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Repulse   Listen
verb
Repulse  v. t.  (past & past part. repulsed; pres. part. repulsing)  
1.
To repel; to beat or drive back; as, to repulse an assault; to repulse the enemy. "Complete to have discovered and repulsed Whatever wiles of foe or seeming friend."
2.
To repel by discourtesy, coldness, or denial; to reject; to send away; as, to repulse a suitor or a proffer.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Repulse" Quotes from Famous Books



... favourable conditions are not present, and a tactical repulse is always possible, then the place for the led horses can only be found so far to the rear that the enemy cannot take us under fire whilst in the act of remounting, and circumstances render it improbable that this emergency can arise before we have ...
— Cavalry in Future Wars • Frederick von Bernhardi

... attack Camp Malakand unawares, and massacre the soldiers, but through the kindness of a friendly native a warning was given. Preparations were quickly made for defence, messengers sent off to ask for re-enforcements, and the soldiers were able to repulse the enemy when ...
— The Great Round World and What Is Going On In It, Vol. 1, No. 41, August 19, 1897 - A Weekly Magazine for Boys and Girls • Various

... she stood hesitating in the threshold. The large hall was brilliantly lit up, and at a table there sat a happy-faced, busy-looking little Boy Scout. He, surely, would not repulse her? Gathering courage she walked up ...
— Good Old Anna • Marie Belloc Lowndes

... the parties for a while. But at length when the Saxons called to their remembrance that the same was the day which should either purchase to them an euerlasting name of manhood by [Sidenote: Scots vanquished by the Saxons.] victorie, or else of reproch by repulse, began to renew the fight with such violence, that the enimies not able to abide their fierce charge, were scattered and beaten downe on ech ...
— Chronicles 1 (of 6): The Historie of England 5 (of 8) - The Fift Booke of the Historie of England. • Raphael Holinshed

... galloping with this force down the ravine, Major Burn-Murdoch drove the Arabs pell-mell out of it. The other two squadrons had now returned, and the whole force dismounted, and, taking up a position among the sandhills near the mouth of the defile, opened fire with their carbines. The repulse of their cavalry seemed to have disheartened the Dervishes, for they made no attempt to attack the dismounted troopers, and contented themselves with maintaining a desultory fire, which was so ill-aimed that but little loss was caused. The heat of the weather was terrific, and both ...
— The River War • Winston S. Churchill

... The repulse of Dieskau, magnified into a splendid victory, had some tendency to remove the depression of spirits occasioned by the defeat of Braddock, and to inspire the provincials with more confidence in themselves. General Johnson, who was wounded in the engagement, ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 1 (of 5) • John Marshall

... was alone with Gladys, and the moment of Fate had come! All that evening I had felt like the soldier who awaits the signal which will send him on a forlorn hope; hope of victory and fear of repulse alternating in his mind. ...
— The Lost World • Arthur Conan Doyle

... up my old journal of thirty years ago, written in pencil because it was impossible to keep ink unfrozen in the snow-hut in which I passed the winter of 1853-4, at Repulse ...
— The Storm-Cloud of the Nineteenth Century - Two Lectures delivered at the London Institution February - 4th and 11th, 1884 • John Ruskin

... were rash and headstrong, so was not the commander of the Spanish garrison, who, massing his men for the repulse of the assault, waited till the last moment, and then received them with a volley of arquebuses, which laid many of them low, and so badly wounded their leader that he had to have his arm amputated on the spot: it says much for his constitution ...
— Sea-Wolves of the Mediterranean • E. Hamilton Currey

... of wheat, we should either die of starvation or be compelled to take grain by force from the municipalities which keep it to themselves." Narbonne starves Toulon; the navigation of the Languedoc canal is intercepted; the people on its banks repulse two companies of soldiers, burn a large building, and want to destroy the canal itself." Boats are stopped, wagons are pillaged, bread is forcibly lowered in price, stones are thrown and guns discharged; the ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 2 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 1 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine

... a rollicking reading-party of students from Oxford with a coach. I explained my painful situation and experiences, and informed them that they made the eighth party I had had to repulse. ...
— The Harmsworth Magazine, v. 1, 1898-1899, No. 2 • Various

... Gabrielle gained a good deal by imagination. It seemed to him that she was far too precious to lose, and the fact that she was a cousin of the exclusive Halbertons settled any social scruples that might have worried him. He forgot his repulse at Howth in the memory of the sweeter moment when they had parted. After all there was no hurry. She was only a child, as her behaviour had shown him so often. At the same time he was anxious that she should not forget him, and ...
— The Tragic Bride • Francis Brett Young

... He would not accept repulse, but followed on with eager and impassioned words. "I love you!" he whispered. "Come, what is this place to you? There's a big world full of things to see and do! We'll be married, we'll travel, we shall see the world. You shall know what ...
— The Law of the Land • Emerson Hough

