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Unruly   Listen
adjective
Unruly  adj.  See ruly.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Unruly" Quotes from Famous Books



... mind, though unfortunately you are not orthodox; would to God you were. Know then, my child, that to-day, Saturday, I went according to my custom to Stephane to catechize him, and for reasons which you know, I redoubled my efforts to impress his unruly head with the holy truths of our faith. Now it appears that without intending it, you have caused him sorrow; and you can believe that such a character, far from having pardoned you, has taken the greatest pains to get me to espouse his side in the difficulty. However he, ...
— Stories of Modern French Novels • Julian Hawthorne

... each other at the same time, and I did not like the expression in his eye as he crooked a finger at me. I went over to his table. He was pleasant looking, as Builders go, with blue eyes less dull than most, and a brown, unruly topknot of hair such as is ...
— B-12's Moon Glow • Charles A. Stearns

... seemed denied—she cast herself on her knees and held up her hands in silent prayer; not to the dreaded Indian woman, but to Him who heareth the prayer of the poor destitute—who alone can order the unruly wills and affections ...
— Canadian Crusoes - A Tale of The Rice Lake Plains • Catharine Parr Traill

... that she had never been destined for him, and that his love for her had been sent as a light by which he was to find himself. He had failed everywhere, he had become an outlaw, he had fought and gone down, certain only of his rectitude and the mastery of his unruly spirit. Now the hour had come when he would perform his last mission, deriving therefrom that satisfaction which the gods could not deny. He would ...
— The Spoilers • Rex Beach

... nightly Watchings, her Mortifications on the cold Marble in long Winter Season, and all her Acts of Devotion abate one spark of this shameful Feaver of Love, that was destroying her within. When she had rag'd and struggled with this unruly Passion, 'till she was quite tir'd and breathless, finding all her force in vain, she fill'd her fancy with a thousand charming Ideas of the lovely Henault, and, in that soft fit, had a mind to satisfy her panting Heart, and give it one ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn - Volume V • Aphra Behn

... joke now, I can tell you," said the earl. "We had to sell him, and it half broke my heart. We don't know what had come to him, but he became quite unruly after that;—knocked Darvel down in the straw-yard! It was a very bad business,—a very bad business, indeed! Come, go and dress. Do you remember how you came down to dinner that day? I shall never forget how Crofts stared at you. Come, you've only got twenty minutes, ...
— The Small House at Allington • Anthony Trollope

... indiscretions) she rebels against the idea of marriage, and founds a college, herself the principal, devoted to the higher education of women. The prince, a gallant blade, and a few of his followers disguise themselves as girls and enter the school. When an unruly masculine tongue betrays him he is cast out with maledictions on his head. His father comes with an army, and makes war against the father of the princess. The prince joins blithely in the fight, is sore wounded, and is carried to the woman's college as ...
— Outlines of English and American Literature • William J. Long

... thou art a true fellow to me, and thy having been so shall advantage thee. Send or take the body to the chapel at Scotland's wall, or to the church of Ballanry, and tell what tale thou wilt of his having fallen in a brawl with some unruly guests of thine. Auchtermuchty knows nought else, nor are the times so peaceful as to ...
— The Abbot • Sir Walter Scott

... says, 'scarce a man so free from it, but that if he should always, on all occasions, argue or do as in some cases he constantly does, would not be thought fitter for Bedlam than civil conversation. I do not here mean when he is under the power of an unruly passion, but in the steady, calm course of his life. That which thus captivates their reason, and leads men of sincerity blindfold from common sense will, when examined, be found to be what we are speaking of. Some independent ideas, of no alliance ...
— Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official • William Sleeman

... Glastonbury, and told Herewald what I thought of the trouble that was surely brewing in the west; and he said that he also had some reason to think that along his borders men were getting more unruly, as if none tried to hinder them from giving cause ...
— A Prince of Cornwall - A Story of Glastonbury and the West in the Days of Ina of Wessex • Charles W. Whistler

... became a scene of misery, confusion, hatred, and strife. The wretched husband, counsellor Helbach, has sold his last shilling for an annuity, without a thought about his wife and son. This son of his is as it were possest by the furies, unruly, headstrong, and without feeling: he ran into debt, then took to swindling, and finally, two years ago, when his weeping mother was trying to admonish him, abused and even struck her in his brutal rage. After this grand feat he set off into ...
— The Old Man of the Mountain, The Lovecharm and Pietro of Abano - Tales from the German of Tieck • Ludwig Tieck

... their grossnesses, their ineffable impotences, their hours, if I may so express myself, of insubordination. It is the work and it is a great part of the delight of any artist to contend with these unruly tools, and now by brute energy, now by witty expedient, to drive and coax them to effect his will. Given these means, so laughably inadequate, and given the interest, the intensity, and the multiplicity of the actual sensation whose effect he is to render with their ...
— The Art of Writing and Other Essays • Robert Louis Stevenson

... Venetians, who had prepared for a mighty host, incurred immense expenses which could not be met. As some reparation it was suggested to the small army of Crusaders who did arrive in the city for deportation that on their way to the Holy Land they should stop at Zara, on the Dalmatian coast, an unruly dependence of the Republic, and assist in chastising it. The objections to this course were grave. One was that the King of Hungary, in whose dominions was Zara, was a Christian and a Crusader himself; another that the Pope (Innocent III) forbade the project. Old blind Dandolo, ...
— A Wanderer in Venice • E.V. Lucas

... Dr Rider struggled with his horse with all the intensity of determination with which he would have struggled against his fate had that been practicable. With set teeth and eyes that blazed with sudden rage and resolution, he subdued the unruly brute, and forced it to acknowledge his mastery. When he drove the vanquished animal, all quivering with pain and passion, on its further course, the struggle had refreshed his mind a little. Ah, if life and adverse fortune could but be vanquished ...
— The Doctor's Family • Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant

... park, or the danger of unruly dogs and horses: The fortitude and affection of Olivia: A visit to ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft

... considered, most unreasonably, that her governess was the alternative of the pony, and that if she were without the one she might possibly acquire the other. Her behaviour had never been exemplary, but on the strength of this grievance she grew so unruly, so disrespectful, and so absolutely unmanageable that Miss Bury at length refused to teach her any longer, and, after an interview with Major Fitzgerald in the library, packed her boxes and returned ...
— The New Girl at St. Chad's - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil

... Poor Corey was often getting before the town Court as accused or accuser. He was, to the end, the victim of ill-usage, either given or taken. Though not a bad-natured man, he was almost always in trouble. The tenor of his long life was as eccentric and unruly as the manner of his ...
— Salem Witchcraft, Volumes I and II • Charles Upham

... fenders makes a sound of angry muttering. But, after all, it may be good for ships to go through a period of restraint and repose, as the restraint and self- communion of inactivity may be good for an unruly soul—not, indeed, that I mean to say that ships are unruly; on the contrary, they are faithful creatures, as so many men can testify. And faithfulness is a great restraint, the strongest bond laid upon the self-will of men and ...
— The Mirror of the Sea • Joseph Conrad

... peeped into the long, low buildings that were the sleeping quarters of the men, with their cots all in a row and clothes hung neatly along the wall. They saw the guardhouse, where unruly soldiers were confined and forced to ...
— The Outdoor Girls in Army Service - Doing Their Bit for the Soldier Boys • Laura Lee Hope

... the false bride said to the prince, "Dear husband, pray do me one piece of kindness." "That I will," said the prince. "Then tell one of your slaughterers to cut off the head of the horse I rode upon, for it was very unruly, and plagued me sadly on the road." But the truth was, she was very much afraid lest Falada should speak, and tell all she had done to the princess. She carried her point, and the faithful Falada was killed; but when the true princess heard of it she wept, ...
— Grimm's Fairy Stories • Jacob Grimm and Wilhelm Grimm

... once, and, as he slowly urged up the unruly sash, the handsome profile was again turned toward me, and again I was possessed by my first impression so strongly that I ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 12, No. 73, November, 1863 • Various

... the rebellion was slowly drawing to its close, Mr. Lincoln's kind heart was drawn towards his erring countrymen, and he made a list of the names of the wisest and best men of the south, who, not having taken an active part in the strife, might be intrusted with the task of bringing back the unruly states to their constitutional relations with the national government. Governor Aiken was informed that his name was upon that list; and he would gladly have accepted the onerous position, and labored in the true interests of the whole people, ...
— Voyage of The Paper Canoe • N. H. Bishop

... Mary. "And I have often noticed how whispers glide into gossip, and gossip into scandal, before people are aware. I've resolved many a time not to talk about people, but things, and then I'll escape doing harm with my unruly member." ...
— Holidays at the Grange or A Week's Delight - Games and Stories for Parlor and Fireside • Emily Mayer Higgins

... burghers, roused their anger and drove them to the passing of still more stringent laws. In 1293, after the Ghibellines had been defeated in the great battle of Campaldino, a series of severe enactments, called the Ordinances of Justice, were decreed against the unruly Grandi. All civic rights were taken from them; the severest penalties were attached to their slightest infringement of municipal law; their titles to land were limited; the privilege of living within ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Second Series • John Addington Symonds

... points, and in most of them troops had been permanently established, composed of Cossacks, formerly possessors of the banks of the River Yaik. But even these Cossacks, who should have been a guarantee for the peace and quiet of the country, had for some time shown a dangerous and unruly spirit towards the Imperial Government. In 1772 a riot took place in the principal settlement. This riot was occasioned by the severe measures taken by General Traubenberg, in order to quell the insubordination of the army. The ...
— The Daughter of the Commandant • Aleksandr Sergeevich Pushkin

... court, a victory at home and abroad; so that even when the young king learned the news he exclaimed, "Ah, gentlemen of the parliament, we shall see what you will say now!" Upon which the queen had pressed the royal child to her heart, whose haughty and unruly sentiments were in such harmony with her own. A council was called on the same evening, but nothing transpired of what had been decided on. It was only known that on the following Sunday a Te Deum would be sung at Notre Dame in honor of the ...
— Twenty Years After • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... what pa thinks either? Dad told Mums last night that he was altogether at a loss to know how to deal with you, you had come back so queer and unruly. And he said, let me see, oh, he said that 'if he didn't see an alteration very soon he should resort to more drastic measures'—drastic measures is Latin for ...
— Vice Versa - or A Lesson to Fathers • F. Anstey

... do hiz office duly: Bit zum o'm, girt vawk in ther wAc— Tha Porish o'ten cAclled,—a girt bell sheep Or two that lead the rest an quiet keep— Put vooAth ther hons iz coose to stAc, Which made en quite unruly. ...
— The Dialect of the West of England Particularly Somersetshire • James Jennings

... scene, and fell on them like a thunderbolt, amply refuting the false and base charge brought against him by his enemies, that he had retreated through cowardice. But to this day, it is a riddle to me how he managed to reduce to obedience the unruly spirits he commanded, and to induce them to retreat across the Brazos to Buffalo Bayou. Of one thing I am certain—only Sam Houston could have done it; no other man ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 363, January, 1846 • Various

... hath in himselfe, for that also many times it hapneth, that he is not a chosen manne. For those that are not thy subjectes, and whiche willyngly doe serve, are not of the beste, but rather of the worste of a Province, for as moche as if any be sclanderous, idell, unruly, without Religion, fugetive from the rule of their fathers, blasphemours, Dise plaiers, in every condicion evill brought up, bee those, whiche will serve, whose customes cannot be more contrarie, ...
— Machiavelli, Volume I - The Art of War; and The Prince • Niccolo Machiavelli

... momentarily taken aback. His first instinct was to check the witness and to ask him to be calm, but the witness took no notice of him. He displayed his judicial authority by an impressive descent of an uplifted hand which compelled the unruly spectators to resume ...
— The Hampstead Mystery • John R. Watson

... that the Methodists found consolation for this scandal in the large income they derived from their unruly visitors' gate-money. This was unfair. No doubt the money played its part, but there was something else far more important. The pious dwellers in the camp, intent upon reviving in their poor modern way the character and environment of the heroic early days, ...
— The Damnation of Theron Ware • Harold Frederic

... ship—the Triton ploughing the deep blue waters of the ocean track from Sandy Hook to New Orleans; for October, the weather is rather unruly, damp, and boisterous. We perceive a number of passengers on board, and by near guess of our memory, we see a person or two we have seen before. Our be-whiskered friend of the "first-class hotel," is there; he does not look so self-possessed and pompous on board the heaving ...
— The Humors of Falconbridge - A Collection of Humorous and Every Day Scenes • Jonathan F. Kelley

... a sheaf of the herbs, preparatory to binding it. The bundle was unruly, and several of the plants dropped. She bent to pick them up and others fell. Kenkenes came to her rescue and gathered them all into ...
— The Yoke - A Romance of the Days when the Lord Redeemed the Children - of Israel from the Bondage of Egypt • Elizabeth Miller

... were Mrs. F's "cubs," in the Quaker City. She took good care that we were at church regularly on Sundays; at the 8-bells prayer meeting every night; and she kept our buttons sewed on and our clothing in order—and in a word was as busy and considerate, and as watchful over her family of uncouth and unruly cubs, and as patient and as long-suffering, withal, as a ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... as several other of the younger boys whose names he had not learned. There was a big fellow called Tom Scoresby that he believed that he would get along with pretty well. Just one scout he found no room for anywhere. That was Matt Burton. He hated him, he was quite sure. His unruly young heart only had one desire for Matt. He wanted just one good chance to measure strength with him and plant his hard, clenched fist right where that smile of insolence ...
— The Boy Scout Treasure Hunters - The Lost Treasure of Buffalo Hollow • Charles Henry Lerrigo

... favour this disorder brought Unto her servants than their awful thought 10 Durst entertain, when thus compell'd they press'd The yielding marble of her snowy breast. While love insults,[1] disguised in the cloud, And welcome force, of that unruly crowd. So th'am'rous tree, while yet the air is calm, Just distance keeps from his desired palm;[2] But when the wind her ravish'd branches throws Into his arms, and mingles all their boughs, Though loth he ...
— Poetical Works of Edmund Waller and Sir John Denham • Edmund Waller; John Denham

... was the function of the Church to guide. Who but the members of an order thus set apart, acting in strict subordination to the central power, and so presenting a front of unbroken spiritual unity, could have held their way among tumultuous tribes, half-barbarous nobles, and proud and unruly kings, protesting against wrong, passionately inculcating new and higher ideas of right, denouncing the darkness of the false gods, calling on all men to worship the cross and adore the mysteries of the true God? Compare now the ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol. 2 of 3) - Essay 4: Joseph de Maistre • John Morley

... defense, but you may tell Mr. Hugh that so far as my chums are concerned he's bearing false witness. They may be poor and rough and unruly, but they're not cruel! They belong to ...
— Peggy-Alone • Mary Agnes Byrne

... with him, especially with regard to those who sin out of weakness, according to Rom. 15:1: "We that are stronger, ought to bear the infirmities of the weak," and not only as regards their being infirm and consequently troublesome on account of their unruly actions, but also by bearing any other burdens of theirs with them, according to Gal. 6:2: ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas

... the unruly officers clamoured their assent to all the earl urged, and expressed their readiness to sally at once from the ...
— The Last Of The Barons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... some of the women screeched. I cannot compare it better than to many passengers in a boat in a tempest, who are commanded to sit still and let the waterman alone with managing the oares, but some unruly people rising overthrowes them all. So was this company served; for the people thus affrighted started up with extraordinary quicknesse, and at an instant the maine summer beame broke in sunder, being mortised in the wall some five foot from the same; and so the whole roofe or floore fell at once, ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury

... anger darts at the offending world, Can with such horrid rigor peirce the earth As these sad words I must demonstrate to you Doe my afflicted brest.—Ime lost; my tongue When I would speake, like to an Isicle Disturbd by motion of unruly winds Shakes to pronounce't, yet freezes to ...
— A Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. II • Various

... he had seen as much smoke in the hall upon a Christmas even.] The mien and appearance of the company assembled was wild, and, even in their social hours, almost terrific. Their prince himself had the gigantic port and fiery eye fitted to sway an unruly people, whose delight was in the field of battle; and the long mustaches which he and most of his champions wore, added to the formidable dignity of his presence. Like most of those present, Gwenwyn was clad in a simple tunic of white linen cloth, a remnant of the dress which the Romans had introduced ...
— The Betrothed • Sir Walter Scott

... struck their ears they became lively, raised their heads, craned their necks, and turned around, as far as their halters would permit, to watch the operation. They evidently had thought themselves forgotten to-night, and there was a keen edge to their appetites, so that some of them became a little unruly, kicking, neighing, and nipping at their neighbors out of sheer sportiveness. "Napoleon," the ancient stallion, had been devoured by such an acute sensation of hunger that as soon as the fat guard aforementioned ...
— A Little Garrison - A Realistic Novel of German Army Life of To-day • Fritz von der Kyrburg

... the oars and pulled ashore. Mae turned her eyes downward and felt the color creep up, up into her cheeks. It seemed eternity. The boat was Charon's, and she was drifting to her fate. Norman Mann stood like a statue. The wind moved his hair over his forehead, and once Mae saw him toss the unruly locks back in a familiar way he had. She did not know why, but the tears half came to her eyes as he did it. He stood as firm and hard and still as a New England rock, while the Italian swayed lithely as he pulled the oars, with the curve and motion ...
— Mae Madden • Mary Murdoch Mason

... possible effect, but did not wish to exceed the number greatly, so that the character of the discussion might be similar to that in a jury. A much larger number would have made the discussion too formal or too unruly. The eighteen men sat around a long table and were first allowed to look for half a minute at the two big cards, each forming his judgment independently. Then at a signal every one had to write down whether the number of dots on the upper card was larger, equal, or smaller. Immediately ...
— Psychology and Social Sanity • Hugo Muensterberg

... myself that the rebels are plotting like so many Satans, and are in earnest about carrying their threat into execution. Now, the question is, what shall be done—yield the point and submit to be turned out of the Court House to-morrow, as if we were a pack of unruly boys, or what?" ...
— The Rangers - [Subtitle: The Tory's Daughter] • D. P. Thompson

... capable to damp such humors (INTELLIGENTIEN), should such still be (but I believe there are now none such), as may repugn against the Royal interest, with possibility of being dangerous; and to put a bridle on mouths that are unruly. And, to say much in little compass, I will be faithful to God, to my King and ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XIII. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle

... girl, with a mop of unruly brown hair escaping from a quaint sun-bonnet, was still sitting in the car and regarding the scene with big awestruck eyes. In a moment she jumped out and approached Bobby. She was only half a head taller than he was, and now gazed at him with soft, ...
— 'Me and Nobbles' • Amy Le Feuvre

... mischiefs that racks their consciences and is their crudest executioner. This, this is the greatest of their evils; for a soul that has shaken off the fetters of flesh and blood, and is full of the love of God, no more disordered with unruly passions, nor blinded with the night of ignorance, sees clearly the vast injury she has done to herself to have offended so good a God, and to have deserved to be thus banished out of His sight and deprived of that Divine fruition. She sees how easily she might have flown ...
— Purgatory • Mary Anne Madden Sadlier

... she had last seen him, stayed with her, till it gave form to a troubled desire moving her to see him again and speak with him. He had always been an unruly subject, inclined to a surreptitious defiance of authority. Repeatedly had he been given work on the plantation and as many times dismissed for various causes. Therese would have long since removed him had it not been for his old father ...
— At Fault • Kate Chopin

... snow had its will of the earth. There was no refuge under the larger trees that still stood, like outposts, here and there; the branches were too high above. Once Adan suggested through his stiff lips and unruly teeth that they turn back and take refuge in some dense grove above; but Roldan shook his head peremptorily. He had heard of the fearful storms of the Sierras; they lasted for days, and the snow stood its ground for weeks. Their only hope ...
— The Valiant Runaways • Gertrude Atherton

... went on Tess, casting back the unruly hair which shrouded her face in its new state of cleanliness. "He wouldn't have hurt a ...
— Tess of the Storm Country • Grace Miller White

... Our unruly steeds had brought us close to the new battery, at the very moment that the train of a mine under the houses in front of it had been fired. The instant the obstacle was removed, the artillerymen had opened a tremendous fire on the fort. The Spaniards ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 54, No. 335, September 1843 • Various

... prevent being sold, and she afterward married Samuel Boyd, to whom she bore three children, viz., Francis Asbury, Marshall William, and Mary Ellen. His father, Samuel, was the son of Hon. Samuel Boyd, of New York. He was noted for his independence of character; was a valuable but unruly slave. He was allowed an opportunity to purchase his freedom, and this he began to do, and had paid $250, three fourths of the price, when his master sold him to Tennessee. He promptly ran away from his new master, but unwilling to forsake his family, went back to Kentucky. His master pursued ...
— History of the Negro Race in America from 1619 to 1880. Vol. 2 (of 2) - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George Washington Williams

... "good bye for the present, my little Amelia, my darling little Amelia! I am so delighted to find that Captain Walsingham's the man, and so glad you have no mysteries: be well, be well soon. I am so pleased, so happy, that I am as unruly as a child, and as easily managed. You see, how I let myself be turned out ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. V - Tales of a Fashionable Life • Maria Edgeworth

... consulted by philosophers of the first rank on the most intricate points of learning, and of the Platonic philosophy in particular, in which she was remarkably well versed.[2] She was much respected and consulted by the governor, and often visited him. The mob, which was nowhere more unruly, or more fond of riots and tumults than in that populous city, the second in the world for extent, upon a {277} suspicion that she incensed the governor against their bishop, seditiously rose, pulled her out of her chariot, cut and mangled ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler

... how the unruly girl wheels her horse and sits erect in her wild career over the flagstones! If the gray falls, it will do her no harm. Such rising stars may drop from the skies, but they will leap up again like the cats which I threw from the roof when a boy. ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... wouldn't come," she said, in a voice that conveyed indeed more than a perfunctory expression. She glanced at him as he sat beside her on the cushions of the flying motor boat, his strange eyes fixed upon the blue mountains of the island whither they were bound, his unruly hair fanned by ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... the old lady, shaking her head sadly. "The sea is very unruly sometimes. Hadn't you better take my advice, sir, and stop here? The moor's very big, and surely if you and the young gentleman look well you'll be able to find plenty of things to fill your bottles, ...
— The Ocean Cat's Paw - The Story of a Strange Cruise • George Manville Fenn

... at thee, Rowland. Truly my gout causeth me so great grief that I have much ado to keep my unruly member within bounds, but I never yet was aweary of my life, and scarce know what I should ...
— St. George and St. Michael • George MacDonald

... business; a man of such steadiness of character, and such a capital eye for a desirable speculation as Mr Farquhar—just the right age to unite the paternal with the conjugal affection, and consequently the very man for Jemima, who had something unruly in her, which might break out under a regime less wisely adjusted to the circumstances than was Mr Bradshaw's (in his own opinion)—a house ready-furnished, at a convenient distance from her home—no near relations on Mr Farquhar's ...
— Ruth • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell

... these Gentlemen belonged to were to be transported in a Ferry-boat, as fast as they could. One of the Friends was now in the Boat, while the other was drawn up with others by the Waterside waiting the Return of the Boat. A Disorder happened in the Passage by an unruly Horse; and a Gentleman who had the Rein of his Horse negligently under his Arm, was forced into the Water by his Horse's Jumping over. The Friend on the Shore cry'd out, Who's that is drowned trow? He was immediately answer'd, Your Friend, Harry Thompson. He very ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele

... that, you know best, guidwife," he answered, smiling, "but I think I have heard of a wife up about the Heathknowes, who in some measure possesses the power of her unruly member. It is possible that Jen there may have picked up a thorn or two ...
— The Dew of Their Youth • S. R. Crockett

... heads to the wind, and those which were not in the yokes after a short while broke from the keepers, and galloped off, followed by the horses, sheep, and dogs. The oxen in the yokes also became quite unruly, trying to disengage themselves ...
— The Mission • Frederick Marryat

... Mexicans, however angry, think twice before seeking to rescue prisoners. But the wish and the spirit were not lacking. Employees of the plotters, men who had received favors from Sorenson or Vorse or Burkhardt, Mexicans of a naturally vicious and unruly temper, were all for rushing the jail. The great number of the people, however, peaceful and indolent, preferred to content themselves with satisfying their curiosity by talk instead of seeking a taste of blood. And so as a result of this divided opinion the hostility ...
— In the Shadow of the Hills • George C. Shedd

... every day to take care of the swine. He was obliged to keep them together in one place, and if any of them ran away into the forest, Prince Fairyfoot was beaten. And as the swine were very wild and unruly, he was very often beaten, because it was almost impossible to keep them from wandering off; and when they ran away, they ran so fast, and through places so tangled, that it was almost ...
— Little Saint Elizabeth and Other Stories • Frances Hodgson Burnett

... the house! The rats are too many for me. What a thing it is to have an unruly family!" ...
— The Great Big Treasury of Beatrix Potter • Beatrix Potter

... velvety, their lashes were long, their lids were faintly smudged with a shadowy under- coloring that magnified their size and intensified their brilliance. Her hair was almost black, nevertheless it was of fine texture; a few unruly strands had escaped from beneath her fur cap and they clouded her brow and temples. At first sight she appeared to be foreign, and of that smoky type commonly associated with the Russian idea of beauty, but she was not foreign, not Russian; nor ...
— The Winds of Chance • Rex Beach

... on the winsome apparition before me, and beheld a young girl, slender as a lily, dressed in a soft, clinging gown which made her appear more slender still, her fair hair arranged in a tangle of unruly curls round the dainty oval ...
— Castles in the Air • Baroness Emmuska Orczy

... had now, through the shameful behaviour of the volunteers, become serious. The news of the defeat spread with great rapidity among the unruly tribes on the frontier of the Colony; and a Mohammedan priest, proclaiming himself a prophet, placed himself at the head of the movement. The Governor acted with promptitude; and recognising the great danger of delay, despatched, on December 17th, all the available men from the garrison of Sierra ...
— The History of the First West India Regiment • A. B. Ellis

... river comes with its mouth full of pearls; the latter yawns to engulf the adjacent land. At present, however, the Yellow River is dry and thirsty, the unruly stream, the opposite of Horace's uxorius amnis, having about forty years ago forsaken its old bed and rushed away to the Gulf of Pechili (Peh-chihli). This produced as much consternation as the Mississippi would occasion if it should plough its way across the state that bears its name ...
— The Awakening of China • W.A.P. Martin

... had been carried out as well as he could expect. He had offered to supply the money necessary for the captain's tour, and had absolutely sent a servant to accompany the traveller. When the traveller had won money at Monaco he had been unruly, but this had not happened very often. When we last saw him he had expressed his intention to Mr. Hart of making a return journey to the Caucasian provinces. But he got no farther than Genoa on his way to the Caucasus, and then, when he found that Mr. Hart ...
— Mr. Scarborough's Family • Anthony Trollope

... cranky pews of every shape. A Carolean pulpit stood against a pillar, with reading-desk and clerk's box underneath. The ante-Communion Service was read from the desk, separated from the liturgy and sermon by such renderings of Tate and Brady as the unruly gang of volunteers with fiddles and wind instruments in the gallery pleased to contribute. The clerk, a wizened old fellow in a brown wig, repeated the responses in a nasal twang, and with a substitution ...
— The Parish Clerk (1907) • Peter Hampson Ditchfield

... Richard Ist, presided at that time over the see of Bayeux. Jealous for the honor of his diocese, the prelate instantly applied himself to rebuild the cathedral; but he lived to see only a small progress made in his work. It was finished by a prelate of still greater, though evil celebrity, the unruly Odo, brother to the Conqueror, who, for more than fifty years, continued bishop of this see, and by his unbounded liberality and munificence in the discharge of his high office, proved himself worthy of his ...
— Account of a Tour in Normandy, Vol. II. (of 2) • Dawson Turner

... the 13th Evans' nose, which had been more or less frost-bitten for some weeks, had an especially bad attack. His attitude [Page 169] to this unruly member was one of comic forbearance, as though, while it scarcely belonged to him, he was more or less responsible for it and so had to make excuses. On this occasion when told that it had 'gone,' he remarked in a resigned ...
— The Voyages of Captain Scott - Retold from 'The Voyage of the "Discovery"' and 'Scott's - Last Expedition' • Charles Turley

... the horses and the trick-dogs, that the trainer can exercise gentle persuasion. So in this great arena, this bedlam of wild beasts, were often heard the blows of club and lash, and the sharp report of pistols fired in the faces of unruly ...
— Black Bruin - The Biography of a Bear • Clarence Hawkes

... settling of affairs, the people's growing confidence in us and in the Government as paymasters, and the absence of the unruly men, the plantations are getting on quite nicely. The land, both corn and cotton, has been divided and allotted to the hands,—so a new system of ...
— Letters from Port Royal - Written at the Time of the Civil War (1862-1868) • Various

... Used in conversation for "to bring to reason." To bring an unruly subject to his senses, to know he is under control, to reduce ...
— The Sailor's Word-Book • William Henry Smyth

... discovery of life. "I used to do just so, busy as I always was, before Eben came," she thought, with a little pang of impatient shame for herself and her daughter that they must yield to such necessities of their natures. Abigail Merritt had never been a rebel, indeed, but there had been unruly possibilities within her. She remembered well what she had told her mother when her vague dreams had ended and Eben Merritt had come a-wooing. "I like him, and I suppose, because I like him I've got to marry him, but it makes me ...
— Jerome, A Poor Man - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

... could never live in an unruly, violent family of modern children, such for instance as those at Blake Hall. Anne is not to return. Mrs. Ingham is a placid, mild woman; but as for the children, it was one struggle of life-wearing exertion ...
— Charlotte Bronte and Her Circle • Clement K. Shorter

... the cards, Anthony and I thought, that there might be another "demonstration" at Esneh, that unruly town where Mohammed Ali banished the superfluous dancing girls of Cairo in the eighteen forties. If Rechid Bey had not discovered the truth about that hurried departure from Luxor for Asiut (as a matter of fact, Mabel and her guardians were almost ...
— It Happened in Egypt • C. N. Williamson & A. M. Williamson

... scene is prepared, and I introduce it by a burlesque hearing of several persons charged by the sbirro captain with offences against morality. The earnestness of the situation becomes more marked when the gloomy form of Friedrich strides through the inrushing and unruly crowd, commanding silence, and he himself undertakes the hearing of Claudio's case in the sternest manner possible. The implacable judge is already on the point of pronouncing sentence when Isabella enters, and requests, before them all, a private interview with the Regent. ...
— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner

... even the riotous fauns and satyrs who were heedless enough to go a-swimming in the river Styx, if they had cared to venture near such a dismal place. But the maiden goddess laid a spell upon their unruly wits, even as the moon controls the tides of the sea. Her precincts were holy. There was one man, however, whose ill-timed curiosity brought heavy punishment upon him. This was Actaeon, a grandson of ...
— Old Greek Folk Stories Told Anew • Josephine Preston Peabody

... which I undertook to see was properly discharged, for I felt an interest in this strangely distorted nature. His sense of helplessness, combined with a damnable scheme for revenge which he had secretly formed, caused Neranya to change his fierce, impetuous, and unruly conduct into a smooth, quiet, insinuating bearing, which he carried so artfully as to deceive those with whom he was brought in ...
— The Ape, the Idiot & Other People • W. C. Morrow

... not often happen; for of all the materials that minister to human comfort and needs, this seems to me the most abused. Iron, like the old-time saints, betrays not its solid worth till it has been tried by fire,—is all the better for being hammered and beaten; stone is as much improved as an unruly boy by a good dressing; while bricks, like ghosts, come forth from their purgatory for the express purpose of being laid. All of these, by appropriate treatment, are invested with graces and glories that by nature they never owned. But a tree, graceful, ...
— Homes And How To Make Them • Eugene Gardner

... thoughts roamed forward and backward—forward to the vague magic land of adventure, where she was to win treasure and delight, fortune and fame; backward to a big, lovely, splendid house in New York City, where a certain tall young man, with brown, unruly hair and shoulders broad as a sheltering wall, must be ...
— The Perils of Pauline • Charles Goddard

... Buon Convento, where the emperor Henry VII. was poisoned by a friar with the sacramental wafer, I refused to give money to the hostler, who in revenge put two young unbroke stone-horses in the traces next to the coach, which became so unruly, that before we had gone a quarter of a mile, they and the postilion were rolling in the dust. In this situation they made such efforts to disengage themselves, and kicked with such violence, that I imagined the carriage and all our trunks would have been beaten in ...
— Travels Through France and Italy • Tobias Smollett

... the other. The doctor happened still to have on the coat which he wore on that occasion. He mentioned, that he himself had his horse shot under him at Culloden; that the ball hit the horse about two inches from his knee, and made him so unruly that he was obliged to change him for another. He threw out some reflections on the conduct of the disastrous affair at Culloden, saying, however, that perhaps it was rash in him to do so. I am now convinced that his suspicions were groundless; for I have had a good deal of conversation ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 5 • Boswell

... Gardiner said, the people of England had given proofs of unruly humour. The queen was their undoubted sovereign, and a measure would be submitted to the Lords and Commons to declare, in some emphatic manner, her claim to her ...
— The Reign of Mary Tudor • James Anthony Froude

... earth will not support human life uncultivated, and men will not labour without some reasonable hope that they will enjoy the fruit of their labour. Anarchy, therefore, is usually shortlived, and perishes of inanition. Unruly persons must either comply with the terms on which alone they are permitted to subsist, and consent to submit to some kind of order, or they must die. The Irish, however, were enabled to escape from this most wholesome provision by the recklessness of the people, ...
— History of England from the Fall of Wolsey to the Death of Elizabeth. Vol. II. • James Anthony Froude

... play with the little waves that danced upon the blue water. He who is our Father, the father of our bodies, whose wife is our Mother the Earth, wishes safety and peace for all his children, therefore he still watches the unruly ones from the middle of the sky, and their battles are ...
— Wigwam Evenings - Sioux Folk Tales Retold • Charles Alexander Eastman and Elaine Goodale Eastman

... he obtained an ensigncy, and "to save Thornton and you [Samuel] the expence of buying a horse to ride home on, I have lent him a mare." Two other sons he assumed all the expenses of, and showed an almost fatherly interest in them. He placed them at school, and when the lads proved somewhat unruly he wrote them long admonitory letters, which became stern when actual misconduct ensued, and when one of them ran away to Mount Vernon to escape a whipping, Washington himself prepared "to correct him, but he begged so earnestly ...
— The True George Washington [10th Ed.] • Paul Leicester Ford

... smiled upon him, though as one somewhat troubled, and answered: "Lord Marshal, I thank thee for visiting this poor house; and I shall tell thee first that the lad lives, and hath thriven marvellously, though he be somewhat unruly, and will abide no correction now these last six years. Sooth to say, there is now no story of his being anywise akin to our late Lord King; though true it is that the folk in this faraway corner of the land call ...
— Child Christopher • William Morris

... thinks of greater importance, or in despair at her own want of success, fretted and worried beyond the power of endurance, she fails in nervous health and gives up the care of her children to ignorant nurses, we wonder that American children are so unruly. We sow the wind and we reap the whirlwind, but the sowing was done long ago in the narrow and unfinished education which we gave to our girls, now ...
— The Education of American Girls • Anna Callender Brackett

... and earnest efforts had been frustrated, and that the natives of the islands had mocked the Spaniards openly; because hitherto they had suffered no ill from the latter, but only the above-mentioned kind treatment and hospitality, which would have proved sufficient to attract a more unruly race. But such is the characteristic of this race, which has afflicted and still afflicts the priests. These people refuse to do anything thoroughly; and in order to get them to perform what is ordered of them, one must use the lash and the rattan—whence ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume XXIII, 1629-30 • Various

... for him. He was obliged to content himself with the knowledge that Rodney's father was worth a good deal of money, and that Rodney would give five hundred and perhaps a thousand dollars, rather than be whipped as if he were a black boy. A Southern youngster, no matter how disobedient and unruly he might be, considered it a disgrace to be whipped, and the school-teacher who ventured upon corporal punishment was likely to get himself into serious difficulty. While Bud was turning these things over in his mind, he came within sight of Elder ...
— True To His Colors • Harry Castlemon

... quivering with sympathy. Her more important dinner parties might have been likened to ill-matched fours-in-hand, and Holder had sometimes felt more of pity than of amusement as she sat with an expression of terror on her face, helplessly watching certain unruly individuals taking their bits in their teeth and galloping madly downhill. On one occasion, when he sat beside her, a young man, who shall be nameless, was suddenly heard to remark in the ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... mother to the ground, and Mrs. Robin was glad to see how cleverly he managed both legs and wings. They found Cock Robin still haranguing his unruly family; but on seeing his wife, ...
— The Story of a Robin • Agnes S. Underwood

... part of this new company consisted of unruly sparks, packed off by their friends to escape worse destinies at home. And the rest were chiefly made up of poor gentlemen, broken tradesmen, rakes, and libertines, footmen, and such others as were much fitter to spoil or ruin a commonwealth, ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 1, July, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various



Words linked to "Unruly" :   robustious, boisterous, difficult, disorderly, disobedient, indocile



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