"Tiff" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... there might have been a bit of a tiff betwixt 'em"—Thus Jennifer inwardly. Then aloud—"Put you straight across the ferry, sir, or take you to the breakwater at The Hard? The tide's on the turn, so we'd slip down along easy and I'm thinking that 'ud spare Miss Verity the traipse over the ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... great proneur of Blackwood. For, in spite of his Jacobinism, he is liberal and inevitably just to real wit. His fear is—that Blackwood may come as Nemesis, and compel him to regorge any puffing and cramming which Tiff has put into his pocket, and is earnest to have a letter addressed in an influential quarter to prevent this. I alleged to him that I am not quite sure but it is an affront to a Professor to presume that ...
— The Uncollected Writings of Thomas de Quincey—Vol. 1 - With a Preface and Annotations by James Hogg • Thomas de Quincey
... see her, and found her in an agony. She had not kissed him when he left her: some little laughing tiff between them, and she had expected to see him again before his regiment marched. She threw herself on her knees and made confession; and then she took a holy vow: if the saints would grant her once more to behold his body, she would devote herself ...
— On the Church Steps • Sarah C. Hallowell
... tiff with Major Mallett, Bertha?" Mrs. Wilson asked one day, when she was alone with ...
— The Queen's Cup • G. A. Henty
... some little dispute about it. Our chaps took offence. 'As if we would harbour a thing like that,' they said. 'Wouldn't you like to look for him in our coal-hole?' Quite a tiff. But they made it up in the end. I suppose he did drown himself. Don't ...
— 'Twixt Land & Sea • Joseph Conrad
... was joking. This was some odd prank. He had borrowed the tin trunk and was giving me a travesty on Tip Pulsifer fleeing over the mountain from his petulant spouse: for last night Tim and I had had a little tiff. For the first time I had forgotten the post-prandial pipe, and undismayed by the horrors of the famine in India or the tribulations of Sister Flora Martin, journeyed up the road to sit at ...
— The Soldier of the Valley • Nelson Lloyd
... about it. He was just the nicest man. I guess he's a German. I told him I couldn't give much, and he said, well, he knew what hard times was too. His name's Ramy—Herman Ramy: I saw it written up over the store. And he told me he used to work at Tiff'ny's, oh, for years, in the clock-department, and three years ago he took sick with some kinder fever, and lost his place, and when he got well they'd engaged somebody else and didn't want him, and so he started this little store by himself. I guess he's real smart, and ...
— Bunner Sisters • Edith Wharton
... that no doubt his wife had most of all thought it strange. How would she explain to herself his sudden, precipitate journey to London alone? Might she not quite naturally put an unpleasant construction upon it? It was bad enough to have to remember that they had parted in something like a tiff; he found it much worse to be fancying the suspicions with which she would be turning over his mysterious absence ...
— The Market-Place • Harold Frederic
... the Danish laundry girls and their friends. I was not the only boy who found these dances gayer than the others. The young men who belonged to the Progressive Euchre Club used to drop in late and risk a tiff with their sweethearts and general condemnation for a waltz ...
— My Antonia • Willa Cather
... had not a dream of your appropinquity. I instantly prepared an Epithalamium, in the form of a Sonata—which I was sending to Novello to compose—but Mary forbid it me, as too light for the occasion—as if the subject required anything heavy— so in a tiff with her I sent no congratulation at all. Tho' I promise you the wedding was very pleasant news to me indeed. Let your reply name a day this next week, when you will come as many as a coach will hold; such a day as we ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb (Vol. 6) - Letters 1821-1842 • Charles and Mary Lamb
... the first little tiff that had taken place between the two girls. Chrissie seemed to have changed lately. She was moody and self-absorbed, and ready to fire up on very slight provocation. Her devotion to Marjorie seemed to have somewhat waned. She scarcely ever made her presents now or wrote her notes. She was ...
— A Patriotic Schoolgirl • Angela Brazil
... in strained silence—for it was the first occasion there had been any hint of a tiff between us—and after a time Marion rose to go. When Henry had put on his overcoat to accompany her home she was nowhere to be found. Hearing voices proceeding from the kitchen, I went in that direction. It was then I heard Marion remark ...
— Our Elizabeth - A Humour Novel • Florence A. Kilpatrick
... knew of the tiff between the colonel and Chadron, for the colonel was a man who kept his family apart from his business. Chadron had not seen fit to uncover his humiliation to his daughter, but had told her that he was acting ...
