"Fluster" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... these revivals Thea's sister Anna professed religion with, as Mrs. Kronborg said, "a good deal of fluster." While Anna was going up to the mourners' bench nightly and asking for the prayers of the congregation, she disseminated general gloom throughout the household, and after she joined the church she took on an air ...
— Song of the Lark • Willa Cather
... leave that spot—standing statue-like and looking along both roads—until I heard the rumble of the departing train, and then I repaired to the Old Hall, my soul uplifted. I found Jone in an awful fluster about my being out so late; but I do stay pretty late sometimes when I walk by myself, and so he ...
— Pomona's Travels - A Series of Letters to the Mistress of Rudder Grange from her Former - Handmaiden • Frank R. Stockton
... enough deceived by his own hopes, as even shrewd men will be sometimes—either did not notice the fluster I was in, or thought to set matters all right with me in his own way; for when he found that I remained silent he took up the talk himself again, and went on to show in detail the profits of a single venture with a live cargo—and his figures were certainly big ...
— In the Sargasso Sea - A Novel • Thomas A. Janvier
... over" from the country round about. It would have been something Madam Schuyler would never have been able to get over if aught had been awry when a single uncle or aunt appeared upon the scene, or if there seemed to be the least evidence of fluster and nervousness. ...
— Marcia Schuyler • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... though she were merely walking out of church, but she still held her hand uplifted. All eyes were turned on her, as well as on George and my father, and the icy calm of her self- possession chilled those who were inclined for the moment to take Hanky's words literally. There was not a trace of fluster in her gait, action, or words, ...
— Erewhon Revisited • Samuel Butler
... financial throe volcanic Ever yet was known to scare it; Never yet was any panic Scared the firm of Grin and Barrett. From the flurry and the fluster, From the ruin and the crashes, They arise in brighter lustre, Like the phoenix from his ashes. When the banks and corporations Quake with fear, they do not share it; Smiling through all perturbations Goes the firm of Grin ...
— It Can Be Done - Poems of Inspiration • Joseph Morris
... Miss Bussey, "I must say you look properly ashamed of yourself [John certainly did], so I'll see what can be done. What a fluster we shall live in! Upon my word you might as well have made it tomorrow. The fuss would have been no worse and a good ...
— Comedies of Courtship • Anthony Hope
... that it was an obscure place they liv'd in, and it might be very dangerous (tho his greatest danger was in being there) and that he shou'd have a good Bed at his Service there: The Gentleman finding himself almost fluster'd, and thinking he was secure where he was, agreed to stay till the next Morning: Upon which the t'other Bottle of Wine was brought in, & then he began to be very frollicksome, and would needs be Kissing Miss Betty, who pretended a great kindness for him; ...
— The London-Bawd: With Her Character and Life - Discovering the Various and Subtle Intrigues of Lewd Women • Anonymous
... and I can possibly manage it, I will ask her myself to make one of your party. If so, you can go to her afterwards and make your own arrangements. Just write her a note, my dear, and say that I will call to-morrow at twelve. It might fluster her if I were to ...
— Doctor Thorne • Anthony Trollope
... saying neither too much, nor too little, to be civil to all, without needless multiplication of words, this requires one to hold his faculties well in hand, never to forget himself, and to show that no demand whatever can vex or fluster him. The librarian should know how, or learn how to adapt himself to all readers, and how to aid their researches without devoting much time to each. This requires a fine quality of tact, of adapting one's self quickly to the varied circumstances of the case in hand. One who has it well developed ...
— A Book for All Readers • Ainsworth Rand Spofford
... place where W.M.P. presumably was still sitting, "I'll show you how to treat a reputable member of the bar old enough to be your grandfather! I'll take the starch out of your darned Puritan collar! I'll harry you and fluster you and heckle you and make a fool of you, and I'll roll you up in a ball and blow you out the window, and turn old Hassoun loose for an Egyptian holiday that will make old Rome look like thirty piasters! You pinheaded, pretentious, pompous, ...
— By Advice of Counsel • Arthur Train
... all the contretemps of his provoking misadventure; happy in spite of the threat of arrest for burglary. For nearly a minute August Wehle was happy in that perfect way in which people of quiet tempers are happy—happy without fluster. But before he had passed the gate, he heard a scream and a wild hysterical laugh; he heard a hurrying of feet and saw a moving of lights. He would fain have turned back to find out what the matter was, he had so much of interest in that house, but he remembered that he had been turned ...
