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More "Nonchalance" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... meant—that a study of it would discourage an aspirant to good society from smiling up at it between her ankles. She forgave the divined intention of the gift, for the gift itself was precisely what her soul had been craving. She borrowed it for the day with affected nonchalance—Tilda never gave herself away—and hugged the volume in her pocket as she and Arthur Miles and 'Dolph explored the coombe's downward ...
— True Tilda • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... the hearts of men, and quickly rear a progeny only too legitimate: and the ruin within the man is gradually consummated as the sublimities of his soul wither away and fade, and in ecstatic contemplation of our mortal parts we omit to exalt, and come to neglect in nonchalance, that within us which ...
— On The Art of Reading • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... time paying the tribute of many an admiring glance to every detail of Mr. Opp's costume, and Mr. Opp, realizing this, assumed an air of cosmopolitan nonchalance, and toyed indifferently ...
— Mr. Opp • Alice Hegan Rice
... But I believed that he was deliberately striving to frighten me, and horrified though I actually was, I was determined he should not have the satisfaction of feeling that he had succeeded. I, therefore, steadily returned his stare with all the coolness and nonchalance I could summon to my aid, and after the lapse of a full minute or more he turned his glance aside to one of the men ...
— A Middy of the King - A Romance of the Old British Navy • Harry Collingwood
... corps, and others in the ambulance waggons; many of the latter were stripped nearly naked, and displayed very bad wounds. This spectacle, so revolting to a person unaccustomed to such sights, produced no impression whatever upon the advancing troops, who certainly go under fire with the most perfect nonchalance: they show no enthusiasm or excitement, but the most complete indifference. This is the effect of ...
— Three Months in the Southern States, April-June 1863 • Arthur J. L. (Lieut.-Col.) Fremantle
... "Nothing much." Nonchalance sat well upon the Kid. "Just a case of raising hell and putting a chunk under. See that bend down there? That's where she'll jam millions of tons of ice. Then she'll jam in the bends up above, millions of tons. Upper jam breaks first, lower jam holds, pouf!" He dramatically ...
— The God of His Fathers • Jack London
... four cottages, and at the first of these the landau stopped to await, as we afterward ascertained, Count Bismarck, with whom the diplomatic negotiations were to be settled. Some minutes elapsed before he came, Napoleon remaining seated in his carriage meantime, still smoking, and accepting with nonchalance the staring of a group of German soldiers near by, who were gazing on their fallen foe with ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... apparent nonchalance, 'Twenty-seven is not very old.' He added, however, 'Anyhow, you're five minutes older, and I've published a book, if ...
— Potterism - A Tragi-Farcical Tract • Rose Macaulay
... listened, with so impervious an immobility, to an endless succession of voluntaries. The Archdeacon prayed, the choir responded with a long Amen, and the procession filed out, the boys with faces pious and wistful, the choir-men moving with nonchalance, their restless eyes wandering over the scene so absolutely known to them. Then came Rogers like a martyr; Dobell gaily as though he were enjoying some little joke of his own; last of all, Brandon, superb in carriage, in dignity, in his magnificent recognition ...
— The Cathedral • Hugh Walpole
... money, but changed his mind. Her eye stopped him. He shook hands with the man, then turned to her again. Her eyes were on him—hot, shining. He felt his blood throb, but he returned the look with good- natured nonchalance, shook her hand, raised his hat, and walked away, thinking what a fine, handsome creature she was. Presently he said: "Poor girl, she'll look at some fellow like that one day, ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... laughed, for his old nonchalance had returned to him. "I've been full of business since nine o'clock. I have an appointment out at La Muette at two, and I'll have to get back ...
— The Golden Face - A Great 'Crook' Romance • William Le Queux
... paleness and languor which loss of blood had left on his handsome and open countenance, gave a grace to the whole person which many of the ladies declared irresistible. All contended for his notice, attracted at once by his affability, and piqued by the calm and easy nonchalance with which it seemed to be blended. The scheming and selfish Mowbray, the coarse-minded and brutal Sir Bingo, accustomed to consider themselves, and to be considered, as the first men of the party, sunk into comparative ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott
... was not going to be chaffed. "Oh, I'll bring you milk fast enough on Sundays, if you give me the word," he said with nonchalance. "Only it won't ...
— The Damnation of Theron Ware • Harold Frederic
... he protested with a nonchalance that rang a little flat. "You must be awfully tired. Hadn't we ...
— The Real Adventure • Henry Kitchell Webster
... with great nonchalance, "I axe you—do you prefer that I should disband the Army of the Callahan, or do ...
— Christmas Eve on Lonesome and Other Stories • John Fox, Jr.
... delicately to sweep the hearth with the brass-handled brush proper to it, remarked with an obvious affectation of nonchalance— ...
— The Price of Love • Arnold Bennett
... his hands, snatching them away from his lips. At this critical moment I appeared around the corner considerably out of breath, my heart beating like a watchman's rattle. I tried to feign nonchalance. ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... nonchalance, though my quick temper was fired. I was as sure he hadn't as I was that Mrs. Van Dam knew his name, and that he would oppose the dance even more strongly than did Aunt; and I wished that I could go without him. But it was useless to think of this, with even the General ...
— The Bacillus of Beauty - A Romance of To-day • Harriet Stark
... further urged to this course by the insolent nonchalance of the two young men. They weren't paying any more attention to him than they were to the inanimate sticks of furniture in ...
— Officer 666 • Barton W. Currie
... punishment is meet. However benevolence shall still hold its sway. Instead of the sword, banishment to the islands for the term of life, to serve as slave therein to the Eta—such his sentence. To this judgment there is no appeal." Abruptly he rose. The weeping father and mother were baffled by the nonchalance of the daughter, who had no chance to give them comfort, but was at once removed in company with the willing lady of pleasure and experience. The huddled form of Masajiro[u] was hustled roughly out with ...
— Bakemono Yashiki (The Haunted House) - Tales of the Tokugawa, Volume 2 (of 2) • James S. De Benneville
... to this abrupt anticlimax so suddenly that I was taken aback. The man was watching me intently for all his apparent nonchalance, and I felt more than ever the necessity for being on my guard. If I could only fathom how much he knew. Of two things I felt fairly sure: the fellow believed me to be Semlin and was under the impression that I still retained my portion ...
— The Man with the Clubfoot • Valentine Williams
... yielded to sexual perversion. After having served his first sentence he was released and again found himself thrown upon his own resources. He had not, as yet, reached the stage of the habitual criminal with the utter disregard for property rights, nor had he reached that nonchalance of the hobo, whose philosophy rests upon the dogma that the world owes him a living, that tomorrow will provide for itself somehow. He began to yearn for the service again. There, at least, he was provided with shelter and food. There, at least, he did not have to worry ...
— Studies in Forensic Psychiatry • Bernard Glueck
... and more or less naturalized, but which are now being driven out of the language, are the following: confrere, congee, cortege, dishabille, distrait, ensemble, fete, flair, mellay (now melee), nonchalance, provenance, renconter, &c. On the other hand, it is satisfactory to note that 'employee' appears to be taking the place ...
— Society for Pure English, Tract 3 (1920) - A Few Practical Suggestions • Society for Pure English
... the liberal elements. In protest against the nonchalance with which the door had been shut in their faces the working classes in Berlin and elsewhere entered upon a fresh series of demonstrations by reason of which the Government was embarrassed through several weeks. ...
— The Governments of Europe • Frederic Austin Ogg
... keen shaft of irony, father and son allowed this story to pass uncontradicted. Perhaps a few believed it; perhaps they had foreseen the future. It may have been that they knew that Millicent Chyne, surrounded by the halo of whatever story she might invent, would be treated with a certain careless nonchalance by the older men, with a respectful avoidance by the younger. Truly women have the deepest punishment for their sins here on earth; for sooner or later the time will come—after the brilliancy of ...
— With Edged Tools • Henry Seton Merriman
... sight, listened in nonchalance, stopping to watch the group for a minute as they would look into a shop window. The exhibition stirred no religious feeling in them, for their minds, with the tenacity of childhood, associated religion with ...
— Jonah • Louis Stone
... you there,' he replied, with great nonchalance, taking a card from his pocket-book, which ...
— The Triumphs of Eugene Valmont • Robert Barr
... narrow ways. He gave out his text slowly and with heavy heart. Then he paused, and, glancing once more round the little building, met again the soft, languid fire of those full dark eyes. This time he did not look away. He saw a faint interest, a slight pity, a background of nonchalance. His cheeks flushed, and the fire of revolt leaped through his veins. He shut up the Bible and abandoned his carefully prepared discourse, in which was a mention of hellfire and many gloomy warnings, which would have brought joy to the heart of Gideon Strong, and to each of which he would ...
— The Survivor • E.Phillips Oppenheim
... aid that rapid power of intuition which passion will develop at moments in the least wise among mortals, while a great man at such a time possesses it to the full. He guessed the terrible truth revealed by the Duchess's nonchalance, and his heart swelled with the storm like a lake ...
