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Mope   /moʊp/   Listen
Mope

verb
(past & past part. moped; pres. part. moping)
1.
Move around slowly and aimlessly.  Synonym: mope around.
2.
Be apathetic, gloomy, or dazed.  Synonyms: moon about, moon around.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Mope" Quotes from Famous Books



... for his mother to come and sing him to sleep,—the happy young mother who had petted and humored him in her own fond American fashion. They could not understand his speech; more than that, they could not understand him. Why should he mope alone in the garden with that beseeching look of a lost dog in his big, mournful eyes? Why should he not play and be happy, like the neighbor's children or the kittens or any other young thing that had life ...
— The Gate of the Giant Scissors • Annie Fellows Johnston

... to be quite sensible about this. And I've been very foolish and silly about it all day. I can't imagine why I behaved as I did. There's nothing to go and mope about, that Lord Talgarth has been kind enough to do me this honor. Because it is an honor, you know, however you look at it, that anyone should ask ...
— None Other Gods • Robert Hugh Benson

... go with the others," said the farmer. "Raising turkeys is a ticklish job; to-day they're scratching gravel for all they're worth; to-morrow they mope around an' die; no telling ...
— Two Thousand Miles On An Automobile • Arthur Jerome Eddy

... that appeared to sweep her last remaining illusion behind her, she started resolutely up the drive to the house. After all, whatever came, she would not let them think that she was either afraid of life or disappointed in love. She would not mope, and she would not show the white feather. On one point she was passionately determined—no man, by any method known to the drama of sex, was going to break ...
— One Man in His Time • Ellen Glasgow

... the evenings, and during breakfast, and she always rebelled when she had to go back to it in vacation. There was so little she could do that she really enjoyed. There was a stupid round of drives and walks, shopping and piano practice, and after that nothing but to mope and fret and worry poor Eliot. At school there was always the excitement of evading some rule or breaking it without being caught; and if there was no joke in prospect to giggle over, there was the memory of one just passed ...
— The Little Colonel's House Party • Annie Fellows Johnston

... friend, of good advice given, and quiet example unheeded at the time, crowded in on Percy's memory now; adding to his sense of loss, certainly, but reminding him that there was something else to be done than mope ...
— A Dog with a Bad Name • Talbot Baines Reed

... unable to stand alone and act for himself, and with a sensitive pride all her own she shrank from even the thought of forcing herself on the proud, rich family that had forbidden the alliance. Moreover, she was a good-hearted, Christian girl, and perceived clearly that it was no time for her to mope of droop. Even on the miserable day which followed the interview that so sorely wounded her, she made pathetic attempts to be cheerful and helpful, and as time passed she rallied slowly into ...
— Without a Home • E. P. Roe

... garnished with pistols of two feet in length, and, armed with steel-cap, back and breast, and a truncheon in his hand, he rushed into the apartment of the astonished Major, with his eyes sparkling, and his cheek inflamed, while he called out, "Up! up, neighbour! No time now to mope in the chimney-corner! Where is your buff-coat and broadsword, man? Take the true side once in your life, and mend past mistakes. The King is all lenity, man—all royal nature and mercy. I will get ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott

... himself in the country again and mope! It's been the making of him being here in town. Goodness knows what will happen to him now!" said Pat, dropping on to the couch with an impatient sigh, and Bridgie ...
— The Love Affairs of Pixie • Mrs George de Horne Vaizey

... one of those women who seem to find nothing in self-communion. Hers was a nature destined for light and gaiety and happiness. To sit in a splendid palace and mope over what had happened was among the last things ...
— The Harbor of Doubt • Frank Williams

... such a loving daughter could not pass from his side and find their places filled. But he did not "mope," as he wrote me one day, "I am too busy for that;" or, he might have said truthfully, too well sustained. His habit of carrying himself with an air of kindliness toward all, and of enjoyment in the opportunities still left him, was very ...
— Authors and Friends • Annie Fields

... draws near. Winter giveth the fields and the trees, so old, Their beards of icicles and snow; And the rain, it raineth so fast and cold, We must cower over the embers low; And, snugly housed from the wind and weather, Mope like birds that are changing feather. But the storm retires, and the sky grows clear, When thy merry step draws near. Winter maketh the sun in the gloomy sky Wrap him round with a mantle of cloud; But, ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