— The Rustler of Wind River • G. W. Ogden
... the Hero sacked For lapses clearly not his own; The midnight murder on the cliff, The wonted ante-nuptial tiff, The orange-blossoms, bored me stiff. The picture-hall was simply packed, But I ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 146., January 21, 1914 • Various
... heavyweights, but he was always a good enough fellow, and industrious. He married a good-hearted, simple-minded girl, and they were mighty devoted to each other. But, back the last of May, Ed and his wife had a little bit of a tiff. They were standing near the top of the stairs in their house. Ed, according to his own story, went to push her aside so he could go downstairs, when his wife lost her balance and fell half way down the stairs. She fainted, I reckon, ...
— The High School Boys' Fishing Trip • H. Irving Hancock
... tired, crushed wife, had imparted to her lord and master, in fear and trembling, the unpleasant intelligence that, so far as she could make out, there was something wrong between Granville and Gwendoline. And this something wrong she ventured to suggest was no mere lover's tiff of the ordinary kiss-and-make-it-up description, but a really serious difficulty in the way of their marriage. So Mr. Gildersleeve, thus suddenly deprived of his expected triumph, took it out another way by more than even his wonted boisterousness of manner in talking ...
— What's Bred In the Bone • Grant Allen
... happen!" she remarked presently. "I had not the least idea of calling on Lavalette when I got up this morning. If I had not had a tiff with somebody, and decided to go on the stage to spite him, I should never ...
— A Chair on The Boulevard • Leonard Merrick
... monosyllables out of a primer, a feat which always commands all ears,—they rightly recognizing a mighty spell, equal to the overthrowing of monarchs, in the magic assonance of cat, hat, pat, bat, and the rest of it. Elsewhere, it is some solitary old cook, some aged Uncle Tiff, with enormous spectacles, who is perusing a hymn-book by the light of a pine splinter, in his deserted cooking booth of palmetto leaves. By another fire there is an actual dance, red-legged soldiers doing right-and-left, and "now-lead-de-lady-ober," ...
— Army Life in a Black Regiment • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... not like that! If we did not quarrel, there would be no making-up. I remember papa and mamma making-up their little tiffs, and they seemed to be very happy about it—and to love each other ever so much better for the tiff and the make-up. I think we must have little quarrels, Sunna; and ...
— An Orkney Maid • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... and temperament, brutal in method, bluntly decisive in opinion. Iron was his metal. "Starboard Jones" was one of the few living men who had successfully run the Jap blockade into Vladivostok during that bloody tiff between the black ...
— Peter the Brazen - A Mystery Story of Modern China • George F. Worts
... equal love. Meanwhile, he smokes, and laughs at merry tale, Or pun ambiguous, or conundrum quaint. But I, whom griping penury surrounds, And Hunger, sure attendant upon Want, With scanty offals, and small acid tiff, (Wretched repast!) my meagre corpse sustain: Then solitary walk, or doze at home In garret vile, and with a warming puff Regale chill'd fingers: or from tube as black As winter-chimney, or well-polish'd ...
— The Book of Humorous Verse • Various
... first real tiff at Naples on a Christmas Eve. Gertrude had set up a sheep-dog in the person of one Mrs. Diedrich, a sour and sallow remnant of New England fashion and beauty, a lady who both on her husband's side and her own claimed all the splendours of Knickerbocker descent. ...
— Despair's Last Journey • David Christie Murray
... jostling &c v.; screw loose. variance, difference, dissension, misunderstanding, cross purposes, odds, brouillerie [Fr.]; division, split, rupture, disruption, division in the camp, house divided against itself, disunion, breach; schism &c (dissent) 489; feud, faction. quarrel, dispute, tiff, tracasserie^, squabble, altercation, barney [Slang], demele, snarl, spat, towrow^, words, high words; wrangling &c v.; jangle, brabble^, cross questions and crooked answers, snip-snap; family jars. polemics; litigation; strife &c (contention) 720; warfare &c 722; outbreak, open rupture, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... Heywood, still with a malicious, friendly quirk at the corners of his mouth, held in his fretful pony. Rudolph stood bending a whip viciously. They two had fetched a compass about the town, and now in the twilight were parting before the nunnery gate. "A tiff's the last thing I'd want with you. The lady, ...
— Dragon's blood • Henry Milner Rideout
... Bright Effie as companion on the walks, and once or twice he did. But Mabel showed very clearly that this was very far from having her approval and on the second occasion said so. There was the slightest possible little tiff about it; and thenceforward—the subject having been opened—there were frequent little passages over Effie, arising always out of his doing what Mabel called "forever sticking up for her." How frequent they were, and how much they annoyed Mabel, he did not realise until, in the ...
— If Winter Comes • A.S.M. Hutchinson
... a little bit of a "tiff" out there on the ice, with the thermometer at eighteen below, only a little dog-sledge to get them anywhere, their ship a hundred miles off, fourteen days' travel as they had come, nobody ever knew it; they kept their secret from us, it is nobody's business, and it is not to ...
— The Man Without a Country and Other Tales • Edward E. Hale
... his mouth, and sipping his tiff of brandy punch with great solemnity, 'our talents were gien us to other use than to sing daft auld sangs sae near ...
— Guy Mannering, or The Astrologer, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... on the point of asking his friend why he was so anxious to revisit the island at such a time, but, recollecting his recent tiff on that subject, refrained. Afterwards, however, when Van der Kemp was settling accounts with the Malay, he ...
— Blown to Bits - The Lonely Man of Rakata, the Malay Archipelago • R.M. Ballantyne
... breach, rupture, dispute, dissension, bickering, wrangle, broil, squabble, row, rumpus, ruction, spat, tiff, fuss, jar, feud.> ...
— The Century Vocabulary Builder • Creever & Bachelor
... gracefully, for having practiced at home, they were well matched, and the blithe young couple were a pleasant sight to see, as they twirled merrily round and round, feeling more friendly than ever after their small tiff. ...
— Little Women • Louisa May Alcott
... we promised to tiff with Bullen, and he would be mad if we did not turn up. How are you thinking of going to-morrow? I intend to drive over, and send my horse on; so I can give one of your boys a ...
— In Times of Peril • G. A. Henty
... coming up to bring some tea, found Hilda indulging in tears that she had been too proud to shed before her husband; and, having had an extended personal experience of such matters, rightly guessed that there had been a conjugal tiff, the blame of which, needless to say, she ...
— Dawn • H. Rider Haggard
... I had a bit of a tiff," James explained to Gordon. "She seemed vexed because I would not tell her what you told me last night. She is curious ...
— 'Doc.' Gordon • Mary E. Wilkins-Freeman
... the week that Alice and Sam had their little tiff. The Captain was getting in the "scrubbers" cattle, which had been left, under the not very careful rule of the Donovans, to run wild in the mountains. These beasts had now to be got in, and put through such processes ...
— The Recollections of Geoffrey Hamlyn • Henry Kingsley
... for her; perhaps I am more reserved than I should be, but I am no longer a boy. I doubt whether I ever was very romantic, even in my younger days, but I think that she and I understand each other, and if we don't tiff and 'make it up,' if we have been engaged three months and have never had a quarrel, that does not mean that my affection is not most ...
— If Only etc. • Francis Clement Philips and Augustus Harris
... Colonel stopped, and then a light shone in his face, and he began to laugh. "Oh, it's only a lovers' quarrel, Frances. They've had a little tiff, and they say they'll never speak to one another again. I warrant they're both heartily sorry already, and before night they'll be engaged as ...
— The Hero • William Somerset Maugham
... down from a mountain. Vouch-safes', yields, conde-scends, gives. Wan'ton, luxuriant. Net'ted, caught in a net. Fledge'ling, a young bird. Rec-og-ni'tion, acknowledgment of ac-quaintance. Pre-con-cert'ed, planned beforehand. Cai'tiff (pro. ka'tif), a mean villain. Thral'dom, bondage, slavery. Scan, to examine closely. Neth'er, lower, lying beneath. Blanch, to turn ...
— McGuffey's Fifth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... need to hide his face when he is dead.' And we had a bit stramash about it, for I can't abide to hide up the face that is honest and well loved, and Lizzie said I was right, and so Elspeth went off in a tiff." ...
— A Knight of the Nets • Amelia E. Barr
... of the sort. Your aunt and I had a tiff the last time we met, and that was some months ago. We're both of us old and cross-grained enough to keep up the grudge for the rest of our lives. Let us, then, make the most of the accident that has led you here, and when you go home, you shall be the bearer of the most submissive message I can ...
— Lord Kilgobbin • Charles Lever
... lover was on the point of coming and she was ready to receive him; when she was parted from him and was filled with longing; when he was constant and she was thus enjoying the calm happiness of stable love; when, for the time being, she was estranged due to some quarrel or tiff; when she had been deceived; when she had gone to meet her lover but had waited in vain, thereby being jilted; when her husband or lover had gone abroad and she was faced with days of lonely waiting; and finally, when she had left the house and gone to meet him. Ladies in situations such ...
— The Loves of Krishna in Indian Painting and Poetry • W. G. Archer
... never told her tales from malice, but from a sheer inability to be quiet. "You'd better look out you don't lose both your beaux," she added. "You and the minister don't seem so chummy since Christmas. Did you have a tiff?" ...
— Duncan Polite - The Watchman of Glenoro • Marian Keith
... has evidently had some tiff with Lionel Beauchamp. She is very resolute about not going to this affair—hints mysteriously she wants to know something, and declines to say what. I have no patience with such nonsense; and if I hear from you that the right people will be there, shall insist upon her going. Her thirst for ...
— Belles and Ringers • Hawley Smart
... how many years that you're one of the most opinionated and obstinate of women. That's what YOU are. You call yourself humble and sinful, but you are the most Bumptious of your sex. That's what YOU are. I have told you, over and over again when we have had a tiff, that you wanted to make everything go down before you, but I wouldn't go down before you—that you wanted to swallow up everybody alive, but I wouldn't be swallowed up alive. Why didn't you destroy the paper when you first ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... to you, Katherine, for being so kind and patient with me in the night," the girl resumed, after a few moments of silence; "and—honey," suddenly facing her and looking her straight in the eyes, though her cheeks were crimson, "I feel mighty mean over our tiff the other day, and—and about what happened ...
— Katherine's Sheaves • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... family quarrels, That discomposed the mechanics of morals, For screws were loose between brother and brother, While sisters fastened their nails on each other; Such wrangles, and jangles, and miff, and tiff, And spar, and jar—and breezes as stiff As ever upset a friendship—or skiff! The plighted lovers who used to walk, Refused to meet, and declined to talk: And wished for two moons to reflect the sun, That they mightn't look together ...
— Playful Poems • Henry Morley
... to the charitable that the Americans are at a disadvantage in this little international "tiff." For while the offenders have inconsiderately written over their own names, the others preserve a privileged anonymity. Any attempt to reply to these voices out of the dark reminds one of the famous duel between the Englishman and the Frenchman which ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... Mr. and Mrs. Barton; for shortly after the birth of little Walter, Milly's aunt, who had lived with her ever since her marriage, had withdrawn herself, her furniture, and her yearly income, to the household of another niece; prompted to that step, very probably, by a slight 'tiff' with the Rev. Amos, which occurred while Milly was upstairs, and proved one too many for the elderly lady's patience and magnanimity. Mr. Barton's temper was a little warm, but, on the other hand, elderly maiden ladies are known to be susceptible; so ...
— Scenes of Clerical Life • George Eliot
... the same evening to inaugurate things generally. I was a little doubtful what I ought to do. Last term philosophy had not tended to diligent work, and with my good resolutions in view I felt that I should be better out of it. The little tiff with my comrades before the holidays had almost solved the difficulty; but since then I had been formally re-admitted to the fold, and it would be almost treasonable to ...
— Tom, Dick and Harry • Talbot Baines Reed
... was saying, my missus was took with it in the night. I had a job waking 'er up, and when she opened her eyes I near had a fit. We'd had a bit of a tiff overnight, but she got up as quiet as a lamb and never said a word agin me, which surprised me. When I 'ad dressed myself I went into the kitchen to get a bit o' breakfast, and she was setting in a chair ...
— The Blue Germ • Martin Swayne
... had done. Peter's future wife had been told all about Peter's weakness, and how Peter's boss looked to her to take care of her husband and make him walk the chalkline. So a week after Peter had entered the holy bonds of matrimony, when he and Mrs. Gudge had their first little family tiff, Peter suddenly discovered who was going to be top dog in that family. He was shown his place once for all, and he took it,—alongside that husband who described his domestic arrangements by saying that he and his wife got along ...
— 100%: The Story of a Patriot • Upton Sinclair
... spinnin' wheel is auld and stiff, The rock o't wunna stand, sir; To keep the temper-pin in tiff Employs ower aft my ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 6 • Various
... had better leave the force of circumstances to settle for them; if they prefer the phraseology, as I do myself, let them leave these matters to God. When He has arranged things for them, do not let them be in too great a hurry to upset His arrangement in a tiff. If they do not like their present and another opening suggests itself easily and naturally, let them take that as a sign that they make a change; otherwise, let them see to it that they do not leave the frying-pan for the fire. A man, finding himself in the field of a profession, should do as ...
— The Note-Books of Samuel Butler • Samuel Butler
... Crapula, from the effects of over-eating, is continually coughing, which is expressed in the old copies by the words tiff toff, tiff toff, within brackets. Though it might not be necessary to insert them, their omission ought to be ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. IX • Various
... transient," said Marion, with a certain clear tone that reminded one of the stage-trainer's direction to "speak to the galleries." "Nellie Burton is sick, and Lufton sent for me. I'll do for a month or so, and like it pretty well; then I shall have a tiff, I suppose, and fling it up again; I can't stand being ordered ...
— The Other Girls • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney
... Mass' George. Dah!" he cried, as he placed the vicious little insect between his teeth, and bit it in two. "You no bite young massa 'gain. How you like be bite, sah? Make you feel dicklus, eh? Oh! Ugh! Tiff! Tiff! Tiff! Oh, um do ...
— Mass' George - A Boy's Adventures in the Old Savannah • George Manville Fenn
... Thad was a pretty clever chap, and Hugh had always been very fond of his chum. They got on wonderfully well together, and seldom had the least "tiff." ...
— The Chums of Scranton High - Hugh Morgan's Uphill Fight • Donald Ferguson
... Jimmy, with a sigh of relief. "Just another little family tiff," he was unable to conceal a feeling of thankfulness. ...
— Baby Mine • Margaret Mayo
... we both were. Nibbles would be furious if he knew—luckily he doesn't. We had a tiff, and he went off to Monte, all on his little lone. But I wish I had any idea where ...
— In Brief Authority • F. Anstey
... stared at one another challengingly. On the earth, their attitude would have indicated some unimportant tiff. None would have dreamed that the most momentous question in their lives had come up, and had found ...
— The Lord of Death and the Queen of Life • Homer Eon Flint
... drinking out of meal time, disputing or falling out; also lying with a wench, A tiff of punch, a ...
— 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue • Captain Grose et al.
... you would come down sometimes of evenings," quoth Doctor Wood; "for, though no book-learned man, Mr. Hayes, look you, you are a man of the world, and I can't abide the society of boys. There's Tom, now, since this tiff with Mrs. Cat, the scoundrel plays the Grank Turk here! The pair of 'em, betwixt them, have completely gotten the upper hand of you. Confess that you are beaten, Master Hayes, and don't like ...
— Catherine: A Story • William Makepeace Thackeray
... false alarm. Tebureimoa had other fish to fry. The ambassador who accompanied us on our return to Butaritari found him retired to a small island on the reef, in a huff with the Old Men, a tiff with the traders, and more fear of insurrection at home than appetite for wars abroad. The plenipotentiary had been placed under my protection; and we solemnly saluted when we met. He proved an excellent fisherman, and caught bonito over the ship's side. He pulled a good ...
— In the South Seas • Robert Louis Stevenson
... presently, I saw mother put out her hand and tenderly touch him on the shoulder, as if to tell him that her temporary tiff had been dispelled, like the smoke from the discharge of the Victory's last gun, whereat I could hear him whisper under his breath as he kissed her cheek softly, "All's well that ends ...
— Crown and Anchor - Under the Pen'ant • John Conroy Hutcheson
... the captain; "he's as anxious as you and I to smother things up. This is a tiff; he'd soon talk 'em out of it if he had the chance, and what I propose to do is to give him the chance. Let's allow the men an afternoon ashore. If they all go, why, we'll fight the ship. If they none of them go, well, then, we hold the cabin, and ...
— Treasure Island • Robert Louis Stevenson
... your daughter's case an interrupted love affair which is depressing her health, and which may cut short her life. Do you think that the engagement is broken off for all time, or is it but a tiff?" ...
— The Faith Doctor - A Story of New York • Edward Eggleston
... deeper anxiety she had forgotten all about her tiff with him. It had seemed important at the time, but since then Tom and his affairs had been relegated to second place in her mind. He was only a boy, full of the vanity that was a part of him. Somehow, her anger against ...
