"Smirk" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... just dined at the station and drunk a little too much lay down on the velvet-covered seat, stretched himself out luxuriously, and sank into a doze. After a nap of no more than five minutes, he looked with oily eyes at his vis-a-vis, gave a smirk, and said: ...
— The Schoolmistress and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... and sprightly, tearful and giggling. Her dress, formerly neglected to the point of untidiness, betrayed a new-born taste for fashionable equipment; she suddenly drew attention to it in the midst of serious talk, asking with a bashful smirk whether ...
— In the Year of Jubilee • George Gissing
... basis? I suppose, if I came lying and pretending, and let you lie and pretend, and let your parents and Sam lie and pretend, you would find me—almost tolerable. Well, I'm not that kind. When there's no especial reason one way or the other, I'm willing to smirk and grimace and dodder and drivel, like the rest of your friends, those ladies and gentlemen. But when there's business to be transacted, I am business-like. Let's not begin with your thinking you are deceiving ...
— The Deluge • David Graham Phillips
... still there. The same look can be seen in the eyes of Russian peasants; and those of us left will see it some day on Gabriel's face when he comes to blow us up. It is a look that should wither and abash man; but he has been known to smirk at it and offer flowers—with a string ...
— The Trimmed Lamp • O. Henry
... rascal—search him—turn his pockets inside out, while I speak to her ladyship." Saying which, the brisk attorney, enchanted with the feat he had performed, approached Lady Rookwood with a profound bow, and an amazing smirk of self-satisfaction. "Just in time to prevent mischief," said he; "hope your ladyship does not suffer any inconvenience from the alarm—beg pardon, annoyance I meant to say—which this horrible outrage must have occasioned; excessively ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth
... was fear in Rogers' eyes, too—a mere glimmer of it. Yet it was there; and when Deveny set his glass down and looked straight at Rogers, it was that fear which brought the fawning, insincere smirk to Rogers' lips. ...
— 'Drag' Harlan • Charles Alden Seltzer
... understand that Mr. Hoopdriver was not one of your fast young men. If he had been King Lemuel, he could not have profited more by his mother's instructions. He regarded the feminine sex as something to bow to and smirk at from a safe distance. Years of the intimate remoteness of a counter leave their mark upon a man. It was an adventure for him to take one of the Young Ladies of the establishment to church on a Sunday. Few modern ...
— The Wheels of Chance - A Bicycling Idyll • H. G. Wells
... opportunity to cultivate his sense of beauty. After his engagement to Clara he gives her fair warning that he has the "very mischievous habit" of being a great admirer of beautiful women and girls. "They make me positively smirk, and I swim in panegyrics on your sex. Consequently, if at some future time we walk along the streets of Vienna and meet a beauty, and I exclaim, 'Oh, Clara! see this heavenly vision,' or something of the sort, you must not be alarmed nor scold me." He had ...
— Chopin and Other Musical Essays • Henry T. Finck
... remarked, with a smirk, while the Inspector stared from one to the other with rounded eyes of wonder, and his jaw dropped from the stark ...
— Within the Law - From the Play of Bayard Veiller • Marvin Dana
... you! The more shame for you to take them. Better throw them away than wear them as a badge of degradation. Yes, throw them away, or send them back whence they came. Wash that paint off your face. Get rid of that made-up smirk around your mouth. Remember that you are ...
— Bessie's Fortune - A Novel • Mary J. Holmes
... portraits on panels built into the masonry. As all visitors to the mansion are aware, these paintings represent women of middle age, of a date some two hundred years ago, whose lineaments once seen can never be forgotten. The long pointed features, narrow eye, and smirk of the one, so suggestive of merciless treachery; the bill-hook nose, large teeth, and bold eye of the other suggesting arrogance to the point of ferocity, haunt the beholder afterwards ...
— Tess of the d'Urbervilles - A Pure Woman • Thomas Hardy
... a little less well-bred, I think she would have bridled. As it was, she really did smirk a little, in a ...
— The Chauffeur and the Chaperon • C. N. Williamson
... dressed. He wore a white cravat, and no collar. He had light hair closely cut, and his face was as smooth as a woman's. His shirt was whiter than any shirt I have ever seen before or since, and it was made of very fine material. He carried an agreeable smirk upon his countenance, and he disinterred, now and then, some very long and extraordinary word from the dictionary, when he was particularly desirous either to make himself understood or conceal his meaning. I had almost omitted to add, that he was a ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... one like a weddingcake standing up miles off my head he said suited me or the dishcover one coming down on my backside on pins and needles about the shopgirl in that place in Grafton street I had the misfortune to bring him into and she as insolent as ever she could be with her smirk saying Im afraid were giving you too much trouble what shes there for but I stared it out of her yes he was awfully stiff and no wonder but he changed the second time he looked Poldy pigheaded as usual like the soup but I could see him looking very hard at my chest when he stood up to open the door ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... readers than editors, and so less chance of a cure. I do not want to believe it is the readers. It is more comforting to suppose those poor people must put up with what they can get in a hurry ten minutes before the train starts, only to find, as they might have guessed, that vacuity is behind the smirk of a girl with a face like that. They are forced to stuff their literature behind them, so that ownership of it shall not openly shame ...
— Waiting for Daylight • Henry Major Tomlinson
... Jenkins, pocketing the money with a smirk, and bowing with the things in his hands, "we are to have the honor of seeing your lordship again, as you leave your portmanteau ...
— Thaddeus of Warsaw • Jane Porter
... Liberals, nimble as fleas, Could clear such gulfs with perfect ease, 'Twas a jump that naught on earth could make Your proper, heavy-built Christian take. No, no,—if a Dance of Sects must be, He would set to the Baptist willingly,[3] At the Independent deign to smirk, And rigadoon with old Mother Kirk; Nay even, for once, if needs must be, He'd take hands round with all the three; But as to a jig with Popery, no,— To the Harlot ne'er ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... and even then he lingered, fiddling about in carefully folding and arranging his garment. In the course of this, and in moving about the narrow cabin, he took apparently casual glances at Baxter and the Frenchman, and I saw from his satisfied, quiet smirk that each was sound and fast asleep. And then he thrust his feet into a pair of bedroom slippers, as loud in their colouring as his pyjamas, and suddenly turning down the lamp with a twist of his wicked-looking fingers, he glided out of the door into the darkness above. At that I, ...
— Ravensdene Court • J. S. (Joseph Smith) Fletcher
... untidy in his dress, that he strode on, gazing at the stars, and that often, in his absent-mindedness, he stumbled and staggered in his gait. In his portraits we can read the same double story. In some the prevailing tone is dignity; in others there is the faint suggestion of a smirk. His faults were those often found in men of genius. He was nearly always in a hurry, and was never in time for dinner. He was unsystematic in his habits, and incompetent in money matters. He was rather imperious ...
— History of the Moravian Church • J. E. Hutton
... which in some men is not displeasing. He knew his job; his voice rolled like the deep notes of an organ; we knew what he meant for us to do, and we did it. The other man was narrow and chicken-breasted, his long legs weak, his smile a smirk, his pronunciation so affected that we disgraced him because we blundered from pure lack of comprehension. Why is it that men's outsides so often correspond to their innards? And how did the latter of these two get ...
— At Plattsburg • Allen French
... creatures!" "Poet's theme!" and so on,—stuff that springs from what Diogenes calls the spooney view of women, and only applicable to the young and handsome,—a very small minority. It is sad to see the graceless, the "gone-off," and the downright elderly smirk complacently at a few phrases which are only aimed at them in derision. The others, too, one would think, ought to care little for adulation that fades away with ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 108, October, 1866 • Various
... idolatrous to all that is gentle and Christian, there follows the triumphant "Before and After" inscription. All the fitness has gone, all the individuality, all the clever adaptation of indigenous material, all the artistic and human interest; and a self-conscious smirk of superiority radiates over made-by-the-million factory garments instead. Whenever I see such contrasting photographs there comes over me a shamed, perverse recollection of a pair of engravings by Hogarth, usually suppressed, which a London bookseller once pulled out of a portfolio in ...
— Ten Thousand Miles with a Dog Sled - A Narrative of Winter Travel in Interior Alaska • Hudson Stuck
... breath, and Connie scrutinized his face, but could not remember to have seen him before. He shifted his glance to the other, who had returned to the edge of the bunk, and was regarding him with a sneering smirk. ...
— Connie Morgan in the Fur Country • James B. Hendryx
... crept into their visitor's soft, impersonal voice as he gibed the boatswain. Martin, staring upward at the lantern-lighted face, half expected to see the smirk flee the lips that threatened torture, and the hateful passions that inspired Ichi's gloating to reveal themselves in his features. But no hint of emotion disturbed the surface of that bland, yellow mask the one-time sea cook wore for a face; only the eyes were leagued with the ...
— Fire Mountain - A Thrilling Sea Story • Norman Springer
... beside a bead-work table bearing a bronze box with a miniature of Beatrice Cenci in the lid. Lily felt for these objects the same distaste which the prisoner may entertain for the fittings of the court-room. It was here that her aunt received her rare confidences, and the pink-eyed smirk of the turbaned Beatrice was associated in her mind with the gradual fading of the smile from Mrs. Peniston's lips. That lady's dread of a scene gave her an inexorableness which the greatest strength of character could not have produced, since it was independent of all considerations of right ...
— House of Mirth • Edith Wharton
... And, shrinking all his mind within, he thought: "Tradition, handed down for hours and hours, Tells that our globe, this quivering crystal world, Is slowly dying. What if, seconds hence, When I am very old, yon shimmering dome Come drawing down and down, till all things end?" Then with a weazen smirk he proudly felt No other mote of God had ever gained Such giant grasp of ...
— Practice Book • Leland Powers
... found husband and wife at home, the baby in his father's arms; what is more, Gavinia was looking on smiling and saying, "You bonny litlin, you're windy to have him dandling you; and no wonder, for he's a father to be proud o'." Corp was accepting it all with a complacent smirk. Oh, agreeable change since last we were in this house! oh, happy picture of domestic bliss! oh—but no, these are not the words; what we meant to say was, "Gavinia, you limmer, so you have got the better of that ...
— Tommy and Grizel • J.M. Barrie
... pass away To bow and smirk and gloze, Come others, for as short a stay; And dear ...
— Books and Habits from the Lectures of Lafcadio Hearn • Lafcadio Hearn
... to see the holy ones air their smug pieties and admire them and smirk over them, and at the same moment frankly and publicly show their contempt for the pieties of the Boer—confidently expecting the approval of the country and the ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... perceived that this was an illusion created by the proportion and thickness of his body. He was, in fact, half a head taller than she, and Stella stood five feet five. His gray eyes met hers squarely, with a cool, impersonal quality of gaze. There was neither smirk nor embarrassment in his straightforward glance. He was, in effect, "sizing her up" just as he would have looked casually over a logger asking him for a job. Stella sensed that, and resenting it momentarily, failed ...
— Big Timber - A Story of the Northwest • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... you happen to have that proof with you?" called out Frank. Upon hearing this, the other hastened up, though there was a satisfied smirk on his face, as though he had accomplished ...
— The Outdoor Chums at Cabin Point - or The Golden Cup Mystery • Quincy Allen
... he said, with a smirk of satisfaction—"it's a great thing to be the go-between between two states of being; to have the exclusive franchise to export and import shades from one state to the other, and withal to have had as clean a record as mine has been. Valuable ...
— A House-Boat on the Styx • John Kendrick Bangs
... a footstep close at hand made them both turn their heads. Along the winding path came Da Souza, with an ugly smirk upon his white face, smoking a cigar whose odour seemed to poison the air. Trent turned upon him ...
— A Millionaire of Yesterday • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... art, science, and letters in a constant fear of having its pockets picked. Think of a man's having vouchsafed to him one of those awful glimpses into the mysteries of creation which should be received with a shudder of prayerful joy, and taking the gracious boon with a smirk of all-satisfied conceit! One page in what Shakspeare calls "Nature's infinite book of secrecy" flies a moment open to his eager gaze, and he hears the rustling of the myriad leaves as they close and clasp, only to make his spirit ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 7, May, 1858 • Various
... look in her eyes was sickening. But was Pat nauseated? Not he! The big goon was lapping it up like a famished feline. His simpering smirk stretched from ear to there as he murmured, "Now, ...
— Lighter Than You Think • Nelson Bond
... young man of Dunbar, Who playfully poisoned his Ma; When he'd finished his work, He remarked with a smirk, "This will ...
— Toaster's Handbook - Jokes, Stories, and Quotations • Peggy Edmund & Harold W. Williams, compilers
... tired and worn, but there was the same complacent repose upon his features that they always wore: and through dirt, and beard, and whisker, there still shone, unimpaired, the self-satisfied smirk of flash Toby Crackit. Then the Jew, in an agony of impatience, watched every morsel he put into his mouth; pacing up and down the room, meanwhile, in irrepressible excitement. It was all of no use. Toby continued to eat with ...
— Oliver Twist • Charles Dickens
... her distress she put on a complacent smirk, straightened her emaciated form, and sat there, looking like the very ghost of pride, wrapped in ...
— The Young Surveyor; - or Jack on the Prairies • J. T. Trowbridge
... him for the first time that hatred of inequalities which, repulsive though it is in theory, is yet the true nerver of the strong right arm of progress. It is as characteristic of the homely, human countenance of Democracy as the supercilious smirk is of the homely, inhuman countenance of caste. Arthur did not want to get up where Ross was seated in such elegant state; he wanted to tear Ross, all the Rosses down. "The damn fool!" he fumed. "He goes lounging about, wasting the money we make. It's all wrong. And if we weren't ...
— The Second Generation • David Graham Phillips
... the religion of the little. The low hills are a-smirk with flowers and greenery; the dominating peaks, austere and desolate, ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Volume 8 - Epigrams, On With the Dance, Negligible Tales • Ambrose Bierce
... she felt the little seeking mouth at her breast, although it was as if a stream of icy-cold water were running down her. But then, when her husband had appeared, had placed himself near the bed in which she lay so feeble, so weak, so at his mercy, and had said with such a satisfied smirk, "Psia krew, we've done that well!" then she could not restrain herself any longer. She had uttered a cry, a feeble, plaintive, yet piercing cry, and had [Pg 26] reared herself up with her last strength, so that ...
