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Rabble  adj.  Of or pertaining to a rabble; like, or suited to, a rabble; disorderly; vulgar. (R.)






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Rabble" Quotes from Famous Books



... that goes to bed Rests with its tail above its head, So in this mongrel state of ours The rabble are the supreme powers. That horsed us on their backs to show us A jadish trick at last, ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 1 (of 2) - With an Introduction upon Ancient Humour • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange

... their livery. They picked up their sorry crust by burning of charcoal, and carting of dead wood to farmers for to consume in their ingles. Now and again, when any of the Quality came to hunt in the Chase, the Head Keeper would make use of a score or so of them as beaters and rabble-prickers of the game; but nine months out of the twelve they rather starved than lived. These Charcoal-burners hated us Blacks, first, because in our sable disguise we rather imitated their own Beastly ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 1 of 3 • George Augustus Sala

... rule. If at present I should undertake an open war against Marx himself, three-quarters of the members of the International would turn against me, and I would be at a disadvantage, for I would have lost the ground on which I must stand. But by beginning this war with an attack against the rabble by which he is surrounded, I shall have the majority on my side.... But, ... if he wishes to constitute himself the defender of their cause, it is he who would then declare war openly. In this case, I shall take the field also and I shall ...
— Violence and the Labor Movement • Robert Hunter

... election. Its near approach caused more excitement in the "Quaker City" than had been witnessed there since the preceding Presidential election. The party-leaders began to lay their plans early, and the wire-pullers on both sides were unusually busy in their vocation. At the head of the rabble upon which one of the parties depended for many votes, was a drunken and profane fellow, whom we will call Tom Simmons. Tom was great at electioneering and stump-spouting in bar-rooms and rum-caucuses, ...
— The Humbugs of the World • P. T. Barnum

... times, meeting the eye of nobody, and lifting my coffee with fingers which trembled with embarrassment at this too great conspicuosity! Those mournful hours passed, one by the year, while the idling bourgeois and the travellers made ridicule; and the rabble exhausted all effort to draw plays ...
— The Beautiful Lady • Booth Tarkington

... numbers of the Christians were seized and convicted, mainly on the plea of their sullen hatred of the whole human race. A frightful persecution followed, Nero perhaps hoping, by an exhibition of human suffering, so dear to the rabble of Rome, to turn the thoughts of the people from ...
— Historic Tales, Volume 11 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris

... a touch of that humanity which beats down prejudice and makes us all akin, turned upon the now unpleasantly demonstrative rabble, and swore at them roundly. In another moment Pasmore was himself again, and he could see that gallows-like tree right in front of him... And what was that hulking brute alongside saying about skulking shermoganish? Was he going to his death hearing the ...
— The Rising of the Red Man - A Romance of the Louis Riel Rebellion • John Mackie

... them away.—And now let's reade these Writes. What's here? complaints against my worthy brothers For corne transported, Copper money stampt,[211] Our subjects goods ceaz'd, and I know not what. A plague upon this busie-headed rabble! We will have tortures made to awe the slaves; Peace makes them ever proud and malapert, They'l be ...
— A Collection Of Old English Plays, Vol. IV. • Editor: A.H. Bullen

... tried to hide the fear that fed upon him with a tinge of swagger. This in the White House—the palace of their President! Storri was more and more convinced that the Americans were a rabble and not a people! ...
— The President - A novel • Alfred Henry Lewis

... this was the Roman habit, the lower citizens were obliged to appear abroad is their tunica, or close garment. The love of praise is so eager a passion, that the public orator is here represented as delighting in the applause of the rabble. Persius, the satirist, has said ...
— A Dialogue Concerning Oratory, Or The Causes Of Corrupt Eloquence • Cornelius Tacitus

... Still I see nothing but a tumultuous mob of idiots and madmen, who are busy in prostrating themselves before a gigantic cameleopard, and endeavoring to obtain a kiss of the animal's hoofs. See! the beast has very justly kicked one of the rabble over—and another—and another—and another. Indeed, I cannot help admiring the animal for the excellent use he is making of ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 1 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe

... vie in exertions of energy. Yet in this scene of tumult, one motive animates the whole—eagerness to engage, with subordination to command. This preserves the dignity of the action, and from a strangling rabble, changes the figures to men, whose legitimate contest interests our wishes." Another example is given—Raffaelle's "Incendio del Borgo"—a good description follows: "the enraged elements of wind and fire," we do not see in the original, not even in the drapery of the woman with her back to us ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 54, No. 338, December 1843 • Various

... with Nature pleased: Hence to thy praises, Garrick, I agree, And, pleased with Nature, must be pleased with thee. 1070 Now might I tell how silence reign'd throughout, And deep attention hush'd the rabble rout; How every claimant, tortured with desire, Was pale as ashes, or as red as fire; But loose to fame, the Muse more simply acts, Rejects all flourish, and relates mere facts. The judges, as the several parties came, With temper heard, with judgment weigh'd each claim; And, in their sentence ...
— Poetical Works • Charles Churchill

... country. I know of scarcely a family more than one member of which has not been or is not in the ranks of the army. The maimed and crippled youths I meet on the highroad certainly do not for the most part belong to the immigrant rabble of which the Northern regiments are said to consist; and even the present conscription is now in many splendid instances most promptly and cheerfully complied with by the wealthy people who could easily purchase exemption, but who prefer ...
— Stonewall Jackson And The American Civil War • G. F. R. Henderson

... around to the square to a rendezvous of soldiers, and told them that an attempt would be made to abduct his sister by force, and if they heard a shriek from the women, to hasten to his house. The rabble of soldiers wanted no better pastime than such a melee among the infidels, and promised to come. When they heard the noise they started on a run. Raheel, having suspected something of the kind, induced ...
— The Women of the Arabs • Henry Harris Jessup

... before the yells of these kings of the packs of savage prairie wolves, and they were masterful indeed, and could easily be distinguished above the feebler pipings of the wolf rabble. ...
— Ted Strong in Montana - With Lariat and Spur • Edward C. Taylor

... thought was of pitying indulgence. So this was the grand outcome of Boris Grogoff's eloquence, and the Rat's plots for plunder!—a fitting climax to such vain dreams. I saw the Cossack, that ebony figure of Sunday night. Ten such men, and this rabble was dispersed for ever! I felt inclined to lean over and whisper to them, "Quick! quick! Go home!... They'll be here in a moment ...
— The Secret City • Hugh Walpole

... the rear door equally long, which also left there empty. Upon coming down James Martin evidently took in the situation at a glance, for, giving my son a pinch, he said: "Mr. Haviland, let us go into the dining-room and call for supper." This was to give the drunken rabble time to leave so that he could relate his adventures with the Southerners after supper. But by this time the porter came to me to inquire if I wished to see Mr. Bayliss, the sick man. I replied in the affirmative, upon which he said: "He ...
— A Woman's Life-Work - Labors and Experiences • Laura S. Haviland

... even the shadow of royalty which had been preserved; and the Jacobins, whose aim was to sweep away rank, wealth, and talent from the land. The two former of these divisions represented the middle classes, and the latter the rabble; but the Girondins were the most powerful and popular. Such was the nature of this assembly. Compared with it the "rump parliament" of Oliver Cromwell was the perfection of wisdom and moderation. Ignorance, passion, and ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan

... be made by his own men, who he thought were thus celebrating their victory. In reality it signified the victory of the Portuguese, who had fallen upon, defeated, and slaughtered one of his detachments. A second detachment, which had entered and begun to plunder the magazine, was set upon by the rabble and completely butchered. Duclerc's defence soon grew hopeless, and he was forced to surrender at discretion. The Portuguese sullied their victory by acts of cruel reprisal, many of the prisoners in their hands ...
— Historical Tales - The Romance of Reality - Volume III • Charles Morris

... La Corne speaks boldly in the absence of the Intendant," said Colonel Leboeuf. "A gentleman would give a louis d'or any day to buy a whip to lash the rabble sooner than a sou to win their applause! I would not give a red herring for the good opinion of ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby

... of Malta.—Marlowe's Jew does not approach so near to Shakspeare's, as his Edward the Second does to Richard the Second. Barabas is a mere monster brought in with a large painted nose to please the rabble. He kills in sport, poisons whole nunneries, invents infernal machines. He is just such an exhibition as a century or two earlier might have been played before the Londoners "by the royal command," when a general pillage and massacre ...
— The Works of Charles Lamb in Four Volumes, Volume 4 • Charles Lamb

... we shall be unmolested for a while," replied Osterberg. "The place was visited early by the rabble soldiery and they took all that was worth taking, so now I don't suppose they will ...
— Under the Rebel's Reign • Charles Neufeld

... general home, The common sewer of Paris and of Rome. Here malice, rapine, accident conspire, And now a rabble rages, now a fire; Their ambush mere relentless villains lay, And here the fell ...
— Heiress of Haddon • William E. Doubleday

... things which have pressed their influences upon the Jew until the fume and reek of the Ghetto, the bubble and squeak of the rabble, and the babble of bazaars are more acceptable to him than the breeze blowing across silent mesa and prairie, or the low, moaning lullaby of ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 11 (of 14) - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Businessmen • Elbert Hubbard

... would no doubt prove a useful supplement to the small body of troops James might be able to spare from Ireland; but even a mind so ardent and sanguine as Dundee's might well have shrank from facing the chances of war with no other resources than a handful of troopers and a rabble of half-armed, half-naked, and wholly undisciplined savages. And in truth experience had shown that these fierce and jealous spirits were little less dangerous as allies than as enemies. Every clan had its hereditary feud, and no one could say that on the ...
— Claverhouse • Mowbray Morris

... deeper grief gnaws at my vitals and drags me down, almost to the very doors of death itself. I am afraid that, with the careless impulsiveness of youth, you may divulge, to the common herd, what you witnessed in the shrine of Priapus, and reveal the rites of the gods to the rabble. On this account, I stretch out my suppliant hands to your knees, and beg and pray that you do not make a mockery and a joke of our nocturnal rites, nor lay bare the secrets of so many years, into which scarcely a thousand ...
— The Satyricon, Complete • Petronius Arbiter

... sovereigns and ministers more widely extended than has perhaps been possessed by any other member of the demi-monde. She ruled a kingdom; and ruled it, moreover, with dignity and wisdom and ability. The political Hypatia, however, was sacrificed to the rabble. Her power was gone, and she could hope no more from the flattery of statesmen. She became an adventuress of an inferior class. Her intrigues, her duels, and her horse-whippings made her for a time a notoriety in ...
— The Magnificent Montez - From Courtesan to Convert • Horace Wyndham

... I was condemn'd a sforzato to the galleys, for poisoning the cardinal Bembo's—cook, hath at all attached, much less dejected me. No, no, worthy gentlemen; to tell you true, I cannot endure to see the rabble of these ground ciarlitani, that spread their cloaks on the pavement, as if they meant to do feats of activity, and then come in lamely, with their mouldy tales out of Boccacio, like stale Tabarine, the fabulist: some of them discoursing their travels, and of their tedious captivity ...
— Volpone; Or, The Fox • Ben Jonson

... rioters invaded the Tower during our absence, killing with their own hands seven men who invaded the apartment of Lady De Courcy, and carrying her and her daughter safely through the crowd. Had all done their duty but a tenth part as well, the disgrace this rabble brought upon us would never have occurred, and the lives of my trusty councillors would ...
— A March on London • G. A. Henty

... could not make worse." The men who fought so valiantly against the Indians and Berkeley's forces, braved the King's anger, faced death on the gallows were called in contempt "the bases of the people," "the rabble," the "scum of the people," "idle and poor people," "rag, tag, and bobtail." The Council reported that there were "hardly two amongst them" who owned estates, or were persons of reputation. Berkeley complained that his was a miserable task to govern a people "where ...
— Virginia under the Stuarts 1607-1688 • Thomas J. Wertenbaker

... with some hundreds of the mob at their heels, as soon as the seeming adversaries were got into Lincoln's Inn Fields, they both fell a running as fast as they could, with their swords drawn, up towards Lord Powis's house, which was then building, and leaped into a saw-pit. The rabble presently ran after them, to part them again, and feared mischief would be done before they could get up to them, but when they arrived at the saw-pit, they saw Chevalier at one side of it and Ogle at the other, sitting ...
— The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume I (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz

... he underwent before and during the battle. All this made the good father say that he was very content to die, and especially because he had not seen the abominations, blasphemies, and shameless acts of that rabble. There was one sick, Tagal, who was the leader of the enemy's fleet, and on this occasion he ended his evil life, to commence payment for his atrocities, blasphemies, and daring. On the other hand, a younger brother of his who was mortally ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 (Vol 27 of 55) • Various

... with your Lordship, and was ever firmly of opinion, that licentiousness of every kind (particularly that of the Press) is dangerous to the state; the rabble should be kept in awe by examples of severity, and a proper respect should be enforced to superiors. I have sufficiently shewn my dislike to the freedom of the Press, by the examples I have frequently made (tho' ...
— The Fall of British Tyranny - American Liberty Triumphant • John Leacock

... securely. But it was in vain for him to endeavour to lock up the soul, which can live and toil independently of the body, for my spirit escaped out of the locked body upon the wings of Fancy, and the first thing which I saw by the side of me was a dancing ring, and a kind of rabble in green petticoats and red caps dancing away with the most furious eagerness. I stood for a time in perplexity whether I should go to them or not, because in my flurry I feared they were a gang of hungry gipsies, and that they would do nothing less than slaughter me ...
— The Sleeping Bard - or, Visions of the World, Death, and Hell • Ellis Wynne

... A rabble of dusky shapes headed by a torch-bearer who had doubtless lighted his fat-stick at the burning temple, pressed forward to force a ...
— The King Of Beaver, and Beaver Lights - From "Mackinac And Lake Stories", 1899 • Mary Hartwell Catherwood

... at the crack of his rifle, there was no movement ahead; then something rolled from the sledge and lay doubled up in the snow. A hundred yards beyond it, the huskies stopped in a rabble and turned to look at the ...
— The Honor of the Big Snows • James Oliver Curwood

... said about the rabble,—the democracy,—their turbulence, corruption, and degradation, their unfitness to rule, and all that sort of thing, which I regard as irrelevant, so far as the usurpation of Caesar is concerned; since the struggle was ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume IV • John Lord

... there. I suppose the government would go to Lynchburg. I shall remain with the army, and see that the tobacco be burnt, at all hazards, according to law. I have seen some of our generals, and am convinced that the Baltimore rabble, and those that direct them, will be suppressed, or exterminated, if they attempt to throw impediments in the way of our soldiers in the work of destroying the ...
— A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital • John Beauchamp Jones

... caustic did his pen become in respect to those, whether painters, musicians, poets, novelists or reformers, who had endeared themselves to the great mass of the public. The Aspirant always called the public "the rabble," and you can't damn humanity more easily and cheaply than by calling it "the rabble." Naturally every one hastened to buy Mr. Early's furniture, his rugs and his pottery, and diligently to read The Aspirant, in order that he ...
— Jewel Weed • Alice Ames Winter

... and destroyed. The military quickly came up, and a regular engagement took place. Stones were firing in all directions—several soldiers were struck; Mr. Fosberry received a blow of a stone in the leg, and it was not until some time had elapsed that this lawless rabble were subdued, and thirteen of them taken prisoners and brought into our gaol. Nothing could exceed the coolness of our magistrates, officers, and soldiers during this rencontre, and we are happy to say that a portion of ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan

... humour by distributions of corn and shows of wild beasts. Every country, from Britain to Egypt, was squeezed for the means of filling the granaries and adorning the theatres of Rome. On more than one occasion, long after the Cortes of Castile had become a mere name, the rabble of Madrid assembled before the royal palace, forced their King, their absolute King, to appear in the balcony, and exacted from him a promise that he would dismiss an obnoxious minister. It was in this ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 4 (of 4) - Lord Macaulay's Speeches • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... came round to Bennington to enlist David Redding, and a friend or two more; as I did, after I arrived, last night, though I was compelled to leave them my sleigh and horses to bring them over, which accounts for my begging a passage with you. So, you see, that if this beggarly rabble offer to make any disturbance, I shall be prepared to teach them the cost of attempting to put ...
— The Rangers - [Subtitle: The Tory's Daughter] • D. P. Thompson

... king. The Constitution had broken down on June 20. The king could not devote himself to the maintenance of a system which exposed him to such treatment, and enabled his adversaries to dispose of all forces in a way that left him at the mercy of the most insolent and the most infamous of the rabble. He had not the instincts of a despot, and would easily have been made content with reasonable amendments. But the limit of the changes he sought was unknown, unsettled, unexplained, and he was identified simply with the reversal of the Constitution he was bound ...
— Lectures on the French Revolution • John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton

... this work, and say not, "Thou hast made my name repugnant to the rabble, to all men." See I have made for thee the portrait of the Mohar: I have travelled for thee through foreign ...
— Egyptian Literature

... was away there in Montreal waiting for the New Yorkers to take it—if they could. They were a sorry rabble, for they rushed on La Prairie, that meagre place,—massacred ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... Excess. That Providence brought none into the World that he might starve; but that all on Earth had a Right to what was necessary to their Support, which they ought to sieze, since the Rich refus'd to share with them. From a Preacher I saw him a Captain of a Rabble, plundering the Houses of the Nobility, was terrible to all; and tho' he declared for levelling, would be serv'd with the Pomp and Delicacy of a Prince; marries his Daughters to Lords, hoards an immense Treasure, and wakes ...
— A Voyage to Cacklogallinia - With a Description of the Religion, Policy, Customs and Manners of That Country • Captain Samuel Brunt

... who, from their habitual intercourse with the lower orders, possess so great an influence over the body of the people, were considered by the commissioners as a rabble multitude of upstart "roturiers." They treated the middling class with disdain and contempt. Deceived by the recollection of the excesses of the revolution, they fancied, that whoever could win the populace, became the ruler of the country. When money is not to be ...
— Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. I • Pierre Antoine Edouard Fleury de Chaboulon

... own creation was divine. Strewn on the breezy continents I see The veined shells and glistening scales which once Enwrapt my being,—husks that had their use; I brood on all the shapes I must attain Before I reach the Perfect, which is God, And dream my dream, and let the rabble go: For I am of the mountains and the sea, The deserts, and the caverns in the earth, The catacombs ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 32, June, 1860 • Various

... different. He's not Saxon, but Welsh—and that's Celtic, the same as you Biscayans. Besides, he isn't to be ranked with that rabble, even though he were of the same race. The Senor ...
— The Flag of Distress - A Story of the South Sea • Mayne Reid

... enough that these persons quickly disgust their audiences, and have a brief life upon the list. They ought never to be introduced to the public as lecturers; and any momentary augmentation of receipts that may be secured from the rabble by the patronage of such mountebanks is more than lost by the disgrace they bring and the damage they do to what is called "The Lecture System." It is an insult to any lyceum-audience to suppose that it can have a strong and permanent interest in a trifler; ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 89, March, 1865 • Various

... nearer until it almost touched the side of the Ark directly below the gangway. The madman's eyes glowed with eagerness, and he reached up his papers, continually yelling his refrain: "A billion! Gilt-edged! Let me in! Don't give the rabble a show!" ...
— The Second Deluge • Garrett P. Serviss

... we were at Sooloo, we had evidence sufficient of the vindictive feeling held by the rabble against Europeans, and at the same time the various ways they resorted to, to give us an idea of their superiority. They drew our attention to some old cannon mounted on rotten gun-carriages; they pointed out the strength of their fort, the ...
— Borneo and the Indian Archipelago - with drawings of costume and scenery • Frank S. Marryat

... of the game was inconclusive. A king remained surrounded by small cards, like a real monarch overwhelmed by the rabble on May Day. Mrs. Thalassa's eyes strayed mournfully over the rows, then she gathered up the cards and ...
— The Moon Rock • Arthur J. Rees

... coercion of them within limits. For the three days of his continuance,—it was but three days in all,—Lacy was as the evil genius of Berlin; Tottleben and his Russians the good. Their discipline was so excellent; all Cossacks and loose rabble strictly kept out beyond the Walls. To Bachmann, Russian Commandant, the Berliners, on his departure, had gratefully got ready a money-gift of handsome amount: 'By no means,' answered Bachmann: 'your treatment was according to the mildness of ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XX. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle

... always the backbone of Gram. And it goes from them down to the commonfolk. Assessments on the lords, taxes on the people, inflation to meet the taxes, high prices, debased coinage. Everybody's being beggared except this rabble of new lords he has around him, and that slut of a wife and ...
— Space Viking • Henry Beam Piper

... zealously exerted himself to raise a respectable army; but to bring a rabble of adventurers from all nations into proper discipline is no easy task, especially where there is not money enough to pay them punctually; even the officers are mostly foreigners, and, with few exceptions, ...
— A New Voyage Round the World in the Years 1823, 24, 25, and 26. Vol. 1 • Otto von Kotzebue

... Supplied such relics as devotion holds Still sacred, and preserves with pious care. So 'twas a hallowed time: decorum reigned, And mirth without offence. No few returned Doubtless much edified, and all refreshed. —Man praises man. The rabble all alive, From tippling benches, cellars, stalls, and styes, Swarm in the streets. The statesman of the day, A pompous and slow-moving pageant, comes; Some shout him, and some hang upon his car To gaze in his eyes and bless him. Maidens wave Their kerchiefs, ...
— The Task and Other Poems • William Cowper

... mountain defiles. Bonaparte reproached Lannes bitterly for having uselessly exposed himself, and "sacrificed, without any object, a number of brave men." Lannes excused himself by saying that the mountaineers had defied him, and he wished to chastise the rabble. "We are not in a condition to play the swaggerer," ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, v3 • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne

... Surowkoff must be consistent; he must be as willing to fight for the cause he espouses as to speak for it: in this case, the sword must follow the oration, else we shall see Poland in the hands of a rabble.' ...
— Thaddeus of Warsaw • Jane Porter

... out at their windows, some came to their doors, and others joined with those that were about him, calling out as they did, "A madman;" but not knowing for what. In this perplexity the affrighted young man happened to come before a pastry-cook's shop, and went into it to avoid the rabble. ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Complete • Anonymous

... and devour every maid and mother's son of us; the fire-engine pump-pump-pumping like daft, showering the water like rainbows, as if the windows of heaven were opened, and the days of old Noah come back again; and the rabble throwing the good furniture over the windows like onion peelings, where it either felled the folk below, or was dung to a thousand shivers on the causey. I cried to them, for the love of goodness, to make search in the beds, in case there might be any weans ...
— The Life of Mansie Wauch - tailor in Dalkeith • D. M. Moir

... makes mice sweat; and that if you cut off a dog's leg the three-legged dog will have a four-legged puppy, I ask myself what spell has fallen on intelligent and humane men that they allow themselves to be imposed on by this rabble of dolts, blackguards, impostors, quacks, liars, and, worst of all, credulous conscientious fools. Better a thousand times Moses and Spurgeon [a then famous preacher] back again. After all, you cannot understand Moses without imagination nor Spurgeon without ...
— Back to Methuselah • George Bernard Shaw

... his opponents, as calculated "to gain a short, contemptible, and soon-fading reward, not to stir the constancy and solid firmness of any wise man ... but to catch the worthless approbation of an inconstant, irrational, and image-doting rabble." ...
— Milton • Mark Pattison

... a camp meeting. We had a great many tents and a large turnout for a new country, and, perhaps, there never was a greater collection of rabble and rowdies. They came drunk and armed with dirks, clubs, knives, and horsewhips, and swore they would break up the meeting. After interrupting us very much on Saturday night, they collected on Sunday morning, determined on a general riot. At eight o'clock I was appointed to ...
— Great Fortunes, and How They Were Made • James D. McCabe, Jr.

... William and Alethea would be. This child,' pointing to Primrose, who had been hanging on her all day in silence, 'is to go to them; but as I can't send Miss Vincent, educational advantages, as the advertisements say, lie on the side of Rockstone; so Jenny here undertakes to be troubled with the rabble.' ...
— Beechcroft at Rockstone • Charlotte M. Yonge

... whirl of cheering through the narrow streets, over the cobbles, beneath arches and strings of flags and flag-bedecked windows, from which the women leaned and showered rice upon him, with a band playing ahead and a rabble shouting astern, up the hill to the battery, where willing hands had wreathed Looe's four eighteen-pounders with trusses of laurel. The very mark moored off for a target had been decorated with an enormous bunch of holly and ...
— Merry-Garden and Other Stories • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... destroyed both churches and chapels. They have left nothing standing but the four bare walls. The lowest rabble! And this it is that damages our good cause. We ought rather to have laid our claims before the Regent, formally and decidedly, and then have stood by them. If we speak now, if we assemble now, it will be said that we ...
— Egmont - A Tragedy In Five Acts • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

... the insect's credit for industry. So over-perverse a traveller, so ultra-dilatory a bee as the author of Modern Painters, must shorten his journey, must leave much honey unfilched. He is as the army which commences in orderly retreat and ends in rabble-like riot and demoralization, gaining a place of safety at last, with the sacrifice of much baggage and treasure. So, as has been said, Mr. Ruskin flings away altogether a large division of his idea. In one place ...
— Art in England - Notes and Studies • Dutton Cook

... selfishness. As ex-Senator Brace has said, speaking in behalf of his own people, "From the red race was taken their lands, from the yellow their labor, from the black their persons. The red race was gradually driven toward a setting sun; the yellow race, the rabble demanded to be driven from the country; the black man was a slave in chains, with no ...
— American Missionary, Vol. XLII., June, 1888., No. 6 • Various

... one William Fitz-Osborn, or, as he was nicknamed, William Long-Beard, began to make a figure in the city. He was a bold and an impudent fellow, and had raised himself to great popularity with the rabble, by pretending to espouse their cause against the rich. I took this man's part, and made a public oration in his favor, setting him forth as a patriot, and one who had embarked in the cause of liberty: for which service he did not receive me with the acknowledgments I expected. ...
— From This World to the Next • Henry Fielding

... hemony, powerful against all spells, guides them to the hall of the sorcerer. The scene now changes to the interior of the palace of Comus, 'set out with all manner of deliciousness,' where the god and his rabble are feasting. On one side we may imagine an open arcade giving on to the banks of the Severn, silvery in the moonlight, the cool purity of its waters contrasting with the rich jewelled light and perfumed air within. We see the Lady seated in an enchanted chair, while before her ...
— Pastoral Poetry and Pastoral Drama - A Literary Inquiry, with Special Reference to the Pre-Restoration - Stage in England • Walter W. Greg

... our journey, and, at three in the afternoon of the 18th, arrived at the City of Morocco, without having seen a single habitation during the whole journey. Here we were insulted by the rabble, and, at five, were carried before the emperor, surrounded by five or six hundred of his guards. He was on horseback before the gate of his palace, that being the place where he distributes justice to his people. He told Captain Barton, by an interpreter, that he was neither at peace nor war ...
— Thrilling Narratives of Mutiny, Murder and Piracy • Anonymous

... I sprang up to my feet, crying, 'Why not?' with an impulse of rage which gave me strength. Was I never to meet with anything but this fiendish laughter? 'There's some authority, I suppose,' I cried in my fury. 'It is not the rabble that is the only master here, I hope.' But nobody took the least trouble to hear what I had to say for myself. The last speaker struck me on the mouth, and called me an accursed fool for talking of what I did not understand; and finally they ...
— The Little Pilgrim: Further Experiences. - Stories of the Seen and the Unseen. • Margaret O. (Wilson) Oliphant

... Proclaimed the murderer of thy royal Laius: Jocasta too, no longer now my sister, Is found complotter in the horrid deed. Here I renounce all tie of blood and nature, For thee, O Thebes, dear Thebes, poor bleeding Thebes!— And there I wept, and then the rabble howled. And roared, and with a thousand antic mouths Gabbled revenge! revenge was ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Vol. 6 (of 18) - Limberham; Oedipus; Troilus and Cressida; The Spanish Friar • John Dryden

... the open gate, flanked on either side by watch-towers and guarded by soldiers wearing Arab fezes and loose white garments, a great rabble came forth to meet us. We heard the din of tom-toms beaten within the city, joyous shouts, and loud ear-piercing blasts upon those great horns formed out of ...
— The Great White Queen - A Tale of Treasure and Treason • William Le Queux

... the blacks buffeted into their shields with a shock that scattered and tossed them up like spray. The wedge held firm; red work for axe and swords while it lasted. They killed most of the Nubians, drove bodily through the rabble at their heels; then into the square of the citadel they came. It was packed with a shrieking horde, whose drums made the day a hell, whose great banners wagged and rocked like osiers in a flood-water. They were trying to fire the citadel, and some ...
— The Life and Death of Richard Yea-and-Nay • Maurice Hewlett

... "... While the rabble was bawling, Rode stately through Holborn to die of his calling; He stopped at the George for a bottle of sack, And promised to pay for it—when he came back. His waistcoat and stockings and breeches were white, His cap had a new cherry ribbon to tie't: ...
— Bygone Punishments • William Andrews

... across the river and to camp, a two hours' halt, a forced march of thirty-five miles—making over fifty miles in all—without eating or drinking, only as could be "caught up" on the march or run. Up the valley this routed, disorganized rabble (it could not be called an army) marched, every man as he saw fit, here a General at the head of a few squads called regiments, or a Colonel or Captain with a few men at his heels, some with colors and some without; here a Colonel without a man, there a score ...
— History of Kershaw's Brigade • D. Augustus Dickert

... their corpses were hurled down the Gemonian Stairs, among the shouts and acclamations of the drunken slavish rabble. ...
— The Roman Traitor (Vol. 2 of 2) • Henry William Herbert

... departments like the American cabinet, was composed of citizens of the middle classes—lawyers, professors of the universities, land-owners, merchants were represented—and at the head of the ministry was a prince. This arrangement did not satisfy the rabble. The radical socialists, most of whom owned no property and wanted all wealth divided up among all the people, were not much happier to be ruled by the moderately well-to-do than they were to submit to the rule of the ...
— The World War and What was Behind It - The Story of the Map of Europe • Louis P. Benezet

... leave, and then he had them watched of spies. The Parliament was held at Salisbury that Michaelmas, whereto all men were forbidden to come in arms. Thither, nathless, came the said Mortimer, with a great rabble of armed men at his heels. My Lord of Lancaster durst not come, so instead thereof he put himself in arms, and sent to expound matters to the King. He was speedily joined by all that hated the Mortimer (and few did not), among whom were the King's uncles, ...
— In Convent Walls - The Story of the Despensers • Emily Sarah Holt

... orders to move at seven to-morrow morning!" The Creole's fervor amuses the rabble, and when Hilary smiles his earnestness waxes to a frown. Kincaid replies lightly and the rider bends the rein to wheel away, but the slippery stones have their victim at last. The horse's feet spread and scrabble, his haunches go low. Constance snatches both Anna's hands. Ah! by good luck ...
— Kincaid's Battery • George W. Cable

... The officer with the warrant was already there. Lyon, Aldridge, and Hague were with Nash in a cab, and were met by others 'riding hard,' who had seized the people found at Mrs. Wells's. There was a rabble of persons on foot and on horse ...
— Historical Mysteries • Andrew Lang

... thoroughly tired of his guest's wild antics, and, resolving to make an end of the business, lest worse should come of it, he went up to Don Quixote and asked pardon for the violence of that low-born rabble, who had acted, he said, without his knowledge, and had been properly chastised for their temerity. He added that the ceremony of conferring knighthood might be performed in any place, and that two hours sufficed for the vigil of arms, so that Don Quixote had fulfilled this part of his ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry

... was.' You might as well bring back the Saxon Heptarchy. But the great Republic is destined to live and flourish, I can't doubt. . . . Do you remember that wonderful scene in Faust in which Mephistopheles draws wine for the rabble with a gimlet out of the wooden table; and how it changes to fire as they drink it, and how they all go mad, draw their knives, grasp each other by the nose, and think they are cutting off bunches of grapes at every blow, and how foolish ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)

... of a Castle, which for seven years was beset by a rabble rout. Arthur and sir Guyon were conducted by Alma over this castle, which though not named is intended to represent the human body.—Spenser, The Faerie Queene, ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama, Vol 1 - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook • The Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D.

... enjoying the scenery and sport excessively. A noble buck nsunnu, standing by himself, was the first thing seen on this side, though a herd of hertebeests were grazing on the Usoga banks. One bullet rolled my fine friend over, but the rabble looking on no sooner saw the hit than they rushed upon him and drove him off, for he was only wounded. A chase ensued, and he was tracked by his blood when a pongo (bush box) was started and divided the party. It also ...
— The Discovery of the Source of the Nile • John Hanning Speke

... who act the part of the 'dreadful boys' who frightened aunts, yelled out that emancipation was a mistake. 'The Jamaica negroes were as savage as when they left Africa.' They might have put it much stronger by saying, as the rabble that attended Tom Sayers's funeral, or that collects at every execution at Newgate. But our golden age is not in the past. It is in the future—in the good time coming yet for Africa ...
— The Personal Life Of David Livingstone • William Garden Blaikie

... offering their lands at very low rates, and so many tempting chances are offered to Northern men. The tide of emigration southward doesn't yet set very strong, however. I think the great drawback is the feeling that the South is still intolerant of Yankees. The rabble and the young men are still clinging to the hope that they are going to have their own way about managing the nigger, somehow or other, as soon as they get rid of the United States forces, and they know very well that Yankees who come among them will not agree with them about the best way ...
— Letters from Port Royal - Written at the Time of the Civil War (1862-1868) • Various

... rabble made a bull savage, and then tried to make it attack his congregation; at Whitechapel they drove cows among the listeners and threw stones, one of which hit Wesley between the eyes; but after he had wiped away the blood he went ...
— Beneath the Banner • F. J. Cross

... other towns of the Church state were infected by an anti-Burgundian sentiment. In Dinant this feeling was high, and there was, moreover, a manifestation of special animosity against the Count of Charolais. A rabble marched out of the city to the walls of Bouvignes, a town of Namur, loyal to Burgundy, carrying a stuffed figure with a cow-bell round its neck. Certain well-known emblems of Burgundy on a tattered mantle showed that this represented Charles ...
— Charles the Bold - Last Duke Of Burgundy, 1433-1477 • Ruth Putnam

... to engage in a deadly conflict with their own neighbours, relatives, and personal friends, in the defence of mere strangers like ourselves. They could not even restrain the younger and more violent portion of the rabble from carrying on the species of desultory warfare, from which Barton had already suffered; on the contrary, the stones and other missiles, thrown by persons on the outskirts of the crowd, fell continually thicker ...
— The Island Home • Richard Archer

... after long ages of egg-laying vertebrates, hitting on the placenta only recently,—experimenting all around the circle, discarding and inventing, taking ages to perfect the nervous system, ages and ages to develop the centralized ganglia, the brain. First life was like a rabble, a mob, without thought or head, then slowly organization went on, as it were, from family to clan, from clan to tribe, from tribe to nation, or centralized government—the brain of man—all parts duly subordinated and directed,—millions ...
— Time and Change • John Burroughs

... vice and crime comes from letting this rabble into the city, where they stay, instead of going out into the country where they can work and get fresh air and fields. They take the jobs of honest men, who are Americans, and I see by the papers that there ...
— Traffic in Souls - A Novel of Crime and Its Cure • Eustace Hale Ball

... known, even dreamed, that we should have to mix with such a rabble, I should have ...
— Dorothy's House Party • Evelyn Raymond

... 1813 (July 27, to be precise) that on my way back from the mail-coach office, Falmouth, to Mr. Stimcoe's Academy for the Sons of Gentlemen, No. 7, Delamere Terrace, I first met Captain Coffin as he came, drunk and cursing, up the Market Strand, with a rabble of children at his heels. I have reason to remember the date and hour of this encounter, not only for its remarkable consequences, but because it befell on the very day and within an hour or two of my matriculation at Stimcoe's. That afternoon I had arrived at Falmouth by Royal Mail, in charge ...
— Poison Island • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch (Q)

... by Jove! And there's no but about it. Mr.—Mr.—never mind what it is. I don't want to know your name. Mrs. Medcroft, will you permit me to send my wife up to you? Mr. Manager, I insist that you take this c'nfended rabble down to the office and tell them to go to the devil? Don't do it up here; do it ...
— The Husbands of Edith • George Barr McCutcheon

... eventually worked his ruin. As an organizer he was unquestionably efficient. His great achievement which secures him a creditable place in American history was the conversion in the autumn of 1861 of a defeated rabble and a multitude of raw militia into a splendid fighting machine. The very excellence of this achievement was part of his undoing. It was so near to magical that it imposed on himself, gave him a false estimate of himself, ...
— Lincoln • Nathaniel Wright Stephenson

... indirectly by American sympathizers; that same party sympathized and even leagued with Napoleon against England while she was defending the liberties of Europe and of mankind; it was the same party that in subsequent years aided the rebel Mackenzie and the rabble Fenians to invade Canada, allowing the United States to be the base of their organizations, and opening to them the American arsenals of arms and ammunition; it was the same party that, in conspiracy with the Tyrant of France and ...
— The Loyalists of America and Their Times, Vol. 2 of 2 - From 1620-1816 • Edgerton Ryerson

... in beating back that rabble!" exclaimed Tony. "We must first pick off the fellows with firearms, and the others will ...
— On the Banks of the Amazon • W.H.G. Kingston

... Kemnisius, Osiander, Bale, Mornay, Fox, Usher, and many others relate. In the mean time, he that shall but see their profane rites and foolish customs, how superstitiously kept, how strictly observed, their multitude of saints, images, that rabble of Romish deities, for trades, professions, diseases, persons, offices, countries, places; St. George for England; St. Denis for France, Patrick, Ireland; Andrew, Scotland; Jago, Spain; &c. Gregory ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior

... I to hang a criminal on yonder tree, the sight would not deter even his own brother from stealing in the crowd at its foot. If I had an old man burnt alive, his son would steal the ashes and sell them. The rabble can be governed by fear only, and I am the one ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - ALI PACHA • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE

... denied the excellence and majesty of a perfect development enhanced so much the more the value of these perfections in his estimation, and helped him to feel that of all the objects in the wide world, he was the most horribly repulsive. He did not mind the brutal sneers of the rabble that surrounded his grandmother's hovel on this day, however, for the sweet lady and the beauteous child were constantly before him, and the look so like his departed mother's; that had penetrated his inmost soul, exalted ...
— The Elm Tree Tales • F. Irene Burge Smith

... one mass of silver. Embroidered silk curtains fluttered all around it, gold ornaments studded its polished sides, and it held no less a person than the nobleman who had feasted the people with baskets of meat. This fact had become known to the rabble before the palace gates. Such an opportunity of showing their exultation in their bondage, their real servility in their imaginary independence, was not to be lost; and accordingly they let loose such a ...
— Antonina • Wilkie Collins

... declared tante-gra'mere. "And with the streets full of a shouting rabble, there is no comfort to be ...
— Old Kaskaskia • Mary Hartwell Catherwood

... across a barricade of urns and teapots, with countenances that seemed to say, "If you want anything, you must ask for it. We are here under protest, and we very much wonder how our people could ever have invited such rabble!" ...
— Vixen, Volume I. • M. E. Braddon

... two legions in order to avoid the shame of seeing the province suffering any injury from such a contemptible rabble. As for Fabius, he led the twenty-five cohorts against the Carnutes and the other tribes whose forces had already been reduced by the defeat they had suffered from Dumnacus. The Carnutes, though often beaten, had ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 2 • Various

... from a new town in Tennessee, a cheerful place—no better, though, for being built on speculation with my money: a few wooden cottages, half of them taverns, filled to the roof with a dirty and outcast emigrant rabble, half of whom are ...
— Debit and Credit - Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag • Gustav Freytag

... Necessity, impetuous remonstrant! Who not with empty names, or shews of proxy, Is served, who'll have the thing and not the symbol, 160 Ever seeks out the greatest and the best, And at the rudder places him, e'en though She had been forced to take him from the rabble— She, this Necessity, it was that placed thee In this high office, it was she that gave thee 165 Thy letters patent of inauguration. For, to the uttermost moment that they can. This race still help themselves at cheapest rate With slavish souls, with ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... there came a tall, finely-featured brunette. She made her way through the yelling crowd as a duchess might cleave a path through a rabble. She was at the side of the cart in an instant. She gave us a bow and smile that were both a welcome and an act of appropriation. She held out a firm, soft, brown hand. When it closed on our own, we knew it to be the grasp of a friend, and the clasp of one who ...
— In and Out of Three Normady Inns • Anna Bowman Dodd

... same writer states that even after death, these animals were held so sacred, that they were often deposited in the niches of the catacombs. If they were killed, even by accident, the murderer was given up to the rabble to ...
— Minnie's Pet Cat • Madeline Leslie

... were, we were stopped by soldiers and mobbed by a dense, excited crowd. Even the wonderful paper did not have its usual effect. I was told I must proceed to headquarters before we could continue our journey, so I got out of the car, but when I saw the rabble which intended to accompany me, I told the two soldiers who were my escort that I should prefer walking arm-in-arm with them, and off we set, greatly to our own amusement and that of the mob which followed at our heels, yelling, ...
— An Account of Our Arresting Experiences • Conway Evans

... uttered a word. She had been subjected to nameless insults, discussed in the assemblies of drunkards, and challenged to speak for herself. Like the chaste lady in 'Comus,' whom the vile wizard had bound in the enchanted seat to be 'grinned at and chattered at' by all the filthy rabble of his dehumanised rout, she had remained pure, lofty, and undefiled; and the stains of mud and mire thrown upon her had fallen ...
— Lady Byron Vindicated • Harriet Beecher Stowe

... had arrived that Lord Dartmouth was withheld from despatching the young Prince to France by his own scruples and those of the navy; and orders were sent for the child's return. Then came a terrible alarm. The escort sent to meet him were reported to have been attacked by the rabble on entering London and dispersed, so that each man had to shift ...
— A Reputed Changeling • Charlotte M. Yonge

... me; see what hideous countenances come to frighten us! You shall soon see, scoundrels!" And then standing up in the boat he began in a loud voice to hurl threats at the millers, exclaiming, "Ill-conditioned and worse-counselled rabble, restore to liberty and freedom the person ye hold in durance in this your fortress or prison, high or low or of whatever rank or quality he be, for I am Don Quixote of La Mancha, otherwise called the Knight of the Lions, for whom, by the disposition ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 7 • Charles H. Sylvester

... system does not proceed, inasmuch as the Porpoise is the smallest of the whales. Above, you have all the Leviathans of note. But there are a rabble of uncertain, fugitive, half-fabulous whales, which, as an American whaleman, I know by reputation, but not personally. I shall enumerate them by their fore-castle appellations; for possibly such a list may ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville

... future delve, For time doth swiftly waft us to our port. Where I must Caesar's message loud proclaim And my strong obligation to you voice. Our noble functions must be so performed, That happy impress graves the rabble mind But thus to meet these vultures with a smile Doth like a colic make mine honor gripe, Machiavelian methods were in sooth The better physic for the patients' needs And I like good physician must the probe Thrust in and sound the ugly, gaping wound. Quezox: Most noble ...
— 'A Comedy of Errors' in Seven Acts • Spokeshave (AKA Old Fogy)

... arm. "They are tuning up. We won't lose a minute. I always like a clear floor, before the rabble begin." ...
— Greatheart • Ethel M. Dell

... little, friv'lous, abject mind, Pleased with the rabble, puff'd with wind, When once, as fast as pride presumes, Itself with vanity it plumes, Is by fond lightness brought with ease To any ridicule you please. One Prince, a piper to the play, Was rather noted in his way, As call'd upon to show his art, Whene'er Bathyllus ...
— The Fables of Phdrus - Literally translated into English prose with notes • Phaedrus

... blown by the favouring breath of their plebeian patrons into reputation and a competence. Each of them passed through the thick of the fight, and well knew that ugly corner where the artist is exposed to cross fires, his own idea of masterly work on the one hand and the necessity for pleasing the rabble on the other. When any man is awake to the fact that the public is a vile patron, when he is conscious also that his bread and his fame are in their gift—it is a stern passage for his soul, a touchstone ...
— Style • Walter Raleigh

... things, and must Be laugh'd aright, and cheated into trust; Whilst a black piece of phlegm, that lays about Dull menaces, and terrifies the rout, And cajoles it, with all its peevish strength Piteously stretch'd and botch'd up into length, Whilst the tired rabble sleepily obey Such opiate talk, and snore away the day, By all his noise as much their minds relieves, As caterwauling of wild cats frights thieves. But Rabelais was another thing, a man Made up of all that art and nature can Form from a fiery genius,—he was one Whose soul so universally ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais

... just in time to save its front grounds from the invasion of the rabble. The wind had not turned back again. The brother-in law's widow was offering prayers of thanksgiving. The cisterns were empty and the garden stood glistening in the afternoon sun like a May queen drenched in tears; but the lovely spot ...
— Strong Hearts • George W. Cable

... enemy? On, on, for God, the Kaiser, and the Fatherland!'" Even Goethe's Wilhelm Meister, who is, according to Bettina, merely a supine hero, fails to elude her electric grasp: "Come, flee with me across the Alps to the Tyrolese. There will we whet our swords and forget thy rabble of comedians; and as for all thy darling mistresses, they ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VII. • Various



Words linked to "Rabble" :   lynch mob, folk, rout, common people, folks, crowd, trash, riffraff, rabble-rousing



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