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Thrifty   /θrˈɪfti/   Listen
Thrifty

adjective
(compar. thriftier; superl. thriftiest)
1.
Careful and diligent in the use of resources.
2.
Mindful of the future in spending money.  Synonym: careful.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Thrifty" Quotes from Famous Books



... outward show, I humbly conceive, we looked rather like a gang of beggars, or banditti, than either a company of honest laboring-men, or a conclave of philosophers. Whatever might be our points of difference, we all of us seemed to have come to Blithedale with the one thrifty and laudable idea of wearing out our old clothes. Such garments as had an airing, whenever we strode afield! Coats with high collars and with no collars, broad-skirted or swallow-tailed, and with the waist at every point between the hip and arm-pit; ...
— The Blithedale Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... grows wild, can also be put up to profit, for the manufacture of guava jelly. It has never been entered upon on a large scale, but to the thrifty farmer it would add a convenient slice to his income, just as the juice of the maple adds an increase to the farmer of the Eastern States. Well made guava jelly will find a market anywhere. In England ...
— The Hawaiian Islands • The Department of Foreign Affairs

... this old lamp they sate, Father and Son, while far into the night 125 The Housewife plied her own peculiar work, Making the cottage through the silent hours Murmur as with the sound of summer flies. This light was famous in its neighborhood, And was a public symbol of the life 130 That thrifty Pair had lived. For, as it chanced; Their cottage on a plot of rising ground Stood single, with large prospect, north and south, High into Easedale, up to Dunmail-Raise, And westward to the village near the lake; ...
— Selections from Wordsworth and Tennyson • William Wordsworth and Alfred Lord Tennyson

... too, a hold upon Santa Anna that he has sought in vain to break. Such a man as he always needs money, not a few thousands, but great sums. He has been thrifty. The treasury of Mexico has been practically at his mercy, but he does not trust the banks of his own land. He has money not only in the foreign banks of Mexico, but also large amounts of it in two of the great banks of London. The English ...
— The Texan Scouts - A Story of the Alamo and Goliad • Joseph A. Altsheler

... his plow or hoe had left in it, and fringed it with grass and flowers. The solitary and slender trees which had been left standing here and there around the clearing, having escaped the fire, she took under her special care—throwing out new and thrifty branches from them, in every direction, and thus giving them massive and luxuriant forms, to beautify the landscape, and to form shady retreats for the flocks and herds which might in subsequent years graze upon the ground. Thus while Albert devoted ...
— Mary Erskine • Jacob Abbott

... household goods and drawn by broad-backed farm- horses, with usually another horse or a milch cow tied behind. The real power of France, these peasants holding fast to the acres they own, with the fire of the French nature under their thrifty conservatism. Others on foot were villagers who had lacked horses or carts to transport their belongings. In the packs on their backs were a few precious things which they had borne away ...
— My Year of the War • Frederick Palmer

... The effect of such a tax would be that he who has spent everything that he has earned on his own enjoyment would go scot free in the matter of the capital tax, and would be rewarded for his improvidence by being asked to make no sacrifice; while his thrifty brother who, out of a smaller income, has set aside a certain proportion during the last twenty or thirty years, would have to hand over a portion of his current income assessed upon the value of the assets into which he has put his savings. Incidentally, it may be remarked ...
— War-Time Financial Problems • Hartley Withers

... show that the clamor is not all on one side. The watchdogs of the Paris Boulevards are noisy enough, but those of Berlin are just the same. And as these are not all of Germany, so the others are not all of France. A great, thrifty, honest, earnest, cultured nation does not find its voice in the noises of the street. On the other hand, Germany, industrious, learned, profound and brave, is busy with her own affairs. She would harm no one, but mind her own business. But she is entangled in mediaeval ...
— The Unpopular Review, Volume II Number 3 • Various

... and thought things over. How to simplify life? How, indeed! It is a subject that interests me strangely. Of course, the easiest method is to let one's ancestors do it for one. If you have been lucky enough to choose a simple-minded, quiet-natured quartet of grandparents, frugal, thrifty and foresighted, who had the good sense to buy property in an improving neighborhood and keep their money compounding at a fair rate of interest, the problem is greatly clarified. If they have hung on to the ...
— Mince Pie • Christopher Darlington Morley

... coolness, came to his chambers, and with a solemn injunction that the matter between them should be quite private, requested him to purchase 1500 pounds worth of Bundelcund shares for her and her darling girls, which he did, astonished to find the thrifty widow in possession of so much money. Had Mr. Pendennis's mind not been bent at this moment on quite other subjects, he might have increased his own fortune by the Bundelcund Bank speculation; but in these two years I was engaged ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray

... now his courtesy breathed less of artifice,—it took a more hearty tone. Another alteration was discernible in him, and that was precisely the reverse of what might have been expected. He became more thrifty, more attentive to the expenses of life than he had been. Though a despiser of show and ostentation, and far too hard to be luxurious, he was too scientific an architect of the weaknesses of others not to have ...
— Paul Clifford, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... by stealth, Some small regard for state and wealth: Of which as she grew up there stayed A tincture in the prudent maid: She managed her estate with care, Yet liked three footmen to her chair, But lest he should neglect his studies Like a young heir, the thrifty goddess (For fear young master should be spoiled) Would use him like a younger child; And, after long computing, found 'Twould come to just ...
— The Battle of the Books - and Other Short Pieces • Jonathan Swift

... of persimmons. The persimmon has only about ten days in which it will fall bud. Before or after this period budding will not succeed. It also is important that the scions be taken from thrifty trees a number of years old. The ordinary "T" shield budding gives good success on the persimmon either spring or fall. The spring bud sticks should be ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Thirty-Fourth Annual Report 1943 • Various

... grown out of what they began, and as we look back upon their condition, trials and experiences, we are apt to imagine that their lot, contrasted with our own, was an unhappy one. Nothing could be further from the truth. They were a brave, hardy, thrifty, frugal, industrious and most capable people. Man for man and woman for woman, they were probably superior to those here to-day in faculty, and in the capacity for healthy enjoyments. Their whole previous lives had inured them to their experiences. They were the sons and ...
— The Two Hundredth Anniversary of the Settlement of the Town of New Milford, Conn. June 17th, 1907 • Daniel Davenport

