"Ruffianly" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... salt-cellar, and next to it Hugh Sorel seated himself, and kept a place for her beside him. Otherwise she would hardly have had seat or food.' She was now able to survey the inmates of the castle. Besides the family themselves, there were about a dozen men, all ruffianly-looking, and of much lower grade than her father, and three women. One, old Ursel, the wife of Hatto the forester, was a bent, worn, but not ill-looking woman, with a motherly face; the younger ones were hard, bold creatures, from whom Christina felt a shrinking recoil. The ...
— The Dove in the Eagle's Nest • Charlotte M. Yonge
... courage that enabled him to do it. Then, if moral courage is not the requisite quality, what could it have been that this stout-hearted Slade lacked?—this bloody, desperate, kindly-mannered, urbane gentleman, who never hesitated to warn his most ruffianly enemies that he would kill them whenever or wherever he came across them next! I think it is a conundrum ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... come to think of it, it must have looked remarkable—a ruffianly-looking man, carrying a disreputable bundle of blankets, a tin cup and water-bottle slung across his shoulders all clanking together, and a small Bible in his hands, with a well-dressed lady on each arm and an armed ...
— The Petticoat Commando - Boer Women in Secret Service • Johanna Brandt
... habitation, but replied not except by a gentle bowing of the head to the cruel scoffs and taunts with which they were greeted by the passing soldiers; but the sturdy rustics did not bear these outrages so tamely, and more than one brawl ensued, in which blood flowed, while a ruffianly arquebussier would have been drowned in the Calder but for the exertions to save him of a monk whom he ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... to her feet in astonishment, and at the same moment heard the voice of the viscount without, saying in ruffianly tones: ...
— Self-Raised • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth
... her superior knowledge; they trusted her, fawned on her, whined when she rebuked them, carried themselves more decently for a day or two when she dropped a rare word of commendation. They respected her in spite of the latent ruffianly instinct which sneers at women; they feared her as a parish fears its priest; they loved her as they loved one another—which was rather toleration than affection; the ...
— A Young Man in a Hurry - and Other Short Stories • Robert W. Chambers
... of execrable treatment, hard fighting, and wounds, they landed back into their homes broken men, with no better prospect than to begin life anew. It was natural that the numerous pressed men should detest the ruffianly man-catchers and their employers, if not the service they were forced into, and that they would nurse the wrong which had ...
— The Tragedy of St. Helena • Walter Runciman
... pretty!" said the man. "Beautiful, I may say. That little fellow with the twinkle in his eye and his coat out at elbows; he is charming, if I do say it. But what is going on now? here comes a crowd of big, hulking, ruffianly fellows, jostling the little people and driving them to the wall. What a villainous-looking set! Their faces are wholly strange to ...
— The Silver Crown - Another Book of Fables • Laura E. Richards
... But Kingsley did not write about the Vikings, nor about his Elizabethan heroes in "Westward Ho!" in a perfectly simple, straightforward way. He was always thinking of our own times and referring to them. That is why even the rather ruffianly Hereward is so great an enemy of saints and monks. That is why, in "Hypatia" (which opens so well), we have those prodigiously dull, stupid, pedantic, and conceited reflections of Raphael Ben Ezra. ...
— Essays in Little • Andrew Lang
... the battle of the Boyne, and was induced to surrender it by William's ruffianly and ...
— Thomas Davis, Selections from his Prose and Poetry • Thomas Davis
... the miser selected was one called Dotheboys Hall, a long, cold-looking, tumble-down building, one story high, in a dreary part of the country. It belonged to a man named Squeers, a burly, ruffianly hypocrite, who pretended to the world to be a kind, fatherly master, but in fact treated his pupils with such cruelty that almost the only ones ever sent there were poor little orphans, whose guardians were glad to get rid of them. ...
— Tales from Dickens • Charles Dickens and Hallie Erminie Rives
... doesn't take that for an excuse. It wants the man. This is a hard country and a hard rule, but no other rule will keep a respect for law in our territories. A shot, a dagger-thrust, anything to punish Seguis for his crime, and this ruffianly collection of ...
— The Wilderness Trail • Frank Williams
... and Boris giving a kind of exhibition of their skill in military exercises. It might be, also, that they desired to teach a lesson for the benefit of the wild robber border folk and the yet more ruffianly kempers who foregathered in this strange inn of Erdberg on the ...
— Red Axe • Samuel Rutherford Crockett
... the private secretary of the governor, the first and second in command, and several old residents. They would apply to the British consul for warrants for the arrest of the ruffianly marksmen, they would wrench them from the rails, and sentence them ...
— Mystic Isles of the South Seas. • Frederick O'Brien
... in light crowns over a counter. The mercer there wears his hat awry, over a shaggy head of hair, that looks like a curly water-dog's back, goes unbraced, wears his cloak on one side, and affects a ruffianly vapouring humour: when in his shop at Abingdon, he is, from his flat cap to his glistening shoes, as precise in his apparel as if he was named for mayor. He talks of breaking parks, and taking the highway, in such fashion that you would think ...
— Kenilworth • Sir Walter Scott
... interrupted and harassed by the crowd—even more surprising she bore with the most recalcitrant members of it—tried to win them over, and yet when they were rude, did not withhold reproof, and at times looked down upon them with so fine a scorn that it seemed as if even those ruffianly young men felt the edge of it. Certainly a curious sight—this well-bred woman standing there in front of the soaring column, talking with grave passion to those loafers about the 'Great Woman Question,' and they treating it as a Sunday afternoon ...
— The Convert • Elizabeth Robins
... marauding Albanians had crossed their frontier and were invading Serbia, and that, to his personal knowledge, there was a gang of these marauders in Geneva, and, in his view, the responsibility for any ruffianly crime committed in this city was not far to seek. He then sat down, amid loud applause from the Greeks and cries of "shame" from the English-speaking delegates. A placid Albanian bishop rose calmly to reply. He, too, it seemed, ...
— Mystery at Geneva - An Improbable Tale of Singular Happenings • Rose Macaulay
... with blood streaming from his fractured skull, for additional particulars. The American reporter whose hand was blown off, and had the good fortune to be upon the spot, is not to be compared with the hero who had the exclusive advantage of being able to supply practical information of the ruffianly ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... for his politeness, and returned to my carriage. The young woman smiled at me, as much as to say: 'Is he not a fine fellow?' I thought he was; and there may be other fine fellows as much out of place in the ruffianly mass with which ...
— France in the Nineteenth Century • Elizabeth Latimer
... side of the breakwater under the wall were two or three dozen of Irish reapers; some were lying asleep, others in parties of two or three were seated with their backs against the wall, and were talking Irish; these last all appeared to be well-made middle-sized young fellows, with rather a ruffianly look; they stared at me as I passed. The whole party had shillealahs either in their hands or by their sides. I went to the extremity of the pier, where was a little lighthouse, and then turned back. As I again drew near the Irish, I heard a hubbub and observed a great commotion ...
— Wild Wales - Its People, Language and Scenery • George Borrow
... youths, but still in company, and with their old love for one another unaltered. They had been duly entered as members of the King's Youths, and had proved themselves not to be the least reckless and truculent of those who form that ruffianly gang, but they had chiefly used their position to carry on their love intrigues with greater freedom and daring. Both were handsome, dashing, fearless, swaggering, gaily-dressed boys, and many were the girls within the palace, and the town which lay around it, who cast loving eyes upon them. Awang, ...
— In Court and Kampong - Being Tales and Sketches of Native Life in the Malay Peninsula • Hugh Clifford
... he pretends to be alone to-night, he has other men with him, hideous, ruffianly looking creatures, whom I saw him admit after the servants had gone. The countess has left the house and gone I ...
— Cleek, the Master Detective • Thomas W. Hanshew
... squalid, ragged, and filthy, to a degree I had never before witnessed. There was apparently but little discipline on board, but a great deal of disputation and a continual jabbering. A ruffianly-looking fellow, with a swarthy complexion and big black whiskers, who proved to be the commander, beckoned Captain Moncrieff to the quarter-deck, where he examined the schooner's papers and various letters, ...
— Jack in the Forecastle • John Sherburne Sleeper
... old-time blue and red coats, the high and fantastic shako made of metal and tapering to a point, of three-cornered hats resting on powdered wigs, of yellow top-boots, and exhaling the general air of ruffianly geniality characteristic of the manners and ...
— William of Germany • Stanley Shaw
... mooring-bitts, tended and nursed with the greatest sympathy and care by all the children, who greatly enjoyed pulling long faces and moving with hushed footsteps. Only the baby—Nicholas—looked on with a cold, ruffianly leer, as if he had belonged to another tribe altogether. Lena perpetually sorrowed over the box, and all of them were in deadly earnest. It was wonderful the way these children would work up their compassion for that bedraggled thing I wouldn't have touched with a pair of tongs. I suppose ...
— Falk • Joseph Conrad
... of all nations, and even for the fighting ships of the smaller Mediterranean powers like Naples and Sardinia, whose weakly manned vessels were often no match for the galleys and feluccas of the Barbary corsairs. The ruffianly Deys made little attempt to conceal the piratical nature of their proceedings, and became a perfect scourge not only to the mariners of all nations in the Mediterranean, but also to the unfortunate inhabitants of its shores. They ravaged ...
— Charles Philip Yorke, Fourth Earl of Hardwicke, Vice-Admiral R.N. - A Memoir • Lady Biddulph of Ledbury
... of her refusal to wear woman's dress. For this she seems to have had two reasons: first, that to give up her old dress would have been to acknowledge that her mission was ended; next, for reasons of modesty, she being alone in prison among ruffianly men. She would wear woman's dress if they would let her take the Holy Communion, but this they refused. To these points she was constant: she would not deny her visions; she would not say one word against her king, "the noblest Christian in the world" she ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... the previous time; the ultimate outcome of that ideal state of things in which the church had its own way during the ages of truth. Must not the system have been wrong, when it had so lost all moral weight as to be at the mercy of a ruffianly plunderer? And so, as we all admit now, the strongest condemnation of the old French regime is the fact that it had not only produced such a set of miscreants as those who have cast permanent odium even upon sound principles; but ...
— Social Rights and Duties, Volume I (of 2) - Addresses to Ethical Societies • Sir Leslie Stephen
... ourselves, modest, sober, and pertinent discourse would appear far more generous and masculine than such mad hectoring the Almighty, such boisterous insulting over the received laws and general notions of mankind, such ruffianly swaggering against sobriety and goodness. If gentlemen would regard the virtues of their ancestors, the founders of their quality; that gallant courage, that solid wisdom, that noble courtesy which advanced ...
— Talkers - With Illustrations • John Bate
... "An impudent, careless, ruffianly fellow, indeed!" said the mild Hartopp, indignantly, as he brushed from his sleeve the splash of dirt which the horseman bequeathed to ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... rich sunset on a garden lake. Item (3): A ship that was armed to the full, as a casual glance told me, with every kind of quick-firing guns, and with two ten-inch guns in her turret. Item (4): A ruffianly blackguard, to whom the cutting of a throat seemed meat and drink, with ten other rogues no less deserving, from a murderous point of view, put to watch about the ship that no strange eye might look upon her. Item (5): The ...
— The Iron Pirate - A Plain Tale of Strange Happenings on the Sea • Max Pemberton
... head, sheered a little in the direction of the voice, and landed stiffly on the sand-bar below the bridge. Then you saw what a ruffianly brute he really was. His back view was immensely respectable, for he stood nearly six feet high, and looked rather like a very proper bald-headed parson. In front it was different, for his Ally Sloper-like head and neck had not a feather to them, and there was a horrible raw-skin pouch on his neck ...
— The Second Jungle Book • Rudyard Kipling
... on all fours. At one point Dougal nodded downward, and the other two saw on a patch of turf, where the Garple began to widen into its estuary, a group of figures round a small fire. There were four of them, all men, and Dickson thought he had never seen such ruffianly-looking customers. After that they moved high up the slope, in a shallow glade of a tributary burn, till they came out of the trees and found themselves ...
— Huntingtower • John Buchan
... Scacciati, to whom he would not, T hoped, refuse the hand of his niece Marianna. You should have seen into what a passion the old fellow flew. He screamed; he flourished his arms about like one possessed of devils; he yelled that I, a ruffianly murderer, was seeking his life, that I had stolen his Marianna from him since I had portrayed her in my picture, and it was driving him mad, driving him to despair, for all the world, all the world, were fixing their covetous, lustful eyes upon his Marianna, his life, ...
— Weird Tales. Vol. I • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... very courageous, did not dare push the matter though he would have liked a more definite assurance. However, he had another motive besides the love of money, and was glad to have the cooperation of Rafferty, though secretly afraid of his ruffianly accomplice. ...
— Joe's Luck - Always Wide Awake • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... to start! A line of nine ruffianly-looking scarecrows, under review by Old Colonial, head-master of the ceremonies. Our shirts are clean, though elaborately embroidered in many colours. Our trousers ditto. Our boots, whether high ankle-jacks, or lace-ups and leggings, are black, if not polished. ...
— Brighter Britain! (Volume 1 of 2) - or Settler and Maori in Northern New Zealand • William Delisle Hay
... boat was steadily forging up-stream and presently it was disclosed to view no more than a cable-length away. It was a pinnace filled with ruffianly fellows, more than a score of them. No merchant seamen these but brethren of the coast, freebooters who were gallows-ripe. Bill Saxby was quick to recognize two or three of them as old hands of Blackbeard's crew who must have deserted their ...
— Blackbeard: Buccaneer • Ralph D. Paine
... seemed bright to Hopson. But in the spring a most painful occurrence threatened for a time to involve him in an Indian war. Two men, Connor and Grace, while cruising off the coast, had landed at Ile Dore, and with the assistance of their ruffianly crew had plundered an Indian storehouse. They were overtaken by a storm, their schooner became a total wreck, and Connor and Grace alone survived. They were rescued by the Indians, who cared for them and gave them shelter. But the miserable cowards ...
— The Acadian Exiles - A Chronicle of the Land of Evangeline • Arthur G. Doughty
... our own house, the history of which, and its former owner, I will give by-and-by, we had a bony, red-headed, ruffianly American squatter, who had "left his country for his country's good," for an opposite neighbour. I had scarcely time to put my house in order before his family commenced borrowing, or stealing from me. ...
— Roughing it in the Bush • Susanna Moodie
... be not among them. I will see what they are about." And as he spoke he hurried to the oriel window which looked out upon the wharf, exclaiming—"Ay, ay,—'t is as I thought. Dick is among them, and at their head. 'Fore heaven! they are attacking those ruffianly braggarts from Whitefriars, and are laying about them lustily with their cudgels. Ha! what is this I see? The Alsatians and the myrmidons are routed, and the brave lads have captured Sir Francis Mitchell. ...
— The Star-Chamber, Volume 1 - An Historical Romance • W. Harrison Ainsworth
... beggar in the street to the king upon the throne, and had I been older I should have been proud of what then was my greatest annoyance. But I was young—a mere boy—and so I watched her jealously, until a new element of disquiet was presented to me in the shape of a ruffianly looking fellow, who was frequently seen about the premises, and with whom I once found Genevra in close converse, starting and blushing guiltily when I came upon her, while her companion went ...
— Family Pride - Or, Purified by Suffering • Mary J. Holmes
... For long the battle waged as fiercely over Pope's poetry as erst it did in his own Homer over the body of the slain Patroclus. Stout men took part in it, notably Lord Byron, whose letters to Mr. Bowles on the subject, though composed in his lordship's most ruffianly vein, still make good reading—of a sort. But the battle is over, at all events for the present. It is not now our humour to inquire too curiously about first causes or primal elements. As we are not prepared with a definition ...
— Obiter Dicta - Second Series • Augustine Birrell
... Masham's ruffianly blow and kick had evidently done far more damage than he or any one supposed. As we waited in silence for the doctor to come our alarm increased, and it even seemed doubtful whether, as we stood there, we were ...
— My Friend Smith - A Story of School and City Life • Talbot Baines Reed
... friends, when startled by the sound of heavy footsteps and gruff voices in their rear, and casting a look behind them, they beheld, rapidly approaching by another path which wound about the base of the mountain, two men of most ruffianly aspect. ...
— Elsie at Nantucket • Martha Finley
... no objection to tell you how I came there," Ronald said. "I was walking on the old wall, which, as you know, runs close by the house, when I saw an ill looking loon hiding himself as if watching the house, looking behind I saw another ruffianly looking man there." Two gasps of indignation were heard from the porch at the back of the court. "Thinking that there was mischief on hand I leapt from the wall to the dormer window to warn the people of ...
— Bonnie Prince Charlie - A Tale of Fontenoy and Culloden • G. A. Henty
... them all he entered into the articles usual among the Brethren of the Coast under which each man was to be paid by a share in the prizes captured. In other respects, however, the articles were different. Aboard the Arabella there was to be none of the ruffianly indiscipline that normally prevailed in buccaneering vessels. Those who shipped with him undertook obedience and submission in all things to himself and to the officers appointed by election. Any to whom ...
— Captain Blood • Rafael Sabatini
... how he had pretended to ally himself with Frank's foes, and thus had heard the plots against the boy. He had sent Frank the warnings, and he had secured the aid of Plug Kirby to aid him in beating off Merriwell's ruffianly assailants. ...
— Frank Merriwell's Races • Burt L. Standish
... luncheon a man rushed up to our host and whispered in his ear something which seemed to give him great satisfaction, for he at once smilingly said, 'Captain, I have found the men you are after;' and sure enough we saw approaching two ruffianly looking fellows, tied together, and being dragged along by men on horseback. I hope they were the right men. I will presume that they were, but they had been very quick in catching them. After my missionary friend who spoke their language had interrogated the prisoners, he requested ...
— Sketches From My Life - By The Late Admiral Hobart Pasha • Hobart Pasha
... Bannerworth Hall!" was the cry. "Burn it—burn it," and augmented by fresh numbers each minute, the ignorant, and, in many respects, ruffianly assemblage, soon arrived within sight of what had been for so many years the bane of the Bannerworths, and whatever may have been the fault of some of that race, those faults had been of a domestic character, and not at all such as would interfere ...
— Varney the Vampire - Or the Feast of Blood • Thomas Preskett Prest
... in all, he presents a very ferocious front; he is, in fact, about the most ruffianly-looking specimen I have seen outside of Asiatic Turkey. As I ride up he motions for me to alight, at the same time retreating a few steps toward his humble stronghold, betraying a spirit of apprehension lest, perchance, he might be unwittingly standing in the way of danger. ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens
... striking. The Christian reconquest of Spain and Portugal began two or three generations before the Council of Clermont; but, from the first, the southward advance against the rulers of Cordova foreshadows the age of the Crusades. In Spain, as in the German marks, the pioneers of Christendom were often ruffianly, and always fought with an eye to the main chance. Among them are mere desperadoes like the Cid Campeador (d. 1099), who serves and betrays alternately the Christian and the Moorish causes, founds a principality at the expense of both religions, but is finally claimed as a hero and ...
— Medieval Europe • H. W. C. Davis
... the multitude who filled the church. At that moment, perhaps many who joined in it hoped that it would have the effect of tranquillising the multitude. Scarcely, however, had it concluded before a band of the most ruffianly-looking of the assemblage united together, and, as if with one accord, made a rush at the figure of the Virgin—the same idol which had been carried about the city a few days previously. Before any one ...
— The Golden Grasshopper - A story of the days of Sir Thomas Gresham • W.H.G. Kingston
... he said, in the smoother tones in which he had begun our curious interview, "I came near a little while ago to doing a ruffianly thing, of a sort I am not wont to do. We must fight out our quarrel in the proper way. Have you any friends in ...
— The Indiscretion of the Duchess • Anthony Hope
... as absolutely ruffianly. His head was knotted in a red, white-spotted handkerchief; his grizzled beard was tangled; he wore a black and rusty cloak, ragged at the edges, and his feet were often bare; at his side would lie his wooden right hand. As a rule, the place of ...
— Romance • Joseph Conrad and F.M. Hueffer
... had so recently passed through, I was compelled to confess to myself that they were by no means a prepossessing lot; they, one and all, O'Gorman and Price not excepted, wore that sullen, hang-dog, ruffianly expression of countenance that marks the very lowest class of British seamen, the scum and refuse of the vocation. Still, we had not far to go, and I consoled myself with the reflection that they would probably prove good enough to ...
— The Castaways • Harry Collingwood
... raising my voice brings my people from the next room to dispose of yourself. But I want you to confess quietly, and save me raising my voice. Why, man, do I not know the old story? The heir between the succeeding heir, and this heir's 150 ruffianly instrument, and their complot's effect, and the life of fear and bribes and ominous smiling silence? Did you throttle or stab my brother's ...
— Selections from the Poems and Plays of Robert Browning • Robert Browning
... a small room. The chief inmates were some Papal soldiers of ruffianly air, engaged in the clamorous game of moro. Unlike the close shorn Englishmen, their beards and mustachios, were allowed to grow to such length, as to hide the greater part ...
— A Love Story • A Bushman
... happily to be quite fresh and not affected by the sultriness of the day. It had cost her small effort to adhere to her statement that she had had no share in the escape of the sisters, when catechised by the ruffianly negro; but she found it hard to defy Othman's benevolent questioning. However, there was no choice, and she succeeded in proving that she had never quitted Memphis nor the house of Rufinus at the time when the Arab warriors met their death between Athribis and Doomiat. The Kadi endeavored ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... exclaimed Mr. Kinosling. "You ruffianly creature! Do you know what's going to happen to you when you grow up? Do you realize what you're ...
— Penrod • Booth Tarkington
... a gridiron like Saint Lawrence," gasped the irate priest. "Would you break my neck, brute beast that you are? Do you but wait until we reach Roccaleone, and by St. Dominic, I'll get your ruffianly commander to hang you ...
— Love-at-Arms • Raphael Sabatini
... turned round, and his sinister and gloomy gaze rested upon the face of Alice, his bad countenance, rendered more haggard by the cold raw light of the cheerless dawn, completed the hideous picture of unveiled and ruffianly wretchedness. ...
— Ernest Maltravers, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... Kwang—one of much higher rank than his visitor of the previous day—came on board. He was attended by thirty of the most ruffianly-looking scoundrels—even for Chinamen—that the captain had ever seen. They were all well armed, and came off in a large, well-appointed boat, which, the mandarin intimated with a polite smile, was to be towed, if she was too heavy to be hoisted aboard. A couple of hands were put in ...
— By Rock and Pool on an Austral Shore, and Other Stories • Louis Becke
... lead. Whereupon, quickly, stealthily, she would rain a little shower of crumbs, from her left hand, on the grass beside her, to a confiding group of finches assembled there. And if ever a sparrow ventured to intrude his ruffianly black beak into this sacred quarter, she would manage, with a kind of restrained ferocity, to "shoo" him away, ...
— The Cardinal's Snuff-Box • Henry Harland
... words, in a coarse, ruffianly tone, a visible shudder of fear or disgust, or both combined, passed through the frame of each of the prisoners; and Algernon turning to him, with an expression ...
— Ella Barnwell - A Historical Romance of Border Life • Emerson Bennett
... revenue hoarded for a great cause—and that cause an attempt at least to pacificate Christendom and avert a universal and almost infinite conflict now already opening—and the France of 1617, with its treasures already squandered among ignoble and ruffianly favourites, with every office in state, church, court, and magistracy sold to the highest bidder, with a queen governed by an Italian adventurer who was governed by Spain, and with a little king who had but lately expressed ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... had less of that angry and heady spirit which evil times have encouraged amongst our young nobles. God knows, I grudge not his life in your Grace's quarrel; and love him for the willingness with which he labours for your rescue. But wherefore should he brawl with an old ruffianly serving-man, and stain at once his name with such a broil, and his hands with the blood of ...
— The Abbot • Sir Walter Scott
... tremendous, and a long mail-shirt reached to his knees; his hair was short-clipped and brown, and beneath his curly brown beard Brian made out a massive face, wide-set brown eyes, and an air not so much ruffianly ...
— Nuala O'Malley • H. Bedford-Jones
... there for them to find out? We know what had happened. The ship scraped her side against a piece of ice, and sank after floating for two hours and a half, taking a lot of people down with her. What more can they find out from the unfair badgering of the unhappy "Yamsi," or the ruffianly abuse of the same. ...
— Notes on Life and Letters • Joseph Conrad
... of the class of men one usually saw in these border forts, men of the lowest type, miztiros and mulattos most of them, criminals from the gaols condemned to serve in the frontier army for their crimes. And in the midst of the low-browed, swarthy-faced, ruffianly crew appeared the tall distinguished-looking young man with a white skin, blue eyes and light ...
— A Traveller in Little Things • W. H. Hudson
... aroused for this poor pale-faced lad, put on the airs of a ruffianly bully. He did not wish that message to be taken indoors by the lad, for the concierge might get hold of it, despite the boy's protests and tears, and after that Blakeney would perforce have to disclose himself before it would be given up to ...
— El Dorado • Baroness Orczy
... a cupuliform membranous calyx. I have only seen however withered specimens. Reached Bahawul ghat at 1 P.M. The Khan visited Mr. Macnaghten in the afternoon, his visit was preceded by one from his Hindoo minister, and another man, Imaam Shah, who is a very fat ruffianly- looking fellow. The Khan was attended by numerous suwarries; he is a ...
— Journals of Travels in Assam, Burma, Bhootan, Afghanistan and The - Neighbouring Countries • William Griffith
... as the offence in him was foulest and the insult from him to her deepest, she assuredly conceived and cherished a bitter loathing. But there was one man who had always been ready to champion her cause, the daring, reckless, ruffianly James Hepburn, Earl of Bothwell, who nevertheless was no mere swash-buckler, but according to Scottish standards of the day, a man of education [Footnote: Lang, Hist. Scotland, ii., p. 168.] and even, it would seem, ...
— England Under the Tudors • Arthur D. Innes
... of them rough-coated Cossacks, and two whose dress showed clearly that they belonged to the Russian Imperial Guard, lay on the floor, bound and helpless. A stout, elderly man, in civilian garb, with a very red face and an angry look, his wig awry, was lashed to a chair. Between two ruffianly looking men, who held her ...
— The Eagle of the Empire - A Story of Waterloo • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... and ruffianly crowd dashed to and fro, overturning the furniture, tearing aside curtains, and looking for plunder, but unable to find anything of value, beyond the furniture, or to see a single living person under the roof. Not a dollar ...
— Wild Bill's Last Trail • Ned Buntline
... state that the second three-quarters of an hour is largely a repetition of the first—short, furious rushes, everlasting scrimmages, and here and there a punt. The ruffians look still more ruffianly from frequent contact with mother-earth and the clutches of one another. Ominous gloom and depressing silence take possession of the friends of Harvard; their very cheers are anxious, and with good reason. Yale has kicked another goal from ...
— The Opinions of a Philosopher • Robert Grant
... takes it into her head to toddle along up here to-night and calls your bluff and summons the gentle Hans or Fritz or whatever that ruffianly waiter's name is to come upstairs and settle your hash! What sort of a fight are you going to put up in that narrow corridor out there with a Hun next door and probably on every side of you, and no exit this end? ...
— The Man with the Clubfoot • Valentine Williams
... other misconduct; and yet I could almost regret that it is not possible to put you once more in the dock, and try you for conspiracy and incitement to riot; as in my own mind I have no doubt that you are in collusion with the ruffianly revolutionists, who, judging from their accent, are foreigners of a low type, and who, while this case has been proceeding, have been stimulating their bloodstained souls to further horrors by the most indecent ...
— The Tables Turned - or, Nupkins Awakened. A Socialist Interlude • William Morris
... general sense, the protectors against harm of the country: and, in fine, how the two orders of neighbours lived in long and happy communion of kind offices with one another; until, upon one unfortunate day, the ill-renowned freebooter, Aymerigot Marcel, with his ruffianly men-at-arms, having approached, by stealth, from his near-lying hold, stormed the romantically seated rock-mansion of the bountiful pigmies: who, scared, and in anger, forsook the land. Ever since the foul outrage, only ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLV. July, 1844. Vol. LVI. • Various
... period, and which was much worse among the French, who have a choice selection of epithets for it. But the fortunes of the youthful Thomas—child of a prostitute of the lowest class, though a very good mother, who afterwards marries a miserly and ruffianly corporal of police—are told with a good deal of spirit—one even thinks of Colonel Jack—and the author shows his curious vulgar common sense, and his knowledge of human nature of a certain kind, pretty frequently, at least in the earlier ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 - From the Beginning to 1800 • George Saintsbury
... him, and young gals, too;" said the dark-mustached man, who seemed to be a little less ruffianly than his companions, "we don't want to do them ...
— The Girl Aviators on Golden Wings • Margaret Burnham
... on in heaven's name. You are a treasure, Gahra Dahra. In rescuing you from those ruffianly Spaniards we did ourselves, as well as ...
— Mr. Fortescue • William Westall
... a pandemonium. The more ruffianly part of the mob—and alas! there were but too many of them—hurled the furniture out of the windows, or ran off with anything that they could carry. In vain I expostulated, threatened; I was answered by laughter, curses, frantic dances, ...
— Alton Locke, Tailor And Poet • Rev. Charles Kingsley et al
... something unusual perturbed his mind. The cause was soon after explained, for, the negress, before mentioned, coming into the room on some trifling errand, to my surprise accosted him rather freely. Her master suddenly broke out in a paroxysm of rage, swore at her awfully, and accused her in a ruffianly way of being insolent to her mistress. Then, violently ringing a bell which stood on the table, he summoned a negro lad into the room, and at once despatched him to a neighbour's house to borrow a new raw-hide whip, threatening all the while to flay her alive. In vain the terrified ...
— An Englishman's Travels in America - His Observations Of Life And Manners In The Free And Slave States • John Benwell
... the train went on again, and as it started Grace was aroused and shocked by the appearance at the forward end of the car of the ruffianly character whom she had but half seen from the car window. For a moment she believed that the train-robbery, that she had been confidently expecting over since her departure from San Francisco, was about to take place. Her heart beat hard, ...
— A Border Ruffian - 1891 • Thomas A. Janvier
... friendliness, if they might see her child. She, looking upon them as friends of her husband, whom kindly feeling had brought thither, gladly complied, and, bringing the infant, laid it in the arms of one of the ruffianly band. ...
— Historic Tales, vol 10 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... to have seen a more ruffianly-looking fellow; he was about six feet high, with an immensely athletic frame; his face was black and bluff, and sported an immense pair of whiskers, but with here and there a gray hair, for his age could not be much under ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow
... rain was falling, but the crowd between the prison and Kennington Common was immense. At the time of our trials the mob had treated us in ruffianly fashion, but now we found a respectful silence. The lawyer Morgan was in an extremely irritable mood. All the way to the Common he poured into our inattentive ears a tale of woe about how his coffee had been cold that morning. ...
— A Daughter of Raasay - A Tale of the '45 • William MacLeod Raine
... that the slavers knew—a man terrible in his anger. Having taken from the ruffianly Arabs who had so cruelly treated the little children, their slaves, their stolen cattle, and their ivory, he would have them stripped and flogged, and ...
— The Story of General Gordon • Jeanie Lang
... demands of the people (as he called them) were granted. Marie Antoinette alone was undaunted and calm; or, at least, if in the depths of her woman's heart she felt terror at the sanguinary and obscene threats of her ruffianly enemies, she scorned to show it. When the firing began, M. de Luzerne, one of the ministers, had quietly placed himself between her and the window; but, while she thanked him for his devotion, she begged him to retire, saying, with her habitually gracious courtesy, ...
— The Life of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France • Charles Duke Yonge
... risen to such a pitch of clamour, that all my attempts at interruption and explanation were lost; while the screams which the girls could not control when they heard her call in assistance, prevented a reply. One after another, five ruffianly-looking fellows rushed in at her call; and ere I could free myself from the importunate exculpations of poor Nanny, they were crowding and cursing round me; while one, apparently their leader, held a lantern to my face, a pike to my throat, and demanded my name and business. That these were one ...
— Tales from Blackwood, Volume 7 • Various
... his feet on the table beside an empty beer bottle and dirty glass, was a ruffianly-looking chap, who had a thick neck that ran straight up with the back of his head. His hair was close cropped and his forehead low. There was a bulldog look about his mouth and jaw, and his forehead was ...
— Frank Merriwell at Yale • Burt L. Standish
... themselves in crowds to the executioner. But even under the rule of Rome it would not be easy to find thirty cases of martyrs burned at the stake by "the bloudie Bishops," between the fifteenth century and the martyrdom of Myln. By 1560 the old Church was in such a hideous decline—with ruffianly men of quality in high spiritual places; with priests who did not attend Mass, and in many cases could not read; with churches left to go to ruin; with license so notable that, in one foundation, the priest is ...
— John Knox and the Reformation • Andrew Lang
... crimes when his soul be confronted with his innocent victims; when he fixed his gaze of concentrated power upon him, the strong man's face relaxed; his eyes faltered and fell; until, at length, unable to bear up under self-conviction, he hid his head beneath the bar, and exhibited a picture of ruffianly audacity cowed beneath the spell of true courage ...
— Something of Men I Have Known - With Some Papers of a General Nature, Political, Historical, and Retrospective • Adlai E. Stevenson
... weak and sick. He raised himself tremulously and looked around, the turf was cut and spoilt by the trampling of many feet. All his life of the last few months floated before his memory, his residence in his father's hovel with ruffianly comrades, the desperate schemes he heard as he pretended to sleep on his lowly bed, their expeditions at night, masked and armed, their hasty returns, the news of his father's capture, his own removal to the house of some female in the town, the ...
— International Weekly Miscellany Vol. I. No. 3, July 15, 1850 • Various
... Raikes put on a calmness. 'You got up the other night, and said you were a tailor—a devotee of the cabbage and the goose. Why the notion didn't strike me is extraordinary—I ought to have known my man. However, the old gentleman who gave the supper—he's evidently one of your beastly rich old ruffianly republicans—spent part of his time in America, I dare say. Put ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... so filled with the bitterness of what he was doing that he carried her sword in his hand all the way to the fort, quite unaware that its point often touched her dress so that she plainly felt it. Indeed, she thought he was using that ruffianly and dangerous means of keeping pace with her. He had sent the patrol on its rounds, taking upon himself the responsibility of delivering her to Hamilton. She almost ran, urged by the strange excitement that burned in her heart, and he followed somewhat awkwardly, stumbling over the unfamiliar ...
— Alice of Old Vincennes • Maurice Thompson
... of note that, though these great parks in and about London were so free, and apparently without any police regulations whatever, yet I never saw prowling about them any of those vicious, ruffianly looking characters that generally infest the neighborhood of our great cities, especially of a Sunday. There were troops of boys, but they were astonishingly quiet and innoxious, very unlike American boys, white or black, a band of whom ...
— Winter Sunshine • John Burroughs
... bowling-green, capital at quoits, unparalleled at rowing a skiff, could play well at nine-pins, could run, hop, skip, jump or whistle with any man of his years, not ignorant of the science of self-defence, and when rudely or ruffianly insulted, could repay the indignity, with interest, at a moment's notice; his lungs were vigorous, he could blow the French horn with most poetic and potential blast, and with no mean degree of skill, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 17, - Issue 493, June 11, 1831 • Various
... not long ago when you were flying from a ruffianly mob and you sought the shelter of my house? But may be you've a short memory. Mine isn't so fleeting. Men's kisses are lightly bestowed. Women are different. I shall never forget the tender touch ...
— Madame Flirt - A Romance of 'The Beggar's Opera' • Charles E. Pearce
... the protection of miscreants. By exercising it they are able to show their power over the authorities of the country—a fact which impresses the masses. That is why in the neighbourhood of many mosques one sees a great number of ruffianly faces, unmistakable cut-throats, men and boys whose villainy is plainly stamped on their countenances. As long as they remain inside the sacred precincts—which they can do if they like till they die of old age—they can laugh at the law and at the world at large. But ...
— Across Coveted Lands - or a Journey from Flushing (Holland) to Calcutta Overland • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... embarked on as a stowaway was bound for America. When I was discovered hiding among the cargo we were in mid-ocean, and there was nothing for it but to carry me to the States. Still, to earn my passage, I was made cabin-boy to a ruffianly captain, and once more tasted the early delights of childhood, viz., kicks, curses, and starvation. When the ship arrived in New York I was turned adrift in the city without ...
— The Silent House • Fergus Hume
... am a slave to my word. There will be a siring of carts and mules on a certain part of the coast, and a most ruffianly lot of men, men you understand, men with wives and children and sweethearts, who from the very moment they start on a trip risk a bullet in the head at any moment, but who have a perfect conviction that I will never ...
— The Arrow of Gold - a story between two notes • Joseph Conrad
... men being bullied, maltreated, deprived of food and sleep for days, in order to force them to tell what the police were anxious to find out. He had heard of secret assaults, of midnight clubbings, of prisoners being choked and brutally kicked by a gang of ruffianly policemen, in order to force them into some damaging admission. A chill ran down his spine as he realized his utter helplessness. If he could only get word to a lawyer. Just as the coroner was disappearing through the door, he darted forward and ...
— The Third Degree - A Narrative of Metropolitan Life • Charles Klein and Arthur Hornblow
... still survives as that of a distinguished regiment of the British army. It was framed in much the same language and to much the same purpose as its predecessor of Rutherglen, though it would not be right to degrade Cameron to the level of Hamilton and his ruffianly associates. It took its title from having been fixed to the market-cross of Sanquhar, a small town in Dumfriesshire, on June 22nd, 1680. Exactly a month later Claverhouse's troopers (though, as I have said, not commanded by Claverhouse himself) came upon the Cameronians in ...
— Claverhouse • Mowbray Morris
... argument would here be—what it is now—in no wise concerned), as is the handling of character throughout; but most especially the subtle force, the impeccable and careful instinct, the masculine delicacy of touch, by which the somewhat ruffianly temperament of the original Ferando is at once refined and invigorated through its transmutation into the hearty and ...
— A Study of Shakespeare • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... the fashion; the Apostle Eliot, Parson Stoddard, Parson Rogers, President Chauncey, President Wigglesworth, all launched burning invective and skilful Biblical argument against the long-growing locks—"the disguisement of long Ruffianly hair" (or Russianly—whichever it may be). It was derisively suggested that long nails like Nebuchadnezzar's would next be in fashion. Men under sentence for offences were offered release from punishment if they would "cut off their ...
— Customs and Fashions in Old New England • Alice Morse Earle
... amazement of all, the gang was headed by a man who seemed the very counterpart of Harold, not, perhaps, quite so tall, but with much the same complexion and outline, though he was somewhat older, and had the wild, fierce, ruffianly aspect of a bushranger. This man was taking deliberate aim at the magistrate who acted as head of the party, when Harold flung down his own loaded rifle, sprang upon him, and there was the most tremendous wrestling ...
— My Young Alcides - A Faded Photograph • Charlotte M. Yonge
... futile discussion of the mystery, the boys went back to camp. It was natural that they should feel a little curious and alarmed. Ruffianly characters are often ...
— The Camp in the Snow - Besiedged by Danger • William Murray Graydon
... assault, but I will move to purpose now. For you and he shall leave there in disgrace before another week goes round. I have you both in my 'practical power,' and I will squeeze satisfaction out of you. He is a ruffianly interloper, and you, Madame, the law would call by ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... smugglers, pirates, and brigand stories. Why, you're as bad as the rest, boy! But there, I'm running away from your question. Yes, I believe there were pirates here at one time; but it is over a hundred years ago, and they were a crew of low, ruffianly scoundrels, who got possession of a vessel and lived for years by plundering the outward and inward bound merchantmen; and being on a fast sailing vessel they always escaped by running for shore, and from their ...
— Cormorant Crag - A Tale of the Smuggling Days • George Manville Fenn
... drew in or picked up our pickets, including the ruffianly Wyandotte, or Erie, as he was now judged to be, and, filing as we had filed the night before we crossed the Ouleout ...
— The Hidden Children • Robert W. Chambers
... nothing more—in that abode at least; for when his cousin Caroline made gentle overtures of friendship, he did not encourage them—he rather avoided than sought her. One living thing alone, besides his pale, crippled scholar, he fondled in the house, and that was the ruffianly Tartar, who, sullen and impracticable to others, acquired a singular partiality for him—a partiality so marked that sometimes, when Moore, summoned to a meal, entered the room and sat down unwelcomed, Tartar would rise from his lair at Shirley's feet and betake himself to the ...
— Shirley • Charlotte Bronte
... to keep up the practice of reading the Scriptures and praying, they must do it as secretly as they would commit a murder, and find it more difficult to accomplish than any crime that could be named. There always will be a large proportion of ruffianly characters among many boys; some naturally so, others made so by example. These have the ascendency of course, and they will use it to check and to stifle whatever might shine in contrast to themselves; while, what ...
— Personal Recollections • Charlotte Elizabeth
... meant. In a moment more Ramona followed,—only a moment, hardly a moment; but when she reached the threshold, it was to hear a gun-shot, to see Alessandro fall to the ground, to see, in the same second, a ruffianly man leap from his horse, and standing over Alessandro's body, fire his pistol again, once, twice, into the forehead, cheek. Then with a volley of oaths, each word of which seemed to Ramona's reeling senses to fill the air with a sound like thunder, he untied ...
— Ramona • Helen Hunt Jackson
... later, while Lucretius was still away, yet another peril came upon her. While Caesar was operating round Dyrrhachium, there was a dangerous rising in Campania and Southern Italy, for which our giddy friend Caelius Rufus was chiefly responsible; gladiators and ruffianly shepherd slaves were enlisted, and by some of these the villa where she was staying was attacked, and successfully defended by her—so much at least it seems possible to infer from ...
— Social life at Rome in the Age of Cicero • W. Warde Fowler
... lady, quite subdued by his noisy entrance and ruffianly conduct, and seeing that an assumption of dignity would only draw down on her some fresh impertinence, appeared to resign herself to her position. All this time Quennebert never took his eyes from the chevalier, who sat with his face towards the ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - LA CONSTANTIN—1660 • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... disgusting! He is horrid!" cried the girl earnestly. "He is an awful, ruffianly creature, but he's nothing to laugh at. Listen, Marty!" and vividly, with all the considerable descriptive powers that she possessed, the girl repeated what had occurred when little Sophie Narnay had run into her drunken parent on ...
— How Janice Day Won • Helen Beecher Long
... and the band of your upper stock, it will have so much the more rakish effect, and will attract you respect in Alsatia, where linen is something scarce. Now, I tie some of the points carefully asquint, for your ruffianly gallant never ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott
... peculiarities. Newcastle became head of the English government; he appointed the absurd Duke of Cumberland, captain-general of the English army, to the direction of American military affairs; and he picked out an obstinate, ruffianly, stupid martinet of a Perthshire Scotchman, sixty years old and of ruined fortunes, to lead the English forces against the French in America. Braddock went over armed with the new and despotic mutiny bill, and with ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne
... harmony. I can safely say, that few Western States have been peopled by such law-abiding, industrious, moral and religious inhabitants as were the first settlers of Minnesota. There was nothing to attract the ruffianly element,—no gold, silver, or other mines; the chief industry being peaceful agriculture. So free from all disturbing or dangerous elements did we consider our territory that I have on several occasions taken a wagon loaded with specie, amounting to nearly one hundred thousand ...
— The History of Minnesota and Tales of the Frontier • Charles E. Flandrau
... the captain; and Mr. Toley, as a matter of policy, never took his part openly. The men resented his superior manners and the fact that he was socially above them. The majority of the seamen were even more ruffianly than the specimens he had seen at the Waterman's Rest—the scum of Wapping and Rotherhithe. His only real friend on board was Bulger, who helped him to master the many details of a sailor's work, and often protected him against the ill treatment of his mates; and, in ...
— In Clive's Command - A Story of the Fight for India • Herbert Strang
... continued, reminding Speed that Buckhurst had collected his ruffianly franc company in the forest; that the day the cruiser sailed he had appeared in Paradise to proclaim the commune; that doubtless he had signalled, from the semaphore, orders for the cruiser's departure; that a few hours later his red battalion had ...
— The Maids of Paradise • Robert W. (Robert William) Chambers
... Salem was formed by a crowd of ruffianly young fellows who were called the "Clary's Grove Boys." Once or twice a week they descended upon the village and passed the day in drinking, fighting, and brutal horse-play. If a stranger appeared in the place, he was likely to suffer a rude initiation ...
— Abraham Lincoln: A History V1 • John G. Nicolay and John Hay
... torches which were its only light, and which scarcely showed the roof and extremity of the building, were, however, enough to show heaps of weapons of every kind—muskets, sabres, pikes, and even pitchforks and scythes, thrown on the floor. On one side, raised on a sort of desk, was a ruffianly figure flinging placards to the crowd below, and often adding some savage comment on their meaning, which produced a general laugh. Flags inscribed with "Liberty Bread or Blood—Down with the Tyrant"—and that comprehensive and peculiarly ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 337, November, 1843 • Various
... she said. 'You must let me tell you a story of him. They have a young new schoolmistress at Wrapworth, his father's former living, you know, close to Castle Blanch. This poor thing was obliged to punish a school-child, the daughter of one of the bargemen on the Thames, a huge ruffianly man. Well, a day or two after, Owen came upon him in a narrow lane, bullying the poor girl almost out of her life, threatening her, and daring her to lay a finger on his children. What do you ...
— Hopes and Fears - scenes from the life of a spinster • Charlotte M. Yonge
... holiday, but the men think it unwise, so we are going in the opposite direction towards the potato patches which we have not yet seen. An opinion expressed at Cape Town of the people by one who had lately visited them does not at all coincide with our experience. They were described as "a ruffianly-looking lot," and the speaker was sure "there was one man at least who had had his knife into ...
— Three Years in Tristan da Cunha • K. M. Barrow
... the afternoon and were still several miles from home, when, passing through a bit of woods, a sudden turn of the road brought them face to face with a band of mounted men, some thirty or forty in number, not disguised but rough and ruffianly in appearance and armed with clubs, ...
— Elsie's Motherhood • Martha Finley
... literally the murder is out. Books which keep a reader on the tenter-hooks of conjecture must always suffer from this undue concentration of the interest; and in spite of cheery, inquisitive Dr. Toole, and the remarkable sketch of Black Dillon, the ruffianly genius with a reputation only recognised in the hospitals and the police-courts (a character admirably invented and admirably used in the plot) one can hardly class Le Fanu among those novelists who have left memorable presentments ...
— Irish Books and Irish People • Stephen Gwynn
... ever to have seen a more ruffianly-looking fellow: he was about six feet high, with an immensely athletic frame; his face was black and bluff, and sported an immense pair of whiskers, but with here and there a grey hair, for his age could not be much under fifty. He wore ...
— Isopel Berners - The History of certain doings in a Staffordshire Dingle, July, 1825 • George Borrow
... there was a feast waiting for him. He was not the only one who was there to enjoy it. For there were three ruffianly red squirrels and a half-dozen chipmunks who appeared on the spot as ...
— The Tale of Frisky Squirrel • Arthur Scott Bailey
... and down the room, henceforward to be called the studio, in sweet and silent communion. They heard rapping at Torpenhow's door. "That's some ruffian come up for a drink," said Torpenhow; and he raised his voice cheerily. There entered no one more ruffianly than a portly middle-aged gentleman in a satin-faced frockcoat. His lips were parted and pale, and there were deep pouches under ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling |
