Sentence Examples:
When, for instance, one of us happy-go-lucky males (more liberally supplied, perhaps, than the housewife with the necessary cash), decides to buy a motor bicycle, or to replenish his stock of collars or ties, does the above analysis bear any resemblance to the actual facts?
The French cathedrals were more beautiful than the English, and it would be pleasant to wander in the French country in happy-go-lucky fashion, resting when he was tired, walking when it pleased him, taking an interest in whatever might strike his fancy.
Careless happy-go-lucky boys chattering in the excitement of the new life which they were entering, only half-informed as to the catastrophes which were taking place, but the mothers and sisters, plain country women in short skirts, quaint bodices and caps, looked upon their departure with anxious faces.
She saw a look cross her father's face such as she had never seen on it before, and for the first time in her careless, happy-go-lucky life realized with keen compunction what a sad, tired, patient face it was, and suddenly she found herself wanting to do things for him to try to cheer and help him, and wished most heartily that they had done anything but bring fresh worry and unpleasantness to him.
In the eagerness they all evinced in purloining what was not theirs, and in the perfect content with which they then proceeded to enjoy what they had taken, they remind us forcibly of that happy-go-lucky class in the community which prefers to live on questionable loans rather than work itself for a living.
Every bullet finds a billet, according to a rather optimistic proverb, and you must admit that nowadays it is becoming increasingly difficult to find billets for a lot of young gentlemen who would have adorned, and probably thoroughly enjoyed, one of the old-time happy-go-lucky wars.
It is much more difficult to verify marriages which took place in other countries, and social workers are often appalled by the prevalence of the so-called "American marriage" among immigrant deserters, who trust to our happy-go-lucky methods for protection against a prosecution for bigamy.
All of a sudden, those men, so skeptical, so happy-go-lucky, so indifferent to religion of every sort, began telling stories about strange occurrences, incredible things which nevertheless had really happened, they contended, falling back into superstitions, beliefs, clinging to these last remnants of the marvelous, becoming devotees of this mystery of magnetism, defending it in the name of science.
It had taken a care-free, happy-go-lucky youth and turned him into a suspicious, distrustful person with a constantly morbid strain which struggled everlastingly for supremacy over his usually cheery grin and his naturally optimistic outlook upon life.
He made up his mind that thereafter he would stop his happy-go-lucky idleness, and the first time that ever he found plenty of food, he would fill that hollow tree just as full as he could pack it, and then if there should come a time when food was scarce, he would have plenty.
There was a feast that night, but the truth is that life was one constant vicissitude, an unfailing series of ups and downs, of jolly happy-go-lucky rejoicings with comrades who were equally careless with myself, and of alternating spells of hardship.
And I did, and not only once, but several times, which fact assured me that she had not only brought a handful of keys with her, but that these keys must have come from some more distant quarter than the town; that indeed she had come provided to the Happy-Go-Lucky for this nocturnal visit, and that any doubts I might cherish were likely to have a better foundation in fact than is usual with women circumstanced like myself.
Still, two things comforted him: the Americans were, he thought, a loose, happy-go-lucky people, without any consecutive or deep-laid policy, as foolish republicans must be; and next, he knew that he had the most powerful army in the world, which, if put to the test, would crush the undisciplined American militia at the first onset.
The one is by habit and training a good soldier, a proverbial idler, an easygoing optimist endowed with genial temper and a happy-go-lucky nature, capable indeed of extremes, yet mostly inclined to the tolerant indifference that leaves things as they are; the other, whose martial qualities have vanished in the melting pot of time, has developed the defensive traits that come to the aid of all races who can no longer maintain their cause in the tented field.
A young man of twenty-three years, when surrounded by nearly perfect specimens of physical manhood, is apt to be painfully self-conscious of any such defect, and it reacted on his nature at times, even though he was well-known for his happy-go-lucky disposition and playfulness.
Before the times of Leeuwenhoek I should perhaps have been unable to see more than this, although, as a matter of fact, in those happy-go-lucky days my ancestors would doubtless have trounced me soundly for wasting my time on such useless and ungodly things as butterfly eggs.
She was beyond reason loveable even in her boyish disdain of restriction, and some day she would come back from the schools a very finished product, and thank the powers that be for having sent her out of knowledge of happy-go-lucky chums of the ranges.
Usually, she returned from her drive at dusk, but as she had not done so up to that late hour, the Collector's servants had come to the conclusion that she was dining at a neighbor's in the happy-go-lucky way that sahibs took "pot-luck" at one another's houses without reference to their domestics.
Many of them drink and gamble, and sow their wild oats in all possible ways; but they are a well-meaning, fairly honest, happy-go-lucky set, who lead hard lives of exhausting labor, and endure long hours of exposure to heat and cold, rain, snow, and blinding sunshine, not only with little complaint or grumbling, but with absolute cheerfulness and hilarity.
The "butterfly" Frenchwoman underwent, before the war, a far more serious social training than did the happy-go-lucky English girl, and was better equipped in consequence, with a knowledge of economic conditions, than the untrained Englishwoman could be.
Underwood died, but the girl had chosen to stay with her father and Dick, and be the one influence which restrained that little household in the woods from lapsing into the happy-go-lucky sort of savagery to which even the most cultivated are liable in a new land.
Brief as had been her stay in the house, she had been long enough to know from other sources than Dennis's confidences that trouble stalked side by side with the gaiety; long enough to have grasped with that intuition which was one of her strongest gifts that this charming, childlike, happy-go-lucky mistress of the house would always buy her sunshine very dearly, with a heavy shadow threatening it.
His letters frequently contain interesting references to the tyranny of the Government, "the inquisitorial suppression of all cultivation of science, whether moral or physical," the idle, happy-go-lucky habits of the common people, the prevalent mendicancy, universal dishonesty, and general corruption.
Some few happy-go-lucky reprobates laughed at Pat's sapience, but the majority felt the matter to be far too serious to permit their indulging in senseless merriment, and strove, with uncontrollable interest, to secure some position whence they could behold an object of which they had heard or read highly-colored accounts.
I asked him if there was any other bridge across the river except the slender plank, and he said there was not; and that it was characteristic of the Irish that there should not be, for a more careless, shiftless, happy-go-lucky race did not exist anywhere on earth.
Instead of the happy-go-lucky methods of the middle and lower class Anglo-Saxon, who will turn a family of sons and daughters loose upon the world with very little thought as to their future beyond the bare necessities of food, clothing, and shelter, the French parent regards it as his duty to see that each daughter is provided with a dot suitable to her position, and the Civil Code requires a parent to leave a proportion of his property to each member of his family.
What with the long rebellion and civil broils, in addition to the careless, happy-go-lucky fashion in which the farce of government was carried on, whole streets were in ruins; business was at a standstill, and even the few merchants who still clung to the remnants of their trade were in despair.
It is true that the discipline of the French soldiers had been exemplary, but the men trained in the happy-go-lucky school of the Paris which had followed the puritanical days of the sainted Maximilian Robespierre did not assist in establishing a deeper respect for good morals.
The imperious will of the Tudor monarchs had, hitherto, prevented the dissemination of Calvinism in England, and so, to the boisterous, happy-go-lucky temperament of the Elizabethan Englishman, the ostentation of religious phraseology, added, probably, to their quaint pronunciation of the language, made them at once a butt of scorn and contempt.
The stories that he has heard amount to very little in themselves, but the way they are told, the happy-go-lucky manner, the subtle partiality, the winning voice, and the sensitiveness of the boy's nature to things of wonder, all combine to turn his head.
When they saw this new man, still under forty, carrying his need for action into their very houses, breaking, from one day to the next, the happy-go-lucky traditions which had made his predecessor popular, they silently assumed the attitude of self-defense.
While the majority of witnesses were averse from the introduction of the hackney sire, on the ground that the happy-go-lucky methods of the small Irish farmer would lead to intermingling of blood to the ultimate deterioration of the Irish hunter, it was generally acknowledged that the bone and substance of the hackney was eminently desirable in many districts to improve the character of the local stock.
It may seem rather a happy-go-lucky way of sending a ship to sea, for the crew to be so short-handed as to make it necessary to call in the aid of a passenger in such an emergency, but those were the "pre-Plimsoll days," and before ships' masters and other officers were subjected to examinations.
They are advancing large sums of money to establish co-operative dairies and to improve the dairy cattle, the swine, and poultry of Ireland, but many of the farmers are indifferent to their opportunities and with the happy-go-lucky characteristic of the Irish race are happy and satisfied so long as they have enough to feed their own mouths.
In certain circumstances it may be regarded as fortunate that not a few of those happy-go-lucky individuals, whose leaning is towards politics, are gifted with the convenient art of adapting themselves and their views to that particular quarter whence the wind happens to be blowing.
On the other hand he suddenly remembered, as vividly as though the whole thing had happened yesterday, a very young and very depraved individual, with whom he had spent many years ago a few weeks of that happy-go-lucky life which Oskar Ehrenberg was now leading with Amy.
His indolent happy-go-lucky way of making a living reminds you of his friend the fisherman who, when not fishing, can do nothing but lounge on the quay with his hands in his pockets, or stand leaning against a sunny wall revolving the quid in his mouth and making an occasional remark to the idler nearest to him.
I had thus an opportunity of observing the curious, happy-go-lucky style in which "schooling" is carried on, and I was sorry to see it, for Mormonism stands urgently in need of more education, and it is pure folly to spend half the revenue of the Territory annually in a school establishment, if the children and their parents are permitted to suppose that education is voluntary and a matter of individual whim.
The Brazilian character may be said to consist of Latin sensibility tinged with the African traits of superstition, fatalism, slovenliness, indiscipline, a certain happy-go-lucky cheerfulness, and an almost total lack of initiative; and to these the country owes most of its social and economic afflictions.
Now and then it has happened to me to come across some of the most careless, happy-go-lucky of my classmates, and to be filled with wonder when I hear them speak of their country, of their work, of the duties to be performed, of the future to be prepared for.
At present those parents who are zealous to maintain a high standard of living, those with talents which they are ambitious to develop, and those who realize keenly the care and expense that children need, are deterred from having many, or any; while the shiftless and happy-go-lucky propagate without scruple.
When this was represented to King Charles by Sir Gilbert Talbot, that happy-go-lucky monarch remarked that if there was no money in the Exchequer naturally Talbot Edwards could get nothing out of it, but, he added, the old man might exhibit the Crown Jewels to the public, charging them such fees as he thought that each visitor might be inclined to pay.
With the happy-go-lucky recklessness of youth, however, I quickly got rid of these fancies, and I could console myself that five years would not be long passing, and at the very worst I should have learned more, situated as I was, than if I were to spend the term at school, and at such a school as the one I had been attending.
David Linton was free from minor anxieties concerning his irresponsible clan, holding the happy-go-lucky Australian belief that worrying does not pay; still, he breathed more freely when the descent of the Peak itself was accomplished, and a slightly easier slope lay before them.
There is (or was lately) a tipster who is never done sounding his own praises; "as I predicted, Chance did the trick easily," "my selection Accident in a walk," "I gave two for such and such a race, and my first selection Happy-go-lucky literally romped in."
The jovial mule was a roly-poly, happy-go-lucky little piece of horseflesh, taking everything easily, from cudgeling to caressing; strolling along with a roguish twinkle of the eye, and, if the thing were possible, would have had his hands in his pockets and whistled as he went.
The unfaithful unbeliever in causality is the Esau, both in the moral and in the intellectual world, the happy-go-lucky hunter who depends on stray venison and refuses to resort to system in order to make a sure provision for the needs of the future; the believer is the quiet plodding Jacob who has his goats in the fold where he knows he can find them when wanted.
"Now, you abandoned wretch," said Butch Brewster grimly, as the happy-go-lucky Hicks finished Scoop's letter, and glanced about him wildly seeking a way of escape, "in one minute you will tell us all about John Thorwald, alias 'Thor,' or be tossed sky-high in a blanket by the football squad, and please believe me, you'll break all altitude records!"