"Grumble" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... campaign—who attend caucuses and primaries, who speak of politics to their neighbors, as members and parts of the machine, and regard only those as good and reliable American citizens who take no part whatever, simply reserving the right to grumble after the work has been done by others. Not much can be accomplished in politics without an organization, and the moment an organization is formed, and, you might say, just a little before, leading ...
— The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Volume VIII. - Interviews • Robert Green Ingersoll
... already," he said, "of what has happened to me. I've had a blow, but I'm not going to lie down under it. There must be work for me somewhere, and when I've found it you'll hear from me again. Not until then though, for I'm rather hard hit, and might be inclined to grumble. But I shall think of you constantly, and I don't believe if I wrote a volume I could make you understand how much the thought will help. I shall wear it ...
— Secret History Revealed By Lady Peggy O'Malley • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... being a praying man himself, he looked around for one who was. At length he found one—a meek young man from Trumbull County—who agreed to pay for his board in praying. For a while all went smoothly, but the boarding-master furnished his table so poorly that the boarders began to grumble and to leave, and the other morning the praying boarder actually "struck!" Something like the following ...
— The Complete Works of Artemus Ward, Part 1 • Charles Farrar Browne
... also received with shouts of laughter by those assembled, and even while Pat was paying over his dust he continued to grumble and threaten; and when we got clear of him he bade us adieu with a mocking smile, perfectly satisfied to think that he had delayed us all that he was able to, and that if he did ultimately have to pay over the money, he afforded sport ...
— The Gold Hunter's Adventures - Or, Life in Australia • William H. Thomes
... Perhaps they think now, that if they had taken the advice of Lord George Bentinck and exerted themselves to return a majority to the House of Commons, it would have profited them more than useless execrations and barren discontent. But it is observable, that no individuals now grumble so much as the farmers who voted for free trader in 1847, unless indeed it be the shipowners, every one of whom for years, both in and out of Parliament, supported the repeal ...
— Lord George Bentinck - A Political Biography • Benjamin Disraeli
... comfortable—with the exception, of course, of the warlike Gartok and the hot-headed Ondikik. These two, being fellow-sufferers, were laid beside each other, in order, perhaps, to facilitate mutual condolence. To do them justice, they did not grumble much at their fate, but entertained each other with a running commentary on the ...
— The Walrus Hunters - A Romance of the Realms of Ice • R.M. Ballantyne
... storm of rain, accompanied with thunder and lightning, came on, which disturbed the rest of all who were exposed to it. Yet in spite of the inconvenience arising from the shower, I cannot say that I felt disposed to grumble at the interruption, for it appeared that what I had before considered as superlatively sublime, still wanted this to render it complete. The flashes of lightning vied in brilliancy with the flames ...
— The Campaigns of the British Army at Washington and New Orleans 1814-1815 • G. R. Gleig
... to look after, as our little home at Middlemoor had been so very, very simple. Yes, I see now it must have been very hard upon her, for, instead of doing all I could to help her, I was quite taken up with my own part of it, and ready to grumble at and exaggerate every little difficulty ...
— My New Home • Mary Louisa Molesworth
... haven't half of it. But if a man feels that he is only a pipe for Omnipotence to sound through, he is not so apt to worry. Besides, these last weeks God has been very good to me and I've been given a kind of assurance. I know the country will grumble a bit about my ways of doing things, but will follow me in the end. I know that we shall win a clean victory. Jordan has been a hard road to travel, but I feel that in spite of all our frailties we'll be dumped on the right side of that stream. ...
— The Path of the King • John Buchan
... heart and full of hope. He set his seamen to work to drag along the coast, and for weeks they went on fishing up seaweed, shingle and bits of rock. No occupation could be more trying to seamen, and they began to grumble one to another, and to whisper that the man in command had brought them on a ...
— How to Get on in the World - A Ladder to Practical Success • Major A.R. Calhoon
... apostrophised the stars. 'That is perfectly untrue,' he said. He walked on again as soon as he perceived that he had stopped, adding, with a grumble, 'I pity the woman ...
— The Philanderers • A.E.W. Mason
... men, and their own grumble. They sent me a deputation to ask us to cancel the Sunday holiday, which they never grant on contract work, and they feared the ...
— Christopher Hibbault, Roadmaker • Marguerite Bryant
... soldiers in Mafeking were disposed to grumble at the small part they seemed to be playing in the great tussle in which England was engaged, the authorities were satisfied that for so small a town to have kept occupied during the first critical month of the war 10,000—and at later ...
— South African Memories - Social, Warlike & Sporting From Diaries Written At The Time • Lady Sarah Wilson
... in health, and Johnnie gaining strength. It is a fine exchange from deep and aching uncertainty on so interesting a subject, to the little spitfire feeling of "Well, but they might have taken the trouble to write"; but so wretched a correspondent as myself has not much to say, so I will just grumble sufficiently to maintain ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott
... want you to drop something, say, a bunch of keys that you had been jingling in your hand. You are to experience some difficulty in finding it again, move about a little to force any one that may be lurking by the garage to retreat around the corner. Grumble a bit and make a little noise; but you are not to overdo it—a couple of minutes at the outside is enough, by that time I shall be under the car seat. You will then run the machine out to the street ...
