sheepwise

Example Sentences

• "The rent is £35; which really seems £10 cheaper than such a House could be had for in Dumfries or Annan. The secret is our old friend, 'Gigmanity': Chelsea is unfashionable; it is also reputed unhealthy. The former quality we rather like (for our neighbours still are all polite-living people); the latter we do not in the faintest degree believe in, remembering that Chelsea was once considered the 'London Montpelier,' and knowing that in these matters now as formerly the Cockneys 'know nothing,' only rush in masses blindly and sheepwise. Our worst fault is the want of a good free rustic walk, like Kensington Gardens, which are above a mile off: however, we have the 'College' or Hospital Grounds, with their withered old Pensioners; we have open carriage-ways, and lanes, and really a very pretty route to Piccadilly (different from the Omnibus route) thro' the new Grosvenor edifices, Eaton Square, Belgrave Place &c: I have also walked to Westminster Hall by Vauxhall Bridge-end, Millbank &c; but the road is squalid, confused, dusty and detestable, and happily need not be returned to. To conclude, we are here on literary classical ground, as Hunt is continually ready to declare and unfold: not a stone-cast from this House Smollett wrote his Count Fathom (the house is ruined and we happily do not see it); hardly another stone-cast off, old More entertained Erasmus: to say nothing of Bolingbroke St. John, of Paradise Row and the Count de Grammont, for in truth we care almost nothing for them. On the whole we are exceedingly content so far."
• "There had, indeed, been no scandal at all. Dr. Bradley might still be found entertaining the politest of tables with his agreeable stories; he had had no unfortunate case to cast a shadow over his professional reputation; his company was still sought at the clubs. Why, then, were people shrugging their shoulders at mention of his name? He was not suspected of any unpopular vice; he had never, so far as any one knew, done the least dishonorable action; he might certainly be hard up, but after the late Government's iniquities, who was not? Yet people did unquestionably shrug their shoulders. Perhaps they did so sheepwise; and yet they found that they had long been expecting to behave in this way. Why? None of them seemed to know. But the affair at the Piccadilly put an end to their shrugs; it broke their silence. Here was something definite. Here was the solution of all their doubts. Personally Dian Bradley might be a charming fellow, but of course he gambled fearfully, and when you gambled, you very often did other foolish things which generally brought trouble in the long run. What could you expect from a man who ... and so on. The men were not disposed to be charitable, and yet a number of them could hardly bring themselves to believe that Dian Bradley had actually descended to a common card-sharping transaction. What on earth could it mean? And it had taken place at the Piccadilly of all places, most exclusive of clubs, where blackballing was in the nature of a monthly pastime! The man must have been mad! But was he? They decided that he was not."
• "The ganders spread abroad, sheepwise, grazing, and gabbling as they grazed. The geese came up from, or went down to the water with their families, stopping by the way to say things to other geese; and the young, waddling and paddling, frolicked even up to the hard, strong legs of the motionless skua."
• "[…] a public that either sheepwise has followed them or that often goes raptly to almost anything provided only it contains songs, girls, and scenery […]"
• "[…] a public that either sheepwise has followed them or that seems frequently to go to almost anything provided only it contains songs, girls, and scenery representing something other than a sitting-room or library. It is this often apparently goat-like and easily impressed […]"
• "It was assumed, when Johns Hopkins showed the way, that every university student was or should be engaged in original research and thus a candidate for the doctor's degree. This not unnatural assumption had the unfortunate result of dividing all graduate students, sheepwise and goatwise, into those who got the doctorate and those who failed, and here the M.A. came in as a solatium. To pursué higher studies for a year without enlisting as an investigator thus became respectable. This was a gain. It enabled school teachers and college graduates of scholarly tastes to undertake university studies without later having to explain that they had not been refused the doctorate."