"Taciturn" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... of the inauguration festival, he had become sullen and taciturn. Like all timid persons, he took refuge in a moody silence, which could not but irritate his cousin. They met every day at the same table; to all appearance their intimacy was as great as ever, but, in reality, there was no mutual exchange of feeling. Julien's continued ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... side, to sit behind her in the shadow of an opera-box and whisper in her ear the ten thousand things which I had to say. I forgave Penelope. I called down maledictions on the robust Malcolms and McLaurins who had carried me out of her world and abandoned me to the garrulous Mrs. Bannister and the taciturn ...
— David Malcolm • Nelson Lloyd
... Bruce did not particularly welcome the sea. There might be another man somewhere. No woman so beautiful as Kathlyn could possibly be without suitors. And when the journey down to the sea was resumed he became taciturn and moody, and Kathlyn's ...
— The Adventures of Kathlyn • Harold MacGrath
... difficult. Natalie was obviously sulking, and Graham was rather taciturn. It was Marion who kept the conversation going, and he surmised in her a repressed ...
— Dangerous Days • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... baser sort. Paul Hentzner, who travelled in England in 1598, and Monsieur Misson, who wrote precisely a century later, note almost in the same words "a perpetual use of tobacco"; and the latter suspects that this is what makes "the generality of Englishmen so taciturn, so thoughtful, and so melancholy." In Queen Elizabeth's time, the ladies of the court "would not scruple to blow a pipe together very socially." In 1614 it was asserted that tobacco was sold openly in more than seven thousand places in London, some ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 8, No. 50, December, 1861 • Various
... down to the shore, occupy a house close to the water, and keep the Malays off till the boats come ashore to fetch you off. Your crew has been very carefully picked. I have consulted the warrant officers, and they have selected the most taciturn men in the ship. There is to be no smoking; of course the men can chew as much as they like; but the smell of tobacco smoke would at once deter any native from entering a hut. If a Malay should come in and try to escape, ...
— Among Malay Pirates - And Other Tales Of Adventure And Peril • G. A. Henty
... window, where Asia was busily working. This taciturn little girl, with her old, solemn face and clever fingers, was her favorite ...
— Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch • Alice Caldwell Hegan
... his guardians and governors, so to say. Every hour of his mother's life, with but very few exceptions, had borne the same belief in upon her, and her nature was the sweetest and gentlest imaginable. With his father, now, the case was somewhat otherwise. There were those who said that the rather taciturn and shy Dermot owed some of his wonderfully heavy coat to the mesalliance of a forbear of his with a Tibetan Sheep Dog of a half-wild sort, with a temper far from reliable. But, as yet at all events, Finn's temper was that of a clean run, well-bred English boy; ...
— Finn The Wolfhound • A. J. Dawson
... clearly a workman also, remained in the boat. He looked rather timid, lean, and taciturn, ...
— The Created Legend • Feodor Sologub
... was the medical student, Basilio, famous for his successful cures and extraordinary treatments, while the other, taller and more robust, although much younger, was Isagani, one of the poets, or at least rimesters, who that year came from the Ateneo, [6] a curious character, ordinarily quite taciturn and uncommunicative. The man talking with them was the rich Capitan Basilio, who was returning from a ...
— The Reign of Greed - Complete English Version of 'El Filibusterismo' • Jose Rizal
... Honor, or any one of the Board of Aldermen. One chubby urchin, with a bundle of Tribunes under his arm, looks mischievously into the pit, and says, "His 'Onor 'ill want the Tribune." Another, of a more taciturn disposition, shrugs his shoulders, gives his cap a pull over his eyes, and says, spicing his declaration with an oath, "He'll buy two Heralds!—he will." The taciturn urchin draws them from his bundle with an air ...
— Justice in the By-Ways - A Tale of Life • F. Colburn Adams
... to all the details of its etiquette, retire into a corner, or into the embrasure of a window, with one of her most intimate friends, there to sadly make her the a confidante of her trials. During this conversation, from which she rose with red and swollen eyes, her husband remained thoughtful and taciturn at the opposite end of the room. Her Majesty, the Queen of Holland, has been accused of many sins; but everything said or written against this princess is marked by shameful exaggeration. So high a fortune drew all ...
— The Private Life of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Constant
... soul be not of taciturn nature, be of vivid, impatient, rapidly productive nature, and aspire much to give itself sensible utterance,—I find that, in this case, the field it has in England is narrow to an extreme; is perhaps narrower than ever offered itself, for the like object, in this world ...
— Latter-Day Pamphlets • Thomas Carlyle
... from the interior was bartering furs for hiagua shells to a native of the sea-coast. At another, a brave skilled in wood-work had his stock of bows and arrows spread out before him, and an admiring crowd were standing around looking on. But the taciturn brave sat coolly polishing and staining his arrows as if he were totally unconscious of spectators, until the magical word "buy" was mentioned, when he at once awoke to life and drove a bargain in bow and quiver versus dried berries and "ickters" that ...
— The Bridge of the Gods - A Romance of Indian Oregon. 19th Edition. • Frederic Homer Balch
... Polly found himself smoking a cigarette and walking up and down outside in the company of Uncle Pentstemon, while Mr. Voules replaced bottles in hampers and prepared for departure, and the womenkind of the party crowded upstairs with the bride. Mr. Polly felt taciturn, but the events of the day had stirred the mind of Uncle Pentstemon to speech. And so he spoke, discursively and disconnectedly, a little heedless of his listener as ...
— The History of Mr. Polly • H. G. Wells
... Pride works from within; it is the direct appreciation of oneself. Vanity is the desire to arrive at this appreciation indirectly, from without. So we find that vain people are talkative, proud, and taciturn. But the vain person ought to be aware that the good opinion of others, which he strives for, may be obtained much more easily and certainly by persistent silence than by speech, even though he has very good things to say. Anyone who wishes ...
— The Essays Of Arthur Schopenhauer: The Wisdom of Life • Arthur Schopenhauer
... distant. If he, by any chance, get wind of this business, Denstroude will find a boat for him readily enough—ay, and men, too, now that the Colonel is at feud with you. Many of your people visit the mainland every night, and in their cups the inhabitants of Usk are not taciturn. An idle word spoken over an inn-table may bring an armed company thundering about your gates. You should have set ...
— Gallantry - Dizain des Fetes Galantes • James Branch Cabell
... have the effect of stimulating his intellectual and conceptive faculties, insomuch that he struck out several new, and, to himself, highly entertaining pieces of pleasantry, one of which consisted of asking a taciturn cabman, ...
— Fighting the Flames • R.M. Ballantyne
... became reserved and taciturn, which the more surprised me, as, up to the present moment, he had at all times been remarkably communicative with respect to his affairs and prospects. From what I could learn from his broken hints and innuendoes, it appeared that, since his arrival at Madrid, ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow
... whaling prosperity, had there taken service on a whaler. Here off and on he had remained for some years, getting gradually more and more silent in his habits, till finally his shipmates protested against so taciturn a mate, and he had found service amongst the fishing smacks of the northern fleet. He had worked for many years at the fishing with always the reputation of being 'a wee bit daft,' till at length he had gradually settled down at Crooken, where the laird, doubtless knowing something ...
— Dracula's Guest • Bram Stoker
... mistress's room, and have had hard work I promise you," replied the girl, impudently. "Mayhap you will give me a help whilst you wait, Sir Taciturn? This is the fifth basket of rubbish I have borne from the demoiselle ...
— Robin Hood • Paul Creswick
... either in mimic war or in love of the chase; but he was growing taciturn and sullen, scarcely ever speaking, save when spoken to, and even in the latter case he generally replied with ...
— The Rival Heirs being the Third and Last Chronicle of Aescendune • A. D. Crake
... " Kurprinz Georg Ludwig" (Electoral Prince and Heir-Apparent), who became George I. of England; he, always a taciturn, saturnine, somewhat grim-visaged man, not without thoughts of his own but mostly inarticulate thoughts, was, just at this time, in a deep domestic intricacy. Uncle George the Kurprinz was painfully detecting, in these very months, that his ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. I. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—Birth And Parentage.—1712. • Thomas Carlyle
... he had a few interesting things to show her, and the party, which also included the watchful and taciturn Colonel Brock, began to make the ...
— A Spaceship Named McGuire • Gordon Randall Garrett
... step forward. Unobserved among the other boys, he has now frequented the Academy's school for six years already, where, always taciturn and silent, he stood by his drawing-board. His answer was "yes" or "no," a nod or a shake of the head; but mildness shone from his features, and good-nature was in every expression. The picture shows us Albert as a candidate for confirmation. He is now seventeen years ...
— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 8 (of 8) • Various
... promised that they should leave the island by the first opportunity. Although Philip was taciturn, yet, as Krantz made himself very agreeable, the commandant invited them to dinner. Krantz, as they became more familiar, informed him that they had each a few pieces of gold, and wished to be allowed a room where they could keep their ...
— The Phantom Ship • Frederick Marryat
... reply. Ever since the terrible calamity that had befallen him he had been a taciturn semi-maniac, but there was a glitter in his black eye that told of latent fires ...
— In the Track of the Troops • R.M. Ballantyne
... less celebrated wife, who, as Lady Churchill and Duchess of Marlborough, so long and wholly swayed the mind and ruled the court of Queen Anne. Brought up in such close intimacy with the Princess, Lady Churchill had assumed from childhood an absolute ascendancy over her mind. Anne was indolent and taciturn; she delighted in the lively talk of her companion and bosom friend, and loved her in spite of her haughty temperament, to which her own easy disposition yielded without offering the slightest resistance. Married to a sullen and insignificant husband, whose sole ...
— Political Women, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Sutherland Menzies
... the beginning of the holidays Ralph's name had hardly been mentioned, since family interests were predominant, and Darsie had learned from experience that the subject of "Percival" was calculated to send Dan Vernon into his most taciturn mood. ...
— A College Girl • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... entire being, so that he felt as if he had scarcely walked any distance at all that day! His endurance, however, was not destined to be further tested that night, for he had not gone far when he came unexpectedly on the hut of a wood-cutter, who received him hospitably, though, being taciturn, it was not easy to ascertain what were his views, as to the religion for which so many people were ...
— The Fugitives - The Tyrant Queen of Madagascar • R.M. Ballantyne
... more at sea. Lisbeth they seldom saw, they said; she never went to church or meetings; and, especially since her mother, in an unprecedented flare of rebellion, had gone to live with a married sister in town, she had grown silent and taciturn. As for old Con Darton, he was going to seed, in spite of the remnants of an earlier erudition that still clung to him. That is, though he went about unshaven and in slovenly frayed clothing, he still ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1921 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... anything more suitable happen to her than that she should take a fancy to Jem Noonan, the upstanding, square-jawed, taciturn youth who had appeared at the Dabney House in his Sunday blacks one night in May, and had reappeared regularly once a week since? Noonan was master of his trade at twenty-one, a lodge man, an attendant at ward meetings, and laying by money to embark as a contractor; he bade ...
— V. V.'s Eyes • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... reckless, even. The nerves give out, and will-power seems to halt on indecision; but decision is the life of the fast train. None of our conductors stood the hopeless fight like Sankey. He was patient, taciturn, untiring; and in a conflict with the elements, ferocious. All the fighting blood of his ancestors seemed to course again in that struggle with the winter king. I can see him yet, on bitter days, standing alongside the track in a heavy pea-jacket and ...
— Golden Stories - A Selection of the Best Fiction by the Foremost Writers • Various
... particularly noticed two members, who seemed to have fallen into disfavor by the course which they had seen fit to adopt. One of these men was Christopher C. Strawn, a young lawyer of this city, of some education, a very fair order of talents, and who had seemed hitherto taciturn and reserved. Upon conversation with him we were astonished to find that he did not approve of the Jeff. Davis principles, and had no fellowship with any overt act of treason. He had been appointed a Brigadier-General, on the ground of his supposed ...
— The Great North-Western Conspiracy In All Its Startling Details • I. Windslow Ayer
... Sacred Veil,"—he said gayly, addressing himself to the King—"Your Majesty considers this venerable gentleman with too much gravity! I recognize in him one of my craft,—a poet, tragic and taciturn of humor, and with a taste for melodramatic simile, . . marked you not the mixing of his word-colors in the picture he drew of Al-Kyris, foundering like a wrecked ship in a blood-red sea, whilst overhead trembled a white sky set thick with ...
— Ardath - The Story of a Dead Self • Marie Corelli
... suddenly dry and taciturn again. I didn't know what had displeased him—unless he was sorry to have my company as far as England; yet somehow I couldn't ...
— The Motor Maid • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson
... the name evokes a taciturn tyrant, devising in the crypts of a palace infamies so monstrous that to describe them new words ...
— Imperial Purple • Edgar Saltus
... pannikin of tea as he reclined on his blanket, and being somewhat fatigued in consequence of his exertions and excitement during the day, said nothing. Mr. Park, for the same reasons, besides being naturally taciturn, was equally mute, so they both enjoyed in silence the spectacle of the men eating their supper. And it ...
— The Young Fur Traders • R.M. Ballantyne
... did not promise to be a success, I took up my book again, and began to read. Yet it was a strange thing that, though we sometimes passed whole hours together without speaking when we were alone, the mere presence of a third—sometimes of a taciturn and wholly uninteresting person—sufficed to plunge us into the most varied and engrossing of discussions. The truth was that we knew one another too well, and to know a person either too well or too little acts ...
— Boyhood • Leo Tolstoy
... carried this character, with his discharge-sheet, back to Polpier, where his old friends and neighbours—who had known him as a brisk upstanding lad, sociable enough, though maybe a trifle shy— edged away from the taciturn man who returned to them. Nor did it help his popularity that he attended neither Church nor Chapel: for Polpier is a deeply religious ...
— Nicky-Nan, Reservist • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch (Q)
... farms his own estate. His farm superintendent is von Treslow, once an officer in the Gleiwitz Hussars, who was compelled to resign because of a crippled arm, badly broken in a steeplechase. This taciturn, soured individual, on the outbreak of war, was given a place as commander of a village way station near the West Front, where his cruelties to the French inhabitants will long ...
— Face to Face with Kaiserism • James W. Gerard
... British Army: law-student is a more likely qualification. However as they near Swansea, Michael Rossiter gives Mr. D.V. Williams his card (D.V.W. regrets he cannot reciprocate but says he has hardly settled down yet to any address) and—though as a rule he is taciturn in trains and cautious about making acquaintances—expresses the hope he will call at 1, Park Crescent some afternoon—"My wife and I are generally at home on Thursdays"—when all are back in town for the autumn. They separate at ...
— Mrs. Warren's Daughter - A Story of the Woman's Movement • Sir Harry Johnston
... Perkins wouldn't be so taciturn. The proprietor of the Inn That Couldn't Get a Start was feeling so blue to-night that speech with some one besides his depressed family was almost a necessity. He couldn't talk with the women; Mr. ...
— A Court of Inquiry • Grace S. Richmond
... An incurious, taciturn creature, this insect-like being. Snap whispered, "Got to talk to him; make him let us get ...
— Wandl the Invader • Raymond King Cummings
... he not known the secret of his sorrow, it would have soon become plain to his acute and watchful nurse that some hidden trouble was gnawing at his heart, for he was taciturn, abstracted and sometimes morose. He manifested no curiosity as to the benefactor upon whose charity he was living, but received the alms bestowed by that unknown hand as children receive the gifts ...
— The Redemption of David Corson • Charles Frederic Goss
... and in liability to certain diseases. Their mental characteristics are likewise very distinct; chiefly as it would appear in their emotional, but partly in their intellectual faculties. Every one who has had the opportunity of comparison, must have been struck with the contrast between the taciturn, even morose, aborigines of S. America and the light-hearted, talkative negroes. There is a nearly similar contrast between the Malays and the Papuans (4. Wallace, 'The Malay Archipelago,' vol. ii. 1869, p. 178.), who live under the same physical conditions, ...
— The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex • Charles Darwin
... taciturn to an unusual degree, but he seldom wrote, or replied to letters. Yet he held an iron grip upon ...
— Philip Dru: Administrator • Edward Mandell House
... looking on, I was joined by Adam Stallman, one of the senior mates of the Harold. I have slightly mentioned him before. He was of a somewhat grave and taciturn disposition, but generous and kind, and as brave and honourable as any knight sans peur et sans reproche. He read much and thought more, and was ready to give good advice when asked for it; but innate modesty prevented him from volunteering to afford ...
— Salt Water - The Sea Life and Adventures of Neil D'Arcy the Midshipman • W. H. G. Kingston
... the doctor, but before he arrived the faintness had passed, so he looked wise at us, like a prize riddle which had to be guessed before his next visit, left us his autograph (a wonderful hieroglyphic), and went away. Since then grandfather has been in the hands of a less taciturn practitioner, whom he calls the 'flower of Glenfaba' (that's me), and after talking nonsense to him all day and playing chess with him all the evening I have to put him to bed laughing, and come back to my own room to finish my letter ...
— The Christian - A Story • Hall Caine
... taciturn and suspicious. Perhaps the slackening of his will, tautened to meet death as his caste demanded that he should, and the confrontation of the object of his violent hate, had completely unnerved him. When Birnier had dragged him within and cut his bonds, he had grunted curt, official thanks for the ...
— Witch-Doctors • Charles Beadle
... to look down upon its beautiful valleys. Others soon followed: Joel Estes, for whom the Park was eventually named; "Rocky Mountain Jim," a two-gun man, living alone with his dogs, looking like a bearded, unkempt pirate, taciturn, yet not without charm, as later events proved, unmolesting and unmolested, enveloped in a haze of respected mystery. There was also that noted lady globe-trotter, Miss Isabella Bird, an Englishwoman of undoubted ...
— A Mountain Boyhood • Joe Mills
... the moment of her arrival, and, when a monosyllabic comment from the taciturn group threatened to reveal to the girl the threatened outbreak of the feud, he went ...
— The Call of the Cumberlands • Charles Neville Buck
... her mother; and it had occurred to me that he must have had some previous acquaintance with the pair. I had even surmised that the Frenchman too must have met Mr. Astley before. Astley was a man so shy, reserved, and taciturn in his manner that one might have looked for anything from him. At all events the Frenchman accorded him only the slightest of greetings, and scarcely even looked at him. Certainly he did not seem to be afraid of him; which was intelligible ...
— The Gambler • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... and seemed to be a very industrious, man; he had two apprentices, Indians like himself: one a young lad, and the other apparently about twenty years of age. His wife was of the same race. The Indian women are not always of a taciturn disposition like their husbands. Senora Dominga was very talkative; there was another old squaw at the house on a visit, and the tongues of the two were going at a great rate the whole evening, using only the Tupi language. Raimundo and his ...
— The Naturalist on the River Amazons • Henry Walter Bates
... individual a somewhat sullen and taciturn man of middle age, who had more the appearance of an Austrian than a Brazilian, and with a swinging gait and an uprightness of bearing which were ...
— Cleek, the Master Detective • Thomas W. Hanshew
... too much disappointed even to smile, and during all the ride she was extremely taciturn, hardly replying at all to Mr. Graham's lively sallies, and winning golden laurels in the opinion of Mrs. Graham, who secretly thought her husband altogether too agreeable. As they turned into the long avenue which led to ...
— 'Lena Rivers • Mary J. Holmes
... that this interrogatory received a reply; nor did his "reverence" expect any, as he continued putting similar questions in quick succession, appealing occasionally to his lieutenant for an answer. The latter, who was of the taciturn school, contented himself, and his superior too, with a ...
— The Rifle Rangers • Captain Mayne Reid
... to a taciturn silence broken by never a sound to indicate that he wasn't a lonely tenant of the little dwelling, then irresolutely lifted a foot to the first step—and withdrew it. If she continued to sleep, why disturb her? He had much to do in the way of thinking things ...
— The Lone Wolf - A Melodrama • Louis Joseph Vance
... majestic, the vulture, Like the implacable soul of a chieftain slaughtered in battle, By invisible stairs ascending and scaling the heavens. Here and there rise smokes from the camps of these savage marauders; Here and there rise groves from the margins of swift-running rivers; And the grim, taciturn bear, the anchorite monk of the desert, Climbs down their dark ravines to dig for roots by the brook-side, And over all is the sky, the clear and crystalline heaven, Like the protecting hand of God inverted ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... almost exclusively with grown people, and very sober grown people too; for her mother's last years had been dulled with sickness, and her father's with care, even if he had not been—which he was—of a taciturn and sombre deportment in the best of times. And this last year past had been one heavy with mourning. So it was no wonder if the little girl's face showed undue thoughtfulness, and a shade of melancholy all premature. And Christopher was honestly glad to see the ...
— A Red Wallflower • Susan Warner
... himself quite intimate at our house, and was disposed to set up for a beau to my sister, though I never could discover that she had any particular liking for him. Even he, however, was habitually taciturn about what was done in their garden, as if he had been well drilled in the art ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 93, July, 1865 • Various
... by a pale young man who was taciturn even to rudeness, and by that trait seemed to commend himself to Marston ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... carry along with us our atmosphere of hearty good will and enthusiasm we know no defeat. The man who is gloomy, taciturn and lives in a world of doubt seldom achieves more than a bare living. There have been a few who have groaned their way through to a competence but in proportion to that overwhelming number of souls who carry cheer through life they ...
