"Sneer" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... twisted to a sneer. "Guess he is. I tried to touch him for two hundred of my own money and he turned me ...
— Sundown Slim • Henry Hubert Knibbs
... a laugh, and half a sneer. I hated him for it, as he sat leaning back on the back legs of his chair, his thumbs in his arm-holes. I felt his eyes—those smart, keen eyes, burning into my miserable head. I thought of the lawyer and the deal he'd give poor Tom, ...
— In the Bishop's Carriage • Miriam Michelson
... was too far gone in his cups to comprehend or even to be curious as to the significance of this sneer and went on sounding his own virtues and Pepeeta's beauty while the judge provoked him to the fullest exhibition of his colossal vanity. He took a sinister delight in drawing him out. It was the pleasure of a cat playing with ...
— The Redemption of David Corson • Charles Frederic Goss
... lamb! Down pitches Madge Winch to help—they did it between them. We who stand aloof admire stupidly. To defend himself from admiring, he condemned the two women for the risk they ran to save a probably broken-legged little beast: and he escaped the melting mood by forcing a sneer at the sort of stuff out of which popular ballads are woven. Carinthia was accused of letting her adventurous impulses and sentimental female compassion swamp thought of a mother's duties. If both those women had broken their legs the child might have cried itself ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... what they were told, men used to vow at their feet that there was nothing they couldn't accomplish, their influence was so great. But now that women have proved that what they choose to do they can do, men sneer at their pretensions to power, and try to depreciate them by comparing the average woman with men in the front rank of their ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand
... Knowledge, Brotherhood; The ignorant may sneer, The bad deny; but we rely To see their triumphs near. No widow's groans shall load our cause, Nor blood of brethren slain; We've won without such aid before, And ...
— Buchanan's Journal of Man, August 1887 - Volume 1, Number 7 • Various
... expect it was all due to that sneer of Elisha P. Bayne's. For while this was about as batty a business proposition as I ever had put up to me, this scheme of Millie's for hockin' her hubby, I'd got more or less int'rested in her yarn. And it struck me that a ...
— Shorty McCabe on the Job • Sewell Ford
... you meet this awful situation, as meet it you will, sneer gently at the puckered lips and repeat over and over that old proverb, Osculation is the ...
— Get Next! • Hugh McHugh
... a moment, and then responded, with a sneer,—for he was not a kind-hearted boy, but, on the contrary, very selfish, and disposed to injure rather than do good to others,—"Oh! how wonderfully wise you are all at once! And no doubt you can tell how many moons Jupiter has? Come, ...
— Sanders' Union Fourth Reader • Charles W. Sanders
... of the country oppressive?" asked the baronet, with as much of a sneer as cowardice would permit ...
— Willy Reilly - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... master; who, he said, had been very badly treated. The chief offender seemed to be his highness's brother, whose name alone would lengthen the old man's lantern jaws and pucker his parrot nose into a sneer. Captain Stephen was a ne'er-do-weel, apparently, and had drained his benevolent brother of hundreds and thousands; forced him to fly from fashionable life and live quietly in this retreat. That was all Paul, the butler, would say, and Paul ...
— The Innocence of Father Brown • G. K. Chesterton
... sending a lictor to one of the soldiers who was clamorous, when a tumult and scuffle arose from the circumstance, being struck with a stone he retired from the crowd; the person who had given the blow, further observing with a sneer, "That the quaestor got what the general had threatened to the soldiers." Postumius being sent for in consequence of the disturbance, exasperated every thing by the severity of his inquiries and the cruelty of his punishment. At last, when he set no bounds ...
— The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 • Titus Livius
... period, he asserted, when the serious attention of the house to public affairs was more imperatively demanded, and he boldly maintained that it was the duty of their lordships to lay the true state and condition of the country before his majesty. After indulging in a quiet sneer at the care the council had bestowed upon horned cattle, he remarked, that he was glad to hear that the king had reason to believe the peace of the country would be preserved, since peace could never be more desirable to a kingdom, than when it was torn to ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... Diable! One would think I was a beggar, not—am I ill-looking, repugnant? Your sex," with a suspicion of a sneer, "have not always found me so. I have given my heart before, you will say! But never as now! For she is a witch, like those that come out of the reeds on the Volga—to steal, alike, the souls of fisherman and prince." He paused; ...
— A Man and His Money • Frederic Stewart Isham
... Cecil Grimshaw going to do in an atmosphere of titled bores, bishops, military men, and cautious statesmen? I could fancy him in his new town house, struggling through some endless dinner party—his cynical, stone-gray eyes sweeping up and down the table, his lips curled in that habitual sneer, his mind, perhaps, gone back to the red-and-blue room in Chelsea, where he had been wont to stand astride before the black mantel, bellowing indecencies into the ears of witty modernists. Could ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1921 • Various
... for pitching the camp and for loading; but we being unaware of the fact that he was Ras el Caffilah, he had not received presents on the arrival of the Embassy at Shoa. Whilst unloading the camels, the following conversation took place. 'Ya Kabtan!' (0 Captain) said he addressing me with a sneer, 'where are you going to?—do you think the Bedoos will let you pass through their country? We shall see! Now I will tell you!—you Feringis have treated me very ill!—you loaded Essakh and others with presents, but never gave me anything. I have, as it ...
— First footsteps in East Africa • Richard F. Burton
... a comrade here, Who'd vow to love this garreteer, By city people's snap and sneer ...
— Late Lyrics and Earlier • Thomas Hardy
... was uncharacteristically disregardful of the public applause which the success of his witty endeavours might have so easily elicited. That the school, indeed, did not feel his design, perceive its accomplishment, and participate in his sneer, was, for many anxious months, a riddle I could not resolve. Perhaps the gradation of his copy rendered it not so readily perceptible; or, more possibly, I owed my security to the masterly air of the copyist, who, disdaining the letter (which ...
— Selections From Poe • J. Montgomery Gambrill
... geometrical solids? Or, again, are they, as others thought, the products of the germs of animals and of the seeds of plants which have lost their way, as it were, in the bowels of the earth, and have achieved only an imperfect and abortive development? It is easy to sneer at our ancestors for being disposed to reject the first in favour of one or other of the last two hypotheses; but it is much more profitable to try to discover why they, who were really not one whit less sensible persons than our excellent selves, should have been ...
— The Rise and Progress of Palaeontology - