"Idly" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... may make relics. One false step, one luckless accident, an obstacle on the track of a train, the tangling of the cord in shifting a sail, and the penknife, the pen, the papers, the trivial articles of dress and clothing, which to-day you toss idly and jestingly from hand to hand, may become dread memorials of that awful tragedy whose deep abyss ever underlies our ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, No. 19, May, 1859 • Various
... The yacht drifting idly at anchor in smooth water, the stars in their bed of velvet black, the magic of air ...
— The Hippodrome • Rachel Hayward
... fair old face flushed. "How can you repeat such absurdity, McCormack?" she said. "Louisa Waring was as likely to go about armed as—as I!" knitting vehemently at a woollen stocking she had held idly ...
— The Galaxy - Vol. 23, No. 1 • Various
... have been the most patient and delightful of nurses. I remember the haven of peace and comfort it seemed to me when I was unwell, to be tucked up on the study sofa, idly considering the old geological map hung on the wall. This must have been in his working hours, for I always picture him sitting in the horsehair arm-chair by the corner of ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume I • Francis Darwin
... time there was a Porter in Baghdad, who was a bachelor and who would remain unmarried. It came to pass on a certain day, as he stood about the street leaning idly upon his crate, behold, there stood before him an honourable woman in a mantilla of Mosul[FN138] silk, broidered with gold and bordered with brocade; her walking shoes were also purfled with gold and her hair floated in long plaits. She raised ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton
... our sister Asia, and it came Each leisure hour to drink the liquid light Out of her eyes, for which it said it thirsted As one bit by a dipsas, and with her It made its childish confidence, and told her 20 All it had known or seen, for it saw much, Yet idly reasoned what it saw; and called her— For whence it sprung it knew not, nor do I— ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... light and undefined darkness contrasting with one another. Soon he became conscious of an odd odour, at first the merest suggestion of odour, in the room, and as it grew more decided he felt surprised that he was not reminded of the chemist's shop or the surgery. Clarke found himself idly endeavouring to analyse the sensation, and half conscious, he began to think of a day, fifteen years ago, that he had spent roaming through the woods and meadows near his own home. It was a burning day at the beginning ...
— The Great God Pan • Arthur Machen
... At the table, idly shuffling a pack of grimy cards, sat Old Meg, a horrible old hag, wrinkled in face like a mummy, with only the stumps of teeth which had more the appearance of tusks. Her unkempt hair was matted and ugly wisps of it hung ...
— The Master Mystery • Arthur B. Reeve and John W. Grey
... love with each other or any such silliness," said she, flicking idly at the hedge ...
— Peregrine's Progress • Jeffery Farnol
... Morgan, throwing the boat-chain around a willow and letting the oars float idly beside the boat. Then, taking Amelie in his arms, he said, "You were right, my Amelie. Oh! blind weak beings! It is at the very moment that happiness knocks at our door that ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas, pere
... lift each pious veil, And see the blushing cheek it shades,— Oh! I should have full many a tale, To tell of young Azorian maids.[3] Yes, Strangford, at this hour, perhaps, Some lover (not too idly blest, Like those, who in their ladies' laps May cradle every wish to rest,) Warbles, to touch his dear one's soul, Those madrigals, of breath divine, Which Camoens' harp from Rapture stole And gave, all ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... Swinnerton himself never appeared to triturate or decoct or do anything else with the mysterious herbs, our old friend was inclined to imagine the weighty commendation of their virtues to have been the idly solemn utterance of mental aberration at the hour of death. So, with the integrity that belonged to his character, he had nurtured them as tenderly as was possible in the ungenial climate and soil of New England, putting some of them into pots for the winter; ...
— The Dolliver Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... number of men were standing idly around the structure, watching others at work. It was a weakness of the citizens of Rocky Springs to watch others work. They had no desire to help. They rarely were beset with any desire to help anybody. They simply clustered together in small ...
— The Law-Breakers • Ridgwell Cullum
... So Walter stood idly watching the said ship, and as he looked, lo! folk passing him toward the gangway. These were three; first came a dwarf, dark-brown of hue and hideous, with long arms and ears exceeding great and dog-teeth that stuck out like the fangs of a wild beast. ...
— The Wood Beyond the World • William Morris
... The other man idly pushed back his artificial bald head, revealing close red hair, and spoke dreamily, perhaps under the influence ...
— The Club of Queer Trades • G. K. Chesterton
... of death over all. Gradually the silence communicated itself to the girls, and the pauses in their chatter grew longer and their eyes more thoughtful. Even their horses for the most part stood idly by. The green grass had but a passing attraction for them. They nibbled at it occasionally, it is true, but with apparently little appetite. After dinner the two friends spread their saddle-blankets upon the grass, and stretched themselves ...
— The Hound From The North • Ridgwell Cullum
... random blow, Can work the bane of such a foe: By nature cautious as he's brave, To Honour only he's a slave; In that weak part without defence, We must to honour make pretence; That lure shall to his ruin draw The wretch, who stands secure in law. Nor think that I have idly plann'd This full-ripe scheme; behold at hand, 450 With three months' training on his head, An instrument, whom I have bred, Born of these bowels, far from sight Of Virtue's false but glaring light, My youngest-born, my dearest joy, Most like myself, my darling ...
— Poetical Works • Charles Churchill
... alert man of sixty years, trimly gray as to garb, hair, and mustache, sat idly watching him, yet with eyes that looked so intently ...
— Oh, Money! Money! • Eleanor Hodgman Porter
... it may be remembered, promised to give Ben and his son an account of the introduction of Christianity among the islands of the Pacific. One day, during a calm, when the ship floated idly on the ocean, her sails scarcely even flapping against the masts, Tom, on going below, declared that it was too hot to read or think or sleep, and that he did not know what he should do ...
— Ben Hadden - or, Do Right Whatever Comes Of It • W.H.G. Kingston
... fear lest praise should make us proud! We know how cheaply that is won; The idle homage of the crowd Is proof of tasks as idly done. ...
— The Professor at the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes (Sr.)
... fever in her little out-of-the-world refuge at Le Trooz, Graham had been gaining health and strength in a pleasant English home, with a sister to nurse and pet him, nephews and nieces to make much of him, and the rosiest cheeks and bluest eyes in the world to fall in love with, as he lay idly on the lawn through the summer days. It was at the house of his sister, who was married to a country doctor in Kent, that this double process of love-making and convalescence went on, with the greatest success and satisfaction to all parties; and it was Miss Maria Leslie, the ward of ...
— My Little Lady • Eleanor Frances Poynter
... coming hot-foot after so much sorrow, loss and doubt, that there followed the happiest event of all my life. Utterly tired out and very despondent, I was seated on an arrow-chest awaiting the order to march, idly watching Oliver and Maqueda talking with great earnestness at a little distance, and in the intervals trying to prevent poor Higgs at my side from falling asleep. While I was thus engaged, suddenly I heard a disturbance, and by the bright moonlight caught sight of a man being led into ...
— Queen Sheba's Ring • H. Rider Haggard
... which the end of the tunnel then was, and began collecting samples of the outcropping ledge. He wanted to analyze these pieces of stone later. Koku was with him, and, giving the giant a bag of stones to carry, Tom walked on rather idly. ...
— Tom Swift and his Big Tunnel - or, The Hidden City of the Andes • Victor Appleton
... historical town," observed Susie, who had happened to notice, as she idly turned over the pages of her Baedeker on the way down, that there was a long description of it with dates. "As of course you know," she added, turning sharply to ...
— The Benefactress • Elizabeth Beauchamp
... the rest sat down and kept their place upon the benches, only Thersites still chattered on, the uncontrolled speech, whose mind was full of words many and disorderly, wherewith to strive against the chiefs idly and in no good order, but even as he deemed that he should make the Argives laugh. And he was ill-favored beyond all men that came to Ilios. Bandy-legged was he, and lame of one foot, and his two shoulders rounded, arched down upon his chest; and over them his head was warped, and ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer (Lang, Leaf, Myers trans.)
... very fancy piece for that newspaper," Cousin Egbert went on, handing me the sheets of manuscript. Idly ...
— Ruggles of Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson
... this put us again in a quake, and now, the snow beginning to fall pretty heavily, we went into the shed to cast about as to what on earth we should do next. There we sat, glum and silent, watching idly the big flakes of snow fluttering down from the leaden sky, for not one of us could imagine a way out ...
— A Set of Rogues • Frank Barrett
... an old man remarked to me, the Spaniards would not employ them so numerously. [99] The largest rancho I visited was nominally under the charge of a captain, who, however, had little real power. At my desire he called to some naked boys idly squatting about on the trees, who required considerable persuasion before they obeyed his summons; but a few small presents—brazen earrings and combs for the women, and cigars for the men—soon put me ...
— The Former Philippines thru Foreign Eyes • Fedor Jagor; Tomas de Comyn; Chas. Wilkes; Rudolf Virchow.
... touches Ysolde's compassionate heart, and she soon uses all her medical science to accomplish his cure, tenderly nursing him back to health. While sitting beside him one day, she idly draws his sword from the scabbard, and her sharp eyes perceive that a piece is missing. Comparing the break in the sword with the fragment in her possession, she is soon convinced that Morold's murderer is at her mercy, and she is about to slay her helpless foe ...
— Stories of the Wagner Opera • H. A. Guerber
... addressed: "Do not thus, excellent though thou be, godlike Achilles, practise deceit in thy mind; since thou shalt not overreach, nor yet persuade me. Dost thou wish that thou thyself mayest have a prize, whilst I sit down idly,[22] wanting one? And dost thou bid me to restore her? If, however, the magnanimous Greeks will give me a prize, having suited it to my mind, so that it shall be an equivalent, [it is well]. But if they will not give it, then I myself ...
— The Iliad of Homer (1873) • Homer
... visible; and now that its days of higher beauty and grace have come, it climbs high up its banks to show that it is ready for new usefulness. It would be dreary for the great logs to see new verdure springing all around them, while they lay idly rotting or sprouting with uncouth funguses, not unsuspect of poison. But they will not be wasted. Lumbermen, foes to idleness and inutility, swarm again about their winter's trophies. They imprint certain cabalistic tokens of ownership on the logs,—crosses, xs, stars, crescents, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 58, August, 1862 • Various
... it was that he or she hadn't put his or her foot down hard and made Jimmy Blair stay at home instead of letting him go down into that unpronounceable Central American place and get killed in an opera bouffe revolution with which he had absolutely nothing to do except that he couldn't stand idly by and see women and little children shot. Still, it was such a blessing to Kate that she had little Kate to help her bear it all. And she had enough money, too; no one seemed to know how; for Jimmy Blair was a reckless ...
— A Fool There Was • Porter Emerson Browne
... gaming, dissipation, extravagance, from getting root in the minds of his children: it is in his power to continue to make his children hearers, when he is reproving servants for idleness, or commending them for industry and care: it is in his power to keep all dissolute and idly-talking companions from his house: it is in his power to teach them, by his uniform example, justice and mercy towards the inferior animals: it is in his power to do many other things, and something in the way of book-learning too, however busy his life may be. It ...
— Advice to Young Men • William Cobbett
... is disposed to regard it with favour,—instead of idly, (as is the way with nine-tenths of mankind,) repeating the formula in terms more or less vague and indefinite; and straightway wincing, falling back on generalities, and in a word shirking the point, the instant it is proposed to bring the ...
— Inspiration and Interpretation - Seven Sermons Preached Before the University of Oxford • John Burgon
... God, were looking for even greater things in years to come. Such fitness for influence as he possessed is not acquired in a day, and just when its worth was being proved he was taken from us. Surely these gifts and graces are not now as if they had never been, or as if, once granted, they had been idly wasted! Can that earnest, patient cultivation really have been gratuitous, and the unselfish instinct that inspired it mistaken? Were it so, the whole universe looks out of joint. The more I consider such lives as that of your brother—lives, I mean, ...
— Letters to His Friends • Forbes Robinson
... told the ladies what he knew of the love which united Heinz and Eva. The four Fs which he had advised his master to heed in his wooing—Family, Figure, Favor, and Fortune—he no longer deemed the right touch-tones. Whilst he was forced to lie idly here he had found that they should rather be exchanged for four Ss—Spirituality, Steadfastness, Stimulation, and Solace—for the eyes and ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... on the run. Under orders of Mr. Pike I shot blindly and many times into the dark, but without result, save that we heard the bullets of answering shots strike against the chart-house. So to-day we have not even a man at the wheel. The Elsinore drifts idly on an idle sea, and we stand regular watches in the shelter of chart-house and jiggermast. Mr. Pike says it is the laziest time he has ...
— The Mutiny of the Elsinore • Jack London
... after tea she wandered idly down the road. The sun behind the swamp was crimsoning the world. Mrs. Vanderpool strolled alone to the school, and saw Sarah Smith. There was no cordiality in the latter's greeting, but when she heard the caller's errand her ...
— The Quest of the Silver Fleece - A Novel • W. E. B. Du Bois
... I left the Halls at Lumley, rose the vision of a comely Maid last season worshipped dumbly, watched with fervor from afar; And I wondered idly, blindly, if the ...
— Departmental Ditties and Barrack Room Ballads • Rudyard Kipling
... when the house was finally completed. From the veranda we had an excellent view up and down the river. We could see our camp on the island and keep watch of our goods. Late one afternoon Dutchy and I were lolling about on the Goblins' Platform, idly watching a hawk soaring above us. The rest of the boys had returned to the island in canoes an hour before and left the heavy scow for us to row back. It was drawing near supper time and we had about decided to start for home, when ...
— The Scientific American Boy - The Camp at Willow Clump Island • A. Russell Bond
... of chaos. The survivors are slowly realizing what is the best course to pursue. The great cry is for men. Men who will work and not stand idly by and do nothing but gaze at the ruins. The following order was posted on a telegraph ...
— The Johnstown Horror • James Herbert Walker
... all the chiefs; and I instantly saw the reason. Omai had, as I have already mentioned, vainly flattered himself that I meant to use force in restoring him to his father's lands in Ulietea, and he had talked idly, and without any authority from me, on this subject, to some of the present assembly, who dreamed of nothing less than a hostile invasion of Ulietea, and of being assisted by me to drive the Bolabola men out of that island. It was of consequence, therefore, that I should undeceive them; and, in ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 16 • Robert Kerr
... train that had just pulled onto a siding, the man saw the neighbor who lived next door to his old home drive hurriedly up. The man in the carriage waved his hand and the man on the moving train, answering in like manner, wondered idly what had brought the neighbor there. Surely he had not come to bid one who was almost a stranger good-bye. And, strangely enough, as the man watched from the window for a last view of the scenes of his Yesterdays, there ...
— Their Yesterdays • Harold Bell Wright
... it was clear to Austria that it was not compatible with the dignity and the spirit of self-preservation of the monarchy to view idly any longer this agitation across the border. The Imperial and Royal Government appraised Germany of this conception and asked for our opinion. With all our heart we were able to agree with our allys estimate of the situation, and assure him that any action ...
— Why We Are At War (2nd Edition, revised) • Members of the Oxford Faculty of Modern History
... the deed forgot; Till one day, idly walking, We marked upon the self-same spot A crowd of veterans, talking. They shook their trembling heads and gray, With pride and noiseless laughter, When, well-a-day! they blew away, And ne'er were heard of ...
— Required Poems for Reading and Memorizing - Third and Fourth Grades, Prescribed by State Courses of Study • Anonymous
... this event, he wrote his Rasselas[1020], Prince of Abyssinia; concerning the publication of which Sir John Hawkins guesses vaguely and idly[1021], instead of having taken the trouble to inform himself with authentick precision. Not to trouble my readers with a repetition of the Knight's reveries, I have to mention, that the late Mr. Strahan the printer told me, that Johnson wrote it, that with ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell
... housework, hates its everlasting routine and ever recurring duties; because she hates children and will adopt every means to evade motherhood; because she loves her ease, loves to have her will supreme, loves, oh how well, to be free to go and come, to let the days slip idly by, to be absolved from all responsibility, to live without labor, without care? Will you love her selfish, shirking, calculating nature after twenty years of ...
— Searchlights on Health: Light on Dark Corners • B.G. Jefferis
... of another kind, his mere mastery of style and presentation, does redeem this reportage to some extent; but this would remain if the thing were wholly fiction, and the other art of invention, divination, mimesis—call it what you will—would come in. Yet it is not worth while to be idly unlike other people and claim it as an actual novel. It may be worth while to point out how it displays some of the great gifts of the novel-writer. The first of these—the greatest and, in fact, the mother of all the rest—is the sheer faculty, so often mentioned but not, alas! so invariably ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 - From the Beginning to 1800 • George Saintsbury
... current made itself felt, those watching saw one of the arms slowly loosen its grip. Another floated upward, as a strand of rope idly drifts in the current. Tom saw this, and called through ...
— Tom Swift and his Undersea Search - or, The Treasure on the Floor of the Atlantic • Victor Appleton
... thus with the Pequod. The wooden reel and angular log attached hung, long untouched, just beneath the railing of the after bulwarks. Rains and spray had damped it; sun and wind had warped it; all the elements had combined to rot a thing that hung so idly. But heedless of all this, his mood seized Ahab, as he happened to glance upon the reel, not many hours after the magnet scene, and he remembered how his quadrant was no more, and recalled his frantic oath about the level ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville
... days I gave myself up entirely to my mental depression, greatly wondering at the perplexing change in my life, and marvelling that in all my explorations in philosophy I had not provided for just such a crisis, whatever it might be. One afternoon as I sat in my room at the tavern, looking idly out of the window and across the little river which rippled by, something seemed to strike me violently in the forehead. It may have been a telepathic suggestion, it may have been a return to consciousness; at all ...
— The Romance of an Old Fool • Roswell Field
... the food that Oberon had given them. Now Huon was uplifted by the gifts the king had given him, and thought that he himself must be in some way better than other men, to be singled out for such honour, and, as young men will, he began to boast and talk idly, making pretence that he doubted the magic qualities of the horn and the cup, so that he might prove them at once before ...
— The Red Romance Book • Various
... immediate supply of threescore talents; forty men of war were ordered to sea: and so zealous we were, that preferring the necessities of state to our very laws, our citizens above the age of five and forty years, were commanded to serve. What followed?—A whole year was spent idly, without any thing done; and it was but the third month of the following year, a little after the celebration of the feast of Ceres, that Charedemus set sail, furnished with no more than five talents, and ...
— The Young Gentleman and Lady's Monitor, and English Teacher's Assistant • John Hamilton Moore
... voice would sing idly or prattle with an imaginary being that had a habit of peeking over the edge of the basket or would shout a greeting to some bird or butterfly and ask finally: 'Tired, ...
— Eben Holden - A Tale of the North Country • Irving Bacheller
... were blooming, and the pink roses were in bud. They strayed idly to the side of the house farthest from the street, and there they found the lilacs, heavy with blooms; they were higher than the girl's head,—a little thicket of them,—and behind the thicket was a rustic seat made of the grape-vines. He stepped toward the chair, pulling her ...
— A Certain Rich Man • William Allen White
... Dunstan's to talk with other men in residence there—a species of initiation. While in hospital, too, as soon as we were able to work a little, we were given the rudiments of Braille. This was not compulsory; and if we wished to yield to fate and sit with hands idly folded we were at liberty to do so. But the majority of the men were eager ...
— Through St. Dunstan's to Light • James H. Rawlinson
... The young girl laughed idly. "But you and I, for instance, mother—we have no secrets from each other, have we? Well? Why should any two people who love each other have secrets? And if they have none, why, then, they know all that ...
— Adam Johnstone's Son • F. Marion Crawford
... and young Macdermot had turned their backs on Ballycloran, Pat Brady, who, stood smoking his pipe, and idly leaning against the gate-post from which, even then, the gate was half wrenched, heard the sounds of Captain Ussher's horse on the road from Mohill. As soon as he came up, Brady very civilly touched his hat: "Well then long life to you, Captain Ussher, and it's you enjoys a fine horse, and ...
— The Macdermots of Ballycloran • Anthony Trollope
... Visvamitra guarded well Among the good Videhans dwell. Their ruler Janak, prompt to own The peerless might my child has shown, To him would knit in holy ties His daughter, valour's lovely prize. If Janak's plan seem good to you, Come, speed we to his city too, Nor let occasion idly by." ...
— The Ramayana • VALMIKI
... struggle cannot very well be denied by the optimistic Americans who say: "A class struggle is monstrous. Sir, there is no class struggle." The class struggle is here, and the optimistic American had better gird himself for the fray and put a stop to it, rather than sit idly declaiming that what ought not to be is ...
