"Sneer" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... less cause for annoyance if she had had a little more severity," said Mrs. Rainham with an unspoken sneer at poor Aunt Margaret. "You had better advise her to do her best in return for the very comfortable home we give her." With which Bob had to endeavour to be content, for the present. He went off to find Cecilia, with a lowering ...
— Back To Billabong • Mary Grant Bruce
... beauty, grandeur, and utility is something that defies a sneer. It is more than imagination. It is next to divine beauty and the gran- deur of Spirit. It lives with our earth-life, and is [25] the subjective state of high thoughts. The atmos- phere of mortal mind constitutes our mortal envi- ronment. What mortals hear, ...
— Miscellaneous Writings, 1883-1896 • Mary Baker Eddy
... undying youth they speak to ours. "Wretched is the man," says Goethe, "who has learned to despise the dreams of his youth!" It is from this misery that the imagination and the poets, who are its spokesmen, rescue us. The world goes to church, kneels to the eternal Purity, and then contrives to sneer at innocence and ignorance of evil by calling it green. Let every man thank God for what little there may be left in him of his vernal sweetness. Let him thank God if he have still the capacity for feeling an unmarketable enthusiasm, for that will make him worthy of ...
— The Function Of The Poet And Other Essays • James Russell Lowell
... that the imaginations of one mind should become the personal recollections of another. Cowper said, forty or fifty years ago, that he dared not name John Bunyan in his verse, for fear of moving a sneer. We live in better times; and we are not afraid to say, that though there were many clever men in England during the latter half of the seventeenth century, there were only two great creative minds. One of those minds produced ...
— The Riches of Bunyan • Jeremiah Rev. Chaplin
... hurt an old man." There was a sneer in her voice which he had not heard before. "But if you promise not to shout, ...
— The Angel of Terror • Edgar Wallace
... a fool if he drowns then," retorted the girl with a sneer. "He can get across easy enough if he finds th' ...
— North, South and Over the Sea • M.E. Francis (Mrs. Francis Blundell)
... when Sim Squires came in to supper, he made casual announcement that he understood Bas had gone away somewhere. His vapid grin turned to a sneer as he mentioned Rowlett's name after the never-failing habit of his dissembling, but Dorothy set down his plate as though it had become suddenly too ...
— The Roof Tree • Charles Neville Buck
... Mr. Hazlehurst will not be easily satisfied," added Mr. Clapp, with an approach to a sneer. "Shall we go on, Mr. Reed, or ...
— Elinor Wyllys - Vol. I • Susan Fenimore Cooper
... you sneer at Strelitski?" he said, pained. "He has a noble soul. It is to the privilege of his conversation that I owe ...
— Children of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... said the Grand Duke amusedly, "I am going to do that which may bring the blush of shame to your brow or the sneer of pity to your lips. I am going to fulfill the destiny provided for every man with a pair of strong hands, and a willing ...
— The Vagrant Duke • George Gibbs
... professor, with a bitter sneer; 'who are my friends? Where have I found any whose friendship was other than a name? My books, my cabinet, my studies, the great work on which I am now laboring—these are my friends; it is only through these that I shall ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, June 1844 - Volume 23, Number 6 • Various
... repudiate" or to "sneer at the idea of any manifestation of design in the material universe,"[III-9] is one thing; while to consider, and perhaps to exaggerate, the difficulties which attend the practical application of the doctrine of final causes to certain instances, is quite another thing: ...
— Darwiniana - Essays and Reviews Pertaining to Darwinism • Asa Gray
... of Dintonknow. He happened incidentally to observe, that education was requisite to promote the interests of religion. But Miss Mally, on that occasion, jocularly maintained, that education had only a tendency to promote the sale of books. This, Mr. Dalgliesh thought, was a sneer at himself, he having some time before unfortunately published a short tract, entitled, "The moral union of our temporal and eternal interests considered, with respect to the establishment of parochial seminaries," and which ...
— The Ayrshire Legatees • John Galt
... come to good, when I heard him attempting to sneer at an unoffending city so respectable as Boston. After a man begins to attack the State-House, when he gets bitter about the Frog-Pond, you may be sure there is not much left of him. Poor Edgar Poe died in the hospital soon after he got into this way of talking; and so sure as you find an unfortunate ...
— The Professor at the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes (Sr.)
... with a sneer, "are you so little skilled in the ways of the woods, as to mistake the voice of a vile animal for that of ...
— The Tiger Hunter • Mayne Reid
... son's account with a contemptuous sneer on his lips. Another subject was at that moment occupying his thoughts. He had just received notice from Sir Ralph's steward to quit the mill ...
— Won from the Waves • W.H.G. Kingston
... 'I think I'll choose another regiment. I'm not hungry for the cat-o'-nine tails, and I should earn it if I were under this brute's command five minutes. You'd be a handsome chap in your own way, Major, if it were not for that silly sneer you're pleased to carry about with you. But I warn you that, under any circumstances whatsoever, if you should presume upon any difference in our rank to insult me by a word, a gesture, or a look I'll spoil ...
— VC — A Chronicle of Castle Barfield and of the Crimea • David Christie Murray
... attention of the house to public affairs was more imperatively demanded, and he boldly maintained that it was the duty of their lordships to lay the true state and condition of the country before his majesty. After indulging in a quiet sneer at the care the council had bestowed upon horned cattle, he remarked, that he was glad to hear that the king had reason to believe the peace of the country would be preserved, since peace could never be more desirable to a kingdom, ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... don't know any man in the world with whom I have more intellectual sympathy than Aylmer Ross. Do you remember how I pointed him out to you at once at the Mitchells'? And sometimes when I think how you used to sneer at the Mitchells—oh, you did, you know, dear, before you knew them—and I remember all the trouble I had to get you to go there, I wonder—I simply wonder! Don't you see, through going there, as I advised, we've made one of the nicest friends we ...
— Tenterhooks • Ada Leverson
... the sensation in high finance just now," Stuart said, with an unconscious sneer. "They say he's destined ...
— The Root of Evil • Thomas Dixon
... you are a notorious gambler, and you sneer at love! Gad! what a change is here! My dear fellow, what ...
— The Amateur Gentleman • Jeffery Farnol et al
... I suppose, the best beloved in recent literature, certainly they are the sweetest to me, but there was a time when my mother could not abide them. She said 'That Stevenson man' with a sneer, and, it was never easy to her to sneer. At thought of him her face would become almost hard, which seems incredible, and she would knit her lips and fold her arms, and reply with a stiff 'oh' if you mentioned his aggravating name. In the novels we have a way of writing ...
— Margaret Ogilvy • James M. Barrie
... coming swiftly across the room with that strange, padding step. He had no eye for her. He was smiling, and she had rather have seen him in a cursing fury than to see this smile. It curled the upper lip with something like a sneer; and she caught the white glint of his teeth; the wolf-dog snarled back over his shoulder to hurry his master. It was the crisis which she had known all day was coming, sooner or later. She had only prayed that it might be delayed for a little time. And confronting the danger ...
— The Night Horseman • Max Brand
... a certain experience of his moods, his intimacy becomes insupportable! A man who uses his balmorals to tread on your toes with much frequency and an unmistakeable emphasis may prove a fast friend in adversity, but meanwhile your adversity has not arrived and your toes are tender. The daily sneer or growl at your remarks is not to be made amends for by a possible eulogy or defence of your understanding against depredators who may not present themselves, and on an occasion which may never arise. I cannot ...
— Impressions of Theophrastus Such • George Eliot
... how to acquire honest wives, aye, and keep them so. There had never been in the de Wissant family any of those ugly scandals which stain other clans, and which are remembered over generations in French provincial towns. Those scandals which, if they provoke a laugh and cruel sneer when discussed by the indifferent, are recalled with long faces and anxious whisperings when a young girl's future is being discussed, and which make the honourable marriage ...
— Studies in love and in terror • Marie Belloc Lowndes
... mention that minx to me," said Mrs. Prague, with a sneer; "but it must be confessed, Sheldon has very limited knowledge of business, or he might have saved a part of his fortune at least. My son-in-law, Esq. Hardin, by his alacrity and far-seeing judgment, secured himself from material loss in the ...
— Eventide - A Series of Tales and Poems • Effie Afton
... and at once put on her company-manners again, behaving to him with great politeness, and a sneer that would not be hid away under it. From this Hugh suspected that she had made a better bargain than she had hoped; but the discovery was now too late, even if he could have brought himself to take advantage of it. He hated bargain-making as heartily ...
— David Elginbrod • George MacDonald
... said Jimmy, with a sneer; "you all time talking 'bout you know all 'bout job; you 'bout the womanishest little girl they is. Now I know job 'cause Miss Cecilia 'splained all 'bout him to me. He's in the Bible and he sold his birthmark for a mess ...
— Miss Minerva and William Green Hill • Frances Boyd Calhoun
... unduly about the oysters and the underdone mutton, little woman. Good plain cooks at twenty pounds a year will see to these things for us. Your work is to teach us gentleness and kindness. Lay your foolish curls just here, child. It is from such as you we learn wisdom. Foolish wise folk sneer at you. Foolish wise folk would pull up the laughing lilies, the needless roses from the garden, would plant in their places only useful, wholesome cabbage. But the gardener, knowing better, plants the silly, short-lived flowers, foolish wise folk ...
— Idle Ideas in 1905 • Jerome K. Jerome
... that which Mrs. Devar deemed ridiculous. As events shaped themselves, it was of the utmost importance to Cynthia, and to Medenham, and to several other persons who had not yet risen above their common horizon, that Mrs. Devar's sneer should pass unchallenged. Though that lady herself was not fashioned of the softer human clay which expresses its strenuous emotions by fainting fits or hysteria, some such feminine expedient would certainly ...
— Cynthia's Chauffeur • Louis Tracy
... said he, with surprise and a half-sneer, "extra train? why you can't have an extra train to Rugby for less ...
— A Unique Story of a Marvellous Career. Life of Hon. Phineas T. • Joel Benton
... idea how wretched and despised all the Irish rebels are here. O'Connor alone is an exception; and this he owes to Talleyrand, to General Valence, and to Madame de Genlis; but even he is looked on with a sneer, and, if he ever was respected in England, must endure with poignancy the contempt to which he is frequently exposed in France. When I was in your country I often heard it said that the Irish were generally considered as a debased and ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... the lobby, for although their party was seated in an alcove they were visible to all in the big room of which it formed a part. Yes, Mr. Isidore Le Drieux was standing near them, as she had feared, and the slight sneer upon his lips proved that he had observed ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces Out West • Edith Van Dyne
... shallow of heart, but she was not of pate," answered Mr. Aylett, with a cold sneer. "She was a fair plotter, and not fickle of purpose when she had her desires upon a much-coveted object. Her marriage proved that. She meant to captivate Chilton before she had known him a month—yes, and to marry him, as she finally did. Her intermediate conquests ...
— At Last • Marion Harland
... introduced a measure for the division of the province of Canada and for the establishment of a local legislature in each division. Fox in the course of debate went out of his way to laud the Revolution, and to sneer at some of the most effective passages in the Reflections. Burke was not present, but he announced his determination to reply. On the day when the Quebec Bill was to come on again, Fox called upon Burke, ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various
... appeared in their midst, feeling humble and contrite, and had been conscience-smitten at sight of her mamma's pale face; but the sneer on Betty's face, the cold, averted looks of Edward and Zoe, and then Rosie's taunt roused her quick temper to almost a ...
— Elsie at Nantucket • Martha Finley
... and charm. In the light of the lanterns swinging to and fro on the shore, a black group forms and moves away. She is saved! It was a sand-hauler who fished her out. Policemen are carrying her, surrounded by boatmen and lightermen, and in the darkness a hoarse voice is heard saying with a sneer: "That water-hen gave me a lot of trouble. You ought to see how she slipped through my fingers! I believe she wanted to make me lose my reward." Gradually the tumult subsides, the bystanders disperse, and the black group ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... and I bowed, and oh! how I gripped Harold's arm as I heard the reply; not openly derisive to a lady, but with a sneer in the voice, "Oh! ah! yes! But you'll come when you've seen her home. We'll send on the ...
— My Young Alcides - A Faded Photograph • Charlotte M. Yonge
... positively quavered with apprehension. During this time the personage never took his eyes off the two friends, and Frobisher was on the point of losing his temper when the unknown, with a distinctly perceptible sneer, turned his back rudely and, with a curt command to his waiting ...
— A Chinese Command - A Story of Adventure in Eastern Seas • Harry Collingwood
... late; he seems to be getting rather shiftless; he is wasting his time over some silly invention, a machine by which he expects to send messages from one place to another. He is a very good painter, and might do well if he would only stick to his business; but, Lord!' he added with a sneer of contempt, 'the idea of telling by a little streak of lightning what a body is saying at the ...
— Samuel F. B. Morse, His Letters and Journals - In Two Volumes, Volume II • Samuel F. B. Morse
... Would be swathed, feet thick, like an ash-tree root. The fox raced on, on the headlands firm, Where his swift feet scared the coupling worm; The rooks rose raving to curse him raw, He snarled a sneer at their swoop and caw. Then on, then on, down a half-ploughed field Where a ship-like plough drove glitter-keeled, With a bay horse near and a white horse leading, And a man saying "Zook," and ...
— Aspects of Literature • J. Middleton Murry
... by for a week or a year, With an air apathetic, or maybe a sneer: Some ev'ryday thing, like a crime or a creed, A mode or a movement, and pay it small heed, Till Somebody started to laud it aloud; Then all but the ...
— The Glugs of Gosh • C. J. Dennis
... uneasy, said nothing in answer to this. Their faces, which had become impassive, seemed made of wax behind their long whiskers. Then, the Prussian officer began to laugh. And still, lolling back, he began to sneer. He sneered at the downfall of France, insulted the prostrate enemy; he sneered at Austria which had been recently conquered; he sneered at the furious but fruitless defense of the departments; he sneered at the Garde Mobile and at the useless artillery. He announced ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume VIII. • Guy de Maupassant
... heart. Amusement, recreation, enjoyment! There are no more beautiful things. But this proceeding falls under another head. We watched the various toilettes of these bounding belles. They were rich and tasteful. But a man at our elbow, of experience and shrewd observation, said, with a sneer, for which we called him to account, "I observe that American ladies are so rich in charms that they are not at all chary of them. It is certainly generous to us miserable black coats. But, do you know, it strikes me as a generosity of display that must necessarily leave the donor ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume II. (of X.) • Various
... persons. The press joined in the cry for remedial legislation. Ashley's speech in support of his Mines and Collieries Bill made an unusual impression in the House of Commons. Even Cobden, who had been ready to sneer at the "philanthropists" who opposed the repeal of the tax on bread, came over to the orator's side at the conclusion of his two hours' plea, and wringing his hand heartily, declared, "I don't think I have ever ...
— Ten Englishmen of the Nineteenth Century • James Richard Joy
... never changed his attitude, although Keith noted that his right hand was hidden beneath the skirts of his long coat. The plainsman drew back, facing his enemy, until he reached the outer door. There was a sneer on Hawley's dark sinister face like an invitation, but a memory of the girl he had just left, and her dependence upon him, caused Keith to avoid an encounter. He would fight this affair out in a different way. As the door opened and he slipped forth into the gloom, ...
— Keith of the Border • Randall Parrish
... be famous than pleasant, I'd rather be rude than polite; It's easy to sneer When you're witty and queer, And I'd rather be Clever ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume IV. (of X.) • Various
... that," answered he, with a half sneer—and then, "Farewell, friend Leigh—farewell, gallant Dick Grenville. God send I see thee Lord High Admiral when I come home. And yet, why should I come home? Will you pray for poor ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley
... but not austere in age; Calm, but not cold, and cheerful though a sage; Too true to flatter and too kind to sneer, And only just when seemingly severe; So gently blending courtesy and art That wisdom's lips ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... of them," SARK grudgingly admits; "but"—he must have the compensation of a sneer—"imagine our House of Lords forming themselves into groups to play the band in Palace Yard, with HALSBURY wielding the mace by way of baton! They'd never do it, TOBY, even in top-hats. Germany's miles ahead of ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101. October 17, 1891 • Various
... Kieff's sneer deepened. It was Kelly's privilege always to speak his mind, and no one took offence however extravagantly he expressed himself. "Can't we have a drink?" he suggested, in the indulgent tone of one humouring ...
— The Top of the World • Ethel M. Dell
... fearful of dangers, desiring to return to Cuba. Here Cortes's diplomacy came to the rescue. "On board, all of you!" he exclaimed. "Back to Cuba and its Governor, and see what happens!" The threat and sneer had the effect he expected. Scarcely a man would return, but on the contrary they clamoured for the establishment of a colony and for a march on Montezuma and his capital, whilst the few who remained disaffected were clapped in irons, among them ...
— Mexico • Charles Reginald Enock
... live, she wondered. She caught at that—and it gave a new current to her thoughts. Perhaps, after all —she must see him. She could not live without seeing him. Would he smile as in the old days when she loved him so; or would he sneer as when she last saw him? If be looked so, she hated him. If he should call her "Laura, darling," and look SO! She must find him. She must ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... on a hand that has thrown the die and has lost; no tolerance for the player who, holding fine cards, will not play them by the rules of the game. "Manquee!" the world says, with a polite sneer, of the lives in which it beholds no blazoned achievement, ...
— Wisdom, Wit, and Pathos of Ouida - Selected from the Works of Ouida • Ouida
... Thorn, with the same sneer. "You have rid yourself of a gentleman's means of protection, what others will ...
— Queechy, Volume I • Elizabeth Wetherell
... impels me to work, and will let me have no rest unless I am doing his behests. The honours of men I value so far as they are evidences of power, but with the cynical mistrust of their judgment and my own worthiness, which always haunts me, I put very little faith in them. Their praise makes me sneer inwardly. God forgive me if I do them ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 1 • Leonard Huxley
... and the devil of a temper," said Bradwyn; "and sympathies—there never was a young woman with so many sympathies! There is an old proverb," he added, with a sneer, "'They are not all friends of the bridegroom who seem ...
— Robert Orange - Being a Continuation of the History of Robert Orange • John Oliver Hobbes
... half a sneer, "you think your forces inadequate. The two legions at Luceria are just detached from Caesar. Perhaps ...
— A Friend of Caesar - A Tale of the Fall of the Roman Republic. Time, 50-47 B.C. • William Stearns Davis
... for To-day! He wins the crown Whose work stands but the crucial test! Who scales the heights through sneer and frown And gives unto the world his best. Bend to your task! The steep slopes climb, And Love's true light will lead the way To perfect peace in God's ...
— The California Birthday Book • Various
... the ruffian, with a sarcastic sneer, "that dodge won't do. You might as well attempt to cheat the devil as deceive Bill Mathews. I know you too well. You and I have a heavy account to settle, and you shall know me better before we part. Take that—and that—and that—as an ...
— Mark Hurdlestone - Or, The Two Brothers • Susanna Moodie
... He was half drunk, and in a great passion. Seizing the carriage whip in one hand and taking the bridle of the horse by the other, he lashed the trembling beast for some seconds. Mrs. Ellwell slipped out of the rear seat and half ran into the house. Bradley got out of the carriage slowly, with a sneer on his face, and nodded to Thornton. He smiled, as if to say: "Badly ...
