"Grouchy" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... emulation must have been: but the Emperor fell into the error of overturning the hopes of their courage and their ambition; he placed General Erlon and Count Reille under the orders of Marshal Ney, whom he brought forward too late; and Count Gerard, and Count Vandamme, under those of Marshal Grouchy, whom it would have been better to have left at ...
— Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. II • Pierre Antoine Edouard Fleury de Chaboulon
... walked in upon them! It was almost worth the walk, she told herself hearteningly. She hoped that dad had a good cook. He would wear a flour-sack apron, naturally, and would be tall and lean, or else very fat. He would be a comedy character, but she hoped he would not be the grouchy kind, which, though very funny when he rampages around on the screen, might be rather uncomfortable to meet when one is tired and hungry and out of sorts. But of course the crankiest of comedy cooks would be decently civil to her. Men always were, except directors who are ...
— The Quirt • B.M. Bower
... the mother that quieted this fear. Sarah complained of not feeling well, and was going to spend a quiet day at home. But Mrs. Montague was certain it was nothing serious. No; she had no temperature. No fever at all. She was just having a spell of thinking about things, sort of grouchy like. She had been grouchy to both her parents. Probably because she wasn't working. No, she said she wouldn't come to the telephone. She also said she was in a bad way and might pass out any minute. But that was just her kidding. It was kind of Mr. Gill ...
— Merton of the Movies • Harry Leon Wilson
... "Si le marechal Grouchy avait ete rejoint par l'officier que Napoleon lui avait expedie la veille a dix heures du soir, toute question eut disparu. Mais cet officier n'etait point parvenu a sa destination, ainsi que le marechal ...
— Wessex Poems and Other Verses • Thomas Hardy
... see all of us under the Provisional Government. "You did not change at all." Misha, who did not know B. before, did not like her very much,—in fact, they all think she is suspicious. Aren't these youngsters peculiar? Especially Misha who is so grouchy lately—all seems dangerous to him. I never think that a woman can be anything but pretty or hideous. There is no middle, and no suspicion about them. If a woman is, what they perhaps would call "suspicious"—then there is a man's influence behind her—so find the man (and ...
— Rescuing the Czar - Two authentic Diaries arranged and translated • James P. Smythe
... from Susan. He sat on the bed and pulled the covers away from her face. "What are you so grouchy about, pet?" he inquired, chucking her ...
— Susan Lenox: Her Fall and Rise • David Graham Phillips
... by the knife scar which ran from the lobe of his left ear to the point of his chin, a broad, red welt in the blackish stubble of his beard. This was Martin O'Connor, owner of the Sunrise racing stable, sometimes know as Grouchy O'Connor. ...
— Old Man Curry - Race Track Stories • Charles E. (Charles Emmett) Van Loan
... been a complete failure after all. As he turned his steps in the direction of the town his mind was wholly engrossed with the events of the past two hours. How Aunt Mary did hate Diablo. Had the girl noticed how badly his clothes fit him in comparison with McCoy's? Why had Jack appeared so grouchy? ...
— El Diablo • Brayton Norton
... very thing. Rather a joke, wasn't it? If railroads had been selling at forty dollars a pair I couldn't have bought a headlight! I went back to Cripple the next day, having spent most of my money, feeling sort of grouchy and down on my luck. That night I thought I'd have a go at the wheel—roulette, you know. I'd steered pretty clear of that sort of thing up to then, but I didn't much care that night what happened. I only had about fifteen dollars and I played it dollar by dollar and couldn't ...
— The Lilac Girl • Ralph Henry Barbour
... house of Grierson that compliance with the terms of the will has lasted through two generations only. The present Bruce Grierson let the time-limit overtake and pass him twenty years ago, but, unmarried and grouchy, he has stood between me and the Canaan Tigmores ever since. I don't count until he dies, and not then unless I am married before I am thirty-five. (However, I feel that I might be more disposed to meet the will's requirements ...
— Sally of Missouri • R. E. Young
... to be examining them. I weighed the pound and when I saw he did not put them back, I took out two. You never saw an Indian laugh so hard in your life. You always had to be careful when weighing things for Indians, for if you got over the quantity and took some out they were always grouchy as they thought ...
