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Apropos   /ˌæprəpˈoʊ/   Listen
Apropos

adverb
1.
At an opportune time.  Synonyms: seasonably, timely, well-timed.
2.
Introducing a different topic; in point of fact.  Synonyms: by the bye, by the way, incidentally.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Apropos" Quotes from Famous Books



... Merna, and he remarked that no doubt it did seem rather strange to us, adding that my mention of air-ships was singularly apropos of what was then in his mind, for he was just about to inform us that an interesting aerial display had been arranged and was to take place that evening, with the view of affording us some idea ...
— To Mars via The Moon - An Astronomical Story • Mark Wicks

... Allan declared. "I prefer champagne at its natural temperature; the wine is far too good to have its flavour frozen out of it. Apropos of what you were saying, Baron, there is one question which I should like to ask you. Why was Major Delahaye sent to St. Argueil for Isobel, and what was he supposed to ...
— The Master Mummer • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... said, quite suddenly, and apropos of nothing, in an effort to change the subject. "That's an odd name. I've heard of Bridges and Bridger; but I never heard ...
— The Mucker • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... "Apropos of this," said the burgomaster, interrupting his friend, "Commissary Passauf, our chief of police, reports to us that a discussion took place in your drawing-room last evening, Doctor Ox. Was he wrong in declaring that it was ...
— A Winter Amid the Ice - and Other Thrilling Stories • Jules Verne

... summers, buds and blossoms were inappropriate; she wore fruits: in the grand coronal of plaits that massed itself upon her head were set, like gems, three or four small, delicious, amber-scented mandarin oranges. With this piece of exquisite apropos did the infallible Mary Ashburleigh crown the edifice of her good taste. The two brides sat opposite each other. A small watch, which I had happened to buy at Coblenz, I managed to detach and lay ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Vol. XV., No. 85. January, 1875. • Various

... "The Theatres have re-opened. Apropos of them—I will tell you a fine instance of the futility of human ambition. Mr. Monck Mason took the King's Theatre, saith report—(which is the creed of devils)—in order to bring out an opera of his own, which Mr. Laporte, with a very uncourteous discretion, had thought fit to refuse. ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 578 - Vol. XX, No. 578. Saturday, December 1, 1832 • Various

... "Apropos," said Bullwig, "who IS Yellowplush? I was given to understand that the name was only a fictitious one, and that the papers were written by the author of the 'Diary of a Physician;' if so, the man has wonderfully improved in style, and there is some ...
— Memoirs of Mr. Charles J. Yellowplush - The Yellowplush Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray

... Apropos of these things and some others William said: 'Being engaged is abominable, because, you see, one has no official position. We must be thankful that we've lots of things ...
— The Kipling Reader - Selections from the Books of Rudyard Kipling • Rudyard Kipling

... grow only alders, elders, and weeds. Everywhere docks thrust up heads through cracks in the fences to catch at the legs or the skirts of passers-by, while masses of nettles squeeze their way under fences to sting little children. Apropos, the latter are all thin and hungry, in the highest degree quarrelsome, and addicted to prolonged lamentation. Also, each spring sees a certain proportion of their number carried off by diphtheria, while scarlatina and measles are as epidemic ...
— Through Russia • Maxim Gorky

... those stirring men who, if he did not possess genius, had its nearest kin—activity, and illustrated the fact that a man might do two things well at one and the same time. He gave us samples of human nature which is quite apropos to the general subject. In discussing the eccentricities of merchandising, he said that usually wealthy customers entering his store would ask to see his cheaper class of boots, such as would do service, "honest material, but not the most ...
— Minnesota; Its Character and Climate • Ledyard Bill

... well have been tried out on Hannibal and have lost his head inside that animal's huge mouth, had not the good fortune of apropos- ness intervened. For, the next moment, Collins was listening to the hasty report of his lion-and-tiger keeper. The man who reported was possibly forty years of age, although he looked half as old again. He was a withered-faced man, whose face-lines, deep ...
— Michael, Brother of Jerry • Jack London

... this he is advised that a body of rioters in his neighborhood "threatened to treat his house like that of M. de Castries," in which everything had been smashed and thrown out the windows. At another time, apropos of the suspensive or absolute veto; "four savage fellows came to his domicile to warn him, showing him their pistols, that if he dared write in behalf of M. Mounier he should answer for it with his ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 3 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 2 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine

... was reading was a discussion of the priesthood. The author affirmed that none might exercise the functions of the priesthood if he was not sound in body, or if any of his members had been amputated, and asking apropos of this, if a castrated man could be ordained a priest, he answered his own question, "No, unless he carries upon him, reduced to powder, the parts which are wanting." He added, however, that Cardinal Tolet did not admit this ...
— La-bas • J. K. Huysmans

... on that in one of the executive offices after the first dinner at Port Carpenter. Rodney Maxwell, in Storisende, had joined them in screen-image; he was mostly listening, and sometimes contributing a remark apropos of something the rest of them ...
— The Cosmic Computer • Henry Beam Piper

... disagree on politics," interposed the low voice of Caroline. She had better not have spoken just then. Having scarcely joined in the conversation before, it was not apropos to do it now. She felt this with nervous acuteness as soon as she had spoken, ...
— Shirley • Charlotte Bronte

... Divine Love is the first vocal utterance and the last. In his notes Boito observes: "Goethe was a great admirer of form, and his poem ends as it begins,—the first and last words of 'Faust' are uttered in Heaven." Then he quotes a remark from Blaze de Bury's essay on Goethe, which is apropos, though not strictly accurate: "The glorious motive which the immortal phalanxes sing in the introduction to the first part of 'Faust' recurs at the close, garbed with harmonies and mystical clouds. In this ...
— A Book of Operas - Their Histories, Their Plots, and Their Music • Henry Edward Krehbiel

... repeat a substantive, adjective, or verb without an intervening space of at least four inches. This, of course, leads to that particular form of "journalese" in which a cricket-ball becomes a "leathern missile" and so forth. Apropos of this I remember a good Fleet Street story. An Editor, enraged with a contributor, tore up an article on grouse, with the exclamation, "Look here! You have actually used the word 'grouse' twenty times in your first paragraph! Why cannot you call them something ...
— The Adventure of Living • John St. Loe Strachey

... expected a severe encounter with Martha apropos of her kitchen-fire being left unlit, and the litter of brick and mortar rubbish made by the bricklayer; but to his surprise the cook did not come into the kitchen, and during breakfast Vane asked ...
— The Weathercock - Being the Adventures of a Boy with a Bias • George Manville Fenn

... to Paula as they came in the hope of provoking some question that would make it possible to tell John Wollaston's wife the tale of his necessities, but nothing of the sort happened. Paula did observe (a little uneasily?) apropos of ...
— Mary Wollaston • Henry Kitchell Webster

... scheme for getting the sheikh's tomb moved. I don't know who it is yet. Meanwhile my time and my head are so full, that in the few hours of the night I put aside for sleep, I dream queerer dreams than the visits of ghostly sheikhs. Apropos of dreams, do you know by chance a man who answers this description: elderly, stoutish, red face, gray hair, black moustache, pale eyes with sharp look in them. ...
— It Happened in Egypt • C. N. Williamson & A. M. Williamson

... indeed I'm in bronze. Apropos! I have just been mentioning Miss Richland's case to a certain personage; we must name no names. When I ask, I am not to be put off, madam. No, no, I take my friend by the button. A fine girl, sir; great justice in her case. A friend of mine—borough interest—business must ...
— Goldsmith - English Men of Letters Series • William Black

... there was absolutely no public demand for what in those days were called 'large mirrors' made in the Venetian fashion, mirrors which to-day would not find a market in the most remote frontier towns of America or Australia. Colbert then wrote to the Comte d'Avaux apropos of the works of Lucas de Nehou in Normandy, that 'there was absolutely no market for large mirrors in the kingdom, the king being the only person who could possibly ...
— France and the Republic - A Record of Things Seen and Learned in the French Provinces - During the 'Centennial' Year 1889 • William Henry Hurlbert

... he said, apropos of nothing at all, "that at any rate the ghost is laid here. Whatever the rappings have been—and the colored man says they began when the family went west three months ago—they ...
— The Circular Staircase • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... Very apropos, thought I, and, at the same time, shows that you have studied Latin. However, it was kind of him, and an attention from a captain is a thing not to be slighted. Thompson's majesty could not have bent to it, in the sight ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana

... "Apropos, tell me please, is it true that the women have all left Moscow? What a queer idea! What had they to ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy

... for her own brood—especially for Alice. Nora could look after herself, and invariably did. Besides Nora was so tiresome! She was always ready to give the family case away—to give everything away, preposterously. And, apropos, Mrs. Hooper expressed her annoyance with some silly notions Nora had just ...
— Lady Connie • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... But, apropos of Pope.—Voltaire tells us that the Marechal Luxembourg (who had precisely Pope's figure) was not only somewhat too amatory for a great man, but fortunate in his attachments. La Valiere, the passion of Louis XIV., ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. 6 (of 6) - With his Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore

... eyes in comfort and grow dead in virtues and respectability. I am a bad man by nature, I suppose; but I cannot be good without suffering a little. And the end of life, you will ask? The pleasurable death of self: a thing not to be attained, because it is a thing belonging to Heaven. All this apropos of that good, weak, feverish, fine spirit, —— ——. We have traits in common; we have almost the same strength and weakness intermingled; and if I had not come through a very hot crucible, I should be just as feverish. My sufferings have been healthier than his; mine have been always a choice, ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 23 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... proficient? No, but by a civilised handy breech-loader, which these ingenious mechanicians could not only make, but no doubt improve; nay, surely I saw one in the Museum. Indeed, as absolute king, I should discountenance vril altogether, except in cases of war. Apropos of war, it is perfectly absurd to stint a people so intelligent, so rich, so well armed, to a petty limit of territory sufficing for 10,000 or 12,000 families. Is not this restriction a mere philosophical crotchet, at variance with the aspiring element ...
— The Coming Race • Edward Bulwer Lytton

... right," said Toubac, astonished at the violence of my excitement. "We will speak of other things. Apropos, Master Christian, where is ...
— Library of the World's Best Mystery and Detective Stories • Edited by Julian Hawthorne

... Apropos of this, he said, "Here is a hen-pheasant from Shan Liang—and in season! and in season!" After Tsz-lu had got it prepared, he smelt it thrice, and then rose up ...
— Chinese Literature • Anonymous

... the impressive thoughts which a visit to an institution like Fisk University is sure to excite, is the relation of all this work to the future. Apropos of this, the Rev. J.O.A. Clark, D.D., LL.D., of Macon, Ga., has just written a little tract of fifty pages on "The Future of the Races." He does not vote in New England, nor is he a Yankee; but he is a good and true witness. He says, ...
— American Missionary, Volume 43, No. 5, May, 1889 • Various

... owe me two letters—pay them. I want to know what you are about. The summer is over, and you will be back to Paris. Apropos of Paris, it was not Sophia Gail, but Sophia Gay—the English word Gay—who was my correspondent.[1] Can you tell who she is, as you did of the defunct ...
— Life of Lord Byron, With His Letters And Journals, Vol. 5 (of 6) • (Lord Byron) George Gordon Byron

... not open the novel and begin reading, even then. She dabbed her handkerchief at her eyes, muttered: "My Heavens, what a fool!" apropos of nothing tangible, and stared dully out at the forlorn waste of cinders with rows of shining rails running straight across it upon ties half sunken in the black desolation, and at the red abomination which was the pump-house squatting beside the dripping tank, the pump breathing asthmatically ...
— Good Indian • B. M. Bower

... worshiped (propitiated) only that which he could see, or feel, or hear, or touch; his undeveloped psychical being could grasp nothing higher; his limited understanding could not frame an idea involving a spiritual element such as animism undoubtedly presents. Apropos of the dream birth of the soul, all terrestrial mammals dream, and in some of them, notably the dog and monkey, an observer can almost predicate the subject of their dreams by watching their actions while they are under dream influence; yet no animal save man, ...
— Religion and Lust - or, The Psychical Correlation of Religious Emotion and Sexual Desire • James Weir

... figures; and when this was given up, the decorative women gave the unexpected impression of being deeply absorbed in something happening out of sight of the spectator below. An explanation which has gained some currency is that the figures represent "Introspection," which seems quite apropos. ...
— An Art-Lovers guide to the Exposition • Shelden Cheney

... several other persons—white, of course—were present, and one of them—after relating the trials of Cadet Smith and the circumstances of his dismissal, which, apropos, had not yet occurred, as he would have me believe— advised me to abandon altogether the idea of going to West Point, for, said he, "Them northern boys wont treat you right." I have a due proportion of stubbornness in me, I believe, as all of ...
— Henry Ossian Flipper, The Colored Cadet at West Point • Henry Ossian Flipper

... evading our present physical tests. Be that as it may, they afford a capital introduction to the study of magic; if, indeed, they, and a few allied phenomena, do not comprise the germs of the whole matter. Apropos of this subject, a society has lately been organized in London, with branches on the Continent and in this country, composed of scientific men, Fellows of the Royal Society, members of Parliament, professors, and literary men, calling themselves the "Psychical Research Society," ...
— Confessions and Criticisms • Julian Hawthorne

... agonies. But the virgin in distress found her knight-errant duly provided. He rose out of the mud romantically apropos. To be sure, I think he was mad. But that is all in the part. The complete hero. Geoffrey, could you be a ...
— The Highwayman • H.C. Bailey

... why it should have suddenly occurred to me, apropos of nothing, that Billy Kemper was unusually handsome. Or why I should have turned and looked at the pretty waitress—except that she was, perhaps, worth gazing upon from a purely non-scientific point of view. In fact, to a man not entirely absorbed in scientific research and not passionately ...
— Police!!! • Robert W. Chambers

... first your mind had got a bit unhinged. Unfortunately, it's not that. Is it because you've turned sour? Anyway, I don't know what advantage you're after, but I must cautionize you that you're anielating everybody. We must put ourselves in these people's places. Apropos of this, and apropos of that, you make proposals of a tendicious character which doesn't escape them. You aren't like the rest any more. If you go on you'll look as silly as a giant, and if you're going to frighten folks, look out ...
— Light • Henri Barbusse

... The telegram apropos of the Ward Five leader was by no means the only cipher message I sent back during my stay. I had not needed to be told that the matter in hand would cost money, but Mr. Watling's parting instruction to me had been to take the Colonel's advice as to specific ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... Moscheles writes in his diary, apropos of Cherubini and his artistic surroundings: "I spent the evening at Ciceri's, son in-law of Isabey, the famous painter, where I was introduced to one of the most interesting circles of artists. In the first room were assembled the most famous painters, engaged in drawing several ...
— Great Italian and French Composers • George T. Ferris

... her wisdom and thought were for you, your father's and her child. When she spoke of you and your future, she said many things which I thought memorable. One of them I remember to this day. It was apropos of my saying that there is a danger of its own kind in extreme poverty. A young man might know too much want. She answered me: "True! That is so! But there is a danger that overrides it;" and ...
— The Lady of the Shroud • Bram Stoker

... instead of a pond there suddenly appears apropos of nothing a huge bull's head without eyes, and the horse and sledge are not driving along, but are whirling round and round in a cloud of smoke. But still he was glad he had seen his own folks. ...
— The Witch and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov

... O, ye great authors!—'Apropos des bottes,'- I have forgotten what I meant to say, As sometimes have been greater sages' lots; 'T was something calculated to allay All wrath in barracks, palaces, or cots: Certes it would have been but thrown away, And that 's one comfort for my lost advice, ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron

... whose pictures of New England life are as full of a delicate sense of humour as they are of real and simple pathos. It was, perhaps, the tale of the London bookseller who referred to his own coiffure the American's remark apropos of the two-volume English edition of a well-known series of "Walks in London"—"Ah, I see you part your Hare in the middle." Whatever it was, my hearer at once capped it by the reply of a Boston girl to her narration of the following anecdote: A railway conductor, ...
— The Land of Contrasts - A Briton's View of His American Kin • James Fullarton Muirhead

... useful manhood. Isabelle took her part modestly—but with a very sweet dignity, that sat well upon her—in the conversation at the table, and in the salon, and her remarks were so to the point, so witty, and so apropos, that the prince was astonished as well as charmed, and grew daily more proud of and devoted to his new treasure; finding a happiness and satisfaction he had longed for all his life in the affection and devotion of ...
— Captain Fracasse • Theophile Gautier

... Apropos of the tax question, I have looked into the matter since, and I am rather surprised to find the proportion not so heavy as I thought; on the whole population it is about L1 a-head—certainly less than is borne by many other states. In England, I believe, we are taxed at over L2 a-head. Then, ...
— Round About the Carpathians • Andrew F. Crosse

... Grangers who had been elected to Congress increased our strength, and an elaborate programme of what was to be done was prepared by the united forces. In all of which Ernest joined loyally and energetically, though he could not forbear, now and again, from saying, apropos of nothing in particular, "When it comes to powder, chemical mixtures are better than mechanical mixtures, you take ...
— The Iron Heel • Jack London

... the model of a temple in Athens, no, nor a TEMPLE in MOORFIELDS, but it is built to act English plays in: and, provided you have good scenery, dresses, and decorations, I daresay you wouldn't break your hearts if the outside were as plain as the pikestaff I used to carry when I was a sergeant. Apropos, as the French valets say, who cut their masters' throats {28}—apropos, a word about dresses. You must, many of you, have seen what I have read a description of, Kemble and Mrs. Siddons in Macbeth, with more gold and silver plastered on their doublets than would ...
— Rejected Addresses: or, The New Theatrum Poetarum • James and Horace Smith

... Ruth. "He got it in Italy and had it sent the whole way by sea. It took all the king's horses and all the king's men to get it up here, I can tell you. And, as I say, nothing less apropos can one possibly imagine. That poor thin female with such very scanty clothing is hardly a cheerful object on a Scotch winter's day, and as for those little naked imps they would make anyone ...
— The Ashiel mystery - A Detective Story • Mrs. Charles Bryce

... Suddenly, apropos of nothing, our prince was guilty of incredible outrages upon various persons and, what was most striking these outrages were utterly unheard of, quite inconceivable, unlike anything commonly done, utterly silly and mischievous, quite unprovoked and objectless. One of the most ...
— The Possessed - or, The Devils • Fyodor Dostoyevsky

... correspondent who answers the question, 'What shall we do with her?'—apropos of the case of the distressed young woman which we considered in ...
— Household Papers and Stories • Harriet Beecher Stowe

... "Apropos to writing verses in a language one don't understand, there is always the allowance given, and that allowance (like our excise drawbacks) commonly larger than it ought to be. The following translation of the verses written with a knife, has been ...
— Autobiography, Letters and Literary Remains of Mrs. Piozzi (Thrale) (2nd ed.) (2 vols.) • Mrs. Hester Lynch Piozzi

... about to rise at eight p.m. Three hours' ascent of the mountain, on such a moonlit, tropical night as would tax the descriptive powers of the greatest artists, was worth any sacrifice. Apropos, among the few artists who can fix upon canvas the subtle charm of a moonlit night in India public opinion begins to ...
— From the Caves and Jungles of Hindostan • Helena Pretrovna Blavatsky

... to hide his own self behind the historical characters," Strindberg tells us, apropos of this very play. [Note: In one of his biographical novels, The Bondwoman's Son, vol. iii: In the Red Room.] "As an idealist he was to be represented by Olof; as a realist by Gustaf; and as a communist by Gert." Farther on in the ...
— Master Olof - A Drama in Five Acts • August Strindberg

... Woman," "'Parsifal' and the Thing-in-Itself," "The Swan in 'Parsifal' and its Relation to the Higher Vegetarianism." It knows the name of every leit-motif, and can nearly pronounce the German for it; it can refer to the Essay on Beethoven apropos of Kundry's scream (or yawn) in the second act; it can chat learnedly of Klingsor, in pathetic ignorance of his real offence, and explain why Amfortas has his wound on the right side, although the libretto distinctly states it to be situated on the left. It is a fact that this year a ...
— Old Scores and New Readings • John F. Runciman

... that old Ma'am Yellett had a school-marm up to her place?" asked one of the men, apropos of Eastern prettiness. ...
— Judith Of The Plains • Marie Manning

... said, "no one would be more delighted than I if my Guru consented to take you as a pupil. But you can't tell what he will do, as he said to me today, apropos of myself, 'I cannot come unless I'm sent.' Was not that wonderful? He knew at once he had been ...
— Queen Lucia • E. F. Benson

... as Dicky had been told—apropos of another youngster who had "made a fool of himself," as the saying is—that matrimony would not only ruin his further chances of advancement, but would lose him his present appointment—came the news that the baby, his own little, little son, ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling

... of my skill has spread. Apropos of letters, I have just read the four letters that I received to-day. Filomena is perpetually complaining of my sweetheart's uncontrollable passion as revealed in this writing madness. She imagines that all the ...
— Recollections Of My Childhood And Youth • George Brandes

... to speak of the situation of the Nautilus, run aground in exactly the same spot in this strait where Dumont d'Urville was nearly lost. Apropos of this: ...
— Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea • Jules Verne

... Unamuno says, apropos of the backwardness of Spaniards in the field of invention: "Other nations can do the inventing." In other words, let foreigners build up the sciences, so that we may take advantage ...
— Youth and Egolatry • Pio Baroja

... (Apropos of this common tendency of the flesh of birds to acquire the taste of their principal article of food, I may mention that in those Melanesian Islands where the small Chili pepper grows wild, the pigeons at certain times of the year ...
— The Call Of The South - 1908 • Louis Becke

... Apropos of the increasing difficulty of obtaining certain old books noted above, the extensive scale on which reproductions of original editions of Early English literature have of recent years been made is certainly a boon to literary inquirers, since the presence ...
— The Book-Collector • William Carew Hazlitt

... known, made great progress in recent years. Apropos of this subject, we shall describe to our readers an operation that was recently performed by one of our most skillful surgeons, Dr. Terrillon, under peculiar circumstances, in which success is quite rare. The subject was a man whose oesophagus ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 643, April 28, 1888 • Various

... have served in so many armies that I mix them up sometimes. Yes, I have seen much of war. Apropos I have seen your Scotchmen fight, and very stout fantassins they make, but I thought from them, that the folk over here all wore—how ...
— The Great Shadow and Other Napoleonic Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle

... An interesting incident, apropos of our embarrassed bee, was narrated to me by the late Alphonso Wood, the noted botanist. He had received by mail from California a small box containing a hundred or more dead bees, accompanied by a letter. The writer, an old bee-keeper, had experience, and desired enlightenment and advice. ...
— My Studio Neighbors • William Hamilton Gibson

... the little romance is quite apropos to our present chat. It is a very simple tale, and rather sad, but it had a great influence on my life, and this brooch ...
— A Garland for Girls • Louisa May Alcott

... "And it is apropos of that candidacy that I have come to disturb your Sunday joys; but perhaps in so doing we shall not go beyond the limits ...
— The Lesser Bourgeoisie • Honore de Balzac

... let us quarrel about it; I am ready to retract. Good-night, mademoiselle. Apropos, did you know that M. Camille Langis had ...
— Samuel Brohl & Company • Victor Cherbuliez

... interesting now, were it apropos, to describe the seemingly very ancient processes by which our ancestors gilded, plated, were deceived and deceived others, previous to about 1845. For those things were done, and the genuineness of life has by no means been destroyed ...
— Steam Steel and Electricity • James W. Steele

... fair things to be saying APROPOS of Robert Schumann; for I do not think he was ever guilty of any excesses of genius — as they are called: I only mean them to apply to the UNREST ...
— Sidney Lanier • Edwin Mims

... few or none of the infirmities of age that make themselves painfully or inconveniently evident. He carried his slight figure erect, and until his latest years his step was quick and sure. Once he spoke of the lessened height of old people, apropos of something that was said, and "They will shrink, you know," he added, as if he were not at all concerned in the fact himself. If you met him in the street, you encountered a spare, carefully dressed old gentleman, with a clean- shaven face and a ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... Susan sought every opportunity of conversing with him even on indifferent matters. She was garnering up his words, his very syllables, and twenty times in the day he saw her eyes fill with tears apropos of such ...
— It Is Never Too Late to Mend • Charles Reade

... amongst other small dishes, after the fatigues of Richard III. O God! they have nothing here, which gives the nerves so smart a blow, as those great characters in the hands of Garrick! but I forgot I am writing to the man himself. The devil take (as he will) these transports of enthusiasm! Apropos, the whole city of Paris is bewitched with the comic opera, and if it was not for the affair of the Jesuits, which takes up one half of our talk, the comic opera would have it all. It is a tragical nuisance in all companies as it is, and was it not for some sudden starts and dashes of ...
— Selected English Letters (XV - XIX Centuries) • Various

... at this unexpected answer. "You seem quite captivated with this Mrs. Wilson; it was for her sake you took Lucy to task. Apropos, you need not have scolded her, for she did not know the ...
— Love Me Little, Love Me Long • Charles Reade

... soul, Mr. Horace Vanney, chief owner of the International Cloth Mills, had given to Banneker a reprint of an address by himself, before some philosophical and inquiring society, wherein he had set forth some of his simpler economic theories. A quotation, admirably apropos to Banneker's present purposes, flashed forth clear and pregnant, to his journalistic memory. From the Ledger "morgue" he selected one of several cuts of Mr. Vanney, and turned it in to the night desk for publication, with this ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams

... former collaborator, holding that by such an interpretation of the Constitution "the Government is no longer a limited one possessing enumerated powers, but an indefinite one, subject to particular restrictions." Jefferson had already expressed himself in a similar way apropos of the bank bill. The suspicions which the Secretary of State entertained of his brilliant colleague were deep-seated. Hamilton's well-known preference for the British Constitution and his disposition to convert his secretaryship into a sort ...
— Union and Democracy • Allen Johnson

... said in his certificate, "J'estime qu'il faut prevenir 'augmentation de ses maux; et en le secourant apropos, c'est assurer la conservation d'un homme dont les travaux doivent servir aux progres des sciences, et a 1'utilite de ...
— A Voyage to Terra Australis Volume 2 • Matthew Flinders

... should like to know how a Hallelujah sung by Strauss would sound: I believe one would have to listen very carefully, lest it should seem no more than a courteous apology or a lisped compliment. Apropos of this, I might adduce an instructive and somewhat forbidding example. Strauss strongly resented the action of one of his opponents who happened to refer to his reverence for Lessing. The unfortunate man had misunderstood;—true, Strauss ...
— Thoughts out of Season (Part One) • Friedrich Nietzsche

... speciale du Saint Siege, en sorte que nulle personne, de quelque qualite qu'elle soit, n'y exerce aucune autorite, mais qu'il jouisse d'une pleine liberte, et que l'abbesse et les religieuses puissent employer quelque eveque ils jugeroient apropos pour les benedictions d'autels, et autres fonctions qui regardent le ministere episcopal: que son neveu, le Comte Henri Seigneur d'Egesheim, en soit la voue, et apres lui, l'aine des ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 193, July 9, 1853 • Various