— Laugh and Live • Douglas Fairbanks
... Thoreau, who seemed to be an individual of exceedingly glum and taciturn disposition, thereupon signed to me to follow him, and led the way down the poop ladder and through an open door in the front of the poop which gave access to a narrow passage, some eight feet long, at the end of which was another open door giving ...
— A Middy of the Slave Squadron - A West African Story • Harry Collingwood
... the sense of leaving them responsibility, as through compelling them to trust him by the force of his personality and by the wide compass of his outlook upon the numberless questions that were ever at issue. He had been described as harsh, taciturn, and unbending. He was on the contrary a delightful chief to serve once one understood his ways, although he would stand no nonsense and, like most people, was occasionally ...
— Experiences of a Dug-out, 1914-1918 • Charles Edward Callwell
... Nevertheless he had something of that old-world courtesy which Mary had been taught, and she felt an odd, instinctive sympathy with him. She even found herself pitying the man, though she did not know why. A man might be taciturn and tired-looking yet ...
— The Guests Of Hercules • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... His two strong, taciturn brothers, with their wives and children, his father Pyrrhus, his wife and their youngest child, a daughter, Dione, a few dogs, cats, and chickens, composed the population ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... was a lean, sallow, sinewy man, mounted on a sorry sorrel nag, who proved, however, to have blood in her, and to be a fast walker and full of endurance. The mail-rider was taciturn, a natural habit for a man who rides alone the year round, over a lonely road, and has nothing whatever to think of. He had been in the war sixteen months, in Hugh White's regiment,—reckon you've heerd ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... more was said before supper was announced, and then the rancher seemed taciturn. Columbine did the serving, and most all of the talking. Wade felt strangely at ease. Some subtle difference was at work in him, transforming him, but the moment had not yet come for him to question himself. He enjoyed ...
— The Mysterious Rider • Zane Grey
... about the results of West India Emancipation. Now and then, for the sake of appearances, they obscurely copy into their immense sheets an inch or two of complaints, from some snarling West India paper, that the emancipated are lazy and won't work. But they make no parade. They are more taciturn than grave-stones. ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... him a shade less taciturn than usual to-night. He felt vaguely that he now had an ally of his own flesh and blood in the house, a spirit sufficiently kindred to prefer his society to theirs, and this ...
— Jewel - A Chapter In Her Life • Clara Louise Burnham
... instruction of the younger Buxtorf, he made the customary tour of the universities. He visited Basle, Tuebingen, Freiburg, Geneva, and Lyons; spending three years before his return home. From a child he was noted for his taciturn, peaceful, confiding disposition; and when he reached manhood these same qualities increased in strength and beauty. His studies had led him somewhat from the course of theology—at least certain branches of it—and he became greatly fascinated with heraldry. But gradually ...
— History of Rationalism Embracing a Survey of the Present State of Protestant Theology • John F. Hurst
... just arrived, and was bewildered by the great city. He listened to me in the taciturn Scotch way, and then he ...
— Echoes of the War • J. M. Barrie
... Soulanges, a young man of about two-and-thirty, was endowed with the nervous temperament which in a man gives rise to fine qualities, his slender build and pale complexion were not at first sight attractive; his black eyes betrayed great vivacity, but he was taciturn in company, and there was nothing in his appearance to reveal the gift for oratory which subsequently distinguished him, on the Right, in the ...
— Domestic Peace • Honore de Balzac
... suppose I must now call him, was, I remember, a terrible pickle; while Mr Murray appeared to be a wonderfully sedate, taciturn young Scotchman, a pattern of correctness and propriety," ...
— The Three Lieutenants • W.H.G. Kingston
... Sunday, and, in pursuance of a promise given some time before, I went ashore to my "flem's" to dinner, he being confined to the house with a hurt leg. It was not by any means a festive gathering, for he was more than commonly taciturn; his daughter Irene, a buxom lassie of fourteen, who waited on us, appeared to be dumb; and his wife was "in the straw." These trifling drawbacks, however, in nowise detracted from the hospitality offered. The dining-room was a large apartment ...
— The Cruise of the Cachalot - Round the World After Sperm Whales • Frank T. Bullen
... down his busy knife and idle fork to gaze on his chief with amazement. Buck Johnson, the austere, the aloof, the grimly taciturn, the dangerous, to be thus complaining ...
— Arizona Nights • Stewart Edward White
... Occasionally they had log-houses, with even here and there a second story above the puncheon-floor, reached by a ladder; but in the main their habitations were half-faced camps, secured in front at night by fires. They were rough, coarse, hardened, drunken men as a rule, generally disagreeable and taciturn; insolent, lazy, and miserable from my point of view, but I judge both industrious and contented from ...
— In the Valley • Harold Frederic
... supreme distinction of Turgot's character. It is less pleasant to learn that Turgot throughout his childhood was always repulsed by his mother, who deemed him sullen, because he failed to make his bow with good grace, and was shy and taciturn. He fled from her visitors, and would hide himself behind sofa or screen; until dragged forth for social inspection.[4] This is only worth recording, because the same external awkwardness and lack of grace remained with Turgot to the end, and had something to do with the unpopularity ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol. 2 of 3) - Turgot • John Morley
... exhibiting the most stoical indifference, never take the least notice of their wives, but sit down, and act, and look, as if they had never been out of the encampment; in fact, if any thing, they are more taciturn and reserved than usual, and some little time elapses before they enter into conversation with freedom, or ...
— Journals Of Expeditions Of Discovery Into Central • Edward John Eyre
... The ladies of the ship nursed me, and tickled my palate with the lightest of sea diet. The men strowed seats for me on deck, and touched their caps with respectful sympathy. One and all were indefatigably kind, but taciturn to a degree beyond belief. A fog of mystery hung and deepened about them and the Lady Nepean, and I crept about the deck in a continuous evil dream, entangling myself in impossible theories. To begin with, there were eight women on board: a number ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 20 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... specimen, except that the nose, as well as being small, is, in European eyes, deficient as to "bridge," and the legs cannot be described as weak, indeed the Brunai Malay, male and female, is a somewhat fleshy animal. In temperament, the Malay is described as "taciturn, undemonstrative, little given to outward manifestations of joy or sorrow, courteous towards each other, kind to their women and children. Not elated by good or depressed by bad fortune, but capable of excesses when roused. Under the influence ...
— British Borneo - Sketches of Brunai, Sarawak, Labuan, and North Borneo • W. H. Treacher
... they see any visitor interested in the collection, they take a special pleasure in going round with him and pointing out the beauty and rarity of the articles, imparting at the same time most interesting information. I wish those melancholy taciturn "staff-in-hand" attendant custodians of our British Museums could or would follow their example, and thus aid the chief object ...
— James Nasmyth's Autobiography • James Nasmyth
... companionable—their own dear Walter—"such a delightful fellow," as his sister Madge declared exultingly—the second of this band of sisters—and, as far as I could observe, on first acquaintance, the brightest. Marion, the elder, was extremely pretty and gentle; and Bertie, the third, taciturn and unprepossessing, yet evidently sensible. She it was who alone ...
— Miriam Monfort - A Novel • Catherine A. Warfield
... resided at The Shallows ever since the death of my uncle Geoffrey, but she had maintained a silent and reserved habit; and Mrs. Balk was of opinion that she had had some great misfortune. She had persistently refused all intercourse with the people at The Mere. Squire Maryon, himself a cold and taciturn man, had once or twice showed a disposition to be friendly, but she had sternly repulsed all such overtures. Mrs. Balk was of opinion that Miss Ringwood was not "quite right," as she expressed it, on some topics; especially did she seem impressed with the idea that The Mere ought ...
— A Stable for Nightmares - or Weird Tales • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... conscience and a turn for oratory, I would, I like to think, have publicly confessed, at that first public performance, to all those tributary clarifying rills to the play's progress: but, as it was, vainglory combined with an aversion to "speech-making" to compel a taciturn if smirking acceptance of the curtain-call with which an indulgent audience flustered the nominal author of The Jewel Merchants.... Now, in any case, it is due my collaborators to tell you that The Jewel ...
— The Jewel Merchants - A Comedy In One Act • James Branch Cabell
... hear stranger things yet. It came out that this stern, grim, wind-tanned, rough, sea-salted, taciturn sailor of sixty-five was not only an artist, but a lover as well. In Haiphong, when they got there after a course of most unprofitable peregrinations (during which the ship was nearly lost twice), ...
— The Shadow-Line - A Confession • Joseph Conrad
... cask that stands alone, And has stood a hundred years or more, Its beard of cobwebs, long and hoar, Trailing and sweeping along the floor, Like Barbarossa, who sits in his cave, Taciturn, sombre, sedate, and grave, Till his beard has grown through the table of stone! It is of the quick and not of the dead! In its veins the blood is hot and red, And a heart still beats in those ribs of oak That time may have tamed, but has not broke; It comes from Bacharach on the Rhine, Is one of ...
— The Golden Legend • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... Old Druce was a taciturn man, even with his only son. He wondered at first that the boy should have so misjudged him as to suppose he would raise objections, no matter whom the lad wished to marry. He was bewildered rather than enlightened when Ed. told ...
— Revenge! • by Robert Barr
... connection with the sanitarium, Mr. Henry Blake was, in a sense, the oracle of Judson Centre, and he enjoyed his proud distinction to the full. Ordinarily, he was taciturn, but the present hour found him in a ...
— At the Sign of the Jack O'Lantern • Myrtle Reed
... comfortable tavern. Its dimensions were goodly, its position a sheltered one, its kitchens ample and well-managed, and its October ale beyond reproach. At first the little man in black doublet and hosen was inclined to be moody and taciturn; the public whipping, apparently, had seared his kindly and humane temperament. But jolly Dan poured oil—not to say ale—on the wounds and eased them. As it was neither dinner-time nor supper-time, the sailor ordered a repast ample enough for both, and fell to his trencher ...
— Sea-Dogs All! - A Tale of Forest and Sea • Tom Bevan
... These opened a narrow alley for the Camp officials to ride through, but their attitude was hostile, and there were cries of: "Leave 'im go, yer blackguards! ... after sich a run! None o yer bloody quod for 'im!" along with other, more threatening expressions. Sombre and taciturn, the Commissioner waved ...
— Australia Felix • Henry Handel Richardson
... found himself seated at a shining table before a simple meal and a flagon of cool white wine with a sprig of green floating on the surface. His companions were two merchants of Lyons, a vintner of Dijon, and a taciturn, soberly clad professor. The four elders talked gravely of the late war, of the prevalence of drunkenness in Zurich, of a sad case of witchcraft at Basle, and of the state of trade in Lausanne and the Pays de Vaud; while the student, listening with respect, contrasted the quietude ...
— The Long Night • Stanley Weyman
... alone seemed to possess the requisite mystery and "local color." Here whole streets of tiny shops, ablaze with rainbow-hued leather goods, were presided over by taciturn, olive-skinned brothers of the Turks, who appeared almost handsome when seen thus in masses, with opportunities for comparison. Hitherto we had thought of the Tatars only as the old-clothes dealers, peddlers, horse-butchers, ...
— Russian Rambles • Isabel F. Hapgood
... horny-fisted clowns, little children, in whom thought has never stirred—have died, and what they have done, we also shall be able to do. It may not be so difficult, may not be so terrible, as our fears whisper. The dead keep their secrets, and in a little while we shall be as wise as they—and as taciturn. ...
— Dreamthorp - A Book of Essays Written in the Country • Alexander Smith
... us said anything after the taciturn habit of our people even on the veld, and indeed I was fully occupied in listening to the truculent talk of a little party of mounted Boers behind us. I put my pipe into my mouth and began to hunt for my tobacco, taking the ...
— Finished • H. Rider Haggard
... questionings and investigations?" "They investigated me for three weeks, and in the end gave me nothing but a black character," a little woman has been heard to assert. This indignation, which is for the most part taciturn, and a certain kindly contempt for her abilities, often puzzles the charity visitor. The latter may be explained by the standard of worldly success which the visited families hold. Success does not ordinarily ...
— Democracy and Social Ethics • Jane Addams
... A taciturn, difficult, unaccountable man, who baffled the people that would fain be friendly with him, and chilled any who showed him warmth, and yet was invariably liked and trusted by all who had the perspicacity to see ...
— The Rhodesian • Gertrude Page
... honest Hutchins: taciturn, a little touchy perhaps, grown grey in the service of the company, and manifesting quite a bulldog-like devotion to ...
— Four Max Carrados Detective Stories • Ernest Bramah
... been waiting, to introduce his "Tale of the Indian." The story of Immalee, who is visited on her desert island by the Wanderer in the guise of a lover as well as a tempter, forms the most memorable part of Melmoth. In the other stories the stranger has been a taciturn creature, relying on the lustre of his eyes rather than on his powers of eloquence to win over his victims. To Immalee he pours forth floods of rhetoric on the sins and follies of mankind. Had she not been one of Rousseau's children of nature, and so innocent alike ...
— The Tale of Terror • Edith Birkhead
... "hungry sheep"—girls among them, perhaps, in peril like Hester, men assailed by the same vile impulses that had made a brute of Philip Meryon. During the preceding months Mary's whole personality had developed with great rapidity, after a somewhat taciturn and slowly ripening youth. The need, enforced upon her by love itself, of asserting herself even against the mother she adored; the shadow of Meynell's cloud upon her, and her suffering under it, during the weeks of slander; and now this rending tragedy at her doors—had ...
— The Case of Richard Meynell • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... too sagacious not to guess the uneasiness of his companion, who became by turns taciturn and over talkative during the meal. He made, however, as though he saw nothing, but after he had said grace he disappeared, and Durtal, who was strolling near the great pond, was surprised to see him coming in his direction ...
— En Route • J.-K. (Joris-Karl) Huysmans
... the woman. It had been with him that I first made acquaintance; we were both engaged on journalistic work, reporting, you know, on different papers—and we came across each other once or twice in that way. He was a saturnine, queer-tempered fellow, taciturn at times, and at other times possessed by a wry sense of humour which made him excellent company, though it kept one in a state of alert disquiet. He would say things with that particular twist to them which made ...
— The Tale Of Mr. Peter Brown - Chelsea Justice - From "The New Decameron", Volume III. • V. Sackville West
... "I have been playing piquet with Lamarque most of the time since I arrived. He is one of the pleasantest men I have met in Louisiana, although a little taciturn, as you perceive, and more than a little deaf. I think he does not like Auguste. He seems to have ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... shoemaking trades, there are usually a considerable proportion of fluent speakers, in the laborious trades, on the other hand, such as those of the mason, ship-carpenter, ploughman, and blacksmith, one generally meets with but taciturn, slow-speaking men. We need scarce say in which of these schools we have been trained. You will at once see—to borrow from one of the best and most ancient of writers—that we are "not eloquent," but "a man of slow speech, and of a slow tongue." ...
— Leading Articles on Various Subjects • Hugh Miller
... travelled; and round it the stars flickered and swam, deep down. Peter could have sworn he heard their thin, tinkling, submerged, funny song, somewhere above or beneath the soft and melodious "Cherie Birri-Bim," that someone (not Lord Evelyn's beautifully trained and taciturn poppe) ...
— The Lee Shore • Rose Macaulay
... an interlude the fugitive hoped with confidence to have lost himself in a taciturn and apathetic wilderness of peak-broken land where his discovery would be as haphazard an undertaking as the accurate ...
— The Roof Tree • Charles Neville Buck
... did not complain of his quarters, but, after we had for the second time refused his offer of an escort to Alessandria, became somewhat taciturn. We left him in the salle a manger, Mamma heading the procession of three which trailed to our room. Maida and I lingered behind for a moment, to play with our first Italian cat, until a wild cry of "Fire!" from Mamma took us after her with a rush. A cloud of wood smoke beat us back, ...
— My Friend the Chauffeur • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... unexpected and startling novelties, in which all the wonders of the "Arabian Nights' Entertainments" seemed to be reproduced for his especial amusement—the king, we say, showed himself cold, reserved, and taciturn. Nothing could smooth the frowns upon his face; everyone who observed him noticed that a deep feeling of resentment, of remote origin, increased by slow degrees, as the source becomes a river, thanks to the thousand threads ...
— The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Or Ten Years Later being the completion of "The Three - Musketeers" And "Twenty Years After" • Alexandre Dumas
... education—was a sore spot with him which did not become less sore with time. If she had lived he was sure it would have been different. With his mother to intercede for him he knew that he would have had it. After her death his father grew more taciturn, more impatient, more bent on preparing him to follow in his footsteps, regardless of his inclinations. The "lickings" became more frequent, for he seemed only to see ...
— The Man from the Bitter Roots • Caroline Lockhart
... together to meals—and I believe there would be a game of cards now and then in the evening, especially at first. What frightened her most was the duplicity of her father, at least what looked like duplicity, when she remembered his persistent, insistent whispers on deck. However her father was a taciturn person as far back as she could remember him best—on the Parade. It was she who chattered, never troubling herself to discover whether he was pleased or displeased. And now she couldn't fathom his thoughts. Neither did she chatter to him. Anthony ...
— Chance - A Tale in Two Parts • Joseph Conrad
... written in the annals of Kentucky, and a reputation for calm courage softened by humanity, conducted by prudence, and embellished by a singular modesty of deportment. His person was rough, robust, and indicating strength rather than activity; his manner was cold, grave, and taciturn; his countenance homely but kind; his conversation unadorned, unobtrusive, and touching only upon the needful. He never spoke of himself ...
— Scouting with Daniel Boone • Everett T. Tomlinson
... down every day to see that the work was being done as quickly as possible. She had interviews with Captain Wilson, who commanded the Ida, and Mr. Maurice Phillips, the first officer. She asked them both to dinner. Captain Wilson, a Scot, was taciturn and suspicious. He regarded the job before him as an objectionable kind of practical joke, likely, before it was over, to impair his natural dignity. Mr. Phillips was filled with delight at the prospect. He was a young man with curly ...
— The Island Mystery • George A. Birmingham
... forward, Should be looked to; For difficult it is to know Where foes may sit Within a dwelling. . . . . Of his understanding No one should be proud, But rather in conduct cautious. When the prudent and taciturn Come to a dwelling, Harm seldom befalls the cautious; For a firmer friend No man ever gets Than great sagacity. . . . . One's own house is best, Small though it be; At home is every one his own master. Though he but two ...
— Song and Legend From the Middle Ages • William D. McClintock and Porter Lander McClintock
... a spirit and resolution. Some other points about her were likewise such as pertain to the women of savage life. Lithe though she was, she loved supineness, but upon occasion could endure like a stoic. She was taciturn, too. From early morning till about three o'clock in the afternoon she would seldom speak—it taking that time to thaw her, by all accounts, into but talking terms with humanity. During the interval she did little but look, and keep looking out of her large, metallic ...
— The Confidence-Man • Herman Melville
... at the persistent reasoning of the man whom hitherto he had regarded as a singularly taciturn old worker, wise in milling ...
— The Plunderer • Roy Norton
... Callie Harbour on Admiralty Island in the South Pacific; and Paul Fremont was one of our European divers. I was in charge of the supply schooner which was tender to our fleet of pearling luggers, and was the one man among us to whom the silent, taciturn Paul would talk—sometimes. ...
— The Call Of The South - 1908 • Louis Becke
... conquered people. She saw them wild, free, sovereign, and there were no greasy, berry-peddling Oneidas among them. They were Sioux, and Pottawatomies (that last had the real Indian sound), and Winnebagos, and Menomonees, and Outagamis. She made them taciturn, and beady-eyed, and lithe, and fleet, and every other adjectival thing her imagination and history book could supply. The fat and placid Capuchin Fathers on the hill became Jesuits, sinister, silent, powerful, with France and the Church of Rome ...
— Fanny Herself • Edna Ferber
... Hawthorne's talking much at the table. Indeed, he was a very taciturn man. One day, tired of seeing him sitting immovable on the sofa in the hall, as I was learning some verses to recite at the evening class for recitation formed by Charles A. Dana, I daringly took my book, pushed it into his hands, and said, 'Will you hear my poetry, Mr. Hawthorne?' ...
— Stories of Authors, British and American • Edwin Watts Chubb
... her," said Francis, the taciturn. He would rather have done a good many things than go to Marjorie with a request, as things stood between them, but there was nothing else for it. He came on her, standing on tiptoe at the cupboard, like a child, trying to reach down a cup. She had ...
— I've Married Marjorie • Margaret Widdemer
... Everet Duyckinck. He was a middle-aged man, when I, a boy, was occasionally at his store, an ample and old-fashioned building, at the corner of Pearl-street and Old Slip. He was grave in his demeanor, and somewhat taciturn; of great simplicity in dress; accommodating and courteous. He must have been rich in literary recollections. He for a long while occupied his excellent stand for business, and was quite extensively engaged as a publisher and seller. He was a sort of Mr. Newbury, ...
— The International Monthly Magazine - Volume V - No II • Various
... MacKelvey was taciturn. But he was not the man to give up a quest once begun. He grew irritable under the sting of Sledge Hume's sneers and Martin Leland's regular weekly enquiries; but he pushed his work tirelessly. As is always the case when the law wants a fugitive ...
— The Short Cut • Jackson Gregory
... husband, sometimes without, running often over to see her Father; who, even after his accession to the English crown, was generally for some months every year to be met with in those favorite regions of his. He himself did not much visit, being of taciturn splenetic nature: but this once he had agreed to return a visit they had lately made him,—where a certain weighty Business had been agreed upon, withal; which his Britannic Majesty was to consummate formally, by treaty, when the meeting in Berlin took effect. His Britannic ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Volume V. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... and take a look at us this quiet afternoon. Not a soul is to be seen or heard; the mountains are covered with the soft haze that says the day is warm but not oppressive, and here and there a brilliantly colored bird flies by, setting "Tweedle Dum," our taciturn canary, into tune. M. and I have driven at our out-door work like a pair of steam-engines, and you can imagine how dignified I am from the fact that an old fuddy-duddy who does occasional jobs for me, summons me to my window by ...
— The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss • George L. Prentiss
... could he work under the paternal roof? Nowhere in the house could he find the necessary quiet, and he was practically looked upon as an incapable, an outcast who would be a disgrace to his family. He himself felt the precariousness of his present situation, and in consequence became taciturn, since he could not communicate to the others his own unwavering faith in the future, and he was forced to admit that, at the age of twenty-two, he had not yet given them any ...
— Honor de Balzac • Albert Keim and Louis Lumet
... would start in about a quarter of an hour. I had some coffee and a roll at the buffet. While I was consuming that trifling refection the young man and his sister joined me. The girl was taciturn as before, but her brother talked cheerfully as he sipped chocolate; he told me that his name was Watts, and he introduced his sister. He had a pleasant but rather weak face, and as for his manner and bearing, I could ...
— The Ghost - A Modern Fantasy • Arnold Bennett
... the next morning in New York where he took them to the bank their L200 was in and saw that they got a cheque-book, and all the day after that waiting in the Chicago hotel for the train they were to go on in to California—Mr. Twist was taciturn. ...
— Christopher and Columbus • Countess Elizabeth Von Arnim
... The great contrast between the reality she beheld before her, and the dark, taciturn, sharp, elderly man of business who had lurked in her imagination—a man with clothes smelling of city smoke, skin sallow from want of sun, and talk flavoured with epigram—was such a relief to her that Elfride smiled, almost ...
— A Pair of Blue Eyes • Thomas Hardy
... melting hoar-frost; here and there a man wore a boot on one foot and a shoe on the other, in fact, there was not one of them but wore some ludicrously odd costume. But the men themselves with such matter for jest about them were gloomy and taciturn. ...
— Farewell • Honore de Balzac
... she rejoices in such perfect mastery of language, on public occasions she is so taciturn that she might be supposed to be indolent. With a few words she unties the knots of entangled litigations, she calmly arranges hot disputes, she silently promotes the public welfare. You do not hear her announce beforehand what will be her ...
— The Letters of Cassiodorus - Being A Condensed Translation Of The Variae Epistolae Of - Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator • Cassiodorus (AKA Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator)
... "he went wandering in search of that comfort and advancement, and those rewards of industry, which he had failed to find where I was—gloomy, taciturn, and selfish. I not only missed his labor; we all missed his abounding activity ...
— The Boys' Life of Mark Twain • Albert Bigelow Paine
... such a long speech for one so taciturn as he remembered Clementina to have been; so unexpected in tone considering her father's attitude towards him, and so unlooked for in its reference to a slight incident of the past, that Grant's ...
— A First Family of Tasajara • Bret Harte
... Indians, though separate from each other, are not surrounded by gardens. The streets, which are wide and very straight, cross each other at right angles. The walls of the huts are made of clay, strengthened by lianas. The uniformity of these huts, the grave and taciturn air of their inhabitants, and the extreme neatness of the dwellings, reminded us of the establishments of the Moravian Brethren. Besides their own gardens, every Indian family helps to cultivate the garden of the community, or, as it is called, the conuco de la comunidad, which is situated ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America • Alexander von Humboldt
... bequeathed to him by former patrons, and, except for his coarse black hair and dark skin, he looked in these city garments no more like a real redskin than a stage Negro looks like a real African. For all that, however, Punk had in him still the instincts of his dying race; his taciturn silence and his endurance ...
— The Wendigo • Algernon Blackwood
... little Heine, a small, taciturn boy of five who had become a daily, silent visitor at the store, came in one afternoon, roused into what, for him, was ...
— Land of the Burnt Thigh • Edith Eudora Kohl
... visits were short, and though invariably kind and considerate, Edna felt an involuntary awe of her, which rendered her manner exceedingly constrained when they were together. Hagar was almost as taciturn as her mistress, and as the girl asked few questions, she remained in complete ignorance of the household affairs, and had never seen any one but Mrs. Murray, Hagar, and the doctor. She was well supplied with books, which the former brought from the library, and thus ...
— St. Elmo • Augusta J. Evans
... the red-brick school clamored loudly of mornings; and dark, taciturn Mexican children, and paler, noisier children from the mining end of town, bubbled out of every door. Seven Vigils obeyed the daily summons, clad, boy and girl, in cotton stuff of precisely the hue of their skin. ...
— A Prairie Infanta • Eva Wilder Brodhead
... seemed to me, had David been so long in going to sleep: David, the taciturn David, even talked to me. Never did the people in the house clatter and walk about and talk so late. And what are they talking about now? thought I. Haven't they had time enough since morning? Outdoors, too, the noise kept up very late. A dog would bark with ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XVII. No. 101. May, 1876. • Various
... at Jargeau, sheltered by the good walls of a fortified town, they had suffered themselves to be taken; at Patay they had fled as fast as their legs would carry them, fled before a girl. This was hard to be borne, and these taciturn English were forever pondering over the disgrace. They had been afraid of a girl, and it was not very certain but that, chained as she was, they felt fear of her still, though, seemingly, not of her, but of the devil, whose agent she was. At least, ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... frivolous, inconsistent, foppish, careless, idle, unstable, giddy, wavering, talkative, tactless, ill-bred, impolite, crotchety, humoursome, will be just as right as those who might affirm me to be thrifty, modest, plucky, tenacious, energetic, hardworking, constant, taciturn, cute, polite, merry. Nothing astonishes me more than myself. I am inclined to conclude I am the plaything of circumstances. Does this kaleidoscope result from the fact that, into the soul of those who claim ...
— Balzac • Frederick Lawton
... peculiarly taciturn, brave, frank, loyal, and incapable of a bad action, his mind was of a gloomy cast; he was always alone, he had no friends, he wanted none, and, if not hunting, reading the Bible or muttering to himself, with his eyes fixed on the ground. ...
— Le Morvan, [A District of France,] Its Wild Sports, Vineyards and Forests; with Legends, Antiquities, Rural and Local Sketches • Henri de Crignelle
... advance in psychological knowledge can be duly estimated only by considering how imperfect were the prevalent notions concerning mental disease. For the most part, our ancestors thought no man insane, whatever his conduct or conversation, who was not actually raving. If the person were quiet, taciturn, apathetic, he was supposed to be melancholy or hypochondriacal. If he were elated and restless, ready for all sorts of undertakings and projects, his condition was attributed to a great flow of ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 59, September, 1862 • Various
... when the door had closed in his face and the Cardinal had gone again as mysteriously as he had come—now three days ago—he had heard no hint that could tell him how things developed. He had not even dared to ask the taciturn servant in uniform who brought him food as to the fate of the old man. For he knew with a certainty as clear as if he had seen the dreadful thing done, that his friend and master was dead—dead, as the Revolutionary Committee ...
— Dawn of All • Robert Hugh Benson
... five rubbers. Lessingham was by far the most expert player, and he and Philippa in the end were the winners. The two men stood together for a moment or two at the sideboard, helping themselves to whisky and soda. Griffiths had become more taciturn than ever, and even Philippa was forced to admit that the latter part of the evening had scarcely ...
— The Zeppelin's Passenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... with its long low undulations, and the bare sweeps, unbroken by tree or bush; but there was always something new and interesting to be seen,—for Frank was fond of Natural History, and the habits and ways of the wild creatures of the prairie were full of interest for him. His companions, although taciturn when on horseback and engaged in scouting the country, or in hunting, were full of anecdote as they sat round the fire of an evening, and Frank heard many a story of wild adventure with the Indians ...
— Captain Bayley's Heir: - A Tale of the Gold Fields of California • G. A. Henty
... so few wants, and those periodically and easily supplied, hardly varied from one year's end to another, it may easily be imagined that I had but few ideas. I might have had more, if my companion had not been of such a taciturn and morose habit; as it was, I looked at the wide ocean, and the sky, and the sun, moon, and stars, wondering, puzzled, afraid to ask questions, and ending all by sleeping away a large portion ...
— The Little Savage • Captain Marryat
... no greater difficulties than in No. 1. An attempt had been made to start two of the seals, but meeting with unexpected resistance in the silk stitches, and finding that further effort would end in tearing the envelope in a very palpable and mundane fashion, the Spirits had grown disheartened and taciturn. ...
— Preliminary Report of the Commission Appointed by the University • The Seybert Commission
... time after. Whither he went, none clearly knew. Folks said, to fight the French; but when he returned suddenly some twenty years later, he said little about sea-fights, or indeed on any other subject; nor did many care to question him, for he came back a stern, taciturn man, apparently with no great wealth, but also without seeming to want for much, and at any rate indisposed to take the world into his confidence. His father had died meanwhile, so he quietly assumed the mastership at Lantrig, nursed ...
— Dead Man's Rock • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... gave her a dark look, and made no answer. The sister felt as if an icy mantle had fallen over her, and said no more. At the sight of him, the glow of gratitude and curiosity died away in their hearts. Perhaps he was not so cold, not so taciturn, not so stern as he seemed to them, for in their highly wrought mood they were ready to pour out their feeling of friendship. But the three poor prisoners understood that he wished to be a stranger ...
— An Episode Under the Terror • Honore de Balzac
... nature and general conduct did not altogether harmonize with John Clemens's more taciturn business methods. Notwithstanding the fact that he was a builder of dreams, Clemens was neat and methodical, with his papers always in order. He had a hearty dislike for anything resembling frivolity and confusion, which very likely were the chief features of John Quarles's storekeeping. ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... The packer was a taciturn inhabitant of the wilds who seldom indulged in an unnecessary remark. There was, however, no moroseness about him; the man was good-humored in his quiet way, and his usual ruminative calm was no deterrent ...
— The Long Portage • Harold Bindloss
... prayer-time, taciturn and thoughtful. Their books were open, but they did little work, and it was evident that Montagu was filled with the most touching grief. During the evening he drew out a little likeness which Eric had given ...
— Eric, or Little by Little • Frederic W. Farrar
... shack, Old Tom, was an ill-favored, taciturn man who would have naught to do with any of his neighbors, and asked only that they keep out of his path and leave him alone. He even evinced an aversion to dogs and to little children, driving them away from his shack whenever ...
— The Master Mystery • Arthur B. Reeve and John W. Grey
... brave has come to be axiomatic. If his life of isolation made him taciturn, it at the same time created a spirit of hospitality, primitive and hearty as that found in the mead-halls of Beowulf. He faced the wind and the rain, the snow of winter, the fearful dust-storms of alkali desert wastes, with the same uncomplaining quiet. Not all his work was on the ranch ...
— Cowboy Songs - and Other Frontier Ballads • Various
... the Master. The dark, taciturn man, for all his self-control, had set teeth into his lip till the blood ...
— The Flying Legion • George Allan England
... fellow refreshed his energies with the glass of whiskey which was never far from his elbow after banking hours, while the young one cultivated the local excess of continual tea. And all this time the rascally Stingaree ranged the district, with or without his taciturn accomplice, covering great distances in fabulous time, lurking none knew where, and springing on the unwary in the last places in which his presence ...
— Stingaree • E. W. (Ernest William) Hornung
... provided her with sufficient to displease her. Her husband drank but not sufficiently to be classed as a heavy drinker. He was a quiet, rather taciturn man, utterly averse to the pleasures for which his wife longed. She wanted to go to dances, to take in the theaters, to live in more expensive rooms, and especially she became greatly attached to a group of people of ...
— The Nervous Housewife • Abraham Myerson
... you tell us, Mr. Lang, why it is that desert lovers like yourself, and like the stranger who was here, as a more extreme case are so silent, so taciturn and ever listening for something? What is it they ...
— Grace Harlowe's Overland Riders on the Great American Desert • Jessie Graham Flower
... widower of a very taciturn disposition. His treatment of his four daughters was unusually severe, almost cruel, and they not unnaturally felt disposed to resent it. Being charming girls with every virtue and many accomplishments, it is not surprising ...
— Amusements in Mathematics • Henry Ernest Dudeney
... man of few words, was LeFroy; dour and taciturn, but a man of brains and one who stood in wholesome fear ...
— The Gun-Brand • James B. Hendryx
... last few days a great change had taken place in her husband. He went out and returned with a pallid, gloomy face. Taciturn and wasting away with anxiety, he withdrew from the members of his family even when at home, repelling his wife curtly and impatiently when, yielding to the impulse of her heart, she approached him ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... of my own to which no one was privy except Spotswoode, a gray-headed, and proverbially taciturn field-hand, without whose knowledge and cooperation the purpose could not have been ...
— When Grandmamma Was New - The Story of a Virginia Childhood • Marion Harland
... met with warm applause, and then the boatswain, who had a grudge against Alister, because the Scotch Captain treated his countryman with leniency, taunted the shy and taciturn lad to ...
— Juliana Horatia Ewing And Her Books • Horatia K. F. Eden
... for conversation—ladies, for instance, people in society, the upper ten—all these sets have some topic or other. It is the thing, but somehow people of the middle-class, like you and I, seem constrained and taciturn. How does that come about, batuchka? Have we no social interests? Or is it, rather, owing to our being too straightforward to mislead one another? I don't know. What is your opinion, pray? But do, I beg, remove your cap; one would really fancy that you wanted to be off, and that pains me. I, you ...
— The Most Interesting Stories of All Nations • Julian Hawthorne
... the cabin, meaning to save her father from his own artlessness and from the snare of a designing widow. She had remembered to call out a breathless 'Good-night' without turning her head. They had taken their dismissal together, understanding Helen's tortured mood. Each man grave and taciturn, like two automatons they buckled on their spurs, mounted ...
— The Desert Valley • Jackson Gregory |
