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More "Amiability" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... would not talk business I could only hope his amiability would carry over till I saw him again in his office tomorrow. I settled down as far as I could, simply to enjoy his company. "You may have been surprised at my referring to my life as unfortunate, Albert, but it is a judicious adjective. Vilely unfortunate. I come of a military family, you know; ...
— Greener Than You Think • Ward Moore
... some time to the proposed tourney for her hand, in which the already proven invincibility of the Count of Blois makes him almost a certain victor, because it involves a conditional consent to admit another mate. To her scrupulousness, a kind of blunt common-sense, tempering the amiability of Urraca, is a pleasant set-off, and the freshness ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 - From the Beginning to 1800 • George Saintsbury
... in spite of her naturally small waist, did not disdain tight stays; her high heels and piles of hair made her appear taller than she was; she wore mittens, and her nails were long and pointed. Her expression was of artificial amiability; she had somewhat arrogant and pouting lips, a rosy complexion, and two rows of dazzling white teeth, which she did not mind showing; when she laughed, dimples formed on chin and cheek, dark brows arched over ...
— Timar's Two Worlds • Mr Jkai
... bridegroom were very young, full of hope, and with every prospect of happiness. La gaie Armagnoise, as the young princess was called, lively and happy, and, according to all historians, a lady of the greatest amiability; the Prince of Bearn affectionate, brave, and handsome. With the ...
— Barn and the Pyrenees - A Legendary Tour to the Country of Henri Quatre • Louisa Stuart Costello
... barracks. Within the barrack courtyard there is an end to all friendship, kinsmanship, camaraderie, and patronage. He is no longer either a county magistrate or an honorary citizen. He has done with all those qualities which make up a man's social amiability. Here Vertessy is only a soldier, a rigorous, inexorable commandant, who never overlooks a blunder, and never leaves a ...
— The Day of Wrath • Maurus Jokai
... years his junior, had been great friends in the far-off days before the tragedy, but the former was too nearly, though half unconsciously, connected with that to be a possible intimate for Aymer now. The possibility of his turning up in this casual manner, ignoring with ruthless amiability all that had passed, had really never occurred to either father or son, and they were both unprepared for a narrowly escaped crisis. But Aymer was evidently not going to own frankly how great had been the strain and how badly ...
— Christopher Hibbault, Roadmaker • Marguerite Bryant
... title bestowed by Bill, or as "Tom Islington," after his adopted father, his was a familiar presence in the settlement, and the theme of much local criticism and comment. His waywardness, indolence, and unaccountable amiability—a quality at once suspicious and gratuitous in a pioneer community like Angel's—had often been the subject of fierce discussion. A large and reputable majority believed him destined for the gallows; a minority not quite so reputable enjoyed his presence without troubling ...
— Mrs. Skaggs's Husbands and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... stock of names for his servant, none of which he employed unless he felt in a good humour. Owl-pig, hog-mouse, ape-dog, rat-weasel, and cat-fish were the highest expressions of his amiability toward the man who had been his ill-tempered, dishonest, impudent, and treacherous attendant all the ...
— Robert Orange - Being a Continuation of the History of Robert Orange • John Oliver Hobbes
... between the flippant and the earnest writer is easily and instinctively recognized. No one can read Ruskin, for instance, without feeling his sincerity and integrity, even in his most impracticable vagaries. In Addison, Goldsmith, and Irving we find a genial, uplifting amiability; and Whittier, in his deep love of human freedom and justice, appears as a ...
— Elementary Guide to Literary Criticism • F. V. N. Painter
... about Vicky. I must say that she has a quick discernment of character, and I have never seen her take any predilection for a person which was not motive by personal amiability, goodness, or distinction of some kind or other. You need be under no apprehension whatever on this subject; and she has, moreover, great tact and esprit de conduite. It is quite extraordinary how popular she is in Society—and again now, all these Foreigners are so struck with her ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume III (of 3), 1854-1861 • Queen of Great Britain Victoria
... and she remains seemingly idiotic—the mere sight of her being enough to drive one wild!—for low be it spoken—it is the sheerest impudence!!! Indeed, the visitor who does not know her, and happens to "strike" on one of these bad days, would have to be dowered with more than his share of amiability and imagination, should he be able to mentally visualize anything approaching "brilliant accomplishments" in the face of one of these fiascos. Whether these "turns" be due to sudden obstinacy, to some feeling ...
— Lola - The Thought and Speech of Animals • Henny Kindermann
... mere exclamations rather than speech. But each time an explanation had been asked concerning the state of France, the Englishman openly drew out a note-book and requested those about him, the wine merchant, the abbe, or the young noble to repeat their remarks; to which each had complied with an amiability equal to the courteous tone of the request. He had noted down the most important, extraordinary and, picturesque features of the robbery of the diligence, the state of Vendee, and the details about the Companions of Jehu, thanking ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas
... that Mrs. Mallet had indefinitely postponed her departure. She remained in the mildest of humours and in the most philosophical of tempers, as I myself can testify; for, meeting her by accident in the hall, I was encouraged by the amiability of her simper to say that I hoped we should have no more trouble with the ghost, when she answered in words I have often since ...
— Cecilia de Noel • Lanoe Falconer
... light and laughter, but there were in her odd little streaks of unconsidered impulse that testified to a passionate soul. She would flash into a temper over a mere trifle, and then in a moment flash back into mirth and amiability. ...
— The Tidal Wave and Other Stories • Ethel May Dell
... arises by reason of goodness and a certain amiability, when one man gives another the notion of being a fine fellow, or brave man, etc., as we said was the case sometimes with those matched against ...
— Ethics • Aristotle
... analysis of the subject. It is, however, not so, but a statement of the preponderance of public character and opinion in those States. As a people they have their countervailing side of advantage—a great deal of amiability and refinement in certain neighborhoods, so long as their inherent right of domination is not disputed. Men and women are found, all over the South, who as individuals are better than the institution by which their characters are affected, and whose native goodness ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol IV, Issue VI, December 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... meets Ysaye and talks with him for the first time is the mental breadth and vision of the man; his kindness and amiability; his utter lack of small vanity. When the writer first called on him in New York with a note of introductio from his friend and admirer Adolfo Betti, and later at Scarsdale where, in company with his friend Thibaud, he was dividing his time ...
— Violin Mastery - Talks with Master Violinists and Teachers • Frederick H. Martens
... upon him. He had to sit beside his destroyers with that smiling amiability which Mr. Lansing records in his book. He had to deal with men on a basis of equality, a thing which he had run away from doing in his youth, which all his life had made too great demands upon ...
— The Mirrors of Washington • Anonymous
... by name, and a princess in her opinion was a princess, an altogether precious and admirable creature, whatever she might choose to do. Her scruples, then, were set at rest, but her ice as far as Anna was concerned showed no signs of thawing. All her amiability and her efforts to produce a good impression were lavished on the princess, who besides being by birth and marriage the grandest person the baroness had yet met, spoke her own tongue properly, had ...
— The Benefactress • Elizabeth Beauchamp
... at Paris, on the 20th of June, 10th of August, 2nd of September, 3rd of May and 2nd of June, as at every critical moment of the Revolution in Paris and the provinces, habits of subordination and of amiability, stamped on a people by a provident monarchy and a time-honored civilization, have blunted in man the foresight of danger, his aggressive instinct, his independence and the faculty of depending upon himself only, the willingness to help one another and of saving ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 4 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 3 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... closest adherence to the strictest etiquette. The next day was the one fixed for the departure; it was but proper that the guests should thank their host, and should show him a little attention in return for the expenditure of his twelve millions. The only remark, approaching to amiability, which the king could find to say to M. Fouquet, as he took leave of him, was in these words, "Monsieur Fouquet, you shall hear from me. Be good enough to desire M. d'Artagnan to ...
— The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Or Ten Years Later being the completion of "The Three - Musketeers" And "Twenty Years After" • Alexandre Dumas
... said Mr. Sheepshanks to himself, when he heard of his successor's affability, and sociability, and amiability, and a variety of other agreeable 'ilities,' from the friends whom the old steward still ...
— Wives and Daughters • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... soothin'ly, "I shan't want to stay so long at any other place." And it bein' past our lunch time we went and had a good meal, and of course Josiah's crossness subsided with every mouthful he took and his liniment looked like a cosset lamb's in amiability when I proposed we should go to the Fishery Buildin', it wuzn't so very fur from there considerin', though as I have said before every place is a good ways off from anywhere else. You'd have knowed the buildin' by the great fish that wuz sculped ...
— Samantha at the St. Louis Exposition • Marietta Holley
... and his rule of life, so far as it was definite, was to play the part of a gentilhomme. This, it seemed to him, was enough to occupy comfortably a young man of ordinary good parts. But all that he was he was by instinct and not by theory, and the amiability of his character was so great that certain of the aristocratic virtues, which in some aspects seem rather brittle and trenchant, acquired in his application of them an extreme geniality. In his younger years he had been suspected of low tastes, ...
— The American • Henry James
... that morning, and soon departed, with hardly a word from Theodora, whose amiability had been entirely overthrown by finding her service postponed ...
— Heartsease - or Brother's Wife • Charlotte M. Yonge
... exclaim, 'How happily the first part of the time would pass away!' Two or three years, at least, would be perfect bliss. On one side or the other there would not fail to be a wish to have the relation continue longer, and the amiability would increase the nearer they got to the parting time. The indifferent, even the dissatisfied party, would be softened and gained over by such behavior; they would forget, as in pleasant company the hours pass always unobserved, how the time went by, and they ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. II • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... friends, so I could observe them all the time without being myself conspicuous. I was able to take note of the somewhat wearied graciousness of Mr. de Valentin, who seemed always to be struggling with a profound boredom; the almost feverish amiability of Mrs. Van Reinberg, and, in a lesser degree, her daughters; and the undoubted reserve with which Adele seemed to protect herself from Mr. de Valentin's attentions. When at last they rose and left the saloon, I quickly followed ...
— The Great Secret • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... all his grace and amiability, had the passionate nature of old France; his instincts were primitive and simple; he longed, and his longing had become irresistible, to send a villain out of the world. Perhaps, too, in Ratoneau's overbearing swagger, he saw and felt an incarnation of ...
— Angelot - A Story of the First Empire • Eleanor Price
... flexibility, richness, and musical tone of that vehicle of thought which could represent with full effect the melancholy tenderness of Tibullus, [Footnote: Albius Tibullus was a poet of singular gentleness and amiability, who wrote verses of exquisite finish, gracefully telling the story of his worldly misfortunes and expressing the fluctuations that marked his indulgence in the tender passion, in which his experience ...
— The Story of Rome From the Earliest Times to the End of the Republic • Arthur Gilman
... impulsive, girlish fashion to the Duchess, who was listening with an interest and animation she had not shown for many days. The Innocent was holding forth, apparently with equal effect, to Mr. Oakhurst and Mother Shipton, who was actually relaxing into amiability. "Is this yer a d——d picnic?" said Uncle Billy, with inward scorn, as he surveyed the sylvan group, the glancing firelight, and the tethered animals in the foreground. Suddenly an idea mingled with the alcoholic fumes that disturbed his brain. It was apparently of a jocular nature, for he ...
— Short Stories Old and New • Selected and Edited by C. Alphonso Smith
... Amiability itself; they know nothing. [Rising and looking down upon FRAYNE.] You see, Chick, all that Miss Fullgarney has to do—if she hasn't already done it—is to tell a trifling taradiddle to Muriel concerning the events of last night. Well, in effect, she has ...
— The Gay Lord Quex - A Comedy in Four Acts • Arthur W. Pinero
... to his own inconvenience, much less invite them to persecute him. We are more straightforward with each other, and that is, after all, the firmest foundation for friendship. It is partly a misplaced amiability, a phase of the unselfishness in which you excel us, and partly also, I think, a want of some measuring quality that makes you women exact unreasonable things, make impossible promises, and after blandly undertaking a multiplicity of small matters ...
— Six to Sixteen - A Story for Girls • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... they will not even kill a mosquito or a flea. They are great business men, however, notwithstanding their soft hearts, and the most rapid money-makers in the empire. They built many of the most beautiful temples in India, in which they worship a kind and gentle god whose attributes are amiability, benevolence and compassion. The Jains of Ahmedabad still maintain a large "pinjrapol," or asylum for diseased and aged animals, with about 800 inmates, decrepit beasts of all species, by which they acquire merit with their god. And about ...
— Modern India • William Eleroy Curtis
... dust to get into my eyes. I was invited to dinners, and fairly showered with invitations to balls and drums and garden parties. I was twitted about the Beauty, most often with only a thin coating of amiability covering the spite of the remark. In short, if my head had not been so heavily laden with other matters, it might well have become light under the strain. Had I been ambitious to enter the arena I should have had but little trouble, since eligibility then might be ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... Lord Dredlinton advanced at once with outstretched hand. All the amiability which he could muster at a moment's notice was diffused into ...
— The Profiteers • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... other enemies. Good-morning! (I've cast him twice in heavy damages) good-morning, Mr. Dunball. He bears malice, you see; he won't speak; he's short in the neck, passionate, and four times as fat as he ought to be; he has fought against my amiability for ten mortal years; when he can't fight any longer, he'll die suddenly, and I shall be the innocent cause ...
— After Dark • Wilkie Collins
... way sought to run counter to his former partner; on the contrary, it arose simply from the fact that Charles was the more capable man of the two. And as Alphonse had now to work on his own account, it was soon clear to any one who observed him closely, that in spite of his promptitude, his amiability, and his prepossessing appearance, he was not fitted to be at the head ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors • Various
... little, but he thought a great deal for a few minutes about how much better it would have been if Sam Hardock had treated Dinass with a little more amiability. He quite forgot all about the matter for three days, and then he had fresh news, for Sam Hardock came ...
— Sappers and Miners - The Flood beneath the Sea • George Manville Fenn
... a fact,—one of those odd facts which life persists in producing. They had shared an apartment (that is a nice compliment, that phrase, applied to their sitting-room, bedroom and bath) for almost a year, continuing in a state of amiability possible only between two people so widely separated in ideals and hopes that there could never be a clash. There had never been much companionship, however. Now and then they ate one meal together, an early dinner for Cecille ...
— Winner Take All • Larry Evans
... Lucien," said Finot, drawing des Lupeaulx in the direction of the poet, and shaking hands with feline amiability. "I cannot think of another example of such rapid success," continued Finot, looking from des Lupeaulx to Lucien. "There are two sorts of success in Paris: there is a fortune in solid cash, which any one can amass, and there is the intangible fortune of connections, position, ...
— A Distinguished Provincial at Paris • Honore de Balzac
... really owing to the men of the Matsushima Kan; and the people are rightly trying to pay them back with love,—for presents, such as thousands would like to make, are prohibited by disciplinary rule. Officers and crew must be weary; but the crowding and the questioning are borne with charming amiability. Everything is shown and explained in detail: the huge thirty-centimetre gun, with its loading apparatus and directing machinery; the quick-firing batteries; the torpedoes, with their impulse-tubes; the ...
— Kokoro - Japanese Inner Life Hints • Lafcadio Hearn
... impossible. The Judge-Advocate-General is a very high official; I cannot allow him to go to the English headquarters and give information as to what is going on here. The authorities would justly put a very bad construction upon such ill-timed amiability, and I should not like to obliterate the good impression which the success of the expedition to Simla has made upon my superiors by an unpardonable act of folly on my ...
— The Coming Conquest of England • August Niemann
... Antonia. Even in the fantastic oddities of his expression there was such a marvellous power of description that I am unable to give even so much as a faint indication of it. Antonia inherited all her mother's amiability and all her mother's charms, but not the repellent reverse of the medal. There was no chronic moral ulcer, which might break out from time to time. Antonia's betrothed put in an appearance, whilst Antonia herself, fathoming with happy instinct the deeper-lying character of her wonderful father, ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: German • Various
... we saw papa coming back accompanied by a gentleman of a certain age, handsome, noble, elegant in his severe suit of black velvet. He had the finest black eyes in the world, and his face beamed with wit and amiability. You have guessed it was the Baron du Clozel. The baron bowed to us profoundly. He certainly knew who we were, but etiquette required him to wait until my father had presented us; but immediately then he asked papa's ...
— Strange True Stories of Louisiana • George Washington Cable
... around in his saddle towards the young lady who had addressed him. He looked into a fair, thoughtful face, whose general amiability was discounted, just then, by a ...
— A Monk of Cruta • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... can it be carried out unless the chums agree. It was to bring about this last condition that our white-haired official now bestirred himself. He made a most active master of ceremonies, introducing likely couples, and even guaranteeing the amiability and honesty of each. The greater the number of happy couples the better for his pocket, for it was he who sold the raw material of the beds. His price for one board and three straw cushions began with two dollars and a half; but before the train left, and, I am sorry to say, long after ...
— Across The Plains • Robert Louis Stevenson
... at her sharply; suddenly suspecting that his auditor was not perfectly sympathetic. She smiled a little at the images passing through her mind, and Leonard, taking her remark for badinage, allowed his own features to relax to their original amiability. ...
— Children of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... Princess Dowager von Reuss, nee Meier, the respect and deference due to her as the widow of the late head of the family, and to which she is justly entitled by her virtue, her blameless conduct, her respectability, beauty, and amiability. The Princess Dowager von Reuss is further authorized to let her servants wear the livery and color of my house, to display the coat- of-arms of the princes von Reuss on her carriages, and to enjoy the full privileges of her rank. If my ...
— LOUISA OF PRUSSIA AND HER TIMES • Louise Muhlbach
... any attention to party-politics. He showed some of his ever-growing liberality, by the way, in speaking of this matter of temper. In old age, he said that the world certainly does get on in minor morals: that when he was young "everybody had a temper"; whereas now no such thing is allowed; amiability is the rule; and an imperfect temper is an offence and a misfortune ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 7, No. 43, May, 1861 • Various
... behind the saddle. The remainder of his belongings had been left with Pop Daggett, who lounged in the doorway fingering a roll of bills in his trousers pocket and watching his new acquaintance with smiling amiability. ...
— Shoe-Bar Stratton • Joseph Bushnell Ames
... home" he was kindly and forbearing, simple and unostentatious. It may be so. Who does not remember that horrible Turk, Jacob Asdrubal, the Old Bailey barrister, the terror of witnesses, the bane of judges,—who was gall and wormwood to all opponents. It was said of him that "at home" his docile amiability was the marvel of his friends, and delight of his wife and daughters. "At home," perhaps, Mr. Daubeny might have been waved at, and have forgiven it; but men who saw the scene in the House of Commons knew that he would never forgive Mr. Gresham. As for Mr. ...
— Phineas Redux • Anthony Trollope
... was able to condemn Lucien's wife for her past conduct, no such criticism could apply to the wife of Jerome, who was a young woman of conspicuous morality, intelligence, and amiability. But she was the daughter of a ship-owner, a merchant, and thus was not a proper match, he thought, for the brother of the powerful monarch who was already dreaming of restoring the vassal kingdoms and the whole vast imperial edifice of Charlemagne. He, the Emperor of the French, the King of ...
— The Court of the Empress Josephine • Imbert de Saint-Amand
... delighted with the amiability of this great personage; but his mind soon returned upon its gloomy preoccupations; for not even the favour of a Prince to a Republican can discharge a ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 4 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... help it. Naturally, I'm curious to know the thoughts in the back of that boy's head, but when he turns that smiling innocent face toward me, all I can see is old-fashioned deference and amiability and courtesy. I watch him when he's talking to Kay—when he cannot possibly know I am snooping, and still, except for that frank friendliness, his face is as communicative as this old adobe wall. A few days ago he rode ...
— The Pride of Palomar • Peter B. Kyne
... little town of Luca, he felt that indescribable sense of a welcoming in the mere outward appearance of things, which seems to mark out certain places for the special purpose of evening rest, and gives them always a peculiar amiability in retrospect. Under the deepening twilight, the rough-tiled roofs seem to huddle together side by side, like one continuous shelter over the whole township, spread low and broad above the snug sleeping-rooms within; and the place one sees for the first time, and must ...
— Marius the Epicurean, Volume One • Walter Horatio Pater
... does," the newcomer said with amiability. "Upon my word, you yourselves seem to be doing remarkably well while I've been working for the good of the community. Give me a bottle of champagne, to begin with. Poor stuff, champagne, only fit for women. But then, there appears to be ...
— The Slave of Silence • Fred M. White
... channel. She dreaded her husband in his black rages, but she feared him more now in his unusual amiability. Perhaps he would strike Tobey when he saw him. She ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1920 • Various
... idyllic. Even Dr. GORGIAS submitted to the benign influence of the Fairy JOGGINS. But it is noticeable that Mr. BURROWES who still resides at St. Michael's, objects to any mention of the Christmas of 1874. This is the only exception to his universal amiability. ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 99., December 27, 1890 • Various
... a short time ago, had commanded his unwilling admiration. Mr. Alfred Burton's expression had undergone a complete change. His eyes had lost their calculating twinkle, his mouth had softened. A pleasant but somewhat abstracted smile had taken the place of his forced amiability. ...
— The Double Life Of Mr. Alfred Burton • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... the art of duping his fellow-men. Even a few days before his death he had still, when we met him, all the dignity of a sovereign, the amiability and good-breeding of the most accomplished "gentleman." His smile was so attractive, his words were so sweet and gracious, that one could hardly believe that the affable monarch was but ...
— A Narrative of Captivity in Abyssinia - With Some Account of the Late Emperor Theodore, - His Country and People • Henry Blanc
... according to strict precedence, each man spoke. With great amiability Colonel Starr presented the demands of the English Government; with greater amiability the Maharajah and his officers repelled them. But Colonel Starr was firm, and he had the unanswerable argument of three hundred well-armed ...
— The Story of Sonny Sahib • Sara Jeannette Duncan
... through the silence in which my soul luxuriated and cast an Eastern enchantment over me. I asked for leave to go to the bazaar on Saturday night. My aunt was surprised and hoped it was not some Freemason affair. I answered few questions in class. I watched my master's face pass from amiability to sternness; he hoped I was not beginning to idle. I could not call my wandering thoughts together. I had hardly any patience with the serious work of life which, now that it stood between me and my desire, seemed to me child's play, ugly ...
— Dubliners • James Joyce
... a band of notorious criminals, we must state in fairness and candour that their conduct has been, while on the field as miners, free from reproach in every way. For James Marston, who was married but a short while since to a Melbourne young lady of high personal attractions and the most winning amiability, great sympathy has been ...
— Robbery Under Arms • Thomas Alexander Browne, AKA Rolf Boldrewood
... taken a great deal of trouble over it," he said, with bright amiability; and then relapsing from the effort: "it's ...
— The Roll-Call • Arnold Bennett
... army, and who gained great credit for independent judgment by pronouncing Niagara a humbug,—Mrs. Kemble, frisky and fragmentary, excepting when her father was concerned, and then filially diffuse,—Mrs. Trollope, who refused to incumber herself with amiability or veracity,—Mr. Lieber, who was principally troubled by a camp meeting at which he assisted,—Miss Martineau, who retailed too much of the gossip that had been decanted through the tunnel of her trumpet,—and Captain Marryatt, who was simply clownish,—afford fair examples of the style which ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 23, September, 1859 • Various
... just had enough drink to make him very good-tempered, or else his wife would not have dared to have acted as she did; and this maudlin amiability took the shape of hospitable urgency that Kinraid should come as often as he liked to Haytersbank; come and make it his home when he was in these parts; stay there altogether, and so on, till Bell fairly shut the outer door to, and locked it before ...
— Sylvia's Lovers, Vol. I • Elizabeth Gaskell
... a few minutes previous to John. They were so much alike that it was difficult to distinguish them when apart. John was just a shade lighter in complexion than Tommy, and Tommy overtopped his brother by something like an inch. The twins were so small as to seem insignificant; but their meek amiability was an efficient set off against their physical deficiencies. If there was any measure of self-assertiveness between them, it belonged chiefly to Tommy. Though both the little men were kind to Marian, Tommy was her especial friend; and it was he who had watched her as she ...
— The Golden Shoemaker - or 'Cobbler' Horn • J. W. Keyworth
... the particularly mild, sweet amiability of the yellow warbler is responsible for the persistent visitations of the cowbird, from which it is a conspicuous sufferer. In the exquisite, neat little matted cradle of glistening milk-weed flax, lined with down from the ...
— Bird Neighbors • Neltje Blanchan
... the scarcity of food, or the amiability of their dispositions, the seeta bhaloo are to be met with constantly in small bodies of from five to ten, differing in this respect from their sable brethren, who are generally found alone, unless a matrimonial alliance has ...
— Forest & Frontiers • G. A. Henty
... who was vulgarly spruce in his attire. Evidently he intended to pass the night at the Priory, since they had let the trap go back to the village. She was glad that he had come, for his presence would act as a restraint upon the Girdlestones. In spite of her guardian's amiability at breakfast, she could not forget the words which he had used the morning before or the incident of the poison bottle. She was as convinced as ever that he meant mischief to her, but she had ceased to fear ...
— The Firm of Girdlestone • Arthur Conan Doyle
... lead it to return. Vicious propensities will, perhaps, begin to show themselves; and in the hardened and shameless youth it will be hard to recognize any trace of the innocence of infancy. But, perhaps, instead of viciousness, carelessness is developed, and youth is brightened by gayety, amiability, and ready generosity. Occasional derelictions from truth and honor find ready apologists among friends, because the boy or the girl is so "good-hearted"; but a closer inspection readily shows that the goodness of heart is very superficial, that the left hand is often unjust while the right ...
— The Elements of Character • Mary G. Chandler
... 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 unite in their persons great acquirements, combined with amiability and strict morality; also a species of Oriental charm which so much captivated Madame de Stael." It will occur to most that the apologist of the Russian fair "doth protest too much." The poet in all probability wrote the offending stanza in a fit of Byronic "spleen," as he would most ...
— Eugene Oneguine [Onegin] - A Romance of Russian Life in Verse • Aleksandr Sergeevich Pushkin
... the pleasure with which I contemplated our day's work; indeed I had special cause to regret the mishap, since it was for my gratification alone K——r was led to push over this unlucky stream, he having before visited the Falls. However, I do not forget his amiability upon this and many other similar occasions, and hereby pledge myself to swim across a broader current, either with him, or for him, on any day between this and the ...
— Impressions of America - During the years 1833, 1834 and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Tyrone Power
... steadfast, judicious qualities that commended him as a soldier seem to have forsaken him as a politician. He supported Burr, he followed Lewis, and he finally ran for lieutenant-governor against DeWitt Clinton, the regular nominee of his party, losing the election by a large majority; yet his amiability and war services kept him a favourite in spite of his political wavering. It was hard for a lover of his country to dislike a real hero of the Revolution, even though he forfeited the confidence ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander
... of herself, in spite of a feeling that this young woman was straying from the point, Mrs. Hignett could not check a slight influx of amiability. She was an authoress who received a good deal of incense from admirers, but she could always do with a bit more. Besides, most of the incense came by mail. Living a quiet and retired life in the country, it was rarely that she got it handed to her ...
— Three Men and a Maid • P. G. Wodehouse
... responded to the respectful amiability with a half-military lifting of his right ...
— The Shuttle • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... expressing her impatience at the delay of her lover, whose absence she tortures herself to account for by a hundred different suppositions, and after a very sufficient expose of her feelings, and some little explanatory details of her private history, conveying a very clear intimation of her own amiability, and her guardian's cruelty, she proceeds, after the fashion of other young ladies similarly situated, to give utterance to her feelings by a song; after, therefore, a suitable prelude from the orchestra, for which, considering the impassioned state of her ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Vol. 2 • Charles James Lever
... said Janetta. "I wouldn't mind writing a letter of angry recrimination or heartless satire to some suitable recipient; in fact, I should rather enjoy it, but I've come to the end of my capacity for expressing servile amiability. Eleven letters to-day and nine yesterday, all couched in the same strain of ecstatic thankfulness: really, you can't expect me to sit down to another. There is such a thing as ...
— Beasts and Super-Beasts • Saki
... main field of his career. The portrait which he draws of Lord Macaulay is so irresistibly attractive in many ways, that a critic may be glad to have delivered his soul before his judgment was subject to a dangerous bias, by the picture of Macaulay's personal character—its domestic amiability, its benevolence to unlucky followers of letters, its manliness, its high public spirit and generous patriotism. On reading my criticism over again, I am well pleased to find that not an epithet needs to be altered,—so ...
— Critical Miscellanies, Volume I (of 3) - Essay 4: Macaulay • John Morley
... He was also one of those men who never held misfortune in contempt, whose outlook wherever it roamed was tolerant. He had patience for the weak, resolution for the strong, and a fearless amiability toward all. He was like the St. Bernard dog, very difficult to arouse. It is rather the way with all men who are strong mentally and physically. He was tall and broad and deep. Under the battered pith-helmet his face was as dark as ...
— Parrot & Co. • Harold MacGrath
... Standing by the embroidery frame was Madame's only child, a boy who, in spite of his youth, was already Monsieur the Viscount. He also was beautiful. His exquisitely-cut mouth had a curl which was the inheritance of scornful generations, but which was redeemed by his soft violet eyes and by natural amiability reflected on his face. His hair was cut square across the forehead, and fell in natural curls behind. His childish figure had already been trained in the fencing school, and had gathered dignity from perpetually treading upon shallow steps and in lofty rooms. From the ...
— Frances Kane's Fortune • L. T. Meade
... return for the many sacrifices this collection has cost me, is, that my readers may do justice to the purpose which chiefly guided me throughout this publication,—my desire being not merely to benefit science, and to give a graphic description of the amiability and purity of heart which so distinguished this attractive man, (for such was my aim in my "Life of Mozart,") but above all to draw attention afresh to the unremitting zeal with which Mozart did homage to every ...
— The Letters of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, V.1. • Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
... soul, but suspicious in mind! She imagines that a pleasant word may often be used to cover a treacherous action, and if a man is as rude and blunt as myself, for example, she prefers that he should be rude and blunt rather than that he should attempt to conceal his roughness by an amiability which it is not his nature to feel." Here he looked up at me from the careful scrutiny of his nearly flayed pear. ...
— The Life Everlasting: A Reality of Romance • Marie Corelli
... 'What! you haven't had a medal yet?' and repeating to all of them: 'Ah! If I belonged to the committee, I'd make them walk straight.' He sent every one away delighted, closed the door behind each visitor with an air of extreme amiability, through which, however, there pierced the secret sneer of an ex-lounger on ...
— His Masterpiece • Emile Zola
... clearness, with a question-mark in it. She was of a very good family, lived in a big house on Murray Hill, and had as large a circle of acquaintance as any one in New York. She prided herself on knowing everybody worth knowing, and everything about everybody. She was not lacking in amiability; she was, indeed, so amiable that she would slander almost any absent friend to please one who was present. She had a little grudge against Keith, for she had been struck from the first by his bright eyes and good manners; but Keith ...
— Gordon Keith • Thomas Nelson Page
... thousand francs the turn, at the club on Rue Royale, without winking. And then he was so convenient when one wanted to get rid of a picture, always ready to buy, no matter at what price. These motives of condescending amiability had been reinforced latterly by a feeling of pity and indignation because of the persistent ferocity with which the poor fellow was being persecuted, because of the cowardly, merciless war upon him, which was carried on so skilfully ...
— The Nabob, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Alphonse Daudet
... back to where his mare was being cleaned by the lean Armenian servant, gave the boy a few curt orders, and there among the shadows made his mind up. He returned and stood before Monty, Kagig eying him with something less than amiability. He pointed toward the ample room ...
— The Eye of Zeitoon • Talbot Mundy
... me,' she began, 'but I cannot be angry with what at least does honour to the mistaken kindness of your heart: it was right for me to know this. I will condescend to tell you. It was with deep regret that I was driven to this step. I admire in many ways the Prince - I admit his amiability. It was our great misfortune, it was perhaps somewhat of my fault, that we were so unsuited to each other; but I have a regard, a sincere regard, for all his qualities. As a private person I should think as you do. It is difficult, ...
— Prince Otto • Robert Louis Stevenson
... men of less than thirty years. Mr MacWhirter was tall, fair, and stoutish; he was very quietly spoken, was humorous and amiable, yet extraordinarily learned. He never, by any chance, gave himself away, maintaining always an absolute reserve amid all his amiability. Therefore Frank would have done anything to win his esteem, while Beatrice was deferential to him. Mr Allport was tall and broad, and thin as a door; he had also a remarkably small chin. He was naive, inclined to suffer in the first pangs of disillusionment; nevertheless, ...
— The Trespasser • D.H. Lawrence
... would probably have been the same: it never having been distinctly shown that Sunday is more favourable to the propagation of the human race than any other day in the week. The second result—the murder of the child—does not speak very highly for the amiability of her natural disposition; and the whole story, supposing it to have had any foundation at all, is about as much chargeable upon the Book of Sports, as upon the Book of Kings. Such 'sports' have taken place in ...
— Sunday Under Three Heads • Charles Dickens
... the wretchedness of the weather and the merits of tea, with a digression relative to the viciousness of boys as a rule, and the amiability of Master Peplow as an exception, Mrs. Walker sees her husband coming down the street; and as he must want his tea, poor man, after his dirty walk from the Docks, she instantly runs across, muffins in hand, and ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... dresser, had quite a wonderful time of it; her assiduous and arduous ministrations were received with the greatest good-nature; now she was never told, if she hurt her mistress in lacing up a dress, that she deserved to have her face slapped. Miss Burgoyne was amiability itself towards the whole company, so far as she had any relations with them: and at her little receptions in the evening she was all brightness and merriment, even when she had to join in the conversation from behind the heavy portiere. Whether this ...
— Prince Fortunatus • William Black
... enthusiast. One result of his spasmodic confidences was to throw a doubt upon their accuracy. This might be what he desired; or with equal probability it might be the chance reflection of a childish and aimless amiability. ...
— The Mystery • Stewart Edward White and Samuel Hopkins Adams
... manage everything, and then you have no time!" said Ethel, sensible all the time of her own ill-humour, and of her sister's patience and amiability, yet propelled to speak the unpleasant truths that in her better moods ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... His amiability was immediately restored, but his gaiety was somewhat forced. "You are looking charming this morning, Miss Ogden. I wished last night that there was a guitar or even a banjo in the camp, that I ...
— Black Oxen • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... in an expression almost of sullenness. Rolfe had never seen her look thus, but it confirmed a suspicion which he had harboured concerning her. Why, he hardly knew—for she always presented a face of amiability, and talked in gentle, womanly tones—doubt as to Abbott's domestic felicity haunted his mind. Perhaps he now saw her, for the first time, as she commonly appeared to her husband—slightly peevish, unwilling to be disturbed, impatient when things ...
— The Whirlpool • George Gissing
... bit,' and went back to camp. And the dog that had done it all, 'Tommy', the great, idiotic mongrel retriever, came slobbering round Dave and lashing his legs with his tail, and trotted home after him, smiling his broadest, longest, and reddest smile of amiability, and apparently satisfied for one afternoon with ...
— Joe Wilson and His Mates • Henry Lawson
... and natural amiability of his disposition eminently fitted him for the high social position he attained; but the fervor he felt for his work made him forget everything foreign to it until the hour arrived when he must leave his painting-room. He was fond of receiving company, especially at dinner, and his dinners ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 102, April, 1866 • Various
... couple pass, and some of us stood on tiptoe to get a glimpse of them; for San Silvestro is a man of no small importance in the political and diplomatic world, and his wife enjoys quite a European fame for beauty and amiability, having had opportunities of displaying both these attractive gifts at the several courts where she has acted as Italian ambassadress. They made their way quickly up the long room,—she short, rather sallow, inclined toward embonpoint, but with ...
— Stories By English Authors: Italy • Various
... its highest degree the sister of goodness. Suffering and amiability may exist together, and writers have loved to depict their conjunction; there is a human and touching harmony in the picture. But perfect happiness is an attribute of angels; and those who possess it, appear angelic. Fear has been said to be the parent of religion: even of that religion ...
— The Last Man • Mary Shelley
... the remains of Vsevolod were deposited, with the most imposing ceremonies of those days, in the church of Saint Sophia, by the side of those of his father. The people, forgetting his weakness and remembering only his amiability, wept at his burial. ...
— The Empire of Russia • John S. C. Abbott
... wait longer for the signal; or, rather, whether it had not been already fired, and the sound failed to reach us on the sultry, heavy air. There were two opinions upon this, and for a time the difference was discussed in amiability, if with some heat. The General felt positive that if the shots had been fired ...
— In the Valley • Harold Frederic
... will you pay me, you hussy?" What did they want of her, good God! She felt that she was being hunted, and something of the wild beast developed in her. About the same time, Thenardier wrote to her that he had waited with decidedly too much amiability and that he must have a hundred francs at once; otherwise he would turn little Cosette out of doors, convalescent as she was from her heavy illness, into the cold and the streets, and that she might do what she liked ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... sorrow and indignation. "You'll be old yerself some day," she sobbed, not noticing that he was stealthily edging toward the door, one eye on her, one on to-morrow's pot-roast. "I tell yew, Tommy," regaining her accustomed confiding amiability, as she lifted the corner of her apron to wipe her eyes, "Miss Ellie will feel some kind o' bad, tew. Yer know me an' her an' Angy all went ter school tergether, although Miss Ellie is so much younger 'n the rest o' us that we call ...
— Old Lady Number 31 • Louise Forsslund
... are cool again, Lorton," he said to me, with an expression of amiability and mingled pity on his face, that made him look to me like Mephistopheles, "you will, I know, be sorry for what you've said; and when you learn good manners I will be glad to speak to you again!" and, he walked back to the church, with the air of a person ...
— She and I, Volume 1 • John Conroy Hutcheson
... see that these people are an open book? Do you not read here the tranquillity of a self-poised life, the Inner sight of clairvoyance, the bitterness of disappointed hopes and unsuccessful plans, the amiability that is not founded upon strength, the pettiness that puts pique above principle, the frankness that scorns affectation, the comprehensiveness that embraces all things in its vision, and commands not only acquiescence, but allegiance, the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 75, January, 1864 • Various
... to you"—though, in the main, their owner was a man of grave and taciturn habit), of the Postmaster (an insignificant-looking individual, yet a would-be wit and a philosopher), and of the President of the Local Council (a man of much amiability and good sense). These three personages greeted Chichikov as an old acquaintance, and to their salutations he responded with a sidelong, yet a sufficiently civil, bow. Also, he became acquainted with an extremely unctuous and approachable landowner ...
— Dead Souls • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... somebody arises and declaims from my open window, dancing meanwhile in helpless rage, to see how futile is the voice of august man when blue-jays hold the floor. Talk about the English sparrow! It is a mild-mannered little gentleman compared to the noisy jay. Its politeness and amiability are Chesterfieldan beside the behavior of its handsomely attired but boorish neighbor. And as for fighting, why, I verily believe a bluejay in good condition could "do up" John L. Sullivan so quickly the gentle pugilist would never know ...
— A String of Amber Beads • Martha Everts Holden
... the officers' stay, which did not extend for more than half an hour after the banquet, that ferocious chieftain of a desperate partida overflowed with amiability and kindness. He had been hospitable before, but now it seemed as though he could not do enough for the comfort and safety of his visitors' journey back to ...
— A Set of Six • Joseph Conrad
... confess, be likely to increase in proportion to your own honesty and generosity. Be comforted, however, by this consideration, that, conflict being the only means of forming the character into excellence, and your natural amiability averting from you many of the usual opportunities for exercising self-control, you would be in want of the former essential ingredient in spiritual discipline did not your very virtues procure it ...
— The Young Lady's Mentor - A Guide to the Formation of Character. In a Series of Letters to Her Unknown Friends • A Lady
... is understood that General Lee is a religious man, though not so demonstrative in that respect as Jackson; and, unlike his late brother in arms, he is a member of the Church of England. His only faults, so far as I can learn, arise from his excessive amiability. ...
— Three Months in the Southern States, April-June 1863 • Arthur J. L. (Lieut.-Col.) Fremantle
... fought and bled for his country, and as therefore being no fit company for runaway felons and pickpockets. His sympathy with himself was so great that the tears chased one another down his cheeks as he was speaking. All the amiability which commonly marked his intercourse with his fellowmen seemed to have utterly departed from him, and he towered above his seat in a perfect whirlwind of rage and fiery indignation. Mr. Bidwell's calm and temperate reply was in striking contrast to the levin bolts ...
— The Story of the Upper Canada Rebellion, Volume 1 • John Charles Dent
... to look at it, of course," assented the agent, who made it a point to agree always with a man of Ford's size and caliber, on the theory that amiability means popularity, and that placation is better than plasters. "You sure ought to let her do the hunting—and the worrying, too. You aren't to blame if she married you unawares. She did it all on her own hook—and she must have known what she was ...
— The Uphill Climb • B. M. Bower
... true bitterness, the wounds which the upstart Prussian had inflicted upon him. Political peace could not immediately re-establish a peace between their dispositions. But this was to be brought about symbolically by the above-mentioned drama. The grace and amiability of the Saxon ladies conquer the worth, the dignity, and the stubbornness of the Prussians; and, in the principal as well as in the subordinate characters, a happy union of bizarre and contradictory elements is ...
— Autobiography • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
... frail woman, a woman not of noble birth, with only beauty, sweetness of disposition, amiability, goodness, and brilliant accomplishments as her weapons! It was not a case of the moth and the flame, but the operation of a wise philosophy, the precepts of which were decently, moderately and carefully inculcated; a philosophy upon the very edge of which modern society is hanging, afraid ...
— Life, Letters, and Epicurean Philosophy of Ninon de L'Enclos, - the Celebrated Beauty of the Seventeenth Century • Robinson [and] Overton, ed. and translation.
... beings, to a kind of negative existence. All these things I did not perceive till long afterwards; but I even then felt, though without stating it clearly to myself, the contrast between the frank sociability and amiability of French personal intercourse, and the English mode of existence, in which everybody acts as if everybody else (with few, or no exceptions) was either an enemy or a bore. In France, it is true, the bad as well as the good points, both of individual and of national character, ...
— Autobiography • John Stuart Mill
... not out of hardness of heart, but merely from soured temper, and because, when people have met disappointment and have settled down into final unhappiness, with no more gush and spring of good spirits, there is nothing any more to create amiability ...
— The Ancestral Footstep (fragment) - Outlines of an English Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... proprietress sat intrenched behind the cash-box in a Parisian manner. She looked with practical amiability at her guests, who dined noisily and with great fire, discussing momentous problems furiously, making wide, maniacal gestures through the cigarette smoke. Meanwhile the little handful of waiters ran to and fro wildly. Imperious ...
— The Third Violet • Stephen Crane
... the design of the Creator that this labor should be controlled and directed by a superior intelligence. In the absence of mental capacity, we find him possessed of equal physical powers with any other race, with an amiability of temper which submits without resistance to this control. We find him, too, without moral, social, or political aspirations, contented and happy in the condition of servility to this superior intelligence, and rising in the scale of humanity ...
— The Memories of Fifty Years • William H. Sparks
... he reached camp, and he found Doctor Worth waiting his arrival. Fortunately there was nothing but good news for the doctor. Luis had seen everything through the medium of his own happiness, and he described the midnight meal and the Senora's amiability with the utmost freedom from anything unpleasant. Rachela's interference he treated with scornful indifference; and yet it affected Worth's mind unpleasantly. For it went straight to the source of offence. "She must have had Fray Ignatius behind her. And my poor Maria, ...
— Remember the Alamo • Amelia E. Barr
... great spirits, and prattled away as they sat at dinner, emboldened by the lady's unusual amiability to ask all sorts of questions, some of which proved rather embarrassing to Miss Henny, and very amusing to Roxy, listening ...
— A Garland for Girls • Louisa May Alcott
... heathen Greek to our ears. However, Don Sanchez explains that our visitor is excusing his appearance as being forced to change his wet clothes for what the innkeeper can lend him, and so we, grinning to express our amiability, all sit down to table and set to—Moll with her most finicking, delicate airs and graces, and Dawson and I silent as frogs, with understanding nothing of the Dons' conversation. This, we learn from Don Sanchez after supper, ...
— A Set of Rogues • Frank Barrett
... Persius, pure in heart and passionless by education, while he lashes wickedness in the abstract, almost ignores its existence, and shrinks from probing to the bottom the vileness of the human heart. His works comprise six satires, all of which breathe the natural amiability and placid ...
— Handbook of Universal Literature - From The Best and Latest Authorities • Anne C. Lynch Botta
... sort of architect himself, comes along and takes apartments. It has never been quite settled whether or not the lodger and the landlord agree pleasantly together, but in the absence of any positive evidence they may be given credit for perfect amiability; because nobody has found traces of owl in a dead marmot's interior, nor of marmot in an owl's. But the rattlesnake is another thing. He waits till the residence has been made perfectly comfortable, and then comes in himself; not in the friendly capacity of a lodger, ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 28, April 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... too belligerent in tone for so grave a matter. There is a heap of 'cussedness' mixed up with your usual amiability, and you are at times too fond of a fight. If I were you, I would simply state the facts as they were. I would give the statement as you have here, without the pepper and salt. Let me try my ...
— Lincoln's Yarns and Stories • Alexander K. McClure
... ground before the lowest servant and would make no fuss about it; and as soon as she is forgiven, you can see by her delight and her caresses that a load is taken off her heart. In a word, she endures patiently the wrong-doing of others, and she is eager to atone for her own. This amiability is natural to her sex when unspoiled. Woman is made to submit to man and to endure even injustice at his hands. You will never bring young lads to this; their feelings rise in revolt against injustice; nature has not fitted them to put ...
— Emile • Jean-Jacques Rousseau
... possessed of "all the cardinal virtues, and counting for nothing." I can do little more than offer my humble testimony to the truthfulness of Miss Halcombe's sketch of the old lady's character. Mrs. Vesey looked the personification of human composure and female amiability. A calm enjoyment of a calm existence beamed in drowsy smiles on her plump, placid face. Some of us rush through life, and some of us saunter through life. Mrs. Vesey SAT through life. Sat in the house, early and late; sat in the garden; sat in unexpected window-seats in passages; sat ...
— The Woman in White • Wilkie Collins
... leaving very few traces behind it. It became simply a charming personal reminiscence for the small number of amiable enthusiasts who had had a hand in it. There were degrees of enthusiasm, and I suppose there were degrees of amiability; but a certain generous brightness of hope and freshness of conviction pervaded the whole undertaking and rendered it, morally speaking, important to an extent of which any heed that the world in general ever gave to it is an ...
— Hawthorne - (English Men of Letters Series) • Henry James, Junr.
... George Smart and Fuerstenau into his bedroom. Fuerstenau, from whom alone he would accept such services, helped him to undress; the effort was a painful one to himself. With his own hand, however, Weber wound up his watch, with his usual punctilious care; then, with all that charm of amiability for which he was conspicuous through life, he murmured his thanks to his friend, and said, 'Now let me sleep.' These were the last words that mortal ear heard the great artist utter. It is clear, however, that Weber must have left his bed later, for, the next morning, the ...
— Among the Great Masters of Music - Scenes in the Lives of Famous Musicians • Walter Rowlands
... subtle casuists. The duty to the female dog is plain; but where competing duties rise, down they will sit and study them out, like Jesuit confessors. I knew another little Skye, somewhat plain in manner and appearance, but a creature compact of amiability and solid wisdom. His family going abroad for a winter, he was received for that period by an uncle in the same city. The winter over, his own family home again, and his own house (of which he was very proud) reopened, he found himself in a dilemma between two conflicting duties of loyalty and ...
— Memories and Portraits • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Etheridge; I shall never have a dearer friend. His odd ways, his lank, possibly ungainly figure crowned by a head of scholarly refinement, his amiability when pleased, his irascibility when crossed, formed a character attractive to me from its very contradictions; and after my wife's death and before my son Oliver reached a companionable age, it was in my intercourse with this man I found my ...
— Dark Hollow • Anna Katharine Green
... Los Guilucos Ranch, Sonoma County, California, is certainly nearest my heart. He was my friend, and sometimes my companion; he had a noble character for fighting, and in spite of his pugnacity he was amiability itself to most human beings. His final end, too, fills me with a sense of pathos, and enrages me against those who owned him. They were obviously incapable of understanding him ...
— A Tramp's Notebook • Morley Roberts
... hard aquiline features, choleric, flashing blue eyes, and a head of crisp, bright red hair; a man of fashion, nattily dressed in the Sardinian uniform, but with something strange, untamed, morose about his whole aspect which contrasted singularly with the effete gracefulness and amiability of young Florentine dandies. He had heard of the Countess of Albany's eccentricities long before; she had ...
— The Countess of Albany • Violet Paget (AKA Vernon Lee)
... drunken fool, "I may," opening his ardent eyes and glancing affectionately about, "have been toying with 'lucent syrups tinct with cinnamon' and my feet may be 'uncertain, coy and hard to please,'" he grinned with wide amiability, "but my head is clear as a bell." His eyes flashed nervously about the shop, resting upon nothing, seeing everything. He spied Grant, "Hello, Red," exclaimed Mr. Fenn, "glad to see you back again. 'M back again myself. Ye crags 'n' peaks 'm with you once again." As he nourished ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White
... jacket of blue cotton, and he made no response to a question which Borasdine asked. Further along were two women putting fish upon poles for drying, and a third was engaged in skinning a large salmon. The women did not look up from their work, and were not inclined to amiability. They had Mongol features, complexion, eyes, and hair, the latter thick and black. Some of the men wear it plaited into queues, and others let it grow pretty much at will. Each woman I saw had it braided in two queues, which ...
— Overland through Asia; Pictures of Siberian, Chinese, and Tartar - Life • Thomas Wallace Knox
... sign of fellowship with him. He was a young Russian, named Bourgonef, as I at once learned; rather handsome, and peculiarly arresting to the eye, partly from an air of settled melancholy, especially in his smile, the amiability of which seemed breaking from under clouds of grief, and still more so from the mute appeal to sympathy in the empty sleeve of his right arm, which was looped to the breast-button of his coat. His eyes were large and soft. He had no beard ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.
... and, to our equal delight and wonder, were saluted by Froll's jumping up and licking our hands and faces—certainly he never appeared in better health and spirits in his life. Whether he did this to atone for his former uncourteous behaviour towards us, or was urged by some unaccountable feeling of amiability as well as restlessness, I cannot say, but certain it is his gentler faculties were that night for once aroused, for this unaccustomed compliment I can safely affirm we never personally received at any former period of our acquaintance. After a time he left us, charmed at experiencing these new and ...
— Anecdotes of Dogs • Edward Jesse
... own judgment. Dodsley gave him L100 for each annual volume, and the sum was welcome enough, for towards the end of 1756 Burke had married. His wife was the daughter of a Dr Nugent, a physician at Bath. She is always spoken of by his friends as a mild, reasonable and obliging person, whose amiability and gentle sense did much to soothe the too nervous and excitable temperament of her husband. She had been brought up, there is good reason to believe, as a Catholic, and she was probably a member of that communion at the time of her marriage. Dr Nugent eventually took up his residence ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various
... when women addict themselves to vice of any kind, they carry it to extravagance, and become far worse than bad men. In like manner, when the natural softness and amiability of the Hindoo character yield to the temptations of luxury and dominion, the individual grows into a tyrant as cruel and odious as any of those depicted in history. This apparent discrepancy has given rise to many speculative ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 429 - Volume 17, New Series, March 20, 1852 • Various
... amiability of character requires, however, that we should state that he never sought to terminate an argument with his fists unless he was invited to do so, and even then he invariably gave his rash challenger fair warning, and offered to let him retreat if so ...
— The Red Eric • R.M. Ballantyne
... that he could not finish the picture there. Back in London he had to find his models in the Jewish school. He left the figures of Christ and the Virgin till the last and then painted them "from a lady of the ancient race, distinguished alike for her amiability and beauty, and a lad in one of the Jewish schools, to which the husband of the lady ...
— Pictures Every Child Should Know • Dolores Bacon
... twenty-five; his long dark hair, perfectly saturated with kvas, stood up in stiff tufts, his small brown eyes twinkled genially; his face was bound up in a black handkerchief, as though for toothache; his countenance was all smiles and amiability. ...
— A Sportsman's Sketches - Works of Ivan Turgenev, Vol. I • Ivan Turgenev
... at the age of eight years. A lady who had remarked the amiability of his manners and his precocious natural abilities, recommended him to the Bishop of Auxerre. Through the influence of this prelate, Fourier was admitted into the military school which was conducted at ...
— Biographies of Distinguished Scientific Men • Francois Arago
... making the house glad with life and laughter, he was not sure that he wanted them. Yet he had always thought that he possessed a strong paternal instinct, an interest in young life, in opening problems. Had that all, he wondered, been a mere interest, a thing to exercise his energy and amiability upon, and had his enjoyment of it all depended upon his real detachment, upon the fact that his responsibility was only a temporary one? It was all very bewildering to him. Moreover, his quiet and fertile imagination flashed suddenly ...
— Watersprings • Arthur Christopher Benson
... which had shut up so much sorrow, happiness and torment. He followed the Marquis. An hour afterwards two gentlemen on noble English steeds—the best the stables of the Marquis afforded—rode toward Sorrento. One of these riders, Rovero, was melancholy, so that even the French amiability of the Marquis could not divert him from gloomy meditations. Ever and anon a smile hung on his lips, till chased away by some painful memory. The Marquis de Maulear, satisfied that Taddeo concealed a secret from him, avoided any allusion ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 2, January, 1851 • Various
... myself up for a journey, and no touting vendor of subscription books or works of art can truthfully say that I have kicked him. On the whole I think I am reasonably even-tempered and of higher than average amiability. Others may judge me differently. I don't wish to quarrel with them. I simply reiterate my opinion. Why then am I to-day in a seething state of exception to my rule? Here is ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 103, September 10, 1892 • Various
... said he, nodding his huge square-cut head. This amiability in the matter of leave taking was unusual. Trina put the dishes down and came up to him, her little chin, once ...
— McTeague • Frank Norris
... tease her, and she responded in that quick rather sharp and very often crudely personal way at which foreigners for the first time in Russian company so often wonder. Badinage with Russians so quickly passes to lively and noisy quarrelling, which in its turn so suddenly fades into quiet contented amiability that it is little wonder that the observer feels rather breathless at it all. Grogoff was a striking figure, with his fine height and handsome head and bold eyes, but there was something about him that I did not like. ...
— The Secret City • Hugh Walpole
... injuring any creature is worthy of the approbation of the righteous. Abstention from injury, truthfulness of speech, justice, compassion, self-restraint, procreation (of offspring) upon one's own wives, amiability, modesty, patience,—the practice of these is the best of a religions as said by the self-create Manu himself. Therefore, O son of Kunti, do thou observe this religion with care. That Kshatriya, who, ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... "Jack's" amiability, too, was a permanent condition. Apparently no one could make him angry or resentful. For this reason, he was the target for many pranks perpetrated by the boys. ...
— Crossing the Plains, Days of '57 - A Narrative of Early Emigrant Tavel to California by the Ox-team Method • William Audley Maxwell
... there!" "Howld yer tongues!" "May the divil ate yez! but the best of yez hashn't the manners of a pig!" Amid such pleasant ebullitions of Celtic amiability, PUNCHINELLO succeeded in carving his way to the door, when it suddenly opened, and a tall, lean, cadaverous man, who looked like the ghost of some Fenian leader, bawled at the top ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 13, June 25, 1870 • Various
... her room. If Bayliss had not been within earshot, she would probably have sung a bar or two. Her amiability extended even to her step-son, though she had not altered her intention of speaking eloquently to him on certain matters when she could get hold of him. That, however, could wait. For the moment, she felt in vein for a gentle ...
— Piccadilly Jim • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... not, I think, from his American blood that Leigh Hunt derived either his amiability or his peaceful inclinations; at least, I do not see how we can reasonably claim the former quality as a national characteristic, though the latter might have been fairly inherited from his ancestors ...
— Our Old Home - A Series of English Sketches • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... this. I have been turning it over in my mind; and it is particularly vexing not to know more. "Delightful" can be such jargon and mean nothing—or, at any rate, nothing more than amiability. Still, that is something, for one is not always amiable, even when meeting strangers. On the other hand it might be, from this man, the ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, April 5, 1916 • Various
... the foundation of art in moral character. Of course art-gift and amiability of disposition are two different things; for a good man is not necessarily a painter, nor does an eye for color necessarily imply an honest mind. But great art implies the union of both powers; it is the expression, by an art-gift, of a pure soul. If ...
— The Queen of the Air • John Ruskin
... ancient times, maintained the custom of publicly demonstrating their esteem of any young female member of a community, who, in her progress from childhood to adolescence, or rather to womanhood, may have given evidence of the possession of any unusual amount of amiability and cleverness. Young girls who are deemed worthy of public recognition as examples of virtue and industry, are waited upon by the villagers on a fete-day, led forth, seated on a throne of flowers, ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 427 - Volume 17, New Series, March 6, 1852 • Various
... as possessed of "all the cardinal virtues, and counting for nothing." I can do little more than offer my humble testimony to the truthfulness of Miss Halcombe's sketch of the old lady's character. Mrs. Vesey looked the personification of human composure and female amiability. A calm enjoyment of a calm existence beamed in drowsy smiles on her plump, placid face. Some of us rush through life, and some of us saunter through life. Mrs. Vesey SAT through life. Sat in the house, early and late; sat in the garden; sat in ...
— The Woman in White • Wilkie Collins
... all this seemed merely a pleasant proof of Eve's amiability, of her freedom from that acrid monopolism which characterises the ignoble female in her love relations. Straightway he did as he was requested, and penned to Miss Ringrose a chatty epistle, with which she could not but be satisfied. A day or two brought ...
— Eve's Ransom • George Gissing
... the faces of his relatives (produced by the conference) did not escape Doctor Minoret. He tried to guess the reason of this sudden amiability, and out of sheer curiosity encouraged Ursula to stop and speak to the two women, who were eager to greet her with ...
— Ursula • Honore de Balzac
... Andrew Farley tells," grinned Billy, all amiability now, "no one will be likely t' know ye from a scrub oak stump when the picters is done. Andrew says when he thinks of all it costs t' paint a boat an' then sees the waste of good, honest paint up on the Hills, it ...
— Janet of the Dunes • Harriet T. Comstock
... remained a long while with the vicequeen, whose intelligence equaled her amiability and her beauty, but returned to Milan to dine; and immediately afterwards the ladies who were received at court were presented to him. In the evening, I followed his Majesty to the theater of la Scala. The Emperor did not remain throughout the play, but ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... a single trait! You cannot possibly imagine a greater difference than between the mother and this child," Miss Dorner exclaimed. "Cornelia was full of amiability and gayety. She always greeted and cheered everyone with her laughing brown eyes. If my cousin could only have the happiness to see his child resemble her mother the slightest bit! He was so fond of his wife! He deserves this joy, for he ...
— Cornelli • Johanna Spyri
... of Luca, he felt that indescribable sense of a welcoming in the mere outward appearance of things, which seems to mark out certain places for the special purpose of evening rest, and gives them always a peculiar amiability in retrospect. Under the deepening twilight, the rough-tiled roofs seem to huddle together side by side, like one continuous shelter over the whole township, spread low and broad above the snug sleeping-rooms within; and the place one sees for the first time, and must tarry ...
— Marius the Epicurean, Volume One • Walter Horatio Pater
... gowns, a maid, cigarettes, breakfast in bed, and a supply of French novels, she appeared the most harmless and engaging of mortals. Her youth had been cruel, disorderly, and vicious. It had lasted long; but now, when middle age stood at last confessed, she was lapsing, it seemed, into amiability and good behavior. She was, indeed, fast forgetting her own history, and soon the recital of it would surprise no one ...
— The Marriage of William Ashe • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... to be able to say NO, but surely it is the essence of amiability to prefer to say YES where it is possible. There is something wanting in the man who does not hate himself whenever he is constrained to say no. And there was a great deal wanting in this born dissenter. He was almost shockingly devoid of weaknesses; ...
— The Pocket R.L.S. - Being Favourite Passages from the Works of Stevenson • Robert Louis Stevenson
... great amiability of disposition, and is easily tamed, becoming much attached to those who treat it kindly. It also exhibits the most extraordinary affection for its own race. Wilson the naturalist, having obtained one while on a journey to the Far West, brought it ...
— The Western World - Picturesque Sketches of Nature and Natural History in North - and South America • W.H.G. Kingston
... brief in its telling. And it brought no explanation of the sudden amiability displayed by the crooked-faced Rodaine. They went on, striving vainly for a reason, at last to stop in front of the post-office, as the postmaster leaned ...
— The Cross-Cut • Courtney Ryley Cooper
... one frail woman, a woman not of noble birth, with only beauty, sweetness of disposition, amiability, goodness, and brilliant accomplishments as her weapons! It was not a case of the moth and the flame, but the operation of a wise philosophy, the precepts of which were decently, moderately and carefully inculcated; a philosophy upon the very edge of which modern society is ...
— Life, Letters, and Epicurean Philosophy of Ninon de L'Enclos, - the Celebrated Beauty of the Seventeenth Century • Robinson [and] Overton, ed. and translation.
... wore a new cassock and carried his broad-brimmed hat under his arm. His appearance made quite a stir. He passed from group to group, urbane, affable, shaking hands right and left; he assumed a set smile of amiability which never left his face ...
— The Octopus • Frank Norris
... credulity to fancy he will not marry. But, if he were safe, I should not so much fear Douglas." The younger, Douglas, was a man whom some people would have called plain. But the dark sallow face, with its irregular features, was illuminated by an expression of mingled intelligence and amiability, which possessed a charm for all ...
— Run to Earth - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... I understand that his Excellency has certain designs upon your amiability, and he most earnestly desires you to remain here at the Blue Fox until such time as he summons you or sends you orders. You are an officer of Tryon County ...
— The Reckoning • Robert W. Chambers
... eyeglass, in the central aisle of tables. Drayton at once gave himself up for lost, and therefore received Mr. Haymaker with kindness and serenity when, a minute or two later, he came plunging up, in his usual ecstasy of sputtering amiability, and seated himself in the chair at the other side of the table with an air as if everything were charming in the most charming of all possible worlds, and he himself the most charming person ...
— David Poindexter's Disappearance and Other Tales • Julian Hawthorne
... day was the one fixed for the departure; it was but proper that the guests should thank their host, and should show him a little attention in return for the expenditure of his twelve millions. The only remark, approaching to amiability, which the king could find to say to M. Fouquet, as he took leave of him, was in these words, "Monsieur Fouquet, you shall hear from me. Be good enough to desire M. d'Artagnan ...
— The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Or Ten Years Later being the completion of "The Three - Musketeers" And "Twenty Years After" • Alexandre Dumas
... to Captain M—- to refuse, and fortunately had imbibed a strong regard for Willy, whose romantic history, early courage, and amiability of disposition, had made him a general favourite. Macallan, therefore, willingly undertook the tuition of a boy who combined energy or mind with docility of disposition and sweetness of temper. There could ...
— The King's Own • Captain Frederick Marryat
... his huge square-cut head. This amiability in the matter of leave taking was unusual. Trina put the dishes down and came up to him, her little chin, once so adorable, in ...
— McTeague • Frank Norris
... had been asked concerning the state of France, the Englishman openly drew out a note-book and requested those about him, the wine merchant, the abbe, or the young noble to repeat their remarks; to which each had complied with an amiability equal to the courteous tone of the request. He had noted down the most important, extraordinary and, picturesque features of the robbery of the diligence, the state of Vendee, and the details about the ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas, pere
... the midshipman of the boat, was a young officer who promised fair to become an ornament to the service, as he was to society by the amiability of his manners and temper. The six seamen had all volunteered for the voyage. They were active and useful young men; and in a small and incomplete ship's company, which had so many duties to perform, this diminution of our force ...
— A Voyage to Terra Australis • Matthew Flinders
... neighbours, which, on the contrary, he abstracted whenever an opportunity presented itself, smiling good-humouredly all the while, and making so many condescending speeches to the owners, that they were delighted with his amiability, and thought in their hearts that he deserved to be Chancellor of ...
— The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby • Charles Dickens
... in doing it that the whole duty of man consists. And when the righteous man turneth away from his righteousness that he hath committed and doeth that which is neither quite lawful nor quite right, he will generally be found to have gained in amiability what he has lost ...
— The Note-Books of Samuel Butler • Samuel Butler
... my thanks with amiability, watched us with stolid curiosity as we pulled off, and then relapsed into their former semi-comatose condition. Their eyrie slipped perspectively astern, sank lower and lower, and suddenly was lost against the background of ...
— Noto, An Unexplored Corner of Japan • Percival Lowell
... one who meets Ysaye and talks with him for the first time is the mental breadth and vision of the man; his kindness and amiability; his utter lack of small vanity. When the writer first called on him in New York with a note of introductio from his friend and admirer Adolfo Betti, and later at Scarsdale where, in company with his friend Thibaud, he was dividing his time between music and tennis, Ysaye ...
— Violin Mastery - Talks with Master Violinists and Teachers • Frederick H. Martens
... the Frenchman had the good sense to meddle very little[57] with worlds that he did not know. Of course it would be simply bete to take it for granted that the majority of Parisian shop- and work- and servant-girls have or had either the beauty or the amiability or the less praiseworthy qualities of his grisettes. But somehow or other one feels that the general ethos of the class has been caught.[58] His bourgeois interiors and outings have the same real and not ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 2 - To the Close of the 19th Century • George Saintsbury
... of me, for I couldn't have borne the business alone. But she was a magnificent monument to the blessing of a want of imagination, and if she could see in our little charges nothing but their beauty and amiability, their happiness and cleverness, she had no direct communication with the sources of my trouble. If they had been at all visibly blighted or battered, she would doubtless have grown, on tracing it back, haggard enough to match them; as matters stood, however, ...
— The Turn of the Screw • Henry James
... little unpleasantly, it seemed to the boys, although Younkins was the soul of amiability and mildness. But Charlie thought it was unkind in them to laugh at his very natural apprehensions; and he said as much, as he and Oscar, with their clothes on their heads, waded the Republican Fork on ...
— The Boy Settlers - A Story of Early Times in Kansas • Noah Brooks
... both conscious that the frankness of their old intercourse was somehow lacking; that it was necessary to begin a new adjustment upon a basis different from the former one. They talked upon indifferent subjects, of what had occurred during the three weeks of Arthur's absence, playing the part of amiability without pleasure, endeavoring to simulate the old relations which ...
— The Pagans • Arlo Bates
... host was still holding him by the hand; and to him his looks returned from this rapid survey. At a second view Mr. Morris surprised him still more than on the first. The easy elegance of his manners, the distinction, amiability, and courage that appeared upon his features, fitted very ill with the Lieutenant's preconceptions on the subject of the proprietor of a hell; and the tone of his conversation seemed to mark him out for ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 4 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... not insensible to her amiability, nor yet to her liveliness and prettiness; but it had just the opposite effect. While she stood pulling his jacket, he heard the voices on the ...
— One of Life's Slaves • Jonas Lauritz Idemil Lie
... time, it must be owned that, alike through pride and gratitude, she truly owed such a testimony of respect to the memory of a husband who had left behind so great a name, and who was throughout his married life full of amiability, deference, and tenderness towards her, and who had suffered with an exemplary patience all the capriciousness of her ...
— Political Women, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Sutherland Menzies
... "Howld yer tongues!" "May the divil ate yez! but the best of yez hashn't the manners of a pig!" Amid such pleasant ebullitions of Celtic amiability, PUNCHINELLO succeeded in carving his way to the door, when it suddenly opened, and a tall, lean, cadaverous man, who looked like the ghost of some Fenian leader, bawled at the top ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 13, June 25, 1870 • Various
... I contemplated our day's work; indeed I had special cause to regret the mishap, since it was for my gratification alone K——r was led to push over this unlucky stream, he having before visited the Falls. However, I do not forget his amiability upon this and many other similar occasions, and hereby pledge myself to swim across a broader current, either with him, or for him, on any day between this and the year of our ...
— Impressions of America - During the years 1833, 1834 and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Tyrone Power
... myself. It was a city of happy people—care free, natural, sympathetic. There was a lack of restraint which, after the oppressive dignity of London, was a rare treat. No one was critical. Every one accepted my halting and faulty French without ridicule or condescension. The amiability and the friendliness of the French people thawed my heart and began to lift me out of my slough of homesickness. Happiness ...
— The Log-Cabin Lady, An Anonymous Autobiography • Unknown
... Isabella Beecher Hooker, who, together with Josephine S. Griffing, Paulina Wright Davis, and Susan B. Anthony, made all the preliminary arrangements, and managed the meeting. Mrs. Hooker's zeal, activity, and amiability gave her the power to make an easy conquest wherever she carries the banner of the good cause. Her generalship in Washington marshalled hosts of new and ardent friends into the movement. Five sessions were held, during each of which the Convention was presided over ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... to Arthur, and total disregard of herself, did not increase Mrs. Atherton's amiability, and taking Edith by the shoulder she attempted to ...
— Darkness and Daylight • Mary J. Holmes
... through letters to show that she had in her make-up a trace of noble discontent. She was not entirely happy in her surroundings, and the amiable ways of her husband were often an exasperation to her, rather than a pleasure—even amiability can be overdone. He never saw more than a mile from home, but her eyes swept England from Cornwall to Scotland, and few men, even, saw so far as that a hundred years ago. The discontent of Samuel Taylor Coleridge was the heritage of mother to son. ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 5 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard
... parts passing through, woods and morasses, and the earl, too much engrossed with his own dark thoughts to attend to his path, lost the track and wandered round and round, instead of going forward. This heightened not the amiability of his previous mood; but until dawn his efforts to retrace his steps or even discover where he was were useless. The morning, however, enabled him to reach Berwick, which he did just as the crowds were pouring into the castle-yard, and the heavy toll of the bell announced ...
— The Days of Bruce Vol 1 - A Story from Scottish History • Grace Aguilar
... the guests had come, including the inevitable late couple for whom the others waited with painful amiability, a great gray emptiness had replaced the purple swirling in Babbitt's head, and he had to force the tumultuous greetings suitable to ...
— Babbitt • Sinclair Lewis
... bore, but respect him for being, as they say, 'a perfect gentleman.' With Russians he is more free and easy, gives vent to his spleen, and makes fun of himself and them, but that is done by him with great amiability, negligence, and propriety. He holds Slavophil views; it is well known that in the highest society this is regarded as tres distingue! He reads nothing in Russian, but on his writing table there is a silver ashpan in the shape of a peasant's plaited shoe. ...
— Fathers and Children • Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
... and the second officer, went off on a jaunt together to Pisa, as the ship was to lie all day at Leghorn. The captain was a capital fellow, but I led him, facetiously, such a life the whole day, that I got most things altered at night. Emerson Tennent's son, with the greatest amiability, insisted on turning out of his state-room for me, and I got a good bed there. The store-room down by the hold was opened for Collins and Egg; and they slept with the moist sugar, the cheese in cut, ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... fact, who, strong-minded as she might be, was nevertheless perpetually tormenting herself and wailing about something or other, continually eulogised that natural equanimity which she envied, that courage allied with good temper, that amiability, and that beau sang qui ne laissait rien d'apre et ...
— Political Women, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Sutherland Menzies
... ever they should spread the night of their rule over the countries of the south! They would bring us a polar despotism, tyranny such as the world has never known, silent as darkness, rigid as ice, insensible as bronze, decked with an outer amiability and glittering with the cold brilliancy of snow, a slavery without compensation or relief. Probably, however, they will gradually lose both the virtues and the defects of their semi-barbarism. The centuries as they pass will ripen these ...
— Amiel's Journal • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... me; the rest is blurred, until I found myself back in our own home divested of my military costume, but allowed, as a special treat, to have my sword beside me when we sat down to tea. We had many good things for tea, and even Krak was thawed into amiability; she told me that I had behaved very well in the cathedral, and that I should see the fireworks from the window presently. It was winter and soon dark. The fireworks began at seven; I remember them very well. Above all, I recollect the fine excitement of seeing my ...
— The King's Mirror • Anthony Hope
... gather when other bees are idle. I have this fall secured from Mr. Frank Benton a Carniolan queen, and shall try crossing the Carniolans with the Syrians. Perhaps we can thus secure a strain with the amiability of the Carniolan, and the business of ...
— Prairie Farmer, Vol. 56: No. 1, January 5, 1884. - A Weekly Journal for the Farm, Orchard and Fireside • Various
... food, or the amiability of their dispositions, the seeta bhaloo are to be met with constantly in small bodies of from five to ten, differing in this respect from their sable brethren, who are generally found alone, unless a matrimonial alliance has been formed, when the intrusion of a third party, whether ...
— Forest & Frontiers • G. A. Henty
... intellectual power, great force of will, and a very tender heart;—a strong head to perceive and grasp the truth of things, a strong will to select and order the materials for expressing it, and a strong heart, which is tenderness, to give the work a soul of beauty and sweetness and amiability. As a man combines all these strengths, and as, moreover, through the unifying power of imagination, he pours the united life and virtue of them all into his work; so will his worth and honour stand as an artist. For whence should the noblest fruitage of human thought and culture grow, ...
— Shakespeare: His Life, Art, And Characters, Volume I. • H. N. Hudson
... his great end and immortal felicity: and beauty is not made by white or red, by black eyes and a round face, by a straight body and a smooth skin; but by a proportion to the fancy. No rules can make amiability; our minds and apprehensions make that: and so is our felicity; and we may be reconciled to poverty and a low fortune, if we suffer contentedness and the grace of God to make the proportions. For no man is poor that does not think himself so: but if, in a full fortune, ...
— The Ontario Readers: The High School Reader, 1886 • Ministry of Education
... very limited direction; reducing them, considered as spiritual beings, to a kind of negative existence. All these things I did not perceive till long afterwards; but I even then felt, though without stating it clearly to myself, the contrast between the frank sociability and amiability of French personal intercourse, and the English mode of existence, in which everybody acts as if everybody else (with few, or no exceptions) was either an enemy or a bore. In France, it is true, the ...
— Autobiography • John Stuart Mill
... Delavie. Remember that your Aurelia's roses and lilies were utterly wasted on me; I never thought whether she was beautiful save when others raved about her. I never saw her till yesterday; but the voice, the goodness, the amiability, in fact all that I did truly esteem and prize in her I had already found matured and mellowed together with that beauty of countenance which is independent of mere skin-deep complexion and feature. You know my history, and how far I am from being able to offer you a fresh untouched ...
— Love and Life • Charlotte M. Yonge
... noontide sun of summer, it can blaze in warm smiles; like the northern lights of winter, it can gleam in depths of woe;—but it is always the same, modified, doubtless, and rendered more or less patent to others, according to the natural amiability of him or her who bestows it. No one can put it on; still less can any one put it off. Its range is universal; it embraces all mankind, though, of course, it is intensified on a few favoured objects; its seat is in the ...
— The Dog Crusoe and His Master - A Story of Adventure in the Western Prairies • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... have entered into the notions prevalent in the civilized world on the subject of a wardrobe; could they have understood how much virtue lies inherent in a superfine broad cloth, how much respectability in a gilt button, how much sense in the tie of a cravat, how much amiability in the cut of a sleeve, how much merit of every sort in a Stultz and a Hoby. There are who pretend, and that with some plausibilty, that these things are but typical; that taste in dress is but the outward and visible sign of the frequentation of good company; ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 14, No. 392, Saturday, October 3, 1829. • Various
... a wild cow. The man who sold her to me had not put it precisely that way. He had represented her to me as a cow of mild manners, thoroughly domesticated, of the sweetest possible temper, used to the women folks, playful with children,—in short, a creature of such amiability that she actually longed to be petted. But I had already discovered that her manners were somewhat abrupt, and that either the man did not understand the nature of the cow or I did not understand the man. I was convinced that, if she had ever ...
— The Busted Ex-Texan and Other Stories • W. H. H. Murray
... noted here that one of the bitterest of tongues could not help doing homage to Oscar Wilde's "amiability": Whistler even preferred to call him "amiable and irresponsible" rather than give his plagiarism a ...
— Oscar Wilde, Volume 1 (of 2) - His Life and Confessions • Frank Harris
... seemed to swell from the inmost depths of the soul, and a conversation the most extraordinary that I had ever met with. She threw out, in the most facile and unpretending fashion, thoughts full of originality and humor, where wit was united with simplicity, and acuteness with amiability; and into the whole a deep truth was cast, as it were out of iron, giving to every sentence a completeness of impression which rendered it hard for the strongest, in any way, to break or rend it. In her presence, I had the conviction that a genuine human being stood before me, in its most pure ...
— The Friendships of Women • William Rounseville Alger
... sympathy with Franklin in his views of Christianity. He was also a man of letters. Mr. Franklin addressed a very polite note to Mr. Gibbon, sending his compliments, and soliciting the pleasure of spending the evening with him. Mr. Gibbon, who was never renowned for amiability of character, replied, in substance, we have ...
— Benjamin Franklin, A Picture of the Struggles of Our Infant Nation One Hundred Years Ago - American Pioneers and Patriots Series • John S. C. Abbott
... many gave up their allegiance. The rebels were cast down from on high into the pit of darkness. Hereupon succeeded the transmigration of souls; every animal and every plant was animated by one of the fallen angels, and the remarkable amiability of the Hindoos towards animals is owing to this belief. They look upon them as their fellow-creatures, and will not put any of ...
— A Woman's Journey Round the World • Ida Pfeiffer
... in great spirits, and prattled away as they sat at dinner, emboldened by the lady's unusual amiability to ask all sorts of questions, some of which proved rather embarrassing to Miss Henny, and very amusing to Roxy, listening in ...
— A Garland for Girls • Louisa May Alcott
... question which Borasdine asked. Further along were two women putting fish upon poles for drying, and a third was engaged in skinning a large salmon. The women did not look up from their work, and were not inclined to amiability. They had Mongol features, complexion, eyes, and hair, the latter thick and black. Some of the men wear it plaited into queues, and others let it grow pretty much at will. Each woman I saw had it braided in two queues, which hung over her ...
— Overland through Asia; Pictures of Siberian, Chinese, and Tartar - Life • Thomas Wallace Knox
... a woman unless he was married to her, agreed to this with some unintelligible mutters through his toothless gums, while Mrs. Hatch remarked with effusive amiability that "it's a sad sight to see a daughter go, even though she's a stepchild. It's a comfort to think," she added immediately, "that Judy's got a God-fearin', pious husband an' one with no nonsense about him ...
— The Miller Of Old Church • Ellen Glasgow
... interested. I was facing Adele and her friends, so I could observe them all the time without being myself conspicuous. I was able to take note of the somewhat wearied graciousness of Mr. de Valentin, who seemed always to be struggling with a profound boredom; the almost feverish amiability of Mrs. Van Reinberg, and, in a lesser degree, her daughters; and the undoubted reserve with which Adele seemed to protect herself from Mr. de Valentin's attentions. When at last they rose and left the saloon, ...
— The Great Secret • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... Celia laughed again, appreciatively. The place had seemed to her a kind of Paradise, and certainly it was inhabited, judging by the specimens she had seen, by persons of angelic amiability. She was so excited that she could scarcely drink her tea, and when Mrs. Dexter reappeared, she sprang up all eagerness. For half an an hour she went from room to room, almost speechless with admiration ...
— The Woman's Way • Charles Garvice
... was the hero of the little circle, where his wit, his person, his education, his amiability, were perpetually praised. One or another would remark that in seven years he had largely increased his fortune, that Bonfons brought in at least ten thousand francs a year, and was surrounded, like the other possessions of the Cruchots, by the vast ...
— Eugenie Grandet • Honore de Balzac
... course, but it isn't Miriam's amiability that I'm thinking about at present. It's what we'd better do to straighten out this trouble for Elfreda," said Grace anxiously. "I felt glad when I came to Overton that I did not have to worry about any one but myself, and now ...
— Grace Harlowe's First Year at Overton College • Jessie Graham Flower
... of his sister, for whose unsparing judgment censure was easier than praise, it is evident that the amiability of the talented boy had its effect upon those about him: as when, for instance, he secretly read a French story with his sister, and recast the whole Berlin Court into the comic characters of the novel; when they made forbidden music with flute and lute; when he went in disguise to her and they recited ...
— The German Classics Of The Nineteenth And Twentieth Centuries, Volume 12 • Various
... thumbed volumes of the modern English poets in the familiar edition of Tauchnitz, he put at my disposal, in return for a collection, somewhat similar, although a little larger, of my own. In his rare moments of amiability, he could talk on such matters with verve and originality: more usually he preferred to pursue with the bitterest animosity an abstract fetish which he called his "luck." He was by temperament an enraged pessimist; ...
— The Poems And Prose Of Ernest Dowson • Ernest Dowson et al
... mean to manage everything, and then you have no time!" said Ethel, sensible all the time of her own ill-humour, and of her sister's patience and amiability, yet propelled to speak the unpleasant truths that in her better moods ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... me," the judge said, now all amiability; "don't forget I'm always at your service in this affair. I see now that you might have preferred to question Webster alone, in the music room; but my confidence in his innocence blinded me to the fact that you could regard him as actually guilty. I expected ...
— No Clue - A Mystery Story • James Hay
... from the very same pages which reveal his weaknesses, that they draw their real knowledge of many of those characteristics which they most admire—his sincere love for his country, his kindness of heart, his amiability in all his domestic relations. It is true that we cannot look into the private letters of Caesar, or Pompey, or Brutus, as we can into Cicero's; but it is not so certain that if we could, our estimate of their characters would be lowered. We might ...
— Cicero - Ancient Classics for English Readers • Rev. W. Lucas Collins
... make-believe gentleman and lady cannot look like the genuine article. Mediocrity shows itself for what it is worth, no matter what temporary name it may have acquired. Ill-temper cannot hide itself under the simper of assumed amiability. The querulousness of incompetent complaining natures confesses itself almost as much as in the tones of the voice. The anxiety which strives to smooth its forehead cannot get rid of the telltale ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XII. July, 1863, No. LXIX. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... only a short time ago, had commanded his unwilling admiration. Mr. Alfred Burton's expression had undergone a complete change. His eyes had lost their calculating twinkle, his mouth had softened. A pleasant but somewhat abstracted smile had taken the place of his forced amiability. ...
— The Double Life Of Mr. Alfred Burton • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... every shift and change in the perplexing postal arrangements, the value of the seediest, weediest Egyptian garron offered for sale in Cairo or Alexandria, who could talk a telegraph-clerk into amiability and soothe the ruffled vanity of a newly appointed staff-officer when press regulations became burdensome—was the man in the flannel shirt, the black-browed Torpenhow. He represented the Central Southern Syndicate in the campaign, as ...
— The Light That Failed • Rudyard Kipling
... or scrubbing, the men probably cleaning their horses, carriages, or harness; but whatever else they may be doing, you may be quite certain they will all be singing, though it is equally certain that, by the greatest exercise of amiability, you could scarcely call the result a song; the words seem to be improvised as the performer goes on. There was a light-hearted groom in one of the patios of our flat, in the Calle Lope de Vega, who would continue almost without a break ...
— Spanish Life in Town and Country • L. Higgin and Eugene E. Street
... of scholarship, polished manners, and amiability of character, we have had few men to surpass the reverend Joseph Spence. His career was suitable to his deserts. He was fortunate in his connections, fortunate in his appointments, and fortunate in his share ...
— Notes and Queries 1850.04.06 • Various
... know your worth, but I also desire to be properly esteemed and respected by you. You must never think you have honored me by making me a countess, but must always remember that my father is a millionnaire, whose only daughter and heiress pays you for your amiability, your title, and her admission to court. And now enough of these tedious affairs. The carriage has stopped, and we have arrived at our destination; let us put on our masks again, and be the fond lovers who marry for ...
— Frederick the Great and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... wasn't he? I have known him Exhibit a celestial amiability:— He'd eat an enemy, and then would own him Of flavor excellent, despite hostility. The crudest captain of the Turkish navy He buried in ...
— The Book of Humorous Verse • Various
... a fit of unwonted amiability, had deigned to carve me out a turnip lantern, an art-and-craft he was peculiarly deft in; and Harold, as the interior of the turnip flew out in scented fragments under the hollowing knife, had eaten largely ...
— The Golden Age • Kenneth Grahame
... white Dutch cap she wore. Her eyes sparkled with indignant protest, her face was piquant and was just then flushed, and her nose had the least bit of a natural uptilt, giving her the air of a young woman who had a will of her own to spice her amiability. ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... merely ordinary understanding and the wife of a subordinate official of the Court. She charmed Frederick, however, and may have loved him. If so, let us remember that the morals of those days were not those of ours, and not grudge the lonely King his enjoyment of her beauty and amiability. ...
— William of Germany • Stanley Shaw
... distinctly shown that Sunday is more favourable to the propagation of the human race than any other day in the week. The second result—the murder of the child—does not speak very highly for the amiability of her natural disposition; and the whole story, supposing it to have had any foundation at all, is about as much chargeable upon the Book of Sports, as upon the Book of Kings. Such 'sports' have taken place in Dissenting ...
— Sunday Under Three Heads • Charles Dickens
... which foreigners for the first time in Russian company so often wonder. Badinage with Russians so quickly passes to lively and noisy quarrelling, which in its turn so suddenly fades into quiet contented amiability that it is little wonder that the observer feels rather breathless at it all. Grogoff was a striking figure, with his fine height and handsome head and bold eyes, but there was something about him that I did not like. Immensely self-confident, he ...
— The Secret City • Hugh Walpole
... Kan; and the people are rightly trying to pay them back with love,—for presents, such as thousands would like to make, are prohibited by disciplinary rule. Officers and crew must be weary; but the crowding and the questioning are borne with charming amiability. Everything is shown and explained in detail: the huge thirty-centimetre gun, with its loading apparatus and directing machinery; the quick-firing batteries; the torpedoes, with their impulse-tubes; the electric lantern, with its searching mechanism. ...
— Kokoro - Japanese Inner Life Hints • Lafcadio Hearn
... stern, imposing-looking personage that Mr. Verdant Green had expected to see in the ruler among dons, and the terror of offending undergraduates, the master of Brazenface was a mild-looking old gentleman, with an inoffensive amiability of expression and a shy, retiring manner that seemed to intimate that he was more alarmed at the strangers than they had need to be at him. Dr. Portman seemed to be quite a part of his college, ...
— The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green • Cuthbert Bede
... suddenly changed from an aspect of moroseness to one of bewitching amiability. He stood in the ...
— Round the Block • John Bell Bouton
... overflow with a feverish jollity, and would improperly overfeed at table or starve his emaciating body. But after a time, when he had watched us narrowly to his heart's content, he recovered his health and amiability, and was the same as he had been. Judith and I were then cold and distant in behavior with each other, but unfailing in politeness: 'twas now a settled attitude, preserved by each towards the other, and betraying no feeling of any ...
— The Cruise of the Shining Light • Norman Duncan
... merits of an English work, The Marrow of Modern Divinity, which he defended against the attacks of the "Moderate" party in the Church. B., if unduly introspective, was a man of singular piety and amiability. His autobiography is an interesting record of Scottish life, full of sincerity and tenderness, and not devoid of humorous ...
— A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature • John W. Cousin
... be, and never had any. Henrietta, if she were alive, could testify that it there is a defect in my relations with women, it arises from my excessive amiability. I could not refuse a woman anything she had set her heart upon—except my hand in marriage. As long as your sex are content to stop short of that they can do as they please ...
— An Unsocial Socialist • George Bernard Shaw
... Harvey's chief lieutenant and obtained an entrance into literary and artistic circles. A man of great originality and initiative ability, of unflagging energy and industry, of considerable artistic taste, and of great amiability, he also had the defect of the creative quality of his mind, so that, owing to that lack of business talent which the public generally associates with the artistic temperament, he did not ultimately prove himself more than a moderate financial ...
— The History of "Punch" • M. H. Spielmann
... who dabbles in letters; if all this were true, and Dumas were merely a piece of human journalism, produced to- day and gone to-morrow, there would still be enough of him to make his a memorable name. He was a prodigy—of amiability, cleverness, energy, daring, charm, industry—if he was nothing else. Gronow tells that he has sat at table with Dumas and Brougham, and that Brougham, out-faced and out-talked, was forced to quit the field. 'J'ai conserve,' ...
— Views and Reviews - Essays in appreciation • William Ernest Henley
... an admirable admixture of grace and beauty, wit being allied to great affability and good-nature; to all these natural gifts she added a capacity and intelligence such as one might desire sovereigns to possess. Her coquetry was mere amiability; of that I am convinced. Being naturally vain, the Prince, her husband, made great use at first of his consort's royal coat-of-arms. It was displayed on his equipages and stamped all ...
— The Memoirs of Madame de Montespan, Complete • Madame La Marquise De Montespan
... the strange amiability of the master of the Works toward the man he had once threatened to break for libel. They had stood there chatting like ...
— V. V.'s Eyes • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... undaunted, promptly dared to exchange growls with "Old Dog Tray," himself. The latter, none else than His Excellency, Lawrence North, Governor of the state, marched toward the wicket, wagging his tail, but the wagging was not a display of amiability. The politicians called North "Old Dog Tray" because his permanent limp caused his coattails ...
— All-Wool Morrison • Holman Day
... this faint and unintentional signal, he smote himself upon the knee, giving utterance again to his feelings of triumph, and departed, considering himself a young man of perception and ability. His amiability lasted so long that his mother congratulated him upon it, and remarked that he must have had good news, but Prescott gallantly attributed his happiness to her presence alone. She said nothing in reply, but kept her ...
— Before the Dawn - A Story of the Fall of Richmond • Joseph Alexander Altsheler
... poor and humble individual; and you have consented to become my wife and abandon home and kindred for my sake. Profoundly then do I rejoice that it is in my power to elevate you to a position of which your beauty, your amiability and your virtue render you so eminently worthy; and in my own native Florence, no lady will be more courted, nor treated with greater distinction than the Countess ...
— Wagner, the Wehr-Wolf • George W. M. Reynolds
... based upon an actual resort to war measures on the part of the young teacher, is given to illustrate the strength as well as the amiability of Garfield's character. It was absolutely necessary that he should show ...
— From Canal Boy to President - Or The Boyhood and Manhood of James A. Garfield • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... To play an intensely exciting game strictly in accordance with rigid moral rules of the player's own arbitrary enforcement, and which are utterly repudiated by a less scrupulous antagonist, can hardly tend to promote contentment and amiability. Neither are slanders and falsehoods mollifying applications to a statesman inspired with an upright and noble ambition. Mr. Adams bore such assaults, ranging from the charge of having corruptly bought the Presidency down to that of being a Freemason with ...
— John Quincy Adams - American Statesmen Series • John. T. Morse
... still speak of with glistening eyes. In another column will be found some interesting recollections of Mr. Sandys by his old schoolmaster, Mr. David Cathro, M.A., who testifies with natural pride to the industry and amiability of his famous pupil. 'To know him,' says Mr. Cathro, 'was ...
— Tommy and Grizel • J.M. Barrie
... was to fancy that she was off somewhere with him, and did not want to be looked up. Before the high moment when one of the instructors appeared, and chose a partner fur the Virginia Reel, Charmian had fused all the faltering and reluctant temperaments in the warmth of her amiability. Nobody ever denied her good nature, in fact, whatever else they denied her, and there were none who begrudged her its reward at last. She was last on the floor, when the orchestra, having played as long as it had bargained to, refused to play any ...
— The Coast of Bohemia • William Dean Howells
... that he held his place by means of fraud. He received sympathy from hardly any of the leaders of his own party in Congress, and met with open condemnation from the Stalwarts; yet he pursued his course with steadiness and equanimity, and was happy in his office. His serene amiability and hopefulness, especially in regard to affairs in the Southern states, were a source of irritation to the Stalwarts; but it was the serenity of a man who felt himself fully equal to ...
— Historical Essays • James Ford Rhodes
... in 1776, where his associate was his younger brother, Sir William, in whom the family virtues had, by exaggeration, degenerated into an indolent good humor fatal to his military efficiency. The admiral, on the contrary, was not more remarkable for amiability and resolute personal courage than he was for sustained energy and untiring attention to duty,—traits which assured adequate naval direction, in case conciliation should give place, as it did, ...
— Types of Naval Officers - Drawn from the History of the British Navy • A. T. Mahan
... second, W. J. Wills (who shared the fate of his leader), he appears to have been a man eminently possessed of most of the qualities that would fit him for the position he held, but apparently tempered with an amiability of disposition that led him to give way completely to the rash judgment of his superior, without striving to temper ...
— The History of Australian Exploration from 1788 to 1888 • Ernest Favenc
... spirits combined to delude and deceive the helpless woman of whom half an hour before they had stood in such abject terror. If they had found her in hysterics they would have pitied and respected her; but her good sense, her amiability, and noble self-control subjected her ...
— A Fearful Responsibility and Other Stories • William D. Howells
... girl and her protege arrived at the boarding-house of the fat manageress they found that the actor had so far kept his promise as to have inveigled her into a condition of alcoholic amiability. She asked them what they could do. Each one sang and danced, and the girl, who also whistled, outlined to the manageress her idea of an "act" in which the two should appear. There was a hitch when the question of salary arose. ...
— Tales From Bohemia • Robert Neilson Stephens
... evident you are not equally generous in surrendering the amiability of Timon, along with the depravity of Iago, to the arsenal of feminine weapons. What corroding mildew of discontent has fallen from Mrs. Parkman's velvet dress, and rusted the bright blade of ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... me that Themire is quite bewitched with the amiability of the maid who has been intrusted to her care. If this be true, then matters are in a bad way. If this is not another of Themire's schemes, but actual sympathy, if this girl, whose remarkable loveliness of character (even Jocrisse is compelled to praise her) has won the piquant little Amelie's ...
— The Nameless Castle • Maurus Jokai
... never for a moment had the proud smile wavered. She was beginning to feel as though an elastic band had been stretched for hours under her nose and behind her ears, and the sole comment her lofty amiability had drawn forth had been a reference to the famed animal ...
— Stories from Everybody's Magazine • 1910 issues of Everybody's Magazine
... drink tea or coffee; he had cocoa for breakfast, and at lunch a glass of milk, with water at dinner. He had a tint like the rose, and when he smiled or laughed, which was often, from a constitutional amiability and a perfect digestion, his teeth showed white and regular, and an innocent dimple punctured either cheek. His name was Godolphin, for he had instinctively felt that in choosing a name he might as well take a handsome one while he was about it, and that if he became ...
— The Story of a Play - A Novel • W. D. Howells
... that while Shakespeare is depicting Richard's heartlessness, he does his work badly; the traits, as I have shown, are crudely extravagant and even contradictory; but when he paints Richard's gentleness and amiability, he works like a master, every touch is ...
— The Man Shakespeare • Frank Harris
... and then chatted for a moment with his uncle, General de Bozonnet, who was quite enlivened by that throng of women, among whom he had been carried hither and thither like an old rudderless ship. After acknowledging the amiability with which Madame Fonsegue had listened to his stories, by purchasing an autograph of Monseigneur Martha from her for a hundred francs, he had quite lost himself amid the bevy of girls who had passed him on, one to another. And now, on his return from them, he had his hands full ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... He is a High-church clergyman to a highly fashionable congregation. His success is partly due to his social position and partly to his elegance of speech, but chiefly to his inherent amiability, which leaves the sinner in happy peace and smiles on the just and ...
— Representative Plays by American Dramatists: 1856-1911: The New York Idea • Langdon Mitchell
... Pennycherry. Indeed it might have been difficult to discover any human being with reasons for liking that sharp-featured lady. Maybe the keeping of second-rate boarding houses in the neighbourhood of Bloomsbury does not tend to develop the virtues of generosity and amiability. ...
— Passing of the Third Floor Back • Jerome K. Jerome
... hopeless problem," Warren Gregory said. The talk drifted away to other persons and affairs, but when they presently parted, with great amiability on both sides, Warren Gregory knew that his mother's suspicions had in some mysterious way been aroused, and old Mrs. Gregory, sitting alone in the heat of the afternoon, writhed in the grip of a definite apprehension. Absurd—absurd—to interpret that married woman's ...
— The Heart of Rachael • Kathleen Norris
... her. Talk was the medicine she trusted to, talk about everything, talk that was free, unguarded, and as candid as a habit of talking with men made natural in her own case. Nor did she encourage those habits of unselfishness and amiability founded upon insincerity which are put at so high a value in mixed households of men and women. She desired that Rachel should think, and for this reason offered books and discouraged too entire a dependence upon Bach and Beethoven and Wagner. But when Mrs. Ambrose would ...
— The Voyage Out • Virginia Woolf
... in love with Mirah. And so much the better; for a tie to Mirah had more promise of indulgence for her father than a tie to Ezra: and Lapidoth was not without the hope of recommending himself to Deronda, and of softening any hard prepossessions. He was behaving with much amiability, and trying in all ways at his command to get himself into easy domestication with his children—entering into Mirah's music, showing himself docile about smoking, which Mrs. Adam could not tolerate in ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot
... together on such terms without ever quarrelling? I doubt it. To make marriage the ideal we love to picture it in romance, the elimination of human nature is the first essential. Supreme unselfishness, perfect patience, changeless amiability, we should have to start with, and continue with, until ...
— The Angel and the Author - and Others • Jerome K. Jerome
... as his sons and the other members of my family, to pay to the Princess Dowager von Reuss, nee Meier, the respect and deference due to her as the widow of the late head of the family, and to which she is justly entitled by her virtue, her blameless conduct, her respectability, beauty, and amiability. The Princess Dowager von Reuss is further authorized to let her servants wear the livery and color of my house, to display the coat- of-arms of the princes von Reuss on her carriages, and to enjoy the full privileges of her rank. If my brother Henry, the heir of my titles, ...
— LOUISA OF PRUSSIA AND HER TIMES • Louise Muhlbach
... her small stock of vocal music. They tried one or two of Mendelssohn's, "I would that my love," and "Greeting," and discovered that they got on wonderfully well together. Vixen fell asleep that night wondering at her own amiability. ...
— Vixen, Volume II. • M. E. Braddon
... Baskerville, whose name has been mentioned as the probable Liberal candidate for Mid-Devon at the next election, has cast a gloom over the county. Though Sir Charles had resided at Baskerville Hall for a comparatively short period his amiability of character and extreme generosity had won the affection and respect of all who had been brought into contact with him. In these days of nouveaux riches it is refreshing to find a case where the scion of an old county family which has fallen upon evil days is able ...
— Hound of the Baskervilles • Authur Conan Doyle
... be putten the better leg afore, gentlemen," she said with becoming amiability; "yer breakfast is nigh ...
— The Shadow of a Crime - A Cumbrian Romance • Hall Caine
... of a much more tender heart than might have been supposed to beat under the armour of a mercenary soldier set to overawe a sullen people. 'He loveth our nation,' say the elders of the Jews,—not certainly because of their amiability, but because of the revelation which they possessed. Like a great many others in that strange, restless era when our Lord came, this man seems to have become tired of the hollowness of heathenism, and to have been groping for the light. His military service ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ezekiel, Daniel, and the Minor Prophets. St Matthew Chapters I to VIII • Alexander Maclaren
... of the table the genial Mr. Jennings Bryan presided as host, his broad countenance beaming with amiability, and a tall flagon of grape juice standing beside his hand. A little further down the table one saw the benevolent head and placid physiognomy of Mr. Norman Angell, bowed forward as if in deep calculation. Within earshot of Mr. Bryan, but not ...
— Further Foolishness • Stephen Leacock
... intelligence whatever, could bring earls into their nets, there was no reason why Nora could not be a princess or a duchess. So she planned accordingly. But the child puzzled and eluded her; and from time to time she discovered a disquieting strength of character behind a disarming amiability. Ever since Nora had returned home by way of the Orient, the mother had recognized a subtle change, so subtle that she never had an opportunity of alluding to it verbally. Perhaps the fault lay at her own door. She should never have permitted Nora ...
— The Place of Honeymoons • Harold MacGrath
... smiling, endeavouring to put a handful of awkward girls at their ease. But neither his nor Mrs. Strachey's efforts availed. It was impossible for the pupils to throw off, at will, the crippling fear that governed their relations with the Principal. To them, his amiability resembled the antics of an uncertain-tempered elephant, with which you could never feel safe.— Besides on this occasion it was a young batch, and of particularly mixed stations. And so a dozen girls, from twelve to fifteen years old, sat on the extreme edges of their ...
— The Getting of Wisdom • Henry Handel Richardson
... high-souled woman, Mrs. Annie Besant, I read the following passage: "Plenty of people wish well to any good cause, but very few care to exert themselves to help it, and still fewer will risk anything in its support. 'Someone ought to do it, but why should I?' is the ever reechoed phrase of weak-kneed amiability. 'Someone ought to do it, so why not I?' is the cry of some earnest servant of man, eagerly forward springing to face some perilous duty. Between these two sentences lie whole centuries of moral evolution." True enough! ...
— The Varieties of Religious Experience • William James
... not suffered to interfere. This anecdote shows, in a strong light, that deep-rooted selfishness, which, in numberless instances, notwithstanding the superiority of Iligliuk's understanding, detracted from the amiability of her disposition. The fact was, that she did not feel inclined so far to exert herself as to comply with Captain Lyon's request; and the slight degree of gratitude and proper feeling which was requisite to overcome that disinclination ...
— Three Voyages for the Discovery of a Northwest Passage from the • Sir William Edward Parry
... one of his trips to town, and told him what a splendid deer he had out at the ranch. Mr. D—— became instantly possessed of a desire to own the marvel, and a bargain was concluded on the spot. Billy by this time had shed his horns, and was all that could be wished for in the way of amiability. We tied his legs together, and shipped him to ...
— Red Saunders' Pets and Other Critters • Henry Wallace Phillips
... 17th of February 1867 the king appointed him the first constitutional Hungarian premier. It was on this occasion that Deak called him "the providential statesman given to Hungary by the grace of God.'' As premier, Andrassy by his firmness, amiability and dexterity as a debater, soon won for himself a commanding position. Yet his position continued to be difficult, inasmuch as the authority of Deak dwarfed that of all the party leaders, however eminent. Andrassy chose for himself the departments of war and foreign affairs. It was he who reorganized ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... mistaken kindness of your heart: it was right for me to know this. I will condescend to tell you. It was with deep regret that I was driven to this step. I admire in many ways the Prince—I admit his amiability. It was our great misfortune, it was perhaps somewhat of my fault, that we were so unsuited to each other; but I have a regard, a sincere regard, for all his qualities. As a private person I should think as you do. It is difficult, I know, to make allowances for state considerations. ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 7 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... the bride, the development of character, distinctly marked in each, progresses through a series of natural events, until the young people reach the point of life when impulse settles into principle, amiability into virtue, generosity into self-abnegation, and we feel that each may now be safely left to life as it is, that circumstance can no longer mould character, and are willing to leave them, certain they will henceforth remain true to themselves, and to those ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 4, October, 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... indignation. "You'll be old yerself some day," she sobbed, not noticing that he was stealthily edging toward the door, one eye on her, one on to-morrow's pot-roast. "I tell yew, Tommy," regaining her accustomed confiding amiability, as she lifted the corner of her apron to wipe her eyes, "Miss Ellie will feel some kind o' bad, tew. Yer know me an' her an' Angy all went ter school tergether, although Miss Ellie is so much younger 'n the rest o' us that we call her ...
— Old Lady Number 31 • Louise Forsslund
... mother of sturdy children, one who will of all things meet life's experiences with a sweet temper. It is impossible to imagine a pleasant home with a cross wife, mother or sister, as its presiding genius. And it is a rule, with exceptions, that good appetite and sound sleep induce amiability. If, with these advantages, a girl or woman, boy or man, is still snappish or surly, why it must be due to her or his ...
— How to Succeed - or, Stepping-Stones to Fame and Fortune • Orison Swett Marden
... called attention to some neglected truths; but, after all, I fear we must go to the old school, if we want to get at the root of the matter. I know there is an outward amiability about many young persons, some young girls especially, that seems like genuine goodness; but I have been disposed of late to lean toward your view, that these human affections, as we see them in our children,—ours, I say, though ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 6, Issue 35, September, 1860 • Various
... was the guest of honor at a reception held at Barnard College (Columbia University), March 7, 1906, by the Barnard Union. One of the young ladies presented Mr. Clemens, and thanked him for his amiability in coming to make them an address. She closed with the expression of the great joy it gave her fellow-collegians, "because ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... marriages was vain after that. My Lady Castlewood and her two children held their peace whilst Madame Bernstein prattled. Harry was enraptured, and Maria surprised. Lord Castlewood was puzzled to know what sudden freak or scheme had occasioned this prodigious amiability on the part of his aunt; but did not allow the slightest expression of solicitude or doubt to appear on his countenance, which wore every mark ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... viewed Niafer through the closed window of Ageus. Dom Manuel looked contentedly enough upon the wife who was the reward of his toil and suffering in Dun Vlechlan, and the child who was the reward of his amiability and shrewdness in dealing with the stork, all seemed well so long as he regarded them through the closed ...
— Figures of Earth • James Branch Cabell
... smiled. His amiability was returning, he had done her the honour to tease her. She departed, all her "things" being ready in the kitchen. Even before she had gone Louis went quickly upstairs, having drunk less than half a cup of tea, and with extraordinary eagerness plunged into the bedroom and unlocked his private ...
— The Price of Love • Arnold Bennett
... had a stock of names for his servant, none of which he employed unless he felt in a good humour. Owl-pig, hog-mouse, ape-dog, rat-weasel, and cat-fish were the highest expressions of his amiability toward the man who had been his ill-tempered, dishonest, impudent, and treacherous attendant all the years ...
— Robert Orange - Being a Continuation of the History of Robert Orange • John Oliver Hobbes
... stead, a slave-girl of my slave-girls, namely, Shu'a'ah Queen of the Fourth Sea, who is vice-reine of my reign. When she was present at the wedding and saw thee and heard thy singing, she sent to me, informing me of thee and setting forth to me thy grace and amiability and the beauty of thy breeding and thy courtesy.[FN215] So I am come to thee, for that which I have heard of thy charms, and hereby I do thee a mighty great favour in the eyes of all the Jann."[FN216] Thereupon Tohfah arose and kissed the ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... "Come, Falieri, what are all these sublime thoughts that are being hatched and nourished in your mind since you first put the Doge's bent bonnet on?" Falieri, coming to himself like one awakening from a dream, stepped forward to meet his old friend with an air of forced amiability. He felt that he really owed his bonnet to Bodoeri, and the words of the latter seemed to be a reminder of the fact. But since every obligation weighed like a burden upon Falieri's proud ambitious spirit, and he could not dismiss the oldest member of the Council, and his tried friend to boot, ...
— Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... heard Winifred make so rude a speech before. But, to my surprise, it seemed to develop an unsuspected amiability ...
— Flint - His Faults, His Friendships and His Fortunes • Maud Wilder Goodwin
... exalted character selecting unworthy and wicked husbands, it does seem as if Providence determines all matrimonial unions independently of our own wills and settled purposes. How often is wealth wedded to poverty, beauty to ugliness, and amiability to ill-temper! The hard, cold, unsocial, unsympathetic, wooden, scheming, selfish man is the only one who seems to attain his end, since he can bide his time,—wait for somebody ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume VIII • John Lord
... after a toilsome troubled morning we came, rather cross from the strain of sustained amiability, to Sir Graham Rivers' house. It seemed all softness and quiet—I recall dead white panelling and oval mirrors horizontally set and a marble fireplace between white marble-blind Homer and marble-blind Virgil, very grave and fine—and how Isabel came in to lunch in a shapeless ...
— The New Machiavelli • Herbert George Wells
... social position, and they never make new acquaintances without finding out what set they belong to; and I was never allowed from a little girl to make acquaintances with any children whose mothers were not in the right set; and amiability and goodness had nothing to do ...
— A Flock of Girls and Boys • Nora Perry
... The number of Ainos in the island of Yezo is given in 1880, which is the last census made of them, as 16,637(17); and this number is believed to be gradually decreasing. Travellers who have visited them unite in testifying to their great amiability and docility. Physically they are a sturdy and well developed race. The characteristic which has been noticed in them more than any other is the abundant growth of hair. The men have a heavy and bushy head of hair and a full beard which is allowed to grow down to their chests. Other parts of ...
— Japan • David Murray
... who in later days noted the enthusiasm with which he would speak of Lord Althorp, his opponent, and of Lord Aberdeen, his chief, dwelling upon the beautiful truthfulness and uprightness of the former and the sweet amiability of the latter, knew that the impression of detachment he gave wronged the sensibility of his own heart. Of how few who have lived for more than sixty years in the full sight of their countrymen, and have been as party leaders exposed to angry and sometimes dishonest criticism, can ...
— William Ewart Gladstone • James Bryce
... so sudden, her cordiality so surprising, that I could frame no answer. Instead I looked helplessly at Dicky. To tell the truth, I rather distrusted this sudden amiability. From past experiences, I knew that when Mother Graham made a sudden change from sulkiness to cheerfulness, she had ...
— Revelations of a Wife - The Story of a Honeymoon • Adele Garrison
... us, Monsieur Bobinet," he said with the most winning amiability, "if we are all in unusually high spirits to-night. You are not aware, perhaps, that our friend Monsieur Jules Charpentier was married this morning, and that we are here in celebration of that happy event. Allow me to introduce ...
— In the Days of My Youth • Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards
... her the wisest of us all," resumed the widow, looking at Old Nell, who with tremulous head nodded violent approval. You must know, old Nell had become as deaf as a post, and, being incapable of understanding anything, she gratified her natural amiability by approving of everything—at least everything that was uttered by speakers with a visible smile. When they spoke with gravity, old Nell shook her tremulous head, and put on a look of alarmingly solemn sympathy. On the present occasion, however, the antique old thing seemed to ...
— The Coxswain's Bride - also, Jack Frost and Sons; and, A Double Rescue • R.M. Ballantyne
... him to come to her without delay. The queer old man immediately waited upon her and found her overwhelmed with grief. She described to him in the blackest colours the barbarity of her husband, and ended by declaring that her whole hope depended upon his friendship and amiability. ...
— Best Russian Short Stories • Various
... help yourself—there are some excellent cigars in that drawer—but I do not feel like smoking myself." Cedric spoke rather sulkily and with none of his accustomed amiability. "Shall I give you some whiskey and soda?" But Malcolm refused this refreshment—no man was ...
— Herb of Grace • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... the President's message in the afternoon. ... Made several suggestions as to changes and omissions. The President came in just as I had finished and we went over the matter together. He accepted my ideas with that singular amiability and open- mindedness which form so striking a contrast with the general idea of his ...
— Theodore Roosevelt • Edmund Lester Pearson
... for a solid year in the village of Banfield? Chiefly work; after that a lake and girls. How many years of faithful service do branch banks owe to the attractiveness and amiability of ...
— A Canadian Bankclerk • J. P. Buschlen
... children of the long-ago in admiring Frithiof's bravery and faithfulness and Ingeborg's amiability and constancy, probably we are most interested in the story because of the many adventures that it contains. How many of the bold deeds of Frithiof can you recall without turning to the story? If you can remember all of them you are surely doing well. Can you name these deeds in just ...
— Journeys Through Bookland V3 • Charles H. Sylvester
... are subtle casuists. The duty to the female dog is plain; but where competing duties rise, down they will sit and study them out, like Jesuit confessors. I knew another little Skye, somewhat plain in manner and appearance, but a creature compact of amiability and solid wisdom. His family going abroad for a winter, he was received for that period by an uncle in the same city. The winter over, his own family home again, and his own house (of which he was very proud) reopened, he found himself in a dilemma between two conflicting duties of loyalty and gratitude. ...
— Memories and Portraits • Robert Louis Stevenson
... reputed to be an able and effective speaker. In speaking of the impression he made upon his associates, the Hon. Robert C. Winthrop says: "I recall vividly the impressions I then formed both of his ability and amiability. We were old Whigs together, and agreed entirely upon all questions of public interest. I could not always concur in the policy of the party which made him President, but I never lost my personal regard for him. For shrewdness, sagacity, and keen practical sense, he ...
— The Every-day Life of Abraham Lincoln • Francis Fisher Browne
... character has been subjected to that ordeal, and who can point to any spot upon it? His clear, sound judgment, personal courage, untiring activity, genius for war, and absolute devotion to his State mark him out as a public man, as a patriot to be forever remembered by all Americans. His amiability of disposition, deep sympathy with those in pain or sorrow, his love for children, nice sense of personal honor, and genial courtesy endeared him to all his friends. I shall never forget his sweet, winning smile, nor his clear, honest ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 2 of 8 • Various
... but unfortunately all the major characters had been provided for, and he was able to offer her only the minor one of the Princesse Negroni. The charming deference with which she accepted the offered part attracted Hugo's attention. Such amiability is very rare in actresses who have had engagements at the best theaters. He resolved to see her again; and he did so, time after time, until he was thoroughly ...
— Famous Affinities of History, Vol 1-4, Complete - The Romance of Devotion • Lyndon Orr
... He therefore followed the natural bent of his inclinations, which led him at all times to exhibit a mild, amiable, and gentle aspect—except, of course, when he was roused. As occasion for being roused was not wanting in the South Seas in those days, Jo's amiability was frequently put to the test. He sojourned, while there, in a condition of alternate calm and storm; but riotous joviality ran, like a rich vein, through all his chequered life, and lit up its most sombre phases like gleams of light ...
— Gascoyne, the Sandal-Wood Trader • R.M. Ballantyne
... whom alone he would accept such services, helped him to undress; the effort was a painful one to himself. With his own hand, however, Weber wound up his watch, with his usual punctilious care; then, with all that charm of amiability for which he was conspicuous through life, he murmured his thanks to his friend, and said, 'Now let me sleep.' These were the last words that mortal ear heard the great artist utter. It is clear, however, that Weber must have left his bed later, for, the next morning, the door through which ...
— Among the Great Masters of Music - Scenes in the Lives of Famous Musicians • Walter Rowlands
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