"Craven" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... which is a sister vessel. By heaven! it's a fair match,' continued Cain, his feelings of combativeness returning for a moment; 'and it will look like a craven to refuse the fight: but fear not, Francisco—I have promised you, and I shall keep ...
— The Pirate and The Three Cutters • Frederick Marryat
... curious matter about the old Countess of Westmoreland and her seven castles may be found in Whitaker's History of Craven, ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli
... certainly looks extremely well on canvas. Clement's relations to her are shown to be exemplary. There is excuse for this in the attacks which have been made upon him in the relation of son. But upon what grounds are Clement's sisters' homes invaded? Because a man is disloyal and craven, shall we inform the world that his brother was crossed in love? Still more shall his wife be taken in hand, and receive what even the late Mr. Smallweed would have considered a thorough "shaking-up"? "If they were all starving," declares the energetic narrator, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 85, November, 1864 • Various
... leaned back in my chair and fixed my eyes on the face of the now thoroughly craven-looking Ovide. "What made you tell us you knew how to cook?" I asked, trying hard to speak without anger, but in utter failure. The cravings of the inner man, just then, ...
— A Lover in Homespun - And Other Stories • F. Clifford Smith
... Cross Hotel is Craven Street, where (says Mr. Allbut), at No. 39, Mr. Brownlow in Oliver Twist resided after removing from Pentonville, and where the villain Monks was confronted, and made a full confession ...
— A Week's Tramp in Dickens-Land • William R. Hughes
... your craven throat; it seems a trifle shady. You said "I saw the gentleman," and then "I saw the ...
— The Little Clay Cart - Mrcchakatika • (Attributed To) King Shudraka
... said Noel suddenly. "I wish you hadn't—I wish we hadn't. I know just exactly what he feels like now. He feels as if he'd like to kill you for it, and I daresay he would if you hadn't been a craven, white-feathered skulker and ...
— New Treasure Seekers - or, The Bastable Children in Search of a Fortune • E. (Edith) Nesbit
... faith expressed in 'One step enough for me,' and the next step will flash before our eyes. One question that used to trouble me is, how we are to do the work. The poem by Edward Sill in 'The Manhood of the Master' cheers me up now as then with the thought that a broken sword flung away by a craven as useless was used by a king's son to win victory in the same battle. God will use it and perform His work. We have dedicated ourselves for His duty which is gripping our souls. He will use them according to ...
— Lighted to Lighten: The Hope of India • Alice B. Van Doren
... a turning-point in Wahb's life. If he had followed up the stranger he would have found the miserable little craven trembling, cowering, in an agony of terror, behind a log in a natural trap, a walled-in glade only fifty yards away, and would surely have crushed him. Had he even taken the bath, his strength and courage would have been renewed, and if not, ...
— The Biography of a Grizzly • Ernest Thompson Seton
... to, is the well-known piece of garden ground lying between Craven Hill and the Uxbridge road, ...
— Notes & Queries 1850.01.12 • Various
... willing to make himself a sort of accessary after the fact in any success; always an old woman or two, ready to remember omens of all quantities and qualities in the childhood of persons who have become distinguished. Accordingly, a certain "Mrs. Grafty, of Craven Street, Finsbury," assures Mr. George Keats, when he tells her that John is determined to be a poet, "that this was very odd, because when he could just speak, instead of answering questions put to him, he would always make a rhyme to the last word people said, and then laugh." The early histories ...
— Among My Books • James Russell Lowell
... more gaunt and rugged and grey than the others, with black lips and red tongue and bloodshot eyes, moved about the circle uneasily as if trying to screw up its craven spirit to the sticking point. The others evidently regarded this one as their leader, for they hung back from him a little, and kept a watchful eye on his movements. So did Vixen, the mare. She kept her tail always turned towards him, looking savagely back at him with ...
— The Buffalo Runners - A Tale of the Red River Plains • R.M. Ballantyne
... to him fast at Cambridge. He won the Chancellor's English Medal with a poem on Plato in 1843, the Craven Scholarship in 1844. In those days Kingsmen did not enter for the Tripos, but received a degree, without examination, by ancient privilege. He succeeded to a Fellowship in 1845, and in the same year was appointed to a Mastership ...
— Ionica • William Cory (AKA William Johnson)
... reflect, who talk so glibly of this government as too large, and as one which must inevitably be sundered, to what a degradation they calmly look forward! No; Union,—come what may,—now and ever. Greatness is to every brave man a necessity. Out on the craven and base-hearted who aspire to being less than the co-rulers of a continent. See how vile and mean are those men who in the South have lost all national pride in a small-minded provincial attachment to a State, who love their local county ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I. February, 1862, No. II. - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... This proposal seemed both craven and foolish. It would allow the fleet of Weald to loot and then betray Dara. But it was Calhoun's idea. It seemed plausible to the admirals of Weald. They felt only contempt for blueskins. Contemptuously, ...
— This World Is Taboo • Murray Leinster
... 'stablishest the Nation, Give wisdom in the midst of our elation; Who are so free that we forget we are— That freedom brings the deepest obligation: Grant us this presage for a guiding star, To lead the van of Peace, not with a craven spirit, But with the consciousness that we inherit What built the Empire out of blood and fire, And can smite, too, in passion and with ire. Purge us of Pride, who are so quick in vaunting Thy gift, this land, that is in nothing wanting; ...
— Lundy's Lane and Other Poems • Duncan Campbell Scott
... her for your mutual shame and death, and then called it "seeing life." Had your mother met you, you would have shrunk away like a craven cur. Had your sister interviewed you, she had blushed to bear your name; or had she been seen by you in company with some other whoremaster, for similar commerce, you would have wished that she had been dead. Now what think you of this "seeing life?" And it is ...
— Searchlights on Health: Light on Dark Corners • B.G. Jefferis
... dishonesty! Nobody was ever less Victorian than Swinburne. And then when these critics have to skate over the "Poems and Ballads" episode—thin, cracking ice!—how they repeat delicately the word "sensuous," "sensuous." Out with it, tailorish and craven minds, and say "sensual"! For sensual the book is. It is fine in sensuality, and no talking will ever get you away from that. Villiers de l'Isle-Adam once wrote an essay on "Le Sadisme anglais," and supported it with a translation of a large part of "Anactoria." And even Paris ...
— Books and Persons - Being Comments on a Past Epoch 1908-1911 • Arnold Bennett
... Roumanian Ambassador gave a select dinner-party at 4 Craven Gardens, yesterday. Among the guests were the Baron de Chauxville, Feneer Pasha, Lord and Lady Standover, Mrs. ...
— The Sowers • Henry Seton Merriman
... Captain Henry W. Morris. Captain Thomas T. Craven. Commander Henry H. Bell. Commander Samuel Phillips Lee. Commander Samuel Swartwout. Commander Melancton Smith. Commander Charles Stewart Boggs Commander John De Camp Commander James Alden. Commander David D. Porter. Commander Richard Wainwright. Commander ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln
... the tone. "You think perhaps that I play but a craven part in this game. I do not. God knows I run a tremendous risk as it is, without madly pledging life and honor to this ...
— Prisoners of Hope - A Tale of Colonial Virginia • Mary Johnston
... me. My son Miles, who, for a wonder, has been reading in my MS., says, "By Jove, sir, I didn't know you and my mother were took in this kind of way. The year I joined, I was hit very bad myself. An infernal little jilt that threw me over for Sir Craven Oaks of our regiment. I thought I should have gone crazy." And he gives a ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... filled the heart of the craven Turk, and he sent a woman to the window to say that he was away from home. Marko knew this to be a lie, and cried so that all should hear him that henceforth the challenge was annulled. "I do not fight with cowards," he said, and again ...
— The Land of the Black Mountain - The Adventures of Two Englishmen in Montenegro • Reginald Wyon
... may prevail, than divine seers have ever been, as their books of record show; but, if he becomes a mere diplomatist, financier, secretary-of-state, or military general, in his counsels or his tone, he evacuates his own position, flees as a craven from his post, and assumes that of other men. Yet it is an extreme still worse for him to resort to lifeless generalities of doctrine and duty, producing as little effect as comes from electric batteries or telegraphic wires when no magnetic current ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XI., February, 1863, No. LXIV. • Various
... pass Mr Waters and get out, casting a suspicious defiant look round the room. The noise he made turned all eyes upon him, and the scrutiny he had brought upon himself redoubled his anxiety to get away. "I'll not stand it, by Jove! Waters, let me go," said the craven, whose confused imagination had mixed up all his evil doings together, and who already felt himself being carried off to prison. It was at this moment that Jack Wentworth rose from his place in his easy careless way, and went forward ...
— The Perpetual Curate • Mrs [Margaret] Oliphant
... us a scene of a very opposite character, the Newmarket Craven Meeting—the most brilliant assemblage ever known there; the town crammed with the children of chance, the innkeepers trebling their charges, and like the Doncaster people, doing "noting widout the guinea." What an heterogeneous ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. - Volume XIII, No. 369, Saturday, May 9, 1829. • Various
... Lessingham's Wednesday evening. The house at Craven Hill opened its doors at ten o'clock, and until midnight there was no lack of company. Singular people, more or less; distinguished from society proper by the fact that all had a modicum of brains. Some came ...
— The Emancipated • George Gissing
... hand. His high hat had rolled away. His broadcloth suit was covered with dust. But he did not note these details of his abasement. Like a craven thing fascinated by a snake he had his starting eyes fixed upon Pan, and his face was something no man ...
— Valley of Wild Horses • Zane Grey
... hopping to the farthest corner of the bottom of his cage, said something feebly. Finding that nothing dreadful happened, he repeated his remark somewhat more boldly, and, being convinced after all that the apparition was quite harmless and that he had displayed his craven spirit for nothing, hopped back on his perch ...
— Sea Urchins • W. W. Jacobs
... "Thy craven fear my truth accused, Thine idlehood my trust abused; He that draws to harbour late, Must sleep without, or burst ...
— The Monastery • Sir Walter Scott
... lord, I was in Prince's Street at supper at Mr Page's, and at ten o'clock at night Mr Page went home with me; and, coming down Drury Lane there stood a coach by my Lord Craven's door, and the hood of the coach was drawn, and a great many men stood by it. Just as I came to the place where the coach stood, two soldiers came and pushed me from Mr Page, and four or five men came up to them, and they knocked my mother down almost, for my mother and my ...
— Love Romances of the Aristocracy • Thornton Hall
... that he believes and trembles, while Whitecraft, on the contrary, neither believed nor trembled. But if he did not fear God, he certainly feared man, and on the night in question went home with as craven a heart—thanks to Lanigan—as ever beat in a coward's bosom. Smellpriest, however, differed from Whitecraft in many points; he was brave, though cruel, and addicted to deep potations. Whitecraft, it is true, drank more deeply still than ...
— Willy Reilly - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... beloved cousin, Prince Rupert, Count Palatine of the Rhine, Duke of Bavaria and Cumberland; George Duke of Albemarle, William Earl of Craven, Henry Lord Arlington, Anthony Lord Ashley, Sir John Robinson, and Sir Robert Vyner, Knights and Baronets; Sir Peter Colleton, Baronet, Sir Edward Hungerford, Knight of the Bath, Sir Paul Neele, Sir John ...
— Canada and the States • Edward William Watkin
... thunderbolt awoke me from this craven slumber of the will. My Aunt Louise was seized with paralysis, towards the end of the sad year 1878, in the month of December. I had come in at night, or rather in the morning, having won a large sum at ...
— Stories of Modern French Novels • Julian Hawthorne
... the sign of the cross, and music, and censer-pots, though I think them all superstitious, I'd be free to leave them alone if they would leave me. But popery is a much deeper thing than that, Lothair, and our fathers found it out. They could not stand it, and we should be a craven crew to stand it now. A man should be master in his own house. You will be taking a wife, some day; at least it is to be hoped so; and how will you like one of these monsignores to be walking into her bedroom, eh; and talking to her alone when he pleases, and where he pleases; and when you want ...
— Lothair • Benjamin Disraeli
... left destitute. Then there was no work. There were 100,000 working men out of employment. All these people had to be kept. The Lord Mayor, assisted by his Aldermen and two noble Lords, Albemarle and Craven, organised a service of relief. The King gave a thousand pounds a week: the City gave 600l. a week: the merchants contributed thousands every week. And so the ...
— The History of London • Walter Besant
... Satsuma man saw this, and said: "Is not this Oishi Kuranosuke, who was a councillor of Asano Takumi no Kami, and who, not having the heart to avenge his lord, gives himself up to women and wine? See how he lies drunk in the public street! Faithless beast! Fool and craven! Unworthy the name of ...
— Tales of Old Japan • Algernon Bertram Freeman-Mitford
... are broad, grassy valleys, lying at heights which vary from 6,000 to 11,000 feet. They are the favourite retreats of innumerable animals—wapiti, bighorn, oxen, mountain lions, the great grizzly, the wary beaver, the evil-smelling skunk, the craven wolf, cayote and lynx, to say nothing of lesser breeds, such as marten, wild cat, fox, mink, hare, chipmonk, and squirrel. Their features have been fully described by Lord Dunraven in his picturesque book, ...
— Celebrated Women Travellers of the Nineteenth Century • W. H. Davenport Adams
... that he exhibited a glorious defiance. He defied the concrete Gedge. He defied the more abstract, but none the less real, tormenting Furies. He defied remorse. In accepting Sir Anthony's praise he defied the craven ...
— The Red Planet • William J. Locke
... I was almost nine years old, and returned home, where I remained upwards of two years before being again sent to school. During this time we lived chiefly at a place called Craven Hill, Bayswater, where we occupied at ...
— Records of a Girlhood • Frances Anne Kemble
... beggary of the Court, which I am sorry to hear, and which I am afeard will bring all to ruin again. So he and I to the Wardrobe to dinner, and after dinner Captain Ferrers and I to the Opera, and saw "The Witts" again, which I like exceedingly. The Queen of Bohemia was here, brought by my Lord Craven. So the Captain and I and another to the Devil tavern and drank, and so by coach home. Troubled in mind that I cannot bring myself to mind my business, but to be so much in love of plays. We have been at a great ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... opposite, that he is alive, or was, for these men saw him and Jeffrey Stokes and Martin the priest, no craven as I know, fighting like devils till the Turks overwhelmed them by numbers, and, having bound their hands, carried them all three unwounded on board one of their ships, wishing doubtless to make slaves of such ...
