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Minion   Listen
noun
Minion  n.  
1.
A loved one; one highly esteemed and favored; in a good sense. (Obs.) "God's disciple and his dearest minion." "Is this the Athenian minion whom the world Voiced so regardfully?"
2.
An obsequious or servile dependent or agent of another; a fawning favorite. "Go, rate thy minions, proud, insulting boy!"
3.
(Print.) A small kind of type, in size between brevier and nonpareil. This line is printed in minion type.
4.
An ancient form of ordnance, the caliber of which was about three inches. (Obs.)






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Minion" Quotes from Famous Books



... cicadas shrilled the music of fifes. He, the despised, the man to spare, now cocked up his helmet like fortune's minion, dizzy with new honors. Nobody had ever praised him to his face. And now she, she of all the world, had spoken words which he feared and longed to believe, and which even said still less than her searching and ...
— Dragon's blood • Henry Milner Rideout

... himself with, yet faine he would haue patcht out a poltfoote tale, but (God he knowes) it had not one true legge to stand on. Then began he to smell on the villaine so rammishly, that none there but was readie to rent him in peeces, yet the minion king kept in his cholar, and propounded vnto him farther, what of the king of Englands secrets (so aduantageable) he was priuie to, as might remoue him from the siege of Turwin in three daies. Hee sayde diuerse, diuerse matters, which askt longer conference, but in good honestie they ...
— The Vnfortunate Traveller, or The Life Of Jack Wilton - With An Essay On The Life And Writings Of Thomas Nash By Edmund Gosse • Thomas Nash

... which Louis XV.'s minion would retire to his Sardanapalian retreat, to gorge himself at leisure on the life blood of the Canadian people, whose welfare he had sworn to watch over! Such, the doings in the colony in the days of La Pompadour. The results of this misrule were soon apparent: the British lion ...
— Picturesque Quebec • James MacPherson Le Moine

... moreover, he soon made a host of personal adversaries; while, as these were far from suspecting the height to which he was ultimately destined to attain, they took little pains to dissemble their dislike and contempt of the new minion; and thus, ere long, De Luynes had amassed a weighty load of hatred in his heart. To him it appeared that all the great dignitaries of the kingdom, although born to the rank they held, were engrossing honours which, possessed as he was of the favour of the sovereign, should have been conferred ...
— The Life of Marie de Medicis, Vol. 2 (of 3) • Julia Pardoe

... three dollars," said Psmith. "It may possibly have escaped your memory, but a certain minion of yours, one J. Repetto, utterly ruined a practically new hat of mine. If you think that I can afford to come to New York and scatter hats about as if they were mere dross, you are making the culminating error of a misspent ...
— Psmith, Journalist • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse

... approach the house, but were to permit no one to depart. It was a weak plan, but knowing the supreme egotism of Barter, Bentley felt that the old scientist would deliberately accept such a challenge. He wouldn't mind risking the loss of a minion. ...
— The Mind Master • Arthur J. Burks

... know, am but a college minion, But still, you'll all be shipped, in my opinion, When brought before Conventus Facultatis. ...
— A Collection of College Words and Customs • Benjamin Homer Hall

... more dignified and true to life than here. The woman with her short clustering curls, the man with his strong face, are resting after that long fever which brought woe to Italy, to Europe a new age, and to the boasted minion of fortune a slow death in the prison palace of Loches. Attired in ducal robes, they lie in state; and the sculptor has carved the lashes on their eyelids heavy with death's marmoreal sleep. He, at least, has passed no judgment on their crimes. Let us, ...
— New Italian sketches • John Addington Symonds

... them literally knocked down by the acknowledged minion of one Courteney, for having ventured to differ politically with another and for daring to mention the pestilence to ...
— Gideon's Band - A Tale of the Mississippi • George W. Cable

... after hour in his little shop,—toiling away days, weeks, and months for a meagre subsistence,—Jacoub finally turned in disgust from his hammer and forge, and became a "minion of the moon." He is said, however, to have been reasonable in plunder, and never to have robbed any of all they had. One night he entered the palace of Darham, prince of the province of Segestan, and, working diligently, soon gathered together an immense amount of valuables, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 30, April, 1860 • Various

... kept him busy for a long time. He had not realized that so many shapes and kinds of letters could exist. Mr. Daggett told him their names and sizes—nonpareil, brevier, agate, pica, minion and a dozen others which Bobby could not remember but which he found exotic and attractive. Especially was he interested in the poster type, made of wood. One letter was bigger than the whole ...
— The Adventures of Bobby Orde • Stewart Edward White

... a fly, In pleasant jollity: With mirth and melody, Sing Money, Money, Money! Money the minion, the spring of all joy; Money, the medicine that heals each annoy; Money, the jewel that man keeps in store; Money, the idol that women adore! That Money am I, the fountain of bliss, Whereof whoso tasteth, doth never amiss. Money, money, ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VIII (4th edition) • Various

... "Minion of the hireling law," began the elder Hepburn, running his fingers through his hair and striking ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys as Lieutenants - or, Serving Old Glory as Line Officers • H. Irving Hancock

... he would scarce ever again discover the carnate dwelling-place of the haunting minion of his imagination. Having gone so near to matrimony with Marcia as to apply for a licence, he had felt for a long while morally bound to her by the incipient contract, and would not intentionally look about him in search of ...
— The Well-Beloved • Thomas Hardy

... I am at liberty to depart?' said Frank; and the Captain returned a polite affirmative. Our hero left the hall of judgment, thoroughly disgusted with the injustice and partiality of this petty minion of the law; for he well knew that had he himself been in reality nothing more than a poor sailor, as his garb indicated, the three words, 'lock him up,' would have decided his fate for that night; and that upon the following morning the three words, 'send him over,' would have decided his fate ...
— City Crimes - or Life in New York and Boston • Greenhorn

... count. "Art thou not sufficiently humiliated? Dare to breathe a word in his favor, and it shall go hard with thy minion. Punishment thou canst not avert; say but a word, and that punishment becomes death; for he is mine, soul and body, to have and to hold, to head or to hang—my vassal, my ...
— The Three Brides, Love in a Cottage, and Other Tales • Francis A. Durivage

... monk, Let him take his pittance; And the parson with his punk, If he craves admittance; Masters with their bands of boys, Priests with high dominion; But the scholar who enjoys Just one coat's our minion! ...
— Wine, Women, and Song - Mediaeval Latin Students' songs; Now first translated into English verse • Various

... the raucous voice of the outlaw booming in her ears, but she paid no heed. She saw Garry Hawks come into the cavern, waddling under the burden of the rope-ladder, which he carried clumsily by reason of the wound in his arm. She observed that the outlaw said something to his minion, putting his lips close to the fellow's ear, lest he be overheard. But she felt no curiosity as to the purport of this secret utterance, nor did she take interest when, immediately afterward, she beheld the wounded man get down on all fours and crawl out of sight through the hole in ...
— Heart of the Blue Ridge • Waldron Baily

... minion of the Prince thus slain, Augments the fault in telling it, and saith, This Prince murdered, for a quarrel vain, By young Rinaldo in his desperate wrath, And with that sword that should Christ's law maintain, One of ...
— Jerusalem Delivered • Torquato Tasso

... Years for thy sake the Crown has worn my Brow, And Years my Foot been growing to the Throne Only for Thee—Oh spurn them not with Thine; Oh turn thy Face from Dalliance unwise, Lay not thy Heart's hand on a Minion! For what thy Proper Pastime? Is it not To mount and manage Rakhsh along the Field; Not, with no stouter weapon than a Love-lock, Idly reclining on a Silver Breast. Go, fly thine Arrow at the Antelope And Lion—let not me my Lion see Slain ...
— Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam and Salaman and Absal • Omar Khayyam and Ralph Waldo Emerson

... a special train had steamed away for Calais, bearing the refugees. The proprietor and his minion had but just returned from the station, whence the train had departed a short half hour before. Aboard it were the Americans who had been stranded in Abbevilliers on the evening previous. My eight young lady seniors were aboard it, doubtlessly assuming, in the haste ...
— Fibble, D. D. • Irvin Shrewsbury Cobb

... perch I crew, And would have sung much longer too, When came a crooked devil's minion, The slater 'twas in my opinion. Who after many a knock and shake Detached me wholly from my stake. My poor old heart was broke at last When from the roof he pulled me past The bells which from their ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VII. • Various

... Herr," assented the incomer with crude agreeableness, all the while grinning in shamefacedness. And floating in the water Jim received another order, from the retreating and apologizing minion of the law, to stand at attention at Headquarters. He was unfamiliar with courts of any sort and did not know he should ask for an interpreter. That the officials had not as yet used one showed apparently an attempt ...
— Villa Elsa - A Story of German Family Life • Stuart Henry

... there, First King the mighty hunter; and that Chief Who did belie his mother's fame, that so He might be called young Ammon. In this court Caesar was crown'd, accurst liberticide; And he who murdered Tully, that cold villain, Octavius, tho' the courtly minion's lyre Hath hymn'd his praise, tho' Maro sung to him, And when Death levelled to original clay The royal carcase, FLATTERY, fawning low, Fell at his feet, and worshipped the new God. Titus [3] was here, the Conqueror of the Jews, He the Delight of human-kind misnamed; Caesars and Soldans, Emperors ...
— Poems, 1799 • Robert Southey

... hear me, maid: This blot of nature, this deformed, loathed Creon, Is master of a sword, to reach the blood Of your young minion, spoil the gods' fine work, And stab you ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Vol. 6 (of 18) - Limberham; Oedipus; Troilus and Cressida; The Spanish Friar • John Dryden

... magnificent eyes ablaze with anger. "Faithless minion of a faithless race, you promised to let ...
— The Strong Arm • Robert Barr

... is best kept conformable to modern tastes, I suspect, by nobody's prying too closely into the earlier relations between the Duke and his handsome minion. The insistently curious may resort to history to learn at what price the favors of Duke Alessandro were secured and retained: it is no part of ...
— The Jewel Merchants - A Comedy In One Act • James Branch Cabell

... for a Persian I cannot say; certain I am that he would have no more fought for a Spartan than he would for his own father: yet he mortally hates the man who hath a kinder muse or a better milliner, or a seat nearer the minion of a king. So much for the two disciples of Socrates who have ...
— Imaginary Conversations and Poems - A Selection • Walter Savage Landor

... by the hand as he left St. Peter's Church. 'My child, my shepherd boy,' he said, and he called Watch after him, and interested himself in establishing a kind of suspicious peace between the shaggy collie and his own 'Minion,' a small white curly-haired dog, which belonged to a family that had been brought by Queen ...
— The Herd Boy and His Hermit • Charlotte M. Yonge

... and truer-hearted of them, at least. Some here, surely, have read Epictetus, the heathen whose thought most exactly coincides with that of the Psalmist. If so, do they not see what enabled him, the slave of Nero's minion, to assert himself, and his own unconquerable personality; to defy circumstance; and to preserve his own calm, his own honour, his own purity, amid a degradation which might well have driven a good man to suicide? ...
— Westminster Sermons - with a Preface • Charles Kingsley

... too strongly by the determination that his widowed mother's hopes should never be blasted by any assertion of his own will? Was he passively permitting himself to be warped and twisted into a minion of an institution alien to his soul in bigoted adherence to his morbid sense of integrity? Was he for the present countenancing a lie, rather than permit the bursting of a bomb which would rend the family and bring his beloved mother in sorrow to the grave? Or was he biding his time, an undeveloped ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking

... 'lovely boy' that, though he be now the 'minion' of Nature's 'pleasure,' he will not succeed in defying Time's inexorable law. Sidney addresses in a lighter vein Cupid—'blind hitting boy,' he calls him—in his Astrophel (No. xlvi.) Cupid is similarly invoked in three of Drayton's sonnets (No. xxvi. in the ...
— A Life of William Shakespeare - with portraits and facsimiles • Sidney Lee

... brave the air, And Bothwell bank is blooming fair, To fix his princely bowers. Though now in age he had laid down His armour for the peaceful gown, And for a staff his brand, Yet often would flash forth the fire That could in youth a monarch's ire And minion's pride withstand; And e'en that day, at council board, Unapt to soothe his sovereign's mood, Against the war had Angus stood, And chafed his ...
— Marmion: A Tale of Flodden Field • Walter Scott

... and his official minion was thus engaged, Tom Dunning was seen coming, with hasty strides, along the road, from the direction of his cabin, which was situated without the village, about a half mile north of the Court House, from which it would have been visible but for the pine thicket by which ...
— The Rangers - [Subtitle: The Tory's Daughter] • D. P. Thompson

... here,' the marquis answered, stepping aside a little. And with the word I understood that this was no minion, but the king himself: Henry, the Third of the name, and the last of the great House of Valois, which had ruled France by the grace of God for two centuries and a half! I stared at him, and stared at him, scarcely believing ...
— A Gentleman of France • Stanley Weyman

... star, The baleful sign of fevers; dust had soil'd His stately crest, and dimm'd his glittering arms. His breast heaved, his lips foam'd, and twice his voice Was choked with rage; at last these words broke way:— "Girl! nimble with thy feet, not with thy hands! Curl'd minion, dancer, coiner of sweet words! Fight, let me hear thy hateful voice no more! Thou are not in Afrasiab's gardens now With Tartar girls, with whom thou art wont to dance; But on the Oxus sands, and in the dance Of battle, and with me, who make no play Of war; I fight it out, and hand to hand. Speak ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 6 • Charles H. Sylvester

... not fashion's minion,—I am not convention's slave! If 'obedience is for woman,' still she has ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. III, No IV, April 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... to the man of God, and having long conversations with him, began immediately to change his life, and to give the demonstrations of that change. From the very fist, he banished out of his chamber a beautiful youth, who was his minion, and also forbade him the entry of his palace. He gave bountifully to the poor, to whom he had formerly been hard-hearted, as thinking it was a crime to pity them, and an act of justice to be cruel ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Volume XVI. (of 18) - The Life of St. Francis Xavier • John Dryden

... fiends in fire, Minion! you shall find that it is not the worst. I know how to make you knuckle under, and I shall do it!" exclaimed the commodore in a rage, as he rose up and strode off toward the room occupied by Mary L'Oiseau. Without the ceremony of knocking, he burst the door open with one blow of ...
— The Missing Bride • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth

... is much bigger than any of the rest. It stands on about 180 great Posts or Trees, a great deal higher than the common Building, with great broad Stairs made to go up. In the first Room he hath about 20 Iron Guns, all Saker and Minion, placed on Field-Carriages. The General, and other great Men have some Guns also in their Houses. About 20 paces from the Sultan's House there is a small low House, built purposely for the Reception of Ambassadors or Merchant Strangers. This also stands on Posts, but ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898—Volume 39 of 55 • Various

... ambassadors assumed a tone of menace: but the perfidious Gray secretly fortified Elizabeth's resolution with the proverb, "The dead cannot bite;" and undertook soon to pacify, in any event, the anger of his master, whose minion he ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin

... The political South. And what is this South? The Southern master and his Northern minion. Have these people wronged the South? Have they filled it with violence, outrage, and murder? No, sir; they are remarkably gentle, patient, and respectful. Have they despoiled its wealth or diminished its grandeur? No, sir; their unpaid toil ...
— History of the Thirty-Ninth Congress of the United States • Wiliam H. Barnes

... accomplish this? Would that proclaim his villainy, of whatever nature it may be, to the world? Would they not rather side with him, their present minion, and even bring forward your unjustifiable conduct as a fresh proof in his favour? How would they give credit to the terms they may hear you apply to him, when even in your family you speak not of the true cause of this strange agitation and ...
— The Mother's Recompense, Volume I. - A Sequel to Home Influence in Two Volumes. • Grace Aguilar

... the hollow of this rock was beheaded, on the first day of July 1312, by barons, lawless as himself, Piers Gaveston, Earl of Cornwall, the minion of a hateful King, in life and death a memorable ...
— From John O'Groats to Land's End • Robert Naylor and John Naylor

... royal hours Couch sorrowful slaves bound by low nature's greed; Why the celestial soul's a minion made ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 3 - Sorrow and Consolation • Various

... you know, and who is sole master in the house, a powerful coadjutor. When they were completely aground, and their desires had become more craving in proportion as the difficulty of gratifying them increased, the lady readily agreed to a plan which her minion proposed to her in private, and which was nothing else "than to sell the honour of her stepdaughter, under an equivocal promise of marriage, at as high a price as the favourite would buy it." The minister had not the slightest suspicion of all this; he only felt his lack ...
— Faustus - his Life, Death, and Doom • Friedrich Maximilian von Klinger

... alike in brute and man. Parker leaped at the sound of the first bullet, fell, and rolled behind a snow-covered boulder. Had Ward or his minion tracked him? Were they now carrying out their desperate plan? The double report was proof that the man or men ...
— The Rainy Day Railroad War • Holman Day

