get it back again, and brought the action for its recovery. The wig had been accidentally burnt, and the judge awarded the plaintiff the sum of L2 as a compensation for the loss ...
— At the Sign of the Barber's Pole - Studies In Hirsute History • William Andrews
... Then, too, in a Lily-bush, shall he find the green Snake again, and the fruit of his marriage with her shall be three daughters, which, to men, shall appear in the form of their mother. In the spring season these shall disport them in the dark Elder-bush, and sound with their lovely crystal voices. And then if, in that needy and mean age of inward obduracy, there shall be found a youth who understands their song; nay, if one of the little Snakes look ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries: - Masterpieces of German Literature Translated into English, Volume 5. • Various
... and the first pale primrose of the dawn showed beyond. A faint flush followed, and then it seemed as if the night sky slowly rolled itself up and was put away, leaving a floor of silver, deepening to lilac, for the first bright beam to disport itself upon. Then the sea smiled, and the weariness of it, back and forth, back and forth, passed into animation. Its smooth surface became diapered with light airs, and moved with a gentle roll. The sullen ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand
... quadrangle of an Oxford College. Not Age but Youth of centuries smiles from gray walls and aery pinnacles upon the joyous children of To-day. Youth, in a bright-haired, black-winged-butterfly swarm, streams out of every dark doorway, from the austere shade of study, to disport itself, two by two, or in larger eddying groups, upon the worn gravel, even venturously flits across the sacred green of the turf. There is an effervescence of life in the clear air, and the sun-steeped walls of stone are resonant with the cheerful noise of young voices. Here and there men ...
— The Invader - A Novel • Margaret L. Woods
... the ranger's experience had taught him that since the men he wanted had money in their pockets to burn gregarious impulse would drive them from the far silent places of the desert to the roulette and faro tables where the wolf and the lamb disport themselves together. ...
— Bucky O'Connor • William MacLeod Raine
... Elsmere, but Catherine did not much like to think about them. Their household teaching under Mrs. Elsmere and her old servant Martha—as great an original as herself—was so irregular, their religious training so extraordinary, the clothes in which they were allowed to disport themselves so scandalous to the sober taste of the rector's wife, that Catherine involuntarily regarded the little cottage on the hill as a spot of misrule in the general order of the parish. She would go in, say, at eleven o'clock in the morning, find her mother-in-law ...
— Robert Elsmere • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... the half- decayed trunks of former monarchs of the forest that filled its bed—a ditch covered with a superstratum of slimy, green water, lank weeds, and rank vegetation; and wherein, at flood time, urchin anglers could fish for eels and sticklebats, and, at ebb, the village ducks disport themselves ...
— She and I, Volume 1 • John Conroy Hutcheson
... fragments, and it was with a tearful and apologetic face that he said, "Talaam, Tahib," when I came home from office. A hasty inquiry resulted in Imam Din informing Muhammad Din that, by my singular favour, he was permitted to disport himself as he pleased. Whereat the child took heart and fell to tracing the ground-plan of an edifice which was to ...
— Short Stories and Selections for Use in the Secondary Schools • Emilie Kip Baker
... development which, like a huge wave, was to sweep over the land of the free and the home of the brave, overwhelming its native simplicity with the virtues, tastes, and vices of the other nations against which our forefathers barred the door. Palaces in all but the name stand where the buffalo was wont to disport himself, and where the American eagle in human form once flapped his wings and screamed most viciously in contempt of the effete civilization of the older world. Sons and daughters of the pioneers who bolted their dinners on the stroke ...
— The Opinions of a Philosopher • Robert Grant
... the Bois de Boulogne and the Champs Elysees, or to the gardens of Beaujon, and Tivoli—or to the yet more attractive magnificence of the palace and fountains of Versailles—where, in one or the other of these places, they carouse, or disport themselves—in promenades, ...
— A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume Two • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... smoke and soot all burnt, ought it not, among so many world-wide conquests, to have a hundred acres or so of free greenfield, with trees on it, conquered, for its little children to disport in; for its all-conquering workers to take a breath of twilight air in? You would say so! A willing Legislature could say so with effect. A willing Legislature could say very many things! And to whatsoever 'vested interest,' or suchlike, ...
— Past and Present - Thomas Carlyle's Collected Works, Vol. XIII. • Thomas Carlyle |