— The Lady Of Blossholme • H. Rider Haggard
... sacrifice to the tarnished honor of their arms. To the order to surrender they answered with a cry of defiance; and as our cavalry, flushed and elated with victory, rode round their bristling ranks, no quailing look, no craven spirit was there. The Emperor himself endeavored to repair the disaster; he rode with lightning speed hither and thither, commanding, ordering, nay, imploring, too; but already the night was falling, the confusion became each moment more inextricable, and the effort ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 2 (of 2) • Charles Lever
... and gentle interests that had been familiar to him from childhood. In one paper he read how such and such Duchesses were preparing yacht-parties for Cowes, and of the thrilling triumphs of the Russian ballet. Another told him that the Government was a collection of craven imbeciles, and that the price of rubber continued disappointing. He saw photographs of golf-champions and ladies in the chorus of musical comedies. One paper had a picture representing the state entry into somewhere or other of a—a German Royalty. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, September 30, 1914 • Various
... Scotland, my father?" she would urge; "is it because her queen is but a child and now far distant, that anarchy and gloom shall enfold our land? Is it not shame in ye thus craven to deem her sons, when in thy own breast so much devotion and loyalty have rest? why not judge others by yourself, my father, and know the dark things of which ye dream can ...
— The Days of Bruce Vol 1 - A Story from Scottish History • Grace Aguilar
... high and free from blame But worms were at its heart; each noble deed Revealed self-seeking as its primal seed. Love, honor, virtue—each was but a name! Naught marked us off, vile creatures of the dust, From ravening brutes, save on the smiling face A honeyed falseness—in the heart so base A craven weakness and a fiercer lust. Where was a friend had not his friend betrayed A brother guiltless of a brother's death, A wife that hid no poisoned sting beneath A fond embrace? Of one clay all were made! Thus I became as they. Since only fear Could tame ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VII. • Various
... exercised. Soon after, John was excommunicated personally. When he found that Philip of France was prepared to seize his kingdom, and that his crimes had so alienated him from his own people that he could hope for little help from them, he cringed with the craven fear so usually found in cruel men, and made the most abject submission. In the interval between the proclamation of the interdict and the fulmination of the sentence of excommunication (A.D. 1210), John visited Ireland. It may be supposed his ...
— An Illustrated History of Ireland from AD 400 to 1800 • Mary Frances Cusack
... say it only to you, as I would to my own heart. The old man told me so—in his last moments. And then there is the look of the man. If you could have seen how his craven ...
— Cousin Henry • Anthony Trollope
... in Craven County seventy eight years ago. My pappa wuz named Andrew Bryant an' my mammy wuz named Harriet. My brothers wuz John Franklin, Alfred, an' Andrew. I ain't had no sisters. I reckon dat we is what yo' call a general mixture case I am part Injun, ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States • Various
... by Craven, framed the piece with appropriate magnificence. The several seaside pictures were admirably representative of the grandeur, the gaunt loneliness, and the glorious colour for which Scotland is so ...
— Shadows of the Stage • William Winter
... mother and Ophelia, that it seemed of no use to kill one villain out of the villainous world; it would seem but 'bestial oblivion'; and, although his reputation as a prince was deeply concerned, any reflection on the consequences to himself would at times appear but a 'craven scruple'; while at times even the whispers of conscience might seem a 'thinking too precisely on the event.' A conscientious man of changeful mood wilt be very ready in either mood to condemn the other. The best and rightest men will sometimes ...
— The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark - A Study with the Text of the Folio of 1623 • George MacDonald
... grandsires, your sires, from whose example your souls from infancy gather lofty thoughts? I scorn to offer Spartans such exhortations as these. Look! we are protected by our position. Though he bring with him the whole East, and parade his useless numbers before our craven eyes, this sea which spreads its vast expanse before us is pressed into a narrow compass, is beset by treacherous straits which scarce admit the passage of a single row-boat, and then by their chopping swell make rowing impossible; it is beset by unseen shallows, ...
— A History of Roman Literature - From the Earliest Period to the Death of Marcus Aurelius • Charles Thomas Cruttwell
... worthy of our admiration, though he be ten thousand times our foe. What should we think of men who, left to guard the Kentish fields, threw down their arms and sued for peace to any leader of an invading host because our cause seemed lost? Should we not curse them as a craven crowd, and teach our lisping babes to mock their memory? Would any fair-faced girl in all the British Isles wed any man who would not fight until the sinews slackened with slaying in defence of the homeland? If so, they are not ...
— Campaign Pictures of the War in South Africa (1899-1900) - Letters from the Front • A. G. Hales
... good, it is difficult, perhaps to single out one set for especial praise; but my advice is, on no account miss the Second Scene of the Prologue, "on the Battlements of a Castle in Normandy," painted by W. TELBIN. "Rosamond's Bower," by HAWES CRAVEN, is equally perfect in another and of course totally distinct line. To pronounce upon Professor STANFORD'S music when "the play's the thing" is impossible. The entr'actes deserve such special attention as they are not likely ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, February 18, 1893 • Various
... of Bacon's Rebellion; Thomas J. Wertenbaker, Virginia Under the Stuarts; and Torchbearer of the Revolution; Philip Alexander Bruce, The Economic History of Virginia in the Seventeenth Century, and The Institutional History of Virginia in the Seventeenth Century; Wesley Frank Craven, The Southern Colonies in the Seventeenth Century; John Fiske, Old Virginia and her Neighbors; John Burk, History of Virginia; Herbert L. Osgood, The American Colonies in the ...
— Bacon's Rebellion, 1676 • Thomas Jefferson Wertenbaker
... undoubtedly the effect of binding us to earth and earthly conditions; they come between us and faith in true immortality. They cannot restore to us what death takes away. They cannot lay the spectre which made Claudio a craven. ...
— Outspoken Essays • William Ralph Inge
... heard about enough of this shock to my system,' said he at length. 'But have it your own way. If you want me to recommend a doctor, my mother swears by an old boy in Craven Street, Strand. I don't know the number, but his name's Leadbetter, ...
— Corporal Sam and Other Stories • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... panic spread through all ranks of society. Our enemies soon considered it as a settled thing that they were always to be beaten. Thus victory begot victory; till, at last, wherever the forces of the two nations met, they met with disdainful confidence on one side, and with a craven ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... news came that other legions had followed the example of those of Galba, all fell away from Nero, and the Praetorians themselves, whom he had petted and spoilt, having no inclination for a fight with Galba's legionaries, proclaimed the latter emperor. Then Nero showed himself a craven, flying in disguise to the house of Phaon. There he remained in hiding, weeping and terrified, knowing that he must die, but afraid to kill himself. He may well have thought then of how many he had compelled to die, and how ...
— Beric the Briton - A Story of the Roman Invasion • G. A. Henty
... finally, the General Presbyterian Assembly of the United States, was based upon the doctrine of the divinely appointed subordination of woman to man, and arose simply because Dr. See admitted two ladies[212] to his pulpit to speak upon temperance; which act, Rev. Dr. Craven, the prosecutor, declared to have been "an indecency in the sight of Jehovah." He expressed the general clerical and ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... a year since Gordon died! A year ago to-night, the Desert still Crouched on the spring, and panted for its fill Of lust and blood. Their old art statesmen plied, And paltered, and evaded, and denied; Guiltless as yet, except for feeble will, And craven heart, and calculated skill In long ...
