"Curmudgeon" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... I was born, I hardly have spied it. Then it must be allow'd, that, whenever I shine, I forward the grass, and I ripen the vine; To me the good fellows apply for relief, Without whom they could get neither claret nor beef: Yet their wine and their victuals, those curmudgeon lubbards Lock up from my sight in cellars and cupboards. That I have an ill eye, they wickedly think, And taint all their meat, and sour all their drink. But, thirdly and lastly, it must be allow'd, I alone can inspire the poetical crowd: This is gratefully own'd ...
— The Poems of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Volume I (of 2) • Jonathan Swift
... of the joke. I tell you, we were all mad enough; and when we got to old Jake Van Couter's, we just rebelled. We all hated Jake, anyhow; and Tom Jones he stood right out in the road, and said Jake was a mean old curmudgeon; and then Pop got hold of Tom before we knew it, and down came ...
— Harper's Young People, March 2, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... a celebrated advocate was arguing before him, when, to express his contempt of what he was saying, the cantankerous old curmudgeon of a Judge pointed with one forefinger to one of his ears, and with the other ...
— The Reminiscences Of Sir Henry Hawkins (Baron Brampton) • Henry Hawkins Brampton
... Bellingham replied; and then she asked: "Shall we walk there together?" and the old curmudgeon actually said ...
— The Vanishing Man • R. Austin Freeman
... acknowledgments; and scarcely had she gone, when a young fellow, who I learned had lately come into possession of a handsome property by the death of an uncle, came to request me not to meddle with the deceased, who he assured me was a shocking old curmudgeon, who never spent his money like a gentleman. A douceur from the young chap secured the repose ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, October 9, 1841 • Various
... of another pack, Rogue or rascal, frater, maunderer, Irish toyle, or other wanderer; No dimber damber, angler, dancer, Prig of cackler, prig of prancer; No swigman, swaddler, clapperdudgeon; Cadge-gloak, curtal, or curmudgeon; No whip-jack, palliard, patrico; No jarkman, be he high or low; No dummerar, or romany; No member of "the Family;" No ballad-basket, bouncing buffer, Nor any other, will I suffer; But stall-off now and for ever, All outliers whatsoever: And as I keep to the foregone, ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth
... manner with which, under these circumstances, the father controlled the people. They yielded in an instant to his will: one tall blacksmith seemed scarcely to relish his somewhat imperious demeanour, and stood rooted to the ground; but Baroni, placing only one hand on the curmudgeon's brawny shoulder, while he still continued playing on his instrument with the other, whirled him away like a puppet. The multitude laughed, and the disconcerted ...
— Tancred - Or, The New Crusade • Benjamin Disraeli
... judgment." As she said this the poor woman thought of those other five who in process of time might become claimants. But here the whole family attacked her, and almost drove her to confess that her brother was a stingy old curmudgeon. ...
— Mr. Scarborough's Family • Anthony Trollope |
