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Dower   /daʊr/   Listen
Dower

noun
1.
Money or property brought by a woman to her husband at marriage.  Synonyms: dowery, dowry, portion.
2.
A life estate to which a wife is entitled on the death of her husband.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Dower" Quotes from Famous Books



... my word is passed, father. Shall that word, the word of a Custis, be less than a Milburn's faith. By the love he bore me, Mr. Milburn gave me these debts for my dower—a rare faith in one so prudent. If I do not marry him, they will be given back to him ...
— The Entailed Hat - Or, Patty Cannon's Times • George Alfred Townsend

... Antigone's death, he married several wives to enlarge his interest and power. He had the daughter of Autoleon, king of the Paeonians, Bircenna, Bardyllis the Illyrian's daughter, Lanassa, daughter of Agathocles the Syracusan, who brought with her in dower the city of Corcyra which had been taken by Agathocles. By Antigone he had Ptolemy, Alexander by Lanassa, and Helenus, his youngest son, by Bircenna; he brought them up all in arms, hot and eager youths, ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough

... but Aunt Kate has always looked after Zay's attire. I believe I was not much interested in clothes, but now I shall be and I have so many pretty things I shall never wear again. Zay is overburdened now," laughing softly, "and Aunt Kate will dower her. Oh, Marguerite, I am so glad to have you! It has given a new impetus to my life," and she held ...
— The Girls at Mount Morris • Amanda Minnie Douglas

... summers and freezing winters, labour and drudgery and ignorance, were the portion of their girlhood; a short wooing, a hasty, loveless marriage, unlimited maternity, thankless sons, premature age and ugliness, were the dower of their womanhood. But what matter? Tonight there was hot liquor in the glass and hot blood in the heart; tonight ...
— The Troll Garden and Selected Stories • Willa Cather

... latter time The promise of the prime Seem'd to come true at last, O Abbey old! It seem'd, a child of light did bring the dower Foreshown thee in thy consecration-hour, And in thy courts his shining freight unroll'd: Bright wits, and instincts sure, And goodness warm, and truth without alloy, And temper sweet, and love of all things pure, And joy ...
— Poetical Works of Matthew Arnold • Matthew Arnold

... 's out, the secret 's out, A doctor has been found, and the secret 's out! For she finds at e'ening's hour, In a rosy woodland bower, Charms worth a prince's dower To ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume IV. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various

... and desire, that all the slaves which I hold in my own right shall receive their freedom—To emancipate them during her life, would tho earnestly wished by me, be attended with such insuperable difficulties, on account of their intermixture by marriages with the Dower negroes as to excite the most painful sensations—if not disagreeable consequences from the latter while both descriptions are in the occupancy of the same proprietor, it not being in my power under tenure by which the dower Negroes are held to manumit them—And whereas among ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 2, 1917 • Various

... can withstand the power Of thy divine, o'ermastering force, To man heaven's richest dower. All know who own thy sovereign sway, No wealth can equal thine, Inspiring and constraining each, ...
— Home Lyrics • Hannah. S. Battersby

... rivals for supremacy. Bombay Island, upon which Bombay City stands, another of the keys of the world, was given to Britain by Portugal as part of the dower of Catherine of Braganza when she married Charles II. Think of a woman giving anything for the privilege of marrying such a wretch! but so little was it esteemed that the government gave it in 1688 to the East India Company for a rental of L10 per ...
— Round the World • Andrew Carnegie

... thousand francs a year? nonsense, you are crazy! Some people will persist in giving millions with the liberality of authors, to whom it doesn't cost a penny to dower their heroines. Madame Firmiani is simply a coquette, who has lately ruined a young man, and now prevents him from making a fine marriage. If she were not so handsome ...
— Madame Firmiani • Honore de Balzac

... won, thou shalt ne'er make thine!" Gunther shouted. "Dost think to grasp Gutrune's dower?" The two men fell a-fighting; and Hagen, piercing Gunther's breast, sprang aside, while Gunther fell dead. Instantly Hagen leaped toward Siegfried's body to snatch the ring; but slowly, slowly the dead hand was raised threateningly, and ...
— Operas Every Child Should Know - Descriptions of the Text and Music of Some of the Most Famous Masterpieces • Mary Schell Hoke Bacon

... criticisms of Henry Mackenzie, published in that popular periodical, "The Lounger," where he says, "Burns possesses the spirit as well as the fancy of a poet; that honest pride and independence of soul, which are sometimes the muse's only dower, break forth on every occasion, in his works." The praise of the author of the "Man of Feeling" was not more felt by Burns, than it was by the whole island: the harp of the north had not been swept for centuries by a hand so forcible, and at the same time so varied, ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham

... not deny her beauty. Such a dower had never been miladi's, though she had been pretty ...
— A Little Girl in Old Quebec • Amanda Millie Douglas

... gratified her. She knew that she was gifted with a wondrous dower of beauty. She knew that men were meek when a beautiful face charmed them. The involuntary homage of this handsome young man pleased her. She would have more of it. When he rejoined his companion, ...
— A Mad Love • Bertha M. Clay