... next ten years Alfred busied himself founding a navy and establishing order in different parts of the country, but in 896 he was compelled to hasten to London from the west of England to assist in the repulse of another attack of the Danes. Two years before (894) the Danes had threatened London, having established a fortification at Beamfleate or South Benfleet, in Essex, whence they harried the surrounding country. The Londoners on that occasion ...
— London and the Kingdom - Volume I • Reginald R. Sharpe

... pass these sunny autumn days, in which the skies seemed to be smiling on the family gladness? To her the change in Miss Assher's manner was unaccountable. Those compassionate attentions, those smiling condescensions, were torture to Caterina, who was constantly tempted to repulse them with anger. She thought, 'Perhaps Anthony has told her to be kind to poor Tina.' This was an insult. He ought to have known that the mere presence of Miss Assher was painful to her, that Miss Assher's smiles scorched her, ...
— Scenes of Clerical Life • George Eliot

... Kilkenny almost complete. Even if F gets going by December and the Scottish repulse is permanent, I believe I shall be better off in Ireland until the first definite victory is won against ...
— Greener Than You Think • Ward Moore

... it flies with extreme rapidity, but the small size of its lungs prevents it from supporting a lengthened chase. The Giraffe defends itself against the lion, its principal enemy, with its fore feet, with which it strikes with such force as often to repulse him. The specimen in the museum at Paris is about two ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. - Volume X, No. 280, Saturday, October 27, 1827. • Various

... aedileship was no obligatory step in an official career, and that, where merit and not money was in question, they could show their appreciation of personal qualities in the elections to the praetorship. A year after his repulse Marius turned to the candidature for this office, which conveyed the first opportunity of the tenure of an independent military command. He was returned at the bottom of the poll, and even then had to fight hard ...
— A History of Rome, Vol 1 - During the late Republic and early Principate • A H.J. Greenidge

... this repulse, Richard continued to make frequent attacks of the same sort, and kept his stone-casters and other engines of war busy night and day until the defences of the city were much weakened. The inhabitants, disheartened also by famine and other hardships, finally sent envoys to Saladin, requesting ...
— With Spurs of Gold - Heroes of Chivalry and their Deeds • Frances Nimmo Greene

... inhabitants then came in flocks, not knowing exactly what to do: then came the police magistrate and his officers, who also got on the roof of the caravanserai, but who only increased the uproar by their cries, exclaiming, 'Strike, seize, kill!' without in fact doing anything to repulse the enemy. Some few shots were fired at random; but, owing to the darkness and the general confusion, we managed to steal away without any serious accident. During the fray I was frequently tempted to leave the desperate gang to which I belonged, and hide myself in some corner ...
— The Adventures of Hajji Baba of Ispahan • James Morier

... 2-1/2 miles of Russian trenches; in the Lublin region, Southern Poland, the Russian troops, having completed their counter-offensive movement, occupy the positions assigned to them on the heights of the right bank of the River Urzendooka; Austrians repulse strong and repeated Montenegrin attacks ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 5, August, 1915 • Various

... have our weapons, but long have they been used only in one pattern, and they are atuned to another race. Did our defenses hold against you, Gordoon, when you strove to prove that you were as you claimed to be? And did another repulse younger brother when he dared the sea gate? So can we trust them in turn against these other strangers with different brains? Only at the testing shall we know, and in such learning perhaps we shall also be forced to eat the sourness of defeat. ...
— Key Out of Time • Andre Alice Norton

... who seemed most wretched, and would try to share their sorrows, but sympathy on the part of a gentleman was strange, or else there was something in himself which failed to express his tenderness, for he complained that the unfortunate always turned away from him. If, at the moment of such a repulse, we had addressed him, and had respectfully offered him our sympathy, he would have struggled with his painful shyness, and would have told us that he felt no resentment against those who rejected his help. Nothing hardened his heart, and the lack of response merely doubled his pity. He ...
— Three French Moralists and The Gallantry of France • Edmund Gosse

... her, and kissed her repeatedly! And how acted the lady—she who had reproved her affianced husband for a similar liberty—how acted she when thus rudely and grossly embraced by that black and miscreant menial? Did she not repulse him with indignant disgust,—did she not scream for assistance, and have him ...
— City Crimes - or Life in New York and Boston • Greenhorn

... with his designs regarding others, and the aid we may render them, yet this should not give us the least desire to aid them, only in the order of his providence. Neither should we be arrested in his work, although the souls we aid repulse the effort. God will make good the results in due time. It implies great death to self, never to put our hand selfishly to the work of the Lord, as it does, also, never to go a step out of the path in which he leads us. When we mingle self, we retard, rather than advance, ...
— Letters of Madam Guyon • P. L. Upham

... Infadoos, as cool as though he were on parade, shouting out orders, taunts, and even jests, to keep up the spirit of his few remaining men, and then, as each charge rolled on, stepping forward to wherever the fighting was thickest, to bear his share in its repulse. And yet more gallant was the vision of Sir Henry, whose ostrich plumes had been shorn off by a spear thrust, so that his long yellow hair streamed out in the breeze behind him. There he stood, the great Dane, for he was ...
— King Solomon's Mines • H. Rider Haggard

