United States or Saint Martin ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
In 1786, a few days after the meeting with Trenck, Amelia died. Trenck lived but a few years; he went to France and died under the guillotine in 1793. As he sat with his companions upon the car on their way to execution, he said to the gaping crowd: "Eh bien, eh bien, de quoi vous eurerveillez-vous? C'eci n'est qu'une comedie a la Robespierre." Suddenly she sprang from her seat.
The place was subdued to stillness, but not extinguished, by the lateness of the hour; no vehicles passed, only now and then a light Parisian foot. Beyond the parapet they could hear the flow of the Seine. Nick Dormer said it made him think of the old Paris, of the great Revolution, of Madame Roland, quoi! Gabriel said they could have watery beer but were not obliged to drink it.
A pretty person, genteel motions, a proper degree of dress, an harmonious voice, something open and cheerful in the countenance, but without laughing; a distinct and properly varied manner of speaking: All these things, and many others, are necessary ingredients in the composition of the pleasing je ne sais quoi, which everybody feels, though nobody can describe.
But it may not be irrelevant to note that M. Desmolins, who, in his remarkable book, A quoi tient la superiorité des Anglo-saxons? hands over the future of civilisation to the Anglo-Saxons, ascribes to the English rural home much of the success of the race. Speed's Chronicle, quoted in Calendar of State Papers, Ireland, 1611-14, p. xix.
"There is nothing new under the sun," she went on, "nor under the 'visiting moon, nor under those somewhat heartless stars. Does it occur to you, Julius, how hopelessly unoriginal we are, how we all follow in the same beaten track? What thousands of men and women have stood, as you and I stand now, at once calmed as I admit that I am and rendered not a little homeless by the realisation of their own insignificance in face of the sleeping earth and this brooding immensity of space! A quoi bon,
I have smiled to hear the Greek, with all his plenteousness of fancy, and all the wealth of his generous language, yet vainly struggling to describe the ineffable spell which the Parisians dispose of in their own smart way by a summary “Je ne sçai quoi.” I went to Larnaca, the chief city of the isle, and over the water at last to Beyrout.
Monsieur Le Quoi, who has been introduced to our readers because no picture of that country would be faithful without some such character, found the island of Martinique, and his sucreboosh, in possession of the English but Marmaduke and his family were much gratified in soon hearing that he had returned to his bureau, in Paris; where he afterward issued yearly bulletins of his happiness, and of his gratitude to his friends in America.
"At close quarters," reflected Henry, "one is not attracted by this unfortunate nation. It lacks or is it rather that it has a je ne sais quoi.... It is perhaps more favourably viewed from a distance: but even so not really favourably. Possibly, like many other nations, it is seen to greatest advantage at home. I must visit Germany."
It seemed becoming for me to say "Beg pardon and thank you," and he bowed and smiled an "il n'y a pas de quoi," thanked me for a pleasant afternoon an "unusual kind of pleasure," he added, "for a soldier in these times," and went away. It was only when I saw him going that it occurred to me that I ought to have offered him tea but you know the worth of "esprit d'escalier."
Zese citoyens goin' to wickwest Jean Poquelin to give to the Ursuline' two hondred fifty dolla'" "Hé quoi!" cried a listener, "Cinq cent piastres, oui!" "Oui!" said Bienvenu, "and if he wiffuse we make him some lit' musique; ta-ra ta!" He hoisted a merry hand and foot, then frowning, added: "Old Poquelin got no bizniz dhink s'much w'isky."
Word Of The Day