— The Man Who Wins • Robert Herrick
... Sweyn, with a laugh that had a little sneer in it, "put them to the test! I will not object to that, if you will only keep your notions to yourself. Now, Christian, give me your word for silence, and we will freeze here ...
— The Were-Wolf • Clemence Housman
... my sneer at the faculty, but proceeded to strike my chest several times, with his finger tips. "Try a short cough now," said he. "Ah, ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Vol. 1 • Charles James Lever
... the icy esprit that leaves the most spontaneous feeling frost-bound and stiff, that checks the most generous inspirations, and gives a sharp ring to the laughter. Their table-talk was full of bitter irony which turns a jest into a sneer; it told of the exhaustion of souls given over to themselves; of lives with no end in view but the satisfaction of self—of egoism induced by these times of peace in which we live. I can think of nothing like it save a pamphlet against mankind at large which Diderot was afraid to publish, a book ...
— The Firm of Nucingen • Honore de Balzac
... his upon herself. It was Pierre, and yet not her Pierre. Rather an exaggerated growth—of the man she had once known. The same soft brown hair, only thicker and rougher, one drooping wave looking tangled and unkempt—the dreamy eyes with the latent sneer in them dreamier than ever and yet the sneer more visible, the thin sensitive nose thinner, the satisfied mouth more satisfied and conscious, the weak chin fatally weaker. And he was married, too! Mdme. Dubois—that must be his wife! How strange it was! Cecilia's ...
— Crowded Out! and Other Sketches • Susie F. Harrison
... chopped in with his cold logic, and declined to believe that any golden mine existed in Guiana "anywhere in nature," as he craftily said. When Raleigh returned after his last miserable failure in May 1617, the monarch spared no sneer and no reproof to the pirate of the seas. Of course, the King was right; there was no mine of diamonds, no golden city. But the immense treasures that haunted Raleigh's dreams were more real than reality; they existed in the future; he looked far ahead, and our sympathies to-day, ...
— Some Diversions of a Man of Letters • Edmund William Gosse
... his arguments? I don't wonder they're convincing—" But as quickly as it had come the sneer dropped, yielding to a wave of pity, the vague impulse to silence and protect her. How could he have given way to the provocation of her weakness, when his business was to defend her from it and lift her above it? He recalled his old dreams of saving her from Van Degenism—it was ...
— The Custom of the Country • Edith Wharton
... noon, when Captain Billings came out of his cabin with his sextant, and found me all ready for him with mine, in obedience to his order, I heard Mr Macdougall utter a covert sneer behind the skipper's back ...
— On Board the Esmeralda - Martin Leigh's Log - A Sea Story • John Conroy Hutcheson
... they vanished back into the arcade where they had lurked; Margaret's wild cry and ashen face as her father was torn away from her, and she sank fainting on to Betty's bejewelled bosom; the cruel sneer on Morella's lips; the king's hard smile; the pity in the queen's eye; the excited murmurings of the crowd; the quick, brief comments of the lawyers; the scratching of the clerk's quill as, careless of everything save ...
— Fair Margaret • H. Rider Haggard
... I relinquish here, And all the evil dreams. Ah, done am I Above all with the narrowed lips, the sneer, The heartless wit that laughed ...
— Poems of Paul Verlaine • Paul Verlaine
... who basked in the sunshine of Napoleon the Little, and laughed uproariously while their Emperor and their social institutions were being castigated by the cynical German Jew and his librettists. "He was the Beethoven of the sneer," said mil Bergerat, when Offenbach died, and then with a fantastic pencil worthy of the caricaturist Hoffmann himself, he drew a dreadful picture of Offenbach and his times; of the mighty fiddler beating time ...
— Chapters of Opera • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... an explanation—the resistance of the women. Grosse indulges in some curious antics (105-108). First he asks: "Since real capture is everywhere an exception and is looked on as punishable, why should the semblance of capture have ever become a general and approved custom?" Then he asks, with a sneer, why sociology should be called upon to answer such questions anyhow; and a moment later he, nevertheless, attempts an answer, on Spencerian lines. Among inferior races, he remarks, women are usually coveted as spoils of war. The captured ...
— Primitive Love and Love-Stories • Henry Theophilus Finck
... a little sneer which his slight foreign accent (he was speaking French) rendered almost ludicrous, "Vienna is a smart town, but it is nothing to this!" And he pointed with pride to ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, December 1878 • Various
... would have dropped his face into his hands and would have wept over this letter; now he laughed at it. And the laugh, this first one, was the laugh men came to know as Dave Drennen's laugh. It was like a sneer and a curse and a ...