— Absolution • Clara Viebig
... some of us smirk in a chiffon shop, and some of us teach in a school; Some of us help with the seat of our pants to polish an office stool; The merits of somebody's soap or jam some of us seek to explain; But all of us wonder what we'll do when we have to go ...
— No Man's Land • H. C. McNeile
... fool like an old fool, as the saying is! Just watch her smirk! I'm mighty glad Ellen Robinson's there to relieve me of the responsibility. She'll be over after a while, and then we'll know who he is. There goes Julia in. She watched him out o' sight! Well, I wonder what her ...
— Cloudy Jewel • Grace Livingston Hill
... believe that if I had the power I'd do this to all of you! I'd do this to all of you! I'd do this to all of you! You just wait, you young scamp! I'll catch you. My heart boils, it boils, it boils over! And now I must smirk before the mistress as if I were a fool. What a life! What a life! The sinners in hell do not suffer as I suffer in this house! [She ...
— Plays • Alexander Ostrovsky
... not wish to speak to him, but, forced upon him as it was by the first lieutenant, he could do no less. So Mr. Templemore touched his hat, and stood before the captain, we regret to say, with such a good-humoured, sly, confiding smirk on his countenance, as at once established the proof of the accusation, and the enormity of ...
— The Pirate and The Three Cutters • Frederick Marryat
... in a barracan jacket and gaiters, with a smirk of welcome, and a very sharp, red nose, that seemed to promise good cheer, opened the door with a promptitude that indicated a hospitable ...
— A Stable for Nightmares - or Weird Tales • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... moment we are both silent. We have sat down side by side on the sofa. Vick is standing on her hinder legs, with her forepaws rested on Roger's knee. Her tail is wagging with the strong and untiring regularity of a pendulum, and a smirk of welcome and recognition is on her face. Roger's arm is round me, and we are holding each other's hands, but we are no longer in heaven. I could not tell you why, but we are not. Some stupid constraint—quite of earth—has fallen upon me. Where are all those most tender words, those profuse ...
— Nancy - A Novel • Rhoda Broughton
... quickness and penetration. They knew nothing of Sherlock Holmes in those days, but there was a good deal said of Talleyrand. And if you could have caught Frank off his guard, he would have confessed with a smirk that, if he resembled any one, it was the Marquis de Talleyrand-Perigord. It was on the occasion of Archie's first absence that this interest took root. It was vastly deepened when Kirstie resented his ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XIX (of 25) - The Ebb-Tide; Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... quite so vulgar as Chalon's. . . . I heard from my sister that you had finished Wilkinson to the perfect content of all: I had charged her particularly not to allow Mrs. W. to intercede for any smirk or alteration whatever. ...
— Letters of Edward FitzGerald - in two volumes, Vol. 1 • Edward FitzGerald
... speculations it is strikingly and abundantly obvious— some of those on geology may be quoted as examples. The offspring of the sciences— those pledges of affection which they present to art, almost all of them, come into the world with a caricature-like smirk upon their faces. Air-balloons and rail-roads have something funny about them; and photogenic drawings are, to say the least, very curious. The learned professions are all tinged with drollery. The law is confessedly ridiculous from beginning to end, and what is very strange, is that no one should ...
— The Comic Latin Grammar - A new and facetious introduction to the Latin tongue • Percival Leigh
... somewhat at this question. He softly drew his hand over his chin as he replied with a smirk: "There ...
— The Albert Gate Mystery - Being Further Adventures of Reginald Brett, Barrister Detective • Louis Tracy
... one always has something! And Pelle"—she leaned confidentially over him with a smirk on her face—"now Mary will soon come home, perhaps no later than this summer. She has earned so much over there that she can live on it, and she'll still be in the prime of her youth. What do you think ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo
... toward him, all my moral superiority betraying itself in the self-satisfied smirk which fixed itself on my face in accordance with the sense of duty which the Philistine feels so keenly in ...
— Mother Earth, Vol. 1 No. 2, April 1906 - Monthly Magazine Devoted to Social Science and Literature • Various
... suspected it could be. The right side of his face was in a condition of semi-paralysis due to the muscular exactions required; he had a sickening fear that the scowl that marked his brow was destined to form a perpetual alliance with the smirk at the corner of his nose, forever destroying the symmetry of his face. If one who has not the proper facial construction will but attempt the feat of holding a monocle in place for unbroken hours, he may come to appreciate ...
— The Husbands of Edith • George Barr McCutcheon
... turned to Molly and asked in one breath who had left it. When the clamor slackened, she replied, "Why, young Cuffy from the baker's, and all he said was, 'David Dubbs,—to be sent—card inside,' and then kissing his hand, and crying 'Love to her,' meaning I don't know who," with a smirk at Polly, "he jumped aboard his wagon and flew ...
— In the Yule-Log Glow, Book I - Christmas Tales from 'Round the World • Various
... said, "it is easily done, and it is as much to your brother as to myself. It is a letter which, methinks, Fulk would not have read out of the family, of which I may call myself one," and he gave a sort of smirk at Agnes;—"but he writes so crabbedly, that I, for one, cannot read two lines,—and I would not willingly give it to a clerk, who might be less secret. So methought, as 'twas the Baron's affair, I would even bring ...
— The Lances of Lynwood • Charlotte M. Yonge
... come so far to see you such a hot morning." Joe said a deal more of the same make; and all the time he was saying it, the old man laid himself back in his great chair, and kept twiddling his thumbs, and glancing up at Joe with a half-smirk on his face, as if he had got something very ...
— The Squire of Sandal-Side - A Pastoral Romance • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... am I to wage war?"—And, in fact, during my last visit I found that Alexyei Sergyeitch had aged very greatly; even the pupils of his eyes had acquired a milky hue—like that in infants—and on his lips there appeared not the discerning smile of former days, but that strainedly-sweet, unconscious smirk which never leaves the faces of very old people even ...
— A Reckless Character - And Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... across the desk, looking at me with his small, dark eyes. He had an expression on his face that looked as if it were trying to sneer and leer at the same time but couldn't get much beyond the smirk stage. ...
— A Spaceship Named McGuire • Gordon Randall Garrett
... near her so long as that odious actor is hanging about. His smirk at me the other ...
— Money Magic - A Novel • Hamlin Garland
... smiling at the idea of all this brandy drunk at the expense of another. He was smiling the contented smirk of ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... about it! But that hanging up of the gittern—. One would fain have put it off, had falling hairs, and marriage-vows, and obesity have permitted it. Nay, is it not so, old friend of the grizzled beard? Dost thou not envy that smirk young knave with his five lustrums, though it goes hard with him to purchase his kid-gloves? He dines for one-and-twopence at an eating-house; but what cares Maria where he dines? He rambles through the rye with his empty pockets, and at the turn of the field-path Maria will ...