— The Thirteen • Honore de Balzac
... not be presumptuous for a mere idler, an individual whose enterprise and industry have been sapped by the insidious nonchalance of the Beachcomber, to tell of practical details of cultural pursuits—the enthusiasm, the disappointments, the glowing anticipations, the realisation of inflexible facts, the plain emphatic truths which others have reason to know ever so much ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield
... mentioning; and if the Obstacle had not been present, I certainly dare not have spoken of it to Nicolete. I mean that she was so shy about her pretty legs. She couldn't cross them with any successful nonchalance. ...
— The Quest of the Golden Girl • Richard le Gallienne
... largely in satire and humor; but joyousness deals in infinitely more. Mirth and laughter are all very well, but they are not all in all. Cheerfulness requires something more than a well-balanced Rabelaisian nonchalance in adversity and a keen relish for ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 3 No 2, February 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... a life, so Isabelle saw, with an order of its own, a direction of its own, a strong undercurrent. Its oddity and nonchalance were refreshing. Like one of the mountain brooks it ran its own course, strong and liquid beneath the snow, to its ...
— Together • Robert Herrick (1868-1938)
... alert, galvanised into vigilant life. Leonora, opposite to her husband, began to pour out the tea; the impassive parlourmaid stood consummately ready to hand the cups; Ethel and Millicent took their seats along one side of the table, with an air of nonchalance which was far from sincere; a chair on the other ...
— Leonora • Arnold Bennett
... its chief charm, but in contour of cheek and vanishing of pallid hue and tragic line. Carley's heart swelled with joy. Beyond all else she had hoped to see the sad fixed hopelessness, the havoc, gone from his face. Therefore the restraint and nonchalance upon which Carley prided herself ...
— The Call of the Canyon • Zane Grey
... here alone," said Judy with great nonchalance, "I bid you good afternoon," and she walked on, trying to keep her back ...
— Molly Brown's Orchard Home • Nell Speed
... to remark," said Captain Everard, with attempted nonchalance, "that that is strange ...
— Annals of a Quiet Neighbourhood • George MacDonald
... this with wonder. It is true, he expected to meet with no great refinement in a wine-house like that of Benedetta; but he was unaccustomed to see such nonchalance of manner in a man of the stranger's class, or, indeed, of any class; the Italian mariners present occupying their chairs in simple and respectful attitudes, as if each man had the wish to be as little obtrusive as possible. Still he let no sign of his surprise escape him, noting ...
— The Wing-and-Wing - Le Feu-Follet • J. Fenimore Cooper
... way, Jack," said my hero, lighting the cigar and blowing the first puff toward the ceiling, his face admirably set with nonchalance, "do you know of a family named Annesley—Colonel Annesley?" I knew it would take only a certain length of time for this ...
— The Man on the Box • Harold MacGrath
... been considerable speculation among those who knew Sam Kirby best, for none of them had ever seen the old fellow in quite such a frame of mind as now. His misfortune had crushed him; he appeared to be numbed by the realization of his overwhelming loss; gone entirely was that gambler's nonchalance for which he was famous. The winning or the losing of large sums of money had never deeply stirred the old sporting-man; the turn of a card, the swift tattoo of horses' hoofs, often had meant far more to him in dollars and cents than the destruction of that barge-load ...
— The Winds of Chance • Rex Beach
... chair with the nonchalance of a man familiar with such accidents, and who is beforehand quite secure ...
— The Conspirators - The Chevalier d'Harmental • Alexandre Dumas (Pere)
... by division along the main road leading to Warrenton, the troops awaited the last of the grand pageants that had made the Army of the Potomac famous for reviews. Its late Commander, as he gracefully sat his bay, had not the nonchalance of manner that he manifested while reading a note and accompanying our earnest President in a former review at Sharpsburg; nor was the quiet dignity that he usually exhibited when at the head of his Staff, apparent. His manner seemed ...
— Red-Tape and Pigeon-Hole Generals - As Seen From the Ranks During a Campaign in the Army of the Potomac • William H. Armstrong
... into hysterics, and she was calling wildly for her mother to come and take her home. Father returned from both visits fairly white with rage. Not at the unfortunates themselves, be it said, but at the cool nonchalance of ...
— People of the Whirlpool • Mabel Osgood Wright
... views at midnight, the great executive achievements at noonday, the heavenly sense of a self-reliance which dare go anywhere, say any thing, attempt any thing in the world. He had not forgotten the nonchalance under slight, the serenity in pain, the apathy to sorrow, which for one month set him calm as Boodh in the temple-splendors of his darkened room. He had not forgotten that the only perfect peace he had ever experienced was ...
— The Opium Habit • Horace B. Day
... run wildly from this big, black, bullockless carriage tearing madly through their village. The women merely peep from the shadows, while the men lazily loll beneath the trees along the roadside, curious beneath their nonchalance. In one place, all the villagers were gaily bathing in the large tank (in their garments, changing by draping dry cloths around their bodies, dropping the wet ones). Women bearing water to their homes, in huge ...
— Autobiography of a YOGI • Paramhansa Yogananda
... time I had assumed and played my role as a white man with a certain degree of nonchalance, a carelessness as to the outcome, which made the whole thing more amusing to me than serious; but now I ceased to regard "being a white man" as a sort of practical joke. My acting had called for mere external effects. Now I began to doubt my ability to play the part. I watched her to see if ...
— The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man • James Weldon Johnson
... again?" queried Winsome, with careless nonchalance, swinging her bonnet by its strings. "Well, you can come back and kiss grannie's hand some other day. You are something of a ...
— The Lilac Sunbonnet • S.R. Crockett
... "half-left" and lolling lazily in his saddle with shortened leg stared back at his enemy with an expression there was no mistaking. His debonair young face had altered in an incredible fashion. Although his lips were pursed up with their whistling nonchalance his eyes had contracted beneath scowling brows into mere pin-points of steel and ice. He looked about as docile as a young ...
— The Luck of the Mounted - A Tale of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police • Ralph S. Kendall
... both Princes had for their greater safety proceeded hither to the foot of the mountain chain, where, for the present, despite the exciting times, they could pursue the pleasures of sport with all the nonchalance ...
— The Coming Conquest of England • August Niemann
... the pews, who appeared to consist almost entirely of farmers, with their wives, sons, and daughters, opened a door to admit us. Mrs. Petulengro, however, appeared to feel not the least embarrassment, but tripped along the aisle with the greatest nonchalance. We passed under the pulpit, in which stood the clergyman in his white surplice, and reached the middle of the church, where we were confronted by the sexton dressed in long blue coat, and holding in his ...
— The Romany Rye • George Borrow
... your letter, the simple, flowing style of gentility, the one which alone a woman of condition who writes to her friend may use with dignity. Your digressions and your thoughts are flowers which . . . (forgive an author who pilfers from you the delicious nonchalance of an amiable writer) or . . . a will-o'-the-wisp which, from time to time, issues from the work, in spite of the ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... disappeared in the galley. In about ten minutes Mr. Reardon saw him climb up the port companion to the bridge; a minute later he came down. Mr. Reardon waited until he was certain the fellow was sipping his coffee in the galley; then with the utmost nonchalance he went up on the bridge and hailed Mr. Schultz, who was standing amidships blowing ...
— Cappy Ricks Retires • Peter B. Kyne
... back until the bride had passed. Now he turned and smiled in her face, and now he offered her the helping hand. But she met his courtesies, and the whole punctilious fabric of his behavior, with the utmost absence and nonchalance. He had, it seemed, been too long in contempt to recover soon his former position of husband and beloved. For long days she had contemplated his naked soul, limited, weak, incapable. He had shown a certain capacity for sudden, explosive temper, but not for courage ...
— IT and Other Stories • Gouverneur Morris
... of them, and held it between his face and the lamp, so that whatever his features might have betrayed was hidden from his companion. At length he dropped the letter with an affected nonchalance, and said,— ...
— Paul Clifford, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... cabin, so that to the middy's way of thinking he had the deck to himself. He took another deep breath, and with his heart beating heavily, swung himself round, laid hold of a rope, and climbed inboard again, when assuming a nonchalance he did not feel as he dropped upon the deck, he thrust his hands into his pockets, mastered the desire to run, and beginning to whistle, stalked slowly aft till he reached the companion-hatch, and began to descend the steps ...
— Fitz the Filibuster • George Manville Fenn
... is introduced, and receives a salutation from the actress haughty and cold enough to check the forwardest; puts on the air of languid nonchalance which is considered (or was before the little experiences of the Crimea) fit and proper for young gentlemen of rank and fashion. So he sits down, and feasts his foolish eyes upon his idol, hoping for a few words before the evening is over. Did I not say well, ...
— Two Years Ago, Volume I • Charles Kingsley
... a curling lip. "You'll disinherit me?" quoth he in mockery. "And of what, pray? If report speaks true, you'll be needing to inherit something yourself to bear you through your present straitness." He shrugged and produced his snuff-box with an offensive simulation of nonchalance. "Ye cannot cut the entail," he reminded his almost apoplectic sire, and ...
