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Retaliate   Listen
verb
Retaliate  v. t.  (past & past part. retaliated; pres. part. retaliating)  To return the like for; to repay or requite by an act of the same kind; to return evil for (evil). (Now seldom used except in a bad sense.) "One ambassador sent word to the duke's son that his visit should be retaliated." "It is unlucky to be obliged to retaliate the injuries of authors, whose works are so soon forgotten that we are in danger of appearing the first aggressors."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Retaliate" Quotes from Famous Books



... aggravated impatience, a growing rebellion, seized him. He wouldn't stay with his wife at Java Head a day longer than necessary; and if anyone, in his family or outside, showed the slightest disdain he could retaliate with his knowledge of local pettiness, the backbiting enmities and ...
— Java Head • Joseph Hergesheimer

... thought of the wrongs he had borne, as it seemed to him, so patiently; in Rainham's lifetime there had doubtless been reasons, but was he never to retaliate? Had not he considered other people enough? His forbearance struck him now as a kind of weakness, as something almost contemptible, to be thought of with a feeling akin ...
— A Comedy of Masks - A Novel • Ernest Dowson and Arthur Moore

... tell you something, Priscilla," impressively. "Someone who is cleverer than I am has said that it is never safe to snub a pretty girl, because there is always the possibility that she'll marry well and be able to retaliate. The same thing applies to one who has brains and is in earnest. I've made it a rule never to disparage the efforts of a person who had a definite purpose and works to attain it. It's about a fifty-to-one ...
— The Fighting Shepherdess • Caroline Lockhart

... surely understand, Mr. Fairfax, that your profession necessarily entails risks. This is one of them. You have been paid to become my enemy. I had no personal quarrel with you. You can scarcely blame me, therefore, if I retaliate when I have an opportunity. I don't know what you may think of it, but the mere fact of you dining with me to-night is very likely to go hard with you, so far as your clients are concerned. Would it be a ...
— My Strangest Case • Guy Boothby

... only knew something of this woman's relations to Marion—which she only instinctively suspected—and could retaliate upon her, Mrs. Bunker felt she would have given up her life ...
— Sally Dows and Other Stories • Bret Harte

... the Rafferty children, who had got to know Hal well, joined in the teasing. "Mister Minetti! Lika da spagetti!" Hal, when he had grasped the situation, was tempted to retaliate by reminding them that he had offered to board with the Irish, and been turned down; but he feared that the elder Rafferty might not appreciate this joke, so instead he pretended to have supposed all along that the Rafferties were Italians. He ...
— King Coal - A Novel • Upton Sinclair

... enough blow to bring tears to his eyes and the angry blood to his cheeks. Catching up a cushion that lay near, he sent it whizzing at Dave, and had the satisfaction of seeing it hit his cousin full in the face; then, before Dave could retaliate, he slipped into the hall and slammed the door of the ...
— The Children's Portion • Various

... and finely adjusted piece of mechanism that any excess is liable to clog its workings and put it out of order. It is made for sufficiency alone. Nature never intended man to be a glutton; and she seldom fails to retaliate and avenge excesses by pain, disease ...
— Explanation of Catholic Morals - A Concise, Reasoned, and Popular Exposition of Catholic Morals • John H. Stapleton

... name, his business, the kind of restaurant he frequented, where he went when he left his room all day, the meaning of those funny slips of paper, and the written manuscripts, and why he was so quiet. But any attempt of his to retaliate by counter questions was met by a sudden reserve so unchildlike and painful to him—as it was evidently to themselves—that he desisted, wisely postponing his inquiries until he could ...
— Under the Redwoods • Bret Harte

... the bravos to recover his troubled senses and to seek to retaliate upon his assailant. He whipped his long rapier from its sheath, and was making for the intruder when Cocardasse flung his strong arms around the hunchback and restrained him. "Be easy," he cried; "it is the little Parisian!" And at the same moment Passepoil, with ...
— The Duke's Motto - A Melodrama • Justin Huntly McCarthy

... Church. And schism is more likely to be charged against those who violate the spirit of Christian charity in making harsh and false statements against their fellow-members in the Body of Christ. Let us not retaliate, lest we also commit that sin. We can afford to wait. Five minutes in heaven, or less, will ...
— Love to the Uttermost - Expositions of John XIII.-XXI. • F. B. Meyer

... a blockade of a port and punish neutrals for violating it, unless their ships were actually caught in an attempt to enter the port. Denmark and Sweden joined Russia in what was known as the Armed Neutrality and promised that they would retaliate upon any nation which did not respect the ...
— Washington and his Comrades in Arms - A Chronicle of the War of Independence • George Wrong

... from the graves, we met a man in mourning, whose wife had been killed in a canoe by natives about Round Head. He and his friends had resolved to retaliate, but through the influence of the teachers they did not do so. The teachers from the villages to the east of Port Moresby came in this afternoon, looking well and hearty. Some of them have suffered a good deal from fever and ague, but are now becoming ...
— Adventures in New Guinea • James Chalmers

... Public disputations were held in the open air. The St. Paul's boys meeting St. Antony's boys would derisively call them St. Antony's pigs, that saint being generally represented with a pig following him, and challenge them to a disputation; the latter would retaliate by styling their rivals "pigeons of St. Paul's," from the bird which then, as now, frequented St. Paul's Churchyard. From questions of grammar, writes Stow,(1050) they usually fell to blows "with their satchels full of books, many times in great heaps, ...
— London and the Kingdom - Volume I • Reginald R. Sharpe

... or much foresight. But, though provoked by everything that can stir the blood of men, their houses and chapels in flames, and with the most atrocious profanations of everything which they hold sacred before their eyes, not a hand was moved to retaliate, or even to defend. Had a conflict once begun, the rage of their persecutors would have redoubled. Thus fury increasing by the reverberation of outrages, house being fired for house, and church for chapel, I am convinced that no power under heaven could have prevented a general conflagration, ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... the town, as distinguished from the suburb, believes the men of the latter to be one and all thieves, and the women and girls of the suburb to be one and all disreputable characters. Hence the town strives always to restrict and extirpate the suburb, while the suburbans retaliate upon the townsfolk with robbery and arson and murder, while despising those townsfolk for their parsimony, decorum, and avarice, and detesting the settled, comfortable mode of life which ...
— Through Russia • Maxim Gorky

... operation case who is needing a lot of special nursing, and some admissions—one in at 11 P.M., who was only wounded at 9 o'clock. I hope these magnificent roars and rumblings are making a mess of the barbed wire and German trenches. There seems to be a pretty general opinion that they will retaliate by dropping them into this place if they have time, ...
— Diary of a Nursing Sister on the Western Front, 1914-1915 • Anonymous

... constitution and favoured France rather than England. Its leader was Thomas Jefferson. Adams proved but a poor party leader, and the power of the Federalists failed after eight years. He had gained some popularity in the early part of his first term when France began to retaliate for the Jay Treaty by seizing American ships, and would not receive the American minister. He appointed Charles Coatesworth Pinckney, with John Marshall and Elbridge Gerry, as a commission to treat with the French. ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol XII. - Modern History • Arthur Mee

... temporary insanity sometimes takes possession of the fish. It is not strange that when harpooned it should retaliate by attacking its assailant. An old swordfisherman told Mr. Blackman that his vessel had been struck twenty times. There are, however, many instances of entirely unprovoked assaults on vessels at sea. Many ...
— Tales of Fishes • Zane Grey

... son, named Uffe, shrinking from a conflict, transported his army into Denmark, thinking it better to assail the house of his enemy than to guard his own, and deeming it a timely method of repelling his wrongs to retaliate upon his foe what he was suffering at his hands. Thus the Danes had to return and defend their own, preferring the safety of their land to lordship of a foreign realm; and Uffe went back to his own country, now ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")

... personal fear in his manner. "If you beat the poor slave to death, you cannot learn what his master hath forbid him to tell. A short walk will save your honour the stain, and yourself the trouble, of beating what cannot resist, and me the pain of enduring what I can neither retaliate ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott

... Lady Jane, and we met the two girls almost at the threshold. I had told Brandon of the bantering conversation about the title and estates of the late Duke of Suffolk, and he had laughed over it in the best of humor. If quick to retaliate for an intentional offense, he was not thin-skinned at a piece of pleasantry, and had none of that stiff, sensitive dignity, so troublesome to one's self ...
— When Knighthood Was in Flower • Charles Major

... general head of Liberalism, when they were likely to be overheard, or when they could not trust the man to whom they were speaking. If no one feared Astrardente, no one trusted him either. Valdarno consequently judged it best to smother his annoyance at the old man's words, and to retaliate by striking him ...
— Saracinesca • F. Marion Crawford

... cares of State," quoted Adrien, with a smile. "But I might retaliate. Why do we not see you up in town? Society misses one ...
— Adrien Leroy • Charles Garvice

... they feared to attempt it lest they be watched and reported. Later, however, even this semblance of fear disappeared, and they acted under me precisely as they do under others, because they are convinced that I will not stoop to spy or retaliate. ...
— Henry Ossian Flipper, The Colored Cadet at West Point • Henry Ossian Flipper

... general liquidation began; while the State legislatures, in the effort to adjust war finances, imposed what were felt to be high taxes. The result was a general complaint of hard times, poverty, and insufficient money. Some States made efforts to retaliate against Great Britain by tariffs and navigation laws, but this only damaged their own ports by driving British Trade to their neighbours'. Congress could afford no help, since it had no ...
— The Wars Between England and America • T. C. Smith

... also, fully aware that, as the Spanish of Florida and Cuba entertained no good will towards him, they would seek an opportunity to retaliate his "assault and battery," which, though it had proved on his part a failure, had been to them a grievous annoyance. He, therefore, kept scout-boats continually on the look out, to give notice of the approach to the coast of any armed vessel. On the ...
— Biographical Memorials of James Oglethorpe • Thaddeus Mason Harris

... effort to retaliate. He cowered under the attack, holding his hands in front of him as if to ward it off. In a moment, Jakdane and the other crewman had reached Asrange and ...
— The Jupiter Weapon • Charles Louis Fontenay

... to retaliate for the fun that had been made of his pretensions to beauty. "They whom the term fits," he growled, "ought not to complain, if I endure it, who ...
— An Enemy To The King • Robert Neilson Stephens

... answered. In the first place, during Crauford's acquaintance with Glendower abroad, the latter had often, though innocently, galled the vanity and self-pride of the parvenu affecting the aristocrat, and in poverty the parvenu was anxious to retaliate. But this desire would probably have passed away after he had satisfied his curiosity, or gloated his spite, by one or two insights into Glendower's home,—for Crauford, though at times a malicious, ...
— The Disowned, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... we will have a proclamation posted in Paris, and in the various camps of the army, saying that we have warned the English Government that, unless the officers and men captured off the coast of Scotland are treated as prisoners of war, we shall retaliate by treating all French officers taken in foreign service in the same way; and that we have furthermore offered to exchange an equal number of such officers and men, in our hands, for those held by the ...
— In the Irish Brigade - A Tale of War in Flanders and Spain • G. A. Henty

... discouraging. Fancy a morning call upon your particular friend. You knock at the door, and are immediately greeted at the threshold with a quart of sulphur thrown into your face. Yet this is precisely the experience of this patient little insect, which manifests no disposition to retaliate with the concealed weapon which on much less provocation he is quick to employ. Here he comes, eager for the fray. He alights upon one of the tiny bells scarce half the size of his body. Creeping down beneath it, he inserts his tongue into the narrowed opening. Instantly a copious shower ...
— My Studio Neighbors • William Hamilton Gibson

... to anger, and he longed to retaliate on his enemies. He knew well enough that the men creeping down upon him were hired tools, chosen by his foes to do him ...
— Frank Merriwell's Races • Burt L. Standish

... war General Scott had been very partial to General Worth—indeed he continued so up to the close of hostilities—but, for some reason, Worth had become estranged from his chief. Scott evidently took this coldness somewhat to heart. He did not retaliate, however, but on the contrary showed every disposition to appease his subordinate. It was understood at the time that he gave Worth authority to plan and execute the battle of Molino del Rey without dictation or interference from any one, for the ...
— Personal Memoirs of U. S. Grant, Complete • Ulysses S. Grant

... to your own comfort at the expense of your neighbours overhead? Have the goodness to be quiet at once!" It's awfully unfair, because when they stoke their anthracite stoves, or throw their boots on the floor at 1 a.m. over my sleeping head, I could only retaliate by climbing to the top of my wardrobe, and knocking the whitewash off my own ceiling. Such are the ironies of life for ...
— The Lady of the Basement Flat • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey

... made food, evolving in the conflict structures fitted to accomplish both reactions. Everywhere the strong prey upon the weak, the swift upon the slow, the clever upon the stupid; and the weak, the slow, the stupid, retaliate by evolving mechanisms of defense, which more or less adequately repel or render futile the oppressor's attack. For each must live, and those already living have proved their right to existence by a more or less complete adaptation ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park

... all day on emplacements. In the evening we were called upon to retaliate for German mortars, and pumped hell into them for a few minutes (excuse the word, it is the only one I can think of), and soon shut them up. I was relieved ...
— Letters from France • Isaac Alexander Mack

... officers are included in this Proclamation, or were previously outlawed and adjudged a felon's death. Delay remonstrance much longer, and retaliation must supersede it. If the Government wishes to be spared the necessity of retaliating, it has only to say that it will retaliate—to declare by proclamation or general order that all its soldiers who may be captured must receive from the Rebels the treatment to which, as prisoners of war, they are, by the usages of war, entitled. The Government can know no distinction of color ...
— History of the Negro Race in America from 1619 to 1880. Vol. 2 (of 2) - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George Washington Williams

... was shocked at the slight regard shown for her charms. Soon she plunged into excesses almost as bad as her husband's." In 1769 they were divorced. Frederick William married a Princess of Darmstadt. The second marriage was no happier than the first. The Princess did not retaliate, though she did not lack incentives to do so. The Prince lapsed back into his dissolute habits. Apart from many passing fancies, he had a recognized mistress-in-chief. This person, who managed always to retain the favour, if not the ...
— German Problems and Personalities • Charles Sarolea

... Negro side, he has been patient and forbearing. With these outbreaks of persecution some are discouraged, and are ready to surrender their manhood. On the other hand, some are no longer patient, but are enraged. They would retaliate. They feel that defense against wrongs is right. An influential Negro paper says, "EDUCATE, AGITATE, RETALIATE. Does one strike me? With the power of God on high, back also will I strike him." This feeling grows. Add to it the fact that the Negro is developing ...
— American Missionary, Volume 43, No. 12, December, 1889 • Various

... time been clamored down, and told that we had no right to speak, and that we were out of our place in public meetings; far be it from us, when women assemble, and a man has a thought in his soul, burning for utterance, to retaliate ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage

... canoe, and dragged him to the shore; where another party of the natives, lying in ambush, seized such of the crew as were absent from the ship. But how did these savages behave, when they had these different persons in their power? Did they not instantly retaliate by murdering them all? No—they only obliged the captain to give an order on the vessel to pay his debts. This fact came out only two months ago in a trial in the court of common pleas—not in a trial for piracy and murder—but in the trial of a civil suit, instituted ...
— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the Abolition of the African Slave Trade by the British Parliament (1808) • Thomas Clarkson

... I imagine he suspected a trap of some sort. But the doctor will discover, probably before the day is out, how he has been tricked. Then he will begin to investigate, and if he finds out that it was my wife who admitted the man, he may in his rage decide to retaliate upon her. I cannot think of leaving Brussels, without her. She must go with me. Upon that I ...
— The Ivory Snuff Box • Arnold Fredericks

... were but armed I would make him respect it," I exclaimed, greatly exasperated at being obliged to submit tamely to being fired at without the power to retaliate. "But," I continued, "since we cannot fight we will run. The wind is light, and that brig must be a smart craft indeed if, in such weather as this, we cannot run away ...
— A Middy in Command - A Tale of the Slave Squadron • Harry Collingwood

... gods! Ah, do I not? I fear not the gods, but still I have a dread of that one God. I destroyed his temple, I plundered his sanctuary, I carried his vessels to the house of my god, in the land of Shinar. Is he about to retaliate? I shall see. Shall I humble myself before a strange god? Shall I now, after having reached the very pinnacle of fame and glory, dishonor myself in the eyes of my nobles? Nay! Sooner than this, I will brave the vengeance ...
— The Young Captives - A Story of Judah and Babylon • Erasmus W. Jones

... god Ammon, Socrates, you are right; and I am glad to see that you have not forgotten your geometry. But before I retaliate on you, I must request the Stranger to ...
— Statesman • Plato

... Phillip, as he gazed wildly around, fearing some one should intrude upon his privacy. "It was the green-eyed monster that goaded the weak-minded Hubert to be tempted. And must I, in possession, of all my senses, retaliate from the same cause! Ah, no, Hubert. You will go free, but Heaven will not suffer you to pollute a pure and innocent being. Ah, no." And more than ever inspired with faith, in the decrees of an All-Wise Providence, Phillip Lawson fully resolved to ...
— Marguerite Verne • Agatha Armour

... without scruple over his counter; when the buyer was cheated or overcharged, as happened with great frequency, he had practically no redress in law. If the merchant were robbed of even ever so little he could retaliate by sending the guilty one to prison. But the merchant himself could invidiously and continuously rob the customer without fear of any law. All of this was converted into a code of moralities; and any bold spirit who exposed its cant and sham was ...
— Great Fortunes from Railroads • Gustavus Myers

... quietly, "you have been hitting me and if you do it again, I shall hit you." But Donald did not heed the warning, and in the next play he bowled at Bemus harder than ever for extra measure. Still the big Indian did not retaliate. ...
— Football Days - Memories of the Game and of the Men behind the Ball • William H. Edwards

... wagon-master in charge, had hired one hundred men. There were rumors, currently reported at that time and believed, that a large body of Texians were waiting on the road to plunder and murder this wagon party, and thus retaliate the treatment Armijo had been guilty of in the case of the "famous Muir Prisoners;" but, in order that this should not happen in Territory belonging to the United States, the War Department had ordered Captain Cook and the dragoons to guard the property as far as the fording ...
— The Life and Adventures of Kit Carson, the Nestor of the Rocky Mountains, from Facts Narrated by Himself • De Witt C. Peters

... some of his household seemed very anxious we should do, nothing could have saved us from a deluge. To commence the game upon the royal platform is the signal of indiscriminate warfare throughout the whole palace; the now passive troops would then have been allowed to retaliate, the garden-engines would have been stormed and captured by opposing squadrons, and the battle would have raged furiously until dark whereas now, company of soldiers after company were ordered in to be shot down like sheep. We, ...
— A Journey to Katmandu • Laurence Oliphant

... rushed by the freshmen, and they resolved to retaliate in a similar manner. On Saturday afternoons the freshmen ball team practiced, and Saturday was at hand. It would be an opportune time to meet the youngsters and make ...
— Frank Merriwell at Yale • Burt L. Standish

... tenants, but I did not particularly want a softling, you understand. Last March one of the tenants—Job Grantley, you know him—sneaked up here. It had been a vile day. He was in difficulties as to his rent, and Curtis was putting the pressure on. He had a fancy for squeezing those who couldn't retaliate, I ...
— Antony Gray,—Gardener • Leslie Moore

... and cousins swore they knew nothing of the matter, and they affected a belief that my father and I had done the job ourselves in dishonest violation of commercial good faith. Uncle William even threatened to retaliate by starting an opposition dance house at Ghost Rock. As 'The Saints' Rest' had become rather unpopular, I saw that this would assuredly ruin it and prove a paying enterprise, so I told my uncle that I was willing to overlook the past if he would take me into the scheme and keep the partnership ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Volume 8 - Epigrams, On With the Dance, Negligible Tales • Ambrose Bierce

... Pigeon could not stand this. Unless he would be jeered at and called sneak ever afterwards by all the little boys in the school, he felt that he must retaliate. He jumped up and sprang at Jack, aiming a blow, which, if the latter had not slipped aside, would have knocked him over. Jack, notwithstanding this, sprang back, and put himself on his defence, not only warding off the next blow Pigeon struck, but planting another between his eyes, which brought ...
— The Three Midshipmen • W.H.G. Kingston

... in part by the Navaho, the tribe had been in the habit of making raids on the New Mexican Indian pueblos and the white settlements along the Rio Grande, chiefly for the capture of livestock, although both Indians and Mexicans also were taken and enslaved. The Mexicans lost no opportunity to retaliate, with the result that scattered throughout their villages in the valley of the Rio Grande there were more captives of Navaho blood than there were Mexican prisoners among the Navaho tribe; but in the matter of sheep, cattle, and horses, the Navaho were ...
— The North American Indian • Edward S. Curtis

... of the dance and the revel. She was not one of those women whose meek and gentle nature would fly what wounds them: Constance had resolved to conquer. Despising glitter and gaiety, and show, she burned, she thirsted for power—a power which could retaliate the insults she fancied she had received, and should turn condescension into homage. This object, which every casual word, every heedless glance from another, fixed deeper and deeper in her heart, took a sort of sanctity from the associations with which she linked it—her father's ...
— Godolphin, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... thick-set grove of twelve-foot spears was far too dense for the cavalry to penetrate." But Edward withdrew the cavalry and ordered the archers to send a shower of arrows on the Scots. Wallace's cavalry made no attempt to interfere with the archers; the Scottish bowmen were too few to retaliate; and, when the English horse next charged, they found many weak points in the schiltrons, and broke up ...
— An Outline of the Relations between England and Scotland (500-1707) • Robert S. Rait

... that I mean to attempt to give them an edition of that Poet's [i.e. Shakespeare's] text, together with my corrections, I have concluded to give this notice, not only by advertisements, but by an occasional pamphlet, which, in order to retaliate some of our Editor's kindnesses to me, I mean to call, An Essay upon Mr. Pope's Judgment, extracted from his own Works; and humbly addressed to him" (id. ii., p. 551). Of this he forwards Warburton an extract. The pamphlet ...
— Eighteenth Century Essays on Shakespeare • D. Nichol Smith

... to look at the details of their costumes? Certainly not! I spring at the throat of the fugitive. He has a revolver and fires. How could I know the weapon was only loaded blank? He, an actor in a cinematograph scene, takes me for another, acting the part of a policeman. He fires at me and I retaliate." ...
— The Exploits of Juve - Being the Second of the Series of the "Fantmas" Detective Tales • mile Souvestre and Marcel Allain

... she said it set Mary's teeth on edge. She had never known any one before who purposely said disagreeable things. She often said them herself in her blundering, impetuous way, but was heartily sorry as soon as they were uttered. Now for the first time in her life she wanted to retaliate by saying the meanest thing she could think of. So she answered, hotly, "Oh, I don't know. I'd rather be named Mary than a name that means noble snake, ...
— The Little Colonel's Chum: Mary Ware • Annie Fellows Johnston

... corporal of the R.M.L.I. party could be prevailed upon to move his catapult and team from the spot where it had been posted by his own C.O. In view of the possibility that the enemy might be tempted, when he found the Vineyard attacked, to retaliate upon Argyle Street, fifty of "D" Company slept in F12, ready to move immediately to the assistance of the garrison of the ...
— The Fifth Battalion Highland Light Infantry in the War 1914-1918 • F.L. Morrison