— Wolf Breed • Jackson Gregory
... with something like a sneer, "leave the girls without protectors, and without a chance of deliverance. No," he continued, turning to our hero, "my advice is to wait here as patiently as we can until we ascertain where the girls are. Few, perhaps none, of our men are known to Harald's men; ...
— Erling the Bold • R.M. Ballantyne
... in the mind of the messenger. He was thinking of Sylvia and smiling still at her implication that while there were larger colleges than Madison there was none better. He turned to look again at the college buildings closely clasped by their strip of woodland. Madison was not a college to sneer at; he had scanned the bronze tablet on the library wall that published the roll of her Sons who had served in the Civil War. Many of the names were written high in the state's history and for a moment they filled the young ...
— A Hoosier Chronicle • Meredith Nicholson
... Leach with a sneer; "I've had no 'special order' for ten years at least! My employers trust me to do what I think best, and I've every right to act accordingly. The trees will begin to rot in another eighteen months or so,—just now they're ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli
... everything that he did—his rolling walk down the Court, his red colour, his football . . . and then he ruined that fellow Thompson. That was a poor game, but no one seemed to think anything of it . . . and indeed he and I seemed to be very good friends. He used to sneer at me behind my back, I know, but I didn't mind that. Any one's at liberty to sneer if they like. But he was really afraid of ...
— The Prelude to Adventure • Hugh Walpole
... a glance in the direction of the well-lighted building, towards which already the younger tide of humanity was setting, and his dark face took on a sneer when he noted their evident ...
— Joyce's Investments - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry
... her unworthy of that name—nothing that could make people say, even the most ill-natured of them—and, alas! she had lately come to learn that the world is filled, not, as she thought, with only bad and good, but with an intermediate race, which is merely ill-natured—say, with a sneer, that Dr. Grey's second ...
— Christian's Mistake • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
... strength of your good right arm," supplemented the stranger, with the faintest hint of a sneer. ...
— Conjuror's House - A Romance of the Free Forest • Stewart Edward White
... the man whom I secretly looked upon as standing between me and all preferment. He was a good-looking fellow, but he wore a natural sneer which for some reason I felt to be always directed toward myself. This sneer grew pronounced about this time, and that was the reason, no doubt, why I continued to work as long as I did in secret. I dreaded the open laugh of this man, a laugh which always ...
— The Filigree Ball • Anna Katharine Green
... more and more of a nucleus, and although there is a large class who hang about missions from interested motives, there are also multitudes of quiet and contented villagers whose simplicity and remoteness shield them from the notice of the travellers who sneer at Christianity and call mission reports couleur de rose, because they have been taken in by some cunning scamp against whom any ...
— Pioneers and Founders - or, Recent Workers in the Mission field • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... sneer. But Hasan is purposely represented as a "softy" till aroused and energized by the ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 8 • Richard F. Burton
... of Grenoble, and two presidents. The counsellor, or reporter of the State, Laubardemont, who had directed them in all, was at their head. Joseph often whispered to them with the most studied politeness, glancing at Laubardemont with a ferocious sneer. ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... and didactic and satiric subjects. Romanticism is characterized by less regard for form than for matter, by a return to nature, and by encouragement of deep emotion. Romanticism says: "Be liberal enough not to sneer at authors when they discard narrow rules. Welcome a change and see if variety and feeling will not ...
— Halleck's New English Literature • Reuben P. Halleck
... offspring to chance for his sake, like puppies in a pond to swim or drown according as Providence pleased; that for her part she must look herself out a place like the other servants, for my face would she never see more.' 'Nor write to me?' said I. 'I shall not, madam,' replied she with a cold sneer, 'easily find out your address; for you are going you know not ...
— Autobiography, Letters and Literary Remains of Mrs. Piozzi (Thrale) (2nd ed.) (2 vols.) • Mrs. Hester Lynch Piozzi
... a pretty go!" he exclaimed, with a sneer. "So you've come here looking for work, have you? I'd like to know what you know about railroad business, anyhow? No, sir; you won't get a job on this road, not if I can help it, and I rather think I can. The best thing for you to do is to go back to Euston, and make up with the old gentleman. ...
— Cab and Caboose - The Story of a Railroad Boy • Kirk Munroe
... devotion's highest flight sublime Exalt the mind, by tenderest pathos' art, Dissolve, in purifying tears, the heart, Or bid it, shuddering, recoil at crime; The fond illusions of the youth and maid, At which so many world-formed sages sneer, When by thy altar-lighted torch displayed, Our natural religion must appear. All things in thee tend to one polar star, Magnetic all thy ...
— Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli, Vol. I • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... prayer-book on the floor; the latter will most likely thump the same with the imperative tip of his boot. How horridly stupid one seems after being aroused! The woman eyes you with the most piquant, self-justifying sneer possible; while all her little IMMACULATES, if she have any, look at you like so many hissing young turkey cocks; and as for the man—bless his holiness!—he'd frown you down ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, Issue 266, July 28, 1827 • Various
... here are those of Mesdames de Montolieu and (again) de Genlis, of Ducray-Duminil, born almost as early as Pigault-Lebrun, even earlier a novelist, and yoked with him by Victor Hugo in respect of his novel Lolotte et Fanfan in the sneer noted in the last volume;[37] the other Ducange, again as much "other" as the other Moliere;[38] the Vicomte d'Arlincourt; and—a comparative (if, according to some, blackish) swan among these not quite positive geese—Paul de Kock. The eldest put in his work before the Revolution ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 2 - To the Close of the 19th Century • George Saintsbury
... moustache. He has (God knows why) a serene contempt for ordinary mortals. He is always growing black with fury, and bullying weak men. On such occasions, his lips may be observed to be twisted into an evil sneer. He is a seducer and liar: he has ruined various women, and had special facilities for becoming acquainted with the rottenness of society: and occasionally he expresses, in language of the most profane, not to say blasphemous character, a momentary regret for having ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 58, August, 1862 • Various
... lips broke into a slight sneer of incredulity. "My dear brother, you do right to say this—any man in your situation would say the same. But I know that my uncle took every pains to ascertain if the report of ...
— Night and Morning, Volume 1 • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... Weise Gehor bei Euch zu verschaffen. But I do not think that [Greek: emauto logon poiaeso] can bear the sense of [Greek: logon tuchoimi], "get a hearing for myself." And the orator's object is, not so much to sneer at the people by hinting that they are ready to hear abuse, as to deter his opponents from retaliation, or weaken its effect, by denouncing their opposition as corrupt. Leland saw the meaning: "Not that, by breaking out into invectives, I may expose myself to the ...
— The Olynthiacs and the Phillippics of Demosthenes • Demosthenes
... a flash in her eyes. "It was an Austrian court. The Count—my husband, I should say—is an Austrian subject. His interests must be protected." She said this with a sneer on her pretty lips. "You see, my father, knowing him now for what he really is, has refused to pay over to him something like a million dollars, still due for the marriage settlement. The Count contends that it is a just and legal debt and the court supports him to this extent: ...
— A Fool and His Money • George Barr McCutcheon
... trees and bushes." Whereupon Washington urgently besought him to let his regulars fight the Indians in their own fashion, which would the better enable them to pick off the lurking foe with less danger to their own safety. But Braddock's only answer to this was a sneer; and some of his regulars, who were already acting upon the suggestion, he angrily ordered back into the ranks, calling them cowards, and even striking them with the flat of his sword. He then caused the colors of the two regiments to be advanced in different ...
— The Farmer Boy, and How He Became Commander-In-Chief • Morrison Heady
... said nothing to Dorothy of her interview with Richard; she appeared to believe that Richard had saved her that labor. There was a kind of sneer in this. Feeling the sneer, Dorothy put no questions; she was willing, in her resentment, to have it understood that Richard had told her. Why should he not?—she who was to be his wife! Dorothy would have been proud to proclaim her ...
— The President - A novel • Alfred Henry Lewis
... the wicked Godrich in his palace heard of Havelok in the kitchen. "Now truly this is the best man in England," he said, with a sneer. And thinking to bring shame on Goldboru, and wed her with a kitchen knave, ...
— English Literature For Boys And Girls • H.E. Marshall
... his bridle. A more outrageous quartet it would have been impossible to find, or a more outraged one. Aggie let down her dress, which she had pinned round her waist, releasing about a quart of water from its folds, and stood looking about her with a sneer. "I don't think much of your cave," she said. "It's little and ...
— More Tish • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... stranger had at last become Tired of long waiting, and of sitting dumb Upon his charger; so with greenest leer He vented his impatience in a sneer. "Is this," he said, "the glorious Table Round, And is its glory naught but empty sound? Braggarts! I put your bluster to the test, And find you quail before a merry jest!" Then the great king himself stood up in ire, With clenched hand raised, and eyes that ...
— Gawayne And The Green Knight - A Fairy Tale • Charlton Miner Lewis
... out again; but a sneer from Richard silenced him, and he obeyed the order. While he was doing so, Richard walked round the barn to satisfy himself that no one was near. They were alone, and ...
— In School and Out - or, The Conquest of Richard Grant. • Oliver Optic
... sub-prefecture of Peking, in Chihli. There Chang Fei, a butcher, who had been selling his meat all the morning, at noon lowered what remained into a well, placed over the mouth of the well a stone weighing twenty-five pounds, and said with a sneer: "If anyone can lift that stone and take my meat, I will make him a present of it!" Kuan Yue, going up to the edge of the well, lifted the stone with the same ease as he would a tile, took the meat, and made off. Chang Fei pursued him, and eventually ...
— Myths and Legends of China • E. T. C. Werner
... frown and tyrants sneer, The red flag is unfurled; We'll to our principles adhere ...
— British Socialism - An Examination of Its Doctrines, Policy, Aims and Practical Proposals • J. Ellis Barker
... mentioned the fact that Webster and Choate both came from Dartmouth; that Wendell Phillips graduated at Harvard, but the university had not seen much of him since. At the mention of Wendell Phillips some of the boys from pro-slavery families began to sneer. Professor Child raised himself up and said determinedly, "Wendell Phillips is as good an orator as either of them!" He was chagrined, however, at Phillips's later public course,—his support of Socialism and General Butler. Neither did he like Phillips's Phi Beta Kappa ...
— Cambridge Sketches • Frank Preston Stearns
... the night, he replied that there was no room in his camp for laggards; pointing to the enemy's fortress, he added: "There will be found plenty of lodging for those who come too late for any other." Saluting his Majesty very courteously, the soldier withdrew, understanding thoroughly the indirect sneer at the valour of his troops; he went back to his regiment, summoned his officers and men, and repeated to them the King's word. One and all agreed that they would, in fact, seek their night's lodging ...
— Spanish Life in Town and Country • L. Higgin and Eugene E. Street
... unknown to fame. Stilwell was told to "stick to his boots and shoes;" and, in resentment, tailors, printers, shoemakers, and men of other handicraft, organised in support of "the working man" against the "Jackson Aristocrats." In answer to the Commercial Advertiser's sneer that Seward was "red-haired," William L. Stone, with felicitous humour, told how Esau, and Cato, Clovis, William Rufus, and Rob Roy not only had red hair, but each was celebrated for having it; how Ossian sung a "lofty race of red-haired heroes," how Venus herself was golden-haired, ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander
... me, but I daresay you will have a good sneer at me, and tell me to stick to my barnacles. By the way, you agree with me that sometimes one gets despondent—for instance, when theory and facts will not harmonise; but what appears to me even worse, and makes ...
— More Letters of Charles Darwin - Volume I (of II) • Charles Darwin
... newspapers and letters, and my Bible in later life, have been all the reading that John Dangerous can boast of. Which makes me so mad against your fine Scholars and Scribblers, who, because they can turn verse and make Te-to-tum into Greek, must needs sneer at me at the Coffee House, and make a butt of an honest man who has been from one end of the world to the other, and has fought his way through it to Fortune ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 1 of 3 • George Augustus Sala
... among them till Philip Ross, fixing his eyes on Eddie, said with a sneer, "So, Master Ed, though you told me one day you'd never talk to your mamma as I did to mine, you've done a good deal worse. I don't set up for a pattern good boy, but I'd die before I'd ...
— Elsie's Motherhood • Martha Finley
... the astonishment of the British officers, as they beheld Trevanion, under this gross and open insult, content himself by a slight smile and half bow, as if returning a courtesy, and then throw his eyes downward, as if engaged in deep thought, while the triumphant sneer of the French, at this unaccountable conduct, was absolutely maddening ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Complete • Charles James Lever (1806-1872)
... discretion I dare say we took too much to drink, and I know we talked too much. We became particularly hot upon some boorish sneer of Drummle's, to the effect that we were too free with our money. It led to my remarking, with more zeal than discretion, that it came with a bad grace from him, to whom Startop had lent money in my presence but a week ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens
... fowk choose one thing, some another, To grace ther prose or rhyme; Some sneerin say 'at tha'lot my brother, Maks me choose thee for mine; Well, let 'em sneer owd Neddy lad, Or laff at my selection, Who fail to see ther type i' thee Are void o' mich perception.— Ther's things more stupid nor an ass, An things more badly treated, Tho' we ait beef, an' tha aits grass, May be we're just related. Throo toil an' trouble on tha jogs, An' then ...
— Yorksher Puddin' - A Collection of the Most Popular Dialect Stories from the - Pen of John Hartley • John Hartley
... I am not laughing! I did not doubt! It was not a sneer!" cried Eve, on her knees before her husband. "But I see plainly now that you were right to tell me nothing about your experiments and your hopes. Ah! yes, dear, an inventor should endure the long ...
— Eve and David • Honore de Balzac
... neglected doing my duty, though sought so much after, he would take it upon himself to see both the girl and Thomas provided for, without any advising or letting me know anything about them; and added, with a malicious sneer, "I must take care of the child I have had by you too, or it will have but an indifferent parent to trust to in case of ...
— The Fortunate Mistress (Parts 1 and 2) • Daniel Defoe
... never suspected, Audrey was very annoyed by it. She detested it and resented it. And especially the charity of Miss Thompkins. She considered that from a woman with eyes and innuendoes like Tommy's charity amounted to a sneer. ...
— The Lion's Share • E. Arnold Bennett
... meet this awful situation, as meet it you will, sneer gently at the puckered lips and repeat over and over that old proverb, Osculation ...
— Get Next! • Hugh McHugh
... perhaps had better answer that question," suggested Barraclough with a little sneer. Day moved some papers ...
— Hurricane Island • H. B. Marriott Watson |