... she fell into step frankly beside him, near him—too near. "Try to be sensible," she was saying gaily; "I like you so much—and it would be horrid to have you mope, you know. And besides, even if I cared for you, there are reasons, you know—reasons for any girl to marry the man I am going to marry. Does my cynicism shock you? What am I to do?" with a shrug. "Such marriages are reasonable, ...
— The Fighting Chance • Robert W. Chambers

... the only prize—though there is much to be got in Syria, flocks and herds and corn and palm-trees yielding fruit—but Lydia as well, Lydia the land of wine and oil and fig-trees, Lydia, to whose shores the sea brings more good things than eyes can feast on, I say that once we realise this we can mope no longer, our spirits will rise apace, and we shall hasten to lay our hands on the ...
— Cyropaedia - The Education Of Cyrus • Xenophon

... and peevish fellow is this King of England, to mope with his fat-brain'd followers so far out ...
— The Life of King Henry V • William Shakespeare [Tudor edition]

... pleasant voice? I spoke to her, but she remained dumb. Spain," ruminating. "For me, New France. Lad, the thought of reaching that far country is inspiriting. I shall mope a while; but there is metal in me which needs but proper molding. . . . For what purpose had you drawn ...
— The Grey Cloak • Harold MacGrath

... to the exclusiveness of their kind, commented on it. Barclay openly lamented, for, as he said, "Was not Sir Paul the best of company when he chose, and why come here to this gay garden spot to mope?" ...
— High Noon - A New Sequel to 'Three Weeks' by Elinor Glyn • Anonymous

... stand out like a mountain in my life;" adding, however, "Fleet Street and the Strand are better places to live in, for good and all. I could not live in Skiddaw. I could spend there two or three years; but I must have a prospect of seeing Fleet Street at the end of that time, or I should mope and pine away." He loved even its smoke, and asserted that it suited his vision. A short time previously he had, in a touching letter to Wordsworth (1801), enumerated the objects that he liked so much in London. "These things," he writes, "work themselves into ...
— Charles Lamb • Barry Cornwall

... have been acquainted with it, but what can she do? If her home is always dull and lonely, and her husband is always absent and finds no pleasure in her society, she is naturally sometimes driven (seldom enough, she is sure) to seek a little recreation elsewhere; she is not expected to pine and mope to death, she hopes. 'Then come, Louisa,' says the gentleman, waking up as suddenly as he fell asleep, 'stop at home this evening, and so will I.' 'I should be sorry to suppose, Charles, that you took a pleasure in aggravating me,' replies ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens

... think it was worth while taking it to heart. Just go out to plenty of dances and be jolly; you mustn't mope. If you can get Aunt Mercer to give you a bed, I'll take you to the play. That will do you all the ...
— The Third Miss Symons • Flora Macdonald Mayor

... parbleu! and why not? Every man in France has a right to meet the enemy in the field. Thou art a soldier, a hussar of the 9th, a brave and gallant corps, and art to be told, that thy comrades have the road to fame and honor open to them; while thou art to mope away life like an invalided drummer? It is too gross an indignity, my boy, and must not be borne. Away with you to-morrow at day-break to the 'Etat Major,' ask to see the commandant. You're in luck, too, for our colonel is with him now, and he is sure to back your request. Say that you ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 3, August, 1850. • Various

... out a clear sweet voice from the inner end of the cave, "and you promised to give up coming here to mope; so you must keep your promise to me ...
— The Lonely Island - The Refuge of the Mutineers • R.M. Ballantyne

... like to talk about my condition at first was because it hurt my throat and lungs. It wasn't because I was afflicted with this heroic melancholy they talk so much about. I was mighty glad to be alive. I couldn't see anything to mope about,—certainly not after I found out I wasn't ...
— Quill's Window • George Barr McCutcheon

... contrary it will be a welcome solution of the problem before him. If perchance any inconvenient inquiries should in future be made by England concerning your welfare he will be spared all responsibility. His niece will have the plaything she desired, and will no longer mope. He will have secured my gratitude and can trust me to preserve the conventionalities; and as for you, my popinjay, your fortune is made. Do not fancy that you will remain a mere montebank. You shall exchange your cap and bells for a ducal ...
— Romance of Roman Villas - (The Renaissance) • Elizabeth W. (Elizbeth Williams) Champney

... glass darkly; wink, blink, nictitate; squint; look askant^, askant askance^; screw up the eyes, glare, glower; nictate^. dazzle, loom. Adj. dim-sighted &c n.; myopic, presbyopic^; astigmatic, moon-eyed, mope-eyed, blear-eyed, goggle-eyed, gooseberry-eyed, one-eyed; blind of one eye, monoculous^; half-blind, purblind; cock-eyed, dim-eyed, mole- eyed; dichroic. blind as a bat &c (blind) 442; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget

... oozing wine, "come and feed out of my hand. Bill me, sweeting, and I bill thee. Ho, ho! Two doves on a branch! What, turtle? Wilt thou mope ...
— Little Novels of Italy • Maurice Henry Hewlett

... jealous of the sisterhood in the favored nook at the north edge of the Plain, and one of their number, who is believed to have completely subjugated that universal favorite, Cadet McKay, has been heard to say that she thought it an outrage that they had to come home so early in the evening and mope away the time without a single cadet, when up there at Craney's the halls and piazzas were full of gray-coats and bell buttons every night ...
— Starlight Ranch - and Other Stories of Army Life on the Frontier • Charles King

... sitting up. "Are you going to mope around all night? Come to bed and get a little rest, that you may be fit to meet any ...
— The Boy Allies with the Cossacks - Or, A Wild Dash over the Carpathians • Clair W. Hayes

... leaving Eglosilyan for good, and his mother will at last have some peace of mind. What a pity it is that this sensitive creature should be at the mercy of the rude passions of this son of hers! that she should have no protector! that she should be allowed to mope herself to death in a ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, April 1875, Vol. XV., No. 88 • Various

... became a sort of hero for her school-girl imagination, and if you were to worry her, and I was to come the stern father, and say, You must marry Dan Barnett, what would be the consequences? She'd mope and think herself persecuted, and be ready to do ...
— A Life's Eclipse • George Manville Fenn

... that music cannot melt? Ah me! how is that rugged heart forlorn! Is there, who ne'er those mystic transports felt, Of solitude and melancholy born? He needs not woo the Muse; he is her scorn. The sophist's rope of cobweb he shall twine; Mope o'er the schoolman's peevish page; or mourn, And delve for life, in Mammon's dirty mine; Sneak with the scoundrel fox, or grunt ...
— The Minstrel; or the Progress of Genius - with some other poems • James Beattie

... Of bloody domes and hybrid hounds Of Titan's forges, cold, unstunned. Oh, vain each sinner's prayer of hope! Alas, alas, all thoughts of future trust! The bloody lanes of reigning Doom Are lasting tombs for souls accurst. When in a pool we lie and mope As vaulted temples rot in dust, Vague shapes and forms ascend to spell Infernal chasms of black gloom. When crested waves of billowed sea Are lashed by winds from foreign shoal, And foam-set breasts are dashed on high As silence holds the voiceless ...
— Betelguese - A Trip Through Hell • Jean Louis de Esque

... Burtis, exultantly, "this is no day to mope in the house. If you will trust yourself to me and Thunder, you shall skim the river there as swiftly as you can next ...
— Nature's Serial Story • E. P. Roe

... little danger on account of his fondness for company, which, not being gratified at home, was taking him away from its safe boundaries to clubs, and questionable company and amusements, much more than pleased his father; but Ralph declared he must have some pleasure—"didn't want to mope in his room alone after being hard at work all day. As for home, there was nothing there, not even a good place to read—gas at the top of the wall in the dingy old dining-room, and the girls always out—or out of humour; he could do no better." Mr. Murray was uneasy: "Their ...
— Divers Women • Pansy and Mrs. C.M. Livingston

... man, I reckon, had a wisht time with me, the next two or three weeks; but, by the mercy of God, the weather behaved furious all the while, leaving a man no time to mope. 'Twas busy all, and busy enough, to keep a clear light inside the lantern, and warm souls inside our bodies. All through February it blew hard and cold from the north and north-west, and though we lay in the very mouth of the Gulf Stream, for ten days together there wasn't ...
— Wandering Heath • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... you are not going to mope away your young life like this," she broke in indignantly, "however, if you have any scruples, you can come away after dinner, before the active pleasures begin—there will be no one there in the afternoon but you and Zita. Surely you ...
— The Doctor's Daughter • "Vera"

... the Sun's warm plenteous hand To every germ of virtue, how below Thy progress, mope Gold Mongers to and fro, Who think they're vaulting from sunlight so grand, It forms thy chiefest glory. Closely scanned, They are gross worms, each with the thought to grow "The Conqueror," as staged by Edgar Poe For darking planets ...
— Freedom, Truth and Beauty • Edward Doyle

... flower wither, her bird mope or her apple rot, I shall know has not kept her faith," said the wise emperor; then mounting his steed he wished them "Good-health" and set off with his brave soldiers on ...
— Roumanian Fairy Tales • Various

... long enough. Augusta, don't you mean to get a proper shawl, and put some sort of lace thing on your head, and come in with us for a look, at least, at the hop? Come, Nell; come, Leslie; you might as well be at home as in a place like this, if you're only going to mope." ...
— A Summer in Leslie Goldthwaite's Life. • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney

... isolation; she liked to be apart—for him. Besides, by her very birth she was outside the fold of society, her love beyond the love of those within it—just as her father's love had been. And her pride was greater than theirs, too. How could women mope and moan because they were cast out, and try to scratch their way back where they were not welcome? How could any woman do that? Sometimes, she wondered whether, if Fiorsen died, she would marry her lover. What difference would it make? ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... the Battery, And see in glassy tanks the seals, The sturgeons, flounders, smelt and eels Disport themselves in ichthyic curves— And when it gets upon our nerves Then, while our wabbling taxi honks I'll tell you all about the Bronx, Where captive wild things mope and stare Through grills of steel that bar each lair Doomed to imprisonment for life— And you may go ...
— Police!!! • Robert W. Chambers

... Skiddaw. Still, I turn back to those great places where I wandered about, participating in their greatness. After all, I could not live in Skiddaw. I could spend a year—two, three years—among them, but I must have a prospect of seeing Fleet-Street at the end of that time, or I should mope and pine away, I know. Still, Skiddaw is a fine creature. My habits are changing, I think: i.e. from drunk to sober. Whether I shall be happier or not remains to be proved. I shall certainly be more happy in a morning; but whether I shall not sacrifice the fat, and the marrow, ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 5 • Edited by E. V. Lucas

... who could mope in joyless plight, While youth and spring bedeck the scene, And scorn the profer'd gay delight, With thankless heart and frowning mien? See Joy with becks and smiles appear, While roses strew ...
— Translations of German Poetry in American Magazines 1741-1810 • Edward Ziegler Davis

... made up my mind that, his commands and threats notwithstanding, I must continue to live as I always did: joyful, free within certain limits and careless of puritan standards. If the rest of the royal ladies, and the women of the service, want to mope and look sour, that's their affair. Let them wear out their lives between confessional, knitting socks for orphan children, Kaffe-klatsches, spying and tale-bearing and prayer-meetings,—it isn't my style. I'm young, I'm pretty, I'm full ...
— Secret Memoirs: The Story of Louise, Crown Princess • Henry W. Fischer

... "when one's young, one's loved; plenty of love, plenty of women; but they do say: 'Where there's wife, there's mope.'" ...
— A Start in Life • Honore de Balzac

... mustn't mope around this way," he remonstrated gently. "What is it—what's gone wrong with ...
— The Bondboy • George W. (George Washington) Ogden

... not their joys. Why does not a kind Father mean for us to profit by the one as much as by the other? And since into nearly every life falls more sunshine than shadow, why leave the sunny places and go out of our way to sit and mope in the darkest, dreariest shade we can find? I believe in the Gospel of Cheerfulness. It is your duty and mine to get every drop of cream off of our own especial pan of milk. And if we do have to drink skim milk, shall we throw away the cream on that account? If ...
— The Secret of a Happy Home (1896) • Marion Harland

... on the scene you have been my chief anxiety. But before that, I treated you, Miss Foster, with a discourtesy, a forgetfulness, that you can't, that you oughtn't to forget; I made no plans for your amusement; I gave you none of my time. On your first visit to Rome, I let you mope away day after day in that stifling garden, without taking a single thought for you. I even grudged it when Mrs. Burgoyne looked after you. To be quite, quite frank, I grudged your coming to us at all. Yet I was your host—you were in my care—I had invited you. ...
— Eleanor • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... leave me alone sometimes," she said; "do you think I would draw a long face, and think only of my own troubles. I guess he's got his own troubles too. If my husband had a battle to fight, do you think I'd mope and pine because he left me at home; no I wouldn't. I'd help him buckle his sword on, and when he came back to me I wouldn't tell him how lonesome I'd been, but I'd take care of him and cry over his wounds, and tell him to be brave—and—and—and ...
— The Pit • Frank Norris

... That's something. You look more like yourself now. How happy we used to be in those days, to be sure!—and how merry! You would make the courts ring with your blithe laughter, and wellnigh kill me with your jests. If love is to make one mope like an owl, and sigh like the wind through a half-shut casement; if it is to cause one to lose one's rosy complexion and gay spirit, and forget how to dance and sing—take no pleasure in hawking and hunting, or any kind of sport—walk about with eyes fixed upon ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth

... declared Margery with some warmth. "In her place I should do just what I liked best. Then again, it wouldn't be fair for Tommy to go away like that and leave us all alone here to mope through the summer. That's right, Tommy. Tell them you won't go unless—unless you can take ...
— The Meadow-Brook Girls Under Canvas • Janet Aldridge

... trappings, you do not know me, though we have lived together thirty years. God is not dead, and the National Bank of Heaven has not suspended payment, and if you don't mind, I don't care a cent. What little we need of food and raiment the rest of our lives we can get, and I don't propose to sit down and mope and groan. Mary, hand me that darning-needle. I declare! I have forgotten to set the rising for those cakes!" And while she is busy at it he hears her ...
— The Wedding Ring - A Series of Discourses for Husbands and Wives and Those - Contemplating Matrimony • T. De Witt Talmage

... cabin since we left Naples, three days ago. Not a word have you spoken. You have done nothing but mope about, and look as miserable as a boiled owl. I say again, I won't have it, for you are infecting me with your low spirits," ...
— Australia Revenged • Boomerang

... Thy low amount Too paltry is to mope for; The more we have in hand to count, The less in ...
— Fringilla: Some Tales In Verse • Richard Doddridge Blackmore

... blue it makes you wonder If it's heaven shining through; Earth so smiling 'way out yonder, Sun so bright it dazzles you; Birds a-singing, flowers a-flinging All their fragrance on the breeze; Dancing shadows, green, still meadows — Don't you mope, you've ...
— The Spell of the Yukon • Robert Service

... particularly lead the dismallest of lives. Being the posterity of popes, though of worse families than the ancient nobility, they expect greater respect than my ladies the countesses and marquises will pay them; consequently they consort not, but mope in a vast palace with two mniserable tapers, and two or three monsignori, whom they are forced to court and humour, that they may not be entirely deserted. Sundays they do issue forth in a most ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole

... God bless you!" he had said in broken voice. "Don't fall to brooding when you're alone, or you'll lose your wits. Now mind yourself! Don't mope!" ...
— Lords of the North • A. C. Laut

... uncle's presence Sedley was on his good behaviour; but if he caught Miss Woodford without that protection, he attempted rude compliments, and when repelled by her dignified look and manner, sneered at the airs of my lady's waiting-woman, and demanded how long she meant to mope after Charley, who would never look so low. "She need not be so ungracious to a poor soldier. She might have to put ...
— A Reputed Changeling • Charlotte M. Yonge

... I can't understand her, for she acts like a weathercock, and I never know how I 'm going to find her. I hate to have her mope so, but, upon my life, I don't know what to do," said Tom; but as he uttered the words, something was suggested by the sight before him. Chairs were few, and Polly had taken half of Will's when they drew round the fire. Now she was leaning against him, in a cosy, confiding way, delightful to ...
— An Old-fashioned Girl • Louisa May Alcott

... they freely use, They never mope or have the blues; And it is always half their joys In all their play to make ...
— The Nursery, No. 107, November, 1875, Vol. XVIII. - A Monthly Magazine for Youngest Readers • Various

... mistake. I said to him many a time to mark-my-words, it would be a mistake. Of course when he died I didn't feel it was up to me to keep her in a nart school. So I took her right into the family, same's I'd take you or anybody. But it's no use. All she does is mope. Even Mr. Perry can't cheer her up, though ...
— Little Miss By-The-Day • Lucille Van Slyke

... very seldom left him by himself to mope or to be melancholy; but, while ever vaguely promising to let him go, did everything in his power to make him rather wish to stay; so that Nick was constantly surprised by the free-handed kindness of this man whom he had every other reason in the world, he thought, for deeming ...
— Master Skylark • John Bennett

... lonely, dear child," said my beautiful hostess, as we parted. "We delight in having you, and you must not mope at home ...
— The Reflections of Ambrosine - A Novel • Elinor Glyn

... one—which is, really, not a home—where no attention is paid to such minor attractions; where a few starveling things, by way of geese, perhaps, picked half a dozen times a year, to within an inch of their lives, mope about the dirty premises, making their nightly sittings in the door yard, if the house has one; a stray turkey, or two, running, from fear of the untutored dogs, into the nearest wood, in the spring, to make their rude nests, and bring out half a ...
— Rural Architecture - Being a Complete Description of Farm Houses, Cottages, and Out Buildings • Lewis Falley Allen

... intend to do with yourself?" asked Lady Cantourne when she had poured out tea. "You surely do not intend to mope in that dismal house in ...
— With Edged Tools • Henry Seton Merriman

... defaults, which the Greeks term 'Eunoeia, and we may construe good nature, which is but another word for Folly. And what? Is not Cupid, that first father of all relation, is not he stark blind, that as he cannot himself distinguish of colours, so he would make us as mope-eyed in judging falsely of all love concerns, and wheedle us into a thinking that we are always in the right? Thus every Jack sticks to his own Jill; every tinker esteems his own trull; and the hob-nailed suiter prefers Joan the milk-maid before any of my lady's daughters. ...
— In Praise of Folly - Illustrated with Many Curious Cuts • Desiderius Erasmus

... young people is sly and underhanded. Never fear. That old Houghton will set his boy down more decidedly than you have Ella, and also send him out of town probably. This cloud will sink below the horizon before we are many months older. Perhaps Ella will mope a little for a time, but we must not notice it, and must make it as cheerful for her as possible. Charleston men are beginning to call on her, and she'll soon discover that there are others in the world ...
— The Earth Trembled • E.P. Roe

... yonder was just more than I could put up with. There's one consolation, we are scheduled to be on our way home to-morrow, after we've seen this one rock or temple, or whatever it is. I'm full up of rocks and temples, Mr. Stephens. I shouldn't mope if I never saw another. Come, ...
— The Tragedy of The Korosko • Arthur Conan Doyle

... L'Ouverture, how cruel I thought him on that dreadful day. But now, in these stirring times, when our whole world, our little world in the middle of the sea, is to be destroyed, or made free and glorious for ever, I do think it is being sullen to mope on the mountain as she does, and speak to nobody, care for nobody, but the Dessalines. However, I would not say a word about it, if I were not sure that she is getting better. And if she were growing worse, instead of better, there is nothing that I would not do to help or console her, though I must ...
— The Hour and the Man - An Historical Romance • Harriet Martineau

... course of my reflections, however, I could not but perceive that his condition, though eligible when compared with what it once was, was likewise disastrous and humiliating, compared with his youthful hopes and his actual merits. For such a one to mope away his life in this unsocial and savage state was deeply to be deplored. It was my duty, if possible, to prevail on him to relinquish his scheme. And what would be requisite, for that end, but to inform ...
— Edgar Huntley • Charles Brockden Brown

... else, 'cause he's here. Monday mornin's they're sleepy and kind o' dreamy and slimpsy, and good fr nothin' on Tuesday and Wednesday. Thursday they git absent-minded, an' begin to look off toward Sunday agin, an' mope aroun' and let the dishwater git cold, rtght under their noses. Friday they break dishes, and go off in the best room an' snivel, an' look out o' the winder. Saturdays they have queer spurts o' workin' like all p'ssessed, an spurts o' frizzin' ...
— Main-Travelled Roads • Hamlin Garland

... month. A similar remittance would come monthly thereafter. It was the remittance-man's custom to pay his month's board and lodging straightway—a duty which his landlord did not allow him to forget—then spree away the rest of his money in a single night, then brood and mope and grieve in idleness till the next remittance came. It ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... I thought, only in my own quiet way. I believe if I had but had the sense to take my old friend with me, he would have shown me ever so much more than I found out by myself. But it was not to be; and year after year I went to grumble and mope at Venice, or Lago Maggiore; and Mr. Harrison to enjoy himself from morning to night at Broadstairs or Box Hill. Let me not speak with disdain of either. No blue languor of tideless wave is worth the spray and sparkle of a South-Eastern ...
— On the Old Road Vol. 1 (of 2) - A Collection of Miscellaneous Essays and Articles on Art and Literature • John Ruskin

... day Glen was too busy to mope. When the camp fire came he was at hand as a candidate for tenderfoot initiation which the scout master had agreed to give. Mr. Newton had ideas of his own about initiation ceremonies. He believed in making them interesting and impressive to candidate and scouts alike, and he devised ...
— The Boy Scout Treasure Hunters - The Lost Treasure of Buffalo Hollow • Charles Henry Lerrigo

... beautiful to mope about religion," he said, carelessly. "When she gets older, and is more tied down by domestic cares, it will be necessary and respectable for her to be religious; and then, egad, if she wishes it, I'd as lief she'd be a Catholic ...
— May Brooke • Anna H. Dorsey

... caught a glimpse of his reflection, and at once turned, alighted before it, and began calling vehemently; holding out, and quivering his wings, and flying up against the figure again and again in the most savage way. The next day he began to mope and refused to come out of the cage; whether because of illness, or disappointed ...
— In Nesting Time • Olive Thorne Miller

... the sky is clouded? What if the rain comes down? They are all dressed to meet it, In water-proof suits of brown. They never mope nor languish, Nor murmur at storm or heat; But say, whatever the weather, "Sweetest, sweet, sweet, ...
— New National Fourth Reader • Charles J. Barnes and J. Marshall Hawkes

... said he, twisting his mustache and putting his pipe in his pocket. "I do not like to mope in a garden when there are taverns outside. We must ...
— The Conscript - A Story of the French war of 1813 • Emile Erckmann

... goes off and doesn't come back till after dark. The missus, poor soul, told me yesterday—crying away like your old mill-wheel—that he takes a bit of bread and cheese with him and goes off to sit and mope somewhere in the woods. He never hardly speaks to her. She said, poor thing, that she'd give anything to see him ...
— Will of the Mill • George Manville Fenn

... Well, there was nothing surprising in that—except that he had not done it before! The irony of it lay in the fact that at last he had been TOO clever, overstepped himself in his own cleverness, that was all. It was Australian Ike, The Mope, and Clarie Deane that Stangeist had gathered around him, the Tocsin had said—and there were none worse in Larry the Bat's wide range of acquaintanceship than those three. Stangeist had made himself master of Australian ...
— The Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard

... I run and frisk, With my bushy tail to whisk All who mope in the old beech-trees. How droll to see the owl As I make him wink and growl, While his sleepy, sleepy head I tease! And I waken up the bat, Who flies off with a scream, For he thinks that I'm the cat Pouncing on him, ...
— Cole's Funny Picture Book No. 1 • Edward William Cole

... your head Upon your bed At set of sun. You will not sing Of anything To any one: You'll sit and mope All day, I hope, And shed a tear Upon the life Your little wife Is passing here! And if so be You think of me, Please tell the moon; I'll read it all In rays that fall On the lagoon: You'll be so kind As tell the ...
— Songs of a Savoyard • W. S. Gilbert

... will profit you nothing to mope thus. It were no disgrace to be bested by John Carter. You have seen that in the ease with which I accounted for Thurid. You knew it before when on the cruiser's deck you saw me slay three ...
— The Gods of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... will continue. "Get lots of starch in you and a backbone that is a backbone! Don't fall down in a heap and mope over things you can't help. The agreeable things in life are as rare as sage-brush growing in Gotham, while the disagreeable is bobbing up eternally. So brace up, my friend, and make the best of it. Discipline yourself. Keep your mind fresh and bright, and your body ...
— The Woman Beautiful - or, The Art of Beauty Culture • Helen Follett Stevans

... awfully good! I won't meddle; don't worry. Here's Dodo. She hasn't learned that lesson yet, bless her heart! Now don't let Mamma mope, Blossom." ...
— Joyce's Investments - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry

... cry out,—that is the surest cure for such troubles as hers. She was always manageable and good enough until Stanley ran away, and since then she does nothing but mope and bite her finger-nails. Cry away, Jessie, and have done with it. Ah, miss, the saddest feature about Asylums is the separation of families; and if the matron had a heart of stone it would melt sometimes at sight of these little motherless things clinging to ...
— Vashti - or, Until Death Us Do Part • Augusta J. Evans Wilson

... outcome of his fear. He tried to tell himself that he was inventing horrors, that the fire might be the simple truth, that Ryder's talk with the girl might actually have ended in farewell—at least a temporary farewell—and that his consequent low spirits had taken him off to mope in camp. ...
— The Fortieth Door • Mary Hastings Bradley

... novelists. Tut-tut!" continued the old lady tenderly. "A nice little ladyship you are,—worrying yourself about nothing! Send Philip to me when he comes home—I'll scold him for leaving his bird to mope in ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli

... perfect regularity. He lost the idea of being sick; he had not even a furred tongue. He fell asleep pretty early, and he slept through the night without a break. He had to laugh a great deal with his mother and sisters, since he could not very well mope without expecting them to ask why, and he did not wish to say why. But there were some laughs which he really enjoyed with the Yankee foreman of the works, who was a droll, after a common American pattern, and said things that were killingly funny, especially about women, of whom his opinions ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... fit in rather well, mayn't it? But if, for any unforeseen reason, I should have to stay sizzling on the sacrificial altar longer than we expect, you mustn't come home to hot Paris to economize and mope in the flat. You must stop in Switzerland till I can meet you in some nice place in the country. Promise that you won't add to my burdens by ...
— Set in Silver • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson

... a better and more worthy frame of mind. After all, I had lost nothing that I had ever had. Ruth was still all that she had ever been to me—perhaps even more; and if that had been a rich endowment yesterday, why not to-day also? And how unfair it would be to her if I should mope and grieve over a disappointment that was no fault of hers and for which there was no remedy! Thus I reasoned with myself, and to such purpose that, by the time I reached Fetter Lane, my dejection had come to quite manageable ...
— The Vanishing Man • R. Austin Freeman

... in general they are low, and get daily lower. That is hopeless; for I do not think I am so much ennuye as I was at nineteen. The proof is, that then I must game, or drink, or be in motion of some kind, or I was miserable. At present, I can mope in quietness; and like being alone better than any company—except the lady's whom I serve. But I feel a something, which makes me think that, if I ever reach near to old age, like Swift, 'I shall die at top' first. Only I do not dread idiotism or madness ...
— Life of Lord Byron, With His Letters And Journals, Vol. 5 (of 6) • (Lord Byron) George Gordon Byron

... dear, and come out and hear the music: your train doesn't go for two hours yet, and you mustn't mope here all that time," said Jack, offering his ...
— Kitty's Class Day And Other Stories • Louisa M. Alcott

... small to save, Quit not certainty for hope; Good denied, you cease to crave, Neither o'er the future mope. ...
— Golden Days for Boys and Girls - Volume XIII, No. 51: November 12, 1892 • Various

... found the act of going away contagious. Who really enjoys being left behind, to mope in a corner of the world others have abandoned? The gay company atop of the coach, as they were whirled beneath the old archway, had left discontent behind; the music of the horn, like that played by the Pied Piper, had the magic of making the ...
— In and Out of Three Normady Inns • Anna Bowman Dodd

... must say! You will grow hypochondriacal if you mope in this fashion,' he returned, following me ...
— Wilfrid Cumbermede • George MacDonald

... said, choking down the lump in her throat, 'it won't do to sit down and mope. That's not the way to bear our sorrows. You must think your fears are nothing to matter, with me here to defend you. Come along to bed now. That's the ...
— Chatterbox, 1906 • Various

... courtesy; nor are you permitted to take your leave without a promise to dine on the next Sunday or holiday—Mrs Stimpson rating you for not coming last Easter Sunday, and declaring she cannot think "why young men should mope by themselves, when she is always happy ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXIX. - March, 1843, Vol. LIII. • Various

... by the time these duties were accomplished The Tattooed Quaker was well out to sea, and the island was only a thin line on the horizon. And then a feeling of sadness for the loss of poor old Billykins, left there all alone again, took hold of the boy, and he retired dismally to his hammock to mope. ...
— The Flamp, The Ameliorator, and The Schoolboy's Apprentice • E. V. Lucas

... procurator, as I look back on that deadly winter, seems to have accepted all my peculiarities without question. If I would remain content and quell obstreperous beasts when spring opened as I had until autumn ushered in winter, I might do and be anything I pleased. If I pleased to mope in my quarters, pace under the arcades of the courtyard, lie abed from early dusk till after sunrise, what mattered that to him? Such, apparently, was his attitude of mind. He gave orders that I was ...
— Andivius Hedulio • Edward Lucas White



Words linked to "Mope" :   loafer, idler, bum, layabout, move, be, do-nothing



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