... lava deep and rich, That dower which fertilizes fields and fills New moles upon the waters, bay and beach. Broad sea and clustered isles, one terror thrills As roll the red inexorable rills; While Naples trembles in her palaces, More helpless than the leaves when ...
— Poems • Victor Hugo

... 484, Zeno had made him consul at Rome. But Theodorick afterwards thought that Zeno had treated him very ill. He marched upon Constantinople: Zeno trembled on his throne. Something had to be done. What was done was to turn Theodorick's longing eyes upon the land possessing "the hapless dower of beauty".[46] Zeno commissioned him to turn Odoacer out, and to take his place. In 489, Theodorick led the great mass of his people into Italy, at the suggestion, and with the warrant of, the man whom Pope Felix had ...
— The Formation of Christendom, Volume VI - The Holy See and the Wandering of the Nations, from St. Leo I to St. Gregory I • Thomas W. (Thomas William) Allies

... beautiful and beauty-making power. Joy, virtuous Lady! Joy that ne'er was given, Save to the pure, and in their purest hour, Life, and Life's effluence, cloud at once and shower, Joy, Lady! is the spirit and the power, Which wedding Nature to us gives in dower, A new Earth and new Heaven, Undreamt of by the sensual and the proud— Joy is the sweet voice, Joy the luminous cloud— We in ourselves rejoice! And thence flows all that charms or ear or sight, All melodies the echoes of that voice, All colours ...
— Poems of Coleridge • Coleridge, ed Arthur Symons

... treasure in the person of thy grandmother—And so, poor bird, thou art already captive—unhappy flutterer! But it is thy lot, and wherefore should I wonder or repine? When was there fair maiden, with a wealthy dower, but she was ere maturity destined to be the slave of some of those petty kings, who allow us to call nothing ours that their passions can covet? Well—I cannot aid thee—I am but a poor and neglected woman, feeble both from sex and age.—And to which of these De Lacys art thou ...
— The Betrothed • Sir Walter Scott

... especially those which sprang from the misconduct of government officials or of powerful oppressors, fell within its cognizance as they fell within that of the Royal Council, and to these were added disputes respecting the wardship of infants, dower, rent-charges, or tithes. Its equitable jurisdiction sprang from the defective nature and the technical and unbending rules of the common law. As the Council had given redress in cases where law became injustice, so the ...
— History of the English People, Volume II (of 8) - The Charter, 1216-1307; The Parliament, 1307-1400 • John Richard Green

... apart from those concerned with the religious sentiment. Their most complete satisfaction rather excludes than encourages pious meditations. That which prayer ought to seek outside of itself is different from all of these, its dower must be divine. ...
— The Religious Sentiment - Its Source and Aim: A Contribution to the Science and - Philosophy of Religion • Daniel G. Brinton

... began his series of pictures called the "Harlot's Progress," and when Sir James saw them he was so satisfied with the talent of Hogarth that he declared that such an artist could support a wife who had no dower, and the two painters were soon reconciled to each other. Before 1744 Hogarth had also painted the series of the "Rake's Progress" and "Marriage ...
— A History of Art for Beginners and Students: Painting, Sculpture, Architecture - Painting • Clara Erskine Clement

... man has a straight and well-cut nose he may sell himself at a higher price than a young man there with the hideous pug; if a girl is beautiful, the marquis will be content with some thousands of francs less for her dower than if her hair were red or her complexion irreclaimably brown. If Julie has a pretty foot, a svelte waist, and can play the piano thunderingly, or sing in the charmingest soprano, her ten thousand ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 1 • Grace Wharton and Philip Wharton

... never see her more, they were so importunate with me, that I was forced to engage that she should go no farther with me than Goa, which was in India, and where they could go to visit her; and that, if at any time I were to go to Portugal or elsewhere, I should then leave her with such a dower as is usual with the Portuguese when they die. But knowing that if my wife should chuse to go with me, all these might have no effect, I concerted with the Jesuits to procure me two seguros or passports; one giving me free permission and ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. VIII. • Robert Kerr

... condition would be no pitiable one, should she once more occupy the position that she held before the reign of Constantine.[109] Faint echo of the unforgotten lines in which Dante cries out to Constantine what woes his fatal dower to the papacy had brought down on religion and mankind.[110] In these sentences lay a germ that events were speedily to draw towards maturity, a foreshadowing of the supreme principle that neither Oxford nor any other place had yet taught him, 'the value of liberty as an essential condition ...
— The Life of William Ewart Gladstone, Vol. 1 (of 3) - 1809-1859 • John Morley

... The dower negroes were kept separate from those owned by himself, but otherwise he seems to have made little distinction between his own and Mrs. Washington's property, which was now, in fact, by Virginia law his own. When Martha ...
— George Washington: Farmer • Paul Leland Haworth

... of how much ill was mother, Not thy conversion, but that marriage dower Which the first wealthy ...
— Divine Comedy, Longfellow's Translation, Hell • Dante Alighieri

