"Shyness" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... some of our most interesting wild animals, and especially of the badger, is to be accounted for by their extreme shyness. They venture abroad only when the shadows of night lie over the woods. For countless years, dogs and men have been their greatest foes, and their fear of them is found to be almost as strong in remote districts as where, near towns, their existence ...
— Creatures of the Night - A Book of Wild Life in Western Britain • Alfred W. Rees
... told him nothing. There had been a modest shyness about her in their relations that had kept him at ...
— The Harbor of Doubt • Frank Williams
... back. "I'll—I'll be warm enough." But laughingly, triumphantly, he seized her and thrust her arms in the sleeves, his fingers pressing against her. Overcome by shyness, she drew away ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... in a round of religious exercises without relaxation or relief. On fine summer evenings, as the sensible Lady Hesketh saw with dismay, instead of a walk, there was a prayer-meeting. Cowper himself was made to do violence to his intense shyness by leading in prayer. He was also made to visit the poor at once on spiritual missions, and on that of almsgiving, for which Thornton, the religious philanthropist, supplied Newton and his disciples with means. This, which ...
— Cowper • Goldwin Smith
... best people. The champion still wore the costume of the morning, in place of evening dress, save that long stockings and dancing-pumps had taken the place of riding-boots. Rena went through the ordeal very creditably. Her shyness was palpable, but it was saved from awkwardness by her native grace and good sense. She made up in modesty what she lacked in aplomb. Her months in school had not eradicated a certain self-consciousness born of her secret. The brain-cells never lose the impressions ...
— The House Behind the Cedars • Charles W. Chesnutt
... boy, with that shyness which we all have come to know in the boys who actually did, "I guess it was a close call, all right. But just as you left us, a hospital corps happened to come along on its way to the back and Miss Nelson—the nurse, you remember?—she ...
— The Americanization of Edward Bok - The Autobiography of a Dutch Boy Fifty Years After • Edward William Bok (1863-1930)
... with the children on the street, her sole diversion, except when playing at home among her father's possessions or making a visit to Kitty, being found in the books of fairy-tales which the old hunchback, Tim Kelsey, had lent her. At first this natural shyness had held her aloof even from O'Day, content only to watch his face as he answered her childish appeals. But before the first week had passed she had slipped her hand into his, and before the month was over ...
— Felix O'Day • F. Hopkinson Smith
... not help colouring slightly. 'No; she is only a schoolfellow who is staying with us,' she replied; and the lady thought she had never met with such an unapproachable girl, and wondered whether it was shyness or pride. She had no idea that she was touching ...
— Sarah's School Friend • May Baldwin
... with a paper-covered book on her knees. She was eating something from a little white box on the window-sill. The boy was at another window, also with a book in which he did not seem to be interested. He looked up at me, as I entered, with a most peculiar expression of mingled innocence and shyness which was almost terror. I could not see why the boy should possibly be afraid of me, but I learned afterward that it was either his natural attitude or natural expression. He was either afraid of every ...
— The Jamesons • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... for a week, making his home at his publishers' house in Fleet Street. With great difficulty Mr. Taylor persuaded him to meet a party of friends and admirers at dinner. It was impossible for him to overcome with one effort his natural shyness, but the cordial manner in which he was welcomed by Mr. Taylor's guests put him comparatively at his ease, for he was made to feel that the labourer was forgotten in the poet and that he was regarded as an equal. The host ...
— Life and Remains of John Clare - "The Northamptonshire Peasant Poet" • J. L. Cherry
... preference on her part for age; and it kept her out of the old man's sight, and in the direct range of Willan's eyes as he conversed with his friend. When she had occasion to hand anything to Willan she did so with an apparent shyness which was captivating; and the tone of voice in which she spoke to him ...
— Between Whiles • Helen Hunt Jackson
... and was dressed in an anaemic gray; her thin hay-coloured hair was combed straight back from a rather fine forehead. She stooped a little when she walked, and even when not employed her hands picked nervously at each other. Martha's shyness, the "unappearing" quality, was another of her virtues in the eyes of Tom's mother. Martha rarely left home even to go to Millford. Martha did not go to the Agricultural Fair when her mats and quilts and butter and darning and buttonholes on cotton got their red tickets. ...
— Sowing Seeds in Danny • Nellie L. McClung
... a very troublesome and vicious habit of turning round suddenly,—we do not here allude to shyness, but restiveness,—without exhibiting any previous symptom of their intention. A horse soon ascertains that the left hand is weaker than the right, and, consequently, less able to oppose him; he, therefore, turns on the off side, and with such force and suddenness, that it is almost impossible, even ...
— The Young Lady's Equestrian Manual • Anonymous
... things were, to come down to Ford House on this sultry day and sit under the shadow of the hornbeam, with Leam looking her loveliest by his side, and butterfly-like Fina running in and out in the joyous way of a lively child fond of movement and not afflicted with shyness; delightful to feel that he was enacting a little poem unknown to all the world beside—that he was the magician who had first wakened this young soul into life and taught it the sweet suffering of love; and delightful to know that he was king ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XVII. No. 101. May, 1876. • Various
... give orders, so, as an experiment, she called out 'Waiter! Bring back the pudding!' and there it was again in a moment like a conjuring-trick. It was so large that she couldn't help feeling a LITTLE shy with it, as she had been with the mutton; however, she conquered her shyness by a great effort and cut a slice and handed ...
— Through the Looking-Glass • Charles Dodgson, AKA Lewis Carroll
... not help perceiving the slight touch of sarcasm in his tone. She saw he was hurt by her coldness and shyness, and that made her still more cold and shy. Without another word she walked before him to the drawing-room, where Mrs. Belding still sat in her rocking-chair, moaning and wringing her hands. Mr. Temple was standing beside her trying to soothe her, telling her ...