... of the intellect that is in him." The Middle Ages were "a healthy age," and therefore there was next to no Literature. "The strong warrior disdained to write." "Actions will be preserved when all writers are forgotten." Two days later, apropos of Dante, he says, "The great thing which any nation can do is to produce great men.... When the Vatican shall have crumbled to dust, and St. Peter's and Strassburg Minster be no more; for thousands of years to come Catholicism will survive in this sublime ...
— Thomas Carlyle - Biography • John Nichol

... Apropos of this subject, and before leaving it, it may be well to quote remarks of Mr. Simons of Rhode Island, in the United States Senate. Said he: "Complaint has been made of Personal Liberty Bills. Now, ...
— The Great Conspiracy, Complete • John Alexander Logan

... your perdition. While you live, my dear Botherby, never defend Yourself or your works; but leave both to a friend. Apropos—Is your play ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 4 • Lord Byron

... say any thing about it. In due time we gathered with our friends around the breakfast table. A sight of them reminded me of the conversation the previous evening, and I felt an irresistible desire to allude to the missing shirt button as quite an apropos and amusing incident. So, speaking from the impulse of the moment, I said, glancing first at Mrs. Jones, then around the table, and then pointing down at my bosom, "The old story of ...
— Trials and Confessions of a Housekeeper • T. S. Arthur

... a tale I heard her tell to Katje, when that damsel had seen fit to observe, apropos of disobedience in general, that her grandfather's character had nothing to do with hers. The tale was in plaintive Dutch, the language that makes or breaks a story-teller, for you must hang your point on the gutturals or you ...
— Vrouw Grobelaar and Her Leading Cases - Seventeen Short Stories • Perceval Gibbon

... you will allow me to say so, a man of the modern world. I have no superstition about me, and am as much of a Positivist as the best of them, although I include among the positive data of nature all the mysterious faculties and feelings of the soul. Well, then, apropos of supernatural, or extra-natural, phenomena, listen to what I have seen and heard, although I was not the real hero of the very strange story I am going to relate, and then tell me what explanation of an earthly, physical, ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: Spanish • Various

... the ingrate added, as he turned away, and let himself drop back into his lounging-chair. "My dear good woman, no amount of prettiness can disguise the fundamental banality of things. Your fireflies—St. Dominic's beads, if you like—and, apropos of that, do you know what they call them in America?—they call them lightning-bugs, if you can believe me—remark the difference between southern euphuism and western bluntness—your fireflies are pretty enough, I grant. ...
— The Cardinal's Snuff-Box • Henry Harland

... garden when some demon urged Ukridge, apropos of the professor's mention of Dublin, to start upon the Irish question. My heart ...
— Love Among the Chickens - A Story of the Haps and Mishaps on an English Chicken Farm • P. G. Wodehouse

... proverbial humility never permitted the ghost of such a suggestion to affright my soul! Judging from the confusion which greeted my entrance, I am forced to conclude that it was mal apropos. But prudent regard for the reputation of the household urged me to venture near enough to the line of battle to inform you that the noise of the conflict proclaims it to the servants, and the unmistakable tones arrested my ...
— St. Elmo • Augusta J. Evans

... appended (apropos of an allusion by Morga) an interesting account of the ancient customs observed by the natives of Pampanga in the administration of justice. These differed, according to the social status of the parties concerned, and the kind of ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XVI, 1609 • H.E. Blair

... ventured on fault-finding about one article, I must not deprive myself of the pleasure of congratulating you heartily on another. Since October 1802 no article on foreign affairs has been so apropos as your Cuban one of last October. Here it has been read with avidity and universal satisfaction, and I believe it will do much to guide influential opinion in England at this crisis. I hope to see you return ...
— Memoirs of the Life and Correspondence of Henry Reeve, C.B., D.C.L. - In Two Volumes. VOL. II. • John Knox Laughton

... time," he confessed apropos of the nymphs, "when I thought those ladies the best ever. Young eyes won't hesitate between a plump ...
— The Henchman • Mark Lee Luther

... "'Apropos of cigars,' said Wilkins, lighting a second fragrant Havana with the stump of the first, 'let's go and see the farmer's establishment for making them. You see that field of tobacco over yonder? Old Standish raises his own weed, dries it in the big open sheds behind the barn, cures ...
— Tobacco; Its History, Varieties, Culture, Manufacture and Commerce • E. R. Billings

