"Shyness" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Uncle Warrington. Only last night his aunt had kissed him and loved him like a son. His uncle had called down blessings on his head, and professed quite a paternal regard for him. With a feeling of shyness and modesty in presence of those virtuous parents and family. Harry had never said a word about his wild doings, or his horse-racings, or his gamblings, or his extravagances. It must all out now. He must confess ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... response to his gentle insistence, but her shyness went with her. She was aware of something intangible in the atmosphere that startled, that ...
— Greatheart • Ethel M. Dell
... persons of a refined and sensitive organization, you suffer from the very uncommon disease of shyness. At the very time, perhaps, when you desire most to please, to interest, to amuse, your over-anxiety defeats its own object. The self-possession of the indifferent generally carries off the palm from the earnest ...
— The Young Lady's Mentor - A Guide to the Formation of Character. In a Series of Letters to Her Unknown Friends • A Lady
... wonderful for you to have done all this," she said with sudden shyness. "You had ...
— The Palace of Darkened Windows • Mary Hastings Bradley
... alight, but Mary and her husband came to them where they waited at the gate and stood long, talking happily. Jamie and Bobby followed at their heels and peered up curiously at the wounded soldier, but Betty was seized with a rare moment of shyness that held ...
— The Eye of Dread • Payne Erskine
... creature— How modest seems his feature! He nestles so demurely, You'd think him safer surely; And yet for all his shyness, There's danger in his slyness! The cunning rogue! Young loves to sell! My pretty loves ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLV. July, 1844. Vol. LVI. • Various
... emotion; perhaps the memory of as dear a face that once beamed upon him with the same holy tenderness, stirred the long-time quiet depths within his young bosom, and sent forth the tear that lay upon his thin cheek! At any rate, the shyness and misery had vanished, and he stood intently gazing into the face of the lady until he seemed to have forgotten his misfortunes in the happiness of that one sacred moment. The gentle voice recalled him to a sense of his position, and he sighed ...
— The Elm Tree Tales • F. Irene Burge Smith
... went on pretty glibly. I fancy he had been afraid of beginning to speak to me, just as I was to him; but he got over his shyness with me sooner than I did mine with him. I let him choose the subjects of conversation, although very often I could not understand the points of interest in them: for instance, he talked for more than a quarter of an hour of a famous race which a certain dog-fox had given him, above ...
— My Lady Ludlow • Elizabeth Gaskell
... left him in the library. May I introduce Miss Bremerton—Sir Henry Chicksands.' The girl spoke with hurried shyness, the quick colour in her cheeks. The lady beside her bowed, and Sir Henry took off his hat. Each surveyed the other. 'A strong-minded female!' thought Sir Henry, who was by no means advanced in his views ...
— Elizabeth's Campaign • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... and remorseless coaching could make him. Everything needful was in his head—but could he get it out again? That was the question. The roaring world in which he would find himself, the strange examination-room, the quizzing professors—would these combine with his native shyness to seal the lips and cramp the pen of Robert Chalmers Fordyce? No—a thousand times no! He would win through! Robert set his teeth, braced himself, ...
— The Right Stuff - Some Episodes in the Career of a North Briton • Ian Hay
... After the first shyness of her intercourse with the young teacher had worn off, she began for a while rather to make eyes at him, which if Keith ever dreamed of, he never gave the least sign of it. She, therefore, soon abandoned the useless campaign, and for a time held ...
— Gordon Keith • Thomas Nelson Page
... was generally given out that Mr. Meeks had a vague desire to get married, but, being a shy and timorous youth, lacked the moral courage to do so. It was also well known that the Widow Conway had not buried her heart with the late lamented. As to her shyness, that was not so clear. Indeed, her attentions to Mr. Meeks, whose mother she might have been, were of a nature not to be misunderstood, and were not misunderstood by anyone but ...
— The Story of a Bad Boy • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... him, as if she had known and loved him for ten years—ten years during which, however, she had never quite been able, in spite of undiscouraged attempts, to cure him, as goddesses had to cure shepherds, of his mere mortal shyness. ...
— The Finer Grain • Henry James
... whether it was due to the fact that Mariana did not reciprocate his feelings, or that his choice should have fallen upon a girl so utterly unlike him, was not quite clear. But most of all she evidently strove to soften Nejdanov, to arouse his confidence towards her, to break down his shyness; she even went so far as to reproach him a little for having ...
— Virgin Soil • Ivan S. Turgenev
... and station" firm. Some one else clapped him on the shoulder, and he turned to meet his banker; behind them towered half a dozen old squatter friends, with fellow clubmen, all trying at once to get hold of his hand. David Linton's constitutional shyness melted in the heartiness of their greeting. Beyond them Norah seemed to be the centre of a mass of girls, one of whom presently detached herself, and came to him. He said in amazement, "Why, it's Jean Yorke—and grown up!" and actually kissed her, to the ...
— Back To Billabong • Mary Grant Bruce
... gaze of these two men, for they had none of the shyness or nothing of the indirection of the ruder men she had met. They expressed something which angered her, though she could not ...
— Cavanaugh: Forest Ranger - A Romance of the Mountain West • Hamlin Garland
... no Ring Lardner, no Irvin Cobb, no Casey at the bat. Mr. Smith is an infinitely close and acute observer of sophisticated social life, tinged with a faint and agreeable refined sadness, by an aura of shyness which amounts to a spiritual virginity. He comes to us trailing clouds of glory from the heaven of pure and unfettered speculation which is our home. He is an elf of utter simplicity and infinite candour. He ...
— Shandygaff • Christopher Morley
... possessed a curious shyness which gave to his character an appearance the more misleading in that it hid in reality a will of iron and a ruthlessness comparable to a Condottiere of the Middle Ages. The fact was that his soul was thirsting ...
— Cecil Rhodes - Man and Empire-Maker • Princess Catherine Radziwill
... something of the great poets. Miss Mary Leicester was taken up with the important business of her own invalidism, but it might be a very good thing for her to take some part in such pleasant plans. Under all Aunt Barbara's shyness and habit of formality Betty had discovered her warm and generous heart. They had become fast friends, and, to tell the truth, Aunt Mary was beginning to have an uneasy and wistful consciousness that she was causing herself to be ...
— Betty Leicester - A Story For Girls • Sarah Orne Jewett
... from the schoolroom, she would have liked to go to picture-galleries, attend concerts, and mix with interesting people; in spite of her shyness and gentleness, she had plenty of mind and character, and Malcolm had already cultivated her artistic tastes. One summer, indeed, they had gone abroad, and Malcolm had been with them, and for two months Anna felt they had been in the ...
— Herb of Grace • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... was not a smile or a sound. That ceremony over, they charged down upon me in an avalanche of gaiety. They waved their lanterns, they called banzai, they laughed and sung some of the old time foolish songs we used to sing. They promptly put to rout all legends of their excessive modesty and shyness. They were just young and girlish. Plain happy. Eager and sweet in their generous welcome. It warmed every fiber of my being. When they thinned out a little, I saw at the other end of the platform a figure flying towards me, with the sleeves of her kimono out-stretched like the wings of a gray bird, ...
— The Lady and Sada San - A Sequel to The Lady of the Decoration • Frances Little
... fabrications of a dismissed servant. Mr. Nicholls had also his grievance. There was just a suspicion implied that he had not been quite the most sympathetic of husbands. The suspicion was absolutely ill-founded, and arose from Mr. Nicholls's intense shyness. But neither Mr. Bronte nor Mr. Nicholls gave Mrs. Gaskell much trouble. They, at any rate, were silent. Trouble, however, came from many quarters. Yorkshire people resented the air of patronage with which, as it seemed to them, a good Lancashire lady had taken their county in hand. ...
— Charlotte Bronte and Her Circle • Clement K. Shorter
... him so?" demanded Clarice of Heliet, in an astonished whisper. "Always," replied Heliet, with a sad smile. "But surely," said Clarice, her amazement getting the better of her shyness, "it must be very wanting in reverence from a ...
— A Forgotten Hero - Not for Him • Emily Sarah Holt
... temperament, and from the earliest age evincing those characteristics of pride and shyness which rendered him unsocial, and therefore unpopular in general society, this nobleman, in the private walks of life, was amiable, and peculiarly disinterested. While in India, his correspondence with those of his own family, evinced in a remarkable degree those ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 4, September, 1850 • Various
... loved before, caressed as men caress a dog, kicking it off when it becomes troublesome. George's boyish shyness, his reverent awe ...
— Frances Waldeaux • Rebecca Harding Davis
... and the friendly rivalry with his fellow-students, had imbued him with the manly courage with which he faced the world. Yet not one of us can permanently alter his temperament; and, to the end of his life, Ivan was destined to suffer periodic torments from shyness, natural reticence, and a never-dying sense of shame at the memory of that unjust disgrace which by this time many interpreted rightly, and ...
— The Genius • Margaret Horton Potter
... back, and it was then the concertinas came in useful. They sat down on the grass, and the concert was begun by Harry, who played a solo; then there was a call for a song, and Jim stood up and sang that ancient ditty, 'O dem Golden Kippers, O'. There was no shyness in the company, and Liza, almost without being asked, gave another popular comic song. Then there was more concertina playing, and another demand for a song. Liza turned to Tom, who was ...
— Liza of Lambeth • W. Somerset Maugham
... out of love for him. Look into yourself! [With a certain shyness of expression.] Search out all that lies under—and behind ...
— Little Eyolf • Henrik Ibsen
... some caress. She looked sick and her lips were quite white, and if Lucis had been a man of quick perceptions he would have realised, her face must have shown him, that she loathed him. He was dense, however, and though he commented on her silence later on it was evident that he attributed it to shyness. ...
— Olive in Italy • Moray Dalton
... marvellously rich hair, in a wild disorder which proclaimed it to be only during the invisible hours of the night that such a condition was discoverable. Her bright eyes were looking into the grey world outside with an uncertain expression, oscillating between courage and shyness, which, as she recognized the semicircular group of dark forms gathered before her, transformed itself into ...
— Under the Greenwood Tree • Thomas Hardy
... therefore, the two young ladies between whom she was seated, rather with a wish of addressing, than a shyness of being attacked by them; but the elder, Miss Larolles, was earnestly engaged in discourse with a gentleman, and the younger, Miss Leeson, totally discouraged her, by the invariable silence and gravity with which from time to time ...
— Cecilia Volume 1 • Frances Burney
... was Tom Longman. Tom was a big, hulking fellow, good-natured and simple-hearted in the extreme. He was the victim of an intense susceptibility to the girls' charms, joined with an intolerable shyness and self-consciousness when in their presence. From this consuming embarrassment he would seek relief by working like a horse whenever there was anything to do. With his hands occupied he had an excuse for not talking to the girls or being addressed by ...
— Dr. Heidenhoff's Process • Edward Bellamy
... at the door apprised him that his expected guests had arrived. Alas! blunder number two trod hard on the heels of number one! He had no tea or coffee, not even a box of biscuits, to take off the edge of the interview and offer a retreat for his own inevitable embarrassment and the possible shyness of his visitors. The arrangements for that reception were as formal as the invitations had been. Was it much wonder if the conference turned out stiff and awkward? In the first place, as all four entered together, and none of them were labelled, ...
— The Master of the Shell • Talbot Baines Reed
... to give dares and to take risks. No class of players needs more sympathetic or tactful understanding and help from a teacher than the timid. Such children often suffer greatly through their shyness. They should first be brought into play in some form of game that does not make them conspicuous; one, for instance, in which they do what all the other players do, or merely take turns. Such children should ...
— Games for the Playground, Home, School and Gymnasium • Jessie H. Bancroft
... The Invention occupied him at night. He read, too, books on optometry. Don't think that he was a Rollo. He wasn't. But he was naturally somewhat shy, and further handicapped by an unusually tall lean frame which he handled awkwardly. If you had a good look at his eyes you forgot his shyness, his leanness, his awkwardness, his height. They were the keynote of his gentle, studious, kindly, humorous nature. But Chicago, Illinois, is too busy looking to see anything. Eyes are something you see ...
— Gigolo • Edna Ferber
... statement—(because if it was quite as bad as you say, you know, I never should have seen you ... and I have!) and also for yours ... because you take such a very preposterously wrong way for overcoming anybody's shyness. Do you know, I have laughed ... really laughed at your letter. No—it has not been so bad. I have seen you at every visit, as well as I could with both eyes wide open—only that by a supernatural influence they won't stay open with you as they are used to do with other people ... so ...
— The Letters of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett, Vol. 1 (of 2) 1845-1846 • Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett
... there can be no question that Goldsmith, conscious of his pitted face, his brogue, and his ungainly figure, was exceedingly nervous and sensitive in society, and was anxious, as such people mostly are, to cover his shyness by an appearance of ease, if not even of swagger; and there can be as little question that he occasionally did and said very awkward and blundering things. But our Japanese friend, whom we mentioned in our opening pages, looking ...
— Goldsmith - English Men of Letters Series • William Black
... her trembling in his arms as they drove through the crowded streets in the shabby neighbourhood she had never seen before, to the house crowded between others all like itself. She had actually not heard the young chaplain's name in her shyness and tremor. He would scarcely have been an entity but for the one moving fact that he himself had just hastily married a girl he adored and must leave, and so sympathised and understood the stress of their hour. On their ...
— Robin • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... conclude she would have carried out whatever plan she might have formed. I can imagine de Barral accustomed for years to defer to her wishes and, either through arrogance, or shyness, or simply because of his unimaginative stupidity, remaining outside the social pale, knowing no one but some card-playing cronies; I can picture him to myself terrified at the prospect of having the care ...
— Chance • Joseph Conrad
... was feeling with every moment less at ease in his companionship and more determined to seem at ease. Being generally self-possessed, she had a horror of slipping into shyness and so retrograding from her usual vantage ground. She expected him to speak. It was his turn. But he said nothing. She felt sure that he had seen through her last lie, and that he was secretly resenting it as a heavy-footed ...
— The Way of Ambition • Robert Hichens
... glance round the rooms and the company; then, as if conscious of the remarks and glances directed toward him, but completely "ignoring" them, and without the least shyness or awkwardness, he walked quietly through the hall to the host ...
— The Continental Classics, Volume XVIII., Mystery Tales • Various
... a stranger from her stool in the most persistent manner, never withdrawing her eyes, as if she would pierce to his soul, and understand by very force of insight whether he was or was not one to be honored with her confidence; and I have often seen the side-long glance of sly merriment, or loving shyness, or small coquetry; but I have never, in any other child, seen that look of self-protective speculation; and it used to make me uneasy, for of course, like every one else in the house, I loved the child. She was ...
— The Vicar's Daughter • George MacDonald
... the 79th—leaned forward and tried to put his hand upon the child's shoulder, not unkindly, but with a rough playfulness of the soldier. Gilian shrank back, his face flushing crimson, then he realised the stupidity of his shyness and tried to amend it by coming a little farther into the room and awkwardly attempting the salute in which the Sergeant More had tutored him. The company was amused at the courtesy, but no one laughed. In a low voice the Paymaster swore. He was a man given to swearing with no great variety ...
— Gilian The Dreamer - His Fancy, His Love and Adventure • Neil Munro
... expression, too, in the whole face, of fixedness of purpose, without any hardness of determination. Her countenance altogether seemed the index to an interesting mental history. Signs of mental trouble were always an attraction to him; in this case so great, that he overcame his shyness, and spoke to her one evening as they left the works. He often walked home with her after that; as, indeed, was natural, seeing that she occupied an attic in the same poor lodging-house in which he lived himself. The street did not bear the best character; ...
— The Portent & Other Stories • George MacDonald
... towards him, palpitating between her shyness of the Commander of the Garrison and her womanly curiosity to ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves
... Gardens are very shy and restless; when alarmed they dash and leap about their dens and utter a short guttural cry somewhat resembling a bark. This shyness is partly to be attributed to their imperfect vision by day, and partly to their resemblance in character to the wolf, whose treachery and suspicious manners in confinement must have struck every one who has gazed on this "gaunt savage" in his den in the Regent's Park. The specimens exhibited ...
— Heads and Tales • Various
... an odd sensation—too sunny upon the nooked, retiring current that flowed in him. He might have turned to the cool accustomed shadow that Alicia made, but she was aware that he did not, that he was struggling through her strangeness and his shyness for something to say to her. He stirred his coffee, and once or twice his long upper lip trembled as if he thought he had found it; but it was Alicia who talked, making light accusations against the rigours of the Mission House, complaining of her cousin ...
— The Path of a Star • Mrs. Everard Cotes (AKA Sara Jeannette Duncan)
... Smoke he was always absurdly gentle; also he was fatherly; and at the same time betrayed a certain diffidence or shyness. He recognised that Smoke called for strong yet respectful management. The cat's circuitous methods puzzled him, and his elaborate pretences perhaps shocked the dog's liking for direct, undisguised action. Yet, while he failed to comprehend these tortuous feline mysteries, ...
— Three John Silence Stories • Algernon Blackwood
... Later in the evening it was with an emotion like alarm that Lois heard that her parents had gone home without waiting to bear her company. Secretly she began to plan methods for stealing away alone. Her shyness of Thor was like nothing she had known in the days of courtship and marriage, or during the months in which they had been holding off from each other ...
— The Side Of The Angels - A Novel • Basil King
... that dropt from my mother's lips, as if at unawares,) that she is very fearful of the consequences that may follow;—to my prejudice, perhaps, is her kind concern; since she sees that they behave to me every hour with more and more shyness and reserve: yet, would she but exert that authority which the superiority of her fine talents gives her, all these family feuds might perhaps be extinguished in their but yet beginnings; especially as she may be assured that all fitting concessions shall ...
— Clarissa, Volume 1 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... and admired their healthy, happy, and well-fed appearance; and then proceeded to the apartment of the boys; all little things of the same age, sitting ranged in a row like senators in congress, and, strange to say, much quieter and graver than the female babies; but this must have been from shyness, for before we came away, we saw them romping in great style. The directresses seem good respectable women, and kind to the children, who, as I mentioned before, are almost all taken away and brought up by rich people, before they have ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon De La Barca
... good fortune to know many wise and virtuous men. I never knew any man of really great intellect, who carried less of the ways of ordinary greatness about him. There was an added charm to the very shyness of his manner when one remembers how fearless he was, if the occasion called for fortitude ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 13 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Lovers • Elbert Hubbard
... when I repeat it. You lose the sweet shyness of her face, the appeal in her eyes not yet dry, and that soft minor chord in her voice that reminds me ...
