Tacking

“ But in spite of her care and assiduity she guessed wrong, and the last two florins followed each other under the croupier's rake, as he cried out with his inexorable voice, the winning colour and number. She gave a sigh, a shrug with her shoulders, which were already too much out of her gown, and dashing the pin through the card on to the table, sat thrumming it for a while. ”

“ What would be the sensation of a polite youth of the present day, if at a ball he saw the young object of his affections taking a box out of her pocket and a pinch of snuff: or if at dinner, by the charmer's side, she deliberately put her knife into her mouth? If she cut her mother's throat with it mamma would scarcely be more shocked. I allude to these peculiarities of by-gone times as an excuse for my favourite, Steele, who was not worse, and often much more delicate than his neighbours. ”

“ Now, it is well known that one cannot step on a tack without saying something about it. ”

“ The young folks could hardly stifle a laugh at seeing him wheel awkwardly in, pay his respects with a grimace, and stumble in an unsuccessful attempt at politeness, while his gestures rendered his wry face, little sharp eyes, and twisted nose, the more conspicuous in their oddity. ”

“ She had entered shortly after Tackleton, and had remained there. She never looked at Tackleton, but fixed her eyes upon her husband. But she kept away from him, setting as wide a space as possible between them; and though she spoke with most impassioned earnestness, she went no nearer to him even then. How different in this from her old self!
‘No hand can make the clock which will strike again for me the hours that are gone,’ replied the Carrier, with a faint smile. ‘But let it be so, if you will, my dear. It will strike soon. It’s of little matter what we say. ”

“ Well, after a rare game of pully-hauly, my scaly enemy took the bottom, and I could not move him. 'Oh! what a weight he must be,' thought I; 'hold on good tackle!' I shook the bait, so as to make his jaws rattle and his teeth ache, when at last he moved with a vengeance, making a violent effort, up and down and all sides, to break away. ”

“ Then, in the evening, there was dancing, or sometimes a masque, in both of which I was often expected to take part; and this I rather liked than otherwise—the acting especially. But still the perpetual restraint and stiffness of Court etiquette, from morning to night, were very wearisome to me, and you cannot imagine how much I enjoyed the short time that I could really call my own, when I could put out my whole strength, hallo as loud as I chose, and use my legs and arms according to my own free will. ”

“ The unpleasant part of all this is that the young women he so condescendingly selects as partners for the dance greet him with seeming rapture, though in their hearts they must feel humiliated by his languid hauteur, and many older people beam upon him almost fawningly if he unbends so far as to throw them a careless, disdainful word! ”

“ Those who do not partake of it cannot possibly understand those who do. It is just the same as music to the deaf—dancing to the lame—or painting to the blind.
Snuff-takers will assure you that there are as many different types of snuff-takers as there are different types of women in a church or in a theatre, or different species of roses in the flower-bed of an horticulturist. ”

“ Some of us have more serious things to hide than a yellow cheek behind a raddle of rouge, or a white poll under a wig of jetty curls. You know, neighbor, there are not only false teeth in this world, but false tongues: and some make up a bust and an appearance of strength with padding, cotton, and what not? while another kind of artist tries to take you in by wearing under his waistcoat, and perpetually thumping, an immense sham heart. Dear sir, may yours and mine be found, at the right time, of the proper size and in the right place. ”

“ Other pet offenses are drumming on the table with one's fingers, making various clicking, whistling, or humming sounds, massaging one's face, scratching one's chin with the cards, or waving the card one is going to play aloft in the air in Smart Alec fashion as though shouting, "I know what you are going to lead! And my card is ready!" All mannerisms that attract attention are in the long run equally unpleasant—even unendurable to one's companions. ”

“ There is a great quantity of eating and drinking, making love and jilting, laughing and the contrary, smoking, cheating, fighting, dancing and fiddling; there are bullies pushing about, bucks ogling the women, knaves picking pockets, policemen on the look-out, quacks (OTHER quacks, plague take them!) bawling in front of their booths, and yokels looking up at the tinselled dancers and poor old rouged tumblers, while the light-fingered folk are operating upon their pockets behind. Yes, this is VANITY FAIR ”

“ I espied a company of men surrounding a ring, made with stakes and ropes, in which two wretched creatures were stripping off their garments, with the intention to do battle upon one another with their fists. These were gentlemen of the fancy, as it is called; though imagination can paint nothing of a more grossly animal and brutish character, afar from all that is fanciful, than that very class that calls itself of the fancy. ”

“ Your partner will be grateful that your consideration has preserved her from the dismal plight in which we have seen some ladies emerge from this dance—their coiffeurs disordered, their dresses torn, and their cheeks crimson with fatigue and mortification, while their indignant glances plainly showed the anger they did not care to express in words, and which their reckless partner had fully deserved. ”

“ They an't so piercing: no, 'tis only stuff, the men will be talking.—Some people are such admirers of teeth—Lord, what signifies teeth! [Showing her teeth.] A very black-a-moor has as white a set of teeth as I.—No, sister, I don't admire myself, but I've a spirit of contradiction in me: I don't know I'm in love with myself, only to rival the men. ”

“ That little girl’s sneering taunt, the ghost of her mother in that taunt—God! when anybody knocks you just in your decency, it doesn’t harm you specially; but when they knock you in your wanting-to-be-decent, it—it undermines you somewhere. ”

“ Fancy, then, in lieu of the conversation, a scoundrel, disappointed and in a fury, wreaking his brutal revenge upon an amiable woman, who sits trembling and pale, and wondering at this sudden exhibition of wrath. Fancy how he clenches his fists and stands over her, and stamps and screams out curses with a livid face, growing wilder and wilder in his rage ”

“ Girls of my sort understood how much necking meant with a man, and how little. If they didn’t, he’d written a book, to help them to, hadn’t he! If a man of his sort wanted something more serious than necking, he didn’t usually take it with the sisters of his best friends. ”

“ I never saw a quicker half-back in my life; and when it comes to making a tackle, the fellow doesn't really know what fear is! If they put him on the regulars, there's going to be something doing among those long-legged chaps from Clifford. ”

“ When the last luff was hooked on, all hands were called to the rope-cook, steward, and all—and ranging ourselves at the falls, one behind the other, sitting down on the hides, with our heads just even with the beams, we set taught upon the tackles, and striking up a song, and all lying back at the chorus, we bowsed the tackles home, and drove the large books chock in out of sight. ”

“ To a great many the business of the undertaker has something dreadful and appalling about it; and without very well understanding themselves the nature of the feeling, it is always associated with the horrible. ”

“ There has been also a confusion, which has influenced the meaning and form of “trick,” with the Dutch trekken, to pull, draw, cf. the South African Dutch trek, a journey, migration, properly the action of drawing a vehicle or travelling by ox-wagon. “Trick” or “tricking” is thus used, in heraldry, as the technical term for the drawing of a coat of arms in monochrome, giving the tinctures by the conventions of vertical, horizontal or diagonal lines, &c. ”

“ The spectator feels it to be fool's play, when he can distinguish the tedious common-place of each man's visage, with the perspiration and weary self-importance on it, and the very cut of his pantaloons, and the stiffness or laxity of his shirt-collar, and the dust on the back of his black coat. ”

“ The rope of the tackle tightened against the blade and was cut, and an eddy rolled over the globe in a grotesquely helpless fashion. Some one waved a handkerchief, some one else tried an ineffectual cheer, a middy was counting slowly: “Eight, nine, ten!” Another roll, then with a jerk and a splash the thing righted itself. ”

“ Oh, but you have. I trust you implicitly because you stand under the shadow of the scaffold, and at a word from me the bolt is drawn. You will postpone all thought of revenge until your neck is out of the noose ”

“ But, my dear friend, you really are asking too much of me; you want all of this done in such a hurry, and without any rehearsal.
Playwright
Must you too persecute me? You are as bad as my enemies down there: you all rejoice in my misfortune. ”

“ She is practised on by the gallants of the play, and no more knows how to resist them than any of the ladies above quoted could resist Congreve.
Lady Plyant.—O! reflect upon the honour of your conduct! Offering to pervert me [the joke is that the gentleman is pressing the lady for her daughter's hand, not for her own] —perverting me from the road of virtue, in which I have trod thus long, and never made one trip—not one faux pas; O, consider it; what would you have to answer for, if you should provoke me to frailty! Alas! humanity is feeble, Heaven knows! ”

“ Most of the hours that can be spared from duelling, fencing, and dancing, are dedicated to what they term “renowning”—that is, of working all kinds of mischief—enacting all sorts of absurdities—attracting everybody’s attention—and earning every one’s contempt and detestation. ”

“ TRICK, a crafty or fraudulent device, deceitful artifice or stratagem, hence an exhibition of skill, especially in sleight of hand or jugglery, the term being also used of a peculiar trait or manner of speech, character or physical habit. ”

“ When doing tricks, it's good to watch folks' eyes pop open. What tickles my wish-bone is what I can see for myself on their silly faces, half of 'em trying to look as if they know how it's done and the other half all grins. I did tricks for a Scotchman once, who got so angry I thought he'd hit me ”

“ The moment you have reached the bottom, a sharp tug at the cord unties the fool's knot, and your tackle falls down after you. My method was to lower Bulger down first, and then let myself down after him. ”

“ In them we find the rakes and dicers, full of strange oaths, deep drunkards, vile women and still viler men, all striving for the royal favor and offering the filthiest lures, amid routs and balls and noisy entertainments, of which it is recorded that more than once some woman gave birth to a child among the crowd of dancers. ”

“ Sometimes, in solitary pantomime, he encountered more than one opponent at a time, for numbers were apt to come upon him treacherously, especially at a little after his rising hour, when he might be caught at a disadvantage—perhaps standing on one leg to encase the other in his knickerbockers. ”

“ It is true that some pieces are called catches that have nothing to offend, and others that may justly pretend to please; but they want what is absolutely necessary for a catch—the break, and cross-purpose. ”

“ One should adopt only those situations in which one is in no need of sham virtues, but rather, like the tight-rope dancer on his tight rope, in which one must either fall or stand—or escape. ”

“ The serious are surely too hard upon poor playgoers. We never for a moment allow rascality to triumph beyond a certain part of the third act; we sympathise with the woes of young lovers—her in ringlets and a Polish cap, him in tights and a Vandyke collar; we abhor avarice or tyranny in the person of ‘the first old man’ with the white wig and red stockings, or of the villain with the roaring voice and black whiskers ”

“ The lark’s notes, however, ringing out over the lists freed the tongue of the Queen’s fool, who suddenly ran out into the lists, in his motley and cap and bells, and in his high trilling voice sang a fool’s song to the fighting twain:
“Who would lie down and close his eyes While yet the lark sings o’er the dale? Who would to Love make no replies, Nor drink the nut-brown ale, While throbs the pulse, and full ‘s the purse And all the world ‘s for sale?” ”

“ Then, spurred by the loud laughter of rivals and the agony of knowing that even in his own house they were monopolizing the attention of one of the Noblest, he hastened into his own, room and took account of his reverses. ”

“ Clapping the hands is not part of the laughter "process," but a separate, often involuntary, action which has the calling of attention to oneself as its explanation, just as slapping the ground or a table or one's thigh has. ”

“ The cracking of nuts was an important ceremony among the young men and maidens, who threw nuts into the fire, and from the way in which they cracked, or burned, foretold all kinds of happiness or misery for themselves. ”

“ And when we bear in mind that there are existing savages who signify submission by placing the neck under the foot of the person submitted to, it becomes obvious that all prostration, especially when accompanied by kissing the foot, expressed a willingness to be trodden upon—was an attempt to mitigate wrath by saying, in signs, "Tread on me if you will." ”