— Mavericks • William MacLeod Raine
... wired in, Never thinking of manners or taste, wich is muck when you're fighting to win. Look at GRANDOLPH, the Marlborough Midget, as often reminds me of BEN! There—there! Don't turn touchy, and tiff; we all need a straight tip now and then. You can do him, next round, I've no doubt, if you'll only fight up to your form. Pull yourself well together, 'it 'ard, bustle up the old boy, make it warm!— Remember wot ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, March 11, 1893 • Various
... graded drive. Clear, sparkling water rippled in tiny acequias through the front yards of each, and so furnished the moisture needed for the life of various little shrubs and flowering plants. The surroundings were at least "sociable," and there was companionship and jollity, with an occasional tiff to keep things lively. The married officers, as a rule, had chosen their quarters farthest from the entrance-gate and nearest those of the colonel commanding. The bachelors, except the two or three who were old in the service and had "rank" in lieu of ...
— The Deserter • Charles King
... borders of a tiff; but Henry recovered himself and said firmly, "I hope we shall not have a thought unshared one day; but, just for the present, it will be kinder to spare me that ...
— Put Yourself in His Place • Charles Reade
... Halloa! what's going on—a matrimonial tiff? My wife has just been giving me a few words, because I told her that she waddles up and down, and rolls about like one of our butter-laden luggers in a squall, as the Dutchmen have it. ALICE. You have no occasion to talk, Mr. Knickerbocker, for, I am sure, your corporation— KNICKERBOCKER. ...
— Representative Plays by American Dramatists: 1856-1911: Rip van - Winkle • Charles Burke
... "Bimshire," white Barbadians being then known as "Bims." Students of Marryat will remember how Mr. Apollo Johnson, at Miss Betty Austin's coloured "Dignity ball," declared that "All de world fight against England, but England nebber fear; King George nebber fear while Barbados 'tand 'tiff," and something of that sentiment persists still to-day. As a youngster I used to laugh till I cried at the rebuff administered to Peter Simple by Miss Minerva at the same "Dignity ball." Peter was carving a turkey, and asked his swarthy partner whether he might send her a slice of the breast. ...
— Here, There And Everywhere • Lord Frederic Hamilton
... unfairness of Madonna Selvaggia's covering up her dainty bosom, just as he was about to discourse upon "those two hills of snow and of roses with two little crowns of fine rubies on their peaks." How could a man lecture if his diagrams were going to behave like that! Then, feigning a tiff, he would close his manuscript, and all the ladies with their birdlike voices would beseech him with "Oh, no, Messer Firenzuola, please go on again; it's SO charming!" while, as if by accident, Madonna ...
— The Quest of the Golden Girl • Richard le Gallienne
... for it keeps Maud happy, and will please my sister Kitty; and I think sewing is better than prinking or reading silly novels, so, now." And Polly stitched away with a resolute air, for she and Fanny had had a little tiff; because Polly would n't let her friend do up her hair "like other folks," and ...
— An Old-fashioned Girl • Louisa May Alcott
... instituted by Arthur, and so called because a diamond was the prize. These nine diamonds were all won by Sir Launcelot, who presented them to the queen, but Guinevere, in a tiff, flung them into the river which ran by the palace.—Tennyson, ...
— 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.
... two resurrecting the ancient race feud in the midst of the trouble storm. And when the trainmaster returned to his post in the wire office, and Judson had been sent back to Biggs's to renew his search for the hidden ring-leader, it was the memory of the little race tiff that cleared the superintendent's brain for the grapple ...
— The Taming of Red Butte Western • Francis Lynde
... the truth, Collins—you've been having a tiff with Mrs. Beaudesart?" continued Montgomery. "Lovers' quarrel? That's nothing. I did n't think you were so pettish as to run ...
— Such is Life • Joseph Furphy
... your apologies, Uncle Sidney. Your little tiff was between man and man, and he'd never think of holding you accountable for anything you were foolish ...
— Empire Builders • Francis Lynde
... brooch, and eyeing it, "you were a poor girl, like me, before grandpapa left you the money, and you know it is just as well to have a tiff now and then with a rich one, because, when you kiss and make it up, you always ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade
... scene. Two of the girls twit each other about the attentions of a handsome young army officer at a ball the night previous, each covertly aiming to outwit the other. It transpires later that the officer has had a little tiff with another girl to whom he was engaged, and his attentions were merely side-play. For cutting but polite sarcasm this sketch is rarely equalled. ...
— Three Hats - A Farcical Comedy in Three Acts • Alfred Debrun
... and I had a slight tiff coming home last night. [Sitting on the settee in front of the writing-table.] Ha! I suppose she kept it from me to pay me ...
— The 'Mind the Paint' Girl - A Comedy in Four Acts • Arthur Pinero
... improved. He behaved "heartily," and everybody appreciates such behaviour in the Five Towns. He was by nature far too insensitive to notice that the married lovers were treating each other with that finished courtesy which is the symptom of a tiff or of a misunderstanding. And the married lovers, noticing that he noticed nothing, were soon encouraged to make peace; and by means of certain tones and gestures peace was declared in the very presence of the unperceiving old brute, ...
— The Price of Love • Arnold Bennett
... to Cousin Mary and asked for Eve. Cousin Mary's face turned red: "You will find her at No. 80 in this street. She is gone into lodgings." The fact is, the cousins had had a tiff, and Eve had left the ...
— Love Me Little, Love Me Long • Charles Reade
... there were a few squabbles. The Herr Burgomaster had a tiff with the Herr Commandant, but now they are just like brothers; all their quarrels are over, and they are ...
— The Young Carpenters of Freiberg - A Tale of the Thirty Years' War • Anonymous
... anything to do with our little tiff. Didn't I owe the money? I got them horses cheap enough, goodness knows! I'd take a thousand of them any day in the week she trotted 'em along. Easiest way to make a fortune ...
— The Return of Blue Pete • Luke Allan
... by taking the Covenant, or by other "wary compliance" during the Visitation, to stay in. Among these four, it does not surprise us to learn, was Dr. Thomas Bainbrigge of Christ's, Milton's old durus magister, with whom he had had that never-forgotten tiff in his under-graduateship (Vol. I. pp. 135-141); the others were Dr. Eden of Trinity Hall, Dr. Rainbow of Magdalen, and Dr. Batchcroft of Caius. The ejections ...
— The Life of John Milton Vol. 3 1643-1649 • David Masson
... Bill's a fine, quaint old chap ... whenever he has a tiff with his wife—of course, never anything serious—he locks himself in the kitchen ... closes all the windows ... smokes up terrifically with his corncob ... and plays and plays for hours on end ... his Red Seal records of classical music of which ...
— Tramping on Life - An Autobiographical Narrative • Harry Kemp
... of the wisdom of this course, which seemed to make her desire it the more, and the result was a tiff between them. 'Since we are obliged to delay it, I won't marry without their consent!' ...
— The Well-Beloved • Thomas Hardy
... after a few inarticulate words of thanks or joy, and after taking a tremendous tiff of snuff with such haste that it nearly strangled him, Mr. Congreve settled into a comfortable, dreamy state, where a face, long since gone from his home, looked out at him from the fire with a smile, and then beside it came another, sweet and patient, with soft eyes, and the two seemed to know ...
— Six Girls - A Home Story • Fannie Belle Irving
... "you've had a tiff with her, and think you have parted for ever! You see, I know all about it without your telling me. You lovers are ever quarrelling and making up again; though, how you manage it, I can't think. But, Frank, there ...
— She and I, Volume 1 • John Conroy Hutcheson
... passed, and to whom he had a delicious consciousness that he appeared an object of interest! This was indeed HAPPINESS, as far as his forlorn condition could admit of his enjoying happiness.—He had no particular object in view. A tiff over-night with two of his shopmates, had broken off a party which they had agreed the Sunday preceding in forming, to go that day to Greenwich; and this trifling circumstance had a little soured his temper, depressed as had ...
— Ten Thousand a-Year. Volume 1. • Samuel Warren
... themselves as such. And I loves the gentlemen of the army in particular. I had like to have been in the army myself once; but I liked the commission I have better. Come, captain, let not your noble courage be cast down; what say you to a glass of white wine, or a tiff of ...
— Amelia (Complete) • Henry Fielding
... "think no more of it. I have no grudge against you—all my thoughts are kindly. Lie down, Virginia, and sleep. Our friendship is too strong for a tiff to break it." She kissed my palms again and again and crept off the straw. I heard her shut the door of the stable after her. Where she passed the night I know not; but I remarked that in our subsequent wanderings she never let me know ...
— The Fool Errant • Maurice Hewlett
... quite sorry, but it wasn't like as if They had killed a decent Whiteman by mistake or in a tiff, It was only some old Injun dog that lay there ...
— Flint and Feather • E. Pauline Johnson
... tiff between the two old comrades might have grown into something more serious, but for the fortunate interruption caused by the ostentatious approach of Colonel Titus and another one of the court retinue from the right county, to whom the General confided the coddled statesman ...
— Roads of Destiny • O. Henry
... desire to inflict a slap upon mortal cheek. She marched away from her in a tiff. On the other hand, Andrew was half fascinated by the Countess's sudden re-assumption of girlhood, and returned—silly fellow! to have another look at her. She had ceased, on reflection, to be altogether so vivacious: her stronger second nature had somewhat resumed its empire: still she was ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... him. Forced to return home. Next day, a lawyer from a Mr. Beaufort—Mr. George Blackwell, a gentlemanlike man called. Mr. Beaufort will do anything for him in reason. Is there anything more I can do? I really am very uneasy about the lad, and Mrs. P. and I have a tiff about it: but that's nothing—thought I had best ...
— Night and Morning, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... my confidence in the amiable Dr. Bowring was ended forever. We had a short interview, but no intimacy after this, and I had begun to think of Northern Europe more seriously than ever, when at last the tiff with the housekeeper settled the question,—the Doctor declaring, though he knew from Mr. Bentham's own lips how much he desired me to stay, and how unwilling he was to part with me, that he, Mr. Bentham, said that he would as lief have ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 97, November, 1865 • Various
... would have thought) must be as close as that of prisoners who shared one cell of the Bastille; the same in language and religion; and yet a few years of quarrelsome isolation—a mere forenoon's tiff, as one may call it, in comparison with the great historical cycles—has so separated their thoughts and ways that not unions, not mutual dangers, nor steamers, nor railways, nor all the king's horses ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XXII (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... had another little—Tiff, shall I call it? It came not up to a quarrel. Married people would have enough to do, if they were to trouble their friends every time they misunderstood one another. And now a word or two of other people: not always scribbling ...
— The History of Sir Charles Grandison, Volume 4 (of 7) • Samuel Richardson
... sardonic laugh). "So long silent!" I like that. Sorry to disappoint you, my dear Mamma, but that phonograph, as a domestic stimulant, was played out long ago—it has played me out often enough! Perhaps you don't know it, but really VIOLA has rather overdone it. Whenever we have a tiff, she sets the "Voice from Eden" at me; if she chooses to consider herself ill-used, I am treated to a preserved echo of our marriage vows, and the Bishop's address; when she is in the sulks, I get the congratulations in the vestry; ...
— Punch, Vol. 99., July 26, 1890. • Various
... Henrietta? As you have been married now nearly six weeks, you can hardly be surprised at a little tiff arising. You are so excitable! You cannot expect the sky to be always cloudless. Most likely you are to blame; for Sidney is far more reasonable than you. Stop crying, and behave like a woman of sense, and I will go to ...
— An Unsocial Socialist • George Bernard Shaw
... mathematics. In five years Philip Armour had saved eight thousand dollars. It was enough to buy the best farm in Oneida County, and this was all he wanted. There was a girl back there who had taunted him and dared him to go away and make his fortune. They parted in a tiff—that's the way she got rid of him. There was another man in the case, but Philip was too innocent to know this. The peaceful hills of New York lured and beckoned. He responded to the call and started back home. In half the time ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 11 (of 14) - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Businessmen • Elbert Hubbard
... she carried it on so admirally, that the quarls which daily took place betwigst him and the Frenchman never seemed to come from her; on the contry, she acted as the reglar pease-maker between them, as I've just shown in the tiff which took place at the door of the Sally Mangy. Besides, the 2 young men, though reddy enough to snarl, were natrally unwilling to come to bloes. I'll tell you why: being friends, and idle, they ...
— Memoirs of Mr. Charles J. Yellowplush - The Yellowplush Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... smilingly pleaded, "do spare it!" and as Tai-yue dashed down the scissors and wiped her tears: "You needn't," she urged, "be kind to me at one moment, and unkind at another; if you wish to have a tiff, why then let's part company!" But as she spoke, she lost control over her temper, and, jumping on her bed, she lay with her face turned towards the inside, and set to work drying ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin |
