"Curtsy" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... curtsy. Was this the man she was to be so dreadfully afraid of? Her whole charming little face broke into ...
— Sue, A Little Heroine • L. T. Meade
... of the Haughtons is reached, and the carriage rolls through the wide open gates. At the pretty lodge door stands the keeper and his wife, he pulls off his cap while she curtsies low, their future mistress tosses them a gold bit at which more curtsy and bow. What a magnificent avenue through the great park, the oak and elm mingling their branches and interlacing their arms overhead, through which a glimpse of blue heavens with golden gleams of sunlight ...
— A Heart-Song of To-day • Annie Gregg Savigny
... wrapped a soft muslin handkerchief round her wounded arm and ran downstairs. Her aunt was already in the drawing-room, but to Pauline's relief no one else was present. The little girl ran up to her aunt, dropped a curtsy, and looked somewhat ...
— Girls of the Forest • L. T. Meade
... he succeeded in comforting her, and even then, she remained more subdued than usual. But when Maurice had gone, and she had dropped the scattered sprays of lilac out of the window on his head, she clasped her hands at the back of her neck, and dropped a curtsy to herself in ...
— Maurice Guest • Henry Handel Richardson
... Amsterdam. Equipped in skates wonderful to behold, with their superb strappings and dazzling runners curving over the instep and topped with gilt balls, he would open his fat eyes a little if one of the maidens chanced to drop him a curtsy but would not dare to bow in return for fear of ...
— Hans Brinker - or The Silver Skates • Mary Mapes Dodge
... you!" cried Benita in Spanish. Then, in spite of her stiff joints, she made a deep, old-fashioned curtsy. ...
— Blue Bonnet's Ranch Party • C. E. Jacobs
... so airy a welcome soon showed a discontented curve not to be belied by the merry words that issued from them, and when we would have escorted her across the fields to her father's house, she made a mocking curtsy, and wandered away with the ugliest old crone who mouths and mumbles in the meeting-house. Did she do this to mock us or him? If to mock him he had best take care, for beauty scorned is apt to grow dangerous. But perhaps it was to mock us? Well, well, there would be nothing new ...
— The Old Stone House and Other Stories • Anna Katharine Green
... might have been somebody else—a real Excellency—or heaven knows what! Or, what is worse in your new magnificence, you might have forgotten one of your oldest, most humble, but faithful subjects." She drew back and made him a mock ceremonious curtsy, that even in its charming exaggeration suggested to Paul, however, that she had ...
— A Ward of the Golden Gate • Bret Harte
... the moment came when, Lady Baird having preceded me, I handed my bit of pasteboard to the usher; and hearing 'Miss Hamilton' called in stentorian accents, I went forward in my turn, and executed a graceful and elegant, but not too profound curtsy, carefully arranged to suit the semi-royal, semi-ecclesiastical occasion. I had not divulged that fact even to Salemina, but I had worn Mrs. M'Collop's carpet quite threadbare in front of the long mirror, ...
— Penelope's Experiences in Scotland • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... browse the hay-field's fragrant heats, Or the flail-heart of Autumn beats; 80 I dog thee through the market's throngs To where the sea with myriad tongues Laps the green edges of the pier, And the tall ships that eastward steer, Curtsy their farewells to the town, O'er the curved distance lessening down: I follow allwhere for thy sake, Touch thy robe's hem, but ne'er o'ertake, Find where, scarce yet unmoving, lies, Warm from thy limbs, thy last disguise; 90 But thou ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell
... two long benches made of split logs. Abe led Nat down the length of the front bench. Each girl rose and made a curtsy. Nat bowed. Each boy rose and bowed. Nat returned the bow. Abe kept saying funny things under his breath that the schoolmaster could not hear. But the children heard, and they could hardly keep ...
— Abe Lincoln Gets His Chance • Frances Cavanah
... into an exaggerated curtsy, thus adroitly avoiding the Duke's outstretched hand and ready lips. His feeble legs failed, he stumbled forward and pitched into the arms of Elmur, who set him upright with a gentle skilfulness that almost cheated the eyes of ...
— A Modern Mercenary • Kate Prichard and Hesketh Vernon Hesketh-Prichard
... of curtsy and offered him her slender fingers; which, as well as the rest of her hand, he took and held. Its shapeliness together with her beauty of face and figure were instantly swept ...
— The Cab of the Sleeping Horse • John Reed Scott
... troubling," she said, and laying a gold coin on the table, drew back with a slight curtsy. "But I think you gave me this by mistake; and now is my only chance to give it back. I am going home in a ...
— Lady Good-for-Nothing • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... said that all the country-folk took her for a foreigner. Some dogs, and the boy who held them in charge, made up the company. They rode silently along, looking with grave, serious eyes at the people, who came out of the scattered cottages to bow or curtsy to the real Squire, 'come back at last,' and gazed after the little procession with gaping wonder, not deadened by the sound of the foreign language in which the few necessary words that passed among them were spoken. One lad, called from his staring by the Squire to come and help about ...
— Curious, if True - Strange Tales • Elizabeth Gaskell
... get on very well with poor people, George. It's very dreadful, I know, but there!—I'm not Lady Maxwell—and I can't help it. Of course, with the poor people at home in our own cottages it's different—they always curtsy and are very respectful—but Mrs. Matthews says the people here are so independent, and think nothing of being rude to you if they don't ...
— Sir George Tressady, Vol. I • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... to her. She regarded it, clasped it in the hand which was against her bosom, and at length dropped a curtsy, though without speaking. ...
— Thyrza • George Gissing
... rap at the minister's door first, of course; and when Mrs. Fairbanks opens the door I shall make my best curtsy, like this:" and Faith took a bit of her skirt in each hand, and bent in a very pretty curtsy indeed; "and I shall say: 'Good-morning, Mrs. Fairbanks. My Aunt Prissy will be very happy if you and the minister will come to her quilting bee to-morrow ...
— A Little Maid of Ticonderoga • Alice Turner Curtis
... its flying pigtails swayed and swung, and the pink legs darted in and out. Backward, forward, right glide, left glide, two skips sidewise. Her breath was almost gone, but she rallied her forces for a grand finale. With a curtsy to the bedpost and hands all around, she dashed into the rollicking ...
— Southern Stories - Retold from St. Nicholas • Various
... and not a little stench, to the real joy of most of the women present, who don't dislike an opportunity of finding fault. Lady Lucy, indeed, was plentifully abused, and Mr Hobart had his share; and common fame says he has never had a card since. Few women will curtsy to him; and I question if he ever will lead any one to their chair again as long as he lives. I leave you to judge how deeply he feels this wound. Every body says it would never have happened if you had not retired to your studies; and you are a little blamed for letting him out alone. He has sunk ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 55, No. 340, February, 1844 • Various
... is my cousin's duty to make a curtsy, and say, "Father, as it please you;" but for all that, cousin, let him be a handsome fellow, or else make another curtsy, and say, "Father, as it pleases me." SHAKESPEARE, Much Ado ...
— Tales • George Crabbe
... mouches, little moon and star-shaped beauty spots, on their faces; square cut bodices, lace stomachers, paniers over brocaded skirts with lace panels; feet encased in high heel satin slippers with jewelled buckles; and gracefully managing their ostrich feather fans as they curtsy to their partners; the latter wearing wigs also powdered white, long coats of brocade, elaborately embroidered waistcoats with lace jabots, satin knee breeches, silk stockings and a garter with jewelled buckle on the right ...
— The Pianolist - A Guide for Pianola Players • Gustav Kobb
... dotes on him!" signed pretty Mistress Polly after she had bobbed her curtsy to my lady. "The brave deeds he did for love of her! Rescued her from those murderers over in France and brought her to England safe and sound, having fought no end of them single-handed, so I've beard it said. Have you ...
— The Elusive Pimpernel • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... Silly boy!" said she, with her forefinger up; and then when I tried to lay hands on her again, she gave a little dainty curtsy, and was ...
— The Great Shadow and Other Napoleonic Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... proud Southern woman said sincerely, with a curtsy. "Some day the 'rebel scout' may thank you also for me and mine." And with a smile that augured friendship when that brighter day should come she passed out of his sight among ...
— The Littlest Rebel • Edward Peple
... was quick-eyed, and threw a nod and a "How do you do?" in the nick of time. In spite of her shabby bonnet and very old Indian shawl, it was plain that the lodge-keeper regarded her as an important personage, from the low curtsy which was dropped on the ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot
... dropped a stately curtsy, and, taking her candle, went away through the tapestry door, which led to her apartments. Esmond stood by the fireplace, blankly staring after her. Indeed, he scarce seemed to see until she was gone, and then her image was impressed upon him and remained ...
— The Literary World Seventh Reader • Various
... death and such dismal bugbears from their minds. "Mais, songez, Mademoiselle," quoth he, interrupted in some observation rather better worth hearing, "que tout le monde ne possede pas votre force de caractere;" a compliment to which the young lady assented with a grateful curtsy. ...
— Itinerary of Provence and the Rhone - Made During the Year 1819 • John Hughes
... early, and got up and went out into the garden, and, turning a corner suddenly, he came upon a little person in a large white cap, with a large white apron on, in which she was gathering sweet pot-herbs, thyme, and basil, and mint, and savory, and sage, and marjoram. She stood up and dropped a curtsy. ...
— Oswald Bastable and Others • Edith Nesbit
... her. 'What do you wish with me?' exclaimed I to her. 'Ah! you are a woman, and of a sex I abhor, and can no longer tolerate; the very gentleness of your look threatens me with some new treason. Go, leave me here alone!' She made me a curtsy without uttering a word, and turned to go out. I called to her to stop: 'Tell me at least,' said I, 'wherefore— how—with what design they sent you here? how did you discover my name, or the place where you ...
— Manon Lescaut • Abbe Prevost
... got to curtsy, whisper, hold your chin up, laugh and lisp, And then you're sure to take: I've known the day when brats, not quite Thirteen, got fifty pounds a night; Then why ...
— The Humourous Poetry of the English Language • James Parton
... you are,' retorted Miss Squeers with a low curtsy, 'almost as witty, ma'am, as you are clever. How very clever it was in you, ma'am, to choose a time when I had gone to tea with my pa, and was sure not to come back without being fetched! What a pity you never thought that other people might ...
— The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby • Charles Dickens
... spare yourself the trouble, my lord," she retorted, sweeping him a curtsy. "I can guess what it is, without ...
— The Lieutenant-Governor • Guy Wetmore Carryl
... D****N. With a face (once divine), and a figure still smart, And a grace that defies even Time's fatal dart, Dame D****n advanced, made her curtsy, and smiled: Truth welcomed the fair, the grave, witty, and wild; All, all gave their votes, and some said they knew That her numbers by no measure equall'd ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle
... and I have done," said Rose.—"To Eveline, whom I love, and who loves me, I can speak freely—but to the Lady of the Garde Doloureuse, the proud Norman damsel, (which when you choose to be you can be,) I can curtsy as low as my station demands, and speak as little truth ...
— The Betrothed • Sir Walter Scott
... she reached the foot of the steep hill which led up to her home. The artist gentleman was there as usual, a pipe in his mouth, and a palette on his thumb, painting busily: as she hurriedly dropped a curtsy in passing, Lilac's ...
— White Lilac; or the Queen of the May • Amy Walton
... Mrs. John and the somewhat awesome Maria—to whom Grandpa and Grandma Burton never could learn not to curtsy—arrived; and almost at once Grandma Burton discovered that not only "farm things," but such precious treasures as the hair wreath and the parlor—set were auctionable. In fact, everything the house contained, except their clothing and a few crayon ...
— Across the Years • Eleanor H. Porter
... worth my while, With such small gear to give myself concern: Indeed I've not the necessary bile; My natural temper's really aught but stern, And even my Muse's worst reproof's a smile; And then she drops a brief and modern curtsy, And glides away, ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron
... Ingmarsson. In the rickety chaise over yonder the Ingmar Ingmarsson who had lived during her childhood had driven to church. She remembered that every time he had passed by her and her mother on their way to church, the mother had nudged her and said: "Now you must curtsy, Stina, fox here comes ...
— Jerusalem • Selma Lagerlof
... a dainty curtsy, and I could only try and hide the pain which this last cruel stab had inflicted on my heart. So she was not "Mademoiselle" after all, and henceforth it would even be wrong to indulge ...
— Castles in the Air • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... him a curtsy, Trudy repaired to do the dishes and swiggle an oil mop about the floor briefly. Then she burnt some scented powder and pulled down the window shades. This constituted getting the establishment in order, the slavey having gone tootling off ...
— The Gorgeous Girl • Nalbro Bartley
... ground," says she. "You don't know what to ask. I am tired of being a peasant woman and a moujik's wife. I was made for something better. I want to be a lady, and have good people to do the work, and see folk bow and curtsy to me when I meet them walking abroad. Go back at once to the fish, you old fool, and ask him for that, instead of bothering him for little trifles like bread troughs and moujiks' huts. ...
— Old Peter's Russian Tales • Arthur Ransome
... his chair and breathed deeply, slowly—and Miss Sarah appeared that moment in the doorway, pinker of cheek and more tremulous of lip than her brother had ever seen her before. She dropped Allison an old-fashioned curtsy, which was an exceedingly frivolous ...
— Then I'll Come Back to You • Larry Evans
... her uncle at Smithfield Market. They then went very lovingly together to an inn upon the paven stones, where Moll asked very readily at the bar if Mr. Tompkins (which was the name of her uncle) was there. The woman of the house made her a low curtsy and said he was only stepped over the way to be shaved, and she would call him. She went accordingly and brought the grave old man, who as soon as he came into the room said, Well, Mary, is this thy husband? Yes, sir, answered she, this is the person I have ...
— Lives Of The Most Remarkable Criminals Who have been Condemned and Executed for Murder, the Highway, Housebreaking, Street Robberies, Coining or other offences • Arthur L. Hayward
... than that His Majesty might mention—quite casually, of course—to the Prince that he had just given a decoration to Mrs. Poppit of Tilling. And it would make me feel very awkward to think that that had happened, and I was not somewhere about to make my curtsy." ...
— Miss Mapp • Edward Frederic Benson
... and to my surprise after taking it she made me an elaborate curtsy. It rather upset me, for I had thought we had got on very well together and were quite free and easy in our talk, very much on a level. But she was not done with me yet. She followed to the gate, and holding ...
— A Shepherd's Life • W. H. Hudson
... pulled the gate towards herself and, crushed behind it, curtsied to Thomas Batchgrew. This curtsy, the most servile of all Western salutations, and now nearly unknown in Five Towns, consisted in a momentary shortening of the stature by six inches, and in nothing else. Mrs. Tams had acquired it in her native village ...
— The Price of Love • Arnold Bennett
... empress excelling in that inclination of the body which the Russian ladies substitute for the curtsy, and which he justly regards as very becoming, the empress adding dignity and grace. He describes Orloff as an herculean figure, finely proportioned, with a cheerful eye, and, for a Russian, a good complexion: Potemkin as having stature and shoulders, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLII. Vol. LV. April, 1844 • Various
... dunna ye may t' squoire a curtsy, wench, an thonk him," said Tetlow, nudging his pretty wife, who had turned away, rather embarrassed by the free gaze of the squire. Nicholas, however, did not wait for the curtsy, but went away, laughing, to overtake Richard Assheton, ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... to her sleek hair and some flicker of a girlhood that had its modicum of grace, flared up in the swift curtsy with which she acknowledged ...
— The Maid of the Whispering Hills • Vingie E. Roe
... pleased Prince Charming?' And Madame von Eisenthal swept him a deep curtsy with a killing glance ...
— Prince Otto • Robert Louis Stevenson
... of something to say to him just to show him there was another side to it. Not that he gave a damn. Some other time would do. The red face turned with a great attentiveness toward the hoarsely oracular Mr. Warren, his eyes dropping a furtive curtsy in the ...
— Erik Dorn • Ben Hecht
... l'Empereur who had so terribly put her out in the gardens. This was done so suddenly, that Katie's presence of mind was quite insufficient to provide her with any means of escape. The Frenchman bowed very low and said nothing. Katie made a little curtsy, and was equally silent. Then she felt her own arm gathered up and put within his, and she stood up to take her share in the awful performance. She felt herself to be in such a nervous fright that she would ...
— The Three Clerks • Anthony Trollope
... came running up in an instant and opened the doors. "What are your graces' orders?" she asked, dropping a curtsy and scraping ...
— The Junior Classics Volume 8 - Animal and Nature Stories • Selected and arranged by William Patten
... Servants, and idle fellows, of which this Town, says she, is too full: At the same time, Whether she knew enough of Breeding, as that if a Squire or a Gentleman, or one that was her Betters, should give her a civil Salute, she should curtsy and be humble, nevertheless. Her innocent forsooths, yess, and't please yous, and she would do her Endeavour, moved the good old Lady to take her out of the Hands of a Country Bumpkin her Brother, and hire her for her own Maid. I staid till I saw them all marched ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... huge kitchen itself, an elderly woman, rolling pastry, paused to curtsy to them, with stolid curiosity in her heavy-featured face. In her character as "single-handed" cook, Mrs. Noakes had sent up uninviting meals to Lady Anstruthers for several years, but she had not seen ...
— The Shuttle • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... says, "and he bowed with the most marked civility of manner." This, be it observed, was just after his opening speech,—a speech which had produced a mighty effect, and which, certainly, no other orator that ever lived could have made. "My curtsy," she continues, "was the most ungrateful, distant, and cold; I could not do otherwise; so hurt I felt to see him the head of such a cause." Now, not only had Burke treated her with constant kindness, but the very last ...
— Critical and Historical Essays, Volume III (of 3) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... my words, if so that any be Known guilty here of incivility: Let what is graceless, discompos'd, and rude, With sweetness, smoothness, softness, be endu'd. Teach it to blush, to curtsy, lisp, and show Demure, but yet full of temptation, too. Numbers ne'er tickle, or but lightly please, Unless they have some wanton carriages. This if ye do, each piece will here be good, And graceful made by ...
— The Hesperides & Noble Numbers: Vol. 1 and 2 • Robert Herrick
... do you Of course I shall be pleased and" (making him a little curtsy) "honored, as one ought to ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... Henrietta's tone conveyed restraint, even comparative reverence—who never for an instant forgot she once had reigned over some microscopic court out in the far Colonial wilderness, nor allowed you to forget it either. Her glance half demanded your curtsy. Still she was the "real thing" and, in that, eminently satisfactory—genuine grande dame by right both of birth ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... was a vain one. The man smiled quizzically at Nora, who acknowledged the salutation by a curtsy which would have frightened away the banshees of her childhood. Nora hated scenes, and Courtlandt had the advantage of her in his knowledge of this. Celeste remained at the piano, but Nora turned as if to ...
— The Place of Honeymoons • Harold MacGrath
... stood out even in this more sickly type of a barbarous autocracy. It is the fashion at present, at least among some who take the name of "philosophical Radicals" in vain when they curtsy before a Machiavellian tyrant, to dwell with admiring pride upon the philanthropic character of Alexander the Benevolent. All the cardinal virtues are his. He is the Liberator of the Serfs, the Deliverer of Downtrodden Nationalities, the Educator ...
— The Contemporary Review, Volume 36, September 1879 • Various
... and a comfortless scullery were deemed sufficient at Fullerton, were here carried on in appropriate divisions, commodious and roomy. The number of servants continually appearing did not strike her less than the number of their offices. Wherever they went, some pattened girl stopped to curtsy, or some footman in dishabille sneaked off. Yet this was an abbey! How inexpressibly different in these domestic arrangements from such as she had read about—from abbeys and castles, in which, though certainly larger than Northanger, all the dirty work of the house was to be ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... was introduced to Duprez and Macfarlane, she gave them each a quaint, sweeping curtsy, which had the effect of making them feel the most ungainly lumbersome fellows on the face of the earth. Macfarlane grew secretly enraged at the length of his legs,—while Pierre Duprez, though his bow was entirely Parisian, decided in his own ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... thousandth-part of the unblushing impertinence of that countrywoman of mine who called your future king 'Tummy'! but she was a beauty, and I am not pretty enough to be anything but discreetly well-mannered. Shall you sit in his presence, or stand and grovel alternately? Does one have to curtsy? Very well, then, make any excuses you like for me, Hilda: say I'm eccentric, say I'm deranged, say I'm a Nihilist. I will hide under the scullery table, fling myself in the moat, lock myself in the keep, let the portcullis fall ...
— Penelope's English Experiences • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... said Miss Deborah, who had dropped her nephew's arm, so that she might be more cautious about the mud, and who lifted her skirt on each side, as though she was about to make a curtsy,—"he's right: a woman ought to think just as her husband does; it is quite wrong in dear Helen not to, and it will bring unhappiness. Indeed, it is a lesson to all ...
— John Ward, Preacher • Margaret Deland
... any member of the royal family, not only at court, but elsewhere. It is not so strange-looking, the kneeling to a royal lady, but to see a stately mother or some soft maiden rendering such an act of homage to a chit of a boy or a gross young gentleman impresses one unpleasantly. The curtsy of a lady to a prince or princess is something between kneeling and that queer genuflection one meets in the English agricultural districts: the props of the boys and girls seem momentarily to be knocked away, and they suddenly catch themselves ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII. No. 30. September, 1873 • Various
... toad-stools, supposed to be clouds. On the stage stood a girl of eighteen, (the handsomest in Kinesma), in hoops and satin petticoat, powdered hair, patches, and high-heeled shoes. She held a fan in one hand, and a bunch of marigolds in the other. After a deep and graceful curtsy to the company, she ...
— Beauty and The Beast, and Tales From Home • Bayard Taylor
... curtsy, flashed a radiant smile upon him and was tempted to hug him; but she refrained from this, not knowing how such a caress might be received. Then she thanked and thanked him till he bade her stop, and with her tin cup in her hand ...
— A Sunny Little Lass • Evelyn Raymond
... King? I would rather he ploughed the fields for bread than served your King. Here he is. Good-bye, Monsieur d'Argenton, may you find all well at Valmy; good night, Monsieur La Mothe, we shall meet again in the morning, or is it already the new day?" and with a smiling curtsy to each she was gone. To Stephen La Mothe it seemed a cold good night after all that had come and gone between them that day, the misunderstood question in her work-room, the shadow of death in the Burnt Mill, and, above all, their nearness as ...
— The Justice of the King • Hamilton Drummond
... the door with a smile of welcome upon his rugged features and a handshake and a pleasant word for everyone. His daughter Susan greeted the men with a little curtsy and kissed the girls upon the cheek. Susan was not pretty, though she was strong and healthy; her laughing blue eyes assured a sunny disposition, and she numbered ...
— Betty Zane • Zane Grey
... cried a silver-toned voice from a passage outside the drawing-room in which I had just seated myself. The next instant a lovely face appeared at the door, its owner tripped into the room, made a comical curtsy, and ran up to ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLV. July, 1844. Vol. LVI. • Various
... could not possibly stay, it would bore my father stiff, as he hated sitting up late; also I was not dressed for dancing and had no idea there was going to be a ball. When supper was over, I made my best curtsy and, after presenting my father to the ...
— Margot Asquith, An Autobiography: Volumes I & II • Margot Asquith
... their ridiculous titles which you young people call dancing nowadays. Fox-trot, indeed! And bunny-hug. And rag-time. I never heard such names in my life! We danced the Highland schottische, and the quadrille, and Sir Roger de Coverley. And do you remember your famous curtsy, Esther? And how Madame made you show off ...
— The Happy Adventurers • Lydia Miller Middleton
... she answered, ducking suddenly with a quaint curtsy. Her voice was shrill and piping, but softened somewhat by age. "Is dis yere whar Mistuh Ryduh lib, suh?" she asked, looking around her doubtfully, and glancing into the open windows, through which some of the preparations for the evening ...
— The Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, 1995, Memorial Issue • Various
... said, and the man's nerves tingled as she rose and swept him a graceful curtsy. She had never looked more beautiful, never so desirable as at that moment. He had conquered so often and so carelessly that he could ...
— The Brown Mask • Percy J. Brebner
... with her arms stuck in her sides, and her wide mouth distended from ear to ear, with a grin so truly uncouth and comic, that Mrs. Lyndsay could scarcely restrain her laughter; with a downward jerk of her broad shapeless person, meant for a curtsy, she burst out in a rude ...
— Flora Lyndsay - or, Passages in an Eventful Life • Susan Moodie
... and, being used to this decoy, had her cue perfect, made me a kind of half curtsy, and asked me to walk up with her; and accordingly showed me a neat room, two pair of stairs backwards, in which there was a handsome bed, where Martha told me I was to lie with a young gentlewoman, a cousin of my mistress, who she was sure would be vastly ...
— Memoirs Of Fanny Hill - A New and Genuine Edition from the Original Text (London, 1749) • John Cleland
... near enough to hear his words. Rosalind tripped past her three fellow-students with an airy little nod and the faint beginning of a mocking curtsy. ...
— A Sweet Girl Graduate • Mrs. L.T. Meade
... of the two of us was the more dumbfounded; but this I do know; that I was still speechless and fair witless when she swept me a low-dipped curtsy and gave ...
— The Master of Appleby • Francis Lynde
... to greet a Duke, for such I hear you are become," said Desire with a profound curtsy and a bewitching tone ...
— The Duke of Stockbridge • Edward Bellamy
... so," he said. "I suppose there must be lucid intervals, now that Norah is grown up, or imagines she is—not that she seems to me a bit different from the time when her hair was down. Still I suppose I must bring her to town, and let her make her curtsy at Government House, and do ...
— Back To Billabong • Mary Grant Bruce
... strut a Gentleman Commoner. In graver moments, I proceed Master of Arts. Indeed I do not think I am much unlike that respectable character. I have seen your dim-eyed vergers, and bed-makers in spectacles, drop a bow or curtsy, as I pass, wisely mistaking me for something of the sort. I go about in black, which favours the notion. Only in Christ Church reverend quadrangle, I can be content to pass for nothing ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb
... said Laura, with a curtsy, not quite so large as those that grow in dancing schools, but, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 21, July, 1859 • Various
... shall ride in the lead, Thereafter shall follow the steward and priest, The people shall all be bid to the feast! Pages so courtly shall guide your steed, And beautiful flowers be strewn at your feet, The peasant shall bow to the ground like a weed, His wife shall curtsy to you as is meet! The church bell shall ring to the countryside: Now rides Olaf Liljekrans home ...
— Early Plays - Catiline, The Warrior's Barrow, Olaf Liljekrans • Henrik Ibsen
... decent loaves in a row on the communion table every Sunday morning, which were provided by a charitable bequest for the benefit of the poor widows of the parish. If the widows did not attend service to curtsy for them, the loaves were given to any one who liked to take them. Old Clerk Briscall baked them himself. He kept a small village shop about two miles from the church. He was also the village shoemaker. A curious ...
— The Parish Clerk (1907) • Peter Hampson Ditchfield
... silent, his memory dwelling in scenes of the dimming past, while Donald's thoughts were busy with the story which he had just heard. The inherent difference between her personality and that of the average mountain girl was explained. The curtsy which she—a three-year-old baby—had made Big Jerry, seemed to indicate that she had been a flower of city hothouse culture before being transplanted to the wilds, and there growing up, in outward semblance at least, in conformity with her ...
— 'Smiles' - A Rose of the Cumberlands • Eliot H. Robinson
... has a sort of grande dame look about her—the sort of woman you can imagine in a powdered wig and a crinoline, curtsying to the queen." She scrambled up, and, snatching a paper fan from the shelf, swept Esther a graceful curtsy ...
— The Phantom Lover • Ruby M. Ayres
... suddenly stopped and performed some new and unexpected steps. When at last, smartly whirling his partner round in front of her chair, he drew up with a click of his spurs and bowed to her, Natasha did not even make him a curtsy. She fixed her eyes on him in amazement, smiling as if she ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... exceeding picturesqueness, the evident content, and helpfulness, and industry of these little creatures, was delightful to look at and to think of. In conversation they were at once very civil and respectful (Bessy dropping her little curtsy, and Harry putting his hand to the lock of hair where the hat should have been, at every sentence they uttered) and perfectly frank and unfearing. In answer to our questions, they told us that "Father was a broom-maker, from the low country; that he had come to these parts and married ...
— The Ground-Ash • Mary Russell Mitford
... and de hoss come a-bringing Marse Tom down de road. Mammy drap everything in the dust and grab her apron to drap a curtsy. She 'low—'Git dat hat off dat head and bow your head ...
— Slave Narratives Vol. XIV. South Carolina, Part 2 • Works Projects Administration
... lounged with them to the door of the house in which they lodged, when his mistress, perceiving, by the countenance of her comrade, that she was on the point of desiring him to walk in, checked her intention with a frown; then, turning to Mr. Pickle, dropped him a very formal curtsy, seized the other young lady by the arm, and saying, "Come, cousin Sophy," ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett
... came round to Rodney's chair to offer him her hand and drop her curtsy; took a carnation from a bowl on the table and tucked it into his button-hole, slid her arm around his neck ...
— The Real Adventure • Henry Kitchell Webster
... said she with equally elaborate politeness. "I would make you a curtsy if I were standing up, but you wouldn't wish me to rise for the purpose. Did you not see, though, anything at all like the ruins of a Roman ...
— Bob Strong's Holidays - Adrift in the Channel • John Conroy Hutcheson
... I, and "aha!" murmured she, With as pretty a curtsy as ever you 'd see; "Won't you pause?" I inquired; "I don't mind," said her mien, So we looked, side by side, from ...
— Sprays of Shamrock • Clinton Scollard
... was going up Pippen Hill, Pippen Hill was dirty; There I met a pretty Miss, And she dropped me a curtsy. ...
— The Little Mother Goose • Anonymous
... Fibsy appeared. He was a strange little figure, and showed a shy awkwardness at the grandeur of his surroundings. He bobbed a funny little curtsy to Ruth, whom he already adored, and with an embarrassed nod, included the rest of us in ...
— Vicky Van • Carolyn Wells
... whispering, if it is any where allowable, may perhaps be indulged the fair sex at church, where the conversation can only be carried on by the secret symbols of a curtsy, an ogle, or a nod. A whisper in this place is very often of great use, as it serves to convey the most secret intelligence, which a lady would be ready to burst with, if she could not find vent for it by this kind of auricular confession. ...
— The Young Gentleman and Lady's Monitor, and English Teacher's Assistant • John Hamilton Moore
... half-mile of road from the station to the village, and gave a grateful shade. The gardens of the cottages were bright with June flowers, and the broad village street, lined with low, irregular buildings, picturesque, but not at all from neglected age, seemed to be dozing in the still, hot air. A curtsy at the lodge gates, a turn of the Squire's wrist, and they were bowling along the well kept road through ...
— The Squire's Daughter - Being the First Book in the Chronicles of the Clintons • Archibald Marshall
... for the hostess was no sooner asked the question than she readily agreed; and, with a curtsy and smile, wished them a good journey. However, lest Fanny's skill in physiognomy should be called in question, we will venture to assign one reason which might probably incline her to this confidence and good-humour. When Adams said he was going to visit his brother, he had ...
— Joseph Andrews, Vol. 2 • Henry Fielding
... Gresham, I am under more than ordinary obligations to you; I am indeed," and Miss Oriel stood still in the path, and made a very graceful curtsy. "Dear me! only think, Lady Margaretta, that I should be honoured with an offer from the heir the very moment he is legally entitled to ...
— Doctor Thorne • Anthony Trollope
... shouted out to her to stop till he came up. She beckoned acquiescence, and slackened her pace into a slow movement. The Laird turned the corner quickly, but when he had rounded it the maiden was still there, though on the summit of the brow. She turned round, and, with an ineffable smile and curtsy, saluted him, and again moved slowly on. She vanished gradually beyond the summit, and while the green feathers were still nodding in view, and so nigh that the Laird could have touched them with a ...
— The Great English Short-Story Writers, Vol. 1 • Various
... quarter to four Olga Loschek was announced. She made the curtsy inside the door that Palace ceremonial demanded and inquired for the governess. Prince Ferdinand William Otto, who had risen at her entrance, offered to see if ...
— Long Live the King • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... when riding out, she met a poor old woman walking along the road, who made a curtsy and was going on, when the queen had her stopped, and cried: 'You are a very impertinent person; don't you know that I am the queen? And how dare you not make ...
— The Grey Fairy Book • Various
... sweeping bow and great assumption of courtesy, made your great-great-grandmother welcome to remain in his house. After the suit had been settled, Williams had occasion to come again to the house, feeling, no doubt, rather crestfallen. Mrs. Devereux met him at the door and, making him a sweeping curtsy, quoted his exact words, making him welcome to ...
— Plantation Sketches • Margaret Devereux
... Mrs. McGregor, making a quaint English curtsy, "and it's scandalized enough I am to see my boy here racing at you as if he was a wild beast and forgetting all the etiquette I've taught him. He had a nice speech ready to say but where it is ...
— Carl and the Cotton Gin • Sara Ware Bassett
... befitting His Majesty's chosen representative. How did the seigneurs rank among themselves and with the leading English-speaking people? Who were to dance in the state minuet? Should dancing cease when the bishops came in, and for how long? Was that curtsy dropped quite low enough to her viceregal self, and did that debutante offer her blushing cheek in quite the proper way to Carleton when he graciously gave her the presentation kiss? How immeasurably far away it all seems now, that stately ...
— The Father of British Canada: A Chronicle of Carleton • William Wood
... like moons. You couldn't have predicted, at any given time, what would become of them next. And when old Fezziwig and Mrs. Fezziwig had gone all through the dance; advance and retire, both hands to your partner, bow and curtsy, cork-screw, thread-the-needle, and back again to your place; Fezziwig "cut"—cut so deftly, that he appeared to wink with his legs, and came upon his ...
— A Christmas Carol • Charles Dickens
... In the main hall Alresca's housekeeper, evidently an old acquaintance, greeted Rosa with a curtsy, and she stopped to speak to the woman. I went on ...
— The Ghost - A Modern Fantasy • Arnold Bennett
... it's best to be on the safe side of the unseen powers. You'll agree to that now, Mr. March, won't you?"—She took a grape skin from between her neat teeth and flicked it out on to her plate.—"So, for myself," she went on, "I curtsy nine times to the new moon, though the repeated genuflexion is perniciously likely to give me the backache; touch my hat in passing to the magpies; wish when I behold a piebald; and bless my ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... me, Sir!" replied Amelia. "This is pretty indeed! But you need not thus affront me, because Miss Charlotte is your favourite!" So saying, and bestowing a contemptuous curtsy on him, she left him with an affected air ...
— The Looking-Glass for the Mind - or Intellectual Mirror • M. Berquin
... grammar when she went to school. Why do you let her wear that white cap? all the old ladies that I know wear black lace caps, with ribbons. I thought I should laugh outright when she made that little dip of curtsy." ...
— The King's Daughter and Other Stories for Girls • Various
... so I did, with the gratifying result that when the sun's lower rim had reached to within a finger's breadth of the western horizon the Mercury slid out past the southern edge of the reef and made her first curtsy as she once more dipped to the swell of the open ocean, having triumphantly negotiated and overcome every one of the difficulties of that endless rock-bound channel. I sprang into the topgallant rigging and ...
— Overdue - The Story of a Missing Ship • Harry Collingwood
... Cerise relaxed to allow a quaint smile to flit across it. She returned Fogerty's bow with a deep curtsy. ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces in Society • Edith Van Dyne
... higher, laughing, singing, talking loudly. Stumbling over a log his burning eyes had not seen, he turned in grotesque humor to offer curtsy and abject apology, then hastened on upward. Later, carroming from a huge tree he had hit head on, he addressed it in grave good humor: "Please keep to the right." His flushed face purple in the green light of the deep woods, he hurried on, again worrying over the nature of his forgotten mission ...
— Terry - A Tale of the Hill People • Charles Goff Thomson
... leaving US, the commander-in- chief(128) most courteously bowed also to M. d'Arblay, and the princesses all came up to speak to me, and to curtsy to him ; and the Princess Elizabeth cried, "I've got leave! and mamma says she won't wait to ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 3 • Madame D'Arblay
... mine," returned Patty, dropping a pretty curtsy. Then they all went to the drawing-room, where Patty was praised and applauded ...
— Patty's Suitors • Carolyn Wells
... to her feet and bobbed a curtsy. She was never lacking in respect to white people of proper quality; but Major Carteret, the quintessence of aristocracy, called out all her reserves of deference. The major was always kind and considerate to these old family retainers, brought up in the feudal atmosphere now so rapidly ...
— The Marrow of Tradition • Charles W. Chesnutt
... a better effect, nor more prepossessing in favor of the performance to follow, than the bow or curtsy at the opening the dance, made with an air of dignity and freedom. On the contrary, nothing is more disgustful than that initial step of the minuet, when auckwardly executed. It gives such an ill impression as is not easily removed by even a good performance in ...
— A Treatise on the Art of Dancing • Giovanni-Andrea Gallini
... years passed before Mazarin expressed a wish to see his ugly niece again; and it was indeed a very different Marie who now made her curtsy to him. Gone were the angular figure, the awkward movements, the sallow face, the slow wits. Time and the healthy life of the cloisters had done their work well. What the Cardinal now saw was a girl of seventeen, of exquisitely modelled figure, graceful and self-possessed; ...
— Love affairs of the Courts of Europe • Thornton Hall
... unless they're crocodile ones. Please to recollect in future, my dears, when you speak to me, that you're addressing a member of the Upper School! You're only little Junior girls! Ta-ta!" and with a mock curtsy, in process of which she nearly dropped her pile of books, Gwen retired laughing from the Fourth Form to take her place and try her luck among ...
— The Youngest Girl in the Fifth - A School Story • Angela Brazil
... association with surrounding things, and took my leave. I went away the more gratified that I had a chance of lifting my cap to a matron, dark-haired and comely, (who, I was sure, at a glance, had once been the maiden of Benjie Westham's "troth-plight,") and receiving a handsome curtsy ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IX., March, 1862., No. LIII. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics, • Various
... at the gate. A tall handsome man stepped from the coach and came up the walk. Betty felt as if she could neither move nor speak. She remembered, however, all that her mother had taught her, and she made a low curtsy as ...
— The Child's World - Third Reader • Hetty Browne, Sarah Withers, W.K. Tate
... before their father. They put their feet together. Kit made a bow, and Kat bobbed a curtsy. ...
— The Dutch Twins • Lucy Fitch Perkins |