— The Lion's Skin • Rafael Sabatini
... I leaning against the wall of the house with an air of studied nonchalance mingled with mild interest, at least that is what I meant to do, and Marut smiling sweetly and staring at the heavens. Whilst I was wondering what exact portion of my frame was destined to become acquainted with that spear, of a sudden Simba ...
— The Ivory Child • H. Rider Haggard
... kinship. On her uncle, whom she regarded as half-witted, she bestowed alternate tolerance and jeers. She was, indeed, the only person whose remonstrances ever got under the wool with old Jim, and her sharp tongue had sometimes a cowing effect on his curious nonchalance which nothing else had. For the rest, they had no neighbours with whom the girl could fraternise, and Whinborough was too far off to provide any adequate food for her vague hunger after emotion ...
— Robert Elsmere • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... frequently reminded of that difference here in Cornwall. Anywhere in Cornwall you may see a carter, a miner, a fisherman, a bricklayer, who with the high distinction of his finely cast face, the mingling in his manner of easy nonchalance and old-world courtesy, seems only to need a visit to the tailor to add dignity to a Pall Mall club. No doubt England is not a new country, and the English lower social classes have become in a definite degree more aristocratic than those of Russia or even Germany. ...
— Impressions And Comments • Havelock Ellis
... would be informed promptly that Orme and the girl were setting out by motor. This analysis apparently accounted for Alcatrante's nonchalance. Orme and the girl seemed to be escaping, but in truth, if they approached their destination at all, they must run into the ambuscade of other enemies. Then the nearer the goal, the greater ...
— The Girl and The Bill - An American Story of Mystery, Romance and Adventure • Bannister Merwin
... morning. He darted little quick questioning glances at his brother and at his sons, but whatever complaint or sarcasm may have trembled upon his lips, was effectually stifled by De St. Quentin's ministrations. With the nonchalance born of long custom, the official covered the royal chin with soap, drew the razor swiftly round it, and sponged over the surface with spirits of wine. A nobleman then helped to draw on the king's black velvet haut-de-chausses, ...
— The Refugees • Arthur Conan Doyle
... assumed an air of nonchalance, for leaning against a big old buhl table he took out a cigarette from his gold case and slowly lit it, ...
— The Stretton Street Affair • William Le Queux
... pulled out an enormous double-case silver watch with an air of perfect nonchalance, and awaited the result. For a few seconds the gypsy was overwhelmed by the lad's coolness; then he burst into a gruff laugh and rushed at him. He might as well have run at a squirrel. The boy sprang to one side, crossed the road at a bound, and, ...
— Freaks on the Fells - Three Months' Rustication • R.M. Ballantyne
... to advance; but with such easy nonchalance that in two or three hours afterwards eight of the ten had returned to the glade, all equally ...
— The Tiger Hunter • Mayne Reid
... Noel said. "What a rotter you are!" He flung himself full length upon the window-seat with elaborate nonchalance. "Run along, Chris," he said. "We're going to talk politics. Shut the door after you. That's right. Now, my good brother-in-law, what can I ...
— The Rocks of Valpre • Ethel May Dell
... scornful and bored expression to his coarse features; he was incessantly screwing up his milky grey eyes—small enough at all times; he scowled, dropped the corners of his mouth, affected to yawn, and with careless, though not perfectly natural nonchalance, pushed back his modishly curled red locks, or pinched the yellow hairs sprouting on his thick upper lip—in fact, he gave himself insufferable airs. He began his antics directly he caught sight of the young peasant girl waiting for him; slowly, ...
— A Sportsman's Sketches - Volume II • Ivan Turgenev
... could carry, for reasons which will be explained in the sequel. I as yet suffered no bodily inconvenience, breathing with great freedom, and feeling no pain whatever in the head. The cat was lying very demurely upon my coat, which I had taken off, and eyeing the pigeons with an air of nonchalance. These latter being tied by the leg, to prevent their escape, were busily employed in picking up some grains of rice scattered for them in ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 1 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... was crowded with women as well as men, commit nuisances of a kind I need not particularize but which seemed to excite neither wonder nor disgust in the by-passers. Indeed I saw they were quite accustomed to such sights, and their nonchalance was only equaled by that of the well-dressed gentlemen who were the guilty parties. I very soon learned more of Paris, and found that not in this matter alone were its citizens deficient in refinement, but ...
— Paris: With Pen and Pencil - Its People and Literature, Its Life and Business • David W. Bartlett
... Butterworth did not seem inclined to begin conversation, Mr. Belcher hem'd and haw'd with affected nonchalance, ...
— Sevenoaks • J. G. Holland
... accomplish anything. He sauntered back, casting furtive glances into the spacious front-yard, and concluded to ease his restless legs by leaning against a tree and crossing them in an attitude of profound nonchalance. The tree happened to be almost directly in front of the Nixon gate. Not to seem actually employed in shadowing the house, he decided to pose with his back to the premises, facing down the street, twisting his whiskers ...
— Anderson Crow, Detective • George Barr McCutcheon
... he spoke, a lambent, sparkling liquid began to flow through the pipette, into the flask. At sight of it, the Billionaire's eyes lighted up with triumph. Waldron, despite his assumed nonchalance, felt the hunting thrill of Wall street, the quick stab of exultation when victory ...
— The Air Trust • George Allan England
... then once more the question was put. Gashed, bleeding, strung up by his thumbs to the crossbeam; every blow of the extemporized whips extorting from him a howl of agony; no rescue at hand; Lysander looking on with a merciless smile; the brothers doing their assigned work with merciless nonchalance; well might poor Toby cry out, in ...
— Cudjo's Cave • J. T. Trowbridge
... reduced the desultory psychology of his predecessors to a system, so that for us the moralizing tendencies of the seventeenth century in France seem to have found their final expression less in the sob of Pascal's conscience than in the resigned ironic nonchalance of La Rochefoucauld, who, as Voltaire so admirably says, "dissolves every virtue in the passions which surround it." Perhaps what the "Maximes" most resembled was the then recently-published analysis of egotism ...
— Three French Moralists and The Gallantry of France • Edmund Gosse
... the trial, the utmost recklessness and nonchalance, had drank many times in the course of the day, and when the rope was placed about his neck, was evidently much intoxicated. All at once, however, he seemed startled into a consciousness of the awful reality of his position, and requested ...
— The Shirley Letters from California Mines in 1851-52 • Louise Amelia Knapp Smith Clappe
... had been that he had checkmated the girls in their disposition to make jesting comparisons, He would retire with so much nonchalance as to leave nothing to be said. They would find complete inaction and silence hard to combat. But the more he thought of it the less it seemed like an honorable retreat. He had openly wooed one girl, he had since lost his heart to another, and she had given him a glimpse ...
— Nature's Serial Story • E. P. Roe
... brief apology for his tardiness. He was dressed well, with a white orchid in his button-hole, and looked prosperous and rosy. Some light badinage on this score from his various acquaintances in the restaurant he parried with a good-humoured nonchalance; then he betook himself to ...
— A Comedy of Masks - A Novel • Ernest Dowson and Arthur Moore
... most impassioned earnestness. A number of men, most of them young, thronged the footpath leading from the stiles to the tent. A few were smoking; all were waiting for the pretty girls to come forth from the Christian camp. Fran pushed her way among the idlers with admirable nonchalance, her sharp elbow ready for the first resistive pair ...
— Fran • John Breckenridge Ellis
... enough to take a correct measure of English courtiers. He conformed himself to the slipshod methods and the rollicking humour of Charles and his circle. He insinuated himself into the intimacy of the King's boon companions: availed himself of the easy access to the King, which Charles's nonchalance permitted, and knew how to suggest what might be useful to him as a diplomat, in the careless intercourse of the table, and amidst the jests of a carouse at Court. Bristol did his best to aid the Spanish ...
— The Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon V2 • Henry Craik
... he drew some arabesque forms with his pencil on the board. He then took an exquisite little saw he had invented for this work, and fell upon the board with a rapidity that, contrasted with his previous nonchalance, looked like fury. But he was one of your fast workmen. The lithe saw seemed to twist in his hand like a serpent, and in a very short time he had turned four feet of the board into open-work. He finished the edges off with his cutting tools, ...
— Put Yourself in His Place • Charles Reade
... courtier, with elaborately jeweled harness, bustled from inside the palace, obviously trying to present an air of strolling nonchalance. He gestured fluidly with a graceful tentacle. "You!" he said to Crownwall. "Follow me. His Effulgence commands you to appear before him at once." The two guards withdrew their pikes and froze into immobility at ...
— Upstarts • L. J. Stecher
... powerful for all things, brought new doubts to her mind. But she could not convince herself, and when at last she went to her bed her mind was still vacillating. The next morning she met Hetta at breakfast, and with assumed nonchalance asked a question about the man who was perhaps about to be her husband. 'Do you like ...