... humming to themselves, the men prepared for action. The first line poked their rifles through the barricade and lay down behind them. All was in readiness to repulse the attack. ...
— The Boy Allies On the Firing Line - Or, Twelve Days Battle Along the Marne • Clair W. Hayes

... grand project of our Society,” Pascal makes his Jesuit informant say (Letter VI.), “is for the good of religion, never to repulse any one, let him be what he may, and so ...
— Pascal • John Tulloch

... were mostly stocked with their cattle, and cultivated by their villains, the clergy took shelter under the bull of Pope Boniface and pleaded conscience in refusing compliance.[**] The king came not immediately to extremities on this repulse; but after locking up all their granaries and barns, and prohibiting all rent to be paid them, he appointed a new synod, to confer with him upon his demand. The primate, not dismayed by these proofs of Edward's resolution, here plainly told him that the clergy owed obedience ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part B. - From Henry III. to Richard III. • David Hume

... across the stars. Clearly and remotely over the plain the hidden east sent up a glow into the sky; its reflection lay on Ray; he fought like one possessed of a demon, scattering destruction broadcast, so fiercely his anger wrapped him, white and formidable. Fresh onset after repulse, and, like the very crest of the toppling wave, one shadowy horseman in all the dark rout, spurring forward, the fight reeling after him, the silver lone star fitfully flashing on his visor, the boy singled for his rifle;—inciting such fearless rivalry, his ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 75, January, 1864 • Various

... extremely beloved in Ireland; having the advantage of a good person, though his voice was weak; he never met with the least repulse from the audience in any of his performances: He therefore resolved to continue on the stage till something better should offer, but his resolution was soon broke by an accident. Being to play the part of Guyomar in Dryden's ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Vol. III • Theophilus Cibber

... rival. For many a long year have I loved you, have I wished to do you honour, I and a crowd of other men of means. But this rascal here has prevented us. You resemble those young men who do not know where to choose their lovers; you repulse honest folk; to earn your favours, one has to be a lamp-seller, a cobbler, ...
— The Eleven Comedies - Vol. I • Aristophanes et al

... women of inferior charms hate her. She is not a Cleopatra, but is, at least, a Charmian. She has a rich Eastern look; she has fine eyes and fine manners. When she comes into the room she makes an impression the same as the Beauty of a Leopardess. She is too fine and too conscious of herself to repulse any Man who may address her; from habit she thinks that nothing particular. I always find myself more at ease with such a woman: the picture before me always gives me a life and animation which I cannot possibly feel with anything inferior. I am at such ...
— A Letter Book - Selected with an Introduction on the History and Art of Letter-Writing • George Saintsbury

... knowing in the least the cause of her troubled face, took this occasion to offer comfort. His manner toward her had changed since she no longer had a part in the management of the eating-house, and for that reason she did not repulse him as sharply as she had been wont to do. He really bore Cavanagh no ill-will, and was, indeed, shrewd enough to understand that Lee admired the ranger, and that his own courtship was rather hopeless; nevertheless, he persisted, his respect for her growing as he found her steadfast in her ...
— Cavanaugh: Forest Ranger - A Romance of the Mountain West • Hamlin Garland

... to the fact that Butler's "bottled" force might be crushed by a Confederate attack while the hazardous passage of the river was being effected. Nevertheless, he decided to risk this bold stroke, and during the night of June 12, 1864, about ten days after the repulse at Cold Harbor, the great ...
— On the Trail of Grant and Lee • Frederick Trevor Hill

... self-assertion alone can the State maintain the conditions of life for its citizens, and insure them the legal protection which each man is entitled to claim from it. This duty of self-assertion is by no means satisfied by the mere repulse of hostile attacks; it includes the obligation to assure the possibility of life and development to the whole body of the nation ...
— Germany and the Next War • Friedrich von Bernhardi

... love, not yet would the woman turn away. Even such hard words as these could not repulse her. ...
— Miracles of Our Lord • George MacDonald

... In the city thousands were willing, but none had courage, for the work, till a man of the people—Bartholomew Maniscalco by name—conspired with several others to give the signal of action. Meanwhile, forces were preparing to repulse the insurgents from Taormina, and the more prudent of the citizens deplored the impending effusion of the blood of their brethren. The people were on the alert, nor ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume VI. • Various

... (c) The Franchise; (d) Their Foreign Affairs; (e) Amnesty for Colonial Burghers; (f) Their relation to other Powers; (g) The Paramount Power of England, and (4) In order that they did not at once repulse the British by using the word "Independence," would it not be better to use another word instead, ...
— The Peace Negotiations - Between the Governments of the South African Republic and - the Orange Free State, etc.... • J. D. Kestell

... this there shall be no dispute, because I want you to grow; but there is another difficulty coming, which you will also have to repulse. ...
— Theaetetus • Plato

... into your family, and distinguished by repeated marks of your friendship and regard, the first return he makes for your civilities is to make love to your wife, if she is handsome; if not, to your sister, or daughter, or niece. If he suffers a repulse from your wife, or attempts in vain to debauch your sister, or your daughter, or your niece, he will, rather than not play the traitor with his gallantry, make his addresses to your grandmother; and ten to one but in one shape or another he will find means to ruin the peace of a family in which ...
— Travels Through France and Italy • Tobias Smollett

... Spain is very problematical in future. The principal object of the letter being our supposed excitements of the Chickasaws against the Creeks, and their protection of the latter, are we to understand from this, that if we arm to repulse the attacks of the Creeks on ourselves, it will disturb our peace with Spain? That if we will not fold our arms and let them butcher us without resistance, Spain will consider it as a cause of war? ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson

... in our affairs, which might prove dangerous to our national existence, why refuse additional means to guard it, though these be derived from an impure source? Will an innocent man, attacked by assassins, repulse the aid of one hastening to save him, on the ground that he, too, is a murderer? Certainly not. History, too, proves it by noble examples. Pelopidas, the Theban hero, invokes the aid of the Persian king, the natural enemy of the Greeks; Cato, who prefers a free death by his own hand to ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. 5, Issue 2, February, 1864 • Various

... learn Clifford's rank, family, and prospects; secondly, having ascertained the proprieties of the outer man, they were to examine the state of the inner one; and thirdly, should our skilful inquirer find his guesses at Clifford's affection for Lucy confirmed, they were to expel the modest fear of a repulse, which the squire allowed was natural enough, and to lead the object of the inquiry to a knowledge of the happiness that, Lucy consenting, might be in store for him. While, with his wonted ingenuity, the squire ...
— Paul Clifford, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... world. "The Lady of the Lake," except in the battle-piece, is told in a less rapid metre than that of the "Lay," less varied than that of "Marmion." "Rokeby" lives only by its songs; the "Lord of the Isles" by Bannockburn, the "Field of Waterloo" by the repulse of the Cuirassiers. But all the poems are interspersed with songs and ballads, as the beautiful ballad of "Alice Brand"; and Scott's fame rests on these far more than on his later versified romances. Coming immediately ...
— Essays in Little • Andrew Lang

... is the long wail of Slavery; in the other, the hymns of Freedom. And if we glance at special achievements, it will be difficult to find any thing in the history of South Carolina which presents so much of heroic spirit in an heroic cause as appears in that repulse of the Missouri invaders by the beleaguered town of Lawrence, where even the women gave their effective efforts to Freedom. The matrons of Rome, who poured their jewels into the treasury for the public defence—the wives of Prussia, who, with ...
— American Eloquence, Volume III. (of 4) - Studies In American Political History (1897) • Various

... exhausted, so was Hereward likewise. He knew well that a repulse was not a defeat. He knew well the indomitable persistence, the boundless resources, of the mastermind whom he defied; and he knew well that another attempt would be made, and then another, till—though it took seven years in the doing—Ely would be won at last. To hold out doggedly as long as ...
— Hereward, The Last of the English • Charles Kingsley

... all, for the sake of the goddess who is the common patron and parent and educator of both our cities. She founded your city a thousand years before ours (Observe that Plato gives the same date (9000 years ago) for the foundation of Athens and for the repulse of the invasion from Atlantis (Crit.).), receiving from the Earth and Hephaestus the seed of your race, and afterwards she founded ours, of which the constitution is recorded in our sacred registers to be 8000 ...
— Timaeus • Plato

... than of the king himself. He had before this become obnoxious to the nation by reason of his wealth and arrogance, because he had violently broken off the performance of some annual games, the omission of which was deemed an impiety: when through resentment of a repulse, because another had been preferred to him as a priest by the suffrages of the twelve states, he suddenly carried off, in the middle of the performance, the performers, of whom a great part were ...
— The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 • Titus Livius

... infliction of damage on the enemy battleship, or its repulse, or its diversion elsewhere, would also be suitable to the appropriate effect desired, though not in the same degree. Each such visualized accomplishment, suitable to the appropriate effect desired, may properly be considered as ...
— Sound Military Decision • U.s. Naval War College

... moment the hopes of peace; but it soon appeared that they had only power to treat for the ransom or exchange of prisoners. Pyrrhus rejected their demand, but at the festival of the Saturnalia he released all the prisoners on their word of honour. Their keeping of that word, and the repulse by the Roman ambassador of an attempt at bribery, were celebrated by posterity in a manner most unbecoming and betokening rather the dishonourable character of the later, than the honourable ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen

... country, that they actually had their deputy governors at Kyoto and in Kyushu in the south-west, and thought nothing of banishing Mikados to distant islands. Their rule was made memorable by the repulse of the Mongol fleet sent by Kublai Khan with the purpose of adding Japan to his gigantic dominions. This was at the end of the 13th century, since which time Japan has never been attacked from without." (B. H. Chamberlain, Things Japanese, ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo, Volume 2 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa

... Signor Grirnaldi, more accustomed than most of his friends to the frank deportment and bold speech of mariners, from having dwelt long on the coast of the Mediterranean, felt disposed rather to humor than to repulse this ...
— The Headsman - The Abbaye des Vignerons • James Fenimore Cooper

... creatures astray. Perhaps as often as once a week, almost always late in the evening, one of these unhappy lost ones seeks to make friends with me. His advances toward this end always begin by his dogging my footsteps at a little distance. If I do not repulse him he will come nearer until he has made sure of my attention. A friendly word will bring him to my hand; but his behavior is never effusive, as it would be if he had found his rightful owner, but ...
— Domesticated Animals - Their Relation to Man and to his Advancement in Civilization • Nathaniel Southgate Shaler

... enemy had been driven away, Carruthers pointed out to Marbo the advantage of gathering the stones up from the ground and returning them to the space around the mouth of the tunnel so that he and his followers would be ready for a second repulse. ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, October, 1930 • Various

... Shortly after the repulse of Proctor, Fernando, who had taken a place in another company, was sent to Fort Stephenson, then commanded by Major George Croghan, a regular army officer only twenty-one years of age. Proctor's dusky allies marched across the country to assist ...
— Sustained honor - The Age of Liberty Established • John R. Musick,

... parents to set out with too sanguine a dependence on the merit of their children, as it is for them to be discouraged at every repulse. When their wishes are defeated in this or that particular instance, where they had treasured up some darling expectation, this is so far from being a reason for relaxing their attention, that it ought to be an additional motive for redoubling ...
— Essays on Various Subjects - Principally Designed for Young Ladies • Hannah More

... makes an offer of his hand by letter, the letter must be answered, and certainly not returned, should the answer be a refusal; unless, indeed, when, from a previous repulse, or some other particular and special circumstances, such an offer may be regarded by the lady or her relatives as presumptuous and intrusive. Under such circumstances, the letter may be placed by the lady in the hands of her parents ...
— Routledge's Manual of Etiquette • George Routledge

... awaited. The colonies took the initiative by asking if reinforcements would be acceptable, and upon an affirmative reply the additional troops and sums required received the votes of men of all parties; Buller's first repulse at Colenso, and the news of Roberts' appointment to the chief {p.082} command in South Africa, contributing simultaneously to harden determination and to swell enthusiasm. Whatever may be thought of the judgment of the Ministry in the first refusal, which but reflected ...
— Story of the War in South Africa - 1899-1900 • Alfred T. Mahan

... certainly always with politeness. Yet, fatal sign, Mary Ellen never ran for her mirror when she knew that Franklin was coming. He was but one of the many who came to the Halfway House; and Franklin, after more than one quiet repulse, began to know that this was an indifference grounded deeper than the strange haughtiness which came to be assumed by so many women of the almost womanless West, who found themselves in a land where the irreverent ...
— The Girl at the Halfway House • Emerson Hough

... kind attempt," said I. "I shall very likely be sorry some day that I repulse it. I shall always be glad to remember ...
— A Man of Mark • Anthony Hope

... I should think we are! It was talking about poor Mr Contrabando that made me think of it. Poor chap! I hope he will be able to repulse, as you call it, the Frenchies at the next attack. He is well provisioned; that's one comfort. And didn't he provision us? My haversack's all right with what I helped myself to at breakfast yesterday. ...
— !Tention - A Story of Boy-Life during the Peninsular War • George Manville Fenn

... Nature's heart, Sought the young singer, and his limpid lays, O'er sweet, perchance, yet made the quick blood start To many a cheek mere glittering; rhymes left cold. But through the gates of Ivory or of Horn His vivid vision flocked, and who so bold As to repulse with scorn The shining troop because of shadowy birth. Of bodiless passion, or light ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 103, October 15, 1892 • Various

... The good influence of the Roaches, Rodmans, Arnolds, Grinnells, and Robesons did not pervade all classes of its people. The test of the real civilization of the community came when I applied for work at my trade, and then my repulse was emphatic and decisive. It so happened that Mr. Rodney French, a wealthy and enterprising citizen, distinguished as an anti-slavery man, was fitting out a vessel for a whaling voyage, upon which ...
— The Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, 1995, Memorial Issue • Various

... the camp with heavy blows; even this, the white man who has inherited Holy Church would have done, but the red men, born savages, would not let him. Although they would not listen to me they let me stay, unharmed. I witnessed, or rather heard, their attack upon you last night, and their repulse has made them only the more eager for your destruction. It has also ...
— The Free Rangers - A Story of the Early Days Along the Mississippi • Joseph A. Altsheler

... regiment had been lost. Mr. Barton, in taking up the evening paper, lying beside Diana, which contained the news, had made very much the remark foretold by Captain Roughsedge in the afternoon. It was, he thought, a pity the repulse had not been more decisive—so as to show all the world into what a hornet's nest the Government was going—"and a hornet's nest which will cost us half a million to take ...
— The Testing of Diana Mallory • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... came when the squadron of cavalry, at one end of the field, and backed by the signal and ordnance detachments, now bearing rifles, impersonated a hostile advance, firing volleys and "at will" at the artillery and infantry, posted to repulse them. ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys as Sergeants - or, Handling Their First Real Commands • H. Irving Hancock

... observed the Tracer meaningly. "Now, Mr. Carden, one last word: The moment you find yourself in love with her, and the first moment you have the chance to do so decently, make love to her. She won't dismiss you; she will repulse you, of course, but she won't let you go. I know what I am saying; all I ask of you is to promise on your honor to carry out these instructions. Do ...
— The Tracer of Lost Persons • Robert W. Chambers

... night there. He will take a disgust to me and have another mistress."—"You will not avoid that," replied the Duchess, "by following your new diet, and that diet will kill you; render your company more and more precious to the King by your gentleness: do not repulse him in his fond moments, and let time do the rest; the chains of habit will bind him to you for ever." They then embraced; Madame de Pompadour recommended secrecy to Madame de Brancas, ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre

... while with the Legion were of no very distinguished character, and require no lengthened chronicle. Their great feat of arms, the repulse of an advanced guard of Victor's corps, had taken place the very morning I had joined them, and the ensuing month was passed in soft ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 1 (of 2) • Charles Lever

... north-west shores of Hudson Bay to the coast of the Arctic at the point where the Back or Great Fish river runs in a wide estuary to the sea. He had wintered on the isthmus (now called after him) which separates Regent's Inlet from Repulse Bay, and in the spring of 1854 had gone westward with sledges towards the mouth of the Back. On his way he fell in with Eskimos, who told him that several years before a party of about forty white men had been seen hauling a boat and sledges over the ice. This was ...
— Adventurers of the Far North - A Chronicle of the Frozen Seas • Stephen Leacock

... prevarications that of base infidelity. Instead of encountering gibbets and wild beasts, we were scared at the sight of the least difficulty; or we had not courage to make the least sacrifice of our passions, or to repulse the weakest and most contemptible assaults of the world. Its example, or that dangerous company from which we had not resolution to separate ourselves, carried us {344} away; and we had not courage to withstand those very maxims which we ourselves ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler

... stimulate the enthusiasm of the troops, and to hold out those threats against England when conceived necessary for diverting attention from the real motive of his hostile preparations, which was to invade Germany and repulse the Russian troops, who had begun their march towards Austria. Such was the true object of Napoleons ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton

... present, they laughed at the grand victories the papers were publishing every day, but rather leaned to the opposite extreme, and gave them less credit than was their due, for they would believe that the Federal troops were always victorious. Even after McClellan's repulse before Richmond, they continued, for weeks, to assure us that he had the town, and had beaten the ...
— Daring and Suffering: - A History of the Great Railroad Adventure • William Pittenger

... obliged to winter upon Beechey Island, and in the following year (September 1846) his two ships were beset in Victoria Strait, about twelve miles from King William Land. Curiously enough, in the following year (1847) J. Rae had been despatched by land from Cape Repulse in Hudson's Bay, and had coasted along the east coast of Boothia, thus connecting Ross's and Franklin's coast journeys with Hudson's Bay. On 18th April 1847 Rae had reached a point on Boothia less than 150 miles from Franklin on the other side ...
— The Story of Geographical Discovery - How the World Became Known • Joseph Jacobs

... as his princess, or in any of the several terms which signify possession. You had fought for me, but had never asked me in marriage, and so when you called me your princess, you see," she faltered, "I was hurt, but even then, John Carter, I did not repulse you, as I should have done, until you made it doubly worse by taunting me with ...
— A Princess of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... deprive him of this last chance of safety, rushed upon him, with the intention of dragging him out into the circle where he would have been trampled under foot. The fear of death gave Father d'Aigrigny extraordinary strength, and he was able once more to repulse the quarryman, and remain entrenched in the corner where he had taken refuge. The resistance of the victim redoubled the rage of the assailants. Cries of murderous import resounded with new violence. The quarryman again rushed upon Father d'Aigrigny, saying, "Follow ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue

... something, referring either to Vendale or to himself, which had raised Marguerite's spirit, and which had placed him, for the first time, face to face with a resolute assertion of his niece's will? It might or might not be. This only was certain—he looked like a man who had met with a repulse. ...
— No Thoroughfare • Charles Dickens and Wilkie Collins

... chemical natural process we observe the most varied elements related to each other in the most various ways. They attract or repulse each other. They enter into combinations or they withdraw from them. These are nothing but actions and interactions which we ascribe to certain forces inherent in ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park

... of his own. Nature not only abhors a vacuum, but she utterly repudiates an entirely successful man. There probably never lived one yet to whom the morning did not bring some disaster, the evening some repulse. John Hunter, the greatest, most successful surgeon, the genius, the wonder, the admired of all, upon whose words they whose lives had been spent in science hung, said, as he went to his last lecture, "If I quarrel with any one to-night, it will kill me." An obstinate surgeon of the old school ...
— Brave Men and Women - Their Struggles, Failures, And Triumphs • O.E. Fuller

... brawling Jihun under a roof of thatch, whose walls were represented by more or less upright wooden posts and debris; for Kagig would not permit anything to stand even for an hour that Turks could come and fortify. None of us believed that the repulse of that handful of Kurdish plunderers and the capture of a Turkish colonel would be the end ...
— The Eye of Zeitoon • Talbot Mundy

... Gaston de Nueil, already rich from his Norman estates that afforded an income of eighteen thousand francs, married Mademoiselle Stephanie de la Rodiere. Wearying of the marriage tie, he wished to renew his former relations with Madame de Beauseant. Exasperated by the haughty repulse at the hands of his former mistress, Nueil killed himself. ...
— Repertory Of The Comedie Humaine, Complete, A — Z • Anatole Cerfberr and Jules Franois Christophe

... from their surprise a dropping fire was opened, almost every shot taking effect. A cheer broke from the defenders of the waggons, and they fought with renewed hope, while the Indians, startled by this unlooked-for attack, and by the repulse of their comrades, began ...
— Captain Bayley's Heir: - A Tale of the Gold Fields of California • G. A. Henty

... Germans, beaten off time after time as they were, must soon abandon the attempt to break the French lines at Verdun; but each repulse brought a new assault mightier than before. The Germans raced across the open ground under a veritable hail of lead. They fell by hundreds and thousands, but what few survived hurled themselves against the barbed wire entanglements ...
— The Boy Allies At Verdun • Clair W. Hayes

... for himself. But the choice between love and gold may not rest altogether with him. He may be an ugly, ungracious, unamiable person, whose affections may seem merely ludicrous and despicable to you. In that case, you may repulse him, and most bitterly humiliate and disappoint him. What is left to him then but to curse the love he can never win, and turn remorselessly to the gold? With that, he will make short work of your golden age, and leave you lamenting ...
— The Perfect Wagnerite - A Commentary on the Niblung's Ring • George Bernard Shaw

... that took place may have been a hard one or a light one. We have no very full account of it. The most we know is that Bacon and his men won the victory, and that the governor's men were driven back, leaving their drum and their dead behind them. Whether hard or light, his repulse was enough for Sir William's valor. Well intrenched as he was and superior in numbers, his courage suddenly gave out, and he fled in haste to his ships, which set sail in equal haste down the river, their speed accelerated by the cannon-balls which ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 2 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris

... country, said that her parents were much employed in making these pots, chiefly it seems as articles of barter. The asbestos, which they use in the shape of a roundish pointed stick called tatko for trimming the lamps, is met with about Repulse Bay, and generally, as they ...
— Journal of the Third Voyage for the Discovery of a North-West Passage • William Edward Parry

... arose out of the war, as Shakespeare arose out of the destruction of the Armada, as the Greek poets arose out of the repulse of the Persians. It was impossible, it was unprecedented, that a national revulsion should not produce national poetry—and ...
— Emerson and Other Essays • John Jay Chapman

... cab, repeated to himself, "She is so cold, this evening particularly. And yet, can it be that it was to hide any other feeling? If I thought so—good God!" and he half started up as if to call to the driver, but sat down again. "No, no, I must not be a fool. I could not stand a repulse from her—I could never see her again. Better not risk it. And then I ...
— Four Ghost Stories • Mrs. Molesworth

... 476)] 29. He did not know how he would repulse the one of them [Footnote: "They" are C. Fabricius Luscinus and Q. Aemilius Papus, Roman consuls.] first, nor how he should repel them both, and was in perplexity. To divide the army, which was smaller than that of his opponents, ...
— Dio's Rome, Vol VI. • Cassius Dio

... of Jennka came back to her, full of such inescapable despair and unbelief ... Would the all-merciful, all-gracious Lord forgive or would He not forgive her foul, fumy, embittered, unclean life? All-Knowing—can it be that Thou wouldst repulse her—the pitiful rebel, the involuntary libertine; a child that had uttered blasphemies against Thy radiant, holy name? Thou—Benevolence, ...
— Yama (The Pit) • Alexandra Kuprin

... should do as well here as anywhere, or better, since, while Matelgar was away, I might yet see Alswythe again; though that, after my repulse by the sheriff, or perhaps I should rather say by his advisers, I thought not of trying yet. It would but be another parting. Still, I might find old Wulfhere, and send her messages by him before setting out ...
— A Thane of Wessex • Charles W. Whistler

... daughter, consent to fight: thou must needs grant one thing or the other. We wish either to die or to have our prayers beard. Something—sorrow if not joy—we will get from thee. Frode will be better pleased to hear of our slaughter than of our repulse." Without another word, he threatened to aim a blow at the king's throat with his sword. The king replied that it was unseemly for the royal majesty to meet an inferior in rank in level combat, and unfit that those of unequal station should fight as equals. But when Westmar persisted in ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")

... were stationed, how we attempted to outflank them, how they left their original positions to protect the assailed outpost, how the battle raged and was decided around that point, and how a single mistake caused our first repulse, and, for lack of subsequent generalship, produced the shameful and disastrous rout. Russell's description is far less clear and concise. "Carleton" confirms McDowell's military scholarship, but not his generalship. It is one thing to set squadrons in ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 13, No. 78, April, 1864 • Various

... station, and had been ready to put up with what nature had given, you would neither have experienced the former affront, nor would your ill fortune have had to feel {the additional pang} of this repulse." ...
— The Fables of Phdrus - Literally translated into English prose with notes • Phaedrus

... repulse of Xerxes it is possible that the Aeginetans played a larger part than is conceded to them by Herodotus. The Athenian tradition, which he follows in the main, would naturally seek to obscure their services. It was to Aegina rather than Athens that the prize of valour at Salamis ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia

... your confidence," said Armstrong. "As the sick beast or the hurt bird knows by an infallible instinct what herb or plant will best promote its cure, so it seems to me does Providence direct me to you. Repulse me not, ...
— The Lost Hunter - A Tale of Early Times • John Turvill Adams

... the seeds of another quarrel between him and Duke Robert, who soliciting the King to perform some covenants of the last peace, and meeting with a repulse, withdrew in great discontent ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, Vol. X. • Jonathan Swift

... silence, as had never before been between us. I had a book before me. I saw no word of it. I could not drive the vision away—the lovely, pleading face, the penitence. Good heavens! How could he repulse her as he had done? Her repeated request that he would take that money—what did it all mean? And, moreover, my heart was sore that he had concealed it all from me. About the past I felt no resentment; there was a secret there which I respected; ...
— The First Violin - A Novel • Jessie Fothergill

... shown your gratitude by mending your way of life. If you have come here to thank me, it was not necessary. Still, however you have found me out, there must be something good in the feeling that has brought you here, and I will not repulse you; but surely you ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens

... that he had actually been one of those who went in the launch of the Dane, to bring down the other boat and raft to the reef, after the ship had been recaptured. It is true, in this attempt, he had met with a cold repulse, but it was so gentlemanlike and distant, that he had still hopes of succeeding in persuading the other to believe what he affirmed; by way of doing which, he endeavoured all he could to believe it himself. So much confusion existed in his own faculties during ...
— Homeward Bound - or, The Chase • James Fenimore Cooper

... of a night advance, a bloody attack and a fearful repulse in which General Juan Dicampa's force had ...
— How Janice Day Won • Helen Beecher Long

... This repulse did not check for a moment the activity of the Indians, though for a long time we hear nothing more of Philip. On the 2d of September they slew eight men at Northfield and on the 4th they surrounded and butchered Captain Beers ...
— The Beginnings of New England - Or the Puritan Theocracy in its Relations to Civil and Religious Liberty • John Fiske

... apparel, and ammunition; they lost also about five hundred men, in killed, wounded and prisoners; but all this was not of so much injury as the loss of the prestige of victory. The peasants had conceived themselves invincible, and they were struck with consternation to find they were liable to repulse and defeat. Early on the following morning, another council of war was held, but the spirits and hopes of the ...
— La Vendee • Anthony Trollope

... hardened. "You must not do that," she said, coldly, unkindly, harshly. She scowled. She would not abate one crease in her forehead to the appeal of his surprised glance. Yet she did not want to repulse him. The instinct which repulsed him was not within her control. Just as a shy man will obstinately refuse an invitation which he is hungering to accept, so, though not from shyness, she was compelled to repulse Chirac. Perhaps if ...
— The Old Wives' Tale • Arnold Bennett

... a picture, painted about 1730, of the Duchess of Bedford, with a black servant behind her, who holds an Umbrella over her, and a sketch of the same period attached to a song called "The Generous Repulse," shows a lady seated on a flowery bank holding a Parasol with a long handle over her head, while she gently checks the ardour of her swain, and consoles him by the ...
— Umbrellas and their History • William Sangster

... house of rather larger size than the rest; my guide having led me into a long, low room, placed me in the middle of the floor, and then hurrying to the door, he endeavoured to repulse the crowd who strove to enter with us. I now looked around the room. It was rather scantily furnished; I could see nothing but some tubs and barrels, the mast of a boat, and a sail or two. Seated upon the tubs were three or four men coarsely dressed, like fishermen or shipwrights. The principal ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume 19 - Travel and Adventure • Various

... could have thoroughly understood the impetuosity of Will's repulse or the bitterness of his words. No one but himself then knew how everything connected with the sentiment of his own dignity had an immediate bearing for him on his relation to Dorothea and to Mr. Casaubon's treatment ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot



Words linked to "Repulse" :   defend, oppose, push back, force back, beat back, fight, repulsion, drive back, fight off, turn off, fight back, displease, disgust, rebuff, drive, repel, snub, churn up, sicken, force, attract, fight down, put off, revolt



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