... and silently rejoined her children, with whom she returned to Clochegourde, leaving me to the count, who began to talk politics apropos of his neighbors. ...
— The Lily of the Valley • Honore de Balzac

... Apropos, I forgot to mention to you that BERTHOLET, a Senator and Member of the Institute, communicated to that society, in one of its sittings last month, a letter from FOURIER, the geometrician, and member ...
— Paris As It Was and As It Is • Francis W. Blagdon

... his pipe. "No doubt you think that you are complimenting me in comparing me to Dupin," he observed. "Now, in my opinion, Dupin was a very inferior fellow. That trick of his of breaking in on his friends' thoughts with an apropos remark after a quarter of an hour's silence is really very showy and superficial. He had some analytical genius, no doubt; but he was by no means such a phenomenon as ...
— A Study In Scarlet • Arthur Conan Doyle

... intensity of action directed toward a definite end we often say "he puts his heart and soul into it." This phrase is apropos of almost everything the Muscular does. He makes no ...
— How to Analyze People on Sight - Through the Science of Human Analysis: The Five Human Types • Elsie Lincoln Benedict and Ralph Paine Benedict

... Apropos to Cornish matters, a dictionary with a very tempting title was advertised for publication two or three ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 192, July 2, 1853 • Various

... think. Apropos of the Angel Fish, the CONTINENTAL heard a lady remark lately that they were well named, and lovely enough to have been caught in the ponds of paradise. 'They certainly must be the kind,' she added, 'which they ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol 2, No 6, December 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... Apropos of this somewhat ungallant sentiment, a Russian scholiast remarks:—"The whole of this ironical stanza is but a refined eulogy of the excellent qualities of our countrywomen. Thus Boileau, in the guise of invective, eulogizes Louis XIV. Russian ladies ...
— Eugene Oneguine [Onegin] - A Romance of Russian Life in Verse • Aleksandr Sergeevich Pushkin

... you always make me feel everything, just as you do; so that I know ten miles off how you feel! But do you remember," she asked, "apropos of great gold cups, the beautiful one, the real one, that I offered you so long ago and that you wouldn't have? Just before your marriage"—she brought it back to him: "the gilded crystal bowl ...
— The Golden Bowl • Henry James

... my father's great uncle who was an Admiral in the British Navy.' As this was the first intimation Miss de Dear had given as to a fondness for water, except on the side, I felt that living and learning were synonymous terms. So, perhaps, did the Judge, who said, apropos of nothing in particular, 'When I was in California in fifty-nine, I saw a snake over forty-seven feet long. The onery rascal wouldn't coil up, and they had to carry him from place to place on flat cars. Now what do you think of that?' Miss de Dear gazed dreamily out at the tossing waves, and said ...
— The Statesmen Snowbound • Robert Fitzgerald

... jackets, aren't you?" she would ask, apropos of my flimsy ulster. "I had taffeta last year, with velvet and satin this winter; but I don't know what I'll get yet ...
— The Woman Who Toils - Being the Experiences of Two Gentlewomen as Factory Girls • Mrs. John Van Vorst and Marie Van Vorst

... not yet twenty-one years since a great daily in New York said that if a society composed wholly of women could hold together one year, a great many men would have to revise their opinion of women. The remark was made apropos of the formation of the first women's clubs in this country, and was echoed on all sides publicly and privately. It is only significant now as showing the isolated position of women, and the general impression ...
— Memories of Jane Cunningham Croly, "Jenny June" • Various

... crowning him king of fate and poet of the world. Long after midnight, upon such and many other occasions, would he and his companions sit laughing and jesting and drinking, some saying witty things, and all of them foolish things and worse; inventing stories apropos of the foibles of friends, and relating anecdotes which grew more and more irreverent to God and women as the night advanced, and the wine gained power, and the shame-faced angels of their true selves, made in the image of God, withdrew into the dark; until at last, between night ...
— Mary Marston • George MacDonald

... made known to the three gentlemen—Colonel Denstroude, [Footnote: He and Vanringham had just been reconciled by Molly Yates' elopement with Tom Stoach, the Colonel's footman. Garendon has a curious anecdote concerning this lady, apropos of his notorious duel with Denstroude, in '61.] Mr. Babington-Herle, and Sir Gresley Carne—who sat over a bowl of punch. Sir Gresley was then permitted to conclude the narrative which Mr. Allonby's entrance had interrupted: the evening previous, being a little tipsy, Sir Gresley ...
— Gallantry - Dizain des Fetes Galantes • James Branch Cabell



Words linked to "Apropos" :   apposite, apt, pertinent, malapropos, appropriateness, appropriate, incidentally



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