... yet retained a fine native caution which counselled him to attempt no violence upon that offender; but his mental tension was such that it could be relieved only by his attacking some one; preferably some one forbidden to retaliate. I walked there temptingly but a pace ahead of him, after ...
— Ruggles of Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson

... resolved to have a demonstration. All their pent-up wrath against the master now found vent, since there was no longer any danger that the old man would have a chance to retaliate. They would serenade him. Bob Holliday was full of it. Harry Weathervane was very active. He was going to pound on his mother's bread-pan. Every sort of instrument for making a noise was brought into requisition. Dinner-bells, ...
— The Hoosier School-boy • Edward Eggleston

... provisions, who committed horrible excesses on the inhabitants, carrying away their cattle, or any provisions they could lay their hands on. It was this that chiefly infuriated the inhabitants against the French, and caused them to retaliate on any of their stragglers or wounded whom they came across butchering and using them in a most awful manner; and even then, after all this work, this method of gathering provisions for so large an army as Massena's was ...
— The Autobiography of Sergeant William Lawrence - A Hero of the Peninsular and Waterloo Campaigns • William Lawrence

... had been hostile, and that in such a character only I could have become their prisoner. Not only did these young people kiss me, but I (seeing no military reason against it) kissed them. Really, if young women will insist on kissing major generals, they must expect that the generals will retaliate. One only of the crowd adverted to the character in which I came before them: to be a lawful prisoner, it struck her too logical mind that I must have been caught in some aggressive practices. "Think," she said, "of this little dog fighting, ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey

... it, Mr Gresham; but if I am, do not you retaliate. I am weaker than you, and in your power; do not you, ...
— Doctor Thorne • Anthony Trollope

... in many respects, an affair to be settled between the kindreds of the plaintiff, so to speak, and the defendant. A man is wounded, killed, robbed, wronged in any way; his kin retaliate on the offender and his kindred. The blood-feud, the taking of blood for blood, endured for centuries in Scotland after the peace of the whole realm became, under David I., "the King's peace." Homicides, for example, were very ...
— A Short History of Scotland • Andrew Lang

... gentleman; John is," simply. "But Mr. McQuade hasn't forgotten; not he. He pays no attention to any of us; but that is no sign that he does not think a good deal. However, we do not worry. There is no possible chance for him to retaliate; at least John declares there isn't. But sometimes I grow afraid when I think it all over. To his mind I can see that he considers himself badly affronted; and from what I know of his history, he never lets an affront pass without striking back in ...
— Half a Rogue • Harold MacGrath

... and slander, the persecution of inferiority, tempts you for just a moment to retaliate, when for an instant you forget yourself so far as to hunger for revenge,—be calm. When the grey heron is pursued by its enemy, the eagle, it does not run to escape; it remains calm, takes a dignified stand, and waits quietly, facing the ...
— The Majesty of Calmness • William George Jordan

... Confederation of the Rhine to place their federal quota on a war-footing, and prepare for the outbreak of hostilities. No sooner had this been done, than the Austrians arrested my courier contrary to international law, and compelled me to retaliate. Nevertheless, I suppose, they are entirely innocent now, and the manifesto of the Emperor Francis proves clearly that France, by her incessant insults and encroachments, by her insatiable thirst after new territories, ...
— Napoleon and the Queen of Prussia • L. Muhlbach

... proposals of Germany saying, "The lives of noncombatants may in no case be put in jeopardy unless the vessel resists or seeks to escape after being summoned to submit to examination," and disposed of the claim that the acts of England gave Germany the right to retaliate, even though American citizens should be deprived of their lives in the course of retaliation by stating: "For a belligerent act of retaliation is perse an act beyond the law, and the defense, of an act as retaliatory, ...
— My Four Years in Germany • James W. Gerard

... you are my friend! you are my brother! I accept your offers, I will receive your benefits, but I will retaliate.' ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft

... wilt thou, prince, Avenge thy father, And for the wrongs of Eglymi Wilt retaliate. Thou wilt the cruel, The sons of Hunding, Boldly lay ...
— Myths of the Norsemen - From the Eddas and Sagas • H. A. Guerber

... his hand was raised above and behind his own head, and in the very attitude necessary to return the attack. It is not certain whether the circumstance of finding himself unexpectedly in this menacing posture and armed tempted the young man to retaliate, or whether sudden resentment overcame his forbearance and prudence. His eye kindled, however, and a small red spot appeared on each cheek, while he cast all his energy into the effort of his arm, and threw back the weapon at his assailant. The ...
— The Deerslayer • James Fenimore Cooper

... planks in his canoes and when he got back wakened the Metis and melted the caulking gum. By daybreak the seams were hard and after a hurried breakfast the party paddled across the lake. He would sooner have waited to see if Stormont would try to retaliate, but this would be rash. If the canoes were damaged or he were injured, it might prevent him from getting ...
— The Lure of the North • Harold Bindloss

... interest to most men, have (unless they are connected with gain or loss of money) no interest for me. But now, I swear, I mix up with the loss, his triumph in telling it. If he had brought it about,—I almost feel as if he had,—I couldn't hate him more. Let me but retaliate upon him, by degrees, however slow—let me but begin to get the better of him, let me but turn the scale—and I ...
— The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby • Charles Dickens

... established modes of thought for a full appreciation of the doctrines of their antagonists; and if De Quincey could recognise no merit in Voltaire or Rousseau, in Locke, Paley, or Jeremy Bentham, their followers were quite prepared to retaliate in kind. One feels, however, that such prejudices are more respectable when they are the foibles of a strong mind engaged in active warfare. We can pardon the old campaigner, who has become bitter in an internecine contest. It is not quite so pleasant to discover the same bitterness in ...
— Hours in a Library, Volume I. (of III.) • Leslie Stephen

... therefore, reader, that with much and severe scrutiny we have discovered this hatred to be founded on the passion of fear, and to arise from an apprehension that the person whom we have ourselves greatly injured will use all possible endeavours to revenge and retaliate the injuries we have done him. An opinion so firmly established in bad and great minds (and those who confer injuries on others have seldom very good or mean ones) that no benevolence, nor even beneficence, on the injured side, can eradicate it. On the contrary, ...
— The History of the Life of the Late Mr. Jonathan Wild the Great • Henry Fielding

... smile or any effort of mirth, he would limp behind as she walked across the floor, unconscious of his close attendance, and when she would turn suddenly and detect him, and shake her clinched fist at him, half in jest, he would retaliate by a similar gesture, and scowl, and stamp of the foot, that so nearly resembled her own proceedings as to cause me much internal merriment. But of course for his own advantage, as well as from regard for her feelings, it was necessary ...
— Miriam Monfort - A Novel • Catherine A. Warfield

... critical reduced her humanity to the factor one. The children had no name for her but "Oni" (fiend). They had reason for this. They would not play with her, and treated her most cruelly. O'Mino, who was of no mild temperament, soon learned to retaliate by use of an unusually robust frame, to which was united by nature and circumstances her father's acidity of character. When the odds were not too great all the tears were not on O'Mino's side; but she suffered greatly, and learned ...
— The Yotsuya Kwaidan or O'Iwa Inari - Tales of the Tokugawa, Volume 1 (of 2) • James S. De Benneville

... pierrot dances past me with Don Juan, and, with a laugh, throws a handful of confetti in my face. I retaliate—a few phrases are exchanged—I look after her for a moment—and then turn to the entrance of the corridor, to get out into ...
— The Gray Nun • Nataly Von Eschstruth

... that the German officers with the Turks are to be up to some form of frightfulness. It cannot be gas, but, if it is, we have been prepared for that for some weeks, and every man has his respirator. To-day I was asked by the A.D.C. about a paper dealing with gases, with which we are to retaliate should the Turk use these first, but it contains names I never heard before, and can give him no enlightenment on ...
— The Incomparable 29th and the "River Clyde" • George Davidson

... permission to strike when insulted will be an 'antidote' to the knife and will prevent disturbances in the State. But no younger man will strike an elder; reverence will prevent him from laying hands on his kindred, and he will fear that the rest of the family may retaliate. Moreover, our citizens will be rid of the lesser evils of life; there will be no flattery of the rich, no sordid household cares, no borrowing and not paying. Compared with the citizens of other ...
— The Republic • Plato

... stood facing him, panting a little. "It's only because you're my pal that I don't retaliate in kind. Any other man who calls me a liar has to go through it, and that's a fact. But as it's you, and as I know I've done the business badly—well"—his voice grew suddenly wistful—"let's sit down and talk it ...
— The Making of a Soul • Kathlyn Rhodes

... peculiar to the Scriptures, as an instance and evidence of human frailty and imperfection. Ham appears to have been a bad man, and probably he rejoiced to find his father in so unbecoming a situation, that, by exposing him, he might retaliate for the reproofs which he had received from his parental authority. And perhaps Canaan first discovered his situation, and told it to Ham. The conduct of Ham in exposing his father to his brethren, and their behaviour in turning away ...
— Aunt Phillis's Cabin - Or, Southern Life As It Is • Mary H. Eastman

... pursued them to a tent, in which they took a final refuge. He surrounded this tent, waited till they were inside it, and then set fire to the four corners. "See," said he to those around him, "they cannot accuse me of vindictive reprisals; my brothers drove me out of doors, and I retaliate by keeping them ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - ALI PACHA • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE

... at the word. Every muscle in his body seemed to become rigid as he mentally vowed that he would retaliate against his traducers if it cost him his life to do it. Hope had informed him only too accurately, he now realized. Little did the Senator know that what he was now about to hear would give him one of the severest ...
— A Gentleman from Mississippi • Thomas A. Wise

... favorite Nation, of privileges denied to others, which is apt doubly to injure the Nation making the concessions; by unnecessarily parting with what ought to have been retained; and by exciting jealousy, ill will, and a disposition to retaliate, in the parties from whom equal privileges are withheld; and it gives to ambitious, corrupted, or deluded citizens (who devote themselves to the favorite nation), facility to betray or sacrifice the interests of their own country, without odium, sometimes even with popularity; gilding, with ...
— Washington and the American Republic, Vol. 3. • Benson J. Lossing

... words "from beyond the present limits thereof," we do not establish any territorial limitation. And whether these States come back or not, no question of territory is raised. But if this reconsideration is carried, and the seceding States do not return to the Union, they will retaliate upon us. In the event of their continued secession we cannot get back from those States those of our slaves who are now temporarily there. We may wish to bring back those slaves, and some of our people may wish ...
— A Report of the Debates and Proceedings in the Secret Sessions of the Conference Convention • Lucius Eugene Chittenden

... Macdonald, who had been prepared to take up free trade if Mackenzie adopted protection, now boldly urged the high tariff panacea. The promise of work and wages for all, the appeal to national spirit made by the arguments of self-sufficiency and fully rounded development, the desire to retaliate against the United States, which was still deaf to any plea for more liberal trade relations, swept the country. The Conservative minority of over sixty was converted into a still greater majority in the general election of 1878, and the leader whom all men five ...
— The Canadian Dominion - A Chronicle of our Northern Neighbor • Oscar D. Skelton

... swear at the universe at large and a desire to laugh at it. Somehow, it did not occur to him to doubt what she had told him. He comprehended now that, chafing under his indebtedness in the affair of Mrs. Pendomer, Charteris would most naturally retaliate by making love to his benefactor's wife, because the colonel also knew John Charteris. And for the rest, it was useless to struggle against a Fate that planned such preposterous and elaborate jokes; ...
— The Rivet in Grandfather's Neck - A Comedy of Limitations • James Branch Cabell

... withdrawn his force from within the Baltic, owing to the lateness of the season, it was no longer in his power to rescue it in that quarter; but he had still a sufficient force in Hawke Roads, and might, had he been compelled to retaliate, have totally destroyed the city ...
— Memoirs and Correspondence of Admiral Lord de Saumarez. Vol II • Sir John Ross

... the insurgents attacked and burned the barracks, and piked any of the soldiers who attempted to escape from the flames. This regiment, the North Cork Militia, had been specially cruel in their treatment of the people, who were only too willing to retaliate. A troop of dragoons, commanded by Captain Erskine, was almost annihilated at Old Kilcullen. But reverses soon followed. At Carlow the insurgents met with a severe defeat; and the defenceless and innocent inhabitants, who fled into their houses for shelter from the fire, ...
— An Illustrated History of Ireland from AD 400 to 1800 • Mary Frances Cusack

... starting from camp with the view of breaking up a nest of rangers, and absent say three days, would return with a number of their own forces killed and wounded (ambushed), without being able to retaliate farther than by foraging on the country, destroying a house or two reported to be haunts of the guerrillas, or capturing non-combatants accused of being secretly active in ...
— Battle-Pieces and Aspects of the War • Herman Melville

... him, and a dark story is told of a secret attempt made by them to assassinate him through his servants. Alberti met these ignoble jealousies with a stately calm and a sweet dignity of demeanour, never condescending to accuse his relatives, never seeking to retaliate, but acting always for the honour of his illustrious house. In the same spirit of generosity he refused to enter into wordy warfare with detractors and calumniators, sparing the reputation even of his worst enemy when chance had placed him in his power. This moderation both of speech and ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Second Series • John Addington Symonds

... saw his home destroyed or his family abused, knew no sufficient reason why he should stand supinely by and welcome the destroyer? More brave than wise, too furious to reason calmly, he did what he could to retaliate, which is against the rules of war. Consequently a merciless foe inflicted the uttermost penalty upon him, his family, and the whole region in which he lived. The world has never witnessed more ...
— The Note-Book of an Attache - Seven Months in the War Zone • Eric Fisher Wood

... again. At the doorway she discovered the undoing of her work. For a minute or two she watched the pair, then passed unnoticed up stairs again. Leigh Shirley was the only girl who ever dared to oppose Jo, and she did it so quietly and completely that Jo could only ignore her. She could not retaliate. ...
— Winning the Wilderness • Margaret Hill McCarter



Words linked to "Retaliate" :   get even, punish, retaliation, hit, avenge, strike, revenge, penalise, retaliator, retaliatory



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