"Boast" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... took me to Versailles yesterday. I suspect that this, in the eyes of the people here, is rather a ridiculous episode; for I notice the Count did not boast of it. Versailles corresponds entirely with the impressions you had given me of it; for there is not the slightest change since you visited ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... is the only original form of painting that modern times can boast. It has not exhausted itself yet; it is capable of infinite development. Ruysdael, Rembrandt, and the rest, did great scenes, it is true, but it has been left to our painters to put soul into the sunshine of a cornfield, and suggest a whole life of labour in a dull evening sky ...
— Wisdom, Wit, and Pathos of Ouida - Selected from the Works of Ouida • Ouida
... the corrective qualities of mathematics; but I was too happy to heed her or care. I was stronger and better, I believe, from that day; though I had not much to boast of. A true tonic had been administered to me; my fainting energies took ...
— Daisy • Elizabeth Wetherell
... Ned said as they made their way down the hill; "don't you say a word about this affair. You haven't got much to boast about in it, sitting there on the grass and doing nothing to help me. I shan't say anything more about that if you hold your tongue; but if you blab I will let all the ...
— Through the Fray - A Tale of the Luddite Riots • G. A. Henty
... for your candour," replied Susan, "and will imitate you in my answer. Your obscure parentage cannot be a matter of consideration to one who has no descent to boast of. That you have not always been leading a creditable life, I am sorry for; more sorry because I am sure it must be a source of repentance and mortification to you; but I have not an idle curiosity to wish you to impart ...
— The King's Own • Captain Frederick Marryat
... in the shabby inn sitting-room. Hotel accommodation is a blot on the civilization of Paris; for with all its pretensions to elegance, the city as yet does not boast a single inn where a well-to-do traveler can find the surroundings to which he is accustomed at home. To Lucien's just-awakened, sleep-dimmed eyes, Louise was hardly recognizable in this cheerless, ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... facts. I fancy, however, I'm wrong. It's only after telling a number of lies that one gets an idea of what might be true. Thus it occurs to me now that I can't conceive of an intelligent person thinking in silence. Intelligence is a faculty which enables people to boast. And it's difficult boasting in silence. And inasmuch as it's necessary to be intelligent to think, why, that sort of settles it. Ergo, people never think. Do you mind ...
— Erik Dorn • Ben Hecht
... Corne, "I would fain not answer, lest I distrust the moral government of the universe. But we are blind creatures, and God's ways are not fashioned in our ways. Let no one boast that he stands, lest he fall! We need the help of the host of Heaven to keep us upright and maintain our integrity. I can scarcely think of that noble girl without tears. Oh, the pity of it! The pity ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... in a flash. As a British editorial put it, we did more under a Code in one day than they in England had been able to do under the common law in eighty-five years of effort. I use this incident, my friends, not to boast of what has already been done but to point the way to you for even greater cooperative efforts this ...
— The Fireside Chats of Franklin Delano Roosevelt • Franklin Delano Roosevelt
... adrift from Rome and subject to the authority of the secular rulers. During the campaign many houses were suppressed in Austria and in the other territories of the empire, but by far the greatest victory of which its authors could boast was the suppression of ...
— History of the Catholic Church from the Renaissance to the French • Rev. James MacCaffrey
... to boast of," replied the captain. "There is no good fellowship, no harmony among ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 4, September, 1850 • Various
... and infinite, the Gnostics were imperceptibly divided into more than fifty particular sects, [33] of whom the most celebrated appear to have been the Basilidians, the Valentinians, the Marcionites, and, in a still later period, the Manichaeans. Each of these sects could boast of its bishops and congregations, of its doctors and martyrs; [34] and, instead of the Four Gospels adopted by the church, [341] the heretics produced a multitude of histories, in which the actions and discourses ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 1 • Edward Gibbon
... is the part of great men to vse great magnificences: And I am perswaded, that as in bodily perfections, and commanding of good people, you doe exceede all men in the world, so likewise you doe in the parts of the minde, in which you may boast of the bountie of nature. The fauour which I hope for of your Lordship is, that you would hold mee for yours, and bethinke your selfe to command me any thing, wherein I may doe ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries of - the English Nation. Vol. XIII. America. Part II. • Richard Hakluyt
... a very beautiful and lovely island, may boast of a situation of suitable loveliness and beauty. Behind it, on the west, stand some gently rising hills, well wooded, beyond which towers Mount Wellington, 4000 feet in height, and having its summit, during more than half the year, covered with snow, but yet seldom obscured with clouds, because ...
— Australia, its history and present condition • William Pridden
... to move. Such a stone, being conscious merely of its own endeavor and not at all indifferent, would believe itself to be completely free, and would think that it continued in motion solely because of its own wish. This is that human freedom, which all boast that they possess, and which consists solely in the fact, that men are conscious of their own desire, but are ignorant of the causes whereby that desire has ...
— The Philosophy of Spinoza • Baruch de Spinoza
... poke fun at the saddle-sore dudes, but all the same the trip is a soul-trying one, and the right to boast to home folks about it ...