— The Bread-winners - A Social Study • John Hay
... Cornelius's drawings to Goethe's mighty Faust when she utters the words, "Bin weder Fraeulein noch schoen"[15] (I am neither a lady of rank, nor yet beautiful), so also may Rose have looked when in the shyness of her pure chaste heart she felt compelled to shun addresses that smacked ...
— Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... school today—a solitary figure, clad in the latest fashion, moodily pacing the Hammersmith Road—and asked myself "where among these is the girlish gush of a Bentley—the passionate volubility of a Vernede, the half-ethereal shyness of a Fordham?!!" I admitted that we had had misfortunes, one of us had a serious illness, another had had a very good story in the Strand Magazine: but I thought that a debating club of 12 members that had given three presidents to the University Unions, had not done badly. The rest was sentimental. ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Maisie Ward
... she's purty," protested the boy with a quick palpitant shyness, "an' most people l——," he stopped trying to talk, laughing brusquely and flushing with ...
— Sally of Missouri • R. E. Young
... a little shy of Cosmo—he had been away so long! but at intervals her shyness would yield and she would talk to him with much the same freedom as of old when they went to school together. In his rambles Cosmo would not pass her grandfather's cottage without going in to inquire ...
— Warlock o' Glenwarlock • George MacDonald
... who, following the direction of her eyes, wheeled round suddenly to discover his son's strange bearing, "Have you lost all the manners as well as the notions of a gentleman, these last two years? Speak to Madame de Savenaye, sir!—Cecile, this is my son; pray forgive him, my dear; the fellow's shyness before ladies is inconceivable. It makes a perfect fool of him, ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... opportunities of education, and she was therefore far less advanced in knowledge than most of her companions. Numberless were the mortifications to which she was obliged to submit on account of her ignorance, while her timidity and shyness increased in proportion to the reproofs of her teachers, and the ridicule of her schoolfellows. She at length came to be regarded as one of those hopelessly dull pupils who are to be found cumbering the benches of every large school, and but for her father's wealth and honorable ...
— Mrs Whittelsey's Magazine for Mothers and Daughters - Volume 3 • Various
... the tiny frill of her thin garment, looked at the broad-shouldered handsome girl Manella who had just brought in her breakfast tray and now stood regarding her with an odd expression of mingled admiration and shyness. ...
— The Secret Power • Marie Corelli
... whom the newcomers gazed in surprise but without recognition. He was a little man dressed in the costume of the backwoods, a belted buckskin shirt, leggings, and moccasins, and a coonskin cap. He hesitated, as though from shyness, as he glanced irresolutely about him. Then Gladwyn, stepping quickly forward, took ...
— At War with Pontiac - The Totem of the Bear • Kirk Munroe and J. Finnemore
... up to say how glad he was to see the traveller back again; and on her way to school Miss Moore looked in with a merry greeting; then Emma and the General were waylaid in the hall and introduced, the former in a dreadful fit of shyness; and last, Miss Sherwin was pounced upon and dragged reluctantly into ...
— The Spectacle Man - A Story of the Missing Bridge • Mary F. Leonard
... but to Lydia this unpolished manner seemed only the result of extreme shyness, and, indeed, embarrassment, which to her appeared proof positive ...
— Run to Earth - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... dear,' whispered Mary, trying in her turn to stop him, with English shyness about tender topics. But he took the soft hand in his, and proudly surveying the one ring it wore, went on with the air of an ...
— Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott
... confidence shaken in the landlord's powers of discrimination, we sent word below that if Anton had returned we should be glad to speak with him. He had been in the village to visit his cousins, but was waiting our orders below. Although his native shyness made it hard for him to step forward and address ladies under the curious gaze of all the relative Seppls and Barthels, he did it with manliness, and turning round and addressing the popular old man as Hansel, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - Vol. XI, No. 27, June, 1873 • Various
... violent language, but formed his judgments and bided his time for acting on them. This sometimes looked like a lack of frankness, and there were times when a warm but honest altercation would have cleared the air and removed misunderstandings. It was really due to a sort of shyness which was curiously blended with remarkable faith in himself. From behind his wall of taciturnity he was on the alert to see what was within sight, and to form opinions of men and things that rooted ...
— Military Reminiscences of the Civil War V2 • Jacob Dolson Cox
... suffered for the cause," said Miss Pringle. "I have suffered for it, too!" And, with a certain shyness, she patted Lady Agatha on the arm. But the next ...
— The Cruise of the Jasper B. • Don Marquis
... he disabled Berry's own gentility for that reason, and easily learning much of the law-student's wild past in the West from so eager an autobiographer, he could not comfort himself with his friendship. While the student poured out his autobiography without stint upon Lemuel, his shyness only deepened upon the boy. There were things in his life for which he was in equal fear of discovery: his arrest and trial in the police court, his mother's queerness, and his servile condition at Miss Vane's. The thought that Mr. Sewell knew about ...
— The Minister's Charge • William D. Howells
... were possible? Such a young girl as this it was whom I was now seeing every day and all day. The charm she exercised over me was no doubt partly owing to my own peculiar temperament—to my own hatred of self-consciousness and to an innate shyness which is apt to make me feel at times that people are watching me, when they most likely are doing nothing ...
— Aylwin • Theodore Watts-Dunton
... she went to the small room at the back of the large room to prepare it. He thought it would be a good plan to ask the girl if she would care to have her tea with him, but a sudden shyness prevented him from doing so, and he was unable to say more than "Thank you" when she put the teapot by his side. There was plenty for two on the table, he said to himself: a loaf and a bap and some soda-farls and a potato cake and the half of a barn-brack and ...
— The Foolish Lovers • St. John G. Ervine
... kneeling upright, and said urgently, "Jason, listen. We are close to Carthon, the others can lead them the rest of the way. Why go back to them at all? Slip away now and never go back! We can—" she stopped, coloring fiercely, that sudden and terrifying shyness overcoming her again, and at last she said in a whisper, "Darkover is a wide world, Jason. Big enough for us to hide in. I don't believe they ...
— The Planet Savers • Marion Zimmer Bradley
... back into herself again in a sudden fit of shyness. But she could not bear to keep silent, she simply longed to speak to somebody about it all. If only she could—dared—say to him, "In a secret chamber of the loft there stands an old chest, and ...
— Absolution • Clara Viebig
... expected his pupil to learn, his expectations were surpassed. The girl beyond clearing up the room had nothing to do, and she devoted herself with enthusiasm to this work. Once she had mastered simple words and felt her own progress, her shyness as to her ignorance left her. She always carried her book in her pocket, and took to asking girls the pronunciation of larger words, and begging them to read a few lines to her; and sitting on the door-step poring over her book, she would salute any passer-by with: "Please tell ...
— Facing Death - The Hero of the Vaughan Pit. A Tale of the Coal Mines • G. A. Henty
... over her that the man she was going to meet she scarcely knew! Shyness seized her, a shyness that bordered on panic. And what was he really like, that she should put her whole trust in him? She glanced behind her: that way was closed: she had a mad desire to get away, to hide, to think. It must have been an ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... Cairnforth, with its familiar and yet long unfamiliar liveries, produced a keen sensation among the simple folk who formed the congregation of Cairnforth. But they had too much habitual respect for the great house and great folk of the place, mingled with their national shyness and independence, to stare very much. A few moved aside to make way for the two grand Edinburg footmen who leaped down from their perch in order to render customary assistance to the occupants ...
— A Noble Life • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
... a flush smoothed out all the fine wrinkles on her brow, but with the pathetic shyness of a woman who has never been caressed she let his hand fall stiffly from her arm and ...
— The Deliverance; A Romance of the Virginia Tobacco Fields • Ellen Glasgow
... Madame's presence would have awed her back to her own realm of the vestibule and the cabinet—for mine, or that of any other teacher or pupil, she cared not a jot. Smart, trim and pert, she stood, a hand in each pocket of her gay grisette apron, eyeing Dr. John with no more fear or shyness than if he had been a picture instead ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte
... found his shyness was mistaken for indifference. He was civil to everybody, but intimate with none. He attached himself to no party, paired off with no individuals. He sought nobody. On the other hand, the persons who went out ...
— Grey Roses • Henry Harland
... trustworthy, but he had an extraordinary amount of moral in addition to physical courage. If any complaint were made, and Saat was called as a witness—far from the shyness too often evinced when the accuser is brought face to face with the accused—such was Saat's proudest moment; and, no matter who the man might be, the boy would challenge him, regardless of all consequences. We were very fond of this boy; he was thoroughly good; and ...
— The Albert N'Yanza, Great Basin of the Nile • Sir Samuel White Baker
... illness from which he had risen with a weak spine, and ever-working brain, and a quiet heart, he had shown himself not merely a good sort of man, for such he had always been, but a religious man; not by saying much, for he was modest even to shyness with grown people, but by the solemnity of his look when a great word was spoken, by his unblamable behaviour, and by the readiness with which he would lend or give of his small earnings to his poor neighbours. The only thing of which anybody could complain was his temper; ...
— Gutta-Percha Willie • George MacDonald
... what was the matter, for I had seen a similar case before. Yet for the moment a certain feeling of shyness made me edge away from her a little; and as I did so, she uttered a prolonged moan, and her almost bursting eyeballs vented hot, murky tears which trickled down her tense and ...
— Through Russia • Maxim Gorky
... grotesque playfulness was succeeded by equally sudden and grotesque bashfulness; now an eager intrepidity of wild enthusiasm, defying all decorum, and then a sour, severe reserve, full of angry and terrified suspicion of imaginary improprieties. Tittering shyness, all giggle-goggle and blush; stony and stolid stupidity, impenetrable to a ray of perception; awkward, angular postures and gestures, and jerking saltatory motions; Brobdingnag strides and straddles, and kittenish frolics and friskings; sharp, shrill little ...
— Records of a Girlhood • Frances Anne Kemble
... but Donal, who held her trembling in his arms as they drove through the crowded streets in the shabby neighbourhood she had never seen before, to the house crowded between others all like itself. She had actually not heard the young chaplain's name in her shyness and tremor. He would scarcely have been an entity but for the one moving fact that he himself had just hastily married a girl he adored and must leave, and so sympathised and understood the stress of their hour. On their way home they had been afraid of chance recognition and had tried ...
— Robin • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... his flame, That placid dame, The Moon's Celestial Highness; There's not a trace Upon her face Of diffidence or shyness: She borrows light That, through the night, Mankind may all acclaim her! And, truth to tell, She lights up well, So I, for ...
— Bab Ballads and Savoy Songs • W. S. Gilbert
... little shyness in greeting my father, whom she did not remember. Her complexion was slightly pink, and her half-open lips smiled with that smile which makes one think of the Infinite— perhaps because it betrays no particular thought, and expresses ...
— The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard • Anatole France
... it should be already fixed," she replied, without a smile. "Perhaps it is unreasonable in me to expect it in you as a man, when you had so little of it as a boy; but I used to think it was only shyness then, and always hoped you would outgrow that and gradually become an ideal lover. You have such a multitude of other perfections, however, that it may be nature has denied you this so that I may be reminded that ...
— Daybreak: A Romance of an Old World • James Cowan
... the town and grew quickly tired when he tried to follow other boys about. On the river bank he lay beside Hugh in silence. The two got into Hugh's boat and went fishing and the merchant's son grew animated and talked. He taught Hugh to write his own name and to read a few words. The shyness that kept them apart had begun to break down, when the merchant's son caught ...
— Poor White • Sherwood Anderson
... their friendship. She was rather shy of the girls at first, for she had scarcely known childish comrades, and her old-fashioned ideas and mature way of speaking often brought a laugh from the others, but her shyness soon wore off and she quickly acquired a style of speech at which her grandparents sometimes frowned, for it included some bits of slang which had never found their way ...
— Little Maid Marian • Amy E. Blanchard
... usual. She sat very quiet as he gathered up the reins, and it was not until they were well on their way along the Trumansburg road that the boy turned to her. How beautiful she looked, her shoulders completely covered with dusky-dark curls and her head bowed in maidenly shyness! All his doubts as to the expediency of his act were set at rest. She was deeply essential to his happiness, to his progress. To know she was his wife, married to him, so that none could separate them, would make his absences from Tessibel much easier to bear. He had in the ...
— The Secret of the Storm Country • Grace Miller White
... to have an instinctive perception of the point on the horizon toward which we ought to direct our course. Antelope were bounding on all sides, and as is always the case in the presence of buffalo, they seemed to have lost their natural shyness and timidity. Bands of them would run lightly up the rocky declivities, and stand gazing down upon us from the summit. At length we could distinguish the tall white rocks and the old pine trees that, as we well remembered, were just above the site of the encampment. Still, we could see nothing ...
— The Oregon Trail • Francis Parkman, Jr.
... girls, with dimples in the roses of their cheeks—drew nearer, as if lured by admiration of the ladies. Nell and Phyllis, seeing them, beckoned, and the fair creatures obeyed the summons with an appearance of shyness. They too, were photographed; and after many politenesses had been exchanged, Starr came to ask if I thought the dear things' feelings would be hurt by a small offering ...
— The Chauffeur and the Chaperon • C. N. Williamson
... meet a woman! Her picture was in his pocket, in his brain, in his blood. A vast shyness, coming to consternation, seized him. He felt a sense of personal guilt; and yet a feeling of indignity and injustice claimed him. But all this and all his sullen anger was wiped out in this great shyness of a man not used to facing women. Sim Gage was product of a womanless ...
— The Sagebrusher - A Story of the West • Emerson Hough
... moment, though Eyebright still felt a little qualm of shyness and fear at the thought of the unknown Mrs. Joyce. "How horrible it would be if she didn't like me when I get there!" she said ...
— Eyebright - A Story • Susan Coolidge
... characters, habits and tastes which comes by instinct with women, and which even the longest practice rarely teaches in similar perfection to men. She saw at a glance all the underlying tenderness and generosity concealed beneath Owen's external shyness, irresolution, and occasional reserve; and, from first to last, even in her gayest moments, there was always a certain quietly-implied consideration—an easy, graceful, delicate deference—in her manner toward ...
— The Queen of Hearts • Wilkie Collins
... this corner with her husband, Elinor Worthington was all herself. She glowed like a rose, with none of the little stiffness in her manner she so often unfortunately showed to strangers and which only the discerning few correctly named as shyness. To the majority of people she was likely to ...
— The Heart of Arethusa • Francis Barton Fox
... precisely the mingling of banter, and earnestness, of archness, devotion, shyness and fervor implied in the Latin words ...
— Andivius Hedulio • Edward Lucas White
... from her forehead and hung in a heavy braid down her back. She wore a very plain black velvet dress with a broad white collar and cuffs, and with her clear blue eyes and straight features she made a strikingly handsome picture, and although she spoke in her same soft melodious voice—all trace of shyness was gone. After the greetings were over, and everybody was comfortably settled, ...
— Polly's Senior Year at Boarding School • Dorothy Whitehill
... their best work on a character of great rectitude and uprightness, even tending to severity, such as softened with advancing years. Remarkably handsome, and with a high-bred tone of manners, he was almost an ideal country gentleman, with, however, something of stiffness and shyness in early youth, which wore off in later years. In 1826 he became member for the county ...
— John Keble's Parishes • Charlotte M Yonge
... sounded close by Betty's side. She recognized it, and an unaccountable sensation of shyness suddenly came over her. She had firmly made up her mind, should Mr. Clarke ask her to dance, that she would tell him she was tired, or engaged for that number—anything so that she could avoid dancing with him. But, now that the moment had come she either forgot her resolution ...
— Betty Zane • Zane Grey
... seat and came round to her side of the table. He had a vague intention of imprisoning her hand, and perhaps her waist, but some indescribable quality held him off. It was difficult to suppose she did not half guess what was in his mind, and yet, without showing the smallest consciousness or shyness, she faced him with a look so boyishly frank and open it utterly ...
— Winding Paths • Gertrude Page
... it's lovely! lovely!" She had forgotten her shyness. She was running round the room like a delighted child looking at the pictures and ornaments with which ...
— The Beggar Man • Ruby Mildred Ayres
... to me, even as a dear child, that I fasten her garment again upon the shoulders. And she did be both shy and glad, and humble, and in dainty pride of submission, and utter Mine Own. And surely, as I did this thing for her, I perceived that she lookt with a great shyness at the belt which did be yet in my hand. And when that I had made an end of fastening her garment, she did nestle unto me for a while, and afterward stood away and made shyly to show me that I put her belt again about her ...
— The Night Land • William Hope Hodgson
... for she saw the boy reddening with embarrassment and she went across and shook hands with him, taking in with a glance his coarse strange clothes and his soiled hands and face and his tangled hair, but pleased at once with his shyness and his dark eyes. She was really never surprised at any caprice of her brother, and she did not show much interest when the Major went on to tell where he had found the lad—for she would have thought it quite possible ...
— The Little Shepherd of Kingdom Come • John Fox
... chief, headed the line. His step was firm, his head erect, his face calm in its noble austerity. His followers likewise expressed in their countenances the steadfastness of their belief. The maidens' heads were bowed, but with shyness, not fear. The children were happy, their bright faces expressive of the joy they felt in the anticipation of listening ...
— The Spirit of the Border - A Romance of the Early Settlers in the Ohio Valley • Zane Grey
... this miracle, the young man turned to Sally. Gallant, one might say reckless, as he had been a moment before, he now gave indications of a rather pleasing shyness. He braced himself with that painful air of effort which announces to the world that an Englishman is about to speak a language other ...
— The Adventures of Sally • P. G. Wodehouse
... I was only going to suggest—" Elaine hesitated, with a little of her old-time shyness. "I was only going to say that if you couldn't do any better, ...
— Peggy Raymond's Vacation - or Friendly Terrace Transplanted • Harriet L. (Harriet Lummis) Smith
... objection be allowed, the proportion would become 16 in 337, or one in twenty-one. Again, some boys who had no visualising faculty at all could make no sense out of the questions, and wholly refrained from answering; this would again diminish the proportion. The shyness in some would help in a statistical return to neutralise the tendency to exaggeration in others, but I do not think there is much room for correction on either head. Neither do I think it requisite to make ...
— Inquiries into Human Faculty and Its Development • Francis Galton
... entered the ward after the others, and the door was closed, but his image, sorrowful and disquieting, lingered before my eyes. Of course, he, too, tried not to attract attention—and therein is the cause of his shyness; and when his wound will be dressed and he will be put into bed, he will also try not to moan. For, what right has he ...
— The Shield • Various
... its author. By a fortunate chance he happened to take lodgings in a house where Mr. Levett frequently visited, who readily obtained Johnson's permission to bring Mr. Langton to him; as indeed, Johnson, during the whole course of his life, had no shyness, real or affected, but was easy of access to all who were properly recommended, and even wished to see numbers at his levee, as his morning circle of company might, with strict propriety, ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol IX. • Edited by Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton
... had died many years before. He was a shy, wild boy—more at home with the sea birds that flew about the lonely shore, than with the children he met sometimes as he wandered about the country; but in spite of his shyness he had friends who loved him everywhere he went. The house dogs on every farm knew his step, and ran out to greet him; the horses rubbed their noses softly upon his homespun tunic; the birds clustered on his shoulders; ...
— Soap-Bubble Stories - For Children • Fanny Barry
... singular expression of shyness on the faces of all. One might have fancied that these men were assembled for some guilty purpose. Guentz alone ...
— 'Jena' or 'Sedan'? • Franz Beyerlein
... paler than usual when he got up to thank his friends. He was a good deal moved by this public tribute—very naturally, for he was in the presence of all his little world, and it was uniting to do him honour. But he felt no shyness about speaking, not being troubled with small vanity or lack of words; he looked neither awkward nor embarrassed, but stood in his usual firm upright attitude, with his head thrown a little backward and his hands perfectly still, in that rough dignity which is peculiar to intelligent, honest, ...
— Adam Bede • George Eliot
... to come and blushed again as he bowed. At the mention of Princess Mary he experienced a feeling of shyness and even of fear, which he himself did ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... breath, and through the whole of that afternoon and evening the vague depression deepened, and refused to be argued away. Ned, it was true, took advantage of every opportunity of being near her, yet the time had been when he had seemed shy of approaching; and she preferred the shyness to this open friendliness. He talked to her more than to any one of her sisters, yes! in frank, cheery words with unlowered voice, as a brother might talk to a sister, or a son to his mother. He looked at her with kindly affection, and the look chilled her heart. Once again Maud passed a ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... little community could not hold together much longer without an explosion. I had a presentiment that Eunice shared my impressions. My feelings towards her had reached that crisis where a declaration was imperative: but how to make it? It was a terrible struggle between my shyness and my affection. There was another circumstance, in connection with this subject, which troubled me not a little. Miss Ringtop evidently sought my company, and made me, as much as possible, the recipient of her sentimental outpourings. I was not bold enough to repel her,—indeed, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 52, February, 1862 • Various
... one of the masters, as his tutor, I assured him he should not be placed till, by diligence, he might rank with those of his own age. He was pleased with this assurance, and felt himself on easier terms with his associates;—for a degree of shyness hung about him for some time. His manner and temper soon convinced me, that he might be led by a silken string to a point, rather than by a cable;—on that principle I acted. After some continuance at Harrow, and when the powers ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. I. (of VI.) - With his Letters and Journals. • Thomas Moore
... were, 'I went in there to clean my rifle,' but not, 'I have been cleaning my rifle,' which would be another thing altogether, he probably had not yet begun cleaning it when he heard Miss Byrne coming and went out to speak to her; it is possible some feeling akin to shyness might make him reluctant to confess this afterwards in public. Indeed I now feel quite sure that this is the explanation of the matter. Later on, when I questioned her again, she did not appear certain which of the two forms of words he ...
— The Ashiel mystery - A Detective Story • Mrs. Charles Bryce
... do whatever you like with them," Mary said hastily, her voice quivering with shyness and compassion. She began dealing out her thousand-franc notes, and did not stop until she had given one to each ...
— The Guests Of Hercules • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... hatch, where they descended and groped their way through the half obscurity of the lower deck. Here they passed one or two shadows, that, recognizing the Senor, seemed to draw aside in a half awed, half suppressed shyness, as of caged animals in the presence of their trainer. At the fore-hatch they again descended, passing a figure that appeared to be keeping watch at the foot of the ladder, and almost instantly came upon a group lit up by the glare of a bull's-eye lantern. ...
— The Crusade of the Excelsior • Bret Harte
... further aid of a complete absence of allusions, when the highest effect was given her method by the beautiful entrance of Kate. The method therefore received support all round, for no young man could have been less formidable than the person to the relief of whose shyness her niece ostensibly came. The ostensible, in Kate, struck him altogether, on this occasion, as prodigious; while scarcely less prodigious, for that matter, was his own reading, on the spot, of the relation between ...
— The Wings of the Dove, Volume II • Henry James
... or shyness, came upon him. The idea of meeting Mrs. Armstrong or even the members of the Smalley family he shrank from. Barbara invited him to come in, but he refused even to ...
— Shavings • Joseph C. Lincoln
... of the future woman, was unique in his experience and went straight to his head. He forgot his sister, dismissed the thought of Dwight with a gesture of contempt. He might be modest and rather diffident in manner, owing to racial shyness, but he had a fine sustaining substructure ...
— The Sisters-In-Law • Gertrude Atherton
... particular came often, when the first shyness had worn away. He was an orphan, like Marie herself: a pretty, dark-eyed little fellow, who looked, she fancied, like the children at home in France. He did not expect her to talk and answer questions, but was content to sit, as she loved to do, gazing ...
— Marie • Laura E. Richards
... me, to me, Amelia Butterworth, of whom men have said I had no more sentiment than a wooden image. I looked my appreciation, and she, blushing slightly, whispered in a delicious tone of mingled shyness and pride: ...
— That Affair Next Door • Anna Katharine Green
... long after the meal was eaten. When all the other fisher-lads were walking the cliffs with their own particular lasses, Rufus was wont to trudge back to his hermitage and draw his mantle of solitude about him once more. He had never walked with any lass. Whether from shyness or surliness, he had held consistently aloof from such frivolous pastimes. If a girl ever cast a saucy look his way the brooding blue eyes never seemed aware of it. In speech with womenkind he was always slow and half-reluctant. That ...
— The Tidal Wave and Other Stories • Ethel May Dell
... now, ma'am, don't think him the more ungrateful for his shyness, for young ladies so high in the world as you are, must go pretty good lengths before a young man will get courage to speak to them. And though I have told my son over and over that the ladies never like a man the ...
— Cecilia vol. 2 - Memoirs of an Heiress • Frances (Fanny) Burney (Madame d'Arblay)
... abashed for an instant. Her old shyness seemed about to settle down on her. She cast it off and sat up very straight, her green eyes gleaming with her initial purpose. "I believe I will look her up, at any rate. She might be a friend ...
— Marjorie Dean, College Sophomore • Pauline Lester
... them up as if they were scalps, or those horrid little soft, boneless masks which head hunters collect. The only trouble was, that among the lot, she had never had one scalp worth the wearing, for a real live beauty, who needed only a bit of luck to be at the top of the world. As for her shyness, it was all in the tricks she played with her eyelashes and the way she ...
— Secret History Revealed By Lady Peggy O'Malley • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... old people, who had attended church that morning, recurred as by a fascination to what Halborough had said, they did so more or less indirectly, and even with the subterfuge of a light laugh that was not real, so great was their shyness under the novelty ...
— Life's Little Ironies - A set of tales with some colloquial sketches entitled A Few Crusted Characters • Thomas Hardy
... know,' said Primrose, with a pretty shyness, and as they pressed her, she whispered, 'He is going to ...
— Beechcroft at Rockstone • Charlotte M. Yonge
... whole effect of a surprise, upon which we had been counting, was entirely lost. When at last every one had made the sign of the cross I became intolerably oppressed with a sudden, invincible, and deadly attack of shyness, so that the courage to, offer my present completely failed me. I hid myself behind Karl Ivanitch, who solemnly congratulated Grandmamma and, transferring his box from his right hand to his left, presented it to her. Then he withdrew a few steps to make ...
— Childhood • Leo Tolstoy
... shyness as he went out after his horse. He saw her picking her dainty way up the road with Conrad Sieger walking by her side. What made it worse for Ben was a dim feeling that she liked him, and would go with him if he had the courage to ...
— Other Main-Travelled Roads • Hamlin Garland
... are met by denials expressed in set terms, but a little patient talk will generally lead to some remarks which point the villagers' minds in the direction required, till at last, after many persuasions, some child begins a story, others correct the details, emulation conquers shyness, and finally the story-teller is brought to the front with acclamations: for there is always a story-teller par excellence in every village—generally ...
— Tales Of The Punjab • Flora Annie Steel
... said John, as he drank his tea noisily, "how's the girl going on? Getting over her shyness a bit, ...
— Adrien Leroy • Charles Garvice
... Agnes Rivers was feeling quite at home in her uncle's house. She had lost much of her nervous shyness, but except with Mrs. Mittens she was very quiet and reserved. She was a little afraid of her uncle, as were the whole family; a little in awe of Eddie too, who was still somewhat stately and grand in his manner; and she always had an uncomfortable ...
— Little Folks (July 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various
... man by ther name of Brent back thar in Coal City ter kinderly see ef anybody along ther road I come hed any timber they sought ter sell." The giant still spoke with a hulking shyness. "I hain't l'arned nothin', because I come through soon in ther mornin' an' ther roads was empty, but I reckon I'd better send him a message ter ...
— A Pagan of the Hills • Charles Neville Buck
... her hair and hand, the door softly opened and her mother came in. Imogen could see her, in her long white dressing-gown, with her wide braids falling on either side, all the traces of weeping carefully effaced. She often came in so to kiss Imogen good-night, gently, and with a slight touch of shyness, as though she knew herself shut away from the inner chamber of the child's heart, and the moment was their tenderest, for Imogen, understanding, though powerless to respond, never felt so sorry or so fond as then. But to-night her mother, seeing them there together hand in hand, ...
— A Fountain Sealed • Anne Douglas Sedgwick
... his coat, she had time to notice the ferns and photographs and draperies, and to hear a hum, or rather a babble, of voices talking each other down, from the sound of them. The rigidity of extreme shyness came over her. She kept as far behind Denham as she could, and walked stiffly after him into a room blazing with unshaded lights, which fell upon a number of people, of different ages, sitting round a large dining-room table untidily ...
— Night and Day • Virginia Woolf
... Marcelle, slowly, with a certain dignified shyness that was characteristic of her. "My mother has told me all about it. She liked the library when she was here. She told me where her room was up-stairs, too, but I did not want to go up while the ...
— Kit of Greenacre Farm • Izola Forrester
... could have become in so short a time in almost any other circumstances, and Miss Essie was a pretty and winning little creature. She was very frank and friendly with him, and an occasional touch of shyness and reserve made her frankness and friendliness all the more charming. What with the one way and the other, she bewitched the happy young fellow, and she had bewitched several others since the Thanksgiving ...
— David Fleming's Forgiveness • Margaret Murray Robertson
... aught she knew, this tranquillity and good-will might go on forever, without affording her an opportunity. She must be denied the smallest contact with these frightful faces and figures, these bars and cages, these deformities of the mind and heart, these curiosities of conscience, shyness, skill, and daring; all these dramas of reclamation, all these scenes of fervent gratitude, thankfulness, and intoxicating liberty—all or any of these things must never come to be the lot of her eyes; and she gave herself up to the ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 6 • Various
... well-bred. Genji treated him with the greatest kindness, at which, in his boyish mind, he was highly delighted. Genji now asked him many questions about his sister, to which he gave such answers as he could, but often with shyness and diffidence. Hence Genji was unable to take him into his confidence, but by skilfully coaxing and pleasing him, he ventured to hand him a letter to be taken to his sister. The boy, though he possibly guessed at its meaning, did not trouble himself much, ...
— Japanese Literature - Including Selections from Genji Monogatari and Classical - Poetry and Drama of Japan • Various
... mean for its own sake apart from what it held of his? I know that he would have cut his tongue out sooner than have confessed it. That is his nature, and I can't help liking him for it—because it is a part of himself, and I like him better than any man in the world. But allowing for that queer shyness, how are we to test his love of our country? Is there a sure test? Well, I know of one, which to my mind is a certainty. Judged by that I must own that Atkins does not stand as ...
— In a Green Shade - A Country Commentary • Maurice Hewlett
... the hall door opened and disgorged a crowd that had thrown off any restraint of shyness that might have influenced its earlier actions. Its vocal efforts in the direction of carol singing were now supplemented by instrumental music; a Christmas-tree that had been prepared for the children of the gardener and other ...
— The Toys of Peace • Saki
... number of others. Upon arrival opposite the band, the bugles and drums suddenly commenced with such a clash of cymbals that he seemed rather startled, and he entered the tent in the most undignified manner, with an air of extreme shyness half ...
— Ismailia • Samuel W. Baker
... and then she had ceased, with a dull sense of loss and disappointment, to expect any answer at all. Her mother inquired briskly every day if her letter had come and urged her to write a note asking if he had received it, for he might be waiting for it all this time, but shyness and pride forbade that, and afterward his mother called and spoke of something that he must have read in that letter. She felt how she must have colored, and was glad that her father called her, at that moment, to help him shell ...
— Miss Prudence - A Story of Two Girls' Lives. • Jennie Maria (Drinkwater) Conklin
... diamonds of exceptional sparkle and water; one stone in particular must have been worth many thousands of pounds. She wore a jacket of white silk, and round her loins was girt a gay silken robe that trailed about her bare feet as she walked. She shook hands with us with a pretty shyness and immediately helped herself to a cheroot, affably accepting a light from mine. The Menghyi told us she was a great scholar—could read and write with facility, and had ...
— Camps, Quarters, and Casual Places • Archibald Forbes
... answer. You will teach me, he insisted, and Dan and Rachel kept silence, so that they might better observe Joseph working round Azariah with questions; and they were amused, for Joseph's curiosity had overcome his shyness; and, quite forgetful of his promise to listen and not to talk, he had begun to beg the scribe to tell him if the language they spoke had been brought back from Babylon, and how long it was since people had ceased to speak Hebrew. Azariah set himself to answer ...
— The Brook Kerith - A Syrian story • George Moore
... with her. So Bobby and Nobbles, with smiling faces, presented themselves at the appointed time, and Lady Isobel greeted the small boy most affectionately, Nurse went off to the house, and then he lost all shyness, and was soon the greatest friends with the sad-faced woman. It was not very long before he told her of the beautiful ...
— 'Me and Nobbles' • Amy Le Feuvre
... enough to make Letty, whose heart was now beating in a very thicket of nerves, at once feel it impossible to carry out her intent—impossible to confess to him any more than to his mother; while Godfrey, on his part, perceiving her manifest shyness and unwonted embarrassment, attributed them altogether to his own wisely guarded behavior, and, seeing therein no sign of loss of influence, continued his caution. Thus the pride, which is of man, mingled with the love, which is of ...
— Mary Marston • George MacDonald
... with the others to early mass and trying vainly to struggle with his prayers against the fainting sickness of his stomach. He saw himself sitting at dinner with the community of a college. What, then, had become of that deep-rooted shyness of his which had made him loth to eat or drink under a strange roof? What had come of the pride of his spirit which had always made him conceive himself as a being apart ...
— A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man • James Joyce
... the individuals to whom art can only be at best a keen stimulus, at worst a drugging pleasure? Is the dead weight of society altogether to crush their delight in life? What is society? What is it but the accumulated emanations of the fear and timidity and shyness that beset human beings whenever they are gathered together? And to this accumulation are those who are not artists to bring nothing but fear and shyness and timidity to make the shadow over life grow denser and darker? Is there to be no reaction? How can there be individuals ...
— Sanine • Michael Artzibashef
... part had she in the life of this companion, this keeper of her own life? She felt a great need of drawing nearer to him, of finding the humanity in him. At first she fought the impulse, reserve, pride, shyness locking her down, till at last her nerves gave her such torment that her fingers knitted into each other and on the outbreathing of ...
— The Branding Iron • Katharine Newlin Burt
... could not bring themselves to ask the way in the street. Fancy what sensitive men like that must endure before they get broken in to medical practice. And then they know that nothing is so catching as shyness, and that if they do not keep a face of stone, their patient will be covered with confusion. And so they keep their face of stone, and earn the reputation perhaps of having a heart to correspond. I suppose nothing would shake ...
— Round the Red Lamp - Being Facts and Fancies of Medical Life • Arthur Conan Doyle
... with me for many years, not so much a possession of my memory as an inherent part of myself. It was ever present to my mind and ready to my hand, but I was loth to touch it from a feeling of what I imagined to be mere shyness but which in reality was a very ...
— Notes on My Books • Joseph Conrad
... mercilessly close, Our social monotone of level days, Might make our best seem banishment; But it was nothing so; Haply this instinct might divine, Beneath our drift of puritanic snow, The marvel sensitive and fine Of sanguinaria over-rash to blow And trust its shyness to an air malign; 390 Well might he prize truth's warranty and pledge In the grim outcrop of our granite edge, Or Hebrew fervor flashing forth at need In the gaunt sons of Calvin's iron breed, As prompt to give as skilled ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell
... startling promptitude, but he did not return. It was an agony of perplexity and shyness which had moved him, not ...
— The Panchronicon • Harold Steele Mackaye
... to him, only a thin board between. In another moment she would step forth into the night, and his eyes, accustomed to the obscurity, would discern her as clearly as though she stood in daylight. A wave of shyness pulled him back into the dark angle of the wall, and he stood there in silence instead of making his presence known to her. It had been one of the wonders of their intercourse that from the first, she, the quicker, finer, more expressive, instead of crushing him ...
— Ethan Frome • Edith Wharton
... the animal spirit careering within; the drooping shoulder, the rounded bust, clean limbs, well-turned ankle, fine almost to a fault, the light springy step, the graceful easy carriage, the absence of sheepishness or shyness, an air cheerful without noise, a manner playful without rudeness, and you have the true son or daughter ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... by Johnny's affectionate interest in her supper; she forgot all her shyness and drew nearer to him as they walked along, and he drew a little closer ...
— The Queen's Twin and Other Stories • Sarah Orne Jewett
... passionate tears of grief. He was a small man, shrunk with age, and I found him clinging to me so like a child that I felt an almost motherly sense of protection and tenderness towards his forlorn old age; but my English shyness was at the moment distressed at the sense of all the servants staring at such a meeting, and I cried out: 'Oh, sir! you should not have come thus.' 'What can I do, but show all honour to the heroic wife ...
— Stray Pearls • Charlotte M. Yonge
... preach and speak oftener; it would have interested me, and it would have been kinder and more brotherly; but one is apt not to do the things which one thinks one can always do, and the fact that I did not hear him was due to a mixture of shyness and laziness, which ...
— Hugh - Memoirs of a Brother • Arthur Christopher Benson
... "Experiences" commenced in real earnest. Brothers and Sisters were exhorted to lay aside shyness and mount the platform. Of course no one would do so at first; and the poor shaky old minister had to come to ...
— Mystic London: - or, Phases of occult life in the metropolis • Charles Maurice Davies
... ye 've come to lift a weight off my heart. God forgi'e me that, i' my shyness, I let 'ee go by wi'out a ...
— I Saw Three Ships and Other Winter Tales • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... made much of her, tried to make her get over her shyness, adroitly made her tell him all about her usual life, took a long time in sounding her chest, helped her to dress and undress, in a very paternal way, gave her a potion and was so thoughtful and caressing, that the poor girl blushed and felt quite uncomfortable ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume II (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant
... is not, because she is a very coquettish, dissipated woman." The most difficult task I had was to change her manners; she had something brusque and too rash in her movements, which made the Regent quite unhappy, and which sometimes was occasioned by a struggle between shyness and the necessity of exerting herself. I had—I may say so without seeming to boast—the manners of the best society of Europe, having early moved in it, and been rather what is called in French de la fleur des pois. A good judge I therefore was, but Charlotte found it ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume 1 (of 3), 1837-1843) • Queen Victoria
... me. She seemed to have lost much of her shyness. I don't know why, but I preferred my timid, ...
— The Trail of '98 - A Northland Romance • Robert W. Service
... the boy was without confidant or friend. Serious and eager, he came through school and college, and moved among a crowd of the indifferent, in the seclusion of his shyness. He grew up handsome, with an open, speaking countenance, with graceful, youthful ways; he was clever, he took prizes, he shone in the Speculative Society. It should seem he must become the centre of a crowd of friends; but something that was in part the delicacy of his mother, in part ...
— Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... these," she said, not without a touch of shyness, against which she struggled by making her tone as commonplace as possible. "I shall bring ...
— The Wild Olive • Basil King
... "Shyness," rejoined Captain Walsh—"pure shyness. He's one of the best. I know his idea. His idea is to be married on the quiet and without any fuss. But it isn't coming off. No, sir. Now, suppose it was you—don't be violent; I only said suppose—how ...
— Salthaven • W. W. Jacobs |