— The End Of The World - A Love Story • Edward Eggleston
... every individual is a bit of both, or either, ad lib. After a sufficient period of idealism, men become hopelessly self-conscious. That is, the great affective centers no longer act spontaneously, but always wait for control from the head. This always breeds a great fluster in the psyche, and the poor self-conscious individual cannot help posing and posturing. Our ideal has taught us to be gentle and wistful: rather girlish and yielding, and very yielding in our sympathies. In fact, many young ...
— Fantasia of the Unconscious • D. H. Lawrence
... hurry and fluster that had so affected her young mistress, Pansy Potts, in neat white cap and apron, opened the door to ...
— Patty at Home • Carolyn Wells
... mean to wilfully deceive them. Very probably he had his excuse ready. Malcolm could almost hear his words. "I said nothing about the Jacobis because I knew your prejudice, and I did not want to fluster you. I thought Mrs. Godfrey would spin her yarn, and I left it to her. It was not my fault if the Wallaces took to them, and that they were often up at Fettercairn." Some such words Cedric would say when ...
— Herb of Grace • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... as if with an immense effort. "I dare say I shall be ready quite as soon as you are, Maudie. You always get into such a fluster about every thing." ...
— Left at Home - or, The Heart's Resting Place • Mary L. Code
... rigged up for me in the gig, so that I was not obliged to dress, but simply got out of one bed into another. The gig was towed by the steam-launch, which also trailed the 'Flash' behind in case we might want to land in any shallow place or get aground on a sand or mud bank. After the first little fluster of moving was over it was a great pleasure to me to be once more in the open air after being shut up for what seems so long a time. It felt deliciously warm too, the temperature being 74 deg.. The scenery was beautiful—sandy shores, green woods ...
— The Last Voyage - to India and Australia, in the 'Sunbeam' • Lady (Annie Allnutt) Brassey
... plain.' 'See, the old woman chides her; she deserves it; She'll not pick up admirers if she plays My Lady Cool so grandly. Watch mamma. The hook is nicely baited; where are all The gudgeons it should lure? I marvel not Mamma is in a fluster; tap, tap, tap, See her fan go! No strategy, no effort, No dandy-killing shot from languid eyes, On that girl's part! And all ...
— The Woman Who Dared • Epes Sargent
... we dragged him, paying no heed to his questions, which, by and by, he abandoned, because he laughed so hard. And down the path we sped—along the road—by the turn to Cut-Throat Cove—until, at last, we came to the cottage of Aunt Amanda and Uncle Joe Bow, whom we threw into a fluster with our news. When the doctor was informed of the exigency of the situation, he married them on the spot, improvising a ceremony, without a moment's hesitation, as though he had been used to it all his life: a family of six meanwhile grinning with ...
— Doctor Luke of the Labrador • Norman Duncan
... Carrows'd. Potations, pottle-deepe; and he's to watch. Three else of Cyprus, Noble swelling Spirites, (That hold their Honours in a wary distance, The very Elements of this Warrelike Isle) Haue I to night fluster'd with flowing Cups, And they Watch too. Now 'mongst this Flocke of drunkards Am I put to our Cassio in some Action That may offend the Isle. But here they come. Enter Cassio, ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... made for the Christmas ball. Gay garlands were hung from ceiling and wall; The Yule log was laid, the tables arrayed, And the Lady Lorraine and her whole cavalcade, From the pompous old steward to the scullery-maid, Were all in a fluster, Excitement and bluster, And everything shone with a ...
— The Jingle Book • Carolyn Wells
... in such a fluster was I—"my brother hath now brought tidings that the Scots come in force by the Aire Valley, with all speed, and are nearhand at the ...
— In Convent Walls - The Story of the Despensers • Emily Sarah Holt
... and her stockings exposed (among ourselves, ladies!) like some good wife that's afraid to be late for the market. Aye, aye! Malcolm Midden—good man!—made a fine pocket of silver in a dirty trade, but his women'll jerk, and toss, and bounce, and fuss, and fluster for a generation or two yet, for all the silks and ...
— Tales from Many Sources - Vol. V • Various
... His eyes did not flinch and his tongue did not falter. He was, I have it on the best authority, admirable in his earnestness, in his sincerity and also in his restraint. He was perfect. Nevertheless the vital force of his unknown individuality addressing him so familiarly was enough to fluster Mr. Smith. Flora saw her father trembling in all his exiguous length, though he held himself stiffer than ever if that was possible. He muttered a little and at last managed to utter, not loud of course but very ...