— I Married a Ranger • Dama Margaret Smith
... the upstart pedant's frown, [iii] Or all the sable glories of his gown; [iv] Who, thus, transplanted from his father's school, Unfit to govern, ignorant of rule— Succeeded him, whom all unite to praise, The dear preceptor of my early days, PROBUS, [7] the pride of science, and the boast— To IDA now, alas! for ever lost! 110 With him, for years, we search'd the classic page, [v] And fear'd the Master, though we lov'd the Sage: Retir'd at last, his small yet peaceful seat From learning's labour is the blest retreat. POMPOSUS fills his magisterial chair; POMPOSUS governs,—but, ...
— Byron's Poetical Works, Vol. 1 • Byron
... over was the gentleman in black, who took it in a stand, and who really seemed to know what he was about. There were some who afterwards asserted that this was the Dean, but the Dean was never heard to boast of ...
— Is He Popenjoy? • Anthony Trollope
... joined us, and who were asked to assist Bombay in the negotiation of the tribute, when the Wagogo returned to us at breathless speed, and shouted out to me, "Why do you halt here? Do you wish to die? These pagans will not take the tribute, but they boast that they will ...
— How I Found Livingstone • Sir Henry M. Stanley
... it would be your answer. Well, for your favour, sir, why, give God thanks, and make no boast of it; and for your writing and reading, let that appear when there is no need of such vanity. You are thought here to be the most senseless and fit man for the constable of the watch; therefore bear you the lanthorn. This is your charge: you shall comprehend all vagrom men; you are to bid ...
— Much Ado About Nothing • William Shakespeare [Craig, Oxford edition]
... of wealth? Are we not all ready to applaud projects which give promise of providing more abundant food, better clothing, and more healthful surrounding for the poor? Does not our national genius seem to lie altogether in the line of what is practically useful? Is it not our boast and our great achievement that we have in a single century made the wilderness of a vast continent habitable, have so ploughed and drained and planted and built that it can now easily maintain hundreds of millions in gluttonous plenty? Is not our whole social and political organization of a kind ...
— Education and the Higher Life • J. L. Spalding
... hold of things in a pretty confident, competent fashion and had made more of an impression in one year than many of his confreres had made in five or ten. To begin with, he had unhesitatingly quartered himself in the most desirable building the town could boast. Many of his colleagues, no less clever (save in this one respect), still lingered in the old Rabbit-Hutch, a building which had been good enough in its day but which belonged, like the building that Andrew P. Hill was preparing to leave, to a day ...
— Under the Skylights • Henry Blake Fuller
... a life of Christian virtue—imitating his master, who went about doing good, healing the sick and preaching the gospel to the poor—yet, so far from having anything whereof to boast before God, he said himself that he felt his need of infinite mercy, and in seeking the pardon of his sins he would not place himself on a level with Paul or Peter, but rather choose a point of self-humiliation by the side of ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 3 of 8 • Various
... believing. Nobody will ever convince me that there was not something more. Perhaps in the light of next year we shall see what was meant by such an apparent blow to our hopes. Certainly we shall start for the Pole with less of that foolish spirit of blatant boast and ridiculous blind self-assurance, that characterized some of us on ...
— The Worst Journey in the World, Volumes 1 and 2 - Antarctic 1910-1913 • Apsley Cherry-Garrard
... nothing. He questioned and cross-questioned and argued till he had proved even to Miss Briggs's satisfaction that the very remarks she had overheard only proved Vava's innocence, as no girl in her senses would boast openly of knowing the questions beforehand if she had looked at them secretly, far less impart one to a friend, and that one a girl whom the girls had nicknamed 'Old Honesty.' At last Miss Upjohn and her visitor had ...
— A City Schoolgirl - And Her Friends • May Baldwin
... "And by that boast you know," said Lady Davenant, "convinced the Cardinal de Retz that he was not a great, but a very little man. We will not have that pen ...
— Helen • Maria Edgeworth
... gentleman. A generous, pious, high-minded person Mrs. Fitzhugh was represented to have been, but extremely sensitive withal on the score of "family." The Fitzhughs of Yorkshire, she was wont to boast, "came in with the Conqueror;" and any branch of the glorious tree then firmly planted in the soil of England that degraded itself by an alliance with wealth, beauty, or worth, dwelling without the pale of her narrow prejudices, was inexorably cut off from her affections, ...
— The Experiences of a Barrister, and Confessions of an Attorney • Samuel Warren
... be necessary, and put them in the field, so as to have them ready for the spring campaign, even if it resulted in the freedom of those thus organized. Will I not employ them to fight the negro force of the enemy? Aye, the Yankees themselves, who already boast that they have 200,000 of our slaves in arms against us. Can we hesitate, can we doubt, when the question is, whether the enemy shall use our slaves against us or we use them against him; when the question may be between liberty and independence ...
— The Day of the Confederacy - A Chronicle of the Embattled South, Volume 30 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Nathaniel W. Stephenson
... you know," charming Gabrielle, what is the delight of obtaining power over the human heart? Let the lords of the creation boast of their power to govern all things; to charm these governors be ours. Let the logicians of the earth boast their power to regulate the world by reason; be it ours, Gabrielle, to intoxicate and humble proud reason to the dust beneath our feet.—And who ...
— Tales And Novels, Vol. 8 • Maria Edgeworth
... And they suspect nothing. I doubt whether they are aware of my existence. No, not even—What would it be to them, besides? They have pushed me so far down into the mud, that they cannot imagine my ever rising again up to their level. They triumph with impunity; they boast of their unpunished wickedness, and think they are strong, and safe from all attacks, because they have the prestige and the power of gold. And yet their hour is coming. I, the wretched man, who have been compelled to ...
— The Clique of Gold • Emile Gaboriau
... through the streets they laid out. We inhabit the houses they built. We practise the customs they established. We gather wisdom from books they wrote. We pluck the ripe clusters of their experience. We boast in their achievements. And by these they speak to us. Every device and influence they have left behind tells their story, and is a voice of the dead. We feel this more impressively when we enter the customary place of one recently ...
— The Crown of Thorns - A Token for the Sorrowing • E. H. Chapin
... 1624 the elder Marvell resigned the living of Winestead, and took up the duties of schoolmaster and lecturer, or preacher, at Hull. Important duties they were, for the old Grammar School of Hull dates back to 1486, and may boast of a long career of usefulness, never having fallen into that condition of decay and disrepute from which so many similar endowments have been of late years rescued by the beneficent and, of course, abused action of the Charity Commissioners. Andrew Marvell the elder succeeded ...
— Andrew Marvell • Augustine Birrell
... both took part in the terrible cavalry charge at Mars-la-Tour, in which their regiment suffered so severely; the eldest, Count Herbert, was wounded and had to be invalided home. Bismarck could justly boast that there was no nepotism in the Prussian Government when his two sons were serving as privates. It was not till the war had gone on some weeks and they had taken part in many engagements, that they received their commissions. This would have happened ...
— Bismarck and the Foundation of the German Empire • James Wycliffe Headlam
... the helm, for two hours. Inexperienced as I was, I made out to steer to the satisfaction of the officer, and neither S—— nor myself gave up our tricks, all the time that we were off the Cape. This was something to boast of, for it requires a good deal of skill and watchfulness to steer a vessel close hauled, in a gale of wind, against a heavy head sea. "Ease her when she pitches," is the word; and a little carelessness in letting her ship a heavy sea, might sweep the decks, or knock masts ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... I. "I am glad not to be killed, for what is the use of having fought Bussy d'Amboise if one may not live to boast of it?" ...
— An Enemy To The King • Robert Neilson Stephens
... one, as Dick, inwardly hoping he was making a favourable impression, passed up the hall and mounted the steps. Whereupon Dick suddenly became conscious of his lower limbs—which, by the way, were as straight and tight a pair of shanks as any boy of fourteen could boast—and tried to ...
— Follow My leader - The Boys of Templeton • Talbot Baines Reed
... Fairchild, "do not boast or think well of yourself; it is always a bad sign when people boast of themselves. If you have not done any very naughty thing lately, it is not because there is any goodness or wisdom in you, but because your papa and I have been always with you, carefully ...
— The Fairchild Family • Mary Martha Sherwood
... sense, as a reward for all she had gone through. There was some spite in it too—a feeling of vengeance against all who looked down on the rag and bone man, although they themselves had little to boast about. ...
— Ditte: Girl Alive! • Martin Andersen Nexo
... have married me if Darrell—Major Darrell, he was—had not jilted her. She told me once, to spite me, that she worshipped the ground the fellow trod on. And he was a cad—confound him!—one of those light-hearted gentry who dance with girls and make love to them, and then boast of their conquests. But he had a way with him, and she never cared for anyone again. She has told me so again and ...
— Lover or Friend • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... fellow, with no brains to boast about, can jump overboard to save any one or do anything of that kind. I want to see you act like a brave fellow who is ready to make a bit of sacrifice of his own feelings, and behave in a manly way. Come, I'm ...
— Steve Young • George Manville Fenn
... ropewalks, sail-lofts, bakeries, and machine-shops capable of turning out marine engines, anchors, cables, and indeed every piece of iron-work which enters into the construction of a ship. It is no vain boast that an army of a hundred thousand men can be embarked any fine morning at Cherbourg, and that the fleet necessary for its transport can be built and armed and equipped and protected to the hour of its departure ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 12, No. 73, November, 1863 • Various
... no men in front who were individually so strong and fast as Miller, Watts, or Grey. Dimsdale and Garraway, the Scotch half-backs, and Tookey, the quarter, whose blazing red head was a very oriflamme wherever the struggle waxed hottest, were the best men that the Northerners could boast of behind. ...
— The Firm of Girdlestone • Arthur Conan Doyle
... of independence, the fearless love of liberty of which we boast, but from our English blood? Whence came our love of territorial extension, our national ambition, exhibited under the affectionate name of annexation? Does not this velvet paw with which we softly play with our neighbors' heads, conceal some long, crooked talons, which tell of the ancestral ...
— Farm drainage • Henry Flagg French
... who have spoken for freedom at the cost Of some weak friendships, or some paltry prize Of name or place, and more than I have lost Have gained in wider reach of sympathies, And free communion with the good and wise; May God forbid that I should ever boast Such easy self-denial, or repine That the strong pulse of health no more is mine; That, overworn at noonday, I must yield To other hands the gleaning of the field; A tired on-looker through the day's decline. For blest beyond deserving still, and knowing ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... hear parents boast that their children are "great readers," just as if their intelligence should, in their opinion, be measured by the number of books and papers which they had read! Need I say, that, on the contrary, they are objects ...
— Happy Days for Boys and Girls • Various
... house?' Thereat he: 'Desire of glory is not gone, nor ambition checked by fear; but torpid age dulls my chilly blood, and my strength of limb is numb and outworn. If I had what once was mine, if I had now that prime of years, yonder braggart's boast and confidence, it had taken no prize of goodly bullock to allure me; nor heed I these gifts.' So he spoke, and on that flung down a pair of gloves of giant weight, with whose hard hide bound about his wrists valiant Eryx was wont to come to battle. They ...
— The Aeneid of Virgil • Virgil
... doubtless have been greater general progress among our people themselves, a more united front to meet past and coming exigencies, and a profounder hold upon the public attention, and a deeper respect on the part of our enemies, than we now can boast of. Looking at public opinion as it is, the living law of the land, and yet a malleable, ductile entity, which can be moulded, or at least affected, by the thoughts of any masses vigorously expressed, ...
— The Colored Regulars in the United States Army • T. G. Steward
... of the Cromwell ministry, if it may be so termed by modern analogy, was followed by a government in which Henry acted as his own prime minister. {309} He had made good his boast that if his shirt knew his counsel he would strip it off.[1] Two of his great ministers he had cast down for being too Catholic, one for being too Protestant. Having procured laws enabling him to burn Romanists as traitors and Lutherans ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith
... course which thou hast chosen, and let him that heareth the plaintiff act rightly. He who followeth a right course of action will not treat a plaintiff wrongly. When the arm is brought, and when the two eyes see, and when the heart is of good courage, boast not loudly in proportion to thy strength, in order that calamity may not come unto thee. He who passeth by [his] fate halteth between two opinions. The man who eateth tasteth [his food], the man ...
— The Literature of the Ancient Egyptians • E. A. Wallis Budge
... set on foot an indiscriminate persecution of an entire description of their fellow-citizens, including persons as eminent for their ability, as blameless in their conduct, and as faithful in their allegiance as this or any other country could boast." In reply, Pitt said that the Birmingham riots had better be consigned to oblivion, especially as sufficient had been done for their atonement; and he broadly hinted that Fox revived the subject for party purposes. He warmly defended the conduct of the cabinet in the interference ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... other noted mountains were Pentel'icus (sometimes called Mende'li), so celebrated for its quarries of beautiful marble, and Hymet'tus, celebrated for its excellent honey, and the broad belt of flowers at its base, which scented the air with their delicious perfume. It could boast of its chief city, the favored seat ...
— Mosaics of Grecian History • Marcius Willson and Robert Pierpont Willson
... methods, to be intolerant of any science courses not employing the laboratory, and to affect a lofty disdain of any pedagogical discussion of the question whatsoever. The tone in which all this is done suggests a boast; but to the discriminating it amounts to a confession! The result of it has been to retard the development of biology to its rightful place as one of the most foundational and catholic of all educational fields. The great variety of aim and of matter not merely ...
— College Teaching - Studies in Methods of Teaching in the College • Paul Klapper
... arbitrarily dealt with after the manner of certain economists. On the contrary, it is many-phased; the fullest and widest development of modern France is indeed modern France itself. The peasant owner of the soil has attained the highest position in his own country. No other class can boast of such social, moral and material ascendency. He is the acknowledged arbitrator of the ...
— In the Heart of the Vosges - And Other Sketches by a "Devious Traveller" • Matilda Betham-Edwards
... intrigue, or venality, the government may not be the choice of the American people, but of foreign nations. It may be foreign nations who govern us, and not we, the people, who govern ourselves; and candid men will acknowledge that, in such cases, choice would have little advantage to boast of ...
— The World's Best Orations, Vol. 1 (of 10) • Various
... to-day and a great deal more. For instance (a third and last idea out of the thousand that Ely arouses), Ely is dumb and yet oracular. The town and the hill tell you nothing till you have studied them in silence and for some considerable time. This boast is made by many towns, that they hold a secret. But Ely, which is rather a village than a town, has alone a true claim, the proof of which is this, that no one comes to Ely for a few hours and carries anything away, ...
