"Unconcerned" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... fully convinced that there is not upon Earth a more impertinent Creature than an importunate Lover: We are daily complaining of the Severity of our Fate, to People who are wholly unconcerned in it; and hourly improving a Passion, which we would persuade the World is the Torment of our Lives. Notwithstanding this Reflection, Sir, I cannot forbear acquainting you with my own Case. You must know then, Sir, that even from my Childhood, the most prevailing Inclination ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... kings, giving themselves no apparent concern about my movements, although they occurred in their own rear. It was too late to retract, and, leaving Herman Mordaunt endeavouring to drive a bargain with Muss and his two companions, I proceeded, unconcerned myself, boldly towards the armed men who held Guert and Jaap prisoners. I thought my approach did cause a slight movement among these savages, and there was a question and answer passed between them and their leaders. The latter said but a ...
— Satanstoe • James Fenimore Cooper
... stopped to seek for the most delicate turn of expression, she repeatedly interrupted me with "Go on—pray, go on; the first word which occurs to you is the plainest, and must be the best. Do not think of my feelings, but speak as you would to an unconcerned ...
— Rob Roy, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... moment be resolved into an attitude of defence, he seemed, to such of his spectators as had sufficiently recovered their senses to look at him coolly, rather to resemble one that had come in on the heels of a tuss and was watching its result with unconcerned eyes than one that with no more assistance than his own agile limbs had been the cause of humiliation to so many powerful adversaries. Staupitz, blinking fiercely as he rubbed his aching head, which ...
— The Duke's Motto - A Melodrama • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... understand him, when he was thinking his strongest and his deepest. Imagine an epistle of his arriving in Rome or Ephesus, and read out in the audience of the church for the first time. Who were the hearers? The majority of them were slaves; many had till a short time before been unconcerned about religion; in all probability not a tithe of them could read or write. Yet what did Paul give them? Not milk for babes; not a compost of stories and practical remarks; but the Epistle to the Romans, with its strict logic and grand ideas, or ...
— The Preacher and His Models - The Yale Lectures on Preaching 1891 • James Stalker
... your obstinacy put it out of my power to do any thing for you. Your father takes it upon himself to be answerable for all consequences. You must not therefore apply to me for favour. I shall endeavour to be only an observer: Happy, if I could be an unconcerned one!—While I had power, you would not let me use it as I would have used it. Your aunt has been forced to engage not to interfere but by your father's direction. You'll have severe trials. If you have ...
— Clarissa, Volume 1 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... tore to the house. It seemed pretty quiet. Charley was in his sitting-room, binding up his wife's hand, and smoking in an unconcerned sort of a way. ...
— The Call Of The South - 1908 • Louis Becke
... specimen of semi-ethical conduct. In this way Erasmus succeeded in dealing with his indignation, so that later on he could declare, when the recollection came up occasionally, 'At one blow I had lost all my fortune, but I was so unconcerned that I returned to my books all the more cheerfully and ardently'. But his friends knew how deep the wound had been. 'Now (on hearing that Henry VIII had ascended the throne) surely all bitterness must have suddenly left your soul,' Mountjoy writes to ...
— Erasmus and the Age of Reformation • Johan Huizinga
... trifling, when I told my wife that Angus and our Margaret had appeared before St. Cuthbert's session to present a certain prayer. My mind was taken up exclusively with the request they proffered. But Margaret's mother was unconcerned with their plea. Of the pleaders she thought alone. Divers questions she flung forth at me, furtive all, their author ...
— St. Cuthbert's • Robert E. Knowles
... Entirely unconcerned, the Indian would have struck off into the forest, but the boys urged upon him the necessity of partaking of food. With a stoical exclamation of indifference, Oje finally followed them into the cabin and seated himself before ...
— Boy Scouts in Northern Wilds • Archibald Lee Fletcher
... dismounted at the far end of the block and was strolling slowly down the board sidewalk on the opposite side. Groups of men packed the doorways, each one striving to appear unconcerned, as if his presence there was an accident instead of being occasioned by knowledge that something of interest would soon transpire. A man she knew for a Slade rider moved out to the edge of the sidewalk across the street from Harris. She saw the lumbering form of Waddles edging up ...
— The Settling of the Sage • Hal G. Evarts
... ne'er use fashing yourself, my young friend, about the matter," observed Pearson, in his usual unconcerned manner, "many as pretty a man as yourself has been in a far worse difficulty, and my advice now to you is to make the best of it. I could hide you away among the mountains in the north, where, should every man in Dutch William's army be sent out ...
— John Deane of Nottingham - Historic Adventures by Land and Sea • W.H.G. Kingston
... commonly and necessarily been associated with militarism. Large destruction of manhood by war leads to a numerical excess of women, and polygamy is a consequence. If the consequences in our modern civilization are less decent than polygamy, which would affront the beautiful minds that are unconcerned for Regent Street, surely our duty is more strenuously than ever to combat the causes which, as we see, are quite definitely ...
— Woman and Womanhood - A Search for Principles • C. W. Saleeby
... those wild western lands to which aboriginal races are held to have been driven by fate itself. But Alfred, as he himself wrote in words that are his challenge to the period, held that a Christian man was unconcerned with fate. He began once more to draw to him the bows and spears of the broken levies of the western shires, especially the men of Somerset; and in the spring of 878 he flung them at the lines before ...
— A Short History of England • G. K. Chesterton
... voices, but he could see Jeems. The swamper's face was bruised and there was a smear of dried blood across one cheek as if he had already been roughly handled. But he stood at ease, facing the cabin. His hands were hanging loosely at his sides and he was seemingly unconcerned by what confronted him. Suddenly his eyes flickered to the bushes at one side. Had Ricky betrayed ...
— Ralestone Luck • Andre Norton
... but left men free To their owne Vote and Ingenuity. When His faire Shepherdesse on the guilty Stage, Was martir'd betweene Ignorance and Rage; At which the impatient Vertues of those few Could judge, grew high, cri'd Murther; though he knew The innocence and beauty of his Childe, Hee only, as if unconcerned, smil'd. Princes have gather'd since each scattered grace, Each line and beauty of that injur'd face; And on th'united parts breath'd such a fire As spight of Malice she shall ne're expire. Attending, not affecting, thus the crowne Till ...
— The Works of Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher in Ten Volumes - Volume I. • Beaumont and Fletcher
... that sovereignty and independence which Providence has enabled you to be so greatly and gloriously instrumental in securing to your country, yet I am persuaded you cannot view them with the eye of an unconcerned spectator. ...
— Life And Times Of Washington, Volume 2 • John Frederick Schroeder and Benson John Lossing
... Greshamsbury. Mary had been, as it were, brought up to love him. Had aught but good happened to him, she would have cried as for a brother. It must not therefore be supposed that when Frank Gresham told her that he loved her, she had heard it altogether unconcerned. ...
— Doctor Thorne • Anthony Trollope
... horn, I tried every expedient to satisfy myself that "Wilbur's" voice was independent of her own; but I did not succeed. Mrs. Smiley spoke almost at the same moment but never precisely synchronous with Wilbur's whisper. She answered all my questions perfectly unconcerned and unexcited, lending herself to my experiments. All in vain. At no time did I succeed in getting "Wilbur's" voice at precisely the same moment with her own, though the whisper, following swiftly on her speech, interjected remarks as if echoing her questions. There was always an approximate ...
— The Shadow World • Hamlin Garland
... moment's intense silence. Duncan was doing his best to look unconcerned, but the hand which played ...
— The Avenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... transfixed with astonishment for one breathless moment, then uttered a piercing cry of alarm that sent the little one dashing away like a streak of lightning. Plainly the youngster understood his mamma's signal, for until she uttered it he had sat perfectly quiet and unconcerned, perhaps not even aware of my presence. Birds are taught the language of fear at a tender age. Of course they learn it so readily because there is a basis of timidity in ...
— Our Bird Comrades • Leander S. (Leander Sylvester) Keyser
... took the credit; it was so finely done, the spectator could only lend himself and admire. Under the pretty hat of gray tulle, whereof the strings were tied bonnet-fashion under the plump chin, there looked out, indeed, a face gay, happy, unconcerned, proof one might have thought of an innocent past and ...
— The Marriage of William Ashe • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... corroboration of our friend only increased our host's precaution. Perhaps he thought it was a carefully worked-out con game, in which our friend was a confederate. We signed our name several times, on little cards, with a desperate attempt to appear unconcerned. In spite of our best efforts, we could not help thinking that each time we wrote it we must be looking as though we were trying to remember how we had written it the last time. Still the banker hesitated. Then he called up our friend again. He asked him ...
— Pipefuls • Christopher Morley
... sprang on his feet in a trice, and half-unsheathed his sword to avenge this taunt on his manhood, but the pilgrim looked so unconcerned, and evinced so little emotion at this burst of anger, that the action and its result were merely momentary. Ulric resumed his seat, and the ...
— Folk-lore and Legends: German • Anonymous
... we should have tided it up the river, but that the wind blew too fresh, and after we had lain four or five days, blew very hard. However, the Roads being reckoned as good as a harbour, the anchorage good, and our ground- tackle very strong, our men were unconcerned, and not in the least apprehensive of danger, but spent the time in rest and mirth, after the manner of the sea; but the eighth day, in the morning, the wind increased, and we had all hands at work to strike our topmasts, ...
— Robinson Crusoe • Daniel Defoe
... whispered. Everybody tried to look unconcerned. Those who had no work to claim attention looked carefully at their finger-nails, or found sudden necessity to adjust collars and belts. Miss Higgins passed along the tables, bending over the heads and speaking to each in a low voice. The tears were running down her cheeks. Those retained ...
— The Long Day - The Story of a New York Working Girl As Told by Herself • Dorothy Richardson
... with his hands in his pockets, looking unconcerned, and, as the furniture began to go off, he came and sat down in the midst of it. Every one noticed his indifference. Some of them said that after all he couldn't have been very ambitious. He didn't seem to take his failure much to heart. Every ...
— A Mountain Woman and Others • (AKA Elia Wilkinson) Elia W. Peattie
... hands in glee,— In sooth, no sentimentalist seemed she,— And cried: "Now, brave Sir Gawayne,—O what fun! Succor us, save us, else we are undone; Show us the prowess of your arm this night; I never saw a tilt by candle-light!" Gaily she spoke, and seemed all unconcerned; And yet a curious watcher might have learned From a slight quaver in her laughter free To doubt the frankness of her flippancy. Gawayne, bewildered, looked the other way, And wondered what she meant; ...
— Gawayne And The Green Knight - A Fairy Tale • Charlton Miner Lewis
... abundant opportunities of doing so were afforded her, as Sir Francis Mitchell visited the Three Cranes almost daily. She appeared to treat the matter very lightly, always putting it off when mentioned; and even towards the last seemed quite unconcerned, as if entertaining no fear of the result. Apparently, everything went on just as usual, and no one would have supposed, from Madame Bonaventure's manner, that she was aware of the possibility of a mine being sprung beneath her ...
— The Star-Chamber, Volume 1 - An Historical Romance • W. Harrison Ainsworth
... was taking place elsewhere, with which the company at the Duck, and even Aubrey Louvaine, were not unconcerned. Lord Monteagle was entertaining friends to supper at his house at Hoxton, where he had not resided for some time previously. Just before the company sat down to table, a young footman left the house ...
— It Might Have Been - The Story of the Gunpowder Plot • Emily Sarah Holt
... believe you," she said. "Thanks." She looked back into the lounge again. Just at present she did have a feeling of relaxed, unconcerned security. It probably wasn't going to last, though. She ...
— Legacy • James H Schmitz
... It was at those droll little beggars. They bowed and courtesied in an unconcerned, wooden way, as if they were moved by some ingenious piece of Swiss clock-work. The stiff old curee, too, had an air of having been wound up and set a-going. I could almost hear the creak of his mainspring. I was smiling at that, perhaps, ...