— Chance • Joseph Conrad
... handled submarine might succeed in groping its way to it and destroying it; but then it would be much better to attack such a vessel and capture it boldly with a few desperate men on a tug. At the utmost the submarine will be used in narrow waters, in rivers, or to fluster or destroy ships in harbour or with poor-spirited crews—that is to say, it will simply be an added power in the hands of the nation that is predominant at sea. And, even then, it can be merely destructive, ...
— Anticipations - Of the Reaction of Mechanical and Scientific Progress upon - Human life and Thought • Herbert George Wells
... instantly warning them, and, in this, alarming their instinct. My particular rabbit had scarcely run out of hearing when half a dozen others were scurrying hither and thither in the same expectant confusion. Poor little things! What a fluster they made, and their scare communicated itself to a crow in a solitary fir-tree, against which I nearly collided. He croaked, flapped his wings and sailed off heavily, ...
— The Black Colonel • James Milne
... till Simon of Gloucester, he who disputed with Leoline the Monk, stood up among them and said, Good my Lords, is it your pleasure to stand here fasting, and that those who count lower in the Church than you do should feast and fluster? Let us order to us the dinner of the Deans and Canons which is making ready for them in the chamber below. And this speech of Simon of Gloucester pleased the Bishops much; and so they sent for the host, one William of Ypres, and told him it was for the public ...
— Essays in English Literature, 1780-1860 • George Saintsbury
... her room since the day before, but remained attentive to all that was happening at the Old Mill, had, through her open door and window, heard and seen the hubbub, the fuss made by the servants, all the mad fluster of a house that feels itself ...
— The Frontier • Maurice LeBlanc
... is Madame! Something has happened/ cried Corentine, as she ran to the door in a fluster, excitement making more conspicuous than usual the marks of her smallpox. Madame Astier made straight for her own room; but the door of the study opened, and a peremptory 'Adelaide!' compelled her to go in. The rays of the lamp-globe showed her that the face ...
— The Immortal - Or, One Of The "Forty." (L'immortel) - 1877 • Alphonse Daudet
... in our myriads we muster. Friendly warning is all that we mean. About SOLLY's "incitement" Rads fluster; We're thrue to the Crown and the QUEEN: But Ulster no "pathriot" shall sever, And Ulster no "Papish" shall school. Whillaloo! Here's the Union for ever, And into the Boyne wid Home Rule! Ri ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 102, June 18, 1892 • Various
... the thought. Why should we fluster ourselves, why wax so hot, when time thus brings its inevitable revenges? Composed in mind, let us pursue our own unruffled course, with calm assurance that justice will at length prevail. Let us comply with the dictates of sweetness and light, in reasonable expectation that iniquity ...
— Essays in Rebellion • Henry W. Nevinson
... as fickle as lotus-flower, Closes her favours when comes the hour. Oh, foolish man, how can you trust her, Who comes of a sudden, and goes in a fluster? ...
— The Cycle of Spring • Rabindranath Tagore
... replied that energetic person, who was flying about the kitchen with a speed that made Chester's head dizzy trying to follow her with his eyes. "All I can see is freckles and bones—but if you're satisfied, I am. For law's sake, don't fluster me, Salome. There's a hundred and one things to be done out of hand. This frolic has clean dundered ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1902 to 1903 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... greeted on the platform by the wealthiest citizen of the county. Judge Briscoe, and his daughter, Minnie, and (what stirred wonder to an itch almost beyond endurance) Mr. Fisbee! and they then drove through town on the way to the Briscoe mansion, all four, apparently, in a fluster of pleasure and exhilaration, the strange lady engaged in earnest conversation with Mr. Fisbee ...
— The Gentleman From Indiana • Booth Tarkington
... Simeon not only recognises, but welcomes the approach of death. 'Thou lettest Thy servant depart in peace.' Yes, there speaks a calm voice tranquilly accepting the permission. He feels no agitation, no fluster of any kind, but quietly slips away from his post. And the reason for that peaceful welcome of the end is 'for mine eyes have seen Thy salvation.' That sight is the reason, first of all, for his being sure that the curfew had rung for him, and that the day's work was done. But it is also the reason ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... comes to the office in a fluster and says: 'First, Rome.' I says: 'There ain't no first Rome, Roma you mean.' 'You know what I want,' says he, and when he took his change I noticed his hands was snowy white: he had a ring on and I could hear the gold chinking ...
