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More "Laconic" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... shortest time, in every place to which he may be successively conducted. This novelty in the work will prove very frequently of great utility, especially to those visitors who have too little time for their trip, and who, for want of such a laconic memento wherever they go, are known in a thousand instances to pass by the most interesting objects unnoticed,—not being aware even of ...
— Brannon's Picture of The Isle of Wight • George Brannon
... Charm's laconic translation of this note, "means that he wishes us to be ready at eleven for the excursion to P——, to spend the day, you may remember, at that old manor. He wants to paint in a background, he said ...
— In and Out of Three Normady Inns • Anna Bowman Dodd
... writers of English, have been many-worded. They have been men who said everything that came into their heads, and trusted to their genius to make their writings readable. The eighteenth century in England, with all its striving after classical precision, has left behind it no great laconic English classic who stands in the first rank. Our own Emerson is concise enough, but he is disconnected and prophetic. Dante is not only concise, but logical, deductive, prone to ratiocination. He set down nothing that he had not thought of a thousand times, and conned over, arranged, ...
— Emerson and Other Essays • John Jay Chapman
... the explanations in which were harder to understand than conundrums. Although greatly averse to following the notary's advice as to seeking Claudet's assistance, he found himself compelled to do so, but was met by such laconic and surly answers that he concluded it would be more dignified on his part to dispense with the services of one who was so badly disposed toward him. He therefore resolved to have recourse to the debtors themselves, whose names he found, ...
— A Woodland Queen, Complete • Andre Theuriet
... laconic all comment! You will no more listen to one of the old circumlocutionary conversers than you would travel by the waggon, or make a voyage ...
— Cornelius O'Dowd Upon Men And Women And Other Things In General - Originally Published In Blackwood's Magazine - 1864 • Charles Lever
... Blucher, "they died of hunger, and, as he says that they were terribly exhausted by a fifty days' march, dropped like flies. Oh, it is true, the Emperor Napoleon is very laconic in his account of that retreat, but he who knows how to penetrate the meaning of his few lines cannot fail to receive a deep impression of the wretchedness that unfortunate army had to undergo. Read ...
— NAPOLEON AND BLUCHER • L. Muhlbach
... his chair, and went forward to the new-comer. 'You are not long behind us, then,' he said, with laconic disquietude. 'I thought you were ...
— A Laodicean • Thomas Hardy
... would willingly wait until the young lady was quite recovered. The mother appeared to assent with willingness to this arrangement, and took the proffered money without comment. An hour or two after I received a laconic epistle stating that the lady had already engaged another teacher, whom she thought preferable—that she had offered me the amount due for half of the term, and I had declined receiving it—therefore she ...
— Friends and Neighbors - or Two Ways of Living in the World • Anonymous
... general, are not treated with great indulgence, nor rewarded by many commendations; for the English are laconic and reserved towards their domestics; but an approving nod and kind word from master or mistress, goes as far here, as an excess of praise or indulgence elsewhere. Neither do servants exhibit any animated marks of affection to their employers; yet, though quiet, they ...
— Bracebridge Hall • Washington Irving
... bondage, what were nations and their ambitions, in comparison with a society where mind and morals had the glorious license of Olympians and could follow the unobstructed paths of inclination in realms controlled only by fancy! Napoleon's greeting was laconic, "Vous etes un homme." This flattered Goethe, who called it the inverse "ecce homo," and felt its allusion to his citizenship, not in Germany, but in the world. The nineteenth-century Caesar then urged the great writer to carry out an already-formed design ...
— The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte - Vol. III. (of IV.) • William Milligan Sloane
... a brakeman—prompt, efficient, laconic. Same head, you see, but different hat. He stands for the hipped roof which has one duty ...
— The House that Jill Built - after Jack's had proved a failure • E. C. Gardner
... his lance through a laced doublet. Sir Piercie Shafton, a man of rank and high birth, by no means encouraged or endured this familiarity, and requited the intruder either with total neglect, or such laconic replies as intimated a sovereign contempt for the rude spearman, who affected to converse with ...
— The Monastery • Sir Walter Scott
... character of the reception given him. Not that his manner betrays anything like swagger—for he is evidently not one of the swaggering sort. Rather is his behaviour characterised by a cool, quiet effrontery—a sort of sarcastic assurance—ten times more irritating. This is displayed in the laconic style of his salutation: "Morning girls! father at home?"— in the fact of his dismounting without waiting to be invited—in sharply scolding the dog out of his way as he leads his horse to the shed; and, finally, in his throwing the saddle-bags over his arm, and stepping inside ...
— The Wild Huntress - Love in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid
... Although my laconic little diary does not show it, I was fiercely resolved upon returning to the Seminary. My father was not very sympathetic. In his eyes I already had a very good equipment for the battle of life, but mother, with a woman's ready understanding, divined ...
— A Son of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland
... of them, offended, no doubt, at the loquacity of his companions, observed a profound silence; when the ambassador, turning to him, asked, "But what have you to say, that I may report it?" He made this laconic, but very pointed reply: "Tell your king, that you have found one among the Greeks who ...
— Essays on Various Subjects - Principally Designed for Young Ladies • Hannah More
... of the year (1861) he was working at the mass of details which are marshalled in order in the early chapter of 'Animals and Plants.' Thus in his Diary occur the laconic entries, "May 16, Finished Fowls (eight weeks); ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume II • Francis Darwin
... The laconic hostess accompanied these words with a gesture, beckoning the young ladies to follow her, and led the way through the second room, to the heavy ...
— A Dream of Empire - Or, The House of Blennerhassett • William Henry Venable
... is no Where more seen than in the dispatches of the one and the bulletins of the other. In his demeanour to his men, the Duke was reserved; in his language, curt and laconic. If his troops felt the moral certainty that he was leading them to victory, and honoured him accordingly, it was not from personal enthusiasm, such as the wild love the emperor inspired in those around him, but from a deep respect for his character and a reliance on his talents. Nor did he ...
— Maxims And Opinions Of Field-Marshal His Grace The Duke Of Wellington, Selected From His Writings And Speeches During A Public Life Of More Than Half A Century • Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington
... regain your health. I saw my young cousin before I set out—she is more charming than ever. I am sure by the time you return she will be the finest woman in England." Lord Nelville said nothing—and Mr Edgermond was also silent. Some other words passed between them, very laconic, though extremely friendly, and Mr Edgermond was going, when suddenly turning back, he said, "Apropos, my lord, you can do me a kindness—they tell me you are acquainted with the celebrated Corinne: I don't much like forming new acquaintances, but I am quite curious to see this lady." ...
— Corinne, Volume 1 (of 2) - Or Italy • Mme de Stael
... Col. I had a friend who lived in Denver, and she was visiting me. I sought her at once, and with fear and trembling asked, 'Have you a bit of land behind your house in Denver where I could put up a small telescope?' 'Six hundred miles,' was the laconic reply! ...
— Maria Mitchell: Life, Letters, and Journals • Maria Mitchell
... occasional bone. When I did not notice him he would plant himself straight before me, and stand wagging that bud of a tail, and looking up, with his head a little to the one side. His master I occasionally saw; he used to call me "Maister John," but was laconic ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 6 • Charles H. Sylvester
... in these books reveal her thoughts in that time, and will touch the uttermost depths of any nature nourished in that beautiful faith which is at once so tender and so austere. The prayer-book with those laconic entries on its fly-leaf, in which she set down the sad and eloquent chronology of her fate, the copy of the "Imitation" which she had read and marked during those weeks in prison—weeks, which, as she so pathetically said, had given her rest and quiet and time to think in a life that had been "so ...
— World's War Events, Vol. I • Various
... in his travelling dress, did the amiable kind man hasten up to me. He now knew me, and he came to me with cordiality. I was just then standing and packing my clothes in a trunk for a journey to the country; I had only a few minutes time: by this means my reception of him was just as laconic as had been ...
— The True Story of My Life • Hans Christian Andersen
... was the laconic reply. I felt somewhat comforted by the decision of the Indian's tone, and a good deal more so by his ordering his warriors to remount before half an hour had passed. He did not however, press on as hard as before, fearing, no doubt that ...
— The Big Otter • R.M. Ballantyne
... going round the press pen portraits of Bulwer, Dickens, and Carlyle. The two first are separated from their wives, and their lives are sunless and their homes are empty. Carlyle, that dry and laconic talker and that fierce hater, is made beautiful when you read that he conducts his company to the pretty sitting-room ...
— The True Woman • Justin D. Fulton
... his literary palate with still finer food. He wrote with temperateness, and in pitying love of human nature, in the instinctive hope of helping it to know and redeem itself. His quality was philosophy, his style forgiveness. And for this temperate and logical and laconic work—giving nothing to the world for its mere enjoyment, but going beyond all that to ennoble each reader by his perfect renunciation of artistic claptrap and artistic license—for this aim he needed a mental method that could ...
— Memories of Hawthorne • Rose Hawthorne Lathrop
... answered, in her literal and simple manner, "It was only half-a-crown." This sum the Prince paid her. He then saluted her, and said: "Notwithstanding all that has happened, I hope, madam, we shall meet in St. James's yet." In this calm, and, apparently laconic manner, he bade Flora adieu. But, though fate did not permit Charles to testify his gratitude at St. James's, he is said never to have mentioned without a deep sense of his obligations the name of his young protectress. In her loyal and simple heart a sense of ...
— Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745 - Volume III. • Mrs. Thomson
... his furs for supplies, and it might be months or even years before he returned to that particular post again. He was ceaselessly wandering. More or less the Royal Northwest Mounted Police kept track of him, and in many reports of faraway patrols filed at Headquarters there are the laconic words, "We saw Bram and his wolves traveling northward" or "Bram and his wolves passed us"—always Bram AND HIS WOLVES. For two years the Police lost track of him. That was when Bram was buried in the heart of the Sulphur Country east of the Great Bear. After that the Police kept an even ...
— The Golden Snare • James Oliver Curwood
... Susan's laconic "The spring's dry," was not necessary. He fell forward on the seat with a moan, his head propped in his hands, his fingers buried in his hair. Courant sent a look of furious contempt over his abject figure, then gave a laugh that fell on the silence bitter ...
— The Emigrant Trail • Geraldine Bonner
... that in spite of its complex inflections, when once a vocabulary is acquired, it is more easy and natural for a modern than his ancestral Latin itself. Latin is the stiffer tongue; it is by nature at once laconic and grandiloquent, and the exceptional condensation and transposition of which it is capable make its effects entirely foreign to a modern, scarcely inflected, tongue. Take, for instance, these ...
— The Sense of Beauty - Being the Outlines of Aesthetic Theory • George Santayana
... in a much more laconic way about the quarrel, than Marie. On the day he left, August thirteenth, he ...
— An Anarchist Woman • Hutchins Hapgood
... Sim Relander feelingly, as if that laconic reply had been the only thing necessary to establish the ...
— Jane Cable • George Barr McCutcheon
... as he was soft to misfortune. Henry once caught a glimpse of this as they spoke of a mutual friend whom he had helped to no purpose. Mr. Fairfax never used many words, on this occasion he was grimly laconic. ...
— Young Lives • Richard Le Gallienne
... to his brother-in-law (whom I will take leave to call the Bishop of Wexcester), and made me its bearer. It is worth quotation. It ran: 'Dear Ted,—Ordain Noy, and oblige yours, Fred.' The answer which I carried back two days later was equally laconic. 'Dear Fred,—Noy ordained. Yours, Ted.' Consequently," wound up Mr. Noy, "I am down here to take over my cure of souls, and had in one of my pockets a sermon composed for my induction by a gifted young scholar of the ...
— Two Sides of the Face - Midwinter Tales • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... of booze going to the knee," was Charlie's laconic rejoinder. "It's generally aimed at ...
— Quill's Window • George Barr McCutcheon
... and reticences, of carnage and destruction, loss and gain, with the miracle of the Marne as the first great sign of the turning of the tide. On September 3 the Paris Government moved to Bordeaux, on the 5th the retreat from Mons ended, on the 13th Joffre, always unboastful and laconic, announced the rolling back of the invaders, on the 15th the battle of the Aisne had begun. What an Iliad of agony, endurance and heroism lies behind these dates—the ordeal and deliverance of Paris, the steadfastness of the ...
— Mr. Punch's History of the Great War • Punch
... produced immense sums of ready money, prevailed. He was received into the camp, and the soldiers instantly swore to obey him as emperor. 21. Upon being conducted to the senate-house, he addressed the few that were present in a laconic speech, "Fathers, you want an emperor, and I am the fittest person you can choose." The choice of the soldiers was confirmed by the senate, and Did'ius was acknowledged emperor, in the fifty-seventh year of his age. 22. It should seem, by this ...
— Pinnock's Improved Edition of Dr. Goldsmith's History of Rome • Oliver Goldsmith
... fallen sick, and died at Ningpo, and another Mongol, named Atahai—written also Antahai—was sent to replace him. Now comes the sudden collapse of the whole expedition, recorded, unfortunately, in most laconic ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume VI. • Various
... "here's somebody who will clear it up." And I pointed to a cottage-door at which I suddenly espied the old woman whose handling of the roller-towel had so impressed me. "Where," I shouted, addressing her, "where is the wounded man?" "Took away," was the laconic reply. "Took away!" I said; "and who has had the impudence ...
— Mad Shepherds - and Other Human Studies • L. P. Jacks
... of Mazarin, when he was no longer capable of transacting any business, the president of the ecclesiastical assembly inquired of the king "to whom he must hereafter address himself on questions of public business." The emphatic and laconic response ...
— Louis XIV., Makers of History Series • John S. C. Abbott
... the laconic reply. But the other pressed him for fuller detail and he proceeded cheerfully. "The Halloway millions didn't come to us on a tray borne by angels. My father made his pile, and much of it he made in coal and iron—here and there in the Appalachians. ...
— A Pagan of the Hills • Charles Neville Buck
... concerning which there are well authenticated utterances of the master. Schindler once asked him for the key to the Sonatas in D minor (Op. 31, No. 2) and F minor ("Appassionata"), and Beethoven replied: "Read Shakespeare's Tempest." The reply was laconic. Beethoven, no doubt, could have furnished further details, but he abstained from so doing, and in this he was perfectly justified. Then Schindler, growing bold, ventured a further question: "What did the master intend to express by the Largo of the ...
— The Pianoforte Sonata - Its Origin and Development • J.S. Shedlock
... followed, the circles deepened beneath his eyes, his high color faded and Mudge's laconic messages "Nothing doing" were not calculated to restore it. As the time shortened toward another payday there were moments when Symes felt that his overtaxed nerves nearly had reached their limit. There was no rest or solace ...
— The Lady Doc • Caroline Lockhart
... would gain him respect in the eyes of a chivalrous foe. "Ali," said he, "has negotiated like a merchant; I will capitulate as a soldier." He sent a herald, therefore, to Ferdinand, offering to yield up his castle, but demanding a separate treaty. (15) The Castilian sovereign made a laconic and stern reply: "He shall receive no terms but such as have been granted ...
— Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada • Washington Irving
... acuteness. There is fancy in them, or at least a phantom of it; for they contain an example of the misapplication of every mental faculty. The authors have found out the secret of being diffuse, even to wearisomeness, and at the same time so epigrammatically laconic, as to be often obscure and unintelligible. Their characters are neither ideal nor real beings, but misshapen gigantic puppets, who are set in motion at one time by the string of an unnatural heroism, and at another by ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art - and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel trans John Black
... MOTHER,—I take the opportunity of Mr Innes's parcel, which leaves this to-morrow afternoon, to give you a more succinct account of my affairs than you could derive from my laconic epistle of last week. I must, however, preface by requesting you to write me as soon as you conveniently can, either by Innes or L. Smith's conveyance, as I am anxious to hear the state of your cold, and how ...
— The Book-Hunter - A New Edition, with a Memoir of the Author • John Hill Burton
... Christmas Day in 1541. The reticence of Michelangelo regarding his own works is one of the most trying things about him. It is true indeed that his correspondence between 1534 and 1541 almost entirely fails; still, had it been abundant, we should probably have possessed but dry and laconic references to matters connected with the business ...
— The Life of Michelangelo Buonarroti • John Addington Symonds
... the fellow sharply as he got into the wagon and noticed nothing in his disfavor. His laconic account of himself was borne ...