— The Rim of the Desert • Ada Woodruff Anderson
... ease. The community song leader must be able to raise a hearty laugh occasionally, and he must by the magnetism of his personality be able to make men and women who have not raised their voices in song for years past forget their shyness, forget to be afraid of the sound of their own voices, forget to wonder whether anyone is listening, and join heartily in ...
— Essentials in Conducting • Karl Wilson Gehrkens
... their feet. It was still hissing and smoking, but Ned, driven by some unknown impulse, seized it and with a mighty effort hurled it over the wall, where it burst. Then he stood licking his burned fingers and looking rather confusedly at Crockett. He felt a certain shyness over what he ...
— The Texan Scouts - A Story of the Alamo and Goliad • Joseph A. Altsheler
... know. I am so shy. My shyness takes a peculiar phase. I never look a person in the face. The reason is that I am afraid they may know me and that I may not know them, which makes it very embarrassing for both of us. I always wait for the other person to speak. I know lots of people, but I don't ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... a measure strange to her, seeing all her girlhood had been spent at her aunt's house in London town, where she had received her education. Possibly she had looked forward not without dread to the rough merry-making of the Fair; but she too had kindled at the Stranger's message. Her shyness fled from her as, with her hand locked fast in her husband's, the two pressed forward. The crowd seemed to melt away at sight of their radiant faces, and almost before the sermon was ended the young couple found themselves face to face ...
— A Book of Quaker Saints • Lucy Violet Hodgkin
... in short, it has become an "understood thing" all over town—there are such moments, when the lady throws off all reserve, and by a look, a smile, a blush, a half-articulate word, repays her lover for months, if he is fool enough to court so long, of prudish and affected shyness, past or future. These moments occur but seldom, even in the most patriarchal courtships, and it is well that it is so. Love is a fiery steed, and should always be ridden with a curb bridle, both before and after marriage. (I am sorry that I cannot think of a nautical metaphor, or I assure ...
— An Old Sailor's Yarns • Nathaniel Ames
... Swiggs!" exclaims the old man, toddling toward Tom, and grasping firmly his hand, as he enters the door. "You are welcome to my little place, which shall be a home." Tom hangs down his head, receives the old man's greeting with shyness. "Your poor father and me, Tom, used to sit here many a time. (The old man points to an old sofa.) We were friends. He thought much of me, and I had a high opinion of him; and so we used to sit for hours, and talk over the deeds of the old continentals. Your ...
— Justice in the By-Ways - A Tale of Life • F. Colburn Adams
... probability of even greater miracles in the matter of price. She saw the average price of ten pounds rising to fifteen, or even twenty, pounds—provided her husband was given no opportunity to ruin the affair by his absurd, retiring shyness. ...
— Buried Alive: A Tale of These Days • Arnold Bennett
... among inverts, it is quite obvious that it was not the masculine character of the boy which kindled the love of man, but it was his physical resemblance to woman as well as his feminine psychic qualities, such as shyness, demureness, and the need of instruction and help. As soon as the boy himself became a man he ceased to be a sexual object for men and in turn became a lover of boys. The sexual object in this case as in many others is therefore ...
— Three Contributions to the Theory of Sex • Sigmund Freud
... happy one, full of generous and kindly feelings, and finding only a strange pleasure where others would have found bitterness and cynicism. Like the melancholy Jacques, he might have said of his pensive shyness, "It is a melancholy of mine own, compounded of many simples, extracted from many objects; ... which, by often rumination, wraps me ...
— Great Fortunes, and How They Were Made • James D. McCabe, Jr.
... future happiness. Every object and every aim of his life had reference to her. It was hard to give up such a perfect love, and she felt that she could not see Andrew face to face and do it. Hence her refusals to meet him, and her shyness and silence when a meeting was unavoidable. Hence, also, came a very peculiar attitude of Andrew's friends and mates; for they could not conceive how Andrew's implicit faith in his love should prevent him from finding out what ...
— A Knight of the Nets • Amelia E. Barr
... bestow too much of my attention in this quarter. On looking again to the long and shady walk I perceive that the two fair girls have encountered the young man. After a sort of shyness in the recognition, he turns back with them. Moreover, he has sanctioned my taste in regard to his companions by placing himself on the inner side of the pavement, nearest the Venus to whom I, enacting on a steeple-top the part of Paris ...
— Twice Told Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... been "up and doing." (Not up and saying, be't well understood). As TUPPER (the Honourable C.H., Minister Of Fisheries) said, in the style of his namesake, "The fool imagines all Silence is sinister, "But the wise man knows that it's often dexterous." Be sure no inquisitive shyness or bounce'll Make us "too previous" with our Report, which goes first to the QUEEN and the Privy Council. Some bigwig's motto is, "Say and Seal," but as TUPPER remarked a forefinger laying To the dexter side of a fine proboscis, "Our motto at present ...
— Punch, or The London Charivari, Volume 101, October 31, 1891 • Various
... came often, when the first shyness had worn away. He was an orphan, like Marie herself: a pretty, dark-eyed little fellow, who looked, she fancied, like the children at home in France. He did not expect her to talk and answer questions, but was ...
— Marie • Laura E. Richards
... the wind was crisp and cold as I rode into Howard's Creek. Smoke rose from the cabins. I limped toward the Davis cabin, a strange shyness holding me back. Some ...
— A Virginia Scout • Hugh Pendexter
... make a girl talk to a man, such a ducking as Lucinda had had would do so. Such sudden events, when they come in the shape of misfortune, or the reverse, generally have the effect of abolishing shyness for the time. Let a girl be upset with you in a railway train, and she will talk like a Rosalind, though before the accident she was as mute as death. But with Lucinda Roanoke the accustomed change ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope
... murmured and then, all at once, from throat to brow crept a wave of hot colour, her long lashes drooped and she turned away with a strange, new shyness; and in this moment I saw she was altogether more lovely than I ...
— Peregrine's Progress • Jeffery Farnol
... not from pride but from shyness, and presently her husband said to her: "Get up, my dear, and show how smart you are." She obeyed, but she had no need to get up to show it. She walked to the end of the studio and then came back blushing, her fluttered eyes on the partner of her appeal. ...
— Some Short Stories • Henry James
... Agnes Rivers was feeling quite at home in her uncle's house. She had lost much of her nervous shyness, but except with Mrs. Mittens she was very quiet and reserved. She was a little afraid of her uncle, as were the whole family; a little in awe of Eddie too, who was still somewhat stately and grand ...
— Little Folks (July 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various
... go with me, Manning,' said he; 'I used to be as impudent a fellow as need be, and rather liked going amongst strangers, and making my way; but since my illness I am almost like a girl, and turn hot and cold with shyness, as ...
— Cousin Phillis • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... architecture, he could not be mistaken in his confidence that I was a connoisseur. All eyes were turned upon me. As a shy man, this made me blush; as a vain man, the blush was accompanied with delight. It might easily have happened that such an appeal, acting at once upon shyness and ignorance, would have inflamed my wrath; but the appeal happening to be directed on a point which I had recently investigated and thoroughly mastered, I was flattered at the opportunity of a ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.
... expected his pupil to learn, his expectations were surpassed. The girl beyond clearing up the room had nothing to do, and she devoted herself with enthusiasm to this work. Once she had mastered simple words and felt her own progress, her shyness as to her ignorance left her. She always carried her book in her pocket, and took to asking girls the pronunciation of larger words, and begging them to read a few lines to her; and sitting on the door-step poring over her book, ...
— Facing Death - The Hero of the Vaughan Pit. A Tale of the Coal Mines • G. A. Henty
... embarrassed, he smiled stupidly and fell to gazing at the stage. He gazed at it but was no longer feeling bliss. He began to be troubled by uneasiness. In the interval, he went up to Brizzhalov, walked beside him, and overcoming his shyness, muttered: ...
— Love and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... always inviting to the guess, the passionate surmise—that told him first here was a maiden made for love. A figure tremulous with a warm grace, a countenance perfect in its form, full of a natural gravity, yet quick to each emotion, turning from the pallor of sudden alarm to the flush of shyness or vexation. The mountains had stood around to shelter her, and she was like the harebell of the hills. Had she been the average of her sex he would have met her with a front of brass; instead there was confusion in his utterance ...
— Doom Castle • Neil Munro
... deep. Standing on the weedy margin, and throwing the line over the elder-bushes that dip into the water, it seems as if we could catch nothing but frogs and mud-turtles, or reptiles akin to them. And even when a fish of reputable aspect is drawn out, one feels a shyness about touching him. As to our river, its character was admirably expressed last night by some one who said "it was too lazy to keep itself clean." I might write pages and pages, and only obscure the impression which this ...
— Passages From The American Notebooks, Volume 2. • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... troubles incidental to folk-song collecting it is unnecessary to speak. But the collection of shanties involves difficulties of a special kind. In taking down a folk-song from a rustic, one's chief difficulty is surmounted when one has broken down his shyness and induced him to sing. There is nothing for him to do then but get on with the song. Shanties, however, being labour songs, one is 'up against' the strong psychological connection between the song and its manual acts. Two illustrations ...
— The Shanty Book, Part I, Sailor Shanties • Richard Runciman Terry
... those happy sons of the gods who are born to success. No young man of his age was more courted both by men and women. There was no one who in his youth had suffered fewer troubles from those causes of trouble which visit English young men,—occasional impecuniosity, sternness of parents, native shyness, fear of ridicule, inability of speech, and a general pervading sense of inferiority combined with an ardent desire to rise to a feeling of conscious superiority. So much had been done for him by nature that he was never called upon to pretend to anything. Throughout ...
— The Prime Minister • Anthony Trollope
... refined manner, with a candid but somewhat frightened-looking face. She was wearing a very plain indoor dress, and had on a shabby old-fashioned hat, but she still carried a parasol. Unexpectedly finding the room full of people, she was not so much embarrassed as completely overwhelmed with shyness, like a little child. She was even about to retreat. "Oh... it's you!" said Raskolnikov, extremely astonished, and he, too, was confused. He at once recollected that his mother and sister knew through Luzhin's letter of "some young woman of notorious behaviour." He ...
— Crime and Punishment • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... feel any shyness about meeting this formidable conclave? Remember you have at least two good friends ...
— The Sword Maker • Robert Barr
... of that, and swung round to face him. Her glance met his own without, shyness now; there was a hardening glitter in her eyes, a faint stir of colour in her cheeks. She suspected him ...
— Scaramouche - A Romance of the French Revolution • Rafael Sabatini
... was struggling with a feeling of uncontrollable shyness which completely tied her usually ...
— The Farringdons • Ellen Thorneycroft Fowler
... men who have grown up in society, Prince Andrew liked meeting someone there not of the conventional society stamp. And such was Natasha, with her surprise, her delight, her shyness, and even her mistakes in speaking French. With her he behaved with special care and tenderness, sitting beside her and talking of the simplest and most unimportant matters; he admired her shy grace. In ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... ways, low tones of voice, lips that can wait, and eyes that do not wander,—shyness of personalities, except in certain intimate communions,—to be light in hand in conversation, to have ideas, but to be able to make talk, if necessary, without them,—to belong to the company you are in, and not to yourself,—to have nothing ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... result of exaggerated humility. If you concentrate upon what you are saying, and forget all about how you are saying it, you will forget your shyness. Respect yourself, have confidence in yourself-and nervousness and shyness ...
— Book of Etiquette • Lillian Eichler
... her affectionate father,—who had procured it at a high rate, and who would have given half his substance to gratify his daughter,—sat the girlish form of Rose Flammock, who had so much of juvenile shyness in her manner, so much of feeling and of judgment in her thoughts and actions. Dame Margery followed, mixed in the party escorted by Father Aldrovand, whose company she chiefly frequented; for Margery affected a little the character of the devotee, and her influence in the family, as ...
— The Betrothed • Sir Walter Scott
... out beneath the tiny frill of her thin garment, looked at the broad-shouldered handsome girl Manella who had just brought in her breakfast tray and now stood regarding her with an odd expression of mingled admiration and shyness. ...
— The Secret Power • Marie Corelli
... Herein lay all her early wildness and strangeness. Herein lay, as yet half hidden, dimly sensed and all unspoken, the power of a mighty all-compelling love for one human soul, and, through it, for all the souls of men. All this lay growing and developing; but as yet she was still a girl, with a new shyness and comeliness ...
— The Quest of the Silver Fleece - A Novel • W. E. B. Du Bois
... if she would not renounce all pensions, abandon the alliance with Austria and give up all the bailiwicks for a term of office. But Bern was by no means so ready for war. In the Council, jealousy or mere political shyness of the often hasty interference of Zurich, appears to have given new animation to the party opposed to her. "We are," wrote Haller to Zwingli, "as unsound as ever in our government; and though we now at Easter possess the Small and ...
— The Life and Times of Ulric Zwingli • Johann Hottinger
... ornament to the age in which he lived." At a comparatively early age he had outlived all his family, and thus became the owner of large landed property. He suddenly became a prey to strange, overmastering habits of indolence, apathy, and shyness, which gradually estranged him from all society. He neglected his property, allowed his rents to remain for years and years in the hands of his steward, without troubling himself about them, and allowed his dividends to grow up in the hands of his bankers without concerning himself as to ...
— A History of the Four Georges and of William IV, Volume IV (of 4) • Justin McCarthy and Justin Huntly McCarthy
... presence of the Houyhnms. These noble animals, so graceful, so clean, so condescending, appalled him. Yet he had found the Silchester men who came to visit the Mission easy enough to get on with. No doubt they, without their background were themselves a little shy, although their shyness never mastered them so far as to make them ill at ease. Here, however, they seemed as imperturbable and unbending as the stone saints, row upon row on the great West front of the Cathedral. Mark apprehended more clearly than ever the powerful personality ...
— The Altar Steps • Compton MacKenzie
... the door for a few moments. She was torn with conflicting fears and emotions. A strange feeling of oppression and shyness had come over her. It had seemed so easy to say that she would be married at once, to-morrow, to Jervis. But she had not known that she would have to ask Jervis's consent. She had supposed, foolishly, that it would all be settled for her ...
— Good Old Anna • Marie Belloc Lowndes
... forth to take a drive with nobody in the Park; and then would come back in order to dress again and go and dine with nobody at the Piazza Coffee-House. He was as vain as a girl; and perhaps his extreme shyness was one of the results of his extreme vanity. If Miss Rebecca can get the better of him, and at her first entrance into life, she is a young person of ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... recollections they retain of their early childhood. A few, as I do, remember it all. Many remember nothing whatever which occurred before they were five years old.... I have suffered much from a feeling of shyness and reserve, and I have not been able to do things by trying to do them. What comes to me comes of its own accord, and almost in spite of me; and I have hardly any power when verses are once written to make them any better.... There were no hardships in my youth, ...
— Lives of Girls Who Became Famous • Sarah Knowles Bolton
... "You are a noble fellow, sir, and will make her an excellent husband. She will not be so foolish as to reject such a disinterested affection. Besides," he added, hesitating a little, "I have a very shrewd notion that all this apparent indifference is only shyness on my little girl's part, ...
— Fenton's Quest • M. E. Braddon
... was greatly disconcerted. He had never been a Lothario. In forty years he had never had an episode with one of "the other sex," but it was not because he was impervious to the softer emotions. An intolerable shyness had ever possessed him when in the presence of women, and even small girl children had frightened him, till he had made friends with little Zoe Barbille, the daughter of Jean Jacques. Yet even with Zoe, who was so simple and companionable and ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... a word because she thought that, like herself, the girl had seen Cynthia's boy coming down the hill and wished with girlish shyness to be out of the house when he came. But Nanny had not seen him, had not been watching the roads, so taken was she with her guilty secret. Her surprise when she almost ran ...
— Green Valley • Katharine Reynolds
... introduced to the owner of the haunting face. He had lived too much in the great world all his life to retain the innate shyness of an Englishman; but he certainly was confused and embarrassed when his eyes met Isaura's, and he felt her hand on his arm. Before quitting the room she paused and looked back. Graham's look followed her own, and saw behind them the lady with the scarlet jacket escorted by some portly and decorated ...
— The Parisians, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... in service in Black Hawk during the few years I lived there, and I can remember something unusual and engaging about each of them. Physically they were almost a race apart, and out-of-door work had given them a vigour which, when they got over their first shyness on coming to town, developed into a positive carriage and freedom of movement, and made them ...
— My Antonia • Willa Cather
... flush and Jimmy's twinkle; his incredible, irrepressible twinkle. You could even see the tips of Jimmy's little front teeth trying to bite down his lip into some sort of composure. You could see that he was very shy and very modest; you could see that in spite of his shyness and his modesty he was frightfully pleased; but more than anything you could see ...
— The Belfry • May Sinclair
... gallops the animal after its fellows, never separating itself from the main body. Every Maratha brings his own horse and his own arms with him to the field, and possibly in the interest they possess in this private equipment we shall find their usual shyness to expose themselves or even to make a bold vigorous attack. But if armies or troops could be frightened by appearances these horses of the Marathas would dishearten the bravest, actually darkening the plains with their ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume IV of IV - Kumhar-Yemkala • R.V. Russell
... not have passed as so proud a man, and would have been more popular. There is no trait of character in a great man less understood than what we call pride, which often is not pride at all, but excessive shyness and reserve, based on sensitiveness and caution rather than ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume X • John Lord
... undersized, red-haired, and somewhat freckled. He was the only man in the party whose outside tallied with this bill of particulars. He was said to be very shy. He is a shy man. Of this there is no doubt. It may not show on the surface, but the shyness is there. After days of intimacy one wonders to see that it is still in about as strong force as ever. There is a fine and beautiful nature hidden behind it, as all know who have read the Uncle Remus book; ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... to make acquaintance with a colley-dog, I have never been able to succeed in producing any degree of familiarity. On the contrary, he has always regarded me with looks of shyness and suspicion. His master appears to be the only being to whom he is capable of showing any degree of attachment; and coiled up on his great-coat, or reposing at his feet, he eyes a stranger with distrust, if not with anger. At the same time there is a look of ...
— Anecdotes of Dogs • Edward Jesse
... cried Aleck, and there came a sudden lull as they scrambled to their feet. Jim was the only one she did not know, and for some reason the sight of this slender young woman in black, with a white rose in her dress, caused him a fit of unusual shyness. Ikey himself could not have been more abashed than he was when Carl ...
— The Story of the Big Front Door • Mary Finley Leonard
... presence, approval, and scorn of men 1. Gregariousness. 2. Attention to human beings. 3. Attention-getting. 4. Responses to approval and scorn. 5. Responses by approval and scorn D. Mastering and submissive behavior 1. Display. 2. Shyness. 3. Self-conscious behavior E. Other social instincts 1. Sex behavior. 2. Secretiveness. 3. Rivalry. 4. Co-operation. 5. Suggestibility and opposition. 6. Envious and jealous behavior. 7. Greed. 8. Ownership. 9. Kindliness. 10. Teasing, tormenting, ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park
... the Cantorei. How eagerly he had looked forward to this break in his life, with what zeal he had planned how he was to assist Michael in his work, when he had smoothed the young one's entry, helped him over his shyness, and shown him all the delightful scenes and circumstances which his new life would comprise. It had infused new vigour into his resolutions, and fired him with fresh ardour for his own work, this coming of his brother to share ...
— Story-Lives of Great Musicians • Francis Jameson Rowbotham
... scant knowledge, but the one I know was wont to cherish the memory of things his love had said and how she had said them; with what a pretty tilt to her chin, with what a daring shyness of the eyes, with what a fine colour and impetuous audacity she had done this or looked that. He was wont in advance to plan out conversations, to decide that he would tell her some odd brain fancy and watch her while he told it. Many ...
— A Daughter of Raasay - A Tale of the '45 • William MacLeod Raine
... anxiety was as to whether Fika would get his share all right; but I expect he did, for the Ajumbas are very honest men; and they were going back with my Fan friends. I found out, by the by, the reason of Fika's shyness in coming through to the Rembwe; it was ...
— Travels in West Africa • Mary H. Kingsley
... Mrs. Spafford and she washed up. Later, they brought their sewing into the sitting-room. While we were trying to thaw the little schoolmarm's shyness, a mouse ran across the floor. In an instant Miss Buchanan was on her chair. The mouse ran round the room and vanished; the girl who had been sent to Paradise to keep in order the turbulent children of the foothills ...
— Bunch Grass - A Chronicle of Life on a Cattle Ranch • Horace Annesley Vachell
... all blushes and shyness. Her hair had gone back into the long plait, and she wore her schoolgirl ...
— The Limit • Ada Leverson
... Consider you've got resources deposited with me. Perhaps at the first blush—it strikes you as odd. People are brought up to be so shy about money. As though it was indelicate—it's just a sort of shyness. But here I am to draw upon. Here I am as an alternative either to nasty ...
— Ann Veronica • H. G. Wells
... still think that there must have been some consultation and decision relating to me in the interval between the meetings and the formation of the new ministry, which produced some alteration.... In confirmation of the notion I have recorded above, I am distinct in the recollection that there was a shyness in Peel's manner and a downward eye, when he opened the conversation and made the offer, not usual with him ...
— The Life of William Ewart Gladstone, Vol. 1 (of 3) - 1809-1859 • John Morley
... girl while his mother talked, and he seemed to detect in her a certain aloofness as far as he was concerned, although he was not sure that the impression was not due to his absence so long from the society of women. It gave him a feeling of shyness which he found difficult to overcome, and which he contrasted in his own mind with her ease and ...
— Before the Dawn - A Story of the Fall of Richmond • Joseph Alexander Altsheler
... is one of the names of the lion). The former is the game-killing tiger, retired in his habits, living chiefly among the hills, retreating readily from man. "He is a light-made beast, very active and enduring, and from this, as well as his shyness, generally difficult to ...
— Natural History of the Mammalia of India and Ceylon • Robert A. Sterndale
... fire; a compelling apparition, erect, with snowy hair waving high over burning black eyes. To-day when I coldly analyse her fascination I recall nothing but these simple elements. She permitted not a moment of the shyness that has always plagued me. What our words were I do not now know, but I know that I kissed the two hands she held out to me as she called me Mantovani's son and her friend. Then I talked as never before or since, told her of my struggles and ambitions, and from time to time I was mute so that ...
— The Collectors • Frank Jewett Mather
... the passage, and one into the douche-chamber, which also served for another bathroom. Presently the first of the doors opened, and a girl, without apology, entered and took away a sponge. Did this intrusion make me feel shy? Well, you see, one gets over shyness after being washed like a baby once or twice; but she had hardly disappeared before the other door opened, giving admission to a second woman, who came in and deposited a towel; a moment later some one else appeared, and after a good stare departed; then came a fourth on some pretext ...
— Through Finland in Carts • Ethel Brilliana Alec-Tweedie
... the public platform had by this time become so insistent that Riley could no longer resist it, although modesty and shyness fought the battle for privacy. He told briefly and in his own inimitable fashion of these trying experiences. "In boyhood I had been vividly impressed with Dickens' success in reading from his own works and dreamed that some day I might follow his example. At first I read ...
— The Complete Works • James Whitcomb Riley
... That placid dame, The Moon's Celestial Highness; There's not a trace Upon her face Of diffidence or shyness: She borrows light That, through the night, Mankind may all acclaim her! And, truth to tell, She lights up well, So I, ...
— Songs of a Savoyard • W. S. Gilbert
... the girls' fault. They had made a tremendous fuss about her the first few days and then, as the novelty had worn off, they had settled back into their own ways, and Janet had not understood the change. Her shyness made her morbid, and by the end of the first week she had made up her mind that she had failed in some way, and she construed the girls' thoughtless indifference ...
— Phyllis - A Twin • Dorothy Whitehill
... days in a round of religious exercises without relaxation or relief. On fine summer evenings, as the sensible Lady Hesketh saw with dismay, instead of a walk, there was a prayer-meeting. Cowper himself was made to do violence to his intense shyness by leading in prayer. He was also made to visit the poor at once on spiritual missions, and on that of almsgiving, for which Thornton, the religious philanthropist, supplied Newton and his disciples with means. This, which Southey appears to think about the worst ...
— Cowper • Goldwin Smith
... poignant moments in the boat I met Dugald Shaw in commonplace fashion at the table, a sudden, queer, altogether unprecedented shyness seized me. I sat looking down at my plate with the ...
— Spanish Doubloons • Camilla Kenyon
... beautiful in face, and dark in colouring, fond of inventing new costumes, and of spending day and night in song and dancing and all manner of delights." In these early days at Pavia and Milan there was, indeed, Trotti tells us, a certain shyness and reserve about her that was only natural and might well be ascribed to maiden shyness and timidity, but in the freedom and gaiety of her new life this soon gave way to the irrepressible mirth and joyousness ...
— Beatrice d'Este, Duchess of Milan, 1475-1497 • Julia Mary Cartwright
... of welcome which she spoke found me hardly self-possessed enough to thank her in the customary phrases of reply. Observing my hesitation, and no doubt attributing it, naturally enough, to some momentary shyness on my part, Miss Halcombe took the business of talking, as easily and readily as usual, into her ...
— The Woman in White • Wilkie Collins
... it, when the Queen, with ready presence of mind, held out her hand: he grasped it, and was able to regain his feet in safety, but did not recover his perceptions enough to make any sign of gratitude before the carriage passed on. He had all a boy's shyness about the adventure; but perhaps it served to quicken the personal loyalty which is an unfailing ...
— Life of John Coleridge Patteson • Charlotte M. Yonge
... nature not demonstrative; they do not greet their wives before strangers with a kiss, on returning from the day's business, as a Frenchman may do; and if very glad to see you on meeting, they are not likely to say so in words; but they cherish warm emotions under a hard crust of reserve and shyness, and lavish all their wealth of affection on the little band collected within the magic circle of Home. Said an American who had spent two years as a public lecturer throughout Great Britain: "Circumstances have introduced ...
— Glances at Europe - In a Series of Letters from Great Britain, France, Italy, - Switzerland, &c. During the Summer of 1851. • Horace Greeley
... pink, so transparent withal that you almost see the animal spirit careering within; the drooping shoulder, the rounded bust, clean limbs, well-turned ankle, fine almost to a fault, the light springy step, the graceful easy carriage, the absence of sheepishness or shyness, an air cheerful without noise, a manner playful without rudeness, and you have the true son or daughter of the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... exhilaration in the emergency, a tendency to be proud of the storm, and of its effect upon their humdrum lives. They laughed and shouted as they battled with it, and as Nature's great barrier of snow threw down the little barriers of convention and shyness. Men held out their hands to slipping and stumbling women, caught them by their shoulders, panted to them that this was a storm, all right, this was the worst yet! Girls, staggering in through the revolving glass doors of the big department ...
— The Beloved Woman • Kathleen Norris
... The bearer of this is the son of an old friend. One of the most agreeable young men I ever saw. As modest as he is well educated, and I can't say more. Procure him some amusement, that a little of his shyness may be rubbed off; and forward his fortunes, my dear friend, as far as you can ...
— Aunt Judy's Tales • Mrs Alfred Gatty
... to a neighbouring hill. If, however, by chance he abruptly meets a single animal, or several together, they will generally stand motionless and intently gaze at him; then perhaps move on a few yards, turn round, and look again. What is the cause of this difference in their shyness? Do they mistake a man in the distance for their chief enemy the puma? Or does curiosity overcome their timidity? That they are curious is certain; for if a person lies on the ground, and plays strange antics, ...
— The Voyage of the Beagle • Charles Darwin
... view of endeavouring to be introduced to its author. By a fortunate chance he happened to take lodgings in a house where Mr. Levett frequently visited, who readily obtained Johnson's permission to bring Mr. Langton to him; as indeed, Johnson, during the whole course of his life, had no shyness, real or affected, but was easy of access to all who were properly recommended, and even wished to see numbers at his levee, as his morning circle of company might, with strict propriety, be called, for he received his friends when he got up from bed, ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol IX. • Edited by Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton
... coming with his father. Then he went to school and college and became a young doctor, and only last year he came back to us, so changed for the better that none of us would have known him but for his kindly voice and fine manly-looking manner. His shyness, too, has stuck to him a little, but it does not seem to hinder him now as it once did. Ah!" continued Mrs Roby, in a sympathetic tone, "it's a great misfortune ...
— Rivers of Ice • R.M. Ballantyne
... With their usual shyness the Indians watched the white man's method from the underbrush skirting the margin of the creeks, and when the trapper had left, they stole his trap and carried it off to their village. A long time elapsed before the savage ...
— The Great Salt Lake Trail • Colonel Henry Inman
... his creations, some sentiment in his poetry. When braggarts, self-satisfied and in love with themselves, step early into the fame which belongs rightly to their future achievements, they are men of genius only in the eyes of fools. If talent is to be measured by youthful shyness, by that indefinable modesty which men born to glory lose in the practice of their art, as a pretty woman loses hers among the artifices of coquetry, then this unknown young man might claim to be possessed of genuine merit. The habit of success ...
— The Hidden Masterpiece • Honore de Balzac
... cheeks, tied up in quaint hats by ribbons under their chins, they made a charming picture. At least Paul thought so as he advanced towards them, hat in hand. They looked up at his approach, but again cast down their eyes with demure shyness; yet he fancied that they first exchanged glances with each other, ...
— Under the Redwoods • Bret Harte
... soft garments, and turned. There in the doorway stood a feminine full moon—an elliptical young woman, with half of her pink and corpulent face showing above a gauzy veil, her two chubby hands clasped in front of her, the whole attitude one of massive shyness. ...
— The Slim Princess • George Ade
... and looked as though she would say: "Do with me as you will, I trust you," while her mother Praskovya the work-woman hid herself in the kitchen numb with shyness. At one time in her youth a merchant whose floors she was scrubbing stamped at her in a rage; she went chill with terror and there always was a feeling of fear at the bottom of her heart. When she was frightened her arms and legs trembled and her cheeks twitched. Sitting in the kitchen she tried ...
— The Witch and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov |
