"Spoil" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Dan, we won't stand it. You're a dashed fool and want to spoil everything for a bit of temper. We'll take the notes and let Mrs. Knightley and the doctor clear out for Bathurst if you'll say honour bright that you'll be at the Black Stump by to-morrow evening at five, and won't ...
— Robbery Under Arms • Thomas Alexander Browne, AKA Rolf Boldrewood
... having placed half the interior of France in bags, the disposal of the same on arriving in the light of day presents difficulties. I admit that the fault lies entirely with the harassed and long-suffering gentleman who boasts the proud title of "spoil's officer." I admit—— But I grow warm, in addition to digressing unpardonably. The trouble is that I always do grow warm, and digress at ...
— No Man's Land • H. C. McNeile
... the day was not a day of pleasure; for the small stock of strength and spirits with which I set out was soon exhausted, and the rest of the day was wasted in efforts to appear cheerful and support myself to the end, lest I should spoil the general mirth: on all I looked with complacency tinged with my habitual melancholy. What I most admired was the delicious view, from an eminence in the wildest part of the gardens, over the city and Campagna ...
— The Diary of an Ennuyee • Anna Brownell Jameson
... embraced the teaching that promised the end of kings and governments and the advent of the "rule of the righteous." Mary of Hungary was not far wrong when she wrote that they planned to plunder all churches, nobles, and wealthy merchants, in short, all who had property, and from the spoil to distribute to every individual according to his need. [Sidenote: October 7, 1531] A new and severer edict would have meant a general massacre, had it been strictly enforced, but another element entered into the situation. ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith
... no longer a saint, but a woman of the world. I really thought my husband and children would go out of their minds with admiration and pleasure. The news of this masterpiece spread about the house, and all our servants, whom we rather spoil, came flocking, one after another, as if sent for, crying out, "Oh, it is madame's own self!" I alone did not share in the general enthusiasm. As for Monsieur de l'Estorade, after working for an hour to find a place in his study where ...
— The Deputy of Arcis • Honore de Balzac
... trouble to get Punin on to his feet again, to convince him that, even if I did suspect something, still it would not do to act like that, on the spur of the moment, especially both together—that would only spoil all our efforts—that I was ready to do my best, but would not answer for anything. Punin did not oppose me, nor did he indeed hear me; he only repeated from time to time in his broken voice, 'Save her, save her and Paramon Semyonitch.' ...
— A Desperate Character and Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... all infernal. Those that relate to Assurbanipal—vulgarly, Sandanapallos,—are even ornate. But Assurbanipal, while probably fiendish and certainly crapulous, was clearly literary besides. From the spoil of sacked cities this bibliofilou took libraries, the myths and epics of creation, sacred texts from Eridu and Ur, volumes in the extinct tongues of Akkad and Sumer, first editions of the ...
— The Lords of the Ghostland - A History of the Ideal • Edgar Saltus
... great-great-grandfather, the very savory and much-respected Simeon Shuttleworth, 'on the occasion of the melancholy defections and divisions among the godly in the town of West Dofield'; and it runs thus,—'Take us the foxes, the little foxes, that spoil the vines: for our ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 88, February, 1865 • Various
... probably part of Babylonia, watered by a broad river and wooded with palms, spearmen on foot in combat with Assyrian horsemen, castles besieged, long lines of prisoners, and beasts of burden carrying away the spoil. Amongst various animals brought as tribute to the conquerors could be distinguished a lion led by a chain. There were no remains whatever of the superstructure which once rose above the colossi, ...
— Museum of Antiquity - A Description of Ancient Life • L. W. Yaggy
... ales fret and spoil very soon in warm weather, which proceeds from the development and avolation of their fixed air; strong beers and ales have their limits under the same influence of heat, time, change of the atmosphere, &c., and owe their preservation ...
— The American Practical Brewer and Tanner • Joseph Coppinger
... smiles and amiability. "How nice of you to come so soon!" she began. Her keen penetration discovered something in his face which checked the gayety of her welcome. "You don't mean to say that you are going to spoil our pleasant little dinner by bringing bad news!" she added, looking ...
— The Evil Genius • Wilkie Collins
... preserved in the Bodleian Library, was edited by Mr. J.E. Baily, F.S.A., and printed (twenty copies only) at London in 1880. In 1556 Dee presented to Queen Mary 'A Supplication for the recovery and preservation of ancient Writers and Monuments.' In this interesting document he laments the spoil and destruction of so many and so notable libraries through the subverting of religious houses, and suggests that a commission should be appointed with power to demand that all possessors of manuscripts throughout the realm should send their books to be ...
— English Book Collectors • William Younger Fletcher
... me in that question, because I suppose they really think they would change to please us. I do not mind talking about it, because I am sociable, and I like conversation; but I never for a moment dream that they will do it. They intend to, and their inclination is always to please us, even to spoil us; but they either cannot or will not change; and they think if they can refuse pleasantly, and mentally chuck us under the chin and make us smile, that they have succeeded in getting our minds off a ...
— From a Girl's Point of View • Lilian Bell
... dream if argument and disapproval crashed into it? If his first intensely passionate impulse had been his desire to save it even from the mere touch of ordinary talk and smiling glances because he had felt that they would spoil the perfect joy of it, what would not open displeasure and opposition make of the down on the butterfly's wing—the bloom on the peach? It was not so he phrased in his thoughts the things which tormented him, but the figures would have expressed his feeling. ...
— Robin • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... bad things had been done in Scotland, but none, so far as he could see, contrary to his interests. It was clear, however, that in this matter Lauderdale had gone too far. The Highlanders were ordered to return to their homes. They returned accordingly, laden with spoil such as they had never dreamed of, and of the use of a large part of which they were as ignorant as a Red Indian or ...
— Claverhouse • Mowbray Morris
... Justice, now nearly eighty years old, a beautiful and venerable person, had opened the big Bible, and after turning the leaves a moment, raised his grave, rugged face and read: "'Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong; because he hath poured out his soul ...
— Southern Lights and Shadows • Edited by William Dean Howells & Henry Mills Alden
... no! Do you want to spoil my nervous system? We are not given much to tea-balls in Durford. We consider ourselves lucky if we get a plain old-fashioned pot. Now you get fixed up," she directed, "while I get supper ready, and I'll stay just this time, if you'll let me, and then if you can stand ...
— Hepsey Burke • Frank Noyes Westcott
... hundreds of his people had been armed with guns by the traders, therefore his tribe and the companies of Abou Saood were thoroughly incorporated, brigands allied with brigands, and Gondokoro had become the nucleus to which the spoil was concentrated. ...
— Ismailia • Samuel W. Baker
... hurry to get off. Paul was too wise a commander to spoil the pleasure of his comrades by unseemly haste, with so much time ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts on a Tour - The Mystery of Rattlesnake Mountain • George A. Warren
... feeling, which now prevailed in the Southern Capital. Absolutely in the dark as to the actual movement and its consequences; knowing only that their cherished stronghold, Manassas, was deserted and its splendid system of river batteries left a spoil; hearing only the gloomiest echoes from the Peninsular advance and ignorant of Johnston's plans—or even of his whereabouts—it was but natural that a gloomy sense of insecurity should have settled down upon the masses, as a pall. A dread oppressed them that the recent dramas ...
— Four Years in Rebel Capitals - An Inside View of Life in the Southern Confederacy from Birth to Death • T. C. DeLeon
... he sat down on the side of a ditch, and remained there without moving for hours, vaguely pondering over the things that had engrossed his whole life, the price of eggs and corn, the sun and the rain which spoil the crops or make them grow. And, worn out by rheumatism, his old limbs still drank in the humidity of the soul, as they had drunk in for the past sixty years, the moisture of the walls of his low thatched house covered ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume IV (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant
... villain and his accomplice, congratulating each other on the successful issue of their crimes, and dividing the spoil thereof (which they are always careful to do in a loud voice, and in a room full of closets), are suddenly set upon and secured by the innocent yet suspected and condemned parties, who are at that moment passing ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... as to induce himself to accept this older and more experienced scoundrel's partnership, he had conceived the possibility of the partner crying out for halves. But that he should want so enormous a share of the spoil ...
— Young Mr. Barter's Repentance - From "Schwartz" by David Christie Murray • David Christie Murray
... since the execution in the morning. This was the longest session he had ever indulged in; but the moral fiber degenerates rapidly in the tropics. Besides, the friendly rain had curtained him and kept away the spoil-sports. All day he had sat communing with the shapes and shadows. And it was very pleasant. ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. XXXI, No. 3, July 1908. • Various
... in its season sweet; So love is in its noon: But cankering time may soil the flower, And spoil its bonnie bloom. Oh, come then, while the summer shines, And love is young and gay; Ere age his withering, wintry blast Blaws o'er ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume III - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... his face if the unrighteous mammon tempted him into this sin; and his brother Desborough anathematized him, and vowed to devote his own sword to Charles Stewart sooner than to him, if he persevered in longing for the forbidden spoil." Lambert, who was in the entire confidence of these two, had seduced the affections of the army; Cromwell, therefore, had a difficult game to play. His passionate desire of royalty combated those secret fears that arose from a mysterious warning which he received when he first meditated ...
— The Loyalists, Vol. 1-3 - An Historical Novel • Jane West
... during the recent tempest of applause he had hoisted his gingham umbrella, and calmly gone on with his slumbers. Washington Hawkins had seen the act, but was not near enough at hand to save his friend, and no one who was near enough desired to spoil the effect. But a neighbor stirred up the Colonel, now that the House had its eye upon him, and the great speculator furled his tent like the ...
— The Gilded Age, Part 5. • Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) and Charles Dudley Warner
... the case even more than in the country. The trees in the parks have then the real vivid green foliage of the country. There is a freshness about everything in London which only lasts through May. By June the smoke and dirt are beginning to spoil the tender, fresh greenery of the young leaves. In the early morning of May 12th, 1897, more than an inch of snow fell in the Cotswolds, but it was all gone by eight o'clock. In spite of the weather, May is "the brightest, merriest month of all the glad New Year." Everything is at its best. ...
— A Cotswold Village • J. Arthur Gibbs
... reduced or reconciled. This consisted chiefly of deputies who had been sent out to suppress the rising of the provinces in 1793. These Commissaries of the Convention had enjoyed the exercise of enormous authority; they had the uncontrolled power of life and death, and they had gathered spoil without scruple, from the living and the dead. On that account they were objects of suspicion to the austere personage at the head of the State; and they were known to be the most unscrupulous and the most determined ...
— Lectures on the French Revolution • John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton
... was there, and kept himself down a little while, but then it was the old story, he seemed to spoil all the good he found; for he gave way to no one save to Hallgerda alone, but she never took his side in his brawls with others. Thorarin, Glum's brother, blamed him for letting him be there, and said ...
— Njal's Saga • Unknown Icelanders
... materials. Within is a spacious court, partly shaded with date trees. The whole of the town towards the desert is defended by a pretty deep ditch, overlooked by a proportionate number of brick-built towers (all the spoil of Babylon) flanking the intermediate compartments of wall. In this rampart are ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 13, - Issue 377, June 27, 1829 • Various
... Steele, "to add just a word or two to emphasise one particular point in Mr Boult's speech; or, rather, to put it in a somewhat different light. And I shall be brief, lest I spoil the general effect on your minds of his ...
— Nicky-Nan, Reservist • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch (Q)
... cream will not give you half so bad, nor so dangerous, colic as one little piece of tainted meat or fish or egg, or one cupful of dirty milk, or a single helping of cabbage or tomatoes that have begun to spoil, or of jam made out of spoiled berries or other fruit. This spoiling can be prevented by strict cleanliness in handling foods, especially milk, meat, and fruit; by keeping foods screened from dust and flies; and by keeping them cool with ice in summer time, thus checking the growth ...
— A Handbook of Health • Woods Hutchinson
... the removal of their enemy from his sphere of meretricious activity. This inversion may arise from the fact that whitewashing a creditor who was about to be cooked would be unwise, as the stuff would boil off the bits and spoil the gravy. There is always some fragment of sound sense underlying African institutions. Kiva was, when I got out, tied up, talking nineteen to the dozen; and so was every one else; and a lady was working up white ...
— Travels in West Africa • Mary H. Kingsley
... and caught up the petticoat as though she would put it away; but presently she laid it down again and smoothed it with quick, nervous fingers. "Can't you talk sense and leave my clothes alone? If Jake comes, and I'm not here, and he wants to make a fuss, and spoil everything, and won't wait, you give him this petticoat. You put it in his arms. I bet you'll have the laugh on him. ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... his subjects, the results of such deliberation. Thou shouldst always, adopting such a conduct, watch over thy people. Thou shouldst never confiscate what is deposited with thee or appropriate as thine the thing about whose ownership two persons may dispute. Conduct such as this would spoil the administration of justice. If the administration of justice be thus injured, sin will afflict thee, and afflict thy kingdom as well, and inspire thy people with fear as little birds at the sight of the hawk. Thy kingdom will then melt away like a boat wrecked ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... any man but himself that had done as he had done, he would have been thanked, not censured. "But such is now my wretched case," he said, "as for my faithful, true, and loving heart to her Majesty and my country, I have utterly undone myself. For favour, I have disgrace; for reward, utter spoil and ruin. But if this taking upon me the name of governor is so evil taken as it hath deserved dishonour, discredit, disfavour, with all griefs that may be laid upon a man, I must receive it as deserved of God and not of my Queen, whom I have reverenced with all humility, and whom I have loved ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... madam,' resumed Ludovico, 'that they were pirates, who had, during many years, secreted their spoil in the vaults of the castle, which, being so near the sea, suited their purpose well. To prevent detection they had tried to have it believed, that the chateau was haunted, and, having discovered the private way to the north apartments, which had been ...
— The Mysteries of Udolpho • Ann Radcliffe
... favorites of our letter'd isle; Thou in wide fields, by tribes of learning fill'd, By folly vainly view'd, by wisdom till'd; Where grain and weed arise in mingled birth, To nourish, or oppress, the race of earth; Well hast thou ply'd thy task of virtuous toil, And reap'd distinction's tributary spoil: Long has thy country, with a fond acclaim, Joy'd in thy genius, gloried in thy fame; Progressive talents in thy works beheld, Thine earlier volumes by thy last excell'd! The noblest motive sway'd thy moral pen, Intent to meliorate the sons of men ...
— Poems on Serious and Sacred Subjects - Printed only as Private Tokens of Regard, for the Particular - Friends of the Author • William Hayley
... Aunt Catherine," said Richard pleasantly. "A sense of responsibility would spoil her. ...
— The Beautiful and Damned • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... stuff that's about to spoil, and we can let you have a whole train of it." He took the sack of credits and tossed it toward a drawer, uncounted. "A damned good thing Security's sending a ship. Credits won't be worth much until they get ...
— Police Your Planet • Lester del Rey
... Harry. You are a first rate feller, and I like you. But you see, if you should blow on me now, you would spoil my kettle of ...
— Try Again - or, the Trials and Triumphs of Harry West. A Story for Young Folks • Oliver Optic
... night, I perceived that the Earl was delicately working at some grand scheme regarding the Duke, and I very soon perceived, too, that he was determined you and I should not have an opportunity of talking the matter over, for fear we should spoil proceedings. I was obliged to watch my opportunity to-night with great nicety, but to-morrow I go back, that is to say, if my sweet Caroline is ready to go with me, for I am the most obedient and loving of husbands, as all reformed rakes ...
— The King's Highway • G. P. R. James
... understood, for, upon asking that functionary towards the end of dinner for a bottle of fine old Madeira which had been kept back as a bonnebouche, he gave a wild stare-of astonishment, and said he had put it all into the chowder. This little addition, I can testify, most certainly did not spoil it. The toddy was not subject to any such unwarrantable addition; and, if I may judge from the quantity taken by my neighbours, they all found it as delicious a drink as I ...
— Lands of the Slave and the Free - Cuba, The United States, and Canada • Henry A. Murray
... I had. It would spoil the whole thing if they left me behind. Bayliss, did you ever see such eyes? Such hair! Look after my father while I am away. Don't let the dukes worry him. Oh, and, Bayliss"—Jimmy drew his hand from his pocket—"as ...
— Piccadilly Jim • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... you robbing these, your mother and sister." Mrs. Malling tried to interfere, but he waved her back. "I've come at the right time, and I tell you that you shall not take one cent of the money. I will never leave you lest you should wheedle it from them. I will spoil your game. This is what I intend to do. You and I will set out for Winnipeg to-night, and together we will interview the Commissioner of Police. Do you understand me? I have the whip hand now. And I promise you your silence shall not ...
— The Hound From The North • Ridgwell Cullum
... pony brought the news to the 195th, though there had been consternation in the Colonel's household for an hour before. The little beast came in through the parade ground in front of the main barracks, where the men were settling down to play Spoil-five till the afternoon. Devlin, the Color Sergeant of E Company, glanced at the empty saddle and tumbled through the barrack-rooms, kicking up each Room Corporal as he passed. "Up, ye beggars! There's something happened to ...
— The Short-story • William Patterson Atkinson
... should secure to him the sum of one thousand pesos de oro in requital of his good-will, and they eagerly closed with his proposal, rather than be encumbered with his pretensions. For so paltry a consideration did he resign his portion of the rich spoil of the Incas! 2 But the governor was not gifted with the eye of a prophet. His avarice was of that short-sighted kind which defeats itself. He had sacrificed the chivalrous Balboa just as that officer was opening to him the conquest of Peru, and he would now have quenched the spirit of enterprise, ...
— History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William Hickling Prescott
... so frequently been met halfway, who knew that men for greed will part smilingly with half in order to save the residue. He knew that many, rather than help a neighbour who is in danger by a robber, will join the robber and share the spoil, crying out that force majeure was used ...
— Barlasch of the Guard • H. S. Merriman
... lulled and deceived her. Piracy? Where were the cutlasses, the fierce moustaches, the red bandannas, the rattle of dice, and the drunken songs?—the piracy of tradition? If she had any fear at all it was for the man at her left—Denny—who might run amuck on her account and spoil everything. All her life she would hear the father's voice—"The jam and the cheese, Togo." What ...
— The Pagan Madonna • Harold MacGrath
... left as Little Mother to the others, and I had been lucky enough to think of a game that pleased them. If I turned selfish now, it would spoil everything. ...
— Last Words - A Final Collection of Stories • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... Veturia began: "Why are you surprised, my child? Why are you startled? We are not deserters, but the country has sent to you, if you should yield, your mother and wife and children, if otherwise, your spoil; hence, if even now you still are angry, kill us first. Why do you weep? Why turn away? Can you fail to know how we have just ceased lamenting the affairs of state, in order that we might see you? Be reconciled to us, then, and retain no longer your anger against your citizens, friends, temples, ...
— Dio's Rome, Vol VI. • Cassius Dio
... with the water it had been boiled in, to which was added some oil; there was also bread and wine, then chicken and afterwards poached eggs which they call eggs in their shirtsleeves. Before we had finished I told them that we have a proverb in England that too many cooks spoil the broth, and added that I had never known precisely how many were supposed to be too many, but that, judging by the excellence of the repast, certainly more than three would be required in the caserma of Custonaci. I said this because I ...
— Diversions in Sicily • H. Festing Jones
... about near the surface. When the fishermen arrived I was sitting among the rocks as usual, and turned to acknowledge the mother bird's Ch'wee? But my deep-laid scheme to find out their method accomplished nothing; except, perhaps, to spoil the day's lesson. They saw my bait on the instant. One of the youngsters dove headlong without poising, went under, missed his fish, rose, plunged again. He got him that time and went away sputtering. The second took his time, came down on a long swift slant, and got his fish without ...
— Wood Folk at School • William J. Long
... copper dishes, another to furs, another to porcelains, and so on. Indeed, the town seems to be a very good place for "picking up" things, for hither come men from the far distant Tibetan lamasseries, and patient effort is often rewarded with interesting spoil, while Chinese productions of real value sometimes drift into the bazaar from the collections ...
— A Wayfarer in China - Impressions of a trip across West China and Mongolia • Elizabeth Kendall
... said, "I have never thought that you believed. I have felt this always in the bottom of your heart. I only ask you not to spoil this day for me. I have stolen it. Let me enjoy it. I shall not put you out of my life—at least not yet. Later, when we are both calm, we will talk that out. But let it rest now, ...
— The House of Mystery • William Henry Irwin
... ain't ye?" growled the navvy. "Why, you white-livered hound, you're too deep in it ever to get out again. D'ye think we'll let you spoil a lay of this sort as we might never get a chance ...
— The Firm of Girdlestone • Arthur Conan Doyle
... much depends upon the cooking as upon the tripe itself," remarked Mrs Janaway, bridling at the thought that her art had been left out of the reckoning; "a bad cook will spoil the best tripe. There are many ways of doing it, but a little milk and a leek is ...
— The Nebuly Coat • John Meade Falkner
... warning when the next "lap's" rent is due. But without some such plan we should doubt whether this kind of wheel would ever become very popular; for while four miles and three quarters might be ridden with much peaceful enjoyment, the last quarter of a mile would be filled with terrors that would spoil the pleasure of the ...
— The Great Round World and What Is Going On In It, Vol. 1, No. 48, October 7, 1897 - A Weekly Magazine for Boys and Girls • Various
... her boy with more than usual tenderness. He would not take to the hunting-field, she thought, the boulevard, and the corps de ballet. She would not lose him. "But, oh, Fred!" she cried, "it is not to be wondered at that he is so fond of you! You spoil him! You will be a devoted father some day; your vocation is evidently ...
— Jacqueline, v3 • Th. Bentzon (Mme. Blanc)
... concerning the young man's wonderful luck. Those who knew Lester Armstrong said the great fortune which had come to him would not spoil him. ...
— Mischievous Maid Faynie • Laura Jean Libbey
... on the pile of burnt and ruined meat in disgust. "I knowed you chillen's would go an' spoil de best part ob my bear. Now you-all jis get out ob de way an' dis nigger goin' to show you ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... apologetically at me, and said, "We all spoil her—that's a fact—every one of us down to Rover, there, who lets her tie tippets round his neck, and put bonnets on his head, and hug and kiss him, to a degree that would disconcert any other dog ...
— The May Flower, and Miscellaneous Writings • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... chestnut has its faults here. It is not very thrifty in growth here and as a rule doesn't bear until late. It is not very productive and the nuts spoil easily. I have since planted much seed from the south and it often doesn't even get here ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Incorporated 39th Annual Report - at Norris, Tenn. September 13-15 1948 • Various
... them cease their game at once and return to church. Some of them obeyed, wandering sheepishly off down the hill; some were defiant and told the worthy man to go back to his prayers and not to come up there to spoil sport. ...
— Legend Land, Vol. 1 • Various
... finished spoiling me now, mamma; so it don't much signify. You always did spoil me;—didn't you, father?" Then Polly kissed Mr. Neefit's bald head; and Mr. Neefit, as he sat in the centre of his lawn, with his girdle loose around him, a glass of gin and water by his side, and a pipe in his mouth, felt that in truth there was something ...
— Ralph the Heir • Anthony Trollope
... are supposed to be descended from domesticated forms. In Australia too horses sometimes grow wild from being left long in the bush. These are known as brumbies, and are generally shot by the stock farmer, as they are of deteriorated quality, and by enticing away his mares spoil his more carefully selected breeds. According to Mr. Anthony Trollope they are ...
— Natural History of the Mammalia of India and Ceylon • Robert A. Sterndale
... of Caroline that Esther was just persuading her mother to spoil the boy, that he would be worse than ever, and many other similar predictions. Esther and the tea combined won a signal triumph, and Charlie was called down from the room above, where he had been exchanging telegraphic ...
— The Garies and Their Friends • Frank J. Webb
... soon the Staff, to spoil our tiny slumbers, Or, as they said, to certify our skill, Sent us a screed, all signs and magic numbers, And what it signified is mystery still. We flung them back a message yet more mazy To say we weren't unravelling their own, And marked it urgent, and designed That it should reach ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Sept. 12, 1917 • Various
... old humbug!" cried Uncle John, indignantly. "Why can't she go, when there's money and time to spare? Would you keep her here to cuddle and spoil a vigorous man like yourself, when she can run away and see the ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces Abroad • Edith Van Dyne
... they had secured a monopoly in Munster and an effective competition with us in poor Connaught. It was hard lines for the Midland, but all was not yet lost. If only we could obtain running powers to Limerick and carry them back to Ireland, we should have secured some of the spoil. Another week was spent fighting over running powers, facilities, etc., and I was in the witness box again. Balfour Browne and Littler now conducted the warfare on either side, and keenly they fought. The Committee ...
— Fifty Years of Railway Life in England, Scotland and Ireland • Joseph Tatlow
... which they went was very warm. It was called the wire-room. A workman who was there told them that it was filled with hot air night and day, so that no damp should come in and spoil the steel. ...
— Chambers's Elementary Science Readers - Book I • Various
... it will surely come to the ears of the first-year boys that we are onto their game. Then they may change their idea and be up to some dodge that we can't fathom. I guess we four can spoil their plans." ...
— Frank Roscoe's Secret • Allen Chapman
... The centurion did not keep his soldiers in better order than she keeps her guests. It is to one, 'Go,' and he goeth; and to another, 'Do this,' and it is done. 'Ring the bell, Mr. Macaulay.' 'Lay down that screen, Lord Russell; you will spoil it.' 'Mr. Allen, take a candle and show Mr. Cradock the picture of Bonaparte.' Her ladyship used me as well, I believe, as it is her way to use anybody. ...
— Home Life of Great Authors • Hattie Tyng Griswold
... they had, that little partie carree; Mrs. Truscott had declined, because she said one more woman would spoil it all, and she wanted to write to Jack. And then Ray had to go and see the colonel and have a long talk with him about the big command he was to take north on the morrow, and to shake hands gravely with the embarrassed veteran, and cordially and gladly with Warner, and to ...
— Marion's Faith. • Charles King
... unguarded moment, and renews in secret her kisses upon our lip. Well, if I cannot persuade you to leave both alone, my next advice is that you attack both; for if you endeavour to express in either of these forms of composition all that is probably fermenting in your mind, the chance is that you spoil ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 57, No. 356, June, 1845 • Various
... Spanish infantry. The battles of Freiburg, Nordlingen, and Lens raised the fame of the French generals to the highest pitch, and in 1649 reduced the Emperor to make peace in the treaty of Muenster. France obtained as her spoil the three bishoprics, Metz, Toul, and Verdun, ten cities in Elsass, Brisach, and the Sundgau, with the Savoyard town of Pignerol; but the war with Spain continued till 1659, when Louis XIV. engaged to marry Maria Theresa, a daughter of the King ...
— History of France • Charlotte M. Yonge
... places—the Castle of Elsinore, for instance—that seem to have an amazing and incomprehensible gift of resisting civilization. They may be brought up to date, and trimmed, and filled with inappropriate people, and everything else done that should spoil them, but in spite of it all they do not for a moment look as if any modern extraneous objects had a meaning for them. They belong to their own day and its manner, and to ...
— Devon, Its Moorlands, Streams and Coasts • Rosalind Northcote
... is a Circumstance that would but just bear the touching upon; and Ovid by his two next Lines, has, I think, spoil'd it. In Mr. SEWEL's ...
— A Full Enquiry into the Nature of the Pastoral (1717) • Thomas Purney
... that wouldn't suit him at all. "The Bobolink person would be sure to sing his most boisterous song," he said, "and it would wake me up and spoil my night's sleep. Let me speak to Benjamin Bat!" he ...
— The Tale of Bobby Bobolink - Tuck-me-In Tales • Arthur Scott Bailey
... make off with it without being seen," said Henry. "A pursuit would spoil everything. We'd have to abandon the canoe and retreat back from the ...
— The Eyes of the Woods - A story of the Ancient Wilderness • Joseph A. Altsheler
... to fear; he freed himself from the grasp of his subordinate and again stepped forward, speaking in a still calmer tone. "No foolishness, my lad; if your case is a good one, which is possible, after all, don't spoil it." ...
— Monsieur Lecoq • Emile Gaboriau
... fresh and smiling. Silver, gilding, and mother-of-pearl shone on the table, and all about the room were rare plants growing in magnificent china jars. As he saw Colonel Chabert's wife, rich with his spoil, in the lap of luxury and the height of fashion, while he, poor wretch, was living with a poor dairyman among the beasts, the ...
— Colonel Chabert • Honore de Balzac
... said Tessa rather wearily. "But I wish I hadn't begun quite so soon. Do you think Uncle St. Bernard will spoil me, ...
— The Lamp in the Desert • Ethel M. Dell
... all that signify in a free country," says I. "It looks like a circus. Do they mean to ride in there? I don't see no horses; and it seems to me their hoofs will spoil the carpet when they come in. Are the Japanese people ...
— Phemie Frost's Experiences • Ann S. Stephens
... if they are not disabled by some misfortune in their body, or dispirited by extreme want, so that you need not fear that those well-shaped and strong men (for it is only such that noblemen love to keep about them, till they spoil them) who now grow feeble with ease, and are softened with their effeminate manner of life, would be less fit for action if they were well bred and well employed. And it seems very unreasonable, that for the prospect of a ...
— Ideal Commonwealths • Various
... he said: "No, rather than sell it for that price, I will tear it apart, and sell the diamonds separately for drill-points to the tinkers who mend dishes. I can make more from it in that way, only I dislike to spoil the ring." The Empress Dowager during her late years, and many of the ladies and gentlemen of the more progressive type, affected, whether genuinely or not, an appreciation of the diamond as a piece of jewelry, especially in the form of rings, though coloured stones, polished, but not cut, have always ...
— Court Life in China • Isaac Taylor Headland
... first real sacrifice Anna had made toward becoming like Melvina. She was quite sure that Melvina would not go for a tramp in the forest. "It would spoil her clothes," reflected Anna, and looked regretfully at her own stout gingham dress, wishing it could be changed and become like one of Melvina's dresses ...
— A Little Maid of Old Maine • Alice Turner Curtis
... shown a rich damask tobe, covered with gold embroidery, which had belonged to Mr Park, and was probably part of the spoil taken from the canoe, intended as a present to some native prince. They were, at first, in hopes of obtaining Park's journals; but only an old nautical almanack was seen, and they afterwards discovered ...
— Great African Travellers - From Mungo Park to Livingstone and Stanley • W.H.G. Kingston
... must go. If I stay longer it may spoil our plans by making Jinaban's friend suspicious. Give me the bottle of gin, and I'll carry it so that every one can see it as I walk through the village. And you must get all your men out of the way by the time I come back. ...
— Rodman The Boatsteerer And Other Stories - 1898 • Louis Becke
... fanciful impersonations, were improvised and taken before the week was over. She went about the work in her usual eager, engrossed, happy-go-lucky fashion, sticking pins by the dozen into Mellicent's flesh in the ardour of arrangement, and often making a really charming picture, only to spoil it at the last moment by a careless movement, which altered the position of the camera, and so omitted such important details as the head of the sitter, or left her squeezed into one corner of the picture, like a ...
— About Peggy Saville • Mrs. G. de Horne Vaizey
... not, or else Mr. Cleon will give you your conge, and that will spoil everything. Further, as regards the mulatto, I have a word or two to say to you. It is quite evident to me that he is the presiding genius at Bon Repos. If you wish to retain your situation you must pay court to him far more than to M. Platzoff, with ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 6, June, 1891 • Various
... a peculiar expression in her black eyes she turned to Nyoda and said respectfully that Mrs. McClure was giving a fancy dress ball that night and, as several of the invited guests had been prevented from coming at the last moment, which would spoil the number for a certain march figure she had planned, she wanted to know if we would mind attending the ball in their places. She begged us to excuse her for not coming in to speak to us herself, but she was in the hands of ...
— The Campfire Girls Go Motoring • Hildegard G. Frey
... said Olly, climbing up on his mother's knee. "Go to Spain. I don't want you to come and spoil my nicey time." ...
— Milly and Olly • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... smells cooked, the loaf is done. Once the bottom is brown it need remain no longer. Should that, however, from fault of your oven, be not brown, but soft and white, you must put it back in the oven, the bottom upwards. An oven that does not bake at the bottom will, however, be likely to spoil your bread. It is sometimes caused by a careless servant leaving a collection of ashes underneath it; satisfy yourself that all the flues are perfectly clean and clear before beginning to bake, and if it still refuses to do its duty, change it, for you will have nothing but loss ...
— Culture and Cooking - Art in the Kitchen • Catherine Owen
... Ethelberta herself. Her honesty was always making war upon her manoeuvres, and shattering their delicate meshes, to her great inconvenience and delay. Thus there arose those devious impulses and tangential flights which spoil the works of every would-be schemer who instead of being wholly machine is half heart. One of these now was to show herself as she really was, not only to Lord Mountclere, but to his friends assembled, whom, in her ignorance, she respected more than they deserved, ...
— The Hand of Ethelberta • Thomas Hardy
... see. "Oh, bother!" he cried, running to where the chauffeur stood, in front of the hood. "Why has it got to go and spoil it all like that! It's mean, I say! Can't ...
— John and Betty's History Visit • Margaret Williamson
... Mr. Briggs!" said Miss Mayfield plaintively, "don't, please—don't spoil the best compliment I've had in many a year. You thought I was a child, I know, and—well, you find," she said audaciously, suddenly bringing her black eyes to bear on him like a ...
— Jeff Briggs's Love Story • Bret Harte
... wun't spoil our day by talkin' of my troubles. This place here is heaven, to me, so quiet, so clean, so good! Le's ...
— Vandemark's Folly • Herbert Quick
... act in every respect dishonestly and unjustly, since they neither fear God nor any Divine law, and therefore are not restrained by any internal bond; consequently they would use every opportunity to defraud, plunder, and spoil others, and this from delight. That inwardly they are such can be clearly seen from those of the same character in the other life, while everyone's externals are taken away, and his internals in which he at last lives to eternity are ...
— Heaven and its Wonders and Hell • Emanuel Swedenborg
... brain. The curate I saw far, far away. I advanced to reply to him without knowing just what I was going to say, but the senior sacristan put himself between us. Padre Damaso arose and said to me in Tagalog: 'Don't try to shine in borrowed finery. Be content to talk your own dialect and don't spoil Spanish, which isn't meant for you. Do you know the teacher Ciruela? [64] Well, Ciruela was a teacher who didn't know how to read, and he had a school.' I wanted to detain him, but he went into his bedroom and slammed ...
— The Social Cancer - A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... this city, who have sworn his death; Jews who, flying hither from Cordova, have seen their parents murdered and their substance seized, and who behold, in the son of Issachar, the cause of the murder and the spoil. They have detected the impostor, and a hundred knives are whetting even now for his blood: let him look to it. Ximen, I have spoken to thee as the foolish speak; thou mayest betray me to thy lord; but from what I have learned of thee from our brethren, I have poured my heart into thy ...
— Leila, Complete - The Siege of Granada • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... errors: and almost all who in that and former ages were such, are in that book censured and set forth: there also is made plain that wholesome advice of Thy Spirit, by Thy good and devout servant: Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ. For in Him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily. And since at that time ...
— The Confessions of Saint Augustine • Saint Augustine
... whole family in health, while many died in the neighbouring houses. It was impossible to bury all the dead, and the bodies were left to decompose where they died. After the plague had ceased, the Arabs of the desert made their appearance for the purpose of robbing and plundering. They found an easy spoil, for they penetrated without resistance into the empty houses, or without difficulty overpowered the few enfeebled people who remained. Herr Swoboda, among the rest, was obliged to make an agreement with the Arabs, and ...
— A Woman's Journey Round the World • Ida Pfeiffer
... his children be fatherless and his wife a widow. Let his children be continually vagabonds, and beg. Let them seek their bread out of desolate places. Let the extortioner catch all that he hath, and let the stranger spoil his labor. Let no one extend mercy unto them, neither let any favor his fatherless children." Did Jehovah say this? Surely He had never heard this line—this plaintive music from the Hindoo: "Sweet is the lute to those who have not heard the voices of their own children." Let us see the generosity ...
— Lectures of Col. R. G. Ingersoll, Volume I • Robert Green Ingersoll
... speck?"—"Ay, ay: 'tis not enough to pain me: Perhaps the collar's mark by which they chain me." "Chain! chain you! What! run you not, then, Just where you please and when?" "Not always, sir; but what of that?" "Enough for me, to spoil your fat! It ought to be a precious price Which could to servile chains entice; For me, I'll shun them while I've wit." So ran Sir Wolf, ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 8 • Various
... repeated to himself, and again "Villa Clementine," to fit it securely in his memory. Then his lips worked with passionate revenge as he thought: "You have spoilt my looks, Mr Englishman; and now, sangredieu, to spoil yours!" ...
— Swirling Waters • Max Rittenberg
... thee; And may thy flood have seignory Of all floods else; and to thy fame Meet greater springs, yet keep thy name. May never newt, nor the toad Within thy banks make their abode! Taking thy journey from the sea May'st thou ne'er happen in thy way On nitre or on brimstone mine, To spoil thy taste! This spring of thine, Let it of nothing taste but earth, And salt conceived in their birth. Be ever fresh! Let no man dare To spoil thy fish, make lock or wear, But on thy margent still let dwell ...
— A History of English Literature - Elizabethan Literature • George Saintsbury
... meal was ready, and the two boys were served with the rest. Notwithstanding their precarious position, each ate heartily It takes a good deal to spoil the appetite of ...
— In A New World - or, Among The Gold Fields Of Australia • Horatio Alger
... had wrought it in a month or little more, and that this meant a gain of more than half a florin a day. Donato, thinking this too much of an insult, turned round in anger and said to the merchant that in the hundredth part of an hour he would have been able to spoil the value of a year's labour; and giving the head a push, he sent it flying straightway into the street below, where it broke into a thousand pieces; saying to him that this showed that he was more used to bargaining ...
— Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects - Vol 2, Berna to Michelozzo Michelozzi • Giorgio Vasari |