— War of the Classes • Jack London
... the pampered King of these; He heard no voice but such as praise and please. Flattered and fooled, victor in every sport, One day he wandered idly with his court Beside the river, seeking to devise New ways to show his skill to wondering eyes. There in the stream a patient angler stood, And cast his line across the rippling flood. His silver spoil lay near him on the green: "Such fish," the courtiers cried, ...
— The Poems of Henry Van Dyke • Henry Van Dyke
... and much to lose, from the overgrown power of Charles, England, in 1524, abstained from action, and even began to make overtures to Francis. Wolsey repaid Charles's inactivity of the previous year by standing idly by, while the imperial forces with Bourbon's contingent invaded Provence and laid siege to Marseilles. But Francis still held command of the sea; the spirit of his people rose with the danger; Marseilles ...
— Henry VIII. • A. F. Pollard
... I idly cut a parsley stalk, And blew therein towards the moon; I had not thought what ghosts would walk With shivering footsteps to ...
— Moments of Vision • Thomas Hardy
... of Commerce and Industry in he Provisional Government, and then scratched out as the hopelessness of the situation became more and more evident. The geometrical figure beneath was probably idly drawn while the Ministers were waiting ...
— Ten Days That Shook the World • John Reed
... consisted in sitting drowsily of an evening in a straw arm-chair, beside Mere Jupillon—sound asleep with her spectacles on her nose—and holding the dogs rolled in a ball in the skirt of her dress; and while the lamp, almost dying, burned pale upon the counter, she would sit idly there, letting her glance lose itself at the back of the shop, and gradually grow dim, with her ideas, as her eyes rested vaguely upon a triumphal arch of snail shells joined together with old moss, beneath which stood a little copper Napoleon, with his ...
— Germinie Lacerteux • Edmond and Jules de Goncourt
... to-day one of the present homes of Lady Henry Somerset, and there are family records of long, sunny days that the young girl-poet passed at the castle, walking on the terraces that lead down to the still water, or lying idly in the boat as the ripples of the little lake lapped against the reeds and rushes that grew on the banks. In the castle library is preserved to-day an autograph copy of the first volume of Elizabeth Barrett's poems, published ...
— The Brownings - Their Life and Art • Lilian Whiting
... tops with equal zeal. Clouds of toy-balloons, of various colors and sizes, flash high above the heads of itinerant vendors, while the sparkling fountains throw up softly musical jets everywhere. Soldiers off duty, strolling idly about, dot the scene with their various uniforms, their shining helmets, and elaborate gold lace. The busy road-way is crowded by a thousand turnouts, drawn by high-stepping horses. Delighted youths, of both sexes, mount wooden horses in the merry-go-rounds and enjoy their ride at a cost of a ...
— Foot-prints of Travel - or, Journeyings in Many Lands • Maturin M. Ballou
... speculate towards discovery of the truth. It may be strange to you to be told that she was reminded of old Mrs. Marrable's utterance of the word "Australia" when old Mrs. Prichard spoke it, and simply let the recollection drop idly, because it was so unlikely the two two's would add up. To be sure, she had quite forgotten, at the moment, what the old Granny at Chorlton had said about the Antipodes. It is only in books that people remember all through, ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... clamour on the portress Destiny, - "Set her wide, so we may issue through! Our vans are quick for that they have to do Suffer still your young desire; Your plumes but bicker at the tips with fire, Tarry their kindling; they will beat the higher. And thou, bright girl, not long shalt thou repeat Idly the music from thy mother caught; Not vainly has she wrought, Not vainly from the cloudward-jetting turret Of her aerial mind, for thy weak feet, Let down the silken ladder of her thought. She bare thee with a double pain, Of the body and the spirit; Thou ...
— Sister Songs • Francis Thompson
... you'd ever been in France," said Lindsay, idly picking a dandelion clock and blowing it ...
— The Manor House School • Angela Brazil
... reclined within the pavilion—the lover and his lady,—of the attendants without, some lounged idly on the beach; some prepared the awning of a pleasure-boat against the decline of the sun; some, in a ruder tent, out of sight in the wood, arranged the mid-day repast; while the strings of the lute, touched by Montreal himself with a careless skill, gave their music to ...
— Rienzi • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... aught in particular, good Roderigo?" demanded the mariner, who knew the Bravo by a sign, and yet who only knew him by that fictitious name. "Thou seest we have not passed the time idly, though yesterday was ...
— The Bravo • J. Fenimore Cooper
... along the beach after one of the heavy winter storms that so often vex the quiet of the Bay of Naples, and to search for fragments of precious marbles that have been spied by the waves amidst the sunken foundations of Roman villas, and thence idly flung upon the shore. Pieces of the choicest white Parian, squares of speckled Egyptian porphyry, of verde, rosso and giallo antico, of the coal-black Africano, all wet and glistening from the waves, can be picked up by the quick-sighted, and the gathering of these beautiful ...
— The Naples Riviera • Herbert M. Vaughan
... highway led the riders along the bank of a stream, on both sides of which smelting works had been erected, as this region is rich in gold-producing ore; but nothing except charred ruins was now left of the buildings. At intervals a deserted mill was passed, its wheel still turning idly under the impulse of the tireless stream. Leaving this mining district behind, the two riders came to a settlement of a different sort, which had not been given over entirely to destruction. Only occasionally a house showed windows ...
— Manasseh - A Romance of Transylvania • Maurus Jokai
... sat idly on the patchwork counterpane of his bed and gazed at the sky. He was feeling a little happier, a little less unsettled, for his stomach was empty and his mind had begun to fix itself with pleasure on the images of hot toast and jam. He 'wanted ...
— Clayhanger • Arnold Bennett
... sparrow. Yet a little higher on the foundation, and we began to be affected by the bottom of the swell, running there like a strong breeze of wind. Or so I must suppose; for, safe in my cushion of air, I was conscious of no impact; only swayed idly like a weed, and was now borne helplessly abroad, and now swiftly - and yet with dream-like gentleness - impelled against my guide. So does a child's balloon divagate upon the currents of the air, ...
— Across The Plains • Robert Louis Stevenson
... of which she had just spoken seemed suddenly to have melted away, for she sat down quite idly and watched him. ...
— Ladies Must Live • Alice Duer Miller
... noticed in the present volume, and the author intended to draw more largely on the rich stores accumulated by the researches of the learned Jesuit; but time and space failed. Like truant boys, the Ramblers had loitered on their early path, idly amusing themselves with very trifles, or stopping to gather the wild flowers that fell in their way, till the harvest-field was reached too late to be carefully gleaned. For a work, however, of this description, attention ...
— Rambles in the Islands of Corsica and Sardinia - with Notices of their History, Antiquities, and Present Condition. • Thomas Forester
... but to act according to thy knowledge, is thy destination." So says the voice which cries to me aloud from my innermost soul, so soon as I collect and give heed to myself for a moment. "Not idly to inspect and contemplate thyself, nor to brood over devout sensations—no! thou existest to act. Thine actions, and only thine actions, determine ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries: - Masterpieces of German Literature Translated into English, Volume 5. • Various
... Bat,' or Bat's children. Very wicked children they were from their cradle, giving their father and mother much trouble and uneasiness; no good in any one of them, neither in the boys nor the girl. Now the boys, once when they were rambling idly about, lighted by chance upon a cave near the Devil's Bridge. Very strange cave it was, with just one little hole at top to go in by; so the boys said to one another: 'Nice cave this for thief to live in. ...
— Wild Wales - Its People, Language and Scenery • George Borrow
... recovered and tidy after a feeble strafing the other day. Even two or three civilians travelling. Not many of the military—a hundred or so, perhaps, all waiting and smoking idly, each armed with his "Movement Order." The dull boom of guns not excessive, though there's a frequent "plom! plom! plom!" of the Archies, and the sky is dotted with clusters of pretty little shrapnel clouds. Sometimes the crack! ...
— Letters to Helen - Impressions of an Artist on the Western Front • Keith Henderson
... suggestions, cheerfully, and he and the captain departed to carry out their own task. When they returned laden with the balance of the canoe's cargo, Walter was standing idly by the fire watching Chris ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... proposed destruction, I turned the letter over idly and my preoccupied gaze rested on the postmark. After a moment I leaned forward and examined it more attentively. The letter directed to me was postmarked Fort Carcajou, Cook's Peninsula, Baffin Land; and now I recalled the handwriting, ...
— Police!!! • Robert W. Chambers
... idly from me. Our poesy is as a gum, which oozes From whence 'tis nourished. The fire i' the flint Shows not till it be struck; our gentle flame Provokes itself, and like the current files Each bound it ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, No. 20, June, 1859 • Various
... as singularly free from sins of omission and commission. "What have I ever done?" she would ask in her self-communings. The question implied so much truth of a certain kind that all her relatives were in gall and bitterness as they remembered the weary months during which she had rocked idly at their firesides. With her, talking was as much of a necessity as breathing; but during the ride to the hillside farm she, in a sense, held her breath, for a keen March wind ...
— He Fell in Love with His Wife • Edward P. Roe
... train started and waved her handkerchief in vain, betook herself indignantly to her carriage. Quite unaware of any remissness on her part, Elsie settled herself comfortably—Mrs. Bennet had disposed of her luggage—folded her hands in her lap, and gazed idly ...
— Elsie Marley, Honey • Joslyn Gray
... dissoluteness appeared, it merely resulted from the despotism of emperors; and still the prejudices founded upon ancient manners were so influential that Rome never saw a woman on a stage. These facts are not put forth idly in scanning the ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac
... profession in the world which Rose had never either idly or seriously considered as a possible one for herself, that of a teacher was it. And yet, the first money she ever earned in her life was the twenty dollars the management paid her for teaching the other four girls in the sextette to say their lines. She was a born teacher, too. And the born teacher ...
— The Real Adventure • Henry Kitchell Webster
... preservation, yet it is much like massing our wild Sweet Williams, Spring Beauties, and Violets in a crowded greenhouse. They bravely do their best, but you can fairly see them gasping for the fresh, free air of their woodland homes. A quilt hung on a clothes line in the dooryard and idly flapping in the wind receives twice the appreciation given one which is sedately folded across a wire with many others in a crowded, ...
— Quilts - Their Story and How to Make Them • Marie D. Webster
... on his desk remained unanswered. His stenographer waited silently. He waved her away, and she went out, closing the door behind her. He lay back in his chair, toying idly ...
— Bert Wilson on the Gridiron • J. W. Duffield
... to take;" returned the young man, who did not make this allusion to Alida without betraying, by the tremor of his voice, how great was her influence still over him. "I see no necessity of violating the domestic feelings to which you allude, by aiding to feed the ears of the idly curious, with ...
— The Water-Witch or, The Skimmer of the Seas • James Fenimore Cooper
... I should fashion images to rest idly on their pedestals, nay but by every trading-ship and plying boat forth from Aigina fare, sweet song of mine, and bear abroad the news, how that Lampon's son, the strong-limbed Pytheas, hath won at Nemea the pankratiast's ...
— The Extant Odes of Pindar • Pindar
... idly, watching the kaleidoscope of gay colors moving dizzily about beneath her. "Then ...
— Betty Wales Senior • Margaret Warde
... by him in his previous lives. There is nothing agreeable or disagreeable which one enjoys or endures without its being the result of the acts one has done in one's previous lives. Whether lying or proceeding, whether sitting idly engaged in his occupations, in whatever state a man may be, his acts (of past lives) good or bad always approach him. One that has attained to the other shore of the ocean, wishes not to cross the main for returning to the shore whence he had sailed.[1567] As the fisherman, when he wishes, ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... he was peering down a steep bank into the boulder-studded bottom of Ripley Creek, where lay a fine young specimen of the genus homo idly tossing pebbles into the crystal water. A smile half sardonic grew in the features of Uncle Sebastian as he stood ...
— The She Boss - A Western Story • Arthur Preston Hankins
... He drummed idly with his forefinger upon the table. His eyes were wandering around the room absently. His ...
— The Betrayal • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... sportive smiles; the face of the great deep was like polished glass; but there was a long swell of the ocean, apparently of miles in length; its bosom heaving and sinking, as if still oppressed with its late troubles. Our ship lay utterly unmanageable, her sails flapping idly against the masts. There was not sufficient wind to make her answer the helm; and there we lay, rolling and plunging, expecting every moment to see our masts go by the board. The lower yards dipped at every roll; and so great was the strain, that it drew the strong iron ring-bolts by which ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, February 1844 - Volume 23, Number 2 • Various
... so obediently, but wonderingly. She then opened the piano and took a seat upon the music stool before it, placed some loose sheets of music in the rack, and ran her fingers lightly over the keys. Thus intrenched, she let her hands fall idly in her lap, and for the first time raised her ...
— Selected Stories • Bret Harte
... tapped upon special occasions, is the memory of the glorious days spent nursing my bruises and lolling around that far-away camp. Sometimes I listened to the quaint yarns of my unique and interesting guide or idly watched the changing colors and effects which the sun and the atmosphere produced on the snow-capped mountains of Darlinkel's Park. I made friends with our little neighbors the rock-chuck, whose home was in the base of the cliff back of the spring, and became intimate with the ...
— The Black Wolf Pack • Dan Beard
... idly as he made and drank the coffee, munching some hard crackers he carried in one of his pockets. Then, rolling up in their blankets, the ...
— The Boy Ranchers on the Trail • Willard F. Baker
... sighted Beachy Head, about half-past five in the evening, and then it nearly died away. We were off Brighton when the moon rose. The long stretch of lights along shore, the clear star-lit sky, the bright moon, the ship gently rocking in the almost calm sea, the sails idly flapping against the mast,—formed a picture of quiet during my first night at sea, which I shall not ...
— A Boy's Voyage Round the World • The Son of Samuel Smiles
... nominee for President. For their voters Lincoln stood on more acceptable ground. His speeches had been more conservative; his local influence in his own State of Illinois was also a factor not to be idly thrown away. ...
— A Short Life of Abraham Lincoln - Condensed from Nicolay & Hay's Abraham Lincoln: A History • John G. Nicolay
... to practical details. Take a girl who wants to be good and dutiful and useful, to be a comfort at home, to keep her brain in good working order, and to enjoy herself: what should she resolve upon if she is to be of use in the world and not drift idly along? She must think it out for herself, and no longer wait for orders. She must put the salt of self-denial and effort into every day, of her own accord, and not feel absolved because her mother has not given any special orders. You are responsible for your own life, and it is ...
— Stray Thoughts for Girls • Lucy H. M. Soulsby
... sleepy. A blankness was invading her mind, and the talk in the crypt seemed to lose its meaning, and to consist chiefly of S's. She pondered idly on the family of children with their elders, all of whom were now studying each other with a certain look of disillusionment. It was a group whose relationships were difficult to make out, the ages of many of the children being unnaturally approximate. There ...
— Living Alone • Stella Benson
... however; so I determined it should be into that motor-boat floating idly on a canal ...
— The Chauffeur and the Chaperon • C. N. Williamson
... course waiting to accompany him, and, when Kirk had finished a leisurely breakfast, the two strolled idly down into ...
— The Ne'er-Do-Well • Rex Beach
... here and there at intervals against some staggering fence? Could a flood of sunlight improve the dingy house-fronts that looked drearily out upon this cheerless prospect, or lend a charm to the hardened faces of those that peered through dirty window-panes, or who stood idly in some ...
— The Doctor's Daughter • "Vera"
... so idly it is our custom to say, I shall never forget! that the words scarcely cause a ripple of comment in the mind; whereas, in fact, they are among the most audacious which we ever take upon our lips. How know we what law of selection ...
— The Gates Between • Elizabeth Stuart Phelps
... else concerned," said Tom, idly defacing the rocks in his neighbourhood by tearing the lichen from them. And Mrs. Marx watched ...
— Nobody • Susan Warner
... companion; but at the same moment the light ornamental ascent gave way and burst into flames. He could just see Fadrique clinging above to a brass grating and swinging himself up to it, but all means of following him were destroyed. Quickly recollecting himself, Heimbert lost no time in idly gazing, but hastened through the adjacent halls in search of another flight of steps which would lead him to his ...
— The Two Captains • Friedrich de La Motte-Fouque
... course that meant most to me was the one I never attended. What it meant to those sophomores of the class of 1909 is another gentle speculation. Three years later, when I was a senior, and those sophomores had left college, another youth and myself were idly prowling about a dormitory corridor where some of those same sophomores had previously lodged. An unsuspected cupboard appeared to us, and rummaging in it we found a pile of books left there, forgotten, by a member of that class. It was a Saturday afternoon, and my companion ...
— Plum Pudding - Of Divers Ingredients, Discreetly Blended & Seasoned • Christopher Morley
... wind died almost completely away; and shortly afterwards a few heavy drops of rain fell, speedily followed by a drenching shower. This killed the remaining light air of wind, and the boats lay idly upon the water, their saturated canvas flapping heavily against the masts. But not for long; the sails were speedily lowered down and spread across from gunwale to gunwale to catch the precious moisture, and so heavy was the downpour that in the quarter of an hour during which the ...
— The Pirate Island - A Story of the South Pacific • Harry Collingwood
... the dream!" sighed the queen; and forthwith her tears began to flow anew, while her hands lay idly ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... with fair words the next moment, and the next rages against Bolingbroke; and then comes the great speech in which the poet reveals himself so ingenuously that at the end of it the King he pretends to be, has to admit that he has talked but idly. I cannot help transcribing the whole of the passage, for it shows how easily Shakespeare falls out of this King's character ...
— The Man Shakespeare • Frank Harris
... His face turned hot, and he lowered the glass guiltily. But of course she could not see him—or if she could, he looked no more than a speck on the rock. He lifted the telescope again, and her face jumped into close view. She was still looking up his way, the little mirror turning idly in her hand. Her face was thoughtful; almost wistful, he dared to think. Perhaps she was lonesome, too. She had told him that she had spells ...
— The Lookout Man • B. M. Bower
... here and there a lonely prowling horseman, cantering on, or dismounted and peering through his glass. It was three minutes to eight when the first shot was fired. 'This will be a bit more history for the kiddies to learn,' yawns the next man to me, leaning idly ...
— With Rimington • L. March Phillipps
... "don't speak of your father in that flippant manner. Why are you lounging here so idly? Gather up the books, put this room in order, and then, with Laura's assistance, I would like you this morning to clean the china closet. Every cup and saucer and plate must be taken down and wiped separately, after ...
— Holiday Stories for Young People • Various
... running westerly into another, or else into a large eucalyptus flat or swamp, which had no apparent outlet. This heavy timber could be seen for two or three miles. Advancing still further, I soon discovered that we were upon the reedy banks of a fast flowing stream, whose murmuring waters, ever rushing idly and unheeded on, were now for the first time disclosed to the delighted eyes of ...
— Australia Twice Traversed, The Romance of Exploration • Ernest Giles
... the elusive mental dews that might awaken something definite concerning her hazy impression of the man beside her, she spoke pleasantly, conventionally, touching idly any topic that might have a bearing; and, under a self-possession so detached as to give an impression of indifference, eyes, ears, and intelligence admitted that he was agreeable to look at, pleasant of voice, and difficult to reconcile with ...
— The Fighting Chance • Robert W. Chambers
... lain until disinterred in the hurried search for linen for Mr. Raoul's wound. Next morning Dorothea was on the point of hiding it again, when, as she opened the covers idly, her ...
— The Westcotes • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... foolish, for it was now nearly November and to wait there idly for five or six months was appalling. Moreover, it seemed their duty to go home and report Peter's loss to his father, even if they returned in the spring to search for the body of ...
— The Come Back • Carolyn Wells
... The medicine which was about to prove fatal to Fido would have caused only prolonged sleep if taken in small doses, at proper intervals, by an adult. "It's a wonder she didn't take 'em all at once," he thought. "And if she had—" He speculated, idly, upon ...
— Flower of the Dusk • Myrtle Reed
... tapestries which form the wall of the apartment at the back. The deck of the ship is seen from mainmast to stern; sailors busy with ropes, groups of knights and their esquires lounging. Tristan stands apart from the rest, with folded arms, staring abstractedly over the water. His servant Kurwenal lies idly outstretched at his feet. Isolde's eyes at once find the half-averted figure; her absorption in it becomes equal to his in the unknown object of the thoughts engrossing him. She does not hear this time the sailor at the topmast singing over again the ...
— The Wagnerian Romances • Gertrude Hall
... seen him go! And while he passed the gate I stood i' the crowd So close I could have touched him! Few discerned In one so soiled the erst Arch-Emperor!— In the lax mood of him who has lost all He stood inert there, idly singing thin: "Malbrough s'en va-t-en guerre!"—until his suite ...
— The Dynasts - An Epic-Drama Of The War With Napoleon, In Three Parts, - Nineteen Acts, And One Hundred And Thirty Scenes • Thomas Hardy
... you inwrought its substance into, not merely your understandings or your emotions, but your daily conduct? Is it indeed the life of your lives, and the leaven that is leavening your whole character? You have it to trade with; see that you do not wrap it in a napkin, and stow it idly away in ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... return by another route. The man I had stopped (whom at first I had taken to be a Frenchman) was a German prisoner, so I started on again; but wherever I looked there were nothing but Germans, busily working at these quarries. No guards were in sight, as far as I could see, and I wondered idly if they would take it into their heads to hold up the car, brain me, and escape. It was only a momentary idea though, for looking at these men, they seemed to be quite incapable of thinking ...
— Fanny Goes to War • Pat Beauchamp
... he laid aside the ferocious and bombastic play-acting which made it hard to discover whether he was very cunning or half-mad. The immense beard flowed down his chest instead of being tricked out in gaudy ribbons. He was idly running a comb through it when his small, rum-reddened eyes took in the two lads in dripping clothes who were shoved toward him by the sentry ...
— Blackbeard: Buccaneer • Ralph D. Paine
... idly, but from knowledge sure— There be who vaunt an utter loyalty, That is but as the ghost of friendship dead, A shadow in a glass, of faith gone by. One only—he who went reluctant forth Across the seas with me—Odysseus—he Was loyal unto me with strength and will, A ...
— The House of Atreus • AEschylus
... definite impression, however, as to the way he should go, which was part instinct and partly remembrance of what the boy on the moving wagon had told him. The people he had left were too inert to think of giving him any instructions. But down the road he passed the big boys of the house sitting idly by the roadside. They had heard with satisfaction their father's opinion as to Steve's going in search of "larnin'." As Steve came in sight one of them nudged the other and said, "Less ...
— The Boy from Hollow Hut - A Story of the Kentucky Mountains • Isla May Mullins
... shall here observe how much some have to answer, in a literary court of conscience, when they unfairly depreciate the works of a contemporary; and how idly the literary historian performs his task, whenever he adopts the character of a writer from another who is his adversary. This may be particularly shown ...
— Calamities and Quarrels of Authors • Isaac D'Israeli
... barely thirty. He was well dressed, of a sprightly and gay appearance, a well-knit figure, and a rich dark complexion. As Arthur came over the stile and down to the water's edge, the lounger glanced at him for a moment, and then resumed his occupation of idly tossing stones into the water with his foot. There was something in his way of spurning them out of their places with his heel, and getting them into the required position, that Clennam thought had an air of cruelty in it. Most of us have more or less frequently derived ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... remembers the articles he has skimmed in the papers about the Constantine Ionides bequest: suppose he strolls into the Museum and asks his way of a patient policeman to the Ionides collection. Suppose he stands before the revolving frame of Rembrandt etchings, idly pushing from right to left the varied creations of the master, would he be charmed? would his imagination be stirred? Perhaps so: perhaps not. Perhaps, being a man of importance in the city, knowing the ...
— Rembrandt • Mortimer Menpes
... in early summer, I was sitting in St. Bartholomew's Church on Fifth Avenue, waiting for the services to begin. It was early and the congregation was assembling. While idly watching the people coming in, I saw a gentleman pass by me up the aisle, who made me forget all the others. He had not the air of a New Yorker; he was not even dressed in city style, but as I noted his face and expression, I said ...
— Initials Only • Anna Katharine Green
... form his camp; he had to divide it into three parts, which were posted on different heights, and his tents whitened the sides of the neighboring hills. When the encampment was formed the army remained gazing idly at the castles. The artillery was upward of four leagues in the rear, and without artillery all attack ...
— Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada • Washington Irving
... uses, in reference to Hyder Ali, the same image which Demosthenes uses in reference to Philip. "Compounding all the materials of fury, havoc, desolation, into one black cloud, he hung for a while on the declivity of the mountains. Whilst the authors of all these evils were idly and stupidly gazing on this menacing meteor, which darkened all their horizon, it suddenly burst, and poured down the whole of its contents upon the plains of the Carnatic." Demosthenes forbears to amplify. "The people gave their voice, and the danger which ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 8, Slice 2 - "Demijohn" to "Destructor" • Various
... do you know that the law exacts an oath, before I can issue such a precept? The habitation of a citizen is not to be idly invaded ...
— The Pioneers • James Fenimore Cooper
... speech more, and if that may not prove true, I shall deserve whatever punishment you may command." The king asked, "What may that be?" He said: "If a peasant bring thee a cup of junket, two measures of it will be water and one spoonful of it buttermilk. If thy slave spake idly be not offended, for great travellers deal most in the marvellous!" The king smiled and replied, "You never in your life spake a truer word." He directed them to gratify his expectations, and he departed ...
— Persian Literature, Volume 2, Comprising The Shah Nameh, The - Rubaiyat, The Divan, and The Gulistan • Anonymous
... did not allow their plates to remain idly before them. Roger sent his for an additional supply of the goodly sirloin which the Colonel was carving, and then, as soon as he had finished eating, without waiting for the pasties or Master Holden's grace, he ...
— Roger Willoughby - A Story of the Times of Benbow • William H. G. Kingston
... She was idly turning over lavallieres on a tray—holding them up for inspection, and letting the pretty chains run through her fingers to drop into the ...
— Nan Sherwood's Winter Holidays • Annie Roe Carr
... an object too for Lady Carse. She fretted sadly, but not quite idly, about her strength failing just now when boats came to the island so often that she might have had many chances of escape if she could now have borne night watching, and exposure to weather and fatigue. She complained and wept much; but all the time she ...
— The Billow and the Rock • Harriet Martineau
... and capital; but here they do themselves injustice. The qualities that are making them masters of the world, unfit them for slighter and less serious pursuits. The Future is for them, the kingdom of elevators, of telephones, of motor-cars, of flying-machines. Let them not idly hark back, misled by effete traditions, to the old European dream of the kingdom of heaven. 'Excudent alii,' let them say, 'for Europe, Letters and Art; tu regere argento populos, Morgane, memento, let America rule the world by Syndicates and Trusts!' ...
— A Modern Symposium • G. Lowes Dickinson
... good master," quoth Stutely, springing to his feet, "that thou hast chosen me for this adventure. Truly, my limbs do grow slack through abiding idly here. As for two of my six, I will choose Midge the Miller and Arthur a Bland, for, as well thou knowest, good master, they are stout fists at the quarterstaff. Is it not ...
— The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood • Howard Pyle
... before whose eyes all sorts of shapes and colours fly, and in whose ears all sounds are ringing; and he thought no more of the helm, nor watched the sails; and so the driving swell carried his boat idly along with its long roll; and in a few minutes more I saw it at the top of a white foaming breaker, and then he and it were dashed down upon the rocks which girdled the sandy beach, and he was seen again ...
— The Rocky Island - and Other Similitudes • Samuel Wilberforce
... her, and on the other a stately form in a corded shovel-hat of glossy beaver and black breeches. This was the Bishop. Viviette carried over her shoulder a sunshade lined with red, which she twirled idly. They were laughing and chatting gaily, and when the group approached the churchyard many of their remarks entered the silence of the church tower through ...
— Two on a Tower • Thomas Hardy
... number is only trifling. When we visited the church there were 280 present, and out of this number 160 were children. We fancied that the weather, for it was rather unfavourable, might have kept many away, but when we recollected that we had passed groups of men standing idly at contiguous street corners, discussing the merits of dogs and ale, as we walked to the church; and saw at least 40 young fellows within a good stone throw of it as we left, hanging about drinking-house sides, in the drizzling rain, waiting for "opening time," and talking coolly about "half ...
— Our Churches and Chapels • Atticus
... sleep, And it slept right on, though the warm rain fell, And Nature found, when she came to look, Nothing at all but an empty shell. The other seed mused—"It cannot be right Thus in the earth to so idly lie, This life of ours will wasted be And soon in this gloom, unused, must die. I shall not sleep—from this narrow shell I'll find my way, and out of this night I shall reach right up, until day by day I nearer and nearer approach the ...
— Nestlings - A Collection of Poems • Ella Fraser Weller
... seat and walked to the window. Was Pixie occupied even as she had been herself in laying out her dress for the evening? She peered curiously through the opposite windows, but no sign of the inhabitants was to be seen; she yawned, drummed her fingers against the pane, and stared idly down ...
— More about Pixie • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... required the consent of Congress for "any agreement or compact." The significance of this distinction was pointed out by Chief Justice Taney in Holmes v. Jennison.[1781] "As these words ('agreement or compact') could not have been idly or superfluously used by the framers of the Constitution, they cannot be construed to mean the same thing with the word treaty. They evidently mean something more, and were designed to make the prohibition more comprehensive. ...
— The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation • Edward Corwin
... and learnedly delineated almost every one of the several parts of animals in a special work, has left the heart alone untouched. Finally, if any use or benefit to this department of the republic of letters should accrue from my labours, it will, perhaps, be allowed that I have not lived idly, and as the old man in the ...
— The Harvard Classics Volume 38 - Scientific Papers (Physiology, Medicine, Surgery, Geology) • Various
... alone with my thoughts. Could it have been only yesterday that I had turned my horse and passed between the sagging posts that marked the entrance to his house? Was it only a day ago I had first seen him leaning back idly in his arm ...
— The Unspeakable Gentleman • John P. Marquand
... quite strangely fell upon him, and though he could not move, the agony of his hands and lacerated waist vanished entirely; such perfect peace that he leant back against the wall and idly tried to count the myriad tiny dainty hoof marks in the dust between the doorway facing him, and the ruined ...
— Leonie of the Jungle • Joan Conquest
... thick obscurity permitted only skylines to be visible of any scene at present. The water at the back of the house could be heard, idly spinning whirpools in its creep between the rows of dry feather-headed reeds which formed a stockade along each bank. Their presence was denoted by sounds as of a congregation praying humbly, produced by their rubbing against each other in ...
— The Return of the Native • Thomas Hardy
... Paul's these fifty years, though his office windows looked on the churchyard. "So that's all? Well, a gloomy old place. ... Where's Nelson's tomb? No time now—come again—a coin to leave in the box. ... Rain or fine is it? Well, if it would only make up its mind!" Idly the children stray in—the verger dissuades them—and another and another ... man, woman, man, woman, boy ... casting their eyes up, pursing their lips, the same shadow brushing the same faces; the leathern curtain of the ...
— Jacob's Room • Virginia Woolf
... his heroism, but he waived the whole matter off by saying, "Think of me as well as you can, for Heaven knows I have need to retrieve my character. But please do not speak as if I had done more than I ought. For a young man to stand idly by, and see the home of his childhood, the place where he had received unbounded hospitality, destroyed, would be simply base. If I had not been reduced by months of ill health, the thing would not have been difficult at all. But you, Miss Walton, displayed ...
— Opening a Chestnut Burr • Edward Payson Roe
... of Queequeg, while busy at the mat. As I kept passing and repassing the filling or woof of marline between the long yarns of the warp, using my own hand for the shuttle, and as Queequeg, standing sideways, ever and anon slid his heavy oaken sword between the threads, and idly looking off upon the water, carelessly and unthinkingly drove home every yarn: I say so strange a dreaminess did there then reign all over the ship and all over the sea, only broken by the intermitting dull sound of the sword, that it seemed as if this were the Loom of Time, and I myself were ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville
... roaring outside for John Perkins to come dance in the train of Momus. And at McCloskey's the boys were knocking the balls idly into the pockets against the hour for the nightly game. But no primrose way nor clicking cue could woo the remorseful soul of Perkins the bereft. The thing that was his, lightly held and half scorned, had been taken ...
— The Trimmed Lamp • O. Henry
... heat, and two Danish warriors reclined under the shadow of an ancient beech, hard by the entrenched camp of the Danes, a few days after the arrival of Alfgar therein. Their spears lay idly on the grass, as if there were no foe to dread, and the land were their own; they seemed deeply ...
— Alfgar the Dane or the Second Chronicle of Aescendune • A. D. Crake
... had brought home the sheep, and having seen them safe in the fold, was sitting on the ground outside the cottage door eating his supper. One arm rested on the neck of a large dog, that was idly reposing by his side, as if tired with the toils of the day, for it was the shepherd's dog, and its duty was to guard the flocks as they were feeding in the fields, and warn his master if any danger seemed near them. At length the boy arose and walked slowly towards the ...
— The Grateful Indian - And other Stories • W.H.G. Kingston
... J. Wallingford Speed and Helen Blake sat together in the hammock, and much of the time her hand was in his. The breath of the hills wandered to them idly, fragrant with the odors of the open fields, the heavens were bright with dancing stars, the night itself was made for romance. From the bunk-house across the court-yard floated the voice of the beloved Echo Phonograph, now sad, now gay; now shrilling the peaceful air ...
— Going Some • Rex Beach
... he paused idly a moment on the verge of this green "God's-acre" to read a perpendicular slab on a wall, and his face broadened into a smile as he followed the absurdly elaborate biography of a rich, self-made merchant who had taught ...
— The Grey Wig: Stories and Novelettes • Israel Zangwill
... the good-by, Cornelia had risen from her seat; by the action the remaining petals of the tea-rose had been shaken off, leaving the nucleus bare and unprotected. Bressant's eyes fastened idly upon it, but he said nothing, and did not move, Cornelia withdrew her unaccepted hand, smiled, and, turning about, walked up the path to the house with an easy and dignified grace, which was not so much natural as ...
— Bressant • Julian Hawthorne |
