"Churlish" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... to yourself with a little more gentleness and common politeness? How petty and narrow it looks to use even an undoubted right, far more a tribal taboo, in a tyrannical and needlessly aggressive manner! How mean and small and low and churlish! The damage we did your land, as you call it—if we did any at all—was certainly not a ha'pennyworth. Was it consonant with your dignity as a chief in the tribe to get so hot and angry about so small a value? How grotesque ...
— The British Barbarians • Grant Allen
... Emerson himself than whimsical eccentricity or churlish austerity. But there was occasionally an air of bravado in some of his followers as if they had taken out a patent for some knowing machine which was to give them a monopoly of its products. They claimed more for each other than was reasonable,—so much occasionally that their ...
— Ralph Waldo Emerson • Oliver Wendell Holmes
... and he was shearing his sheep in Carmel. Now the name of the man was Nabal; and the name of his wife Abigail: and she was a woman of good understanding, and of a beautiful countenance: but the man was churlish and evil in his doings; and he was of the house of Caleb." Caleb was Joshua's friend, who had conquered all that land in Joshua's time. Nabal, therefore, had all the pride of a man of most ancient and noble family—and no shame to him if he had had a noble, courteous, ...
— True Words for Brave Men • Charles Kingsley
... again. "Thelma, don't spoil me too much! If you let me have my own way to such an extent, who knows what an awful domestic tyrant I may become! No, dear—we must go tonight—there's no help for it. You see we've accepted the invitation, and it's no use being churlish. Besides, after all"—he gazed at her admiringly—"I want them to see my Norwegian rose! Come along! ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... a Romeo; he walks seven years disconsolate, moping, because he cannot enjoy his miss, insanus amor is his melancholy, the man is mad; delirat, he dotes; all this while his Glycera is rude, spiteful, not to be entreated, churlish, spits at him, yet exceeding fair, gentle eyes (which is a beauty), hair lustrous and smiling, the trope is none of mine, AEneas Sylvius hath crines ridentes—in conclusion she is wedded to his rival, a boore, a Corydon, ...
— The Works of Charles Lamb in Four Volumes, Volume 4 • Charles Lamb
... just and native sentiment of the human heart. Says the priest, "We should profane the service of the dead To sing a requiem and such rest to her As to peace parted souls." And Laertes replies, "Lay her in the earth; And from her fair and unpolluted flesh Shall violets spring. I tell thee, churlish priest, A ministering angel shall my sister be When ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger
... deserves a better return than my abrupt and rather churlish departure from "Wake Robin," and, if it isn't already too late to restore myself to your graces, I hope you will accept my regrets and apologies, and the sketch from Thimble Island, which goes to you by express. I hope you will like it. I do. That's why I've giving ...
— Madcap • George Gibbs
... so wide for to turn, *orbit Hath more power than wot any man. Mine is the drowning in the sea so wan; Mine is the prison in the darke cote*, *cell Mine the strangling and hanging by the throat, The murmur, and the churlish rebelling, The groyning*, and the privy poisoning. *discontent I do vengeance and plein* correction, *full I dwell in the sign of the lion. Mine is the ruin of the highe halls, The falling of the towers and the walls Upon ...
— The Canterbury Tales and Other Poems • Geoffrey Chaucer
... the crowd to come forward to partake with him in the last sacrament, not a soul moved. Only the old woman who had been ill-treated by the Red Fox for so many years—only she, of all the crowd, gave any answer, and she for one instant turned her face toward him. With a churlish gesture the old man pushed the bread over toward her and with hesitating, trembling fingers she reached ...
— The Trail of the Lonesome Pine • John Fox, Jr.
... alas! my very heart will break, Quoth she, to hear this churlish bird thus speak Of Love, and of his holy services; Now, God of Love! thou help me in some wise, That vengeance on this Cuckoo ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. II. • William Wordsworth
... since you ask me, sir, I should be merciful because of your misfortunes. And yet, Sir Crispin, your profligacy and the evil you have wrought in life must weigh heavily against you." Had this immaculate bigot, this churlish milksop been as candid with himself as he was with Crispin, he must have recognized that it was mainly Crispin's offences towards himself that his mind now dwelt on indeeper rancour than became one so well acquainted ...
— The Tavern Knight • Rafael Sabatini
... attempted in vain to buy the boma, or fetish-drum, a venerable piece of furniture hung round with human crania, of which only the roofs remained. King Blay, however, eventually sent us home a boma, and it was duly exhibited in town. Kikam was the only place in Apollonia where we met with churlish treatment; no hospitality, however, could be expected when the strangers were supposed to be mixed up in a ...
— To The Gold Coast for Gold, Vol. II - A Personal Narrative • Richard Francis Burton and Verney Lovett Cameron
... sent us back his sword And doth renounce our service. Now, by heaven! He thus hath rid us of a churlish man, Who insolently sought to lord it ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... him sometimes to leave the hospital for part of a day. But whatever alleviations he might thus have occasionally enjoyed, he was for seven long years a prisoner in the asylum, tantalised by continual expectations held out to him of approaching release. One person only—the nephew of his churlish jailer—acted the part of the Good Samaritan towards him, cheered his solitude, wrote for him, and transmitted the letters of complaint or entreaty which he addressed to his friends, and which would otherwise have been suppressed or forwarded to his relentless enemy. His sufferings increased ...
— Roman Mosaics - Or, Studies in Rome and Its Neighbourhood • Hugh Macmillan
... about her, some on large paper at ten guineas the volume. I have sometimes fancied, indeed,' he added, doubtfully,' that it was their own capacity for admiring Nature that they admired, but that were a churlish thought. For, do they not run innumerable excursion trains for the purpose of bowing at her shrine? Epping Forest must be one of Nature's favourite haunts, from the numbers of people who come here to worship her, especially on Bank Holidays. Those are her high festivals, ...
— 'That Very Mab' • May Kendall and Andrew Lang
... the general longing of human nature, have given a reputation to the Spring, that it rarely merits. Though this imaginative class of writers have said so much of its balmy airs and odoriferous gales, we find it nearly everywhere the most reluctant, churlish, and fickle of the four seasons. It is the youth of the year, and, like that probationary period of life, most fitted to afford the promise of better things. There is a constant struggle between reality and hope throughout the whole of this slow-moving ...
— The Wept of Wish-Ton-Wish • James Fenimore Cooper
... star is he, Thou fickle as an April sky, More churlish too than Adria's sea, With thee I'd live, with ...
— Horace • William Tuckwell
... days, set a silver basin before us, wherein there was the leg of a beaver, and desired all the nations to come and eat of it,—to eat in peace and plenty, and not to be churlish to one another; and that if any such person should be found to be a disturber, I here lay down by the edge of the dish a rod, which you must scourge them with; and if your father should get foolish, in my old days, I desire you may use it upon ...
— From Farm House to the White House • William M. Thayer
... passed—excellent fellows and capital company—but nature demands an occasional enlargement of the mental horizon. Then if by chance he has one special bugbear—a bore or an egotist, a man with dirty hands or a churlish temper—that man will inevitably come and sit down beside him and insist on being affectionate ...
— Collections and Recollections • George William Erskine Russell
... powerful forehead, like that of Socrates or Verlaine; and, under a little black nose, blunt as a churlish assent, a pair of large hanging and symmetrical chops, which made his head a sort of massive, obstinate, pensive and three-cornered menace. He was beautiful after the manner of a beautiful, natural monster that has ...
— Our Friend the Dog • Maurice Maeterlinck
... at least, when you are sure of being welcome wherever you go, and of having, as it were, the world all thrown open to you; and I am almost disposed to join with Poor Robin in his malediction on every churlish ...
— The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. • Washington Irving
... hospitality, and, though there were occasionally sharp differences of opinion, we got on very well together. When the king treated our leader so affectionately, calling him "Father," and placing his arm round his neck, the members of the royal household could not afford to be churlish. ...
— For The Admiral • W.J. Marx
... how much longer I was to have of him. Strange that a little boy can give so much pain. I dropped his hand and walked on in silence, and presently I did my most churlish to hurt him by ending the story abruptly in a very cruel way. "Ten years have elapsed," said I, "since I last spoke, and our two heroes, now gay young men, are revisiting the wrecked island of their childhood. 'Did we wreck ourselves,' ...
— The Little White Bird - or Adventures In Kensington Gardens • J. M. Barrie
... dissipation and pleasure of civilised life—to the life of fashionable society, where the refinements of luxury have multiplied their artificial wants beyond the proportion of the largest fortunes, and have brought most men into the class of the necessitous, inducing that churlish habit of the mind, in which every feeling is considered as a weakness, which terminates not in self, unlike those generous sympathies of the Arabs, where every individual seems impelled to seek, as they express it, (e dire ...
— An Account of Timbuctoo and Housa Territories in the Interior of Africa • Abd Salam Shabeeny
... be conveyed, then, through the medium of characterization, with the help of little human touches. The girl must be shown as sweet, clean, without a wrong thought; the man must be clearly depicted, his reason for being so seemingly churlish and careless of the duties imposed upon him by his ownership of many tenements must be handled in such a way that he will not be ...
— Writing the Photoplay • J. Berg Esenwein and Arthur Leeds
... next morning after her arrival, Mandy Meacham shook her by the shoulder and bade her get up, the room was humming with the roar of mill whistles, and the gray dawn leaking in at its one window in a churlish, chary fashion, reminded her that they were under the shadow of a mountain instead ...
— The Power and the Glory • Grace MacGowan Cooke
... carry it lovingly towards their children, mixing their mercies with loving rebukes, and their loving rebukes with fatherly and motherly compassions, they are more likely to save their children than by being churlish and severe towards them. But if they do not save them, if their mercy do them no good, yet it will greatly ease them at the day of death to consider, I have done by love as much as I could to save and deliver my child ...
— The Riches of Bunyan • Jeremiah Rev. Chaplin
... custom,' said Zenobia in reply, 'when seeking repose, as now, from the cares of state, to allow aught to break it. But we will not be selfish nor churlish. Bid the servants of your Emperor draw near, ...
— Zenobia - or, The Fall of Palmyra • William Ware
... trying to interest me; and conscious that my somewhat frigid attitude was churlish, if she was really what she professed to be—namely, a friend of Lady Coverly's—I endeavored in turn to display an intelligent interest in the history ...
— The Green Eyes of Bast • Sax Rohmer
... fire glows on her silken dress, And shows its ample grace, And warmly tints each hazel tress, Curled soft around her face. The beauty that in youth he wooed, Is beauty still, unfaded; The brow of ever placid mood No churlish grief has shaded. ...
— Poems • (AKA Charlotte, Emily and Anne Bronte) Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell
... the roads died away, and it became an ordinary Scotch glen, the poor pasturage of the hills creeping down into the valley, where it was little better for the shelter, I mean little greener than on the hill-sides; but a man must be of a churlish nature if, with a mind free to look about, he should not find such a glen a pleasing place to travel through, though seeing little but the busy brook, with here and there a bush or tree, and cattle pasturing near the thinly-scattered dwellings. ...
— Recollections of a Tour Made in Scotland A.D. 1803 • Dorothy Wordsworth
... the irritated users of the impolite phrase "petty artificialities." For it does at any rate show a "divine discontent"; it does prove a high dissatisfaction with conditions which at best are not the final expression of the eternal purpose. It does make for a sort of crude and churlish righteousness. I well know that feeling which induces one to spit out savagely the phrase "petty artificialities of modern life." One has it usually either on getting up or on going to bed. What a petty artificial business it is, getting up, even for a male! Shaving! Why shave? ...
— Mental Efficiency - And Other Hints to Men and Women • Arnold Bennett
... and this matter of the dinner really troubled him exceedingly. How many of his parishioners could have been fed for such an expenditure? On the other hand, city companies did a very great deal of good, and it would be churlish to object to their members dining together two or three times a year. In the end, he blamed the lad, Alban, for putting such thoughts into ...
— Aladdin of London - or Lodestar • Sir Max Pemberton
... the stream are a number of banana-trees I have often seen a score or two of young people making a merry foray on the great golden clusters, and bearing them off, one after another, to different parts of the vale, shouting and trampling as they went. No churlish old curmudgeon could have been the owner of that grove of bread-fruit trees, or of these gloriously ...
— Typee - A Romance of the South Sea • Herman Melville
... slayer of the Medusa might destroy the dragon which guarded it, and then rob him of his treasures. He therefore refused to grant the hospitality which the hero demanded, whereupon Perseus, exasperated at the churlish repulse, produced from his wallet the head of the Medusa, and holding it towards the king, transformed him into a stony mountain. Beard and hair erected themselves into forests; shoulders, hands, and limbs became huge rocks, and the head grew up into ...
— Myths and Legends of Ancient Greece and Rome • E.M. Berens
... service, than to his whole circle of ostentatious friends; for he thought a good companion emphatically the greatest benefactor. I know there are people in the world who cannot feel grateful unless the favour has been done them at the cost of pain and difficulty. But this is a churlish disposition. A man may send you six sheets of letter-paper covered with the most entertaining gossip, or you may pass half an hour pleasantly, perhaps profitably, over an article of his; do you think the service would be greater, ...
— Virginibus Puerisque • Robert Louis Stevenson
... survey Where rougher climes a nobler race display; Where the bleak Swiss their stormy mansion tread, And force a churlish soil for scanty bread, Yet still, e'en here, Content can spread a charm, Redress the clime, and all its rage disarm. Though poor the peasant's hut his feast though small, He sees his little lot, the lot of all; Cheerful at morn, he wakes from short repose, Breathes the keen air, and carrols as he ...
— Translations of German Poetry in American Magazines 1741-1810 • Edward Ziegler Davis
... in a certain kingdom, in a certain empire, there dwelt a certain Tsar who had never had a child. One day this Tsar went to the bazaar (such a bazaar as we have at Kherson) to buy food for his needs. For though he was a Tsar, he had a mean and churlish soul, and used always to do his own marketing, and so now, too, he bought a little salt fish and went home with it. On his way homeward, a great thirst suddenly fell upon him, so he turned aside into a lonely mountain where he knew, as his father had known before him, there ...
— Cossack Fairy Tales and Folk Tales • Anonymous
... with those silken flowers than in this faded velveteen; and if I have ever said aught in commendation of its appearance, it was because we were bent on merry-making, and being one of the party, it would have been churlish to have withheld a word of praise to a companion, who, as thou knowest, does not dislike a civil speech in his ...
— The Bravo • J. Fenimore Cooper
... and uncomfortable as she picked her way warily among the rain-pools in the semi-darkness. Her companion was inclined to be silent; most likely he considered her churlish in repelling his civil offers of help: so, to make amends, and set herself at her ease, she began to talk to him with an attempt at ...
— Not Like Other Girls • Rosa N. Carey
... is so proud of being called a good fellow, should be civil. And it cannot be denied, but we are, in many cases, and particularly to strangers, the most churlish ...
— The True-Born Englishman - A Satire • Daniel Defoe
... literary journal. As I have no copy of that paper before me, it is impossible that I should save myself any labor of writing. The words at any rate I must invent afresh: and, as to the idea, you never can be such a churlish man as, by insisting on a new one, in effect to insist upon my writing a false one. In the following paragraph, therefore, I give the substance of a thought suggested by myself ...
— The Notebook of an English Opium-Eater • Thomas de Quincey
... Jesus Christ." But who among us is ever heard thanking God for the piety of his brethren? On the contrary, how many of the prayers that are offered up in our social meetings resemble the errands of a churlish man, who never visits his neighbor's house without entering some complaint against his children! Yet, we are under greater obligations for the least exhibition of gracious fruits in the lives of his people, than for the daily bounties ...
— A Practical Directory for Young Christian Females - Being a Series of Letters from a Brother to a Younger Sister • Harvey Newcomb
... its productions are evidently those of a colder and less happy climate. What the former loses in grandeur and picturesque effect, it gains in fertility of soil and warmth of temperature. In the lower division of the province you feel that the industry of the inhabitants is forcing a churlish soil for bread; while in the upper, the land seems willing to yield her increase to a moderate exertion. Remember, these are merely the cursory remarks of a passing traveller, and ...
— The Backwoods of Canada • Catharine Parr Traill
... to look amused at all this, Claude rose up and said, in a churlish voice: 'Oh, you; nothing will make you laugh—let's ...
— His Masterpiece • Emile Zola
... his to look to as other men. Now he pointed to certain rocks or low crags that a little way off rose like a reef out of the treeless plain; then said he: "Shipmate, underneath yonder rocks is our resting-place for to-night; and I pray thee not to deem me churlish that I give thee no better harbour. But I have a charge over thee to bring thee safe thus far on thy quest; and thou wouldst find it hard to live among such housemates as thou wouldst find up yonder amongst our folks to-night. But to-morrow ...
— The Story of the Glittering Plain - or the Land of Living Men • William Morris
... and the shores of merry England, which he now for the first time contemplated in peace and serenity, were dressed in morning smiles; a morning, it is true, of winter; yet of winter not angry—not churlish and chiding—but of winter cheerful and proclaiming welcome to Christmas. The colours, which predominated, were of autumnal warmth: the tawny ferns had not been drenched and discoloured by rains; the oaks retained their dying leaves: ...
— Walladmor: - And Now Freely Translated from the German into English. - In Two Volumes. Vol. I. • Thomas De Quincey
... Thalabi, "there is, I am persuaded, no one so churlish as to refuse to do aught that he may be requested to do, with the object of amusing your guests at this ...
— Tales of the Caliph • H. N. Crellin
... vexation at the words. "It is in truth great honor to the house of Loring," said she, "yet our roof is now humble and, as you have seen, our fare is plain. The King knows not that we are so poor. I fear lest we seem churlish and niggard in ...
— Sir Nigel • Arthur Conan Doyle
... whereof had yong Leanders shape, When through the swelling main (whose waues did gape) He sought his chastest Hero, beating from him The waues, which murmuring stroue for to com nere him: And at the other, matchlesse Hero stood Viewing Leander tossed by the flood, And how the churlish billowes beat that head On which herselfe was so enamoured; Praying to Neptune, not to be so cruell, But to deliuer vp her dearest iewell: To figure to the world whose shining eies She set two diamonds of highest prise. ...
— Seven Minor Epics of the English Renaissance (1596-1624) • Dunstan Gale
... and while they there do stand, Each one draws out a fagot stick, the next that comes to hand, Which if it straight and even be, and have no knots at all, A gentle husband then they think shall surely to them fall; But, if it foul and crooked be, and knotty here and there, A crabbed, churlish husband then they earnestly ...
— In The Yule-Log Glow—Book 3 - Christmas Poems from 'round the World • Various
... prodigious supply of meats destined for the support of the poor or the entertainment of the traveller. No kindly porter stands at the gate, to bid the stranger enter and partake of the munificent abbot's hospitality, but a churlish guard bids him hie away, and menaces him if he tarries with his halbert. Closed are the buttery-hatches and the pantries; and the daily dole of bread hath ceased. Closed, also, to the brethren is the refectory. The cellarer's office is ended. The strong ale which he brewed in October, is tapped ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... McMurrough, who had come from the house in search of the kinsman he dared not suffer out of his sight. He had approached unnoticed, and his churlish tone showed that what he had overheard was not to his liking. But Asgill supposed that James's ill-humour was directed against his enemy, ...
— The Wild Geese • Stanley John Weyman
... caught in this Pickle; but my Husband and I were sitting all alone by our selves, and I did not expect to see such good Company—This by the way is a fine Compliment to the good Man, which tis ten to one but he returns in dogged Answers and a churlish Behaviour, without knowing what it is that ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... Hugh Dalton craves no pardon now. This, this was my hope—my pride; for her I would have been honest, and well thought of! Behold! she stiffens on my arm. She is nothing now but clay! Yet, by the God that made her! no churlish earth shall sully this fair form. She was as pure as the blue sea that cradled her first months of infancy; and, mark ye, when the rays of the young sun rest upon the ocean, at the morning-watch, by my own ship's side, in the bosom ...
— The Buccaneer - A Tale • Mrs. S. C. Hall
... think, he will assault the gate; Not that his heart will faint or arm will fail, But that he knows he on this field must die, Unless Apollo's oracle prove false, Which if he tells not, prudence seals his lips. Yet shall our champion be stout Lasthenes, A churlish gate-ward to intruders he, An aged head upon a youthful frame. Quick is his eye and nimble is his hand From the shield's cover to dart forth the spear. But who shall win the gods ...
— Specimens of Greek Tragedy - Aeschylus and Sophocles • Goldwin Smith
... have lost a hand rather than accept such churlish hospitality, but he was in no position to choose. The pain of hunger was like ...
— Way of the Lawless • Max Brand
... Amen, and asked him how his lordship could answer before God and man for what he had done to a wretched man like myself and to my child? But he answered, saying, Why had I come with her? And when I told him of the rude people here, item, of the churlish miller's man, he said that it was not his fault, and threatened the people all around with his fist, for they were making a great noise. Thereupon he commanded my child to get down and to follow him, and went before her into the castle; motioned ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V2 • William Mienhold
... lack of balance, he is full of noble qualities. Apemantus has the very thing which he lacks, yet Apemantus is contemptible beside him. The churlish philosopher is like some dingy little scow, which rides out the tempest because the small cargo which it has is all in its hold; Timon is like some splendid, but top-heavy, battleship, which turns turtle in the storm through lack ...
— An Introduction to Shakespeare • H. N. MacCracken
... supposing that when the person you thus served came to know it was you who rendered the service, he did not feel thankful, he did not think it handsome of you, thus to repair any little harm he might have done you before, but became churlish and sore and cross-grained, and with a wretched false pride said that because he had offended you once he resented your taking the liberty of befriending him now, would you not think that person an ungrateful fellow; ungrateful ...
— Kenelm Chillingly, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... enough? "I love you!" Three words only; but they changed the world. A beautiful girl loved him, she had kissed him, and his life could never again be the same. She had held out her arms to him—and he, cold, churlish, unfeeling brute, had let her shame herself, fighting for her happiness, for the joy that is a woman's divine right. He had been blind; he had not understood the significance of her gracious action; he had never realized until too late, what it must have cost her, ...
— The Last Trail • Zane Grey
... presence, he was moved by her distress, and willing to offer his assistance. "Damsel," said he, "thou seemest in no ordinary distress; peradventure, like myself, thou hast been refused passage at the bridge by the churlish keeper, and thy crossing may concern thee either for performance of a vow, ...
— The Monastery • Sir Walter Scott
... Kermit had urged, as strongly as possible, that the name be kept as Rio da Duvida. We felt that the "River of Doubt" was an unusually good name; and it is always well to keep a name of this character. But my kind friends insisted otherwise, and it would have been churlish of me to object longer. I was much touched by their action, and by the ceremony itself. At the conclusion of the reading Colonel Rondon led in cheers for the United States and then for me and for Kermit; and the camaradas cheered with a will. I proposed three cheers for Brazil and then for Colonel ...
— Through the Brazilian Wilderness • Theodore Roosevelt
... received all manner of new books and periodicals, and gradually gained an interest in the events of the passing time. Yet he remained almost a hermit, not absolutely refusing to see his neighbors, nor ever churlish towards them, but on the other hand not cultivating any ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. VI.,October, 1860.—No. XXXVI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... therefore became necessary to find Mrs Durbeyfield. She had told him she was not now at Marlott, but had been curiously reticent as to her actual address, and the only course was to go to Marlott and inquire for it. The farmer who had been so churlish with Tess was quite smooth-tongued to Clare, and lent him a horse and man to drive him towards Marlott, the gig he had arrived in being sent back to Emminster; for the limit of a day's journey with that horse ...
— Tess of the d'Urbervilles - A Pure Woman • Thomas Hardy
... unkempt. Surely he whom thou servest must be an ungrateful master. Tell me his name, if thou wilt, and answer me truly if this be indeed the land of Ithaca to which I am come, as I heard from a man whom I met by the way. He seemed a churlish fellow, and would not stay to answer my questions; for I was fain to ask him concerning a friend whom I once entertained in my house, a native of Ithaca, as he told me, and a son of one Laertes. Many days he dwelt with me, eating and drinking of the best, and I sent him away laden with rich gifts, ...
— Stories from the Odyssey • H. L. Havell
... a characteristic of the master of the house for over half a century, and therefore the reader need not fear to enter, especially at this Christmas-time, when the world, as if to make amends for the churlish welcome it gave to its Divine Guest, for whom no better place was found than a stable, now throws open the door and heart in kindly feeling and ...
— Nature's Serial Story • E. P. Roe
... ashamed. Honestly, he reflected, he had not a good word to say for the girl. (Observe, please, that the fact that the pleasaunce was to his liking did not weigh with him. The little inn and its curtilage had become but environs.) She had been unreasonable and worse than churlish. There was no getting away from it—she had been aggressively rude, administering a rebuff though he had made no advance. To pile Ossa upon Pelion, she now knew him for what he was—a flunkey, acting the gentleman ...
— Anthony Lyveden • Dornford Yates
... roses and jessamine for the Princess, and to collect some of the curious fossil echini, which he believed to be olives turned to stone by the Prophet Elijah, as a punishment to a churlish peasant who refused him a meal. He thought that such treasures would be a welcome addition to the store he was accumulating for the good old Grand Prior. He gave his horse to Hob Longbow, his only attendant ...
— The Prince and the Page • Charlotte M. Yonge
... gone," quoth she, "sweet boy, ere this, But that thou told'st me thou wouldst hunt the boar. O, be advised! thou know'st not what it is With javelin's point a churlish swine to gore, Whose tushes never sheathed he whetteth still, Like to a mortal butcher ...
— Six Centuries of English Poetry - Tennyson to Chaucer • James Baldwin
... said Anthony, with impressive slowness, "I personally owe so great a debt of thankfulness, it would be churlish of me even to hint a criticism. And yet—and yet—how shall I express it? Eppur' si muove. It moves, it hastes away;—while I could wish it to remain forever, fixed as the Northern Star. Do they know, in your part of Italy, any means by which the sparkling minutes ...
— The Lady Paramount • Henry Harland
... Together remained in the gorgeous tent, The virtuous virgin and the vicious deceiver, Dreadful and direful; they dared not, however, Awaken the warrior, not one of the earls, Nor be first to find how had fared through the night 260 The most churlish of chieftains and the chastest of maidens, The pride of the Lord. Now approached in their strength The folk of the Hebrews. They fought remorselessly With hard-hammered weapons, with their hilts requited Their strife ...
— Old English Poems - Translated into the Original Meter Together with Short Selections from Old English Prose • Various
... Athens. Lucius, And Lucullus, two Flattering Lords. Appemantus, a Churlish Philosopher. Sempronius another flattering Lord. Alcibiades, an Athenian Captaine. Poet. Painter. Ieweller. Merchant. Certaine Theeues. Flaminius, one of Tymons Seruants. Seruilius, another. Caphis. Varro. ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... he go to priestesses? I would swear that that is a pretence, and that this churlish Hittite, instead of going to a feast with women, is going ...
— The Pharaoh and the Priest - An Historical Novel of Ancient Egypt • Boleslaw Prus
... and becomes the good angel of the convicts, who adore her. "When she appeared while they were at work, all took off their hats and made a bow. 'Little mother, Sophia Semenova, thou art our mother, tender and compassionate,' these churlish and branded felons said to her. She smiled in return; they loved even to see her walk, and turned to look upon her as she passed by. They praised her for being so little, and knew not what not to praise her for. They even went to ...
— Essays on Russian Novelists • William Lyon Phelps
... The freshness, vigor, and affluence of his genius are not more evident in the "Old Curiosity Shop" than in "Great Expectations," the novel he is now publishing, in weekly parts, in "All the Year Round." Common as is the churlish custom of depreciating a new work of a favorite author by petulantly exalting the worth of an old one, no fair reader of "Great Expectations" will feel inclined to say that Dickens has written himself out. In this novel he gives us new scenes, new incidents, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 7, No. 43, May, 1861 • Various
... made with so frank and manly a mien, and the air of the free-trader, as he leaned beyond the gunwale of his boat, was so superior to his pursuit, that, unwilling to seem churlish, or to be outdone in courtesy, he reluctantly consented, and laid his palm within that the other offered. The smuggler profited by the junction to draw the boats nearer, and, to the amazement of all who witnessed the action, he stepped boldly into the yawl, and was seated, face ...
— The Water-Witch or, The Skimmer of the Seas • James Fenimore Cooper
... receiving the care of man, and by contributing to his wants. They have become a part of the family; and their individual characters are as well understood and appreciated as those of the human members. One tree is harsh and crabbed, another mild; one is churlish and illiberal, another exhausts itself with its free-hearted bounties. Even the shapes of apple-trees have great individuality, into such strange postures do they put themselves, and thrust their contorted branches so grotesquely in all directions. And when they have stood around a house for many ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 105, July 1866 • Various
... however, be supposed, that they dined tete-a-tete; no, no—the corporal and his wife were not so churlish as that. The dinner party consisted of a chosen set, the most particular friends of the corporal. Mr Short, first officer and boatswain, Mr William Spurey, Mr and Mrs Salisbury; and last, although not the least important person in this history, Peter Smallbones, Esquire, who ...
— Snarleyyow • Captain Frederick Marryat
... Hugh, with sudden passion, "why should a woman's whole life be spoiled, and other lives be darkened and made sad, just by the angry, churlish, sullen ...
— The White Ladies of Worcester - A Romance of the Twelfth Century • Florence L. Barclay
... I beg you not to let the present straits you labour under to narrow your mind, or render you morose or churlish, but rather resign yourself and all your affairs to Him who best knows what is fittest for you, and will never fail to provide for whoever sincerely trusts in Him. I think I may say I have lived in a state of affliction ever since I was born, being the ridicule of mankind ...
— Hetty Wesley • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... the corned beef and carrots; but as soon as the tarts and cheese-cakes made their appearance, he quitted his seat and stood aloof till he was summoned to return thanks for the repast, from a great part of which he had been excluded.' Gay refers to this churlish custom in the second book ...
— An English Garner - Critical Essays & Literary Fragments • Edited by Professor Arber and Thomas Seccombe
... burthen of the plough, When ev'ning came, and her sweet cooling hour, Should seek to wander in a neighbour copse, Where greener herbage wav'd, or clearer streams Invited him to slake his burning thirst? The man were crabbed who should say him nay; The man were churlish who should drive ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb IV - Poems and Plays • Charles and Mary Lamb
... silence, he turned away, hurt. This churlish attitude on the part of one returning to God's country on one of God's own mornings surprised ...
— The Coming of Bill • P. G. Wodehouse
... Churlish Autumn hath uncrowned me, Still I feel thy fond embrace; Winter sad throws gloom around me: Sweet! thou smil'st up in my face; Spring arrives with flowery treasures, Summer skips by, sun-caressed; Yet thou, envying not their pleasures, Bloom'st upon my rugged breast. Time ...
— The Death of Saul and other Eisteddfod Prize Poems and Miscellaneous Verses • J. C. Manning
... inner hoard, Of thrice ten summers dignify [130] the board. —Alas! in every clime a flying ray 500 Is all we have to cheer our wintry way; [131] And here the unwilling mind [132] may more than trace The general sorrows of the human race: The churlish gales of penury, that blow Cold as the north-wind o'er a waste of snow, [133] 505 To them [134] the gentle groups of bliss deny That on the noon-day bank of leisure lie. Yet more;—compelled by Powers which only deign That solitary man disturb their reign, Powers that support an unremitting ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth - Volume 1 of 8 • Edited by William Knight
... doth befall, They're paid, and never read at all. Parsons must practise what they teach, And bishops are compell'd to preach. She who on earth was nice and prim, Of delicacy full, and whim; 450 Whose tender nature could not bear The rudeness of the churlish air, Is doom'd, to mortify her pride, The change of weather to abide, And sells, whilst tears with liquor mix, Burnt brandy on the shore of Styx. Avaro[212], by long use grown bold In every ill which brings him gold, Who his Reedemer would ...
— Poetical Works • Charles Churchill
... then reserved it to her mortal favourite to discover in my mistress, my paragon of all virtue, the Lady Rose O'Neill? My Hollander, why this churlish secrecy? why told ye not ...
— Sir Ludar - A Story of the Days of the Great Queen Bess • Talbot Baines Reed
... the refreshment with considerable emphasis. This visit to the closed house so recently shadowed by death seemed to her in doubtful taste, and she would now have preferred to return home; but Peter had seen them from the house, and being the least churlish of men he came out on to the terrace and invited the party to come in. He disliked Mr. Lawrence as much as it was in his uncritical nature to dislike any one; but it is more than possible that he would have resented a word said in his disfavour. ...
— Peter and Jane - or The Missing Heir • S. (Sarah) Macnaughtan
... upon the rare bushes, whilst swallows joined the caravan, and skimmed round and round for hours among the camels, almost brushing the faces of the drivers. Lizards glanced and snakes writhed across the path. We started three wadan or mouflon, churlish animals, fond of such solitudes. As to the birds, our people say they do not drink in winter, and in summer leave the Hamadah altogether. Four-fifths of the surface were utterly barren. Little mounds marked ...
— Narrative of a Mission to Central Africa Performed in the Years 1850-51, Volume 1 • James Richardson
... bold step, and of doubtful legality; but the Bishop characteristically declared that he would chance the illegality, feeling sure that, when the Vicar and Churchwardens invited a lay-reader to speak, no one would be churlish enough to raise legal objections. The result proved that the Bishop was perfectly right, and the Diocese of London has now a band of licensed lay-preachers who render the clergy a great deal of valuable aid. I was from the first a good deal attracted ...
— Fifteen Chapters of Autobiography • George William Erskine Russell
... received all manner of new books and periodicals, and gradually gained an interest in the events of the passing time. Yet he remained almost a hermit, not absolutely refusing to see his neighbors, nor even churlish towards them, but on the other hand not cultivating any intimate ...
— Elsie Venner • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... at once elementary and violent, is combined with the fantastic story of Erisichthon, 'a churlish husband-man,' who in the nymphs' despite cuts down the sacred tree of Ceres, into which the chaste Fidelia had been transformed. For this offence the goddess dooms him to the plague of hunger. The ghastly ...
— Pastoral Poetry and Pastoral Drama - A Literary Inquiry, with Special Reference to the Pre-Restoration - Stage in England • Walter W. Greg
... answer him, or move, but stood looking down at him. After a moment of this, he grew restive, his temper being churlish and impatient at the best. Besides, I think he retained just so much of a gentleman's feelings as enabled him to understand my contempt and smart under it. He moved a step upward, his brow ...
— A Gentleman of France • Stanley Weyman
... own case, have allowed for no wine-parties. Let our friend, the abstraction we are speaking of, give breakfast-parties, if he chooses to give any; and certainly to give none at all, unless he were dedicated to study, would seem very churlish. Nobody can be less a friend than myself to monkish and ascetic seclusion, unless it were for twenty-three hours ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey
... mother: be not an apostate. Your wives offence serves not (were it the worst 10 You can imagine) without greater proofes To sever your eternall bonds and hearts; Much lesse to touch her with a bloudy hand. Nor is it manly (much lesse husbandly) To expiate any frailty in your wife 15 With churlish strokes, or beastly ods of strength. The stony birth of clowds will touch no lawrell, Nor any sleeper: your wife is your lawrell, And sweetest sleeper; doe not touch her, then; Be not more rude than the wild seed of vapour 20 To her that is more gentle than that ...
— Bussy D'Ambois and The Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois • George Chapman
... attempt to speak to Putney though he leaned over the side and shook his umbrella at the launch as it drew away. The Governor told Perky to produce food and invited Eliphalet and the detective to supper. The officer, churlish from his bath in the bay and his enforced appearance in jumper and overalls during the drying of his garments, replied to a polite inquiry that his name was Briggs but that his credentials had been lost in ...
— Blacksheep! Blacksheep! • Meredith Nicholson
... cold, lowering his visage to avoid the cutting blast, is it surprising that the churlish pleasure of drinking drams takes place of social enjoyments amongst the poor, especially if we take into the account that they mostly live on high-seasoned provision and rye bread? Hard enough, you may imagine, ...
— Letters written during a short residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark • Mary Wollstonecraft
... ourselves in the large and hospitable cradle of the Free Press, where the peer and the commoner, the priest and the alderman, the friar and the swaddler,[2] can stretch themselves at full length, provided they be not too churlish, let us laugh at those who breed useless quarrels, and set to the world the bright example of toleration and benevolence. A peaceable life and happy death to all Adam's children! May the ministers of religion ...
— Irish Wit and Humor - Anecdote Biography of Swift, Curran, O'Leary and O'Connell • Anonymous
... sum. John o' the Scales had often had twice as much from him, but the churlish fellow started up ...
— Tales From Scottish Ballads • Elizabeth W. Grierson
... make a lovelier picture than the cheerful beauty of prosperous Normandy, or the olive-groves and orange-gardens of Provence. Arthur Young thought the Limousin the most beautiful part of France. Unhappily for the cultivator, these gracious conformations belonged to a harsh and churlish soil. For him the roll of the chalk and the massing of the granite would have been well exchanged for the fat loams of level Picardy. The soil of the Limousin was declared by its inhabitants to be the most ungrateful in the whole kingdom, returning no more ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol. 2 of 3) - Turgot • John Morley
... that may be," replied one of the officers. "How they will prove when they come into action with the enemy, I can not tell; but a more perverse and churlish set of fellows in camp, than these I have got in my regiment, I never knew. The other day, for example, when there had been a sacrifice, the meat of the victims was sent around to be distributed to the soldiers. In our regiment, when the steward ...
— Cyrus the Great - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... the King kept Sir Damas from deeds of violence; yet, to the end, he remained cowardly and churlish, unworthy of the golden spurs of knighthood. But Sir Ontzlake proved him a valiant knight, fearing God and ...
— Stories from Le Morte D'Arthur and the Mabinogion • Beatrice Clay
... is this, That dares control the pleasures of our will? Vaunt, churlish cur, besmeared with gory blood, That seemst to check the blossoms of delight, And stifle the sound of sweet Bellona's breath: Blush, monster, blush, and post away with shame, That seekst disturbance of a ...
— 2. Mucedorus • William Shakespeare [Apocrypha]
... very good to me," he murmured, in excuse for his presumption. And what could she say in rebuke that would not be churlish ...
— The Scarlet Feather • Houghton Townley
... you in this strain my conscience pricks me. Is it not unkind toward Paul, whose attachment to me is positively touching? Is it not churlish to exercise such cold crticism upon a friend whose faithful affection has never for one moment wavered? He surrounds me with endless proofs of his affection, and is always on the lookout for something which may give me pleasure. He is a passionate sportsman—his only passion as far as I ...
— The Malady of the Century • Max Nordau
... advances to offer us the national drink of Italy, sweet vermouth that is frothed up with a little fizzing water in a narrow tumbler; and though carriage exercise is not liable to produce thirst, yet we cannot be so churlish as to refuse the draught, especially as the delay allows us to take our farewell look at the Bay of Naples. For here we have reached the peak of the rocky saddle that divides the two famous gulfs; and before us we now behold the wide crescent of the Bay of Salerno with its sunburnt vineyards ...
— The Naples Riviera • Herbert M. Vaughan
... all this, the House of Lords has made provision for the appearance of lovely woman, which contrasts most favourably with the curmudgeon and churlish arrangements of the House of Commons. In the House of Commons women have to hide themselves, as though they were in a Mahommedan country, behind a grille—where, invisible, suffocated, and crowded, they are permitted to see—themselves unseen—the gambollings of their male companions below. ...
— Sketches In The House (1893) • T. P. O'Connor
... which would have made you look just like the village bridegroom to whom we sold it? and yet how you stormed at London when you thought it lost; what fine stories you told the king about the quicksand; and how churlish you looked, when you first began to suppose that this country booby wore it ...
— The Memoirs of Count Grammont, Complete • Anthony Hamilton
... that for a man to prepare himself for wickedness is a sin against himself and his God. If this be so, the social element in drinking makes it all the more dangerous. Men and women drink often because it is considered a kind and hospitable thing to offer it, and an ungenerous and churlish thing to refuse it. What is this but calling ...
— Broken Bread - from an Evangelist's Wallet • Thomas Champness
... your own and others' souls: as, 1. Proud, disdainful, and haughty words conduct, and conversation; for these are grievous and provoking evils, which will justly offend all the observers of them. 2. Sullen, sour, and churlish language and behavior, which is offensive unto all sorts of persons; for this is an evil altogether unbecoming the followers of Jesus Christ. 3. A cross, captious, and contradictive spirit and conduct, delighting in opposition ...
— The Divine Right of Church Government • Sundry Ministers Of Christ Within The City Of London
... he paid to the cottage of the once prejudiced and churlish Sullivan, now no longer so, for the practical lesson of kindness he had learned from the untutored Indian was not lost upon him. It was made the means of bringing him to a knowledge of his own sinfulness in the sight of God, and his deficiencies in duty toward his fellow men. He was led by ...
— Choice Readings for the Home Circle • Anonymous
... it best, To head a little nearer south by west. And this they feel: the ship came too near wreck, In the long quarrel for the quarter-deck, Now when she glides serenely on her way,— The shallows past where dread explosives lay,— The stiff obstructive's churlish game to try Let sleeping dogs and still torpedoes lie! And so I give you all the Ship of State; Freedom's last venture is her priceless freight; God speed her, keep her, bless her, while she steers Amid the breakers of unsounded years; Lead ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... us so lonely on the ocean, and makes us glad to watch even the track of our own vessel. But on the mountain-top, how eagerly we trace out the "road that brings places together," as Schiller says. It is the first thing we look for; till we have found it, each scattered village has an isolated and churlish look, but the glimpse of a furlong of road puts them all in friendly relations. The narrower the path, the more domestic and ...
— Oldport Days • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... place at the head of the table, and Archie noticed the circumstance, though it did not seem a proper time to make any remark about it. For Sophy was not able to eat, and did not rise from her couch; and Madame seemed to fall so properly into her character of hostess, that it would have been churlish to have made the slightest dissent. Yet it was a false kindness to both; for in the morning Madame took the same position, and Archie felt less able than on the previous night to make any opposition, though he had told ...
— A Knight of the Nets • Amelia E. Barr
... lamentation to rest "under the cross of gold that shines over river and city," and the tolling bells and echoing cannon sound over hushed London, and the silent masses line the streets, and the learned and the noble stand uncovered around the open grave, it would be a diseased and churlish mind which did not feel the spell ...
— The Trial and Death of Jesus Christ - A Devotional History of our Lord's Passion • James Stalker
... religion or the character of a literature is noticed by Mr. Finlay. Temples open to the heavens, theatres for noonday light and large enough for receiving 30,000 citizens—these could no longer be transplanted from sunny regions of Hymettus to the churlish atmospheres which overcast with gloom so perpetual poor Ovid's sketches of his exile. Cherson, it is true, in the Tauric Chersonese, survived down to the middle of the tenth century; so much is certain from the evidence of a Byzantine emperor; ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. II (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey
... a quandary. The thought of the grimy hand touching Clare's was detestable yet, if the request had been made in innocence it seemed churlish to object. Clare, who overheard, settled the question for him, by coming out and offering her hand to the Indian ...
— The Woman from Outside - [on Swan River] • Hulbert Footner |
