It was then, and I fancy is still, one of the stiffest courts in Europe.

Libbie insisted on giving the "balcony scene" from Romeo and Juliet, in which she was supported by the unwilling Frances, who was certainly the stiffest Romeo who ever walked the stage.

Even when he returned to the office it was empty except for Ann, who in the stiffest of starched muslin and whitest of stockings was spread out carefully upon the widest chair.

Me and a few mates took it comfortable under the to'gallant fo'castle (I being on watch below), reeling off the stiffest yarns we had in tow.

A hovel represented what was still called the parsonage-house: it stood on a glebe of three hundred acres of the stiffest clay in Yorkshire: a brick-floored kitchen, with a room above it, both in a ruinous condition was the residence which, for a hundred and fifty years, had never been inhabited by an incumbent.

The hardiest men are offended with this heat, and stiffest clowns cannot resist it, as Constantine affirms, Agricult.

Perfectly hardy, and of free, almost rampant growth in any but the stiffest soils.

Sheriff Lawley had on his stiffest professional air and Si Hardscrabble's chest was puffed out like a pouter pidgeon.

When he got to me he made the stiffest bow; and just then the Comte and Comtesse de Tournelle, the Marquise de Vermandoise, and the Vicomte were announced, and immediately following, "Antoine" and two cousins of Godmamma's.

"Glasses all roundthese noble knights will pay Of hottest hot, and stiffest stiff.

Both boats were now straining their uttermost, and from now on to the finish it was to be the stiffest rowing of which each was capable.

"Well, IThat's about the stiffest," he murmured; and as she made no answer he added: "Afraid I'll ask to be introduced to your friend?" She made a faint movement of entreaty.

It was the steady joy of her life to see the doctor's young gentlemen go out walking, in the largest possible shirt-collars and the stiffest possible cravats.

When at last my ablutions were completed, I was put into clean linen of the stiffest character, and in my tightest and fearfullest suit, I was then delivered over to Mr. Pumblechook, who said dramatically: "Boy, be forever grateful to all friends, but especially unto them which brought you up by hand!"

Her pride was to see the boys in the largest possible collars and stiffest possible cravats, which she deemed highly classical.

Mrs. P. grumbles a little, but it is her custom to lament most when she is in the midst of comforts: she complains of solitude, and says she could enjoy the very stiffest of stiff visits.

Unshaken, too, is the courage of Burgomaster Max of Brussels, "who faced the German bullies with the stiffest of stiff backs."

" Grandmamma behaved with the stiffest decorum.

The Roberts Island dredger, of which the Ajax is an improved copy, handles steadily 700 yards per day of 12 hours, in the stiffest and most tenacious clay in which it has been worked; and ranges from that average to 1,500 yards per day in soft, peaty mud.

Even Mr. Gladstone, the stiffest of sticklers for official reticence, held that a Cabinet Minister might impart his secrets to his wife and his Private Secretary.

Only now and then I encountered some aristocratic equipage rolling almost noiselessly over the brick pavement, or the stiffest of lackeys stood before a door, or the blonde head of a lady was visible behind a curtain.

I see that will be your stiffest job.

Like those creatures, they too were full of life in their time and made a great deal of noise; but now they are stiff and fossilised, and only of interest to the literary palaeontologist.

I then made the stiffest of stiff bows to the excellent Tapottes, and, ushered to the door by Müller, took my departure majestically in the character of Lord Smithfield.

The paraffin starch on his shirt front and collar and cuffs gave to them the appearance and consistency of celluloidit being the intention of his old laundress to make him indeed the stiffest and most highly polished gentleman of his high world.