"Vex" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... wildfowl riding out the storm Upon a pitching sea, Beyond grey rollers vex'd that rear and form, When piping winds urge on their destiny, To fall back ruined in white continually. And I at our trysting stone, Whereto I came down alone, Was fain o' the wind's wild moan. O, welcome were wrack and ...
— Poems by Jean Ingelow, In Two Volumes, Volume II. • Jean Ingelow
... successively while the tree itself lives for ever, and if we measure their duration not by our own few swift years, but by the life of nations and races of men. It is, I imagine, a sense capable of cultivation, and enables us to look upon many of man's doings that would otherwise vex and pain us, and, as some say, destroy all the pleasure of our lives, not exactly as an illusion, as if we were Japanese and had seen a fox in the morning, but at all events in what we call ...
— Afoot in England • W.H. Hudson
... and the income of their church; her past contendings and sufferings, and present dangers, all endear their church to their heart. But if tribulation and persecution arise, that is to say, if anything arises to vex or thwart or disappoint them with their church, they incontinently pull up their roots and their religion with it, and transplant both to any other church that for the time better pleases them, or to no church at all. Others, again, have all their religiosity rooted in their family life. ...
— Bunyan Characters - First Series • Alexander Whyte
... delightful to have you live in this country; but if she were only to see you en passant, it hardly matters whether you came or not; that she has not forgotten you, but that she will forget you. Eh! Why shouldn't she forget you? She does not know you.... A hundred speeches of the sort which vex me. ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 11 • Various
... men who listened aimed at simplicity, and therefore naturally argued, the simpler the better; in fact, the conversational style is best of all. Where, then, the need for elaborate preparation? We shall only vex and confuse the people, consequently preparation is superfluous. We know the results. 'A few words' on the schools; an obiter dictum on the stations; a good, energetic, Demosthenic philippic against ...
— My New Curate • P.A. Sheehan
... the Auld Light flocks are bleatin'; Their zealous herds are vex'd an' sweatin': Mysel', I've even seen them greetin' Wi' girnin' spite, To hear the moon sae sadly lie'd on ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... who had loved her tenderly, and after her death had become morose and sullen, withdrawing himself from all company and exercise, and brooding angrily over his loss, as though God had determined to vex him. He had never cared much for the child, who had been peevish and fretful; and the boy's presence had done little but remind him of the wife he had lost; so that the child had lived alone, nourishing ...
— Paul the Minstrel and Other Stories - Reprinted from The Hill of Trouble and The Isles of Sunset • Arthur Christopher Benson
... which the surrounding air hastens to fill, causing thus a constant indraught from both the north and south towards the equator; and the fact of the opposing winds meeting at this point produces those very calms which vex us poor mariners. There, Master Tom, that's all I can tell you; for, I must see about my sextant now to consult the great luminary we have been talking of, so as to see where our scudding has taken ...
— The White Squall - A Story of the Sargasso Sea • John Conroy Hutcheson
... did not know that I was observing him, I discovered a preoccupied look in Philip's eyes. He laughed when I asked if anything had happened to vex him. Was it a natural laugh? He put his arm round me and kissed me. Was it done mechanically? I daresay I am out of humor myself. I think I had a little headache. Morbid, probably. I won't think of it ...
— The Legacy of Cain • Wilkie Collins
... man, but two or three, had appeared from behind the rocks of the hills, and the heart of Wee Willie Winkie sank within him, for just in this manner were the Goblins wont to steal out and vex Curdie's soul. Thus had they played in Curdie's garden, he had seen the picture, and thus had they frightened the Princess's nurse. He heard them talking to each other, and recognized with joy the bastard Pushto that he had picked up ...
— Kipling Stories and Poems Every Child Should Know, Book II • Rudyard Kipling
... religious energy, and because your upward gaze at me now is the very sublime of faith, truth, and devotion: it is too much as if some spirit were near me. Look wicked, Jane: as you know well how to look: coin one of your wild, shy, provoking smiles; tell me you hate me—tease me, vex me; do anything but move me: I would rather be incensed ...
— Jane Eyre - an Autobiography • Charlotte Bronte
... three sons heard the news that the emperor had quitted his home and gone to the war, they made an agreement among themselves and sprang on their horses to ride to the palace and vex the monarch by making his three daughters faithless to his trust. The oldest prince, a brave, spirited, handsome fellow, went first to see how matters stood and bring ...
— Roumanian Fairy Tales • Various
... after a moment's wondering pause, in which she had taken time to reflect that Mrs. Arles's corner of the estate was carried on faultlessly, "it is too bad to vex you with my matters, when you have as much as you can do in the house, yourself,"—and relapsed into what she called ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 13, No. 79, May, 1864 • Various
... weak and fearful," she murmured, leaning her head upon her husband, and concealing her face. "But I will try to have courage. If you feel it to be your duty to accept this call, I will go with you; and, come what may, will not vex your ears by a complaining word. It was only for our little ones ...
— The Lights and Shadows of Real Life • T.S. Arthur
... vex myself, Theo, and annoy myself, and whip myself, as I deserve, child. And, besides, how can you expect such an idiot as I am to say anything but idiotic things? Do you know, it quite pleased me to see him angry. I thought, ah! now I have hurt his feelings! ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... being all of which they were sure, it was best to live well or to live in pleasure. The Stoics were the philosophers who upheld the love of virtue and honour; the Epicureans said that it was of no use to vex themselves in this life, but that they might as well enjoy themselves while they had time. St. Paul was well learned in all these questions, and set forth to the Athenian students, in glorious words, that the truth was come for which they had so ...
— The Chosen People - A Compendium Of Sacred And Church History For School-Children • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... themselves again. And fawning breed Of house-bred whelps do feel the sudden urge To shake their bodies and start from off the ground, As if beholding stranger-visages. And ever the fiercer be the stock, the more In sleep the same is ever bound to rage. But flee the divers tribes of birds and vex With sudden wings by night the groves of gods, When in their gentle slumbers they have dreamed Of hawks in chase, aswooping on for fight. Again, the minds of mortals which perform With mighty motions mighty enterprises, Often ...
— Of The Nature of Things • [Titus Lucretius Carus] Lucretius
... registered Cossacks, and he subsequently served under Koniecpolski in the Ukraine campaign of 1646. His hopes of distinction were, however, cut short by a decree of the Polish diet, which, in order to vex the king, refused to sanction the continuance of the war. Chmielnicki, now doubly hateful to the Poles as being both a royalist and a Cossack, was again maltreated and chicaned, and only escaped from gaol by bribing his gaolers. Thirsting for vengeance, he fled to the Cossack settlements ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 3 - "Chitral" to "Cincinnati" • Various
... shall be standing on the piano in the drawing- room, straightening a picture. I never can bear a picture crooked, and I had Jane tip it a little this morning, just to vex me. Fred Rangely will come in unannounced. Of course I shall be dreadfully confused, and have to get down. In my maidenly confusion I am almost sure I can't help showing my slippers, and just a trifle—a very discreet trifle, of course,—of ...
— The Puritans • Arlo Bates
... inconsiderate Jade! had you been hang'd, it would not have vex'd me, for that might have been your Misfortune; but to do such a mad thing by Choice; ...
— The Beggar's Opera • John Gay
... who'd have thought our cousin D Could think of marrying Mrs. E. True I don't like such things to tell; But, faith, I pity Mrs. L, And was I her, the bride to vex, I would engage with Mrs. X. But they do say that Charlotte U, With Fanny M, and we know who, Occasioned all, for you must know They set their caps at Mr. O. And as he courted Mrs. E, They thought, if she'd have cousin D, That things ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... not the like of thee, neither beseemeth she the goodliness of thy youth and the pleasantness of thy compostition and the sweetness of thy speech;" but Ala al-Din replied, "This talk becometh thee not, neither is it seemly in thee; if I be content with her, how should this vex thee?" So the Kazi was satisfied and they came to an accord and concluded the marriage contract at a dower precedent of five purses[FN264] ready money and a dower contingent of fifteen purses, so it might be hard for him to put her away, her father having given him fair warning, but ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... one hundred and six years, informed me, and the dogs hunted her. He told me of the Tadley witch, who "wished" several people, and greatly injured them. It seems to have been a common practice of the old witches to turn themselves into hares, in order to vex the squires, justices, and country parsons, who were fond of hunting, as the old dames could elude the speed of the swiftest dogs. An old writer states "that never hunters nor their dogs may be bewitched, they cleave an oaken branch, and both they and their dogs pass over it." Mary Dore, ...
— English Villages • P. H. Ditchfield
... high in glory reigns, Laughs at their pride, their rage controls; He'll vex their hearts with inward pains, And speak in ...
— The Psalms of David - Imitated in the Language of The New Testament - And Applied to The Christian State and Worship • Isaac Watts
... their teens they have wit to perplex us, With letters and lovers for ever they vex us; While each still rejects the fair suitor you've brought her; Oh, what a plague is an obstinate daughter! Wrangling and jangling, Flouting and pouting, Oh, what a plague ...
— The Duenna • Richard Brinsley Sheridan
... great, bold, sombre Martinswand, as you like best; and in this spot Findelkind would sit hour after hour while his brothers and sisters were playing, and look up at the mountains or on to the altar, and wish and pray and vex his little soul most woefully; and his ewes and his lambs would crop the grass about the entrance, and bleat to make him notice them and lead them farther afield, but all in vain. Even the dear sheep he hardly heeded, and his pet ewes Katte and Greta and the big ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, October, 1880 • Various
... preferred, whom every man envies; When love so rumbles in his pate, no sleep comes in his eyes. Our gallant's case is worst of all—he lies so just betwixt them: For he's in love, and he's in debt, and knows not which most vex him!' ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2 No 4, October, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... them, he would have given almost any price in his gift to know the name of this or that wonderful bird, or brilliant flower; he used to tremble with excitement and intensity of interest when some new bird was seen, or when some strange song came from the trees to thrill him with its power or vex him with its mystery, and he had a sad sense of lost opportunity when it flew away leaving him dark as ever. But he was alone and helpless, he had neither book nor friend to guide him, and he grew up with a kind of knowledge ...
— Boy Scouts Handbook - The First Edition, 1911 • Boy Scouts of America
... let fall a stone sieve, her distress was changed into rejoicing by the prayer of the holy child, at which the broken parts came together and were made whole; that once on receiving his food in a basket, let down to his otherwise inaccessible cell, the devil vainly tried to vex him by breaking the rope; that once Satan, assuming the form of a blackbird, nearly blinded him by the flapping of his wings; that once, too, the same tempter appeared as a beautiful Roman girl, to whose fascinations, in his youth, St. Benedict had been sensible, and from which ...
— History of the Intellectual Development of Europe, Volume I (of 2) - Revised Edition • John William Draper
... experience and incapable of proof, are the bases of all proof. (See Grote's Essay on the Origin of Knowledge, first printed in Bain's Mental and Moral Science, now re-published in Grote's Aristotle.) Zeno's [Greek: ennoiai] were all this and more. Reperiuntur: two things vex the edd. (1) the change from oratio obliqua to recta, which however has repeatedly taken place during Varro's exposition, and for which see M.D.F. I. 30, III. 49; (2) the phrase reperire viam, which seems to me sound enough. Dav., Halm give aperirentur. There is no MSS. variant. ...
— Academica • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... through the mill; he wished to be a painter. The words fell on his father like a thunderbolt, and Norris made haste to give way. "It didn't really matter, don't you know?" said he. "And it seemed an awful shame to vex the old boy." ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 13 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... of Captain Sword, But their chief look'd vex'd, and said not a word, For thought and trouble had touch'd his ears Beyond the bullet-like sense of theirs, And wherever he went, he was 'ware of a sound Now heard in the distance, now gathering round, Which irk'd him to know what the issue ...
— Captain Sword and Captain Pen - A Poem • Leigh Hunt
... hoped that it may prove useful to the higher classes in schools, as well as to teachers. When I was a boy I should have been glad to get hold of a brief account of the War for Independence that would have suggested answers to some of the questions that used to vex me. Was the conduct of the British government, in driving the Americans into rebellion, merely wanton aggression, or was it not rather a bungling attempt to solve a political problem which really needed to be solved? Why were New Jersey ...
— The War of Independence • John Fiske
... But I don't vex myself o'er 'em as you do. And then, you see, I hit 'em a slap sometimes: and them little 'uns—I gives 'em a good whipping now and then: there's nothing else will do for 'em, as what they say. Howsoever, I've lost ...
— Agnes Grey • Anne Bronte
... in the morning How wearily all the day The words unkind Would trouble my mind I said when you went away, I had been more careful, darling, Nor given you needless pain; But we vex "our own" With look and tone We may ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For, Book Two • Various
... left: all which towns, once famous and flourishing, now lie overturned and buried in their ruins. Upon this sight, I could not but think presently within myself, Alas! how do we poor mortals fret and vex ourselves if any of our friends happen to die or be killed, whose life is yet so short, when the carcasses of so many noble cities lie here exposed before me in one view."—See Middleton's Cicero, 1823, ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 2 • George Gordon Byron
... me cease, for why should I prolong My notes, and vex a Singer with a Song? Oh thou with pen perpetual in thy fist! Dubbed for thy sins a stark Miscellanist, So pleased the printer's orders to perform For Messrs. Longman, Hurst and Rees and Orme. Go—Get thee hence to Paternoster Row, Thy patrons wave a duodecimo! (Best form ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Vol. 7. - Poetry • George Gordon Byron
... nothing more than a composition between the bully and the bullied;" [Ibid p. 399.] of his attack on Holland in 1672; of the districts and barrier-towns of the Spanish Netherlands which were secured to him by the treaty of Nimeguen in 1678; of how, after this treaty, he "continued to vex both Spain and the Empire, and to extend his conquests in the Low Countries and on the Rhine, both by the pen and the sword; how he took Luxembourg by force, stole Strasburg, and bought Casal;" of how ...
— The Fifteen Decisive Battles of The World From Marathon to Waterloo • Sir Edward Creasy, M.A.
... interrupted Humphrey, "I did dream of bees and of following them. We go straight to this Isle of Axholme. Vex me no more." ...
— A Boy's Ride • Gulielma Zollinger
... "Don't vex yourself, Saturius," said the auctioneer, "bidding is one thing, paying another. At present I have a bona-fide bid of fifteen hundred from you. Unless this liberal but unknown lady is prepared with the cash I shall close on that. Do ...
— Pearl-Maiden • H. Rider Haggard
... effects of moisture. In outward appearance, however, Arcadia House had sadly degenerated. The stucco that originally covered the outer walls had fallen away here and there, leaving unsightly patches to vex the eye, and in many of the windows the glazing had been destroyed either wholly or ...
— The Doomsman • Van Tassel Sutphen
... baffled by toad or by rat? The gravamen's in that! How the lion, who crouches to suit His back to my foot, Would admire that I stand in debate! But the small turns the great If it vexes you, that is the thing! Toad or rat vex the king? 50 Though I waste half my realm to unearth Toad ...
— Dramatic Romances • Robert Browning
... Bays, they are so much their due; They'l wear, inspite of impudence and you; You are so hateful cruel and unjust, To Load that Sex, with ugly brand of Lust: Those whome deserved Slights and losses vex, Invent new Sins, and throw 'em on that Sex; Whose thrifty wickedness the Sex forsakes, He on these beauteous Fields a Sodom makes: He ne're assaults but where the Walls are slight, True Bullies will with none but Cowards ...
— The Pleasures of a Single Life, or, The Miseries Of Matrimony • Anonymous
... And in this consists the great, the fearful problem—a problem which both reason and revelation propound; but the truths which can alone solve it, seem to lie beyond the horizon of darkness—and we vex ourselves in vain. 'Tis a sort of moral asymptotes; but its lines, instead of approaching through all space without meeting, seem receding through ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume 2 - Historical, Traditional, and Imaginative • Alexander Leighton
... and feeling nothing very particular. I do not believe that ordinary people, when worried by some little care, or pressed down by some little sorrow, have only to go and muse in a churchyard in order to feel how trivial and transient such cares and sorrows are, and how very little they ought to vex us. To commonplace mortals, it is the sunshine within the breast that does most to brighten; and the thing that has most power to darken is the shadow there. And the scenes and teachings of external ...
— The Recreations of A Country Parson • A. K. H. Boyd
... to vex Constable Plimmer. To a man crossed in love, action is the one anodyne; and Battersea gave no scope for action. He dreamed now of the old Whitechapel days as a man dreams of the joys of his childhood. ...
— The Man with Two Left Feet - and Other Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... moon,-a book Of little verses, or a dancing child. My heart turns crying from the rose and book, My heart turns crying from the thin bright moon, And weeps with useless sorrow for the child. The Moods have loosed a wind to vex my hair, And made my heart too ...
— ANTHOLOGY OF MASSACHUSETTS POETS • WILLIAM STANLEY BRAITHWAITE
... was the first of sorrow among the jubilant King's. By some accident of under-floor drafts the cat did not vex the dormitory beneath which she lay, but the next one to the right; stealing on the air rather as a pale-blue sensation than as any poignant offense. But the mere adumbration of an odor is enough for the ...
— Stalky & Co. • Rudyard Kipling
... very sorry, mamma, but I cannot help it. Indeed, I do not want to be disobedient, or to vex you, but you must see that if I did go it would only make us both wretched, and besides, it would not ...
— A Canadian Heroine, Volume 2 - A Novel • Mrs. Harry Coghill
... rivalling Lord Byron, as well I may, and there is no other with whom it is worth contending." To Ollier, in 1820, he wrote: "I doubt whether I shall write more. I could be content either with the hell or the paradise of poetry; but the torments of its purgatory vex me, without exciting my powers sufficiently to put an end to the vexation." It was not that his spirit was cowed by the Reviews, or that he mistook the sort of audience he had to address. He more than once acknowledged that, while Byron wrote for the many, his poems ...
— Percy Bysshe Shelley • John Addington Symonds
... somewhere, in some great assembly, men could have seen how beautifully she was made and the colour of her skin, she would have vanquished all Italy, the whole world. Her talk of her figure, of her skin, offended me, and observing this, she would, when she was angry, to vex me, say all sorts of vulgar things, taunting me. One day when we were at the summer villa of a lady of our acquaintance, and she lost her temper, she even went so far as to say: "If you don't leave off ...
— The Darling and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... imp of blackness, off at once, Expend thy mirth as likes thee best: Thy toil is over for the nonce; Yes, "opus operatum est." When dreary authors vex thee sore, Thy Mentor's old, and would remind thee That if thy griefs are all before, Thy pleasures are not all ...
— London Lyrics • Frederick Locker
... tightly knit Around me than the ivy clasps the oak, Didst breathe a vow—mocking the gods with it— A vow which, false one, thou hast foully broke; That while the ravening wolf should hunt the flocks, The shipman's foe, Orion, vex the sea, And zephyrs waft the unshorn Apollo's locks, So long wouldst thou be fond, be true ...
— Horace • Theodore Martin
... But Saturus spake gently for the rest: 'How perfect and acceptable must be Your soul to God, Perpetua, that thus He bends to you, and through you speaks his will. We know now that our martyrdom is fixed, Nor need we vex us further for ...
— Alcyone • Archibald Lampman
... been like this before," pouted Dulce, when they were left alone. "She drives us away from her as though we had done something purposely to vex her." ...
— Not Like Other Girls • Rosa N. Carey
... that if he dared, he would bite it. This horrid old thing (who called herself our grandmother) used to be like a storm blowing through the house. She never was two minutes in the room before she began to scold somebody; and if she could not find reasonable fault with any body, that seemed to vex her more than anything else. Then she scolded us all in a lump together. "Dame Hilda, what an untidy chamber!"—she usually began in that way—"why don't you make these children put their playthings tidy? (Of course Dame Hilda did, ...
— In Convent Walls - The Story of the Despensers • Emily Sarah Holt
... nature, the nature and extent of whose force it either cloaks or minimizes, and those imponderable and supersensuous values which it tends to ignore and which are not ordinarily included in its definition of experience, return to vex and plague it. Indeed the worst foe of humanism has never been the religious view of the world upon whose stored-up moral reserves of uncompromising doctrine it has often half-consciously subsisted. Humanism has long profited from the admitted ...
— Preaching and Paganism • Albert Parker Fitch
... do you know it really wasn't natural to me. As a child, I used to be idle and get on very badly, and it used to vex my poor father, who was then living, very much. Well, one day, not long before he died, I had been very obstinate, and would learn nothing. He didn't say much, but in the afternoon, when we were taking a walk, we passed an old barn, and on ...
— St. Winifred's - The World of School • Frederic W. Farrar
... bedecked, heartless coquette of the pleasure-seeking world. She stood in the shadow of gray walls, a grating over her head, with deep, soulful, girlish eyes lifted in piteous appeal; and in each of these characters an unfathomed depth remained to vex and ...
— The Light of the Star - A Novel • Hamlin Garland
... be wi' your kindness," quo' Symon, "Nor vex me wi' tears and your cares, For now to be ruled by a woman, Nae laurels shall ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... gentlemen, 'tis but a week more, I intreat you But 7. short days, I am not running from ye; Nor, if you give me patience, is it possible All my adventures fail; you have ships abroad Endure the beating both of Wind and Weather: I am sure 'twould vex your hearts, to be protested; Ye are all ...
— Beggars Bush - From the Works of Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher (Vol. 2 of 10) • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher
... thought it thy delight, Why hast thou lost it? Can it be restor'd? Where is thy widowhood, there is thy shame. Gismund, it is no man's nor men's report, That have by likely proofs inform'd me thus. Thou know'st how hardly I could be induc'd To vex myself, and be displeas'd with thee, With flying tales of flattering sycophants. No, no, there was in us such settled trust Of thy chaste life and uncorrupted mind That if these eyes had not beheld thy shame. In vain ten thousand censures could ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VII (4th edition) • Various
... out upon him: Cease, 30 Leave me in peace: Fear not that I should crave Aught thou mayst have. Leave me in peace, yea trouble me no more, Lest I arise and chase thee from my door. What, shall I not be let Alone, that thou dost vex me yet? ...
— Goblin Market, The Prince's Progress, and Other Poems • Christina Rossetti
... Helen, observing her frayed aspect, and in turn becoming the supporter. "You've seen something to vex ...
— The Death Shot - A Story Retold • Mayne Reid
... relations between his country and ours. In cases such as those just referred to he was very broad-minded; and in one of the first which I had to present to him, when I perhaps showed some nervousness, he said, "Mr. Minister, don't allow cases of this kind to vex you; I had rather give the United States two hundred doubtful cases every year than have the slightest ill-feeling arise between us.'' This being the fact, it was comparatively easy to deal with him. Unfortunately, he died early during my stay, and ...
— Volume I • Andrew Dickson White
... "Charon, vex not thyself, it is thus willed there where is power to do that which is willed; and farther ask not." Then the fleecy cheeks were quiet of the pilot of the livid marsh, who round about his ...
— The Divine Comedy, Volume 1, Hell [The Inferno] • Dante Alighieri
... plain, Who with no deep researches vex the brain; Who from the dark and doubtful love to run. And hold their glimmering tapers to ...
— The Woman's Bible. • Elizabeth Cady Stanton
... as lucid intervals between the paroxysms of an inherent malignancy of nature; and even the laughing effusions of his wit and humour got credit for no other aim than that which Swift boasted of, as the end of all his own labours, "to vex the world ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. 6 (of 6) - With his Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... once exalted and refined, I'll watch her skill in music's art; By ear and fingers judge the heart, And then it will not be believ'd I can be easily deceiv'd. I only grieve that in my prime I've wasted so much precious time, For long ere this I might have married, Had I not so unwisely tarried, And vex'd my brains in looking round For that ...
— Vignettes in Verse • Matilda Betham
... as gauze, were very lively and mischievous, though they often helped honest and hard working people in their tasks, as we shall see. But first and most of all, they were fond of fun. They loved to vex cross people and to please those who were bonnie and blithe. They hated misers, but they loved the kind and generous. These little folks usually took their pleasure in the grassy meadows, among the flowers and butterflies. On bright nights ...
— Dutch Fairy Tales for Young Folks • William Elliot Griffis
... washing-book and engaging of housekeepers, etc., etc. I who have praised woman more than Frauenlob, have not one for my companion. The truth is, I have spoiled Minna; too much did I indulge her, too much did I yield to her; but it were better not to talk upon a subject which never ceases to vex me." ...
— The Love Affairs of Great Musicians, Volume 2 • Rupert Hughes
... Occasion to be very soft in his Oglings upon a Lady he danced with, and whom he knew of all Women I love most to outshine. The Contest began who should plague the other most. I, who do not care a Farthing for him, had no hard Task to out-vex him. I made Fanfly, with a very little Encouragement, cut Capers Coupee, and then sink with all the Air and Tenderness imaginable. When he perform'd this, I observed the Gentleman you know of fall ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... ground for what his aristocratical pride doubtless considered a hard blow, and what King Francis, indeed, condescended to feel as such. He met with the notion somewhere, and chose to believe it, in order to vex the French and their princes. The spirit of the taunt contradicts his own theories elsewhere; for he has repeatedly said, that the only true nobility is in the mind. But his writings (poetical truth excepted) ...
— Stories from the Italian Poets: With Lives of the Writers, Volume 1 • Leigh Hunt
... troops, many of whom were reckless men; the army then was not up to the standard of today. Besides, there came in the wake of the soldiers a trail of gamblers and other disreputable people to vex and perplex us. In the blockhouses could be seen bullet marks which we knew did not ...
— Ox-Team Days on the Oregon Trail • Ezra Meeker
... schoolman's question," said I, smiling; "but I know how these idle subtleties vex the mind; and you, my brother, are ever too occupied with considerations of the future. If Heaven does pre-order our destiny, we know that Heaven is merciful, and we should be fearless, as we arm ...
— Devereux, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... much sought after by gentlemen of doubtful nicety in the choice of female friends. She leads a jolly life, certainly; for she rides in an elegant barouche, has nothing to do, no household cares to vex her, no pork to boil, no potatoes to peel, and has genuine wax candles in the private boudoir where she receives those not over-nice gentlemen. What more could feminine heart wish? You don't know her now. Mrs. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 93, July, 1865 • Various
... consulted for the space of six-and-forty weeks, finding that they could not fasten their teeth in it, nor with such clearness understand the case as that they might in any manner of way be able to right it, or take up the difference betwixt the two aforesaid parties, it did so grievously vex them that they most villainously conshit themselves for shame. In this great extremity one amongst them, named Du Douhet, the learnedest of all, and more expert and prudent than any of the rest, whilst one ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... thou so puffed with pride, canst thou Thus meekly bow To go on churchward e'er old age Doth on thee press? 58 Let pleasure, pleasure rule thy ways, For many hours in years to roll To thee are given, And when death comes to end thy days, If prayer thou raise, Then all sins that can vex a soul Shall be forgiven. 59 Look to thy wealth and property: There is a group of houses should Be thine by right, Great source of income would they be, Unhappily At thy parents' death the matter stood In no clear light. 60 The case is simple, 'tis averred Such lawsuits ...
— Four Plays of Gil Vicente • Gil Vicente
... feelings that were not encouraged. That, and my uncle's indiscreet permission to you to travel with us, have precipitated our relations in a way that I could neither foresee nor avoid, though of late I have had apprehensions that it might come to this. You vex and disturb me ...
— A Laodicean • Thomas Hardy
... Fields that the fervid noontide warms, Or Winter's rugged grasp deforms, Or bright with Autumn's golden store; Thou coverest up thy face with storms, Or smilest serene—but still thy roar And dashing foam go up to vex the sea-beat shore." LUNT. ...
— Afloat And Ashore • James Fenimore Cooper
... seeks thy shrine On him but seldom, power divine, Thy spirit rests! Satiety And sloth, poor counterfeits of thee, Mock the tired worldling. Idle hope And dire remembrance interlope To vex the feverish slumbers of the mind: The bubble floats before, the spectre ...
— The Greville Memoirs (Second Part) - A Journal of the Reign of Queen Victoria from 1837 to 1852 - (Volume 1 of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville
... too much upon our patience," he said, sharply. "You will vex the King again." As he spoke he glanced in the direction of Sigurd Blue Wolf, a significant glance, suggesting that it was time these interruptions should be ended. Sigurd moved leisurely a little nearer ...
— The Proud Prince • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... taxes and leave the Frenchman free; we will overvalue their properties, and undervalue our own; we will divide their constituencies; we will proclaim parishes out of townships; we will deprive them of offices, harass their commerce, vex their heretical altars; we will force new privileges from the Federal power; we will colonize the public lands with our own people exclusively, and repatriate our children lost; we will possess ourselves of those palaces and that vast wealth they wring ...
— The Young Seigneur - Or, Nation-Making • Wilfrid Chateauclair
... so, or ever loose me. Heeres[100] sweet stuffe! Can this be in a vowed monastick lyfe Or to be fownd in churchmen? 'tis a question Whether to smyle or vex, to laughe or storme, Bycause in this I finde the cause of boathe. What might this sawcy fellowe spy in mee To incorradge such a boldnes? yes this letter Instructs mee what: he seythe my affability And modest smiles, ...
— A Collection Of Old English Plays, Vol. IV. • Editor: A.H. Bullen
... we not a perpetual inclination, in the teeth of our best judgment, to violate that which is Law, merely because we understand it to be such? This spirit of perverseness, I say, came to my final overthrow. It was this unfathomable longing of the soul to vex itself—to offer violence to its own nature—to do wrong for the wrong's sake only—that urged me to continue and finally to consummate the injury I had inflicted upon the unoffending brute. One morning, in ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 2 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... the man who has his face heavenwards be surprised if he hears Tobiah's sneer. 'Ah, wait a bit,' says Tobiah; 'let us see if it will last. Even a fox will throw down that wall; the very first thing that comes to vex him, the very first temptation, however small, will be sufficient to overturn the wall of good resolutions, and his religious professions will lie low in the dust, and will be shown to be ...
— The King's Cup-Bearer • Amy Catherine Walton
... decided that "her boy" is beyond petticoat government. Nurse Bundle cried so bitterly over this matter, that my most chivalrous feelings were roused, and I vowed that "Papa shouldn't say things to vex my dear Nursey." But ...
— A Flat Iron for a Farthing - or Some Passages in the Life of an only Son • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... vex or soothe, corrupt or purify, exalt or debase, barbarize or refine us, by a constant, steady, uniform, insensible operation, like that of the air we ...
— The Elements of Character • Mary G. Chandler
... was absurd, it was preposterous, he was robbing her of her pride. She had eaten long ago—besides, it was the woman's place, and Nonna was in the kitchen, ashamed to appear in the state she was in. Signor Francesco must please her in this—she would be vexed— and surely he would not vex his hostess. To this wilful chant the doctor contributed his burden of "Che! che! S'accommodi!" and rapped with his knife-handle upon the table. Old Nonna, toothless, bearded and scared, popped her head beyond the ...
— The Fool Errant • Maurice Hewlett
... wife, there is no need a pang should vex your heart— 'T is many years since fate ordained that she and I should part; To each a true, maturer love came in good time, and yet It brought not with its nobler grace the power to forget. And would you fain begrudge me now the sentimental ...
— Songs and Other Verse • Eugene Field
... had so bitterly denounced it; and being above all tender-hearted and gallant where a woman, and a sorrowing one, was concerned, he must give Corinne and the child a fair and square start in the house of Breen, with no overdue accounts to vex her except such petty ones as a small life insurance and a few uncollected ...
— Peter - A Novel of Which He is Not the Hero • F. Hopkinson Smith
... promise that is lacking. This will I not give until the Giustiniani make me welcome, or there would be no happiness for Marco. He shall not lose, in loving me. The Signor Giustinian Giustiniani is so stern—and one of the Chiefs—I would not vex him and bring down the displeasure of the Ten; I would bring my ...
— A Golden Book of Venice • Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull
... not like to vex her by calling for her and telling her how unhappy he was, in spite of all her goodness; so he just kept his trouble to himself, went back to his lonely tower, and spent three days in silent melancholy, without even attempting another journey ...
— The Little Lame Prince - And: The Invisible Prince; Prince Cherry; The Prince With The Nose - The Frog-Prince; Clever Alice • Miss Mulock—Pseudonym of Maria Dinah Craik
... fields she wandered, Past the marshes, and the heathlands, Through the shady, gloomy forests. 270 Thus she sang, as on she hastened, Thus she spoke, as on she wandered: "All my heart is filled with trouble; On my head a stone is loaded. But my trouble would not vex me, And the weight would less oppress me, If I perished, hapless maiden, Ending thus my life of sorrow, In the burden of my trouble, In the sadness ...
— Kalevala, Volume I (of 2) - The Land of the Heroes • Anonymous
... named Nooz Wana, the Whelmer of Ships, and from the Straits of Pondar Obed I am come, wherein it is my wont to vex the seas. There I chased Leviathan with my hands when he was young and strong; often he slipped through my fingers, and away into the weed forests that grow below the storms in the dusk on the floor of the sea; but at last I caught and tamed him. For there ...
— The Sword of Welleran and Other Stories • Lord Dunsany
... God help thy case: Our owner holds us sadly cheap, And scorns our race. Each time he sees, he calls us scum, Or worthless tares; Hell-weeds that but to vex him ...
— The Expedition to Birting's Land - and other ballads - - - Translator: George Borrow • Thomas J. Wise
... the Office, where sat all the morning, and the new Treasurers there; and, for my life, I cannot keep Sir J. Minnes and others of the Board from shewing our weakness, to the dishonour of the Board, though I am not concerned but it do vex me to the heart to have it before these people, that would be glad to find out all our weaknesses. At noon Mrs. Mary Batelier with us, and so, after dinner, I with W. Hewer all the afternoon till night beginning to draw up our answer to Middleton, and ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... him with Oliver. She liked to vex him generally. Indeed in this by no means abnormal love affair, there was a very strong antagonism. She seemed to resent the attraction Mr. Britling had for her and the emotions and pleasure she had with him. She seemed under the sway of an instinctive desire ...
— Mr. Britling Sees It Through • H. G. Wells
... them a living; these are they who fail to realize that society has given them support through infancy and childhood; has given them language, literature, liberty. Wise men know that the noblest and strongest have received from society a thousandfold more than they can ever repay, though they vex all the days and nights with ceaseless toil. In this number of non-sufficing persons are to be included the paupers—paupers plebeian, supported in the poorhouse by many citizens; paupers patrician, supported in palace by one citizen, generally father or ancestor; the two classes ...
— A Man's Value to Society - Studies in Self Culture and Character • Newell Dwight Hillis
... to remove them to another and a better world, and we must submit to the will of Providence. I must, however, request of you to think sometimes upon them, and to be very careful not to do anything that will displease or vex your mother. It is therefore proper that you do not roamp [Scottish indeed] too much about, and that ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 16 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... unparalleled progress and combination, what are the little toys with which we vex ourselves in Europe? What is this needle gun we are anxious to get from Prussia, that we may beat her next year with it? Had we not better take from America the principle of liberty she embodies, out of which have come her citizen pride, ...
— The United States in the Light of Prophecy • Uriah Smith
... age? I can sing you, or run you, or dance you. What I thought was that at your age I was dandified too about my clothing. I'll give you the benefit of believing that it's not the small discomfort of a journey in wet tartan you vex yourself over. Have we not—we old campaigners of Lumsden's—soaked our plaids in the running rivers of Low Germanie, and rolled them round us at night to make our hides the warmer, our sleep the snugger? Oh, the old days! Oh, the stout days! God's name, but I ken one man who wearies of these ...
— John Splendid - The Tale of a Poor Gentleman, and the Little Wars of Lorn • Neil Munro
... rocky steep, That frowns incumbent o'er the boiling deep, Solicitous, and sad, a softer form Eyes the lone flood, and deprecates the storm.— Ill fated matron!—for, alas! in vain Thy eager glances wander o'er the main! Tis the vex'd billows, that insurgent rave, Their white foam silvers yonder distant wave, Tis not his sails! thy husband comes no more! His bones now whiten an accursed shore!— Retire,—for hark! the seagull shrieking soars, The lurid atmosphere portentous lours; Night's ...
— Narrative of the Voyages Round The World, • A. Kippis
... There came a rush of stupid expressions to my mind that my rising sense of the supreme importance of the moment saved me from saying. The gap of silence widened until it threatened to become the vast memorable margin of some one among a thousand trivial possibilities of speech that would vex ...
— Tono Bungay • H. G. Wells
... weary night, when the silence lies Around me, broad and deep, And dreams of earth, and dreams of heaven, That vex me ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 385. November, 1847. • Various
... am sure that you have done it. I know you are friendly to me; so am I to you. But it is not at all kind to vex those who are friendly to ...
— Minna von Barnhelm • Gotthold Ephraim Lessing
... teaser, Now take yourself off; Of your buzzing and fussing I've had quite enough. You will not? Tormentor, I mean to rest here, So mind how you vex me, And ...
— The Nursery, June 1877, Vol. XXI. No. 6 - A Monthly Magazine for Youngest Readers • Various
... me the letther, an' I'm the boy that'll soon do the job. Long life to you, Art! Be the contints o' the book, Art, I'll never pelt you or vex you agin, my worthy; an' I'll always call you captain!" Phelim immediately commenced his journey to M———, which was only five miles distant, and in a very short time reached the jail, saw the jailer, and ...
— Phelim O'toole's Courtship and Other Stories • William Carleton
... once (it hath pleased Fate to spare our Captain to be a prodigious trouble to us, and a wholesome trial for our tempers), Madame Bernstein came three days running to Lambeth; vowed there was nothing the matter with the baby;—nothing at all;—and that we only pretended his illness, in order to vex her. ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... thing that makes my food sit heavy on my stomach, and that of my two messmates." "What is it, my brave fellow?" replied the superintendent;—"the persons on whom you are quartered don't grudge it you?" "No, your honour;—if they did, that would not vex us." "What, then, do you complain of?" "Only this, your honour—that the poor folk cheerfully lay their scanty allowance before us for our mess, and we have just found out that they have hardly touched a mouthful themselves, or their six babes, for the last two days; ...
— The Book of Three Hundred Anecdotes - Historical, Literary, and Humorous—A New Selection • Various
... some secret, selfish, and perhaps subtle motive were controlling, then indeed hindrances might well be interferences of God, designed to stay his steps. In the latter case, Mr. Muller rightly judged that difficulties in the way would naturally vex and annoy him; that he would not like to look at them, and would seek to remove them by his own efforts. Instead of giving him an inward satisfaction as affording God an opportunity to intervene in his behalf, they would arouse impatience and vexation, as ...
— George Muller of Bristol - His Witness to a Prayer-Hearing God • Arthur T. Pierson
... tempests vex the sea, Nor always clinging clouds offend the sky; Cold snows before the sunbeams haste to flee, Disclosing flowers that 'neath their whiteness lie; The saints each one doth wait his day to see, And time makes all ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Second Series • John Addington Symonds
... the good-natured young man soothingly—"don't you vex yourself any more about it. Now you go in, and forget all your trouble awhile, please God, by my fireside, my ...
— It Is Never Too Late to Mend • Charles Reade
... romanesque, so prone to sacrifice appearances and social advantages for love, will never be set down to the girl of the period. Love, indeed, is the last thing she thinks of, and the least of the dangers besetting her. Love in a cottage, that seductive dream which used to vex the heart and disturb the calculations of prudent mothers, is now a myth of past ages. The legal barter of herself for so much money, representing so much dash, so much luxury and pleasure; that is her idea of marriage; the only ...
— Modern Women and What is Said of Them - A Reprint of A Series of Articles in the Saturday Review (1868) • Anonymous
... opinions, Slow distinctions and degrees,— Vex not thou thy weary pinions With such leaden weights as these— Through this mystic jurisdiction Reaching out a hand by chance, Resting on a dull conviction Whetted but by ignorance; Living ever to behold Mournful eyes that watch and weep; Spirit suns ...
— Poetical Works of George MacDonald, Vol. 2 • George MacDonald
... this, madam: I love you. For God's sake don't turn away! Oh, I know that I should have been strong to the end, that I should not vex you thus! It is the coward's part I play, perhaps, but I must speak! I cannot die without. I love you, I ...
— Prisoners of Hope - A Tale of Colonial Virginia • Mary Johnston
... smile, who call Quirinus god, All temples bright, in shining white, fly open at thy nod! A lucky sun doth shine; nor voice, nor thought of ill, be stirr'd To tempt the time; the happy day demands the happy word. No brawls assail the ear; cease now the harsh-vex'd forum's hum, And calumny with eager tongue, for once thy spite be dumb! Lo! where the pure and fragrant flame from every altar round Upwreathes, while ears devout receive the saffron's crackling sound! The wandering flame, far darting, strikes the golden-fretted roof, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 57, No. 351, January 1845 • Various
... way Till deeper gloom announced the night, then slept Guarded by angels. But the Saint all night Watched, strong in prayer. The second day still on They fared, like mariners o'er strange seas borne, That keep in mist their soundings when the rocks Vex the dark strait, and breakers roar unseen. At last Benignus cried, "To God be praise! He sends us better omens. See! the moss Brightens the crag!" Ere long another spake: "The worst is past! This freshness ...
— The Legends of Saint Patrick • Aubrey de Vere
... was based. The tenor of this law was as follows: It is forbidden to swear in God's name; to mention the devil; to sleep after the hour for prayer; to handle lights; to destroy or waste food; to meddle with the duties of the drawer of liquor; to play at dice or cards after sunset; and to vex the cook or annoy the crew under penalty of a monetary fine. The following are some of the penalties inflicted for various offences: Whoever sleeps while on guard or creates a disturbance between decks shall be drawn under the keel of the vessel; whoever attempts to ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume VI. • Various
... answer my mother in that way?" said Lady Meredith. "You saw that she was vexed, She had other things to vex her besides ...
— Framley Parsonage • Anthony Trollope
... vex the shy and sacred grief With harsh obtrusions of relief; Yet, Verse, with noiseless feet, Go whisper, "This death hath far choicer ends Than slowly to impearl in hearts of friends; These obsequies 'tis meet Not to seclude in closets of the heart, But, church-like, with wide door-ways, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 75, January, 1864 • Various
... more changed and cold embraces, More misery, disappointment, and mistrust To own me for their father...Would the dust 315 Were covered in upon my body now! That the life ceased to toil within my brow! And then these thoughts would at the least be fled; Let us not fear such pain can vex the dead. ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... turned away, but only for a minute. "Tell me when he asked you this?" she cried. "Prithee, tell me, Mary. I wish not to vex you, but this ...
— Hayslope Grange - A Tale of the Civil War • Emma Leslie
... winged words one to the other: "Small blame is it that Trojans and well-greaved Achaians should for such a woman long time suffer hardships; marvellously like is she to the immortal goddesses to look upon. Yet even so, though she be so goodly, let her go upon their ships and not stay to vex us and our children ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer (Lang, Leaf, Myers trans.) |
