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Gaudy   Listen
noun
Gaudy  n.  (pl. gaudies)  One of the large beads in the rosary at which the paternoster is recited. (Obs.)






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Gaudy" Quotes from Famous Books



... fallen. "The gaudy bubbling and remorseful day" had "crept into the bosom of the sea." From the cross-trees the look-out man had already been able to distinguish through the glass the faint distant glimmer of Scarthey beacon, when Captain Jack knocked for admittance at ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle

... give in exchange for his soul?" It is not the wealth, nor the magnificence of life which will make your home happy; these are but the outward and fleeting ornaments of the world, and are too often the gaudy drapery in which demon guilt ...
— The Christian Home • Samuel Philips

... livid scar, that extended from the corner of his mouth to his ear. Notwithstanding this, the fellow was a great dandy, spending many hours each day in greasing and arranging his long coarse hair, which he ornamented with plates of silver, bits of gaudy-colored cloth, bright feathers, and tinsel. Every hair was scrupulously plucked from his brows and eyelashes, and the lids of his eyes were painted a bright vermilion, giving to his face the expression of a demon rather than ...
— The Young Trail Hunters • Samuel Woodworth Cozzens

... gaunt forms of the hollyhocks That shower the seeds from out their withered purses; Here were the pinks; there the nasturtium nurses The last of colour in her gaudy smocks; The ruins yonder Show but a vestige of the flaming phlox; The poppies on ...
— Lundy's Lane and Other Poems • Duncan Campbell Scott

... lace-makers. The women sit in the streets by groups of five or six; and the noise of the bobbins is audible from one group to another. Now and then you will hear one woman clattering off prayers for the edification of the others at their work. They wear gaudy shawls, white caps with a gay ribbon about the head, and sometimes a black felt brigand hat above the cap; and so they give the street colour and brightness and a foreign air. A while ago, when England largely supplied herself from this district with the lace called ...
— Essays of Travel • Robert Louis Stevenson

... caparisons of their fellow-brutes, and eyed with jealousy their glittering harness. In imitation of this finery, they were fond of thrums of many-colored threads; and I saw one creature, who supported the squalid rag that wrapped his waist by a suspender of gaudy worsted, which he turned every moment to look at on his naked shoulder. The greater number, however, were as unconscious of any covering for use or ornament, as ...
— An Appeal in Favor of that Class of Americans Called Africans • Lydia Maria Child

... mused aloud. Berthe struck her pony in a tremor of fright. The American was riding ahead. "Fire and sword," Jacqueline went on, and her voice lowered to intense scorn, "they make the final tableau, but—it's gaudy, ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle

... sound of a great city's distractions and with blissful unconcern of them all, partaking of a hearty lunch of insects that infest the leaves before one's eyes, one counts the bird less rare and shy than one has been taught to consider it. Whoever looks for a warbler with gaudy yellow wings will not find the golden-winged variety. His wings have golden patches only, and while these are distinguishing marks, they are scarcely prominent enough features to have given the bird the rather misleading name he bears. But, then, ...
— Bird Neighbors • Neltje Blanchan

... of from thirty to fifty per cent, even more, in wages, he suddenly began to revel in a wealth that he never dreamed was possible. The more he made the more he spent. He squandered his financial substance on fine cigars, expensive clothes, and excessive drinks, while his wife bedecked herself in gaudy finery and installed pianos or phonographs in her house. No one thought ...
— The War After the War • Isaac Frederick Marcosson

... hands for use in skinning up the tree, and one hand for scaring off the mother bird and one hand for stealing the eggs. And for hanging on behind wagons the combination positively could not be beaten. Then there would be the gaudy conspicuousness of going around with four arms weaving in and out in a kind of spidery effect while less favored boys were forced to content themselves with just an ordinary and insufficient pair. Really, there was only one drawback to the contemplation of this scheme—there'd ...
— Cobb's Anatomy • Irvin S. Cobb

... a great sensation in its time and is still the best representative of the old-time gaudy red-and-yellow garden gladiolus, or corn flag. It was eagerly welcomed by breeders of the day, among others the accomplished French hybridizer, Mons. Souchet, of Fontainebleu, who really laid the ...
— The Gladiolus - A Practical Treatise on the Culture of the Gladiolus (2nd Edition) • Matthew Crawford

... the winter wild While the heaven-born child All meanly wrapt in the rude manger lies— Nature, in awe to Him, Had doffed her gaudy trim, With her great Master so to sympathize; It was no season then for her To wanton with ...
— The World's Best Poetry Volume IV. • Bliss Carman

... frozen and the hedgerows clustered with ice. But at mid-day there was spring in the air. In the courtyard of the hospital, convalescents sat on the benches and watched for robins. The fountain, which had frozen out, was being repaired. Here and there on ward window-sills tulips opened their gaudy petals ...
— K • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... their young leaves and their blossoms, their sunshine and their dew, their song of the chaffinch and their rapturous music of the thrush. Appreciation is heightened by contrast; and the buttercup—England's gift to her little children—is pronounced far brighter than the "gaudy melon-flower" which the exiled Englishman has at this ...
— A Handbook to the Works of Browning (6th ed.) • Mrs. Sutherland Orr

... tournament for on three sides of the meadow of battle scaffolds had been built and rows of seats had been placed. These were covered over with tapestries and hangings of divers colors—some of figured and some of plain weaving—so that the green and level meadow-land was hung all about with these gay and gaudy colors. ...
— The Story of the Champions of the Round Table • Howard Pyle

... that is dainty, nice, and spare, Who never knew what belong'd to good housekeeping, or care, Who buyes gaudy-color'd fans to play with wanton air, And seven or eight different dressings of other women's hair; Like ...
— English Songs and Ballads • Various

... fast as I obtained it, and had realised a considerable sum. I could not help comparing myself to a chrysalis previous to its transformation. I had before been a caterpillar, I was now all ready to burst my confinement, and flit about as a gaudy butterfly. Another week I continued my prudent conduct, at the end of which I was admitted to my superior, in whose hands I placed a sum of money which I could very conveniently spare, and received his benediction and ...
— The Pacha of Many Tales • Frederick Marryat

... in the height of our jubilant self-gratulation, some sweet and gracious figure, full of heavenly wisdom, could have twitched the gaudy curtain aside for a moment and shown us other things than these; who could have assured us that we all, however stupid and dreary and awkward and indolent, however vexed with low dreams and ugly temptations, yet had our share and place in the rich inheritance of life; and ...
— At Large • Arthur Christopher Benson

... wherever that foe was met, he seemed to reel before the mailed hand that buffeted his front. All frippery and decoration had long been stripped from the army. The fingers of war—real war—had torn off the gaudy trappings; and the grim lips had muttered, "What I want is hard muscle, and the brave heart—not tinsel!" The bands were seldom heard—the musicians were tending the wounded. The drums had ceased their jovial rattle, and were chiefly used in the ...
— Mohun, or, The Last Days of Lee • John Esten Cooke

... She was dressed in black, with a good deal of lace about her; and on her ungloved hand Lady Caroline's keen sight enabled her to distinguish some very handsome diamond rings. The effect of the costume was a little spoiled by a large gaudy fan, of violent rainbow hues, which hung at her side; and perhaps it was this article of adornment which decided Lady Caroline in her opinion of the woman's social status. But about the man she was equally positive in a different way. He was a ...
— A True Friend - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant

... different. He was a desperado, one of the dashing, reckless kind—more famous along the Pecos and Rio Grande than more really desperate men. His attire proclaimed a vanity seldom seen in any Westerner except of that unusual brand, yet it was neither gaudy ...
— The Rustlers of Pecos County • Zane Grey

... attraction for him. The formal black or brown derby for winter and the seasonable straw hat for summer seemed necessary to tone down the frivolity of his neckties, which were chosen with a cowboy's gaudy taste. To the day of his death Field delighted to present neckties, generally of the made-up variety, to his friends, which, it is needless to say, they never failed to accept and seldom wore. Often in the afternoon as it neared two o'clock he would stick his head above ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson

... moment a thin, tense-faced Hebrew girl of eighteen or nineteen came rushing in, carrying a wire basket full of typewritten sheets. She was as gaunt as a plucked spring chicken, and her cheap, gaudy clothes might have been thrown on her. She looked as if she were running to catch a train and in mortal dread of missing it. While Miss Devine examined the pages in the basket, Becky stood with her shoulders drawn up and her elbows drawn in, apparently trying to hide herself ...
— A Collection of Stories, Reviews and Essays • Willa Cather

... gravitate to the lower levels. If his spirit is not attuned to majestic harmonies, he will drift down to association with his own kind. If he cannot thrill with pleasure at the beauty and fragrance of the lily of the valley, he will seek out the gaudy sunflower. If his spirit cannot rise to the plane of Shakespeare and Victor Hugo, he will roam into fields that are less fruitful. The spirit that is rightly attuned lifts him away from the sordid into the realms of the chaste and the glorified; away from the coarse and ugly into the realm of things ...
— The Vitalized School • Francis B. Pearson

... who would exchange the rapture of such a reflexion for all the gaudy tinsel which the world ...
— Charlotte Temple • Susanna Rowson

... sense, and fond of an equable life. He had means, and often, if not always, the proper leisure to live well. And by living well we mean, not that he indulged in a greedy enjoyment of the good things of this life, nor yet in a profuse and gaudy display, but that, being a heathen, he lived as an upright heathen lawyer, magistrate, statesman and millionaire ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII. No. 31. October, 1873. • Various

... doubly sweet to hold All gay and gleamy to the campfire blaze. The evening sky was sinister and cold; The willows shivered, wanly lay the snow; The uncommiserating land, so old, So worn, so grey, so niggard in its woe, Peered through its ragged shroud. The lone man sighed, Poured back the gaudy dust into its poke, Gazed at the seething river listless-eyed, Loaded his corn-cob pipe as if to smoke; Then crushed with weariness and hardship crept Into his ragged robe, ...
— Rhymes of a Rolling Stone • Robert W. Service

... and the Andhakas. At the mountain-festival of the Bhojas, the Vrishnis and the Andhakas, the heroes of those tribes began to give away much wealth unto Brahmanas by thousands. The region around that hill, O king was adorned with many a mansion decked with gems and many an artificial tree of gaudy hue. The musicians struck up in concert and the dancers began to dance and the vocalists to sing. And the youth of the Vrishni race, endued with great energy, adorned with every ornament, and riding in their ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli

... they lie in deep and easy water, but as the season advances, they draw into the great rough streams, taking up their stations where they are likely to be least observed. But there the wily wand of the practiced angler casts its gaudy lure, and "Kinmont Willie," "Michael Scott," or "The Lady of Mertoun," (three killing flies,) darting deceitfully within their view, a sudden lounge is made—sometimes scarcely visible by outward signs—as often accompanied by a watery heave, and a flash like that of an aurora ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine—Vol. 54, No. 333, July 1843 • Various

... to his house once," said Ransome—"had to. A lame Indian in a suit of gaudy red-and-white stripes opened the door. I knew that striped canvas. It was the awnings of the old Lily Grant, and I saw along the seams the smoke-marks of the fire that had burnt her innards out.... Then the Indian opened the jalousies with a hand ...
— Master Tales of Mystery, Volume 3 • Collected and Arranged by Francis J. Reynolds

... silently, each busy with his own thoughts. And behind the view wall of Alexander's apartment Kardon's brilliant yellow sun sank slowly toward the horizon, filling the sky with flaming colors of red and gold, rimmed by the blues and purples of approaching night. The sunset was gaudy and blatant, Kennon thought with mild distaste, unlike the restful day-end displays of ...
— The Lani People • J. F. Bone

... known the pomps of state, (For things unknown, 'tis ignorance to condemn;) And after having viewed the gaudy bait, Can boldly say, the trifle I contemn; With such a one contented could I live, Contented could ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell

... of the harvest, a host of customs have been kept up from time immemorial, which have been duly noticed by Brand, while towards the close of the month we are reminded of St. Bartholomew's Day by the gaudy sunflower, which has been nicknamed St. Bartholomew's star, the term "star" having been often used "as an emblematical representation of brilliant virtues or any sign of admiration." It is, too, suggested by Archdeacon Hare that the filbert may owe its name to St. Philbert, whose festival was ...
— The Folk-lore of Plants • T. F. Thiselton-Dyer

... made so wretched, scorn'd a Thing. How little cause has mankind to be proud Of Noble Birth, the Idol of the Crowd! Have I abroad in Battels Honour won To be at home dishonourably undone? Mark'd with a Star and Garter, and made fine With all those gaudy Trifles once call'd mine, Your Hobby-Horses [1] and your Joys of State, And now become the Object of your Hate; But, d———'ee, Sir, I'll be Legitimate. I was your Darling, but against your Will, And know that I will be the Peoples ...
— Quaint Gleanings from Ancient Poetry • Edmund Goldsmid

... at work farther down the gully, she kept a sort of sly grog-shop, and passed the day in selling and drinking spirits, swearing, and smoking a short tobacco-pipe at the door of her tent. She was a most repulsive looking object. A dirty gaudy-coloured dress hung unfastened about her shoulders, coarse black hair unbrushed, uncombed, dangled about her face, over which her evil habits had spread a genuine bacchanalian glow, whilst in a loud masculine voice she uttered ...
— A Lady's Visit to the Gold Diggings of Australia in 1852-53. • Mrs. Charles (Ellen) Clacey

... spectacle, for in promiscuous and gay confusion were seen the splendid apparel of the noble, and the modest garb of the peasant; the shining armour and waving plumes of the Christian warrior, and the gaudy fantastic habiliments of the Moslem. With them appeared the solemn and lugubrious vestments of the ecclesiastical dignitaries, and the coarse habit and ...
— Gomez Arias - The Moors of the Alpujarras, A Spanish Historical Romance. • Joaquin Telesforo de Trueba y Cosio

... noticed that "Cards" was too absorbed by the way that Dune was "taking it" to "take it" himself consciously at all. Olva's aloof surveying of the world about him, as a man on a hill surveys the town in the valley, made of "Cards'" last year and a half a gaudy and noisy thing. He had thought that his attitude had been nicely adjusted, but now he saw that there were still heights to be reached—perhaps in this welcome that he was giving to Dune's success ...
— The Prelude to Adventure • Hugh Walpole

... do. There is more than enough wealth spent in the churches in this city, for useless, gaudy display, and in trying to get ahead of some other denomination, than would be needed to clothe every naked child in warmth to-night. You claim to be God's stewards, but spend his goods on yourselves, while Christ, in the person of that boy in the cemetery, is crying for food and clothing. ...
— That Printer of Udell's • Harold Bell Wright

... A gaudy dress and gentle air May slightly touch the heart; But it's Innocence and Modesty ...
— Stories of Authors, British and American • Edwin Watts Chubb

... nothing remained of the habiliments I possessed only the day before—even my portmanteau had disappeared. After a most diligent search, I discovered on a chair in a corner of the room, a small bundle tied up in a handkerchief, on opening which I perceived a new suit of livery of the most gaudy and showy description and lace; of which colour was also the coat, which had a standing collar and huge cuffs, deeply ornamented with worked button holes and large buttons. As I turned the things over, ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Vol. 2 • Charles James Lever

... which pass rapidly before him, and from them impresses on his fancy the germ of many a future picture; the susceptible youth opens his heart to every elevating feeling; age becomes young again in recollection; even childhood sits with anxious expectation before the gaudy curtain, which is soon to be drawn up with its rustling sound, and to display to it so many unknown wonders: all alike are diverted, all exhilarated, and all feel themselves for a time raised above the daily cares, the troubles, and the sorrows of life. As the drama, with the arts which are ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel

... A tunnel about 100 feet long passed under the noble terrace, reaching from Knoyle to Fonthill Bishop, at least three miles in length; the tunnel was formed to keep the grounds private. The beech trees, now arrayed in gaudy autumnal tints, seen through this archway have a lovely effect. Emerging from the tunnel, the famous wall, seven miles long, was just in front. To the left you trace the terrace, on a charming elevation, leading to Fonthill Gardens, and ...
— Recollections of the late William Beckford - of Fonthill, Wilts and Lansdown, Bath • Henry Venn Lansdown

... limpid fluid into the vegetable vases at the extremity of its leaves. The Orchideae suspend their pendulous flowers from the angles of branches, whilst the bare roots and the lower part of the stem are occasionally covered with fungi of the most gaudy colours, bright red, yellow, ...
— Ceylon; an Account of the Island Physical, Historical, and • James Emerson Tennent

... people denied it, I suspect that they make a practice of following slave caravans and cutting off the sticks from those who fall out in the march, and thus stealing them. By selling them again they get the quantities of cloth we see. Some asked for gaudy prints, of which we had none, because we knew that the general taste of the Africans of the Interior is for strength rather than ...
— The Last Journals of David Livingstone, in Central Africa, from 1865 to His Death, Volume I (of 2), 1866-1868 • David Livingstone

... nor a frill, nor a silken gown, nor a flashy waist with aurora borealis sleeves. There was not a curl paper, nor even a threat of crinoline. Raiment was an after thought, the mask of a tainted soul, born of original sin. Beauty was unmarred by gaudy rags; Eve was dressed in sunshine, Adam ...
— Gov. Bob. Taylor's Tales • Robert L. Taylor

... bastard of great Mercury, Got on Thalia when she was asleep: My gaudy grandsire, great Apollo hight,[113] Born was, I hear, but that my luck was ill, To all the land upon the ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. IX • Various

... young porters' in severe cocked hats and formidable batons, into a broad hall,—threw off our furred boots and cloaks, ascended a carpeted marble staircase, in every angle of which stood a statuesque footman in gaudy coat and unblemished unmentionables, and reached a broad landing upon the top thronged as usual with servants. Thence we passed through an antechamber into a long, high, brilliantly lighted, saffron-papered room, in which a dozen card-tables were arranged, and thence into the ...
— Memoir of John Lothrop Motley, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

... early breakfast, I set off in the carriage with Caroline in charge, and before noon, we arrived at her father's house. The servants dressed in very gaudy liveries, ushered us into the library, where we found her father and mother waiting to receive her. A first glance satisfied me that they were swelled with pride at the change in their fortunes. Caroline ...
— Valerie • Frederick Marryat

... brightness on the Sabbath. Her lamp was brimming with oil against the judgment day, and she was as one divinely appointed to be the chastener of the unrighteous. So, at least, Honora beheld her. Her attire was rich but not gaudy, and had the air of proclaiming the prosperity of Israel Simpson alone as its unimpeachable source: her nose was long, her lip slightly marked by a masculine and masterful emblem, and her eyes protruded in such a manner as to give the impression of ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... stooped to add the gaudy-labeled cans to his pack that Daddy Dunnigan, of the twisted leg, volunteered the bit of advice that ...
— The Promise - A Tale of the Great Northwest • James B. Hendryx

... vain deluding Joys, ............The brood of Folly without father bred! How little you bested ............Or fill the fixed mind with all your toys! Dwell in some idle brain, ............And fancies fond with gaudy shapes possess, As thick and numberless ............As the gay motes that people the sun-beams, Or likest hovering dreams, ............The fickle pensioners of Morpheus' train. But, hail! thou Goddess sage and holy! Hail, divinest Melancholy! ...
— L'Allegro, Il Penseroso, Comus, and Lycidas • John Milton

... found him on a chair drying himself by detachments. Already his upper man had been rubbed by Pierre, and clothed with a shirt, vest and velveteen coat from his wardrobe. Now he was polishing his nether extremities with a towel, preparatory to adding a pair of gaudy striped trousers to his borrowed gear. Striding up to him with a ferocious air, the lawyer presented the smoking glass, exclaiming: "Drink this down, Wilks, or I'll kill you ...
— Two Knapsacks - A Novel of Canadian Summer Life • John Campbell

... curses of posterity from being heaped upon your memories. If you, with united zeal and fortitude, oppose the torrent of oppression; if you feel the true fire of patriotism burning in your breasts; if you, from your souls, despise the most gaudy dress which slavery can wear; if you really prefer the lonely cottage, while blessed with liberty, to gilded palaces, surrounded with the ensigns of slavery you may have the fullest assurance that tyranny with her whole accursed train, will hide her hideous head in ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick

... certainly mixed, some very beautiful things rubbing shoulders with modern specimens of clumsy early Victorian furniture. A room at the back was given up to the Delft china, but even this was spoilt by ordinary yellow arabesque wall-paper, on which were hung the rare plates and dishes, and by some gaudy window curtains, evidently recently added. The collection itself, made by Mrs. Koopman at very moderate prices, before experts bought up all the Dutch relics, was then supposed to be of great value. Our hostess conversed in good English with a foreign accent, and was evidently a person of much ...
— South African Memories - Social, Warlike & Sporting From Diaries Written At The Time • Lady Sarah Wilson

... memoirs of a friend of Scanderbeg, which would introduce me to the man, the time, and the place. In the old and national history of Marinus Barletius, a priest of Scodra, (de Vita. Moribus, et Rebus gestis Georgii Castrioti, &c. libri xiii. p. 367. Argentorat. 1537, in fol.,) his gaudy and cumbersome robes are stuck with many false jewels. See likewise Chalcondyles, l vii. p. 185, l. ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 6 • Edward Gibbon

... the moss-pink, and the grape-hyacinth may sometimes be seen growing in country fields and byways. The homely and cheerful blossoms of the orange-tawny ephemeral lily, and the spotted tiger-lily, whose gaudy colors glow with the warmth of far Cathay—their early home—now make gay many of our roadsides and crowd upon the sweet cinnamon roses of our grandmothers, which also are undaunted ...
— Home Life in Colonial Days • Alice Morse Earle

... every feature in the landscape, the deeper and deepening tint of the glowing sky, the roseate hue of the mountain-peaks as they stood out against the cloudless orient, and the rich emerald shades of the woods sparkling with fruit. The fragrant rose and the chaste lily, the blushing peony and the gaudy tulip, and all the choicest flowers of that delicious clime, expanded into renewed loveliness to greet the sun: and the citron and the orange, the melon and the grape, the pomegranate and the date drank in the yellow light ...
— Wagner, the Wehr-Wolf • George W. M. Reynolds

... jewellery be of the best, but the least gaudy description, and wear it very sparingly. A set of good studs, a gold watch and guard, and one handsome ring, are as many ornaments as a gentleman can wear with propriety. In the morning let your ring be a seal ring, with your ...
— Routledge's Manual of Etiquette • George Routledge

... plants as chrysanthemums, auriculas, geraniums, and many others, to be exposed to the influence of cold, frosty nights, as when the "fell destroyer" commences to exert its power all plants touched by it rapidly decay. Gladioli will now be clothed in the full glory of their gaudy, but handsome dress; they are comparatively easy to manage in well-drained spots, and being such continuous bloomers, at least three or four or even half a dozen should be in every small garden. In winter they must be covered by about six inches of litter; but in cold and ...
— Little Folks (Septemeber 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various

... looking from afar at these and a hundred similar things, lo! there came by us a gaudy, strapping quean of arrogant mien, and after whom a hundred eyes were turned; some made obeisance, as if in worship of her, a few put something in her hand. I could not make out what she was, and so I enquired. "Oh," said my friend, "she is one whose entire dowry is on show, ...
— The Visions of the Sleeping Bard • Ellis Wynne

... poet of nature, the daisy seems perfectly intelligible. Scattered throughout the lowly places, with meekness it seems to shed beauty over its surroundings, and compensate for gaudy vesture by cheerful contentment. Wordsworth calls the daisy "the poet's darling," "a nun demure," "a little Cyclops," "an unassuming commonplace of nature," and sums up its excellences in a verse which may fitly conclude ...
— The Aldine, Vol. 5, No. 1., January, 1872 - A Typographic Art Journal • Various

... examining every thicket of bushes to see if it concealed an enemy, we made but slow progress. Yet trusting more to the dog than to ourselves, we at length came in sight of the scene of our former exploits. All was quiet and still in the vicinity. Not a twig moved, unless displaced by a gaudy-colored parrot, too lazy, under the withering influence of ...
— The Gold Hunter's Adventures - Or, Life in Australia • William H. Thomes

... lean against the mountain for support. Stains of travel were on her dress; lines of fatigue and pain, and traces of burning passionate tears, were on her face; her black hair flowed from beneath her gaudy bonnet; and, shamed out of his brutality, Rand placed his strong arm round her waist, and half carrying, half supporting her, began the ascent. Her head dropped wearily on his shoulder; her arm encircled his neck; her hair, as if caressingly, lay across his breast and hands; her grateful ...
— The Twins of Table Mountain and Other Stories • Bret Harte

... voyageur when he put this question, and the voyageur gave a broad grin as he replied in the affirmative, while Antoine looked a little confused. He did not care much, however, for jesting. So, after getting one or two more articles—not forgetting half-a-dozen clay pipes, and a few yards of gaudy calico, which called forth from Peter a second reference to Annette—he bundled up his goods, and made ...
— The Young Fur Traders • R.M. Ballantyne

... his crimson skirts, and looking with exceeding kindness and frankness on the other two tenants of the room. "You seem to like my dressing-gown, sir," he said to Mr. Tatham. "A pretty thing, isn't it? Neat, but not in the least gaudy. And how do you do, Major Pendennis, sir, and how does ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray

... of a glorious day. The luggage was piled on the hotel omnibus. We took an open cab and rattled through the narrow flag-paved streets of the harbour quarter of the town. As we emerged into a more spacious thoroughfare, suddenly from a gaudy column at the corner flared the name of Ras Fendihook. I caught the heading of the affiche: "Music-Hall-Eldorado." Part of the mystery was solved. Jaffery had been right in his deduction that he had left London on a professional engagement; but we had not thought of an engagement ...
— Jaffery • William J. Locke

... of organic unities to accumulate when once they are formed is absolutely all the truth I can distill from Spencer's unwieldy account of evolution. It makes a much less gaudy and chromatic picture, but what there is of ...
— Memories and Studies • William James

... blue vitriol, both very poisonous, are often used on grape vines before the grapes are formed, and very gaudy vines they are for a little while after this bright poison has been ...
— The Insect Folk • Margaret Warner Morley

... the time would come when they would enjoy them as freely as anyone. They should not be impatient to advance. Prejudice could not be overcome in a short period. He said the best way to overcome all prejudice was by elevating themselves; but not by gaudy extravagance, groans, abuse, war, or tumult of war. They had the same right to become lawyers, doctors, soldiers and heroes as the ...
— Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet - An Autobiography. • John Sherman

... to copy Scripture maps, and draw small illustrations of any Biblical scene that occurred in the lesson of the day. I have a book full of his childish fancies now, all elaborately colored on week-days—"Joseph and his Brethren" in gaudy turbans, and wonderfully inexpressive countenances, reminding me of Flurry's dolls; the queen of Sheba, coming before Solomon, in a marvelous green tiara and yellow garments; a headless Goliath, expressed with a painful degree of detail, more fit for the ...
— Esther - A Book for Girls • Rosa Nouchette Carey

... the dreary sala, with the gaudy painted ceiling, the bare dirty floor, the innumerable rattling doors and windows! Ellinor was submissive and patient in demeanour, because so sick and despairing at heart. Her maid was ten times ...
— A Dark Night's Work • Elizabeth Gaskell

... jumping over ditches where they were the broadest, and clapping her hands and shouting to frighten away phlegmatical crows. It was not long, however, before she gave up these outbreaks, and turned her mind to a much sedater course; and then, whenever a stiff-necked millifolium or gaudy hip came in her way, she carefully broke it off, and preserved it in her apron, for the use of the family. Henrik ran back every now and then to the wicker-carriage, in order to kiss "the baby," and give her the very least flowers he ...
— The Home • Fredrika Bremer

... left the cottage with a small pile of books, disinterred from the depths of the box which contained all her belongings—cheap books in gaudy covers of red, blue, and green cloth, lavishly gilded without, execrably printed within: The Wide, Wide World; Caspar; Poor John, or Nature's Gentleman; The Parents' Assistant. Her system of education recognised merit, but rewarded ...
— Shining Ferry • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... sweetheart," he cried, "and the rose you wear on your heart and—and all these rings that mar your sweet, white hand with their gaudy reds and blues. Leave only mine to prove ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905 • Various

... was large, deep-bosomed, and comely after her kind, and in her careless gestures there was something of the fine fervour of the artist. She sang boldly, her full body rocking from side to side, her bared arms outstretched, her long throat swelling like a bird's above the gaudy handkerchief upon her breast. ...
— The Battle Ground • Ellen Glasgow

... sizes, and Two Arrows admitted to himself that anything so very bright and pretty must have special effectiveness. Any of those spoons was brilliant enough to have been worn in the hat of a great chief, but the doubt remaining was as to what the trout would think of them. The gaudy assortment of artificial flies Two Arrows quite turned up his nose at. The fish of the western mountains were not in the habit of biting at such things, and could not be taught to do so. As to the hooks, however, large and small, anybody could see their superiority ...
— Two Arrows - A Story of Red and White • William O. Stoddard