— Australia Revenged • Boomerang
... crossing his game leg over his sound one, "will you tell me your story?" 'I was in a fluster, but I told him nearly everything from the time he left me the five hundred dollars in Philadelphia, up to my losing ship and cargo at Le Havre. Boney began by listening, but after a bit he dropped into his own ...
— Rewards and Fairies • Rudyard Kipling
... were many of Perry's, and still more of those who had followed Puttock, or were reported to be about to follow Coxon, and among them the members for several divisions in and near Kirton. These last, feeling that all the stir was largely for their benefit and on their account, were in a fluster of self-consciousness and apprehension, and very loud in their condemnation of the Premier's ...
— Half a Hero - A Novel • Anthony Hope
... fool Roderigo, Whom love hath turn'd almost the wrong side out, To Desdemona hath to-night carous'd Potations pottle-deep; and he's to watch: Three lads of Cyprus,—noble swelling spirits, That hold their honours in a wary distance, The very elements of this warlike isle,— Have I to-night fluster'd with flowing cups, And they watch too. Now, 'mongst this flock of drunkards, Am I to put our Cassio in some action That may offend the isle:—but here they come: If consequence do but approve my dream, My boat sails freely, both with ...
— Othello, the Moor of Venice • William Shakespeare
... the bowling-green. Susannah conducted them to it, unlocked the box of bowls, and was returning to the house in a fluster, when, in the verandah before the front door, she came plump upon a bevy of young ladies, all as pretty as you please in muslin frocks and great summer hats to shield their complexions: whereof one, ...
— Merry-Garden and Other Stories • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... in many ways yet producing effects very different. The younger man had the physical makeup of the older, though of a slighter mould. They had the same high, proud look of conscious strength, of cool fearlessness that nothing could fluster. But the soul that looked out of the grey eyes of the son was quite another from that which looked out of the deep blue eyes of the father—yet, after all, the difference may not have been in essence but only that the older man's soul had learned in life's experience ...
— To Him That Hath - A Novel Of The West Of Today • Ralph Connor
... of a small fluster of guilt. There had been considerably less actual coverage in the Beldon costume than there was in the minute two-piece counterpart to Brule's silver trunks she wore at the moment. She'd have to tell Brule about ...
— Legacy • James H Schmitz
... parts," continued the the young Frenchman, "and of deportment; is it not so? Have you seen me of a fluster, or gross ever, or, what sall I say—bourgeois? Shall you be shame' for your guest' manner? No, no! And my appearance, is it of the people? Clearly, no. Do I not compare in taste of apparel with your yo'ng Englishman? Ha, ha! To be hope'. Ha, ha! ...
— Monsieur Beaucaire • Booth Tarkington
... one ear and go out at the other; forget &c (have no remembrance) 506. call off the attention, draw off the attention, call away the attention, divert the attention, distract the mind; put out of one's head; disconcert, discompose; put out, confuse, perplex, bewilder, moider^, fluster, muddle, dazzle; throw a sop to Cerberus. Adj. inattentive; unobservant, unmindful, heedless, unthinking, unheeding, undiscerning^; inadvertent; mindless, regardless, respectless^, listless &c (indifferent) 866; blind, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... at the Idol in this manner, we who come to do Business, or talk Politicks, are utterly poisoned: They have also Drams for those who are more enamoured than ordinary; and it is very common for such as are too low in Constitution to ogle the Idol upon the Strength of Tea, to fluster themselves with warmer Liquors: Thus all Pretenders advance, as fast as they can, to a Feaver or a Diabetes. I must repeat to you, that I do not look with an evil Eye upon the Profit of the Idols, or the Diversion ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... little feeble squeaking voice, ("that's Bill" thought Alice,) which said "well, I hardly know—I'm all of a fluster myself—something comes at me like a Jack-in-the-box, and the next minute up I goes like a rocket!" "And so you did, old fellow!" said the ...
— Alice's Adventures Under Ground • Lewis Carroll
... And when the Cheap Jack declared that she was quite free to look without buying, and that he did not want her to buy, Mrs. Lake allowed him to pull down his goods as before, and listened to his statements as if she had never proved them to be lies, and was thrown into confusion and fluster when he began to bully, and bought in haste to be rid of him, and repented at leisure—to no purpose as far as the ...
— Jan of the Windmill • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... were sitting about on soap boxes, smoking and eating sweet crackers out of tin cases. Gerhardt was working at a plank table with paper and crayons, making a clean copy of a rough map they had drawn up together that morning, showing the limits of fire. Noise didn't fluster him; he could sit among a lot of men and write as calmly as ...
— One of Ours • Willa Cather
... now had got into a fluster. At the kitchens he had lost his head, and when his turn came—he had had to wait—he had yielded his place to those behind, saying that he didn't matter. And he had wasted more precious time buying bananas, though he knew that the Pembrokes were not partial to fruit. ...
— The Longest Journey • E. M. Forster
... the fluster that your father got into, Mary, when he heard that Sarah McMinn was ...
— The Drone - A Play in Three Acts • Rutherford Mayne
... hurry. The man whom you trust most readily is the man with a little time to spare, or who makes you think that he has. When my life gets tangled and twisted, and I want a minister to help me, I shall be too timid to approach the man who is always in a fluster. I feel instinctively that he is far too busy for poor me. He tears through life like a superannuated whirlwind. If I meet him on the street, his coat tails are always flying out behind him; his eyes wear a hunted look; and a sense of feverish ...
— Mushrooms on the Moor • Frank Boreham
... cluster, Then September, ripe and hale; Bees about his basket fluster,— Laden deep with fruity cluster. Skies have now a softer lustre; Barns ...
— Collected Poems - In Two Volumes, Vol. II • Austin Dobson
... ar chicken alont, Miss Chris," she said, skilfully reducing the charge to a single offence. "Des' let dat ar chicken alont. 'Tain' no use yo' rilin' yo'se'f 'bout dat. Hit's done en it's been done. Hit don't becomst de quality ter fluster demse'ves over de gwines on uv er low-lifeted fowl. You des' bresh yo'se'f down an steddy like hit ain' been fool you ef you knowed yo'se'f. You des' let dat ar chicken be er little act uv erdultery betweenst you en me. Ef'n it's gone, hit'll ...
— The Voice of the People • Ellen Glasgow
... poor daughter. I am called to go to bed by Mrs. Jervis, for it is past eleven; and I am sure she shall hear of it; for all this is owing to her, though she did not mean any harm. But I have been, and am, in a strange fluster; and I suppose too, she'll say, I have been ...
— Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded • Samuel Richardson
... wut to live on; 190 Ef it aint jest the thing thet's well pleasin' to God, It makes us thought highly on elsewhere abroad; The Rooshian black eagle looks blue in his eerie An' shakes both his heads wen he hears o' Monteery; In the Tower Victory sets, all of a fluster, An' reads, with locked doors, how we won Cherry Buster; An' old Philip Lewis—thet come an' kep' school here Fer the mere sake o' scorin his ryalist ruler On the tenderest part of our kings in futuro— Hides his crown underneath ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell
... knows who Batty was." Surely, the inference that Batty was not a real personage in some distant age—that he was a mere myth—must be a non sequitur from the premises before us. Perhaps Mr. Batty was a person of notable industry—perhaps remarkable for always beings in a "fluster"—perhaps the rural Paul Pry of his day and district. He has left, too, a large progeny; whether as regards the name alone, or whichever of the ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 33, June 15, 1850 • Various
... feet every inch a leader of men. Thorpe did not wish to bring about an actual scene of violence. He had attained his object, which was to fluster the other out of ...
— The Blazed Trail • Stewart Edward White
... in we had met the Village Settlement homeward bound—the bonnie baby still riding on its mother's knee, and smiling out of the depths of its sunbonnet; but every one else was longing for the bush. Darwin had proved all unsatisfying bustle and fluster, and the trackless sea, a wonder that inspired strange sickness when ...
— We of the Never-Never • Jeanie "Mrs. Aeneas" Gunn
... near in his surplice, and the pew-opener was all in a fluster at the idea of a runaway marriage. Brian came out of the dusky background—the daylight being tempered by small painted windows in heavy stone mullions—as Ida entered the church. Everything was ready. Before she knew how it came to pass, she was standing before the altar, and the fatal words ...
— The Golden Calf • M. E. Braddon
... there was a brief fluster. Two Gridley men went "woozy" over the same signal. But alert Dave Darrin rushed in and snatched a clever advantage out ...
— The High School Captain of the Team - Dick & Co. Leading the Athletic Vanguard • H. Irving Hancock
... SAM. Tha do fluster a feller so as A doan't knaw wheer A am. A've not been nagged like that theer sin' my ould ...
— The Atlantic Book of Modern Plays • Various
... little bird has got a false bill," replied Dolly, who was not very easy to fluster. "Who is there to spend sixpence with in a little hole of this kind? I am not a customer for tea, coffee, tobacco, snuff, or pepper, nor even for whiting, soles, or conger. Old Cheeseman imports all the fashions, as he says; but I go by ...
— Springhaven - A Tale of the Great War • R. D. Blackmore
... leisure for seeing them, but Easter services, royal birthday processions, or battles of flowers. As she seldom broke her routine of idleness, these occasions excited her, not with pleasurable anticipation, but with a nervous fluster that she might somehow miss something; and the concierge, the porter, Madame, and the head-waiter, would all be flying about the hotel half an hour before it was necessary for her to start, sent on some perfectly ...
— The Third Miss Symons • Flora Macdonald Mayor
... the letter, and seemed in a fluster, and asked if your worship was in drink; and I said you were speaking a little Spanish, as one who ...
— Kenilworth • Sir Walter Scott
... base and black, That puts me in a fluster— My Rover, would she bring you back? No, no, I will ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101, August 22, 1891 • Various
... to fluster ye, but she's been ower lang wi' Lisbeth Fargus no to hae learnt her ways. An a'body kins what a life ...
— Auld Licht Idylls • J. M. Barrie
... and Tommy, taking up his gun and pack, gave a whistle to Sate, who was nosing around. Suddenly the snow around began to move, and out from under the snow appeared first the head of one dog and then of another, until every one—Buster and Muster and Fluster and the rest—had come up and stood shaking himself to get the snow out of his coat. Then Tommy remembered that his father had told him that that was the way the Eskimo dogs often kept themselves warm when they slept, by boring down deep in the snow. Never were two boys more delighted. ...
— Tommy Trots Visit to Santa Claus • Thomas Nelson Page
... smile and something of a blush, "pledged his friends in return. Most serene Elector of Covent Garden, I drink to your highness's health," and he filled himself a glass. Joseph required scarce more pressing than Dick to that sort of amusement; but the wine never seemed at all to fluster Mr. Addison's brains; it only unloosed his tongue, whereas Captain Steele's head and speech were quite overcome by ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... at her head and ran into the kitchen. The governor's sudden visit stirred and overwhelmed the whole household. A ferocious slaughter followed. A dozen fowls, five turkeys, eight ducks, were killed, and in the fluster the old gander, the progenitor of our whole flock of geese and a great favourite of mother's, was beheaded. The coachmen and the cook seemed frenzied, and slaughtered birds at random, without distinction of age or breed. For the sake of some wretched sauce a pair ...
— The Wife and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... In short, he gave me an opportunity of studying John Bull, as I may say, stuffed naked—his greed, his usuriousness, his hypocrisy, his perfidy of the back-stairs, all swelled to the superlative—such as was well worth the little disarray and fluster of ...
— St Ives • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Well, I was very fond of Stella. It would be good to have her back,—to have her back to jeer at me, to make me feel red and uncomfortable and ridiculous, to say rude things about my waist, and indeed to fluster me just by being there. Yes, it would be good. But, upon the whole, I am not sorry that Stella ...
— The Cords of Vanity • James Branch Cabell et al
... don't know how it is, but this lady, the moment I come into her presence, half-assimilates me to her own virtue.— Once or twice (to say nothing of her triumph over me on Sunday night) I was prevailed upon to fluster myself, with an intention to make some advances, which, if obliged to recede, I might lay upon raised spirits: but the instant I beheld her, I was soberized into awe and reverence: and the majesty of her even visible purity first damped, and then extinguished, ...
— Clarissa, Volume 4 (of 9) - History Of A Young Lady • Samuel Richardson
... it rather frightened me being run after like that. And he said something and ran back—for nine was just striking, and in a moment the Ting-tang would be ringing and he must be back to answer his name. So in my fluster I didn't catch what he meant. When I got home and opened it, I saw my mistake. But you were downstairs at dinner—I couldn't get to speak with you alone—I waited to tell you; and just now, when I was drawing the blinds, I heard ...
— The Westcotes • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... I said, "you must come right back to shore with me." I spoke calmly, for unless you are perfectly calm with Aunt Jane you fluster her. ...
— Spanish Doubloons • Camilla Kenyon |