... that, when Rizzio was dragged out of the chamber of the Queen, the heat and fury of the assassins, who struggled which should deal him most wounds, despatched him at the door of the anteroom. At the door of the apartment, therefore, the greater quantity of the ill fated minion's blood was spilled, and there the marks of it are still shown. It is reported further by historians, that Mary continued her entreaties for his life, mingling her prayers with screams and exclamations, until she knew that he was assuredly slain; ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott

... thus was a life of extortion and of fraud brought to an ignominious end through the force of public opinion, and by the decree of that same Caesar who himself had largely benefited by the mal-practices of his minion. ...
— "Unto Caesar" • Baroness Emmuska Orczy

... incurred on entrance was over as far as Vane was concerned. For the sixth time since leaving his battalion he had, in a confidential aside, informed a minion of the B.A.M.O. that he was a Wee Free Presbyterian Congregationalist; and for the sixth time the worthy recipient of this news had retired to consult War Office Sealed List of Religions A.F.31 to find out if he was entitled to be anything of the ...
— Mufti • H. C. (Herman Cyril) McNeile

... decree an end? Drink, and drink largely, that delicious juice, The em'rald vines in purple gems produce, Which for its excellence surpasses far That liquor which, to bright celestial souls, Jove's minion, Ganimede, with steady care, ...
— Ebrietatis Encomium - or, the Praise of Drunkenness • Boniface Oinophilus

... it," he exclaimed, "or I throw you, with my knife in your heart, upon the body of your minion." ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, No. 382, October 1847 • Various

... firm against the earnest expostulations of his brother the Comte d'Artois, his niece the Duchesse d'Angouleme, and all the Royalists who had influence with him. But he despised and hated in his soul Fouche,—that minion of Napoleon, that product of blood and treason,—and waited only for a convenient time to banish him from the councils and the realm. Nor did he like Talleyrand (at that time the greatest man in France), but made use of his magnificent ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume IX • John Lord

... natural parts, and used frequently to blush for his own ignorance and want of education, which had been wilfully neglected by his mother and her minion. ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole

... the baker's gamin is called a mitron, the lackey's gamin is called a groom, the marine gamin is called the cabin-boy, the soldier's gamin is called the drummer-boy, the painter's gamin is called paint-grinder, the tradesman's gamin is called an errand-boy, the courtesan gamin is called the minion, the kingly gamin is called the dauphin, the god gamin is ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo

... done, By frugal handmaids let the board be laid; Let them refresh their vigor in the shade, Or deem their straw as down to lie upon, Ere the great nation which our sires begun Be rent asunder by hell's minion, Trade! If jarring interests and the greed of gold, The corn-rick's envy of the mined hill, The steamer's grudge against the spindle's skill,— If things so mean our country's fate can mould, O, let me hear again the shepherds ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 122, December, 1867 • Various

... day I have believed the legend which tells that, when the Roman, helpless in his dungeon, thundered forth, "Slave! darest thou kill Caius Marius?" the armed minion of murder turned and fled, dropping the knife he held, in his panic, at the feet of the man he came to slay. Almost such effect was for a ...
— Sea and Shore - A Sequel to "Miriam's Memoirs" • Mrs. Catharine A. Warfield

... which can bear examination one by one. So far Cleopatra is, as Enobarbus calls her, "a wonderful piece of work," a woman of women, inscrutable, cunning, deceitful, prodigal, with a good memory for injuries, yet as quick to forgiveness as to anger, a minion of the moon, fleeting as water yet loving-true withal, a sumptuous bubble, whose perpetual vagaries are but perfect obedience to every breath of passion. But now Shakespeare without reason makes her faithless to Antony and to love. In the second scene of the third act Thyreus comes ...
— The Man Shakespeare • Frank Harris

... slave bearing Treasure! Ranged bags of glittering gold! Then upspake brave EUAN-SMITHEZ. "Hold, base Sultan; minion, hold! Dost thou think to bribe and buy a Christian Knight? A Paynim plan! If I take it, thou mayst sell me ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 103, July 30, 1892 • Various

... dare, when I am dead, to charge me with dishonor; let no man attaint my memory by believing that I could have engaged in any cause but that of my country's liberty and independence; or that I could have become the pliant minion of power in the oppression or the miseries of my countrymen. The proclamation of the provisional government speaks for our views; no inference can be tortured from it to countenance barbarily or debasement at home, or subjection, humiliation, or treachery from abroad. I would not have submitted ...
— Phrases for Public Speakers and Paragraphs for Study • Compiled by Grenville Kleiser

... day we reckoned our selues to be 25 leagues from the Grand Canarie, and this day about nine of the clocke our pinnesse brake her rudder, so that we were forced to towe her at the sterne of the Minion, which we were able to doe, and yet kept company with the rest of our ships. About eleuen of the clocke this day we had ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of - The English Nation, Vol. 11 • Richard Hakluyt

... fop! that over-dressed minion! I know the fellow; with his smooth face and the silver quiver on his shoulder he believes he is Eros in person. Be off with you, you house-rat. The women and girls in here know how to protect themselves against the sort who parade ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... scene with Margot, in which she calls her a "petty minion,"—pretty language for a young gentlewoman,—"sweeps with unutterable scorn from the room," never, to the reader's huge astonishment, to appear in the story again, and Margot flies with Di Sorno to Grenada, where the Inquisition, consisting apparently of a single ...
— Certain Personal Matters • H. G. Wells

... stalwart young knight I see before me. You are indeed changed and improved. Who would think that my gossip Editha's son would come to be the Earl of Evesham! The Lady Margaret is eager to see you; but I think that you exaggerate the dangers of her residence here. I cannot think that even a minion of Prince John would dare to violate ...
— Winning His Spurs - A Tale of the Crusades • George Alfred Henty

... Against this minion of the Crown The swelling murmurs grew - From Camberwell to Kentish Town - From Rotherhithe to Kew. Still humoured he his wagsome turn, And fed in various ways The coward rage that dared to burn, But did not dare ...
— Fifty Bab Ballads • William S. Gilbert

... beautiful epigram, which C. R. H. has somewhat mutilated even in the two lines which he gives of it, was written by Jerome Amaltheus, who died in 1574, the year in which Henry III. of France came to the throne; so that it is unlikely at least that the "Amor" was meant for Mangirow, his "minion." In the edition of the poems of the three brothers Amalthei, which I possess, and which was printed at Amsterdam ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 76, April 12, 1851 • Various

... the car up at the curb, leaped out and approached the minion of the law. A short colloquy, and he had returned and the car shot down Broadway. "You can look back now, Miss," suggested Dan. Willa turned. The motor-cycle had been halted in mid-pursuit, its rider gesticulating in futile rage and vexation ...
— The Fifth Ace • Douglas Grant

... When campaigning Edward denied himself nothing. His wardrobe and arms; his enormous and apparently well-supplied array of food wagons; his ecclesiastical vestments for the celebration of victory; his plate; his siege artillery; his military chests, with all the jewelry of his young minion knights, fell into the hands of the Scots. Down to Queen Mary's reign we read, in inventories, about costly vestments "from the fight at Bannockburn." In Scotland it rained ransoms. The Rotuli Scotiae, in 1314 full of Edward's preparation for war, in ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various

... the horns in trophy of thy skill?" repeated the girl in wrathful incredulity. "Brought them to thee, forsooth! Why, minion, thou didst not kill the ...
— In Doublet and Hose - A Story for Girls • Lucy Foster Madison

... swaddled, and rocked, and dandled into a legislator: "Nitor in adversum" is the motto for a man like me. I possessed not one of the qualities, nor cultivated one of the arts, that recommend men to the favor and protection of the great. I was not made for a minion or a tool. As little did I follow the trade of winning the hearts by imposing on the understandings of the people. At every step of my progress in life—for in every step was I traversed and opposed—and at every turnpike I met, I was obliged to shew my passport, ...
— The Ontario Readers: The High School Reader, 1886 • Ministry of Education

... mocked at him, and said, 'Of what use is a man's soul to us? It is not worth a clipped piece of silver. Sell us thy body for a slave, and we will clothe thee in sea-purple, and put a ring upon thy finger, and make thee the minion of the great Queen. But talk not of the soul, for to us it is nought, nor has it ...
— A House of Pomegranates • Oscar Wilde

... of Edinburgh, aloft on the rock frowning above the town, had been held by the English full twenty years, and, when Randolph was sent to besiege it, was governed by a Gascon knight named Piers Luband, a kinsman of Gaveston. In hatred and suspicion of all connected with the minion, the English soldiers rose against the foreigner, threw him into a dungeon, and, electing a fresh captain, made oath to hold out to the last. The rock was believed to be inaccessible, and a blockade appeared to be the only means of reducing the garrison. ...
— Cameos from English History, from Rollo to Edward II • Charlotte Mary Yonge

... personal variations. The lyric in him is through some temperamental twist reversed. Fantastic dreams overflow his reality, and he always dreams with wide-open eyes. Watteau's l'Indifferent! A philosophical vaudevillist, he juggles with such themes as a metaphysical Armida, the moon and her minion, Pierrot; with celestial spasms and the odour of mortality, or the universal sigh, the autumnal refrains of Chopin, and the monotony of love. "Life is quotidian!" he has sung, and women are the very symbol of sameness, that is their tragedy—or ...
— Ivory Apes and Peacocks • James Huneker

... voice; Then let the strong hand, which had overthrown Her minion-knights, by those he overthrew Be bounden straight, and so they ...
— Idylls of the King • Alfred, Lord Tennyson

... two flowers blossom In a garden 'neath the hill, One a lily fair and handsome, And one a rose with crimson frill; Erect the rose would lift its pennon And survey the garden round, While the lily—lovely minion! Meekly rested on ...
— The Poetry of Wales • John Jenkins

... one nation for the glory of another—such is the sum total of fatal traditions which Bismarck now solicits to be allowed to continue by means of free discussion, and in the bosom of open parliament. Palmerston and Gortchakoff cannot hop in the same bag. The minion of a Czar and the representative of a nation cannot be united in one and the same person. What programme can Bismarck develop to his colleagues which will have the moral character of necessary work? Moreover, the divine word called human eloquence descends only on the ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 24, November, 1891 • Various

... soft service with a hard fee. None could say whether the actor piped or wept the louder; he showed by his bitter flood of tears how little place bravery has in the breasts of the dissolute. For the fellow was a mere minion of pleasure, and had never learnt to bear the assaults of calamity. This man's hurt was ominous of the carnage that was to follow at the feast. Right well did Starkad's spirit, heedful of sternness, hold with stubborn gravity to steadfast revenge; for he ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")

... overran the country with little opposition, burnt the houses, and laid waste the lands of those whom he styled rebels; but whenever he returned to England they came forth again, only the more embittered against the contemptible minion of the English king, the more determined against the tyranny of England. The regent, Sir Andrew Murray, pursued, with untiring activity, Balliol and his adherents. When Edward marched homeward to spend in London ...
— Christmas: Its Origin and Associations - Together with Its Historical Events and Festive Celebrations During Nineteen Centuries • William Francis Dawson

... of Eboli.—In his controversy with Bowles touching the poetry of Pope, Byron states that it was upon the Princess of Eboli, mistress of Philip II. of Spain, and Mangirow, the minion of Henry III. of France, that the famous Latin epigram, so well known to classic readers, was ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 72, March 15, 1851 • Various

... in the evening, the travellers went down to the boat, not a soul did they find on board. Seven o'clock came, but no Captain Pierce, no minion of his. Burr made inquiry of the agent, the tavern-keeper and others, without obtaining information concerning any of ...
— A Dream of Empire - Or, The House of Blennerhassett • William Henry Venable

... Maister Edvvard Winter Captaine in the Aide. Maister Christopher Carleill the Lieftenant generall, Captaine in the Tygar. Henry White Captaine of the sea Dragon. Thomas Drake Captaine of the Thomas. Thomas Seelie Captaine of the Minion. Baily Captaine of the Barke Talbot. Robert Crosse Captaine of the Barke Bond. George Fortescute Captaine of the Barke Bonner. Edward Carelesse Captaine of the Hope. James Erizo Captaine of the vvhite Lion. Thomas Moone Captaine of the Francis. Iohn Riuers Captaine of ...
— A Svmmarie and Trve Discovrse of Sir Frances Drakes VVest Indian Voyage • Richard Field

... Who, for his own bad end, to hide his fault, Makes use of her, a Princess of the realm, As of a mule,—a beast of burden!—borne Upon her shoulders through the winter's night And wind and snow?" "Death!" said the angry lords; And knight and squire and minion murmured, "Death!" Not one discordant voice. But Charlemaign— Though to his foes a circulating sword, Yet, as a king, mild, gracious, exorable, Blest in his children too, with but one born To vex his flesh like an ingrowing nail— Looked kindly on the trembling pair, and said: "Yes, Eginardus, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, Issue 45, July, 1861 • Various

... now on my main work, with the Lord Lovell; The gallant-minded, popular Lord Lovell, The minion of the people's love. I hear He's come into the country; and my aims are To insinuate myself into his knowledge, And then invite him to ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 4, April 1810 • Various

... not to 'give me and mine our last fatal blow by obtaining from his Majesty the inheritance of my children and nephews, lost in law for want of words.' He made the attempt after his manner of neglecting no possibility. He can have put little trust in royal justice, and less in a worthless minion's magnanimity. Early in January, 1608, the Court of Exchequer decided against the validity of the conveyance. Chamberlain wrote on January 10, 1608, to Dudley Carleton: 'Sir Walter Ralegh's estate is fallen into the King's hands by reason of a flaw in the conveyance. ...
— Sir Walter Ralegh - A Biography • William Stebbing

... proved a long task. From Miss Minion's boarding-house on Seventeenth Street, where I established myself, I went forth daily to the siege of Park Row. I was shot up to heaven to editorial rooms beneath gilded domes, and as quickly shot down again. I climbed to ...
— David Malcolm • Nelson Lloyd

... to his sceptre young; he leaves it old: Look to the state in which he found his realm, And left it; and his annals too behold, How to a minion first he gave the helm;[522] How grew upon his heart a thirst for gold, The beggar's vice, which can but overwhelm The meanest hearts; and for the rest, but glance Thine eye along ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 4 • Lord Byron

... Cutting the clouds towards Paphos, and her son Dove-drawn with her. Here thought they to have done Some wanton charm upon this man and maid, 95 Whose vows are, that no bed-right shall be paid Till Hymen's torch be lighted: but in vain; Mars's hot minion is returned again; Her waspish-headed son has broke his arrows, Swears he will shoot no more, but play with sparrows, 100 And be a boy ...
— The Tempest - The Works of William Shakespeare [Cambridge Edition] [9 vols.] • William Shakespeare

... unknowable mischance mine enemy discovered my whereabouts and a third minion, who escaped my wrath before the statue that morning, appeared in the city and caused me to be delivered up to the authorities on the charges ...
— The Yoke - A Romance of the Days when the Lord Redeemed the Children - of Israel from the Bondage of Egypt • Elizabeth Miller

... usual variety of Irish dances—the reel, jig, fling, three-part-reel, four-part-reel, rowly-powly, country-dance, cotillion, or cut-along (as the peasantry call it), and minuet, vulgarly minion, and minionet—were going forward in due rotation, our readers may be assured that those who were seated around the walls did not permit the time to pass without improving it. Many an attachment is formed at such amusements, ...
— The Hedge School; The Midnight Mass; The Donagh • William Carleton

... well dressed and manured by the Lord was a wonder! Lord, what was man that thou didst so magnify him, and make him a little lower than the angels,—that thou didst put all things sublunary under his feet, and exalt him above them! For that creature chosen and selected from among all, to be his minion, to stand in his presence, adorned and beautified with such gifts and graces, magnified with such glorious privileges, made according to the most excellent pattern, his own image, to forget all, and forget so soon, and when he had such ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning

... has a solemn covenant been more grossly and wickedly violated. Is it, Sir, in virtue of this agreement, that you voted to fine and imprison every conscientious, humane citizen who may refuse, at the command of a minion of a commissioner, to join in a slave hunt? Did this agreement confer on the holders of slaves an enlarged representation in Congress? Was it in pursuance of this agreement that the importation of slaves was guaranteed for twenty ...
— A Letter to the Hon. Samuel Eliot, Representative in Congress From the City of Boston, In Reply to His Apology For Voting For the Fugitive Slave Bill. • Hancock

... said Armstrong tartly, but glad of the opportunity to talk back to the personage who treated him in the House as a Czar treats a minion. "We are the only party that is ready to cling to the Constitution as if it were the rock ...
— Senator North • Gertrude Atherton

... Kapchack, as you know), is not here. The pampered fawning wretch!—I hate such favourites—they disgrace a court. Why, all the rest of our family are driven forth like rogues, and are not permitted to come near! If the tyrant kills his children in his wanton freaks even then this minion remains loyal: despicable being! But now without further delay let us ask the owl to state the case plainly, so that we can all understand ...
— Wood Magic - A Fable • Richard Jefferies

