"Raillery" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... without perhaps comprehending, the joviality arising from a return to Nature. Every man was forthwith nicknamed, and pitiless was the raillery upon the venerable subjects of long and short, fat and thin. One sang a war-song, another a love-song, a third some song of the sea, whilst the fourth, an Eesa youth, with the villanous expression of face common ...
— First footsteps in East Africa • Richard F. Burton
... where he had an interview with him. Upon entering the room, Swift desired to know his commands. "Sir," says he, "I am Sergeant Bet-tes-worth;" in his usual pompous way of pronouncing his name in three distinct syllables. "Of what regiment, pray?" says Swift. "O, Mr. Dean, we know your powers of raillery; you know me well enough, that I am one of his majesty's sergeants-at-law." "What then, sir?" "Why then, sir, I am come to demand of you, whether you are the author of this poem (producing it), and ...
— Irish Wit and Humor - Anecdote Biography of Swift, Curran, O'Leary and O'Connell • Anonymous
... ineptissimi, quod si sentire simulacra et moveri possent, adoratura hominem fuissent a quo sunt expolita. (Divin. Institut. l. ii. c. 2.) Lactantius is the last, as well as the most eloquent, of the Latin apologists. Their raillery of idols attacks not only the object, but the form ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 5 • Edward Gibbon
... and falling slides combined form the circumflex, or wave, which is a very impressive and significant modification of the voice. It is chiefly used in sarcasm, raillery, irony, wit, and humor. It well deserves careful study ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick
... Fable" must have great accomplishments—wit, fancy, judgment, memory; "an universal knowledge of the World, of the Interest of Princes, and the humors of Nations," and of both closet-policy and the art of war; familiarity with "politeness of conversation, the art of ingenious raillery, and that of making innocent Satyrs; nor must he be ignorant of that of composing of Verses, writing Letters, and making Orations." The "secrets of all hearts" must be his and "how to take away plainness and driness ...
— Prefaces to Fiction • Various
... slap he gave them about their close dealings with the Indians was much enjoyed. Soon all were on the best of terms, and it was a mutual pleasure, in that lonely place, to meet and interchange the news of the country, as well as to have the flashings of wit and fun and pleasant raillery. ...
— Three Boys in the Wild North Land • Egerton Ryerson Young
... down on the dressing-table and began to run, too, in little quick dancing steps, her wincey skirt bellowing out all round her. Their shadows bobbed and darted, swelling and shrinking on the plaster walls. Soon breathless, Mademoiselle sank down on the side of her bed, panting and volleying raillery and broken tinkles of laughter at Miriam standing goosestepping on the strip of matting with an open umbrella held high over her head. Recovering breath, she began to lament.... Miriam had not during the whole ...
— Pointed Roofs - Pilgrimage, Volume 1 • Dorothy Richardson
... disliked the tone of raillery that existed between her and Veslovsky, but fell in with it against ...
— Anna Karenina • Leo Tolstoy
... McFarlane broke in upon the bitter raillery. He had no thought for the man or his feelings, just for one moment it seemed to him that some sort of miracle had happened. And his every thought and feeling was absorbed in it. Here, after five years of vain effort, here, after five years of depredations which ...
— The Forfeit • Ridgwell Cullum
... have entered on the chapter of Madame de Sable's weaknesses, this is the place to mention what was the subject of endless raillery from her friends—her elaborate precaution about her health, and her dread of infection, even from diseases the least communicable. Perhaps this anxiety was founded as much on aesthetic as on physical grounds, ...
— The Essays of "George Eliot" - Complete • George Eliot
... from Court and told me that I was publicly laughed at, and charged with having fomented the insurrection instead of appeasing it; that I had been ridiculed two whole hours and exposed to the smart raillery of Beautru, to the buffoonery of Nogent, to the pleasantries of La Riviere, to the false compassion of the Cardinal, and to the loud laughter ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... retribution. The cause to which she was attached, for which she was prepared to squander her wealth, to give her life even were that necessary, had compelled her companionship with this adventurous Englishman. She had met him in a spirit of raillery, measuring her woman's wit and beauty against his brusqueness, and his resourcefulness and calm determination had won her admiration. The cause was altogether forgotten sometimes in the mere pleasure she had in being with him. He was not as other men, quick with a compliment, ...
— Princess Maritza • Percy Brebner
... colloquy, conference, confabulation, chat, parley, causerie, parlance, confab; dialogue, interlocution; soliloquy, monologue; palaver, buncombe, blarney, blandishment, flattery, flummery; chaff, banter, raillery, persiflage, badinage, asteistn; chatter, babble, chit chat, gibberish, jargon, twaddle, fustian, moonshine, hanky-panky, jabbering, rhapsody, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... Stillman made a futile attempt to remedy the trouble with his engine, and twice he retired defeated to the shelter of the car. Claire was relieved that she was in the company of a man who did not emphasize the monotonous hours by indiscriminate raillery against the tricks of chance. At first he dismissed the situation with the most casual of shrugs; later he acknowledged his annoyance by an expression of regret at his companion's discomfort, but ...
— The Blood Red Dawn • Charles Caldwell Dobie
... listened to her bright retorts to O'Dowd's sallies, and marvelled at the ease and composure with which she met the witty Irishman on even terms. Her voice, always low and distinct, was never without the suggestion of good-natured raillery; he was enchanted by the faint, delicious chuckle that rode in every sentence she uttered during these ...
— Green Fancy • George Barr McCutcheon
... at the Dutch Embassador's, after dinner they drank and were pretty merry; and among the rest of the King's company there was that worthy fellow my Lord of Rochester, and Tom Killigrew, whose mirth and raillery offended the former so much, that he did give Tom Killigrew a box on the ear in the King's presence; which do give much offence to the people here at Court to see how cheap the King makes himself, and the more, for that the King hath not ...
— The Diary of Samuel Pepys • Samuel Pepys
... holy Virgin, invoking her assistance against the infernal powers, insomuch, that the vicar, to whom the young man had related the words which he had heard, sometimes repeated them to Xavier with an inoffensive kind of raillery. ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Volume XVI. (of 18) - The Life of St. Francis Xavier • John Dryden
... lines and with his bride starts for the upper world. The catastrophe is treated in much the same manner as it has been in subsequent versions of the story. Euridice disappears. Orpheus is about to turn back, but he is stopped by Tisiphone. He then breaks into virulent raillery, swears he'll never love woman more and advises all husbands to seek divorce. All this is in resounding octave rime. Then a Maenad calls upon her sisters to defend their sex. They drive Orpheus off the stage and ...
— Some Forerunners of Italian Opera • William James Henderson
... waved her raillery away with a smile. The physical resemblance between father and daughter was remarkable. "I asked you what was the matter with ...
— The Squirrel-Cage • Dorothy Canfield
... raillery in which this was spoken did not in any way mollify the chagrin of the other, who still looked at her with a frown, and as she ended, ...
— The Living Link • James De Mille
... Charles Dickens, who pilloried his parents in print, one as Mr. Micawber and the other as Mrs. Nickleby. Dickens told the truth and painted it large, but Francois Arouet dealt in indiscreet fallacy when he endeavored to give his father a reputation for raillery. ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great Philosophers, Volume 8 • Elbert Hubbard
... Severus, who had carried the Roman eagles to the extreme south of Mesopotamia. Ships, accordingly, were collected, and probably built during the winter of A.D. 362-3; provisions were laid in; warlike stores, military engines, and the like accumulated; while the impatient monarch, galled by the wit and raillery of the gay Antiochenes, chafed at his compelled inaction, and longed to exchange the war of words in which he was engaged with his subjects for the ruder contests of arms wherewith use had made ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 7. (of 7): The Sassanian or New Persian Empire • George Rawlinson
... so very important?" the soft, clear voice asked, still, I thought, with a faint undercurrent of raillery. ...
— The Jervaise Comedy • J. D. Beresford
... me for thanking you very gravely for all the obliging concern you express for me. 'Tis certain that I may, if I please, take the fine things you say to me for wit and raillery; and, it may be, it would be taking them right. But I never, in my life, was half so well disposed to take you in earnest as I am at present; and that distance which makes the continuation of your friendship improbable, has very much increased my faith in it. I find ...
— Letters of the Right Honourable Lady M—y W—y M—e • Lady Mary Wortley Montague
... against a virtuous woman, and her busy brain was already at work, mending her fences. In the interview with Donna she had expected tears and anguish. Instead she had been met with smiles and good-natured raillery; and she had an uncomfortable feeling that her fellow committeewomen were already enraged at her and preparing to turn against her. She drank her lemonade hastily and explained that their visit had been for the ...
— The Long Chance • Peter B. Kyne
... "Your ladyship's raillery is far too severe for me to withstand or reply to," said Mr. Cargill, bowing with more ease than her ladyship expected; and, retiring gently backward, he extricated himself from a conversation which he ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott
... raillery was in progress, BELINDA felt somebody tugging at her dress. She looked down, and saw Mr. ARCHIBALD BLINKSOP, a sailor-looking chap who smelt of tar, and well he might, for he had ploughed the tempestuous deep for upwards of six ...