— The Bertrams • Anthony Trollope
... up his lugs at this appeal, and, looking as wise as if he had been Solomon's nephew, gave a knowing smirk, and said— ...
— The Life of Mansie Wauch - Tailor in Dalkeith, written by himself • David Macbeth Moir
... Rejoicing. — N. rejoicing, exultation, triumph, jubilation, heyday, flush, revelling; merrymaking &c. (amusement) 840; jubilee &c. (celebration) 883; paean, Te Deum &c. (thanksgiving) 990[Lat]; congratulation &c. 896. smile, simper, smirk, grin; broad grin, sardonic grin. laughter (amusement) 840. risibility; derision &c. 856. Momus; Democritus the Abderite[obs3]; rollicker[obs3]. V. rejoice, thank one's stars, bless one's stars; congratulate oneself, hug oneself; rub one's hands, clap one's hands; smack the lips, fling up one's ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... don't blame the young lady!—dear me, no!" he said, with a smirk. "Loyalty, you know. What ...
— The Paternoster Ruby • Charles Edmonds Walk
... Happuch's work and feel nothing added to her toil," was the sharp response. "Small use are her hands in any kitchen. We had better make up our minds to wed her to a fine gentleman, who wants naught of his wife but to dress up in grand gowns, and smirk and simper over her fan; for no useful work will he get out of her. If rushes are wanted, she had better go quickly ...
— The Lost Treasure of Trevlyn - A Story of the Days of the Gunpowder Plot • Evelyn Everett-Green
... city is unhappily familiar. In Buck's terminology, it was identified as "The Centre Street mashers": those pimply, weak-faced, bad-eyed young men who congregate at prominent corners every afternoon, especially Saturdays, to smirk at the working-girls, and to pass, wherever they could, from their murmured, "Hello, Kiddo," and "Where you goin', baby?" to less ...
— Queed • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... and even if we consider them worthy of only secondary honors, it matters not, they remain indelibly impressed on our minds. After one has seen Steen's pictures it is impossible to see a drunkard, a buffoon, a cripple, a dwarf, a deformed face, a ridiculous smirk, a grotesque attitude, without remembering one of his figures. All the degrees of stupidity and of drunkenness, all the grossness and mawkishness of orgies, the frenzy of the lowest pleasures, the cynicism of the vulgarest vice, the buffoonery of the wildest rabble, all the most brutal emotions, ...
— Holland, v. 1 (of 2) • Edmondo de Amicis
... admire the break?" asked Mr. Jawkins, with a preliminary bow and smirk. "It is a new pattern; and the panels picked out in cream color are thought to give a monstrous fine tone to the body. And as for the horses—they're from ex-President ...
— The King's Men - A Tale of To-morrow • Robert Grant, John Boyle O'Reilly, J. S. Dale, and John T.
... the door, and was answered by a red-haired young woman, with a silly grin on her face, the smirk flanked on each side with cork-screw curls which hung down over her bright blue dress; which, as I could see, was pulled out at the seams under her round and shapely arms. She put out a soft and plump hand to me, but I did not take it. She looked ...
— Vandemark's Folly • Herbert Quick
... in the honest working world, With posture and hint and smirk, These sons of the devil are standing by While ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 4 (of 4) • Various
... brothers, Reuben and Burke And Nathan and Jotham and Solomon, lurk Around the corner to see him work— Sitting cross-legged, like a Turk, Drawing the waxed-end through with a jerk, And boring the holes with a comical quirk Of his wise old head, and a knowing smirk. But vainly they mounted each other's backs, And poked through knot-holes and pried through cracks; With wood from the pile and straw from the stacks He plugged the knot-holes and caulked the cracks; And a dipper ...
— The Book of Humorous Verse • Various
... encore; but once entered, he would have seen that all faces were at present sober, and most of them serious—it was the regular and respectable thing for those excellent farm-labourers to do, as much as for elegant ladies and gentlemen to smirk and bow over their wine-glasses. Bartle Massey, whose ears were rather sensitive, had gone out to see what sort of evening it was at an early stage in the ceremony, and had not finished his contemplation until a silence ...
— Adam Bede • George Eliot
... at the hotel is but a few hours, but eleven domestics range themselves in a row to wait upon our departure and to smirk and extend their palms for tips as we prepare to go. No country under the sun save the Caucasus could thus muster eleven expectant menials on the strength of one meal served and but three hours ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens
... purposes of improvement. Instead of such meetings of choice friends, we now have mobs of people, drawn together by every sort of factitious motive—crowds who crush each other's dresses, desperately bow and smirk at each other; exchange intolerable commonplaces, with unmeaning conventionality; affect to listen to music, which no one can hear or would care for if he could hear; mix all their buzzing voices in one oceanic roar; or, when there is room, break up into ...
— The Friendships of Women • William Rounseville Alger
... found that everything appeared to be in great confusion; indeed an event was occurring which had astonished the whole household; the butler made a profound bow to the captain; the footmen forgot their usual smirk when he alighted. Captain Delmar was ushered in solemn silence into the drawing-room, and his aunt, who had notice of his arrival received him with a stiff, prim air of unwonted frigidity, with her arms crossed before her on her white ...
— Percival Keene • Frederick Marryat
... young fellow with a sly, twisted smirk which gives him the appearance of perpetually winking his eye, detaches himself from a group on the right. All join in with urging exclamations: "Go on, Peters! Go to it! Pedal up, Pete! Give us a rag! That's the boy, ...
— The Straw • Eugene O'Neill
... the completion of Mrs. Gamp's affecting narrative of the confidential opinions of her sobriety entertained by Mrs. Harris, Mr. Mould, the undertaker, opportunely presented to the audience his well-remembered countenance—"a face in which a queer attempt at melancholy was at odds with a smirk of satisfaction." The impersonation, here, was conveyed in something better than the unsatisfactory hint by which that attempted in regard to Mr. Pecksniff was alone to be expressed. Speaking of Old Chuzzlewit's funeral, ...
— Charles Dickens as a Reader • Charles Kent
... abode—and so they dream, but don't unload. They like to take a check in hand, and, headed by the village band, present it to some charity—'twould mean five cents to you or me; then they're embalmed in song and ode; they smirk and ...
— Rippling Rhymes • Walt Mason
... round the bruised and wounded joint. The man, Bideabout, did not concern himself with the wrath or the anguish of the man. He rubbed his hands together, and clapped a palm on each knee, and looked into the fire with a smirk on his face, but with an eye on the alert lest his adversary should attempt to steal an advantage ...
— The Broom-Squire • S. (Sabine) Baring-Gould
... "Our old forefathers went through worse trials than this when they eat their cartridge boxes and friz themselves at Valley Forge," and he fingered some of them bows and ornaments on his breast agin with a vain, conceited smirk of satisfaction. I wuz at my wits' end; I glanced at the door; there wuz no lock on it; what should I do? Religion and common sense wouldn't move him, and as for my sharpest weepon—good vittles—here I wuz hampered, I couldn't cook 'em for him, ...
— Around the World with Josiah Allen's Wife • Marietta Holley
... There was a growing bald spot, scarcely hidden by the Hyperion Polish curls; there were crows'-feet around the bold, insolent eyes, and the man's smile was lean and wolfish when the glittering white teeth flashed through the professional smirk of the traveling artist. The old, easy assurance was still there, but cognac had dulled the fires of genius; the tones of the violin trembled, even under the weakening but still magic fingers, and the splendid sapphire and diamond cluster ring of old was replaced by a too evident Palais Royal ...
— A Fascinating Traitor • Richard Henry Savage
... nor to the left as she swung her leaders around the corner, yet no sign of the town's retrogression since her last visit escaped her—any more than did the mean small-town smirk upon the faces of a group of doorway loafers, who commented humorously upon the ...
— The Fighting Shepherdess • Caroline Lockhart
... with swaggering alacrity. We hoped he would make a mistake and were ready to jeer and laugh at him. But to our great annoyance his salute was perfect, affectedly perfect. As he came back to the ranks he leered horribly at the Sergeant and then looked at us with a smirk ...
— Combed Out • Fritz August Voigt
... was a tall person, wearing a silk travelling-cap. He had a face of stupid benignity and a self-satisfied smirk; and he was formally trying to put at his ease, and hopelessly confusing the loutish youth before him. "You say you saw the whole accident, and you're probably the only passenger that did see it. You'll be the most important witness at the trial," he added, as if there would ever be any ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... full-blown woman, rightful queen of her half of the dominion. Between the Aminta of then and now, the difference was marked as between Northern and Southern women: the frozen-mouthed Northerner and the pearl and rose-nipped Southerner; those who smirk in dropping congealed monosyllables, and those who radiantly laugh out the ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... office of Vice-Chamberlain. Next to him is Sir H. Selwin-Ibbetson, Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, and whom I have heard genially described as "one of the prosiest speakers in the House." Next to him, with a paper in his hand and a smirk of supreme self-satisfaction on his face, is Mr. ...
— Faces and Places • Henry William Lucy
... As though an artificer, after contriving 200 A wheel-work image as if it were living, Should find with delight it could motion to strike him! So found the Duke, and his mother like him: The lady hardly got a rebuff— That had not been contemptuous enough, 205 With his cursed smirk, as he nodded applause, And kept ...
— Selections from the Poems and Plays of Robert Browning • Robert Browning
... money from him first?" the priest suggested with a fat smirk. None guessed better than he how low debauch had ...
— Guns of the Gods • Talbot Mundy
... Jewish physiognomies. There was one, a solemn lean fellow in black, with his collars extremely turned over, and holding before him a long ivory-tipped ebony cane, who tripped along the little place with a solemn smirk, which gave one an indescribable feeling of the truth of "Gil Blas," and of those delightful bachelors and licentiates who have appeared to ...
— Notes on a Journey from Cornhill to Grand Cairo • William Makepeace Thackeray
... The best actor was he who represented the blind man. The chief actress is an overgrown dame, all fat and dimples, who kept up a constant sobbing and heaving of her chest, yet never getting rid of an eternal smirk upon her face. A bolero, danced afterwards by two Spanish damsels in black ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon de la Barca
... the mother, drawing her away from the door and down the stairs. "He must be trying to teach himself to dance. I suppose he wants to learn how, so he'll be able to dance at the party," she added, with smirk. Then Mother Stina began to shake with laughter. "He came near frightening the life out of me," she confessed. "Thank God he can be young for once!" When she had got over her fit of laughing, she said: "You're not to say a word about this to ...
— Jerusalem • Selma Lagerlof
... a smirk and bow, taking off his broad brimmed hat, and running his fingers through his hair, making it fluff out more than ever, "I have lost a bolt out of part of my wagon, and I'm afraid to go on lest I break down. It dropped somewhere in the dust, ...
— The Outdoor Girls in a Motor Car - The Haunted Mansion of Shadow Valley • Laura Lee Hope
... as lightly as before; and then turning to the mantelpiece again, she raised her glance to the portrait. "I never liked it," she commented frankly, "he's got me in an unnatural position—I never stood like that in my life—and there's an open smirk ...
— The Wheel of Life • Ellen Anderson Gholson Glasgow
... said Mr. Crow with a smirk, "I'll report to Jimmy Rabbit. I'll tell him where, when and how you want to race, and there's no doubt that ...
— The Tale of Grumpy Weasel - Sleepy-Time Tales • Arthur Scott Bailey
... compassed murkily about With ravage of six long sad hundred stairs, Dizzily plunging with tumultuous glee! Whirling the stairdust, hazarding oblique, The moon safe in her pocket! See she treads Cool citric crystals, fierce pyropus stone; While crushing sunbeams in a triple line Smirk at the insane roses in her hair, And Strojavacca, frowning, looks asquint To see that trick of toe,—that dizened heel,— As she, the somewhat, hangs 'twixt naught and naught. A perfect Then,—a sub-potential Now— A facile ...
— The Re-echo Club • Carolyn Wells
... smile distorted the wrinkled face of AEsop and made it appear more than usually repulsive. "You mean me," he said, and the smirk deepened, only to dissipate ...
— The Duke's Motto - A Melodrama • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... you are crazy and that it is not. There is no other way of telling the difference. So a conspiracy of fools, lawyers, and doctors is formed. If you do not live the life of the stupid: cheat, lie, steal, smirk, eat, dance, and drink—then you are crazy! That fact agreed upon, the hypocrites, who are quite mad, but cunning enough to dissemble, lock behind bolted doors those free souls, the poets, painters, musicians—artistic folk in general. ...
— Visionaries • James Huneker
... bustled off, and Bugs Butler, with a final smirk, left Sally and dived under the ropes. There was a stir of interest in the audience, though the newspaper men, blase through familiarity, exhibited no emotion. Presently Mr. Burrowes reappeared, shepherding a young man whose face was hidden ...
— The Adventures of Sally • P. G. Wodehouse
... laughed Charles, tauntingly, with a wink at his companions; "a pretty piece of heraldry, a bold escutcheon, a dainty poniard—pale as a lily, and how he did sigh and drop his lids and smirk and smirk and dance your latest galliard to surpass De Grammont. Ask brother James how he ...
— Mistress Nell - A Merry Tale of a Merry Time • George C. Hazelton, Jr.
... a seductive smirk, asked, "what he was going to give them?" The poet replied, "a little thing of his own—'Rosalie; or, the Broken ...
— Handy Andy, Volume One - A Tale of Irish Life, in Two Volumes • Samuel Lover
... his Majesty will hang every mother's son of 'em. All pleasure of life is gone, and they've folly enough to think they can resist the fleet. And the worst of it is," cried he, "the worst of it is, I'm forced to smirk to them, and give good gold to their government." Seeing that my father did not answer, he asked: "Have you joined the Highlanders? ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... town I made inquiries, and was told by a black fellow in the Circle that Mr. Carvel was but just left for Upper Marlboro with a cavalcade of four coaches-and-six and some dozen gentlemen with their servants. I am sure my mistake was pardonable, Mr. Carvel," he concluded with a smirk; "this gentleman was plainly of the first quality, as was he to whom I was directed. And as he was about to leave town for I knew not how long, I hope I was in the right in bidding the black ride after him, for I give you my word the ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... beside Thurid, and ere the devilish smirk had faded from his handsome face I had caught him full upon the mouth with my clenched fist; and as the good, old American blow landed, the black dator shot back a dozen feet, to crumple in a heap at the foot of Kulan Tith's throne, spitting blood and ...
