The Essays of Elia |
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Common terms and phrases
admired April Fool beauty Belshazzar Benchers better Bo-bo Bridget character child CHRIST'S HOSPITAL comedy common confess countenance cousin day's pleasuring dear dreams Elgin marble Elia face fancy fear feel female gentle gentleman give Gladmans grace guests hand hath head heart Hertfordshire honor hour humor imagination impertinent Inner Temple kind knew lady less lived look Malvolio manner Margate Marriage at Cana matter mind moral morning nature never night occasion once passed passion person play pleasant pleasure poor present pretty Quakers reason remember ROBERT WILLIAM ELLISTON scene seemed seen sense sight Sir Philip Sydney smile sometimes sort speak spirit stood supposed sure sweet taste tender theatre thee thing thou thought tion Titian told true truth walk watchet whist young younkers youth
Popular passages
Page 114 - What wondrous life is this I lead! Ripe apples drop about my head; The luscious clusters of the vine Upon my mouth do crush their wine; The nectarine and curious peach Into my hands themselves do reach; Stumbling on melons, as I pass, Ensnared with flowers, I fall on grass.
Page 157 - Bo-bo, whose scent was wonderfully sharpened since morning, soon raked out another pig, and fairly rending it asunder, thrust the lesser half by main force into the fists of Ho-ti, still shouting out, "Eat, eat, eat the burnt pig, Father, only taste— O Lord," with suchlike barbarous ejaculations, cramming all the while as if he would choke.
Page 84 - Like one, that on a lonesome road Doth walk in fear and dread, And having once turned round walks on, And turns no more his head ; Because he knows, a frightful fiend Doth close behind him tread.
Page 27 - I behold like a Spanish great galleon, and an English man-of-war ; Master Jonson (like the former) was built far higher in learning ; solid, but slow in his performances. Shakespeare with the English man-ofwar, lesser in bulk, but lighter in sailing, could turn with all tides, tack about and take advantage of all winds, by the quickness of his wit and invention.
Page 158 - Bo-bo was strictly enjoined not to let the secret escape, for the neighbors would certainly have stoned them for a couple of abominable wretches, who could think of improving upon the good meat which God had sent them. Nevertheless, strange stories got about. It was observed that Ho-ti's cottage was burnt down now more frequently than ever. Nothing but fires from this time forward.
Page 31 - To one like Elia, whose treasures are rather cased in leather covers than closed in iron coffers, there is a class of alienators more formidable than that which I have touched upon ; I mean your borrowers of books — those mutilators of collections, spoilers of the symmetry of shelves, and creators of odd volumes.
Page 276 - With how sad steps, O Moon, thou climb'st the skies; How silently, and with how wan a face; What, may it be that even in...
Page 134 - We are not of Alice, nor of thee, nor are we children at all. The children of Alice call Bartrum father. We are nothing ; less than nothing ; and dreams. We are only what might have been, and must wait upon the tedious shores of Lethe millions of ages before we have existence, and a name.
Page 133 - ... look at — -or in lying about upon the fresh grass, with all the fine garden smells around me — or basking in the orangery, till I could almost fancy myself ripening, too, along with the oranges and the limes in that grateful warmth — or in watching the dace that darted to and fro in the...
Page 324 - I used to deposit our day's fare of savoury cold lamb and salad — and how you would pry about at noontide for some decent house, where we might go in, and produce our store — only paying for the ale that you must call for — and speculate upon the looks of the landlady, and whether she was likely to allow us a tablecloth — and wish for such another honest hostess, as Izaak Walton has described many a one on the pleasant banks of the Lea, when he went a-fishing — and sometimes they would...