"Deprecating" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... angry, squirrel-like expression of the princess' pretty face changed into a winning and piteous look of fear. Her beautiful eyes glanced askance at her husband's face, and her own assumed the timid, deprecating expression of a dog when it rapidly but feebly wags its ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... was so deprecating and touching that Morris indulged in another little demonstration of affection. "But he will be sure to say it," ...
— Washington Square • Henry James
... copy of his Ballads and also The Music Lesson of Confucius, then about to appear. At the same time he wrote to Borrow drawing his attention to one of the ballads written in German Romany jib, and enquiring if it were worth anything. Whilst deprecating his "impudence" in writing a Romany gili and telling, as a pupil might a master, of his interest in and his association with the gypsies, he continues: "My dear Mr Borrow, for all this you are entirely ...
— The Life of George Borrow • Herbert Jenkins
... from the hips, and he used his hands in a deprecating fashion that seemed to beseech so much recognition as might be conveyed in a ...
— Earth's Enigmas - A Volume of Stories • Charles G. D. Roberts
... this time by Julian, rather than by Valentine. Julian's disappointment plunged him in a deep sea of indifference, from which he declined to be rescued. The doctor's invitations to him remained unanswered. If he called, Julian was never at home. Several times the doctor met Valentine, who, with a deprecating smile, told him that Julian was ...
— Flames • Robert Smythe Hichens
... you out, doesn't it?" with an amused yet deprecating smile. "I suppose I ought to have explained before, but really I could hardly believe it would amount to anything. Marilla must have come from fairy land to have all these things happen to her. May ...
— A Modern Cinderella • Amanda M. Douglas
... dear!" repeated the mother in deprecating accents, but with a significant glance at Rowland which seemed to bespeak his attention to the glory of possessing a daughter who could deal in that ...
— Roderick Hudson • Henry James
... companion; and giving the end of the halter a turn round one of the thills, he had overtaken her before she had well taken half a dozen steps. They went together through the barnyard. Diana found the harness, and the young officer threw it over his shoulder with a smile at her which answered her deprecating words; a smile extremely pleasant and gentlemanly, if withal a little arch. Diana shrank back somewhat before the glance, which to her fancy showed the power of keen observation along with the habit of giving orders. They went ...
— Diana • Susan Warner
... not get this check before I needed it. It is pleasant to be first, and I was beginning to like it. Now this precious month taken from me, at the time I needed it most, will put me back. To be sure," added he, with a deprecating glance, "it is not much to be first among so few. But as Janet used to say, Pride is an ill weed and grows easily—flourishes even on a barren soil; and in the pleasure and excitement of study, it is not difficult to forget that it is only a ...
— Janet's Love and Service • Margaret M Robertson
... remarks I would wish to be understood as deprecating offense from my American friends, if in the course of my book should be found aught which may seem to argue against the excellence of their institutions and the grace of their social life. Of this at any rate I can assure them, in sober earnestness, that I admire what they have done in the ...
— Volume 1 • Anthony Trollope
... surprising that literary tendencies began to show themselves in her son, accompanied by a growing distaste for the career of commerce which his father wished him to follow. Heinrich Schopenhauer, although deprecating these tendencies, considered the question of purchasing a canonry for his son, but ultimately gave up the idea on the score of expense. He then proposed to take him on an extended trip to France, where he might meet his young friend Anthime, and then to England, if he would give ...
— Essays of Schopenhauer • Arthur Schopenhauer
... a deprecating wave of his shapely hand, "don't be so dreadfully blunt. Pray tell me of what you accuse me—of forcibly abducting Miss Dane last night at ten o'clock? With my hand on my heart, madame, on the word of a man and brother—on the honor of an artist—I solemnly asseverate I ...
— The Unseen Bridgegroom - or, Wedded For a Week • May Agnes Fleming
... forgotten. The coffee was unusually good that morning, even for Jakie. He was subdued, was Jakie, and his soft, brown eyes were humble whenever they met the eyes of Happy Jack. His smile was infrequent and fleeting, and his voice more deprecating than ever. Aside from these minor changes everything seemed the same as before the sheepmen ...
— The Happy Family • Bertha Muzzy Bower
... all stopped howling, Jinks moved slowly forward, with a deprecating air, for he was not sure of his reception. And, indeed, had he known what sort of a reception he would get, it is doubtful whether he would ever have ventured forward at all. For the moment the jackals caught sight of him, with one accord they left ...
— Rataplan • Ellen Velvin
... weak-willed man, there had been times, within her memory, when he had thrown off her rule and asserted himself to a degree that terrified her. She had stumbled upon one of those times now, and sank back in her place with a deprecating gesture, advancing ...
— Jessica, the Heiress • Evelyn Raymond
... you do, I will forgive you, only smiling to myself—I give you notice,—with a smile of superior pleasure! Mr. Chorley made me quite laugh the other day by recommending Mary Hewitt's 'Improvisatore,' with a sort of deprecating reference to the descriptions in the book, just as if I never read a novel—I! I wrote a confession back to him which made him shake his head perhaps, and now I confess to you, unprovoked. I am one who could have forgotten the plague, listening to Boccaccio's stories; and I am not ashamed of ...
— The Letters of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett, Vol. 1 (of 2) 1845-1846 • Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett
... the chant of dilation or pride, We have had ducking and deprecating about enough, I show ...
— Leaves of Grass • Walt Whitman
... becoming of living things," which haunted us like an apparition. For, dim as our conception must needs be as to what such oracular and grandiloquent phrases might really mean, we felt confident that they presaged no good to old beliefs. Foreseeing, yet deprecating, the coming time of trouble, we still hoped that, with some repairs and makeshifts, the old views might last out our days. Apres nous le deluge. Still, not to lag behind the rest of the world, we read the book in ...
— Darwiniana - Essays and Reviews Pertaining to Darwinism • Asa Gray
... signature. No one but John Milton Harcourt could have written it. His personality stood out of it so strongly that once or twice Mrs. Ashwood almost unconsciously put up her little hand before her face with a half mischievous, half-deprecating smile, as if the big honest eyes of its ...
— A First Family of Tasajara • Bret Harte
... too particular," said Allonby, with a deprecating gesture. "You see, once they started in to do that kind of thing the State would have to crush them, which, of course, would suit us quite nicely. As it is, after the last affair at Hamlin's, they have sent in a draft ...
— The Cattle-Baron's Daughter • Harold Bindloss
... house was absent—"had gone to town with a load of wood," so his spouse informed the ladies, at the same time pouring out a cup of tea, which she said she had tried to make strong enough to bear up an egg. "Betsy Jane," she continued, casting a deprecating glance, first at the blue sugar bowl and then at her daughter, "what possessed you to put on this brown sugar, when I told you to get crush? Have some of the apple sass? It's new—made this morning. Dew have some," she ...
— Maggie Miller • Mary J. Holmes
... delivered into their hands, they found themselves hampered by the coils of a cast-off lie. No shade, however, of hesitancy appeared on the open countenance of the friend. He approached Miss Fitzroy with a mincing step, a deprecating wave of the hand, and a deeply respectful ogle. He was going to adopt the desperate resource of telling the truth, but to tell the truth profitably was a part that required rather more playing than ...
— All on the Irish Shore - Irish Sketches • E. Somerville and Martin Ross
... the sparkling black eyes, the clear brunette complexion, and the jetty locks which clustered around its brow and neck, proclaimed him the native of a warmer and brighter climate. Half laughing, yet blushing with shame, the boy looked with arch timidity in his lady's face, as if deprecating the expected reproof; but she smiled affectionately on him, ...
— The Rivals of Acadia - An Old Story of the New World • Harriet Vaughan Cheney
... upon this last assurance, deprecating the value of his advice with an affectation that was as transparent as his ...
— Lady Audley's Secret • Mary Elizabeth Braddon
... contemplation of this portrait, Bettina turned to its companion. Here she encountered a face and form which were truly all womanly, if by womanliness is meant abject submission and self-effacement. The poor little lady looked patiently hopeless, and her deprecating air seemed the last in the world calculated to hold its own against such a lord. That she had not done so—of her own full surrender of herself, in mind and soul and body—the picture ...
— A Manifest Destiny • Julia Magruder
... sons, Isaac and John; Reverend Doctor Samuel Cooper, minister of the church in Brattle Street; Doctor Warren, physician to the family of the shipmaster; Lieutenant-Colonel Dalrymple, commanding the king's troops,—for Mr. Brandon, though deprecating the presence of the troops in Boston, determined to be courteous to the representatives of his majesty; Admiral Montague, who came in his gig rowed by six sailors from his flagship, Romney; William Molineux[33] and John Rowe, merchants; Richard ...
— Daughters of the Revolution and Their Times - 1769 - 1776 A Historical Romance • Charles Carleton Coffin
... She, too, flung a look at the priest, but a more honest one, although in flinging it she shrank away from him. The priest, a sensual, loose-lipped man, whose mere aspect invited one to kick him, smiled sideways and downwards with a deprecating air, and spread out his hands as who should say that here was no ...
— Sir John Constantine • Prosper Paleologus Constantine
... shepherd came in. "Don't 'ee mind I," he said with a deprecating wave of the hand; "bide here as long as ye will. But mid you be thinking o' getting back to Melchester to-night by train? Because you'll never do it in this world, since you don't know the lie of the country. I don't mind going with ye some o' the ways, but even then the ...
— Jude the Obscure • Thomas Hardy
... and reviewed the whole scene about him. Mrs. Gray and Winifred were already in conversation with a group of people near him, and he heard his mother's soft, deprecating voice, as in reply to an eager storm of questioning. A flush was rising in his sister's face, and just a touch of iron determination, not unknown to the house of ...
— The First Soprano • Mary Hitchcock
... essays dispersed throughout the book display a good sense which even Lyly's style cannot conceal. Ascham and Lyly were alone in deprecating the excessive use of the rod, and in so doing were far in advance of the age. Cruelty seems to have been a common characteristic of the school-teacher. "I knew one," said Peacham, "who in winter would ordinarily in a cold morning whip his boyes over for no other ...
— A History of English Prose Fiction • Bayard Tuckerman
... are coarse or casual, it is because they are not sufficiently convinced that they are the servants of the beautiful city and the agents of sweetness and light. Politeness is not really a frippery. Politeness is not really even a thing merely suave and deprecating. Politeness is an armed guard, stern and splendid and vigilant, watching over all the ways of men; in other words, politeness is a policeman. A policeman is not merely a heavy man with a truncheon: a policeman is a machine for the smoothing and sweetening of the accidents of everyday existence. ...
— All Things Considered • G. K. Chesterton
... simply, and there was a little deprecating appeal in the words as though she would have added, "Be ...
— Vera Nevill - Poor Wisdom's Chance • Mrs. H. Lovett Cameron
... Gerald might have answered that she was not so during an afternoon call; but that the most characteristic thing about that gentle and delicate woman had been the fact of her living so much in the life of others and being open to endless sorrows through them. The dim affectionate eyes, the deprecating half-smile of his mother, engaged ...
— Aurora the Magnificent • Gertrude Hall
... said Ascher, with a deprecating gesture, "we fellows know other ways of spending ...
