Improve your vocabulary by Quiz

Use masquerade in a sentence

Definition of masquerade:

  • (noun) a party of guests wearing costumes and masks
  • (noun) a costume worn as a disguise at a masquerade party
  • (noun) making a false outward show; "a beggar's masquerade of wealth"
  • (verb) take part in a masquerade
  • (verb) pretend to be someone or something that you are not;

Sentence Examples:

His equivocal personages are not always recognized in this travesty of their Roman masquerade.

"It is not a masquerade," replied Arthur, with a dogmatic coolness and transcendental gravity which at any other time would have made me laugh.

There were certain poses and gestures about her, which made her thread gloves and rusty skirts seem a mere whim and masquerade, adopted, perhaps deliberately, from a high-bred love of congruity, to suit the country lanes.

It is true that ordinarily Jones and Brown and Smith and Green do not receive invitations to attend masquerades at fashionable hunt clubs; but somehow they seem to worry along without these equivocal honors, and prosper.

Enormous native impudence, which amused but never offended; immeasurable cunning, masquerading habitually under the double disguise of quaint prejudice and dry humor, were the solid moral foundations on which the character of this elderly person was built.

This consideration gave zest to the idea, for things seemed to have been providentially arranged so that Marion might remain in the background, wrathfully powerless to interfere in what had every appearance of proving to be a most entertaining masquerade.

The beauty of their gold pieces dazzled the shopkeepers; sports, dinners, balls, masquerades, plays, tournaments, pomp, finery, pleasures, luxuries, and all the allurements which seduce men (say contemporary writers), captivated the worldly and particularly the youth.

Meanwhile, under that splendid masquerade of dignities sacred and secular which seemed to make the life of lucky Churchmen and princely families so luxurious and amusing, there were certain conditions at work which slowly tended to disturb the general festivity.

In addition to the various plans among themselves, the college gave them masquerade and dancing parties, musical or theatrical entertainment, candy pulls, and sleigh rides, so no girl had reason to complain of dullness, or envy her fortunate roommate at home.

The transformation of Republican generals and ancient Jacobins into the peerage of a monarchical government, gave a species of incongruity to this splendid masquerade, and more than one of the personages showed not a little awkwardness in supporting their new titles.

Profound commiseration seems due to the Elizabethan playgoer, who was liable to have his faith in the tenderness and gentleness of Desdemona rudely shaken by the irruption on the stage of a brawny, broad-shouldered athlete, masquerading in her sweet name.

The impotent monarch, instead of establishing himself in the affections of his subjects, by vigorously driving the invaders from his realms, with almost inconceivable silliness endeavored to win their popularity by balls and smiles, pleasant words and masquerades.

The author plainly states that his whitecaps are not to be confounded with vigilance committees that undertake to reform the morals of individuals, but that they are rowdies who masquerade as whitecaps merely for purposes of private mischief and vengeance.

Thus far he had been able to meet each new surprise, each fresh situation, with a resource that amazed himself, but if they came face to face with him and Alfred, his own masquerade would end at once and disastrous explanations would certainly follow.

There were the silken colonists, sporting round their Maypole; perhaps teaching a bear to dance, or striving to communicate their mirth to the grave Indian, or masquerading in the skins of deer and wolves which they had hunted for that especial purpose.

Time enough if he galloped down at four, when the road would be pretty clear, instead of being clogged by a perfect procession of women and coolies masquerading in ridiculous costumes; whence it may be inferred that Lewis Gordon was in a bad temper.

A practical playwright, our author had no patience with those who attempted to dispense with the frame of the footlights, who would turn the playhouse into a literary farm through which would gambol all sorts of incompetents masquerading as original dramatic thinkers.

These theatrical performances were doubtless entertaining to the people, who, in all countries, love public shows, as well to the principals who never seemed to tire of their masquerading and lulled to rest complaints and dissatisfaction, with the existing order of things.

Masquerades on horseback, torchlight parades, cane contests and bullfights succeeded each other, in all of which the King made a sumptuous appearance with his brother, Don Carlos; and the Queen, who had given an heir to the crown, was honored to the full.

Even now March could not be certain whether the change was merely a sort of masquerade of sunshine, or that effect of clear colors and clean-cut outlines that is always visible on the parade of a marine resort, relieved against the blue dado of the sea.

It is true that recent taste has returned with a certain passion to the brilliant mannerisms of the eighteenth century; but it is because they are voluntary mannerisms, as frankly factitious as the masquerading of children, that they have retained their hold on the fancy.

The furniture is moved, master, mistress and servants are excited, the cook is overworked and is perhaps complaining a little, and the brilliant costumes of the masquerade divert the eye of the visitor so that he hardly knows what sort of house he is in.

Young ladies take their notions of our sex from the novels written by their own, and compared with the monstrosities that masquerade for men in the pages of that nightmare literature, Pythagoras' plucked bird and Frankenstein's demon were fair average specimens of humanity.

Or the family might have been shown as Rossetti, in one of the loveliest, most cruel, and most significant of his pictures, has shown it: a light, laughing masquerade of innocence, the boy and girl dancing before the cushioned idol and her two worshipers.

Once before, in the tenth chapter of this narrative, we took occasion to introduce one of those fiends to the notice of the reader; it was at the masquerade ball, where the Spanish ambassador made a diabolical proposal to Josephine Franklin, whom he supposed to be a boy.

All the younger people, and even many of the older ones were in masquerade, under their burly overcoats and mufflers, and vast entertainment was derived from trying to guess who was who, as one sleigh passed another, the occupants waving and shouting.

In this satiric sermon upon the shams and hypocrisies of life, Mother Rigby, with her sardonic humor, her cynical comments, parodies society, holds the mirror up to human life and shows more than one poor painted scarecrow, simulacrum of humanity, masquerading as a man.

The picture embraces an extensive space of ground, which is covered with hundreds of figures, all occupied, singly or in groups, in different manners, conversing, masquerading, buying and selling, playing games, and performing in various ways; each group or figure is a picture in itself.

Having found her, carry her off to the secret department, and having given her a slight taste of corporal punishment, as a small token of remembrance, bring back the aforesaid little lady, with all honor, and deliver her safely over to the masquerade.

The next day the Masquerade takes place, beginning with a procession to the ground, and is repeated two or three times before huge crowds of spectators, for the townsmen are as excited as the students and the relatives, at least on the first two days.

This nearly always means that their natural feeling for poetry has been vitiated in some way, generally by contact, often forced upon them, with work that only masquerades as poetry, or by such misgovernment of their lives as dulls all their finer instincts.

As far as the apparition of the beautiful queen is concerned, I have always deemed it to be a dream, unless it should have been some masquerade got up for the occasion, but it is not always in the druggist's shop that are found the best remedies for severe diseases.

She laughed a little, so did he; they were used to exchange these passages in an admirably artistic masquerade, but it was always a little droll to each of them to see the other wear the domino of sentiment, and neither had much credence in the other.

It is but necessary to consider the variegated costumes, rich in color, whose ultimate extravagances necessitated special dress regulations, as well as the tournaments, the numerous archer festivals, and the frequent masquerades, to realize that the people of that day appreciated the good things of life.

She had been made to feel the new name almost at once, and it gave her a sense of masquerading pleasant enough for the time being, but with a dim foreboding of nameless dread and emptiness for the future, like all masquerading which must end sometime.

From a tiny cabinet at one end of the gallery a stair led down to my lady's garden where bushes masqueraded as birds, a sundial questioned the smiling moon and a gathering of young frogs leapt hastily from the stone fountain at sound of Paul's footsteps.

They had seemed very human before; but when they began to be vexed at him because he would not gratify their benevolence with the sense of success, I really could see no reason why they should be masquerading there in feathers, being as human as anybody!

Rapidly was Es-sat weakening and with the knowledge of impending death there came, as there comes to every coward and bully under similar circumstances, a crumbling of the veneer of bravado which had long masqueraded as courage and with it crumbled his code of ethics.

A portrait painted at this time by a fashionable artist, probably in the studio of Sir Joshua Reynolds, shows him arrayed in a fine doublet of silk and a high lace collar, with a mask in one hand as if to indicate he was about to hasten away to some masquerade.

This explains the rapid and wide spread of errors, and also the fame of what is bad; for the professional purveyors of opinion, such as journalists and the like, give as a rule only false wares, as those who hire out masquerading dresses give only false jewels.

Men like Paul Kelly, Jimmie Kelly and other Italians masquerading under Irish names play a prominent part in Tammany politics, supplying "strong arm" men as repeaters in the elections, whom they recruit from the boxing and other athletic clubs with which they are affiliated.

Henry had not escaped the natural influence of the dissolute society in the midst of which he had been educated, and manifested, on his first return to his mother, a strong passion for balls and masquerades, and all the enervating pleasures of fashionable life.

I had lived that life, I had rubbed shoulders with those reckless multitudes, I had laughed amid that sorry masquerade, yet I had shut my eyes to shut out from me the frolic and brilliancy around, and stumbled on, sad, thoughtful, and yet purposeless.

Now it was Euterpe that Eve was to represent at the masquerade; and what ornament so fit and fanciful as this amulet of spring-time, whose charm commanded all that hour of freshness, fragrance, and dew, when the burdened heart of the dawn bubbles over with music?

That liquid sparkle of her eye, that lingual music, that turn of the head, how well he knew it all, despite the many superficial changes, and how instantly he would recognize it under whatever complexion, contour, accent, height, or carriage that it might choose to masquerade!

The dark glossy ringlets, that were no longer artfully converted to the purposes of the masquerade, fell naturally in curls about the temples and brows, shading a countenance which in general was playfully arch, though at that moment it was shadowed by reflection and feeling.

About a month after this masquerade, Goldsmith dined at Boswell's lodging with Garrick, Johnson, Davies, and others, where 'Goldsmith,' says the biographer, 'strutted about, bragging of his dress, and I believe was seriously vain of it, for his mind was wonderfully prone to such impressions!'

In their place comes a straining after effect, a love of startling color, produced now by over-gorgeous or over-minute imagery, now by a surfeit of brilliant epigram, while controlling good sense and observance of due proportion are often absent and imitative preciosity too frequently masquerades as originality.

The expression, too, is a curious combination of childlike simplicity with the sentimental melancholy of young maidenhood; and one cannot escape the impression that the models are not genuine peasant children, but pretty and somewhat worldly young women, masquerading in pastoral costumes for a fancy ball.

He fancied that by masquerading in leaves and flowers he helped the bare earth to clothe herself with verdure, and that by playing the death and burial of winter he drove that gloomy season away, and made smooth the path for the footsteps of returning spring.

You are no stranger to the passion I have long entertained for your wife, and from your shewing no resentment for what I termed a frolic on the night of the masquerade, I have reason to believe, you will not be mortally offended at this my open avowal of my attachment.

Charles Strickland, who wrote his father's biography "to remove certain misconceptions which had gained currency," viz., that Doctor Maugham is masquerading as a psychiatrist and publishing his experiences with the insane, meanwhile throwing off "punk" about art and traducing normal, though admittedly "immoral," man.

She was pleased now that she had not obeyed an impulse which had come to her more than once in that first week of their acquaintance to confess to him that she was an imposter masquerading under false colors, making believe to be something she had never been.

The faces of the more distant ones were hidden by their projecting hoods, and it looked as if the wine was being poured down into empty cowls; in short, the scene altogether with the boisterous music appeared to her like a mad masquerade, that had lasted too long already.

The chances were ten to one that the eighty men would meet five or ten times their number, and, as they were to masquerade as troops of the enemy, they could not complain, under the recognized laws of war as to spies, at being summarily shot if captured alive.

One of the ridiculous and disgraceful amusements of the vulgar men and women collected in the court of Elizabeth, was what was called masquerade balls, in which all the men were required to dress as women, and all the women as men, and yet no masks were worn.

Thus, a tale of the seduction of an abbess is rendered acceptable by changing the abbess into a countess; the story of how a priest led a woman astray by impersonating the angel Gabriel is merely changed by making the priest a layman masquerading as a fairy king.

When I was quite ready, it seemed to me that I was a different person, very pretty, very tall, with a tendency to look backward over my shoulder, wearing, as well as a beautiful sweeping gown, a lofty and complete set of monarchical prejudices, which I thought becoming in masquerade.

They feared the conqueror, but disdained the masquerade of liberty in which they were invited to play a part: thus the better classes shrunk from forming a part of the new governments, and the offices devolved upon men who had little to lose either in possessions or character.

This pageant was performed in churches, in which the chief characters in society were supported in a sort of masquerade, mixing together in a general dance, in the course of which every one in his turn vanished from the scene, to show how one after the other died off.

I did not dare to bestow another look upon that poor broken old warrior, that faithful, lifelong servant, turned thus cruelly upon the world by a woman whom bigotry had sapped of all human feelings and a boy who was a coward masquerading under a great name.

Even masquerading lords at such places, have been known to be slain outright; and although Society allows to its highest and dearest to save the honor of their families, and heal their anguish, by indecorous compromise, you, if you are a trifle below that mark, must not expect it.

Masks of a texture calculated to baffle the most determined attempts of the minute invisible homicide were made compulsory, and in the great cities masquerading millions became a constant feature of the streets, until an idea of the danger of masks, as microbe preservers and carriers, dawned upon the official mind.

His years of oriental study at Delft had been just gay enough to enable him later to believe that he had once been young; and, because he had taken part in a masquerade, he even thought that he had spent quite a dissolute life, with much squandering of money and riotous living.

Still the cry of the calf reverberated and re-echoed, and the single horseman crouching beneath his masquerade, led the herd on and on, eluding their onslaught, luring them forward between the lines of his companions who stood silent, trembling with eagerness for the sport.

Often they disguise themselves under the lofty names of patriotism and nationality, and men whose whole lives have been spent in sowing class hatreds and dividing kindred nations may be found masquerading under the name of patriots, and have played no small part on the stage of politics.

In another instant she had slipped from the table, extracted poor Puss from a clutter of pans in the back of a cupboard, stripped the last shred of masquerade from her outraged form, and brought her back growling and bristling to perch on one arm of the high-backed chair.

It has been hinted that a wardrobe of habiliments for different sized mayors might be kept on hand at the Town-Hall, but as the cost would be great, and the arrangement would partake too much of the customary preparation for a fancy ball or masquerade, it was thought objectionable.

One night he went to the masquerade with only ten guineas, but joining a party at cards, he won above five hundred pounds; but this money was no sooner in his possession, than a lady, most magnificently dressed, made some advances to him, on which he put the most favorable construction.

I was neither driven to pretend I was something other than myself, with grand surroundings, and illustrious belongings, nor had I masqueraded under a feigned name and a false history; but as Potts, son of Potts the apothecary, I had carried my head high and borne myself creditably.

Begin to pack and clear out wherever possible, but do not let this work interfere with the program which should be continued to within a day or two of closing, or the giving of a last grand party, a fancy dress or masquerade affair with "eats," as campers would say.

Bernardo was employed, also, with much credit to him, for the nuptials of his and our Prince, in certain masquerades, in the Triumph of Dreams, as will be told, and in the interludes of the comedy that was performed in the Palace, as has been described exhaustively by others.

Nevertheless, so great was his doubt as to his own character that all this seemed to him as if he must be merely masquerading in sheep's clothing to gain her consideration, and that it must in some way soon come to an end from his own sheer inability to live up to it.

The redness of mortification rushed over the Count's face at this artificial postponement of the acquaintance; he felt that, after such a tone from the heart, he would have immediately, without a dead interim of five days, and without an homage-day masquerade in a double sense, gone to his friend and become his.

He racked his brains in the vain effort to imagine what could possibly have detained his lady, who, only a short time before, had expressed such a strong desire to be present at the masquerade; and when it struck eleven, and nothing had appeared, he secretly gave up the affair as lost.

This is owing to the fact, that ladies of station no longer honor them with their presence, save during the period of the 'masquerades,' when it is said that even the queen herself has mingled among the general throng, confident that her disguise would secure her from either scrutiny or recognition.

At that time they were indulging in a grand, week-long festival, with masquerades, dancing, and fireworks; and in anticipation of the quick capture of the young French hero, a special party was invited for the next evening at which the guests were promised the pleasure of meeting the distinguished prisoner.

Queen Charlotte did not appear, she did not approve of masquerades; her virtuous husband also did not approve of them, but could not resist the temptation of being present, though he compromised with his conscience by peeping at the gay scene from a private box, behind transparent shutters.

Having once crossed the narrow boundary which divides honesty from its opposite, it was characteristic of her flighty disposition, surcharged with feminine vanity, that she should masquerade in her mistress's gowns and jewelry and pass herself off under a preposterous name culled from one of her favorite penny romances.

To study nature in his works is like exploring a new and beautiful country; to study man in his works is like going into a great city, viewing the motley crowd as one views a great masquerade in which past and present mingle freely and familiarly, as if the dead were all living again.

He had been deeply shocked by the levity and frivolity of his diocesans; he had learned that even ordained priests and personages in high official positions were in the habit of attending public balls and masquerades, the latter especially offering opportunity to indulge in polite intrigues and adventures of a dubious nature.

The March afternoon, judged at the window, had blundered back into autumn; it had been raining for hours, and the color of the rain, the color of the air, of the mud, of the opposite houses, of life altogether, in so grim a joke, so idiotic a masquerade, was an unutterable dirty brown.

It had not been long, thanks to the freedom of the masquerade, before they stood on so familiar a footing as to call each other "Du;" and the startling incident that drove Jansen away from the ball so early had broken down the last trace of reserve in the friendship between them.

The spacious arena thus opened, soon wore a busy and interesting appearance, when the masques began to arrive; and the boxes were speedily filled with ladies and gentlemen who, wearing no fancy costumes, had thronged thither for the purpose of beholding, but not commingling with, the diversions of the masquerade.

Ludwig, when not masquerading in woman's clothing, or ordering it from Paris, or appearing at private performances in one opera or another, suffered from great attacks of religion; and, unhappily for the art of music, what appealed to his diseased brain from one side appealed to Wagner's tired brain from the other side.

They nod and laugh and pose gracefully to their attendant gallants, then they rise in their seats to pose and laugh again for other gallants who are in the masquerading throng beneath, and upon whom they will shower comfits and flowers and smiles alike, to get comfits and flowers in return.

My mind was still too unsettled to enjoy masquerading, notwithstanding the temptation of the turnkey's wardrobe; and I felt all that absence of accommodation to circumstances, that want of plasticity, that failure of grasping at every hair's-breadth of enjoyment, which is declared by foreigners to form the prodigious deficiency of John Bull.

This brave and noble document will forever remain one of the gravest indictments of German misrule, and as it states, on the authority of one who was in a position to know, the details of the savage tyranny which masqueraded under the forms of law, it is appended, with some condensation, to this article.

To provide resources for the invalids of the Russian army, great care is taken; and in addition to more fixed estimates, the emperor makes extraordinary exertions, by balls, and lotteries, and masquerades, of a charitable nature, to augment the ways and means of the veterans who have been disabled in his service.

One lonely little native sheet masquerades as a newspaper, the languid little shops, often owned by foreigners, offer a meager and ancient stock chiefly imported and all high in price; for it takes great inducement to make the natives produce anything beyond the corn and beans for their own requirements.

We have already glanced at the mixture of tedious masquerading, hunting, and amorous intrigue which formed the principal occupations of the ladies and gentlemen who surrounded Henry and Katharine in their daily life; and from her arrival in England, Anne appears to have entered to the full into the enjoyment of such pastimes.

Every other kind of eloquence is the dress of sense; but this is the mask by which a true master of his art will so effectually conceal it, that a man will as easily mistake his own positions, if he meets them thus transformed, as he may pass in a masquerade his nearest acquaintance.

Amid much joking and laughter, my wife explained that she had been washing all day, and while their clothes were drying, the boys amused themselves by dressing up in things they found while rummaging the sailor's chest, and had kept them on, that Ernest and I might see the masquerade.

He is too much your inferior in principles, manners, character, station, and everything else, to render him of so much account; and then, were we to clear up this masquerade into which the chances of a ship have thrown us, we might have our scruples concerning others, as well as concerning this wolf in sheep's clothing.

Nor will I refrain from saying that Piero, in his youth, being fanciful and extravagant in invention, was much employed for the masquerades that are held during the Carnival; and he became very dear to the young noblemen of Florence, having improved their festivals much in invention, adornment, grandeur, and pomp.

It was the man who could end this hideous masquerade that he, Billy Kane, was forced to assume; the man who could clear his name of the foul blot that had cost him friends, the companionship of honest men, and that was like at any instant to cost him his life.

This isolation would be at worst a group isolation, and there can be no doubt that my friend is right in pointing out that there is much more social toleration for an act committed under the sanction of a group than for an isolated act that may be merely impulsive misbehavior masquerading as high principle.

This plate went thus in masquerade to Rome, Venice, and Amsterdam, and was received by all the amateurs and curious with astonishment and pleasure, and was purchased at a very high price by those who esteemed themselves too happy to have found an opportunity of possessing themselves of an engraving by Albert Durer.

Amid much joking and laughter, the mother explained that she had been washing all day, and while their clothes were drying, the boys amused themselves by dressing up in things they found while rummaging the sailor's chest, and had kept them on, that Ernest and I might see the masquerade.

Nothing could have been farther from reproach than the marital fidelity of Lady Elizabeth, but it must have gratified Bacon to annoy the man who had crossed and conquered him in love, or in what masqueraded under that name, by fanning the flames of Lady Elizabeth's fiery hatred against her husband.