A Confidential Agent, Volume 1Chato & Windus, 1880 |
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Common terms and phrases
ain't Amy's Artemis Barlow better bird of paradise called Captain Cavendish Grove circumstances colour confessed CONFIDENTIAL AGENT course cried diamonds Dick Dartmoor doubt Durham employer errand exclaimed eyes face fashion fellow Frank Barlow garden gentleman guest hand heard honest John hope horse host husband Hybla Mews inquired jewels John Rutherford Jute knew Lady Pargiter Lady Pargiter's ladyship Langton Latbury late laughing looked Lovell Madge manner married Master Matthew matter Matthew Helston means ment mind Miss Thurlow missus Moor Street morning nature nephew never night observed Matthew observed Uncle Stephen occasion once Paramatta parure Patty Paulet Street perhaps person present replied Roger Helston Sabey Sabey's Sally seemed sense sighed Sir Charles smile sort Star and Signet sure talk Tarlton tell thing thought tion tone took topaz wife woman word young
Popular passages
Page 11 - MORTE D'ARTHUR. So all day long the noise of battle rolled Among the mountains by the winter sea ; Until King Arthur's table, man by man, Had fallen in Lyonness about their Lord, King Arthur : then, because his wound was deep The bold Sir Bedivere uplifted him, Sir Bedivere, the last of all his knights, And bore him to a chapel nigh the field, A broken chancel with a broken cross, That stood on...
Page 15 - Came on the shining levels of the lake. There drew he forth the brand Excalibur, And o'er him, drawing it, the winter moon, Brightening the skirts of a long cloud, ran forth And sparkled keen with frost against the hilt : For all the haft twinkled with diamond sparks. Myriads of topaz-lights, and jacinth-work Of subtlest jewellery.
Page 5 - Saturn, quiet as a stone, Still as the silence round about his lair; Forest on forest hung about his head Like cloud on cloud. No stir of air was there, Not so much life as on a summer's day Robs not one light seed from the...
Page 38 - In spite of which, as often happens, he felt considerable contempt for those whom Nature had endowed in a less lavish manner ; nor am I quite certain that his very choice of a song had not been made with a view of moral reproof. If Amy had guessed, however, that those lively lines, Some folks get grey hairs, Some folks do, some folks do, Brooding o'er their cares — But that's not me nor you...
Page 22 - SYMPOSIUM. I AM afraid it was a poet, and a true one, who once wrote, Love in a hut, with water and a crust, Is — Lord, forgive us ! — cinders, ashes, dust. But between the hut and the palace there are many kinds of dwelling-houses — Agar's Buildings, as I once heard a house-agent term them, ' because Agar's prayer, you know, was for neither riches nor poverty, and these lots are for your middle-class people : ' in these, rather than in the two extremities of the social scale, is true happiness...
Page 96 - ... as on the greatest. It was no doubt in one sense a quiet street : no omnibus ever approached it nearer than Piccadilly, and no organ-grinder dared to ply his dreadful trade in it, on account of the sensitive ears of its Lady Honorias and Wilhelminas ; until the afternoon, too, its inhabitants were mostly asleep, but for the rest of the day, and all through the night, it must be confessed that they made a considerable noise of their own. There was a ceaseless champing of steeds, and clatter of...
Page 100 - ... this occasion he had forgotten to do so. Impatient at his employer's delay, and unable (from loathing of his errand) to concentrate his thoughts upon their usual topic, he had thrown himself into a chair, and was casting his eyes moodily about him, when they suddenly rested upon a picture standing on the floor in an obscure corner of the room. It was no doubt a new acquisition, for which no place had as yet been found in the town-house, or which was perhaps destined for Pargiter Park. Matthew...
Page 82 - ... secret — did not at all affect him : the driver of the cab (he always employed the same man) was a trusty fellow, who had come from his own part of the country, and was well known to him : and he himself, as we have seen, always carried a revolver with ' six men's lives ' in it in his breast pocket : but looked at from whatever point of view, his visits to Moor Street were paid under very unpleasant circumstances, and it was natural that he should shrink from them. It would be perhaps too much...
Page 6 - ... but where he liked he loved, and what he did do for his fellow-creatures was done without stint. His white hair, which was still abundant, and the long white beard, as fine as though it were of spun glass, gave him a venerable and philanthropic appearance; but the keen grey eyes and the deep lines it the wrinkled face somewhat detracted from this. A student and a recluse, he had in fact been at odds with the world from an early date, and had but an indifferent opinion of it. Nevertheless, it...
Page 149 - Then don't,' cried Mr. Signet, with sudden asperity : ' for I really cannot listen to such a thing. Look here, my dear sir — my very dear sir,' he added, sitting down by Matthew's side, and speak-' ing with more unctuousness even than before, " An honest woman,' says the Scripture, " is above rubies : " which, however, I rather doubt: at least, I never knew one who was above taking them if she had a chance : but an honest man is even more valuable — at all events, in my profession. It is a humiliating...