... a well-shaped head set on square shoulders, brown hair inclined to curl, large blue eyes which could be merry or exceedingly grave, I thought him a picture of manly beauty. Good-natured, clever, prosperous, and not yet thirty. What a dower! ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... Warwick, Isabel, the young widow of the Lord de Chaworth, and the mother's mother of Alianora of Lancaster. Thou and thy father's wife, therefore, are near akin. This Isabel (after whom thy mother was named) was a famed beauty, and brought moreover a very rich dower. My grandfather and she had many children, but I need only speak ...
— The Well in the Desert - An Old Legend of the House of Arundel • Emily Sarah Holt

... during fifty-one years. She was married to Dabrieschescourt in the church of Wingham in Kent, and died here in Bedhampton, and was buried in the church of St Thomas, for the manor was her father's and part of her first dower. ...
— England of My Heart—Spring • Edward Hutton

... always at Florence. As examples of such buildings I may cite the palace of the Poppi at Casentino which he built for the count there, who had married the beautiful Gualdrada, with the Casentino as her dower; the Vescovado for the Aretines, and the Palazzo Vecchio of the lords of Pietramela. It was at Florence that he laid the piles of the ponte alla Carraia, then called the ponte Nuovo, in 1218, and finished them in two years. A short while afterwards it was completed ...
— The Lives of the Painters, Sculptors & Architects, Volume 1 (of 8) • Giorgio Vasari

... a daughter, to whom he married me, and he presented me with a hundred dinars as her dower. After some time my wife unveiled her disposition, which was ill-tempered, quarrelsome, obstinate, and abusive; so that the happiness of my life vanished. It has been well said: 'A bad woman in the house of a virtuous man is hell even in this world.' Take ...
— Flowers from a Persian Garden and Other Papers • W. A. Clouston

... 25th, 1789. "On this day personally appeared before me, Dennis Dooley, Justice of the Peace of the said county of the commonwealth of Virginia, Elizabeth Scurr, and voluntarily relinquished her right of a dower in a certain tract or piece of land in the town of Westmoreland and Province of New Brunswick, viz.: Three eighty-acre lots, Nos. sixteen, eighteen and twenty, with the marsh and wilderness thereto belonging. All in division letter B, and described ...
— The Chignecto Isthmus And Its First Settlers • Howard Trueman

... men, grown more numerous, feel the need of the ancient wisdom and prudence. It is at least permitted the philosopher and the historian to ask if this magnificent but unbridled freedom which we enjoy suits all times, and not only those in which nations coming into being can find a small dower in their cradle as you have done—three millions of square ...
— Characters and events of Roman History • Guglielmo Ferrero

... her husband, was as enthusiastic as the duke. When his resources were at an end and Lone unfinished she gave up her marriage settlements, including her dower house, which was sold that the proceeds might go ...
— The Lost Lady of Lone • E.D.E.N. Southworth

... threatened to interfere with Hiram's arrangements. His wife would have a right of dower in all his real estate, in case she survived him. This ...
— Continental Monthly, Volume 5, Issue 4 • Various

... the Nabob's children, with all the eunuchs, the ancient servants, and a multitude of the dependants of his splendid court. These were all to be provided, for present maintenance and future establishment, from the lands assigned as dower, and from the treasures which he left to these matrons, in trust for the ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... last to find a resistless voice, a limitless scope, an unrepressed expansion, on a new and magnificent theatre. For freedom is of no time, nor clime, nor color, nor sect, nor nationality. She is the primal gift of God to his intelligent creatures, and is the kingly dower of every human soul. She was not born with the Puritans, nor did she die with them. In no age or land, among no sect or people, has she been without her priesthood, her altar, her ritual, her heart ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No 3, September 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... but a poor man, and belike thou wilt ask a heavy dowry." Replied the King, "O my son, know that Khirad Shah, lord of Shiraz and dependencies thereof, seeketh her in marriage and hath appointed an hundred thousand dinars to her dower; but I have chosen thee before all men, that I may make thee the sword of my kingship and my shield against vengeance.''[FN353] Then he turned to his Chief Officers and said to them, "Bear witness[FN354] against me, O Lords of mine Empire, ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton

... the world: a whole pack of men without wives, without homes, and usually without fortune. High above all this deferential male crowd, moves the lady of the castle: highborn, proud, having brought her husband a dower of fiefs often equal to his own, and of vassals devoted to her race. About her she has no equals; her daughters, scarcely out of the nurse's hands, are given away in marriage; and her companions, if companions they ...
— Euphorion - Being Studies of the Antique and the Mediaeval in the - Renaissance - Vol. II • Vernon Lee

... Charles, two brothers, James and Patrick Hays, being the lawful heirs of their brother Alexander, who had died intestate in Hamburg, had obtained a decree in their favour in the Hamburg Court, assigning them all the said Alexander's property, except dower for his widow. From that day to this, however, chiefly by the influence of Albert van Eizen, a man of consequence in Hamburg, they have been kept out of their rights. They are in extreme poverty and have applied to the Protector. As he considers it the first duty of his Protectorate to look ...
— The Life of John Milton, Volume 5 (of 7), 1654-1660 • David Masson

... itself with the anticipation of becoming the capital of his future kingdom. His ill-disguised attempts upon the Electorate of Mentz, which he first intended to bestow upon the Elector of Brandenburg, as the dower of his daughter Christina, and afterwards destined for his chancellor and friend Oxenstiern, evinced plainly what liberties he was disposed to take with the constitution of the empire. His allies, the Protestant princes, had claims on ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller

... of intellect, damned with a dower of beauty; sensitive, alert, possessing an impetuous nature that endeavored to find its gratification in religion. Born into a rich family, and marrying a rich man, unkind Fate gave her time for introspection, and her mind became morbid ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 13 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Lovers • Elbert Hubbard

... Julia received her cup she scrutinized the girl more carefully. It was not such a girlish face, after all—definite lines were forming under the rosy haze of youth. She reflected that Una must be six-and-twenty, and wondered why she had not married. A nice stock of ideas she would have as her dower! If THEY were to be a part of the ...
— The Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton, Part 2 (of 10) • Edith Wharton

... Italia! thou who hast The fatal gift of beauty, which became A funeral dower of present woes and past, On thy sweet brow is sorrow plowed by shame, And annals graven in characters of flame. O God! that thou wert in thy nakedness Less lovely, or more powerful, and couldst claim Thy right, and awe the robbers back, who press To shed thy blood and drink ...
— The Cryptogram - A Novel • James De Mille

... the castle of Falaise against the father of Henry II., and these walls have probably echoed to the lays of minstrels, whose harps were tuned in praise of the beautiful and haughty heiress of Aquitaine. The fair wife of Coeur de Lion had this castle for her dower, and, for some time, is said to have lived here. Philip Augustus accorded some singular privileges to Falaise, two of which ...
— Barn and the Pyrenees - A Legendary Tour to the Country of Henri Quatre • Louisa Stuart Costello

... upon her. I shall never suffer disgrace through her; rather I think to win more honour. Have my chaplain summoned now, and do you go and fetch the lady. The half of all my land I will give her as her dower if she will comply with my desire." Then they bade the chaplain come, in accordance with the Count's command, and the dame they brought there, too, and made her marry him perforce; for she flatly refused to give consent. But in spite of all, the Count married her in accordance ...
— Four Arthurian Romances - "Erec et Enide", "Cliges", "Yvain", and "Lancelot" • Chretien de Troyes

... hangings, curtains, and valances to go with them. Feather beds, feather pillows, linen sheets, tablecloths, and napkins, ten blankets, and three quilts. How much of this store of household linens was part of his wife's wedding dower ...
— Quilts - Their Story and How to Make Them • Marie D. Webster

... convent in Siena. At one time it had been said that Count Ottaviano, who was a most amiable and accomplished young man, was to marry the daughter of the strange Englishman, Doctor Lombard, but difficulties having arisen as to the adjustment of the young lady's dower, Count Celsi-Mongirone had very properly broken off the match. It was sad for the young man, however, who was said to be deeply in love, and to find frequent excuses for coming to Siena to ...
— The Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton, Part 1 (of 10) • Edith Wharton

... gold, You see, though all he needed was a little, And what he gave said nothing of who gave it. He would have given it all if in return There might have been a more sufficient face To greet him when he shaved. Though you insist It is the dower, and always, of our degree Not to be cursed with such invidious insight, Remember that you stand, you and your fancy, Now in his house; and since we are together, See for yourself and tell me what you see. Tell me the best you see. Make a slight noise ...
— The Three Taverns • Edwin Arlington Robinson

... convent. The house chosen was that of S. Chiara in the town of Lucca. On June 5, she assumed the habit of S. Francis, cut her hair, changed her name from Lucrezia to Umilia, and offered two thousand crowns of dower to this monastery. Only four days had elapsed since her husband's assassination. But she, at all events, was safe from immediate peril; for the Church must now be dealt with; and the Church neither relinquished its suppliants, nor disgorged the wealth they poured into its coffers. The Podesta, ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volumes 1 and 2 - The Catholic Reaction • John Addington Symonds

... Marjoram! (Sing of sweet old gardens all a-glow); It will scent your dower drawer, dear, Folk would strew it on the floor, ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Volume 152, March 21, 1917 • Various

... here ye shall not tarry. Go to the next buckle-beggar! A pretty wedding truly! When thou hast learned how to keep her honestly 'twill be time enough to wed. But thou hast not earned a doit to put beside her dower, and all our ready moneys, and more, be in trade; though, for the matter o' that, the pulling would be no great business either. But I tell thee again, thy father shall not portion an idler like thyself and pinch his trade. ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby

... there have been various instances wherein their industry and quickness of understanding, which in a great measure arises from the manner of their education, has proved more profitable to their husbands than a more ample dower. ...
— A Description of Millenium Hall • Sarah Scott

... though I own the mystery she has made to me of her flight confounds me; though it seems inconsistent with the friendship between us; I cannot forget the disinterested warmth with which she always opposed my taking the veil. She wished to see me married, though my dower would have been a loss to her and my brother's children. For her sake I will believe well of ...
— The Castle of Otranto • Horace Walpole

