"Effrontery" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... all cried out, but Miss Livingstone would not change her mind. "I haven't seen him for three weeks," she said, with gentle effrontery, making nothing of his presence, "and he's much more improving than either of you. I also shall choose the ...
— Hilda - A Story of Calcutta • Sara Jeannette Duncan
... then, whether this provision, after all, refers to "fugitive slaves." Now, although he has said much in regard to "the effrontery of the Southern members of the convention" that formed the Constitution, we may safely defy him, or any other man, to point to any thing in their conduct which approximates to such audacity. What! the clause in question not designed to embrace fugitive slaves? Mr. Butler, even before ...
— Cotton is King and The Pro-Slavery Arguments • Various
... the island led to frequent invasions from France, but while fighting and resistance did not impair the loyalty of the islanders, it nourished a love of freedom, and of hostility to any enemy who had the effrontery to assail it. As a rule the sojourn of these invaders was brief. When sore pressed in a pitched battle on the plateau above St. Peter's Port, the inhabitants would retreat behind the buttresses of Castle Cornet, when, as in the invasion by Charles V. of France, ...
— The Story of Isaac Brock - Hero, Defender and Saviour of Upper Canada, 1812 • Walter R. Nursey
... cross-legged, pipes and tea are brought in, on which a whole crowd of young girls come in and, chatting pleasantly, settle themselves around the guests, observing all the while complete decency even according to the most exacting European ideas. There is not to be seen here any trace of the effrontery and coarseness which are generally to be found in similar places in Europe. One would almost believe that he was among a crowd of school-girls who had given the sour moral lessons of their governess ...
— The Voyage of the Vega round Asia and Europe, Volume I and Volume II • A.E. Nordenskieold
... The man's effrontery did not exasperate her as it obviously exasperated Margaret and Arthur. He amused her, and she was ...
— The Magician • Somerset Maugham
... darling, it's not effrontery, it's calculation, God forgive her! They say you are sending her off to Lavriky; ...
— A House of Gentlefolk • Ivan Turgenev
... is generally one of the youngest in the company, he will always be one of the most modest, not from the vanity which apes humility, but from a natural feeling founded upon reason. He will not have the effrontery of the young fop, who speaks louder than the wise and interrupts the old in order to amuse the company. He will never give any cause for the reply given to Louis XV by an old gentleman who was asked whether he preferred ...
— Emile • Jean-Jacques Rousseau
... young miss closely watched by governess or guardian—a ward in Chancery—an heiress of expectant thousands! It is but "child's play" to break through the entourage that surrounds one of such. To scribble sonnets and scale walls is but an easy task, compared with the bold effrontery that challenges the passions and ...
— The Quadroon - Adventures in the Far West • Mayne Reid
... sits down by MRS. ROBERTS, who has taken a more provisional pose on the sofa. "Mrs. Roberts, you're the only woman in Boston who could hope to get people, with a fireside of their own—or a register—out to a Christmas dinner. You know I still wonder at your effrontery a little?" ...
— The Elevator • William D. Howells
... Of course, it was all very wicked; it is impossible to justify them in any way. In Bayswater and all other haunts of unbridled chastity they were tortured, burnt alive, stewed in oil, and submitted to every conceivable penalty for their saucy effrontery. Yet, somehow, there was a touch about it, this spectacle of four men defying the law and order of the greatest country in the world, which thrilled every man with any devil in him. Peter the Painter is a hero ...
— Nights in London • Thomas Burke
... on board, Adair ordered them to handcuff the whole of the party. The Arabs looked somewhat alarmed, their skipper very much so. "What have you done with my officers and men?" asked Adair. The negoda, recovering himself, with the coolest effrontery made the action of shaking hands, then pointed astern, as if to signify that those whom Adair was asking after had parted good friends and gone ...
— The Three Commanders • W.H.G. Kingston
... With the effrontery of them when they are young, she made room for him on her step, but he declined the invitation, knowing that her design was to skip up the stair the moment he was ...
— Sentimental Tommy - The Story of His Boyhood • J. M. Barrie
... inexperienced to recognize the gulf between frankness and effrontery, but he made her vaguely uneasy. He knew so many things, and yet he was so obviously not quite a gentleman, in her family's sense of the word. He had a curious effect on her, too, one that she resented. He made her insistently conscious of ...
— A Poor Wise Man • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... to be done?" repeated Harriet, as she followed her mother to the house. She was helpless before such effrontery. What awful thing—what awful person had come to Lilia? "Some one in the hotel." The letter only said that. What kind of person? A gentleman? An Englishman? The letter ...
— Where Angels Fear to Tread • E. M. Forster
... off a few feet to get a better look at the terrible stranger. He had not expected opposition and such effrontery was new ...
— Black Bruin - The Biography of a Bear • Clarence Hawkes
... any expedient untried, by which he might be cut off from the possibility of supporting life. The same disposition she endeavoured to diffuse among all those over whom nature or fortune gave her any influence; and, indeed, succeeded too well in her design; but could not always propagate her effrontery with her cruelty; for some of those, whom she incited against him, were ashamed of their own conduct, and boasted of that relief which ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D. in Nine Volumes - Volume the Eighth: The Lives of the Poets, Volume II • Samuel Johnson
... of answering Andreae, he wrote to the bishop of Skara, saying: "Certain persons are beginning to urge that we should not banish Luther's writings, but should study them carefully to the end that we may write against them, as if, forsooth, we were simple enough to trouble ourselves about the effrontery of Luther. He flatters himself that he possesses greater wisdom than all the saints. But we shall bow the knee to God, not man, and shall do our utmost that the kingdom be not corrupted by this ...
— The Swedish Revolution Under Gustavus Vasa • Paul Barron Watson
... the house seemed resolved not to hear him, and a friend urged him to desist—"Speak," he said, "I must, for my speech has been in print for the newspapers this half-hour." Fortunately for him, he was gifted with a coolness and effrontery which were only equalled by his intrepidity, all three of which qualities constantly served his turn in the hour of need. As an instance of his audacity, it may be stated that on one occasion he and another person put forth, ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... intellectual coherence in his talk, but merely pathological coherence. Can the insulting jumble of ignorance and effrontery, of scientific phrase and French paraphrase, of slang and inspired adjective, which he puts forward with the pretence that it represents thought, be regarded, from any possible point of view, as a philosophy, or a system, or a belief? Is it individualism of any statable kind? Do the ...
— Emerson and Other Essays • John Jay Chapman
... were usually honored by the railroad authorities, who reasoned that they could better afford to bear the shameless effrontery of the ermined extortioner than the damage which might result ...
— The Railroad Question - A historical and practical treatise on railroads, and - remedies for their abuses • William Larrabee
... and she thought of a hundred ways in which she could make it brighter for so many of the unfortunates. Her heart was opened to the world, and looking across to Henderson, who was deep in the morning paper, she said, with a wife's unblushing effrontery, ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... replied, 'the Greek has less confidence in me than I thought, and I must take it as a warning. It may be. On the other hand, there is the possibility that Petronilla's effrontery outwits us all. Of course she has done her best to ruin both of us, and perhaps is still trying to persuade Bessas that you keep Veranilda in hiding, whilst I act as your accomplice. If this be the case, ...
— Veranilda • George Gissing
... was taken ashore he had the effrontery to ask for a talk with his cousin. Blythe did not even submit his request to her. Fleming and he were removed from the vessel while the ladies were eating breakfast with Yeager, so that they did not even know until afterward that ...
— The Pirate of Panama - A Tale of the Fight for Buried Treasure • William MacLeod Raine
... Erasmus wittily said, Luther committed two unpardonable sins: he touched the pope's crown and the monks' bellies. Such effrontery would ...
— Luther and the Reformation: - The Life-Springs of Our Liberties • Joseph A. Seiss
... the nature of the country aided the rebels like an ally. Mortal warriors could not contend against wind and storm. But he who from without directed the defence here, who had issued the order to break through the dikes, and then with shameful effrontery had founded in the scarcely rescued city a university which was to nurture the spirit of resistance in the minds of the young men, was again the Prince of Orange; and who else than he, his shrewdness and firmness, robbed ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... may have led them into the church of S. Moise, will remember to have seen there a monument to a famous Scotchman—John Law. This is the last home of an outlaw, a gambler, and an adventurer, who, by his amazing skill and effrontery, plunged the regency into a vortex of speculation, and for a time controlled the finances of France. He persuaded the regent that by a liberal issue of paper money he might wipe out the accumulated national deficit of 100,000,000 livres, revive trade and industry, ...
— The Story of Paris • Thomas Okey
... more than a quarter of a century. In fact, they have reduced the decision to an absolute nullity. That decision, I repeat, is repudiated in the Cincinnati platform; and still, as if to show that effrontery can go no further, Judge Douglas vaunts in the very speeches in which he denounces me for opposing the Dred Scott decision, that he stands on ...
— The Great Conspiracy, Complete • John Alexander Logan
... with cool effrontery, "that assumption of indifference is sublime. But I am not deceived," he continued, with a scornful laugh; "my revenge is most complete, my plans have been entirely successful," and making her a low bow, he retired. And Isabel was left to her own thoughts. But this would not do; she ...
— Isabel Leicester - A Romance • Clotilda Jennings
... abdicated monarch of tragedy and comedy, in Harry the Eighth and Lord Townley. There hang the two Aickins, brethren in mediocrity—Wroughton, who in Kitely seemed to have forgotten that in prouder days he had personated Alexander—the specious form of John Palmer, with the special effrontery of Bobby—Bensley, with the trumpet-tongue, and little Quick (the retired Dioclesian of Islington) with his squeak like a Bart'lemew fiddle. There are fixed, cold as in life, the immovable features of Moody, who, afraid of o'erstepping nature, sometimes stopped ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb
... be discovered thus by the blunder of a servant, he met this little vexation with the characteristic effrontery which had served his turn so well in the endless intrigues of his self-seeking career. Without altering his attitude a hair's breadth, one leg in a silk stocking advanced, his head twisted over his left shoulder, ...
— The Point Of Honor - A Military Tale • Joseph Conrad
... he had given a still better specimen of his effrontery. He had picked up a number of old Harrovians, with whom he had repaired to a tavern for song, supper, and sociability, and as usual in such cases, in the lap of Alma Mater, the babes became sufficiently ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 2 • Grace & Philip Wharton
... that the moderns "are always saying 'you can't put the clock back.' The simple and obvious answer is, 'You can.' A clock, being a piece of human construction, can be restored by the human finger to any figure or hour." The effrontery of an answer like that is so magnificent that it takes one's breath away. The chief difficulty of Mr. Chesterton and Mr. Belloc, however, seems to be that they want their clock to point to two different hours at the same time, neither of which happens to be the hour which the sun has ...
— Old and New Masters • Robert Lynd
... allocated to carry out, replied, "For the love of God hang the damned rascals first, and then let the Bishop deal with them if he did not think hanging was a sufficient degradation." Nothing in the annals of history can surpass the effrontery of these intriguers, which throws a lurid light on the class of administrators who associated with the British nation and spilt the blood of the flower of our land in bolstering up a government that was a disgrace and put all human ...
— Drake, Nelson and Napoleon • Walter Runciman
... to public opinions, bordering on effrontery, was not entirely unattractive to women, but it always, sooner or later, ...
— The Danger Mark • Robert W. Chambers
... a man of mean capacity, and of little reputation for learning or virtue. He had been, during the reign of William, an outrageous Whig; but, finding his services disregarded, he became a violent Tory. By a sort of plausible effrontery and scurrilous rhetoric, he obtained the applause of the people, and the valuable living of St. Saviour, Southwark. The audacity of his railings against the late king and the revolution at last attracted the notice of government; ...
— A Modern History, From the Time of Luther to the Fall of Napoleon - For the Use of Schools and Colleges • John Lord
... call for little but effrontery on my part," said he. "But think how it would affect these boys who came here for the sole purpose of enjoying themselves. I will not so much as mention ...
— Room Number 3 - and Other Detective Stories • Anna Katharine Green
... hypocrite!" his wife almost shouted. "Gambled every day of his life for twenty-five years on the New York Stock Exchange, and now he has the effrontery to make a statement like that! ...
— The Pride of Palomar • Peter B. Kyne
... not altogether as he had represented—that woman is merely a delusion, and poetry merely fiddle-faddle; and that a man cannot escape his fate, and that, though good in war, boldness is, in peace affairs, but naked effrontery. In this, brother, lies the chief, the fundamental law of life. For the world contains certain people of high station, and certain people of low; and so long as these two categories retain their respective ...
— Through Russia • Maxim Gorky
... effrontery of Master Jack, in assigning to me such an office, absolutely left me unable to reply to him; while he continued to expatiate upon the great field for exertion thus open to us both. At last it occurred ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Vol. 2 • Charles James Lever
... He inferred from it that Conolly was ignorant of Susanna's proceedings, but he had not sufficient effrontery to welcome him unconcernedly at once. So he stood still ...
— The Irrational Knot - Being the Second Novel of His Nonage • George Bernard Shaw
... Shirley preserves in the main the great tradition of the Elizabethans. A further step downwards, a more deadly stage in the history of decadence, is marked by Sir William Davenant. That arch-impostor, as is well known, had the effrontery to call himself the "son of Shakespeare": a phrase which the unwary have taken in the physical sense, but which was undoubtedly intended to mark his literary kinship with the Elizabethans in general and with the greatest of Elizabethan dramatists ...
— English literary criticism • Various
... her, and as a milliner thought no more about her, or even if she had opened a hotel, with a bar attached, they would have been willing to greet her as a fellow worker, and all would have had even chances. But her effrontery in opening an eating house, where only water—pure or adulterated with tea or coffee—was drunk—Well, her immaculate pretensions, to use the vernacular of one of ...
— That Girl Montana • Marah Ellis Ryan
... undrooping. For a dramatic instant she paused, as though in the rehearsal of a part—a part of which it might be said that the regent was not alone the author. This triumph of woman over other women, this triumph of vice over other vice, of effrontery over effrontery akin—this could not have been so planned and executed by any but a woman. One another these beauties might tolerate, knowing one another's frailties as they did; yet the elegance, the disdain, the indifference of this newcomer—this ...
— The Mississippi Bubble • Emerson Hough
... to her niece, 'though it is good in a girl not to flaunt these naughtinesses in effrontery, I care for you too much not to say—Be what ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... the time for flying was past; all prudent choice was over, even all reflection was gone for ever, or only admitted on compulsion, when it imperiously forced its way amidst the scenes of tumultuous mirth or licentious passion, of distracted riot, shameless effrontery, and wild intoxication, when it would force its way, even through the walls of ...
— Nature and Art • Mrs. Inchbald
... of red copper, of fair women, and of iron, my share of the spoils that we have taken; but one prize, he who gave has insolently taken away. Tell him all as I now bid you, and tell him in public that the Achaeans may hate him and beware of him should he think that he can yet dupe others for his effrontery ...
— The Iliad • Homer
... their demand; yet he was ready to reward them with money to any extent. The pertinacious ferrymen, who were not anxious for money, then demanded his armor, and this was also refused; and such was their independence or their effrontery, that they replied, "If not one of these four things you are disposed to grant, cross the river as best you may." Giw whispered to Kai-khosrau, and told him that there was no time for delay. "When Kavah, the blacksmith," said ...
— Persian Literature, Volume 1,Comprising The Shah Nameh, The - Rubaiyat, The Divan, and The Gulistan • Anonymous
... absurd in the presence of the fact that the Commission included among its members Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman and Sir William Harcourt. Is it conceivable that these gentlemen held their hands for fear of damaging the Government, or that Mr. Chamberlain could afterwards have the effrontery to publicly and solemnly deny all knowledge of the business in the presence of gentlemen who had connived at the suppression of the proofs that he did know? Such a supposition is ridiculous, and yet it is involved in the theory that the Commission refrained from pushing their examination ...
— The War in South Africa - Its Cause and Conduct • Arthur Conan Doyle
... never!' he heard her exclaim, 'if that's not a nursery rhyme of my childhood that I've not heard for sixty years and more! I declare,' she added with innocent effrontery, 'I've not heard it since I was ten years old. And I was born ...
— A Prisoner in Fairyland • Algernon Blackwood
... after the health of the family, sent in his service to the Doctor, and expressed his intention of coming in to comfort him in his misfortunes. Every drop of Mrs. Mellicent's blood rushed into her face at the effrontery of his proposal, and the familiar terms in which it was couched; but her brother begged her to consider that since no good could arise from appearing to feel an insult which they had not power to punish, the best way would be to seem to regard ...
— The Loyalists, Vol. 1-3 - An Historical Novel • Jane West
... by the merchant's effrontery, Mr. Smith hurries us to the den which the cruel coal-dealer calls his office, and demands to know how it is that, when the nation no longer requires coal for the uses of war, and coal ought, in the very nature of things, to come down, he has actually raised the price ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 103, May, 1866 • Various
... and incomprehensible inconsistency between the child's words and the reality. The little thing tells him gravely, holding up the acorn-cup, that "this is a queen's crown," or "a fairy's boat," and, with beautiful effrontery, expects him to believe the same. But observe—the acorn-cup must be there, and in his own hand. "Give it me; then I will make more of it for myself." That is the ...
— Aratra Pentelici, Seven Lectures on the Elements of Sculpture - Given before the University of Oxford in Michaelmas Term, 1870 • John Ruskin
... I put both of mine behind my back; then, with the utmost effrontery, he leaned forward and plucked away one little black rosette that had fallen loose from my curls and was slipping down upon my shoulder. This he raised to his lips with a laugh, and then fastened upon ...
— Margaret Tudor - A Romance of Old St. Augustine • Annie T. Colcock
... two orders of reason. That distinction issued in a new theory of knowledge. It laid a new foundation for an idealistic construing of the universe. In one way it was the answer of a profoundly religious nature to the triviality and effrontery into which the great rationalistic movement had run out. By it the philosopher gave standing forever to much that prophets and mystics in every age had felt to be true, yet had never been able to prove by any method which the ordered reasoning ...
— Edward Caldwell Moore - Outline of the History of Christian Thought Since Kant • Edward Moore
... Sidwell raised to the towering face, and his eyes fell. Every trace of fight, of effrontery, had left him, and he dropped ...
— Ben Blair - The Story of a Plainsman • Will Lillibridge
... and the effrontery in his eyes repelled the old, vanishing self in her, yet drew all her awakening sensuousness. He saw enough in her face to impel him to take her hand and hold it while he said his ...
— The Awakening and Selected Short Stories • Kate Chopin
... the entire assembly followed him curiously as he went back to his corner, and Black Tex was so taken aback by this unexpected effrontery on the part of his guest that he made no reply whatever. Then, perceiving that his business methods had been questioned, he drew ...
— Hidden Water • Dane Coolidge
... again, but, alas! it brought no balm to the congregation; rather, was it a day of unrest. The plate-glass window still flashed in iniquitous effrontery; still the ungodly proprietor allured the stream ...
— Ghetto Comedies • Israel Zangwill
... whole gigantic glory of Skale's purpose came upon him like a tempest. The magnificent effrontery by which the man sought to storm his way to heaven again laid its spell upon him. The reaction was of amazing swiftness. It almost seemed as though time ceased to operate, so instantaneously did his mood ...
— The Human Chord • Algernon Blackwood
... quilts; some were of the "log cabin" and "rising sun" variety, but others were of geometric intricacy of form and were kaleidoscopic of color with an amazing labyrinth of stitchings and embroideries—it seemed a species of effrontery to dub one gorgeous poly-tinted silken banner a quilt. But already it bore a blue ribbon, and its owner was the richer by the prize of a glass bowl and the envy of a score of deft-handed competitors. She gazed upon the glittering ...
— The Mystery of Witch-Face Mountain and Other Stories • Charles Egbert Craddock
... anecdotes fresh and sparkling. The tone of light banter and raillery in which he described public life in Greece and Greek statesmen, might have lost some of its authority had any one remembered to count the hours the speaker had spent in Athens; and Nina was certainly indignant at the hazardous effrontery of the criticisms. It was not, then, without intention that she arose to retire while Atlee was relating an interesting story of brigandage, and he—determined to repay the impertinence in kind—continued to recount his history as he arose ...
— Lord Kilgobbin • Charles Lever
... phases makes variety. There are only a few themes in current American short stories,—the sentimental theme from which breed ten thousand narratives; the theme of intellectual analysis and of moral psychology favored by the "literary" magazines; the "big-business" theme; the theme of American effrontery; the social-contrast theme; the theme of successful crime. Add a few more, and you will have them all. Read a hundred examples, and you will see how infallibly the authors— always excepting our few masters—limit themselves to ...
— Definitions • Henry Seidel Canby
... added that Miss Avellanos was quite aware of his new and unexpected vocation, which in Costaguana was generally the speciality of half-educated negroes and wholly penniless lawyers. Then, confronting with a sort of urbane effrontery Mrs. Gould's gaze, now turned sympathetically upon himself, he breathed out ...
— Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard • Joseph Conrad
... that former self had been beguiled. As if to give emphasis to his jest he arose from his box, lounged over to the window, cleared its panes of mist with his hand, and gazed out upon the landscape of his choice. It stared back at him with immobile effrontery, with the glazed wide-parted eyes of the prostrate prize-fighter who, in his falling, has been stunned—eyes in which hatred is the only sign of life. He threw back his head and guffawed at the conceit, as though it had been conceived by a brain and given utterance to by a voice other than his ...
— Murder Point - A Tale of Keewatin • Coningsby Dawson
... time in dwelling on the guilt of this man before you, from whose cruelty you have rescued yourselves by force of arms, nor will I suffer him to add impudence to his other crimes in defending himself. Wherefore, Appius Claudius, I pardon you for all the impious and nefarious deeds you have had the effrontery to commit one after another for the last two years; with respect to one charge only, unless you shall choose a judge who shall acquit you that you have not sentenced a free person to slavery, contrary to the laws, I shall order that you be taken into custody." ...
— Roman History, Books I-III • Titus Livius
... which it may not be amiss to cast a glance. It is of recent date and consists of German elements already resident in the Tsardom. It is a monument of Teuton audacity and Slav forbearance. One might ransack the history of European nations without finding another such instance of downright effrontery and disloyalty on the part of a privileged section of the community, and of easy-going toleration on the part of the State. The German elements of the provinces of Kurland and Livland, subjects of the ...
— England and Germany • Emile Joseph Dillon
... years younger; and although by no means a man of small stature, he was but a pigmy alongside his gigantic companion. His countenance also lacked the serenity which distinguished that of the other—his black eyes gave out an expression of boldness approaching to effrontery; and the play of his features indicated a man whose passions, fiery by nature, once aroused, would lead him into acts of violence—even of cruelty. Everything about him bespoke the second trapper to be a man of different race from his companion—a man in whose ...
— Wood Rangers - The Trappers of Sonora • Mayne Reid
... full the hue of his manly tan. The red flush of his shocked contrition touched his cheeks, and, all in all, whatever the daughter of Julius Marston, Wall Street priest of high finance, may have thought of his effrontery, the melting look she gave him from under lowered eyelids indicated her appreciation ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... been the rule of my conduct—wherefore from my youth up I have had no occasion to repent of any action—I will be content to receive Mesopotamia and Armenia, which was fraudulently extorted from my grandfather. We Persians have never admitted the principle, which you proclaim with such effrontery, that success in war is always glorious, whether it be the fruit of courage or trickery. In conclusion, if you will take the advice of one who speaks for your good, sacrifice a small tract of territory, one always in dispute and ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 7. (of 7): The Sassanian or New Persian Empire • George Rawlinson
... dear. We were in by eleven." This was a faint attempt to help dignity by a parade of accuracy in figures, and an affectation of effrontery. "But really we needn't go over it again. You know what a nice letter he wrote Aunt Frances?" And instead of waiting for an answer, Tishy, perhaps to avoid catechism about the moonrise and things, ploughs straight on into a recitation of her lover's ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... have been more hateful than this trial, in which Almagro and Pizarro were at the same time both suitors and judges. The heads of the accusation were so ridiculous and absurd, that one is in doubt whether to be most surprised by the effrontery or the wickedness of Pizarro, in subjecting the head of a powerful empire, over which he had no jurisdiction, to such an inquiry. Atahualpa, being found guilty, was condemned to be burnt alive; but ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part I. The Exploration of the World • Jules Verne
... escorted him to the institution, carrying his bag, as what with his disease and his antidote he was weak. The hospital was a block away from the lagoon. It was surrounded by a high stone wall, and as it was built by the military, it was ugly and had the ridiculous effrontery of the army and all its lack of common sense. The iron gate was shut, and a sign said, "Sonnez s'il vous plait!" A toothless French portiere of thirty years let us in. All the doctors of Tahiti had left the island for a few days on ...
— Mystic Isles of the South Seas. • Frederick O'Brien
... thing they did was to sink my schooner—in the morning you will see her spars sticking up through the ice out in front there. One of their tugs 'accidentally' ran her down, although she was at anchor fully three hundred feet inside the channel line. Then Marsh actually had the effrontery to come here personally and demand damages for the injury to his towboat, claiming there were ...
— The Silver Horde • Rex Beach
... combined with considerable information and talent. Still, however, in order to such a person {p.045} being actually spoiled by his mixing in such debates, his talents must be of a very rare nature, or his effrontery must be proof to every species of assault; for there is generally, in a well-selected society of this nature, talent sufficient to meet the forwardest, and satire enough to penetrate the most undaunted. I am particularly obliged to this sort of club for introducing me about my seventeenth year ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume I (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart
... yourself as well as to me: the fear of shocking you led me just now to conceal what a greater fear now urges me to mention. The honour I have had in view is already known to many, and in a very short time there are none will be ignorant of it. That impudent young man, Morrice, had the effrontery to rally me upon my passion for you, and though I reproved him with great asperity, he followed me into a coffee-house, whither I went merely to avoid him. There I forced myself to stay, till I saw him engaged with a news-paper, and then, through various private streets and ...
— Cecilia vol. 2 - Memoirs of an Heiress • Frances (Fanny) Burney (Madame d'Arblay)
... when there arose a babel of howls. He turned round and came out again, facing the crowd. I can see him now, all splashed and muddy, with his shirt open at the neck. He was pale, ugly, and sinister; but he surveyed us all with entire effrontery, drew out a pince-nez, being very short-sighted, and then looked calmly round as if surprised. I have certainly never seen such an exhibition of courage in my life. He knew that he had not a single friend present, and he did not know that he would not be maltreated—there ...
— Where No Fear Was - A Book About Fear • Arthur Christopher Benson
... and might put any one of them out of the way either on his own responsibility or with the consent of the rest; it was ridiculous to suppose that they could offer any opposition or refuse to condemn a man. Some would praise Titus, only not in Domitian's hearing; for such effrontery would be deemed as grave an offence as if they were to revile the emperor in his presence and within hearing: but [Lacuna] [Footnote: A gap must probably be construed here. Bekker (followed by Dindorf) regarded it as coming after "secretly" and consisting ...
— Dio's Rome, Volume V., Books 61-76 (A.D. 54-211) • Cassius Dio
... difficulty vacant rooms in a second-rate pension in Passy. The food was even worse than at the hotel, the rooms were barely heated, and as trams at Alexina's hours were airless and jammed, and taxicabs in swarming Paris as scarce as tiaras, with drivers of an unsurpassable effrontery, she was forced to walk three miles a day in all weathers. It is true that she could have rented a limousine for a thousand francs a month, but it was almost a religion with workers of her class to ...
— The Sisters-In-Law • Gertrude Atherton
... by all the ill luck in the world? Who else could have had the effrontery? She dared not turn to look, both in fear of falling, and in shame at being caught in that absurd predicament. What a sight! she thought. Her skirt was above her knees, and one stocking, caught by a projection of bark, had slipped ...
— The Heart of Thunder Mountain • Edfrid A. Bingham
... fitness of her coming to mass, and receiving as sacred the sacrament and sacramentals of the Holy Ghost. "If these things were in the word of God," said Mrs. Lewes, "I would with all my heart receive, believe, and esteem them." The bishop, with the most ignorant and impious effrontery, replied, "If thou wilt believe no more than what is warranted by scripture, thou art in a state of damnation!" Astonished at such a declaration, this worthy sufferer ably rejoined, "that his words were as impure, as they ...
— Fox's Book of Martyrs - Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant - Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs • John Fox
... short second all things seemed to whiz about him; the certainty of detection overpowered his mind. The indisputable knowledge that he was John Loder and no other, despite all armor of effrontery and dress, so dominated him that all other considerations shrank before it. It wanted but one word, one simple word of denunciation, and the whole scheme was shattered. In the dismay of the moment, he almost wished that the word might be spoken ...
— The Masquerader • Katherine Cecil Thurston
... the affair had been thoroughly investigated by them, my guilt established beyond the possibility of doubt, and yet my accusers had actually been dismissed while I was retained.* This is cited as an example of Republican rule; and the writer had the effrontery to ask, "How long shall such things be?" I did not reply to it then, nor do I intend to do so now. Such assertions from such sources need no replies. I merely mention the incident to show how wholly given to party prejudices some men can be. They seem to have no ...
— Henry Ossian Flipper, The Colored Cadet at West Point • Henry Ossian Flipper
... in my indignation, I fell back upon first principles. What right has this man to the soil he thus guards with dragons? What excessive effrontery, to lay sole claim to a solid piece of this planet, right down to the earth's axis, and, perhaps, straight through to the antipodes! For a moment I thought I would test his traps, and enter the ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville
... previous dishonest actions of which he had been guilty. His story is worthy of narration, as being no bad instance of the career of a Turkish parvenu, whose only qualifications were a little education and a large amount of effrontery. ...
— Herzegovina - Or, Omer Pacha and the Christian Rebels • George Arbuthnot
... great faith in examinations, for he noticed that boys never did so well in them as in form: it was disappointing, but not significant. In due course they were moved up, having learned little but a cheerful effrontery in the distortion of truth, which was possibly of greater service to them in after life than an ability to read Latin ...
— Of Human Bondage • W. Somerset Maugham
... on their part endeavored to bring matters to a satisfactory termination and secure the punishment of the Ring; but the members of that body met them at every step with defiance and effrontery. They used every means in their power to prevent an investigation of the public accounts, and to defeat the efforts that were made to recover the money they had stolen from the city. Meanwhile the Citizens' Committee labored faithfully, and, through the efforts of Mr. Tilden, evidence ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe
... the faithful critic of his master—the dramatist presented one whose cynical incredulity and scorn of all religion are united with the most complete moral licence; but hypocrisy is the fashion of the day, and Don Juan in sheer effrontery will invest himself for an hour in the robe of a penitent. Atheist and libertine as he is, there is a certain glamour of reckless courage about the figure of his hero, recreated by Moliere from a favourite model of Spanish origin. His comedy, while a vigorous study of character, is ...
— A History of French Literature - Short Histories of the Literatures of the World: II. • Edward Dowden
... consumption of distilled spirits, it would have been apparent that it was well calculated to promote the purposes intended; but, surely, to assert that it will obstruct the use of these liquors, is to discover a degree either of ignorance, of effrontery, or of folly, by which few ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 11. - Parlimentary Debates II. • Samuel Johnson
... continued Mrs. Osborne, in a broken voice. "After all this had happened, the scoundrel had the effrontery to renew his suit, and say if Emma would marry him he would see that Mr. Osborne was released; that he had powerful political friends who could accomplish this. We spurned his proposition as it deserved. I knew my husband would rather rot in ...
— Raiding with Morgan • Byron A. Dunn
... eggs that should have made their breakfasts, eager to wreak vengeance upon their employer; but a printer in the pillory has advantages over others traders, and Curll had caused handbills to be struck off and distributed amongst the crowd, stating, with his usual effrontery, that he was put in the pillory for vindicating the blessed memory of her late Majesty Queen Anne. This either touched or tickled the mob—it does not matter which—who protected Curll whilst he stood on high from further outrage, and ...
— Obiter Dicta - Second Series • Augustine Birrell
... with whom Mrs. Budlong had never exchanged Christmas presents, at all, but with whom an intimacy had sprung up since Mrs. Budlong came into the reputation of her money—Myra Eppley had the effrontery to call up on the telephone ...
— Mrs. Budlong's Chrismas Presents • Rupert Hughes
... council of five called to discuss the enormity of the doctor's conduct and his growing record of outrages upon humanity. "To extract a portion of the intestines was madness and murder, for who can exist without intestines as God made them?—and his effrontery to put the blame upon the women who in the tenderness of their hearts had fed the youth on dhal and rice for the restoration of his strength—ai Khodar! What harm was there ever in plain dhal and rice? It was but an excuse, and now there is Gunesh ...
— Banked Fires • E. W. (Ethel Winifred) Savi
... be arguing against an impenetrable obstinacy," snapped the Professor. "Do you, Roger, who were educated under my own eye, in my house, have the effrontery to tell me that you believe Miss Michell is descended from the union of an evil spirit and a human being; as the Eastern legends ...
— The Thing from the Lake • Eleanor M. Ingram
... but to be sacrificed to the gods; so that they were jeered by the mob who thronged around them, as it was plain to all that they were equally afraid to sacrifice and to die. Others advanced more briskly, carrying their effrontery so far as to avow that they never had been Christians." [301:2] Multitudes now withdrew into deserts or mountains, and there perished with cold and hunger. The prisons were everywhere crowded with Christians; and the magistrates ...
— The Ancient Church - Its History, Doctrine, Worship, and Constitution • W.D. [William Dool] Killen
... the deck with a confident tread, and mounted the steps to the poop. His eyes were gloomy, his teeth set, his fists clenched convulsively. His appearance betrayed neither effrontery nor timidity. When he found himself in the presence of Lord Glenarvan he folded his arms and awaited the ...
— In Search of the Castaways • Jules Verne
... I have never given any orders to Messrs. Hamon and Company, tailors, rue de Helder, they have no claim on me; and I am positively compelled to repudiate the bill for 1371 francs which you have the effrontery to demand in ...
— The Magnificent Montez - From Courtesan to Convert • Horace Wyndham
... a long stare, I choking down my temper, he smooth and placid, to outward seeming, as the idol he resembled. The resolution with which he stuck to his silly pose was, in its way, a rogue's masterpiece; nothing more exasperating than this stolid effrontery was ever devised. The scoundrel feared, and yet knew he had, in a sense, the better of me; the helpless old man between ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol 31, No 2, June 1908 • Various
... slave-holders and slave-catchers in visiting Massachusetts in pursuit of their runaway property, would be met by just such weapons as Theodore Parker presented William with, to the surprise of all Boston, the owners of William and Ellen actually had the effrontery to attempt their recapture under the Fugitive Slave Law. How it was done, and the results, taken from the Old Liberator, (William Lloyd Garrison's organ), we copy ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still
... mention how many of my salutary advices you have despised: I have given you line upon line and precept upon precept; and while I was chalking out to you the straight way to wealth and character, with audacious effrontery you have zigzagged across the path, contemning me to my face; you know the consequences. It is not yet three months since home was so hot for you, that you were on the wing for the western shore of the Atlantic, not to make a fortune, but to hide ...
— The Letters of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... another day and then expired. Before the funeral ceremonies were over, I had seen how Mademoiselle de Gringrimeau tyrannise over this young sister-in-law, who was still a mere gentle child, and was absolutely cowed by the woman. When I tried to take her home with me, Mademoiselle had the effrontery to say that the Count himself, as well as the late dowager, had given her authority over Madame as dame de compagnie, and that she did not consider it etiquette to visit after so recent a bereavement, thus ...
— Stray Pearls • Charlotte M. Yonge
... affection, helping her in many ways, and submitting to her guidance in every little social matter with the charming humility of a docile and obedient spirit all too rare in these days when youth is more full of effrontery than modesty. She had managed her "literary" business so far well and carefully, representing herself as the private secretary of an author who wished to remain anonymous, and who had gone abroad, entrusting her with his manuscript to ...
— Innocent - Her Fancy and His Fact • Marie Corelli
... they had seized some of the friendly Indians who had gone there to feast with their friends, had wounded the Indian slave of a soldier, beaten and frightened two or three others, and wounded another soldier with an arrow. When the effrontery of the Moros was seen, and that they could do us some injury with their artillery, it was decided to attack them. [32] Therefore in the twinkling of an eye, the Spaniards attacked and took the palisade, hurling down the bombardiers with linstock in hand, ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1803 - Volume III, 1569-1576 • E.H. Blair
... could be no doubt as to the course which should be pursued with regard to the unfortunate man. His offences of fifteen years before had been suffered to pass into oblivion. Even his great {127} crime—the atrocious murder of Thomas Scott—had gone unwhipped of justice. His subsequent effrontery in offering himself for election and attempting to take his seat in parliament had been visited with no greater punishment than expulsion from the House of Commons. Now he had suddenly emerged from his obscurity in the United States to lead the half-breeds ...
— The Day of Sir John Macdonald - A Chronicle of the First Prime Minister of the Dominion • Joseph Pope
... her eyebrows. Her beautiful eyes were dark, her nose short, while her superb teeth and rich, ruby-colored lips gave her the effect of a pretty doll; and she had gayety, playful vivacity, gracious effrontery, and a passionate caressing glance. Dressed extravagantly, like the Parisian woman who has not a sou, but who adorns everything she wears, she had an ease, a freedom, a natural elegance that was charming. With this ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... ballad, or mere nursery rhyme, has survived in right of some intrinsic merit of its own, and will not be snuffed out of existence by any of our precautionary or hygienic measures. . . . Puss in Boots is one long record of triumphant effrontery and deception. An honest and self-respecting lad would have explained to the king that he was not the Marquis of Carabas at all; that he had no desire to profit by his cat's ingenious falsehoods, and no weak ambition to connect ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry
... French minister, undertook to fit out privateers in Charleston. Washington issued a proclamation of neutrality (1793), which was followed by a Neutrality Act of Congress (1794). When Genet had the effrontery to appeal from the President to the people, at the demand of Washington ...
— Outline of Universal History • George Park Fisher
... certainty, from the compositions of his great archetype. Hawkesworth was his closest imitator, a circumstance of which that writer would once have been proud to be told; though, when he had become elated by having risen into some degree of consequence, he, in a conversation with me, had the provoking effrontery to say he was ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell
... the poor hidalgo, unwilling to expose their poverty, they wore this cloak by turns, those who had no right to it remaining at home.2 Whether true or not, the anecdote well illustrates the extremity to which Almagro's faction was reduced. And this distress was rendered yet more galling by the effrontery of their enemies, who, enriched by their forfeitures, displayed before their eyes all the insolent bravery of equipage and apparel that ...
— History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William Hickling Prescott
... prevenient capacity for a new degree which yet they have not attained. I know our moralists look upon themselves as matchless, in talking of following his steps as he hath left us an example; in this they make a flourishing with flanting effrontery, but for all their boasting of wisdom, such a poor simple man as I, am made to wonder at their folly, who proposing, as they say, the purity of Christ as their pattern, are not even thence convinced, that in order to ...
— Christ The Way, The Truth, and The Life • John Brown (of Wamphray)
... persecutions which they endured. Hence Bernard de Foucald (Monastier History), a writer of the twelfth century, says, "These Waldenses, although condemned by Pope Lucius II., continued to pour forth, with daring effrontery, far and wide all over the world, ...
— The Vaudois of Piedmont - A Visit to their Valleys • John Napper Worsfold
... limit to Martha's wrath when she learned that she was going to be left behind. Her effrontery was so great that she advised her mistress "for her own sake" not to put such an affront upon her, since she would not submit to it without seeking revenge. But her mistress never dreamed of what Martha was planning, and ...
— The Most Interesting Stories of All Nations • Julian Hawthorne
... started back in indignation and horror. "Not want to be introduced to Lady Fashion! the girl must be out of her senses! Not one moment longer shall Folly condescend to stay near one who has the effrontery to own that she does not want to be introduced to Lady Fashion!" and, snatching up her cockatoo, Parade, Miss Folly rushed out of the cottage as fast as her mass of ...
— The Crown of Success • Charlotte Maria Tucker
... understand. They regret it deeply, and beg you to overlook their misbehavior.' The government clerk was softened once more. 'I consent, count, and am ready to overlook it; but you perceive that my wife—my wife's a respectable woman —has been exposed to the persecution, and insults, and effrontery of young upstarts, scoundrels....' And you must understand, the young upstarts are present all the while, and I have to keep the peace between them. Again I call out all my diplomacy, and again as soon as the thing was ...
— Anna Karenina • Leo Tolstoy
... thrive on sensations. The yellow journal with its blatant enthusiasms and its brazen effrontery finds a congenial habitat there, not because it is brazen, nor even because it is enthusiastic, but because it supplies a community need. The screaming headline is a mental cocktail. Bellowed forth by a trombone-lunged newsboy, it crashes against ...
— Little Lost Sister • Virginia Brooks
... alone. That Sophia should be at large in the town, without leave, without notice, exactly as if she were her own mistress, was a proposition which a day earlier had been inconceivable. Yet there she was, and moving with a leisureliness that must be described as effrontery! ...
— The Old Wives' Tale • Arnold Bennett
... retreated behind the instrument, and strove hard to get the drum recognised as an essential of the office. When Duncan recoiled from the drum with indignation, but without losing the support of his party, the opposition had the effrontery to propose a bell: that he rejected with a vehemence of scorn that had nearly ruined his cause; and, assuming straightway the position of chief party in the proposed contract, declared that no noise of his making should be other than the noise of bagpipes; that he ...
— Malcolm • George MacDonald
... nothing else for it," admitted Steingall with a shrug. Be it remembered he had seen Curtis, and heard his story. If such a man had committed the most daring crime recorded in New York during a decade, and had flouted the police with such cool effrontery, he (Steingall) would never again ...
— One Wonderful Night - A Romance of New York • Louis Tracy
... evaded recognition, nor had he made the slightest attempt to alter his appearance. From his bold insouciance it seemed evident that he was totally indifferent as to who recognized him. Either the man possessed moral courage of the extremest sort or else an unbelievable effrontery. ...
— The Winds of Chance • Rex Beach
... receiving its envoys and doing homage. To the Pope he turned for support against the infidel, but his only response was that Michael should first adopt the true faith—he being, of course, a member of the schismatic Greek Church; and just before entering Moldavia with his army he had the effrontery, in order to throw Mogila off his guard, to propose a marriage between his daughter and Mogila's son. Finally, in order to secure the obedience of his subjects in Siebenbuergen during his absence in Moldavia, he sent a large number of Transylvanian nobles to his son ...
— Roumania Past and Present • James Samuelson
... had been taught how to value the friar's censures, listened attentively, and sought to draw him out by ambiguous answers. "Wherefore this wrath, Sir?" he began. "Have I crucified Christ?" "Ay, mark the fellow's effrontery!" retorted the friar: "list to what he says! He talks, forsooth, as if 'twere a year or so since, and his villanies and lewdnesses were clean gone from his memory for lapse of time. Between matins and now hast thou forgotten this morning's outrage? Where wast thou this morning ...
— The Decameron, Volume I • Giovanni Boccaccio
... justified in asking that the whole being and the most sacred thing in life should be given over utterly to him? It seems astounding that any man should ever have the impudence to answer such questions in the affirmative. Doubtless he would not have had such effrontery ...
— The Heart of Nature - or, The Quest for Natural Beauty • Francis Younghusband
... felt for his cigar-case, really forgetting that it was gone, like all other incidents of his old self; while Jolland giggled with unrestrained delight at such charming effrontery. ...
— Vice Versa - or A Lesson to Fathers • F. Anstey
... external guarantee. Two cardinals, who, at the same time, were princes of ruling houses, Giovanni d'Aragona, son of King Ferrante, and Ascanio Sforza, brother of Lodovico il Moro, sold their votes with shameless effrontery; so that, at any rate, the ruling houses of Naples and Milan became interested, by their participation in the booty, in the continuance of the papal system. Once again, in the following conclave, when all the cardinals ...
— The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy • Jacob Burckhardt
... used the word with the deference some men can combine with effrontery, so that very tenderness has barbs. "You might have had that thing back if you had sent a messenger for it at any time. A word by a ...
— King—of the Khyber Rifles • Talbot Mundy
... think you'd do such a caddish thing as that. Think it over for a minute. You come down here; you sweep that unfortunate girl off her feet; you make love to her with the fury of a stage villain; you force her to betray her very evident partiality for you—and then you have the effrontery to say: 'Good-by. ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VI. (of X.) • Various
... twenty-third, 1812, he presented himself to the commander of the Paris guard, announcing Napoleon's death on the seventh; by the use of a forged decree of the senate purporting to establish a provisional republican government, and by the display of an amazing effrontery, he secured the adhesion of both men and officers. Marching at their heads, he liberated his accomplices, Lahorie and Guidal, from La Force, seized both Savary and Pasquier, minister and prefect ...
— The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte - Vol. III. (of IV.) • William Milligan Sloane
... separately from the power of execution." One need not be a composer, but one must be able to feel with a composer before he can discuss his productions as they ought to be discussed. Not all the writers for the press are able to do this; many depend upon effrontery and a copious use of technical phrases to carry them through. The musician, alas! encourages this method whenever he gets a chance; nine times out of ten, when an opportunity to review a composition falls to him, he approaches it on its technical side. Yet music ...
— How to Listen to Music, 7th ed. - Hints and Suggestions to Untaught Lovers of the Art • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... much physical fatigue by way of relief as satisfied this powerful frontiersman for the day. He, at least, like all the educated class, did so much homage to industry as to persuade himself he was industrious. But the average mechanic recognises his idleness with effrontery; he has even, as I am ...
— Essays of Travel • Robert Louis Stevenson
... his nightly attendance at the Beargarden, but still with some faint hope that he might have remained on this special occasion to tell her of his fortune. She had watched the whispering, had noticed the cool effrontery with which Felix had spoken,—for without hearing the words she had almost known the very moment in which he was asking,—and had seen the girl's timid face, and eyes turned to the ground, and the nervous twitching ...
— The Way We Live Now • Anthony Trollope
... constitutional principles, which the language of some of the advocates of the Court was by no means calculated to allay. Among others, a Noble Earl,—one of those awkward worshippers of power, who bring ridicule alike upon their idol and themselves,—had the foolish effrontery, in the House of Lords, to eulogize the moderation which His Majesty had displayed, in not following the recent example of the king of Sweden, and employing the sword, with which the hour of difficulty had armed him, for the subversion of ...
— Memoirs of the Life of the Rt. Hon. Richard Brinsley Sheridan V1 • Thomas Moore
... provincial audience to interest a young gentleman fresh from the capital. Odo looked about for any one resembling the masked beauty of the market-place; but he beheld only ill-dressed dowagers and matrons, or ladies of the town more conspicuous for their effrontery than for ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton
... Yet the Directors were, almost without exception, men of mediocre talents, [Footnote: Carnot, upright and sincere, and the only member of first-rate ability, was forced out of the Directory in 1797.] who practiced bribery and corruption with unblushing effrontery. They preferred their personal gain to the welfare ...
— A Political and Social History of Modern Europe V.1. • Carlton J. H. Hayes
... The startling effrontery of the proposal provoked Roswell, and he told her that so far as a separation from himself was concerned she should be gratified to her heart's content, and that while she remained as she was he would not divulge the marriage, but he warned her that if she should attempt ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson
... Anne Boleyn's death and the king's third marriage, the chancellor dared to address the English legislature in these terms: and either he spoke like a reasonable man, which he may have done, or else he was making an exhibition of effrontery to be paralleled only by Seneca's letter to the Roman Senate after the murder of Agrippina. The legislature adopted the first interpretation, and the heads of the speech were embodied in an act of parliament. While the ...
— History of England from the Fall of Wolsey to the Death of Elizabeth. Vol. II. • James Anthony Froude
... generally clamored for the right, nor by the fact that some protest against it. In Persia, it is a law of society that virtuous women shall appear in public with their faces covered, and instead of murmuring at the restraint, they are universal in upholding it, and wonder at the immodesty and effrontery of English women who appear upon the streets unveiled. Custom hardens us to any kind of degradation. When woman was not admitted to the dinner-table as an equal with man, she undoubtedly thought ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various
... hadn't I done so before? "You ought to be ashamed of yourself," I said aloud. "Could it really have entered your head to ask the man for a shilling and put him to inconvenience again?" and I got downright angry with myself for the effrontery of which I had almost been guilty. "That is, by God! the shabbiest thing I ever heard," said I, "to rush at a man and nearly tear the eyes out of his head just because you happen to need a shilling, you miserable dog! So—o, march! quicker! quicker! you big thumping ...
— Hunger • Knut Hamsun
... found me in this lonely spot, moved more by his own villainy than by my beauty, sought to take advantage of the opportunity which these solitudes seemed to present him, and with little shame and less fear of God and respect for me, began to make overtures to me; and finding that I replied to the effrontery of his proposals with justly severe language, he laid aside the entreaties which he had employed at first, and began ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... to talk, but was so annoyed by the quick effrontery with which Westcott had carried the day that he could not say anything quite to his own satisfaction. At last Dave rose to go, and said he had thought maybe he mout git a chance to explain things to Miss Charlton ef Mr. Westcott hadn't gone ...
— The Mystery of Metropolisville • Edward Eggleston
... of our patronage. On my representing the enormity of his former conduct, he declared that it was all a mistake; that he was the master of the hotel, and was unfortunately absent at the time. I was pleased with this effrontery, having paid the exorbitant charge into his own hands, not a month before. It is delightful, in these remote, desolate, and semi-barbarous regions, to meet with characteristics that remind us of a ...
— Journal of an African Cruiser • Horatio Bridge
... returned his gaze with terror. They who had but a moment before been so bold, now became confused; and all their wicked effrontery left them. They were condemned, and afterwards acknowledged that, in the presence of the cat, they, for the first time during the whole course of the horrid business, felt their courage ...
— Minnie's Pet Cat • Madeline Leslie
... personal estates, pensions, and offices. A great number of priests and Roman catholics, who had been frighted away by the revolution, were now encouraged by the treaty of Ryswick to return, and appeared in all public places of London and Westminster with remarkable effrontery. The enemies of the government whispered about that the treaty contained a secret article in favour of those who professed that religion; and some did not even scruple to insinuate that William was a papist in his heart. The commons, alarmed at the number and ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... confined to the line of his profession. He had at different times resided a good deal in England, and his address was free both from country rusticity and professional pedantry; so that he had considerable powers both of address and persuasion, joined to an unshaken effrontery, which he affected to disguise under plainness of manner. Confident, therefore, in himself, he appeared at Woodbourne about ten in the morning, and was admitted as a gentleman come to wait ...
— Guy Mannering, or The Astrologer, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... can not coherently define it—do you really think yourself wiser than Jesus of Nazareth? Do you seriously suppose yourselves competent to amend his plan for dealing with all the evils besetting states and souls? Have you the effrontery to believe that those who spurn his Golden Rule you can bind to obedience of an act entitled an act to amend an act? Bah! you fatigue the spirit. Go get ye to your scoundrel lockouts, your villain strikes, your blacklisting, your boycotting, your speech-ing, marching and maundering; ...
— The Shadow On The Dial, and Other Essays - 1909 • Ambrose Bierce
... erring hearts; hence the life and fresh impulse which He imparted to the being and experience to those with whom He dealt. Hence the maniac, freed from the legion, sat at His feet, clothed, and in his right mind. Hence the outcast woman, whom human scorn would have hardened into brazen effrontery, hearing an unwonted voice of human sympathy, "washed His feet with her tears, and wiped them with ...
— Sermons Preached at Brighton - Third Series • Frederick W. Robertson
... these swindles and their monumental effrontery led the New York Sun humorously to suggest the erection of a statue to the principal Robber Baron, "in commemoration of his services to the commonwealth." A letter was sent out asking for funds. There were a great many men in New York, ...
— The Boss and the Machine • Samuel P. Orth
... wish that your heart was as sound," replied the husband with a sneer; "but, madam, I am not quite blind. An honest woman—a virtuous woman, Mrs Sullivan, would have immediately acquainted her husband with what had passed—not have concealed it; still less have had the effrontery to deny it, when ...
— Newton Forster - The Merchant Service • Captain Frederick Marryat
... documents under his own hand. Whether he is to be blamed for this resolution, or for the state of matters which rendered it necessary, is not here the question. But the fact is remarkable, as throwing further light on the effrontery of the Whigs. Lord Palmerston, in last August, twitted the Ministry with Lord Ellenborough's supposed intention to retire from beyond the Indus, and congratulated the country on the frustration of that intention, as having saved us "from the eternal disgrace." He was answered by the Prime Minister ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - April 1843 • Various
... companion was Chowles. He was seated at a table, on which stood a flask of brandy and a couple of glasses, and seemed a good deal confused at being caught in such a situation, though he endeavoured to cover his embarrassment by an air of effrontery. ...
— Old Saint Paul's - A Tale of the Plague and the Fire • William Harrison Ainsworth
... with pain and longing, was for him alone. To the other dancers, to the crowded room at large, she seemed a brazen girl, with beauty to make a goddess, wit to mask as a great lady, effrontery to match that of the gentleman who had brought her here. The age was free, and in that London which was dear to the hearts of the Virginians ladies of damaged reputation were not so unusual a feature ...
— Audrey • Mary Johnston
... slaves obeyed with the slowness and hesitation of astonishment, while Ivan held out his glass with the utmost effrontery. ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - VANINKA • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... with that hopeless effrontery which never deserts criminals of his class, even under the guillotine. ...
— The Maids of Paradise • Robert W. (Robert William) Chambers
... senate, said, that his back was not so broad that he should think himself bound, once for all, by any opinion once given on so important a matter; he would willingly swear and submit to the law, if so be it were one, a proviso which he added as a mere cover for his effrontery. The people, in great joy at his taking the oath, loudly clapped and applauded him, while the nobility stood by ashamed and vexed at his inconstancy; but they submitted out of fear of the people, and all in order took the oath, till it came to Metellus's turn. But he, though his friends begged and ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... two sudden developments. What was left of the first advancing company of Turks halted below the ramp, and with sublime effrontery, born no doubt of knowledge that we had no artillery, proceeded to dig themselves a shallow trench. The Zeitoonli were making splendid shooting, but it was only a question of minutes until the shelter would be high ...
— The Eye of Zeitoon • Talbot Mundy
... schoolboy language, "a cooler hand"—it would have been impossible to find. He had early gained the name of Raven from his artful looks. His manner was a mixture of calm audacity and consummate self-conceit. Though you knew him to be a thorough scamp, the young imp would stare you in the face with the effrontery of a man about town. He was active, sharp, and nice-looking, and there was nothing which he was either afraid or ashamed to do. He had not a particle of that modesty which in every good boy is as natural as it is graceful; he ...
— St. Winifred's - The World of School • Frederic W. Farrar
... I've said to that fellow: "MR MAYOR,—You had the effrontery to-day to discharge me with a caution—forsooth!—your fellow —magistrate. I've consulted my solicitor as to whether an action will lie for false imprisonment. I'm informed that it won't. I take this opportunity of saying that justice in this ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... not agreeable for him to remain under the kindly shelter of the paternal mansion; so he, prodigal like, took the portion his father gave him and spent it in riotous living. But he was determined not to feed on husks, if unmitigated cheek and unblushing effrontery could bring him ...
— From Wealth to Poverty • Austin Potter
... have a waiter so independent that once, when he brought me a yellow Chartreuse,[239-1] and I said I had ordered green, he replied, "No, sir, you said yellow." William could never have been guilty of such effrontery. In appearance, of course, he is mean, but I can no more describe him than a milkmaid could draw cows. I suppose we distinguish one waiter from another much as we pick our hat from the rack. We could have plotted a murder safely before William. He never presumed to have opinions ...
— Short Stories of Various Types • Various
... without being under the legal or moral necessity of paying them a single cent for their improvements. In the state of public temper, the officials of the State of New York decided to fight his claim. Astor offered to sell his claim to the State for $667,000. But such was the public outburst at the effrontery of a man who had bought what was virtually an extinct claim for $100,000, and then attempting to hold up the State for more than six times that sum, that the Legislature ...
— History of the Great American Fortunes, Vol. I - Conditions in Settlement and Colonial Times • Myers Gustavus |