— The Queen of Sheba & My Cousin the Colonel • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... dusks, with their tender skies and silver stars, Nance and Dan kept company, unconcerned with the past or the future, wholly content with the May-time of the present. At a word or touch from Dan, Nance's inflammable nature would have taken fire but Dan, under Mrs. Purdy's influence, was passing through an acute ...
— Calvary Alley • Alice Hegan Rice
... And as of late he had placed such reliance in the fond love of his grandmother that his father and mother even could not exercise any extreme control over him, he had become so much the more remiss, dissolute, selfish and unconcerned, not taking the least pleasure in what was proper, that she felt convinced, whenever she entertained the idea of tendering him advice, that he would not listen to her. On this day, by a strange coincidence, came about the discussion respecting her ransom, and she designedly made use, in ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... of harmony with the still dignity of the day and the scenes of desolate grandeur about was the mind within me. The excitement at the rapid had seemed to increase the strain I was under, and every moment it became more intense. I did wish that the men would not chat and laugh in the unconcerned way they were doing, and they paddled as leisurely as if I were not in a hurry at all. If only I could reach the post and ask about the ship! If only I might fly out over the water without waiting for these ...
— A Woman's Way Through Unknown Labrador • Mina Benson Hubbard (Mrs. Leonidas Hubbard, Junior)
... at Betty mischievously—at Betty who could not for the life of her look as unconcerned as she would ...
— The Outdoor Girls at Wild Rose Lodge - or, The Hermit of Moonlight Falls • Laura Lee Hope
... that part of the money he put up was furnished by me," thought Hooker. "He's got an awful crust. I couldn't do a thing like that, and be so cheeky and unconcerned. Gee! but he'll get the fellows ...
— Rival Pitchers of Oakdale • Morgan Scott
... largeness and beauty of form through which he poured his genius in the creation of such works as have given him so distinct a place in musical history. The pope created Orlando di Lasso Knight of the Golden Spur, and sought to keep him in Italy. Unconcerned as to fame, the gentle, peaceful musician lived for his art alone, and the flattering expressions of the great were not so much enjoyed as endured by him. A musical historian, Heimsoeth, says of him: "He is the brilliant ...
— Great Italian and French Composers • George T. Ferris
... told her of her hunt for the poudriere, and was so obviously unconcerned about any incident other than the adventures they had both experienced since they parted, that Isobel questioned her no further. A bath and a change of clothing worked marvels. Though thin and weak for want of proper food, neither Isobel nor Mrs. Somerville had suffered ...
— The Captain of the Kansas • Louis Tracy
... if he were quite unconcerned, looking at the Governor and not so much as glancing at Aksionov. Aksionov's lips and hands trembled, and for a long time he could not utter a word. He thought, "Why should I screen him who ruined my life? Let him pay for what I have suffered. But if I tell, they will probably flog the ...
— Best Russian Short Stories • Various
... realizing of him as being also a Providence ruling the world, that is of moral value and significance, and was due in particular to the lofty dignity with which he declaimed six lines of Lucretius, setting forth the Epicurean view of the gods as unconcerned with mankind. There were probably not ten men in the House of Commons who could follow the sense of the lines so as to appreciate their bearing on his argument. But these stately and sonorous hexameters—hexameters that seemed to have lived on through nineteen ...
— William Ewart Gladstone • James Bryce
... unconcerned as if he had done nothing amiss; and now the clock striking two, which was the hour for returning to school, Billy Meanwell, Sammy Sober, Bobby Bright, Tommy Telltruth, and all the rest of the good boys, with Little King Pippin at their head, ran as fast as they could, to try who should ...
— The History of Little King Pippin • Thomas Bewick
... called Christianity, Which the wild dramas of the wheeling spheres Include, with divers other such, in dim Pathetical and brief parentheses, Beyond whose span, uninfluenced, unconcerned, The systems of the suns go sweeping on With all their many-mortaled planet train In mathematic ...
— The Dynasts - An Epic-Drama Of The War With Napoleon, In Three Parts, - Nineteen Acts, And One Hundred And Thirty Scenes • Thomas Hardy
... idly stroking the long frond of an air plant that hung in the wide window near where he stood. He wondered, vaguely, that he should be so collected, almost unconcerned, in the face of what awaited him. He saw the door open slowly, wider, then arrest as if the hand on the knob had faltered, and in the instant his self-possession ...
— Terry - A Tale of the Hill People • Charles Goff Thomson
... Sellers of eye-water fame never looked more cool and unconcerned when calling attention to the facts, "100,000,000 of people, two eyes each, a bottle of my patent eye-wash for each at a dollar a bottle, and eye-wash made at a net cost of a dime a barrel"—"simple, simple; you name your price, I pay it, ...
— Frenzied Finance - Vol. 1: The Crime of Amalgamated • Thomas W. Lawson
... with the hope of sifting him on the subject. Although Lamb could not know who sent him the lines, yet he looked very hard at the writer of them the next time they met, when he walked up, as usual, to Lamb's desk in the most unconcerned manner, to transact the necessary business. Shortly after, when they were again in conversation, something dropped from Lamb's lips which convinced his hearer, beyond a doubt, that his suspicions were correct. He therefore wrote some more lines (anonymously, ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb (Vol. 6) - Letters 1821-1842 • Charles and Mary Lamb
... terrified pair wondering why the doctor, who had been warned months before, should thus culpably neglect their urgent summons. As he lay there so grim and derisive and solitary, so fatigued with days and nights, so used up, so steeped in experience, and so contemptuously unconcerned, he somehow baffled all the efforts of blankets, cloths, and bags to make his miserable frame look ridiculous. He had a majesty which subdued his surroundings. And in this room hitherto sacred to the charming mysteries ...
— Leonora • Arnold Bennett
... could think of,—'Billy in the Low Grounds,' ''Possum up the Gum-Stump,' 'Chicken in the Bread-Tray,' and all those hoppery-skippery, jiggery-dancery tunes that make your feet go whether or no. But there Brother Terrapin sat, looking as unconcerned as if the fiddle had been ten miles away. He didn't even keep time to the music with his foot. More than that, he didn't even wag his ...
— Little Mr. Thimblefinger and His Queer Country • Joel Chandler Harris
... earlier days the royal house itself had not been secure from his presumptuous love. He was believed to have carried his conquests into the family of Orleans; and some suspected that he was not unconcerned in the mysterious remorse which embittered the last hours of the charming mother of Louis the Fifteenth. But the Duke was now sixty years old. With a heart deeply corrupted by vice, a head long accustomed to think only ...
— Critical and Historical Essays, Volume III (of 3) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... event of special interest that occurred during the absence of the scout was the coming of Sam Oliver. As unconcerned as if he had long been a member of the company and had earned his thirty-three cents per day for his labours, the hunter entered the fort one night and composedly received the warm greetings which were given him. It was ...
— Scouting with Daniel Boone • Everett T. Tomlinson
... have the hermits protected, and Osric manned our boat and sent it away, bidding the men hasten. They had a two-mile sail to the island now, but the Danes stood and watched the coming of the boat as if unconcerned. Doubtless they had not seen what happened to their comrades, ...
— A Sea Queen's Sailing • Charles Whistler
... peaceably fold it up, or fling it aside, and read no more. It would be happy for me to have the same power over people's tongues, and not be forced to hear my own work railed at and commended fifty times a day, affecting all the while a countenance wholly unconcerned, and joining out of policy or good manners with the judgment of both parties: this, I confess, is too great a hardship for so bashful and unexperienced ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D. D., Volume IX; • Jonathan Swift
... so rough that the geishas were startled and did not answer. Porcupine, unconcerned, brought out a cane, and began performing the sword-dance in the center of the room. Then Clown, having danced the Kii-no-kuni, the Kap-pore[K] and the Durhma-san on the Shelf, almost stark-naked, with a palm-fibre broom, began turkey-trotting about the room, shouting ...
— Botchan (Master Darling) • Mr. Kin-nosuke Natsume, trans. by Yasotaro Morri
... returned to his culinary effort, as unruffled and unconcerned, apparently, as though naught had occurred to disturb his ...
— The Mucker • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... first time I saw Seraphina, looking over her father's shoulder. I remember her face on that day; her eyes were gray—the gray of black, not of blue. For a moment they looked me straight in the face, reflectively, unconcerned, and then travelled to the spectacles of ...
— Romance • Joseph Conrad and F.M. Hueffer
... germinated some new ideas," said Quinny, unconcerned. "The story has a moral,—I detest morals,—but this has one. An artist should always marry unhappily, and do you know why? Purely a question of chemistry. Towsey, when do ...
— Murder in Any Degree • Owen Johnson
... him somewhere, but he could not recollect. Every few moments, when the man spoke, or moved, or smiled, he would start and fix his eyes on him, and then suddenly withdraw them, as the bright, dark eyes met his with such unconcerned coolness. At last, a sudden recollection seemed to flash upon him, for he stared at the stranger with such an air of blank amazement and alarm, that ...
— Uncle Tom's Cabin • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... on, unconcerned and unconvinced by the pathos and triumph of such a death. But the rough soldier who commanded the executioners had no prejudices or hatred to blind his eyes and ossify his heart. The sight made its natural impression on him; and his exclamation, though not to be taken as a Christian ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Mark • Alexander Maclaren
... the only perfectly unconcerned member of our party, and it was through his persevering attendances on the promenade deck, that I became acquainted with a young lady who will figure largely in these pages, although she in reality was by no means of commanding stature, but one of those charming ...
— A Queen's Error • Henry Curties
... was so full of variety that I saw it was all my memory could do, if it carried away anything like a correct picture of its aspect. I was contemplating it fixedly, when a little stifled cry from Wynnie made me start and look round. Her face was flushed, yet she was trying to look unconcerned. ...
— The Seaboard Parish Vol. 2 • George MacDonald
... humanity an overseer of the poor, and he will quickly find the tender feelings of commiseration hardened. Make him a physician, and he will be the only person upon the premises, the heir excepted, unconcerned at the prospect of death. Make him a surgeon, and he will amputate a leg with the same indifference with which a cutler saws a piece of bone for a knife handle. You commit a rascal to prison because he merits transportation, but by the time he comes out he merits a halter. By uniting ...
— An History of Birmingham (1783) • William Hutton
... and there was instant response in language of a violent character from the young disciple of Christian Science. As the two stood in a ring of boys, each watching the other and alert to catch some advantage of beginning, Billy was certainly the most unconcerned, and he appeared to advantage. He was occupied throughout every nerve and vein of his being, first in "holding the thought" he had fixed upon for this special occasion, and second, by his plan of attack, for Billy made it a point always to take the ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VI. (of X.) • Various
... about the room, his hands in his pockets, vainly endeavoring to appear very mannish and unconcerned, but his eye roved unceasingly to the baby. He was the longest and most upstanding six-feet-four of proud father that Margery or her husband had ever had the ...
— Sundown Slim • Henry Hubert Knibbs
... below her knees, but no one would have called her a beauty; in her whole face the only good point was her eyes, and even her eyes were not good—they were grey, and not large—but their glance was swift and deep, unconcerned to the point of audacity, and thoughtful to the point of melancholy—an enigmatic glance. There was a light of something extraordinary in them, even while her tongue was lisping the emptiest of inanities. She dressed with elaborate ...
— Fathers and Children • Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
... metre. It felt more like riding a bicycle than walking. And to this stride I had got accustomed. In the Evening Songs, without thinking of it, I somehow broke off this habit. Nor did I come under any other particular bondage. I felt entirely free and unconcerned. I had no thought or fear of being taken ...
— My Reminiscences • Rabindranath Tagore
... history, were not so high-spirited as to fling Faustus a declaration of war from beneath their closely-folded robes of office; on the contrary, they communicated the invitation to the mayor's festival in as unconcerned a tone as if nothing had happened,—a new proof of their expertness in negotiation. Had they, for example, replied to the insult, they would thereby have acknowledged that they felt the force of it; but when they let it fall flat upon the ground, as if it were ...
— Faustus - his Life, Death, and Doom • Friedrich Maximilian von Klinger
... and the huge black form of the rogue appeared upon the scene. Unlike the lively young elephant that had escaped us in the morning, this old rogue marched sedately and leisurely down the hill-side, apparently as much unconcerned about the uproar of shooting and shouting in his rear as if it had been but the buzzing of a few mosquitoes. I confess that doubts as to the issue of the combat arose in my mind when I first saw him, for he appeared to be nearly, ...
— The Eagle Cliff • R.M. Ballantyne
... he even refrained from going to the shore at the bathing hour, or bathing there himself. By degrees, however, he grew accustomed to it, seeing that nobody thought anything of it, and that the almost nude figures disported themselves among their equally unconcerned parents, relatives, and friends with the naive unconsciousness ...
— The Malady of the Century • Max Nordau
... dismay I discovered that their good-nature went so far as not to destroy the captured brutes, which were merely picked up most gently, so as not to injure them, and flung down from the castle-village wall, on the top of which this operation took place. As there were other people sitting quite unconcerned down below, no doubt this provided a good deal of perpetual occupation to the women of the castle, and the parasites were provided with ...
— Across Coveted Lands - or a Journey from Flushing (Holland) to Calcutta Overland • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... their turned-down collars, they wiped their lips upon handkerchiefs with embroidered initials that gave forth a subtle perfume. Those who were beginning to grow old had an air of youth, while there was something mature in the faces of the young. In their unconcerned looks was the calm of passions daily satiated, and through all their gentleness of manner pierced that peculiar brutality, the result of a command of half-easy things, in which force is exercised and vanity amused—the management of thoroughbred horses and ...
— Madame Bovary • Gustave Flaubert
... stands beneath the mistletoe As though she did not know it. She looks quite unconcerned, you know, ...
— When hearts are trumps • Thomas Winthrop Hall
... alone satisfy the people whose lives had been endangered by the robber. Nevertheless, I declined delivering the victim for such a fate, so that, in the end, we compromised the sentence by shooting Barrah in the presence of all the slaves and townsfolk,—the most unconcerned spectators among whom were his ...
— Captain Canot - or, Twenty Years of an African Slaver • Brantz Mayer
... castle, a man's house was himself. He could not tear himself away from his house, it was like tearing up the shrieking mandrake by the root, almost death itself. Now we walk in and out of our brick boxes unconcerned whether we live in this villa or that, here or yonder. Dark beams inlaid in the walls support the gables; heavier timber, placed horizontally, forms, as it were, the foundation of the first floor. This horizontal beam has warped a little ...
— Highways & Byways in Sussex • E.V. Lucas
... and one of the others I rode at, practised the same pretty trick, first appearing perfectly unconcerned at my presence and then, when I made a charge at them, with just one little careless movement placing themselves a ...
— Far Away and Long Ago • W. H. Hudson
... mind. As against this, however, must be set the fact that his telegrams to the Secretary of State for War, the last of which he must have despatched only about half-an-hour before he was shot, are cool and collected, and written in the same unconcerned tone,—as though he were a critical spectator of an interesting scene—that characterises all his communications, more especially his despatches. They at any rate give no evidence of shaken nerve or unduly excited brain, nor can I see ...
— Cetywayo and his White Neighbours - Remarks on Recent Events in Zululand, Natal, and the Transvaal • H. Rider Haggard
... to our table, which was tastefully decorated with La France roses, the Countess' favorites (charged to expenses). As we walked slowly down the passage to our table, many eyes were turned toward us. The Countess appeared unconscious of it all. Lazily, half insolently observant, yet wholly unconcerned, she was without doubt the most strikingly beautiful woman in the assembly; this, though the society of the world seemed to fill the ...
— The Secrets of the German War Office • Dr. Armgaard Karl Graves
... used to say to me, in his peculiar way: "A Chancery Lawsuit; justice, nay justice in mere money, denied a man, for all his pleading, till twenty, till forty years of his Life are gone seeking it: and a Cockney Funeral, Death reverenced by hatchments, horsehair, brass-lacquer, and unconcerned bipeds carrying long poles and bags of black silk:—are not these two reverences, this reverence for Death and that reverence for Life, a notable pair of reverences ...
— Past and Present - Thomas Carlyle's Collected Works, Vol. XIII. • Thomas Carlyle
... oak leaves, loosened by frost two days before. If only a fox would break this side, and they could have the first fields to themselves! It was so lovely to be alone with hounds! One of these came trotting out, a pretty young creature, busy and unconcerned, raising its tan-and-white head, its mild reproachful deep-brown eyes, at Winton's, "Loo-in Trix!" What a darling! A burst of music from the covert, and the darling vanished among ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... savage, more of a tramp and poacher, more of a scold, than ever. He even went so far as to huff at the sparrows outside the window. He never entered into the feelings of his neighbors in any way; when every other bird in the room was excited, alarmed, or disturbed, he alone remained perfectly unconcerned, exactly as if he did not ...
— Upon The Tree-Tops • Olive Thorne Miller
... in of the flood of guests about the tables, Mrs. Chump and Mr. Pole sat apparently unconcerned in their places, and, as if to show their absolute indifference to observation and opinion, went through the ceremony of drinking to one another, upon which they nodded and chuckled: a suspicious eye had the option of divining that they used the shelter of the table cloth for an interchange ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... you mean by this wild talk, my friend?' I replied in as unconcerned and quieting a tone as I could immediately assume. 'Come, sit down: I was asking the meaning of your ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 434 - Volume 17, New Series, April 24, 1852 • Various
... breathless anxiety which was now visible in every countenance, while, as the breeze continued to a fresh gale, we ran quickly up the sound. The mast-heads were crowded by the officers and men during the whole afternoon; and an unconcerned observer, if any could have been unconcerned on such an occasion, would have been amused by the eagerness with which the various reports from the crow's-nest were received; all, however, hitherto favourable to our most ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part III. The Great Explorers of the Nineteenth Century • Jules Verne
... fourth, emperor to the number of his victims. The soldiers, who united the rage of factious citizens with the savage manners of Barbarians, were indulged, without control, in the license of rapine and murder: the crowd of slaves and plebeians, who were unconcerned in the event, could only gain by the indiscriminate pillage; and the face of the city exhibited the strange contrast of stern cruelty and dissolute intemperance. [110] Forty days after this calamitous event, the subject, ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 3 • Edward Gibbon
... sail immediately. However, as the two privateers got under way on September 1st,—with the Hastings, a man-of-war—the majority of the crew drank a health to their spouses; waved their hands to them over the rail; and "parted unconcerned." Truly, a sailor has a lass in ...
— Famous Privateersmen and Adventurers of the Sea • Charles H. L. Johnston
... was my Judge, That I, who first brought death on all, am graced The source of life; next favourable thou, Who highly thus to entitle me vouchsaf'st, Far other name deserving. But the field To labour calls us, now with sweat imposed, Though after sleepless night; for see! the morn, All unconcerned with our unrest, begins Her rosy progress smiling: let us forth; I never from thy side henceforth to stray, Where'er our day's work lies, though now enjoined Laborious, till day droop; while here we dwell, What can be toilsome in these pleasant walks? Here let ...
— Paradise Lost • John Milton
... talk. His mind found business in its own devices. He would have chosen to avoid the speaker altogether; but even Asad's unconcerned announcements, sandwiched in between gibes at the Orthodox faith were better than no tidings of his former patron. And Asad always lay in wait for him, delighting to dazzle one so downcast with the vision of his own high future. One morning ...
— The Valley of the Kings • Marmaduke Pickthall
... Lu behave so that night; she scarcely spoke to Rose, appeared entirely unconcerned while he hovered round her like an officious sprite, was all grace to the others and sweetness to Mr. Dudley. And Rose, oblivious of snubs, paraded his devotion, seemed determined to show his love for Lu,—as if any one cared a straw,—and took the pains to be positively ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 5, No. 28, February, 1860 • Various
... the man. This dry, unconcerned, business-sort of gabble was not the language of a suddenly-bereaved parent, and one, too, who had lost a considerable annuity by his son's death. What could it mean? I was ...
— The Experiences of a Barrister, and Confessions of an Attorney • Samuel Warren
... came upon the same carriage standing on another corner, the driver as quiet and unconcerned as if he had not been dodging vehicles at the risk of a smash-up, or urging his horses to a lawless pace in that ...
— True Love's Reward • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... the whole. Or, even better, he was as one caught in a mill-race, tossed along and battered, yet feeling nothing acutely, curious indeed as to what the end would be, and why it had had a beginning, yet fundamentally unconcerned. The thing was so: there was no more to be said. He knew that it was necessary that he should be here, about to start for almost certain death, as that his soul should be inhabiting ...
— Dawn of All • Robert Hugh Benson
... on, the kind of unconcerned nonsense that was, her strange, new instinct told her, best calculated to quite his vibrant nerves. "Little child, little child," he returned mutely, "how little you know! Well—as you are so innocent, why should not I snatch this fearful joy while ...
— The Halo • Bettina von Hutten
... shoes not too lately cleaned. She was instantly glad she had been particular as to Wilbur's outfit. He looked ever so much more distinguished than either Merle or his friend. She watched him as he stood unconcerned under the chatter of the three girls. They had begun at once to employ upon him the oldest arts known to woman, and he was not flustered or "gauche"—a word Winona had lately learned. Beyond her divining was the truth that he would much rather have been talking to ...
— The Wrong Twin • Harry Leon Wilson
... up, Olof felt his senses in a whirl once more, and clenched his teeth in an effort to appear unconcerned. ...
— The Song Of The Blood-Red Flower • Johannes Linnankoski
... And wit in northern climates will not blow, Except, like orange-trees, 'tis housed from snow. There needs no care to put a playhouse down, 'Tis the most desart place of all the town: We and our neighbours, to speak proudly, are, Like monarchs, ruined with expensive war; While, like wise English, unconcerned you sit, And see us play the ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Volume 5 (of 18) - Amboyna; The state of Innocence; Aureng-Zebe; All for Love • John Dryden
... the stream, leisurely crossing a hill. A council was at once held, and the officers all turned to Boone for advice. His advice was given frankly: he was for waiting till Logan should arrive with his men. The Indian party, he felt assured, was at the least from four to five hundred strong, and the unconcerned mode in which the Indians crossed the hill showed that the main body was near, and their design was to draw them over the river. Moreover, he was acquainted with all that region of the country. After they crossed the ford, they ...
— The Adventures of Daniel Boone: the Kentucky rifleman • Uncle Philip
... woman of the world did nothing rashly. She was always acting from motive and though apparently unconcerned was keenly alive to the ...
— Marguerite Verne • Agatha Armour
... present study is less interesting from a technical than a rhythmical point of view. While the chief beats of the measure (1st, 3d, 5th and 7th eighths) are represented only by single tones (in the bass part), which are to a certain extent "free and unconcerned, and void of all encumbrance," the inferior parts of the measure (2d, 4th, 6th and 8th eighths) are burdened with chords, the most of which, moreover, are provided with accents in opposition to the regular beats of the measure. Further, there ...
— Chopin: The Man and His Music • James Huneker
... 7th. For me all the world was this morning electric with excitement. That Paris should go calmly about her daily routine, unconscious and unconcerned, seemed monstrous. I wanted to grasp everyone I met and cry: "The Germans are only twenty miles away! A great battle is even now being fought just outside the gates!—a battle on the issue of which hangs the fate of ...
— The Note-Book of an Attache - Seven Months in the War Zone • Eric Fisher Wood
... with equal awkwardness. Trevor moved on, delicately. This was no place for him. Bob's face was looking like a stuffed frog's, which was Bob's way of trying to appear unconcerned and at his ease, while Mike seemed as if at any moment he might burst into tears. Spectators are not wanted at ...
— Mike • P. G. Wodehouse
... Laughed in the old, unconcerned way; but presently the rising awe and question in the lovely eyes looking into his own, sobered him. He began to understand and to get her point of view. He stood straighter, and a new expression passed ...
— Joyce of the North Woods • Harriet T. Comstock
... back to their camp; so that the Carthaginians that day were more like persons besieged than besiegers. As many as one thousand three hundred of the Carthaginians were slain, and fifty-nine made prisoners, having been unexpectedly overpowered, while standing careless and unconcerned near the walls and on the outposts, fearing any thing rather than a sally. Gracchus sounded a retreat, and withdrew his men within the walls, before the enemy could recover themselves from the effects of this sudden terror. The next day Hannibal, supposing that the consul, elated with his ...
— The History of Rome; Books Nine to Twenty-Six • Titus Livius
... pathetically unconcerned. "Aunt Isabel likes to have him around. He often comes in ...
— Missy • Dana Gatlin
... the agony over!" and Bud tried to make his voice sound cheery and unconcerned. "Good-by, Ruth," and, urging his horse up close to the side of his sister's horse, he leaned over, threw his arms around her neck and kissed her. Then he turned and quickly served Iola in the same way; and, striking spurs into ...
— The Cave of Gold - A Tale of California in '49 • Everett McNeil
... "stoops" or low porches in front, above, and below. Grant was seated on the upper "stoop," resting his chin on his folded arms, which were on the rail of a baluster. He was smoking a cigar, and doubtless casting his eyes on the situation across the river. He then looked happy, contented, and unconcerned. He did not change when Wright exhibited, by word and act, great solicitude for the fate of the cavalry. When Wright had finished, Grant withdrew his cigar from his lips, raised his head only a little, and pleasantly said: "The cavalry ...
— Slavery and Four Years of War, Vol. 1-2 • Joseph Warren Keifer
... are three different kinds of people on earth, among whom Christians must live. The first of these are that rude class which is unconcerned about the nature of God and how he rules. They have no regard for God's Word. Their faith is only in their mammon and their own appetites. They think only of how they may live unto themselves, like swine in the sty. To such we need not preach anything of this ...
— Epistle Sermons, Vol. III - Trinity Sunday to Advent • Martin Luther
... against a hundred thousand slaughter-houses in our American cities. In the name of our happy homes, of our refined circles, of our schools, of our churches,—in the name of all that is dear and beautiful and valuable and holy,—I enter the complaint. If you now sit unconcerned, and leave to professed philanthropists the work, and care not who are in authority or what laws remain unexecuted, you may live to see the time when you will curse the day in ...
— The Abominations of Modern Society • Rev. T. De Witt Talmage
... see you in a rage. I've been watching you for weeks, and have found myself irritated by that perpetual calm of yours. That day of the riot you stood on the curb as unconcerned as though you ...
— The Pagan Madonna • Harold MacGrath
... brother and her husband would not wear anxious faces for nothing. Her usually bright face clouded with a look of distress. She had seen enough of Indian warfare to make her shudder with horror at the mere thought. Betty seemed unconcerned. She sat down beside the dog and ...
— Betty Zane • Zane Grey
... existence, and fixed the geographical boundaries of their habitation in order that they may seek the Lord," can not have been unmindful of the Greek nation, and of its grandest age of philosophy. "The Father of the spirits of all flesh" could not be unconcerned in the moral and spiritual welfare of any of his children. He was as deeply interested in the Athenian as in the Hebrew. He is the God of the Gentile as well as the Jew. His tender mercies are over all his works. If the Hebrew race was selected to be the agent of his ...
— Christianity and Greek Philosophy • Benjamin Franklin Cocker
... had the inclination of cutting off the inhabitance of the pale faces. Nevertheless, they did not always remain idle or unconcerned spectators of the feuds and dissensions that so long prevailed among the white people, toward the red men. The successive and regular encroachments, on their hunting grounds and plantations, which the increase of the European population occasioned, ...
— Legends, Traditions, and Laws of the Iroquois, or Six Nations, and History of the Tuscarora Indians • Elias Johnson
... not particularly allude to recent circumstances or latter years, for from my earlier years I have been the child of Providence—then why should I distrust its care now? I do not distrust it—neither do I trust it. I feel perfectly unanxious, unconcerned, and indifferent as to the future; but this is not trust in Providence—not that trust which alone claims it protections. I know this is a blamable indifference—it is more—for it reaches to the interminable future. It turns almost with disgust ...
— Abbotsford and Newstead Abbey • Washington Irving
... so, and again I was left to meditate. It is astonishing how unconcerned I had come to feel, how reliant on the ingenuity of this charming princess with the small head, the high, broad forehead, the burning, black eyes the curly blonde hair, the quizzically ...
— An Enemy To The King • Robert Neilson Stephens
... why so unconcerned? Hast no soul? or dost think thou mayst lose thy soul, and save thyself? Is it not pity, had it otherwise been the will of God, that ever thou wast made a man, for that thou settest so little ...
— The Jerusalem Sinner Saved • John Bunyan
... out, and there was only one practicable way in, which was the one that served as the village drinking place. It is true that this was a wide area, but there were more than a hundred horsemen crowded together there, all with their bridles in their hands and their carbines slung, so unconcerned that some of them were singing. You may imagine ...
— The Memoirs of General the Baron de Marbot, Translated by - Oliver C. Colt • Baron de Marbot
... down with the shock of a bullet that broke his left arm; two others of his men, who had stood up in the moment of excitement, were dead, and two others severely wounded. Only the unconcerned Timmins had passed through the ...
— The Wilderness Trail • Frank Williams
... part of the programme until I have had a bite to eat, or do you think there's nobody hungry but yourselves?" asked the prisoner, in the most unconcerned manner possible; and there was no mistaking his voice. It was Tom ...
— Rodney The Partisan • Harry Castlemon
... day, I went to East St. Louis myself, three or four gentlemen accompanying me. There I found several thousand men sitting about on the curbs of the sidewalks, apparently perfectly quiet and inoffensive, if not unconcerned, and I concluded that there was no reason ...
— Fifty Years of Public Service • Shelby M. Cullom
... democracy, the head of the new administration, the host at this official banquet, the President of the United States, Thomas Jefferson, stood quietly, serenely, looking out over the long table, entirely unconcerned with what he saw. If there was trouble, it was for others, ...
— The Magnificent Adventure - Being the Story of the World's Greatest Exploration and - the Romance of a Very Gallant Gentleman • Emerson Hough
... Edith, and advancing towards the table at which Claverhouse now placed himself, stood at a little distance, resting on his sheathed broadsword, a silent, but not an unconcerned, spectator of that ...
— Old Mortality, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... were on our way to help their husbands defend France, and they honored us. It was our due. But can the sahib accept his due with a dry eye and a word in his throat? Nay! It is only ingratitude that a man can swallow unconcerned. No man spoke. We rode like graven images, and I think the French women wondered at our silence. I know that I, for one, felt extremely willing to die for France; and I thought of Ranjoor Singh and of how his heart, too, would have burned if he had been with us. With such thoughts as swelled in ...
— Hira Singh - When India came to fight in Flanders • Talbot Mundy
... looked at an empty chair near him; then he looked at Carroll and his sister standing, and did not seat himself. He also leaned against the mantel on the other corner from Carroll, and endeavored to assume an unconcerned air, as if it were quite the usual thing for him to drop into the house and encounter such a nondescript company. He looked across at the druggist and postmaster, and bowed with flourishing politeness. He said to Carroll, endeavoring ...
— The Debtor - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... saw him often during the fighting at Elands Laagte, Tinta Inyoni, and Lombard's Kop. He was usually walking about close to the firing line, leading his grey horse, a conspicuous mark for every bullet. Veteran officers used to marvel that he was not hit. In the midst of it all he would stand quite unconcerned, and speak in his usual voice—slow, trenchant, restrained by a cynicism that came partly from youth and an English horror of fuss. How different from the voice of unconsciousness which I heard raving in his ...
— Ladysmith - The Diary of a Siege • H. W. Nevinson
... but explaining at the same time with most unnecessary elaboration; and here was she, coming towards them, with both of them looking at her, conscious of blushing to a terrible extent, but trying to throw up her eyebrows carelessly, and pout her rosy lips, as if she were the coolest and most unconcerned of little women. ...
— Life And Adventures Of Martin Chuzzlewit • Charles Dickens
... heavy-breaking seas of the Channel Islands do not appear to disturb the composure of these birds in the least, for once, on my voyage home on the 16th November, 1871, I saw a small flock of Goosanders off Herm, close to the steamer; they were swimming perfectly unconcerned in a heavy-breaking sea, which made the steamer very lively, dipping first one and then the other paddle-box into the water; as we got close up to them they rose, but only flew a short distance and pitched again in the white water. They ...
— Birds of Guernsey (1879) • Cecil Smith
... dipped his pen and began to turn the leaves of the agreement over. 'We must then take his name off,' he says in a kind of unconcerned sing-song. ...
— Chance - A Tale in Two Parts • Joseph Conrad
... these wholly discouraged by a portion of the leaders. A riot seemed imminent—a riot Antonelli feared and firmly opposed, since it would alienate the sympathy of that wider public in the country on which the success of the strike depended. Watchful, yet apparently unconcerned, unmoved by the quarrels, the fierce demands for "action," he sat on the little stage, smoking his ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... but the retainers stared in horror at their master. He seemed to be quite unconcerned. He merely held out his sword to the nearest attendant, who, with a wooden dipper, poured water over the blade from haft to point, and then carefully wiped the steel several times with sheets of soft paper... And thus ended the ceremonial part of ...
— Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things • Lafcadio Hearn
... of persons. Shameless and unconcerned, he tells the story of his life over and over again. Outside of the ballot-box he is the greatest repeater that ...
— Toaster's Handbook - Jokes, Stories, and Quotations • Peggy Edmund & Harold W. Williams, compilers
... heard leaping and tumbling down the deep abyss on the other side. The horses were familiar with the road, and had confidence in the stout hand that guided them, or they would not have gone on at such a quiet, unconcerned, uniform gait, close beside abrupt gorges that would have destroyed us all as instantly as a stroke of lightning, were the wheels to diverge but a few ...
— Due West - or Round the World in Ten Months • Maturin Murray Ballou
... resolution itself nor the heart-rending appeal of the grazier produced the slightest effect on the railway company. John Crawford continued to sell tickets, even to Father Fahey himself, and appeared entirely unconcerned ...
— Hyacinth - 1906 • George A. Birmingham
... a countenance that appears cheerful, open and unconcerned. A young gentleman saw Laetitia this winter at play, and became her captive. His fortune was such, that he wanted very little introduction to speak his sentiments to her father. The lover was admitted with the utmost freedom into the family, where a constrained ...
— The Young Gentleman and Lady's Monitor, and English Teacher's Assistant • John Hamilton Moore
... others, that Marzucco was a good man of the city of Pisa, whose son was beheaded by order of Count Ugolino, the tyrant, who commanded that his body should remain unburied. In the evening his father went to the Count, as a stranger unconcerned in the matter, and, without tears or other sign of grief, said, 'Surely, my lord, it would be to your honor that that poor body should be buried, and not left cruelly as food for dogs.' Then the Count, recognizing him, said astonished, ...
— The Divine Comedy, Volume 2, Purgatory [Purgatorio] • Dante Alighieri |
