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Good form

noun
1.
Behavior that conforms to social conventions of the time.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Good form" Quotes from Famous Books



... fool. He had thought a good deal about the lonely life she and her father led. Many men came into this country three jumps ahead of the law. It was not good form to ask where any one came from unless he volunteered information about antecedent conditions. Was it possible that Jake Houck had something on Tolliver, that he was using his knowledge to force June into a marriage with him? Otherwise ...
— The Fighting Edge • William MacLeod Raine

... Rome; with them the idea of law has not been disengaged from that of morals or propriety; so that tapu has to cover the whole field, and implies indifferently that an act is criminal, immoral, against sound public policy, unbecoming or (as we say) "not in good form." Many tapus were in consequence absurd enough, such as those which deleted words out of the language, and particularly those which related to women, Tapu encircled women upon all hands. Many things were forbidden to men; to women we may say that few were permitted. They must not sit on ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 18 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... upon the side that related him to social custom and usage,—to the many fictions, concealments, make-believes, and subterfuges of the world of parlors and drawing-rooms. He never was an adept in what is called "good form;" the natural man that he was shows crude in certain relations. His publication of Emerson's letter with its magnificent eulogium of "Leaves of Grass" has been much commented upon. There may be two opinions as to the propriety ...
— Whitman - A Study • John Burroughs

... hands agree not with the warlike spear. Men handle those; all manly hopes resign, Thy mistress' ensigns must be likewise thine. 10 Please her—her hate makes others thee abhor; If she discards thee, what use serv'st thou for? Good form there is, years apt to play together: Unmeet is beauty without use to wither. She may deceive thee, though thou her protect; What two determine never wants effect. Our prayers move thee to assist our drift, While thou hast time yet to ...
— The Works of Christopher Marlowe, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Christopher Marlowe

... the following day he preached a simple, plain, straightforward sermon on Christian morals. Both these utterances impressed me and strengthened my conviction that every thinking young man and woman ought to maintain relations with some good form of religious organization just as long ...
— Autobiography of Andrew Dickson White Volume II • Andrew Dickson White

... have dared. But that makes no difference to Marcia. I was there. You told her. Don't you know, Jerry, that it isn't good form ...
— Paradise Garden - The Satirical Narrative of a Great Experiment • George Gibbs

... in God—vaguely. That is, it had always been a matter of good form with him to go to church and to call for the offices of religion on occasions of death or marriage. He had assisted at the saying of prayers and assented to their contents. He had even joined in them himself, since a liturgical ...
— The Street Called Straight • Basil King

... Southern lady, and therefore I need not remind you that it is not considered good form to treat even the slaves of those one does not like uncivilly, and I must, therefore, ask you to keep your active animosity ...
— Clarence • Bret Harte

... Alan to win both matches; at the same time she was glad Mr. Hallam's horses showed such good form. She was quite willing to accept his excuse that they would have done better had they been thoroughly acclimatized. There was, however, little time to think over these things; all attention was concentrated on the ...
— The Rider in Khaki - A Novel • Nat Gould

... strong than to have liberty upon a right footing, and our legal constitution firmly preserved. A nation may be as well called free under a limited kingship as in a commonwealth, and it is to this good form of our government that we partly owe that doubling of the people which has probably happened here in the 435 years last past. And if the ambition of some, and the mercenary temper of others, should bring us at any time to alter our constitution, and to give up our ancient rights, we shall ...
— Essays on Mankind and Political Arithmetic • Sir William Petty

... for the right side may be followed lying on the left side. This is important to learn as the pupil should swim equally well on either side. It will also help him to acquire good form. Arm Strokes. Movement I.—Draw the right arm forward close to the chest, palm out, elbow at the side. Movement II.—Extend the right arm forward as far as possible, keeping the hand about six inches below the surface. Movement III.—Sweep the right arm sharply down to the right ...
— Swimming Scientifically Taught - A Practical Manual for Young and Old • Frank Eugen Dalton and Louis C. Dalton

... with an impatient gesture. "Such a nuisance about this bad news. Erskine seems disgusted with the whole affair. He has gone off with Major Carew to see what can be done, and is to go straight to the Willoughbys. So tiresome, for I particularly wanted him to be in good form this afternoon! What's it all about? As it has happened in my house, I think I am entitled to an explanation. Something to do with Major Carew's servant? How can your friend be associated with a servant? The man has bolted, it appears. ...
— The Independence of Claire • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey

... word to describe the writings of Lorenzo Dow—Miscellanies. Anything whatsoever that came to the evangelist's mind was set down, not always with good form, though frequently with witty and forceful expression. Here are "Hints to the Public, or Thoughts on the Fulfilment of Prophecy in 1811"; "A Journey from Babylon to Jerusalem," with a good deal of sophomoric ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Vol. I. Jan. 1916 • Various

... M. Martin, a banker of my acquaintance, who would be his surety. I could make no objection to this, and the agreement was made out in duplicate in good form. ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt

... mounted very accurately in a thin cylindrical wooden handle about 5 inches long by one-quarter of an inch diameter, or, better still, a bit of pinion wire 6 inches long, of which 1.5 inches are turned down as far as the cylindrical core, An old dentists' chisel or filling tool is also a very good form of instrument. ...
— On Laboratory Arts • Richard Threlfall

... lips. So I wasn't surprised, as perhaps an outsider will be, when Mr. Sewall didn't raise his hat, excuse himself, and leave me alone on the rustic seat, as he should have done according to all rules of good form and etiquette. Instead he remarked, "I beg your pardon, but haven't I met ...
— The Fifth Wheel - A Novel • Olive Higgins Prouty

... eyebrows. His hair came to an odd point at the middle of his forehead, where he divided it, and his chin was faintly and attractively cleft. He had a soft voice, a quiet, conservative manner, and both in and out of this brokerage and trading world was controlled by good form. Cowperwood wondered at first why Rivers should work for Tighe—he appeared almost as able—but afterward learned that he was in the company. Tighe was the organizer and general hand-shaker, Rivers the floor and ...
— The Financier • Theodore Dreiser

... bustle about the little homestead on that eventful Tuesday afternoon. Two very steady old horses were saddled, one for me and the other for one of the "new chums," who was not supposed to be in good form for a long walk, owing to a weak knee. Everything which we thought we could possibly want was heaped on and around us after we had mounted; the rest of the gentlemen, four in number, walked, and we reached the first stage of our expedition in about an hour. Here we dismounted, as the horses could ...
— Station Life in New Zealand • Lady Barker

... the repairs of the roads. But it must be allowed that the art of constructing a good and firm road was ill understood, and worse attended to; and when, in the beginning of the last century, turnpike roads were first made, it was imagined that the only good form was that of a ridge and furrow lying across the road on the line of its direction. Turnpike gates were also in many places considered as such impositions that even in the beginning of the reign of George the second, some persons contested the payment, several were frequently seen together, especially ...
— A Walk through Leicester - being a Guide to Strangers • Susanna Watts

... himself against the bill; for, as he has said, the "respectable people" and the "business men" whom he knew did not believe in such intrusions upon the right even of workingmen to do what they would with their own. The laissez faire doctrine of economic life was good form in those days. ...
— Theodore Roosevelt and His Times - A Chronicle of the Progressive Movement; Volume 47 in The - Chronicles Of America Series • Harold Howland

... girls are in good form this year," said Rachel Hunter, who had a cousin at a school at the other side of Stedburgh. "Nell ...
— The Youngest Girl in the Fifth - A School Story • Angela Brazil

... four days' rest before being presented with problem 2. He was occasionally fed in the apparatus, but regular continuation of training was not necessary to keep him in good form. During this rest interval, locks were attached to the doors of the apparatus so that the experimenter by moving a lever directly in front of him could fasten either one or both of the doors of a given ...
— The Mental Life of Monkeys and Apes - A Study of Ideational Behavior • Robert M. Yerkes

... is necessary also that one apply it in contradiction of the thesis. And when I answer someone by denying some premiss, in order to compel him to prove it, or some conclusion, to compel him to put it in good form, it cannot be said that I answer nothing or that I answer nothing intelligible. For as it is the doubtful premiss of the adversary that I deny, my denial will be [116] as intelligible as his affirmation. ...
— Theodicy - Essays on the Goodness of God, the Freedom of Man and the Origin of Evil • G. W. Leibniz

... enthusiasm for the profession of arms, the great air of indolence with which over-work was concealed in the other fashionable professions. As a matter of fact these beautiful priests in the temple of "good form" were splendid stoics. They would lay it down that as long as correctness of attitude was maintained ...
— George Du Maurier, the Satirist of the Victorians • T. Martin Wood

... finds a new sort of fitness demanded of him, executive, thorough- going, careful of details, full of drudgery and obedience to orders. Everybody is ahead of him. Just now he was a senior, at the top of the world he knows and reigned in, a finished product and pattern of good form. Of a sudden he is a novice again, as green as in his first school year, studying a thing that seems to have no rules—at sea amid crosswinds, and a bit seasick withal. Presently, if he be made of stuff that will shake into shape and fitness, ...
— When a Man Comes to Himself • Woodrow Wilson

... would have fainted. In the "citizen's class," such and such a sub-class, according to Pennewip, is found a certain scantiness that does not obtain in the common laboring class. In the matter of eating, laborers, who do not invest their money in Geneva, are not troubled so much by "good form" as people who give their ...
— Walter Pieterse - A Story of Holland • Multatuli

... Queen Anne's day. Slowly recovering from the licentious excesses of the Restoration, society at this time was perhaps unmoral rather than immoral. It was quite without ideals, unless indeed the conventions of "good form" may be dignified by that name. It lacked the brilliant enthusiasm of Elizabethan times as well as the religious earnestness of the Puritans and the devotion to patriotic and social ideals which marked ...
— The Rape of the Lock and Other Poems • Alexander Pope

... would not be reckoned good form for the husband to be continually going into the zenana, except at particular hours ...
— The Home and the World • Rabindranath Tagore

... but with delicate consideration for the rights and sentiments of others. The atmosphere of the school interdicts rudeness. There is a quiet dignity, serenity, and intensity, with no abatement of freedom. In this school it is not good form for a boy to be less than a gentleman or for a girl to ...
— The Vitalized School • Francis B. Pearson

... opposition to its head was something of a shock. And yet, if he had given Wren leave to go down town, he had probably done the same kind office by others. It irritated Kennedy more than the most overt act of enmity would have done. It was not good form. It was hitting below the belt. There was, of course, the chance that Wren's story had not been true. But he did not build much on that. He did not yet know his Wren well, and believed that such an audacious lie would be beyond the daring of a fag. But ...
— The Head of Kay's • P. G. Wodehouse

