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Ado   Listen
verb
Ado  v.  To do; in doing; as, there is nothing ado. "What is here ado?"






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Ado" Quotes from Famous Books



... yet we could not bring it to answer our end fully; and when we launched her into the water, she was so leaky, and took in the water so fast, that we thought all our labour had been lost, for we had much ado to make her swim; and as for pumps, we had none, nor had we any ...
— The Life, Adventures & Piracies of the Famous Captain Singleton • Daniel Defoe

... upon inquiry, that Sir Roger was several times staggered with the reports that had been brought him concerning this old woman, and would frequently have bound her over to the county sessions, had not his chaplain with much ado ...
— The De Coverley Papers - From 'The Spectator' • Joseph Addison and Others

... soon after, and on her death-bed she swore a solemn oath on the crucifix that the baby's father was none other than Kirkup himself. The poor old gentleman had grown so accustomed to believing in miracles that he made little ado about accepting this one also; he received the child as his daughter, and made provision for her in his will. No one had the heart or thought it worth while to enlighten him as to certain facts which might have altered ...
— Hawthorne and His Circle • Julian Hawthorne

... 1773, and earlier than had been meant, my father set sail for London with my ever dear mother. Many assembled to see the "Fair Trader" leave her moorings. I went with my people as far as Lewes, and on account of weather had much ado to get ashore. The voyage down the Delaware was slow, for from want of proper lights we must needs lay by at night, and if winds were contrary were forced ...
— Hugh Wynne, Free Quaker • S. Weir Mitchell

... weeping—one above all—that he understood. It was not a shock of grief to these women, for such is their depth that the little matters which concern all flesh and which are inevitable, cannot be made much ado of. Still it was feminine and beautiful to him, their weeping; and possibly the one who wept loudest had mothered old Gobind in her heart, and there was emptiness in the thought that she could not fill his begging-bowl again. Bedient, as well as others of the village, knew that to Gobind, ...
— Fate Knocks at the Door - A Novel • Will Levington Comfort

... Clennam moved to sit down by the side of Little Dorrit, she trembled so that she had much ado to hold her needle. Clennam gently put his hand upon her work, and said, 'Dear Little Dorrit, let ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens

... responded the Retainer, "has already devised a most excellent plan. It's this: To-morrow, when your Lordship sits in court, you should, merely for form's sake, make much ado, by despatching letters and issuing warrants for the arrest of the culprits. The murderer will naturally not be forthcoming; and as the plaintiffs will be strong in their displeasure, you will of course ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin

... the arrogance, the despotism," she said jestingly; "still, if I confess you were in the right and that I deserve correction, will you on your part acknowledge that you are making somewhat too much ado about a ...
— Major Frank • A. L. G. Bosboom-Toussaint

... the towne, and went aboord without doing any farther hurt to the towne: and when I came aboord, I found our pinnesse come from Cormatin, which had taken there two pound and fiue ounces of golde. Then after much ado with the froward Mariners, we went thitherwards with our ship, and the Christopher went ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of - The English Nation, Vol. 11 • Richard Hakluyt

... and of ten the little undercurrents pre-eminently shape the events themselves. The truth of this axiom is illustrated principally in the recall of the resolute, indefatigable, far and clear-sighted patriot and statesman, General Butler. To jump to a conclusion without much ado, the recall of Butler from New Orleans is due principally, if not even exclusively, to the united efforts—or conspiracy—of Mr. Seward and Mr. Reverdy Johnson. Thirteen months ago Mr. Seward expected, as he still expects for the future, an uprising of a Union Party in the hottest hot-bed of ...
— Diary from November 12, 1862, to October 18, 1863 • Adam Gurowski

... stolen a march on me, that the automobile could have left the premises without my being roused? It was only four o'clock, but all wish for sleep had left me. I decided to investigate without any more ado. ...
— The Firefly Of France • Marion Polk Angellotti

... had been reinforced in the meantime by several companies of loyalist militia from Hemmingford. As the rebels appeared the loyalist militia attacked them; and after a brisk skirmish, which lasted from twenty to twenty-five minutes, drove them from the field. Without further ado the rebels fled across the border, leaving behind them eleven dead and a number of prisoners, as well as a six-pounder gun, a large number of muskets of the type used in the United States army, a keg of powder, a quantity ...
— The 'Patriotes' of '37 - A Chronicle of the Lower Canada Rebellion • Alfred D. Decelles

... into my troubled senses, and lulling them into a treacherous security. "Just so," I reasoned, "shock and countershock. The terrible scourge has by this time exhausted its strength. It was only a farce, after all. Much ado about nothing. The people of this town have become so familiar with the earthquake that they make a carnival of it. By this time they are perhaps feasting and rioting under their booths. Ho! am I the only craven here? ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851. • Various

... Babylon had soon to recognize the young man's vogue. Through its supposed advocacy of woman suffrage the poem had all but founded a cult, and the disclosure of its true author, after months of guesswork and silly-season gush, bounced and ricochetted among the newspapers with astonishing ado. With the Whig in the forefront the local press began to echo the gossiping paragraphs and character sketches which, true, half true, and of whole cloth, padded the lean columns of a mediocre literary season, and New Babylon ...
— The Henchman • Mark Lee Luther

... kings had from the Norman Conqu'ror reign'd With intermix'd and variable fate, When England to her greatest height attain'd Of power, dominion, glory, wealth, and state; After it had with much ado sustain'd The violence of princes, with debate For titles and the often mutinies Of nobles for their ...
— Biographia Literaria • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... the sad ado—how far my mother's suspicions wronged my father; for the eye of jealousy (and what loving woman ever lived that was not jealous?) has its optic nerve terminating not in the brain but in the heart, which was not constructed for the reception of true vision—I never knew. Later, ...
— Paul Kelver • Jerome Klapka, AKA Jerome K. Jerome

... went to be married to the brave young Wallace. He was as handsome a youth as ever the sun shone upon, and he loved my lady from a boy. I never shall forget the day when she stood on the top of that rock, and let a garland he had made for her fall into the Clyde. Without more ado, never caring because it is the deepest here of any part of the river, he jumps in after it, and I after him; and well I did, for when I caught him by his bonny golden locks, he was insensible. His head had struck against a stone in the plunge, and a great cut was over his forehead. ...
— The Scottish Chiefs • Miss Jane Porter

... presence of my friend. A notice on my punctiliousness may be put down to-night in her 'private diary.' I kept the letter in my hand and only read it with those sapient ends of the fingers which the mesmerists make so much ado about, and which really did seem to touch a little of what was inside. Not all, however, happily for me! Or my friend would have seen in my eyes what they ...
— The Letters of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett, Vol. 1 (of 2) 1845-1846 • Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett

... upon the deck kicked him savagely in the stomach. Then he allowed him to rise, caught him by the neck and the slack of his overcoat, and ran him forward to where a hatchway, not two feet across, opened in the deck. Without ado, he flung him down into the darkness below; and while Wilbur, dizzied by the fall, sat on the floor at the foot of the vertical companion-ladder, gazing about him with distended eyes, there rained down upon his head, first an oilskin coat, then a sou'wester, a pair of oilskin breeches, ...
— Moran of the Lady Letty • Frank Norris

... deg. to 40 deg. C.; nevertheless, the development does not proceed very quickly. As we watched, exactly eight minutes elapsed before Mr. Winter cried out sharply, "That will do." Immediately one of the assistants seizes the wet canvas, crumples it up without more ado, as if it were dirty linen, and takes it off to a wooden washing trough, where it is kneaded and washed in true washerwoman fashion. Water in plenty is sluiced over it, and after more vigorous manipulation still, ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 315, January 14, 1882 • Various

... another man before this would have cast his perplexities to the winds and declared that Mr. Hudson must lie on his bed as he had made it. Some men, perhaps, would even say that I am making a mighty ado about nothing; that I have only to give him rope, and he will tire himself out. But he tugs at his rope altogether too hard for me to hold it comfortably. I certainly never pretended the thing was ...
— Roderick Hudson • Henry James

... out of the room without more ado, and, following her, closed and locked the door behind them. "We'll not write another word of that stuff to-day. Get your hat and things. I'm going out to tell Lewis ...
— A Man's Woman • Frank Norris

... the general's arrest. What was my surprise! I had hardly time to address myself to the porter before he informed me that M. Carbonnet and his nephew were both arrested. "I advise you, sir," added the man, "to retire without more ado, for I can assure you that the persons who visit M. Carbonnet are watched."—"Is he still at home?" said I. "Yes, Sir; they are examining his papers."—"Then," said I, "I will go up." M. Carbonnet, of whose friendship I had reason to be proud, and whose memory will ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne

... answer them, especially if one desires to be on good terms with one's contemporaries: but, if I must give an answer, it is this: The growth of physical science is now so prodigiously rapid, that those who are actively engaged in keeping up with the present, have much ado to find time to look at the past, and even grow into the habit of neglecting it. But, natural as this result may be, it is none the less detrimental. The intellect loses, for there is assuredly no more effectual method of clearing ...
— Chips from a German Workshop - Volume IV - Essays chiefly on the Science of Language • Max Muller

... call in the old men to help him decide difficult cases. The usual method of punishment is by means of a fine. Should the culprit be unwilling or unable to pay he is placed in servitude until such a time as the debt is considered canceled, but should he refuse to serve he is killed without further ado. The datu appoints a man for this purpose, and he usually gets his victim by stealth, either by waylaying him in the road or by driving a spear through him as he lies asleep on the floor of his house. When a fine is levied the ...
— The Wild Tribes of Davao District, Mindanao - The R. F. Cummings Philippine Expedition • Fay-Cooper Cole

... the benefit of the tide and by often tacking about, they yet advanced three leagues in their course; and when the tide failed, they were forced to cast anchor at the buoy in the Nore, the same place where Whitelocke first anchored when he came from England. The pilots and mariners had much ado to manage their sails in this tempestuous weather; and it was a great favour of God that they were not out at sea in these storms, but returned in safety to the place where the kindness of God had ...
— A Journal of the Swedish Embassy in the Years 1653 and 1654, Vol II. • Bulstrode Whitelocke

... hungry and for that matter so am I!" So saying I rose and, without more ado, strode away across the sands towards the reef. Now as I went, I chanced upon a great turtle-shell (to my joy!) and divers others marvellously shaped and tinted, and chose such as might serve us for cups and the like. ...
— Black Bartlemy's Treasure • Jeffrey Farnol

... of his genius; he is great in so little a way. To be a poet is to be the man—not a petty portion of occasional low passion worked up into a permanent form of humanity. Shakespear has thrust such rubbishy feelings into a corner-the dark, dusky heart of Don John, in the Much Ado about Nothing. The fact is, I have not seen your "Expostulatory Epistle" to him. I was not aware, till your question, that it was out. I shall ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 5 • Edited by E. V. Lucas

... just coming for you, miss," she said, "thinking that you might not be able to find your way, after all, there are so many twists and turns hereabouts," and without further ado she quickly retraced her steps, nodding ...
— Kidnapped at the Altar - or, The Romance of that Saucy Jessie Bain • Laura Jean Libbey

... mother's offspring are being murdered before her eyes; and on rushing out, prepared to risk his life in their defense, he finds, perhaps, that a child has strayed near the tree, or something equally dreadful has occurred. Jays have no idea of relative values; they could not make more ado over a heart-breaking calamity than they do over a slight annoyance. Some of their cries, notably that of the jay baby, sound like the wail of a human infant. As to one curious utterance in the jay repertoire, I could not quite make up my mind whether it was a real call to arms, or intended ...
— A Bird-Lover in the West • Olive Thorne Miller

... when a magician arrived in the camp and offered to sell his services to the emperor. His proposals were gladly accepted, and in a moment the whole of the garrison sank down as if they were dead, and Virgilius himself had much ado to keep awake. He did not know how to fight the magician, but with a great effort struggled to open his Black Book, which told him what spells to use. In an instant all his foes seemed turned to stone, and ...
— The Violet Fairy Book • Various

... side. Perhaps we had not curled in our tail quite quick enough, or perhaps the enemy has grown more enterprising of late, in any case just as we were reaching the ridge a single shot was fired from Hussar Hill, and then without more ado a loud crackle of musketry burst forth. The distance was nearly two thousand yards, but the squadrons in close formation were a good target. Everybody walked for about twenty yards, and then without the necessity of an order broke into a brisk canter, opening ...
— London to Ladysmith via Pretoria • Winston Spencer Churchill

... without more ado, ducked his shock head, and, before she had time to collect her surprised senses, had melted away in the thinning swirls of humanity, ...
— Joyce's Investments - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry

... days were critical days. A breach twelve thousand to fifteen thousand yards wide and as much as six thousand yards and more in depth is not a thing to be mended without more ado. It takes a good deal to repair the inordinate wastage of men and guns as well as munitions that results from such a breach. It was the business of the Supreme Command to provide reserves on a large scale. But ...
— Now It Can Be Told • Philip Gibbs

... preached several times in a large, populous, and wicked settlement, and there was serious attention, deep convictions, and a good many conversions; but, between my occasional appointments these preachers would rush in and try to take off our converts into the water; and indeed they made so much ado about baptism by immersion that the uninformed would suppose that heaven was an island, and there was no way to get there ...
— Great Fortunes, and How They Were Made • James D. McCabe, Jr.