... till thou hast command to do some dastard's deed and nay-sayest it, as thou wilt: and then farewell to thee; for I know what my Lord meaneth for thee." "Yea," said Ralph, "and what is that?" Said Redhead; "He hath bought thee to give to his wife for a toy and a minion, and if she like thee, it will be well for a while: but on the first occasion that serveth him, and she wearieth of thee (for she is a woman like a weather-cock), he will lay hand on thee and take the manhood from thee, and let thee drift about Utterbol a mock ...
— The Well at the World's End • William Morris

... to court? Certain 'tis the rarest sport; There are silks and jewels glistening, Prattling fools and wise men listening, Bullies among brave men justling, Beggars amongst nobles bustling; Low-breath'd talkers, minion lispers, Cutting honest throats by whispers; Wherefore come ye not to court? Skelton swears 'tis glorious sport. ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott

... occasionally to be met with in old-fashioned families and out-of-the-way corners of the world. This Monitor was as terrible to the marquis as another more modern Monitor was to the Merrimac, and the Scotch minion was compelled to bestir himself. He called in to his aid Bubb Doddington, who, during the lifetime of the preceding king, had done good service for the party of the Prince of Wales, in a journal styled the Remembrancer, and they, in conjunction with Smollett as editor, brought out the ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 5, May, 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... them in his cabinet, where he was accompanied only by the Duke of Joyeuse—his foremost and bravest "minion"—by the Count of Bouscaige, M. de Valette, and the Count ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... huge rough bearded Irishman who in outward appearance might have passed anywhere for a Russian, was not less efficient or less loved and trusted by me than O'Malley. As a proprietor of a cab stand every driver was a minion of his and served him precisely as O'Malley's waiters did their chief; and it may readily be determined that the power thus exerted for making reports, for knowing the distinction and the engagements of certain individuals was far reaching indeed. Coyle also had served ...
— Princess Zara • Ross Beeckman

... I was perfectly calm. With the exception of slightly expectorating twice in the face of the minion, I did not betray my agitation. Haughtily, ...
— The Luck of Roaring Camp and Other Tales • Bret Harte

... I took the minion of Caesar from Caesar and made him my playfellow. He came to me at night in a litter. He was pale as a narcissus, and his ...
— Miscellanies • Oscar Wilde

... kings: can we therefore surfeit on this delicate Ambrosia? can we drink too much of that whereof to taste too little tumbles us into a churchyard, and to use it but indifferently throws us into Bedlam? No, no, look upon Endymion, the moon's minion, who slept three score and fifteen years, and was not a hair the worse for it. Can lying abed till noon (being not the three score and fifteenth thousand part of ...
— A History of English Literature - Elizabethan Literature • George Saintsbury

... characters of his correspondents lie bare to his keen eye and flow from his facile pen. From time to time he pauses and appeals to the source of his inspiration; his humanity prompts him to extend the inspiration to Policeman Hogan. The minion of the law walks his beat with a feeling of more than tranquillity. A solitary Chinaman, returning home late from his midnight laundry, scuttles past. The literary instinct has risen strong in Hogan from his connection with the man of genius above him, and the passage of the lone Chinee gives ...
— Literary Lapses • Stephen Leacock

... injurious, loathsome and abominable? Who would have been able to make such a bold statement, and to censure a life so faultless and conforming so closely to the Law as Paul's, without being pronounced by all men a minion of the devil, had not the apostle made that estimation of it himself? And who is to have any more respect for the righteousness of the Law if we are ...
— Epistle Sermons, Vol. III - Trinity Sunday to Advent • Martin Luther

... Paris Opera, may be passed over as comparative failures, but 'Esclarmonde' (1889) marks an important stage in Massenet's career. The libretto is drawn from an old French romance. Esclarmonde, the Princess of Byzantium, who is a powerful enchantress, loves Roland, the French knight, and commands her minion spirits to guide him to a distant island, whither she transports herself every night to enjoy his company. He betrays the secret of their love, and thereby loses Esclarmonde, but by his victory in a tournament at Byzantium ...
— The Opera - A Sketch of the Development of Opera. With full Descriptions - of all Works in the Modern Repertory • R.A. Streatfeild

... old armorial lists o'erspread, In records destined never to be read. Fain would I view thee, with prophetic eyes, Exalted more among the good and wise, A glorious and a long career pursue, As first in rank, the first in talent too: Spurn every vice, each little meanness shun; Not Fortune's minion, ...
— My Recollections of Lord Byron • Teresa Guiccioli

... as in England, and the means of reformation to Parliament itself be far better provided. Mr. Benfield was therefore no sooner elected than he set off for Madras, and defrauded the longing eyes of Parliament. We have never enjoyed in this House the luxury of beholding that minion of the human race, and contemplating that visage which has so long reflected the happiness ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. III. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... captiue, at the ouerthrow of the Assyrians. King Cyrus then after his enemyes were vanquished, hearinge tell of this gentlewoman, called vnto him one of his dearest frends named Araspas which was a Median borne, the very minion, playe felow, and companion of Cyrus from his youth: to whom for the great loue that he bare him, he gaue the Median robe of from his owne backe at his departure from Astiages into Persia. To this gentleman, king ...
— The Palace of Pleasure, Volume 1 • William Painter

... He did not want to go with the soldier; his southern blood had not been fired by the wrongs of his country; and he was equally averse to being shot in cold blood by this minion of the Confederacy. His position was exceedingly embarrassing, for he could neither run, fight, nor compromise. While matters were in this interesting and critical condition, Tom ventured to raise his head ...
— The Soldier Boy; or, Tom Somers in the Army - A Story of the Great Rebellion • Oliver Optic

... for fame and power? Then when that person shall possess these, let him ask him- self, and answer to his name in this corner-stone of our [10] temple: Am I greater for them? And if he thinks that he is, then is he less than man to whom God gave "do- minion over all the earth," less than the meek who "in- herit the earth." Even vanity forbids man to be vain; and pride is a hooded hawk which flies in darkness. Over [15] a wounded sense of its own error, let not mortal ...
— Miscellaneous Writings, 1883-1896 • Mary Baker Eddy

... would exhaust the supply. A big freshly-shaven policeman strolled by, eying him suspiciously. It gave the young man the impression of being a prisoner out on good behavior; and in an indefinite way it almost insulted his self-respect. For the lack of something better to do he watched the minion of the law as he pursued his beat. Not Ben Blair alone, but every person the officer passed, went through this challenging inspection. The countryman had been too much preoccupied to notice that he had companions; but now that his interest was aroused, he began inspecting the ...
— Ben Blair - The Story of a Plainsman • Will Lillibridge

... been stated above, the partition of this kingdom had been planned by Godoy in concert with Napoleon early in 1806. That pampered minion of the Spanish Court, angry at the shelving of plans which promised to yield him a third of Portugal, called Spain to arms while Napoleon was marching to Jena, an affront which the conqueror seemed to overlook but never really forgave. Now, however, he appeared wholly to enter ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose

... forester and minion of the moon, shall commend himself to the grace of the Virgin, and shall have the gift of continency on pain of expulsion: that the article of chivalry may be secure from infringement, and maids, wives, and widows pass without fear ...
— Maid Marian • Thomas Love Peacock

... whereof were gilt, and the scabbard of velvet, of the color of his breeches, the end in gold, and goldsmith's work. The dagger of the same. Their caps were of black velvet, adorned with jewels and buttons of gold. Upon that they wore a white plume, most prettily and minion-like parted by so many rows of gold spangles, at the end whereof hung ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VII (of X)—Continental Europe I • Various

... fair room yet hung with arras, and some great cardinal to lug me by th' ears, as his endeared minion. ...
— The White Devil • John Webster

... much later invention of the Enemy—but I am sure of the men with trays full of mosaic pins and brooches, and looking, they and their wares, just as they used to look. The Colosseum itself looked unchanged, though I had read that a minion of the wicked Italian government had once scraped its flowers and weeds away and cleaned it up so that it was perfectly spoiled. But it would take a good deal more than that to spoil the Colosseum, ...
— Roman Holidays and Others • W. D. Howells

... shall keep your girl, and do as you please with her; we will produce our girl, and do as we please with her. You shall have as much money as you want, I can promise that for the Prince of Gonzague, and you can live in Madrid or where you please with your pretty minion. Make a bargain, man, and ...
— The Duke's Motto - A Melodrama • Justin Huntly McCarthy

... of Burgundy!" said Duke Charles, "is our will to be thwarted, and our commands disputed, at every turn? Up, I say, minion, and withdraw for the present—when we have time to think of thee, we will so order matters that, Teste Saint Gris! you shall either ...
— Quentin Durward • Sir Walter Scott

... the drunkard, "I may obtain some favor in your eyes, for I despatched hither on a flood of good ale many a fatted prey, and when I failed to slay others, I willingly came myself to feed you." "By the court's leave," said the minion, "not half so many as I have despatched to you as a burnt offering ready for table." "Ha, ha," exclaimed Death, "it was to feed your own accursed lusts, and not me, that all this was done. Let them be bound together and hurled ...
— The Visions of the Sleeping Bard • Ellis Wynne

... to understand it. And yet, to one acquainted with these lovers of brief phrases, what more intelligible answer could have been returned? The poor fellow simply meant to say that his horses had been stolen—a thing of frequent occurrence in that country, or, perhaps, that some minion of the Government of the moment had seized them for the use ...
— The Naturalist in La Plata • W. H. Hudson

... severer punishment. I said I would "cut" the wretched minion's pay that month to the amount of a rupee. Vengeance was satisfied, and the ...
— A Holiday in the Happy Valley with Pen and Pencil • T. R. Swinburne

... ashamed of the decision to which they had driven the jury. He was therefore reprieved, and committed to the Tower, where his wife was allowed to bear him company, and where his youngest son was born. His estates were, in general, preserved to him, but Carr, the infamous minion of the King, under some pretext of a flaw in the conveyance of it by Raleigh to his son, seized upon his manor of Sherborne. In the Tower he continued for twelve years. These years his industry and genius rendered the happiest probably of his ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan

... the Zephyr, sportive minion, Spreads the blue, aurelian pinion. Now in love's low whispers winging, Now in giddy fondness clinging, With all a lover's warmth he wooes thee, With all a lover's ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 569 - Volume XX., No. 569. Saturday, October 6, 1832 • Various

... said, "our doom of forfeiture and imprisonment against this disobedient and insolent minion! She shall to the penitentiary, to herd with those whose lives have rendered ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VIII • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.

... in art and of historical interest must be awarded. Sculpture has rarely been more dignified and true to life than here. The woman with her short clustering curls, the man with his strong face, are resting after that long fever which brought woe to Italy, to Europe a new age, and to the boasted minion of Fortune a slow death in the prison palace of Loches. Attired in ducal robes, they lie in state; and the sculptor has carved the lashes on their eyelids, heavy with death's marmoreal sleep. He at least has passed no judgment on their crimes. Let us too bow ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds

... be safe that require protection. Modern history is a history of Church spoliation. And by whom? Not by the people; not by the democracy. No; it is the emperor, the king, the feudal baron, the court minion. The estate of the Church is the estate of the people, so long as the Church is governed on its real principles. The Church is the medium by which the despised and degraded classes assert the native equality ...
— Coningsby • Benjamin Disraeli



Words linked to "Minion" :   dependent, dependant



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