— Old Rail Fence Corners - The A. B. C's. of Minnesota History • Various
... so. Neatness is a "without-which- not;" but there must be more—a boy must work hard, be polite, honest, full of force, bright, quick, frank, good-natured. The "Old Man" may keep to sweep the floor a lazy, shiftless, stupid, silly, grouchy "stiff"; but when he wants some one to go on the road he looks for a live manly man. When you get in stock it is up to you; for eyes are on you, eyes just as anxious to see your good qualities as you are to show them, eyes that are trying to see ...
— Tales of the Road • Charles N. Crewdson
... of ought to," said Tod, seriously. "That's a rough, bad gang. I've heard of them before. I don't know what's the matter with them, but they're grouchy. All the other fishermen around here are fairly good-natured, but this lot is noted for ugly temper and they especially dislike and resent the summer people. I forgot all this, and of course Dotty didn't know it. But I didn't think, and when they supposed the baby was alive, ...
— Two Little Women • Carolyn Wells
... guns, only to break against the bayonet-hedged squares of the infantry. At the end of eight hours' fighting the French center had advanced to within sixty yards of the British position, but the line still held, and Blucher's Prussians were rapidly coming up on the right flank. Marshal Grouchy having failed to prevent this fatal manoeuver, Napoleon shot his last bolt, sending Ney with the Old Guard against the British right. But "the bravest of the brave had fought his last battle," and as his ten battalions were flung back in disorder, Wellington ...
— Ten Englishmen of the Nineteenth Century • James Richard Joy
... of the writer being a scholar. 3. No one ever heard of that man running for office. 4. Brown being a politician prevented his election. 5. I do not doubt him being sincere. 6. Grouchy being behind time decided the ...
— Higher Lessons in English • Alonzo Reed and Brainerd Kellogg
... Astronomer, Bailly, by one vote. In the next year, D'Alembert, his faithful friend, died, leaving him the whole of his wealth; his uncle, the bishop, likewise died in the same year, from whom he would receive a fresh accession of property. Shortly after this, time, Condorcet married Madame de Grouchy—also celebrated as a lady of great beauty, good fortune, and an educated Atheist. The marriage was a happy one. The only offspring was a girl, who married General Arthur O'Connor, uncle to the late Feargus O'Connor, ...
— Ancient and Modern Celebrated Freethinkers - Reprinted From an English Work, Entitled "Half-Hours With - The Freethinkers." • Charles Bradlaugh, A. Collins, and J. Watts
... up of officers who nearly all reached senior positions; four were already colonels. The most outstanding was, undoubtedly, Grard. He was very clever, brave and had a natural talent for warfare. He was under the command of Marshal Grouchy at Waterloo, and gave him some sound advice, which could have led us to victory. Out of the eleven aides-de-camp attached to Bernadotte's staff, two became marshals, three lieutenant-generals, four were brigadiers and one was ...
— The Memoirs of General the Baron de Marbot, Translated by - Oliver C. Colt • Baron de Marbot
... they could not make him angry. When other boys were apt to scowl and feel "grouchy," Fritz would come up smilingly after each and every round, ready to take ...
— Boy Scouts on a Long Hike - Or, To the Rescue in the Black Water Swamps • Archibald Lee Fletcher
... the Outdoor Girls looked as the grouchy old farmer came toward them. Mollie was making all sorts of noises under the car, apparently tinkering with its mechanism, while the girls kept up a ...
— The Outdoor Girls at Bluff Point - Or a Wreck and a Rescue • Laura Lee Hope
... brought the Prussians again into communication with the British. Napoleon, after an unexplained inaction during the night of the 16th and the morning of the 17th, committed the pursuit of the Prussians to Marshal Grouchy, ordering him never to let the enemy out of his sight; but Bluecher and Gneisenau had already made their escape, and had concentrated so large a body in the neighbourhood of Wavre, that Grouchy could not now have prevented a force superior to his own from uniting with ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe
... Grouchy Stale's line of endeavor. Say, Bunch, if it were not for the knocks contained therein one of that guy's essays would read like the maiden effort ...
— You Can Search Me • Hugh McHugh
... Camp. He's rich and owns a lot of railroads and things. He used to be mad at the scouts, but after a while when he saw what kind of fellows scouts are, he got glad at them and started Temple Camp. He's awful grouchy when you first see him, but you should worry about that. Once, when he was out west about some railroads, he saw Jeb Rushmore, who was a trapper and all that, and he was getting old, so Mr. Temple made him come to Temple Camp to be camp manager and ...
— Roy Blakeley's Adventures in Camp • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... brother, fifteen, commonly called Pudge. Pink, pudgy, sensitive; always imposed upon, always grouchy and too good-natured to ...
— The Sturdy Oak - A Composite Novel of American Politics by Fourteen American Authors • Samuel Merwin, et al.
... meantime, came to France from America, and induced Carnot to send an expedition to Ireland, under the command of General Hoche. It ended disastrously. A few vessels cruised for a week in the harbour of Bantry Bay; but, as the remainder of the fleet, which was separated by a fog, did not arrive, Grouchy, the second in ...
— An Illustrated History of Ireland from AD 400 to 1800 • Mary Frances Cusack
... to be an accident," predicted the grouchy actor. "I think you may count me out of this play, Mr. Pertell. I have had ...
— The Moving Picture Girls Under the Palms - Or Lost in the Wilds of Florida • Laura Lee Hope
... gipsy woman to divine, and she told him his fate. Through fire and a rock she said that he would fall. I suppose the rock was St. Helena, and the fire was the fire of Waterloo. Napoleon was the terror of England, and he would have beat the English at Waterloo but for treachery, the treachery of Grouchy. It was, maybe, not his fault he was treacherous, he might be the same as Judas, that had his treachery settled for him four thousand years before his birth. There was a curse on Napoleon the Third because of ...
— The Kiltartan History Book • Lady I. A. Gregory
... non-arrival of reinforcements is much the easiest way of accounting for a foiled combination. The rout of Howard's corps was not to be considered, as it happened under the General's own eye: so Sedgwick was, by some, made the Grouchy of the day: but he seems to have fought his division as well as any of his fellows, and it was probably a superior force that checked his advance towards the main army, and eventually hurled him back ...
— Border and Bastille • George A. Lawrence
... of King John, who, after Crecy, visited England for a season. A disregard of ethics gave Copenhagen to Lord Nelson, who insisted on looking at Admiral Parker's signal to withdraw from action with his sightless eye, which could not see it. A fear of disregarding ethics lost to Grouchy the chance of assisting Napoleon at Waterloo. In our strife against ignorance and quackery the profession should follow the general plan of action usually adopted by Lord Nelson—lie alongside of whom you can and sink or capture your ...
— History of Circumcision from the Earliest Times to the Present - Moral and Physical Reasons for its Performance • Peter Charles Remondino
... little figures under the arc-light melted away in the direction of the commanding voice and home and bed. And Emma McChesney forgot all about fresh young kids and featherloom petticoats and discounts and bills of lading and sample-cases and grouchy buyers. After all, it had been her protecting maternal instinct which had been aroused by the boy at supper, although she had not known it then. She did not know it now, for that matter. She was busy remembering just such evenings in her own life—summer ...
— Roast Beef, Medium • Edna Ferber
... preserved the phenomenal force of earlier years; but, in Mr. Ropes's words, he disclosed "no conspicuous lack of energy and activity." Soult was far from being an ideal chief of staff. Ney, to whom was assigned the command of the left wing, only reached the army on the 15th, and without a staff; Grouchy, to whom on the 16th was suddenly given the command of the right wing, was not a ...
— Camps, Quarters, and Casual Places • Archibald Forbes
... words, so I study them out and use them; it catches the crowd for they laugh, and then pay me for making them. See? This world down on the streets is in such a mix a laugh is the scarcest thing there is; so they pay for it. No grouchy, sad-cat-working-on-your-sympathy kid sells many. I can beat one with a ...
— Michael O'Halloran • Gene Stratton-Porter
... against an allied force of two hundred and twenty thousand, by his central advance on Charleroi and Ligny, he gained a most decided advantage over the enemy—an advantage lost by the eccentric movement of Grouchy: and even in 1813, his central position at Dresden would have secured him most decisive advantages, had not the faults of his lieutenants lost these advantages in the disasters of ...
— Elements of Military Art and Science • Henry Wager Halleck
... my office to-day, as it often has tinkled before. I turned in my chair in a half-grouchy way, for a telephone call is a bore; And I thought, "It is somebody wanting to know the distance from here to Pekin." In a tone that was gruff I shouted "Hello," a sign for the talk to begin. "What is it?" I asked in a terrible way. I was huffy, ...
— Just Folks • Edgar A. Guest
... even conclude that some other qualities of the epic would to more cautious ears have been equally perceptible in the narration. Of a like character, we suspect, is the statement that Selves, being on the staff of Grouchy on the day of Waterloo, "urgently represented to that general the propriety of joining the main body of the army as soon as the Prussians, whom he had been sent to intercept, were out of sight." Lord Houghton has evidently not read the best and most recent criticisms on ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII. No. 30. September, 1873 • Various
... answered Nat, and walked away. Somehow, it made him angry to see Dave and his chums cheering, and in such an earnest manner. He would have been better satisfied had Dave acted grouchy or stayed away ...
— Dave Porter and His Rivals - or, The Chums and Foes of Oak Hall • Edward Stratemeyer
... Farm was more than a sad one when the old Ninth was made into a Reserve Battalion. The men were so greatly discouraged and the sergeants so grouchy that at times it became ...
— Private Peat • Harold R. Peat
... added; "you may be interested to hear that accidentally I got on the track of that beggar who ate the hermit's eggs. Took a tramp this morning, and found him held up at a kind of sailor's inn, waiting for money. Grouchy old party; no wonder his men ...
— The Stolen Singer • Martha Idell Fletcher Bellinger
... I believe, I have elucidated. I show also, that it was not, as General Gourgaud and other writers assert, to raise the spirits, and excite the courage of the French army, that its leader announced to it the arrival of Marshal Grouchy. It is a certain fact, that Napoleon was himself deceived by a brisk firing, which took place between the Prussians and Saxons; and it is falsely, that he has been charged with having knowingly deceived his soldiers, at a ...
— Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. I • Pierre Antoine Edouard Fleury de Chaboulon
... it," replied Buell, impatiently. "I've got Leslie fixed as far as this lumber deal is concerned, but he won't stand for any more. He was harder to fix than the other rangers, an' I'm afraid of him." he's grouchy now. ...
— The Young Forester • Zane Grey
... Cronin. You're a good sight for a grouchy man's eyes! Sit down and confide the brand of your particular favorite ...
— The Voice on the Wire • Eustace Hale Ball
... meetin's wa'n't such gay affairs. A grouchy lot of tinhorn investors we was, believe me; for the parties young Mr. Woodbury had decoyed into this fool scheme wa'n't Standard Oil plutes or any of the Morgan crowd: mostly salaried men, with a couple of dentists, a retail grocer, and a real estate agent! None of us was stuck on droppin' ...
— Shorty McCabe on the Job • Sewell Ford
... dead!" he protested. "Mr. Bashford always struck me as a pretty decent, square sort of chap, and not at all the familiar grouchy uncle of fiction and the drama. I made notes on him from time to time with a view to building a play around him—the perfect uncle, unobtrusive, never blustering at his nephew; translating the avuncular relationship into something remote and ...
— Lady Larkspur • Meredith Nicholson
... not have materially weakened the enemy, whose force still exceeded what the rebel delegates had required; but the two commanders had embarked in one of the missing frigates, the Fraternite; and Rear-Admiral Bouvet and General Grouchy, the seconds in command, could scarcely act with decision while their ...
— The Life of Admiral Viscount Exmouth • Edward Osler
... fortresses. Even in Belgium, he ought to have poured the whole mass of his army on the English at once, instead of violating his own first principle of war, and dividing it into three armies, Ney's at Quatre-Bras, Grouchy's at Wavre, and ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, No. 382, October 1847 • Various
... Tom. "That's another favorite, though I'll admit the Russians have the monopoly. Our specialty is stories about little girls who break their spines and get adopted by grouchy old men because they smile so much. You'd think we were a race of cheerful cripples and that the common end of the Russian ...