— Grass of Parnassus • Andrew Lang
... influence over our giant, the same cannot be said of his companions. Oolichuk, indeed, was almost as bold, though he exhibited a considerable amount of caution in his looks and movements; but Eemerk, and one or two of his friends, betrayed their craven spirits in frequent startled looks and changing colour. Ivitchuk was a strange compound of nervousness and courage, while Akeetolik appeared to have lost the power of expressing every feeling but one—that of blank amazement. Indeed, ...
— The Giant of the North - Pokings Round the Pole • R.M. Ballantyne
... dealeth him a great buffet of his sword so as that it went nigh to stun him altogether. Howbeit the Coward Knight moveth not. Perceval looketh at him in wonderment and thinketh him that he hath set too craven a knight in his place, and now at last knoweth well that he spake truth. The robber-knight smiteth him all over his body and giveth him so many buffets that the knight seeth his ...
— High History of the Holy Graal • Unknown
... Gaza, appears surrounded by Philistine soldiers. He rails at the Israelites as slaves, sneers at their God as impotent and craven, lifts up the horn of Dagon, who, he says, shall pursue Jehovah as a falcon pursues a dove. The speech fills Samson with a divine anger, which bursts forth in a canticle of prayer and prophecy. There is a flash as of swords in the scintillant scale passages which rush ...
— A Second Book of Operas • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... adjourned at once to the wood behind the village. A little open glade was soon found; the ground was soon measured; the pistols were soon loaded. De Caylus looked horribly pale, but it was the pallor of concentrated rage, with nothing of the craven hue in it. Dalrymple, on the contrary, had neither more nor less color than usual, and puffed away at his cigar with as much indifference as if he were waiting his turn at the pit of the Comedie Francaise. ...
— In the Days of My Youth • Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards
... over, which always absorb every other interest, I have leisure to turn my mind to other things. This year there has been a miserable catastrophe. Berkeley Craven deliberately shot himself after losing more than he could pay. It is the first instance of a man of rank and station in society making such an exit. He had originally a large landed estate, strictly entailed, got into difficulties, was obliged to go abroad, ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. III • Charles C. F. Greville
... the most exhaustive tests. The advocates of "darkness and composure" have not been very happy in their arguments, but they are at least preferable to the members of Parliament deservedly trounced by Mr. Bonar Law, who declared that if their craven squealings were typical he should despair of victory. Meanwhile, we have to congratulate our gallant French allies on their splendid bag of Zepps. But the space which our Press allots to air raids moves Mr. Punch to wonder and scorn. Our casualties ...
— Mr. Punch's History of the Great War • Punch
... saw the fury of the squall, he felt that all his skill and all his courage would avail him as nought to save the Sea Hawk. In this, his last dire extremity, no craven fear filled his heart, and though for his own life he cared not, he remembered that there were others whose lives depended on him. To fly towards the stern before the vessel's deck had become completely perpendicular, was the work of one ...
— The Pirate of the Mediterranean - A Tale of the Sea • W.H.G. Kingston
... But Governor Craven was one of the best governors of his time. He was a man of action and courage as well as a wise ruler, and he quickly gathered an army with which to march against the savages. The North Carolinians too, remembering ...
— This Country Of Ours • H. E. Marshall Author: Henrietta Elizabeth Marshall
... not a little distracted by these and a great many other incoherent exclamations of joy, Rose read the address, which was Craven Street, in the Strand. She very soon determined upon turning the ...
— Oliver Twist • Charles Dickens
... of all, was the most utter craven of the whole number, and shrieks, curses and prayers for mercy rolled unceasingly from his lips, until the rope choked his utterance. Just outside the camp, stood a considerable grove of trees; to this we repaired with our prisoners, ...
— Seven and Nine years Among the Camanches and Apaches - An Autobiography • Edwin Eastman
... Gerbino, who knew that his grandfather, King Guglielmo, had given the King of Tunis the desired assurance, at a loss how to act. But prompted by love, and goaded by the lady's words and loath to seem a craven, he hied him to Messina; and having there armed two light galleys, and manned them with good men and true, he put to sea, and stood for Sardinia, deeming that the lady's ship must pass that way. Nor was he far out in his reckoning; for he had not been there many days, when the ...
— The Decameron, Volume I • Giovanni Boccaccio
... matter; and let us gratefully allow for the exceptions that may require to be recognized in the application of our charges against the English people or press as a whole. It has been said that we have shown a timid and almost craven sensitiveness to the opinions pronounced abroad upon our national struggle, especially those pronounced by our own kinsfolk of England. It is urged, that a strong and prosperous and united people, if conscious of only a ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, Issue 49, November, 1861 • Various
... from the book. Next, think over with some care the things for which you may pray, the aspirations which your children can share with you. Few things are more difficult than this, so to pray that all can make the prayer their own. Let it also be a prayer of love and joy, not a craven begging off from punishments, nor a cowardly plea for protection and provision. We can pray over all these things with gratitude and with confidence toward the God of love. Do not try to preach in your prayers. ...
— Religious Education in the Family • Henry F. Cope
... miserable detail may be of infinite value for social and reforming purposes. It may be the duty of every one of us to study these sores in the body politic for the existence of which we are collectively responsible. It may be craven cowardice not to open our eyes wide to these painful and hideous facts, which cry out to be removed and prevented. And if any person whose enthusiasm in life it is to abolish them hits upon an artistic device for calling attention to them, he is justified by his object. But let ...
— Personality in Literature • Rolfe Arnold Scott-James
... M.A. Fellow and Lecturer of St John's College, Oxford. Formerly Fellow and Tutor of Merton College. Craven Scholar ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 1 - "Austria, Lower" to "Bacon" • Various
... Of pittie, man! that never enters heere, And if it should, Ide threat my craven heart To stab it home for harbouring such a thought. I see no reason whie I should relent; It is a charitable vertuous deede, To end this princkocke[19] from ...
— A Collection Of Old English Plays, Vol. IV. • Editor: A.H. Bullen
... but still she staid on. For love makes the proudest a craven, and turns the strength of the strongest into weakness; and so, in spite of herself, she staid, because she ...
— The Cryptogram - A Novel • James De Mille
... numerous mechanics, losing, and being defrauded of that for which they have labored hard during the week. Hope, anxiety, and even desperation is pictured on the countenances of the players. Maddened and disappointed, one young man rises from a table, at which sits a craven-faced man sweeping the winnings into his pile, and with profane tongue, says he has lost his all. Another, with flushed face and bloodshot eyes, declares it the sixth time he has lost his earnings here. A third reels confusedly about the room, says a mechanic is but a dog in South Carolina; and ...
— Justice in the By-Ways - A Tale of Life • F. Colburn Adams
... "restrictions" imposed upon his royal highness; and, however tempered by compliment and excuse, "the diamonds blaze" reached not farther than the hall, and were destined to waste their splendour, for the remainder of the night, in the limited apartments of Craven-street. ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, - Vol. 10, No. 283, 17 Nov 1827 • Various
... of the hottest fire, were utterly ignorant of military tactics, and fell before the destroyer, like the brave untutored Indians before the civilised European. Now Vivian Grey was conscious that there was at least one person in the world who was no craven either in body or in mind, and so he had long come to the comfortable conclusion, that it was impossible that his career could be anything but the most brilliant. And truly, employed as he now was, with a peer of the realm, in a solemn consultation on that realm's most important interests, ...
— Vivian Grey • The Earl of Beaconsfield
... my hold! What was the little craven clerk doing there at this time of night, and ...
— Hurricane Island • H. B. Marriott Watson
... his part of the programme; but on the evening of the 4th the Tecumseh arrived, together with the Richmond, which had been for a few days at Pensacola preparing for the fight. "I regret to have detained you, admiral," said Craven, the commander of the monitor, "but had it not been for Captain Jenkins (of the Richmond), God knows when I should have been here. When your order came I had not received an ounce of coal." In his report of the battle, Farragut warmly acknowledged the zeal and energy of Jenkins, ...
— Admiral Farragut • A. T. Mahan
... arose, so loud that it silenced, if it did not convince, the craven few. As for Master Edward Sharpless, he disappeared behind ...
— To Have and To Hold • Mary Johnston
... removed his hand. He found such patriotism somewhat craven. Genuine patriotism comes only from the heart. It knows no parleying with reason. English ladies will declare abroad that there are no fogs in London, and Mr. Pembroke, though he would not go to this, was only restrained by the certainty of being ...
— The Longest Journey • E. M. Forster
... their presence greet?" Before his tongue could make reply, A burly warrior, standing by, Strode forward, and, with murderous look, His tomahawk before her shook, And fiercely said: "I am Two Bear; Great chief am I! 'Tis sweet to tear The craven hearts and drink the blood Of Two Bear's foes; a big red flood Shall flow from coward Sioux, this morn Their scalps Ojibway spears adorn. Why have you kept us waiting here? Behold, the sun will soon appear, The hour is late, the good time flies, ...
— Indian Legends of Minnesota • Various
... ineffable selfishness than Adam's plea in the garden? "The woman whom thou gavest to be with me, she gave me of the tree and I did eat." Had Eve been of no finer stuff than he, she would have left him there. But his craven answer at once revealed the essential weakness that demanded the devoted stay of unselfish constancy. Were woman the ever-selfish, Eve would have abandoned Adam to himself while she tripped to solitary pastures new. But the same quality that ...
— From the Easy Chair, vol. 1 • George William Curtis
... subsided as with a formidable countenance he turned towards the impassive figure on the box. The advance was also a regular progression from high daring to craven hesitation. At last, when some yards from the monster, the lad came to a full halt, as if he had encountered a stone wall. The observant little boys in the distance promptly hooted. Stung again by these cries, the lad sneaked two yards forward. ...
— The Monster and Other Stories - The Monster; The Blue Hotel; His New Mittens • Stephen Crane
... he enter'd the Netherby Hall, Among bridesmen, and kinsmen, and brothers, and all: Then spoke the bride's father, his hand on his sword, (For the poor craven bridegroom said never a word) "Oh, come ye in peace here, or come ye in war, Or to dance at ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... had indicated a spot from which part of the patio, or courtyard, was visible. His command was instantly obeyed, for the craven Comandante saw that certain ...
— The White Chief - A Legend of Northern Mexico • Mayne Reid
... the tyrant in his traitorous mind, But durst not follow what he had decreed, Yet if the innocents some mercy find, From cowardice, not truth, did that proceed, His noble foes durst not his craven kind Exasperate by such a bloody deed. For if he need, what grace could then be got, If thus of peace he broke ...
— Jerusalem Delivered • Torquato Tasso
... the hand of such a craven,' answered Rodrigo in anger, 'and I hold that my father has heaped disgrace on his family by humbling himself in such a fashion!' And so saying, he rode away, with ...
— The Red Romance Book • Various
... have dragged him to face this man had he been free. Even now a chill crept over Girty. For a moment he was enthralled by a mysterious fear, half paralyzed by a foreshadowing of what would be this hunter's vengeance. Then he shook off his craven fear. He was free; the hunter's doom was sure. His sharp face was again wreathed in a savage leer, and he spat once more ...
— The Spirit of the Border - A Romance of the Early Settlers in the Ohio Valley • Zane Grey
... driven a lady, and lightly clad, Out in the stormy cold! Was she a ghost?—Divinely sad Are the people of Hades old! A wandering ghost? Oh, self-care bad, Caitiff and craven and cowering, which had ...
— Poetical Works of George MacDonald, Vol. 2 • George MacDonald
... saw you at your craven work just after the Alma; you ought to have been shot then. The world would have been ...
— The Thin Red Line; and Blue Blood • Arthur Griffiths
... Bravo country! Neither his friends nor his enemies had suspected him of aught else than the finest courage. It was purely a physical cowardice, and only by an extreme, grim effort of will had he forced his craven body to do the bravest deeds. Scourging himself always, as a monk whips his besetting sin, Buckley threw himself with apparent recklessness into every danger, with the hope of some day ridding himself of the despised affliction. ...
— Heart of the West • O. Henry
... "O thou craven!" it said, "thou wicked man! what sin can be greater than thine? If thou hadst done this thing thou ownest to, it had gone better with thee than now, when thou standest a liar and boaster in a filthy cause. Wilt thou foul thyself, Battista, and think it honour? ...
— Little Novels of Italy • Maurice Henry Hewlett
... say," he said,—"I am ashamed as a citizen of our great land to be obliged to admit, that there are at home a few craven-hearted, mean-spirited men—shall I call them men? No, nor even women—there are creatures, I say, who disapprove of our glorious deeds, who spurn the flag and the noble principles for which it stands and to which I have alluded, who say that we have no business ...
— Captain Jinks, Hero • Ernest Crosby
... what became of his body, nor did we hear that his head was cut off; but we saw the head of the traitor Farig Pasha, who met with his deserts. We have heard it was the blacks that ran away; and that the Egyptian soldiers fought well; that is not true, they were craven. Had it not been for them, in spite of the treachery of many within the town, the Arabs would not have got in, for we watched the traitors. And now fearful scenes took place in every house and building, in the large Market Place, in the small bazaars; ...
— General Gordon - Saint and Soldier • J. Wardle
... matter, Bertie," she said. "I had some good things all stored up. But, as you've rallied round like this, I suppose I shall have to let you off. And, anyway, it is probably all for the best that you evaded your obligations in that sickeningly craven way. I have an idea that this Spink-Bottle of yours is going to be good. If only he ...
— Right Ho, Jeeves • P. G. Wodehouse
... ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling, By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore, "Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou," I said, "art sure no craven, Ghastly grim and ancient Raven wandering from the Nightly shore— Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian shore!" Quoth the ...
— Edgar Allan Poe's Complete Poetical Works • Edgar Allan Poe
... said Eveline. "One were craven to forget a benefit. Only show me how I can aid thee, and my ...
— The Knight of the Golden Melice - A Historical Romance • John Turvill Adams
... avoids the shock of combat, the hard-hearted crowd immediately discover it and rain maledictions on his head. I saw a picador once enter the ring as pale as death. He kept carefully out of the way of the bull for a few minutes. The sharp-eyed Spaniards noticed it, and commenced shouting, "Craven! He wants to live forever!" They threw orange-skins at him, and at last, their rage vanquishing their economy, they pelted him with oranges. His pallor gave way to a flush of shame and anger. He attacked the bull so awkwardly that the animal, ...
— Castilian Days • John Hay
... peers that distinguished themselves in the opposition were Beaufort, Strafford, Craven, Foley, Litchfield, Scarsdale, Grower, Mountjoy, Plymouth, Bathurst, Northampton, Coventry, Oxford and Mortimer, Willoughby ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... that most delightful of all books about London, The Town, tells us that No. 7 Craven Street, Strand, was once the dwelling of Benjamin Franklin, and he adds, with the manliness which is always such a curious element of his unmanliness: "What a change along the shore of the Thames in a few years (for two centuries are less than ...
— London Films • W.D. Howells
... did not appeal to Dirty Dan. However, he had his orders to protect The Laird's son; he had his own peculiar notions of honor, and in his wild Irish heart there was not one drop of craven blood. So presently, with the stealth of an animal, he crawled soundlessly away until he judged it would be safe for him to stand up and walk, which he did with ...
— Kindred of the Dust • Peter B. Kyne
... not get this news about Clayton." Ferris' eyes were averted. In his craven heart there was but one burning question, "My God! Did he remake his will after our marriage? I may be left a ...
— The Midnight Passenger • Richard Henry Savage
... of Cranbury, Thomas Chamberlayne, Esq., died on October 1876, being succeeded by his son Tankerville Chamberlayne, Esq.; and Brambridge, after descending from the Smythes to a niece, the Honourable Mrs. Craven, whose son sold it, has ...
— John Keble's Parishes • Charlotte M Yonge
... He who loves his own soul let him fight beside me: for I will have no disgrace." [14] But if he met soldiers who had fought for him before, he only said, "To you, gentlemen, what need I say? You know the brave man's part in battle, and the craven's." [15] And when he came to Abradatas, he halted, and Abradatas gave the reins to his charioteer and came up to him, and others gathered round from the infantry and ...
— Cyropaedia - The Education Of Cyrus • Xenophon
... quiet eyes on the man; and for one little instant the craven that dwelt under Lounsbury's skin told him he had said one sentence too many; but he took heart when Bill looked away. "I'll keep what I've got on," he announced. "I'm not used to being told what kind of clothes to wear. ...
— The Snowshoe Trail • Edison Marshall
... tyrant, I will not reveal to you. Begone. By heaven! if you stand there I shall bury my hands in your foul, craven throat." ...
— The Story of Louis Riel: The Rebel Chief • Joseph Edmund Collins
... armed and bearing long swords over their shoulders: he stopped as they met, and stared at them in the face, but answered not their greeting; and they had no will to meddle with him, seeing his inches and that he was well armed, and looked no craven: so they went on. ...
— The Well at the World's End • William Morris
... patience, of concealment! Oh, what a base and coward thing am I, That on mine own security I thought And took no care of thine! Thy precious head Left as a pledge within the tyrant's grasp! Hence, craven-hearted prudence, hence! And all My thoughts be vengeance, and the despot's blood! I'll seek him straight—no power shall stay me now— And at his hands demand my father's eyes. I'll beard him 'mid a thousand myrmidons! What's life to me, if in his heart's best ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. III • Kuno Francke (Editor-in-Chief)
... instructed me how much sweeping might be done in a little time. I found at my door in Craven-street, one morning, a poor woman sweeping my pavement with a birch broom; she appeared very pale and feeble, as just come out of a fit of sickness. I ask'd who employ'd her to sweep there; she said, "Nobody, but I am very poor ...
— The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin • Benjamin Franklin
... doing,' he faltered, shrinking before her like the veriest craven; 'it was the girls—Urania and Bessie—who started the notion as a practical joke, just to see what you would think of me, believing me to be my cousin. And when you seemed to like me—a little—Bessie, who is fond of me and ...
— The Golden Calf • M. E. Braddon
... voice would thrill Each craven breast with fear; For dumb distress or human ill There drops no ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, - Issue 573, October 27, 1832 • Various
... hate that his character had forbidden him to express on a living counterfeit. Wilson was shaken, as if by a palsy. He choked over passionate, incoherent invective. It was class hate first, then the hate of real manhood for a craven, then the hate of disgrace for a murder. No man so fair as a gun-fighter in the Western creed of ...
— The Man of the Forest • Zane Grey
... ball, and resolved that he would not be sat upon by Roger Carbury. The time was coming,—he might almost say that the time had come,—in which he might defy Roger Carbury. Nevertheless, he dreaded the words which were now to be spoken to him with a craven fear. ...
— The Way We Live Now • Anthony Trollope
... lying legend in honour of St. Tully. He was holding up as a model of every virtue a man whose talents and acquirements, indeed, can never be too highly extolled, and who was by no means destitute of amiable qualities, but whose whole soul was under the dominion of a girlish vanity and a craven fear. Actions for which Cicero himself, the most eloquent and skilful of advocates, could contrive no excuse, actions which in his confidential correspondence he mentioned with remorse and shame, are represented by his biographer as wise, virtuous, heroic. The whole history of that great ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... he cried. "O craven youth! O babe! O suckling! Was it for this thou wert begot? Hast thou no bowels, no blood, no manhood? Forsooth, and must I spit ...
— Beltane The Smith • Jeffery Farnol
... circumstances, a crumbling of the veneer of bravado which had long masqueraded as courage and with it crumbled his code of ethics. Now was Es-sat no longer chief of Kor-ul-ja—instead he was a whimpering craven battling for life. Clutching at Om-at, clutching at the nearest pegs he sought any support that would save him from that awful fall, and as he strove to push aside the hand of death, whose cold fingers he already felt upon his heart, his tail sought Om-at's side and the handle of the ...
— Tarzan the Terrible • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... prior made a sign to his servants, and immediately one of the most timorous and craven of the prisoners was brought up before him. He was far too cunning a judge to try first to bend the spirit of the hunchback. He knew that with that man he could do nothing, and he knew too what marvels were sometimes accomplished ...
— The Secret Chamber at Chad • Evelyn Everett-Green
... hardly be called a nervous or a timid man. He was certainly not a coward, like Owen; but neither did he have the shrewd, scheming mind which was the bulwark of the craven secretary's weakness. At the moment when they discovered the young lovers safe at the foot of the cliff after the escape from the balloon and rock ledge, the two arch conspirators were two very different men. Owen was ...
— The Perils of Pauline • Charles Goddard
... ii. 191), that after he had entered on his charge as domestic tutor to Lord Craven's son, he called on Johnson, who asked him how he liked his place. On his hesitating to answer, he said: 'You must expect insolence.' He added that in his youth he had entertained great expectations from a ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell
... you are rightly served for a craven and a miser, sir!" burst out the angry Governor, turning savagely upon the ...
— Good Cheer Stories Every Child Should Know • Various
... that for the time she was mad, and would kill me even as she had said, did I not swear. So I did take that fearful oath, coward as I was, and to this day am I a craven when I think on 't. When I had sworn, she turned from me as though there were no such woman in all the earth, and went once more to the door o' th' ...
— A Brother To Dragons and Other Old-time Tales • Amelie Rives
... had another [Footnote: No less than five letters were received by Miss Edgeworth at different times, from different young people, asking for a description of the dresses in the "Contrast."] odd letter signed by three young ladies—Clarissa Craven, Rachel Biddle, and Eliza Finch, who, after sundry compliments in very pretty language, and with all the appearance of seriousness, beg that I will do them the favour to satisfy the curiosity they feel about the wedding dresses of the Frankland family in the "Contrast." ...
— The Life And Letters Of Maria Edgeworth, Vol. 1 • Maria Edgeworth
... for the moment. Perhaps he was satisfied at the success of his taunt, even though the terror within his craven soul still caused the cold shiver to course up and down his spine. Chauvelin had once more turned to the window; his gaze was fixed upon the distance far away. The window gave on the North. That way, in a straight line, lay Calais, Boulogne, England—where he had been made to ...
— The League of the Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... insulted a gentleman, and not only challenged, but even pursued him, and blocked up his passage in the public highway; outrages which he (Sir Launcelot) would not suffer to pass unpunished. Accordingly, he insisted on the combat, on pain of treating Sycamore as a craven, and a recreant. This declaration was reinforced by Dawdle, who told him, that, should he now decline the engagement, all the world would look upon ...
— The Adventures of Sir Launcelot Greaves • Tobias Smollett
... Mr. Chairman, I rise to express sentiments similar to those of the gentleman from Craven. For my part, were it practicable to put an end to the importation of slaves immediately, it would give me the greatest pleasure, for it certainly is a trade utterly inconsistent with the rights of humanity, and under which great cruelties have been exercised. When the entire ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... go from the house of prayer To wrong his worthy neighbour, By dint of quoting the texts of Blair, And singing the songs of Weber; Sir Harry will leave the Craven hounds, To trace the guilty parties— And ask of the Court five thousand pounds, To prove how rack'd his heart is: An Advocate will execrate The spoiler of Hymen's shrine— And the speech that did for Twenty-eight ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 351 - Volume 13, Saturday, January 10, 1829 • Various
... the sake of the solid silver service. She had taken it for granted that I would slip the bolt and go part way down stairs, at least, pistol in hand, and she had wished to caution me against undue rashness. Consequently, it was a rude blow to her sensibilities to find that I was such a craven. She cared no more for our apostle spoons and gold-lined vegetable dishes than I did; it was the principle of the thing which distressed her. Why had I bought a six-shooter shortly after our marriage except to be equipped for just such ...
— The Opinions of a Philosopher • Robert Grant
... who went up Vesuvius with us, and was very merry and agreeable. He is travelling with Lord and Lady Somers, and Lord Somers being laid up with an attack of malaria fever, Layard had a day to spare. Craven, who was Lord Normanby's Secretary of Legation in Paris, now lives at Naples, and is married to a French lady. He is very hospitable and hearty, and seemed to have vague ideas that something might ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 1 (of 3), 1833-1856 • Charles Dickens
... me, in the hope that he might profit by it. He sought to break an engagement of marriage that existed between me and Miss Winthrop, of Boston. Before he succeeded in making this breach it is my belief that he had become so touched and charmed by the letters she wrote that even his craven heart was turned to see its own baseness. He had every opportunity of tampering with our mail. He felt, when I was left wounded at the Monocacy, that that would end the play; and then, in his despair and remorse, he deserted. He was around Frederick ...
— A War-Time Wooing - A Story • Charles King
... could not turn round in her tracks in twenty minutes, while he parenthetically endorsed Hungerford's remarks to me—though he was ignorant of them—that lascars should not be permitted on English passenger ships. He was supported by Sir Hayes Craven, a shipowner, who further said that not one out of ten British sailors could swim, while not five out of ten could row a boat properly. Ryder's anger was great, because Clovelly remarked with mock seriousness that the lascars were picturesque, and asked the American if he had watched ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... craven Fledgeby felt that the time was now come when he must strike a blow. He struck it by saying, partly to Mrs Lammle and partly to the circumambient air, 'I consider myself very ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens
... animals, we number a few servants who have submitted only through indifference, cowardice or stupidity: the uncertain and craven horse, who responds only to pain and is attached to nothing; the passive and dejected ass, who stays with us only because he knows not what to do nor where to go, but who nevertheless, under the cudgel and the pack-saddle, retains the idea that lurks behind ...
— Our Friend the Dog • Maurice Maeterlinck
... hospitality. This I would gladly have done, had it been possible. As it was not, I have pointed out those features which seemed to me objectionable,—certainly with no design so ridiculous as that of setting up myself against Harvard University, but equally certainly with no heart so craven as to shrink from denouncing what seemed to me wrong because it would be setting myself against Harvard University. Opinions must be judged by their own weight, not by the weight of the persons who utter them. The fair fame of Harvard is the possession of every son and daughter of Massachusetts, ...
— Gala-days • Gail Hamilton
... true heart. "I will follow you, for the lifting of a finger, anywhere," she had said, and the words reeled madly in his thoughts. Her impassioned look returned to him, and he closed his eyes as a man does in the face of an emotion which proclaims him craven. ...
— The Deliverance; A Romance of the Virginia Tobacco Fields • Ellen Glasgow
... five thousand, ten thousand pounds to be set free; he would give back the Why Not?; he would leave Moonfleet; and all the while the sweat ran down his furrowed face, and at last his voice was choked with sobs, for he was crying for his life in craven fear. ...
— Moonfleet • J. Meade Falkner
... he knows it, because perhaps after all this lie is a better thing for him than the truth would be, this same man being all the time an honest fellow-citizen whom you have every reason to trust. Surely I have heard that this craven crookedness is the object of our national detestation. And yet it is constantly whispered that it would be dangerous to divulge certain truths to the masses. 'I know the whole thing is untrue: but then ...
— Men, Women, and Gods - And Other Lectures • Helen H. Gardener
... The word is obnoxious. It has stood so long for craven fear, for exotistical inebriation, for selfish retirement from the trials and buffets and ...
— God and my Neighbour • Robert Blatchford
... the Court, which I am sorry to hear, and which I am afraid will bring all to ruin again. I to the Opera, and saw "The Witts" again, which I like exceedingly. The Queen of Bohemia was here, brought by my Lord Craven. [William, First Earl of Craven, a Privy Councillor, and Colonel of the Coldstream Guards; supposed to be married to the Queen of Bohemia, ...
— The Diary of Samuel Pepys • Samuel Pepys
... turned he, as not deigning Those craven ranks to see; Naught spake he to Lars Porsena, To Sextus naught spake he; But he saw on Palatinus[18-22] The white porch of his home; And he spake to the noble river That rolls by the ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 6 • Charles H. Sylvester
... made. We are apt to forget how great institutions are often based on compromise,—not a mean and craven sentiment, as some think, but a spirit of conciliation and magnanimity, without which there can be no union or stability. Take the English Church, which has survived the revolutions of human thought for three centuries, ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XI • John Lord
... cruel devices in the way of death-taboos and death-customs than anything else I've met in my researches. Indeed, most of our nomologists at home believe that all taboos originally arose out of ancestral ghost-worship, and sprang from the craven fear of dead kings or dead relatives. They think fetiches and gods and other imaginary supernatural beings were all in the last resort developed out of ghosts, hostile or friendly; and from what I see abroad, I incline to agree with them. But this mourning ...
— The British Barbarians • Grant Allen
... was walking from the park, now and then giving a punch to the turf with his cane, in discontented abstraction, he nearly ran against a man who had just passed the gate, and, looking up angrily, saw Hepworth Closs. The poor craven turned white as he saw that face; but Hepworth was in haste, and took no heed ...
— The Old Countess; or, The Two Proposals • Ann S. Stephens
... the South wings forth; Will ye cringe to the hot tornado's rack, And the vampires of the North? Strike! ye can win a martyr's goal, Strike! with a ruthless hand— Strike! with the vengeance of the soul, For your bright, beleaguered land! To arms! to arms! for the South needs help, And a craven is he who flees— For ye have the sword of the Lion's Whelp,[1] And ...
— War Poetry of the South • Various
... and Latin walls all open lies the way; Up hearts, for war! and let your hope foregrip the battle-day, That nought of sloth may hinder you, or take you unaware, When Gods shall bid the banners up, and forth with men ye fare 20 From out of camp,—that craven dread clog not your spirits then: Meanwhile give we unto the earth these our unburied men, The only honour they may have in nether Acheron. Come, fellows, to those noble souls who with their blood have won A country for us, give those gifts, the last ...
— The AEneids of Virgil - Done into English Verse • Virgil
... craven, Thy caution I slight, No brave-hearted champion Should shrink from the fight. The blood I inherit Doth prompt me to do— Let us go to the challenge, To the Ford let ...
— Poems • Denis Florence MacCarthy
... my mother will call me craven-hearted," said the lad with a slight smile, after a moment's silence, "and I myself may think differently anon. But tonight all seems wrapped in gloom, and I would I were far away from this city, which seems to breathe hatred to all of our name and ...
— In the Wars of the Roses - A Story for the Young • Evelyn Everett-Green
... called murder, and no one to save him—not a blow struck in his defence—not an arm raised. How much gallant blood has been shed in vain! Spirit of my fathers—didst thou leave none of thy mettle and thy honour behind thee? Or has all England become craven? Well, the time will come; and if I can no longer hope to fight for my king, at all events I can fight against ...
— The Children of the New Forest • Captain Marryat
... the State. This would have been formidable enough if he had been provided with an equal number of soldiers; but this was far from being the case. He had but twenty-five hundred men to aid him in his difficult work, and of these eleven hundred, under Colonel Craven, were a hundred miles away, at Paris, Kentucky, and this hundred miles was no level plain, but a rough, mountainous country, infested with guerrillas and occupied ...
— From Canal Boy to President - Or The Boyhood and Manhood of James A. Garfield • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... managed to get myself believed or not. But the fact of the matter is, that, as things were, I could not bring myself to face Irma again and so bring back the pain. My father had come up to see me twice. Once he had brought my mother, of whom Mrs. Craven had made much, recognizing a kindred refinement of spirit. But Amelia and my Aunt Jen (who came at the time of the General Assembly) learned to respect one another—all the more that they had been highly ...
— The Dew of Their Youth • S. R. Crockett
... what ye will," returned the dauntless Princess. "Never yet furled I my colours in peace; and I were double craven if I should ...
— The White Rose of Langley - A Story of the Olden Time • Emily Sarah Holt
... your head all shorn and shaven, I am now weeping, And sad watch keeping, Over, Ah me! The Noble Flea. The raven he, Wept over the flea, And flew to a green palm tree— And in grief, dropped a feather, Like snow in winter weather. The palm tree said my glossy raven, Why do you look so craven, Why did you drop a feather, Like snow in winter weather? The raven said, The flea is dead! I saw the brilliant bug weeping And his sad watch keeping, Alas, Alas, Ah me! Over the Noble Flea. Then the green Palm tree, Wept over the noble flea. Said he, The flea ...
— The Women of the Arabs • Henry Harris Jessup
... another boy his fag, and you express a sneering pity for the boy who consents to fag. You have read Dr. Birch and His Young Friends, and you would like to break the head of Master Hewlett, who shies his shoe at the poor shivering, craven Nightingale, and you justly remark that close observation of John Bull seems to warrant the conclusion that the nature of his bovine ancestor is still far from eliminated from his descendant. And what is the secret of your feeling? Simply that you hate bullying. Why, then, young ...
— Ars Recte Vivende - Being Essays Contributed to "The Easy Chair" • George William Curtis
... with breast of woman And face so debonair Had the sleek false paws of a lion, That could furtively seize and tear. So far to the shoulders,—but if you took The Beast in reverse you would find The ignoble form of a craven cur Was all ...
— Pike County Ballads and Other Poems • John Hay
... makes no effort,—shrinking without a struggle from his duty,—he himself will not the less certainly perish for this baseness of poltroonery. He will die no less: and why not? Wherefore should we grieve that there is one craven less in the world? No; let him perish, without a pitying thought of ours wasted upon him; and, in that case, all our grief will be reserved for the fate of the helpless girl who now, upon the least shadow of failure in him, must by the fiercest of translations—must without time for a prayer—must ...
— The English Mail-Coach and Joan of Arc • Thomas de Quincey
... and leading, and, petite and slender, wore long flaxen curls after the English fashion, and could boast of a transparent profile. Every one said that she was even cleverer and more learned than her mother, but I was never in a position to judge of that, since, overcome with craven bashfulness at the mere thought of her intellect and accomplishments, I never spoke to her alone but once, and then with unaccountable trepidation. Woloda's enthusiasm, however (for the presence of an audience never prevented him from giving vent to his rapture), ...
— Youth • Leo Tolstoy
... any other man," answered Morgan, and from where he sat Hornigold marked the little dialogue and swore in his heart that this man who boasted so should beg for his life at his hand, with all the beseeching pity of the veriest craven, before he finished with him. But for the present he said nothing. After a short ...
— Sir Henry Morgan, Buccaneer - A Romance of the Spanish Main • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... remembered how I had seen him that same morning, a nerveless, terror-stricken wretch, grovelling, like some craven cur, upon the floor, frightened, to the verge of imbecility, by a shadow, and less than a shadow, I was confronted by two hypotheses. Either I had exaggerated his condition then, or I exaggerated his condition now. So far as appearance ...
— The Beetle - A Mystery • Richard Marsh
... master was seen upon the poop, in the midst of the smoke and fire, encouraging his men. To do him justice, he was no craven, though his white hat, his short gray trousers, and his long snuff-coloured surtout reaching to his heels (the self-same coat in which he had spited Boldheart), contrasted most unfavourably with the brilliant uniform of the latter. At this moment, ...
— Holiday Romance • Charles Dickens
... Oh, craven souls! Go off yourselves! Thank heaven I have a heart That quails not at the thought of meeting men; I will discharge ...
— The Complete Plays of Gilbert and Sullivan - The 14 Gilbert And Sullivan Plays • William Schwenk Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan
... till Tracy arrived, quite out of breath, and exceedingly in love. He insisted on knowing where she lived, which she refused to tell him; and after much disputing , went to the house of one of her companions, and Tracy with them. He there made her discover her family, a butterwoman in Craven Street, and engaged her to meet him the next morning in the Park; but before night he wrote her four love-letters, and in the last offered two hundred pounds a-year to her, and a hundred a-year to Signora ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole
... We know them all—Ledyard, who died stainless, with his own sword murdered; Herkimer, who died because he was not brave enough to do his duty and be called a coward for doing it; Woolsey, the craven Major at the Middle Fort, stammering filthy speeches in his terror when Sir John Johnson's rangers closed in; Poor, who threw his life away for vanity when that life belonged to the land! Yes, we know them all—great, greater, and less ...
— The Maid-At-Arms • Robert W. Chambers
... with this unfortunate man, who had no territories, no riches, no honors to offer them, but had come as a vassal to pacify the wrath of Napoleon, and save at least a remnant of his kingdom. But the king did not come with craven heart; he did not hasten his approach to the emperor with fawning submissiveness, but slowly, with his head proudly erect, ...
— NAPOLEON AND BLUCHER • L. Muhlbach |