— Warlord of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... surprise, as he entered the store, not a soul was visible, but at the sound of his footsteps on the hard floor his guardian suddenly appeared from his private office, his shrewd face suffused by the ingratiating smirk he always put on when going to meet a prospective customer. At the sight of his ward standing in the middle of the floor, however, he started, and then his face assumed ...
— Bob Chester's Grit - From Ranch to Riches • Frank V. Webster
... on a young thing to have to enjoy herself in a foreign language, and spend the holidays with a maiden lady and a snuffy old Pere, because there wasn't enough money to come home. Yes," concluded Pixie, with a smirk of satisfaction, "I've had my trials, and now I'm to be crossed in love, and have my young lover rent from me. ... You couldn't have the audacity to call life ...
— The Love Affairs of Pixie • Mrs George de Horne Vaizey
... Bonnycastle, Dr. George Fordyce, Mr. George Anderson, Dr. Geddes, and a host of other prominent artists, scientists, and literary men. Their meetings were informal. They gathered together to talk about what interested them, and not to simper and smirk, and give utterance to platitudes and affectations, as was the case with the society to which Mary had lately been introduced. The people with whom she now became acquainted were too earnest to lay undue stress on what Herbert Spencer calls the non-essentials of social intercourse. ...
— Mary Wollstonecraft • Elizabeth Robins Pennell
... have been hoping all along, for the reader's sake, they would have dispensed with; they burst into tears; whereupon the Major, with his Irish appreciation of the ludicrous, turned away to hide his smirk and began good-humoredly to scratch himself first on the temple and then ...
— Old Creole Days • George Washington Cable
... my eyes grew dim with rapture, alarm, and ineffable delight. I was ashamed in presence of the old woman, who began to smirk and wink odiously, and I flew like an arrow to the loneliest nook of the garden. There I threw myself on the grass beneath the hazel-bushes and read the note again, repeating the words by heart, and then re-reading them over and over, ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries: - Masterpieces of German Literature Translated into English, Volume 5. • Various
... little mechanical toy should be contrived to make the motion of striking, and brilliantly make it. Thus, as a mechanical toy, was the only way to treat this minute critic, for like the Duke at Ferrara, this Duke (and his mother) did not choose to stoop. He would merely wear his "cursed smirk" as he nodded applause, but he had some trouble in keeping off the "old ...
— Browning's Heroines • Ethel Colburn Mayne
... A half smile—a contemptuous smirk of the lips—seamed for a moment the bronzed, weather-beaten and wrinkled face of the lone horseman. He tightened the reins and his steed made ready to ...
— The Boy Ranchers at Spur Creek - or Fighting the Sheep Herders • Willard F. Baker
... lips. Catia was not unimpressive in her new dignity of wifehood; but the dignity bore traces of diligent rehearsal, and left singularly little to the imagination. By her side, Scott, looking down upon his fellow townsmen, wore the self-conscious smirk of a sheepish schoolboy; and the best of his fellow townsmen respected him the more on that account. Catia was the more impressive of the two, they told themselves; but there was no especial sense in a pair of young things like ...
— The Brentons • Anna Chapin Ray
... for all those objects. And why? Because every bald head in this Republican Government gets pink at the top whenever her dress rustles outside the door. They bow with immense deference when the door opens, but the bow conceals a smirk because of those Venetian days. That confounded Versoy shoved his nose into that business; he says accidentally. He saw them together on the Lido and (those writing fellows are horrible) he wrote what he calls a vignette (I suppose accidentally, ...
— The Arrow of Gold - a story between two notes • Joseph Conrad
... man was expensively dressed in a flashy way. His oily, pimple-garnished face wreathed itself in a smirk of patronising familiarity, and with the bow of a dancing master he advanced. I saw her give a quick start, bite her lip and shrink back. "Good for you, little girl," I thought. But the man was ...
— The Trail of '98 - A Northland Romance • Robert W. Service
... said with his vain smirk. "No weight whatever. This entire platform together with its huts is lighter than air. If I should tear loose this little door it would float out of my hands instantly and go straight up to the stars. The substance—I ...
— The Floating Island of Madness • Jason Kirby
... work No burning faith I find; The deeper thinkers sneer and smirk, And give my toil no mind; From nod and wink I read they think That I ...
— Poems of the Past and the Present • Thomas Hardy
... step the experimental sculptor would run up against disaster. What could be seen in the streets, while it offered plenty of subjects, offered none that could stimulate his talent. His patrons asked only for illustration and applied ornament; his models offered only the smirk and sad humour of a stunted life. Here and there his statues might attain a certain sweetness and grace, such as painting might perfectly well have rendered; but on the whole sculpture ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana
... to the "Paphian Mimp!" MOMUS is dead, and e'en that tricksy imp Preposterous Puck hath too much native grit To take the taste of OSRICK turned a wit. Humour baccilophil, microbic merriment, Might suit him better. He will try the experiment. His mirth's a smirk and not a paroxysm; "Papa, potatoes, poultry, prunes and prism" Do not disturb the "plie" of his prim lips, Neither do cynic quirks and querulous quips. Mirth would guffaw—when hearts and mouths were bigger, OSRICK would shrink from aught beyond a snigger, Such as is stirred by screeds ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 104, February 4, 1893 • Various
... even a blind man would believe him ill now! It was something of a coincidence that Don should run across Walton in the corridor a few minutes later. Don was for passing by with no recognition of the other, but Walton, with a smirk, placed himself fairly ...
— Left Guard Gilbert • Ralph Henry Barbour
... and when finished leaves Molly standing before her maid with (it must be confessed) a very self-satisfied smirk upon ...
— Molly Bawn • Margaret Wolfe Hamilton
... think I need to be told it? She was too far above me before, and now she is gone quite out of my reach. But why come and fling it in my face? Can't you give a poor, undone man one hour to draw his breath in trouble? And when you know I have got to play the host this bitter day, and smile, and smirk, and make you all merry, with my heart breaking! O Christ, look down and pity me, for men are made of stone! Well, then, no; I will not, I cannot say the word to give her up. She will discharge me, and then I'll fly the country ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 101, March, 1866 • Various
... it," says the shopman, with a smirk. "You were so taken up with that fine student that . . . it's queer you ...
— The Darling and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... not a traitor to your mind. Who, knowing innocence in danger, dares Not turn his eye, for fear of smirk, or stares, By other courts, is Justice's statue blind, That to the wall, not Bench, should be assigned. Oft, Precedent is Folly with gray hairs; So you, recalling Junius, heard the prayers Of friendless Stilow; ...
— Freedom, Truth and Beauty • Edward Doyle
... in khaki struts the limelit boards: With false moustache, set smirk and ogling eyes And straddling legs and swinging hips she tries To swagger it like a soldier, while the chords Of rampant ragtime jangle, clash, and clatter; And over the brassy blare and drumming din She strains to squirt ...
— Miscellany of Poetry - 1919 • Various
... comical-looking fellow of medium height; he wore nippers, and had a perpetual smirk on ...
— Soldiers of the Queen • Harold Avery
... saw that we were talking of the boy, her interest in the conversation vanished, even more quickly than her appetite. She had to go, she said suddenly; she was so sorry, and the discontented curiosity of her look gave place again to the smirk of affected politeness. ...
— Oscar Wilde, Volume 2 (of 2) - His Life and Confessions • Frank Harris
... said with a forced smirk, "Yes, Miss Marilyn. Excuse me fer not recognizing you. You've grown a lot. Why no, Cherry ain't at home this morning. She'll be awful sorry not to see you. She thought a lot of you, she did. She got on so well with you in her music too. I says to her the other ...
— The City of Fire • Grace Livingston Hill
... never among them. And many a night she lay awake, yearning for Hansel, praying for him, and blessing him. She seemed to hear his gay and careless laugh ringing from Alp to Alp—how different from the polite smirk of the junior, the fat grin of the senior Hahn! She saw his tall, agile figure standing upon a rock leaning upon his gun, outlined against the blue horizon,—and she heard his strong clear voice yodling and calling to her from afar. It is not to be wondered at that Ilka did not thrive in ...
— Ilka on the Hill-Top and Other Stories • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... at last exclaimed Frank Digby; "you are quite embarrassing to her ladyship. Will the lady Louisa take my arm? Allow me, madam, to interpose my powerful authority." And he offered his arm to Louis with a smirk and low bow, which set all the spectators off laughing; for Frank was one of those privileged persons, who, having attained a celebrity for being very funny, can excite a ...
— Louis' School Days - A Story for Boys • E. J. May
... Some few business men may smirk at their stenographers; some few painters may behave in the same way to their models. I fancy it's the exception to the rule in any kind of business—isn't ...
— The Common Law • Robert W. Chambers
... handful of coloured, feather-weight celluloid balls, with which to bombard strangers across the room. The inevitable shamefaced Englishman departed in tow of an overdressed Frenchwoman with pride of conquest in her smirk. The equally inevitable alcoholic was dug out from under his table and thrown into a cab. An American girl insisted on climbing upon a table to dance, but swayed and had to be helped down, giggling foolishly. A Spanish dancing girl was afforded a clear floor for her specialty, ...
— The Lone Wolf - A Melodrama • Louis Joseph Vance
... amateur executioners observing their victim that every eye went back to the clock as well. Even Carl was guilty of that imitation. Consequently he saw the editor, standing at the back, make notes on his copy-paper and smirk like an ill-bred hound stealing a bone. And the Greek professor stared at Frazer's gauche movements with a grim smugness that indicated, "Quite the sort of thing I expected." The Greek's elbows were on ...
— The Trail of the Hawk - A Comedy of the Seriousness of Life • Sinclair Lewis
... you for the favor, a cat that would eat you if he dared, is a pretty revelation. Ca donne furieusement a penser. [Footnote: Ca donne furieusement a penser: "That makes one think very hard."] It gives you a suspicion of just how far the polish we most of us smirk over will go. My cats at San Lorenzo knew some few moments of peace between two and three in the afternoon. That would have been the time to get up a testimonial to the kind soul who fed them. Try them at five and they would ignore you. But ...
— Short Stories and Selections for Use in the Secondary Schools • Emilie Kip Baker
... about the colour in the cheek," he answered, with a smirk at what he took to be the ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... hunger in the whole countenance. He had scarcely glanced at the horse, when drawing in his cheeks, he thrust out his lips very much after the manner of a baboon, when he sees a piece of sugar held out towards him. "Is this horse yours?" said he, suddenly turning towards me, with a kind of smirk. "It's my horse," said I; "are you the person who wishes to make an honest penny by it?" "How!" said he, drawing up his head with a very consequential look, and speaking with a very haughty tone, "what do you mean?" We looked at each other full in the face; after a few moments, the ...
— The Romany Rye • George Borrow
... Dr. Delmour, while we stood in a respectful semi-circle before her, modestly conscious of our worth, our toes turned out, and each man's features wreathed with that politely unnatural smirk which masculine features assume when confronted by feminine beauty. "Gentlemen, on the eve of your proposed departure for Baffin Land in quest of living specimens of the five-spotted Philohela quinquemaculata, I have been instructed by Professor Bottomly to announce to you a great good ...
— Police!!! • Robert W. Chambers
... compelled to forego the search from fear of mortification, as they trace their family line through long generations of intelligent American farmers. Superficial 'Young America' and 'our best society' may smirk, snicker, sneer, and live on, slaves to fashion and the whims of Mrs. Grundy, in their fancied secure social position for all time. But ere long the balance of man's better judgment, the best society ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 5, May, 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... nodded to acquaintances. Others gathered round the bar, and a few looked at the drop-curtain as if they thought their ascetic glances would cause it to roll up and disappear. The overture at length ended. The stage was disclosed, and a man came forward with a smirk, and a wriggle of gigantic feet, ...
— Flames • Robert Smythe Hichens
... Henrietta Hen remarked with a silly smirk. "If it weren't for getting my feet wet I'd be tempted to learn myself. No doubt ...
— The Tale of Henrietta Hen • Arthur Scott Bailey
... replies with a knowing smirk, which is the nearest approach to a laugh in which he ever indulged. Then he takes out his snuffbox and taps it, which is a sign that he is going to say something worth while. "Yes, one must go everywhere, ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great - Volume 14 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Musicians • Elbert Hubbard
... neighbor on my right, An Eager Ass, considered bright; Asker of questions.... How he'll stand, With earnest air and fidgy hand, After this hour, telling you He sat all night and burrowed through Your book.... Oh, you'll be coy and he Will simulate precosity, And pedants both, you'll smile and smirk, And leer, and hasten ...
— This Side of Paradise • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... face had a queer attempt at melancholy, sadly at variance with a smirk of satisfaction which might be read between the lines. Though his calling was not a lively one, it did not depress his spirits, as in the bosom of his family he was the most cheery of men, and to him the "tap, tap" of coffin-making ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer
... from a clear sky, and it fell with terrible effect on Felix. For a moment the knife trembled in his grasp with an almost irresistible impulse. He could hardly restrain himself, as he heard those horrible, incredible words, and saw the loathsome smirk on the speaker's face by which they were accompanied, from leaping then and there at the savage's throat, and plunging his blade to the haft into the vile creature's body. But by a violent effort he ...
— The Great Taboo • Grant Allen
... last night? Indecent, if you ask me, with not a petticoat under it, I'll be bound!... Always wears shoes twice too small for her ... What men can see in her ... How they can endure that perpetual smirk!..." They were at last discussing the Klondike woman, and whatever had befallen our guest of honour I knew that those present would never regain their first awe of the occasion. ...
— Ruggles of Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson
... fancies. She always insisted on her dolls joining our studies. It used to be a little embarrassing to me at first to see myself surrounded by the vacant waxen faces staring at us, with every variety of smirk and bland fatuous expression: the flaxen heads nid-nodded over open lesson-books, propped up in limp, leathery arms. When Flossy grew impatient for a game of play, he would drag two or three of them down with a vicious snap and a stroke of his feathery paws. Flurry would shake ...
— Esther - A Book for Girls • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... with an energy that amazed his faithful follower. The nightmare horror of the situation had affected him much as a sudden blow in the parts about the waistcoat might have done. But, now, as Spike would have said, he caught up with his breath. The smirk faded slowly from the other's face as he listened. Not even in the Bowery, full as it was of candid friends, had he listened to such a trenchant summing-up of his mental and ...
— The Intrusion of Jimmy • P. G. Wodehouse
... Wingrave answered. "Do you suppose a man, with the best pages of his life rooted out, is likely to look out upon his fellows from the point of view of a philanthropist? Do you suppose that the man, into whose soul the irons of bitterness have gnawed and eaten their way, is likely to come out with a smirk and look around him for the opportunity of doing good? Rubbish! My aim is to encourage suffering wherever I see it, to create it where I can, to make sinners ...
— The Malefactor • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... seriousness in looks and motions gives dignity, without excluding wit and decent cheerfulness, which are always serious themselves. A constant smirk upon the face, and a whifing activity of the body, are strong indications of futility. Whoever is in a hurry, shows that the thing he is about is too big for him. Haste and hurry are ...
— The PG Edition of Chesterfield's Letters to His Son • The Earl of Chesterfield
... protection of the Stars and Stripes, which he would drag down, has made himself so emphatically one of the "capitalists," whom he hates, that he resides on New York's famous "Riverside Drive," and was able to testify with a smirk, "I flatter myself that I am not a failure." (See printed "Testimony" of the trial of the five Assemblymen ...
— The Red Conspiracy • Joseph J. Mereto
... stolid, hard face, rose and steadied himself against a beam. His full bass tones were sad, and he showed no sign of that self-satisfied smirk which sometimes makes the mind revolt against ...
— A Dream of the North Sea • James Runciman
... I did was to fall aff the flower-pot; but syne I came to, and says I, wi' a polite smirk, 'I'm thinking your leddyship,' says I, 'as you're the ...
— The Little Minister • J.M. Barrie
... a sallow, shabby person, driving a covered wagon, who recognized me at once. It was the "Doctor" who had lightened the journey down the Chesapeake, by a discourse upon embalming. He pointed toward the field with a long bony finger, and called aloud, with a smirk upon his face— ...
— Campaigns of a Non-Combatant, - and His Romaunt Abroad During the War • George Alfred Townsend
... a smirk, and a blush on her face, "I'll promise to wed the boy Who takes me to-morrow to Epsom Race!" (Which I would have ...
— More Bab Ballads • W. S. Gilbert
... was waiting for them—an oily smirk on a face smooth save where a thin fringe of white whiskers dangled from his jaw-bone, ear to ear; fat, damp hands rubbing in anticipation of the large fee that was to repay him for celebrating the marriage and for keeping quiet about ...
— The Cost • David Graham Phillips
... had elapsed since Sam had seen him last, an extraordinary transformation had taken place in this young man. His wan look had disappeared. His eyes were bright. His face wore that beastly self-satisfied smirk which you see in pictures advertising certain makes of fine-mesh underwear. If Eustace Hignett had been a full-page drawing in a magazine with "My dear fellow, I always wear Sigsbee's Super-fine Featherweight!" ...
— The Girl on the Boat • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... in appropriating a ludicrous character in some popular comedy, and dubbing his adversaries with it. In the same spirit he ridiculed Dr. Turner, of Cambridge, a brother-genius to Parker, by nicknaming him "Mr. Smirk, the Divine in Mode," the name of the Chaplain in Etherege's "Man of Mode," and thus, by a stroke of the pen, conveyed an idea of "a neat, starched, formal, and forward divine." This application of a fictitious character ...
— Calamities and Quarrels of Authors • Isaac D'Israeli
... ladies who are playing with little parasols, or little dogs, or little children—it's the same rule in art, only varying the objects—are smirking. In fact,' said Miss La Creevy, sinking her voice to a confidential whisper, 'there are only two styles of portrait painting; the serious and the smirk; and we always use the serious for professional people (except actors sometimes), and the smirk for private ladies and gentlemen who don't care so ...
— The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby • Charles Dickens
... a smirk of suspicion crossing his narrow fox face. "Oh! You'll bring it to-morrow, will you?" he sneered. "Well, do you know that to-morrow's New Year's Eve and that this mantilla's got to be delivered to-night? They have been telephoning all day ...
— Felix O'Day • F. Hopkinson Smith
... personality and merriment is distorted by malevolence.(!) No man who really knows the qualities of Mr. Whistler's best work will imagine that he really believes the highest expression of his art to be realized in reproduction of the grin and glare, the smirk and leer, of Japanese womanhood as represented in its professional types of beauty; but to all appearance he would fain persuade us that ...
— The Gentle Art of Making Enemies • James McNeill Whistler
... apartment was an arched alcove closed in by deep red curtains, and containing a lofty four-post bedstead with a kind of grand baldacchino covering it in. The sight of this reminded me that I had been six hours on horseback, and undressing with a self-satisfied smirk on ...
— The Man-Wolf and Other Tales • Emile Erckmann and Alexandre Chatrian
... worth while, I could develop her into a real woman. But I haven't, and it wouldn't be worth while when there are so many real women, ready made, out where I come from. This girl would be exactly the wife for you, though. Just as she is, she'd help you mince about from parlor to parlor, and smirk and jabber and waste time. She's been educating for the job ever since she was born." He laid his hand in gracious, kindly fashion on his friend's shoulder. "Think it over. And if you want my help it's yours. I can show her what a fine fellow you are, what a ...
— The Fashionable Adventures of Joshua Craig • David Graham Phillips
... became evident that faults of training or, perhaps, of temperament, were to be set off against the actress' unquestionable merits. The elegant artificiality of the American school, a tendency to pose and be self-conscious, to smirk even, if the word may be permitted, especially when advancing to the footlights to receive a full measure of applause, were fatal to such sentiment as even so stilted a play could be made to yield. It was but too evident that Parthenia was at all times more concerned with the fall of her drapery ...
— Mary Anderson • J. M. Farrar
... he said. "I admire you for it, George. Yes, I admire you, because of course you know what is going to happen to you, George, and to your son also. Perhaps you will wipe away that smirk of yours when a French firing squad backs ...
— The Unspeakable Gentleman • John P. Marquand
... expects to get the fur anyway," said Strange with a seeming deprecatory air—but the suspicion of a smirk wreathed ...
— The Fur Bringers - A Story of the Canadian Northwest • Hulbert Footner
... Professor with a knowing smirk, "don't it tell you to choose between the two? And how can you tell if you don't even look—whether the golt or the ...
— Silver and Gold - A Story of Luck and Love in a Western Mining Camp • Dane Coolidge |