— Hills and the Sea • H. Belloc
... informed of this boast and threat, remarked, "My brother Charles wants to act the part of Alexander, but he shall not find in me ...
— The Empire of Russia • John S. C. Abbott
... others have made the leap and reached its slippery surface only to slide off, and suffer instant death on the craggy rocks in the awful chasm below. Every young man of the many tribes was ambitious to perform the feat, and those who had successfully accomplished it were permitted to boast ...
— The Old Santa Fe Trail - The Story of a Great Highway • Henry Inman
... (James I.), it is certain that the latter alone can boast of a Newton, a Locke, a Clarke, or a Boyle. Archbishop Usher is said to have lived a Calvinist; and died an Arminian. The members of the episcopal church in Scotland; the Moravians, the general Baptists, the Wesleyan Methodists, the Quakers or Friends, are Arminians; ...
— The Life of Hugo Grotius • Charles Butler
... a queen—an empress—were only loss and shame; One heart for me—Pauline's! One boast—that dearest name! Her love was virgin gold! O ne'er shall baser metal ring From mine, who live her name to bless! her peerless praise to sing! O, words are naught, till that I see her face, Then doubly naught till I my love embrace. In every war ...
— Polyuecte • Pierre Corneille
... Gustavus promptly invaded Denmark, drove the Danish fleet from the sea, placed strong garrisons at Elsinore and Kronborg, and laid siege to Copenhagen. Van Beuningen had proudly asserted that "the oaken keys of the Sound lay in the docks of Amsterdam," and his boast was no empty one. At the beginning of October a force of thirty-five vessels under Obdam carrying 4000 troops sailed for the Sound with orders to destroy the Swedish fleet, and to raise the siege of Copenhagen. On November 8 Obdam encountered the ...
— History of Holland • George Edmundson
... says, that the man who has not anything to boast of but his illustrious ancestors, is like a potato,—the only good belonging ...
— The Jest Book - The Choicest Anecdotes and Sayings • Mark Lemon
... of our house—indeed, he was the only Irishman we could boast of, and the fact of his being an Irishman always made us inclined to laugh whenever he spoke. We could see now by the twinkle in his eye that he was going to let off the steam at ...
— Boycotted - And Other Stories • Talbot Baines Reed
... commanded by skilful officers; and now worthily maintains a position as a naval power second only to that of Great Britain. At this moment, whilst the British fleet includes but thirty-six screw line-of-battle ships, mounting 3,400 guns, and propelled by 19,759 horse-power, that of France may boast of forty such ships, mounting 3,700 guns, propelled by 27,500 horse-power; and while England has but thirty-eight ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume V, Number 29, March, 1860 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... of the citizens should not be without a voice in making the laws which they are to obey, and in choosing the magistrates who are to administer them.... Let it be remembered, finally, that it has ever been the pride and the boast of America that the rights for which she contended were the rights of ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 2 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper
... opinion, and sometimes reason, are the only arbiters of right. It may well happen that, in a new age, men will be more generous and less exacting, once again recognizing inherent rights in spontaneous activities; but that age is not ours. Not even art can claim privilege; in vain will the artist boast of his genius or the art-lover of his delights, if he can exhibit no pervasive good. It is not enough, therefore, that we should have described the peculiar, inward value of art; we must further establish that it has a function ...
— The Principles Of Aesthetics • Dewitt H. Parker
... own provide; Passions, though selfish, if their means be fair, List under Reason, and deserve her care; Those, that imparted, court a nobler aim, Exalt their kind, and take some virtue's name. In lazy apathy let stoics boast Their virtue fixed; 'tis fixed as in a frost; Contracted all, retiring to the breast; But strength of mind is exercise, not rest: The rising tempest puts in act the soul, Parts it may ravage, but preserves the whole. On life's vast ...
— Essay on Man - Moral Essays and Satires • Alexander Pope
... circle Of her footprints round the cornfields. No one but the Midnight only Saw her beauty in the darkness, No one but the Wawonaissa Heard the panting of her bosom; Guskewau, the darkness, wrapped her Closely in his sacred mantle, So that none might see her beauty, So that none might boast, "I saw her!" On the morrow, as the day dawned, Kahgahgee, the King of Ravens, Gathered all his black marauders, Crows and blackbirds, jays and ravens, Clamorous on the dusky tree-tops, And descended, fast and fearless, On the fields ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... the tawny thief, Hid beneath the waxen leaf, Growling at his fairy host, Bidding her with angry boast Fill his cup with wine distilled From the dew the dawn has spilled: Stored away in golden casks Is the ...
— The Little Book of Modern Verse • Jessie B. Rittenhouse
... Zeta fell to the Balsic, who proved themselves to be a strong and competent race of rulers. They increased their territories to such an extent that, at the time of the battle of Kossovo, they could boast to ruling over all the land from Ragusa to the mouth of the Drin, including the present West Montenegro and Southern Hercegovina, with Skodra as the capital. After the overthrow of the great Servian Empire on the field of Kossovo, Montenegro became entirely independent ...
— The Land of the Black Mountain - The Adventures of Two Englishmen in Montenegro • Reginald Wyon
... gents at the West Diddlesex, because I came of a better family than most of them; had received a classical education; and especially because I had a rich aunt, Mrs. Hoggarty, about whom, as must be confessed, I used to boast a good deal. There is no harm in being respected in this world, as I have found out; and if you don't brag a little for yourself, depend on it there is no person of your acquaintance who will tell the world of your merits, and take the ...
— The History of Samuel Titmarsh - and the Great Hoggarty Diamond • William Makepeace Thackeray
... Jesuitical knavery; by many our motto was supposed to be no longer the old one of 'divide et impera,' but 'annihila et appropria.' Finally, looking back to our dreadful conflicts with the three conquering despots of modern history, Philip II. of Spain, Louis XIV., and Napoleon, we may incontestably boast of having been single in maintaining the general equities of Europe by war upon a colossal scale, and by our councils in the general ...
— Theological Essays and Other Papers v1 • Thomas de Quincey
... dis bressed day, Mahs'r," said the proud mother as she vanished into the kitchen to boast of her good-fortune in getting two silver dollars out of Marse Desmit instead of the one customarily given by him on such occasions. And so the record was made up in the brass-clasped book of Colonel Potestatem Desmit, the only baptismal register of the colored man who twenty-six years afterward ...
— Bricks Without Straw • Albion W. Tourgee
... which were almost thrillingly beautiful. In Africa there is no twilight, and darkness swoops down like a hawk. All afternoon the teapoy men, after their fashion, carried on what was literally a running crossfire of questions among themselves. They usually boast of their strength and their families and always discuss the white man they are carrying and his characteristics. I heard much muttering of Mafutta Mingi and I knew long before we stopped that my weight was not ...
— An African Adventure • Isaac F. Marcosson
... squadron of us had loved Ranjoor Singh to the death. He was a Sikh of Sikhs. It had been our boast that fire could not burn his courage nor love corrupt him, and I was still of that mind; but not so the others. They began to remember how he had stayed behind when we left India. We had all seen him in ...
— Hira Singh - When India came to fight in Flanders • Talbot Mundy
... satisfied their taste for intensity and novelty and a touch of extravagance. It has been said by high authority that Mr. King saved California to the Union. California was too loyal at heart to make the boast reasonable; but it is not too much to say that Mr. King did more than any man, by his prompt, outspoken, uncalculating loyalty, to make California know what her own feelings really were. He did all that any man could have done to lead public sentiment that ...
— Unitarianism in America • George Willis Cooke
... years, anyhow, Danny. Robey had to start at the bottom and build up the whole thing. We hadn't been playing football here for several years before that. It takes a couple of years at the least to get a foundation laid. If we win this year we'll have something to boast of. No other team ever beat Claflin ...
— Left Guard Gilbert • Ralph Henry Barbour
... from land to land; to rob the poor; to betray the confiding; to murder in cold blood the defenceless. With such a people I want no peace—no friendship. War, never-ending, exterminating war, is all the boon I ask. You boast yourself valiant; and so you may be, but my faithful warriors are not less brave; and this, too, you shall one day prove, for I have sworn to maintain an unsparing conflict while one white man remains in my borders; not openly, ...
— Ferdinand De Soto, The Discoverer of the Mississippi - American Pioneers and Patriots • John S. C. Abbott
... of cold meat and maybe the bite of an onion, had been put away by the time the horses' nose bags were empty. With a French guide in the lead, we moved off the platform, rattled along under a railroad viaduct, and down the main street of Jarville, which was large enough to boast street car tracks ...
— "And they thought we wouldn't fight" • Floyd Gibbons
... state and nation. Losses by such misapplication of public funds—piled Pelion on Ossa—no longer run in the millions but the hundreds of millions. Our city governments are, in many instances, foul cancers on the body politic; and for us to boast of having solved the problem of local self-government is as fatuous as for a strong man to exult in his health when his body is covered with running sores. It has been estimated that the annual profits from violations of the prohibition laws have reached $300,000,000. Men who thus violate ...
— The Constitution of the United States - A Brief Study of the Genesis, Formulation and Political Philosophy of the Constitution • James M. Beck
... an exceptionally good temper this morning. Everything had turned out as he had hoped for and anticipated, and the literal kicking-out of Henson the previous evening was still fresh and sweet in his memory. It would be something to boast ...
— The Crimson Blind • Fred M. White
... what regions tossed, And what inhabitants those regions boast? So shalt thou quickly reach the realm assigned, In wondrous ships, self-moved, instinct with mind; No helm secures their course, no pilot guides; Like man intelligent they plough the tides, Conscious of every ...
— TITLE • AUTHOR
... peaceful scene that was soon to be transformed into a battle-field. Here, within a few days, victory and defeat would meet face to face. Which side would claim the former? Until this moment Ridge had never doubted. He had often heard the boast that his own regiment could drive every Spaniard out of Cuba, and had believed it. Now he knew that here alone was work cut out for ...
— "Forward, March" - A Tale of the Spanish-American War • Kirk Munroe
... other, and his long neck invariably hung forward, so that his thin, nervous face seemed always to be peering about. One had a sense of a pair of keen eyes, behind which a restless brain was constantly plotting. Some people rated Davenant as earning a quarter of a million a year, and it was his boast that no one who made money according to plans which he approved had ever been made to give any of ...
— The Moneychangers • Upton Sinclair
... a Sabbath morn—our service had far advanced; we could boast of but a limited congregation, for many had died, some had fled from the pestilence into the interior; others had avoided the place in consequence of the threats of their countrymen. A few children, and two or three women, were all their ...
— The Little Savage • Captain Frederick Marryat
... from those young disciples of Christ? Fanny felt that, however deceitful the world's polite intercourse might be, this was holy:—and how can sin approach purity without fear and trembling? She felt this mysterious fear. The reckless girl, whose highest boast had always been that she feared nothing, now trembled, as in imagination she changed places with Emma, and stood where she saw her standing,—upon ...
— Be Courteous • Mrs. M. H. Maxwell
... sister, Harold was prepared to like at once. She was Agnes. After these came a long array,—no less than nine more,—ending with a sturdy little chap of three, whom Polly presently picked up and carried off to bed. Mr. Connolly, of Lisnahoe, could boast of a ...
— Stories by English Authors: Ireland • Various
... remembered by a striking sentence, quoted in a note to the Christian Year,[9] had impressed his readers with a deeper sense of the uses of Scripture. Cambridge, besides scholars like Bishop Kaye, and accomplished writers like Mr. Le Bas and Mr. Lyall, could boast of Mr. Hugh James Rose, the most eminent person of his generation as a divine. But the influence of this learned theology was at the time not equal to its value. Sound requires atmosphere; and there was as yet no atmosphere in the public mind ...
— The Oxford Movement - Twelve Years, 1833-1845 • R.W. Church
... 2. Boast not thyself in thy riches if thou hast them, nor in thy friends if they be powerful, but in God, who giveth all things, and in addition to all things desireth to give even Himself. Be not lifted up because of thy strength or beauty of body, for with ...
— The Imitation of Christ • Thomas a Kempis
... Epicurus to a friend, which are these: "If the love of glory is dear to thy breast, these letters of mine will make thee more famous and known than all those other things which thou honourest, by which thou art honoured, and of which thou mayest boast. The same might Homer have said if Achilles or Ulysses had presented themselves before him, or Eneas and his offspring before Virgil; as that moral philosopher well said; Domenea is more known through the letters of Epicurus, ...
— The Heroic Enthusiast, Part II (Gli Eroici Furori) - An Ethical Poem • Giordano Bruno
... question must here remain to be determined by the evidence of the words in the table of obsoletes, which I think is convincing; my overruling contention being that, however successful we may be in the coinage of new words (and we have no reason to boast of success) and however desirable it is to get rid of some of the bad useless homophones, yet we cannot afford to part with any old term ...
— Society for Pure English, Tract 2, on English Homophones • Robert Bridges
... three hundred came in. (Loud applause.) Not above two or three that night were wanting of those who were going to remain at the school. (Cheers.) Well have you taken in your address that staunch adherence of parent and boy as the proudest honour that a school can boast of (cheers), and well have you noted that at Borth also the entries kept level with the leavings, and that we have brought back this year—this day—almost a hundred boys who had never seen Uppingham. (Renewed cheering.) This was worth ...
— Uppingham by the Sea - a Narrative of the Year at Borth • John Henry Skrine
... consisted of bread and butter, potatoes boiled in their jackets, fried bacon swimming in fat, and scalding tea in handleless cups. Asking for eggs, we were told there was not one to be had in the "town." Query, what is a town? Crookstown could not boast of half a ...
— A Trip to Manitoba • Mary FitzGibbon
... stern lockers, they proceeded to fling the water overboard. It was heartbreaking work, for many a barrelful was flung back upon them again; but they persevered, and when night fell the Dazzler, bobbing merrily at her sea-anchor, could boast that her pumps sucked once more. As 'Frisco Kid had said, the backbone of the storm was broken, though the wind had veered to the west, ...
— The Cruise of the Dazzler • Jack London
... "There is no battle. You are old, your beard is white, your head is flowery, you are growing childish. You love your silly nephew, Roland, too well. He is only hunting among the mountains. He would blow his horn all day for a single hare, and then he would boast before you of his valor. Ride on. Your own France is ...
— Hero Tales • James Baldwin
... champion of the time, able to rival, if he had the opportunity, the prowess of Harold Hardraade himself. Yes, he would go and see his mother: he would be kind if she was kind; if she were not, he would boast and swagger, as he was but too apt to do. That he should go back at the risk of his life; that any one who found him on English ground might kill him; and that many would certainly try to kill him, he knew very well. But that only gave special ...
— Hereward, The Last of the English • Charles Kingsley
... before Edward Stanley, afterwards Bishop of Norwich, became Rector there, "the clerk used to go to the churchyard stile to see whether there were any more coming to church, for there were seldom enough to make a congregation. The former Rector used to boast that he had never set foot in a sick person's cottage." When the shepherds thus deserted and starved their flocks, it was only natural that the sheep betook themselves to every form of schism, irreligion, ...
— Sydney Smith • George W. E. Russell
... Platyschisma (fig. 72, d), Cyclonema, Pleurotomaria, Murchisonia, Trochonema, &c. The oceanic Univalves (Heteropods) are represented mainly by species of Bellerophon; and the Winged Snails, or Pteropods, can still boast of the gigantic Thecoe and Conularioe, which characterise yet older deposits. The commonest genus of Pteropoda, however, is Tentaculites (fig. 73), which clearly belongs here, though it has commonly been ...
— The Ancient Life History of the Earth • Henry Alleyne Nicholson
... clanging of the church bell. In a few words he explains the reasons of the occupancy. He orders the hired men to remain in the enclosure under the guard of the sentinels. He dresses skilfully the wound of Maxime. He patches up the face of the wounded scout, whose proudest future boast will be that Joaquin Murieta gave ...
— The Little Lady of Lagunitas • Richard Henry Savage
... boast a white more soft, 25 The spell hath so perfumd thee, That careless Love shall deem thee oft A blossom from his Myrtle tree. Then, laughing at the fair deceit, Shall race with some Etesian wind 30 To seek the woven arboret Where ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... They are never to boast of their Intrigues with the Women. If they do, none of the Girls value them ever after, or admit of their Company in their Beds. This proceeds not on the score of Reputation, for there is no such thing (on that account) known amongst them; and although ...
— A New Voyage to Carolina • John Lawson
... we know that it was an apple and not some other fruit? Why, on the best authority extant after the Holy Scriptures themselves, namely, our auxiliary Bible, "Paradise Lost;" in the tenth book whereof Satan makes the following boast to his infernal peers ...
— Bible Romances - First Series • George W. Foote
... our proud cry—a vain and empty boast; Love did not ask so great a sacrifice; The first reveille found you at your post; You knew the cost; clear-eyed you paid the price; Some far clear call we were too dull to hear Had caught ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, May 10, 1916 • Various
... city were fiddling day and night, or blowing trumpets, oboes, and bassoons. Sunday, however, was the most harmonious day in the week. The Opera amused the Court and the wealthiest citizens, and few private houses could not boast their family concert or small party of performers. In the tea-gardens, of which there were many in the suburbs of the city, bearing the euphonious, romantic, and fashionable titles of Tivoli, Arcadia, and Vauxhall, a strong and amateur orchestra ...
— Vivian Grey • The Earl of Beaconsfield
... Here entered the Drill Book maxim: "An attack should be met with a counter-attack." For this was to be the last and desperate throw of the Turkish Staff. If it broke the Australasian lines, the enemy would realise their boast of pushing them into the sea. The New Zealanders and Kangaroos appreciated the danger to the full. And so the command rang out: "Prepare to charge!" Every man placed his ...
— The Kangaroo Marines • R. W. Campbell
... this were luxury, were bliss refin'd, To view the alter'd region of the mind; Where whim and mystery, like wizards, rule, And conjure wisdom from the seeming fool; Where learned heads, like old cremonas, boast Their merit soundest that are cracked the most; While Genius' self, infected with the joke, His person decks with ...
— The Sylphs of the Season with Other Poems • Washington Allston
... the sentiment that would prompt any man to say that 'the courage and devotion' which so long withstood our arms, prolonging the terrible conflict of war, and sacrificing the lives of thousands of loyal men, are hereafter to be the common boast of the nation, 'the priceless possession of the American Republic through all time to come;' that it is the pride of our country so many infamous rebels were so ...
— History of the Thirty-Ninth Congress of the United States • Wiliam H. Barnes
... make a great boast of learning a series of suggestive words in pairs and without interfering with the mind's action in doing so, when they are clearly indebted to Thomas Hallworth for this inadequate method, yet they never have the ...
— Assimilative Memory - or, How to Attend and Never Forget • Marcus Dwight Larrowe (AKA Prof. A. Loisette)
... We boast our superior civilization and our enlightened freedom of speech; and yet, how few of us—when a strange voice begins to utter unfamiliar or unpalatable things—how few of us stop and ask ourselves, may not this man ...
— America First - Patriotic Readings • Various
... countless readers of Boswell there would be many who would care to study in one of the earliest attempts of his joyous youth the man whose ripened genius was to place him at the very head of all the biographers of whom the world can boast. My hopes were increased by the elegance and the accuracy of the typography with which my publishers, Messrs. De La Rue & Co., adorned this reprint. I was disappointed in my expectations. These curious Letters met with a neglect which they did not deserve. Twice, moreover, I was drawn ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell |
