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Tartan   Listen
noun
Tartan  n.  Woolen cloth, checkered or crossbarred with narrow bands of various colors, much worn in the Highlands of Scotland; hence, any pattern of tartan; also, other material of a similar pattern. "MacCullummore's heart will be as cold as death can make it, when it does not warm to the tartan." "The sight of the tartan inflamed the populace of London with hatred."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Tartan" Quotes from Famous Books



... sloping reaches of the park; the trees shone silverly in the cold light, their black shadows cast along the grass. Robert found himself quartered in the Stuart room, where James II. had slept, and where the tartan hangings of the ponderous carved bed, and the rose and thistle reliefs of the walls and ceilings, untouched for two hundred years, bore witness to the loyal preparations made by some bygone Wendover. ...
— Robert Elsmere • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... or kilt, as distinct from the plaid, in all probability, is comparatively modern. The truis, consisting of breeches and stockings, is one piece and made to fit closely to the limbs, was an old costume. The belted plaid was a piece of tartan two yards in breadth, and four in length. It surrounded the waist in great folds, being firmly bound round the loins with a leathern belt, and in such manner that the lower side fell down to the middle of the knee joint. The upper part was fastened to the left shoulder with a large brooch ...
— An Historical Account of the Settlements of Scotch Highlanders in America • J. P. MacLean

... birthday feast to which we had been bidden, and we had done our best to honor the occasion. We had prepared a large bouquet tied with the Maclean tartan (Lady Baird is a Maclean), and had printed in gold letters on one of the ribbons, "Another for Hector," the battle-cry of the clan. We each wore a sprig of holly, because it is the badge of the family, while I added a girdle and shoulder-knot ...
— Penelope's Progress - Being Such Extracts from the Commonplace Book of Penelope Hamilton As Relate to Her Experiences in Scotland • Kate Douglas Smith Wiggin

... Heathknowes. Not that my aunt had much faith in Irma. She had an art, which my aunt counted uncanny, indeed savouring of the sin of witchcraft. It mattered not at all what Irma was given to wear—an old tartan of my grandmother's Highland Mary days when she was a shepherdess by the banks of Cluden, a severe gown designed on strictly architectural principles by the unabashed shears of Aunt Jen herself, a bodice and skirt of my mother's, dovelike in hue and carrying with them some of ...
— The Dew of Their Youth • S. R. Crockett

... a thin queue in the military fashion of former days, and the right side of his head a little turned up, the better to catch the sound of the clergyman's voice, were all marks of his profession and infirmities. Beside him sat his sister Janet, a little neat old woman, with a Highland curch and tartan plaid, watching the very looks of her brother, to her the greatest man upon earth, and actively looking out for him, in his silver-clasped Bible, the texts which the ...
— A Legend of Montrose • Sir Walter Scott

... time I saw Lady Randolph was at Punchestown races, in 1887, where I went with my new friends, Mrs. Bunbury, Hatfield Harter and Peter Flower. I was standing at the double when I observed a woman next to me in a Black Watch tartan skirt, braided coat and astrachan hussar's cap. She had a forehead like a panther's and great wild eyes that looked through you; she was so arresting that I followed her about till I found some one who could tell me who ...
— Margot Asquith, An Autobiography: Volumes I & II • Margot Asquith

... to rise. And the riders rode, and the summons Came to the western shore, To the land of the sea and the heather, To Appin and Mamore. It called on all to gather From every scrog and scaur, That loved their fathers' tartan And the ancient game of war. And down the watery valley And up the windy hill, Once more, as in the olden, The pipes were sounding shrill; Again in Highland sunshine The naked steel was bright; And the lads, once more in tartan, Went forth again ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 14 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... these visits, Ralph once or twice tried the experiment of leaving Paul with his grand-parents and calling for him in the late afternoon; but one day, on re-entering the Malibran, he was met by a small abashed figure clad in a kaleidoscopic tartan and a green velvet cap with a silver thistle. After this experience of the "surprises" of which Gran'ma was capable when she had a chance to take Paul shopping Ralph did not again venture to leave his son, ...
— The Custom of the Country • Edith Wharton

... heroic queen. At the head of a motley band of soldiery who came at her call—half-clad, uncouth, and savage—she rode into the west, sleeping at night upon the bare ground, sharing the camp food, dressed in plain tartan, but swift and fierce as any eagle. Her spirit ran like fire through the veins of those who followed her. She crushed the insurrection, scattered its leaders, and returned in triumph ...
— Famous Affinities of History, Vol 1-4, Complete - The Romance of Devotion • Lyndon Orr

... Wynd; the tall houses of Edinburgh hung over them; the few lights struggled against the thick, enveloping air. Figures came out of one dark passage, and disappeared into another. A body of Highlanders, in the Campbell tartan, for a moment blocked the way. Twice they were cursed by unknown voices, and when Claverhouse reached his lodging someone called out his name, and added: "The day of vengeance is at hand. The blood of John Brown crieth from the altar!" And ...
— Graham of Claverhouse • Ian Maclaren

... and forty persons of rank attainted by Act of Parliament. More extensive measures of repression were needful in the Highlands. The feudal tenures were abolished. The hereditary jurisdictions of the chiefs were bought up and transferred to the Crown. The tartan, or garb of the Highlanders, was forbidden by law. These measures, and a general Act of Indemnity which followed them, proved effective for their purpose. The dread of the clansmen passed away, and the sheriff's writ soon ran through the Highlands with as little ...
— History of the English People, Volume VII (of 8) - The Revolution, 1683-1760; Modern England, 1760-1767 • John Richard Green

... may be desirable for a gentleman, had many a fair clean hand laid in his, and many a maiden waist yielded to his arm, while "the woman" flitted about half an alien amongst her own, with his child wound in her old shawl of Lossie tartan; wandering not seldom in the gloaming when her little one slept, along the top of the dune, with the wind blowing keen upon her from the regions of eternal ice, sometimes the snow settling softly on her hair, sometimes the hailstones nestling in its meshes; the skies growing ...
— The Marquis of Lossie • George MacDonald

... nervously opened, and a funny little quartette issued forth. Dickory did not often get the air, and she enjoyed herself very much, sitting well up in Peter's arms, and wrapped up, head and all, in an old tartan shawl. Flossy, holding the bag, walked by her brother's side, and Snip-snap behaved in his usual erratic fashion, now running before, now lingering behind, now stopping to exchange a greeting with a fellow-dog, or to sniff with watering ...
— Dickory Dock • L. T. Meade

... of four eggs should be beaten very stiff and when partly beaten sprinkle over 1/2 teaspoonful of cream of tartan Finish beating egg whites and sift in slowly 1/2 cup of fine granulated sugar, then sift 1/2 cup of flour (good measure). Flavor with a few drops of almond flavoring. Bake in small Gem pans, placing a tablespoonful of butter ...
— Mary at the Farm and Book of Recipes Compiled during Her Visit - among the "Pennsylvania Germans" • Edith M. Thomas

... full-grown soldier, and the spacious sleeves were rolled up at the shoulders and tied with string, revealing a pair of skinny arms. Round his middle hung what was meant to be a kilt—a kilt of home manufacture, which may once have been a tablecloth, for its bold pattern suggested no known clan tartan. He had a massive belt, in which was stuck a broken gully-knife, and round his neck was knotted the remnant of what had once been a silk bandanna. His legs and feet were bare, blue, scratched, and very dirty, and ...
— Huntingtower • John Buchan

... I received a visit from Dona Maria de Jesus, the young woman who has lately distinguished herself in the war of the Reconcave. Her dress is that of a soldier of one of the Emperor's battalions, with the addition of a tartan kilt, which she told me she had adopted from a picture representing a highlander, as the most feminine military dress. What would the Gordons and MacDonalds say to this? The "garb of old Gaul," chosen as a womanish attire!—Her father is a Portuguese, named Gonsalvez de Almeida, and possesses ...
— Journal of a Voyage to Brazil - And Residence There During Part of the Years 1821, 1822, 1823 • Maria Graham

... seclusion of the area, or take boldly to the open street. Before he could do either M'Allister, the retainer, had magnetised him into the hall, relieved him of his hat—almost with the seductive adroitness of a Drury Lane thief—and drawn him down a tartan passage into a very sensible-looking boudoir, in which Lady Enid was sitting by a wood fire with a very ...
— The Prophet of Berkeley Square • Robert Hichens

... scarlet waistcoat which hung down to his knees; it had belonged to the defunct Monsieur Chantemesse, who had been a cab-driver. Cadine for her part wore a white and blue check gown, made out of an old tartan of Madame Chantemesse's. All the canaries in the garrets of the Latin Quarter knew them; and, as they passed along, repeating their cry, each echoing the other's voice, every cage poured ...
— The Fat and the Thin • Emile Zola

... prominent, though curtained with thick black lashes. The glossy chestnut hair partook of the redundance and vigour of the whole being, and the roses hung on it gracefully though not in congruity with the thick winter dress of blue and black tartan, still looped up over the dark petticoat and hose, and stout high-heeled boots, that like the grey cloak and felt hat bore witness to the early walk. Grace's countenance and figure were in the same style, though ...
— The Clever Woman of the Family • Charlotte M. Yonge

... on a question of more than local interest. Byron's most careful biographer has said of him: "Although on his first expedition to Greece he was dressed in the tartan of the Gordon clan, yet the whole bent of his mind, and the character of his poetry, are anything but Scottish. Scottish nationality is tainted with narrow and provincial elements. Byron's poetic character, on the other hand, is ...
— Byron • John Nichol

... earliest of my recollections," wrote he in 1824, "that I lay in bed one morning during the grievous famine in Britain in 1800-1, while my poor mother took from our large kist the handsome plaid of the tartan of our clan, which in her early life her own hands had spun, and went and sold it for a trifle, to obtain for us a little coarse barley meal, whereof to make our scanty breakfast; and of another time during the same famine when she left ...
— The Story of the Upper Canada Rebellion, Volume 1 • John Charles Dent

... Gemini- Crimini! Nimini- Pimini Representatives of the Tartan hero, Who wildly tear a passion into rags More ragged than the hags That round about the cauldron go! Murderers! who murder Shakspeare so, That 'stead of murdering sleep, ye do not do it; But, vice versa, send the audience to it. And, oh!— But no— Illustrious ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various

... struck with the peculiar grace and dignity of the Chieftain's figure, Above the middle size, and finely proportioned, the Highland dress, which he wore in its simplest mode, set off his person to great advantage. He wore the trews, or close trousers, made of tartan, chequed scarlet and white; in other particulars, his dress strictly resembled Evan's, excepting that he had no weapon save a dirk, very richly mounted with silver. His page, as we have said, carried his claymore and the fowling-piece, which he held ...
— Waverley • Sir Walter Scott

... king took it, and yet had no regard to what he had promised; but while he himself went to the war against the Egyptians and Ethiopians, he left his general Rabshakeh, and two other of his principal commanders, with great forces, to destroy Jerusalem. The names of the two other commanders were Tartan and Rabsaris. ...
— The Antiquities of the Jews • Flavius Josephus

... senior, with mottled legs and a tartan costume, who was frisking about between his grandpapa's legs, who heartily wished him ...
— The Second Funeral of Napoleon • William Makepeace Thackeray (AKA "Michael Angelo Titmarch")

... Mother Fetu, but Mother Fetu transformed, magnificent in a clean white cap, a new gown, and tartan shawl wrapped round her shoulders. Her voice, however, still retained its ...
— A Love Episode • Emile Zola

... Barrett the only specimen of this rough race whom New Zealanders may remember with interest. There was Stewart, ex-Jacobite, sealer, and pilot, whose name still conceals Rakiura, and whose Highland pride made him wear the royal tartan to the last as he sat in Maori villages smoking among the blanketed savages. There was the half-caste Chaseland, whose mother was an Australian "gin," and who was acknowledged to be the most dexterous ...
— The Long White Cloud • William Pember Reeves

... A tall man in light clothes was coming to the house—a tall man, with a clear-cut, sunburnt face, and a lean, curved nose that gave him the air of a bird of prey. By his side was a lady with sweet, delicate features, dressed in a tartan travelling costume. There was a knock at the door. Josephine went down very slowly, and ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol. I • Various

... broad-shouldered, deep-chested, with a well-turned, stately head, a Grecian profile, a fair, open brow, dark, deep blue eyes, and very rich auburn hair and beard. He wore the picturesque highland dress—the tartan of the ...
— The Lost Lady of Lone • E.D.E.N. Southworth

... thou guardian of freedom and truth, Thou stay of old age, and thou guidance of youth! Still, still thy enthusiast transports pervade The breast that is wrapt in the green tartan plaid. And ours are the shoulders that never shall bend To the rod of a tyrant, that scourge of a land; Ours the bosoms no terror of death ever shakes, When call'd in defence of the ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume III - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various

... dances to represent agriculture and the vintage performed with wine-skins; (3) the simple arts, such as weaving, where the dancers, each holding a long coloured ribbon, dance round a pole on which is gradually formed a pattern like a Scotch tartan; (4) war-dances, as the sword-dance and others; (5) religious dances in procession before the Host and before the altar; (6) ceremonial dances in which both sexes take part at the beginning and end ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 3 - "Banks" to "Bassoon" • Various

... pleases your palate. The Shaw is one of the most esteemed of the early potatoes for field culture; and the Kidney and Bread-fruit are also good sorts. The Lancashire Pink is also a good potato, and is much cultivated in the neighbourhood of Liverpool. As late or long-keeping potatoes, the Tartan or Red-apple stands ...
— The Book of Household Management • Mrs. Isabella Beeton

... with it when they have ceased to believe in its existence. If her complexion had not been netted all over with a lacework of infinitesimal wrinkles, she would have looked like a little girl dressed up for an old lady. She had a ribbon of the MacGregor tartan on her cap, and an uncompromising cairngorm fastened her fichu of valuable point lace. A figure more out of place than hers in an ancient Arab palace of Algiers it would be impossible to conceive; yet it was a pleasant figure to see there, and Stephen knew that ...
— The Golden Silence • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson

... neighbourhood of Lichfield [in 1750] the principal gentlemen clothed their hounds in tartan plaid, with which they hunted a fox, dressed in a red uniform.' Mahon's Hist. of ...
— The Life Of Johnson, Volume 3 of 6 • Boswell

... presided as Lord High Steward with judicial impartiality at the famous trial of the rebel Lords, and was chiefly responsible for the means taken in the pacification of Scotland, the most questionable of which was the suppression of the tartan! Good fortune, as is usually the case when a man rises to great eminence, played its part in his career. He had friends who early recognised his ability and gave him the opportunities of which he was quick to avail himself. ...
— Charles Philip Yorke, Fourth Earl of Hardwicke, Vice-Admiral R.N. - A Memoir • Lady Biddulph of Ledbury

... aspect of the great levels of the Gatinais, where they border with the wooded hills of Fontainebleau. Here and there a few grey rocks creep out of the forest as if to sun themselves. Here and there a few apple-trees stand together on a knoll. The quaint, undignified tartan of a myriad small fields dies out into the distance; the strips blend and disappear; and the dead flat lies forth open and empty, with no accident save perhaps a thin line of trees or faint church-spire against the sky. Solemn and vast at all ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XXII (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... mind, my dear. I'll make you and all your kindred laugh before the ball is over," said the lively young Cricket, hurrying away, and going straight up to the Scotch Bee, who was clad in a tartan plaid and kilt. ...
— The Butterfly's Ball - The Grasshopper's Feast • R.M. Ballantyne

... in milk is so trifling, that it can hardly answer that purpose. I have heard of only one instance of its being used for the production of a spirituous liquor, and this is by the Tartan Arabs; their abundance of horses, as well as their scarcity of fruits, has introduced the fermentation of mares' milk, by which they produce a liquor called koumiss. Whey is likewise susceptible of being acidified by ...
— Conversations on Chemistry, V. 1-2 • Jane Marcet

... were walking. Two wore uniform—one an alert, grey-haired general, sharp and brusque in manner, with many war ribbons across his tunic; the other a tall, thin-faced staff captain, who wore the tartan of the Gordon Highlanders. With them were two civilians, both in rough shooting-jackets and breeches, one about forty-five, the other a ...
— The Doctor of Pimlico - Being the Disclosure of a Great Crime • William Le Queux

... Scotch tartan shawl for you, Aunt Hannah, and a heavy shepherd's maud for Uncle Reuben. They are such articles as you cannot purchase in this country. I will send them to you by one of the servants. I would have brought them myself, only you see my arms ...
— Self-Raised • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth

... trichroism; iridescence, play of colors, polychrome, maculation, spottiness, striae. spectrum, rainbow, iris, tulip, peacock, chameleon, butterfly, tortoise shell; mackerel, mackerel sky; zebra, leopard, cheetah, nacre, ocelot, ophite^, mother-of-pearl, opal, marble. check, plaid, tartan, patchwork; marquetry-, parquetry; mosaic, tesserae^, strigae^; chessboard, checkers, chequers; harlequin; Joseph's coat; tricolor. V. be variegated &c adj.; variegate, stripe, streak, checker, chequer; bespeckle^, speckle; besprinkle, sprinkle; stipple, maculate, dot, bespot^; tattoo, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget

... notes, gathering up all the others and fusing them into a pealing strain, it was electin'. Everybody sang. Old voices, that had not sung for a quarter of a century or more, joined in. It was a furor: Dalgetty swung his tartan cap, Sandy his hat; handkerchiefs were waved, staves rang on the floor. The children, half frightened in spite of their pleasure, were ...
— Between Whiles • Helen Hunt Jackson

... Spaniard but for his blue eyes. The second was a mere boy with a ruddy face and eyes full of dancing merriment. The third was tall and red-haired, tanned of countenance and lean as a greyhound. He wore trews of a tartan which Mr. Lovel, trained in such matters, recognised as that of ...
— The Path of the King • John Buchan

... have to put up with a compromise in the matter of kilts which makes their retention almost ridiculous, i.e., in order to screen his gay attire from the keen eyes behind the Mauser barrels every Highlander wears over the tartan a dingy apron of khaki. The war pictures we occasionally see in illustrated papers of Scotch regiments charging with flying sporrans are probably drawn in England. Even when the apron is used, the khaki jacket, the tartan kilt and the white legs offer a good mark when the wearer ...
— With Methuen's Column on an Ambulance Train • Ernest N. Bennett

... torrent of the most close and conclusive argument, brilliant with all the exuberance of an imagination which ranged over all nature for illustrations, and yet managed and applied each of them with the same unerring dexterity, as if that single one had been the study of a whole life. "The tartan beats us," said Mr. Canning; "we have no preaching like that ...
— Books and Authors - Curious Facts and Characteristic Sketches • Anonymous

... were directed to "Major Molly," the name that had been given to Molly when she was a little tot of a thing, and the pet of the fort where she lived. On this Christmas day, as she watched her mother fold up the pretty bright tartan dress that was to be her Christmas present to Wallula, she ...
— A Flock of Girls and Boys • Nora Perry

... remis, into the old days of Jacobitism. I must speak my plain mind, Mr. Croftangry. I cannot tell what innovations in Kirk and State may now be proposed, but our fathers were friends to both, as they were settled at the glorious Revolution, and liked a tartan plaid as little as they did a white surplice. I wish to Heaven, all this tartan fever bode well to the Protestant succession and ...
— The Surgeon's Daughter • Sir Walter Scott

... clothes, which were stretched on him tightly, his short trousers showing the tops of his patched boots, which were several sizes too large for him, and gave him a very ungraceful appearance. He had not even a collar, only an old tartan scarf knotted round his neck, and from the shrunk sleeves of the old jacket his hands, red and bony, appeared abnormally large. But when she looked at his face, at the eyes which looked out from the tangle of his hair, she forgot all the rest, and her heart warmed ...
— The Guinea Stamp - A Tale of Modern Glasgow • Annie S. Swan

... unexpected ways and places. Wilson was struck with the Gaelic traits of the Mongolian Budhists who inhabit the mountains of Zanskar, south-east of the valley. "The sound of their language, the brooches which fasten their plaids, the varieties of tartan which their woollen clothes present, and even the features of the people (which are of an Aryan rather than a Tartar type), strongly reminded me of the Scotch Highlanders." He had the support, too, of one of those imaginative savants who delight in Welsh, Erse and Gaelic ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, September, 1878 • Various

... we reached the sunken, dismasted hull, that of course she was abandoned, but concluded to board her, and see if there was anything of value inside. We made her out to be a tartan, probably with an Arab, or African, crew and it was evident she had been through a heavy storm, for her masts were washed clean overboard, and her bulwarks stove in. We could not distinguish a soul aboard, and if she had carried boats they were gone, but as we went down into the hatchway ...
— All Aboard - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry

... left in them for another passenger. Then he fought his way across two or three blocks to the nearest "L" station. He managed to wedge himself into a train there, and then at least he was on his way. He was thinking hard and fast, but through all his planning the warm hug of the tartan comforter round his neck kept Little Ann near him. He had been very thankful for the additional warmth as the whirling snow and wind had wrought their will with him while he waited for the cars at the street corner. On the "L" train ...
— T. Tembarom • Frances Hodgson Burnett

... busily employed on some plans which he had taken home from Mr Todd's office, when he was aroused by a knock at the door. On opening it he saw standing before him a tall slight young man, whom he knew by his bonnet and tartan coat to be Scotch, "Does one Donald Morrison live here?" asked the stranger, gazing eagerly at his face. The moment he spoke Donald knew the voice; it was David's, and the ...
— Janet McLaren - The Faithful Nurse • W.H.G. Kingston

... plaid arranged in a manner which seemed to say, 'I have trustworthy information that that is the way they do it in the Highlands'? Was he not exemplary and very poor, so that I supposed he had no overcoat and his tartan was what he slept under at night? Was he not working very hard still, and wouldn't he be in the natural course, not yet satisfied that he knew enough to launch out? He would be a man of long preparations—Miss Mavis's ...
— A London Life; The Patagonia; The Liar; Mrs. Temperly • Henry James

... and slender frame, But firmly knit, was Malcolm Graeme. The belted plaid and tartan hose Did ne'er more graceful limbs disclose; His flaxen hair, of sunny hue, Curled closely round his bonnet blue. Trained to the chase, his eagle eye The ptarmigan in snow could spy; Each pass, by mountain, lake, and heath, He knew, through Lennox and Menteith; Vain was the bound ...
— The Lady of the Lake • Sir Walter Scott

... subjects by wearing the Highland garb, in which he was very carefully dressed by the Laird of Garth, but the pride of the Macgregors and Glengarries who thronged around the royal person, suffered a serious blow when a London alderman entered the circle clothed in a suit of the same tartan. The portly figure and civic dignity of Sir William Curtis gave to the costume too much the appearance of a burlesque to pass unnoticed either by the Sovereign or his loyal admirers, and it was some ...
— Memoirs of the Court of George IV. 1820-1830 (Vol 1) - From the Original Family Documents • Duke of Buckingham and Chandos

... dazzling white caps astonishingly gauffered; the lawyer in decent black, with his white cambric tie; the fat and greasy citizen with fat and greasy wife and prim, pig-tailed little daughter clad in an exiguous cotton frock of loud and unauthentic tartan, and showing a quarter of an inch of sock above high yellow boots; the superb pair of gendarmes with their cocked hats, wooden epaulettes and swords; the white-aproned waiters standing by cafe tables—all these types are ...
— Jaffery • William J. Locke

... her, and she showed me to the best spare room, with oleographs of Highland scenery on the walls, and coloured Landseer prints, and tartan curtains, and everything made of ormolu that can be made of ormolu. In about twenty minutes the girl returned with tea and poached eggs and toast, and jam and marmalade. So I dressed for the lecture, which was to begin at eight—just when people ought to be dining—and came down into the drawing-room. ...
— The Disentanglers • Andrew Lang

... achieved unqualified success in the part of the Englishman. He had kept on purpose an immense chimney-pot hat and a tartan plaid which he used to perfection, and his "Oh's!" and "Ah's!" were of such ludicrous prolongation, and his gait so stiff, and his comical blunders delivered with so much of haughty assurance, that he ...
— Philip Gilbert Hamerton • Philip Gilbert Hamerton et al

... Choir, heard in Gairloch school-house. That energetic and complaisant conductor brought his clear-throated minstrels over to the meeting in a brake. It was a luxury to see them with their white robes and tartan sashes, while in front of them stood their genial leader clad in kilts. The Gaelic Mod, which is now a regular institution in the land, is bound to do splendid service towards keeping alive the fine old music of the North. The Poolewe Choir, I am happy to say, won much distinction at ...
— Literary Tours in The Highlands and Islands of Scotland • Daniel Turner Holmes

... work is a translation made at Tobolsk by Swedish officers, prisoners of war from the battle of Pultava, from a Tartan manuscript by Abulgasi Bayadur Chan. The original manuscript (?) is in the library at Upsala, to which it was presented in 1722 by Lieutenant-Colonel Schoenstroem. The translation has notes by Bentinck, a Dutchman by birth, who was also taken prisoner in the Swedish ...
— The Voyage of the Vega round Asia and Europe, Volume I and Volume II • A.E. Nordenskieold

... we were received by Mr. Allan Macdonald and his wife, the celebrated Miss Flora Macdonald. She is a little woman of a genteel appearance, and uncommonly mild and well-bred. Dr. Johnson was rather quiescent, and went early to bed. I slept in the same room with him. Each had a neat bed with tartan curtains. Dr. Johnson's bed was the very bed in which the grandson of the unfortunate King James II. lay on one of the nights after the failure of his ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume 19 - Travel and Adventure • Various

... animal's tooth resembles a gun-shot wound; it is generally followed by a great deal of sloughing and discharge, and pains are felt in the part periodically ever afterward. I had on a tartan jacket on the occasion, and I believe that it wiped off all the virus from the teeth that pierced the flesh, for my two companions in this affray have both suffered from the peculiar pains, while I have escaped with only the inconvenience of a false joint ...
— Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa - Journeys and Researches in South Africa • David Livingstone

... the Philistines. The Egyptians, having seized it some time before, had fortified it with such care, that it was their strongest bulwark on that side. Nor could Sennacherib enter Egypt, till he had first made himself master of this city,(456) which was taken by Tartan, one of his generals. The Assyrians had possessed it hitherto; and it was not till after the long siege just now mentioned, that ...
— The Ancient History of the Egyptians, Carthaginians, Assyrians, • Charles Rollin

... it was the tartan cloak that she wore, by special request, as we climbed the hill to the Ledge. It was spring indeed—bluebirds in the air, and all the ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII. No. 31. October, 1873. • Various

... "My dear, ye 're sune asteer; Cam' ye to hear the lav'rock's sang? Oh, wad ye gang and wed wi' me, And wed a rantin' Highlandman? In summer days, on flow'ry braes, When frisky are the ewe and lamb, I 'se row ye in my tartan plaid, ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various

... wink, the chieftains shrink, The stranger's gone—amidst the crew A form was seen in tartan green, And tall ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant

... said the smith, who, as the reader may have noticed, had no goodwill to the Highland race. "I will wager on Old Nick, of whom I should know something, he being indeed a worker in the same element with myself, against Catharine on that debate: the devil will have the tartan, that is sure enough." ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott

... whom mortals know as Trotting Nelly in her tartan cloak, will bring us the stranger's answer to our ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott

... afterwards, I know, with his Bootjack. But Sir Walter for ever! What a fine Picture would that make of Evan Dhu's entrance into Tully Veolan Breakfast Hall, with a message from his Chief; he standing erect in his Tartan, while the Baron keeps his State, and pretty Rose at the Table. There is a subject for one of your Artists. Another very pretty one (I thought the other Day) would be that of the child Keats keeping guard with a drawn sword at his sick Mother's Chamber door. Millais might do it ...
— Letters of Edward FitzGerald in Two Volumes - Vol. II • Edward FitzGerald

... sovereignty over them 140 I set. On my return to the country of Amanus I ascended. Beams of cedar I cut, 141 I removed, to my city Assur[1] I brought. In my 27th year the chariots of my armies I mustered. Dayan-Assur 142 the Tartan,[2] the Commander of the wide-spreading army, at the head of my army to the country of Armenia I urged, 143 I sent. To Bit-Zamani he descended. Into the low ground to the city of Ammas he went down. ...
— Babylonian and Assyrian Literature • Anonymous

... hearts and ears, has begun. It is the fine pipe band of the 42nd Royal Highlanders from Montreal, khaki clad, kilts and bonnets, and blowing proudly and defiantly their "Wha saw the Forty-twa." Again a pause and from the other side of the hill gay with tartan and blue bonnets, their great blooming drones gorgeous with flowing streamers and silver mountings, in march the 43rd Camerons. "Man, would Alex Macdonald be proud of his pipes to-day," says a Winnipeg Highlander ...
— Defenders of Democracy • The Militia of Mercy

... welcome to Scotland his son, Colonel William Duncan, who, with the highest character for military and civil merit, had made a considerable fortune in India. In [1795], a few days before his death, I paid him a visit, to inquire after his health. I found him emaciated to the last degree, wrapped in a tartan night-gown, and employed with all the activity of health and youth in correcting a history of the Revolution, which he intended should be given to the public when he was no more. He read me several passages ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume I (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart

... hewer. On hearing that it had been remarked among a party of Edinburgh masons that, though regarded as the first of Glasgow stone-cutters, he would find in the eastern capital at least his equals, he attired himself most uncouthly in a long-tailed coat of tartan, and, looking to the life the untamed, untaught, conceited little Celt, he presented himself on Monday morning, armed with a letter of introduction from a Glasgow builder, before the foreman of an Edinburgh squad of masons engaged upon one of the finer ...
— Good Stories For Great Holidays - Arranged for Story-Telling and Reading Aloud and for the - Children's Own Reading • Frances Jenkins Olcott

... feeling the yearning strong upon her, put on her bonnet and shawl—that is to say, the bundle of dirty silk, pasteboard, and flowers which represented the one, and the soiled tartan rag that did ...
— Dusty Diamonds Cut and Polished - A Tale of City Arab Life and Adventure • R.M. Ballantyne

... to be expected, was the deck member, with her curiously-wrought chair and her furs and her portable bookcase; while Miss Skeat, who looked tall and finny, and sported a labyrinthine tartan, was generally to be seen entangled in the weather-shrouds near by. As for the Duke's sister, Lady Victoria, she was plain, but healthy, and made regular circuits of the steamer, stopping every now and then to watch the green swirl of ...
— Doctor Claudius, A True Story • F. Marion Crawford

... culmen of Gibbie's day! its cycle, rounded through regions of banishment, returned to its nodus of bliss. In triumph he spread over his sleeping father his dead mother's old plaid of Gordon tartan, all the bedding they had, and without a moment's further delay—no shoes even to put off—crept under it, and nestled close upon the bosom of his unconscious parent. A victory more! another day ended with success! his father safe, and all his own! the canopy of the darkness and the plaid over ...
— Sir Gibbie • George MacDonald

... Croftangry when the changes is frae the field to the habited place, and not from the place of habitation to the desert; for Shanet, her nainsell, kent a glen where there were men as weel as there may be in Croftangry, and if there werena altogether sae mony of them, they were as good men in their tartan as the others in their broadcloth. And there were houses, too; and if they were not biggit with stane and lime, and lofted like the houses at Croftangry, yet they served the purpose of them that lived there, and mony a braw bonnet, and mony a silk snood and comely white curch, would ...
— Chronicles of the Canongate • Sir Walter Scott

... loom; the pattern consists of a stripe of red, yellow, and blue, once repeated, and arranged so that the two blue lines meet in the centre. At each end, for about six or seven inches, and at spaces set at regular intervals, these lines of colour are crossed, so as to form a check or tartan; the spaces corresponding with the words in the following inscription, and one word being allotted ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 216, December 17, 1853 • Various

... sermon—I had to be back for breakfast, you know. It was specially pleasing to see at church the detachment of British soldiers, the more so as they were Highlanders. My heart will warm to the tartan. One strange feature I shall not soon forget. Several soldiers, in their scarlet uniforms, sang in the choir. I scarcely ever see soldiers without being saddened by the thought that the civilization of the race is ...
— Round the World • Andrew Carnegie

... the innumerable customary da capos) and a bright sketchy EVANS obbligato. As a Grand Duchess and Duke respectively the genial twain present themselves. Mr. GEORGE GRAVES, in a flounced skirt of green tartan check, copper curls and mahogany features, is a delectable creation; says some strangely unlady-like things (as is expected of him); is still oddly preoccupied with "gear-boxes" and other anatomical detail; and generally indulges in a fine ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, January 5, 1916 • Various

... the courtesy of his address on such occasions. On our way to the house he stopped and called his two little grandchildren, Walter and Charlotte Lockhart, who were chasing each other like butterflies among the flowers—the boy was quite a Cupid, though not an alfresco one; for he wore a Tartan cloak, whose sundry extras fluttered in the breeze as he ran to obey the summons, and gave occasion to his grandfather to present him to me as "Major Waddell;" [1] the pretty little fairy-looking girl he next introduced as "Whipperstowrie," and then (aware of my love ...
— Marriage • Susan Edmonstone Ferrier

... boy to lead my horse to grass,' replied George, giving a peculiar whistle, which brought to his side a shock-headed, barefooted lad, in a shepherd's tartan and little else, but with limbs as active as a wild deer, and an eye twinkling ...
— Two Penniless Princesses • Charlotte M. Yonge

... had given utterance to this amazing rigmarole stood at the top of a terrace flight (much cracked and broken) between two leaden statuettes (headless)—a willowy child in a large-brimmed hat, with a riding-switch in one hand and the other holding up an old tartan shawl, which she had pinned about her to imitate a horse-woman's habit. As she paced to and ...
— Old Fires and Profitable Ghosts • A. T. Quiller-Couch

... words, put me grandly in the lead, come gasping at a respectful distance behind, modelling his behavior (as he thought) after that of some flunky of nobility he had once clapped eyes on; and as we thus proceeded up the hill—a dandy in tartan kilt and velvet and a gray ape in slops—he would have a quick word of wrath for any passenger that might chance to jostle me. 'Twas a conspicuous progress, craftily designed, as, long afterwards, I learned; ...
— The Cruise of the Shining Light • Norman Duncan

... they'd have me swathe the clamorous tartan In lieu of trousers round my waist, Then they evoke the spirit of the Spartan Inherent in my simple taste; Inexorably I decline To drape the kilt on ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, January 14, 1920 • Various

... or of making acquaintance with such Americans as she did meet, and for the purpose of buying mementos for her relations. She was perpetually adding to her store of articles in tortoise-shell, in mother-of-pearl, in olive-wood, in ivory, in filigree, in tartan lacquer, in mosaic; and she had a collection of Roman scarfs and Venetian beads, which she looked over exhaustively every night before she went to bed. Her conversation bore mainly upon the manner in which she intended to dispose of these accumulations. She was constantly ...
— Georgina's Reasons • Henry James

... accomplished in bed; the shorthand studies on the top of a packing-case which hailed originally from a match factory in east London, and doubtless had contained the curious little cylindrical cardboard boxes of wax vestas, stamped with a sort of tartan plaid pattern, that are seen so far as I know only in Australia, though ...
— The Record of Nicholas Freydon - An Autobiography • A. J. (Alec John) Dawson

... shepherds of the south of Scotland, and the appearance of which gives a romantic air to the peasantry and middle classes; and which, although less brilliant and gaudy in its colours, is as picturesque in its arrangement as the more military tartan mantle of the Highlands. When they approached near to each other, the lady might observe that this friend of her guide was a stout athletic man, somewhat past the middle of life, and already showing marks of the approach, but none of the infirmities, of age, upon a countenance ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott

... surrounding mountains and of the neighbouring river Dee. Upon the interior decorations Albert and Victoria lavished all their care. The wall and the floors were of pitch-pine, and covered with specially manufactured tartars. The Balmoral tartan, in red and grey, designed by the Prince, and the Victoria tartan, with a white stripe, designed by the Queen, were to be seen in every room: there were tartan curtains, and tartan chair-covers, and even tartan linoleums. Occasionally the Royal Stuart tartan ...
— Queen Victoria • Lytton Strachey

... means of his friend the counsellor, contracted an acquaintance with this gentleman, and, being desirous of seeing some parts of Italy, particularly the carnival at Venice, they set out together from Marseilles in a tartan for Genoa, coasting it all the way, and lying on shore every night. Having shown him what was most remarkable in this city, his friend the abbe was so obliging as to conduct him through Tuscany, and ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett

... had you seen the philibegs, And skyrin tartan trews, man, When in the teeth they dared our Whigs, And Covenant TRUE-BLUES, man; In lines extended lang and large, When bayonets opposed the targe, And thousands hasten'd to the charge, Wi' Highland wrath, they frae the sheath Drew blades o' death, till, ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 65, January 25, 1851 • Various

... fixed their wild homes amidst the sands and caves of Palestine. The stranger supported his steps by a long staff. His hair and beard hung long and matted over his broad shoulders. A rusted mail, once splendid with arabesque enrichments, protected his breast; but the loose gown—a sort of tartan, which descended below the cuirass—was rent and tattered, and his feet bare; in his girdle was a short curved cimiter, a knife or dagger, and a parchment roll, clasped and ...
— Leila or, The Siege of Granada, Book V. • Edward Bulwer Lytton

... when Mr Henry Morton perceived an old woman, wrapped in her tartan plaid, supported by a stout, stupid-looking fellow, in hoddin-grey, approach the house of Milnwood. Old Mause made her courtesy, but Cuddie took the lead in addressing Morton. Indeed, he had previously stipulated with his mother that he was to ...
— Old Mortality, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott

... FATHER,—To this place am I once more returned, after having made an excursion to the far-famed city of Granada and still more renowned palace of the Alhambra. My last letter was dated from Gibraltar on the 17th of Decr. We left the Rock in a Vile Tartan,[12] rendered still less agreeable by belonging to Spaniards, who, at no time remarkable for cleanliness, were not likely to exert themselves in that point in a small trading Vessel. We were crowded with Passengers and ...
— Before and after Waterloo - Letters from Edward Stanley, sometime Bishop of Norwich (1802;1814;1814) • Edward Stanley

... I will tell you! And now I'm going to Scotland, into the Highlands, to paint a prince who, when he's king, will, no manner of doubt, wear the tartan and make every thane of Glamis thane of Cawdor likewise!... One half the creature's body is an old, childish loyalty, and the other half's ambition. The creature's myself. There are also bars and circles and splashes of various colors, dark and bright. Sometimes it dreams of wings—wings ...
— Foes • Mary Johnston

... the shape and slenderness of which at once pronounced her a psychic. She greeted me with all the stately courtesy of the Old School; my portmanteau was taken upstairs by a solemn-eyed lad in the Macdonald tartan; and the tea bell rang me down to a most appetising repast of strawberries and cream, scones, and delicious buttered toast. I fell in love with my hostess—it would be sheer sacrilege to designate such a divine creature by the vulgar term of "landlady"—at once. When ...
— Scottish Ghost Stories • Elliott O'Donnell

... blue dress-coat, trimmed with lace, and bearing a Government gilt button. In his hand he carried a cocked hat. At the Communion on Sunday (he sat on Dr. Wilson's right hand, who sat on my right) he wore a blue surtout, with Government gilt buttons, and shepherd-tartan trousers; and he had a gold band round his cap[67]. I spent two hours In his society last evening at Dr. Wilson's. He was not very complimentary to Burton. He is to lecture in ...
— The Personal Life Of David Livingstone • William Garden Blaikie

... kept before his eyes for years was not at that moment sufficient. He had dressed himself in his full chieftain's suit to meet them. The eagle's feather in his Glengary gave to his great stature the last grace. The tartan and philibeg, the garters at his knee, the silver buckles at his shoulder, belt, and shoon, the jewelled mull and dirk, had all to these poor fellows in this last hour a proud and sad significance. As he stood on the steps to welcome ...
— Scottish sketches • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr

... people these Lowlanders are!" exclaimed the senior lady—"so different from the brave and noble mountaineers. My brother, the chieftain, is lucky in having such a splendid set of retainers, and the tartan ...
— Tales from Blackwood, Volume 7 • Various

... saluting some old familiar face at each moment, I could not help feeling struck at the evidence of the desperate battle that so lately had raged there. The whole surface of the hill was one mass of dead and dying, the bearskin of the French grenadier lying side by side with the tartan of the Highlander. Deep furrows in the soil showed the track of the furious cannonade, and the terrible evidences of a bayonet charge were written ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 1 (of 2) • Charles Lever

... Fanny that he thought he was an old farmer, when he first saw him in his tartan shooting-coat and trowsers, with a bonnet on his head, a plaid over his shoulders, and a thick stick in his hand. Old as he was, however, he could walk many a mile over those heathery hills he loved so well, and not only Norman, but Norman's papa, might have had ...
— Norman Vallery - How to Overcome Evil with Good • W.H.G. Kingston

... were spent there, before a fresh start was made for a cruise through the islands in the region which was now exciting Jack's expectations. Soon after they were passing great heavy-looking junks with their Celestial crews, or light Malay prahus with their swarthy, coffee-coloured sailors in tartan skirts, in whose folds at the waist the formidable wavy dagger known as a kris was worn, the handle, like the butt of a pistol in form, carefully covered by the silk or cotton sarong ...
— Jack at Sea - All Work and no Play made him a Dull Boy • George Manville Fenn

... the sweetness of her mouth, the blueness of her eyes, the extreme darkness of her hair, were not to be distinguished. The man also was dark. His coat was of some rough brown material, probably dyed and woven in the village, and his kilt of tartan. They were more than well worn—looked even in that poor light a little shabby. On his head was the highland bonnet called a glengarry. His profile was remarkable—hardly less than grand, with a certain aquiline expression, although the nose was not ...
— What's Mine's Mine • George MacDonald

... still; and over her topknot she wore a rusty black cap that enclosed the keen monkeyish face like a ruff. Her every-day gown was one of coarse brown camlet, any number of years old, darned and patched till it was like a Joseph's coat; and the Rob Roy tartan shawl which she pinned across her bosom hid a state of dilapidation which even she did not care should be seen. She wore a black stuff apron full of fine tones from fruit-stains and fire-scorchings; and she ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - Vol. XVII, No. 102. June, 1876. • Various

... colours. We hastened to get ourselves ready as soon as we saw the party approach, but had longer to wait than we expected, the lake being wider than it appears to be. As they drew near we could distinguish men in tartan plaids, women in scarlet cloaks, and green umbrellas by the half-dozen. The landing was as pretty a sight as ever I saw. The bay, which had been so quiet two days before, was all in motion with small waves, while the ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. II. • William Wordsworth

... with joy. He was so beautiful. His hair was bright and curly. His broad forehead was clear white where he had pushed back his bonnet with the eagle feather standing upright on it. His strong legs and knees were white between his tartan kilt and his rolled back stockings. The clasps which held his feather and the plaid over his shoulder were set with fine stones in rich silver. She did not know that he was perfectly equipped as a little Highland chieftain, the head of his ...
— The Head of the House of Coombe • Frances Hodgson Burnett

... by degrees learned that they were none other than the old man's two sons, who had been at poor Menie's last funeral, but were now grown up, and studying for the medical profession at the college in Glasgow. Their father evidently kept them on short allowance, judging from their coarse tartan clothes, and continual munching of oaten cakes: but I was told they were hard students, and particularly clever in the anatomy class. One dark, dreary morning, about the Christmas-time, I noted that Lady Catherine and ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 436 - Volume 17, New Series, May 8, 1852 • Various

... the scene. Rogers' Rangers, dressed in buckskin, led the way in birch canoes. Lord Howe was there, dressed like a bushfighter; and with bagpipes setting the echoes ringing amid the lonely mountains, were the Highland regiments in their tartan plaids. Flags floated from the prow of every boat. Each battalion had its own regimental {257} band. Scarcely a breath dimpled the waters of the lake, and the sun shone without a cloud. Little wonder those who passed ...
— Canada: the Empire of the North - Being the Romantic Story of the New Dominion's Growth from Colony to Kingdom • Agnes C. Laut

... were many things in the world for us to do and we could be useful men, honored and respected, if we always did what was right. It was a repetition of Helen Macgregor, in her reply to Osbaldistone in which she threatened to have her prisoners "chopped into as many pieces as there are checks in the tartan." But the reason for the outburst was different. It was not because the occupation suggested was peaceful labor, for we were taught that idleness was disgraceful; but because the suggested occupation was somewhat vagrant in character and not entirely respectable ...
— Autobiography of Andrew Carnegie • Andrew Carnegie

... London was reached, and an audience obtained with the Duke of Argyie. His Grace's heart warmed to the tartan when Jeannie appeared before him in the dress of a Scottish maiden of her class. His grandfather's letter, too, was a strong injunction to assist Stephen Butler, his friends or family, and he exerted himself to such good purpose, that ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VII • Various

... their way to a job, debating Church affairs and politics with their tools upon their arm. But the most part are of a different order—skulking jail-birds; unkempt, barefoot children; big-mouthed, robust women, in a sort of uniform of striped flannel petticoat and short tartan shawl: among these, a few supervising constables and a dismal sprinkling of mutineers and broken men from higher ranks in society, with some mark of better days upon them, like a brand. In a place no larger than Edinburgh, and where the traffic is mostly centred in five or six chief ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... malodorous and slippery well his interested friend saw him sit down upon his bundle, roll a cigarette, and fall into easy conversation with an Italian voyager who, having shaved, was now putting on a clean collar and a tartan necktie. ...
— Rest Harrow - A Comedy of Resolution • Maurice Hewlett

... domes of Lucknow, Moslem mosque and Pagan shrine, Breathed the air to Britons dearest, The air of Auld Lang Syne. O'er the cruel roll of war-drums Rose that sweet and homelike strain; And the tartan clove the turban, As the Goomtee cleaves ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier

... with jezails, umbrellas, brooms, catapults, pikes, brickbats, kukeries,[52] pokers, clubs, axes, horse-pistols, bottles, dead fowls, polo-sticks, assegais and bombs. They were commanded by a Highlander in a bum-bee tartan kilt, top-hat and one sock, with a red nose a foot long, riding on a rocking horse and brandishing a dem great cucumber and a tea-tray made into a shield. There was a thundering great drain-pipe mounted on a bullock-cart and a naked man, painted blue, in ...
— Driftwood Spars - The Stories of a Man, a Boy, a Woman, and Certain Other People Who - Strangely Met Upon the Sea of Life • Percival Christopher Wren

... indisposed in a hotel in London, the landlord came to enumerate the good things he had in his larder, to prevail on his guest to eat something. The earl at length, starting suddenly from his couch, and throwing back a tartan night-gown which had covered his singularly grim and ghastly face, replied to his host's courtesy; "Landlord, I think I could eat a morsel of a poor man." Boniface, surprised alike at the extreme ugliness of Lord B.'s countenance, and the ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 333 - Vol. 12, Issue 333, September 27, 1828 • Various

... to Allengrange in 1801, the boys were sent to school at Munlachy, about a mile and a half distant from the farm. The school was attended by about forty barefooted boys in tartan kilt's, and about twenty girls, all of the poorer class. The schoolmaster was one Donald Frazer, a good teacher, but a severe disciplinarian. Under him, William made some progress in reading, writing, and arithmetic; ...
— Industrial Biography - Iron Workers and Tool Makers • Samuel Smiles

... once or twice was tempted to ask the coachman to stop till she had gathered a nosegay. She began to dread the end of her little journey of seven miles; the only drawback to which was, that her silk was not a true clan-tartan, and a little uncertainty as to Miss Rose's punctuality, At length they came to a village; straggling cottages lined the road, an old church stood on a kind of green, with the public-house close by it; there was a great tree, with a bench all round the trunk, midway between ...
— Wives and Daughters • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell

... book, of course." Even more than her sisters, she had inherited her father's love of books, and a new book was an event at the parsonage. "Oh," she cried again, taking off the paper and disclosing the pretty tartan cover within, "O Paul! It's 'Penelope's Progress.' Don't you remember those bits we read in those odd magazines Josie lent us? And how we wanted ...
— The S. W. F. Club • Caroline E. Jacobs

... changes his garb five, six, and even seven times a day. The consequence is that it is necessary to have at hand not only a vast number of naval and military uniforms, but also a diversity of shooting suits, hunting suits, civilian clothes, Tyrolese jaeger costumes, and even the kilt, sporran and tartan of a Highlander, for he is very proud of the fact that Stuart blood flows in his veins, and considers that he is quite as much entitled to wear the Stuart tartan as his ...
— The Secret Memoirs of the Courts of Europe: William II, Germany; Francis Joseph, Austria-Hungary, Volume I. (of 2) • Mme. La Marquise de Fontenoy

... this," replied Alec. "I have been watching him, and I have noticed that the only two things he seems to have any love for are his red-beaded leggings and his brilliant red neckerchief. So I have been thinking that if I offer him that red tartan shirt of mine it will so please him that it will break through his reserve, and ...
— Three Boys in the Wild North Land • Egerton Ryerson Young

... her mother, and then left her answer to Jamie Logan. For he came in at the moment with a little tartan shawl in his hand, which he gallantly threw across the shoulders of ...
— A Knight of the Nets • Amelia E. Barr

... work was over, But nearer shouts were heard, And came, with Gibbs to head it, The gallant Ninety-third. Then Pakenham, exulting, With proud and joyous glance, Cried, "Children of the tartan— Bold Highlanders—advance! Advance to scale the breastworks And drive them from their hold, And show the staunchless courage That ...
— Poems of American Patriotism • Brander Matthews (Editor)

... and by the neat shrubberies, up the steps to the hall-door, which old John opened, Mr. Wagg noted everything that he saw; the barometer and the letter-bag, the umbrellas and the ladies' clogs, Pen's hats and tartan wrapper, and old John opening the drawing-room door, to introduce the new-comers. Such minutiae attracted Wagg instinctively; he seized them in ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray

... of quaint Dutch cut, with hollow pillars at each of its four corners and two glasses extravagantly tall of stem, and he filled out the drams upon the table, removing with some embarrassment before he did so the book of arms. It surprised Count Victor that he should not be in the native tartan of the Scots Highlander. Instead he wore a demure coat and breeches of some dark fabric, and a wig conferred on him all the more of the look of a lowland merchant than of a chief of clan. He was a man at least twenty years the senior of his visitor—a handsome man of his kind, dark, deliberate ...
— Doom Castle • Neil Munro

... miracle was the word 'exquisite.' 'Exquisite,' pinned on a piece of broad tartan ribbon, appeared to Constance and Mr. Povey as the finality of appropriateness. A climax worthy to close the year! Mr. Povey had cut the card and sketched the word and figures in pencil, and Constance was doing her executive portion of the undertaking. They were very happy, very absorbed, ...
— The Old Wives' Tale • Arnold Bennett

... country of his youth never forsook him. In his early voyage into Greece, not only the shapes of the mountains, but the kilts and hardy forms of the Albanese,—all, as he says, "carried him back to Morven;" and, in his last fatal expedition, the dress which he himself chiefly wore at Cephalonia was a tartan jacket. ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. I. (of VI.) - With his Letters and Journals. • Thomas Moore

... pinnace, scow, banca, transport, dory, galley, cruiser, ship, barge, bark, brig, bucentaur, skiff, caique, drogher, schooner, cockleshell, vessel, tug, towboat, tow, cog, wangan, ferry-boat, dinghey, argosy, oomiac, junk, longboat, catboat, felucca, cutter, frigate, xebec, tartan, una boat, moses, raft, catamaran, sampan, lifeboat, caravel, trekschuit, masoola, argo, coggle. Associated Words: davits, oar, helm, stern, pilot, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming

... Malcolm Macleod was a fine manly fellow of about three and thirty, lusty and well-proportioned, very tanned and ruddy. He had a quick lively eye and a firm good-humoured mouth. In brief, he was the very picture of a frank open-hearted Highland gentleman, and in the gay Macleod tartan looked as gallant a figure of a soldier as one would wish to see. He greeted me with charming friendliness and expressed himself as deeply gratified for my care of his sister, offering again and again to put himself at my service in any ...
— A Daughter of Raasay - A Tale of the '45 • William MacLeod Raine

... and well proportioned, with a manly countenance, tanned by the weather, yet having a ruddiness in his cheeks, over a great part of which his rough beard extended. His eye was quick and lively, yet his look was not fierce, but he appeared at once firm and good-humoured. He wore a pair of brogues, tartan hose which came up only near to his knees, and left them bare, a purple camblet kilt, a black waistcoat, a short green cloth coat bound with gold cord, a yellowish bushy wig, a large blue bonnet with a gold thread button. I never saw a figure that gave ...
— The Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides with Samuel Johnson, LL.D. • James Boswell

... same ripe brown. Thence right-handed again and gradually back to civilization, or, rather, to life first and civilization some way behind. Eventually people strolling about and shops. I bought a pair of those jolly French-tartan stockings for little Bun. With a grey dress they will look ...
— Letters to Helen - Impressions of an Artist on the Western Front • Keith Henderson

... girl began making a sandwich of the bread and cheese, which she wrapped up in a clean handkerchief. She would not take the napkin, because that belonged to Grandma. Hanging up in the wardrobe was a long cloak of the MacDonald hunting tartan, which looked as if it had been fashioned out of a man's plaid. On each side was a pocket; and into one of these Barrie slipped her little package. Already made up and lying on the floor of the wardrobe was another parcel, ...
— The Heather-Moon • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson

... through the streets that slumbered in repose The living current of devotion flows, Its varied forms in one harmonious band Age leading childhood by its dimpled hand; Want, in the robe whose faded edges fall To tell of rags beneath the tartan shawl; And wealth, in silks that, fluttering to appear, Lift the deep borders of the proud cashmere. See, but glance briefly, sorrow-worn and pale, Those sunken cheeks beneath the widow's veil; Alone she wanders where with HIM ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

... amusements of a Scotch tour nowadays is to watch the pipers playing and dancing on the quays where the steamers touch. Their gay tartan attire and quaint instruments, with their gaudy bags and fringes, make a bright note of colour, and, judging by the money collected, bagpiping must be a fairly ...
— Chatterbox, 1906 • Various

... counted to him for good, but the restrained sumptuousness of his waistcoats and cravats were as wasted efforts. If he had habitually smoked cigarettes in a pink coral mouthpiece, or worn spats of Mackenzie tartan, the great heart of the voting- man, and the gush of the paragraph-makers might have been unreservedly his. The art of public life consists to a great extent of knowing exactly where to stop ...
— The Unbearable Bassington • Saki

... heard of famous Neil, The man who play'd the fiddle weel; He was a heartsome merry chiel', And weel he lo'ed the whisky, O! For e'er since he wore the tartan hose He dearly liket Athole brose![63] And grieved he was, you may suppose, To bid "farewell to ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume II. - The Songs of Scotland of the past half century • Various

... sense. You'll see a swatch on Friday of what I talked about and we'll—Come away this minute, Mary, and look me out my uniform. Jiggy Crawford! Young Jiggy that danced in the booze-house in Madrid! He was Ensign then and now he has his spurs and handles tartan. He is at the very topmost of the thing and I am going down, down, down, out, out, out, like this, and this, and this," and so saying he pinched out the candle flames one by one. The morning swept into the room, no longer with a rival, lighting up this parlour of old people, showing the wrinkles ...
— Gilian The Dreamer - His Fancy, His Love and Adventure • Neil Munro

... vision, in her robes of misty texture, and with hair arranged in folds the most complicated, wreathed, and satin-shoed, with the homely figure that took a walk with you that afternoon, russet-gowned, tartan-plaided, and shod with serviceable boots for tramping through country mud. One does not think of loveliness in the case of men, because they have not got any; but their aspect, such as it is, is mainly ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, No. 48, October, 1861 • Various

... called in England the parrot of the sun, is very remarkable: he can erect at pleasure a fine radiated circle of tartan feathers quite round the back of his head from jaw to jaw. The fore-part of his head is white; his back, tail and wings green; and his breast and ...
— Wanderings In South America • Charles Waterton

... Rigolette, ever neat and coquettish. A little plain cap, very clean, and trimmed with cherry-colored ribbons, which harmonized wonderfully with her jet-black hair, surrounded her pretty face; a very white collar was turned over her long brown tartan. She carried on her arm a straw basket, and, thanks to her neat and graceful manner of walking, her thick-soled boots were of marvelous cleanliness, although ...
— The Mysteries of Paris V2 • Eugene Sue

... amidship, in white jacket and indian-red kilt. He is paddling, behind him are green bananas, and in the stern a lady sits in pink petticoat and white jacket. The clothes of men and women are somewhat similar; the man's coloured "putsoe," or kilt, often of tartan, is tied in a knot in front of his waist, and comes down to the middle of his calf. The woman tucks her longer skirt or "tamaine," above her bosom, as you might hitch a bath-towel, and it falls rather tightly to her ankles, and both men and women wear a loose white cotton jacket, which just comes ...
— From Edinburgh to India & Burmah • William G. Burn Murdoch

... certain mercantile brilliancy best described perhaps as stylish; nor could anything be said against him, as a rule, but that he looked a trifle too like a wedding guest to be quite a gentleman. Today he had fallen altogether from these heights. He wore a flannel shirt of washed-out shepherd's tartan, and a suit of reddish tweeds, of the colour known to tailors as 'heather mixture'; his neckcloth was black, and tied loosely in a sailor's knot; a rusty ulster partly concealed these advantages; and his feet were shod with rough walking boots. His hat ...
— The Wrong Box • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne

... Dr. Beaton in Westminster has passed his youth, and, in middle age, is astounded by some neighbourly gossip concerning a mysterious personage who has taken up his quarters in an adjacent mansion. This unknown individual is described as wearing the red tartan, and as having that peculiar look of the eye "which was never in the head of man nor bird but the eagle and Prince Charlie." His name also is given as Captain O'Haleran, so that there can be no difficulty in tracing his ...
— Celebrated Claimants from Perkin Warbeck to Arthur Orton • Anonymous

... those mechanical and hushed tones that had at first affected him, 'you must go on to Holyhead alone; go on board the steamer; and if you see a man in tartan trousers and a pink scarf, say to him that all has been put off: if not,' she added, with a sobbing sigh, 'it ...
— The Dynamiter • Robert Louis Stevenson and Fanny van de Grift Stevenson

... picture of him in the "Heart of Mid-Lothian" as the patriotic Scotchman, whose heart must "be cold as death can make it when it does not warm to the tartan"—the kind and generous protector of Jeanie Deans. Argyll was a man of many gifts. He was a soldier, a statesman, and an orator. He had charged at Ramilies and Oudenarde, had rallied a shrinking column at Malplaquet, ...
— A History of the Four Georges, Volume I (of 4) • Justin McCarthy

... as 1746, a statute was passed to punish with six months' imprisonment, and on a second offense with seven years' transportation, the Scottish Highlanders, men or boys, who wore their national costume or a tartan plaid, it being conceived to be closely associated with a rebellious disposition. After thirty-six years the statute was repealed. While the act was in force it was evaded by people carrying their clothes in a bag over their shoulders. The prohibition was hateful to ...
— Mother Earth, Vol. 1 No. 3, May 1906 - Monthly Magazine Devoted to Social Science and Literature • Various

... her figure that was in classic harmony with the surrounding scenery. At the moment of my appearance she was in the act of dressing the wounded shoulder of a stag, that had recently been shot; and from the broad tartan riband I perceived attached to its neck, added to the fact of the tameness of the animal, I presumed that this stag, evidently a favourite of its mistress, was the same I had fired at and wounded. The rustling ...
— Wacousta: A Tale of the Pontiac Conspiracy (Complete) • John Richardson

... fevers and tartan agues, continual and intermitting fevers, imposthumes, erisepelas, carbuncles, fistulas, dysentery, and ...
— Thaumaturgia • An Oxonian

... men, among whom are barelegged Highlanders (I must say that this costume is very fine and becoming, though their thighs did look blue and frost-bitten) and also some soldiers of other Scotch regiments, with tartan trousers. Almost immediately on passing the gate, we found an old artillery-man, who undertook to show us round the castle. Only a small portion of it seems to be of great antiquity. The principal edifice within the castle wall is a palace, that was either built or renewed by ...
— Passages From the English Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... a second horse. My father's dress sounds curious to modern ears. Below a jacket and one of the big flapping collars of the period, he wore a waistcoat of crimson cut-velvet with gold buttons, a pair of skin-tight pantaloons of green tartan with Hessian boots to the knee, further adorned with large brass spurs with brass chains. A schoolboy of twelve would excite some comment were he to appear dressed like that to-day, though my father assured me that he could run in his Hessian boots and spurs as fast ...
— Here, There And Everywhere • Lord Frederic Hamilton

... word well said at last, and I will reward you for it with my story. That same night of your desertion I came late from a friend's house—where I was excessively admired, whatever you may think of it—and what should I hear but that a lass in a tartan screen desired to speak with me? She had been there an hour or better, said the servant-lass, and she grat in to herself as she sat waiting. I went to her direct; she rose as I came in, and I knew her at a look. ('Grey Eyes!' says I to myself, but ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 11 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... with the muslin dressing-gown, and the satin shoes; in the hall, she might find her hat, her little sabots which she wore in the garden, and the large tartan cloak for driving in wet weather. She half-opened her door with infinite precautions. Everything slept in the house; she crept along the corridor, ...
— L'Abbe Constantin, Complete • Ludovic Halevy

... now acted as head-foreman to a firm of stevedores. He was an office-bearer of the local Scottish Society, talked braid Scots on occasions (though his command of Yankee slang when stimulating his men in the holds was finely complete), and wore a tartan neck-tie that might aptly be called a gathering ...
— The Brassbounder - A Tale of the Sea • David W. Bone



Words linked to "Tartan" :   plaid, textile, cloth, fabric



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