... The old dower-house of Fawsley, not many miles to the north-east of Broughton, in the adjoining county of Northamptonshire, had a secret room over the hall, where a private press was kept for the purpose of printing political tracts at this time, ...
— Secret Chambers and Hiding Places • Allan Fea

... far as to smile faintly. It was just the sort of deficiency which she had it in her power to make up. The reflection set her to dreaming when she wanted to be doing something else. She could have brought him the dower of all the things he didn't know, while he could give her.... But she ...
— The Street Called Straight • Basil King

... parents, gave him a crown of gold, the spirit of divination, and in conclusion made him a demigod. O vis superba formae, a goddess beauty is, whom the very gods adore, nam pulchros dii amant; she is Amoris domina, love's harbinger, love's loadstone, a witch, a charm, &c. Beauty is a dower of itself, a sufficient patrimony, an ample commendation, an accurate epistle, as [4829]Lucian, [4830]Apuleius, Tiraquellus, and some others conclude. Imperio digna forma, beauty deserves a kingdom, saith Abulensis, paradox. 2. cap. 110. immortality; and [4831]"more have got this honour and ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior

... is, The Manor House, Wimperton, Tavistock, Devon. They retired there at the accession of their brother to the title. It has been used as a dower house in the family for many years; and, pending the search for your father, I obtained permission for them to continue to reside there. I was not obliged to ask for an allowance for them, as they had an income, under their mother's marriage settlement, sufficient ...
— With Kitchener in the Soudan - A Story of Atbara and Omdurman • G. A. Henty

... deny the flower Because its roots are in the earth, And crave with tears from God the dower They have, and have despised as dearth, And scorn as low their human lot, With frantic pride, too blind to see That standing on the head makes not Either for ease or dignity! But fools shall feel like fools to find (Too late inform'd) that angels' mirth Is ...
— The Angel in the House • Coventry Patmore

... began, Time that was not before creation's hour, Divided it, and gave the sun's high power To rule the one, the moon the other span: Thence fate and changeful chance and fortune's ban Did in one moment down on mortals shower: To me they portioned darkness for a dower; Dark hath my lot been since I was ...
— Renaissance in Italy Vol. 3 - The Fine Arts • John Addington Symonds

... said she, in the heart of the woods The sweet south-winds assert their power, And blow apart the snowy snoods Of trilliums in their thrice-green bower. Now all the swamps are flushed with dower Of viscid pink, where, hour by hour, The bees swim amorous, and a shower Reddens the stream where cardinals tower. Far lost in fern of fragrant stir Her fancies roam, for unto her All Nature ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 7, No. 43, May, 1861 • Various

... up their abode in the house of Custennin the herdsman. The next day with the dawn they arrayed themselves in haste and proceeded to the castle, and entered the hall, and they said, "Yspaddaden Penkawr, give us thy daughter in consideration of her dower and her maiden fee, which we will pay to thee and to her two kinswomen likewise. And unless thou wilt do so, thou shalt meet with thy death on her account." Then he said, "Her four great- grandmothers, and her four great-grandsires are yet alive, it is needful that I take counsel of them." "Be ...
— The Mabinogion • Lady Charlotte Guest

... here a survival of very ancient practice, it may be noticed that in Spiti, a part of the Punjab, an exact parallel occurs. There the father retires from the headship of the family when his eldest son is of full age, and has taken unto himself a wife; on each estate there is a kind of dower-house with a plot of land attached, to which the father in these cases retires.[92] In Bavaria and in Wuertemberg the same custom obtains,[93] and the sagas of the North also confirm ...
— Folklore as an Historical Science • George Laurence Gomme

... my beloved Wife Sarah a good Sute of mourning apparrel Such as she may Choose—also if she acquit my estate of Dower and third-therin (as we have agreed) Then that my Executer return all of Household movables she bought at our marriage & since that are remaining, also to Pay to her or Her Heirs That Note of Forty ...
— The Adventures of Ann - Stories of Colonial Times • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

... morrow of this hasty tying of the wedding knot that the Countess of Charolais sent a messenger to announce the fact to her parents. They seem to have been perfectly satisfied, made no further objection to any point, and the mooted territory of Chinon made part of the dower in spite of ...
— Charles the Bold - Last Duke Of Burgundy, 1433-1477 • Ruth Putnam

... which may have been the Parthenon, or again a mathematical diagram. And why was the pebble so emphatically ground in at the corner? It was not to count his notes that he took out a wad of papers and read a long flowing letter which Sandra had written two days ago at Milton Dower House with his book before her and in her mind the memory of something said or attempted, some moment in the dark on the road to the Acropolis which (such was her creed) mattered ...
— Jacob's Room • Virginia Woolf

... already accomplished by education! The Thakore Sahib of Philawat was refused leave from the Government to go to the war, on account of his youth. Yet his sister, who wedded the Rana of Haliana had prepared a contingent of infantry out of her own dower-villages. They were set down in the roll of the Princes' contingents as stretcher-bearers: they being armed men out of the desert. She sent a telegram to her brother, commissioning him to go with them as Captain of stretcher-bearers: ...
— The Eyes of Asia • Rudyard Kipling

... strength of mind and high principles, is apt to be a fatal dower. In every family there are sad histories," murmured the ...
— Charlotte's Inheritance • M. E. Braddon