... your magazine except that there are not enough stories in each issue. The uneven edges are just fine, for it makes the pages easier to turn. The covers are not too gaudy. The covers should depict a thrilling incident in ...
— Astounding Stories, May, 1931 • Various

... beams from under archly lifted brows, and said gravely, "Don't form yourself on her, Rebecca; clover blossoms that grow in the fields beside Sunnybrook mustn't be tied in the same bouquet with gaudy sunflowers; they are too sweet and fragrant ...
— Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm • Kate Douglas Wiggin

... twice over, Lest you should think he never could recapture 15 The first fine careless rapture! And though the fields look rough with hoary dew, All will be gay when noontide wakes anew The buttercups, the little children's dower —Far brighter than this gaudy melon-flower! 20 ...
— Selections from the Poems and Plays of Robert Browning • Robert Browning

... now from what it had been when he first saw it. There were four little masts put up in it, on which were hoisted gay and gaudy flags. Her "hull," or body, was now coppered and neatly painted, while all the rubbish of the building-yard was cleared away, so that everything looked neat and clean. The stocks, or framework on which she had been built, sloped towards the ...
— The Life of a Ship • R.M. Ballantyne

... thou art precious to my soul; My transport and my trust: Jewels to thee are gaudy toys, ...
— Life and Labors of Elder John Kline, the Martyr Missionary - Collated from his Diary by Benjamin Funk • John Kline

... our usual rest day, and I stood in the open square before the huge church at Brunn, watching the motley, shifting, and clamorous crowd which had converted its very steps into a market-place. There was something strikingly Eastern in the character of the women's attire: intensely gaudy and highly contrasted; and their head-dresses the very next thing to a turban with double-frilled ends. There was also something peculiarly Catholic in the nature of the articles exposed for sale; beads, crosses, coloured pictures of saints, and tiny images of ...
— A Tramp's Wallet - stored by an English goldsmith during his wanderings in Germany and France • William Duthie

... A new pulse beat triumphantly every time a timber, burned through, fell in, or a crash came from a falling roof. He laughed inwardly as the flames disclosed the dismay on the faces of the Iroquois and Tories, and it gave him deep satisfaction to see Braxton Wyatt, his gaudy little sword at his thigh, stalking about helpless. It was while he was looking, absorbed in such feelings, that the warrior of the alert eye saw him and ...
— The Scouts of the Valley • Joseph A. Altsheler

... drawing near the house at Asnieres. Frantz had noticed at a distance a fanciful little turreted affair, glistening with a new blue slate roof. It seemed to him to have been built expressly for Sidonie, a fitting cage for that capricious, gaudy-plumaged bird. ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet

... might very easily be devoted to worse: and if two or three faces can be rendered happy and contented, by a trifling improvement of outward appearance, I cannot help thinking that the object is very cheaply purchased, even at the expense of a smart gown, or a gaudy riband. There is a great deal of very unnecessary cant about the over- dressing of the common people. There is not a manufacturer or tradesman in existence, who would not employ a man who takes a reasonable degree of pride in the appearance of himself and those about ...
— Sunday Under Three Heads • Charles Dickens

... precious metals, with pictured representations of human life, and perhaps with statuary of a rough kind, they must have added to the impression produced by size a sense of richness and barbaric magnificence. The African spirit, which loves gaudy hues and costly ornament, was still strong among the Babylonians, even after they had been Semitized; and by the side of Assyria, her colder and more correct northern sister, Babylonia showed herself a true child of the south—rich, glowing, careless of the laws of taste, bent on provoking ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 4. (of 7): Babylon • George Rawlinson

... beauty, like the night Of cloudless climes and starry skies; And all that 's best of dark and bright Meet in her aspect and her eyes; Thus mellow'd to that tender light Which Heaven to gaudy day denies.[551-2] ...
— Familiar Quotations • John Bartlett

... be a crowned king, For all his gaudy gear; I would not be that pampered thing, His gew-gaw gold to wear: But I would be where I can sing Right merrily, all the year; Where forest treen, All gay and green, Full blythely ...
— The Baron's Yule Feast: A Christmas Rhyme • Thomas Cooper

... morning Langaffer village presented a lively picture of bustle and excitement. Soldiers in gaudy uniforms, and with gay-coloured banners waving in the breeze, marched in to the sound of trumpet and drum. How their spears and helmets glittered in the sunshine, and what a neighing and prancing their steeds made in the little market-square! ...
— Fifty-Two Stories For Girls • Various

... gaudy maiden came out as plain as a Quakeress, and hastened to the Methodist prayer meeting. Seeing her thus evidently taught of the Holy Spirit, they took hold of her case with new courage as she bowed ...
— Elizabeth: The Disinherited Daugheter • E. Ben Ez-er

... expressed, is, to me, truly surprising. For where, in the name of wonder, should the house acquire the necessary knowledge or intelligence? Is it by turning these musty old volumes, or by rummaging these gaudy boxes which lie on your table? No! they contain none of these mysteries. How then are they to be explored? Is there any virtue or inspiration in these benches or cushions, by which they are to be communicated, ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan

... the broad face of God's Word. The promptings of such sentimentalism are to permit children to do as they please, and to bring them up under the influence of domestic libertinism. Honor thy father and thy mother, is a command which explodes such a gaudy theory; and he who does not obey it, brutalizes human nature, dishonors God, subverts the principles of constitutional society, throws off allegiance to the prerogatives of a divinely constituted superior, and overthrows ...
— The Christian Home • Samuel Philips

... paper-blinds. A huge fire of logs, such as Mollie had never beheld in her life before, roared gloriously in the old-fashioned fire-place, and lighted the room with a lurid glow. A four-post bedstead, the bed covered with a gaudy patch-work or counterpane, stood in one corner, a table with a white cloth stood in another, a chest of drawers in a third, and the door by which they entered in the fourth. This was ...
— The Unseen Bridgegroom - or, Wedded For a Week • May Agnes Fleming

... to the people of Puerto Rico. The coast waters and fresh water streams swarm with fishes of strange shapes and gaudy colors. ...
— A Little Journey to Puerto Rico - For Intermediate and Upper Grades • Marian M. George

... I have availed myself of every means within my reach to render my visit agreeable to the rajah. I carry with me many presents which are reported to be to his liking; gaudy silks of Surat, scarlet cloth, stamped velvet, gunpowder, &c., beside a large quantity of confectionery and sweets, such as preserved ginger, jams, dates, syrups, and to wind up all, a huge box of China toys for his children! I have likewise taken coarse nankeen to the amount of ...
— The Expedition to Borneo of H.M.S. Dido - For the Suppression of Piracy • Henry Keppel

... a good deal about the town, and entered the cathedral with some feelings of reverence, for a part of it at least was built by Don Henry of Portugal, who founded and endowed the college adjoining. The interior of the church is in some parts gaudy, and there is a silver rail of some value. The ceiling is of cedar, richly carved, and reminds me of some of the old churches at Venice, which present a style half Gothic half Saracenic. Near the church a public garden has lately been ...
— Journal of a Voyage to Brazil - And Residence There During Part of the Years 1821, 1822, 1823 • Maria Graham

... miniature green plateaus, bordered by conical hills, covered to the very summit by mimosas and huge cactuses, alive with large hordes of antelopes (the agazin), which, bounding from rock to rock, scared by their frolics the countless host of huge baboons. The valley itself, graced by the presence of gaudy-feathered and sweet-singing birds, echoed to the shrill cry of the numerous guinea-fowls, so tame, that the repeated reports of our fire-arms did not ...
— A Narrative of Captivity in Abyssinia - With Some Account of the Late Emperor Theodore, - His Country and People • Henry Blanc

... Quarrel, and supported the several Pretensions of the Daughters with all that ill-chosen Sort of Expence which is common with People of plentiful Fortunes and mean Taste. The Girls preceded their Parents like Queens of May, in all the gaudy Colours imaginable, on every Sunday to Church, and were exposed to the Examination of the Audience for ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele

... imagination than William Roscoe, its author. There were some amongst us, however, who were already being weaned to a knowledge of life's mysterious changes, and we sought the third volume of the romance of the flitting gaudy thing in a little ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 2 • Grace & Philip Wharton

... child, pictures from worn-out books or advertisements, which Ethel was colouring—Aubrey volunteering aid that was received rather distrustfully, as his love of effect caused him to array the model school-children in colours gaudy enough, as Gertrude complained, 'to corrupt a saint.' Nor was his dilettante help more appreciated at a small stand, well provided with tiny drawers, and holding a shaded lamp, according to Gertrude, 'burning something horrible ending in gen, that would kill anybody but ...
— The Trial - or, More Links of the Daisy Chain • Charlotte M. Yonge

... stockades apes sat sad and listless, and on the roof-ridges storks were dying. Over the branches of the trees, whose leaves were as thin as though we had had a six months' drought, the toucans and Martian parrots hung limp and fashionless like gaudy rags, and in the courtyard ground the corn-rats came up from their tunnels in the scorching earth to die, squeaking in scores along under ...
— Gulliver of Mars • Edwin L. Arnold

... their dimes With hasty verses hammered out in rhymes: The Muses whisper—'"Tis the age of brass." Workmen are plenty, but the masters few— Fewer to-day than in the days of old. Rare blue-eyed pansies peeping pearled with dew, And lilies lifting up their heads of gold, Among the gaudy cockscombs I behold, And here and there a lotus in the shade; And under English oaks a rose that ne'er ...
— The Feast of the Virgins and Other Poems • H. L. Gordon

... an ell, the rain was falling on the grandmother's bed and the little children's cradles. The roof and walls were repaired; we supplied the materials and paid the workmen; but no more money for gaudy aprons. In another case, an old woman had been reduced to beggary because she had listened too well to her heart, and given all she had to her children, who had turned her out of doors, or made her life so unbearable that she preferred to be a tramp. We took up the ...
— Mauprat • George Sand

... all day: I was amused. I marvel at my own versatility when I think how soon my quick spirits were excited by this gay, gaudy, noisy, idle place. The different appearance of the streets of London and Paris is the first thing to strike a stranger. In the gayest and most crowded streets of London the people move steadily and rapidly along, with a grave collected air, as if all had some business in view; here, ...
— The Diary of an Ennuyee • Anna Brownell Jameson

... heavens; every object smiled; innumerable gaudy flies glanced in the sunbeams that played in a clear spring by the cottage; I saw with pleasure the sultry glow of the distant cliffs and forests, whilst indolently reclined in the shade, listening to the summer hum; one hour passed after another neglected away, during my repose ...
— Dreams, Waking Thoughts, and Incidents • William Beckford

... from being a gaudy or flowery writer, that he was one of the severest writers we have. His words are the most like things; his style is the most strictly suited to the subject. He unites every extreme and every variety of composition; the lowest and the meanest words and descriptions ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin

... beauty appeared to him. {236} One was Vice, the other Virtue. The former was full of artificial wiles and fascinating arts, her face painted and her dress gaudy and attractive; whilst the latter was of noble bearing and modest mien, her ...
— Myths and Legends of Ancient Greece and Rome • E.M. Berens

... Arab sands the false mirage, which offers A lucid lake to his eluded thirst, Are gone. Around me are the stars and waters— Worlds mirrored in the Ocean, goodlier sight[ee] Than torches glared back by a gaudy glass; 70 And the great Element, which is to space What Ocean is to Earth, spreads its blue depths, Softened with the first breathings of the spring; The high Moon sails upon her beauteous way, Serenely smoothing o'er the lofty walls Of those tall piles and sea-girt palaces,[ef] ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 4 • Lord Byron