— Punchinello, Vol. II., No. 35, November 26, 1870 • Various
... Colline in a tone of raillery, "what can one be waiting for when one is twenty, when there are stars in the sky and ...
— Bohemians of the Latin Quarter • Henry Murger
... "Much Ado about nothing," has given us an amusing instance of that sense of reality with which we are impressed by Shakspeare's characters. He says of Benedick and Beatrice, as if he had known them personally, that the exclusive direction of their pointed raillery against each other "is a proof of a growing inclination." This is not unlikely; and the same inference would lead us to suppose that this mutual inclination had commenced before the opening of the play. ...
— Characteristics of Women - Moral, Poetical, and Historical • Anna Jameson
... ought to pay to the queen, he frequently let himself into discourses about Herod's kindness, and great affection towards her; and when the women, especially Alexandra, used to turn his discourses into feminine raillery, Joseph was so over-desirous to demonstrate the kings inclinations, that he proceeded so far as to mention the charge he had received, and thence drew his demonstration, that Herod was not able to live without ...
— The Antiquities of the Jews • Flavius Josephus
... remembering, I fancy," she replied; and then made some observation about Mrs. Hubbard, to turn the conversation. The raillery and pleasantry of a man with no more tact, or true delicacy, than William Cassius Clapp, was more than even Elinor's sweet temper could ...
— Elinor Wyllys - Vol. I • Susan Fenimore Cooper
... unhappiness of a man's life, are easily counted, and distinctly remembered. The HAPPINESS of life, on the contrary, is made up of minute fractions—the little, soon-forgotten charities of a kiss, a smile, a kind look, a heartfelt compliment in the disguise of playful raillery, and the countless other infinitesimals of pleasurable ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... distinguished from gross slanderers. When the wit has gained over the laughers on his side, he has struck a blow which puts his adversary hors de combat. A grave reply can never wound ridicule, which, assuming all forms, has really none. Witty calumny and licentious raillery are airy nothings that float about us, invulnerable from their very nature, like those chimeras of hell which the sword of AEneas could not pierce—yet these shadows of truth, these false images, these fictitious realities, have made heroism tremble, turned ...
— Calamities and Quarrels of Authors • Isaac D'Israeli
... the contest had raged markedly fierce; for M'Adam noticed his son's more frequent presence at home, and commented on the fact in his usual spirit of playful raillery. ...
— Bob, Son of Battle • Alfred Ollivant
... This raillery was intended to have been uttered with a pert archness; but the crimson cheek and tremulous lips ...
— Hatchie, the Guardian Slave; or, The Heiress of Bellevue • Warren T. Ashton
... intercourse which for some time past had been customary between him and Miss Dunstable. There were no passages of arms between them; no abuse from the doctor against the lady's London gaiety; no raillery from the lady as to the doctor's country habits. They were very courteous to each other, and, as Mrs. Gresham thought, too civil by half; nor, as far as she could see, did they ever remain alone in each other's company for five minutes at a time during the ...
— Framley Parsonage • Anthony Trollope
... Maurice, resuming his usual gay tone of raillery, "why, if I am the incomparable being you pretend to think me, why are you so particularly averse to becoming my wife? What do you say to that? I should like to have an explanatory answer, little cousin; or else you must take ...
— Fairy Fingers - A Novel • Anna Cora Mowatt Ritchie
... Curran's retort upon an Irish judge, who was quite as remarkable for his good humour and raillery as for his legal researches. Curran was addressing a jury on one of the State trials in 1803 with his usual animation. The judge, whose political bias, if any judge can have one, was certainly supposed not to be favourable to the prisoner, shook his head in doubt ...
— Law and Laughter • George Alexander Morton
... would inform M. Dudelay, that I admitted into the circle of my acquaintance only such as were known to the king; and that if he thought proper to apply to his majesty, I should obey his royal will on the subject, whatever it might be. He justly considered this repulse as a biting raillery, for which he never forgave me. I entertained no ill will against him for his past perfidy, but I considered it strange that he should presume to approach me with familiarity. I should not have adopted the same line of conduct towards ...
— "Written by Herself" • Baron Etienne Leon Lamothe-Langon
... tear or two which would have way, she little imagined what agony her husband was enduring from this letter, which she was supposing must make his heart overflow with pleasure. The letter was half full of reply to Edward's account of Margaret, in his epistle of last June—of raillery about her, of intreaty that Edward would give him such a sister-in-law, and of intimations that nothing could be more apparent than that the whole rich treasure of his heart's love was Margaret's own. Hope's soul sickened as he read, ...
— Deerbrook • Harriet Martineau
... newspapers seemed to be altogether different. At Tankerville there had been an indignant and sometimes an indiscreet zeal which had communicated itself to the whole proceedings. The general flavour of the trial at Durham was one of good-humoured raillery. Mr. Browborough's counsel in cross-examining the witnesses for the prosecution displayed none of that righteous wrath,—wrath righteous on behalf of injured innocence,—which is so common with gentlemen employed in the defence of criminals; but bowed and simpered, and nodded at Sir Gregory ...
— Phineas Redux • Anthony Trollope
... Bank to Barnes, &c. with some account of the Regions east of Kensington. By an Inside Passenger. With a Model for a Magazine, being the product of the Author's sojourn at the village of Barnes, during five rainy days." The author is a shrewd, clever fellow, who loves a little raillery on the follies of the day, and joins with our friend, Popanilla in deploring the present artificial state of society; therefore, suppose we give a few flying extracts from his tour, premising that the good ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 13, No. 375, June 13, 1829 • Various
... the day that this swinish multitude were not to be driven by force. They were to be humoured, borne with very patiently: a courteous though sedate manner impressed them; a very rare flash of raillery did good. Severe or continuous mental application they could not, or would not, bear: heavy demand on the memory, the reason, the attention, they rejected point-blank. Where an English girl of not more ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte
... raillery vanished in a moment. "He was a great friend of father's, you know, Harvey; and first he asked father, and father said I was too young, and then when I was leaving school in San Francisco to come home he wrote to me and asked me if he could come ...
— Tessa - 1901 • Louis Becke
... delivered the day before yesterday, and whose baby arrived on the very day the news of the bombardment of Tangier by its father was received. It is a little girl. The Princess de Joinvile passes the whole day kissing her and saying: "How pretty she is!" with that sweet southern accent which the raillery of her brothers-in-law has not yet ...
— The Memoirs of Victor Hugo • Victor Hugo
... They carried water jugs to show they were the Biblical women from Samaria. From their mothers they had borrowed earrings and breast-pins. Their plump legs were ostentatiously exposed in open-work stockings under short Polish peasant skirts. But this was not the occasion for mocking raillery from ...
— Mayflower (Flor de mayo) • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... reasons of his own for disposing of his time in a manner different from what is customary, has to contend against the gossip, the jibes and the mockery of all. Hence, almost all localities have their peculiar characters, whose idiosyncrasies are well known, and who are frequently the subject of raillery, ...
— Bucholz and the Detectives • Allan Pinkerton
... dividing them into portions like the Arabian Nights, and supposing Gog and Magog to entertain each other with such narrations in Guildhall all night long, and to break off every morning at daylight. An almost inexhaustible field of fun, raillery, and interest would be laid open by ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... the faiths and morals of its inexperienced youth, accompany to the Common Hall, and allow to address the students a man who has degraded his powers to the life-labour of sapping and mining the foundations of the truth, and opened the fire of his fiendish raillery against the citadel of our best aspirations ...
— Thomas Carlyle - Biography • John Nichol
... was fond of a joke, and rather given to teazing, and being less guarded than usual, introduced some subject exceedingly unpleasant to young Elwyn. The quick temper of the latter was aroused at once, and he gave a hasty and angry reply. The raillery was pushed still farther; and before those about him had time to interfere, the fatal blow was ...
— Lewie - Or, The Bended Twig • Cousin Cicely
... principal topics of reproach is that he is a grocer, that he has a "pipe in his mouth, ledger-book, green canisters, dingy shop-boy, half a hogshead of brown treacle," &c. Nay, the same delicate raillery is upon the very title-page. When controversy has once commenced upon this footing, as Dr. Johnson said to Dr. Percy, "Sir, there is an end of politeness—we are to be as rude as we please—Sir, you said that I was short-sighted." As a man's profession is generally ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. 6 (of 6) - With his Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... purposely hidden there by Candaules. The king's persistency in begging her not to veil so austerely a face which the gods had made for the admiration of men, his evident vexation upon her refusal to appear in Greek costume at the sacrifices and public solemnities, his unsparing raillery at what he termed her barbarian shyness, all tended to convince her that the young Heracleid had sought to admit some one into those mysteries which should remain secret to all, for without his encouragement no man could ...
— King Candaules • Theophile Gautier
... Guillaume's age and Guillaume's profession. Paul was not a safe man to laugh at. If from time to time, in the way of business, he was obliged to throw a light brighter than he would have preferred on his own character, he did not therefore choose to be made the subject of raillery. And if it was not safe to mock him, neither was it very safe to talk of money to him. The thought of money—of thousands of francs, easily convertible into pounds, marks, dollars, florins, or whatever chanced to be the denomination of the country ...
— Captain Dieppe • Anthony Hope
... manly and the womanly sides of the feminine nature, and, for foundation, there was the profound unity of common blood between them. If Cassandra adored Katharine she was incapable of adoring any one without refreshing her spirit with frequent draughts of raillery and criticism, and Katharine enjoyed her laughter at least ...
— Night and Day • Virginia Woolf
... her raillery, however, was turned upon Mr. Lovelace, on occasion of the character of the people who kept the lodgings, which, she said, I had thought myself so well ...
— Clarissa, Volume 6 (of 9) - The History Of A Young Lady • Samuel Richardson
... But, raillery apart, why access to Juba? For he was owned and received as a lover neither by the father nor by the daughter. Well, but let that pass. Syphax puts Sempronius out of pain immediately; and, being a Numidian, abounding in wiles, supplies him with a stratagem ...
— Lives of the Poets: Addison, Savage, and Swift • Samuel Johnson
... Temptation of changing his Religion for Bread?" And many Citations us'd to be produc'd out of his Writings, as Specimens of his ironical Talent; among which I particularly remember his Ridicule of his Adversary Mr. Alsop, a famous Presbyterian Wit and Divine; whose Book, which was full of low Raillery and Ridicule, he resembles [35] to the Bird of Athens, as made up of Face and Feathers. And the Doctor himself adds, in Justification of the polite Method of Raillery in Controversy, that there is a pleasantness of Wit, which serves to entertain the Reader in the rough and ...
— A Discourse Concerning Ridicule and Irony in Writing (1729) • Anthony Collins
... his unseemly mirth and all his wanton raillery, he stood up with his face a-shine, and spake as if he were the heaven-sent ...
— The Little Colonel's Chum: Mary Ware • Annie Fellows Johnston
... Mr. Pepper, standing on one foot with the other raised on a horse-block, looked on without moving a muscle of his face. The lieutenant was disgusted, but was too weak in his inner man to be capable of instant raillery;—when, on a sudden, the whole aspect of things was changed by the appearance of Mr. ...
— Ralph the Heir • Anthony Trollope
... on one side and four on the other, and two in the middle, which make ten in all,"—raillery in my tones. What the deuce was the matter with everybody ...
— Hearts and Masks • Harold MacGrath
... over the discomfiture of the sheik. Peggy and Brewster found themselves looking sheepishly at one another now and then in the course of the recital. She purposely had avoided him during the evening, but she had gamely endured the raillery that came from the rest of the party. If she was a bit pale, it was not surprising. Now that it was over the whole affair appalled her more than she could have suspected. When several of the guests of the evening soberly announced that Mohammed ...
— Brewster's Millions • George Barr McCutcheon
... of our landlord's family who plays, I doubt not,' Emily, as she listened, thought he could be scarcely less than a professor of music whom she heard; and the sweet and plaintive strains soon lulled her into a reverie, from which she was very unwillingly roused by the raillery of Cavigni, and by the voice of Montoni, who gave orders to a servant to have the carriages ready at an early hour on the following morning; and added, that he meant ...
— The Mysteries of Udolpho • Ann Radcliffe
... were great conversationalists, their racy raillery is said to have been as good as their plays. They were members of the celebrated Mermaid Club in Fleet Street, a centre where the wits of the day sharpened their humour in friendly conflict. In his epistle ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 1 (of 2) - With an Introduction upon Ancient Humour • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... upon our friend. He is homesick. Trot over the hill and bring to him the petite Medaine! Ah oui," he laughed in immense enjoyment at his raillery, "bring to him the petite Medaine to make him laugh and be happy." Then, seeing that the man was struggling vainly for a semblance of cheeriness, he slid beside him on the bench and tousled his hair with one big hand. "Nev' min' old Ba'teese," he said hurriedly; "he joke when eet ...
— The White Desert • Courtney Ryley Cooper
... kitchen?" asked the Duchessa, a faint spark of raillery kindling amid the forlornness of ...
— The Cardinal's Snuff-Box • Henry Harland
... had a simple taste in raillery, was so convulsed by this jesting that she put down her tray in order to laugh at ease; and chiefly because she was laughing, ...
— The Devil's Garden • W. B. Maxwell
... adventure; he took things as they came, and now that he knew the girl for what she was he did not allow himself the slightest liberty. He was a fervent suitor, to be sure, yet he courted her with jests and concealed his ardor behind a playful raillery. ...
— The Auction Block • Rex Beach
... had pronounced upon his little paragon. All the flattering attention which was shown her, and it was a good deal, could not draw Fleda a line beyond the dignified simplicity which seemed natural to her; any more than the witty attempts at raillery and endeavours to amuse themselves at her expense, in which some of the gentlemen showed their wisdom, could move her from her modest self-possession. Very quiet, very modest, as she invariably was, awkwardness could not fasten upon her; her colour might come and her timid eye fall it ...
— Queechy, Volume I • Elizabeth Wetherell
... peculiar little sister of mine clings to some of her childish beliefs and pleasures in spite of Prue's preaching and my raillery," began Mark, after a refreshing whiff or two. "She is overflowing with love and good will, but being too shy or too proud to offer it to her fellow-creatures, she expends it upon the necessitous inhabitants of ...
— Moods • Louisa May Alcott
... looked searchingly into Carter's eyes and laughed in faint raillery; he partially understood. His reply was evasive. "It is not every one," he said, "who can gain a throne by marrying a pretty girl." Shrugging his shoulders, he abruptly left his companions and approached ...
— Trusia - A Princess of Krovitch • Davis Brinton
... yet not to employ any depth of shadowing. This is the mystery of that noble trade, which yet no master can teach to his apprentice; he may give the rules, but the scholar is never the nearer in his practice; neither is it true, that this fineness of raillery is offensive. A witty man is tickled, while he is hurt, in this manner, and a fool feels it not: the occasion of an offence may possibly be given, but he cannot take it. If it be granted, that, in effect, this way does more mischief—that a man is secretly wounded, and, though he be not ...
— A Voyage to the Moon • George Tucker
... happiness that surrounded him like a mist, he caught the bitterness under her raillery. It ...
— A Poor Wise Man • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... centuries and beliefs; this rude country of farmers and pioneers, has nothing fitted to please us. It has the exuberant life and the eccentricities of youth; that is, it affords to our mature experience inexhaustible subjects of blame and raillery. ...
— The Uprising of a Great People • Count Agenor de Gasparin
... tripping measure, sometimes loosely constructed, or purposely halting and broken, well adapted to vituperation, unrestrained by any regard to morality and decency. At the public tables of Sparta keen and pointed raillery was permitted, and some of the most venerable and sacred of their religious rites afforded occasion for their unsparing and audacious jests. This raillery was so ancient and inveterate a custom, that it had given rise to a peculiar word, ...
— Handbook of Universal Literature - From The Best and Latest Authorities • Anne C. Lynch Botta
... sacrament at Notre Dame was a novel sight to the Parisians, and many attended as if it were a theatrical representation. Many, also, especially amongst the military, found it rather a matter of raillery than of edification; and those who, during the Revolution, had contributed all their strength to the overthrow of the worship which the First Consul had just re-established, could with difficulty conceal ...
— The Private Life of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Constant
... the Old Boys in the evening as he had disappointed the school by day. We had looked to him for a noble raillery, a lofty and loyal disdain, and he had fobbed us off with friendly personalities not even in impeccable taste. Nevertheless, this light treatment of a grave offence went far to restore the natural amenities of the occasion. It was impossible even for Nasmyth to reply to it as he might to a ...
— A Thief in the Night • E. W. Hornung
... evening of his stay at the Sherwoods', and, in spite of Gussie's raillery, he was silent and sad; even Guy could ...
— Miss Dexie - A Romance of the Provinces • Stanford Eveleth
... felt that she was being ridiculed and treated as though she were an incapable doll. She divined that by his raillery he had been making fun of her, and forthwith her predilection was turned to resentment. Not nurse her husband? Did this brow-beating doctor realize that, as a girl, she had been the constant attendant of her invalid ...
— Unleavened Bread • Robert Grant
... For although the queen had ordered a little equipage of all things necessary for me, while I was in her service, yet my ideas were wholly taken up with what I saw on every side of me, and I winked at my own littleness, as people do at their own faults. The captain understood my raillery very well, and merrily replied that he did not observe my stomach so good, although I had fasted all day; and, continuing in his mirth, protested he would have gladly given a hundred pounds to have seen my closet in the eagle's bill, and afterwards in its fall from so great a height into the sea; ...
— Gulliver's Travels - Into Several Remote Regions of the World • Jonathan Swift
... his friend's raillery, proceeded to relate with much vivacity and graphic fervor the occurrences of the morning. Lorimer listened patiently with a forbearing smile on his open, ruddy countenance. When he had heard everything he looked ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... the nature and extent of the excisions to which the bulk of the correspondence was subjected. The result was a curious obscuration of some of Arnold's most characteristic traits—such, for example, as his over-flowing gaiety, and his love of what our fathers called Raillery. And, in even more important respects than these, an erroneous impression was created by the suppression of what was thought too personal for publication. Thus I remember to have read, in some one's criticism of the Letters, that Mr. Arnold appeared to have loved his parents, brothers, sisters, ...
— Matthew Arnold • G. W. E. Russell
... of the heart—for this was a serious and most unlooked-for event, and for a while put out of his head all the agitating thoughts of the last few hours. Poor Titmouse had enough to bear—what with the delicate raillery and banter of his refined companions for the rest of the day, find the galling tyranny of Mr. Tag-rag, (who dogged him about all day, setting him about the most menial and troublesome offices he could, and constantly ...
— Ten Thousand a-Year. Volume 1. • Samuel Warren
... the past and bring out in fresh colors the staring eyes and mummied cheeks which would otherwise soon be lost to memory. She certainly made the most of her opportunity to taunt and tease him, for there was time for a laugh and a word of raillery only, to which he seemed too shamefaced to respond, before she was at our side again, gravely announcing, "My lady's chamber!"—and as we looked around the apartment, whose furniture and decorations imparted to it a superior air of neatness and refinement to ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 80, June, 1864 • Various
... Beyond' is a brilliant parody, and the other sketches are all of Mr. Leacock's very best, 'Homer and Humbug' being as fine a piece of raillery as Mr. Leacock has written. Mr. Leacock is a humorist of the first rank, unique in his own sphere, and this volume will add ...
— Winsome Winnie and other New Nonsense Novels • Stephen Leacock
... puffed with pride, as it appeared in the brilliant lights and gorgeous appointments of the palatial supper-hall, within twenty-four hours the lacerating indignation of Mr. Watterson and the trenchant raillery of Mr. Bryan had let the tumid pretentiousness all out of it, and it had collapsed into a flaccid and "innocuous desuetude." The "star-eyed goddess" turned her back upon it, the "wild-orbed anarch" snapped his fingers at it, and even everyday ...
— The Arena - Volume 18, No. 92, July, 1897 • Various
... complaints. The learned had their plagiarisms detected, and the wit had his claims disputed. Sarasin called the gazettes of this new Aristarchus, Hebdomadary Flams! Billevesees hebdomadaires! and Menage having published a law book, which Sallo had treated with severe raillery, he entered into a long argument to prove, according to Justinian, that a lawyer is not allowed to defame another lawyer, &c.: Senatori maledicere non licet, remaledicere jus fasque est. Others loudly declaimed against this new species of imperial tyranny, and this attempt to regulate ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli
... political. The Roundheads, a masterly pasquinade, shows the Puritans, near ancestors of the Whigs, in their most odious and veritable colours. The City Heiress lampoons Shaftesbury and his cit following in exquisite caricature. The wit and humour, the pointed raillery never coarsening into mere invective and zany burlesque, place this in the very front rank of her comedies.[36] The False Count, the third play of this year, is non-political, and she has herein borrowed a suggestion from Moliere. ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. I (of 6) • Aphra Behn
... little group. Such was his gusto that he did not seem to notice the lukewarmness of the father's and son's greeting. Mr. Giddings introduced John, Paul, and Tom, and then the publisher of the Clarion continued with good-humored raillery: "I'm mighty glad to see you fellows here, for I began to think you would get scared and flunk us at the last moment. Was over on the hotel veranda when I saw a plane land here, and I guessed it might be you, and hurried right over. Put ...
— Around the World in Ten Days • Chelsea Curtis Fraser
... and baked—principally boiled—we could see not only the suite of rooms reserved for the great man and his party—one end of the inn, really, with a separate entrance—but we could see, too, part of the tap-room, with its rows of bottles, and could hear the laughter and raillery of the barmaid as she served the droppers-in and loungers-about. We caught, as well, the small square hall, flanked by the black-oak counter, behind which were banked bottles of various shapes and sizes, rows of pewter tankards and the like, the whole made comfortable with ...
— A Gentleman's Gentleman - 1909 • F. Hopkinson Smith
... anything more than merely interesting. The persons gain our attention by following their own aims, which resemble ours; the action advances by means of intrigue and the play of character and incident; while wit and raillery season ...
— The Art of Literature • Arthur Schopenhauer
... night. The men were in high spirits; they talked very loudly and laughed. They made facetious and good-humored ironical remarks to the boy about his adventure, which evidently they did not believe in. The boy accepted their raillery with seriousness, making no reply. He had a sense of the fitness of things and knew that one who professes to have seen a dead man rise from his seat and blow out a candle is not a ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Vol. II: In the Midst of Life: Tales of Soldiers and Civilians • Ambrose Bierce
... wore such foul linen, replied, he could get no other, for the Pope had made his washerwoman a princess,—meaning thereby the Pope's sister, Donna Camilla, who had formerly been a laundress, but was now established with a fortune and a palace. "This stinging piece of raillery was carried directly to his Holiness, who ordered a strict search to be made for the author, but to no purpose. Upon which he stuck up printed papers in all the public places of the city, promising, upon the word of a Pope, to give the author ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. VI.,October, 1860.—No. XXXVI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... It contained nothing but the ring. Unmitigated by any word of greeting, remembrance, or even raillery, it seemed almost an insult. Had she intended to flaunt his folly in his face, or had she believed he still mourned for it and deemed its recovery a sufficient reward for his slight service? For an instant he felt tempted to follow Charley's advice, ...
— Frontier Stories • Bret Harte
... (fallen miserably between two stools) on the back. 'There's a champion for you!' he cried. 'Beauty in distress! Lord! how it fires his blood and turns his look to flame! What! going, Tommy?' he continued, as Mr. Thomasson, unable to bear his raillery or the girl's fiery scorn, turned and fled ignobly. 'Well, my pretty dear, I see we are to be left alone. And, damme! quite right too, for we are the only man and the only woman of the party, and should come ...
— The Castle Inn • Stanley John Weyman
... me from a bitterness of chagrin from which I was happy to escape. We dined together. His flow of spirits and raillery were unabating; I combated his opinions, he laughed at my arguments, rather than answered them, and, though I even then conceived him to be a very bad moralist, I ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... that Mrs. Edmonstone should confide such a subject to her son, but she knew that in a case really affecting his sister, and thus introduced, his silence was secure. In fact, confidence was the only way to prevent the shrewd, unscrupulous raillery which would have caused great distress, and perhaps led to the very disclosure to be deprecated. Of late, too, there had been such a decrease of petulance in Charles, as justified her in trusting him, and lastly, it must be ...
— The Heir of Redclyffe • Charlotte M. Yonge
... thing in principle is, as far as meaning goes, subject to different constructions; as is exemplified by those in the world whose heart is set upon lewdness. Some delight solely in faces and figures; others find insatiable pleasure in singing and dancing; some in dalliance and raillery; others in the incessant indulgence of their lusts; and these regret that all the beautiful maidens under the heavens cannot minister to their short-lived pleasure. These several kinds of persons are foul objects ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... the Medici, where commerce, literature, and the arts made one of the most splendid, useful, and powerful coalitions that ever were seen in modern times. Here is a fine sentence! Mr. Hammond once, when piqued by my raillery, declared that he never in his life saw, or could have conceived, till he saw me, that a philosopher could laugh so ...
— The Life And Letters Of Maria Edgeworth, Vol. 1 • Maria Edgeworth
... changes of expression now visible in every countenance, no language can portray. Only twenty hours ago, and all was hope and animation; wherever you went, you were enlivened by the sounds of merriment and raillery. The expected attack was mentioned, not only in terms of sanguine hope, but in perfect confidence as to the result. Now gloom and discontent everywhere prevailed. Disappointment, grief, indignation and rage succeeded each ...
— The Battle of New Orleans • Zachary F. Smith
... of mockery relieved the servility of his manner. To save himself he had the habit of leaving his flattery open to the interpretation of raillery. But Corley ...
— Dubliners • James Joyce
... raillery, Sir Knights," said Fitzurse;—"and it were well," he added, addressing the Prince, "that your highness should assure the worthy Cedric there is no insult intended him by jests, which must sound but harshly in the ear ...
— Ivanhoe - A Romance • Walter Scott
... complicated machinery within the inner man,—the harsh and dissonant voice. and the screech-owl notes to which it was exalted when he was exhorted to pronounce more distinctly,— all added fresh subject for mirth to the torn cloak and shattered shoe, which have afforded legitimate subjects of raillery against the poor scholar, from Juvenal's time downward. It was never known that Sampson either exhibited irritability at this ill usage, or made the least attempt to retort upon his tormentors. He slunk from college by the most secret paths he could ...
— Guy Mannering • Sir Walter Scott
... printed in all pomp, with the inscription, which makes me proudest. It will be attended with proeme, prolegomena, testimonia scriptorum, index authorum, and notes variorum. As to the latter, I desire you to read over the text, and make a few in any way you like best; whether dry raillery, upon the style and way of commenting of trivial critics; or humourous, upon the authors in the poem; or historical, of persons, places, times; or explanatory, or collecting the parallel passages of the ancients. Adieu. ...
— Selected English Letters (XV - XIX Centuries) • Various |