— The Way We Live Now • Anthony Trollope
... reddening with anger that he could speak and look with such perfect nonchalance. Ah! he was too deeply in love with some one else to remember anything he had felt for her. But the next moment she was conscious of her folly;—'as if he could show any feeling then!' This conflict of emotions stretched into a long interval the few moments that elapsed before the door opened ...
— Scenes of Clerical Life • George Eliot
... all this with the greatest nonchalance. He took some papers from his pocket, and looked at them carefully; but the papers were not charts nor maps—like as not they were things no way connected ...
— Growth of the Soil • Knut Hamsun
... contrast! Patty, dainty, graceful and sweet, was the very antithesis of tall, gawky Azalea, with her countrified dress and badly made black shoes. Her careless air, too, was unattractive,—for it was not the nonchalance of experience, but the unselfconsciousness of sheer ignorance of ...
— Patty and Azalea • Carolyn Wells
... Africa in my life," said Mr. Hoopdriver, completing the confession. Then he pulled his right hand from his pocket, and with the nonchalance of one to whom the bitterness of death is passed, began to ...
— The Wheels of Chance - A Bicycling Idyll • H. G. Wells
... inquisitively:—"Why I know when I was an under graduate{2} of ——, where my father was principal, I used to keep a good prad here for a bolt to the village,{3} and then I had a fresh hack always on the road to help me back to chapel prayers."{4} The nonchalance of the speaker, and the easy indifference with which he alluded to his former situation in life, struck me with astonishment, and created a curiosity to know more of his adventures; he had, I found, brought himself to his present degradation by a passion for gaming and driving, ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle
... John remained in the bank parlor. The clerks had gone. Potts was in that state of dejection in which even liquor was not desirable. John showed his usual nonchalance. ...
— Cord and Creese • James de Mille
... to care much for the feelings of people like these. He paid but little regard to their likes or dislikes, especially where these interfered with his pleasures; and, after lighting his cigar, he sat down on a "banqueta," with as much nonchalance as if he were in his own quarters. He smoked some ...
— The White Chief - A Legend of Northern Mexico • Mayne Reid
... with an air of easy nonchalance into the faces of the two men who smoked their short pipes, and uttered ever and anon some short ejaculation, such as, "Hem!" "Ah!" "Zounds!" and so forth, while the sow exhibited a familiarity with her superiors only to be acquired by mixing in the best society. There was a respectful deference ...
— The Humourous Story of Farmer Bumpkin's Lawsuit • Richard Harris
... things point to an inmate of the garrison, do they not?" asked Miller, with as much nonchalance as he ...
— 'Laramie;' - or, The Queen of Bedlam. • Charles King
... well. They may feast like Lucullus on fresh trout and on the dainty aniseed cakes which are a local speciality. But hygienic arrangements were almost prehistoric, and although politeness itself, mine host and hostess showed strange nonchalance towards their guests. Thus, when ringing and ringing again for our tea and bread and butter between seven and eight o'clock, the chamber—not maid, but man—informed us that Madame had gone to mass, and everything was locked ...
— In the Heart of the Vosges - And Other Sketches by a "Devious Traveller" • Matilda Betham-Edwards
... we saw a lively picture of nonchalance (to speak in the fashion of clear Ireland). There, in the wide sunny field, with neither tree nor umbrella above his head, sat a pedler, with his pack, waiting apparently for customers. He was not disappointed. We bought what hold, in regard to the human world, as unmarked, ...
— At Home And Abroad - Or, Things And Thoughts In America and Europe • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... regrets at having told the truth about her love for Steve O'Valley. The regrets were all on Steve's side of the ledger. Contrary to customary procedure it was he who practised nonchalance and indifference, and the office force saw no whit of difference in the attitude of the president toward his private ...
— The Gorgeous Girl • Nalbro Bartley
... carefully deciphered the name on the wall. Now he stopped to look into a shop, then to gaze up at the windows of a house as if he expected to see some one there, and then to throw a copper to some importunate beggar. He walked with an air of so much independence and nonchalance, indeed, at times, almost of haughtiness, that it was difficult to suppose he had the slightest apprehension of danger. Not a person, however, who, passed him, escaped his scrutiny; and even when he appeared to stop carelessly, or for the sake of considering the ...
— The Pirate of the Mediterranean - A Tale of the Sea • W.H.G. Kingston
... exaggerated nonchalance, "meanwhile, what about the bees? Are they going to be permitted to show their superiority or not?" Van Emmon took this to be aimed at him. "Of course not! We can't allow a race of human beings to ...
— The Devolutionist and The Emancipatrix • Homer Eon Flint
... description. Some fifteen young fellows were painting. All wore workmen's blouses. All had mustaches, and most of them had long hair. They appeared intent on their work, but smiles and winks were furtively exchanged, and the careless nonchalance of this tall young Englishman evidently amused them. In four or five minutes M. Goude turned round and walked towards the easels. Cuthbert stepped to them and removed the cloths. The master stopped abruptly, looked ...
— A Girl of the Commune • George Alfred Henty
... suddenly felt very small, but she concealed her embarrassment beneath an excessive nonchalance. "Why, in Boston don't people use their banisters? We find them so ...
— Kildares of Storm • Eleanor Mercein Kelly
... felt they must meet to discuss their constant perplexities and the problems of their difficult situation; but when they reached their trysting-places, there was more of gayety than gravity, more of nonchalance than concern, more of looking into each other's hearts than looking into the troublesome future. And there was hardly an inviting spot within miles of Music Mountain that one or the other of the two ...
— Nan of Music Mountain • Frank H. Spearman
... fire-ball come quietly gliding up to him, apparently rising from the earth rather than falling towards it. Instead of running away, like a practical man, the intrepid doctor held his ground quietly and observed the fiery monster with scientific nonchalance. After continuing its course for some time in a peaceful and regular fashion, however, without attempting to assault him, it finally darted off at a tangent in another direction, and turned apparently into forked ...
— Falling in Love - With Other Essays on More Exact Branches of Science • Grant Allen
... hold on, as I believe it is called, without assistance. Miss E., however, who was more observant, hooked her parasol into one of the ropes, which she subsequently caught. We were now to be taught a new lesson—the extreme nonchalance with which the officers of a Government steamer treat the passengers who have the misfortune to choose these boats instead of making the voyage on board merchant vessels. Some minutes elapsed before any notice was taken of us, or any assistance afforded in getting up our baggage; ...
— Notes of an Overland Journey Through France and Egypt to Bombay • Miss Emma Roberts
... a sudden search for a handkerchief. When Nora stood at his chair, and repeated to him frostily the menu of the day, all the world went round to Sam, and he gained no idea of what was offered him. With much effort at nonchalance, he would again wipe his face, take up his fork for twiddling, and say always ...
— The Girl at the Halfway House • Emerson Hough
... with an effort at nonchalance which, however, failed to deceive any one who noticed his change of color. "You can tell me, then, where I ...
— That Affair Next Door • Anna Katharine Green
... and handed it with an assumed nonchalance for Raymonde's inspection. On the gold band was engraved: "To Cynthia Greene, a token of esteem ...
— The Madcap of the School • Angela Brazil
... snatched the watch from his pocket—I broke the chain, I see—and then left him and ran again. He didn't make the slightest resistance nor utter a word. Of course it wouldn't do for him to make any noise about it, and I dare say he was glad to get off so easily.' With affected nonchalance: 'I'm pretty badly rumpled, I see. He fell against me, and a scuffle like ...
— The Garotters • William D. Howells
... glass and his left eyebrow simultaneously with easy nonchalance, "may we all get ...
— Juggernaut • Alice Campbell
... Ferdinand was the first person on whom he found an opportunity of venting his gathered sours. The young gentleman heaved in sight near the lodge gates, smoking a cigar and gazing about him with an air of lazy nonchalance which had very much the look of being practised in hours of private leisure. Behind him came the valet, bearing the big square color-box, the camp-stool, ...
— Aunt Rachel • David Christie Murray
... clashing of irons, the forty rose and stood each by his stone-heap. The third constable came round, rapping the leg-irons of each man with easy nonchalance, and roughly pulling up the coarse trousers (made with buttoned flaps at the sides, like Mexican calzoneros, in order to give free play to the ankle fetters), so that he might assure himself that no tricks had been played since his last visit. As ...
— For the Term of His Natural Life • Marcus Clarke
... of nonchalance, replied to the effect that Dr. Sampson was not her offspring, and so she was not bound to correct his eccentricities. "And I suppose," said she, languidly, "we must accept these extraordinary people as we find them. But that is no reason why ...
— Hard Cash • Charles Reade
... sold here on the streets, but those of Constantinople, which are more powerful and more dangerous. She rang, and a maid appeared. She entered an alcove without a word, and a few minutes later I saw her leaning on her elbow in her habitual attitude of nonchalance. ...
— Child of a Century, Complete • Alfred de Musset
... Springfields and wearing the Haer kilts in such wise as to indicate permanent status in Vacuum Tube Transport came to the salute as they approached. The Upper preceding Joe Mauser flicked his swagger stick in an easy nonchalance. Joe felt envious amusement. How long did it take to learn how to answer a salute with ...
— Mercenary • Dallas McCord Reynolds
... back, its breast projecting, every muscle in motion, the whole body dancing. An accompanying piece, however, was lacking to this little deity so full of spring and vigor, and that piece has been exhumed by recent excavations, in quite an humble tenement. It represents a delicate youth, full of nonchalance and grace, a Narcissus hearkening to the musical echo in the distance. His head leans over, his ear is stretched to listen, his finger is turned in the direction whence he hears the sound—his whole ...
— The Wonders of Pompeii • Marc Monnier
... howld yer tongue, Blunderbore," cried O'Riley, handing the glowing coal demanded, with as much nonchalance as if his fingers were ...
— The World of Ice • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... particular character of the most suspicious facts presented by the plaintiff; he was severe upon Mr. Clapp, showing a shrewd and thorough knowledge of the man, and the legal species to which he belonged. The Longbridge lawyer put on an increase of vulgar nonchalance for the occasion, but he was unable to conceal entirely his uneasiness under the sharp and well-aimed hits of one, so much his superior in standing and real ability. Mr. Grant dwelt particularly upon the suspicious appearance of the facts connected with the volume of the Spectator, and the ...
— Elinor Wyllys - Vol. I • Susan Fenimore Cooper
... Gipsy, who was viewing the drama with the nonchalance of a spectator rather than ...
— The Goose Girl • Harold MacGrath
... and attendants took my threats with characteristic nonchalance. Such threats, often enough heard in such places, make little or no impression, for they are seldom made good. When I made these threats, I really wished to put these men in prison. To-day I have no such desire, ...
— A Mind That Found Itself - An Autobiography • Clifford Whittingham Beers
... Josephine did not finish her sentence. The words she uttered were, however, so full of poignant surprise and disappointment that I felt constrained to inquire with a guilty attempt at nonchalance: ...
— The Opinions of a Philosopher • Robert Grant
... Beneath the mask of nonchalance which he wore it might have been possible to detect excitement repressed with difficulty; and had Gray been more composed and not obsessed with the idea that Sir Lucien had deliberately intruded upon ...
— Dope • Sax Rohmer
... the deceased, and had served with him in the same yeomanry corps. Jack O'Malley was a Roman Catholic—a square, stout-built, and handsome fellow, with a pleasant word for every one, and full of that gaiety, vivacity, and nonchalance for which the Roman Catholic peasantry of Ireland are so particularly distinguished. He was now about forty-five years of age, sternly attached to the dogmas of his religion, and always remarkable for his revolutionary and anti-British ...
— Stories by English Authors: Ireland • Various
... not at all prepared to hold on, as I believe it is called, without assistance. Miss E., however, who was more observant, hooked her parasol into one of the ropes, which she subsequently caught. We were now to be taught a new lesson—the extreme nonchalance with which the officers of a Government steamer treat the passengers who have the misfortune to choose these boats instead of making the voyage on board merchant vessels. Some minutes elapsed before any notice was taken of us, or any assistance afforded in getting up our baggage; our ...
— Notes of an Overland Journey Through France and Egypt to Bombay • Miss Emma Roberts
... The nonchalance[160] of boys who are sure of a dinner, and would disdain as much as a lord to do or say aught to conciliate one, is the healthy attitude of human nature. A boy is in the parlor what the pit is in the playhouse;[161] independent, irresponsible, looking out from his corner ...
— Essays • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... down to the street entrance in silence. There Jimmy, with a nonchalance that rang a little flat on his own ear, ...
— The Real Adventure • Henry Kitchell Webster
... the wide prairie, we saw a lively picture of nonchalance (to speak in the fashion of clear Ireland). There, in the wide sunny field, with neither tree nor umbrella above his head, sat a pedler, with his pack, waiting apparently for customers. He was not disappointed. We bought what hold, in regard to the ...
— At Home And Abroad - Or, Things And Thoughts In America and Europe • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... with a scornful smile and a curling lip. "You'll disinherit me?" quoth he in mockery. "And of what, pray? If report speaks true, you'll be needing to inherit something yourself to bear you through your present straitness." He shrugged and produced his snuff-box with an offensive simulation of nonchalance. "Ye cannot cut the entail," he reminded his almost apoplectic sire, and ...
— The Lion's Skin • Rafael Sabatini
... kalsomining, and then fell upon Curly so suddenly that the roadster had no excuses ready. Irresistibly, but so composedly that it seemed almost absendmindedness on his part, the dispenser of drinks pushed Curly to the swinging doors and kicked him out, with a nonchalance that almost amounted to sadness. That was the way of ...
— Heart of the West • O. Henry
... entered and took his place opposite him with a brief apology for his tardiness. He was dressed well, with a white orchid in his button-hole, and looked prosperous and rosy. Some light badinage on this score from his various acquaintances in the restaurant he parried with a good-humoured nonchalance; then he betook himself ...
— A Comedy of Masks - A Novel • Ernest Dowson and Arthur Moore
... trail as she went on. Now breaking a bush, now dropping a piece of her dress, and when she crossed a stream, slyly turning over a stone, she hoped thus to guide her husband in pursuit or enable herself to find her way back to the block-house. The vigilance of the Indians was relaxed by the nonchalance with which she bore her captivity, and in a few days she succeeded in effecting her escape and pursuing the trail which she had marked, reached home after a weary march of two days and nights, ...
— Woman on the American Frontier • William Worthington Fowler
... all a diplomatist, a fencer with words and with looks, the envoy of France determined to know, to probe and to read. He forced himself once more to careless laughter and nonchalance of manner and schooled his lips to smile up with gentle irony at the good-humoured face ...
— The Elusive Pimpernel • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... most suspicious facts presented by the plaintiff; he was severe upon Mr. Clapp, showing a shrewd and thorough knowledge of the man, and the legal species to which he belonged. The Longbridge lawyer put on an increase of vulgar nonchalance for the occasion, but he was unable to conceal entirely his uneasiness under the sharp and well-aimed hits of one, so much his superior in standing and real ability. Mr. Grant dwelt particularly upon the suspicious appearance of the facts connected with the volume of the Spectator, ...
— Elinor Wyllys - Vol. I • Susan Fenimore Cooper
... inappetency[obs3], apathy, phlegm, dullness, hebetude[obs3], supineness, lukewarmness[obs3]. cold fit, cold blood, cold heart; coldness, coolness; frigidity, sang froid[Fr]; stoicism, imperturbation &c. (inexcitability) 826[obs3]; nonchalance, unconcern, dry eyes; insouciance &c. (indifference) 866; recklessness &c. 863; callousness; heart of stone, stock and stone, marble, deadness. torpor, torpidity; obstupefaction|, lethargy, coma, trance, vegetative ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... come to being impressed by what Charlie had said. Of course, there could be nothing in it; certainly not, from such a source. It was the old John M. Hurd who turned again to face his visitor, who with but one card left to play awaited breathlessly but with outward nonchalance the effect of ...
— White Ashes • Sidney R. Kennedy and Alden C. Noble
... audience rose, and my gentleman, with the nonchalance assurance of his character, a total disregard of the feelings and convenience of others, and an entire complaisance for his own, stepped forward into the second seat from the door, on which there were previously four people, its full compliment. But he had noticed ...
— Anna St. Ives • Thomas Holcroft
... like old neighbours; whose speech had not seldom a rustic flavour about it; who always seemed to have time for a homely talk and never to be in a hurry to press business; and who occasionally spoke about important affairs of State with the same nonchalance—I might almost say irreverence—with which he might have discussed an every-day law case in his office ...
— Abraham Lincoln • Lord Charnwood
... champion of reform in the building, was putting on a bold front. He laughed and he talked and he whistled. He took people up and down with as much nonchalance as if he did not know that up at the top of that shaft angry eyes were straining themselves for a glimpse of the car, and terrible curses were descending, literally, ...
— Lifted Masks - Stories • Susan Glaspell
... said he, with an effort at nonchalance which, however, failed to deceive any one who noticed his change of color. "You can tell me, then, ...
— That Affair Next Door • Anna Katharine Green
... this hereditary song of the French camp was given by "Colonel Alexandre Jules Caesar" of the "brave battalion of the Marais," his capitally awkward imitation of the soldier of the old regime, and his superb affectation of military nonchalance, were so admirable, that his song excited actual raptures of applause. His performance was encored, and he was surrounded by a group of nymphs and graces, among whom his towering figure looked like a grenadier of Brobdignag in the circle of a Liliputian light company. He carried on ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLII. Vol. LV. April, 1844 • Various
... military activities which marked the winning of Mexican Independence from Spain in the eighteen-twenties, and also in the incessant Indian wars. He was a fighter by necessity, but also by choice. They shed blood with grace and nonchalance in those days, and the Delcasars were always known as ...
— The Blood of the Conquerors • Harvey Fergusson
... just wanted to go to walk in the Public Garden." Pollyanna was trying hard to speak unconcernedly. "I—I thought maybe you'd like to go with me, too." Outwardly Pollyanna was nonchalance itself. Inwardly, however, she was aquiver ...
— Pollyanna Grows Up • Eleanor H. Porter
... the sight, listened in nonchalance, stopping to watch the group for a minute as they would look into a shop window. The exhibition stirred no religious feeling in them, for their minds, with the tenacity of childhood, associated religion with churches, ...
— Jonah • Louis Stone
... waiting for that question. He delivered his answer with all the nonchalance of a man dropping a burnt ...
— Damned If You Don't • Gordon Randall Garrett
... her easel, trying bravely to disregard the collapse of her happy omen; Michael lounging in a cane chair, with Shelley and a cigarette. He had returned from Jundraghat in a mood of skin-deep nonchalance, beneath which irritation smouldered, and Quita's news had set the sparks flying. Behold him, therefore, doubly a martyr; ready, as always, to make capital out of his crown of thorns. A renewed pattering ...
— The Great Amulet • Maud Diver
... which he had stood at the Font; but the languor and indolence of the voice indicated that the tropical indifference was far from conquered, and it was an anxious question whether the life destined for him might not be exceptionally perilous to his peculiar temperament of nonchalance ...
— The Pillars of the House, V1 • Charlotte M. Yonge
... spoken of dealt largely in satire and humor; but joyousness deals in infinitely more. Mirth and laughter are all very well, but they are not all in all. Cheerfulness requires something more than a well-balanced Rabelaisian nonchalance in adversity and a keen relish ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 3 No 2, February 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... borrowed at various times and more or less naturalized, but which are now being driven out of the language, are the following: confrere, congee, cortege, dishabille, distrait, ensemble, fete, flair, mellay (now melee), nonchalance, provenance, renconter, &c. On the other hand, it is satisfactory to note that 'employee' appears to be taking the ...
— Society for Pure English, Tract 3 (1920) - A Few Practical Suggestions • Society for Pure English
... wheeling "half-left" and lolling lazily in his saddle with shortened leg stared back at his enemy with an expression there was no mistaking. His debonair young face had altered in an incredible fashion. Although his lips were pursed up with their whistling nonchalance his eyes had contracted beneath scowling brows into mere pin-points of steel and ice. He looked about as docile ...
— The Luck of the Mounted - A Tale of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police • Ralph S. Kendall
... Constantinople, which are more powerful and more dangerous. She rang, and a maid appeared. She entered an alcove without a word, and a few minutes later I saw her leaning on her elbow in her habitual attitude of nonchalance. ...
— Child of a Century, Complete • Alfred de Musset
... scanned the dreadful pathway with eyes deep-set and burning, resolute, vigilant, and yet defiant, too, as though she had been trapped into this track of danger, and was fighting without great hope, but with the temerity and nonchalance of despair. Her arms were bare to the shoulder almost, and her face was again and again drenched, but second succeeded second, minute followed minute in a struggle which might well turn a man's hair gray, and now, at last—how many hours was it since they had been cast into this den of ...
— Northern Lights • Gilbert Parker
... of speedy success, led her to take her place, on the first day, very near the master, in a peculiar seat—a sort of small, low easy chair which inspired one with a sense of nonchalance. She was in full sight. Her gaze, profound and sombre at times, roamed over the room with the natural air of a meditative queen. She inspired all beholders with curiosity and interest. The feeling which she aroused in her fellow-pupils was less distinct. Her rare advantages ...
— Delsarte System of Oratory • Various
... by taking a decanter of whiskey and glasses from a cupboard. The captain filled his glass, and continued with the same gentle but exasperating nonchalance, ...
— Trent's Trust and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... have been given because they were true. The snare is more worthy of a writer of begging-letters than of a genuine artist. Balzac occasionally indulges in somewhat similar devices; little indirect allusions to his old characters are thrown in with a calculated nonchalance; we have bits of antiquarian information as to the history of buildings; superfluous accounts of the coats-of-arms of the principal families concerned, and anecdotes as to their ancestry; and, after he has given us a name, he sometimes takes care to explain that the pronunciation ...
— Hours in a Library, Volume I. (of III.) • Leslie Stephen
... women grown in the open. But he didn't. With the exception of Ann Leighton, mammy, and Natalie, who were not women at all so much as part and parcel of his own fiber, women were just women. He treated them all alike, and with a gallant nonchalance that astounded his two neighbors, Lady Blanche Trevoy and the Hon. Violet Materlin, accustomed as they were to find youths of his age stupidly callow or at best, in their innocence, mildly exciting. Leighton, seated at H lne's left, ...
— Through stained glass • George Agnew Chamberlain
... lambent, sparkling liquid began to flow through the pipette, into the flask. At sight of it, the Billionaire's eyes lighted up with triumph. Waldron, despite his assumed nonchalance, felt the hunting thrill of Wall street, the quick stab of exultation when victory seemed well ...
— The Air Trust • George Allan England
... as we afterward ascertained, Count Bismarck, with whom the diplomatic negotiations were to be settled. Some minutes elapsed before he came, Napoleon remaining seated in his carriage meantime, still smoking, and accepting with nonchalance the staring of a group of German soldiers near by, who were gazing on their fallen foe with curious ...
— The Memoirs of General P. H. Sheridan, Complete • General Philip Henry Sheridan
... Tuesday) by way of expediting things opened fire on the cattle at Kenilworth. A supreme effort was made to wipe them out. The effort was futile; the cows chewed the cud under fire with inimitable nonchalance, while the goats, our whiskered pandoors, with fine satire sagaciously cocked their horns. Not that we cared. The non-success of the bombardment was if anything disappointing (I say it advisedly). What substantial difference was there between four ounces ...
— The Siege of Kimberley • T. Phelan
... very much, and they allowed him to narrate a whole list of terrible acts he had committed in the East. Before he had been in his new company an hour, he had talked of thefts and even killings with the nonchalance of a man who had served a dozen years in jail. His listeners enjoyed the absurdity of the situation, and allowed him to talk ...
— My Native Land • James Cox
... Marguerite Blakeney, with the pretty nonchalance peculiar to herself, and with the most winning of smiles, "will you venture to excite the jealousy of your fair lady by asking ...
— The Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... an air of nonchalance, replied to the effect that Dr. Sampson was not her offspring, and so she was not bound to correct his eccentricities. "And I suppose," said she, languidly, "we must accept these extraordinary people as we find them. But that is no reason ...
— Hard Cash • Charles Reade
... lions for arms, covered with a thick cushion of purple stuff starred with gold and crossed with black, the end of which fell over the back, was seated a young woman, or rather, a young girl of marvellous beauty, in a graceful attitude of nonchalance and melancholy. ...
— The Works of Theophile Gautier, Volume 5 - The Romance of a Mummy and Egypt • Theophile Gautier
... Occasionally, however, when an unbidden thought of you makes it imperative that some one should be kissed, I sweep him up into my arms rapturously, and bestow my alms upon his brow. But if you could see the nonchalance, the prosaic indifference with which he endures these caresses, you could not ...
— The Jessica Letters: An Editor's Romance • Paul Elmer More
... stayed in the camp for a few days, set out homeward, riding on a camel through the Berber desert to Korosko, a distance of five hundred miles. After an absence of exactly four months he turned up for duty at the Cavalry Barracks, Windsor, with as much nonchalance as if he had been for a trip to the United States ...
— Faces and Places • Henry William Lucy
... left him and ran again. He didn't make the slightest resistance nor utter a word. Of course it wouldn't do for him to make any noise about it, and I dare say he was glad to get off so easily.' With affected nonchalance: 'I'm pretty badly rumpled, I see. He fell against me, and a scuffle like that doesn't improve ...
— The Garotters • William D. Howells
... air of nonchalance, for leaning against a big old buhl table he took out a cigarette from his gold case and slowly lit it, after which ...
— The Stretton Street Affair • William Le Queux
... the semi-gloom and with him his fellow members of the technical staff needed in the taking of the scenes in the library. The camera men I guessed, and a property boy, and an assistant director. The last, at any event, of all those in the huge room, had summoned up sufficient nonchalance to bend his mind to details of his work. I saw that he was thumbing a copy of the scenario, or detailed working manuscript of the story, making notations in some kind of little book, and it was that which enabled me to establish his identity ...
— The Film Mystery • Arthur B. Reeve
... escritoire, Victor opened the envelope with a display of languid interest. Curiosity about the contents of a telegram is ordinarily acute. Victor, on the contrary, sat for a long moment staring thoughtfully at nothing and absently turning the envelope over and over in his hands; while Nogam with specious nonchalance found something unimportant to do in another ...