... sacrifice, and dwelt in homes Free, where nor Love nor Woman goes and comes How, is that daughter not a bane confessed, Whom her own sire sends forth—(He knows her best!)— And, will some man but take her, pays a dower! And he, poor fool, takes home the poison-flower; Laughs to hang jewels on the deadly thing He joys in; labours for her robe-wearing, Till wealth and peace are dead. He smarts the less In whose high seat is set a Nothingness, A woman naught availing. ...
— Hippolytus/The Bacchae • Euripides

... settlement, had prospered, had even married herself, thinking the first marriage void. Then her second husband died and evil times came. Blakeley was dead, but she came East. Since then she had been fighting to establish the validity of the first marriage and hence her claim to dower rights. It was ...
— The Treasure-Train • Arthur B. Reeve

... and so their lives became one, and the melody of happy children's voices drew nearer and nearer, and listening to the sweet voice of the mother singing to her babe, and looking into the bright and rosy faces that with every glance and motion thanked him for their dower of health and honor, he blessed the great Creator from whom he had received the wondrous gift of potential fatherhood, and gave thanks that he had wisely listened to the angel's voice bidding him keep his gift for those whose life, in the years to come, was ...
— Almost A Man • Mary Wood-Allen

... sought her hand—one rich, the other poor. The poor man she declared to be her choice, but the purse-proud father declared his firlot of silver money, his twelve cows, and as many calves, his sheep and oxen, intended as his daughter's dower, would never enrich a pennyless man without houses and lands. So he said; yet he changed his mind through the influence of a fortune-teller, hired to tell what pleased her employers best. In presence of father and mother the sibyl professed to see, first, in ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant

... For, behold! great Nature's self Builds her no abstemious shelf, But provides (her love is such For all) her own great, good Too-Much,— Too much grass, and too much tree, Too much air, and land, and sea, Too much seed of fruit and flower, And fish, an unimagin'd dower! (In whose single roe shall be Life enough to stock the sea,— Endless ichthyophagy!) Ev'ry instant through the day Worlds of life are thrown away; Worlds of life, and worlds of pleasure, Not for lavishment ...
— In The Yule-Log Glow—Book 3 - Christmas Poems from 'round the World • Various

... ivory or in ebony, As Day or Night may rule; and let Time see Its flowering crest impearled and orient. A Sonnet is a coin; its face reveals The soul,—its converse, to what Power 'tis due:— Whether for tribute to the august appeals Of Life, or dower in Love's high retinue, It serve; or 'mid the dark wharfs cavernous breath, In Charon's palm it ...
— Recollections of Dante Gabriel Rossetti - 1883 • T. Hall Caine

... the accursed old woman, as she were a cassia[FN103] pod, for excess of blackness and leanness, and laden with fetters and shackles. When Zoulmekan and the bystanders saw her, they took her for a man of the dower of God's servants and the most excellent of devotees, more by token of the shining of her forehead for the ointment with which she had anointed it. So Zoulmekan and Sherkan wept sore and kissed her hands ...
— The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume II • Anonymous

... not cognisant of nature's dower to her sex. To wear the coronet and to refuse the crown! To be wife and not to be mother! To think of baby fingers and to think to put away the offer ...
— This Freedom • A. S. M. Hutchinson

... which she could never hope to find amid the persecutions to which she was daily subjected, Marie de Medicis at length resolved to retire to Moulins in the province of Bourbon, which was one of her dower-cities; and she accordingly sent to request the consent of the ...
— The Life of Marie de Medicis, Vol. 2 (of 3) • Julia Pardoe

... arrayed by nature with all the charms at its command."[14] The continued favor of the goddess had to be purchased by the sacrifice of virginity to a stranger. It was likewise in line with the old idea that the Lybian maids earned their dower by prostituting their bodies. In accord with the mother-right, these women were sexually free during their unmarried status; and the men saw so little objection in these pickings, that those were taken by them for wives who had been most in demand. It was thus also ...
— Woman under socialism • August Bebel

... cares for you." It is a sign that they have never yet thanked God for their children, have never yet rightly prayed for them, have never yet commended them to Him; otherwise they would know and have experienced that they ought to ask God also for the marriage dower of their children, and await it from Him. Therefore also He permits them to go their way, with cares and ...
— A Treatise on Good Works • Dr. Martin Luther

... his affairs in such utter disorder,—no schedule of property,—no statement of debts; too good a business man for that was Walter Kinloch. I shall now be able to know from these documents what my late client was really worth, and how large a dower the disconsolate widow has reserved for herself. Doubtless she has put by enough to suffice for her old age,—and mine, too, I am inclined to think; for I don't believe I can do better than marry her when the mourning is ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 10, August, 1858 • Various

... der goot knight had a Schauer, Und felt most ongommonly queer, Vhen he find on de top of de dower De goblum, pesite him, abbear. Denn he find he no more could go valkin, Und shtood, shoost and potrified ding, Vhile de goblum vent round about talkin, Und chaffin ...
— The Breitmann Ballads • Charles G. Leland

... Brothers") was performed at the Funeral Games of Lucius AEmilius Paulus, who was surnamed Macedonicus, from having gained a victory over Perseus, King of Macedon. He was so poor at the time of his decease, that they were obliged to sell his estate in order to pay his widow her dower. The Q. Fabius Maximus and P. Cornelius Africanus here mentioned were not, as some have thought, the Curale AEdiles, but two sons of AEmilius Paulus, who had taken the surnames of the families into ...
— The Comedies of Terence - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Notes • Publius Terentius Afer, (AKA) Terence

... thoughts are sweet glimpses of heaven, Her life is that heaven brought down; Oh, never to mortal was given So rare and bejewelled a crown! I'll wear it as saints wear the glory That radiantly clasps them above— Oh, dower most fair! Oh, diadem rare! Bright crown of ...
— Hesperus - and Other Poems and Lyrics • Charles Sangster

... herself—perhaps nearly seventy—of very fine family. Of course you have read it all, but let me sketch it so you will look at it from my point of view. This woman, apparently in good health, with every luxury money can buy, is certain within a very few years, from her dower rights, to be numbered among the richest women in America. Yet she is discovered in the middle of the night by her maid, seated at the table in the library of her home, unconscious. She never regains consciousness, but dies ...
— The Silent Bullet • Arthur B. Reeve

... thy graces blend With loveliest Nature all that Art can lend. Come from the bowers where Summer's life-blood flows Through the red lips of June's half-open rose, Dressed in bright hues, the loving sunshine's dower; For tranquil Nature owns no mourning flower. Come from the forest where the beech's screen Bars the fierce moonbeam with its flakes of green; Stay the rude axe that bares the shadowy plains, Stanch the deep wound That dries the maple's veins. Come with the stream whose silver-braided rills ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

... through the successive gradations of leet juror, constable, and alderman to high bailiff in 1568, although unable to write his own name. He married, in 1557, Mary Arden, the daughter of his father's landlord, who brought him as dower about sixty acres of land and the equivalent of $200 in money. His pride was apparently inflamed by political success, and he applied to the Herald's College for a grant of arms, which was refused. From this time his fortunes rapidly declined. He mortgaged his property, squandered his ...
— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 7 of 8 • Charles F. (Charles Francis) Horne

... the settlement to Pudentilla's sons. Take the deeds into your own hands, give them to Rufinus who incited you to this accusation. Let him read them, let him blush for his arrogant temper and his pretentious beggary. He is poor and ill-clad and borrowed 400,000 sesterces to dower his daughter, while Pudentilla, a woman of fortune, was content with 300,000, and her husband, who has often refused the hand of the richest heiresses, is also content with this trifling dowry, a mere nominal ...
— The Apologia and Florida of Apuleius of Madaura • Lucius Apuleius

... embassy which arrived in England during the year 1550 to make arrangements respecting the dower of the princess, and to confer on her intended spouse the order of St. Michael, was received with high honors, but found the court-festivities damped by a visitation of that strange and terrific malady ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin

... therefrom about the life of our forefathers can hardly be believed, save by those who have turned the pages of such a collection as the great Testamenta Eboracensia.[4] In wills you may see how many daughters a man could dower and how many he put into a nunnery, and what education he provided for his sons. You may note which were the most popular religious houses, and which men had books and what the books were, how much of their money ...
— Medieval People • Eileen Edna Power

... other reasons had to be discovered. James saw the Infanta's dower of two million crowns and jewels within his grasp. The Spanish Court showed the friendliest disposition. It had expressed its delight at the welcome news of its enemy's capture in the act of flight, and his committal again to the Tower. Nothing was wanting, James imagined, to crown the negotiations, ...
— Sir Walter Ralegh - A Biography • William Stebbing

... husband), who had left her unmolested for several months, was now taking possession of everything, so that what kept her in town was the business of her "turning out," and certain formalities connected with her dower. This was very ample, and the large provision made for her included the London house. She was very gracious on this occasion, but she certainly had remarkably little to say. Still, she was different, or at any rate (having taken that hint), ...
— The Path Of Duty • Henry James

... Orestes, my stripling boy that is nurtured in all abundance. Three daughters are mine in my well-builded hall, Chrysothemis and Laodike and Iphianassa; let him take of them which he will, without gifts of wooing, to Peleus' house; and I will add a great dower such as no man ever yet gave with his daughter. And seven well-peopled cities will I give him, Kardamyle and Enope and grassy Hire and holy Pherai and Antheia deep in meads, and fair Aipeia and Pedasos land ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer (Lang, Leaf, Myers trans.)