... Jerry-Jo surlily and passionately came to the conclusion that he must in some way capture his prize. Other youths were wearing gaudy ties and imperilling their Sunday bests; he was letting precious time slip. Then, too, by Farwell's advice, old Jerry was growing rigid along financial lines, and at last the States took definite shape in Jerry-Jo's mind, but he meant to have Priscilla before he heeded the lure. With all ...
— The Place Beyond the Winds • Harriet T. Comstock

... Howbeit I be a stranger, yet I like brotherly love and Christian fellowship well; but drunkenness and gluttony, feasting and carousing I hate, especially now when the kirk of Scotland is going in dool-weed: therefore be sober. 1. Be sober in your apparel; I think there is too much of gaudy apparel among you. 2. Be sober in your conceits. 3. Be sober in your judgments. 4. Be sober in your self-conceiting. 5. Be sober in your speaking. 6. Be sober in your sleeping. 7. Be sober in your lawful recreations. 8. Be sober in your lawful ...
— The Covenants And The Covenanters - Covenants, Sermons, and Documents of the Covenanted Reformation • Various

... meadowlarks on the fence posts; herons stalking solemnly, or waiting like so many Japanese bronzes for a chance at a gopher; red-tailed hawks circling slowly; pigeon hawks passing with their falcon dart; little gaudy sparrow hawks on top the telephone poles; buzzards, stately and wonderful in flight, repulsive when at rest; barn-owls dwelling in the haystacks, and horned owls in the hollow trees; the game in countless numbers; ...
— The Killer • Stewart Edward White

... sip honey from flowers and hum their thanks when they leave. The gaudy butterfly is sure that the flowers owe ...
— Stray Birds • Rabindranath Tagore

... barn, the wide threshing floor had been covered with gay rag-rugs, and strewn with tables, couches, and chairs in picturesque profusion. Roomy box-stalls had been carpeted deep with clean straw, curtained off with gaudy bed-quilts, and converted into cozy sleeping apartments. The mow and the stalls had been screened off with lace curtains and blazing counterpanes, and the whole effect was one of Oriental luxury and splendor. Alas, it was only an "effect"! The ...
— The Best American Humorous Short Stories • Various

... has been written concerning the fact that Wagner used to wear gaudy costumes of silk and satin while he was composing, and that he had colored glass in his windows, which gave every object a mysterious aspect. He was called an imitator of the eccentric King of Bavaria, and some went so far as to declare ...
— Chopin and Other Musical Essays • Henry T. Finck

... considerable quantities of the same metal in dust, or in crude masses, [10] numerous vegetable exotics, possessed of aromatic or medicinal virtue, and several kinds of quadrupeds unknown in Europe, and birds, whose varieties of gaudy plumage gave a brilliant effect to the pageant. The admiral's progress through the country was everywhere impeded by the multitudes thronging forth to gaze at the extraordinary spectacle, and the more extraordinary man, who, in the emphatic language of that time, which has now lost its ...
— The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella The Catholic, V2 • William H. Prescott

... must have descended to me. My childhood's antipathy to wearing red enabled me later to comprehend the feelings of a little niece, who hated everything pea green, because she had once heard the saying, "neat but not gaudy, as the devil said when he painted his tail pea green." So when a friend brought her a cravat of that color she threw it on the floor and burst into tears, saying, "I could not wear that, for it is the color of the devil's tail." I sympathized ...
— Eighty Years And More; Reminiscences 1815-1897 • Elizabeth Cady Stanton

... living things, men and animals, wild or tame, and fish and gaudy fowl, rush to this flame of love." ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne

... What has he done to thee that thus, among The seeds of reason, which he sowed unmixed, Pure in my soul, thou ever must be seeking To plant the weeds, or flowers, of thy own land. He wills not of these pranking gaudy blossoms Upon this soil. And I too must acknowledge I feel as if they had a sour-sweet odour, That makes me giddy—that half suffocates. Thy head is wont to bear it. I don't blame Those stronger nerves that can support it. Mine - Mine it behoves not. Latterly thy angel ...
— Nathan the Wise • Gotthold Ephraim Lessing

... Philip's [Endnote W] brow, Or dash Octavius from the trophied car; Say, does thy secret soul repine to taste The big distress? Or wouldst thou then exchange Those heart-ennobling sorrows for the lot Of him who sits amid the gaudy herd 760 Of mute barbarians bending to his nod, And bears aloft his gold-invested front, And says within himself, I am a king, And wherefore should the clamorous voice of woe Intrude upon mine ear?—The baleful dregs Of these late ages, ...
— Poetical Works of Akenside - [Edited by George Gilfillan] • Mark Akenside

... adorn, And the world looks as it were newly born. So, when your sense his mystic reason cleared, The melancholy scene all gay appeared; Now light leapt up, and a new glory smiled, And all throughout was mighty, all was mild. Before this palace, which thy wit did build, Which various fancy did so gaudy gild, And judgment has with solid riches filled, My humbler muse begs she may sentry stand, Amongst the rest that guard this Eden land. But there's no need, for ev'n thy foes conspire Thy praise, and, hating ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Volume 5 (of 18) - Amboyna; The state of Innocence; Aureng-Zebe; All for Love • John Dryden

... too. But I hadn't any idea how much there was, until we started buying copies of everything there was on the news-stands, and then ransacking musty little stores for back issues and ones that had gone out of publication, until Paul's office was just full of teetery piles of gaudy magazines and everywhere you looked there were pictures of strange stars and eight-legged monsters and ...
— The Sound of Silence • Barbara Constant

... broad-brimmed hats, which in some instances cost more than all the rest of their suits, the leggings, flannel overshirts, and gaudy handkerchiefs tied loosely ...
— The Great Cattle Trail • Edward S. Ellis



Words linked to "Gaudy" :   Britain, cheap, colorful, tasteless, tawdry, gaud, Great Britain, tacky, garish, gaudiness, feast, UK, showy, sporty, colourful, United Kingdom, gimcrack, banquet, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, flashy, jazzy, loud, brassy, meretricious, tatty, U.K., trashy, flash



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