... bore this pretty well; but Mr Pressick, being a grave man, at first hung down his head, and was very melancholy. But he grew better acquainted with the people by degrees, and came to like them so well, that we had much ado to get him away, when it became necessary for ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 11 • Robert Kerr

... I remarked that we could make something out of it. We wrestled with the translation, although it was a slow and tedious operation, but at last we finished the task. The German depositions being quite in order, and fairly translated I signed the papers without further ado. ...
— Sixteen Months in Four German Prisons - Wesel, Sennelager, Klingelputz, Ruhleben • Henry Charles Mahoney

... Sylph up to the clearing, Mrs. Kennard walked all the way with us, because she wished to see for herself what the place was like. When she saw what a remote, wild region it was, she was loath to leave her pet there, and Mr. Kennard had some ado to reassure her. At last, after giving the colt many farewell pats and caresses, she came away with us. On the way home she said over and over to Addison and me, "Be sure to go up often and see that Sylph is all right." And, laughing a little, we promised that we would, and that we would ...
— A Busy Year at the Old Squire's • Charles Asbury Stephens

... had of the merciless war in Ireland, Brian had much ado in making up his mind to hold to the plan he had formed on the previous evening. These ten ruffians were scoundrels enough, to judge by looks, and yet they were men; and he had been raised in no such school of war as this, where surrender ...
— Nuala O'Malley • H. Bedford-Jones

... more ado these self-reliant men parted in the middle of the vast mountain wilderness. They planned a later junction of their two parties at the mouth of a river which then was less known than the Columbia had been, through a pass which none ...
— The Magnificent Adventure - Being the Story of the World's Greatest Exploration and - the Romance of a Very Gallant Gentleman • Emerson Hough

... brightly. Then she emptied the bowls on the stones and again bowed three times. No one took the smallest notice of her. She took a few more paper cash from her basket and flung them in the fire. Then, without further ado, she took up her basket, and with the same leisurely, rather heavy tread, walked away. The gods were duly propitiated, and like an old peasant woman in France, who has satisfactorily done her day's housekeeping, she ...
— When Winter Comes to Main Street • Grant Martin Overton

... Without more ado the Martian descended, cut out some large, juicy chunks as his fancy dictated, and brought his loot back up the tree. The meat was delicious and apparently wholesome. They gorged themselves and threw away what they could not eat, ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, August 1930 • Various

... house; he carried in his person the authority of Shipping Commissioner and in his hand the articles of the Golden Bough. After the careless fashion of the day and port we signed on without further ado for a voyage to Hong Kong and beyond—sitting at a table in the back room, and cementing the contract with ...
— The Blood Ship • Norman Springer

... came the next morning. She decided that if she had any spare time during the day she would write him what she had to say. When she saw him drift in from lunch at twenty minutes past one, she took the time without further ado. She snatched a sheet of office paper, rolled it into the machine, snapped the carriage into position, ...
— The Wall Street Girl • Frederick Orin Bartlett

... will say, Why such an ado about a matter concerning which, however we may theoretically differ, we all practically agree? In this age of toleration, no scientist will ever try actively to interfere with our religious faith, provided we enjoy ...
— The Will to Believe - and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy • William James

... a fire, just for the fun of it, and a grouse was plucked and broiled with much ado, and never was greater feast. And, the meal over, he produced a cigar and—which was not really good form for the woods—lay on the grass and smoked it, looking at her ...
— A Man and a Woman • Stanley Waterloo

... still less reassuring, they invaded the church, walking about as if quite at home, disturbing everybody, upsetting chairs, knocking against you without begging pardon; then they knelt down with much ado, in the attitude of contrite angels, murmured interminable paternosters, and left the church more ...
— En Route • J.-K. (Joris-Karl) Huysmans

... more ado, secured the spokes of the wheel, clapped his cap on his head, hitched up his trowsers, and, taking the glass from the mate, rolled away up the fore-rigging. Meanwhile Mr. Binks walked forward, stopping a moment at the caboose to take ...
— Captain Brand of the "Centipede" • H. A. (Henry Augustus) Wise

... glorious morsel it is to put into the hands of certain incendiaries. The metaphors are so strong and so appalling that Miss Logan could only stand them a very short time; she was obliged to withdraw in confusion. The laird stood his ground with much ado, though his face was often crimsoned over with the hues of shame and anger. Several times he was on the point of turning the officious sycophant to the door; but good manners, and an inherent respect that lie entertained for the clergy, as the immediate ...
— The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner • James Hogg

... the Jackdaw, "that as soon as the beautiful becomes true, God does not intend it to be for us." He got up softly from among his brothers. "I will carry you down," he said. And without more ado, he picked it up and carried it down out of the nest, and laid it in the long grass at the ...
— The Blue Moon • Laurence Housman

... looked down into the courtyard and perceived that it was filled with Marcobrun's soldiers; so, without more ado, he took Bova's battle sword and slew ten thousand men, drove all the rest out of the city, closed the gates, and barred them fast, after which he returned into the castle, awakened Bova Korolevich, and told him all that had happened. Bova ...
— The Russian Garland - being Russian Falk Tales • Various

... light, and I saw that the proctors were there, together with the prior and various servants of the college. Not being able to obtain any reply to their summons, they had up a man with a great bunch of keys; and after some ado they forced open the door, and forthwith entered the chamber. It was empty of its occupant; but they were by no means satisfied with that, and made great search everywhere, tossing everything about in the greatest confusion, ransacking his chest and flinging his clothes about hither and thither, ...
— For the Faith • Evelyn Everett-Green

... however, so worked on Richard Talbot, that before morning be declared that, hap what hap, if he and his wife were to bring up the child, she should be made a good Protestant Christian before they left the house, and there should be no more ado ...
— Unknown to History - A Story of the Captivity of Mary of Scotland • Charlotte M. Yonge

... tried to help the animal to its feet; but the poor thing either could not or would not move. It was clear that I must leave it, and though hating to do so, I walked a few paces down the narrow path. The fall had shaken me considerably. My head ached, and I had much ado to grope my way along. Three several times in the course of a short distance I stumbled, and the third time fell heavily to the ground, twisting my left foot underneath me. I tried to rise, but could not. Now, ...
— At the Point of the Sword • Herbert Hayens

... Nancy let down her hair. It fell in profusion over her shoulders and down her back. Quickly the detective ran her fingers over the girl's head. Without further ado Miss Watt did the same with ...
— The Lost Despatch • Natalie Sumner Lincoln

... proved no more sympathetic, and in 870, during the reign of the Emperor Basil I, it was decided without more ado that the Bulgarian Church should be directly under the Bishop of Constantinople, on the ground that the kingdom of Boris was a vassal-state of the basileus, and that from the Byzantine point of view, as opposed to that of Rome, the State came ...
— The Balkans - A History Of Bulgaria—Serbia—Greece—Rumania—Turkey • Nevill Forbes, Arnold J. Toynbee, D. Mitrany, D.G. Hogarth

... meaning there might be to these last words the priest did not explain, nor did the lady understand. In fact, there was no time for explanation. The priest, without any more ado, raised the lady in his arms and marched off ...
— A Castle in Spain - A Novel • James De Mille

... came so pat!" Though, even if that addition had been vouchsafed, we should still, no doubt, have hungered for the descriptive particulars that followed, relating not only how the former hall-porter chuckled until he was black in the face—having so much ado, in fact, to become any other colour, that his fat legs made the strangest excursions into the air—but that Mrs. Tugby, that is, Chickenstalker, after thumping him violently on the back, and shaking him as if he were a bottle, was constrained to cry out, in great terror, ...
— Charles Dickens as a Reader • Charles Kent

... the watch on deck was too wide awake for them to risk that, and the cabin compass was screwed to the roof close to the skipper's berth; and so the old man who was their leader, old sailor and whaler as he was, actually gave up the idea of taking a compass, and these people without more ado, one night slipped over the side into the whaleboat, cut the painter, and by daylight the boat was out of sight of land and of the ship. They were afloat upon the Pacific, running six or seven miles before a north-east ...
— "The Gallant, Good Riou", and Jack Renton - 1901 • Louis Becke

... freebooting vagrants turned their horses up a narrow path and galloped off, carrying with them two bales of goods, and a number of smaller articles. To follow them was useless; indeed, it was with much ado that the convoy got into port with the residue of the cargoes; for some of the guards were pillaged of their knives and pocket handkerchiefs, and the lustrous tin case of Mr. John Reed was ...
— Astoria - Or, Anecdotes Of An Enterprise Beyond The Rocky Mountains • Washington Irving

... came to the thorn, and went straight over the eyot (which was but a furlong over at that place) and down to the southward-looking shore thereof. There she let herself softly down into the water and thrust off without more ado, and swam on and on till she had gone a long way. Then she communed with herself, and found that she was thinking: If I might only swim all the water ...
— The Water of the Wondrous Isles • William Morris

... ado and greate perill' he landed on Italian soil. He was fully prepared to have the most delicious pleasure in this classical land, having already, even during the stormy weather off the coast, 'smelt the peculiar joys of Italy in the perfumes of orange, citron, and jassmine flowers ...
— Sylva, Vol. 1 (of 2) - Or A Discourse of Forest Trees • John Evelyn

... one or two of them made jests at him and brought him to laugh with them; and in the end he made them a present of one of the skins in addition to what they had. Upon that they lay down there without more ado, being minded to drink, and they took him into their company and invited him to remain with them and join them in their drinking: so he (as may be supposed) was persuaded and stayed. Then as they in their drinking bade him welcome in a friendly manner, ...
— The History Of Herodotus - Volume 1(of 2) • Herodotus

... among themselves, and presently had the audacity to move towards the sentries with the intention of forcing their way. I was exasperated beyond measure, and turned out the guard, at the same time telling the Mooltanis that, if they did not at once retire, I would fire upon them without more ado. They then at once changed their threatening attitude, contented themselves with swearing at the Gore log,[2] and rode away, saying that now Nicholson was dead no one cared for them, and they would return to their homes. These men ...
— A Narrative Of The Siege Of Delhi - With An Account Of The Mutiny At Ferozepore In 1857 • Charles John Griffiths

... King and entreated him that he might be suffered to go himself to the dwelling of Murtach the herd, promising that the King's son should be then restored to him, "or if not," said he, "let me then be slain there without more ado." With great difficulty Cormac was moved to consent to this, for he believed it was but a subterfuge of Flahari's to put off the evil day or perchance to find a way of escape. But next day Flahari was straitly bound and set in a chariot, and, with a guard of spearmen about him ...
— The High Deeds of Finn and other Bardic Romances of Ancient Ireland • T. W. Rolleston

... sounding the onset, and summoning the ministers and churches to surrender, you had without any introductory flourish just gone right among them and lectured, when and where and as you could find opportunity, and paid no attention to criticism, but pushed right on, without making any ado about 'attacks,' and 'invasions,' and 'opposition,' and have let the barkers bark their bark out,—within one year you might have practically brought over five hundred thousand persons, of the very moral elite ...
— The Grimke Sisters - Sarah and Angelina Grimke: The First American Women Advocates of - Abolition and Woman's Rights • Catherine H. Birney

... gone the Cock-sparrow's eyes fell on his wife's share of the dinner. "Ah," thought he, "how I should like another bit! Well, why shouldn't I have it? A man does all the work, and women don't want much to eat at any time." So without any more ado, he just set to, and gobbled up ...
— The Talking Thrush - and Other Tales from India • William Crooke

... it roared, and cried gayly, "Now You sturdy old oaks, I'll make you bow!" And it made them bow without more ado, Or it cracked their great branches ...
— New National Fourth Reader • Charles J. Barnes and J. Marshall Hawkes

... directed him to Mr. Pearson who kept the key. Here was another trouble; for the said Mr. Pearson being a lodger in the shop of a bookseller living in Little Britain, Wood was forced to walk thither, and much ado there was to find him.' The library was afterwards moved to Essex Street, and then to Ashburnham House in Little Dean's Yard, where the great fire took place in 1731, which some attributed to 'Dr. Bentley's villainy.' Dean Stanley has told us how the Headmaster of Westminster, coming ...
— The Great Book-Collectors • Charles Isaac Elton and Mary Augusta Elton

... asked him: "Sir boatman, what aileth thee? By Heaven, it availeth thee naught; thou shall ferry us over swiftly. Now make us no ado, or this shall be thy last day. By the Lord who made us, of what art thou afraid? This is not the devil! Hell hath he never seen! 'Tis but my comrade; let him in. I ...
— The Romance of Morien • Jessie L. Weston

... Othello sold for twenty-nine pounds, eight shillings; King Lear and the Merry Wives of Windsor for twenty-eight pounds each; Henry the Fifth for twenty-seven pounds, six shillings; A Midsummer Night's Dream for twenty-five pounds, ten shillings; and Much Ado about Nothing for the same sum. The first edition of Shakespeare's Sonnets went for three pounds, nineteen shillings. Steevens's copies of the Merry Wives of Windsor and the Sonnets fetched respectively three hundred and thirty guineas ...
— English Book Collectors • William Younger Fletcher

... man whose renown has since filled the civilized world fuller even than the name of his contemporary, Shakespeare (they died on the same day), was then so unknown to the authorities of Valladolid that he had great ado to establish the innocence of himself and his household. To be sure, his Don Quixote had not yet appeared, though he is said to have finished the first part in that miserable abode in that vile region; but he had written poems and plays, especially his most noble tragedy of "Numancia," ...
— Familiar Spanish Travels • W. D. Howells

... time one Thorir "wooden-leg" and his wife Thorgrima "charm- cheek" were being maintained at Froda, and there was little love between them and Thorgunna. The person that she had most ado with was Kjartan, the son of the house; him she loved much, but he was rather cold towards her, and this often vexed her. Kjartan was then fifteen years old, and was both big of ...
— The Book of Dreams and Ghosts • Andrew Lang

... but a memory now, though a pungent one. A night's work at the kiln produced from two to three hundred-weight, and the price in the good seasons ranged from L4 to L5 a ton; so many shared the labour that a family had much ado to earn L10 in a whole season. Under such conditions, too, the work was roughly done. Too often the sides of the kiln would fall in and the sand—always the curse of Saaron—would mingle with the kelp and spoil it. And when some wiser folk in Scotland learned to prepare ...
— Major Vigoureux • A. T. Quiller-Couch

... after his Creditors were in cool blood, and admitting of second thoughts, and fearing lest delays should make them lose all, they admit of a second debate, come together again, and by many words, and great ado, they obtained five shillings i'th' pound. {94d} So the money was produced, Releases and Discharges drawn, signed, and sealed, Books crossed, and all things confirmed; and then Mr. Badman can put his head out of dores again, and be a better man ...
— The Life and Death of Mr. Badman • John Bunyan

... Mr. Lester—the Lester Wallack that was to be—did Beatrice and Benedick. I yield to this further proof that we had our proportion of Shakespeare, though perhaps antedating that rapt vision of Much Ado, which may have been preceded by the dazzled apprehension of A Midsummer Night's Dream at the Broadway (there was a confessed Theatre;) this latter now present to me in every bright particular. It supplied us, we must have felt, our greatest conceivable adventure—I cannot otherwise account ...
— A Small Boy and Others • Henry James

... long treble intonation, "what's folks's kin got to do wi't? Not a chip. Poyser's wife may turn her nose up an' forget bygones, but this Dinah Morris, they tell me, 's as poor as iver she was—works at a mill, an's much ado to keep hersen. A strappin' young carpenter as is a ready-made Methody, like Seth, wouldna be a bad match for her. Why, Poysers make as big a fuss wi' Adam Bede as if he war ...
— Adam Bede • George Eliot

... look at them." Scheich Ibrahim, by this time, was incapable of asking this counterfeit fisherman how or which way he came thither, his whole thought being only to oblige the fair Persian. With much ado he turned his head towards the door, being quite drunk, and, in a stammering tone, calling to the caliph, whom he took to be a fisherman, "Come hither, thou nightly thief," said he, "and let us ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments vol. 2 • Anon.

... is my kind of affair.' He took a rope and an axe with him, went forth into the forest, and again bade those who were sent with him to wait outside. He had not long to seek. The unicorn soon came towards him, and rushed directly on the tailor, as if it would gore him with its horn without more ado. 'Softly, softly; it can't be done as quickly as that,' said he, and stood still and waited until the animal was quite close, and then sprang nimbly behind the tree. The unicorn ran against the tree ...
— Grimms' Fairy Tales • The Brothers Grimm

... of a little over six hundred men, consisting of detachments from no less than three different regiments, the 58th, 60th, 92d, and the Naval Brigade, to be got ready for an expedition, without revealing his plans to anybody, until late in the afternoon: and then without more ado, marched them up to the top of Majuba—a great square-topped mountain to the right of, and commanding the Boer position at Lang's Nek. The troops reached the top about three in the morning, after a somewhat exhausting climb, and were stationed at different points of the plateau in a scientific way. ...
— Cetywayo and his White Neighbours - Remarks on Recent Events in Zululand, Natal, and the Transvaal • H. Rider Haggard

... the castle gate was raised and there appeared many knights and ladies welcoming Balin into the castle. So he entered, and presently they were all seated at supper. Then the lady of the castle said to Balin: "Sir Knight, to-morrow thou must have ado with a knight that keeps an island near-by; else mayest thou not pass that way." "That is an evil custom," answered Balin; "but if I must, I must." So that night he rested, but with the dawn he arose, and was ...
— Stories from Le Morte D'Arthur and the Mabinogion • Beatrice Clay

... is settled, eh? We sail for the Orient without more ado, just as soon as your extensive business deals are done and you will need a long rest in order to recuperate for next ...
— Polly's Business Venture • Lillian Elizabeth Roy

... ceremony consisted simply of the statement of a mutual pledge by the contracting parties in the presence of the congregation, and, this being done, all went quietly about their business without ado or merry-making. The pledge recited by the first husband of Dolly Madison was doubtless a typical one among the Friends of Pennsylvania: "'I, John Todd, do take thee, Dorothea Payne, to be my wedded wife, and promise, through divine assistance, ...
— Woman's Life in Colonial Days • Carl Holliday

... the passionate nature of the Italians to have incredible ado about buying and selling, and a day's shopping is a sort of campaign, from which the shopper returns plundered and discomfited, or laden with the spoil ...
— Venetian Life • W. D. Howells

... d'), brother of M. d'Hauteserre; somewhat like his young kinsman in disposition; made some ado over his noble birth; thus it happened that he was killed, shot in the attack on the Hotel de Cinq-Cygne by the people of Troyes, in 1792. [The ...
— Repertory Of The Comedie Humaine, Complete, A — Z • Anatole Cerfberr and Jules Franois Christophe

... took off my coat, and thought a little more in my shirt sleeves. But beginning to feel very cold now, half undressed as I was, and remembering what the landlord said about the harpooneer's not coming home at all that night, it being so very late, I made no more ado, but jumped out of my pantaloons and boots, and then blowing out the light tumbled into bed, and commended myself to the ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville

... there, and the Provost, too!" "I don't care if it is Jeff Davis, I'll find out if she is hurt!" he answered. Miriam and Anna recognized him, as they followed behind us, and called to him. Without more ado, he jumped into their buggy, finding them alone, and drove them home. He asked me something as he passed, but I could ...
— A Confederate Girl's Diary • Sarah Morgan Dawson

... Without ado, the lean, wild man of the Sahara was led, in wrinkled burnous, with disheveled hair, wild eyes, and an expression of helpless despair, to where the Master stood. At sight of the massed horsemen, the grassy plain—a sight never yet beheld by him—and ...
— The Flying Legion • George Allan England

... informing Madame de Beauharnais [* - Perhaps Josephine told Napoleon herself, but I think she was clever enough to let him imagine he owed the appointment to his merits.] that he was to command the army of Italy, probably made less ado ...
— The Bread-winners - A Social Study • John Hay

... goat-footed fairy wife of Don Diego Lopez in the Spanish tale narrated by Sir Francis Palgrave. "Holy Mary!" exclaimed the Don, as he witnessed an unexpected quarrel among his dogs, "who ever saw the like?" His wife, without more ado, seized her daughter and glided through the air to her native mountains. Nor did she ever return, though she afterwards, at her son's request, supplied an enchanted horse to release her husband when in captivity to the Moors. In two Norman variants the lady forbids the utterance ...
— The Science of Fairy Tales - An Inquiry into Fairy Mythology • Edwin Sidney Hartland

... bar?... The night was waxing old, the dawn was coming. Upon the Mere Honour Baptist Manwood, a brave and honest soul who did his duty, steered his ship, encouraged his men, fought the Spaniard and made no more ado, trained his guns upon the landing, and with their menace kept back the enemy while, boatload after boatload, the English left the bank and reached in safety the two ...
— Sir Mortimer • Mary Johnston

... ADO'PT, v.a. take a son by choice; make him a son who is not so by birth; place any person or thing in a nearer relation than they have by ...
— The Illustrated London Reading Book • Various

... labourer, much less any one else, his eye fell on his good falcon, which he saw on his perch in his little saloon; whereupon, having no other resource, he took the bird and finding him fat, deemed him a dish worthy of such a lady. Accordingly, without more ado, he wrung the hawk's neck and hastily caused a little maid of his pluck it and truss it and after put it on the spit and roast it diligently. Then, the table laid and covered with very white cloths, whereof he had yet some store, he returned with a blithe countenance ...
— The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio • Giovanni Boccaccio

... Without more ado the defrauded one hurled herself into the middle of the bed, buried her head in the immaculate pillows and burst ...
— A Dixie School Girl • Gabrielle E. Jackson

... ado—for Sandy was small and thin—he lifted him bodily, carried him up the steps, and rang a peal which soon brought his wife to the door. Placing the old man on a sofa in the warm sitting-room where the light ...
— Harper's Young People, January 13, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various

... and fortify'd, Sir Knight From peaceful home set forth to fight. But first with nimble, active force 405 He got on th' outside of his horse; For having but one stirrup ty'd T' his saddle, on the further side, It was so short, h' had much ado To reach it with his desp'rate toe: 410 But, after many strains and heaves, He got up to the saddle-eaves, From whence he vaulted into th' seat, With so much vigour, strength and heat, That he ...
— Hudibras • Samuel Butler

... with which the poor lamb contrived to keep up a sort of trot, and their mutual calls and lamentations were really so affecting, that Ellen and I, although not at all lachrymose sort of people, had much ado not to cry. We could not find a boy to carry the lamb, which was too big for us to manage;—but I was quite sure that the ewe would not desert it, and as the dark was coming on, we both trusted that the shepherds on folding their flock would miss them and return for them;—and so I am happy ...
— Our Village • Mary Russell Mitford

... doomed to disappointment. At the next court, no records were forthcoming; and though he defended his case with great zeal, he was thrown in his suit again; when he concluded, I suppose, to yield to his fate without further ado." ...
— The Rangers - [Subtitle: The Tory's Daughter] • D. P. Thompson

... went in, and, with much ado and amid a great deal of laughter and joking, places were made for Soederberg and Osa, though the tent was already crowded to the limit with natives. Osa understood none of the conversation. She sat dumb and looked in wonderment at the kettle and coffee pot; at the fire and smoke; ...
— The Wonderful Adventures of Nils • Selma Lagerlof

... art who understand how to bring out the values of the human face, yet to leave provocative shadows which make for mystery and charm. Richard received it with a respectful hand, and then had much ado to keep from showing how the sight of her pictured face made ...
— The Twenty-Fourth of June • Grace S. Richmond

... And without more ado he passed round the table, caught her quickly in his arms, and, without the smallest expression of interest, kissed her. If interest were lacking, his movements were so swift that, had the girl the least idea of avoiding ...
— The Twins of Suffering Creek • Ridgwell Cullum

... more ado, while the poor trembling girl writhed and groaned in her agony before their eyes, that mob of wild savages, let loose to torture and slay, fell upon her with hideous shouts, and bound her, as they had bound ...
— The Great Taboo • Grant Allen

... Patrick O'Prism walked out into the grounds to study the effect of moonlight on the snow-clad mountains: Mr Foster and Mr Escot continued to make love, and Mr Panscope to digest his plan of attack on the heart of Miss Cephalis: Mr Jenkison sate by the fire, reading Much Ado about Nothing: the Reverend Doctor Gaster was still enjoying the benefit of Miss Philomela's opiate, and serenading the company from his solitary corner: Mr Chromatic was reading music, and occasionally ...
— Headlong Hall • Thomas Love Peacock

... in your lordship to taste Shakespeare!" protested Sir Ralph Masaroon, shaking a cloud of pulvilio out of his cataract of curls. "There was a pretty enough play concocted t'other day out of two of his—a tragedy and comedy—Measure for Measure and Much Ado about Nothing, the interstices filled in with the ...
— London Pride - Or When the World Was Younger • M. E. Braddon

... all? We are enacting much ado about nothing," said the marchioness, seating herself smilingly at the desk. "You shall have the invitation, modest and mysterious petitioner. What name shall ...
— Fairy Fingers - A Novel • Anna Cora Mowatt Ritchie

... glass was heard; voices called. And then Max came in, looking as cool as you please, though I could read by his heaving chest that he had been sprinting up back streets. The boys crowded around him, and there was much ado over the laggard. ...
— The Princess Elopes • Harold MacGrath

... bribed to let it pass.) Now while this brazen chain prevail'd, Jove saw that all devotion fail'd; No temple to his godship raised; No sacrifice on altars blazed; In short, such dire confusion follow'd, Earth must have been in chaos swallow'd. Jove stood amazed; but looking round, With much ado the cheat he found; 'Twas plain he could no longer hold The world in any chain but gold; And to the god of wealth, his brother, Sent Mercury to get another. Prometheus on a rock is laid, Tied with the chain himself had made, On icy Caucasus ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift

... hall we part without a word, and I, spiritlessly, mount the staircase alone. How I flew down it this morning, three steps at a time, and had some ado to hinder myself from sliding down the banisters, as we have all often, with dangerous joy, done at home! Now I crawl up, like some sickly old person. When I reach my bedroom, I throw myself into the first chair, and ...
— Nancy - A Novel • Rhoda Broughton

... last word fell on my ear, I had much ado to keep my seat, for I turned sick and faint, and all the crowd of men and horses seemed to whirl round and round. Haribee! Right well I knew that fateful name, for it was the place at Carlisle where they hanged ...
— Tales From Scottish Ballads • Elizabeth W. Grierson

... it seems to me, that ere this day is done The voice, that now is speaking, may be beyond the sun; For ever and for ever with those just souls and true: And what is life, that we should moan? why make we such ado? ...
— Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, March 1844 - Volume 23, Number 3 • Various

... free. Forgetful of the gloomy prospects of the Jacobite cause, and ignoring the victorious enemies encamped within a few miles of them, they talked hopefully of future meetings at St. James's, the Prince declaring that 'if he had never so much ado he would be at least one night merry with his Highland friends.' But St. James's was far enough off from Coridale, and in the meantime it became daily more certain that there was no longer safety for the ...
— The True Story Book • Andrew Lang

... the beauty of the world," he answered smiling, and he kissed her hand—a matter about which she could make no great ado, for it was not the first time that he ...
— McClure's Magazine, Volume VI, No. 3. February 1896 • Various

... feeling, is not alone to be found among pleasure-seekers of the upper classes: the people also are infected. I know more than one little household, which ought to be happy, where the mother has only pain and heartache day and night, the children are barefoot, and there is great ado for bread. Why? Because too much money is needed by the father. To speak only of the expenditure for alcohol, everybody knows the proportions that has reached in the last twenty years. The sums ...
— The Simple Life • Charles Wagner

... the princes batayle, and came and fought with the men at armes hande to hande. Than the second batayle of thenglyshe men came to socour the prince's batayle, the whiche was tyme, for they had as than moche ado, and they with the prince sent a messangar to the kynge who was on a lytell wyndmill hill. Than the knyght sayd to the kyng, Sir therle of Warwyke and therle of Cafort [Stafford] Sir Reynolde Cobham and other such as be about the prince your sonne are feersly fought with all, and are sore handled, ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various

... took it otherwise. The veins on his forehead swelled, and he had much ado to control himself. The truth was, he feared ridicule more than he feared danger, perhaps more than he feared death; and such an end to such an enterprise was hard to bear. To have set forth to raise the south of Ireland, to have undertaken a diversion that ...
— The Wild Geese • Stanley John Weyman

... so quite contrary to the practice of the world; there being nothing more familiar in speaking of the dominion of countries, than to say such an one conquered it; as if conquest, without any more ado, conveyed a right of possession. But when we consider, that the practice of the strong and powerful, how universal soever it may be, is seldom the rule of right, however it be one part of the subjection of the conquered, not to argue against the conditions cut out ...
— Two Treatises of Government • John Locke

... the water in order to escape by swimming. Thus the enemy were victorious, although more of their men were killed than of ours. They tried to take the galley, notwithstanding its condition, but it sank in a few moments. That was a great misfortune. The enemy were triumphant, and made much ado about ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XXII, 1625-29 • Various

... just-discovered island, so gladly to have been self-appropriated, was found to have, sticking on one corner of it, the flag of another king; that the havoc of my brain, subsiding calmly into the pendulum regularities of metre, was much ado about nothing; and all those pretty fancies were the catalogued property of another. Such a subject, too! intrinsically worthy of a niche in the temple of Fame, besides Hope, Memory, and Imagination, if only one could manage it well enough to be named in the same breath with Campbell, ...
— The Complete Prose Works of Martin Farquhar Tupper • Martin Farquhar Tupper

... say that such is not the case now. But such was the case, they think, in the Revolution of '75. If one were to tell me that this was a bad government because it taxed certain foreign commodities brought to its ports, it is most probable that I should not make an ado about it, for I can do without them. All machines have their friction; and possibly this does enough good to counterbalance the evil. At any rate, it is a great evil to make a stir about it. But when the friction comes to ...
— Walden, and On The Duty Of Civil Disobedience • Henry David Thoreau

... wagon beds, why couldn't we do likewise? Without more ado all the old clothing that could possibly be spared was assembled, and tar buckets were scraped. Old chisels and broken knives were hunted up, and a boat repairing and calking campaign began. Very soon the wagon box rode placidly, even if not gracefully, ...
— Ox-Team Days on the Oregon Trail • Ezra Meeker

... of Tortuga, Monsieur Ogeron, finding that the wild dogs killed so many of the wild boars, that the hunters of that island had much ado to find any; fearing lest that common substance of the island should fail, sent for a great quantity of poison from France to destroy the wild mastiffs: this was done, A.D. 1668, by commanding horses to be killed, and empoisoned, ...
— The Pirates of Panama • A. O. (Alexandre Olivier) Exquemelin

... "I have it here safe and sound, and you shall see it." And thereupon and without more ado he drew out his wallet, opened it, and handed the other the mysterious note which he had kept carefully by him ever since he had received it. His interlocutor took the paper, and drawing to him the candle, burning there for the convenience of those who would smoke tobacco, ...
— Stolen Treasure • Howard Pyle

... birds, for example, this is easy enough, but with others this is by no means true. The life-history of the Sole is a case in point; only by the slow accumulation of facts has this been put together. But the result is most interesting, and without more ado we now proceed ...
— Chatterbox, 1906 • Various

... had much ado to find his master again, and endless work to persuade him to quit his sulks and join the other suitors in the hall that night, when each presented his bride-gift. Even when I had won him over, he refused ...
— The White Wolf and Other Fireside Tales • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... to think of aught, for the men who waited for us heard the voices, and had been told that we had halted; whereon here they came up the road at a hand gallop, in silence. The two men of the reeve made no more ado, but fled townwards, and after them, swearing, went their leader. With him the stranger went also, shouting, and we three were left in the road with plunging horses; and then, with a wild half thought that we might meet and cut our way through these knaves ere they knew ...
— A King's Comrade - A Story of Old Hereford • Charles Whistler

... hung suspended from our tops and stays—they, too, are gone! Yes, they are all departed, and there is nothing left us but salt-horse and sea-biscuit. Oh! ye state-room sailors, who make so much ado about a fourteen-days' passage across the Atlantic; who so pathetically relate the privations and hardships of the sea, where, after a day of breakfasting, lunching, dining off five courses, chatting, playing whist, and drinking champagne-punch, ...
— Typee - A Romance of the South Sea • Herman Melville

... food—and the colony accordingly legalizes fan-tan and semi-daily lotteries, supplies the requisite machinery for carrying on the games, and reaps a benefice for its enterprise that runs the community without further ado. That is all there is to Macao's fiscal policy. Hong Kong, only forty miles across the estuary, bristles with commercial prosperity. The British government permits Hong Kongers to bet on horse-races, buy and ...
— East of Suez - Ceylon, India, China and Japan • Frederic Courtland Penfield

... peace, praised him for his courage, said that he would love him as his son, and bade him be a help to mankind, remembering not to glory in his own strength, for he held it from God, and death without more ado might subdue it altogether. "Many, many treasures," he said, "must pass from me to you to-morrow, but now rest ...
— Legends That Every Child Should Know • Hamilton Wright Mabie

... much ado to get to work; the heat here being so intense that I can do nothing but lie on the bare floor all day. I never felt it anything ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 1 (of 3), 1833-1856 • Charles Dickens

... traders, but live by their agriculture.[NOTE 2] They have a great many abbeys and minsters full of idols of sundry fashions, to which they pay great honour and reverence, worshipping them and sacrificing to them with much ado. For example, such as have children will feed up a sheep in honour of the idol, and at the New Year, or on the day of the Idol's Feast, they will take their children and the sheep along with them into the presence of the idol with great ceremony. Then they ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa

... Congress and in the country as a whole has found a leader who is a fighter, who today still has a large following in Congress and out of it. And in Congress, through the masses, the question must finally be decided. Meanwhile, is it to be assumed without further ado that President Wilson himself stands diametrically opposed to the peace views of Bryan? We do not believe that. We are even today still of the opinion that Wilson desires war with Germany as little as does Bryan, the friend ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 4, July, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various

... March, 17., 1896, will ever live green in the memory of Alonzo Walling and Scott Jackson. It was on this day they were taken to Kentucky, quietly and without much ado. Sheriff Plummer appeared at the Hamilton County, O., Jail in Cincinnati, and the prisoners were given in his charge. Walling was at once handcuffed to Detective Crim and Jackson to Detective McDermott. The crowds about the Jail and the reporters had no idea what was going on until ...
— The Mysterious Murder of Pearl Bryan - or: the Headless Horror. • Unknown

... face the enemy and form up in line and take breath, and was encouraging them, for they had retreated from the wall of the Greeks across the whole plain, past the hill that was the tomb of Ilus, a king of old, and past the place of the wild fig-tree. Much ado had Hector to rally the Trojans, but he knew that when men do turn again they are hard to beat. So it proved, for when the Trojans had rallied and formed in line, Agamemnon slew a Thracian chief who had come to fight for Troy before King ...
— Tales of Troy: Ulysses the Sacker of Cities • Andrew Lang

... no," he murmured. "Coming back, though, was rather difficult," he continued. "The carriage was very heavy, and we had some ado to—" ...
— Captain Dieppe • Anthony Hope

... the courtezan's avarice and her incivility! To think of her making so short a story of it! Over and over she repeats something about the affection she feels, and then without more ado she pockets the necklace. She is rich enough so that she might at least have said: "Good Maitreya, rest a little. You must not go until you have had a cup to drink." Confound the courtezan! I hope I 'll never ...
— The Little Clay Cart - Mrcchakatika • (Attributed To) King Shudraka

... great cannon ceased not; smoke and fire seemed to envelop the walls of the towers; the air was darkened by clouds of arrows; great stones came crashing into our midst. Men fell on every side; we had much ado to press on without treading under foot the dead and dying; but the white pennon fluttered before us, and foot by foot we crept up towards the base ...
— A Heroine of France • Evelyn Everett-Green

... cannot say just what he does think, major, because he utterly refuses to speak of it. He said it was absurd to make such an ado about nothing, and declared he would be seriously annoyed ...
— 'Laramie;' - or, The Queen of Bedlam. • Charles King

... Without further ado, Mr. McGuffey started across the deckload to the fo'castle head. Scraggs could not see him but he could hear him—so he pelted the engineer with potatoes, cabbage heads, and onions, the vegetables descending about the honest McGuffey in a veritable barrage. Even ...
— Captain Scraggs - or, The Green-Pea Pirates • Peter B. Kyne

... knew that it was best, and he closed his eyes without further ado. When he opened them again it was because the hunter was shaking his shoulder, and he knew by the position of the sun that ...
— The Rulers of the Lakes - A Story of George and Champlain • Joseph A. Altsheler

... grinned. "Bless you," he retorted, "don't make so much ado about nothing. She's quite as wise ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand

... nobody holds him by the button but some desperate, dilapidated philanthropist. People say, while turning a corner, "How do you do, Doctor?" which is very much as if they said, "How do you do, Abstraction?" I live in a "lone conspicuity," preach in a vacuum, and call, with much ado, to find nobody. "What doest thou here, Elijah?" one might say to a ...
— Autobiography and Letters of Orville Dewey, D.D. - Edited by his Daughter • Orville Dewey

... of you can tell me where I can buy a stopped-up nose, for there is no work more disgusting than to mix food for a beetle and to carry it to him. A pig or a dog will at least pounce upon our excrement without more ado, but this foul wretch affects the disdainful, the spoilt mistress, and won't eat unless I offer him a cake that has been kneaded for an entire day.... But let us open the door a bit ajar without his seeing it. Has he done eating? Come, pluck up ...
— Peace • Aristophanes

... excepting one little room, which he did not like to offer to such a man as he. But the Chancellor wished to see it; and on being shown into it, said, "O, this will do very well—it is a fine room." Which do you think was the greater of these two men? A small mind makes much ado ...
— Anecdotes for Boys • Harvey Newcomb

... of Commons, where members were crowded to assist at the formal passing of the Irish and Welsh Bills. On the adjournment, Mr. Will Crooks, from his seat on the front bench below the gangway, called out, "Mr. Speaker, would it be in order to sing 'God save the King'?" and without more ado uplifted his voice and the House chimed in. There must have been strange thoughts in the minds of Redmond, of Mr. Dillon, and others of the Irish, standing in the places where they had fought so long and bitter ...
— John Redmond's Last Years • Stephen Gwynn

... my eyes. Santos looked of uncanny stature in the low yellow light, from my pillow close to the earth. Harris turned away at my glance; he carried a spade, and began digging near the boxes without more ado, by the light of a second lantern set on one of them: his back was to me from this time on. Santos shrugged a shoulder towards the captain as he opened a campstool, drew up his trousers, and seated himself with much deliberation at the ...
— Dead Men Tell No Tales • E. W. Hornung

... cried the Genoese seamen, and without further ado, twenty-two galleys careened forward, their white sails bellying in the wind, their hawsers groaning, spars creaking, and sailors chattering like magpies on a ...
— Famous Privateersmen and Adventurers of the Sea • Charles H. L. Johnston

... ado, he called four lesser imps, who ushered me within. What a dreadful plain lay before me! There was a vast city laid out in regular streets, but there were no houses. Along the streets were places of torment and torture ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... very painful concern I mention to your Excellency this attempt of Mr Lee to undermine me in this manner; when I thought he had enough ado to fulfil his commissions through Germany, and therefore was very open and unaware in my letters to him. It is with the same concern, I learn just now by a letter of a very worthy servant of the United States, that his brother Arthur ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. IX • Various

... ask for some ships in order to return by sea: if he refused to give them ships, let them demand of him a guide to lead them back through a friendly district; and if he would not so much as give them a guide, they could but put themselves, without more ado, in marching order, and send on a detachment to occupy the pass—before Cyrus and the Cilicians, whose property," the speaker added, "we have so plentifully pillaged, can anticipate us." Such were the remarks of that speaker; he was followed by Clearchus, who merely said: "As to ...
— Anabasis • Xenophon

... tramp, and I marveled at them. Without more ado we 'got down to business,' and it was nearly two hours later when we parted at the gate. In answer to a question of mine, ...
— The Alchemist's Secret • Isabel Cecilia Williams

... the fire was tended unceasingly by busy hands, and round it men were going always. They never slackened in their zeal, or kept aloof, but pressed upon the flames so hard that those in front had much ado to save themselves from being thrust in; if one man swooned or dropped, a dozen struggled for his place, and that, although they knew the pain and thirst and pressure to be unendurable. Those who fell down in fainting fits, and were not crushed or burned, ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 11 • Various

... are accepted as Brahmins. I told them that in my opinion the treatment of non-Brahmins by the Brahmins was as satanic as the treatment of us by the British. I added that the non-Brahmins should be placated without any ado or bargaining. But my remarks were never intended to encourage the powerful non-Brahmins of Maharashira or Madras, or the mischievous element among them, to overawe the so-called Brahmins. I use the word 'so-called' advisedly. For the Brahmins who have freed themselves from the thraldom of superstitious ...
— Freedom's Battle - Being a Comprehensive Collection of Writings and Speeches on the Present Situation • Mahatma Gandhi

... stung me to the quick, smelling very offensively; and I could easily trace that viscous matter, which, our naturalists tell us, enables those creatures to walk with their feet upwards upon a ceiling. I had much ado to defend myself against these detestable animals, and could not forbear starting when they came on my face. It was the common practice of the dwarf, to catch a number of these insects in his hand, as schoolboys do among us, and let them out suddenly under my nose, on purpose ...
— Gulliver's Travels - into several remote nations of the world • Jonathan Swift

... but it was of no use, for Harry had got such influence over that animal that when one day he was coaxing him out to lead him under some trees, and the mahout tried to stop him, Nabob makes no more ado, but lifts his great soft trunk, and rolls Mr Chunder Chow over into the grass, where he lay screeching like a parrot, and chattering like a monkey, rolling his opal eyeballs, and shewing his white teeth with fear, for he expected that ...
— Begumbagh - A Tale of the Indian Mutiny • George Manville Fenn

... more ado went down to the fat toad and said, "I have to take home the fairest woman." "The fairest woman, hey? She is not right here, but none the less you shall have her." She gave him a hollowed out carrot to which were harnessed ...
— Hidden Symbolism of Alchemy and the Occult Arts • Herbert Silberer

... you are saved," was all I could utter; poor N—— was faint with sudden joy and hope. We tore open the envelope, which contained bills from his son in India to a large amount. I saw N—— was unable to think, and without more ado, I squeezed his hand, seized the letter, and put spurs to my horse. The bidding had commenced when I reached the wondering crowd, who rapidly fell back as they saw me approach. But why should I tire you any longer; in ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 17, Number 490, Saturday, May 21, 1831 • Various

... readiness to make the attempt forthwith; and without further ado the pair straightway entered the water, hand in hand, Lance first taking the precaution to place his watch in his hat and ram the latter well down upon his head. They waded steadily in until Blanche felt ...
— The Pirate Island - A Story of the South Pacific • Harry Collingwood

... that Deformed; he has been a vile thief this seven years; he goes up and down like a gentleman: I remember his name."—Much Ado About Nothing. ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley



Words linked to "Ado" :   tumult, bustle, stir, commotion, rumpus, hustle, ruckus, flurry, din



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