"Connoisseur" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... I see your happiness completed, Morgan, even though this may be our last meeting. Till then I dare not go; you are not to be trusted to take the happiness that is within your grasp. You know I claim to be a connoisseur of women, and I am perfectly satisfied that you shall marry your Margaret. That is the highest compliment I could pay her. There is that indefinable, unseizable something in her face which reveals the whole personality, and it won me immediately. We have met three or four times now, but, ...
— Cleo The Magnificent - The Muse of the Real • Louis Zangwill
... masterpieces of great value. At the time of their purchase I thought I had a keen admiration for them. I begin to suspect that I acquired them less because I really cared for such things than because I wished to be considered a connoisseur. There they hang—my Corots, my Romneys, my Teniers, my Daubignys. But they might as well be the merest chromos. I never look at them. I have forgotten that they exist. So have the ...
— The "Goldfish" • Arthur Train
... times laid aside Caecilius for Plautus and Terence; and, if nevertheless the critics of the true literary age of Rome—the Varronian and Augustan epoch—assigned to Caecilius the first place among the Roman editors of Greek comedies, this verdict appears due to the mediocrity of the connoisseur gladly preferring a kindred spirit of mediocrity in the poet to any special features of excellence. These art-critics probably took Caecilius under their wing, simply because he was more regular than Plautus and more vigorous ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen
... entered the room with a low, stealthy tread, and looked me over in a cursory way and yet with the air of a connoisseur. ...
— Nye and Riley's Wit and Humor (Poems and Yarns) • Bill Nye
... scholar and an antiquarian, on the strength of an account of some travels in the Mediterranean, which the world has long since willingly let die. But the few weeks or months of foreign travel that permitted Sandwich to pose as a connoisseur when he was not practising as a profligate could not inspire him with the humor or the appreciation of Wilkes, and a friendship only cemented by a common taste for common vices soon fell asunder. There is a story to ...
— A History of the Four Georges and of William IV, Volume III (of 4) • Justin McCarthy and Justin Huntly McCarthy
... in design and adornment, . . he knew where to pick up choice bits of antique furniture, dainty porcelain, bronzes, and wood-carvings, while in the acquisition of rare books he was justly considered a notable connoisseur. His delicate and fastidious instincts were displayed in the very arrangement of his numerous volumes, ... none were placed on such high shelves as to be out of hand reach, . . all were within ...
— Ardath - The Story of a Dead Self • Marie Corelli
... and disinterested spirit of inquiry, that influence his daily practice, to other subjects. He perceives form, he distinguishes character. He reads men and books with an intuitive eye. He is a critic as well as a connoisseur. The conclusions he draws are clear and convincing, because they are taken from the things themselves. He is not a fanatic, a dupe, or a slave; for the habit of seeing for himself also disposes him to judge for himself. The most sensible men I ...
— Table-Talk - Essays on Men and Manners • William Hazlitt
... a good exchange of career, and success, and other such accidents of his material existence, for the right to touch these hands at will. The one thing necessary is, that he be fit for the post. I demand of him that he be a gourmand, a connoisseur in beauty. And it's here, mind you, that I have doubts of our friend.—Is ...
— Maurice Guest • Henry Handel Richardson
... long-sought Rose) that the finest cacao in the world is produced: the criollo, the bean with the golden-brown break. The tree which produces this is as delicate as the cacao is fine, and there is some danger that this superb cacao may die out—a tragedy which every connoisseur would wish ...
— Cocoa and Chocolate - Their History from Plantation to Consumer • Arthur W. Knapp
... and connoisseur of every kind of instrument, seized it at once. "An English glass," he said, holding it first at one eye and then at the ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XVII. No. 101. May, 1876. • Various
... catch a glint in his eye. "These sketches now," he approached the table on which lay the skyscraper studies. "Very harsh—cruel, you might say—but clever, yes, sir, mighty clever." Mary saw Stefan writhe with irritation at the other's air of connoisseur. She shot him a glance at once amused and pleading, but he ignored it with a shrug, as if to indicate that Mary was responsible for this intrusion, and must expect ...
— The Nest Builder • Beatrice Forbes-Robertson Hale
... began to examine the horses with the air of a connoisseur, until at last he found an animal that suited him. Thereupon he beckoned to the driver, and going to the little office where a woman sat reading: "My five sous, if you ...
— The Count's Millions - Volume 1 (of 2) • Emile Gaboriau
... story. I am invited to a dinner where a rich New Yorker has asked some connoisseur friends to inspect his new purchase, a Raffaelle Madonna and child, for which he has just given a fabulous amount of dollars. I was asked for special judgment as an artistic Englishman. Well: the drawing was perfect; but I didn't ...
— My Life as an Author • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... contained scarabs (of which I am no connoisseur); the second some two dozen intaglios, and of these, by the light of my bull's-eye lantern, I examined five or six before sweeping the lot into my bag—Europa and the Bull, Ganymede in the eagle's claw, Agave carrying the head of Pentheus, Icarus with relaxed wing dropping headlong ...
— Corporal Sam and Other Stories • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... just as necessary," pursued the old connoisseur, when Peter was reseated, "it is just as necessary for a gentleman to have a delicate palate for the tints of the vine as it is for him to have a delicate eye for the tints of the palette. Nature bestowed a taste both in art and ...
— Birthright - A Novel • T.S. Stribling
... he retired and sent in a man who requested me to state my business. "You are not the censor," I said, after a glance at him. "Send him out, or I will go to him." Then they decided that I was a connoisseur in censors, and the proper official made his appearance, accompanied by an interpreter, on the strength of the foreign name upon my card. Convinced that the latter would not understand English well, like many Russians who can talk the language fluently enough, I declined his services, ...
— Russian Rambles • Isabel F. Hapgood
... your plan, like that of Coleman and Thornton, in the "Connoisseur," and like that of your relation, Solomon Saunter, in "Literary Leisure," admits Poetry as well as Prose, which one may feed upon alternately, as we eat bread and cheese, I send you a translation, from the German of ...