— This Side of Paradise • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... the mind to decrease vitality, we recognize the duty of seeming happy, buoyant, cheerful, vital, at least when with others, for the sake of others' minds and bodies. Secondly, we find the duty to refrain from commenting on others' appearance in a way that will start "ingrowing thoughts." A "grouchy" foreman can give blues and indigestion to a roomful of factory girls. A self-pitying teacher can check the heart beats of her class, cause arteries and lungs to contract, and deprive the brain of fresh ...
— Civics and Health • William H. Allen
... happily portrayed by a motion picture I recently saw. Old Grouchy Moneybags, wealthy beyond measure and afflicted with gout, is seated at his breakfast table. In the next room, seen with the all-seeing eye of the movie, the butler makes love to the very willing maid. In the kitchen the fat cook is feeding the ever hungry butcher's boy with gingerbread ...
— The Nervous Housewife • Abraham Myerson
... gossip came to Lagroin, as he sat in his doorway, babbling of Grouchy and Lannes and Davoust, the Little Corporal outflanking them all in his praise, his dim blue eyes flared out from the distant sky of youth and memory, his lips pursed in anger, and he got to his feet, his stick fiercely ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... the country, and if it came up in season all would yet be well. The great conqueror, confident in its arrival, formed his reserve into an attacking column, and ordered them to charge the enemy. The whole world knows the result. Grouchy failed to appear; the imperial guard was beaten back; and Waterloo was lost. Napoleon died a prisoner at St. Helena because one of his marshals was ...
— McGuffey's Fifth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... trade be tough, it's always well to make a bluff, to face the world with cheerful eye, as though the goose were hanging high. No merchant ever made a friend by dire complainings without end. And people never seek a store to hear a grouchy merchant roar; they'll patronize the wiser gent who doesn't air ...
— Rippling Rhymes • Walt Mason
... came next. He had an ingrowing toe nail, which sometimes made him grouchy and sour, so he was dubbed Pickles. He looked and acted like his name now. He squealed when the old woman picked him up in her hand, and when a splash of rain landed on the back of his neck he kicked both hind ...
— Bumper, The White Rabbit • George Ethelbert Walsh
... which means victory, and to lose in hesitation means disaster. He said that he beat the Austrians because they did not know the value of five minutes; and it has been said that, among the trifles that conspired to defeat him at Waterloo, the loss of a few minutes by himself and Grouchy on that fatal morning, was the most significant. Blucher was on time, and Grouchy was late. That may seem a small matter, but it was enough to bring Napoleon's career to a close, and to send him to ...
— The True Citizen, How To Become One • W. F. Markwick, D. D. and W. A. Smith, A. B.
... the coffee brought to us before dawn, in grouchy, sleepy, monosyllabic silence. Immediately after, the cattle were to water and feed ... and a hungry lot they were ... but despite their appetites, with each day, because of the excessive heat of ...
— Tramping on Life - An Autobiographical Narrative • Harry Kemp
... if you don't enj'y talkin' business with me," observed the Cap'n, with a meek wistfulness that was peculiarly aggravating to his grouchy partner. ...
— The Skipper and the Skipped - Being the Shore Log of Cap'n Aaron Sproul • Holman Day
... Duke of the Abrubsky!" sarcastically said Dump Kane. When the grouchy Kane offered to lend his bat matters were critical ...
— The Redheaded Outfield and Other Baseball Stories • Zane Grey
... the men sallied forth to work, returned for noon dinner, and rode off again soon afterward. Lynch was neither grouchy nor over-jovial. He seemed the typical ranch-boss, whose chief thought is to get the work done, and his berating was entirely impartial. Bud had spent most of his time around the ranch, but once or twice he rode out with the others, and there ...
— Shoe-Bar Stratton • Joseph Bushnell Ames
... the only witness," he began, "I guess I must tell the story. One of our planters, Sears, took a dislike to Terry on the way down from Zamboanga: no reason for it—he was grouchy and sore, had been drinking too hard trying to ...
— Terry - A Tale of the Hill People • Charles Goff Thomson
... Frank," Bill remarked as they turned and skirted the parade ground in New Post. "I never saw a fellow change so in such a short time. He is brooding all the time and is as grouchy as he can be. I wish there was something I could ...
— Battling the Clouds - or, For a Comrade's Honor • Captain Frank Cobb
... that I spoke to was blind. 12. Grouchy did not arrive at the time that Napoleon most ...
— Higher Lessons in English • Alonzo Reed and Brainerd Kellogg
... as thick as thieves. They're gettin' along like two pups in a basket, when in comes a disturbin' element in the shape of one of them half-hoss half-alligator felons, whose distinguishin' characteristic is that they're allers grouchy an' hostile. That's the drawback to Red Dog. It certainly is the home camp of some of the most ornery ...
— Faro Nell and Her Friends - Wolfville Stories • Alfred Henry Lewis
... grouchy. The stranger, however—a tall bronzed man—made himself known to me in the most cordial manner. He told me he was Colonel Hughes, a close friend of the dead man; and that, unutterably shocked and grieved, he had come to inquire whether there was anything he might do. "Inspector," said ...
— The Agony Column • Earl Derr Biggers
... cheers mingled with the cannonade; the ground was recovered, to be captured no more. The Federals were driven back across the turnpike, and now dark masses of reinforcements debouched on the plain, and marched toward our left. Was it Grouchy or Blucher? Some moments of painful suspense ensued, while General Beauregard strained his eyes to decipher the advancing banner. Red and white and blue, certainly; but was it the ensign of Despotism or of Liberty? Nearer and nearer came the rushing column, and lo! upon the breeze ...
— Macaria • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... take advantage of which means victory, and to lose in hesitation means disaster. He said that he beat the Austrians because they did not know the value of five minutes; and it has been said that among the trifles that conspired to defeat him at Waterloo, the loss of a few moments by himself and Grouchy on the fatal morning was the most significant. Blucher was on time, and Grouchy was late. It was enough to send Napoleon to St. Helena, and to ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden
... grouchy!" Mary Rose flew to the defense of her new friend. "She was just lonesome. Now that she has Germania for company, she is very, very pleasant. I go ...
— Mary Rose of Mifflin • Frances R. Sterrett
... was thrown into confusion from this unexpected reinforcement to their enemies, and at half-past nine they fled in all directions. The arrival of these two corps was occasioned by some strange misconduct, or something worse, on the part of Marshal Grouchy, who was dispatched by Napoleon to attack these corps with a division of the French army, but by some strange fatality he suffered them to approach the right wing of Napoleon's army unmolested. This and this alone caused the defeat of Napoleon, as these corps of themselves were more numerous than ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 3 • Henry Hunt
... Manuel, and of John III. Castanedas history was printed in black letter at Coimbra, in eight volumes folio, in the years 1552, 1553, and 1554, and is now exceedingly scarce. In 1553, a translation of the first book was made into French by Nicolas de Grouchy, and published at Paris in quarto. An Italian translation was published at Venice in two volumes quarto, by Alfonso Uloa, in 1578[1]. That into English by Lichefield, employed on the present occasion, is in small quarto and black-letter. The voyage of De Gama is related by De Barros ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. II • Robert Kerr
... we all despise as long as we have it and would give our souls to get back as soon as we have lost it. No, as you say, Youth doesn't amount to much. It is only the nearest approach to Immortality that mortals have ever known. Why, where should I be now,—a grouchy old bachelor like me—without Youth in my house? Why, Frederik, this girl has made me feel kindlier ...
— The Return of Peter Grimm - Novelised From the Play • David Belasco
... falling out. He—Mr. Hungerford—is, so I am told, a good deal of a sport—ahem! that is, he is a young gentleman of fashionable and expensive tastes, and he wrote his aunt, asking for money, rather frequently. The February letter reached her when she was grouchy—er—not well, I mean, and she changed her will, practically disinheriting him. Under the new will he receives twenty thousand dollars in cash. The balance—" Mr. Farwell, who, during this long statement, had interspersed legal dignity of term with an occasional lapse ...
— Cap'n Dan's Daughter • Joseph C. Lincoln |