... Quite time, I think, she should learn housekeeping—something every young girl should know. We should hear of fewer divorces and a less number of failures of men in business, had their wives been trained before marriage to be good, thrifty, economical housekeepers and, still more important, good homemakers. To be a helpmate in every sense of the word is every woman's duty, I think, when her husband works early and late to procure the means to provide for her comforts and luxuries and a competency for ...
— Mary at the Farm and Book of Recipes Compiled during Her Visit - among the "Pennsylvania Germans" • Edith M. Thomas

... cotton factory at the Blantyre Works, situated on the Clyde, above Glasgow. His uncles all entered His Majesty's service either as soldiers or sailors, but his father remained at home, and his mother, being a thrifty housewife, in order to make the two ends meet, sent her son David, at the age of ten, to the factory ...
— Great African Travellers - From Mungo Park to Livingstone and Stanley • W.H.G. Kingston

... hidden ore of our new Territories. Time and space, whose natural demands have been so rudely disregarded by the iron progress of science and skill between you and us, still to a great degree maintain their ancient rule over the lands west of us. That vast, thrifty vine of speedy transportation, which has wound itself about the trunk of our national tree, strikes here and there one of its tendrils out upon the branches beyond us, over the region of a few counties. In one instance, in the State immediately south of ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 1, July, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... whole better. They are more industrious, thrifty and dependable. Have you ever seen a 'Colonel' Lukins or a Bap ...
— A Man for the Ages - A Story of the Builders of Democracy • Irving Bacheller

... a tawny-headed girl... Lemons in a greenish broth And a huge earthen bowl By a bronzed merchant With a tall black lamb's wool cap upon his head... He has no glance for her. His thrifty eyes Bend—glittering, intent Their hoarded looks Upon his merchandise, As though it were some splendid cloth Or sumptuous raiment Stitched in gold ...
— The Ghetto and Other Poems • Lola Ridge

... as little known and valued as Alaska was last year. But the discovery of gold in Sutton's mill-race changed the whole aspect of affairs in California, and it is now a State with a large and thrifty population, and its western shore is connected with the Atlantic seaboard by railroads, towns and cities. The discovery of gold made the change. The recent discoveries on the Yukon River in Alaska ...
— The American Missionary - Volume 52, No. 1, March, 1898 • Various

... better woman than here sleeps, there's none, Sara, Rebecca, Rahel, three in one: Religious, pious, thrifty, wise, fayre, and chast: Soe many goods in one, ...
— Highways and Byways in Surrey • Eric Parker

... honest lad, and gave him good wages, so that he had a trifle to lay up, besides providing his board and clothing, and getting an occasional present for Mrs. Bates or Nannie. It was altogether a very thrifty household now, and Mr. Bond felt no uneasiness about going ...
— The Elm Tree Tales • F. Irene Burge Smith

... attention at the soldier, who expected them to pull off his cowl and expose a head of thrifty clusters which had never known the tonsure. His beaver cap lay in the trench with the real ...
— The Lady of Fort St. John • Mary Hartwell Catherwood

... I can save them. At first I was puzzled by their performances. You know, father, that short nursery row grafted with our seedling apple, the Highland Beauty? Well, I found many of the lower twigs taken off with a sharp, slanting cut, as if they had been severed with a knife, and I imagined that a thrifty neighbor had resolved to share in our monopoly of the new variety, but I soon discovered that the cuttings had been made too much at random to confirm the impression that some one had been gathering scions for grafting. ...
— Nature's Serial Story • E. P. Roe

... went on, addressing Genestas, "is for me a whole philosophical treatise; take a good look at him when he comes, he is sure to amuse you. He was a laborer, a thrifty, hard-working man, eating little and getting through a good deal of work. As soon as the rogue came to have a few crowns of his own, his intelligence began to develop; he watched the progress which I had originated in this little district with an eye to his own profit. ...
— The Country Doctor • Honore de Balzac

... Flag-Lieutenant. The marshy banks of the Canton River are lined with interminable paddy-fields, for, as every one knows, rice is a crop that must be grown under water. After the rice harvest, these swampy fields are naturally full of fallen grain, and thrifty John Chinaman feeds immense flocks of ducks on the stubbles of the paddy-fields. The ducks are brought down by thousands in junks, and quack and gobble to their hearts' content in the fields all day, waddling back over a plank to their junks at night. At sunset, ...
— Here, There And Everywhere • Lord Frederic Hamilton

... should have been resting and reaping the fruit of her early industry, she was obliged to toil more assiduously than ever. It was little consolation to her that she was but a type of many women, who, hardworking and thrifty themselves, are married to men who are nothing but an incubus to their wives and to their families. Small wonder, then, that Mrs. Hableton should condense all her knowledge of the male sex into the one bitter aphorism, ...
— The Mystery of a Hansom Cab • Fergus Hume

... labor wars alternated with times of industrial peace. Months of prosperity were followed by months of "hard times," and want was in turn succeeded by plenty. When the community was at work the more intelligent and thrifty among those who toiled with their hands and the more conservative of those who labored in business were able to put by in store enough to tide them over the next period of idleness ...
— Helen of the Old House • Harold Bell Wright

... thrifty and less liberal owners, who remained the greater part of the year on their estates, were perhaps more respected but still less liked. Any attempt at careful management of the estate was invariably considered to be a sign of stinginess or of hardheartedness. ...
— The Russian Revolution; The Jugo-Slav Movement • Alexander Petrunkevitch, Samuel Northrup Harper,

... was, beyond all dispute, the most tidy, fidgety, thrifty little personage that ever inhaled the smoke of London; and the house of Mrs. Tibbs was, decidedly, the neatest in all Great Coram-street. The area and the area-steps, and the street-door and the street-door ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens

... were connected by highways which the Knights of the Cross, or rather the merchants of the towns, kept in good condition, and which were as good as the Polish roads, which were under the care of the thrifty and energetic King Kazimierz. The weather was excellent, the nights were serene, the days bright, and about noon a dry and warm zephyr-like wind blew which filled the human breast with health-giving air. The cornfields assumed a green hue, the meadows were covered with abundant flowers, ...
— The Knights of the Cross • Henryk Sienkiewicz

... pacing the rapidly growing wheat, the Territorial Grain Growers' Association spread and took root till by harvest time it was standing everywhere in the field, a thrifty and full-headed champion of farmers' rights, lacking only the ripening of experience. There had been as yet no particular opportunity to demonstrate its usefulness in dollars and cents; but with the approach of the fall and market ...
— Deep Furrows • Hopkins Moorhouse

... into general company, but her influence was mildly exercised in her rooms at the large old hotel, and in her carriage as she made excursions in pleasant weather to the South and West rivers, to "the Forest" of Prince George and to the thrifty Quakers of Montgomery. She wrote and received a daily letter, her husband being attentive and tender, despite his growing cares, as he had promised to be on that severe day he made his suit ...
— The Entailed Hat - Or, Patty Cannon's Times • George Alfred Townsend

... lodging they walked across the Park to a church not far from Belgrave-square. There was a charity sermon at Saint James's, as the major knew by the bills posted on the pillars of his parish church, which probably caused him, for he was a thrifty man, to forsake it for that day: besides he had other views for himself and Pen. "We will go to church, sir, across the Park; and then, begad, we will go to the Claverings' house, and ask them for lunch in a friendly way. Lady Clavering likes to be asked for lunch, ...
— The History of Pendennis, Vol. 2 - His Fortunes and Misfortunes, His Friends and His Greatest Enemy • William Makepeace Thackeray

... sound of a shot betrayed my whereabouts I should have to abide by it, for I had to eat. Stepping softly along, I glanced about me with sharp eyes. Deer trails were thick. The bottom of this canyon was very wide, and grew wider as I proceeded. Then the pines once more became large and thrifty. I judged I had come down the mountain, perhaps a couple of thousand feet below the camp in the gorge. I flushed many of the big blue grouse, and I saw numerous coyotes, a fox, and a large brown beast which moved swiftly into a thicket. It was enough to make my ...
— The Young Forester • Zane Grey

... elder were hard-working, thrifty lads, who had no care except as to how they might better themselves in the world. But the youngest, whose name was Boots, was not thrifty at all. He was a do-nothing and was quite content to sit in the chimney corner and warm his shins and ...
— Tales of Folk and Fairies • Katharine Pyle

... mak' ye a guid wife, Sanders. I hae studied her weel, and she's a thrifty, douce, clever lassie. Sanders, there's no the like o' her. Mony a time, Sanders, I hae said to mysel', 'There's a lass ony man micht be prood to tak'.' A'body says the same, Sanders. There's nae risk ava, man—nane to speak o'. Tak' her, ...
— Stories by English Authors: Scotland • Various

... was of a very thrifty disposition, and the following was her solution of the problem: "Sam, if you find that you can't be home for dinner, phone me at exactly six o'clock. If the telephone rings at that hour, I'll know it is you and that you are not coming for dinner. I won't answer ...
— More Toasts • Marion Dix Mosher

... appropriations of subject territory, allowances for attending theatres, payments for performing public duties, and by these bad habits were, under the influence of his public measures, changed from a sober, thrifty people, that maintained themselves by their own labors, to lovers of expense, ...
— The Boys' and Girls' Plutarch - Being Parts of The "Lives" of Plutarch • Plutarch

... opinion of our money-making civilization. It will be as if he rose from the dead to tell us what he thinks of our doings. He has been represented by this critic and by that as a master of affairs, a prudent thrifty soul; now we shall see if this monstrous hybrid of tradesman-poet ever had ...
— The Man Shakespeare • Frank Harris

... had not been ripped from their hinges by February no'theasters; its roof grew bald in spots as the shingles loosened and were blown away; the swallows flew in and out of its stone-broken windowpanes. Year by year it became more of a disgrace in the eyes of Bayport's neat and thrifty inhabitants—for neat and thrifty we are, if we do say it. The selectmen would have liked to tear it down, but they could not, because it was private property, having been purchased from the Howes heirs by the third Cy Whittaker, ...
— Cy Whittaker's Place • Joseph C. Lincoln

... once so thrifty and prosperous, are now hardly more than ruins. It is no wonder that this part of the country (Vincennes, St. Maur, Chenvieres, etc.) is so destroyed, because it was all about here that the French, shut up in Paris, had made the most frequent ...
— In the Courts of Memory 1858-1875. • L. de Hegermann-Lindencrone

... Snakes! Creep forth, ye thrifty Ants! Handless and strengthless He provides your wants Who from the 'Is not' planned the 'Is to be,' And Life in ...
— Reviews • Oscar Wilde

... small band of Mormons—headed by Brigham Young—commenced in the present thrifty metropolis of Utah. The population of the territory of Utah is over 100,000—chiefly Mormons—and they are increasing at the rate of from five to ten thousand annually. The converts to Mormonism now are almost exclusively confined to English and Germans—Wales and ...
— The Complete Works of Artemus Ward, Part 6 • Charles Farrar Browne

... weekly dress allowance of ten shillings out of his salary, so that she might attend the sales at the big drapery shops in the West End and inspect the windows containing expensive articles that she could not hope to buy. Mr. Mattingford was an exceedingly thrifty man, and his wife possessed some of the qualities of a spendthrift. Thus it came about that Mr. Mattingford kept up the fiction that he had no savings and that each week's salary must see him through till the next week. Mrs. Mattingford ...
— The Hampstead Mystery • John R. Watson

... offers a most admirable, con- venient, and secure depository for the savings of the industrial classes and of others. Its value to the thrifty and timid investor is incalculable, for here he may rest satisfied that he has abso- lute security, and the system is so hedged about with safeguards that it is difficult to discover any means ...
— Everybody's Guide to Money Matters • William Cotton, F.S.A.

... which give variety to the painful record, and these should yield the utmost satisfaction to the promoters of the Act, in proving to them the fell measure of their achievement. One example of these experiences was that of a white farmer who had induced a thrifty Native in another district to come and farm on his estate. The contract was duly executed about the end of May, 1913. It was agreed that the Native should move over to the new place after gathering his crops and ...
— Native Life in South Africa, Before and Since • Solomon Tshekisho Plaatje

... passed, and already a young "CANADIAN" generation has sprung up sturdy, thrifty, progressive from the transplanted Ruthenian stock. The numerous children of that prolific race are gradually passing from the home into the schools and from the schools into the community life of the country. This Slavic race is striking deep roots in Canadian ...
— Catholic Problems in Western Canada • George Thomas Daly

... is altogether desirable in reference to a great poet. The Shakespeare whom I met there took various guises, but had not his laurel on. He was successively the roguish boy,—the youthful deer-stealer,— the comrade of players,—the too familiar friend of Davenant's mother,— the careful, thrifty, thriven man of property who came back from London to lend money on bond, and occupy the best house in Stratford,—the mellow, red-nosed, autumnal boon-companion of John a' Combe,—and finally (or else the Stratford gossips belied him), the victim of convivial habits, who ...
— Our Old Home - A Series of English Sketches • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... It has a direct bearing, too, upon the character of the immigrants. Easy and cheap transportation involves deterioration in quality. In the days when a journey across the Atlantic was a matter of weeks or months and of considerable outlay, only the most enterprising, thrifty, and venturesome were ready to try an uncertain future in an unknown land. The immigrant of those days was likely, therefore, to be of the sturdiest and best type, and his coming increased the general prosperity without ...
— Aliens or Americans? • Howard B. Grose

... families were well-paid, thrifty, clannish Swedes, most of them, with a liberal sprinkling of Belgians and Slavs. They belonged to all sorts of societies and lodges to which they paid infinitesimal dues and ...
— Half Portions • Edna Ferber

... feel that the heirs of his body are to be made glorious by what he has accumulated, and his only fear is that they will squander what he has spent his strength in amassing. He educates his children to be thrifty and rejoices when they spend no money, readily believing them to be as careful as himself, and seldom reflecting that, if he furnished them with the means, their true disposition might turn out to be very different. It is so intensely ...
— Sant' Ilario • F. Marion Crawford

... nobles alike. Two special causes fanned the fury of the populace to a white heat. The first was the decline of the Mediterranean trade due to the rise of the Atlantic commerce; the other was the racial element. Valencia was largely inhabited by Moors, the most industrious, sober and thrifty, and consequently the most profitable of Spanish laborers. The race hatred so deeply rooted in human nature added to the ferocity of the class conflict. Both sides were ruined by the war which, beginning in ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith

... imaginative soul, might perhaps retain his ideal unbroken till his death; but in the young bronze-worker's practical mind ideals had no place, and his bride would slip naturally into the post of housewife, from whom nothing more exalted would be demanded than thrifty habits ...
— In the Yule-Log Glow, Book II - Christmas Tales from 'Round the World • Various

... disunion in her heart, because she wants to please her husband, and at the same time she wants to "keep up" with her neighbors and friends. And who sets the pace for her, for all of her group; who establishes the standard of expenditure? Not the thrifty, saving woman, not the one who mends her clothes and makes her own hats, but the extravagant woman, the rich woman perhaps of recently acquired wealth who cares little for a dollar. Against her better judgment the woman of the house enters a race with no ending and becomes ...
— The Nervous Housewife • Abraham Myerson

... niece of the late Kaiser Karl's, cousin of Maria Theresa's; making the due 'renunciations,' as was thought; and has been Kurfurst himself for the last fourteen Years, ever since 1726, when his Father died. A thrifty Kurfurst, they say, or at least has occasionally tried to be so, conscious of the load of debts left on him; fond of pomps withal, extremely polite, given to Devotion and to BILLETS-DOUX; of gracious address, generous temper (if he had the means), and great skill in ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XIII. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle

... be glad! Why, Fraulein is the grandest housekeeper," cried Helen, using the name that Mrs. Schuler's old pupils never remembered to change to "Frau." "German housekeepers are thrifty and neat and careful—why, she's exactly the person we want. How great of you to think of her, ...
— Ethel Morton at Rose House • Mabell S. C. Smith

... might not even go away from the manor to which they were born, and they might not marry without the lord's license, and for that license they always had to pay. Let a villein be ever so shrewd or enterprising or thrifty, there was no hope for him to change his state, except by the special grace of the lord of the manor. [Footnote: I do not take account of those who ran away to the corporate towns. I suspect that there were many more cases of this than some writers allow. It was sometimes a serious inconvenience ...
— The Coming of the Friars • Augustus Jessopp

... days immediately thereafter and had to have six stitches taken in his head besides. Oddly enough, the only place from which a brick was found to be missing was in the walk leading to the stables, and Butts, being a thrifty soul, filled up the vacant spot with the heaven-sent substitute, having found on investigation that it fitted the vacuum perfectly. It was Melissa who kept Watson from taking out a warrant for young Master Frederick. She spoke very sharply to the ...
— Mr. Bingle • George Barr McCutcheon

... day the bursar presents to every member a needle and thread with the words, "Take this and be thrifty." We have not been able to obtain a statistical return of the standing of the Queen's men in the books of the tradesmen of Oxford as compared with members of other colleges, but we recommend the question to Mr. Newdegate or some other ...
— Rides on Railways • Samuel Sidney

... now a matter for consideration. With improved means of intercourse and traffic, each year found some family thrifty enough to thrust its head above the rude level of settlers' equality, and take on the airs of superiority. Twenty years before, it had been Colonel Johnson first, and nobody else second. Now the Baronet-General ...
— In the Valley • Harold Frederic

... Among other subjects, he gave me a lively and curious description of the Yeomanry of Georgia—more properly termed pine-landers. Have you visions now of well-to-do farmers with comfortable homesteads, decent habits, industrious, intelligent, cheerful, and thrifty? Such, however, is not the Yeomanry of Georgia. Labour being here the especial portion of slaves, it is thenceforth degraded, and considered unworthy of all but slaves. No white man, therefore, of any ...
— Journal of a Residence on a Georgian Plantation - 1838-1839 • Frances Anne Kemble

... contest with so superior an antagonist. With a cowardly prudence they made their just discontent submit to the stern law of necessity, and imposed a hard sacrifice on their pride because their pampered vanity was capable of nothing better. Too thrifty and too discreet to wish to extort from the justice or the fear of their sovereign the certain good which they already possessed from his voluntary generosity, or to resign a real happiness in order to preserve the shadow of another, ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller

... returned by the stores, which black porters were closing. But I stood long looking in, saturating my imagination, and as it appeared, my clothes, with the spicy suggestion. For when I reached home my thrifty mother—another Prue—came ...
— Prue and I • George William Curtis

... when he has fought his battle with the world, and conquered more or less; when he has made his way up, and seems to himself safe, and comfortable, and thriving; when he feels that he is a shrewd, thrifty, experienced man, who knows the world and how to prosper in it—Then how easy it is for him to say in his heart—as Moses feared that those old Jews would say—'My might and the power of my wit has gotten me this wealth,' and to forget the Lord his God, who guided him and trained ...
— Discipline and Other Sermons • Charles Kingsley

... little left. Mrs. Myrover was thrifty, and had laid by a few hundred dollars, which she kept in the house to meet unforeseen contingencies. There remained, too, their home, with an ample garden and a well-stocked orchard, besides a considerable tract of country land, partly cleared, but productive ...
— The Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, 1995, Memorial Issue • Various

... picture. The foreground is a cultivated clearing of about one hundred acres, with woody walls, unbroken in their leafy density, hemming it in on every side. Directly in front is a field of corn, the dark and thrifty green of which may well bespeak the deep, rich soil of the Paradise. Farther in are several other inclosures, either white with clover or brightly green with blue-grass, or darkly green with the yet unripened wheat. In the midst of all, and forming the central feature, stands ...
— Burl • Morrison Heady

... "A sturdy, thrifty, hardworking, law-loving people, fond of good cheer and strong drink, of shrewd, blunt speech, and a stubborn reticence, when speech would be useless or foolish; a people clean-living, faithful to ...
— Sutherland and Caithness in Saga-Time - or, The Jarls and The Freskyns • James Gray

... and collected in many cases where it could be secured. Those who refused to pay were given the choice of ball and chain. A thriving trade in cotton was opened against the positive orders of the Washington Government. Butler's own brother was the thrifty banker and ...
— The Victim - A romance of the Real Jefferson Davis • Thomas Dixon

... The Germans are a careful, thrifty, painstaking, systematic race, and the chief of the Valkyrie was the flower of the flock. When that little French gunboat captured her this chief engineer looked into the future and saw himself and the Valkyrie interned ...
— Cappy Ricks Retires • Peter B. Kyne

... Baden-Baden, plaintively gave the attendant a double fee to show that meanness had not caused my apparently thrifty act. Then for the first time in our lives we found ...
— Abroad with the Jimmies • Lilian Bell

... first place, the delicious suggestiveness of the name,—Martha's Vineyard! At once we ask, Who was Martha? and how did she use her vineyard? Was she the thrifty wife of some old Puritan proprietor of untamed acres?—and did she fancy the wild grapes of this little island, fuller of flavor, and sweeter for the manufacture of her jellies and home-made wine, than those which grew elsewhere?—and did she come in the vintage season, with ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 23, September, 1859 • Various

... mosquitoes are few, the fish in the Pen1 are remarkably fat, the River wine is exceedingly good, and indeed for the most part the food is like that of the North Country. Although the mouths within my doors are many and the salary of a Sub-Prefect is small, by a thrifty application of my means, I am yet able to provide for my household without seeking any man's assistance to clothe their backs or fill their bellies. This is ...
— More Translations from the Chinese • Various

... seem to be an exhaustive process to the trees, as the trees of a sugar-bush appear to be as thrifty and as long-lived as other trees. They come to have a maternal, large-waisted look, from the wounds of the axe or the auger, and that is ...
— In the Catskills • John Burroughs

... deposits. There the billiard chairs once did service in the old home on the West Side. In the hall beside the Westminster clock stood a "sofa," covered with figured velours. That had once adorned the old Twentieth Street drawing-room; and thrifty Mrs. Hitchcock had not sufficiently readjusted herself to the new state to banish it to the floor above, where it belonged with some ugly, solid brass andirons. In the same way, faithful Mr. Hitchcock had seen no good reason why he should ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick

... held each velvet-soft and tiny hand. "Nay," I dissented; "the subject is somewhat too sacred for jest. I am no modish lover, dearest and best of creatures, to regard marriage as the thrifty purchase of an estate, and the lady as so much bed-furniture thrown in with the mansion. I love you with completeness: and give me leave to assure you, madam, with a freedom which I think permissible on so serious an occasion that, even ...
— Gallantry - Dizain des Fetes Galantes • James Branch Cabell

... dining-room. A red-and-white heifer browsing at a little distance looked up from her meal and surveyed the intruders with mild attention, but apparently satisfied that they contemplated no invasion of her rights, resumed her agreeable employment. Over an irregular stone wall our travelers looked into a thrifty apple-orchard laden with fruit. They halted beneath a spreading chestnut-tree which towered above its neighbors, and offered them a grateful shelter from the ...
— Paul Prescott's Charge • Horatio Alger

... nothing will grow in the short, cold summers except potatoes and a little barley. Farther inland, there are great forests and lakes, and ranges of mountains where bears, wolves, and herds of wild reindeer make their home. No people could live in such a country unless they were very industrious and thrifty. ...
— The Junior Classics • Various

... Ludolph was not in as bad a humor as was imagined. This thrifty Teuton had not lost much by the mishap of the afternoon, for a month or two of wages was due Pat, and this kept back would pay in the main for the injury he had done. His whole soul being bent on the acquirement of money, for reasons that will be explained ...
— Barriers Burned Away • E. P. Roe

... without a feeling of awe of the magnitude of the sum left her by her thrifty husband, the bulk of which sum was represented by those unfruitful certificates. She stooped and felt the rails, looking cautiously up and down the road to be sure no train was coming. After all, it was consoling to think that that good honest steel and timber was partly her ...
— Peak and Prairie - From a Colorado Sketch-book • Anna Fuller

... been one of the three persons chosen according to the tenor of the statute; that they would advise the king to have recourse to the three persons that were chosen according to the statute, or that some other thrifty man be intreated to occupy the office for this year; and that, the next year, to eschew such inconveniences, the order of the statute in this behalf made be observed." But, notwithstanding this unanimous resolution of all the judges of England, thus entered ...
— Commentaries on the Laws of England - Book the First • William Blackstone

... wasteful and dirty, and let sewers run into the sea instead of putting the stuff upon the fields like thrifty reasonable souls; or throw herrings' heads and dead dog-fish, or any other refuse, into the water; or in any way make a mess upon the clean shore—there the water-babies will not come, sometimes not for hundreds of years (for they cannot abide anything smelly ...
— The Water-Babies - A Fairy Tale for a Land-Baby • Charles Kingsley

... was proud of its fete. But Coutances was also a thrifty city. Once the cortege had passed, it was high time to snuff out the tapers. Who could stand by and see good candles blowing uselessly in the wind, and one's money going along ...
— In and Out of Three Normady Inns • Anna Bowman Dodd

... procure it. On such an occasion he took up a handful of grains of corn, and presently gave them the form and appearance of thirty hogs well fatted for the market. He drove these hogs to the residence of one Michael, a rich dealer, but who was remarked for being penurious and thrifty in his bargains. He offered them to Michael for whatever price he should judge reasonable. The bargain was presently struck, Ziito at the same time warning the purchaser, that he should on no account drive them to the river to drink. Michael however paid no attention to ...
— Lives of the Necromancers • William Godwin

... our little friend, Freda, has lost some property; that is, her mother and herself have lost a certain claim to it. This little colony around here is fairly bristling with the prosperity implanted in it by such thrifty men as was Freda's grandfather, but in spite of that, strangers come in, make a big fuss about riparian rights, and government laws, and property claims and, in so doing, pretend to discover a flaw in a title that for years has been considered perfectly clear." She paused, for Bess ...
— The Motor Girls on Crystal Bay - The Secret of the Red Oar • Margaret Penrose

... were, what men they grew to be. How honor, thrift, and courage made them rise By steps that you can learn if you be wise. First, Pocahontas in a woodland green; Then life among the Pilgrim folk is seen— Thrifty Priscilla, Maid o' Plymouth Town, In Puritanic cap and somber gown! For the next scene comes life in Southern climes— The Ferry Farm of past Colonial times. Then Washington encamped before a blaze O' fagots, swiftly learning woodland ways. Then Boone ...
— Patriotic Plays and Pageants for Young People • Constance D'Arcy Mackay

... cockatoo lived on her wages; and all the tips added up, and never spent, year after year, went to swell a very comfortable little account at interest in the Birkbeck Bank. This little account had mounted up to a very tidy sum, and the thrifty widow—or old maid—no one ever knew which she was—was generally referred to by the young artists of the Rubens Studios as a 'lady of means.' But this is ...
— The Old Man in the Corner • Baroness Orczy

... in emulating the splendour of some richer neighbour on their patron saint's feast-day, when, in proportion to their means, an immense deal of extravagant expenditure usually takes place; but, with the exception of the cockpit, all their other expenses are very slight and thrifty. ...
— Recollections of Manilla and the Philippines - During 1848, 1849 and 1850 • Robert Mac Micking

... fifty years ago—in 1883—WHAT SOCIAL CLASSES OWE TO EACH OTHER is even more pertinent today than at the time of its first publication. Then the arguments and "movements" for penalizing the thrifty, energetic, and competent by placing upon them more and more of the burdens of the thriftless, lazy and incompetent, were just beginning to make headway in our country, wherein these "social reforms" now all but dominate political and ...
— What Social Classes Owe to Each Other • William Graham Sumner

... that Alfred was introduced to Columbus. They were the good old days, when all thrifty people made their kraut on All Hallowe'en and the celebration of Schiller's birthday was only overshadowed by that of Washington's; when the first woods were away out in the country and quail shooting good anywhere this side of Alum Creek. The State Fair grounds ...
— Watch Yourself Go By • Al. G. Field

... lead them to the right, by appealing to their conscience and their better feelings, rather than to their fears. To his wife he was gentle and considerate in an unusual degree, always thinking of her ease and comfort; and she repaid it with the utmost reverence. She was a careful and thrifty housewife, but, whenever her domestic tasks allowed, she would return to hang with devout attention on the discourse that fell from her wise husband. Under that father's guidance knowledge was sought for as hid treasure, and ...
— Robert Burns • Principal Shairp

... counters, middle-aisle showcase, and so forth. The right-hand division was a drygoods and millinery department, with such a display of hats and finery as never had been seen before in Jordantown. The left division contained everything necessary to thrifty existence, from horse collars to hams, sugar and molasses, flour ...
— The Co-Citizens • Corra Harris

... seldom bothered with warbles or grubs. However, this is not practical in range cattle; dipping instead should be resorted to, and it is surprising what results will be derived from fly repellants in a year or two. They will practically exterminate the pest, and consequently the cattle are thrifty and look much better. ...
— The Veterinarian • Chas. J. Korinek

... or thinking this remark unworthy of notice, the farmer went on with unusual fervour: "Marry him, Adele; save our family and his from ruin and disgrace, and make your old dad happy. I will teach him to work and to be thrifty; ...
— The Silver Lining - A Guernsey Story • John Roussel

... position of a nameless son of an unknown father, to be as overseer for one of the wealthiest proprietors of that region, and finally, by a not unusual turn of fortune's wheel, became the owner of a large part of his employer's estates. Thrifty in all things, he married in middle life, so well as nearly to double the fortune then acquired, and before his death had become one of the wealthiest men in his county. He was always hampered by a lack of education. ...
— Bricks Without Straw • Albion W. Tourgee

... his State, "we may behold numerous fine houses, once the abode of intelligent freemen, now occupied by slaves, or else tenantless and dilapidated; that we may see fields, once fertile, covered with foxtail and broom-sedge—moss growing on the walls of once thrifty villages, and may find that 'one only master grasps the whole domain' which once furnished homes ...
— Slavery: What it was, what it has done, what it intends to do - Speech of Hon. Cydnor B. Tompkins, of Ohio • Cydnor Bailey Tompkins

... for the most part now followed their example. Holland fraternised with France. A requisition of clothes and provisions for the use of the republican army, to the amount of one million and a half sterling, cooled the ardour of the thrifty Dutchmen for a moment; but it soon returned, on considering the blessings they were to obtain for their money. They were flattered by a convocation of a representative assembly, on the principles of equality and ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan

... upon the land, they have a bit of vegetable garden about them, rented for a time from the farmer; but, even with the floaters, chickens are commonly kept, generally in a coop on the roof, connected with the shore by a special gang-plank for the fowls; and the other day, we saw a thrifty houseboater who had several ...
— Afloat on the Ohio - An Historical Pilgrimage of a Thousand Miles in a Skiff, from Redstone to Cairo • Reuben Gold Thwaites

... Beethoven, and Paganini. Far-seeing minds alone disapprove such excess, and respect only the energy represented by a finished execution whose perfect quiet charms superior men. The life of this essentially thrifty people amply fulfils the conditions of happiness which the masses desire as the lot of the ...
— The Alkahest • Honore de Balzac

... flight from Norway, Arne Ormgrass had roamed about for several months as "a wanderer and a vagabond upon the earth," until, finally, he settled down in New Orleans, where he entered into partnership with a thrifty young Swede, and established a hotel, known as the "Sailors' Valhalla." Fortune favored him: his reckless daring, his ready tongue, and, above all, his extraordinary beauty soon gained him an enviable reputation. Money ...
— Ilka on the Hill-Top and Other Stories • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen

... and regular detachment of the trans-Hudson army. Pleasant it is (I can hear the parody-fiend murmur), when things are green and price of meat is low, to move amid the market-scene, where gourmands stout and housewives lean with baskets come and go. Tempting too, alike to the dainty and the thrifty. Like Robinet in the "Evenings at Home," it adds much to the relish of one's little supper to have selected it one's self out of a whole marketful and to inhale its imaginary savors all the way home. Then, it is so nice to surprise ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, November 1885 • Various

... is the first school of its kind in Alabama to demonstrate the fact that a school planted among the people in the rural districts of the South will make for intelligent, honest, thrifty citizenship. The success of this work made possible the establishment of many similar schools that have been planted in Alabama and other parts ...
— Tuskegee & Its People: Their Ideals and Achievements • Various

... another has shot up luxuriantly, but in a short time has been choked by brambles. Other seeds have been cast out with the chaff upon the dung heap, and after various mutations, have come in contact with a clod of earth, through which they have sent their roots, and have finally grown into thrifty plants. A thought thrown out on the world, if it possesses vital force, never dies. How much is remembered of the work of our greatest men? Only a sentence here and there; and many a man whose name will go down through all the ages, owes ...
— Life in Canada Fifty Years Ago • Canniff Haight

... Wall Street. To realize in its full glare of vicious vulgarity the influence of this environment, let us take the case of some refined young man just after he has quitted school and entered the office of a thrifty broker—perhaps a warm friend of his father, who hugs the keenly American doctrine that a youth should be put in the way of piling dollars together as quickly as possible after he leaves the educational leash. By degrees this young ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 24, November, 1891 • Various

... same orchard, that the seeds of no one can be pure; they mix in the blossoms. On this account, the surest method of perpetuating a variety is by budding. This tree is of rapid growth, often bearing the third year from the seed, and producing abundantly the fifth. The peach-tree is often called thrifty when its growth is very luxuriant, but tender and unhealthy, perishing in the following winter. A moderate, steady, hardy growth is most profitable. The following directions, though ...
— Soil Culture • J. H. Walden

... of material prosperity among his people. He would have considered himself a failure, had his reign not meant "good times" for farmers and merchants. He encouraged industry. He fostered the manufacture of silk. He invited thrifty farmers to move from other countries and to settle in Prussia. He built canals. Marshes were drained and transformed into rich pasture-land. If war desolated a part of the country, then, when peace was concluded, Frederick gave ...
— A Political and Social History of Modern Europe V.1. • Carlton J. H. Hayes

... for the accommodation of these interesting birds. By their cheerful twitterings and their vigilance in driving from the neighbourhood every Hawk and Crow that ventures near, they not only repay the slight effort made in their behalf, but endear themselves to the thrifty chicken-raising ...
— The Bird Study Book • Thomas Gilbert Pearson

... was a sixteen year old boy living in the country near Detroit, Michigan. He was not fond of farm work but nevertheless he did his share in helping his father, who was a thrifty farmer. Day after day, this boy trudged back and forth two and one-half miles each way to the school house. In his spare hours when he was not farming, he had fitted up a work shop for his own use. There was a vise, ...
— Modern Americans - A Biographical School Reader for the Upper Grades • Chester Sanford

... These include light railways, but are exclusive of all railways, light or ordinary, that are worked not by themselves but by other companies. Scotland has exhibited her usual good sense, her canny, thrifty way, by keeping the number of operating railway companies within such moderate bounds. Ireland does not show so well, and England relatively is almost as bad as Ireland, yet England might well have shown the path of prudence to her poorer ...
— Fifty Years of Railway Life in England, Scotland and Ireland • Joseph Tatlow

... Scot, with the usual thrifty characteristics of his race. Wishing to know his fate, he telegraphed a proposal of marriage to the lady of his choice. After waiting all day at the telegraph office he received an affirmative answer late ...
— Best Short Stories • Various

... 9d, being less than they could generally be obtained for elsewhere, even after a customer had spent his ingenuity and breath in half-an-hour's "prigging." The advantages to be obtained at Messrs. Campbell's establishment soon became known, and although it required a great effort to induce thrifty housewives to desist from attempting to cheapen and "prig" down their goods, Messrs. Campbell ultimately succeeded in putting a stop to the practice, so far at least as their own establishment was concerned. ...
— Western Worthies - A Gallery of Biographical and Critical Sketches of West - of Scotland Celebrities • J. Stephen Jeans

... Madame Coudert was so cheerful herself; and kept them so busy they had no time to mope. Pierrette helped make the little cakes, and Pierre scraped the remains of the icing from the mixing-bowl and ate it lest any be wasted. In some ways Pierre was a very thrifty boy. Then, too, Madame Coudert allowed them to stand behind the counter and help wait upon the customers. Moreover, there was Fifine, the cat, for Pierrette to play with, and the little raveled-out dog lived only two doors below; so ...
— The French Twins • Lucy Fitch Perkins

... woman thus ceased to exist, but her powers for good or evil were transferred to her companion; and on passing along the road from Burnley to Blackburn we can point out a farmhouse at no great distance with whose thrifty matron no neighbouring farmer will yet dare to ...
— Myths and Myth-Makers - Old Tales and Superstitions Interpreted by Comparative Mythology • John Fiske

... the leisure to summon Volero before me," he added. "I wished also that you, Arvina, should be present when I examine him. I judge that it will be best, when we shall have dismissed all these, except the lictors, to visit him this very night. He is a thrifty and laborious artisan, and works until late by lamp light; we will go thither, if you have naught to ...
— The Roman Traitor (Vol. 1 of 2) • Henry William Herbert

... proportion, neither more nor less, He is the arbiter of the diverse, he is the key, He is the equalizer of his age and land, He supplies what wants supplying, he checks what wants checking, In peace out of him speaks the spirit of peace, large, rich, thrifty, building populous towns, encouraging agriculture, arts, commerce, lighting the study of man, the soul, health, immortality, government, In war he is the best backer of the war, he fetches artillery as good as the engineer's, he can make every word he speaks draw blood, The years straying ...
— Whitman - A Study • John Burroughs

... deceitful. To the traveler who may chance to cast his eyes upon this little brown, house, a little brown house it will be to him, 'and nothing more.' He will not even notice the woodbines that are flinging their arms around the windows, nor will he dwell for an instant upon the thrifty cotton-woods that guard the door, or bestow more than a casual glance on the artistically arranged garden-beds, wherein I have anxiously watched tulips and radishes sprouting into existence. Anxiously—for winter has been writing a somewhat lengthy postscript to his annual ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2 No 4, October, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... men, run in the blood of the race; and a given degree of pure human heat infallibly brings them out. Not more surely does the rose appear on the rose-bush, or the apple, pear, or peach upon the trees of the orchard, than these fruits of the soul upon nations of powerful and thrifty spirit. For want of vitality the shrub may fail to flower, the tree to bear fruit, and man to bring forth his spiritual product; but if Thought be attained, certain thoughts and imaginations will come of it. Let two nations at opposite sides of the globe, and without intercommunication arrive ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 57, July, 1862 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... way to a house apart from the others at the very edge of the shelving rock. The dooryard was scrupulously clean and unlittered; the little footpath through it was neatly bordered by white clam shells; several thrifty geraniums in bloom looked out from the ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to 1901 • Lucy Maud Montgomery

... legitimate son of Adelaide Fouque, was a thrifty, selfish lad who saw that his mother by her improvident conduct was squandering the estate to which he considered himself sole heir. His aim was to induce his mother and her two illegitimate children to remove from the house and land, and in this he was ultimately successful. Having sold the property ...
— A Zola Dictionary • J. G. Patterson

... economical, and moral, and that they produce the best work, and the most of it, with the least injury to the machinery. They are, in short, in all respects the most useful, profitable, and the safest operatives; and as a class, they are more thrifty, and more apt to accumulate property for themselves. "I am very sure," he remarks, "that neither men of property nor society at large have any thing to fear from a more general diffusion of knowledge, ...
— Popular Education - For the use of Parents and Teachers, and for Young Persons of Both Sexes • Ira Mayhew

... been done, this matter is already receiving earnest consideration. The French are confident of victory and are satisfied that they will soon be able to rebuild their cities and reorganize their industries. They are a frugal and thrifty people, and usually have more private means than the average American whose manner of living would indicate that he is wealthy. On this account it is my impression that France will recover very rapidly after the war and will soon be ...
— A Journey Through France in War Time • Joseph G. Butler, Jr.

... away somewhere in the chimney, behind a loose brick. Then, at night, when no one was looking, these miserly folks counted, rubbed, jingled, and gloated over the shining coins and never helped anybody. So there grew up three sorts of people, called the thrifty, the spendthrifts, and the misers. These last were the meanest and most disliked of all. Others, again, hid their money away, so as to have some, when sick, or old, and they talked about it. No one found fault with these, though some laughed and said "a penny in the savings jar makes more ...
— Dutch Fairy Tales for Young Folks • William Elliot Griffis

... Freshen, refresh, revive, renovate, renew. Friendly, amicable, companionable, hearty, cordial, neighborly, sociable, genial, complaisant, affable. Frighten, affright, alarm, terrify, terrorize, dismay, appal, daunt, scare. Frown, scowl, glower, lower. Frugal, sparing, saving, economical, chary, thrifty, provident, prudent. ...
— The Century Vocabulary Builder • Creever & Bachelor

... natural traits in common, and are almost, if not altogether, 'natural enemies' each to each. Thus we have a settlement of Protestant Highland Scotch close by a large estate peopled with Monaghan or Kilkenny Irish Catholics; and perhaps a little farther on is a hamlet of Low-landers, or a village of thrifty English folk. ...
— Adrift in the Ice-Fields • Charles W. Hall

... toss-up, sir. I was not one of the lucky ones! My friend Morier, indeed, saved something handsome. But our commander-in-chief took care of him, and Morier is a thrifty, economical dog,—not like the rest of us soldiers, who spend our money as carelessly as if ...
— The Lady of Lyons - or Love and Pride • Edward Bulwer Lytton



Words linked to "Thrifty" :   provident, thriftiness, scotch, wasteful, stinting, penny-wise, frugal, thrift, saving, sparing, economical



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