— Translations of German Poetry in American Magazines 1741-1810 • Edward Ziegler Davis
... bodily heat possible before the long, cold drive. Miss Forrest, unheeding them, remained by the window in the unlighted bedroom. Minutes passed. Hugh Breckenridge had fallen to examining the larger room's eighteenth century features—he was something of a connoisseur in antiques. ...
— The Brown Study • Grace S. Richmond
... turning a heavy ring upon his finger, showing in face and tone that the connoisseur's dogmatism troubled him more than he wished ...
— Denzil Quarrier • George Gissing
... Peyncteyning yn Englande wroten by T. Rowleie 1469 for Mastre Canynge[5] with the suggestion that it might be of service to Mr. Walpole 'in any future edition of his truly entertaining anecdotes of painting.' This drew from the connoisseur one of the politest letters[6] that have been written in English, in which the simple and elegant sentences expressed with a very charming courtesy the interest and curiosity of its author. He gave his correspondent 'a thousand thanks'; 'he would not be sorry ...
— The Rowley Poems • Thomas Chatterton
... two swell boats," Monsieur Dufour repeated gravely, and he examined them closely, commenting on them like a connoisseur. He had been in the habit of rowing in his younger days, he said, and when he had that in his hands—and he went through the action of pulling the oars—he did not care a fig for anybody. He had beaten more than one Englishman formerly at ...
— Selected Writings of Guy de Maupassant • Guy de Maupassant
... that was plainly willing to be unsympathetic; applause came doubtfully and in patches, till she gained a hold of them and made herself their master by main force of personality. Monsieur Vaucher, the manager, was still a connoisseur of art. Years of feeling the public pulse through the box-office had not stripped him of a certain shrewd perception of what was fine and what was mean in drama; and he chuckled and wagged his head in the ...
— The Second Class Passenger • Perceval Gibbon
... except to indicate an indescribable noise before the rising of the curtain. Nobody had heard of Weber and Beethoven, and Mozart, dead more than a score of years, was mentioned by a well-known musical connoisseur as a young man of great promise! Such surroundings as these were a species of purgatory to Berlioz, against whose bounds he fretted and raged without intermission. The director's receptions were signalized by ...
— Great Italian and French Composers • George T. Ferris
... be a connoisseur of antiques," he said. "Your dagger is certainly a collector's gem, and your revolver is equally out of date. I recommend an automatic the next time you contemplate ...
— The Dark Star • Robert W. Chambers
... what he liked from the wine card. I looked for a courteous refusal, accompanied by some such gallant speech as, that he would drink to the ladies only with his eyes; but nothing of the kind happened. He searched the list for a moment with the absorption of a connoisseur, then unblushingly ordered a bottle of Romanee Conti, which wine, he carelessly announced, he preferred to champagne, as being "less obvious." The price, however, would be pretty obvious on Mrs. Kidder's bill, I reflected; seventy francs a bottle, if it were a ...
— My Friend the Chauffeur • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... almost entirely forgotten the original cause of the turmoil, and now took a pleasing interest in proving to the young man that he was intoxicated—a great disgrace for an honorable painter. The stout, smiling gentleman from the arbor, who was—as I afterward learned—a great connoisseur and patron of Art, and who was always ready to lend his aid for the love of Science, had thrown aside his baton, and showed his broad face, fairly shining with good humor, in the midst of the thickest confusion, zealously striving ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries: - Masterpieces of German Literature Translated into English, Volume 5. • Various
... quality of liqueur with which the wines have been dosed. Out of some fifty samples of all ages and varieties which in my capacity of juror I tasted at the Paris Exhibition I cannot call to mind one that a real connoisseur of sparkling wines would care to admit ...
— Facts About Champagne and Other Sparkling Wines • Henry Vizetelly
... Carnival, which was now expiring. The Marchese Lamberto, who, among many other avocations and occupations, all of them contributing in some way or other to the welfare and advantage of his native city, was a great lover and connoisseur of music, and patron of the theatre, had been mainly instrumental in bringing La Lalli to Ravenna. The engagement had been a most successful one. The "Diva Bianca" had sung through the Carnival, charming all ears and hearts ...
— A Siren • Thomas Adolphus Trollope
... is nothing low in a boor's head by Guido. What makes the difference between the two? The absence or presence of the Ideal! But every one can judge of the merit of the first, for it is of the Familiar school; it requires a connoisseur to see the merit of the last, for it is ...
— The Last Of The Barons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... German, Russian, French, and Latin, one of the first Hebrew writers to become thoroughly acquainted with Russian literature. He devoted much time to the study of Hebrew philology and grammar, and he was justly reputed a distinguished connoisseur of the language. Both his linguistic researches and his new linguistic formations ...
— The Renascence of Hebrew Literature (1743-1885) • Nahum Slouschz
... represented by any of the works of Rossini, Bellini, Donizetti, or of Verdi himself when he was the popular idol. Was it a French opera? A German opera? A lyric drama in the Wagnerian manner? To the connoisseur, if not to the idle prattler about music, each of these designations suggests a distinct idea—a form, a style, a manner. Which of them might with most propriety be applied to this work? The circumstance that the book was ...
— Chapters of Opera • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... revelation, in the glow and freshness and power of her just developed womanly charms. He was glad he had found her in that picturesque spot, graceful attitude, and partaking largely and richly of the glorification of nature. He was glad that Bryant Clinton, the greatest connoisseur in female beauty he had ever seen, should meet her for the first time under circumstances of peculiar personal advantage. He thought, too, there was more than her wonted cordiality in her greeting, and that her cheek grew warm under his hearty, ...
— Helen and Arthur - or, Miss Thusa's Spinning Wheel • Caroline Lee Hentz
... to the size of page; (4) according to the binding material; or (5) according to the color of the binding. Each of these may be useful classifications for some purpose. For the student of literature none is of value except the first; for the connoisseur in bindings, only the last three. A classification of animals including classes of land animals and water animals would hardly suit a student of zoology, as it would associate with the shad and perch such differently ...
— The Classification of Patents • United States Patent Office
... made a strong impression on Kuragin. At supper after the opera he described to Dolokhov with the air of a connoisseur the attractions of her arms, shoulders, feet, and hair and expressed his intention of making love to her. Anatole had no notion and was incapable of considering what might come of such love-making, as he never had any notion of the outcome of any of ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... was bombarded with eager questions as soon as she arrived. Miss Reade's home was a dream of a place, it appeared. The house was just covered with ivy and there was a most delightful old garden—"and," added the Story Girl, with the joy of a connoisseur who has found a rare gem, "the sweetest little story connected with it. And I saw the hero of the ...
— The Golden Road • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... life under the ocean wave?' asked Williams, who was watching Ken's progress with the eye of a connoisseur. ...
— On Land And Sea At The Dardanelles • Thomas Charles Bridges
... that a few years ago graced the walls of Burlington House. The chief attraction during my visit was a copy of Miss Thompson's, "Roll Call," said to be by the artist herself. L4000 was to be given for it on proof of its authenticity, but it did not require the eye of a connoisseur to judge that such proof was not likely to be forthcoming, and so it proved. It is evidently an inferior copy by another hand. The principal residential street is Macquarie Street, which faces the public gardens. Six years ago an Exhibition was held in these ...
— Six Letters From the Colonies • Robert Seaton
... dodged, and with the dangerous iron tried to guard his head from a threatening fist. Mr. Baker ceased grunting for a moment.—"Good! By Jove," murmured appreciatively Mr. Creighton in the tone of a connoisseur.—"Don't tech me," snarled Donkin, backing away.—"Then go. Go faster."—"Don't yer 'it me.... I will pull yer up afore the magistryt.... I'll show yer up." Captain Allistoun made a long stride, and Donkin, turning his back fairly, ran off a little, then stopped and over his ...
— The Nigger Of The "Narcissus" - A Tale Of The Forecastle • Joseph Conrad
... white neckcloth for wattles. He was known in the parish as Mess John, and was full of dignified discourse and excellent taste in the good cheer of the farmers. He was a judge of nowt [cattle], and a connoisseur of black puddings, which he considered to require some Isle of Man brandy to bring ...
— The Lilac Sunbonnet • S.R. Crockett
... and out of reach of the enemy's shot, we had time to take a look at ourselves and realise the extent of our damages. When passing over the same ground a few hours before, the "Juno" presented as pretty a picture as a nautical connoisseur could wish to see, with her hull recently painted, every spar in its place, and adjusted there to a nicety, her rigging in perfect order, and her white sails—the new look just worn off them, and barely stretched ...
— Under the Meteor Flag - Log of a Midshipman during the French Revolutionary War • Harry Collingwood
... Czarewitch had already given L.200 at Newmarket. The announcement was received with renewed cheering. All kings are fond of horses; and the monarch of the most numerous and active cavalry in the world, may be allowed to be a connoisseur in their strength, swiftness, and perseverance, by a superior right. The Emperor can call out 80,000 Cossacks at a sound of his trumpet. He exhibited an evident interest in the races. The horses were saddled before the race in front of the grand stand, and brought up to it after the race, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLV. July, 1844. Vol. LVI. • Various
... Aragon, Upon that Female Paragon So gazed the Prophet's Cam-u-el, that primal Desert Ship. A connoisseur meticulous, He found her that ridiculous He grinned from ear to auricle until ...
— The Book of Humorous Verse • Various
... two maids instead of one. And this, if Harry's salary rose to a hundred and fifty, they thought they might manage. Of course it was a dreary life for him after what he had been accustomed to, but he made the best of it, and really interested himself in Egyptian trade, till he became a connoisseur in gum. His principal recreation was shooting at the Wimbledon butts on Saturday afternoons, he having joined a volunteer corps for that purpose. He had done so at Harton, and was the best shot there. He now had to compete with the best in the ...
— For Fortune and Glory - A Story of the Soudan War • Lewis Hough
... gift of nature, yet admit that it may be helped by exercise. Antonius, in Cicero's books of the Orator, calls it a sort of observation and not an art. But this opinion is not there asserted as truth, but only to keep up the character of Antonius, who was a connoisseur at concealing art. Lysias seems to be of the same opinion, which he defends by saying that the most simple and ignorant people possess a kind of rhetoric when they speak for themselves. They find something like an exordium, they make a narration, they prove, refute, and their prayers and entreaties ...
— The Training of a Public Speaker • Grenville Kleiser
... "the old farm-house where the vendue will take place, is filled with real old furniture; the family that owned the farm have held it for five generations. Mr. Van Styne admits that he is not enough of a connoisseur to judge the actual value of the antiques, but there are some mahogany pieces, and loads of queer old things that his wife would have kept in the attic, or split up for kindlings. As he thinks this is what is now called 'Period Furniture,' he would suggest that we ...
— Polly's Business Venture • Lillian Elizabeth Roy
... adding that Mr. X was an enlightened connoisseur of bronzes and china, and asking me to show ...
— A Set of Six • Joseph Conrad
... Starvation stared them in the face, when it was discovered that Mount Pitt was honeycombed with mutton-bird burrows. They were slain in thousands. "The slaughter and mighty havoc is beyond description," wrote an officer. "They are very fine eating, exceeding fat and firm, and I think (though no connoisseur) as good as any I ever eat." Many people who are not hunger-driven profess to relish young mutton-bird, whose flesh is like neither fish nor fowl, but an oily blend ...
— The Life of Captain Matthew Flinders • Ernest Scott
... upon his dignity. In my opinion, there is nothing more idiotic than always to be imprisoned in one's grandeur; above all, a lofty rank becomes very inconvenient in the transports of amorous ardour. Jupiter, no doubt, is a connoisseur in pleasure, and he knows how to descend from the height of his supreme glory. So that he can enter into everything that pleases him, he entirely casts aside himself, and then it is no longer Jupiter ...
— Amphitryon • Moliere
... first place, it is assumed that morality, too, is a special interest; and that if the artist or connoisseur lets the moralist alone, it is no more {175} than fair that the moralist should let ...
— The Moral Economy • Ralph Barton Perry
... remote resorts, unfrequented by those with means, by travelers, by those who know good music. Ah! he shuddered at the thought of what might happen if, some night, forgetting his surroundings, he should play as he could play in hearing of a connoisseur. Then, certainly, discovery. ...
— The Old Flute-Player - A Romance of To-day • Edward Marshall and Charles T. Dazey
... Musulman, or Half-and-halfs. Thus they would seem to have retained sundry Kafir characteristics; among others that love of wine which is so strong among the Kafirs. The boiling of the wine is noted by Baber (a connoisseur) as the custom of Nijrao, adjoining, if not then included in, Kafir-land; and Elphinstone implies the continuance of the custom when he speaks of the Kafirs as having wine of the consistence of jelly, and very strong. The wine of Kapishi, the Greek Kapisa, immediately south of ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... Carlisle when he began to show his shirt collar; his clattering brogues gave place to silent pumps, his leathern bendy to a fashionable hat, and his coarse grey jacket to a coat with tails. Moreover, he began to bow and smile to the ladies when they entered the shop; he also became quite a connoisseur in teas and confections; he recommended them to them, and he bowed and smiled again as they left. Such was the work of less than two years; and before three went round, there was not a smarter or a better dressed youth in all Carlisle ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Vol. XXIII. • Various
... inspecting the ash of his cigar with the aspect of a connoisseur, and evading my glance, "your position gives you an advantage, but you are trying to make too much use of it. I had the most perfect assurances that the old man would be treated kindly, and I know that ...
— In Direst Peril • David Christie Murray
... carried to the day of his death. If the gazing visitor be a person of abandoned character he makes humourous pretence that the householder has done wisely to turn a key upon these treasures, against the ravishings of the overwhelmed and frenzied connoisseur. He wears the look of one who is gnawed with envy, and he heaves the ...
— The Spenders - A Tale of the Third Generation • Harry Leon Wilson
... whistled softly and muttered: "Whew!" Then he added: "She is a handsome woman." He admired his son's wife, and in his day had considered himself a connoisseur. ...
— Bel Ami • Henri Rene Guy de Maupassant
... called The Connoisseur[1249]. He said it wanted matter.—No doubt it has not the deep thinking of Johnson's writings. But surely it has just views of the surface of life, and a very sprightly manner. His opinion of The World was not much higher ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... drowned valleys, where the normal fluviatile conditions are modified by those characteristic of lakes. The occurrence of sapphires in Zanskar gives the State also an interest to the mineralogist and connoisseur of gem-stones. ...
— The Panjab, North-West Frontier Province, and Kashmir • Sir James McCrone Douie
... and around his rather melancholy eyes were those broad spaces which give genius room to develop as it will. He had black hair, a black moustache, and a chin which bore witness to the family opposition. Rosina, who chanced to be a connoisseur in chins, looked ...
— A Woman's Will • Anne Warner
... the breast of her white embroidered gown she wore a beautiful brooch in the shape of a coronet, and on her finger a ring with one single but very valuable pearl. He was a connoisseur of such things. At last, after watching her for several minutes, he knit his brows, and, putting forward his hard, determined ...
— The White Lie • William Le Queux
... jeopardy from which we had just escaped, and the imminent hazard so lately run, all three of us watched the movements of the frigate with as much satisfaction as a connoisseur would examine a fine painting. Even Neb let several nigger expressions of ...
— Miles Wallingford - Sequel to "Afloat and Ashore" • James Fenimore Cooper
... through it, rubbed the edges between thumb and finger, pinched the stem with his thumb-nail till it broke in half a dozen places, and remarked with enthusiasm, to the Northern man, who stood rubbing and smelling of the sample he held, in awkward imitation of one whom he recognized as a connoisseur: ...
— Bricks Without Straw • Albion W. Tourgee
... accession of William and Mary. Pepys was a man of very wide interests. He was a member of parliament, and became president of the Royal Society. He was an accomplished musician and a keen critic of painting, architecture, and the drama. But it is as a connoisseur of human nature that Pepys is known to-day. The "Diary" extended over the ten years, January, 1659-60, to May, 1669; it closed when he was thirty-seven years old, and he lived thirty-four years afterwards. The manuscript, written in shorthand, fills six volumes, which repose at Magdalene College, ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol X • Various
... addition to his partiality for whistling, Mr. Wisbottle had a great idea of his singing powers. There were two other boarders, besides the gentleman in the back drawing-room—Mr. Alfred Tomkins and Mr. Frederick O'Bleary. Mr. Tomkins was a clerk in a wine-house; he was a connoisseur in paintings, and had a wonderful eye for the picturesque. Mr. O'Bleary was an Irishman, recently imported; he was in a perfectly wild state; and had come over to England to be an apothecary, a clerk in a government office, an actor, a reporter, or anything else that turned up—he ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... common ways of studying old and foreign arts—the way of the connoisseur and the way of the craftsman. The collector may value such arts for their strangeness and scarcity, while the artist finds in them stimulus in his own work and hints ...
— Wood-Block Printing - A Description of the Craft of Woodcutting and Colour Printing Based on the Japanese Practice • F. Morley Fletcher
... upon it unexpectedly in this green dell, at the foot of the precipice, seeing it rise from the water on one side, reflected as in a broken mirror, and draped in young, golden foliage on the other, it really was an ideal castle for a fairy tale. A connoisseur in the best architecture of the Renaissance would perhaps have been ungracious enough to pick faults; for to a critical eye the turrets and arches might fall short of perfection; and there was little decoration ...
— The Motor Maid • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson
... He was a connoisseur of travel-pictures, for all his life he had been planning a great journey. Though he had done Staten Island and patronized an excursion to Bound Brook, neither of these was his grand tour. It was yet to be taken. In Mr. Wrenn, apparently ...
— Our Mr. Wrenn - The Romantic Adventures of a Gentle Man • Sinclair Lewis
... Throckmorton disliked her, and thought her unsuited to Denis Oglethorpe. There was an absence of anything girl-like in her fine, ivory-pale face, somehow, though it was a young face and a handsome face, at whose fine lines and clear contour even a connoisseur could not have caviled. Its long almond-shaped, agate-gray eyes, black-fringed and lustrous as they were, still were silent eyes—they did not speak ...
— Theo - A Sprightly Love Story • Mrs. Frances Hodgson Burnett
... brother Ned, let me ask where you got your connoisseurship upon women? eh? Oh, in the dictionary, I suppose, where the common people say everything is to be found. Observe me, Mr. Burke, you are taking your worthy son out of his proper vocation, the Church. Send him to 'Maynewth,' he is too good a connoisseur on beauty to be ...
— The Emigrants Of Ahadarra - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton
... his style. The deuse take that boy and his picture, Ned! What if we two fools have been playing too roughly with such plastic clay? I wish to-night were come and gone safely. I'll go see Dr. Thorne, and ask him to accompany us to-night. He claims to be something of a connoisseur, and the picture is really worth seeing, if the lad has not spoiled it with his 'final touches'. And anyhow, the boy will be a study for a psychological monomaniac ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 32, June, 1860 • Various
... ten or twelve feet of crashing creaking timber, and then flump on to a lot of rotten, wet debris, with more snakes and centipedes among it than you had any immediate use for, even though you were a collector; but there you had to stay, while Wiki, who was a most critical connoisseur, selected from the surrounding forest a bush-rope that he regarded as the correct remedy for the case, and then up you were hauled, through the sticks you had turned the wrong way on ...
— Travels in West Africa • Mary H. Kingsley
... He beats me at billiards, and Harry at picquet; he's a dead shot at a button, and can drive his curricle-wheels over a brace of sovereigns." "Radicalism," says Caustic, looking round for a laugh. "He is a great amateur of pictures," observed the Exquisite, "and is allowed to be quite a connoisseur in beauty; but there," simpering, "everyone must claim the privilege of judging for themselves." "Upon my word," said Candour, "you allow poor Charles too little. I have no doubt he has great courage—though, to be sure, there was a whisper that young Hawthorn ...
— English Satires • Various
... he tilted against a dragon candlestick like a young St. George; he burnt his budding whiskers in an attempt to discover the source of the flame in the wick of the candle. He became, too, a great connoisseur of vases, ornaments, and pictures, sitting before them and examining them for an hour at a time. He was also very much given to voyages of discovery, dark continents having a peculiar fascination for him. Even the lion's mouth had no terror for him. I once produced him from the interior ...
— The Junior Classics Volume 8 - Animal and Nature Stories • Selected and arranged by William Patten
... Umanojo, pronounced it to be the work of Shidzu Kanenji; and as they could not agree, but each maintained his opinion, their lord sent for a famous connoisseur to decide the point; and the sword proved, as Sanza had said, to be a genuine Muramasa. Sanza was delighted at the verdict; but the other two went home rather crestfallen. Umanojo, although he had been worsted in the argument, bore no malice nor ill-will in his heart; but Banzayemon, ...
— Tales of Old Japan • Algernon Bertram Freeman-Mitford
... presume, while the old ladies were occupied with lunch, sampled the cans of soup that stood in rows along the floor. He used to come along with dripping whiskers which betrayed his excursion, and the look of a connoisseur in his large round eyes—as if he were certifying that justice had been done ...
— A Labrador Doctor - The Autobiography of Wilfred Thomason Grenfell • Wilfred Thomason Grenfell
... going by means of a manager. Even in that light it was a handsome old shop. The walls were lined with polished oak, so was the low ceiling, and there was an oak staircase leading from one storey to another which a connoisseur in staircases might have coveted. "Robinson's" was a positive feature in Redcross, and if it had been anything else than a good shop of its kind would have been greatly admired. The son of the founder of the shop was ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Sarah Tytler
... It is never applied except to a particular and exceedingly rare sort of pottery," went on the connoisseur. "But perhaps you are not familiar ...
— The Secret of a Happy Home (1896) • Marion Harland
... of him, of his figure and his face. Madame Carre-Lamadon, who had known many officers and who judged them as a connoisseur, found that this one was not so bad looking after all; she even regretted that he was not French, because he would have made a very handsome husband with whom all the women ...
— Mademoiselle Fifi • Guy de Maupassant
... you know, he was, like grandpere, a true connoisseur of all those things that belong to the arts of beautiful living. Like grandpere he had that perception by three ways—occupation, education, talent. And he had it so abboundingly because he had also the art—of ...
— The Flower of the Chapdelaines • George W. Cable
... of other people. For formerly I used to take a delight in inquiring, in what vase the crafty Sisyphus might have washed his feet; what was carved in an unworkmanlike manner, and what more roughly cast than it ought to be; being a connoisseur, I offered a hundred thousand sesterces for such a statue; I was the only man who knew how to purchase gardens and fine seats to the best advantage: whence the crowded ways gave me the surname of Mercurial. I know ...
— The Works of Horace • Horace
... Myrtella Flathers considered herself a connoisseur was murder. In sundry third floors back, she had for years followed the current casualties with burning interest. Realism, romance, intrigue, adventure, she found them all, in these grim recitals of ...
— A Romance of Billy-Goat Hill • Alice Hegan Rice
... gave the rower fairly to the tribune's view—erect, and, like all his fellows, naked, except a cincture about the loins. There were, however, some points in his favor. He was very young, not more than twenty. Furthermore, Arrius was not merely given to dice; he was a connoisseur of men physically, and when ashore indulged a habit of visiting the gymnasia to see and admire the most famous athletae. From some professor, doubtless, he had caught the idea that strength was as much of the quality as the quantity of the muscle, while superiority ...
— Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ • Lew Wallace
... Connoisseur, Collector. By BYRON WEBBER. Illustrated with nearly 100 Photogravure Plates and a number of Drawings in half-tone. Two Vols., small folio, buckram ...
— Chatto & Windus Alphabetical Catalogue of Books in Fiction and General Literature, Sept. 1905 • Various
... this was quite impossible, and the day was to be fixed after reference to the Abbess. Meantime the King's eye was caught by the illuminated breviary. He was a connoisseur in such arts, and eagerly stood up to look at it as it lay on the desk. Eleanor could not but come and direct him to the pages with which she had been most delighted. She found him looking at Jacob's dream on the one side, the ...
— Two Penniless Princesses • Charlotte M. Yonge
... girl, rather a blue-stocking, face rather intelligent than pretty, but Montague won't care for that—excuse the old joke, but it is the figure Monte is after. He hasn't any manners, but he's not a bad sort of a fellow, generally good-natured, immensely pleased with New York, and an enthusiastic connoisseur in ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... on the walls or lay on brackets and tables, but no books such as our modern time produces were to be seen; only tied- up bundles of papyri and curious little tablets of clay inscribed with mysterious hieroglyphs. Flowers adorned every corner—many of them strange blossoms which a connoisseur would have declared to be unknown in Egypt,—palms and ferns and foliage of every description were banked up against the walls in graceful profusion, and from the latticed windows the light filtered through colored squares, giving a ...
— Ziska - The Problem of a Wicked Soul • Marie Corelli
... belong to that very rare kind to be met with only in royal treasuries," said the jeweller. "They are antique, and look like sparkling blood. Their value is immense, your majesty; only a connoisseur would be able to appreciate them, and it is difficult to appraise them but by the standard value of other Turkish rubies. A jeweller might, however, receive twice as much as I name—four thousand dollars, according to the ...
— Napoleon and the Queen of Prussia • L. Muhlbach
... tapestry design is as striking and suggestive as the colors themselves. When musical taste has passed from a sentimental intoxication with the sensuous beauty of the sounds themselves, the beauty we admire is primarily beauty of form or structure. The musical connoisseur likes to trace the recurrence of a theme in a symphony, its deviations and disappearances, its distribution in the various choirs of wood-wind, brass, and strings, its interweaving with other themes, its resilient, surprising, ...
— Human Traits and their Social Significance • Irwin Edman
... the knowledge and the power of a scenery hunter may be often seen illustrated in the fields of art. How common is the old sapless connoisseur in pictures, who retains his learned eye and his distinguished skill, but whose sensibilities are as dry as summer dust to the interests of the art. On the other hand, daily you see young people whose hearts and souls are in the forests and the hills, ...
— Theological Essays and Other Papers v2 • Thomas de Quincey
... overseer of the Baroness's parties in the Rue Murillo, did not confess himself inferior to any one as an epicure. He would taste the wines, with the air of a connoisseur, holding his glass up to the light, while the liquor caressed his palate, and shutting his eyes as if more thoroughly to decide ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... both in its general appearance, and perhaps in part of its actual self, a genuine relic of mediaeval London. There, till within a very few years from the present date, might still be had a draught of that London ale of which Chaucer's "Cook" was so thorough a connoisseur; and there within the big courtyard, surrounded by a gallery very probably a copy of its ...
— Chaucer • Adolphus William Ward
... adopting artificial means for drowning the pangs of separation. I glanced round the deck and took a running inventory of my compagnons de voyage. They presented the usual types met with upon these occasions. There was no striking face among them. I speak as a connoisseur, for faces are a specialty of mine. I pounce upon a characteristic feature as a botanist does on a flower, and bear it away with me to analyse at my leisure, and classify and label it in my little anthropological museum. There was nothing worthy of me here. Twenty types ...
— The Captain of the Pole-Star and Other Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... book for one franc twenty-five centimes, Monsieur," replied Coccoz, whose face at once beamed with joy. "It is historical; and you will be pleased with it. I know now just what suits you. I see that you are a connoisseur. To-morrow I will bring you the Crimes des Papes. It is a good book. I will bring you the edition ...
— The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard • Anatole France
... the hands that had held his throat slipped down around his shoulders, or he would have fallen. The man's eyes opened and closed again, and he swayed weakly backward and forward, and choked as if his throat were dry and burning. Even to such a hardened connoisseur in crime as Gallegher, who stood closely by, drinking it in, there was something so abject in the man's terror that he regarded him with what was almost a touch ...
— Short Stories for English Courses • Various (Rosa M. R. Mikels ed.)
... saucers—gold inside, with a view of a town outside, and surrounding them, 'A Present from Clacton-on-Sea,' or, alliteratively, 'A Memento of Margate.' Of these many were broken, but they had been mended with glue, and it is well known that pottery in the eyes of the connoisseur loses none of its value by a crack or two. Then there were portraits innumerable—little yellow cartes-de-visite in velvet frames, some of which were decorated with shells; they showed strange people with old-fashioned clothes, the women with bodices ...
— Liza of Lambeth • W. Somerset Maugham
... approaching down the long stairway with the appreciation of a connoisseur. Beside her moved a slender sprite of a girl, whose hair gleamed like spun gold above a dress of apple-green. But his glance for her was merely cursory, and returned at once to the older woman. Of this Jemima ...
— Kildares of Storm • Eleanor Mercein Kelly
... dinners which later became so famous. Among his early friends were Diderot, Rousseau and Grimm. With them he took the side of the Italian Opera buffa in the famous musical quarrel of 1752, and published two witty brochures ridiculing French music. [12:9] He was an art connoisseur and bought Oudry's Chienne allaitant ses petits, the chef d'oeuvre of the Salon of 1753. [12:10] During these years he was hard at work at his chosen sciences of chemistry and mineralogy. In 1752 he published in a huge volume in ...
— Baron d'Holbach - A Study of Eighteenth Century Radicalism in France • Max Pearson Cushing
... another bottle of that wine," called the bartender, from the other side of the table, "those bottles don't hold nothin' anyway, and a woman who can't empty more'n one of 'em ain't much," and a second bottle was handed the female dispenser of grog, a connoisseur of long standing, and one who could "stand up" under as much as the next person. By this time the woman opposite her was considerably along the road to hilarity, and shouts and laughter came from both, called forth by the jests of ...
— A Woman who went to Alaska • May Kellogg Sullivan
... the service with more willingness than to the northward. The river meandered through a mountainous and barren country, rich only in picturesque beauty which, though pleasing to the eye of the artist and the connoisseur, has less charms for the philosopher, who finds more real beauties to exist in a soil, however tame and uniform, that can be rendered subservient to ...
— Travels in China, Containing Descriptions, Observations, and Comparisons, Made and Collected in the Course of a Short Residence at the Imperial Palace of Yuen-Min-Yuen, and on a Subsequent Journey thr • John Barrow
... her kerchief a rather large field glass in a copper setting, covered with morocco, yellow with age. David, as a connoisseur of all sorts of instruments, seized ...
— Knock, Knock, Knock and Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... it was cut from the frame one dark, foggy night in London, sealed up in the false bottom of a trunk and brought to New York. Here it lay for more than twenty years, when Colonel Patricius Sheedy, connoisseur and critic, arranged for its delivery to the heirs of the original owners on payment of some such trifle as twenty-five thousand dollars. This superb picture, with its romantic past, was not destined to traverse the Atlantic again; for thanks to the generosity of J. Pierpont Morgan, ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 6 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Artists • Elbert Hubbard
... graven with needle-gravers on the eye-corners it would be a warning to whoso would be warned and a matter of thought to whoso would think. Learn, O Commander of the Faithful, that my father was a jeweller man, a connoisseur in gems, who owned no son save myself; but when I had increased in age and had grown in stature and Allah had given me comeliness and perfection and beauty and brilliancy and plenty and good fortune, and my sire had brought me up with the best of education, Allah ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... certainly been no great enthusiasm at Calais. He did not think there had been any cries for Boulanger, but there was no emotion. This he explained by telling me that the people had not been properly 'style.' 'In these cases, you know,' he said with the air of a connoisseur in enthusiasm, 'you must have a ...
— France and the Republic - A Record of Things Seen and Learned in the French Provinces - During the 'Centennial' Year 1889 • William Henry Hurlbert
... the absence of certain little tricks and get no glimmer of what Katie vaguely called the essence. Might not Mrs. Prescott find the reality in the possibilities? "It comes to this," Katie suddenly saw, "I'm not shamming, I'm revealing. I'm not vulgarly imitating; I'm restoring. The connoisseur should be the ...
— The Visioning • Susan Glaspell
... handling some rare snuff-box or Tanagra statuette and, though unacquainted with that particular branch of art, yet straightway classes it correctly as to its merits, so, to him, an idea of whatever kind is an objet de vertu, to be appraised with unfailing accuracy. He is a connoisseur of abstractions. What the Goth carves out grotesquely after a painful labour of mental elimination, the right deposited, as residue, after a thousand wrongs—what the Latin smothers under a deluge of mere words: this your Frenchman ...
— Fountains In The Sand - Rambles Among The Oases Of Tunisia • Norman Douglas
... the victory is gained. A taste is unconsciously formed for the qualities necessary to the next development of art—qualities which Blake in his garret, Millet without the sou, set down in immortal work. At last, when the time is ripe, some connoisseur sees the picture, blows the dust from the book, and straightway blazons his discovery. Mr. Swinburne, so to speak, blew the dust from 'Wuthering Heights'; and now it keeps its proper rank in the shelf where Coleridge ...
— Emily Bront • A. Mary F. (Agnes Mary Frances) Robinson
... that most that was best in the history of architecture in France was epitomized in the monuments of Arles. To the connoisseur in America, Arles is well-known. I remember many years ago their pointing out to me the portal of Trinity Church in Boston, saying it was inspired from a church called St. Trophime in a town called Arles in France. The architect of that church, Richardson, our greatest ...
— A Journey Through France in War Time • Joseph G. Butler, Jr.
... vendange; this was done in April or in May, when the vintage was received at headquarters. Ropiness was cured by repeated rackings and by brandying, eight gallons per pipe being the normal ratio. That distinguished connoisseur found in an old malmsey of 1859 all the aroma and lusciousness of a good liqueur; the 'London particular' of 1865 tasted remarkably soft, with a superior nose; an 1871-72, made for the Russian market, had an oily richness with ...
— To the Gold Coast for Gold - A Personal Narrative in Two Volumes.—Vol. I • Richard F. Burton
... "handling," and that no man could impose a copy upon me for an original. "And can it be possible," cried I aloud, "that while picture-dealers revel in fortune—fellows whose traffic goes no higher than coloured canvass—that I, the connoisseur of humanity, the moral toxicologist—I, who read men as I read a French comedy—that I should be obliged to deny myself the generous claret my doctor thinks essential to my system, and that repose and change of scene he deems of more consequence ...
— Cornelius O'Dowd Upon Men And Women And Other Things In General - Originally Published In Blackwood's Magazine - 1864 • Charles Lever
... treasures, the Lares and Penates of the little stone rose-covered cottage "at hame awa' ayont the sea." On the mantel a solid hewn log of oak, a miracle of broad-axe work, were "bits o' chiny" rarely valuable as antiques to the knowing connoisseur but beyond price to the old white-haired lady who daily dusted them with reverent care as having been borne by her mother from the Highland home in the far north country when as a bride she came by the "cadger's cairt" to her new home in the lonely city of Glasgow. ...
— To Him That Hath - A Novel Of The West Of Today • Ralph Connor
... I wear, though I have no more than the first four orders, your worship is one of the most famous knights-errant that have ever been, or will be, all the world over. A blessing on Cide Hamete Benengeli, who has written the history of your great deeds, and a double blessing on that connoisseur who took the trouble of having it translated out of the Arabic into our Castilian vulgar tongue for the ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... was boldly conceived and well executed, considering the difficulties under which he labored: the subject was Phaeton driving the chariot of the sun. It was shown to the clergyman of the village, a man of great taste, and a connoisseur in painting. He was so much pleased with it that he became the warm friend of the young artist, and, as far as circumstances permitted, his instructor in literature and painting. The younger brother inherited his father's taste for music, and was ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 3, July, 1851 • Various
... The millionaire connoisseur consulted his watch. "Lith will be at the museum until six, at least. Yes, we can catch him there. I have a dinner engagement at seven myself. I can give you half an hour of the time before then. If you're ready, just jump into the car, both ...
— The Dream Doctor • Arthur B. Reeve
... Avenue, saluting those who passed him with absent-minded courtesy. At length he raised his eyes and looked up the hill to the long, low roof against the cloudless sky. For the thousandth time his eyes kindled at the sight, for the thousandth time he experienced the artistic satisfaction of the connoisseur in collegiate architecture, and mentally limned the remainder of the plan. His sensations were like those of a skilled musician who has heard the first movement of a masterly sonata and is left to imagine the perfect whole. The sun, now mounting toward ...
— The Mayor of Warwick • Herbert M. Hopkins
... near him in dignified adoration,—brothers, but not peers. A cloud of more ecstatic seraphs floats behind the Father. At the feet of the Son is the Holy Ghost, the Heavenly Dove. In the description, by a connoisseur, of this picture, read to me while I was looking at it, it is spoken of as in Raphael's first manner, cold, hard, trammeled. But to me how did that face proclaim the Infinite Love! His head is bent back, as if seeking ...
— Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli, Vol. I • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... a breed that would have puzzled a connoisseur, gave themselves the rousing shake, and, deserting the luxurious hearth, came in various welcome ...
— The Disowned, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... 6. ——- "I am ignorant of that art in which you are said to excel". This modest confession did not prevent Goldsmith from making fun of the contemporary connoisseur. See the letter from the young virtuoso in 'The Citizen of the World', 1762, i. 145, announcing that a famous 'torse' has been discovered to be not 'a Cleopatra bathing' but 'a Hercules spinning'; and Charles ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Oliver Goldsmith • Oliver Goldsmith
... Another salesman entered the room with bows, and keys were produced, and the two salesmen between them swung back the majestic dark green doors of the safe. In another minute various pearl necklaces were lying on the table. The spectacle would have dazzled a connoisseur in pearls; but Mr. Prohack was not a connoisseur; he was not even interested in pearls, and saw on the table naught but a monotonous array of pleasing gewgaws, to his eye differing one from another only in size. He was, however, actuated by a high ...
— Mr. Prohack • E. Arnold Bennett
... name is all. From Garrick's breath a puff Of praise gave immortality to snuff; Since which each connoisseur a transient heaven Finds in each ...
— Highways & Byways in Sussex • E.V. Lucas
... of eminent attainments in life, he seemed born to have acquired them. He understood so perfectly how to make both himself and others forget and keep at a distance the seamy side of life, with all its petty troubles and vicissitudes, that it was impossible not to envy him. He was a connoisseur in everything which could give ease and pleasure, as well as knew how to make use of such knowledge. Likewise he prided himself on the brilliant connections which he had formed through my mother's family or through friends of his youth, and was secretly jealous of any one ...
— Childhood • Leo Tolstoy
... eating, and I cannot be expected to touch what is repulsive." The middle brother, when he heard this speech of his, said to his brother, "Then I am a more fastidious person than you, for I am a most fastidious connoisseur of the fair sex." When the middle one said this, the eldest went on to say, "Then let the younger of you two take the turtle." Then the youngest brother frowned, and in his turn said to the two elder, "You fools, I am very fastidious about ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... 32-55 of this book will be drawn upon for the ensuing details of Jackson's career), M. Annison, Director of the Imprimerie Royale, for whom Jackson produced many cuts, introduced him to Count de Caylus, collector, connoisseur, etcher, and the leading spirit in French engraving at the time. De Caylus had, in 1725, undertaken to direct the reproduction of drawings and paintings in the best French collections.[21] Pierre Crozat, the famous collector, sponsored ...
— John Baptist Jackson - 18th-Century Master of the Color Woodcut • Jacob Kainen
... blew his nose. Meanwhile the box went round the table; Padre Ricardo took a huge pinch with his dirty fingers, and feasted his eyes upon the precious lid. The doctor scarcely gave the elegant bawble a glance as he helped himself. The Don, however, examined it with the eye of a connoisseur, and not only that, but he threw a spark at the captain's flashy waistcoat, and thought he detected some other article in the capacious pockets vice the handkerchief. Perhaps he may have been mistaken and perhaps not, though he was so very suspicious an old villain that ...
— Captain Brand of the "Centipede" • H. A. (Henry Augustus) Wise
... Falmouth Scheme—with very large promises. I was then living at W——, when one day, just before I was going to sit down to dinner, a chaise stops at my door, out steps a very "smart man," and is ushered into my library. When I went into the room, he was examining, quite in a connoisseur attitude, Eusebius, a picture; he was very fond of pictures, he said; had a small but choice collection of his own, and I won't say that he did not speak of the Correggiosity of Correggio. I was upon the point of interrupting him, with the intimation that I did not ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 366, April, 1846 • Various
... in the least a prig, was something of a connoisseur in the details of dress, had delighted to adorn his bride with everything which could enhance her beauty, and Bessie wore her plumage well, and there was a most striking contrast between the girl of fifteen, who, in her washed linen gown and faded ribbons, had once stood up in ...
— Bessie's Fortune - A Novel • Mary J. Holmes
... driving storm came on. Tying our horses to the horns of the victims, Henry began the bloody work of dissection, slashing away with the science of a connoisseur, while I vainly endeavored to imitate him. Old Hendrick recoiled with horror and indignation when I endeavored to tie the meat to the strings of raw hide, always carried for this purpose, dangling at the back of the saddle. After some difficulty ...
— The Oregon Trail • Francis Parkman, Jr. |