— A Ghetto Violet - From "Christian and Leah" • Leopold Kompert
... sure," said a little, withered man, passing around the chair and facing the old woman with an humble, deprecating air. He was clothed in black, and his smooth-shaven, deeply lined face was pleasant of expression and not without power and shrewd intelligence. The eyes, however, were concealed by heavy-rimmed spectacles, ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces • Edith Van Dyne
... and sparkled like a great blue star! I made myself a deprecating smile as I took it from him, but how dare I call it false to its face? As well accuse the sun in heaven of being a cheap imitation. I faltered and prevaricated feebly. Where was my moral courage, and where was the good, honest, thumping lie ...
— Masterpieces of Mystery - Riddle Stories • Various
... closed behind him, and, though their faces showed him his mistake, his air, which was striking, was all good confidence. The curtain had just again arisen, and, in the hush of the general attention, Strether's challenge was tacit, as was also the greeting, with a quickly deprecating hand and smile, of the unannounced visitor. He discreetly signed that he would wait, would stand, and these things and his face, one look from which she had caught, had suddenly worked for Miss Gostrey. She fitted to them all an answer for Strether's last question. ...
— The Ambassadors • Henry James
... words implied that the flapper had waved a deprecating hand. "Why, I know about him in just the same way; you can't tell how. ...
— Bunker Bean • Harry Leon Wilson
... me a sick-bed and a dying lady," said he, "and I'll be pathetic myself. But Richardson had picked the kernel of life," he said, "while Fielding was contented with the husk." It was not King Lear cursing his daughters, or deprecating the storm, that I remember his commendations of; but Iago's ingenious malice and subtle revenge; or Prince Hal's gay compliance with the vices of Falstaff, whom he all along despised. Those plays had indeed no rivals ...
— Anecdotes of the late Samuel Johnson, LL.D. - during the last twenty years of his life • Hester Lynch Piozzi
... drove out of the avenue on the circle to the hall-entrance. Flitch was driver. He had no right to be there, he was doing wrong, but he was doing it under cover of an office, to support his wife and young ones, and his deprecating touches of the hat spoke of these apologies to his former master ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... ye take on so, shepherd, and sit down!" said Henery, with a deprecating peacefulness equal to anything ...
— Far from the Madding Crowd • Thomas Hardy
... Written in reply to some very beautiful verses printed in the Evening Mail, deprecating and defying the assumed hostility of the Irish Celts to ...
— Thomas Davis, Selections from his Prose and Poetry • Thomas Davis
... and their friends in other parts of the house joined in. They howled like wolves, and for a few minutes the uproar was terrific, and Verdi's music was overwhelmed by the clamour of voices until the conductor, turning towards the audience, said something inaudible with a deprecating bow and a ...
— Olive in Italy • Moray Dalton
... was, however, officially waited upon by Berlaymont and Noircarmes, on the part of the Regent. He at this point, moreover, began to receive deputations from various cities, bidding him a hollow and trembling welcome, and deprecating his displeasure for any thing in the past which might seem offensive. To all such embassies he replied in vague and conventional language; saying, however, to his confidential attendants: I am ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... and the blue eyes opened and looked at him with such pleading deprecating misery in their beautiful depths, that he was touched, and involuntarily laid his ungloved hand on her little bare fingers. Instantly they closed around it, twining like soft tendrils about his, and unconsciously ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... Powers and Fanny Leroy; in fact, she knew she would be received kindly by the majority of the members, but about Lily and two or three others she had her misgivings, and hence that doubtful, half-deprecating glance at the former, who ...
— Bessie Bradford's Prize • Joanna H. Mathews
... much,' said General Vincente with a deprecating little smile, 'but they did not fight much. Their pay was generally in arrear, and they were usually in the rear as well. What will you, my dear Conyngham? You are a commercial people—you keep good soldiers in the shop window, and when ...
— In Kedar's Tents • Henry Seton Merriman
... aid of a long and rather aimless walk. He was to go to the office later, but he had the next two or three hours, and he gave himself as a pretext that he had eaten much too much. After Kate had asked him to put her into a cab—which, as an announced, a resumed policy on her part, he found himself deprecating—he stood a while by a corner and looked vaguely forth at his London. There was always doubtless a moment for the absentee recaptured—the moment, that of the reflux of the first emotion—at which it was beyond disproof that one was back. His full parenthesis was closed, ...
— The Wings of the Dove, Volume II • Henry James
... His attributes, and yourself out of your faith, and not know at last when to stop.' These are weighty and wise words, and it would be well if they were borne in mind by disputants on this profound mystery in every age. But while deprecating all presumptuous prying into the secret nature of God, Waterland is perfectly ready to meet his adversaries on that ground on which alone he thinks the ...
— The English Church in the Eighteenth Century • Charles J. Abbey and John H. Overton
... of the sofa, sat talking to Carrie, who, on a low stool at her feet, was looking up into her face as if in perfect admiration. Without deigning other reply than a haughty shake of the head, Mrs. Graham cast a deprecating glance toward Carrie, who muttered, "How disgusting! But for pa's ...
— 'Lena Rivers • Mary J. Holmes
... to hear the doctor's opinion and anything else pertaining to the affair. Swan was coming slowly from the bunk-house, buttoning his coat. He seemed to feel that they were waiting for him and to know why. His manner was diffident, deprecating even. ...
— The Quirt • B.M. Bower
... Bradstreet seems to have bidden a final farewell to any attempt at sustained composition. A sense of disgust at the poor result of long thought and labor appears to have filled her, and this mood found expression in a deprecating little poem in which humor struggles with this oppressive sense of deficiency and incompleteness, the inclination on the whole, however, as with most authors, being toward a lenient judgment of her own ...
— Anne Bradstreet and Her Time • Helen Campbell
... waved a deprecating hand. "I am come on a matter that interests me greatly. I am a financier, I have offices in London. Until lately I was employing a young ...
— The Imaginary Marriage • Henry St. John Cooper
... in silence, not without a shiver. Even at the Poodle Dog, we took our food with small appetite and less speech; and it was not until he was warmed with a third glass of champagne that Pinkerton cleared his throat and looked upon me with a deprecating eye. ...
— The Wrecker • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne
... slowly on his way. Suddenly a benevolent, white-bearded man halted him, with a deprecating gesture. "Excuse me, sir," he began, ...
— The Girl and The Bill - An American Story of Mystery, Romance and Adventure • Bannister Merwin
... i. p. 20. Hallam says, in a note loc. cit.: 'In Italy they inspired such terror that a mass was composed especially deprecating this calamity, ...
— Roumania Past and Present • James Samuelson
... drawing-room door with a pen in his hand, and a deprecating air. He suspected no malice, and only came to ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... smile, sad and deprecating, flickered for an instant over his lips. It gave the boyish face a patient and rather sweet expression as ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces Out West • Edith Van Dyne
... hers with an innocent sort of deprecating consciousness. "I—I never thought about myself in that way before," admitted ...
— Vagabondia - 1884 • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... the mean time, was elevated to the laurel, and that by statesmen whom it was the fate of Pope to detest in secret, and yet not dare to attack in print. The Fourth Book of the "Dunciad" appeared in 1742, and its attacks were mainly levelled at the Laureate. The Laureate replied in a pamphlet, deprecating the poet's injustice, and declaring his unconsciousness of any provocation for these reiterated assaults. At the same time he announced his determination to carry on the war in prose as long as the satirist should wage it ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 11, September, 1858 • Various
... at the sullen, ominous manner with which he and his two companions were immediately dragged before the lawless chief. Though the love of life was strong and active in his breast, it was not, even in that fearful moment, exhibited in any deprecating or unmanly form. Not for an instant did his mind waver, or his thoughts wander to any subterfuge, that might prove unworthy of his profession or his former character. One anxious, inquiring look was fastened on the eye of him whose power alone might save ...
— The Red Rover • James Fenimore Cooper
... She made a deprecating gesture. "Oh, yes, if you aren't a good enough gambler, then I come into everything. It puts me in such a sweet position, doesn't it? So comfortable for me." Her smile was bitter; she was recalling what her brother had ...
— Rope • Holworthy Hall
... said Poots, "by Allah! I have done my best, but I must tell you that I have little hopes of your mother rising from her bed again. She may live one day or two days, but not more. It is not my fault, Mynheer Philip," continued Poots, in a deprecating tone. ...
— The Phantom Ship • Captain Frederick Marryat
... amendment to the address in reply to the prince regent's message announcing that measures for the security of Europe were being concerted with the allies, but he was only supported by 32 votes against 220. On April 28 his motion for an address to the prince regent, deprecating war with Napoleon, was defeated by 273 votes against 72. This was Whitbread's last prominent appearance in parliament. On July 6, during a fit of insanity, he died by his own hand. The subsidies to the allies were opposed by Bankes, but were carried on May 26 by 160 votes ...
— The Political History of England - Vol XI - From Addington's Administration to the close of William - IV.'s Reign (1801-1837) • George Brodrick
... Captain, who has an honest habit of deprecating your agreement, when it occurs to him that he has obtained it for sentiments which fall somewhat short of the stoical,—"well," said he, with a very dry expression of mouth, "she's born to do her duty. We are all ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 100, February, 1866 • Various
... lavish of her praise as Adelaide. It was really delightful to note the generosity with which she eulogized her friend Joseph, and the pleasure that she had in dwelling on her heroism; Josephine deprecating her praises in that weak, conscious, and blushing way which seems to ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, April, 1876. • Various
... gave vent to a deprecating grunt. "They won't thank us if they happen to turn around an' ketch us at it. 'Sides, I got to be startin' to'ards home. That ole hoss o' mine ain't used to bein' out nights. Like as not, he's sound asleep this minute, standin' ...
— Viola Gwyn • George Barr McCutcheon
... other boys. He is so sensitive, you can't think how this little affair has hurt him, and I felt that it might even make him ill. You see, I HAD to respect his reason for wanting to join the club. And if I AM his mother"—she gave a deprecating little laugh—"I must say that it seems noble to want to join not really for his own sake but for the good that he felt his influence would have over the other boys. Don't you ...
— Penrod and Sam • Booth Tarkington
... held up both his hands, deprecating her coaxing piteous look, and used his voice rather loudly to overpower hers, and say what he had ...
— Hopes and Fears - scenes from the life of a spinster • Charlotte M. Yonge
... indifferent on that subject as I am waiting in suspense," said Stepan Arkadyevitch, with his most deprecating smile. "I hardly think that the time for such questions ...
— Anna Karenina • Leo Tolstoy
... said, in a deprecating way, as though ashamed of her years and her helplessness. "I'm old enough to work, and I will work if I get where it's any use trying. But I won't keep house ...
— That Girl Montana • Marah Ellis Ryan
... fields who, though they by no means ignored this doctrine of hysteria or even rejected it, were inclined to think that it was too absolutely stated. Writing in the Dictionary of Psychological Medicine at the same time as Charcot, Donkin, while deprecating any exclusive emphasis on the sexual causation, pointed out the enormous part played by the emotions in the production of hysteria, and the great influence of puberty in women due to the greater extent of the sexual organs, and the consequently large area of central innervation involved, ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 1 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... in terrible trouble about him. Unhappily I am in great ignorance of my Father and his life. I only came to live with him a year ago; and I know nothing whatever of his affairs. I do not even know who you are, or in what way your business is associated with him." She said this with a little deprecating smile, all conventional and altogether graceful; as though to express in the most ...
— The Jewel of Seven Stars • Bram Stoker
... down Legation Street like this in the full glare of day, with a knife and regalia proclaiming the dawn of Boxerism in the Capital of Capitals, and withal, was a very ugly sign. What did K—— do—go home and invite some one to write a despatch for him to his government deprecating the growth of the Boxer movement, and the impossibility of carrying out conciliatory instructions, as some of his colleagues, including my own chief, would have done? Not a bit of it! He tilted full at the man with his walking stick, and before he could escape had beaten a regular roll ...
— Indiscreet Letters From Peking • B. L. Putman Weale
... we, Emily? It's because they're our own, you know," the mistress would say, with her deprecating smile. "It's because they're ours, that they seem ...
— Mrs. Day's Daughters • Mary E. Mann
... biscuit accompanied the apostrophe, and poor Amazon, who was indeed very lonely and very hungry, capitulated, and came sidling up to the charmer, with propitiatory smiles, and deprecating stern wagging, beneath her, and in advance of her hind legs, instead of above her and ...
— Mount Music • E. Oe. Somerville and Martin Ross
... its immoral tendency very clearly so soon as it descends from theological seminaries into the lay world. Poets at first begin to justify, on its authority, their favourite passions and to sing the picturesqueness of a blood-stained world. "Practical" men follow, deprecating any reflection which may cast a doubt on the providential justification of their chosen activities, and on the invisible value of the same, however sordid, brutal, or inane they may visibly be. Finally, politicians learn to invoke destiny and the movement of the age to save ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana
... would speed them on their way,—therefore, as I have already been making overtures of reconciliation, first between Polite Literature and Religion, and next between Physics and Theology, so I would now say a word by way of deprecating and protesting against the needless antagonism, which sometimes exists in fact, between divines and the cultivators of ...
— The Idea of a University Defined and Illustrated: In Nine - Discourses Delivered to the Catholics of Dublin • John Henry Newman
... mine under the muslin ruffles of her dress, and her eyes, when she looked at me, held a soft, deprecating expression, as if she were trying to understand, and could not, how she had hurt me. When at last we came to our own door and the General, after insisting again that the only improvement needed to the place was that the big poplars should come down, had driven serenely ...
— The Romance of a Plain Man • Ellen Glasgow
... kahars, or bearers, however, take a different view of life, and at every relief a crowd of sniggering darkies assemble, on both sides, with applications for bukshish. At first one hears, "Sahib, Sahib!" in a deprecating tone of voice, mindful of sudden wakings of former Sahibs, sticks, and consequent sore backs, then piu forte, "Sahib!" crescendo, "Sahib, Sahib!" and then at last, in a burst of harmony, "Sahib purana Baira kutch bukshish mil jawe?"[33] ...
— Diary of a Pedestrian in Cashmere and Thibet • by William Henry Knight
... to complain of," said Fanny, speaking by no means in a defiant tone, but humbly as it were, and deprecating her ladyship's wrath. Fanny had gained one signal victory over Lady Lufton, and on that account, with a prudence equal to her generosity, felt that she could afford to be submissive. It might, perhaps, not be long before she would be equally ...
— Framley Parsonage • Anthony Trollope
... come by the first post in the morning. And she would have waited, no doubt, if she had not been Gwen. Being Gwen, her first instinct was to get away before that letter came, enjoining caution, and deprecating panic, and laying stress on this, that, and the other—a parcel of nonsense all with one object, to counsel pusillanimousness, to inspire trepidation. She knew that would be the upshot. She knew also that Dr. Dalrymple would play double, frightening ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... I believe) a letter from Arago, writing for the plans of our observing-room shutters.—Mr Vernon Harcourt wrote deprecating the tone of my Report on Astronomy as related to English Astronomers, but I refused to alter a word.—Sheepshanks wrote in September in great anxiety about the Cambridge Circle, for which he thought the pier ought to be raised: I would have no such thing, ...
— Autobiography of Sir George Biddell Airy • George Biddell Airy
... of his wife. Women might be illogical, but they were to be considered, for all that. With all his satire and love of argument, Mr. Harcourt valued his wife's comfort before his own. 'I am quite ready, dear,' he said, as she looked up at him with a deprecating smile; 'and I know your ...
— Lover or Friend • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... his hand rather shyly. She had put on her daintiest white frock in his honour, but the rosebuds savoured of vanity to her. She never disputed Malcolm's opinion on any subject, but as she adjusted the flowers she gave Mrs. Herrick a deprecating glance, which the latter ...
— Herb of Grace • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... said to himself, with sudden temper. The outburst seemed to clear his mind. He went to the bell and rang it. A thin woman in a black dress appeared, a woman with a depressed and deprecating expression which was often annoying to Lord Buntingford. It represented somehow an appeal to the sentiment of the spectator for which there was really no sufficient ground. Mrs. Mawson was not a widow, ...
— Helena • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... of music; he was miserable all evening until somebody begged him to sing. When he had bellowed one of his airs, he revived again; strutted about, raised himself on his heels, and received compliments with a deprecating air; but modesty did not prevent him from going from group to group for his meed of praise; and when there was no more to be said about the singer, he returned to the subject of the song, discussing its difficulties or extolling ...
— Two Poets - Lost Illusions Part I • Honore de Balzac
... a frown and he gave a deprecating laugh. "Didn't I knock? Don't look so savage! They told me downstairs you'd got back, and I ...
— The Custom of the Country • Edith Wharton
... the Doctor gave a little bow and deprecating smile. "I am not in any way connected with the Church. I am a doctor of laws and literature,—a humble student of ...
— Ziska - The Problem of a Wicked Soul • Marie Corelli
... A deprecating committeeman turned back, however. "I know you are honest, Morrison. But a lot of us are beginning to think that the general policy in the state regarding outside capital has been a bit too conservative. ...
— All-Wool Morrison • Holman Day
... Pedro had seen her smile in any but a grave, quiet way. Now, accompanied as it was with the half-playful, half-deprecating manner in which she uttered her chiding, it ...
— Old Mission Stories of California • Charles Franklin Carter
... this by you in case of need. I know you will forgive me if I say that I shall go away feeling much happier if you will oblige me by doing what I ask in this matter." Under the tan his face had got very red, and there was a deprecating expression in ...
— Good Old Anna • Marie Belloc Lowndes
... was by my varied life, the suddenness and violence of the thing made me shudder. The man's age, his feeble frame, his humble and deprecating manner, all cried shame against the deed. So hot was my anger, that I was on the point of striding up to the cabin, unarmed as I was, when the sound of voices from within showed me that the victim had recovered. The sun had ...
— Danger! and Other Stories • Arthur Conan Doyle
... deprecating gesture with her hand, as if to entreat her mother to betray no more. But Michael only noticed it by drawing her closer to himself. See, here at last is one being in the wide world who knows how to love him; who in the "Man of Gold" loves the man and not the gold. And it seemed to him ...
— Timar's Two Worlds • Mr Jkai
... himself deprecating the compulsory facilities of communication in the civilized world. The Deanery must be informed of ...
— The Rough Road • William John Locke
... regard to the actor and actress. Nevertheless it was worth while looking at Caterna while his papers were being examined. He assumed the attitude of a criminal endeavoring to mollify a magistrate, he made the sheepiest of eyes, and smiled the most deprecating of smiles, and seemed to implore a grace or rather a favor, and yet the most obdurate of the Chinamen had not a word to say ...
— The Adventures of a Special Correspondent • Jules Verne
... deprecating smile towards Elizabeth, held out his hand. He was tall and of rather a rugged type for the New York stage. Like the rest of the little party, his eyes were full of curiosity as he shook hands ...
— The Cinema Murder • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... art always boasting of the fame of our enemies, deprecating the sons of Dhritarashtra. We know, O Vidura, of whom thou art really fond. Thou always disregardest us as children. That man standeth contest, who wisheth for success unto those that are near to him and defeat unto those that are not his favourites. His ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Part 2 • Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa
... soldier as prolonged suspense, in a critical situation like the present; and he feared lest his ardor might evaporate, and be succeeded by that nervous feeling natural to the bravest soul at such a crisis, and which, if not fear, is near akin to it.6 He returned an answer, therefore, to Atahuallpa, deprecating his change of purpose; and adding that he had provided everything for his entertainment, and expected him that night ...
— History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William Hickling Prescott
... that, sir," the man answered with a deprecating smile. "I think you have been misled by those who did not wish you ...
— A Maker of History • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... another moment, and he might be dragged down, overwhelmed by numbers, torn limb from limb. All that was in him of quelling power he put hastily into his eyes, and manoeuvred his tongue to gentler discourse, deprecating his right to judge "this lady," and merely pointing the marvel, the awful though noble folly, of his resolve. He ended on a note of quiet pathos. "To-night I shall be among the shades. There ...
— Zuleika Dobson - or, An Oxford Love Story • Max Beerbohm
... have thrust a settlement of Ireland's affairs into the foreground of the Peace Conference and to have made it a sine qua non would have been futile and foolish and might have resulted in disaster. Unfortunately, the friends of Irish freedom, deprecating and bitterly resenting well-considered methods like this, were desirous of having the matter thrust into the early conferences at Paris. The President knew that England would never consent to this and would resent any attempt on his part to carry out idea. If the President ...
— Woodrow Wilson as I Know Him • Joseph P. Tumulty
... Europe, and the fortunate mislaying of a certain message deprecating any prompt action, the Governor General took a popular step in deciding to send every available man to the seat of war, and ...
— From Jungle to Java - The Trivial Impressions of a Short Excursion to Netherlands India • Arthur Keyser
... as it were, to the man's fury, even pitifully deprecating it. "What is it? What's there? ...
— At a Winter's Fire • Bernard Edward J. Capes
... call upon Sibylla?" Lionel said to her one day that he had gone to Deerham Court. He spoke in a low, deprecating tone, and his face flushed; he anticipated he knew not ...
— Verner's Pride • Mrs. Henry Wood
... girl hesitated a moment, her eyes going from one eager face to the other with a deprecating glance. No one knew better than she how delightful this change of diet would be; but she quickly put aside her own desire, and ...
— Sara, a Princess • Fannie E. Newberry
... hands with a smile deprecating, intimate; and her shoulder drooped toward him. Her whole being seemed turned toward him. He cuddled her right hand within his, murmuring: "See, my hand's a house where yours can keep warm." Her fingers curled ...
— The Trail of the Hawk - A Comedy of the Seriousness of Life • Sinclair Lewis
... said the tailor, with a deprecating smile. "The hundred was the cash advanced to oblige you, ...
— The Queen's Scarlet - The Adventures and Misadventures of Sir Richard Frayne • George Manville Fenn
... down his nose at the papers in his hand as though deprecating their size] I'll just take Boulter's lease in to young Falder to draft the instructions. [He goes out into ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... said Gerald, 'you believe something like that. Only I can't FEEL it, you see.' He put his hand on Birkin's arm, with a sort of deprecating affection. And he smiled as ...
— Women in Love • D. H. Lawrence
... well established, there was an undercurrent of opposition to him, that kept the price of his work down. The little authors—venomous with spite and jealousy—the little authors, chief among whom was Rufus Griswold of the furtive eye and deprecating voice, were sending forth little whispers defaming his character, exaggerating his weakness and damning his work with faint ...
— The Dreamer - A Romantic Rendering of the Life-Story of Edgar Allan Poe • Mary Newton Stanard
... so sly, so penetrating, so expressively humorous, as should show her at once he was in possession of her secret and master of her fate, and should compel her to humble herself towards him, at least into the look and manner of respectful and deprecating observance. ...
— The Abbot • Sir Walter Scott
... a charm indescribable, this sudden admission of weakness, accompanied by a deprecating, pleading glance, and the Irishman was filled with a sudden sense of having ...
— Max • Katherine Cecil Thurston
... lady, who had dried her eyes the moment she was accused of selfishness, walked, head erect, from the room. Josephine cast a deprecating glance at her mother. "Yes, my angel!" said the latter, "I was harsh. But we are no longer of one mind, and I suppose never shall ...
— White Lies • Charles Reade
... was informed that Yates had breakfasted, and was awaiting orders. He descended to the basement, and stood confronted with a respectable-looking gentleman, who greeted him in a courtly way, yet with a deprecating look in his eyes, which said, as plainly as words could express; "don't humiliate me any more than you can help! Use me, but spare the little pride I ...
— Sevenoaks • J. G. Holland
... in a smugly humble fashion, a deprecating smirk on his face. Out of my experience with stewards on the Atlantic liners at the end of the voyage, I could have sworn he was waiting for his tip. From my fuller knowledge of the creature I now know that the posture was unconscious. An hereditary ...
— The Sea-Wolf • Jack London
... was rather too far removed from the other buildings to be altogether convenient as a living place, but its isolated situation had attracted the boys, and the idea of calling it Hero Cabin was an inspiration of Roy's. Mr. Keller, one of the trustees, had fallen in with the notion and while deprecating the use of this remote shack for regular living quarters, had good-naturedly given his consent that it be used as the honored domicile of any troop a member of which had won an honor medal. Perhaps he thought that, honor medals being not so easily ...
— Tom Slade at Temple Camp • Percy K. Fitzhugh
... to, but the wind's changed into the north, 'n' I thought mebby you wouldn't want 'em out." Jase turned back aimlessly to the door. His voice was getting cracked and husky, and the deprecating note dominated pathetically all that he said. "You'll have to face the wind goin' home," he said to Billy Louise. "More 'n likely you'll be facin' snow, too. Looks bad, ...
— The Ranch at the Wolverine • B. M. Bower
... man, Caius Metellus, had the boldness to ask Sulla in the Senate-house, when there would be an end to these miseries, and how far he would proceed before they could hope to see them stop. "We are not deprecating," he said, "your vengeance against those whom you have determined to put out of the way, but we entreat you to relieve from uncertainty those whom you have determined to spare." Sulla replied, that he had not yet determined whom he would ...
— Plutarch's Lives, Volume II • Aubrey Stewart & George Long
... joined in lamenting his danger and deprecating his exile; and the Princess was so much disturbed with the tumult of grief and indignation that she retired to her apartment. They continued with their kind inviter a few days longer, and then went ...
— Rasselas, Prince of Abyssinia • Samuel Johnson
... he scanned it, melted—changed—became all soft sadness, and deprecating appeal. Never had she seemed to him so fascinating. Never had he felt himself so powerless. He thought, despairingly—"If I had her to myself, I could take her in my arms, and make her ...
— Delia Blanchflower • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... the first thing I remarked, was written paper, deprecating the disgusting depravity which had led some of the visitors to mark and deface the casts in a most indecent and shameless manner. This abomination has unquestionably been occasioned by the coarse-minded custom which sends alternate groups of ...
— Domestic Manners of the Americans • Fanny Trollope
... commenced, Grace clasped her hands, and cast a deprecating look on Henry, as much as to say, "Be moderate." And then her eyes roved to and fro, and the whole woman was in arms, and ...
— Put Yourself in His Place • Charles Reade
... Pennsylvania, and McDuffie, of South Carolina, accordingly strove, by amendments, to narrow down the discussion so as to make it bear upon Mr. Adams or Mr. Clay, and to give countenance to every slander with which the newspapers were teeming against them, but deprecating all general investigations. ...
— Memoir of the Life of John Quincy Adams. • Josiah Quincy
... whole literature of Revolt. Its production brought upon the author a storm of furious denunciation. He had outraged both throne and altar, and his sacrilegious hand had not spared things the most sacrosanct. But a less passionate judgment, while still deprecating something of the author's violence, will recognize the fact that the core of the work is a noble idealism in both politics and religion, and will justify the hot indignation with which the author assails ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 5 • Various
... very little," he said. "When I was a boy I remember thinking how magnificent they were. What an eye opener it must have been for Alec when he realized that he had given up Paris—for this!" and he waved a deprecating hand toward the unkempt houses, yellow washed and dingy; for the White City, though white when seen from a distance, turns out to be an unhealthy looking saffron at close quarters. The Princess cared nothing for the squalor of ...
— A Son of the Immortals • Louis Tracy
... cousin. Nay—one exception there was! Upon a reception-day he did find her in her mother's drawing-room, seated before a samovar, prepared to answer "oui" or "non" to any remark addressed to her. But Ivan had kept his place beside her for less than ten minutes when he was superseded by a deprecating envoy from the Countess. Fifteen minutes later he left the house and went raging home, to endure, for the first time, serious pangs of jealousy. And, as he sat listening to de Windt's calm prophecies of Nathalie's success, next winter, ...
— The Genius • Margaret Horton Potter
... watched him go, and it was not until he was out of earshot that Besnard turned with a deprecating gesture to Hanaud. ...
— At the Villa Rose • A. E. W. Mason
... bite is dangerous to their health, and often attended with serious mischief to the animal bitten. But I have never yet seen a camel kick or attack a man. They invariably grumble and growl, sometimes most piteously, when they are being loaded, as if deprecating the heavy burden about to be placed upon them, and appealing to the mercy of their masters. The merchants pay 13½ Tunisian piastres per cantar for goods now conveyed from Ghadames to Ghat. The Touaricks carry goods cheaper, ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson
... quiet now. "You do not know, yet, what you have seen, but there was a tremendous potential there—an amperage I can't measure with my limited facilities." He waved a deprecating hand about the ill-furnished laboratory. "But you have seen—" His voice trembled and failed at the forming of ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science July 1930 • Various
... looked upon his fool and vouchsafed him What moiety of fastidious wonderment A generous nobleness could deign to give To such humility, with eye superb Where languor and surprise both showed themselves, Each deprecating t'other. "Now, dear knave, Be kind and tell me — tell me quickly, too, — Some proper reasonable ground or cause, Nay, tell me but some shadow of some cause, Nay, hint me but a thin ghost's dream of cause, (So will I thee absolve from being whipped) ...
— The Poems of Sidney Lanier • Sidney Lanier
... he had gone a little too far in his effort to create the proper dramatic setting for his clemency. He had not expected the young woman to "rise" quite so far and high. His deprecating half-apology, half-eulogy, gave ...
— Little Citizens • Myra Kelly
... good! Certainly!" and Del Fortis gave a piously- deprecating nod—"He ought to be made to pay! Especially when he hurts the feelings of his old friends! Are you going, Mr. Jost? Yes? What a pity! But you no doubt ...
— Temporal Power • Marie Corelli
... have us hung for parjery, out and out!" exclaimed the terrified husband, casting a deprecating look at Puck. "Poor craythur, she doesn't know ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 4 October 1848 • Various
... October Montanelli returned to his see in the Romagna, and, before leaving Florence, preached a farewell sermon in which he spoke of the controversy, gently deprecating the vehemence of both writers and begging his unknown defender to set an example of tolerance by closing a useless and unseemly war of words. On the following day the Churchman contained a notice that, at Monsignor Montanelli's publicly expressed desire, "A Son of the ...
— The Gadfly • E. L. Voynich
... overworked brain. The country must open its arms, whether it will or not, and share its blessings. And so the summers and the summerings go on, and there are always to be heard in the land the voices of murmuring boarders, and of landlords deprecating, vindicating. We confess that our sympathies are with the landlords. The average country landlord is an honest, well-meaning man, whose idea of the profit to be made "off boarders" is so moderate and simple that the keepers of city boarding-houses ...
— Bits About Home Matters • Helen Hunt Jackson
... from unexpected sources, so that invitations had to be sent afterwards to the givers. Women who had never crossed the Robinson threshold came now like Hindoo gift-bearers before some deity whom they wished to propitiate. Meeting there, they exchanged droll, half-deprecating glances. Mrs. Robinson's calls had formed the subject of much laughing comment; but weddings were not common in Marshfield, and the desire to be bidden to this one was universal; ...
— Different Girls • Various
... a little deprecating giggle. "I meant it was fine weather for the fields," he explained. He had meant nothing of the kind, of course; he had merely been talking at random in his wish to be civil to that important man, ...
— The House with the Green Shutters • George Douglas Brown
... felt indignant at the unscrupulous way in which the skipper had misrepresented the nature of the officers' recent interview with him, and had conveyed the impression that they were rather favouring than deprecating the severity of his discipline. Such conduct struck me as being not only barbarously tyrannical, but also in the highest degree impolitic; for what could any man of sense expect but that, by persistence in it, he would make good men bad, and bad men worse. ...
— The Rover's Secret - A Tale of the Pirate Cays and Lagoons of Cuba • Harry Collingwood
... the widow's faded eyes for a moment, and her heart gave a throb of grateful surprise at the child's ingenuous friendliness; but she drew back with a deprecating ...
— Apples, Ripe and Rosy, Sir • Mary Catherine Crowley
... it shrinks into retirement from the pretensions of the crowd, goes along with a high and pitying sense of superiority, and a self-complacency of which the good humour never fails. His masters also taught him to value purity. For this he almost makes a sort of deprecating apology. He saw, indeed, "the vanity of this virtue as of all the others"; he admits that it is an unnatural virtue. But he says, "L'homme ne doit jamais se permettre deux hardiesses a la fois. Le libre penseur doit etre regle en ses moeurs." In this doctrine it may be doubted whether ...
— Occasional Papers - Selected from The Guardian, The Times, and The Saturday Review, - 1846-1890 • R.W. Church
... not wish to employ any such person," replied the lady, standing and looking as if no more was to be said; and Clemence could only give a little deprecating bow, and turn away. ...
— Clemence - The Schoolmistress of Waveland • Retta Babcock
... father's place among the violins of an orchestra, and to teach music. As he grew older his father's friends told him he was leading a wretchedly lonely life; that he ought to marry. And at this Haldane smiled his deprecating, affectionate smile—a smile that, somehow, convinced his advisers in ...
— Life at High Tide - Harper's Novelettes • Various |