— The Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard
... "married," in accordance with the custom which couples a driver with a gunner, they had lived happily together, with the one exception of meal-times. Louis, an intelligent man and the better informed of the two, did not grumble at the airs of superiority that are affected by every mounted over every unmounted man: he pitched the tent, made the soup, and did the chores, while Adolphe groomed his horses with the pride of a reigning potentate. When the former, a little black, lean man, afflicted with an enormous appetite, ...
— The Downfall • Emile Zola
... Twelve good men pressed out of thirty-five; an eighteen-pound shot-hole close beside our rudder; our mainsail looking like spectacles where the Frenchman had hit us—and the Channel crawling with short-handed British cruisers. Put that in your pipe and smoke it next time you grumble at ...
— Rewards and Fairies • Rudyard Kipling
... 'pon this here pie, then I'll hear what you've got to grumble at," answers the wise woman; and five minutes later she sat down and folded her hands and shut her eyes and heard what Sarah ...
— The Torch and Other Tales • Eden Phillpotts
... comrades were not the men to grumble over a piece of necessary duty like that, and they knew it ...
— The Talking Leaves - An Indian Story • William O. Stoddard
... If she had been able to talk much, she would have philosophized too, about the number and size of one's negative blessings—all the things one hasn't got, all the very horrid things; why, there's no end to them once you begin to count up, she thought, waterily happy, and yet people grumble. ...
— Christopher and Columbus • Countess Elizabeth Von Arnim
... she was to have little peace that night! Hardly had Dick finished his grumble and sauntered away, before her husband's step ...
— Not Like Other Girls • Rosa N. Carey
... England; but no starvation and no sign of it. There were partisan criticisms and plenty of "grousing." The Britisher is never contented unless he can grumble—especially at his own government. But there was no lack of a real unity of purpose, nor of a solid, cheerful, bull-dog determination to hang on to the enemy until he came down. It is this spirit that has enabled a nation, which was ...
— Fighting For Peace • Henry Van Dyke
... most diligent of housewives, began at last that "spring cleaning" which she makes so pleasant that none find the heart to grumble as they do when other matrons set their premises a-dust. Her hand-maids, wind and rain and sun, swept, washed, and garnished busily, green carpets were unrolled, apple-boughs were hung with draperies ...
— A Modern Cinderella - or The Little Old Show and Other Stories • Louisa May Alcott
... if you soak them for a day in warm water and then boil them, you can begin to think about them as a possible food. But Mrs. Burton and her maids ate them for three months. She didn't seem to think she had anything to grumble about—in fact, she said she still felt friendly towards potatoes, but she hoped she'd never see a herring or a ...
— Back To Billabong • Mary Grant Bruce
... unsuitable, such as saddling a horse or bringing in water. The days go very fast; it was 3:30 today before I knew that it was 1. It is a calm life without worries. The men are so easy to live with; they never fuss, or grumble, or sigh, or make a trouble of anything. It would amuse you to come into our wretched little kitchen before our disgracefully late breakfast, and find Mr. Kavan busy at the stove frying venison, myself washing the supper dishes, and Mr. Buchan drying them, or both the men ...
— A Lady's Life in the Rocky Mountains • Isabella L. Bird
... ever found the world quite as he would like it. You will be sure to have burdens laid upon you that belong to other people, unless you are a shirk yourself; but don't grumble. If the work needs doing and you can do it, never mind about the other one who ought to have done it and didn't; do it yourself. Those workers who fill up the gaps, and smooth away the rough spots, and finish up the jobs that others leave undone,—they ...
— Cheerfulness as a Life Power • Orison Swett Marden
... gentleman with a club-foot. In front of us an elderly female with short hair is chatting to a very plain young woman draped like a lay figure. On the right an emaciated man with a very bad cough shuffles on his chair; on the left two old grey-beards grumble to one another about the weather, a subject which leads up to the familiar "Mine catches me in the small of the back"; while behind us the inevitable curate, of whose appearance it would be trite to speak, describes to an astonished old lady the recent discovery ...
— The Treasury of Ancient Egypt - Miscellaneous Chapters on Ancient Egyptian History and Archaeology • Arthur E. P. B. Weigall
... do grumble, I know; but I feel sometimes that you must be tired and anxious, placed, as you are, as the only thing instead of a mother ...
— Great Possessions • Mrs. Wilfrid Ward
... We're all disagreeable and grumble when we're knocked over. That's only natural. Children are cross when they're unwell, and I suppose we're only big children. I say, heard ...
— Fix Bay'nets - The Regiment in the Hills • George Manville Fenn
... after the interchange of various hoarse and to him unintelligible bellowings, that he was to wait in that narrow damp lobby for the coming of his fellow- Commissioner, the grating on his feelings was even more discordant. He had not pluck enough left to grumble: but he grunted his displeasure. He grunted, however, in vain; for in about a quarter of an hour Alaric was close to him, shoulder to shoulder. He also wore a white jacket, &c., with a nightcap of mud and candle on his head; but somehow ...
— The Three Clerks • Anthony Trollope
... he eats he rejoices, if he looks at the sky he rejoices. In short, for such a man, the mere process of living is happiness. But it is quite the reverse with the other sort of man; you may plate him with gold, and he will continue to grumble; nothing satisfies him; success in life affords him no pleasure, even if it be perfectly self-evident. The man simply is incapable of experiencing satisfaction; he is incapable, and that is the end of the matter." And in ...
— A Survey of Russian Literature, with Selections • Isabel Florence Hapgood
... of things, "if I hadn't been hit I might ha' lived on and been drowned, and then there'd ha' been no pension to enj'y as I enj'ys mine; and I don't never have to buy no boots nor shoes, so there arn't much to grumble about, arter all." ...
— The Lost Middy - Being the Secret of the Smugglers' Gap • George Manville Fenn
... people murmured for food, and God sent them manna, which they gathered every day except the Sabbath; but with all God's care and kindness the Israelites continued to grumble whenever any difficulty arose. Journeying forward, they entered another wilderness, called the Desert of Sin, and came to a place named Rephidim, where they found no water. They were very thirsty, and came to Moses murmuring and saying, "Give us water ...
— Mother Stories from the Old Testament • Anonymous
... Doctor. 'But do not suppose me so unwary as to adopt him out of hand. I am, I flatter myself, a finished man of the world; I have had all possibilities in view; my plan is contrived to meet them all. I take the lad as stable boy. If he pilfer, if he grumble, if he desire to change, I shall see I was mistaken; I shall recognise him for no son of mine, and ...
— The Merry Men - and Other Tales and Fables • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Clod. Never grumble, Nor fling a discontent upon my pleasure, It must and shall be done: give me some wine, And fill it till it leap upon my lips: [wine Here's to the foolish maidenhead you wot of, The toy I must ...
— Beaumont & Fletcher's Works (1 of 10) - The Custom of the Country • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher
... two o'clock in the morning, and the mate thought that the sailors would grumble; but he didn't care. ...
— The Sandman: His Sea Stories • William J. Hopkins
... of what might seem great drawbacks to others, Grandfather Mole was contented with his lot. The only thing he was ever known to grumble about ...
— The Tale of Grandfather Mole • Arthur Scott Bailey
... light of reason begins to unfold itself, and make us sensible of our infantine faults; but this period of life had a different effect on Rosina, who had then contracted an unhappy disposition, which cannot better be described, than by the practices of those snarling curs that grumble incessantly, and seem always ready to run and bite at those ...
— The Looking-Glass for the Mind - or Intellectual Mirror • M. Berquin
... I heard Bob Chowne grumble. "I stopped on purpose to have a bit of pistol-shooting, and now there's none. See if I'd have stayed if I ...
— Devon Boys - A Tale of the North Shore • George Manville Fenn
... believe half the time she says things on purpose to provoke you. She doesn't seem to get much comfort out of it any way. I never saw such a discontented mortal. Don't you think it is wicked for people to grumble the way she does, Evadne? It is growing on her, too. She finds fault with everything. Even the snow came in for a share of her disapprobation this morning, because it would spoil the skating, as if the Lord had no other plans to further ...
— A Beautiful Possibility • Edith Ferguson Black
... Guardian Angel were to ask me, What in the world have you to grumble about? I couldn't tell him. For I never come away from that awful and sacred duty of the confessional without a sense of the deepest humiliation. I never sit in "the box," as the people call the confessional. A slight deafness in one ear, and the necessity of stretching ...
— My New Curate • P.A. Sheehan
... affairs, and it regulated its own conduct much to its own satisfaction, without any outside interference. Of course, sometimes things were managed badly; but the village knew it had only itself to blame, and therefore could not grumble at the Government, or the fickleness of members of Parliament, or the unreasonable conduct of Local Government Boards. Was not the lord of the manor quite capable of trying all criminals? and did not the rector and the vestry settle everything to the satisfaction ...
— English Villages • P. H. Ditchfield
... all these rogues have good dinners; even Bois l'Hery has his meals sent in to the prison from the Cafe Anglais, and poor old Passajon is reduced to live on scraps picked up in the kitchen. Still we must not grumble too much. There are others more wretched than we are—witness M. Francis, who came in this morning to the Territorial, thin, pale, with dirty linen and frayed cuffs, which he still pulled down ...
— The Nabob • Alphonse Daudet
... grumble, and admire. Look at this," showing her the tassels of the inner window curtains done up in little bags. "And the glass is pinned up with nice yellow paper; and here is a damask napkin fastened to the wall behind the washstand. And everything stands on a mat. ...
— The Morgesons • Elizabeth Stoddard
... is easy to grumble, and especially in a cheerful, open, light, and smiling city, crammed with works Of art, ancient and modern, its architecture a study of all styles, and its foaming beer, said by antiquarians to be a good deal better than the mead drunk ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... meager allowance of a pint and a half each for the twenty-four hours did little more than increase their thirst. They could not safely alter their unpleasant situation, however, and they wisely made the best of it and did not grumble. ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... what he was saying. Then she heard Aunt Isabel's voice, no louder than uncle Charlie's but more penetrating; it had a queer note in it—almost as if she were crying. Suddenly she did cry out!—And then Uncle Charlie's deep grumble again. ...
— Missy • Dana Gatlin
... a brief noon hour and no free time planned. There were even a number of chores to be done after supper. "Vacation" to Jack had hitherto meant long, cloudless days with leisure to read lazily in the hammock, or go swimming when he pleased and license to grumble when his father suggested that a little weeding would do ...
— Rainbow Hill • Josephine Lawrence
... and the exalted intelligence and comeliness of their inhabitants, found hosts of believers; and nothing else formed the staple of conversation, until the beaux and belles, and dealers in small talk generally, began to grumble, and openly express their wishes that the Dickens had Doctor Dick ...
— The Humbugs of the World • P. T. Barnum
... face, but language and voice, an spite of its low grumble, told me the speaker was Kirby. The very coldness of his tone served to send a chill ...
— The Devil's Own - A Romance of the Black Hawk War • Randall Parrish
... strolling in and hang round, jerking out aimless remarks. When he wanted a still quieter 'confab' with his maturing novel, their voices and footsteps echoed too clearly in the verandahs and the scantily furnished rooms. But did he venture to grumble at these minor drawbacks, Lance would declare he was demoralised by floating loose in an Earthly Paradise and becoming a mere appendage to ...
— Far to Seek - A Romance of England and India • Maud Diver
... level ground of") Jebel Malih ("Mount Pleasant"?), which the broad-speaking Bedawin lengthen to Malayh. Our camel-men had halted exactly between two waters, and equally distant from both, so as to force upon us the hire of extra animals. We did not grumble, however, as we were anxious to inspect the Afran ("furnaces") said to be found upon the upper heights of the Sharr—of these apocryphal features more hereafter. Fresh difficulties! The Jerafin-Huwaytat tribe, that owns the country south of the Surr, could not be reached ...
— The Land of Midian, Vol. 1 • Richard Burton
... as he leaned against the rudder, "There's nothing to grumble at; Timar knows what to do." With the courage of despair Trikaliss drew his dagger out of his girdle in order to cut the rope himself; but the steersman pointed toward the stern, and what Trikaliss saw ...
— Timar's Two Worlds • Mr Jkai
... Spanish armies—seeing, I say, this figure, the fellows retired, exclaiming, "Adios, corpo di bacco, nosotros," and so on, clearly proving (by their words) that they would, if they dared, have immolated the victim whom I had thus rescued from their fury. "Villains!" shouted I, hearing them grumble, "away! quit the apartment!" Each man, sulkily sheathing his sombrero, obeyed, ...
— Burlesques • William Makepeace Thackeray
... in a disapproving grumble, as though he were saying that he wasn't satisfied yet, and would renew the subject upon ...
— The Adventure League • Hilda T. Skae
... saving crumbs of consolation for those who laugh at fate, and look good-humouredly for them; life's only evil to him who wears it awkwardly, and philosophic resignation works as many miracles as Harlequin; grumble, and you go to the dogs in a wretched style; make mots on your own misery, and you've no idea how pleasant a trajet even drifting ...
— Wisdom, Wit, and Pathos of Ouida - Selected from the Works of Ouida • Ouida
... the ocean, we will have a 'Young Crusader' built before long, and she will do good service if, by her means, we can get away to some Christian land. We might have been much worse off than we are, and, to my mind, we have no cause to grumble. Here's our boat still safe, and, with some tinkering, she may be made to swim and serve us well. We will tow her on shore; but first we will see what provisions we can come at ...
— The Voyages of the Ranger and Crusader - And what befell their Passengers and Crews. • W.H.G. Kingston
... the vine weather vor I," he would frequently grumble to his greatest crony, James Coachman, who, for his part, bitterly resented the abnormal length of the daily drives. "Zure as vate, when I zits down tu my tea, cumes a message from one are t'other on 'em, an' oop I goes. 'Yu bain't been lukin' round zo careful as 'ee shude; there be a ...
— Peter's Mother • Mrs. Henry De La Pasture
... we cannot hear all the noises of the earth at the same time, nor know of every danger that lurks near as we are passing by! We grumble a great deal that God does not send us as much as we think he might, but we give scarce a thought to our escape from the many perils, lying close as our very breath, of which ...
— Exit Betty • Grace Livingston Hill
... official, not, however, very successful at the Board of Trade, and greatly given to grumble and growl. He held the mildly reciprocitarian views in which he followed Mill and expanded Cobden's opinions, and was thought by us to be the author of the Letters of a Disciple of Richard Cobden, the circulation of ...
— The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke V1 • Stephen Gwynn
... the base-burner, and the two sat around it for a month trying to assimilate each other; but they could not. He knew nothing of women; she nothing of such men as him. He never smiled; and, when he joked, the joke was lost in the rumble and grumble of his voice. He caressed her with the gentleness of a grizzly fondling the hunter, and was nonplussed and set back when she cried ...
— The Grain Ship • Morgan Robertson
... Hoot-Toot. "Eames gives him the best of characters. He says the boy is thoroughly to be depended upon, and that his work is well done, even to cleaning the pigs; and, best of all, he is never heard to grumble." ...
— Great Uncle Hoot-Toot • Mrs. Molesworth
... immediately separate them, for the 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 ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson
... consisted of an imaginary dialogue between Cato and Laelius. We found the first portion rather heavy, and retired a few moments for refreshment (pocula quoedam vini).—All want to reach old age, says Cato, and grumble when they get it; therefore they are donkeys.—The lecturer will allow us to say that he is the donkey; we know we shall grumble at old age, but we want to live through youth and manhood, in spite of the troubles we shall groan over.—There was considerable prosing as to what ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 7, May, 1858 • Various
... to grumble and fret again, thrashing about restlessly on the lounge; and the tall young girl watched him out of lowered eyes, silent, serious, the lamplight edging her hair with ...
— The Common Law • Robert W. Chambers
... these people find it hard to bear the changes from hot to cold in the normal regions of the earth. Perhaps once in two or three years there comes a day when there is no fog, no wind, and a high temperature in the coast district. Then follows hot weather, perhaps up in the eighties, and Californians grumble, swelter and rustle for summer clothes. These rare hot days are the only times when one sees women in light dresses on the streets of ...
— The City That Was - A Requiem of Old San Francisco • Will Irwin
... and instead of being thankful that they had been so greatly favoured thus far, everybody of course began forthwith to grumble. The passengers, perhaps, chafed under the delay quite as much as Captain Staunton, but their outward manifestations of impatience were confined for the most part to dissatisfied glances at the hard cloudless blue ...
— The Pirate Island - A Story of the South Pacific • Harry Collingwood
... increased—the peals become less loud and less frequent, the lightning feebler and less brilliant, until at length it seems to take another course, and after a few exhausted volleys it dies away with a hoarse grumble in ...
— The Evil Eye; Or, The Black Spector - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... ought to be ashamed of abetting him in it." These were the thanks which honest Bows got for his friendship and his life's devotion. And I do not suppose that the old philosopher was much worse off than many other men, or had greater reason to grumble. On the second floor of the next house to Bows's, in Shepherd's Inn, at No. 3, live two other acquaintances of ours. Colonel Altamont, agent to the Nawaab of Lucknow, and Captain the Chevalier Edward Strong. No name at all is over their door. The captain does not choose to let all the ...
— The History of Pendennis, Vol. 2 - His Fortunes and Misfortunes, His Friends and His Greatest Enemy • William Makepeace Thackeray
... for a' of us. Women and men wull be comrades more; there'll be fewer helpless lassies who canna find their way aboot without a man to guide them. But men wull like that—I can tell ye so, though they may grumble at the first. ...
— Between You and Me • Sir Harry Lauder
... leave the small arguments ([Greek: logaria]) about these matters to others, to lazy fellows, that they may sit in a corner and receive their sorry pay, or grumble that no one gives them anything; and will you not come forward and make use of what you have learned? For it is not these small arguments that are wanted now; the writings of the Stoics are full of them. What then is the thing which is wanted? A man who shall apply ...
— A Selection from the Discourses of Epictetus With the Encheiridion • Epictetus
... manner that plainly indicated that the Shiuana ordered him to wait until daylight. It was sure destruction, he felt it; but the Shiuana spoke through the medium of the old man, and the Shiuana were of course right. He could not complain or even grumble. ...
— The Delight Makers • Adolf Bandelier
... the boys don't seem to think it quite so funny now as when they started in. They say they can't see where the pay is going to come in, and have begun to grumble," whispered the other. ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts - Or, The Struggle for Leadership • George A. Warren
... it. He has levied a store tax, a copra tax, and a tobacco tax. There are harbour dues and regulations, and other taxes. But the people are not taxed—only the traders. When the copra tax was levied, I lowered the purchasing price accordingly. Then the people began to grumble, and Feathers of the Sun passed a new law, setting the old price back and forbidding any man to lower it. Me he fined two pounds and five pigs, it being well known that I possessed five pigs. You will find them entered in the ledger. Hawkins, who is trader for the Fulcrum ...
— A Son Of The Sun • Jack London
... by some discouraged men illustrated the proverbial carelessness of the sailor. The articles had frozen stiff during the night, and the owners considered, it appeared, that this state of affairs provided them with a grievance, or at any rate gave them the right to grumble. They said they wanted dry clothes and that their health would not admit of their doing any work. Only by rather drastic methods were they induced to turn to. Frozen gloves and helmets undoubtedly are very uncomfortable, and the proper thing is to keep these articles thawed by placing ...
— South! • Sir Ernest Shackleton
... "Scotsman". Dr. Holland thinks he has found out what is the matter with me, and now hopes he shall be able to set me going again. Is it not mortifying, it is now nine weeks since I have done a whole day's work, and not more than four half days. But I won't grumble any more, though it is hard work to prevent doing so. Since receiving your note I have read over my chapter on Coral, and find I am prepared to stand by almost everything; it is much more cautiously and accurately written than I thought. I had set my heart upon having my volume completed before ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume I • Francis Darwin
... learned they were about to leave him he at first looked greatly pleased, but he suddenly recollected that nothing ought to please him and so began to grumble about being ...
— The Scarecrow of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... mortgages as her own. In our State she has a right to her own property. She can not sell it, though, if it is real estate, simply because the moment she marries her husband has a life-time right. The woman does not grumble at that; but still when he dies owning real estate, she gets only the rental value of one-third, which is called the widow's dower. Now I think the man ought to have the rental value of one-third of ...
— Debate On Woman Suffrage In The Senate Of The United States, - 2d Session, 49th Congress, December 8, 1886, And January 25, 1887 • Henry W. Blair, J.E. Brown, J.N. Dolph, G.G. Vest, Geo. F. Hoar.
... of this composition is, that thoughtless people grumble more than is fair about railroad management in the United States. When we consider that every day and night of the year full fourteen thousand railway-trains of various kinds, freighted with life and armed with death, go thundering over the land, the marvel is, ...
— The $30,000 Bequest and Other Stories • Mark Twain
... won the bet. Alan's luck improved as May passed and June dwindled; at the beginning of July he hit a hot streak when he seemed to be marching up to the winner's rostrum every other round, and the other Class C patrons began to grumble. The night he came home with six hundred newly-won credits, Hawkes opened a drawer and took out a slim, sleek ...
— Starman's Quest • Robert Silverberg
... worth noting that in this context appears the original form of an English word quite common recently, but almost unknown a very short time ago—"grouse" in the sense of "complain," "grumble": "Ce dist Corsols ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 - From the Beginning to 1800 • George Saintsbury
... all the "East India traders," when I suggested to him that he was fortunate in obtaining twenty per cent. on some copper ventures about which he was grumbling. (My readers must not confuse a Boston grumble with the ordinary ejaculations of discontent indulged in by the inhabitants of other portions of the world remote from the Hub of the Universe. A Boston grumble consists of an upward movement of the eyebrow, a slight twitch of the mustache ...
— Frenzied Finance - Vol. 1: The Crime of Amalgamated • Thomas W. Lawson
... now ranges from 45 to 60 and I am not able to do anything except the school work. Four of the children have had chills and fever, and I have had to rise at night to care for them. I have been trying to do the work of three people and not complain. Still I'd like to grumble a little, if I could find the right one to talk to. I am beginning to feel a little like Josiah Allen's wife, when she said, 'Betsy Bobbet, you're a fool, ...
— The Choctaw Freedmen - and The Story of Oak Hill Industrial Academy • Robert Elliott Flickinger
... almost absurd: like Father's story of the soldier who greeted his master every morning in India with 'Another hot day, sirr.' We thought if we got one good day out of the three we were to be on the road we wouldn't grumble, and here it goes on and on.... We must come back to Shrewsbury, Davie. It deserves more than just ...
— Penny Plain • Anna Buchan (writing as O. Douglas)
... fashion. After one of these feasts there was often much that was objectionable; and, wherever possible, farmers have abolished them, giving a small sum of money instead; but in places the labourers grumble greatly at the change, preferring the bacon and the beer, and the unrestrained license. It is noticeable how the women must have their tea. If it is far from home, the children collect sticks, and a fire is made in a corner of ...
— The Toilers of the Field • Richard Jefferies
... have all one interest; if you want anything, let us know, and if it can be had you know enough of us to know you shall not want it. We have not much to spare certainly, but necessaries we will try to procure; and so long as we need not groan about the present it is not my way to grumble about the future. We shall ...
— Hills of the Shatemuc • Susan Warner
... made dry, and the lighted lantern was hoisted to the top of the mast, Tom resumed his place at the helm, and Harry and Joe prepared to take another nap. "I don't want to grumble," said Joe, "but I wish I didn't have to lie on the coffee-pot and a tin cup. I don't feel comfortable on that ...
— Harper's Young People, July 27, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... to grumble, those old salts, for as soon as one had shot off his grievance his neighbour would follow with another, each more bitter ...
— Rodney Stone • Arthur Conan Doyle
... to those who do nothing, and that they should be very thankful to God and to the idlers for being allowed to have even the very worst food to eat and the rags, and broken boots to wear. He also tells them that they mustn't grumble, or be discontented because they're poor in this world, but that they must wait till they're dead, and then God will reward them by letting them go to a ...
— The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists • Robert Tressell
... Marcus. "Running would suit you better, my lad, than it would me. I've got a deal more flesh to carry than you have, and running is not good in armour with a big helmet on your head. You'd have something to grumble at about feeling sore, or I'm mistaken. But never mind; we want to ...
— Marcus: the Young Centurion • George Manville Fenn
... Mr. Warrington and the rest of the spectators had but little pleasure out of that encounter. Then ensued some cudgel-playing; but the heads broken were of so little note, and the wounds given so trifling and unsatisfactory, that no wonder the company began to hiss, grumble, and show other signs of discontent. "The masters, the masters!" shouted the people, whereupon those famous champions at length thought fit ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... and paper, books and journals, the procession bade fair to be a perfect godsend. Even when the inhabitants of the village took to rising at four o'clock in the morning, and fanfaronaded with ill-blown bugles, and flaring torches, and a dreadful untiring drum about the street, I forbore to grumble, and when on Sundays they turned out in a body after mass to see their own military section drilled in the Place of the Hotel de Ville, one bored valetudinarian welcomed them heartily. The military section had got down uniforms from one of the Brussels theatres,—busbies and helmets, ...
— Schwartz: A History - From "Schwartz" by David Christie Murray • David Christie Murray
... not many of them to-night, John, but I saw some goods behind the cart, just now; and though they give more trouble, perhaps, still they pay as well; so we have no reason to grumble, have we? Besides, you have been delivering, I dare say, ...
— The Cricket on the Hearth • Charles Dickens
... all green brush and white sand, set in transcendently blue water; even the coco-palms were rare, though some of these completed the bright harmony of colour by hanging out a fan of golden yellow. For long there was no sign of life beyond the vegetable, and no sound but the continuous grumble of the surf. In silence and desertion these fair shores slipped past, and were submerged and rose again with clumps of thicket from the sea. And then a bird or two appeared, hovering and crying; swiftly these became more numerous, and presently, looking ahead, we were aware ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 18 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... out of her sight after their first meeting, and the ridiculous excuse she gave to her husband's family was, she feared he would be kidnapped and made a Cossack of! And young Lord Cressett, her husband, began to grumble concerning her intimacy with a man old enough to be her grandfather. As if the age were the injury! He seemed to think it so, and vowed he would shoot the old depredator dead, if he found him on the grounds ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... the elbow. Countrymen came down from distant villages into towns and cities, to see perverters whom they had never heard of, and to learn the righteousness of hatred. When heretics waxed fewer the religious began to grumble that God, in losing his enemies, ...
— Citation and Examination of William Shakspeare • Walter Savage Landor
... to grumble. Yet sometimes—as one grows older—one gets a dreadful sense that the delights of life are past; and that perhaps one has been overscrupulous, over-timid and so missed the best.—That is one reason why I find it so infinitely pleasing to have you ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... a stout mile and half! You shall drink your reward at Christmas time," said one of the dealers to his porters, who, stout, strong men as they were, showed a disposition to grumble at their task. Encouraged by large promises, they shouldered sullenly the Nuernberg stove, grumbling again at its preposterous weight, but little dreaming that they carried within it a small, panting, trembling boy; for August began to tremble now that he was about to see the ...
— Famous Stories Every Child Should Know • Various
... now and still. He could hear the footsteps of his recent visitor pounding up the road, and the splashy grumble of the surf on the bar was unusually audible. He stood for a moment looking up at the black sky, with the few stars shining between the cloud blotches. Then he turned and looked at ...
— Shavings • Joseph C. Lincoln
... our own we hate: Each blames the place he lives in: but the mind Is most in fault, which ne'er leaves self behind. A town-house drudge, for farms you used to sigh; Now towns and shows and baths are all your cry: But I'm consistent with myself: you know I grumble, when to Rome I'm forced to go. Truth is, our standards differ: what your taste Condemns, forsooth, as so much savage waste, The man who thinks with Horace thinks divine, And hates the things which you believe so fine. I know your secret: 'tis the cook-shop breeds That ...
— The Satires, Epistles, and Art of Poetry • Horace
... a couple of days before he began to pry around, and find fault, and grumble at the expense; and I saw there was danger of things relapsing into something like their former condition. So I took him one ...
— The Man Who Stole A Meeting-House - 1878, From "Coupon Bonds" • J. T. Trowbridge
... was good to her brother and sister, and almost invariably kind to her parents. She would not, Breckon saw, have brooked much meddling with her flirtations from them, but as they did not offer to meddle, she had no occasion to grumble on that score. She grumbled when they asked her to do things for Ellen, but she did them, and though she never did them without grumbling, she sometimes did them without being asked. She was really very watchful of ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... myself planned for a substantial night's rest. For the first time since breaking camp, on the night of March 28th, we unpacked our blankets and made a bed. It was after sunrise when we awoke. Far to the right we could hear the low grumble of artillery, sounding like the roar of distant thunder. Since four o'clock in the morning a great battle had been raging in front of Petersburg, from the Appomattox on the right, to Hatcher's Run on ...
— In The Ranks - From the Wilderness to Appomattox Court House • R. E. McBride
... submissive speech evidently disarmed Mr. Hamilton, and deprived him of his Englishman's right to grumble to his womankind: so he said, quite amiably, that they would wait for Parker's pleasure a little longer, and then relapsed ...
— Uncle Max • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... place is so rich that I will not grumble. I must say that the men are never too attentive, and it would be unpleasant if we were to be ...
— The Rajah of Dah • George Manville Fenn
... the middle of the afternoon. Far off in the distance somewhere, an action was certainly going on, for the grumble of heavy cannonading came almost constantly ...
— The Boy Scouts on Belgian Battlefields • Lieut. Howard Payson
... We listened all day for cannon thunder; under certain conditions of the atmosphere the sound of heavy guns may reverberate as far perhaps, as from Sedan to Waterloo. That day, however, there was no ominous grumble from the eastward, the sky was cloudless, the flowers bloomed about the Chateau d'Hougomont, and the birds twittered in peace at the point before La Haie-Sainte to which the First Napoleon advanced in the evening and where for the last time he heard the shout ...
— The Last Leaf - Observations, during Seventy-Five Years, of Men and Events in America - and Europe • James Kendall Hosmer
... native visitors, because of the greater politeness and consideration shown to them by the former. Of course, as in all other countries, servants are described as one of the greatest plagues in life; but this must be taken for what it is worth. And what would the ladies do without such a subject to grumble about? ...
— Spanish Life in Town and Country • L. Higgin and Eugene E. Street
... Dentist Bills because he needed all his Money to buy more Poland Chinas and build other Cribs. If she wanted a Summer Kitchen or a new Wringer or a Sewing Machine, or Anything Else that would lighten her Labors, Henry would Moan and Grumble and say she was trying to land him in ...
— More Fables • George Ade
... and worked much harder for their own pleasure than they had done for their master's bidding, for it is a strange truth that fairies and children never complain of the toil and trouble they take in search of amusement, although they often grumble when asked to work for the ...
— Story of My Life • Helen Keller
... said the sailor, "if I ever grumble at work, my name's not Jack Pencroft, and if you like, captain, we will make a little America of this island! We will build towns, we will establish railways, start telegraphs, and one fine day, when it is quite changed, quite put ...
— The Mysterious Island • Jules Verne
... as we had, squire, and we don't grumble. Why, you're not half a fellow. Like to go ...
— The Peril Finders • George Manville Fenn
... when they returned to the theater. The rehearsal of the day's performance was in full swing. Cabinski was about to grumble at them for coming late, but Majkowska gave him such a crushing look that he merely ...
— The Comedienne • Wladyslaw Reymont
... and got him home at last; and when he'd got home he was that dismal and depressed from the reaction that he sat in his armchair all day and did nothing but grumble and burst into tears, for, you see, he'd overdone it, and it was bound to tell upon him. But after that all his natural pluck and determination got hold of him again, and if he wasn't mad to have that dance that ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 28, April 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... month's time you should grumble and fall out with me for not writing, you will certainly be in some degree justified; for I think it must be near upon three weeks since I wrote to you, which is a sin and a shame. To say that I have not had time to ...
— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble
... few literary paragraphs you can easily scatter about; these attract booksellers, and booksellers will give advertisements where they find their works are noticed. Above all things, write cautiously concerning all localities; if you praise much, a hundred will grumble; if you are severe, one only may complain, but twenty will shake the head. You will have friends on one side of the water desiring one thing, friends on the other side desiring the reverse, and in seeking to please one you vex ten. An honest heart, ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume IV. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... off again, our order of march was reversed and otherwise changed. Gummidge and I went ahead single file, with, our muskets ready for immediate use. The women came next, and then the canoe; we had put the luggage into it, and the voyageurs did not grumble at ...
— The Cryptogram - A Story of Northwest Canada • William Murray Graydon
... smiling face, and Hassan felt compelled to follow, although he would far sooner have gone home again. He could see nothing but grass all around and the great trees that shaded it from the burning sun. As he trudged after the Magician, Hassan continued to grumble about his breakfast until it was dinner-time, and it seemed useless to grumble about breakfast any more. He began to wonder where the Magician was taking him, because, though he had walked for many hours, he had seen nothing ...
— The Bountiful Lady - or, How Mary was changed from a very Miserable Little Girl - to a very Happy One • Thomas Cobb
... notwithstanding, had pretensions that he seldom showed any signs of, except of ill—humors, a good share of which he bestowed on me; though I was pleased to hear him play the flute, on which he was a tolerable musician. This second Egistus was sure to grumble whenever he saw me go into his mistress' apartment, treating me with a degree of disdain which she took care to repay him with interest; seeming pleased to caress me in his presence, on purpose to torment him. ...
— The Confessions of J. J. Rousseau, Complete • Jean Jacques Rousseau
... public mind at this time is thus described by Gray:—"Grumble, indeed, every one does; but, since Wilkes's affair, they fall off their metal, and seem to shrink under the brazen hand of Norton and his colleagues. I hear there will be no Parliament till after Christmas. If the French should be so unwise as to suffer the Spanish ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole Volume 3 • Horace Walpole
... inland lochs, up to which the said boat had been dragged years before, upon rough runners like a sleigh, partly by the ponies, partly by hand labour. Scoodrach was seated amidships, rowing slowly, and every now and then tucking his oar under his leg, to give his nose a rub, and grumble something ...
— Three Boys - or the Chiefs of the Clan Mackhai • George Manville Fenn
... road. His horse stood still; but after remaining patiently for some time, and not observing any disposition in his rider to get up and proceed further, he took him by the collar and shook him. This had little or no effect, for the farmer only gave a grumble of dissatisfaction at having his repose disturbed. The animal was not to be put off by any such evasion, and so applied his mouth to one of his master's coat-laps, and after several attempts, by dragging at it, to raise ...
— Stories about Animals: with Pictures to Match • Francis C. Woodworth
... he will not grumble because too much sugar is used in the house. So let him take it ...
— The Home • Fredrika Bremer
... says in his notes: "Guynemer disliked walking about Paris, because people recognized him. When he saw them turn to look at him, he would grumble at the curse of having a face that was public property. So he preferred waiting for evening, and then drove his little white car up the Champs Elysees to the Bois. He enjoyed this peaceful recreation thoroughly, and forgot the excitement of ...
— Georges Guynemer - Knight of the Air • Henry Bordeaux |