— Red Masquerade • Louis Joseph Vance
... every muscle in motion, the whole body dancing. An accompanying piece, however, was lacking to this little deity so full of spring and vigor, and that piece has been exhumed by recent excavations, in quite an humble tenement. It represents a delicate youth, full of nonchalance and grace, a Narcissus hearkening to the musical echo in the distance. His head leans over, his ear is stretched to listen, his finger is turned in the direction whence he hears the sound—his whole body listens. ...
— The Wonders of Pompeii • Marc Monnier
... inclination of the head, tinctured with disdain: on which his lordship turned his back, with a kind of open-mouthed nonchalance that was truly epigrammatic; and fell into conversation with Sir Barnard, who had advanced toward the fire, with all the apparent ease of the most intimate friendship: though, since his lordship had changed sides, they had become, in politics at ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... his saying, but I feared to let him see it, and asked with nonchalance—"How do you pick up ...
— The Iron Pirate - A Plain Tale of Strange Happenings on the Sea • Max Pemberton
... Bunyip, and caught Cleopatra from his back. Then dismounting, I arranged the new saddle with ostentatious offhandedness, though in a prayerful frame of mind, and presently climbed on as if nothing was the matter. I certainly anticipated Westminster Abbey rather than a peerage; but the horse, with a nonchalance greater than my own, inasmuch as it was genuine, turned quietly round as I pressed the rein against his neck, and sailed away across the plain at his own inimitable canter. Then I looked back to see the bullock drivers ...
— Such is Life • Joseph Furphy
... with anger that he could speak and look with such perfect nonchalance. Ah! he was too deeply in love with some one else to remember anything he had felt for her. But the next moment she was conscious of her folly;—'as if he could show any feeling then!' This conflict of emotions stretched into a long interval the few moments that elapsed before ...
— Scenes of Clerical Life • George Eliot
... to him, perceiving that my prospects bid fair to improve. For very few people can feel out of it without drifting into a self-regarding mood, and then they are the easiest prey imaginable. Undoubtedly a man like Zaluski, with his easy nonchalance, his knowledge of the world, his genuine good-nature, and the background of sterling qualities which came upon you as a surprise because he loved to make himself seem a mere idler, was apt to eclipse an ordinary mortal like James Blackthorne. The curate perceived this and did not like ...
— The Autobiography of a Slander • Edna Lyall
... patroness. She would write her notes for her, as La Raffe did for Richelieu, and fetch and carry like the best of retrievers; venturing every now and then on a timid caress, which was permitted rather than accepted with an imperial nonchalance. The only subject on which she ever expanded into eloquence was the fascinations of her friend. She spent all her weak breath in blowing that laudatory trumpet, as if she expected the defenses of the best guarded heart to fall prostrate before it, like the walls of Jericho. ...
— Guy Livingstone; - or, 'Thorough' • George A. Lawrence
... Sir, but Mr. Dangerfield, who promised you five hundred guineas,' said Mr. Lowe, with a dry nonchalance. ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... Lanyard had remarked had been a transitory humour. Mr. Blensop was now in what seemed the most equable and blithe of tempers. His very posture at the telephone eloquently betokened as much: he had thrown himself into the chair with picturesque nonchalance, sitting with body half turned from the desk, his right hand holding the receiver to his ear, his left thrust carelessly into his trouser pocket, thus dragging back the lapel of that impeccable morning-coat and exposing the bright cap of ...
— The False Faces • Vance, Louis Joseph
... shrieks from the passing steamer, the usual signal that a boat was wanted to land some stray passenger. A couple of boats were pushed out from the beach, and half a dozen men, with red-peaked caps and a certain picturesque nonchalance in their attire, scrambled into them and soon surrounded the gangway of the steamer. First some large trunks and boxes were lowered, showing that the passenger, whoever he might be, was a person ...
— Ilka on the Hill-Top and Other Stories • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... sow looked up with an air of easy nonchalance into the faces of the two men who smoked their short pipes, and uttered ever and anon some short ejaculation, such as, "Hem!" "Ah!" "Zounds!" and so forth, while the sow exhibited a familiarity with her superiors only to be acquired by mixing in the best society. There was a ...
— The Humourous Story of Farmer Bumpkin's Lawsuit • Richard Harris
... my hands to my ears and shook my head violently to intimate my temporary deafness; and the figure disappeared, leaving the placid candle to watch me as it seemed with a kind of indolent nonchalance. ...
— The Jervaise Comedy • J. D. Beresford
... her surprise. Was this Arthur? Had a few weeks' work and a close connection with the really serious things of life made this change in him? Her face beamed at the thought, which seeing, but not understanding what underlay this evidence of joy, he bent and kissed her, saying with some of his old nonchalance: ...
— Masterpieces of Mystery In Four Volumes - Detective Stories • Various
... see, had arrived at such a stage as to look with the greatest nonchalance on the awful destruction in which they were about to perish. Their hatred against Robur and his people had so increased that they would sacrifice their own lives to destroy the "Albatross" and all she bore. The act was that of madmen, ...
— Rubur the Conqueror • Jules Verne
... divined pretty well what was passing in his mate's mind. He also knew that as long as they were in sight of the boat, his enemy would not dare to injure him; he therefore threw his rifle carelessly over his shoulder, and walked with the most easy air of nonchalance over the strip of level land that lay between the sea and the forest that fringed ...
— The Madman and the Pirate • R.M. Ballantyne
... carelessness and want of heart the repose and inactivity of their King Henry, had compelled him to arouse himself, and to revive by the same means the pretensions of some of his predecessors on the crown of France." "Les Anglais, impatiens de repos a leur ordinance, blamans de nonchalance et de manque de coeur le repos et l'oisivete de leur Roi Henri, l'avaient oblige de se reveiller."—M. Laboureur, Life of Charles VI, translated from the Latin of a contemporary ecclesiastic. Whatever be the degree of authority to which this author is entitled, whilst he supplies the letters ...
— Henry of Monmouth, Volume 2 - Memoirs of Henry the Fifth • J. Endell Tyler
... French was highly resented. And all the mortification of the French contempt for Greece was vented upon him. Although Greece won such a goodly share of the booty of the war, she was treated throughout the war with a brutal nonchalance. Venizelos had much respect, but Greece had none. A comparison is often made between the machinations of the Allies in Petrograd in 1917 for the deposing of the Tsar, and the intrigues which forced Constantine to flee. Venizelos nevertheless was one of the cleverest ...
— Europe—Whither Bound? - Being Letters of Travel from the Capitals of Europe in the Year 1921 • Stephen Graham
... manner in which he applies his white hand, studded with brilliants, to his perfumed hair. Observe the graceful emphasis with which he offers up the prayers for the King, the Royal Family, and all the Nobility; and the nonchalance with which he hurries over the more uncomfortable portions of the service, the seventh commandment for instance, with a studied regard for the taste and feeling of his auditors, only to be equalled by that displayed by the sleek divine who succeeds him, ...
— Sunday Under Three Heads • Charles Dickens
... Minstrel. Her heroes do not merely love, they are "enamoured to a romantic degree." Her arbours are "composed of jasmine, white rose, and other odoriferous sweets of Flora." She sprinkles French phrases with an airy nonchalance worthy of the Lady Hysterica Belamour, whose memoirs are included in Barrett's Heroine. Her duchesses "figure away with eclat"—"a party quarrie assemble at their dejeune." It is noteworthy that by 1820 even Miss Wilkinson ...
— The Tale of Terror • Edith Birkhead
... hearts are softened by weariness and lowering peace—he desired something else than power, some little touch of human sympathy perhaps, his was the blame if no heart responded to his own. Christian Vellacott sat and wondered dreamily, with the nonchalance of a man who has been at the very gates of death, if power were ...
— The Slave Of The Lamp • Henry Seton Merriman
... she? He would show her. Wait till he saw her again. He would send her about her business in a hurry. He resolved upon a terrible demeanour in the presence of the dairy girl—a great show of indifference, a fierce masculine nonchalance; and when, the next morning, she brought him his breakfast, he had been smitten dumb as soon as she entered the room, glueing his eyes upon his plate, his elbows close to his side, awkward, ...
— The Octopus • Frank Norris
... had loved the theatre, and old Jolyon recalled how he used to sit opposite, concealing his excitement under a careful but transparent nonchalance. ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... who analyzes the operations of finance in the language of a monte dealer describing a prize fight, and whose notion of a successful career is something between a gambler, a revolutionist and a buccaneer. He is supposed to vibrate in cheerful nonchalance between Delmonico's and a beanery, according as he is in funds or hard up, and to exhibit a genial assurance that "a member of the New York Stock Exchange, sir," will prove a pleasant addition ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905 • Various
... such expression coming from English hands. The feeling of shame lingered as the younger sister followed with a spirited vivace. Her hollow-cheeked pallor remained unstained, but her thin lips were set and her hard eyes were harder. She played with determined nonchalance and an extraordinarily facile rapidity, and Miriam's uneasiness changed insensibly to the conviction that these girls were learning in Germany not to be ashamed of "playing with expression." All the things she had heard Mr. Strood—who had, as the school prospectus ...
— Pointed Roofs - Pilgrimage, Volume 1 • Dorothy Richardson
... all, dearest," he laughed, for his old nonchalance had returned to him. "I've been full of business since nine o'clock. I have an appointment out at La Muette at two, and I'll have to get ...
— The Golden Face - A Great 'Crook' Romance • William Le Queux
... quality of wildness which Willan had felt in her voice was in her nature. Neither her grandfather nor her mother had in the least comprehended her during the few months she had lived with them. A certain gentleness of nature, which was far more physical than mental, far more an idle nonchalance than recognition of relations to others, had blinded them to her real capriciousness and selfishness. They rarely interfered with her, or observed her with any discrimination. Their love was content ...
— Between Whiles • Helen Hunt Jackson
... beautiful in the cropped bloom of youth, idealise the hero of romance—if Michelangelo's Penseroso translate in marble the dark broodings of a despot's soul—if Della Porta's Julia Farnese be the Roman courtesan magnificently throned in nonchalance at a Pope's footstool—if Verocchio's Colleoni on his horse at Venice impersonate the pomp and circumstance of scientific war—surely this Medea exhales the flower-like graces, the sweet sanctities of human life, that even in that turbid age were found among high-bred Italian ladies. Such power ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds
... rather absurd. But when one member of this life-partnership business is stiff with constraint, you can't expect the other member to fall on his neck and weep. And Dinky-Dunk, for all his nonchalance, looked worried and hollow-eyed. He was in the saddle again, and headed back for Casa Grande, when he caught sight of Peter at work on the windmill. So he loped over to my hired man and had a talk with him. What they talked about I couldn't tell, ...
— The Prairie Mother • Arthur Stringer
... and he had so much confidence in the practice of his captains, that he well knew nothing could occur so long as his orders were obeyed; to doubt the latter would have been heresy in his eyes. In professional nonchalance, no man exceeded our vice-admiral. Blow high, or blow low, it never disturbed the economy of his cabin-life, beyond what unavoidably was connected with the comfort of his ship; nor did any prospect of battle cause a meal to vary a minute in ...
— The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper
... desire to be observed do they stroll to and fro across the quads, so keenly aware in their inmost bosoms of the presence of visitors and determined to grant an appearance of mingled wisdom, great age, and sad doggishness! What a devil-may-care swing to the stride, what a nonchalance in the perpetual wreath of cigarette smoke, what a carefully assumed bearing of one carrying great wisdom lightly and easily casting it aside for the moment in the pursuit of some waggish trifle. "Here," those very self-conscious young visages seem to betray, "is one who might tell ...
— Pipefuls • Christopher Morley
... out over the North Sea, keeping their stations accurately apart. At a given signal all the guns are trained on a target which (the master gunner counts the seconds, watch in hand—at the sixth he looks up) flames into splinters. With equal nonchalance a dozen young men in the prime of life descend with composed faces into the depths of the sea; and there impassively (though with perfect mastery of machinery) suffocate uncomplainingly together. Like blocks of tin soldiers the army covers the cornfield, moves up the hillside, ...
— Jacob's Room • Virginia Woolf
... deal, and had understood the various characters which Fate had put in my way, so that I really knew enough of human nature to be able to depict it." She now had that facility, that abundance of matter and that nonchalance which were such characteristic features of ...
— George Sand, Some Aspects of Her Life and Writings • Rene Doumic
... completed their education, partly at Smyrna, the last year at Marseilles. This had quite turned their heads; they had come back with a contempt for Syria, the bitterness of which was only veiled by the high style of European nonchalance, of which they had a supreme command, and which is, perhaps, our only match for Eastern repose. The Mesdemoiselles de Laurella were highly accomplished, could sing quite ravishingly, paint fruits and flowers, and drop to each other, before surrounding savages, mysterious ...
— Tancred - Or, The New Crusade • Benjamin Disraeli
... quick glance, and returned to his supper, eating with an exaggerated nonchalance, as if ...
— Barlasch of the Guard • H. S. Merriman
... Bonbright of six months before. The boy in him was gone, never to return. He had lost none of his old look of breeding, of refinement, of blood—but he had lost that air which rich young men bear about with them. It is an air, not of carelessness, precisely, but of absence of care; a sort of nonchalance, bred of lack of responsibilities and of definite ambitions. It is an air that makes one think of them that they would fit better into the scenery of a country club or a game of golf than into an office where men strain their intelligence and ...
— Youth Challenges • Clarence B Kelland
... this nonchalance, they conspired to hide from themselves the seriousness of that which had passed between them. The grotesque, pretentious little apartment was mysteriously humanised; it was no longer the reception-room of ...
— The Pretty Lady • Arnold E. Bennett
... at the other end of the shaded avenue, and, following in their wake, were those of the court. Olympia cast aside her nonchalance, and raised her head that she might be seen. The crisis had come! She was now to quaff the intoxicating drink of success, or drain the poisoned ...
— Prince Eugene and His Times • L. Muhlbach
... Isabelle saw, with an order of its own, a direction of its own, a strong undercurrent. Its oddity and nonchalance were refreshing. Like one of the mountain brooks it ran its own course, strong and liquid beneath the ...
— Together • Robert Herrick (1868-1938)
... salt here pulled out an enormous double-case silver watch with an air of perfect nonchalance, and awaited the result. For a few seconds the gypsy was overwhelmed by the lad's coolness; then he burst into a gruff laugh and rushed at him. He might as well have run at a squirrel. The boy sprang to one side, ...
— Freaks on the Fells - Three Months' Rustication • R.M. Ballantyne
... suggested that this sort of thing isn't exactly an edifying social event. It's amusing to come here now and then, just as it's amusing to go to a menagerie. You see what I mean, don't you?" Flossy asked, plying her feathery fan with blithe nonchalance and looking into her companion's face with ...
— Unleavened Bread • Robert Grant
... place upon his finances, Geordie slowly put his hand into his pocket, drew out the twenty pounds, and gave his mother one for interim expenditure. As he returned the money into his pocket, he said, with an air of the most supreme nonchalance, "If ye want ony mair, ye can ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume VI • Various
... think that distinction of birth and a perfect education will render them capable of appearing upon the stage with the same facility and nonchalance with which one enters a ball-room, and they are not at all timid about walking upon the boards, presuming that they can do it as well as an actor who has been raised upon them. A ...
— [19th Century Actor] Autobiographies • George Iles
... While his wife basked in the sun on the pavement, trailing her skirt with nonchalance and impudence, shameless and unconcerned, he followed behind her, pale and shuddering, repeating that it was all over, that he would be unable to save himself and would be guillotined. Each step he saw her take, seemed to him a step nearer punishment. Fright gave him a sort of blind conviction, and ...
— Therese Raquin • Emile Zola
... here. No familiarity, but under the veil of friendship, is permitted, and love's dictionary is as much prohibited, as at first sight one should think his ritual was. All you hear, and that pronounced with nonchalance, is, that Monsieur un tel has had Madame un telle. The Duc de Nivernois has parts, and writes at the top of the mediocre, but, as Madame Geoffrin says, is manqu'e par tout; guerrier manqu'e, ambassadeur manqu'e, homme d'affaires manqu'e and auteur manqu'e—no, he ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole Volume 3 • Horace Walpole
... senatorial tribunals. After these failures Caesar determined to take no active part in politics for a time, and retraced his steps to the East in order to study rhetoric under Molon, at Rhodes. On the journey thither he was caught by pirates, whom he treated with consummate nonchalance while awaiting his ransom, threatening to return and crucify them; when released he lost no time in carrying out his threat. Whilst he was studying at Rhodes the third Mithradatic War broke out, and Caesar at once raised ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various
... negligence, heedlessness, remissness, incaution, nonchalance, inadvertence, laxity, improvidence, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... everything that you wanted?" he said easily, stooping to a little table to light a cigarette. The coolness of his words and manner were like a dash of cold water. She had been prepared for anything but this calm nonchalance in a situation that was intolerable. His tone conveyed the perfunctory regret of a host for an unavoidable absence. Her fear gave way to rage, her body stiffened, her ...
— The Sheik - A Novel • E. M. Hull
... he said between his clenched teeth. "He is a mere Spaniard. He takes this farcical conspiracy with perfect nonchalance. Decayed races ...
— The Rescue • Joseph Conrad
... pictorial satires of 1824, I find one entitled Arrogance or Nonchalance? of the Tenth Reported,—the "tenth" here referred to being the Tenth Hussars. This distinguished regiment set the pencils of the Brothers Cruikshank and their fellow caricaturists in motion at this period, and I find ...
— English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the Nineteenth Century. - How they Illustrated and Interpreted their Times. • Graham Everitt
... we may not, through wilfulness or nonchalance, fall into that wherefrom we may, peradventure, an we but will, by some means or other escape, I know not if it seem to you as it doth to me, but methinketh it were excellently well done that we, such as we are, depart this city, as many have done before us, and eschewing, as we would death, ...
— The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio • Giovanni Boccaccio
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