... can talk only with friends, and about which we can jest with no one, that have inspiration in them, that can give us power to follow our ideals and to lay a restraining hand on the brute within us. Fortunately the self-control which manifests itself in heroism, in good form, and in the sportsmanlike spirit is sacred to almost all. To most, a mother's love is sacred. To many, all that is implied in the word religion. To a few, sexual passion and the great manifestations of human genius in poetry, music, painting, sculpture, and architecture. Exactly ...
— Youth and Sex • Mary Scharlieb and F. Arthur Sibly

... only use Britain ever contemplated making of her Navy, should peace continue, was that of a policeman who co-operates with others in watching lest anyone should jostle his neighbor on the maritime highway. He believed in the Sittlichkeit, which we here mean when we speak of "good form." But that was not the faith of his critics in Berlin. They wanted to have Russia, and if possible France also, along with their navies, on the side of Germany. Peace, yes, but peace compelled by fear—a very unwholesome and unstable ...
— Before the War • Viscount Richard Burton Haldane

... The traders march in good form; one flag leads the party, guarded by eight or ten men, while a native carries a box of five hundred cartridges for their use in case of an attack. The porters and baggage follow in single file, soldiers being at intervals to prevent them from running away; in which case ...
— The Albert N'Yanza, Great Basin of the Nile • Sir Samuel White Baker

... 12th has been in my hands several days. Inclosed I send the leave of absence for your brother, in as good form as I think I can safely put it. Without knowing whether he would accept it. I have tendered the collectorship at Portland, Maine, to your other ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln

... practice before the courts his presence ever commanded the utmost respect. Of good form, of handsome and expressive features, and of most gentlemanly and pleasing address, with his great learning and untiring industry, it is not strange that he should have succeeded at the bar ...
— The History of Dartmouth College • Baxter Perry Smith

... several of the large limbs as the 'possum had moved about in the tree for his Christmas dinner. We were guests at the same festive board, and both of us at Nature's invitation. It mattered not that the 'possum had eaten and gone this hour or more. Such is good form in the woods. He was expecting me, so he came early, out of modesty; and, that I too might be entirely at my ease, he departed early, leaving his greetings for me in ...
— Modern Prose And Poetry; For Secondary Schools - Edited With Notes, Study Helps, And Reading Lists • Various

... a porcupine. You might try her with one of those. Tether it in the back yard, and when she is in specially good form turn her out there and let them sport together.—Easy now, Mehit—easy." For Miss Upton's escort had jumped out and she was essaying to ...
— In Apple-Blossom Time - A Fairy-Tale to Date • Clara Louise Burnham

... the night before was wildly praying for this moment. Nearly every man in that crowd was calm, but Bob Brownley was the calmest of them all. It's the Exchange code that at any cost of heart or nerve-tear a man must retain good form until the gong strikes. Then, that he must be as near the uncaged tiger as human mind and body can be made. Only I realised what volcano raged inside my chum's bosom. If any other man of the crowd had ...
— Friday, the Thirteenth • Thomas W. Lawson

... affairs of public interest, morning, noon and night. It seems, though, in America only policemen and people who live in Washington care about politics really, except to get benefits for themselves; and it isn't good form to be too much ...
— Lady Betty Across the Water • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson

... almost all parts of the United States and Canada. Speaking in a general way, the medium and mammoth varieties can be grown at their best between parallels 37 deg. and 49 deg. north latitude. Alfalfa has special adaptation for mountain valleys of the entire West, but it will also grow in good form in parts of all, or nearly all, the other States. Alsike clover grows in about the same areas as the common and mammoth varieties, but it may also be grown further North, owing to its greater hardihood. Crimson clover has ...
— Clovers and How to Grow Them • Thomas Shaw

... three years standing; no children. An amiable good fellow of a husband, fifteen years older than herself, inclined already to be an invalid. No excuse! Yet, in one month from that night, Winton and she were lovers, not only in thought but in deed. A thing so utterly beyond "good form" and his sense of what was honourable and becoming in an officer and gentleman that it was simply never a question of weighing pro and con, the cons had it so completely. And yet from that first evening, he was hers, she his. For each of them the one thought was how to be with ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... hard, and when the bowels are easily acted upon, two, or three, or four pills made of Castile soap will frequently answer the purpose; and if they will, are far better than any other ordinary laxative. The following is a good form. ...
— Searchlights on Health - The Science of Eugenics • B. G. Jefferis and J. L. Nichols

... useless, and most despicable man of his set; yet he could venture to assume haughty airs towards a man whose shoes he was not fit to black, and he could assume those airs on the strength of his slangy impassivity—his "good form." When we remember that this same fictitious indifference characterized the typical grand seigneur of old France, and when we also remember that indifference may be rapidly transformed into insolence, and insolence into cruelty, we may well look grave at the symptoms ...
— The Ethics of Drink and Other Social Questions - Joints In Our Social Armour • James Runciman

... work cannot be overstated. It not only assures knowledge of material but the power to express that knowledge correctly and in good form. ...
— Applied Design for Printers - Typographic Technical Series for Apprentices #43 • Harry Lawrence Gage

... Enoch insisted on toting the camera and the coil of rope. The sun was hot on the plateau and the way very rough. They climbed constantly over ragged boulders, and chaotic rock heaps, or rounded deep fissures that cut the plateau like spider webs. Muscular and in good form as was the trio, frequent rests were necessary. They had one mishap. Na-che, lagging behind, slipped into a fissure. Enoch and Diana blanched at her sudden scream and ran back as she disappeared. Mercifully a great rock had tumbled into the ...
— The Enchanted Canyon • Honore Willsie Morrow

... He was by no means illiterate. His writing is trim, his accounts in good form and correctly figured. But it was more a fashion in that day to spell as pronounced, and his orthography gives us a personal ...
— Dwellers in Arcady - The Story of an Abandoned Farm • Albert Bigelow Paine

... they nearly always have—there'll be parasites as long as there's easy money—old man Metford eats breakfast in evening dress. And she orders the chiffonier to take the guests down to the depot in their Packer. But one thing has gone to her heart. She didn't realize in time that it wasn't good form to be prolific. Now that she knows three is the limit she has sent the other six to the country. But that isn't what I started on. She called up this morning and gave me hell because I said yesterday that she had served ...
— The Cow Puncher • Robert J. C. Stead

... make them say what you wish. No, no divorce for Gilberte. [In a soft, low voice.] Simply a legal separation—that is admissible, at least, and it is good form. Let them separate. I am separated—all fashionable people separate, and everything goes all ...
— A Comedy of Marriage & Other Tales • Guy De Maupassant

... the sentence for him because it is considered good form for natives to hint at possible dissolution of the Anglo-Indian Government. Everybody knows that the British will not govern India forever, but the British—who know it best of all, and work to that end most fervently—are the only ones ...
— King—of the Khyber Rifles • Talbot Mundy

... speaking to me,—as if I were the girl of sixteen and you the woman of forty,—but I hope you won't use it before the aunts and cousins. I shall be sure to lay myself open, but, dear, be careful. It isn't very good form to be too amused with one's mother. Of course there's as much difference in mothers as in girls," Mrs. Valentin acknowledged. "A certain sort of temperament interferes with the profit one ought to get out of one's experience. ...
— A Touch Of Sun And Other Stories • Mary Hallock Foote

... "thrust their paws into his bowels" by prying into his intimacies. To the last he dismissed similar proposals by critics of the highest status with a cavalier bluntness highly surprising to persons who only knew him as the man of punctilious observance and fastidious good form. For the rest, London contained much that was bound by degrees to temper the gloom and assuage the hostility. Florence and Rome could furnish nothing like the circle of men of genius and varied accomplishment, ...
— Robert Browning • C. H. Herford

... it; I had been taking more or less pains with my mode of speech for a dozen years. "Rather too good," said he. "But that's better than making the breaks that aren't regarded as good form." ...
— The Deluge • David Graham Phillips

... generation Jew show there is an almost complete approach to the "American" type in emotional display, in what is known as poise. This third generation Jewish-American has dropped all the mannerisms of excitability in gesture and voice, and his adherence to good form includes that attitude of nonchalant humor ...
— The Foundations of Personality • Abraham Myerson

... complex sentence offers a good form for introducing pertinent, minor details, which are necessary, yet which do not merit inclusion in the general level of the speech. Aided by proper pitch and inflection of the voice, they can be skilfully ...
— Public Speaking • Clarence Stratton

... bad taste here and there—in taste so bad that Mr Arnold himself later cut out the most famous passage of the book, to which accordingly we need here only allude—can be denied by nobody except those persons who hold "good form" to be, as somebody or other puts it, "an insular British delusion of the fifties and sixties." But this excision of his and, I think, some others, besides the "citations and illustrations" which he confesses to having excluded from the popular ...
— Matthew Arnold • George Saintsbury

... protested. "Cathy was awfully tired and not in good form, and I was feeling tip-top. I'd ...
— Judy of York Hill • Ethel Hume Patterson Bennett

... is not considered good form in Roscoe to admit a stranger too eagerly—for a decent interval to elapse. Thanks to aunt Mary's coaching, Annie did not knock again, but stood in pretty decision with her eyes straight before her. A leisurely ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905 • Various

... |or snuffing tobacco to be | |functions of the human system, a |always detrimental to the human| |menace to the home, and their use as|system, an enemy to perfect | |a drink an outrage against society, |health and happiness, and an | |the State and the Nation, I hereby |offense against good form and | |promise to not only abstain from |respectable society, I hereby | |them myself, but to use my influence|express myself against the use | |against their manufacture, sale, and|of this vile poison. I shall | |consumption. |also endeavor to discourage its| ...
— Choice Readings for the Home Circle • Anonymous

... bread, Boston brown or oatmeal bread, white bread and rye bread made into square, deep loaves; in fact, all bread used for sandwiches should be made especially for the purpose, so that the slices may be in good form, and sufficiently large ...
— Sandwiches • Sarah Tyson Heston Rorer

... and his Staff turned up from Mudros. Stopford in very good form. The first thing he did was to deliver himself of a personal message from Lord K. He (Stopford) wrote it down, in the ante-room, the moment he left the presence and I may take it as being as good ...
— Gallipoli Diary, Volume 2 • Ian Hamilton

... have bought some very interesting books in New York, especially by a writer named Hawthorne, but the type and paper are so poor that they are not worth binding." The reason why American publishers do not bring out books in such good form as foreign publishers—is that there is no demand for a first-rate article. Thus do the fine arts languish. When rich young Americans take as much interest in painting and sculpture as they do in foot-ball and yachting, we shall have ...
— The Life and Genius of Nathaniel Hawthorne • Frank Preston Stearns

... ruined in certain parts and threatened to go to ruin in certain others. At Civitavecchia he built many beautiful and magnificent edifices. At Civita Castellana he rebuilt more than a third part of the walls in a good form. At Narni he rebuilt the fortress, enlarging it with good and beautiful walls. At Orvieto he made a great fortress with a most beautiful palace—a work of great cost and no less magnificence. At Spoleto, ...
— Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects - Vol. 3 (of 10), Filarete and Simone to Mantegna • Giorgio Vasari

... rubber poncho-blankets above their overcoats in wet weather, and two "pardners" would make a shelter tent of the pair of waterproofs which had metal eyelets to adapt them to this use. Veterans carefully selected the place for the tent, pitched it in good form, trenched it so that the water would flow off and not run into the tent; then with their bed of cedar boughs, their haversacks and coffee-kettles, they were not worse off than the officers,—better off indeed than their company officers ...
— Military Reminiscences of the Civil War V2 • Jacob Dolson Cox

... great abundance, the adjuncts of ribbon barriers, special electric illuminations, special music, full ritual, ushers, bridesmaids, and millinery. Antonia was chief bridesmaid, and Cornish best man. The severe conformity to vogue, and preservation of good form, were generally attributed to his management. It was a ...
— Aladdin & Co. - A Romance of Yankee Magic • Herbert Quick

... uneducated—this is all the wife; nothing can knock anything into her head. [To his wife] How many times have I told you: if you want to have a party in the evening, call in the musicians, and have things in good form. You can't ...
— Plays • Alexander Ostrovsky

... good fellow, as he drew forth from his pocket a thin roll of manuscript and spread it out before her, that she might see—but it was not discreet for me to continue, neither is it good form to embrace before the old garcon de cafe, who at that moment entered apologetically with the liqueurs—as for myself, I have long since ceased to count in such tender moments of reward, during which I am of no more consequence than ...
— A Village of Vagabonds • F. Berkeley Smith

... poets and essayists, who learned in Tillotson that theology might be compatible with reason and common sense, or in Shaftesbury that an enlightened free-thinker might still be a gentleman and a man of virtue. Among the cultivated and the well-bred it was no more than good form to open the mind to all the tolerant liberalisms of the age; and no one in the colonies lost caste who endeavored, in the manner if not in the substance of his thinking, to achieve the polished urbanity of those Englishmen who made ...
— Beginnings of the American People • Carl Lotus Becker

... word," he says, "I had no idea the St. Vincent was such good form. Floyd has the lucky card everywhere. Is it really true the patent is a success and that there ...
— Floyd Grandon's Honor • Amanda Minnie Douglas

... than among the white people. Yes, madam, the slaves who lived in the family with master and mistress were taught just about the same as their own children. At any rate, they imitated them in all matters; to speak with a low voice, use good English, the niceties of manners, good form and courtesy in ...
— Slave Narratives: Arkansas Narratives - Arkansas Narratives, Part 6 • Works Projects Administration

... "we've had a regular field-day, haven't we? And I'm afraid Lord Fallowfeild bored you atrociously at luncheon. He does talk most admired foolishness half his time, poor old boy. All the same Ludovic shouldn't show him up as he does. It's not good form. I'm afraid Ludovic's getting rather spoilt by London. He's growing altogether too finicking and elaborate. It's a pity. Lady Louisa Barking is a rather exterminating person. Her conversation is magnificently deficient in humour. It is to be hoped Barking is not troubled by lively perceptions ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet

... cannot say. Are Doctors of the carnal or the spiritual? They hold me. So soon as I was given a few ducats these banditti rose to rob me. Polite, they are, these modern sons of Dick Turpin, and clever indeed, for they contrive that you shall be helpless, that you may not in good form resist their calculated, schemed, coordinated blood-drawing. And I had as lief have a Sioux Medicine man dance a one-step round my camp fire, and chant his silly incantation for my curing, as any of these blood pressure, electro-chemical, pill, powder specialists. Give ...
— The Letters of Franklin K. Lane • Franklin K. Lane

... manners he was accustomed to look them coldly over and retort that things had come to a pretty pass when comparatively new people ventured to instruct the oldest of the old settlers as to what was or was not good form. The only person who ever succeeded in bowling him over on this point was Uncle Zib, hitherto referred to as the billionaire member of our family, who, after listening to a long and somewhat supercilious discourse from Adam on the subject of family, turned ...
— The Autobiography of Methuselah • John Kendrick Bangs

... of good quality, containing an active form of diastase, is a good form of relish to take with meals. The diastase promotes starch digestion and makes a good addition to foods of the cereal order. The thick sticky form is the best because the diastase is then in an active condition. ...
— The Healthy Life, Vol. V, Nos. 24-28 - The Independent Health Magazine • Various

... of life. Was this really a malicious jest or a test of his endurance? To what black purpose had belated love sprung up in his heart for this woman of the streets? And to think that once he had fancied that so withering a passion was as much a matter of good form as of cosmic urging! There had been conventions in love—and styles and seasons! One loved purity and youth and freshness. Yes, it had been as easy as that for him. Just as it had been as easy for him to choose a nice and pallid calling ...
— Broken to the Plow • Charles Caldwell Dobie

... said, with promptitude, after the pause which I had learned good form in drinking dictates. Of course, while we drank our beer, which I had paid for, it was incumbent on him to listen to me and to talk to me. And Johnny, like a true host, made the tactful remarks that enabled us to find mutual topics of conversation. And of ...
— John Barleycorn • Jack London

... remaining in the cave was this very kink in the Celebrity's character. There was nothing Bohemian in that character; it yearned after the eminently respectable. Its very eccentricities were within the limits of good form. The Celebrity shunned the biscuits and beer of the literary clubs, and his books were bound for the boudoir. To have it proclaimed in the sensational journals that the hands of this choice being had been locked for grand larceny was a thought too horrible to entertain. His very manservant ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... world we live in, Miss Virginia! Who would have thought of meeting you here?" said Adams, taking her hand at the precise elevation prescribed by good form—Boston good form. ...
— A Fool For Love • Francis Lynde

... island under an assumed name," said Darrow in tones that had the smoothness and the rasp of silk. "Rather annoying. Not good form, quite, even for ...
— The Mystery • Stewart Edward White and Samuel Hopkins Adams

... college student who in the early nineties drove tandems and coaches and tallyhos between Princeton and Yale and New York City to show that they appreciated the social importance of football games. He believed passionately in good form—his choosing of gloves, his tying of ties, his holding of reins were imitated by impressionable freshmen. Outside of his own set he was considered rather a snob, but as his set was THE set, it never worried him. He played football in the autumn, drank high-balls ...
— Flappers and Philosophers • F. Scott Fitzgerald

... the prevalence of any so-called paternal instinct. Paternal instinct is, we suspect, a minus, rather than a plus, quantity. It seems to us that fathers more often learn to love their children through following the conduct prescribed by good form and pretending to love them, or through love of display, pride or by association, than through ...
— Women As Sex Vendors - or, Why Women Are Conservative (Being a View of the Economic - Status of Woman) • R. B. Tobias

... is beautiful and always good form. For those wanting colour, the same famous makers of England have an infinite variety, ...
— The Art of Interior Decoration • Grace Wood

... Real honest laughter is not considered 'good form' by certain sections of society. A gentle imitation of the nanny-goat's bleat is the most seemly way for cultured persons to give vent to the expression of mirth. Maryllia alone was grave and preoccupied. The conversation of her guests annoyed her, though in London ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli

... I speculated gloomily, as I turned into the Sproul gate, but the brilliant sunshine seemed to fling me a dazzling denial from every petal of the white clematis that wreathed itself across the front porch, under which Mrs. Sproul, arrayed in all the midday magnificence of good form, sat and waited for her guests. Mrs. Cockrell sat beside her and they were delighted to see me and demanded happiness from me which it was hard for me to give from the depths that had been stirred by my strange interview with Martha, to which I felt I ought to have a key, but ...
— The Heart's Kingdom • Maria Thompson Daviess

... schoolgirl religion is the natural atmosphere of life. She discusses her faith with as little self-consciousness as if she were choosing the ingredients for the next day's curry. She knows nothing of those Western conventions that make it "good form" for us to hide all our emotions, all our depth of feeling, under the mask of not caring at all. She has none of that inverted hypocrisy which causes us to take infinite pains to assure our world that we are vastly worse than we are. What Lotus ...
— Lighted to Lighten: The Hope of India • Alice B. Van Doren

... work. Attention is called to paragraphing and emphasis is laid upon both the form and the manner of writing, but form is made subservient to thought. The interrelation of Art Department helps the student to appreciate the need of good form in the appearance ...
— The Making of a Trade School • Mary Schenck Woolman

... simplicity which Peter thought admirable, and which, of course, he attributed to his Duchessa's own good taste. He was not yet familiar enough with the Black aristocracy of Italy, to be aware that in the matter of food and drink simplicity is as much the criterion of good form amongst them, as lavish complexity is the criterion of good form amongst ...
— The Cardinal's Snuff-Box • Henry Harland

... children's own thoughts. Flat copies are not used, and the scholars evolve their own technique, for the Head Teacher is not strong herself in this respect. The development of thought carries with it the development of skill, and this is clearly seen in the children's drawings, which show good form and proportion, some knowledge of light and shade, a delicate and refined perception of colour, and a wonderful power of dealing with the difficulties of foreshortening. The central law is self-effort,—confidence ...
— What Is and What Might Be - A Study of Education in General and Elementary Education in Particular • Edmond Holmes

... said to some of the officers who had not seen her. "She will make quite a sensation; and there are five or six ladies in the station, whose names I need hardly mention, who will not be very pleased at her coming. She is thoroughly in good form, too; nothing in the slightest degree fast or noisy about her. She is quiet and self-possessed. I fancy she will be able to hold her own against any of them. Clever? I should say 'certainly'; but, of course, that is from her ...
— Rujub, the Juggler • G. A. Henty

... several years and have been practising eye work for a long while. My gentlemen friends tell me that I have the other movie vamps backed off the map. I have made a particular study of Theda Bara. I don't know much about close-ups, but suppose I could learn. I have a good form, swell brown eyes, ...
— More Toasts • Marion Dix Mosher

... Good Form, Breeding, etc.: Candidates shall not vote for themselves; nor stump the valley proclaiming at the top of their lungs that they alone can keep the country ...
— If You Touch Them They Vanish • Gouverneur Morris

... no being so cruel as Mirza; no being that takes such delight in mere extermination. They used to call our nobility, in the time of Louis XIV and Louis XV, cruel, but they did not kill, they merely taxed. In the height of the ancient regime, it was not good form to kill a peasant, because then the country had one less taxpayer. The height of the art was to take all the peasant had and then to induce him to set to work again. When he had earned another surplus, his lord came and took it. France had an accomplished nobility. England ...
— The Turquoise Cup, and, The Desert • Arthur Cosslett Smith

... respectable minute and then rang the bell again, although he had little belief that this would bring Miss Sally to the door. It is good form to ring the bell of the front door several times, before going to the back door, for it may be that the lady of the house is dressing, or is hastily taking the folded paper "curlers" out of her front hair, or slipping on her "other skirt" before admitting ...
— Kilo - Being the Love Story of Eliph' Hewlitt Book Agent • Ellis Parker Butler

... told of how Captain William Brooke Johns, of the United States Army, one day saw at a picnic the beautiful Miss Leonora de la Roche, and fell in love with her immediately. But, since it was not considered good form in those days to be presented to a lady at a picnic, he watched her from a distance all day. The next afternoon he went to call. It was a case of love at first sight for both, and the wedding soon followed, ...
— A Portrait of Old George Town • Grace Dunlop Ecker

... Culture is certain to mock itself in time Disease of conformity Disposition of people to shift labor on to others' shoulders Do not like to be insulted with originality Eve trusted the serpent, and Adam trusted Eve Fit for nothing else, they can at least write Good form to be enthusiastic and not disgraceful to be surprised Housecleaning, that riot of cleanliness which men fear Idle desire to be busy without doing anything Imagining that the more noise there is in the room the better Imitativeness ...
— Quotes and Images From The Works of Charles Dudley Warner • Charles Dudley Warner

... such topics in the day's news as were of an unexciting nature. The meal varied greatly in length. If J. P. was feeling tired, or out of sorts, he eat his dinner quickly and left us, taking somebody along to read to him until he was ready to go to bed. But, if he was in good form, and an interesting topic was started, or if he was in a reminiscent mood and wanted to talk, dinner would last from half-past-seven to nine, ...
— An Adventure With A Genius • Alleyne Ireland

... don't know,—she says they're not good form, and all that; but I'm sure she knows queer people enough herself. There is that tiresome old Miss Gisborne down in Washington Street,—the girls are forever going there; and I've seen them myself ever so many times coming out of the ...
— A Little Country Girl • Susan Coolidge

... for the Grand Christmas, is to see the tables covered and furnished: and the Ordinary Butlers of the House are decently to set bread, napkins, and trenchers in good form, at every table; with ...
— Christmas: Its Origin and Associations - Together with Its Historical Events and Festive Celebrations During Nineteen Centuries • William Francis Dawson

... House, as one writer has remarked, lost under Jackson something of the good form of the Virginia regime, but it lost nothing of the air of domesticity. Throughout the two Administrations the mistress of the mansion was Mrs. Andrew Jackson Donelson, wife of the President's secretary ...
— The Reign of Andrew Jackson • Frederic Austin Ogg

... did I appreciate the kindly motives of the magistrates who invited me to these feasts, for their purpose was as generously hospitable as the purpose of any American who invites a visitor to dinner. But the Chinese bill-of-fare includes dishes that are rather trying to a Christian palate, and good form requires the guest to taste at least each dish, for if he fails to do so, he makes his host "lose face''—a serious breach of etiquette in China. For example, here is the menu of a typical Chinese feast to which I was invited, the dishes being served in ...
— An Inevitable Awakening • ARTHUR JUDSON BROWN

... infantry, who are to make the assault, arrive at their places of assembly, full of quips and jests, a sure sign that they are cheery and in good form for the coming fray. Rum is served out, and the men lie down in little bunches, either to snatch a few minutes' sleep or else to resume their constant arguments and bickerings on every subject under the ...
— Three years in France with the Guns: - Being Episodes in the life of a Field Battery • C. A. Rose

... of his wonderful stories, and expatiated on Mr. Sponge's goodness in bringing him the nice comfits, though Mrs. Jogglebury could not but in her heart blame them for some little internal inconvenience the wonder had experienced during the night. However, she brought him to breakfast in pretty good form, where he was cocked up in his high chair beside his mamma, the rest of the infantry occupying the position of the previous day, all under ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees

... own whim, and found it peculiarly diverting. There was positively no longer anything the matter with me. I was in good form—was, so to say, still in the best of form; I had a level head, nothing was wanting there, God be praised and thanked! My mirth rose in measure as I paced the floor and communed with myself. I laughed aloud, and felt amazingly ...
— Hunger • Knut Hamsun

... have no idea what regard for so-called 'GOOD FORM' means for us English people. No scandal—for Heaven's sake, no scandal! That is the first and prime law of our Society. Kind as the Colonel and his wife have been to me until now, I am very much afraid they would drop me, without question of my guilt or innocence, if I should allow ...
— The Coming Conquest of England • August Niemann

... discovered on the road several kinds of grapes still on the vines, called speck (pork) grapes, which are not always good, and these were not; although they were sweet in the mouth at first, they made it disagreeable and stinking. The small blue grapes are better, and their vines grow in good form. Although they have several times attempted to plant vineyards, and have not immediately succeeded, they, nevertheless, have not abandoned the hope of doing so by and by, for there is always some ...
— Journal of Jasper Danckaerts, 1679-1680 • Jasper Danckaerts

... "It's very good form here," she went on, dancing about her room. It was hardly more than a marble gallery, the peristyle choked with flowering bushes, camellias and althea and hibiscus, barely furnished, and filled with drifting perfumes and the savor of the sea. "What a shame that ...
— The Happy End • Joseph Hergesheimer

... his eye badly. Now, the colonel prided himself with justice on his powers as a shot; but on this particular day he had a touch of liver, which resulted in his shooting over the birds, and under the birds, and on each side of the birds, but very rarely at the birds. Dallas being in especially good form, it was found, when the bag came to be counted, that, while he had shot seventy brace, the colonel had only managed to ...
— A Wodehouse Miscellany - Articles & Stories • P. G. Wodehouse

... drinking should begin, Sir Kay would have me in and exhibit me before King Arthur and his illustrious knights seated at the Table Round, and would brag about his exploit in capturing me, and would probably exaggerate the facts a little, but it wouldn't be good form for me to correct him, and not over safe, either; and when I was done being exhibited, then ho for the dungeon; but he, Clarence, would find a way to come and see me every now and then, and cheer me up, and help me get word ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... have been mouldering for generations. In this awesome place one must enter with sealed lips, and sit and silently ponder over his golf and other crimes. It is sacrilege to utter a word, and not in good form to breathe too rapidly. ...
— John Henry Smith - A Humorous Romance of Outdoor Life • Frederick Upham Adams

... frankly, I don't like her. She told you she did society work for her newspaper. She does a great deal more. She is constantly watching at the legations to see if she can spy on any of their secret information. It is not good form to warn one girl against another. But if I were you, Miss Thurston, I would take with a grain of salt any information that Miss ...
— The Automobile Girls At Washington • Laura Dent Crane

... are canons of good taste, good form, as the world puts it, in preaching as in other matters. It was sufficient to indicate the parallel; people could then look up chapter and verse for themselves. As no doubt you ...
— Ringfield - A Novel • Susie Frances Harrison

... be distorted in a picture; if the attitude be natural or grand or mean; though he has never received any instruction in drawing or heard any conversation on the subject, nor can himself draw with correctness a single feature. A good form strikes all eyes pleasantly, long before they have any science on the subject, and a beautiful face sets twenty hearts in palpitation, prior to all consideration of the mechanical proportions of ...
— Essays, First Series • Ralph Waldo Emerson

... know what devotion is. Your fashionable friends have taught you what good form is; you are blase, indifferent; it's not women, it's cards, that interest you. You have no fresh feeling left," continued this ingenue of the greenroom. "You have been ...
— Prince Fortunatus • William Black

... "grand-stand plays"; that is, he attempts to make difficult plays or one-handed stops with an unnecessary display of motions, to bring the applause of the spectators. No ball player was ever made by playing to the audience. Good form is not only very desirable but very necessary, but the main thing in ball playing is to play your part and to forget that there is such a thing as an audience or applause. If your form is good so much the better, but if by paying too much attention to it you ...
— Outdoor Sports and Games • Claude H. Miller

... It is not good form in Morovenia for a husband or father to discuss his home life, or to show enthusiasm on the subject of mere woman; but the Count, prompted by a fretful desire to dispose of his rapidly maturing offspring, ...
— The Slim Princess • George Ade

... customary for the guilty one to make at least a partial payment immediately after the arbitration, and to treat the assembly to a banquet in which it is good form for the two opponents to close the breaches of friendship by generous quaffs to each ...
— The Manbos of Mindano - Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences, Volume XXIII, First Memoir • John M. Garvan

... flaunting and arrogant; but they flaunt unobtrusively, and their attempts at arrogance are depressing. Their chief duty hitherto has been the development of variety, vivacity, and fulness of life; oligarchy was the world's first experiment in liberty. But now they have adopted the opposite ideal of 'good form,' which may be defined as Puritanism without religion. Good form has sent them all into black like the stroke of a funeral bell. They engage, like Mr. Gilbert's curates, in a war of mildness, a positive competition of obscurity. ...
— The Defendant • G.K. Chesterton

... sometimes in the left hand and sometimes in the right. It should be in the left, when holding foods that are being cut with the knife. It may be held in either hand when conveying food to the mouth. It used to be considered "good form" to use only the right hand in lifting food to the mouth, though this necessitated changing the fork to the right hand after the knife had been laid aside. The common-sense method of keeping the fork ...
— School and Home Cooking • Carlotta C. Greer

... rightly, be furious with me if I were to balk him. But neither do I wish him to kill me, for that would entirely upset all my plans. What I should like to do would be to give him a tremendous punishing without endangering his life. I suppose it would not be good form to choose fists as the weapons, ...
— The Cruise of the Thetis - A Tale of the Cuban Insurrection • Harry Collingwood

... bass. The carriage drove up and both got in. It was only for the first few moments, while the carriage was driving out of the clubhouse gates, that Levin was still under the influence of the club atmosphere of repose, comfort, and unimpeachable good form. But as soon as the carriage drove out into the street, and he felt it jolting over the uneven road, heard the angry shout of a sledge driver coming towards them, saw in the uncertain light the red blind of a tavern and the shops, this impression was dissipated, and he began to think ...
— Anna Karenina • Leo Tolstoy



Words linked to "Good form" :   properness, propriety, correctitude



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