... the beings that surround thee; To me, thou art a dream of hope and fear; Yet why of fear?—oh sure! the Power that lent Such gifts, to make thee fair, and excellent; Still watches one whom it has deigned to bless With such a dower of grace and loveliness; Over the dangerous waves 'twill surely steer The richly freighted bark, through storm and blast, And guide it safely to the port at last. Such is my prayer; 'tis warm as ever fell From off my lips: accept it, and farewell! And though in this strange world where first I ...
— Poems • Frances Anne Butler

... the purposes therein mentioned; and the E. M. Putnam being by me examined apart from her husband, and being fully acquainted with the contents of the foregoing conveyance, acknowledged that she executed the same freely, and relinquished her dower, and any other claim she might have in and to the property therein mentioned, freely, and without fear, compulsion, or undue influence of her ...
— Behind the Scenes - or, Thirty years a slave, and Four Years in the White House • Elizabeth Keckley

... walled-off room, a sound of voices at night in dark corridors where no voices could possibly be, a hidden tragedy, and at last Father and Mother would lift the burden from the place, and end their days in the rose-covered dower-house.... Not that Father was sure just what a dower-house was, but he was quite definite ...
— The Innocents - A Story for Lovers • Sinclair Lewis

... King Death Stayed no more delicate breath On earth, we give for dower Wood-sorrel, that frail flower ...
— Helen Redeemed and Other Poems • Maurice Hewlett

... gazed on her glorious self, Then trembling with the thrill of sudden thought, Commanded that the skilful wight be brought That she might dower him with lands and pelf. Then out upon the silent sea-lapt shelf And up the hills and on the downs they sought Him who so well and wondrously had wrought; And with much search found and brought home the elf. But he put by ...
— The Complete Poems of Paul Laurence Dunbar • Paul Laurence Dunbar

... returns, our pension will be restored; WE shall consent after clashing a little with our wife's common-sense. Jacques' fortune will then be permanently secured. That result obtained, I shall leave monsieur to lay by as much as he likes for Madeleine, though the king will of course dower her, according to custom. My conscience is easy; I have all but accomplished my task. And you?" ...
— The Lily of the Valley • Honore de Balzac

... down. Why should I make that name a curse as well as a burden? Nothing is left to me but that which is permitted to all men,—wedded and holy love. Could I win to my heart the smile of a woman who brings me that dower, the home of my fathers would lose its gloom.' And therefore, if at that time I had become familiarly acquainted with her who had thus attracted my eye and engaged my thoughts, she might have ...
— The Parisians, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... Embankment? Flush of pride mantles brow of MATTHEWS. This red-hot building—its gables, its roofs, its windows, its doorways, and its twisted knockers—was designed under his direction. It is his dower to London, set forth on one of its most spacious sites. What does HARCOURT want to know about it? Why is PLUNKET so studious in repudiating all responsibility for the thing? Wherefore does crowded House cheer ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 98, May 3, 1890. • Various

... exercising only a very precarious authority as the boy's guardian; while the Dowager Margaret, the second wife of Charles the Bold, the lady whose hostility to the House of Lancaster has been already noted, possessed some dower-towns, and considerable influence. In 1486 Maximilian was elected "King of the Romans," in other words his father's ...
— England Under the Tudors • Arthur D. Innes

... for torture.—Lo! they come, The loathsome waters, in their rage! And with their roar make wholesome nature dumb! The forest's trees (coeval with the hour When Paradise upsprung, Ere Eve gave Adam knowledge for her dower, Or Adam his first hymn of slavery sung), So massy, vast, yet green in their old age, 870 Are overtopped, Their summer blossoms by the surges lopped, Which rise, and rise, and rise. Vainly we look up to the lowering skies— They meet the seas, And shut out God ...
— The Works of Lord Byron - Poetry, Volume V. • Lord Byron

... thy dower, Lofty lineage, ample might, Ah, too early lost, thy flower Withered by untimely blight! Glance was thine the world discerning, Sympathy with every wrong, Woman's love for thee still yearning, And thine ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke

... Amelia out of her wits, and not a little staggered Booth, who was himself no contemptible scholar. He expressed great admiration of the lady's learning; upon which she said it was all the fortune given her by her father, and all the dower left her by her husband; "and sometimes," said she, "I am inclined to think I enjoy more pleasure from it than if they had bestowed on me what the world would in general call more valuable."—She then took occasion, from the surprize which Booth had affected to conceive ...
— Amelia (Complete) • Henry Fielding

... of Luxemburg, widow of the Duke of Bedford, married, secondly, the brave and handsome knight, Sir Richard Woodville, when she came to England in 1435 to claim her dower. The birth of her eldest child Elizabeth probably occurred in 1436. The marriage caused great scandal and Sir Richard was imprisoned; but was subsequently released and they settled at Grafton Castle. The Duchess kept the rank of aunt to the King; and on occasions of ceremony was the ...
— The Letter-Bag of Lady Elizabeth Spencer-Stanhope v. I. • A. M. W. Stirling (compiler)

... high Southannon's distant tower Arrived a young and noble dame; With Kenneth's lands to form her dower, ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant

... yet is the denizen of all airs and of every world; and in space its soul meets with mine,—the child communes with the father! Cruel and forsaking one,—thou for whom I left the wisdom of the spheres; thou whose fatal dower has been the weakness and terrors of humanity,—couldst thou think that young soul less safe on earth because I would lead it ever more up to heaven! Didst thou think that I could have wronged mine own? Didst ...
— Zanoni • Edward Bulwer Lytton



Words linked to "Dower" :   present, benefice, life estate, give, dowery, dowry, estate for life, gift



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