— Ranching for Sylvia • Harold Bindloss
... then he and Nutter went out of the church, and took a hasty leave of one another, and away went Nutter on his nag, to the mills. And Dangerfield, just before mounting, popped into Cleary's shop, and in his grim, laconic way, asked the proprietor, among his meal-bags and bacon, about fifty questions in less than five minutes. 'That was one of Lord Castlemallard's houses—eh—with the bad roof, and manure-heap round the corner?'—and, 'Where's the ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... of music to French words and produced a French opera, "Le Devin du Village." Diderot was also a warm partisan of the Italians. Pergolesi's beautiful music having been murdered by the French orchestra players at the Grand Opera-House, Diderot proposed for it the following witty and laconic ...
— Great Italian and French Composers • George T. Ferris
... in the work, but that a gracious public full of nerves would not stand so much cold water poured upon it. The seventh firm to whom he submitted the tale was on the verge of bankruptcy. Kinross was absolutely startled when he received a laconic note accepting his MS., and offering a very fair royalty. He was not to know that these publishers had taken it in the spirit of a man who with six shillings for his only capital puts five of them in a sweep where the odds are a ...
— In the Mist of the Mountains • Ethel Turner
... distinctive. There lives no man who at some period has not been tormented, for example, by an earnest desire to tantalize a listener by circumlocution. The speaker is aware that he displeases; he has every intention to please, he is usually curt, precise, and clear, the most laconic and luminous language is struggling for utterance upon his tongue, it is only with difficulty that he restrains himself from giving it flow; he dreads and deprecates the anger of him whom he addresses; yet, the thought strikes him, that ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 2 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... them to India instead. 'I have;' he recorded the act at the time, 'directed that all vessels arriving here with troops for China, shall proceed direct to Calcutta instead of to Singapore.' They are laconic words, but their place is over the front door of the British Empire. To it they brought a service, not ordinary in its annals, as they marked a man willing to put all to the touch. A nation and a personality are ...
— The Romance of a Pro-Consul - Being The Personal Life And Memoirs Of The Right Hon. Sir - George Grey, K.C.B. • James Milne
... which she folded her work and smoothed the white brocaded surface in her lap. There was decision, too, in the quickness with which he rose and stood looking down at her. For a second she expected him to turn from her, as he had turned once before, and leave her with no explanation beyond a few laconic words. She held her ...
— The Inner Shrine • Basil King
... Shi contains curious confirmation of the facts which led up to Marco Polo's conducting a wife to Arghun of Persia, who lost his spouse in 1286. In the eleventh moon of that year (say January, 1287) the following laconic announcement appears: 'T'a-ch'a-r Hu-nan ordered to go on a mission to A-r-hun.' It is possible that Tachar and Hunan may be two individuals, and, though they probably started overland, it is probable that they were in some way connected ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo, Volume 2 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... entered the observant stage of his development, noted the laconic, quiet answer and stored it away for classification and meditation among the many other details that his new attitude of ...
— The Varmint • Owen Johnson
... of our people, who had remained behind a short time at the wells of Aisou, saw a Tuarick coming up to the place, and, two others slowly following, all three mounted on tall maharees. They spoke to the one who arrived first, and inquired if many were behind. To this they received a laconic answer, "Yes." One of them accordingly, feigning to retire, left his servant hid behind a rock to watch what took place, and ran after us to communicate the unwelcome intelligence, that we might expect an attack. ...
— Narrative of a Mission to Central Africa Performed in the Years 1850-51, Volume 1 • James Richardson
... in such sharp terms to this laconic opinion that the two friends finally parted in a way they had never parted before. Johns was to be no groomsman to Darton after all. He had flatly declined. Darton went off sorry, and even unhappy, particularly as Japheth was about to leave that ...
— Wessex Tales • Thomas Hardy
... I wrote a brief answer, to say that I was astonished at his communication, but that I should attend on the next field-day, for an explanation, and that I should not fail to bring my arms with me. I own that I was at a loss to conjecture the cause of this unceremonious and laconic epistle of his lordship, and I conjured up a hundred imaginary reasons for this abrupt dismissal of me from his Troop of Yeomanry. I had been in it for many months; I had never been once fined, or received the slightest ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 1 • Henry Hunt
... to receive a few who had yet to come up from the interior, he sailed on the 3rd of September for England. On the 8th, when on his way to Gibraltar, he wrote an account of the battle to his brother, to whom he had previously sent a very laconic communication, stating merely ...
— The Life of Admiral Viscount Exmouth • Edward Osler
... uncertain of their whereabouts, though apparently not altogether out of touch with them, for one of their Officers, who was met in hospital later in the day, reported having received from someone in our Battalion the laconic message: "We are at ——. Where is the Australian Corps?" The enemy were still holding in force a position at no great distance from our left flank, and indeed, at one time were reported to be massing for a counter-attack which, however, ...
— The Sherwood Foresters in the Great War 1914 - 1919 - History of the 1/8th Battalion • W.C.C. Weetman
... instincts and point of view being essentially Conservative. After Robert Baldwin's retirement Sandfield Macdonald's natural course would have been an alliance with the progressive Conservatives under John A. Macdonald, but his antipathy to acknowledging any leader kept him aloof. His laconic telegram in reply to John A. Macdonald's offer of cabinet office is ...
— The Fathers of Confederation - A Chronicle of the Birth of the Dominion • A. H. U. Colquhoun
... the conversation, Lady Heloise asked him who he was and what was the matter with the child; also what crime he had committed and where they were taking him with such an escort. Kohlhaas doffed his leather cap to her and, continuing his occupation, made laconic but satisfactory answers to all these questions. The Elector, who was standing behind the hunting-pages, remarked a little leaden locket hanging on a silk string around the horse-dealer's neck, and, since no better topic of conversation offered itself, he asked him what it signified and ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IV • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... ready for the final draft, and we'll all go over the thing to-morrow morning." The Duke was grimly laconic. That resolution whacked ...
— The Ramrodders - A Novel • Holman Day
... matter to him that his landlady should have a word of his writing? Still, it may be as you say. Then, again, why such laconic messages?" ...
— The Adventure of the Red Circle • Arthur Conan Doyle
... the balance of the whole. That is the test of a list. But there is a good balance, a balance of power, and a balance of mere weight or prestige. It is the power we are after here. Regard for a moment the way 'Tom Cringle' balances Dana's laconic record of facts. No power on earth could hold 'Tom Cringle' to facts, with the result that his story is more truly a representation of sea life in the old navy than a ton of statistics. He has the seaman's ...
— Plum Pudding - Of Divers Ingredients, Discreetly Blended & Seasoned • Christopher Morley
... rarely saw Vertessy's officers gathered together there. The officers had to know everything which the General asked them about, and were often obliged to work out for themselves, with the aid of their mother wit, the details of their extremely laconic instructions. Everyone knew, too, that he could not endure the slightest suspicion of cowardice; if an officer were insulted, he was obliged to fight in defence of his honour, or the regiment was made too hot to hold him. If, on the other hand, the townsmen got ...
— The Day of Wrath • Maurus Jokai
... power of expression in a few words, portraying a whole field of action. Tending to go into great detail in public matters, he comes to the heart of an issue with a laconic expression that tells all there is to be told. "I favor going in"—on the League of Nations is one. Assuring his supporters that the proposal for separate peace with Germany was "opening their front lines," he drew a word sketch of a gigantic contest in which he as a general had sensed ...
— The Progressive Democracy of James M. Cox • Charles E. Morris
... great country, which would soon send Young America out on the world to proclaim manifest destiny.' I said amen, and the punch disappeared into his depot, as he concluded. It was clear his inards warmed, he beginning to brighten up soon after. With a laconic air, he touched me on the elbow, and said, 'Somehow, it seems to touch the right place—I declare it does! I am half inclined to the belief that General Pierce sups formidably of this just before he talks about winding things up in a straight sort of way, all of which he ultimately ...
— The Adventures of My Cousin Smooth • Timothy Templeton
... princess that shall intercede to avert from the traitor Nicephorus the doom he has deserved! Did he think that one born in the purple chamber could be divorced—murdered, perhaps—with the petty formula of the Romans, 'Restore the keys—-be no longer my domestic drudge?'[Footnote: The laconic form of the Roman divorce.] Was a daughter of the blood of Comnenus liable to such insults as the meanest of Quirites might bestow on a ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott
... had received from the Emperor of Russia this laconic answer: "No peace, no truce, with that man: any thing ...
— Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. II • Pierre Antoine Edouard Fleury de Chaboulon
... "though Joe told me the story in his own very laconic fashion, I am sure that it was much more interesting than I can make it. I'll do the best ...
— Bob Hunt in Canada • George W. Orton
... they waited at first patiently and then impatiently for it to start. At last, unable to understand the delay, one of them put out his head and asked a passing official when the train was going. "It has gone" was the laconic reply. The coach which they had chosen was not attached to the rest of the train, and they were not so meticulously careful about examining tickets on the Great Western system as they are to-day. When the belated passengers did eventually ...
— The Story of the Cambrian - A Biography of a Railway • C. P. Gasquoine
... art close, the doctor's dose Is quite a decent tonic. Thy presence, too, makes all things new, And five-act plays laconic. And, with thee by, the earth's the sky, And your "day out" is my day, While tailors' bills are daffodils, And Saturday is Friday! When thou art here, love, Just where you are, Far things are near, love, Near things are far. Beef-tea is wine, love, Champagne is beer, Wet days are ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 99, July 19, 1890 • Various
... by J. W. H., "the connexion of the Welsh dwr with the Greek [Greek: hudor] is remarkable," he appears not to have known that Vezron found so many resemblances in the Doric or Laconic dialect, and the Celtic, that he thereupon raised the theory that the Lacedaemonians and the Celts were of ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 69, February 22, 1851 • Various
... in the sanction of the treaties being signified October 23, 1865, by the following laconic decree(308) addressed to the shogun: "The imperial consent is given to the treaties, and you will therefore undertake the ...
— Japan • David Murray
... one they shot," was Washburn's laconic observation. He looked the animal over admiringly and slapped him so vigorously under the belly that the horse grunted and humped ...
— Westerfelt • Will N. Harben
... yet he has scarcely any admirers; which some ages ago was the case of Philistus the Syracusan, and even of Thucydides himself. For as the lofty and elevated style of Theopompus soon diminished the reputation of their pithy and laconic harangues, which were sometimes scarcely intelligible through their excessive brevity and quaintness; and as Demosthenes eclipsed the glory of Lysias, so the pompous and stately elocution of the moderns has obscured ...
— Cicero's Brutus or History of Famous Orators; also His Orator, or Accomplished Speaker. • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... in question was likewise approached for a political contribution, whereupon he handed out $100 for himself and the same amount for Vanderbilt. On being told of his debt, Vanderbilt declined to pay it, closing the matter abruptly with this laconic pronunciamento, "When I give anything, I give it myself." At another time Vanderbilt assured a friend that he would "carry" one thousand shares of New York Central stock for him. The market price rose to $115 a share and then dropped to $90. A little later, before setting out to ...
— Great Fortunes from Railroads • Gustavus Myers
... fait pas de mal' (It does no harm), was his laconic reply; but one could see from his look of satisfaction that he highly appreciated the pacific invasion. The plain truth of the matter is, that the Canon du Tarn is proving a mine of wealth ...
— The Roof of France • Matilda Betham-Edwards
... from the doctor, they waited in confidence. They had no wish, they told each other, that he should act hastily: it was merely a question of time; they could afford to be patient. And at last the doctor sent them a laconic note,—"Come ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, Old Series, Vol. 36—New Series, Vol. 10, July 1885 • Various
... from Steele Weir's laconic statement of what had actually occurred, the girl divined that his words concealed vastly more than their surface purport. With the general hostility against the engineer that had existed, for him to swing the community to his side meant ...
— In the Shadow of the Hills • George C. Shedd
... speaking, the Alcalde, sitting smoking his cigar. He had just breakfasted, and the plates and dishes were still upon the table. He did not appear to be much given to compliments or ceremony, or to partake at all of the Yankee failing of curiosity, for he answered our salutation with a laconic "good-morning," and scarcely even looked at us. At the very first glance, it was easy to see that he came from Tennessee or Virginia, the only provinces in which one finds men of his gigantic mould. Even sitting, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 54, No. 338, December 1843 • Various
... outbreak were put on their trial, found guilty, and sentenced to death by strangulation, as hanging really was in those days. Word was sent to headquarters in Sydney, and instructions were asked for to carry the sentence into effect. The laconic order was sent back from Sydney to "hang half of them." The Captain acknowledged the humour of the despatch, though it placed him in a difficulty. Which half should he hang, when all were equally guilty? In his pleasant way the Captain ...
— An Australian in China - Being the Narrative of a Quiet Journey Across China to Burma • George Ernest Morrison
... and not less revolting, cannot be doubted. How these shocking and pernicious usages were abolished at one swoop is shown by the brief passage in the Book of Rites now under discussion. The injunctions are laconic, but full of meaning. When a death occurs, the people are told, "this shall be done." A delegation of persons, officially appointed for the purpose, shall repair to the dwelling of the deceased, bearing in a pouch some strands of mourning wampum. ...
— The Iroquois Book of Rites • Horatio Hale
... at the gate. He stopped, startled at the sight of Hazel dancing in the shadowy garden with her hair loose and her abandon tempered by weariness. He stood behind the hedge until Abel brought the tune to an early end with the laconic remark, 'Supper,' and went indoors with ...
— Gone to Earth • Mary Webb
... a Kai man will often say, "A ghost has just leaped from the tree into the cave; that is why the earth is shaking." Down below the ghosts are received by Tulmeng, lord of the nether world. Often he appears in a canoe to ferry them over to the further shore. "Blood or wax?" is the laconic question which he puts to the ghost on the bank. He means to say, "Were you killed or were you done to death by magic?" For it is with wax that the sorcerer stops up the fatal little tubes in which he encloses ...
— The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead, Volume I (of 3) • Sir James George Frazer
... these proceedings, was conducting the defense of Belgrade with great vigor and with great success, when he was astounded by the arrival of a courier in his camp, presenting to him the following laconic ...
— The Empire of Austria; Its Rise and Present Power • John S. C. Abbott
... hundred points of novelty for us, from the whiteness of its buildings, the beauty of its domestic architecture, the up-to-date advertising of its churches, to its policemen on traffic duty who, on a rostrum and under an umbrella, commanded the traffic with a sign-board on which was written the laconic commands, "Go" ...
— Westward with the Prince of Wales • W. Douglas Newton
... shave—not too close, and a bath afterward," was his laconic order; and a modest tip facilitated things and provided ...
— The Price • Francis Lynde
... seeing Snowball spring out from the Catamaran, and swim towards him, that the sailor suspected the proximity of a shark. At the same instant, also, he remembered the interrogatory that had been addressed to him by little William, and his own laconic reply designating the individual as a hammer-head. From these various circumstances he could tell that there was a shark bearing down upon him; but in what direction he could not conjecture, until the hurried words of Snowball ...
— The Ocean Waifs - A Story of Adventure on Land and Sea • Mayne Reid
... gentle and modest creature,[16] concerning whom the biographers have been only too laconic, saw all this, and mourned over it in silence, but though weak as mothers are, she would not despair of her son, and when the neighbors told her of Francis's escapades, she would calmly reply, "What are you thinking about? I am very sure ...
— Life of St. Francis of Assisi • Paul Sabatier
... these names brought back to him! Yes, that was a fine time, that of work, of struggle,—the best part of the engineer's life. Starr re-read his letter. He pondered over it in all its bearings. He much regretted that just a line more had not been added by Ford. He wished he had not been quite so laconic. ...
— The Underground City • Jules Verne
... Harry Higginson had attended to Alfred, Mr Clare and Walter took care of Drake. He was very laconic in his replies to their questions, and made light of the injury; but he was faint from the wound in the head, and his sleeveless arm was so stiff as to be useless to ...
— Captain Mugford - Our Salt and Fresh Water Tutors • W.H.G. Kingston
... for yourself presently, Professor," was the laconic reply, nor could we get anything more ...
— Queen Sheba's Ring • H. Rider Haggard
... called to each other. There were cries of joy, whispers, exclamations of astonishment or vexation, then long silences, which left the prisoner perplexed. The next day when Licquet came to visit her she noticed that his face wore a troubled expression. He was very laconic, mentioned grave events which were preparing, and disappeared like a busy man. To prisoners everything is a reason for hope, and that night Mme. de Combray gave free course to her illusions. The following day she received through ...
— The House of the Combrays • G. le Notre
... million men were butchered in order to crush the spirit understood by a few hundreds at most; one stake was kindled by the other; in the memory of man no greater sacrifice to tradition and dogma had ever been made. Simon de Montfort, the head of the expedition, sent the following laconic report to the pope: "We spared neither sex nor age nor name, but slew all with the ...
— The Evolution of Love • Emil Lucka
... He signed this laconic order, which I instantly despatched to General Ferino. I acquainted my cousin with what had passed, and remained at ease as to the result ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... Thomas Davenport, a great Nisi Prius leader, had long flattered himself with the hope of succeeding to some valuable appointment in the law; but several good things passing by, he lost his patience and temper along with them. At last he addressed this laconic application to his patron: "The Chief Justiceship of Chester is vacant; am I to have it?" and received the following laconic answer: "No! by G—d! Kenyon shall ...
— Law and Laughter • George Alexander Morton
... resolution declaring that "the efforts of Abolitionists in this community are neither necessary nor useful." When the riot occurred in Alton, the Springfield papers uttered no word of condemnation, giving the affair only a laconic mention. ...
— McClure's Magazine, March, 1896, Vol. VI., No. 4. • Various
... under glass and heated, where the gaffers of Chicago are collected together to discuss interminably the exciting politics of a city anxious about its soul. And while listening to them with one ear, with the other you may catch the laconic tale of a park official's perilous and successful vendetta ...
— Your United States - Impressions of a first visit • Arnold Bennett
... the table. His speech was nothing curt or "Laconic"; it was even drawling. "On the contrary, dear Democrates, I was only commending your excellent foresight, something that I see characterizes all you do. You are the friend of Glaucon. Since Aristeides has been banished, only Themistocles exceeds you ...
— A Victor of Salamis • William Stearns Davis
... Wilkes, who was then sheriff of London and Middlesex, received the following laconic reply: "Sir, I do not think it my business to cut the throat of every desperado that may be tired of his life; but as I am at present High Sheriff of the City of London, it may shortly happen that I ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... the Roman theory of its cause, for the exposure of it was perpetual.] bareheaded, and never assumed a hat or a cap, a petasus or a galerus, a Macedonian causia, or a pileus, whether Thessalian, Arcadian, or Laconic, unless when they entered upon a journey. Nay, some there were, as Masinissa and Julius Csar, who declined even on such an occasion to cover their heads. Perhaps in imitation of these celebrated leaders, Hadrian adopted the same ...
— The Caesars • Thomas de Quincey
... him, that my chances were but indifferent. I found him as "close as a clam." Our conversation was very brief; his answers laconic. ...
— The Quadroon - Adventures in the Far West • Mayne Reid
... conceptions, and the magnanimity of their conduct, attain a degree of glory which can never be reached by the keenest followers of Fame—They seek not panegyricks; and panegyricks can add nothing to their honour. The Eulogies have perished which were devoted by the luxuriant genius of Tully, and by the laconic spirit of Brutus, to the public virtue of Cato; yet the name of that illustrious Roman is still powerful in the world, and excites in every cultivated mind, an animating idea of independent integrity. The name of Howard has superior force, and a happier ...
— The Eulogies of Howard • William Hayley
... Europe, knowing that Europe is not curious in the matter, and will be easily satisfied. A few copies of the annual Budget are published; they are certainly not in everybody's reach. The statement of receipts and expenditure is prodigiously laconic. I have now before me the estimates prepared for 1858, in four pages, the least blank of which contains just fourteen lines. The Finance Minister sums up the receipts and the outgoings, both ordinary and extraordinary. Under the head of Receipts, he lumps the whole of "the ...
— The Roman Question • Edmond About
... August. But the people's eyes were mostly fixed upon the land. So a much greater effect was produced by Sherman's laconic dispatch of the second of September announcing the fall of Atlanta. The Confederates, despairing of holding it to any good purpose, had blown up everything they could not move and then retreated. This thrilling news heartened ...
— Captains of the Civil War - A Chronicle of the Blue and the Gray, Volume 31, The - Chronicles Of America Series • William Wood
... the town when he crossed the plaza to his quarters. Matak, silent as ever but of more cheerful countenance, set the table. At his second laconic announcement Terry rose and crossed to the dinner table, and as he seated himself a white missile was tossed through the open window by an unseen hand and landed with a thud on the bare floor. Matak brought it to him, and unwrapping the paper from about the pebble Terry read the note. It was from ...
— Terry - A Tale of the Hill People • Charles Goff Thomson
... where—Hampstead, Greenwich, Windsor? WHERE?????? while the day is bright, not when it has dwindled away to nothing! For who can be of any use whatsomdever such a day as this, excepting out of doors?" Or it might be interrogatory summons to "A hard trot of three hours?" or intimation as laconic "To be heard of at Eel-pie House, Twickenham!" When first I knew him, I may add, his carriage for his wife's use was a small chaise with a smaller pair of ponies, which, having a habit of making sudden rushes up by-streets in the day and peremptory standstills ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... have nothing to do when they go home." No man cared less for the profits of the profession, or more for the honour of it. He cared not for money himself, and wished the Doctor [his brother William] to estimate it by the same scale, when he sent a poor man with this laconic note:— ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 10, No. 274, Saturday, September 22, 1827 • Various
... congregate like lost souls in Hades and wait and suffer. They say those suffer most who continue to have hope in that region. The hopeful clamour and push and mortify themselves, whilst highly indifferent and laconic Magyars chuckle among themselves and throw ink across an inky table asking foreigners in Hungarian their mother's maiden name and their natal town. The officials have adopted the principle of the division of ...
— Europe—Whither Bound? - Being Letters of Travel from the Capitals of Europe in the Year 1921 • Stephen Graham
... ancestors got on without sugar when it was a high-priced luxury brought painfully in small quantities from the Orient, and assured one another that it was not a necessary article of diet. At last we all agreed to Karstens's laconic advice, "Forget it!" and we spoke of sugar no more. When we got on the ridge the chocolate satisfied to some extent the craving for sweetness, but we all missed the sugar sorely and continued to miss it to the end, Karstens as much as ...
— The Ascent of Denali (Mount McKinley) - A Narrative of the First Complete Ascent of the Highest - Peak in North America • Hudson Stuck
... officers, who came on board his ship for instructions previous to the engagement with Admiral de Winter, was both laconic and humorous, "Gentlemen, you see a severe winter approaching; I have only to advise you to keep up a ...
— The Book of Anecdotes and Budget of Fun; • Various
... Grammarian gave a consequence to the books in the eyes of Amru, and made him scrupulous of giving them away without permission of the Caliph. He forthwith wrote to Omar, stating the merits of John, and requesting to know whether the books might be given to him. The reply of Omar was laconic, but fatal. "The contents of those books," said he, "are in conformity with the Koran, or they are not. If they are, the Koran is sufficient without them; if they are not, they are pernicious. Let them, ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 4 • Various
... whom we have applied Our shopman's test of age and worth, Was elemental when he died, As he was ancient at his birth: The saddest among kings of earth, Bowed with a galling crown, this man Met rancor with a cryptic mirth, Laconic — ...
— The Little Book of Modern Verse • Jessie B. Rittenhouse
... footman closed the door, and the carriage turned into Piccadilly Circus. The woman did not pay very much attention to him. She made a laconic explanation, the sort of explanation one would make ...
— The Sleuth of St. James's Square • Melville Davisson Post
... began to tremble. He stood unknowingly under the jurisdiction of the power called social morality, and his highflown democratic notions were already so strongly modified, that he came near confessing his guilt to Hoeflinger. Yet the impulse only intensified his hatred of the man who by his laconic and deeply ordered life deprived him of one freedom after another, until it became an unendurable torture. He had lost his heart to Spiele's charm over which the enemy had unlimited mastery. Now his self-will, too, was being shattered and pushed under ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various
... that there was not the slightest fear of the dogs straying away from the horse, he kept his eyes fixed upon the notch in the mountains right ahead, and rode steadily on, keeping his horse to a steady canter; and bearing Leather's laconic warning in mind, he left the track to one side or the other wherever growth seemed to be abundant, his father's order about going as the crow flies being ...
— First in the Field - A Story of New South Wales • George Manville Fenn
... Secondly, in this place it is out of accord with wrought, which is correctly spelled. If Messrs. Plummer and Mosely would be logical, let them write wrought as wrot—or perhaps plain rot would be still more correct and phonetic, besides furnishing a laconic punning commentary on simple spelling in general. The Phoenician's editorial column is conducted with laudable seriousness, the item of "The Power of Books" being well worthy of perusal. What could best be spared from the magazine are the vague ...
— Writings in the United Amateur, 1915-1922 • Howard Phillips Lovecraft
... pleased at the turn of affairs, became very affable, but confined his remarks chiefly to the weather, while Holcroft, who had an uneasy sense of being overreached in some undetected way, was abstracted and laconic. He was soon on the road home, however, with Mrs. Mumpson and Jane. Cousin Lemuel's last whispered charge was, "Now, for mercy's sake, do keep your tongue ...
— He Fell in Love with His Wife • Edward P. Roe
... an important position held by a large number of his troops under one of his most trusted generals. "What have you been doing?" asked Grant. "Fighting," answered the commander in charge of that position, equally laconic. For a while Grant surveyed the field, and, turning, was about to ride away. "But what shall I do now, General?" asked his subordinate. "Keep on ...
— The Young Man and the World • Albert J. Beveridge
... "Perhaps," was Donald's laconic reply, "but those women and children will be safe in Vera Cruz under the guns of Admiral Fletcher's fleet by daylight, or ...
— The Broncho Rider Boys with Funston at Vera Cruz - Or, Upholding the Honor of the Stars and Stripes • Frank Fowler
... "don't say that you'll take me to Sweden. I wouldn't go to the hateful country. It's a hideous language, anyway, isn't it, Archie? It is a nasty, laconic, ugly tongue. You heard me say Tig to her just now. Tig means 'be silent.' Could anything sound more repulsive? Tig! ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume I. (of X.) • Various
... present, are the only prophecies known to us that deserve any particular attention. The prediction in both is timid and laconic; but, in those regions where the least gleam of light assumes extraordinary importance, it is not to be neglected. I admit, for the rest, that there has so far been no time to carry out a serious enquiry on this point, but I should be greatly surprised if any such enquiry ...
— The Wrack of the Storm • Maurice Maeterlinck
... writer, speaking of Kalidasa and another poet, is more laconic in this alliterative line: Bhaso hasah, Kalidaso vilasah—Bhasa is mirth, ...
— Translations of Shakuntala and Other Works • Kaalidaasa
... inner room of the office, William laid down the money he had collected with the laconic statement, "It's kinder slow work," ...
— William Adolphus Turnpike • William Banks
... made their way to the side of General French and joined the members of his staff. The gallant British commander was sitting his horse quietly, his staff grouped about him. Occasionally one went dashing away with some order, as the general gave a laconic command. ...
— The Boy Allies On the Firing Line - Or, Twelve Days Battle Along the Marne • Clair W. Hayes
... not over, the majority of the audience had begun to stream out. Two men who loitered in the gangway in front of Stonehouse exchanged laconic comments. ...
— The Dark House • I. A. R. Wylie
... the conversation fell upon his shoulders. Fitz, no great talker at any time, was markedly quiet. He had nothing to offer for the general delectation. His remarks upon all subjects mooted were laconic and valueless. The duties as temporary host occupied him for the moment, and his thoughts were obviously elsewhere. His attitude towards Eve had been friendly, but rather reserved. There was no suggestion ...
— The Grey Lady • Henry Seton Merriman
... for some moments, chewing energetically the while, then, having delivered himself with the same delicacy and skill as before of his surplus tobacco juice, made laconic reply: ...
— Corporal Cameron • Ralph Connor
... empress, accustomed for thirty years to see him enter daily her apartments, has become used to his homeliness, and often in the kindness of her heart enters into conversation with him. His answers are always laconic, in a tone of perfect indifference—at times brusque, even harsh—but they have a sensible and often a deep meaning. When the empress speaks with him, he does not cease his work for a moment, and when he has finished he does not remain a minute longer, but goes without asking if she ...
— Frederick The Great and His Family • L. Muhlbach
... immediate battle. Their blind rancour found expression in the curt and pithy harangue of Sthenelaidas, one of the five Ephors, a college of magistrates which in recent years had greatly encroached on the authority of the kings. Sthenelaidas spoke with true laconic brevity. "I don't understand," he said, "all the fine talk of these Athenians. They have told us a great deal about their own merits, but have not said a word in answer to the charges brought against them. Even if we accept their own account of themselves, their ...
— Stories From Thucydides • H. L. Havell
... into the inner apartments. Wieck had scarcely left the room when Mendelssohn and Chopin entered. The former, who had some engagement, said, "Here is Chopin!" and then left, rightly thinking this laconic introduction sufficient. Thus the three most distinguished composers of their time were at least for a moment brought together in the narrow space of a room. [Footnote: This dictum, like all superlatives and sweeping assertions, will no doubt raise objectors; but, I think, it may be maintained, ...
— Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician - Volume 1-2, Complete • Frederick Niecks
... new way north," was the muffled and laconic reply. "Yaas," he continued presently, after regarding his reflection in the bottom of a tin cup that had been full of coffee the moment before, "an' it's over on ...
— The Free Range • Francis William Sullivan
... appeared in London. The object of the author was to answer all Anderson's charges and imputations. This Horrebow did categorically, and hence come these Chapters, though it must be added that they owe their laconic celebrity to the English translator, the author being rather profuse than otherwise in giving his predecessor ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 3 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... I count Martell among my friends and am at this moment, as I said before, smoking one of his cigars. It came in a box of a hundred, with the laconic ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, April 15, 1914 • Various
... p. 211 This laconic epistle is truly the work of a soldier; it abounds with military phrases and words, some of which cannot be understood without difficulty. Ferramenta samiata is well explained by Salmasius. The former of the words means all weapons of offence, ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 1 • Edward Gibbon
... after) "that the sum intended for the Wesleyan Methodist Church in Canada, should be given to the Wesleyan Methodists, who are now, and who may be hereafter, connected with the British Wesleyan Conference." I believe Lord Sydenham's laconic reply was, that he had to do with religious bodies in Canada, ...
— The Story of My Life - Being Reminiscences of Sixty Years' Public Service in Canada • Egerton Ryerson
... I think it very easy, and consequently pretty; but, from the ease, should never have guessed it Glover's. I delight in your, "the patriots cry it up, and the courtiers cry it down, and the hawkers cry it up and down," and your laconic history of the King and Sir Robert, on going to Hanover, and turning out the Duke of Argyle. The epigram, too, you sent me on the ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole
... baldness, connected with the Roman theory of its cause, for the exposure of it was perpetual.] bareheaded, and never assumed a hat or a cap, a petasus or a galerus, a Macedonian causia, or a pileus, whether Thessalian, Arcadian, or Laconic, unless when they entered upon a journey. Nay, some there were, as Masinissa and Julius Caesar, who declined even on such an occasion to cover their heads. Perhaps in imitation of these celebrated leaders, Hadrian adopted the same practice, but not ...
— The Caesars • Thomas de Quincey
... of a nargileh, forgot himself, however, and suddenly felt himself recalled to the urgent reality when his colleague, the Minister of War, a spare man with a grizzled moustache, dropped an infrequent remark in which, in the laconic speech of a soldier, could be comprehended some cause of anxiety or of hope. Sulpice listened then, more moved than he was willing to have it appear, trying, in his turn, to hide all his artistic and patriotic anxieties under that firm exterior ...
— His Excellency the Minister • Jules Claretie
... the observant stage of his development, noted the laconic, quiet answer and stored it away for classification and meditation among the many other details that his new attitude of watchful analysis ...
— The Varmint • Owen Johnson
... difference between the classical apologue and the fable in The Nights is that while AEsop and Gabrias write laconic tales with a single event and a simple moral, the Arabian fables are often "long-continued novelle involving a variety of events, each characterised by some social or political aspect, forming a narrative highly interesting in itself, often exhibiting the most ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 10 • Richard F. Burton
... loyally sent on to Ferris the first news of the millionaire's demise in laconic words, "Died at ten o'clock, fully conscious. Daughter with him since four A.M. Full Associated Press ...
— The Midnight Passenger • Richard Henry Savage
... himself, hunt him down like a wolf, and shoot him with as little ceremony, or stab him in his bed, or waylay him in his walks of recreation. He even wrote the hero of San Jacinto to that effect. The latter replied in a note of laconic brevity: ...
— Thrilling Adventures by Land and Sea • James O. Brayman
... written to Wilfrid a full account of her interview with her father. Wilfrid's reply was laconic. "If you cannot stand a week of the brogue, give up Besworth, by all means." He made no further allusion to the place. They engaged an opera-box, for the purpose of holding a consultation with him in town. ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... liberation of Trento by more than half a century, and greatly modified the problems of Italian policy in recent years. The story is well known of the recall of Garibaldi, which reached him at the moment of victory at Bezzecca, and of his famous reply, a model of laconic self-discipline, in the one word "Ubbidisco"—"I obey." The little town of Bezzecca lay this July behind the Italian lines, but in full view and easy range of the Austrians. A company of Arditi was billeted here, with whom I lunched one day, returning from a front line reconnaissance. ...
— With British Guns in Italy - A Tribute to Italian Achievement • Hugh Dalton
... enjoyed the reputation of being the greatest of scientific politicians. The Abbe, however, had soon perceived that Napoleon was to be the real creator of whatever should be adopted; and, in the progress of the ensuing consultations, submitted, step by step, to the laconic Dictator, who accepted or discarded propositions, exactly as they happened to coincide, or be at variance with, his own notions of his own personal interest. He cared little in what manner the structure of the future representative ...
— The History of Napoleon Buonaparte • John Gibson Lockhart
... petrified, and this outburst of the grief of the usually haughty and laconic young man filled him with the utmost surprise ...
— Andreas Hofer • Lousia Muhlbach
... chiefly pleased with that close mode of oratory, which in a laconic manner states the facts, and forms an immediate conclusion: in that case, it is obvious how necessary it is to be a complete master of the rules of logic. Others delight in a more open, free, and copious style, where the arguments are drawn from topics ...
— A Dialogue Concerning Oratory, Or The Causes Of Corrupt Eloquence • Cornelius Tacitus
... full in view of her terrible pursuer, leaning upon his rifle, and surveying her with the most eager admiration. "Rebecca, this is young Boone, son of our neighbor," was their laconic introduction. Both were young, beautiful, and at the period when the affections exercise their most energetic influence. The circumstances of the introduction were favorable to the result, and the young hunter felt that the eyes of the deer had shined his ...
— The First White Man of the West • Timothy Flint
... of its brown coat I remembered. Its extreme thinness was the only circumstance in which the picture was unlike my Caesar. I inquired from the scolding woman of the shop how she came by this picture—'Honestly,' was her laconic answer; but when I asked whether it were to be sold, and when I paid its price, the lady changed her tone; no longer considering me as the partisan of the little boy, against whom she was enraged, but rather looking upon me as a customer, who had paid too much for her goods, ...
— Tales And Novels, Volume 1 • Maria Edgeworth
... Revolution," writing urbanely to a young and unknown admirer; "I do not blame your enthusiasm." But when a less happily-minded youth sent him some suggestions for the reformation of society, Carlyle, who could do all his own grumbling, returned his disciple's complaints with this laconic denial: "A pack of damned nonsense, you unfortunate fool." It sounds unkind; but we must remember that there were six posts a day in London, that "each post brought its batch of letters," and that nine tenths of these letters—so Carlyle says—were from ...
— Americans and Others • Agnes Repplier
... everybody would not be just as delighted to read it. The first time my book weighed on me was one morning when a thin, meagre little letter came to me, which turned out to be only a card bearing the laconic inscription,— ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 75, January, 1864 • Various
... their sister nations, and not less revolting, cannot be doubted. How these shocking and pernicious usages were abolished at one swoop is shown by the brief passage in the Book of Rites now under discussion. The injunctions are laconic, but full of meaning. When a death occurs, the people are told, "this shall be done." A delegation of persons, officially appointed for the purpose, shall repair to the dwelling of the deceased, bearing ...
— The Iroquois Book of Rites • Horatio Hale
... But the people's eyes were mostly fixed upon the land. So a much greater effect was produced by Sherman's laconic dispatch of the second of September announcing the fall of Atlanta. The Confederates, despairing of holding it to any good purpose, had blown up everything they could not move and then retreated. This thrilling news heartened the whole loyal North, and, as Lincoln at once ...
— Captains of the Civil War - A Chronicle of the Blue and the Gray, Volume 31, The - Chronicles Of America Series • William Wood
... the challenge, on the 19th of May he received a sealed packet containing the following superbly laconic reply: "BALTIMORE, October ...
— Jules Verne's Classic Books • Jules Verne
... political contribution, whereupon he handed out $100 for himself and the same amount for Vanderbilt. On being told of his debt, Vanderbilt declined to pay it, closing the matter abruptly with this laconic pronunciamento, "When I give anything, I give it myself." At another time Vanderbilt assured a friend that he would "carry" one thousand shares of New York Central stock for him. The market price rose to $115 a share and then dropped ...
— Great Fortunes from Railroads • Gustavus Myers
... considerable critical powers in art, literature, and science. He penetrated through all shams and impostures. He was rarely deceived as to men or women. He could be eloquent and interesting in conversation. Some of his expressions pierced like lightning, and were exceedingly effective. His despatches were laconic and clear. He knew something about everybody of note, and if he had always been in a private station his intellectual force would have attracted attention in almost any vocation he might have selected. His natural ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume IX • John Lord
... of the famous "Temporary Rules" which were sanctioned by the Tzar on May 3, 1882. Shorn of all bureaucratic rhetoric, the new laws may be reduced to the following laconic provisions: ...
— History of the Jews in Russia and Poland. Volume II • S.M. Dubnow
... on before you, sir, that you may not mistake your way;" and without waiting for an answer the laconic messenger turned his steed's head and ...
— Vivian Grey • The Earl of Beaconsfield
... my residence at Sydney I find as the result of one day's experience, the following laconic and somewhat enigmatical memorandum: "Is this grass?" The question implies a doubt, which it would not be easy for any person unacquainted with the circumstances of time and place, to solve: but the reader, ...
— Discoveries in Australia, Volume 1. • J Lort Stokes
... in general, are not treated with great indulgence, nor rewarded by many commendations; for the English are laconic and reserved towards their domestics; but an approving nod and kind word from master or mistress, goes as far here, as an excess of praise or indulgence elsewhere. Neither do servants exhibit any ...
— Bracebridge Hall • Washington Irving
... predecessor, he shook his head, and retiring said, "No man in England can compete with James Seymour." The Duke now condescended to recall his discarded cousin. "My Lord," was the answer of Seymour, "I will now prove to the world that I am of your blood—I won't come." Upon receiving this laconic reply, the Duke sent his steward to demand a former loan of L100. Seymour briefly replied that "he would write to his Grace." He did so, but directed his letter, "Northumberland House, opposite the Trunkmaker's, Charing Cross." Enraged at ...
— Anecdotes of Painters, Engravers, Sculptors and Architects, and Curiosities of Art, (Vol. 2 of 3) • Shearjashub Spooner
... understood by a few hundreds at most; one stake was kindled by the other; in the memory of man no greater sacrifice to tradition and dogma had ever been made. Simon de Montfort, the head of the expedition, sent the following laconic report to the pope: "We spared neither sex nor age nor name, but slew all with ...
— The Evolution of Love • Emil Lucka
... very busy at the time, and said, "I guess so," and let the matter go at that. Parks passed that laconic permission on to the sergeant-major, and the two boys reported to ...
— The Brighton Boys with the Flying Corps • James R. Driscoll
... of the Scotch rustic who was quizzed by an English tourist, who surprised him at his mid-day meal of brose. The tourist asked him what he had for breakfast and supper respectively, and on getting each time the laconic answer "brose," he burst out in amaze: "And do you never tire of brose!" Whereupon the still more astonished rustic rejoined "Wha wad tire o' their meat!" "Meat" to this happy youth was summed up in brose, and to go ...
— Reform Cookery Book (4th edition) - Up-To-Date Health Cookery for the Twentieth Century. • Mrs. Mill
... welcomed home very cordially by their mother. Mrs. Bennet wondered at their coming, and thought them very wrong to give so much trouble, and was sure Jane would have caught cold again. But their father, though very laconic in his expressions of pleasure, was really glad to see them; he had felt their importance in the family circle. The evening conversation, when they were all assembled, had lost much of its animation, and almost all its sense by the absence of ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... "Police Department," said a laconic voice from the speaker. At the same time, the blue-clad image of a police officer appeared on the screen. He looked polite, but he also looked as though he expected nothing ...
— Damned If You Don't • Gordon Randall Garrett
... Johnson, Esq., by favour of Augustus Folair, Esq.; and the astonishment of Nicholas was in no degree lessened, when he found it to be couched in the following laconic terms:— ...
— The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby • Charles Dickens
... Tomo Chichi, on presenting the feather of an Eagle to Oglethorpe, is very expressive in his own laconic explication. By a little paraphrase it may be understood to import: "The Eagle has a sharp beak for his enemies, but down on his breast for his friend. He has strong wings, for he is aspiring; but they give shelter to feeble ones, for he is ...
— Biographical Memorials of James Oglethorpe • Thaddeus Mason Harris
... the Five Towns we are apt to end our marriages in that laconic manner. Toby did not complain too much; he simply and unaffectedly went. It might be imagined that the situation was a trying one for Priscilla. Not so! Priscilla had experienced marriage with Toby and had found it wanting. She was content ...
— The Grim Smile of the Five Towns • Arnold Bennett
... generally useful. Wrote letters and carried messages and went to the city," is the laconic reply. ...
— Floyd Grandon's Honor • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... making a stay. I wrote him a letter which was to await him at Aden—I besought him to relieve my suspense. That he found my letter was indicated by a telegram which, reaching me after weary days and without my having received an answer to my laconic dispatch at Bombay, was evidently intended as a reply to both communications. Those few words were in familiar French, the French of the day, which Corvick often made use of to show he wasn't a prig. It had for some persons the opposite effect, but his message may fairly ...
— Embarrassments • Henry James
... echoed Maria, falling behind after a futile effort to keep up, Paolo slackened his pace with a laconic "Wait and see," that ...
— Chico: the Story of a Homing Pigeon • Lucy M. Blanchard
... Way of Thinking and the Style must be Laconic: Much must be contained in a little Compass. Brevity of Diction adds new Life to a good Thought: And since every perfect Stroke ought to be a distinct Representation of a particular Feature, Matters shou'd be so ...
— A Critical Essay on Characteristic-Writings - From his translation of The Moral Characters of Theophrastus (1725) • Henry Gally
... That is the test of a list. But there is a good balance, a balance of power, and a balance of mere weight or prestige. It is the power we are after here. Regard for a moment the way 'Tom Cringle' balances Dana's laconic record of facts. No power on earth could hold 'Tom Cringle' to facts, with the result that his story is more truly a representation of sea life in the old navy than a ton of statistics. He has the seaman's mind, ...
— Plum Pudding - Of Divers Ingredients, Discreetly Blended & Seasoned • Christopher Morley
... from the Emperor of Russia this laconic answer: "No peace, no truce, with that man: ...
— Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. II • Pierre Antoine Edouard Fleury de Chaboulon
... of their whereabouts, though apparently not altogether out of touch with them, for one of their Officers, who was met in hospital later in the day, reported having received from someone in our Battalion the laconic message: "We are at ——. Where is the Australian Corps?" The enemy were still holding in force a position at no great distance from our left flank, and indeed, at one time were reported to be massing for a counter-attack ...
— The Sherwood Foresters in the Great War 1914 - 1919 - History of the 1/8th Battalion • W.C.C. Weetman
... after some hard fighting, was within a march of Trento. The order was explicit: instant evacuation of the enemy's territory. Garibaldi, to whom from first to last had fallen an ungrateful part, took up his pen and wrote the laconic telegram: 'Obbedisco.' 'I have obeyed,' he said to the would-be mutineers, 'do you obey likewise.' Someone murmured 'Rome.' 'Yes,' said the chief, 'we ...
— The Liberation of Italy • Countess Evelyn Martinengo-Cesaresco
... fellow sharply as he got into the wagon and noticed nothing in his disfavor. His laconic account of himself was borne out by ...
— Ranching for Sylvia • Harold Bindloss
... fairer; her lips were not so firmly closed, so rigid in line, so constricted in motion; her brows were more flexible and not so often knit together; and her slight, lithe figure was perfect in line and movement. Still, she had enough of her former manner of being for identity. Grave, quiet, laconic, direct, she was but a modification of the former Leam as they had known her—Leam, Pepita's daughter, and with blood in her veins that was not the ordinary blood ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - February, 1876, Vol. XVII, No. 98. • Various
... objected, but the Harrisonites ultimately carried their point. Of the two principal opponents, Ludlow was fairly talked off his feet by the voluble patois of Loewenberg, and Benson completely put down by the laconic and inflexible Sumner. So far so bad, but worse was to follow; for after the horses had been ordered, and most of the ladies, including the Robinsons, bonneted and shawled for the start, the lionne, who had, doubtless, heard of the ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 2, No. 4, March, 1851 • Various
... her rebellious lips to the laconic assent. She drooped the lids over her rebellious eyes, lest he should detect her wounded ...
— The Grain Of Dust - A Novel • David Graham Phillips
... of asking, you can see that he feels you do not owe him anything; he knows that what he asks is really a favor to him, which humanity will induce you to grant. His expressions are simple and laconic. His voice, his look, his gesture, are those of one equally accustomed to consent or to refusal. They show neither the cringing submission of a slave, nor the imperious tone of a master; but modest confidence in his ...
— Emile - or, Concerning Education; Extracts • Jean Jacques Rousseau
... amiable kind man hasten up to me. He now knew me, and he came to me with cordiality. I was just then standing and packing my clothes in a trunk for a journey to the country; I had only a few minutes time: by this means my reception of him was just as laconic as had been his ...
— The True Story of My Life • Hans Christian Andersen
... person who proposed the last toast has not made a satisfactory apology to me before the hand of my watch points to the hour, I will thrash him till he does. I am an officer in the English army, and always keep my word.' A small band of Australians was in the cabin. One and all of them applauded this laconic speech. It was probably due in part to these that the offender did not wait till ...
— Tracks of a Rolling Stone • Henry J. Coke
... skin contained the qualities necessary; and the illiterate who could ride and shoot and live to himself was far more esteemed than the educated who could not do those things. The more a man depends upon himself and the closer is his contact to a quick judgment the more laconic and even-poised he becomes. And the knowledge that he is himself a judge tends to create caution and judgment. He has no court to uphold his honor and to offer him protection, so he must be quick to protect himself and to maintain his own standing. His nature saved him, or it executed; ...
— Hopalong Cassidy's Rustler Round-Up - Bar-20 • Clarence Edward Mulford
... too genteel for signs, but many were franker, some offering "board by the day, week or meal," and some, more laconic, contenting themselves with the label: "Rooms." One, having torn out part of an old stone-trimmed bay window for purposes of commercial display, showed forth two suspended petticoats and a pair of oyster-coloured flannel trousers to prove ...
— The Magnificent Ambersons • Booth Tarkington
... Glumm's laconic answer, as he felt the edge of his long two-handed sword, settled himself more firmly on his seat, and carefully looked to the fastenings ...
— Erling the Bold • R.M. Ballantyne
... might even Pontiac falter. With uneasy glances, the party crowded into the council room, where Gladwyn and his officers sat waiting. "Why," asked the chieftain stolidly, "do I see so many of my father's young men standing in the street with their guns?" "To keep them in training," was the laconic reply. ...
— The Old Northwest - A Chronicle of the Ohio Valley and Beyond, Volume 19 In - The Chronicles Of America Series • Frederic Austin Ogg
... all those who make use of their eyes." Yet this sentiment is a fair specimen of the stern stuff of which Mr. St. John's creeds and opinions are made up.[8] Nevertheless, the volumes are entertaining, and in proof we have carved out a few laconic extracts: ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 484 - Vol. 17, No. 484, Saturday, April 9, 1831 • Various
... upon one now to see the finish," was the laconic reply. "If he doesn't take a hand in the matter at once there'll soon be a finish to the chief actor. You can't do anything when British justice is perverted through cowardice and partiality. Simon ...
— The Unknown Wrestler • H. A. (Hiram Alfred) Cody
... the guard. The twelve convicts implicated in the outbreak were put on their trial, found guilty, and sentenced to death by strangulation, as hanging really was in those days. Word was sent to headquarters in Sydney, and instructions were asked for to carry the sentence into effect. The laconic order was sent back from Sydney to "hang half of them." The Captain acknowledged the humour of the despatch, though it placed him in a difficulty. Which half should he hang, when all were equally guilty? In his pleasant way the Captain used ...
— An Australian in China - Being the Narrative of a Quiet Journey Across China to Burma • George Ernest Morrison
... the further end, talking somewhat heatedly to one or two of his supporters. At Norgate's entrance, however, he dismissed them and motioned his visitor to a chair. He was a tall, powerful-looking man, with the eyes and forehead of a thinker. There was a certain laconic quality in his speech which ...
— The Double Traitor • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... covered with self-satisfaction, and virtuously clutching in my hand half-a-crown, the final change out of the "fiver." This in due course I put in an envelope, together with the batch of receipts, and laid on Crofter's table after morning school, with the laconic message under the flap, "All ...
— Tom, Dick and Harry • Talbot Baines Reed
... for at this juncture in the final proceedings of the war Sheridan was vigorously carrying out Grant's laconic instruction to "press things." When the sentinel waked the captain, Sheridan's lines were less than fifty yards in front and were pouring heavy volleys into the ...
— A Captain in the Ranks - A Romance of Affairs • George Cary Eggleston
... The rescript was promulgated in May, and at this time the subscription list amounted to less than L8,000. Within a month it had doubled, and by the end of the year it amounted to L37,000. The amount of the mortgage was L13,000. As Parnell, in a characteristically laconic way, put it in his evidence before the Commission, "The Irish people raised a collection for me to pay off the amount of a mortgage. The amount of the collection considerably exceeded the amount necessary." The retort of the country to the document "Qualecumque de Parnellio," ...
— Ireland and the Home Rule Movement • Michael F. J. McDonnell
... national, but that was in the domination of Russia and of those who were playing into her hands. On the march back to Warsaw, Poniatowski sent in his resignation to the King, and on another page of The same document Kosciuszko—followed by hundreds of others—in a few laconic words laid down his tardily and hardly ...
— Kosciuszko - A Biography • Monica Mary Gardner
... dressed out with wit and acuteness. There is fancy in them, or at least a phantom of it; for they contain an example of the misapplication of every mental faculty. The authors have found out the secret of being diffuse, even to wearisomeness, and at the same time so epigrammatically laconic, as to be often obscure and unintelligible. Their characters are neither ideal nor real beings, but misshapen gigantic puppets, who are set in motion at one time by the string of an unnatural heroism, and ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art - and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel trans John Black
... of Gravelotte. King Wilhelm has issued his laconic order for the day, and all know how bloody and arduous is the task before his host. The French tents are visible away in the distance yonder by the auberge of St. Hubert, and already the explosion of an occasional ...
— Camps, Quarters, and Casual Places • Archibald Forbes
... political situation. Rogers remarked, 'What a powerful band Lord John Russell will have to contend with! There's Peel, Lord Stanley, Sir James Graham——;' and the Duke interrupted him at this point with the laconic reply, 'Lord John Russell is a ...
— Lord John Russell • Stuart J. Reid
... the sanction of the treaties being signified October 23, 1865, by the following laconic decree(308) addressed to the shogun: "The imperial consent is given to the treaties, and you will therefore undertake the necessary ...
— Japan • David Murray
... brows, his thin, tight-locked lips, obstinate square jaw, and close-cropped wiry hair, was hardly accepted as a handsome man. Striking, too, was the contrast between her undisguised happiness and brilliant gaiety, and his laconic reserve. Yet neither she nor his friends would have wished him different, even in those days; for this reserve was characteristic of him. Matters on which he would have staked his life were turned by him into mere every-day commonplaces, when he permitted ...
— Captain Mansana and Mother's Hands • Bjoernstjerne Bjoernson
... looking very much better, it was also observed that she had not her customary spirits. She no longer vied with Leonetta in leading the entertainment of the party, and was particularly and conspicuously subdued and laconic whenever Lord ...
— Too Old for Dolls - A Novel • Anthony Mario Ludovici
... last act, I approached that truly dreadful five-page speech, which after a laconic "Go on!" from the young minister is continued through several more pages, I actually trembled with fear, lest her ennui should find some unpleasant outward expression. However, I dared not balk at the jump, so took it as ...
— Stage Confidences • Clara Morris
... unconscious of its approach; and it was only on seeing Snowball spring out from the Catamaran, and swim towards him, that the sailor suspected the proximity of a shark. At the same instant, also, he remembered the interrogatory that had been addressed to him by little William, and his own laconic reply designating the individual as a hammer-head. From these various circumstances he could tell that there was a shark bearing down upon him; but in what direction he could not conjecture, until the hurried words of Snowball ...
— The Ocean Waifs - A Story of Adventure on Land and Sea • Mayne Reid
... from taught or brought. Secondly, in this place it is out of accord with wrought, which is correctly spelled. If Messrs. Plummer and Mosely would be logical, let them write wrought as wrot—or perhaps plain rot would be still more correct and phonetic, besides furnishing a laconic punning commentary on simple spelling in general. The Phoenician's editorial column is conducted with laudable seriousness, the item of "The Power of Books" being well worthy of perusal. What could best be spared from the ...
— Writings in the United Amateur, 1915-1922 • Howard Phillips Lovecraft
... York; not for St. Petersburg, was his laconic reply, as he looked around for another chair. Everything was littered with books and papers, and at last he leaned over and lifted the dress from the chair to place it on the bed, as the easiest way of securing a seat in the ...
— The Poisoned Pen • Arthur B. Reeve
... incomprehensible than distinctive. There lives no man who at some period has not been tormented, for example, by an earnest desire to tantalize a listener by circumlocution. The speaker is aware that he displeases; he has every intention to please, he is usually curt, precise, and clear, the most laconic and luminous language is struggling for utterance upon his tongue, it is only with difficulty that he restrains himself from giving it flow; he dreads and deprecates the anger of him whom he addresses; yet, the thought strikes him, that by certain involutions and parentheses ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 2 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... to commandeer all the former military wires in the Austro-Hungarian countries for use in the relief work. So he was able to keep Hoover advised of all the news, not only promptly, but in good Americanese. His laconic but fully descriptive message to Paris announcing the Archduke's passing read: "August 24th, Archie went through the hoop at 8 ...
— Herbert Hoover - The Man and His Work • Vernon Kellogg
... Ma'am," was the laconic reply; and looking more narrowly at the tiny object, it proved to be one of the small portable ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 83, September, 1864 • Various
... and property. It is at the moment when evil passions reappear and threaten to prevail that good citizens should endeavour to stifle them, even at the peril of their lives." The style, and the very errors in spelling, made this note—the brevity of which suggested the laconic style of the ancients—appear all the more heroic. Not one of the gentlemen of the Provisional Commission put in an appearance. The last two who had hitherto remained faithful, and Granoux himself, even, prudently stopped at home. Thus Rougon was the only member of the Commission ...
— The Fortune of the Rougons • Emile Zola
... but I was urged to it by Mrs. Mowbray. Unaccustomed to disguise, I had expatiated upon the beauty of Eleanor, and in such terms, I fear, that I excited some uneasiness in his breast. His letter was laconic. He made no allusion to the subject upon which I had expatiated when writing to him. He commanded me ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth
... who will clear it up." And I pointed to a cottage-door at which I suddenly espied the old woman whose handling of the roller-towel had so impressed me. "Where," I shouted, addressing her, "where is the wounded man?" "Took away," was the laconic reply. "Took away!" I said; "and who has had the impudence ...
— Mad Shepherds - and Other Human Studies • L. P. Jacks
... the control wires broken!" was Tom's laconic answer. "I'll have to volplane down. Sit ...
— Tom Swift and his War Tank - or, Doing his Bit for Uncle Sam • Victor Appleton
... This laconic note contained all that Neb ought to know, and at the same time asked all that the colonists wished to know. It was folded and fastened to Top's collar in ...
— The Mysterious Island • Jules Verne
... quite consistent, for the latter implies that matter is independent of God, whereas according to the former everything owes its existence and continuance to God, from whom it emanates. But it is difficult from the fragmentary and laconic sayings of Ibn Ezra to extract a consistent and ...
— A History of Mediaeval Jewish Philosophy • Isaac Husik
... and brevity which suited the minister and the man, Godfrey told his business, and Lord Oldborough, with laconic decision, equally pleasing to the young soldier, replied, "that if it was possible, the thing should be done for Major Gascoigne"—inquired how long Captain Percy purposed to stay in town—desired to see him the day before he should leave London, ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. VII - Patronage • Maria Edgeworth
... troop-ships passing the Cape for China, and his sending of them to India instead. 'I have;' he recorded the act at the time, 'directed that all vessels arriving here with troops for China, shall proceed direct to Calcutta instead of to Singapore.' They are laconic words, but their place is over the front door of the British Empire. To it they brought a service, not ordinary in its annals, as they marked a man willing to put all to the touch. A nation and a personality are ...
— The Romance of a Pro-Consul - Being The Personal Life And Memoirs Of The Right Hon. Sir - George Grey, K.C.B. • James Milne
... the matter for some moments, chewing energetically the while, then, having delivered himself with the same delicacy and skill as before of his surplus tobacco juice, made laconic reply: ...
— Corporal Cameron • Ralph Connor
... any other this purification; and from whom the great power which it had been necessary to place in his hands fully justified the regent in exacting it. It was not, however, advisable to proceed against him with the laconic brevity adopted towards Brederode and the like; on the other hand, the voluntary resignation of all his offices, which he tendered, did not meet the object of the regent, who foresaw clearly enough how really dangerous he would become, as soon as he should feel himself independent, and be no ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... girl-like, knowing his caresses were all her own—knowing she could at an instant call forth enough to smother her—she tyrannized his importuning and, like a lovely miser, hoarded her responsiveness under calm eyes and laconic whispers until, when she did give back his eagerness, ...
— Nan of Music Mountain • Frank H. Spearman
... brings me up to the date of my receiving, in Waterbury, the laconic cable from Edward to the effect that he wanted me to go to Branshaw and have a chat. I was pretty busy at the time and I was half minded to send him a reply cable to the effect that I would start in a fortnight. But I was having a long interview ...
— The Good Soldier • Ford Madox Ford
... were nations and their ambitions, in comparison with a society where mind and morals had the glorious license of Olympians and could follow the unobstructed paths of inclination in realms controlled only by fancy! Napoleon's greeting was laconic, "Vous etes un homme." This flattered Goethe, who called it the inverse "ecce homo," and felt its allusion to his citizenship, not in Germany, but in the world. The nineteenth-century Caesar then urged the great writer to carry out an already-formed design and compose a ...
— The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte - Vol. III. (of IV.) • William Milligan Sloane
... 8th St. Miami, Florida, is one of the oldest ex-slave women in Miami. Like most ex-slaves she is very courteous; she will talk about the "old times", if she has once gained confidence in you, but her answers will be so laconic that two or three visits are necessary in order for an interviewer to gain tangible information ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States - From Interviews with Former Slaves - Florida Narratives • Works Projects Administration
... sharp terms to this laconic opinion that the two friends finally parted in a way they had never parted before. Johns was to be no groomsman to Darton after all. He had flatly declined. Darton went off sorry, and even unhappy, particularly as Japheth was about to leave that side of the county, so that the words which ...
— Wessex Tales • Thomas Hardy
... most warmly received in her new home, and about the anniversary of her own marriage-day, the Queen had the happiness of receiving from her new son this laconic telegram: "The whole royal family is enchanted with my ...
— Queen Victoria, her girlhood and womanhood • Grace Greenwood
... freedom of Paretz had to be exchanged for the restraints of court life. Little as either of the two desired regal pomp, they played their new parts well. Friedrich Wilhelm, stately in bearing, and acknowledged as the handsomest man in his realm, looked every inch a king; and if his laconic speech and caustic criticisms sometimes gave offence, the winning gentleness of his beautiful wife more than made amends. Nobles and citizens, statesmen, soldiers, and savants were alike made welcome; and Louise ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 6 of 8 • Various
... necessary," was Montagu's laconic reply. Among other boys who had left the room before the fracas had taken place was Vernon Williams, who shrank away to avoid the pain of seeing his new friend Wright bullied and tormented. But curiosity soon took him back, and he came in just as the second round began. At ...
— Eric, or Little by Little • Frederic W. Farrar
... one,' was Theodore Racksole's laconic request, and he walked out of the shop smoking the penny cigar. It was a ...
— The Grand Babylon Hotel • Arnold Bennett
... above sentence is, that imagination is not the source of beauty, for although no scene seizes so strongly on the imagination, yet there are scenes "more beautiful than Runnymede." And though instances of self-contradiction as laconic and complete as this are to be found in few writers except Alison, yet if the arguments on the subject be fairly sifted from the mass of confused language with which they are always encumbered and placed in logical form, they will be found invariably to involve one of these ...
— Modern Painters Volume II (of V) • John Ruskin
... the following day when the question was to be brought forward in the upper house, it would pass. I should here remark, that it is well known here that it will not pass—but that in all probability in the next session it will. The laconic answer of the book ran thus:—'You will have no success this time.' They then made a young American lady ask if she should soon be married. 'Not in this part of the ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. - Volume 19, No. 536, Saturday, March 3, 1832. • Various
... Kayans to laconic speech is well illustrated by their way of referring to well-known stories or fables with one or two words, in order to sum up or characterise a situation — much as we say ...
— The Pagan Tribes of Borneo • Charles Hose and William McDougall
... his laconic answer as he caught my arm and hurried me along. 'Found this morning. I want you to take a look ...
— Against Odds - A Detective Story • Lawrence L. Lynch
... move," was the laconic but excellent speech of Mr. Henry Plumb. He already had his forefinger on the trigger ...
— Anderson Crow, Detective • George Barr McCutcheon
... The later laconic reports are nearer to the facts. They set the figure of arrested rioters at no less than fourteen hundred, and make mention of a number of persons who had been wounded during the suppression of the excesses, ...
— History of the Jews in Russia and Poland. Volume II • S.M. Dubnow
... much upon his mind; and as soon as he saw that there was not the slightest fear of the dogs straying away from the horse, he kept his eyes fixed upon the notch in the mountains right ahead, and rode steadily on, keeping his horse to a steady canter; and bearing Leather's laconic warning in mind, he left the track to one side or the other wherever growth seemed to be abundant, his father's order about going as the crow flies being ample ...
— First in the Field - A Story of New South Wales • George Manville Fenn
... when he crossed the plaza to his quarters. Matak, silent as ever but of more cheerful countenance, set the table. At his second laconic announcement Terry rose and crossed to the dinner table, and as he seated himself a white missile was tossed through the open window by an unseen hand and landed with a thud on the bare floor. Matak brought it to ...
— Terry - A Tale of the Hill People • Charles Goff Thomson
... in my own way. It deals with the old law—the old border days—therefore it is better first. Soon, perchance, I shall have the pleasure of writing of the border of to-day, which in Joe Sitter's laconic speech, "Shore is 'most as ...
— The Lone Star Ranger • Zane Grey
... Pigafetta's journal and the still more laconic pilot's logbook leave us in the dark on this point—how the ignorant and suffering crews interpreted this everlasting stretch of sea, vaster, said Maximilian Transylvanus, "than the human mind could conceive." To them it may well have seemed that the theory of a round ...
— Great Epochs in American History, Volume I. - Voyages Of Discovery And Early Explorations: 1000 A.D.-1682 • Various
... the porter, Lady Chatterton observed to him significantly—"Nobody at home, Willis."—"Yes, my lady," was the laconic reply, and Lord Herriefield, as he took his seat by the side of his wife in the carriage, thought she was ...
— Precaution • James Fenimore Cooper
... to the Chantraine district," was the laconic answer; and like the gentleman who could not weep at the sermon because he belonged to another parish, this specimen of a French Dogberry would not hear reason except in ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Complete • Charles James Lever (1806-1872)
... especially delight in the view of a fourteenth-century church close to the castle, with its chancel with creepers growing over it, and peeping out between the stones; and historians will be interested in the laconic inscription on its walls, 'rebuilt in 1438, a year of war, death, plague, and famine.' If such artists as Brewer, or Burgess, would only come here and give us drawings of these streets (of one especially, taking in the cathedral at the end, with its stone walls built over by shops, as at Pont ...
— Normandy Picturesque • Henry Blackburn
... stir among the Indians. Long-Hair stalked about scrutinizing the ground. Beverley saw him come near time and again with a hideous, inquiring scowl on his face. Grunts and laconic exclamations passed from mouth to mouth, and presently the import of it all could not be mistaken. Kenton and Jazon were gone—had escaped during the night—and the rain had completely obliterated ...
— Alice of Old Vincennes • Maurice Thompson
... Stokes; you've told me, and may consider that you've done your duty in doing so," replied the skipper, grimly laconic. "But I'm not going to ease down till seven bells, my hearty, unless we run across Dick Haldane's ship before, when we'll go as slow as you like and bear up again on our course ...
— The Ghost Ship - A Mystery of the Sea • John C. Hutcheson
... had to do with a man who depended for support solely upon his own talent, and whose virtue and simplicity raised him above all intrigue and scheming; and who, with much ability and intelligence, was severe in command, very laconic, disinterested, and of ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XIV., His Court and The Regency, Complete • Duc de Saint-Simon
... we'll see what we can do for him.' At the same time he rang a tiny hand-bell. A boy, rather the worse for printer's ink, appeared at the summons. Mr. Lancaster handed him Ernest's careful manuscript unopened, with the laconic order, 'Press. Proof immediately.' The boy took it without a word. 'I'm very busy now,' Mr. Lancaster went on in the same wearied dispirited manner: 'come again in thirty-five minutes. Jones, show these gentlemen into a room somewhere.' And the editor fell back forthwith into his easy-chair and ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen
... the better to plant among them law end civility, it is to be wondered how useless and unbookish they were, minding nought but the feats of war. There needed no licensing of books among them, for they disliked all but their own laconic apothegms, and took a slight occasion to chase Archilochus out of their city, perhaps for composing in a higher strain than their own soldierly ballads and roundels could reach to. Or if it were for his broad verses, they were not therein so cautious, but were ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to prose. Volume III (of X) - Great Britain and Ireland I • Francis W. Halsey
... various games of strength and agility on the green, at which a knot of village veterans presided, as judges of the lists. Among these I perceived that Ready-Money Jack took the lead, looking with a learned and critical eye on the merits of the different candidates; and, though he was very laconic, and sometimes merely expressed himself by a nod, yet it was evident that his opinions far outweighed those ...
— Bracebridge Hall, or The Humorists • Washington Irving
... caricature of the methods of interpretation which were practised by the Sophists—for the following reasons: (1) The transparent irony of the previous interpretations given by Socrates. (2) The ludicrous opening of the speech in which the Lacedaemonians are described as the true philosophers, and Laconic brevity as the true form of philosophy, evidently with an allusion to Protagoras' long speeches. (3) The manifest futility and absurdity of the explanation of (Greek), which is hardly consistent with the rational ...
— Protagoras • Plato
... Nasci, a learned Jew residing there, that the dialect of those Indians common in Guinana is soft, agreeable, and regular, and their substantives are Hebrew. "Their language, in the roots, idioms, and particular construction, has the genius of the Hebrew language, as their orations have the bold, laconic, and figurative ...
— Diary in America, Series Two • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)
... primarily to the immensity of the Russian artillery, which maintained a violent, continuous fire, smashing the successive rows of wire entanglements, breastworks, and trenches. The town was surrounded with nineteen rows of entanglements. The laconic order to attack was given at dawn on June 7, 1916. Up to noon the issue hung in the balance, but at 1 o'clock the Russians made a breach in the enemy's position near the village of Podgauzy. They repulsed a fierce Austrian counterattack and captured ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume V (of 8) • Francis J. (Francis Joseph) Reynolds, Allen L. (Allen Leon)
... back hopelessly upon the seat; and Maurice, according to the manners and customs of infuriated Britons, gave utterance to a very laconic word of bad ...
— Vera Nevill - Poor Wisdom's Chance • Mrs. H. Lovett Cameron
... slept"; but throughout there resounds a note of pure and deep rejoicing at the victory of justice over oppression, which Concord fight so aptly symbolized. In "Hamatreya" and "The Earth Song," another chord is struck, of calm, laconic irony. Shall we too, he asks, we Yankee farmers, descendants of the men who gave up all for freedom, go back to the creed outworn of medieval feudalism and aristocracy, and say, of the land that yields us its produce, "'Tis mine, my children's, ...
— Confessions and Criticisms • Julian Hawthorne
... interested. More joined, and we were soon the centre of a crowd. We imagined in time of war even a stray automobile must prove of account. We all laughed to find ourselves of such importance. Then up came a charming boy officer, who asked the chauffeur if he spoke German. "Ja wohl," was the laconic reply. "Are you ...
— An Account of Our Arresting Experiences • Conway Evans
... put forward by the refugees, none was so insistent, none so dolefully sincere, as the one for means to return home. It is a mistake to suppose that the Indian, traditionally laconic and stoical, is without family affection and without that noblest of human sentiments, love of country. The United States government has, indeed, proceeded upon the supposition that he is destitute of emotions, natural to his more highly civilized ...
— The American Indian as Participant in the Civil War • Annie Heloise Abel
... told you beforehand," Adrian consoled him, "that you had n't the ghost of a chance with her. You grim, glum, laconic sort of men are n't at all the sort that would appeal to a rich, poetic, southern nature like Madame Torrebianca's. She would be attracted by an exuberant, expansive, warm, sunny sort of man,—a man genial ...
— The Lady Paramount • Henry Harland
... of Dominie Sampson, from whom, in his own juridical style of wit, he contrived to extract great amusement both for himself and one or two friends whom the Colonel regaled on the same occasion. The grave and laconic simplicity of Sampson's answers to the insidious questions of the barrister placed the bonhomie of his character in a more luminous point of view than Mannering had yet seen it. Upon the same occasion he drew forth a strange quantity of miscellaneous ...
— Guy Mannering, or The Astrologer, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... contracted, terse, concise, condensed, sententious, laconic, succinct, summary, epigrammatic, pithy; limited, inadequate, insufficient, deficient, scanty; abrupt, curt, uncivil; lacking, shy, unsupplied; crisp, friable, brittle. Antonyms: diffuse, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... this perseverance, and very honestly told him all the miseries of the situation for which he seemed so ambitious. They did not shake his resolution. I then left him, and spoke to Mr Farmer. "Let the fool enter," was the laconic reply. ...
— Rattlin the Reefer • Edward Howard
... Mr. Davis to interview President Huerta, with safe conduct (this being about as safe as nonskid tires) to Mexico City. Mr. Davis was asked if he would make the trip. In less than two hours back came this laconic cable: ...
— Adventures and Letters • Richard Harding Davis
... Caesar imitated laconic brevity when he announced to Amintius his victory at Zela, in Asia Minor, over Pharna'c[^e]s, son ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer
... "THERE'S laconic eloquence: almost a proposal in a single word! Never mind, I shan't hold you to it. But to answer you: well, I'm always looking ahead, and somehow I usually see about ...
— Alice Adams • Booth Tarkington
... morning for the Falls," was the laconic answer; and, without knowing why he should particularly wish to do so, Mr. Carrollton ...
— Maggie Miller • Mary J. Holmes
... citizens. Joseph Stocker Newhall, a manufacturer of roundings in sole leather, was a just man, of positive views, and although interesting himself in the political issues of the day would not take office. Eminently social he was at times somewhat abrupt and laconic in denouncing what he conceived to be shams. As a manufacturer his motto was, "the laborer is worthy of his hire." He died in 1875, aged 67 years. George Pearson was Treasurer of the town and one of the Selectmen, and also Treasurer and Deacon of the Orthodox ...
— The Bay State Monthly - Volume 2, Issue 3, December, 1884 • Various
... most nonplussed 'perennial bachelor' who ever led a grand march when Karen snapped him up.... Loved him—actually! And it seems to have worked out marvelously.... A baby boy three months old," she concluded in her laconic style. Then, ashamed; "I don't know why I'm ...
— Murder at Bridge • Anne Austin
... action. When the larger British ships surrendered, the smaller craft were compelled to follow the example, and the squadron yielded to Perry after three hours of battle. It was in no boastful strain but as the laconic fact that he sent his famous message to the nation. He had met the enemy and they were all his. It was leadership—brilliant and tenacious—which had employed makeshift vessels, odd lots of guns, and crews which included militia, sick men, and ...
— The Fight for a Free Sea: A Chronicle of the War of 1812 - The Chronicles of America Series, Volume 17 • Ralph D. Paine
... curiosities of Moscow he kept it a profound secret. It was only by the most rigid inquiry and an adroit system of cross-examination that I could get any thing out of him, and then his information was vague and laconic, sometimes a little sarcastic, but never beyond what I knew myself. Yet he was polite, dignified, and gentlemanly—never refused to drink a glass of beer with me, and always knew the way to a traktir. To the public functionaries with whom ...
— The Land of Thor • J. Ross Browne
... assistance was from Virginia, North Carolina being separated from the Watauga people by great mountain chains; and Sevier had already notified the officers of Fincastle that the Indians were advancing. His letter was of laconic brevity, and contained no demand for help; it was merely a warning that the Indians were undoubtedly about to start, and that "they intended to drive the country up to New River before they returned"—so that it behooved the ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume One - From the Alleghanies to the Mississippi, 1769-1776 • Theodore Roosevelt
... exchanged for the restraints of court life. Little as either of the two desired regal pomp, they played their new parts well. Friedrich Wilhelm, stately in bearing, and acknowledged as the handsomest man in his realm, looked every inch a king; and if his laconic speech and caustic criticisms sometimes gave offence, the winning gentleness of his beautiful wife more than made amends. Nobles and citizens, statesmen, soldiers, and savants were alike made welcome; and Louise knew instinctively how to make each show at his best. ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 6 of 8 • Various
... shade of its brown coat I remembered. Its extreme thinness was the only circumstance in which the picture was unlike my Caesar. I inquired from the scolding woman of the shop how she came by this picture—'Honestly,' was her laconic answer; but when I asked whether it were to be sold, and when I paid its price, the lady changed her tone; no longer considering me as the partisan of the little boy, against whom she was enraged, but rather looking upon me as a customer, who had paid too much for ...
— Tales And Novels, Volume 1 • Maria Edgeworth
... These uses of the word are not of significance as regards the problem of art, and we must return to Baltasar Gracian (1642) for a definition of taste as a special faculty or attitude of the soul. Italian writers of the period echo the praises of this laconic moralist, who, when he spoke of "a man of taste," meant to describe what we call to-day "a man of tact" in the conduct ...
— Aesthetic as Science of Expression and General Linguistic • Benedetto Croce
... "Hesitantly following this laconic advice, I soon found myself near a tree whose branches were sheltering a guru with an attractive group of disciples. The master, a bright unusual figure, with sparkling dark eyes, rose at my ...
— Autobiography of a YOGI • Paramhansa Yogananda
... of James I. would have done wisely to have embraced the philosophic sentiment of a Hungarian prince (1095-1114) who is said to have dismissed the absurd superstition with laconic brevity: 'De strigis vero, quae non sunt, nulla ...
— The Superstitions of Witchcraft • Howard Williams
... Sylvia; "there's one from George—it's a little disappointing, but you can read it. As usual, he's laconic." ...
— Ranching for Sylvia • Harold Bindloss
... of the ship to the other; and that they played blind-man's buff or danced quadrilles and waltzes on moonlight evenings on the quarter-deck; and that at odd moments of unoccupied time they jotted a laconic item or two in the journals they opened on such an elaborate plan when they left home, and then skurried off to their whist and euchre labors under the cabin lamps. If these things were presumed, the presumption ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... fer ter git angry with me, Rose gal. Hit aint thet I wants ter be selfish er onreasonable, but ..." Judd stopped. Words of passionate love trembled on his lips, but were held there by a barrier of inherited reticence in matters of the heart. Iron reserve and laconic speech were essentially typical of his breed; but, at length, the eager utterances strained against the fetter of his will, ...
— 'Smiles' - A Rose of the Cumberlands • Eliot H. Robinson
... north," was the muffled and laconic reply. "Yaas," he continued presently, after regarding his reflection in the bottom of a tin cup that had been full of coffee the moment before, "an' it's over ...
— The Free Range • Francis William Sullivan
... eleven o'clock, the happy Leon was at his toilet when a telegram was brought to him. He opened it without noticing that it was addressed to M. Fougas, and uttered a cry of joy. Here is the laconic message which ...
— The Man With The Broken Ear • Edmond About
... to the breakfast table pale and weary-eyed. From her laconic remarks to Elsie, Lennon gathered that she had spent the night waiting upon her father. After forcing herself to eat a hasty meal, she came around the table and laid an old short-barreled ...
— Bloom of Cactus • Robert Ames Bennet
... Falls," was the laconic answer; and, without knowing why he should particularly wish to do so, Mr. Carrollton ...
— Maggie Miller • Mary J. Holmes
... Bilot, with a broad grin, "one must be very virtuous indeed to make use of the laconic style so highly esteemed by the ancients. However, as I am devoted to your lordship, I will answer in ...
— Captain Fracasse • Theophile Gautier
... in clean, quiet Kelso, I mused over the intruded opinions of the gentleman in the train (whom I had ticked off as a good-natured bagman), and having been warned beforehand by a laconic postscript, "Prospects not rosy," remembered that in angling there is something needed besides endurance and energy, and that when you are waiting day by day for the water to fall into condition there is a substantial demand upon patience. ...
— Lines in Pleasant Places - Being the Aftermath of an Old Angler • William Senior
... Virgin, of Jesus, and of several of the saints, is proved by the character and the customs of its inhabitants; by the perpetual feuds, as terrible as they are causeless, which unite or separate them; and by the gloomy black eyes, pale complexions, laconic speech, and infrequent laughter ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: Spanish • Various
... in the sunshine, seemed to greet and cheer him. These two laconic but expressive words, sans souci, smoothed the lines which the crown and its duties had laid upon his brow, and made his heart, which was so cold and weary, beat with the hopes and strength ...
— Berlin and Sans-Souci • Louise Muhlbach
... of the book is revealed in Peak's laconic ambition, 'A plebeian, I aim at marrying a lady.' It is a little curious, some may think, that this motive so skilfully used by so many novelists to whose work Gissing's has affinity, from Rousseau and Stendhal (Rouge et Noire) to Cherbuliez (Secret du Precepteur) ...
— The House of Cobwebs and Other Stories • George Gissing
... destruction, loss and gain, with the miracle of the Marne as the first great sign of the turning of the tide. On September 3 the Paris Government moved to Bordeaux, on the 5th the retreat from Mons ended, on the 13th Joffre, always unboastful and laconic, announced the rolling back of the invaders, on the 15th the battle of the Aisne had begun. What an Iliad of agony, endurance and heroism lies behind these dates—the ordeal and deliverance of Paris, the steadfastness of the "Contemptibles," ...
— Mr. Punch's History of the Great War • Punch
... in this place it is out of accord with wrought, which is correctly spelled. If Messrs. Plummer and Mosely would be logical, let them write wrought as wrot—or perhaps plain rot would be still more correct and phonetic, besides furnishing a laconic punning commentary on simple spelling in general. The Phoenician's editorial column is conducted with laudable seriousness, the item of "The Power of Books" being well worthy of perusal. What could best be spared from the magazine are ...
— Writings in the United Amateur, 1915-1922 • Howard Phillips Lovecraft
... exhibition of these archives was accompanied by an infinite number of spoken details which seemed to make the identity of the Marquis de Sallenauve indisputable. On all other subjects my father is laconic; his mental capacity does not seem to me remarkable, and he willingly allowed his mouthpiece to talk for him. But here, in the matter of his parchments, he was loquaciously full of anecdotes, recollections, ...
— The Deputy of Arcis • Honore de Balzac
... simple words raised to a higher power and animated with a purer intention than they carry in ordinary life. It is this unfailing note of sincerity, eloquent or laconic, that has made poetry the teacher of prose. Phrases which, to all seeming, might have been hit on by the first comer, are often cut away from their poetical context and robbed of their musical value that ...
— Style • Walter Raleigh
... of Mississippi, showing that the hands of that officer were more than full. [Footnote: The letter, however, did not reach Johnston till after he had been relieved of command.] On the 10th Johnston had forwarded a laconic dispatch, saying, "On the night of the 8th the enemy crossed at Isham's Cavalry Ford; intrenched. In consequence we crossed at and below the railroad, and are now about two miles from the river, guarding the crossings." [Footnote: ...
— Military Reminiscences of the Civil War V2 • Jacob Dolson Cox
... of their eyes." Yet this sentiment is a fair specimen of the stern stuff of which Mr. St. John's creeds and opinions are made up.[8] Nevertheless, the volumes are entertaining, and in proof we have carved out a few laconic extracts: ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 484 - Vol. 17, No. 484, Saturday, April 9, 1831 • Various
... and Chios, or to the Hellespont. The Lacedaemonians, however, decidedly favoured the Chians and Tissaphernes, who were seconded by Alcibiades, the family friend of Endius, one of the ephors for that year. Indeed, this is how their house got its Laconic name, Alcibiades being the family name of Endius. Nevertheless the Lacedaemonians first sent to Chios Phrynis, one of the Perioeci, to see whether they had as many ships as they said, and whether their city generally was ...
— The History of the Peloponnesian War • Thucydides
... town when he crossed the plaza to his quarters. Matak, silent as ever but of more cheerful countenance, set the table. At his second laconic announcement Terry rose and crossed to the dinner table, and as he seated himself a white missile was tossed through the open window by an unseen hand and landed with a thud on the bare floor. Matak brought it to him, and unwrapping the paper from about the pebble Terry read ...
— Terry - A Tale of the Hill People • Charles Goff Thomson
... "Get me a good dog with points," was the laconic message; and it irritated me to receive such idiotic instructions at such a time and in such a place. A good dog? Where the mischief could I find a dog in a town consisting of ten houses and a water-tank? I said as much to the ...
— In Search of the Unknown • Robert W. Chambers
... ago, and on foot," was the laconic reply. "As I had only a paper of salt and some matches, I couldn't afford to travel in high style, so I footed it. I had a ring and a blanket, and I traded them up at Karlo for an old tub of a dugout, and ...
— That Girl Montana • Marah Ellis Ryan
... taken place there, and the happy couple had already reached Paris before either of them thought of informing their friends and before any notice of the event appeared in the papers. Even then, society felt itself aggrieved by the laconic form in which the information ...
— Don Orsino • F. Marion Crawford
... Even the laconic Jake appeared relieved when they forced their way a little farther through the tangled undergrowth, until finding a clear space they set ...
— The Long Portage • Harold Bindloss
... with self-satisfaction, and virtuously clutching in my hand half-a-crown, the final change out of the "fiver." This in due course I put in an envelope, together with the batch of receipts, and laid on Crofter's table after morning school, with the laconic message under the flap, ...
— Tom, Dick and Harry • Talbot Baines Reed
... the other would-be mediator; for he hated to see the two principal parishioners of his tiny cure at enmity. First he tackled James Moore on the subject; but that laconic person cut him short with, "I've nowt agin the little mon," and would say no more. And, indeed, the quarrel was ...
— Bob, Son of Battle • Alfred Ollivant
... to the hasty summons, heard the message before the clerk had time to write it out. His lips were closely compressed as he put his own hand on the key and sent these laconic sentences: "O. K. Keep perfectly dark. Will ...
— The Denver Express - From "Belgravia" for January, 1884 • A. A. Hayes
... had rather promises than treasure to bestow. The offers of Did'ius, who produced immense sums of ready money, prevailed. He was received into the camp, and the soldiers instantly swore to obey him as emperor. 21. Upon being conducted to the senate-house, he addressed the few that were present in a laconic speech, "Fathers, you want an emperor, and I am the fittest person you can choose." The choice of the soldiers was confirmed by the senate, and Did'ius was acknowledged emperor, in the fifty-seventh year of his age. 22. It ...
— Pinnock's Improved Edition of Dr. Goldsmith's History of Rome • Oliver Goldsmith
... Montagu's laconic reply. Among other boys who had left the room before the fracas had taken place was Vernon Williams, who shrank away to avoid the pain of seeing his new friend Wright bullied and tormented. But curiosity soon took him back, and he came in just as ...
— Eric, or Little by Little • Frederic W. Farrar
... affected by this laconic piece of intelligence, as I might have been had I known more of the sea; and perhaps I should have regarded it still less, but for the gloomy glances and apprehensive air of those around me. I was not stunned by it at the first announcement; but it was not long before ...
— Ran Away to Sea • Mayne Reid
... you here,' was the laconic reply of my companion; 'come, let's go. You are sure that is the lady,' he continued, when we ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various
... his call on Miss Purry that scheme went adrift through the sudden disagreement of the uncertain Wobbles brothers who owned the land. It was a day of failures; and at four o'clock he returned to the office and inscribed, upon the credit side of his unique little day-book, the laconic entry: ...
— Five Thousand an Hour - How Johnny Gamble Won the Heiress • George Randolph Chester
... it, what do you make on't? The seer is ancient, the style laconic, the sentences dark like those of Scotus, though they treat of matters dark enough in themselves. The best commentators on that good father take the jubilee after the thirtieth to be the years that are included in this present age till 1550 (there being but one jubilee every fifty ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... INDEX of what ought to be seen, and how best seen in the shortest time, in every place to which he may be successively conducted. This novelty in the work will prove very frequently of great utility, especially to those visitors who have too little time for their trip, and who, for want of such a laconic memento wherever they go, are known in a thousand instances to pass by the most interesting objects unnoticed,—not being aware ...
— Brannon's Picture of The Isle of Wight • George Brannon
... somewhat laconic. All that they learned was that he was named Jonas, and that his grandmother thought ...
— O. T. - A Danish Romance • Hans Christian Andersen
... of, is it, Berkeley?' he said in a wearied way. 'Well, well, we'll see what we can do for him.' At the same time he rang a tiny hand-bell. A boy, rather the worse for printer's ink, appeared at the summons. Mr. Lancaster handed him Ernest's careful manuscript unopened, with the laconic order, 'Press. Proof immediately.' The boy took it without a word. 'I'm very busy now,' Mr. Lancaster went on in the same wearied dispirited manner: 'come again in thirty-five minutes. Jones, show ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen
... clear; that is to say, if he stipulates for payment on fulfilment of a condition, or on some determinate future day, and you answer: 'I. promise to pay today,' the contract is void; but if you merely answer: 'I promise,' you are held by this laconic reply to have undertaken payment on the day, or subject to the condition specified; for it is not essential that every word used by the stipulator should be repeated in ...
— The Institutes of Justinian • Caesar Flavius Justinian
... impersonal, dry, easy, cool, laconic, and yet it could not have been more pregnant with meaning. Jean's sharp sensibilities absorbed much. None of the slouch-sombreroed, long-mustached Texans—for so Jean at once classed them—had ever seen Jean, but ...
— To the Last Man • Zane Grey
... absence of the favourite senior conductor, was called upon to lead the music to Egmont at Munich, I induced him, amongst other things, to attend to the proper rendering of this passage. It proved at once strikingly effective—concise, laconic—as Beethoven meant it. The tempo, which up to that point had been kept up with passionate animation, was firmly arrested, and very slightly modified—just as much, and no more than was necessary to permit the orchestra properly to attack this thematic combination, so full of energetic ...
— On Conducting (Ueber das Dirigiren): - A Treatise on Style in the Execution of Classical Music • Richard Wagner (translated by Edward Dannreuther)
... nonplussed 'perennial bachelor' who ever led a grand march when Karen snapped him up.... Loved him—actually! And it seems to have worked out marvelously.... A baby boy three months old," she concluded in her laconic style. Then, ashamed; "I don't know why I'm ...
— Murder at Bridge • Anne Austin
... night: A carriage has drawn up before the lower gates to the Perse grounds, and a tall, shadowy figure leaves it to hurry through the shrub lined walks to the massive doors. A watchman in the garden salutes him. The tall figure dips his umbrella in response, characteristically laconic. A footman lifts his hand to his forelock at the top of the steps and throws open the doors without question. This visitor is expected, it is plain to be seen; a circumstance which may or may not explain the nervousness ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... approached for a political contribution, whereupon he handed out $100 for himself and the same amount for Vanderbilt. On being told of his debt, Vanderbilt declined to pay it, closing the matter abruptly with this laconic pronunciamento, "When I give anything, I give it myself." At another time Vanderbilt assured a friend that he would "carry" one thousand shares of New York Central stock for him. The market price rose to $115 a share ...
— Great Fortunes from Railroads • Gustavus Myers
... who was a laconic young person, much given to observing conditions about her and equally prone to ...
— The Touchstone of Fortune • Charles Major
... a joyful, strong, noble Christian life lies here—that on the foundation of faith we should rear tenacious adherence to Him in spite of all obstacles. So it was a most encyclopaedic, though laconic, exhortation that that 'good man' sent down from Jerusalem to encourage the first heathen converts gave, when instead of all other instruction or advice, or inculcation of less important, and yet real, Christian duties, Barnabas exhorted them all 'that with purpose of heart'—the ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... "Chawed up," was the laconic reply, as the old fellow shaded his brow, and gazed long and anxiously beyond the headland they were ...
— Cormorant Crag - A Tale of the Smuggling Days • George Manville Fenn
... our wary senior is infectious, and we confess ourselves so far disenchanted by it, that, when we go into a library, the lettering on the backs of nine-tenths of the volumes contrives to shape itself into a laconic Hic jacet. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 5, No. 28, February, 1860 • Various
... sorrel mare with all the ease and confidence of a practised rider. Her habit was of very dark blue, with huge puffed sleeves and a high lace collar. She wore a top-hat of black, a long blue veil trailing down her back. He heartily agreed with the laconic bystander who remarked that she was "purtier ...
— Viola Gwyn • George Barr McCutcheon
... the disposal of the Admiralty. We only asked that, in the event of the declaration of war, the Expedition might be considered as a single unit, so as to preserve its homogeneity. There were enough trained and experienced men amongst us to man a destroyer. Within an hour I received a laconic wire from the Admiralty saying "Proceed." Within two hours a longer wire came from Mr. Winston Churchill, in which we were thanked for our offer, and saying that the authorities desired that the Expedition, which had the full sanction and support of the Scientific ...
— South! • Sir Ernest Shackleton
... and Hindenburg's still counting..."). And all you could find in the papers was the General Staff report that "at one place the fighting has been very severe; up to the present we have made some twenty-six thousand prisoners," etc., and even this laconic sentence lost in the middle of the regular communique beginning: "Yesterday on the Belgian coast, after ...
— Antwerp to Gallipoli - A Year of the War on Many Fronts—and Behind Them • Arthur Ruhl
... both," Constance breathed, realizing the import of Mr. Critchlow's laconic words. "I'm sure ...
— The Old Wives' Tale • Arnold Bennett
... was very busy at the time, and said, "I guess so," and let the matter go at that. Parks passed that laconic permission on to the sergeant-major, and the two boys ...
— The Brighton Boys with the Flying Corps • James R. Driscoll
... generalizing. Returning to particulars, Mr. Nicholas B. confided to his sister-in-law (my grandmother) in his misanthropically laconic manner that this supper in the woods had been nearly "the death of him." This is not surprising. What surprises me is that the story was ever heard of; for granduncle Nicholas differed in this from the generality of ...
— A Personal Record • Joseph Conrad
... have ever encountered from a reviewer was the laconic and cynical remark (commenting upon my rather altruistic belief in the duty of giving one's best thought to the conversational circle), that "Nowadays, people don't talk: if they have any good ideas, they save them and write them out and sell ...
— Etiquette • Agnes H. Morton
... house stood listening about us in the early hours of this chill morning upon the edge of winter, she told me, with laconic brevity, things about Mabel that I heard as from a distance. There was nothing so unusual or tremendous in the short recital, nothing indeed I might not have already guessed for myself. It was the time and scene, ...
— The Damned • Algernon Blackwood
... Grant rode to an important position held by a large number of his troops under one of his most trusted generals. "What have you been doing?" asked Grant. "Fighting," answered the commander in charge of that position, equally laconic. For a while Grant surveyed the field, and, turning, was about to ride away. "But what shall I do now, General?" asked his subordinate. "Keep on ...
— The Young Man and the World • Albert J. Beveridge
... expected in a day or two to shake hands with Medici, who, after some hard fighting, was within a march of Trento. The order was explicit: instant evacuation of the enemy's territory. Garibaldi, to whom from first to last had fallen an ungrateful part, took up his pen and wrote the laconic telegram: 'Obbedisco.' 'I have obeyed,' he said to the would-be mutineers, 'do you obey likewise.' Someone murmured 'Rome.' 'Yes,' said the chief, 'we will ...
— The Liberation of Italy • Countess Evelyn Martinengo-Cesaresco
... frequented sea-ports in Laconia were Trinassus and Acria, situated on each side the mouth of the Eurotas; and Gythium, not far from Trinassus, at the mouth of a small river on the Laconic Gulf. The mouth of this river, which was navigable up to Sparta, was defended by a citadel, the ruins of which were remaining in the time of Pausanias. As the Lacedaemonians regarded this town as their principal port, in which their naval ...
— Robert Kerr's General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 18 • William Stevenson
... forced her rebellious lips to the laconic assent. She drooped the lids over her rebellious eyes, lest he should detect her wounded ...
— The Grain Of Dust - A Novel • David Graham Phillips
... one of his officers requested a furlough. The reason being asked, and given, that the place was unhealthy, and the applicant feared to die an inglorious death from fever: Napoleon replied, in his accustomed laconic style, "Go to ...
— A New Guide for Emigrants to the West • J. M. Peck
... literal and simple manner, "It was only half-a-crown." This sum the Prince paid her. He then saluted her, and said: "Notwithstanding all that has happened, I hope, madam, we shall meet in St. James's yet." In this calm, and, apparently laconic manner, he bade Flora adieu. But, though fate did not permit Charles to testify his gratitude at St. James's, he is said never to have mentioned without a deep sense of his obligations the name of his ...
— Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745 - Volume III. • Mrs. Thomson
... places I feel no shock of sadness but am rather possessed by a familiar spirit of peace. As I wander from path to path, my fancy is not lamed by mournful thoughts, but finds suggestion amid the poor laconic histories by which these headstones appeal to him ...
— Apologia Diffidentis • W. Compton Leith
... would-be assassin. There was no resentment in his heart. The adventure was only part of the day's work. The destroyer neared; her bow overlooked them. The two captains looked at each other. The dialogue was laconic. ...
— World's War Events, Volume III • Various
... a cottage-door at which I suddenly espied the old woman whose handling of the roller-towel had so impressed me. "Where," I shouted, addressing her, "where is the wounded man?" "Took away," was the laconic reply. "Took away!" I said; "and who has had the ...
— Mad Shepherds - and Other Human Studies • L. P. Jacks
... to laconic speech is well illustrated by their way of referring to well-known stories or fables with one or two words, in order to sum up or characterise a situation — much as we ...
— The Pagan Tribes of Borneo • Charles Hose and William McDougall
... was made one day after a brisk six rounds of mimic battle. They soaped and bathed and dried their bodies. Then they rested—sitting upon up-ended beer kegs in the storeroom of Pegleg McCarron—and talked a little of life. Spike for a week had been laconic, even for him, and had taken little trouble to pull his punches. To-day he revealed that the Interests had triumphed over his simple mind. He was going and going quick. He recovered a morsel of gum from beneath ...
— The Wrong Twin • Harry Leon Wilson
... Men of laconic speech say much by tone and gesture, and often by silence. In Ike's tone Shock read contempt, ...
— The Prospector - A Tale of the Crow's Nest Pass • Ralph Connor
... red-faced, boorish fellow, and his Adjutant sat beside him at the desk, for the Colonel was not particularly well up in his job. The Adjutant was tall, slightly bald, and fat-faced, and he leaned back throughout the interview with an air of sneering boredom, only vouchsafing laconic replies to his superior's occasional questions. Peter didn't know which he hated the more; but he concluded that whereas he would like to cut the Colonel in Regent Street, he would enjoy shooting ...
— Simon Called Peter • Robert Keable
... my cheeks began to burn even more hotly than Milly's. I had been questioning Eagle about his adventures, and he had been answering in the laconic way most brave men have when teased to talk of themselves; but for a minute, keen though I was, I lost the thread of narrative I had begun eagerly drawing out. This was when I met Milly's eyes and flung a ...
— Secret History Revealed By Lady Peggy O'Malley • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... Catamaran, and swim towards him, that the sailor suspected the proximity of a shark. At the same instant, also, he remembered the interrogatory that had been addressed to him by little William, and his own laconic reply designating the individual as a hammer-head. From these various circumstances he could tell that there was a shark bearing down upon him; but in what direction he could not conjecture, until the hurried words of Snowball ...
— The Ocean Waifs - A Story of Adventure on Land and Sea • Mayne Reid
... his errand of good nature by handing over the physic he has been to get, which he delivers with the laconic verbal direction that "it's to be all took d'rectly." Secondly, Mr. Snagsby has to lay upon the table half a crown, his usual panacea for an immense variety of afflictions. Thirdly, Mr. Bucket has to take Jo by the arm a little above the elbow and ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... in Hyde Park, and the talk turned on the political situation. Rogers remarked, 'What a powerful band Lord John Russell will have to contend with! There's Peel, Lord Stanley, Sir James Graham——;' and the Duke interrupted him at this point with the laconic reply, 'Lord John Russell ...
— Lord John Russell • Stuart J. Reid
... wrote him a letter stating the reasons why a certain valuable and centrally situated piece of land owned by him would be the most advantageous site for the proposed building. His reply was in the laconic style characteristic of his manner of ...
— The New England Magazine, Volume 1, No. 1, January 1886 - Bay State Monthly, Volume 4, No. 1, January, 1886 • Various
... having challenged Wilkes, who was then sheriff of London and Middlesex, received the following laconic reply: "Sir, I do not think it my business to cut the throat of every desperado that may be tired of his life; but as I am at present High Sheriff of the City of London, it may shortly happen that I shall have an opportunity of ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... sha'nt," she replied, with laconic indifference. "I value my looks too much to spoil 'em. She wants my hair to get another lover with; though if stories are true she's broke the heart of many a ...
— The Woodlanders • Thomas Hardy
... conversation rather by assenting to what was said by the others than by advancing any ideas of his own. The Alto was a grave, learned, and sententious man. He supported the discourse of the first Violin by laconic maxims, striking for their truth. The Bass was a worthy old lady, rather inclined to chatter, who said nothing of much consequence, and while she was talking the other interlocutors had time to breathe. It was, however, evident that she ...
— The Violin - Its Famous Makers and Their Imitators • George Hart
... morning of Gravelotte. King Wilhelm has issued his laconic order for the day, and all know how bloody and arduous is the task before his host. The French tents are visible away in the distance yonder by the auberge of St. Hubert, and already the explosion of an occasional shell gives earnest ...
— Camps, Quarters, and Casual Places • Archibald Forbes
... wonder, and he had a long arm. My respect for Crawford increased amazingly as I read that message, and I began at once to bully the agent because the special was not ready at that minute to start. The second message was a laconic statement that dad was still alive; I folded it hurriedly and put it out of sight, for somehow it seemed to say a good many ...
— The Range Dwellers • B. M. Bower
... sum intended for the Wesleyan Methodist Church in Canada, should be given to the Wesleyan Methodists, who are now, and who may be hereafter, connected with the British Wesleyan Conference." I believe Lord Sydenham's laconic reply was, that he had to do with religious bodies ...
— The Story of My Life - Being Reminiscences of Sixty Years' Public Service in Canada • Egerton Ryerson
... cottage of the lame old man who had fired such a broadside of lurid words at Gregory, as he stood on the fence opposite. With a crutch under one arm and leaning on his gate, Daddy Tuggar seemed awaiting them, and secured their attention by the laconic salutation, "Evenin'!" ...
— Opening a Chestnut Burr • Edward Payson Roe
... the same reign half a shekel of silver and 1 gur of wheat from the royal storehouse were paid to five men who had brought a flock of sheep to the King's administrator in the city of Ruzabu. The following laconic letter also tells the same tale: "Letter from Tabik-zeri to Gula-ibni, my brother. Give 54 qas of meal to the men who have dug the canal. The 9th of Nisan, fifth year of Cyrus, King of Eridu, King of the World." The employer had a right to the workman's ...
— Babylonians and Assyrians, Life and Customs • Rev. A. H. Sayce
... is vulgarly supposed to be. He wrote that same day to his brother-in-law (whom I will take leave to call the Bishop of Wexcester), and made me its bearer. It is worth quotation. It ran: 'Dear Ted,—Ordain Noy, and oblige yours, Fred.' The answer which I carried back two days later was equally laconic. 'Dear Fred,—Noy ordained. Yours, Ted.' Consequently," wound up Mr. Noy, "I am down here to take over my cure of souls, and had in one of my pockets a sermon composed for my induction by a gifted ...
— Two Sides of the Face - Midwinter Tales • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... captain Wells, that my fire is kindled on the spot appointed by the Great Spirit above; and, if he has any thing to communicate to me, he must come here:—I shall expect him in six days from this time." With this laconic, but dignified reply, the conference ended. The agent at fort Wayne declined waiting on Tecumseh, in person, but on the appointed day, sent Shane back to Greenville, with a copy of the President's communication, contained in a letter from the Secretary at War; the substance of which ...
— Life of Tecumseh, and of His Brother the Prophet - With a Historical Sketch of the Shawanoe Indians • Benjamin Drake
... and esteem of his fellow citizens. Joseph Stocker Newhall, a manufacturer of roundings in sole leather, was a just man, of positive views, and although interesting himself in the political issues of the day would not take office. Eminently social he was at times somewhat abrupt and laconic in denouncing what he conceived to be shams. As a manufacturer his motto was, "the laborer is worthy of his hire." He died in 1875, aged 67 years. George Pearson was Treasurer of the town and one of the Selectmen, and also Treasurer and Deacon of the Orthodox ...
— The Bay State Monthly - Volume 2, Issue 3, December, 1884 • Various
... childhood, while he lived among the peasants, he became familiar with their mode of thought and speech, and it entered into his being, and became his own natural mode of expression. There is in his daily conversation a certain grim directness, and a laconic weightiness, which give an air of importance and authority even to his simplest utterances. This tendency to compression frequently has the effect of obscurity, not because his thought is obscure, but rather because energetic brevity of expression has fallen into disuse, and even a Norse public, ...
— Essays on Scandinavian Literature • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... remained unaware of the interesting complications that were being woven for him in the hot-hearted frontier community of which he was now a part; for Merrifield and Sylvane, as correspondents, were laconic, not being given to spreading themselves out on paper. His work in the Assembly and the pre-convention campaign for presidential candidates completely absorbed his energies. He was eager that a reform candidate should be named by the Republicans, ...
— Roosevelt in the Bad Lands • Hermann Hagedorn
... Juvenal and Persius, Mr. Creech did the 13th Satire of Juvenal, and subjoined Notes. He also translated into English, the verses before Mr. Quintenay's Compleat Gardiner. The Life of Solon, from the Greek of Plutarch. Laconic Apophthegms, or Remarkable Sayings of the Spartans, printed in the first Volume of Plutarch's Morals. A Discourse concerning Socrates's Daemon. The two First Books of ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Vol. III • Theophilus Cibber
... draught like the draught through the tube of a pipe. The savage warriors of North America enjoyed the blessing before we did; and to the pipe is to be ascribed the wisdom of their councils and the laconic delivery of their sentiments. It would be well introduced into our own legislative assembly. Ladies, indeed, would no longer peep down through the ventilator; but we should have more sense and fewer words. It is also to tobacco that is to be ascribed the stoical firmness of those ...
— Jacob Faithful • Captain Frederick Marryat
... of activity but not of excitement, or in any sense of joy. The matter was too hard an importance; it made too much difference on both sides whether potatoes were twelve or fifteen cents a peck. The dealers were laconic and the buyers anxious; country neighbours exchanged the time of day, but under the pressure of affairs. Now and then a lady of Elgin stopped to gossip with another; the countrywomen looked on, curious, grim, and a little contemptuous of so much demonstration and so many ...
— The Imperialist • (a.k.a. Mrs. Everard Cotes) Sara Jeannette Duncan
... through this list again, only naming each letter himself, and receiving laconic answers from Grimm—answers which seemed to be numbers, but I could not be sure. For minutes together I caught nothing but the scratching of pens and inarticulate mutterings. But out of the muck-heap I picked five pearls—four sibilant nouns and a name that I ...
— Riddle of the Sands • Erskine Childers
... Commonwealth men, they protested against this presence as "a breach of privilege, and inconsistent with that dignity and freedom with which they had a right to deliberate, consult, and determine." The Governor's laconic reply was,—"I have no authority over His Majesty's ships in this port or his troops within this town; nor can I give any orders for their removal." The House, resolving that they proceeded to take part in the elections of the day from ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 58, August, 1862 • Various
... to say to her. There was a species of abandon in her gaiety. Her exotic language embarrassed one who had been used to mariners' laconic directness of speech. She looked at him, teasing him with her eyes. He was a bit relieved when the pale-faced secretary came dragging himself up the ladder and broke ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... Her laconic reply, as it were, kindled a light within her which rendered everything outside clear. She sighed in relief. Shifting her position on the bench, she settled herself more firmly on it, ...
— Mother • Maxim Gorky
... too quickly, for at this juncture in the final proceedings of the war Sheridan was vigorously carrying out Grant's laconic instruction to "press things." When the sentinel waked the captain, Sheridan's lines were less than fifty yards in front and were pouring heavy volleys into ...
— A Captain in the Ranks - A Romance of Affairs • George Cary Eggleston
... us." "You are right," replied the king, smiling; "besides, an old broom taken from a masthead would be as useful to us as he would." Then, turning to M. de la Vrilliere, the king dictated the following laconic notice:— "COUSIN,—I have no further occasion for your services; I exile you to Praslin, and expect you will repair thither within four and twenty hours after the receipt of this." "Short and sweet," cried I. "Now ...
— "Written by Herself" • Baron Etienne Leon Lamothe-Langon
... no appeal from the honest publican's fiat; so, in a quick and laconic manner, it being Attie's favourite dogma that the least said is the soonest mended, the warrior sung ...
— Paul Clifford, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... we have applied Our shopman's test of age and worth, Was elemental when he died, As he was ancient at his birth: The saddest among kings of earth, Bowed with a galling crown, this man Met rancor with a cryptic mirth, Laconic — and Olympian. ...
— The Little Book of Modern Verse • Jessie B. Rittenhouse
... Charlie Webster's laconic note was naturally our chief topic over breakfast. "Tobias escaped—just heard he is on your island. Watch out. Will follow in a day or two." The "King" read it out, when I handed him the note across ...
— Pieces of Eight • Richard le Gallienne
... in this laconic description of the homely dreamer a richness of beauty which no efforts of the artist can adequately portray; and in the concise dialogue of the speakers, a simple sublimity of eloquence which any commentary could only weaken. ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... both the Way of Thinking and the Style must be Laconic: Much must be contained in a little Compass. Brevity of Diction adds new Life to a good Thought: And since every perfect Stroke ought to be a distinct Representation of a particular Feature, Matters shou'd be so order'd, that every ...
— A Critical Essay on Characteristic-Writings - From his translation of The Moral Characters of Theophrastus (1725) • Henry Gally
... this laconic epistle, put it in his pocket, and gave the order for departure. His voice, which rang above the east wind, had something ...
— The English at the North Pole - Part I of the Adventures of Captain Hatteras • Jules Verne
... required. To argue therefore, that God cannot have left man to such uncertainty, is to argue, as the pertinacious lawyer did, who, on seeing a man in the stocks, asked him what he was there for; and on being told, said, 'They cannot put you there for that.' 'But I am here,' was the laconic answer. ...
— Reason and Faith; Their Claims and Conflicts • Henry Rogers
... Franklin's table. He represents him as saying that he could not have borne the insults heaped upon him by the privy council, but for the consciousness, that he had done only that which was right. On Monday morning Franklin received a laconic letter from the Postmaster General, informing him that the king had found it necessary to dismiss him from the office of deputy ...
— Benjamin Franklin, A Picture of the Struggles of Our Infant Nation One Hundred Years Ago - American Pioneers and Patriots Series • John S. C. Abbott
... evidently not in the course of preparation to-day, for Leam had never been more laconic or more candidly disdainful than she was now; and what sweetness the pomegranate flower might hold in its heart was certainly not shaken abroad on the surrounding world. She answered when she was spoken to, because even Leam felt the constraining influences of ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XVII. No. 101. May, 1876. • Various
... chose Denver, Col. I had a friend who lived in Denver, and she was visiting me. I sought her at once, and with fear and trembling asked, 'Have you a bit of land behind your house in Denver where I could put up a small telescope?' 'Six hundred miles,' was the laconic reply! ...
— Maria Mitchell: Life, Letters, and Journals • Maria Mitchell
... upon a given subject, are exceedingly laconic, and neither answer my desires nor the purpose of letters; which should be familiar conversations, between absent friends. As I desire to live with you upon the footing of an intimate friend, and not of a parent, I could wish ...
— The PG Edition of Chesterfield's Letters to His Son • The Earl of Chesterfield
... took his cigar from his lips and studied it with deliberation. When he spoke his words were laconic. ...
— The Tyranny of Weakness • Charles Neville Buck
... "The epistle is laconic," said D'Artagnan; "and if there had not been a postscript, probably I should not have understood it; but happily there ...
— Twenty Years After • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... What can it matter to him that his landlady should have a word of his writing? Still, it may be as you say. Then, again, why such laconic messages?" ...
— The Adventure of the Red Circle • Arthur Conan Doyle
... of more or less dilapidated humanity interested in the retail sale of newspapers. At six o'clock Ephraim Bander, a retired constable, now on the staff of the Beacon, had taken his station at the door, in order to greet would-be purchasers with the laconic and discouraging words: ...
— The Slave Of The Lamp • Henry Seton Merriman
... from his chair, and went forward to the new-comer. 'You are not long behind us, then,' he said, with laconic disquietude. 'I thought you ...
— A Laodicean • Thomas Hardy
... much probability, to have belonged to the Aesculapian temple in the Insula Tiberina. The present translation, in which some errors either of the artist or copyist are rectified, is extracted from the first volume of Gruter's Corp. Inscriptionum. The narrations are perspicuous and laconic. ...
— Thaumaturgia • An Oxonian
... for an expedition to search the boundaries between Asia and America. In a word, he set in motion that forward march of the Russians across the Orient, which was to go on unchecked for two hundred years till arrested by the Japanese. The Czar's instructions were always laconic. They were written five weeks before his death. "(1) At {8} Kamchatka . . . two boats are to be built. (2) With these you are to sail northward along the coast. . . . (3) You are to enquire where the American coast begins. . . . Write it down . . . obtain reliable information . . . then, having ...
— Vikings of the Pacific - The Adventures of the Explorers who Came from the West, Eastward • Agnes C. Laut
... man found his own way at a rate which allowed him to complete the survey in six days. Foreign telegrams, however, and political intelligence, as well as the turmoil of the great cities, were strange to him, and here he greatly valued Posty's laconic hints, who, visiting the frontier, was supposed to be in communication with those centres. "Posty says that the Afghans are no makin' muckle o' the war," and Hillocks would sally forth to enjoy Sir Frederick Roberts' great march, ...
— Kate Carnegie and Those Ministers • Ian Maclaren
... as we have already said, Solomin sat silent the whole time; but when Markelov began enlarging upon the hopes they put on the factory workers, Solomin remarked, in his usual laconic way, that they must not depend too much on them, as factory workers in Russia were not what they were abroad. "They are an extremely ...
— Virgin Soil • Ivan S. Turgenev
... similar laconic phrase, to employ a more scientific, though perhaps a less striking expression: "The rate of wages depends upon the proportion which the supply of labor bears ...
— What Is Free Trade? - An Adaptation of Frederic Bastiat's "Sophismes Econimiques" - Designed for the American Reader • Frederic Bastiat
... and his affairs, and if he had yet a ship; and, to let him see a person might reside in a Court, and yet have no undue influence, I related his proceedings with Lord Chatham, and his laconic letter and interview. The first running ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madam D'Arblay Volume 2 • Madame D'Arblay
... life and property. It is at the moment when evil passions reappear and threaten to prevail that good citizens should endeavour to stifle them, even at the peril of their lives." The style, and the very errors in spelling, made this note—the brevity of which suggested the laconic style of the ancients—appear all the more heroic. Not one of the gentlemen of the Provisional Commission put in an appearance. The last two who had hitherto remained faithful, and Granoux himself, even, prudently stopped at home. Thus ...
— The Fortune of the Rougons • Emile Zola
... tightening of John McGuire's lips and the proud lifting of his chin told that Keith's challenge had been accepted even before the laconic answer came. ...
— Dawn • Eleanor H. Porter
... intonation in Fleur-de-Lys's—laconic words. The young man understood that it was indispensable that he should whisper something in her ear, a commonplace, a gallant compliment, no matter what. Accordingly he bent down, but he could find nothing in his imagination more tender ...
— Notre-Dame de Paris - The Hunchback of Notre Dame • Victor Hugo
... with "Mice and Men" is a characteristic Frohman story. Charles ordered this play written from Madeleine Lucette Ryley for Maude Adams. When he read the manuscript he sent it back to Miss Ryley with the laconic comment, "Worse yet." She showed it to Gertrude Elliott, who bought it for England. When Charles heard of this he immediately accepted the play, and it proved to be a success. The moment a play was in demand it ...
— Charles Frohman: Manager and Man • Isaac Frederick Marcosson and Daniel Frohman
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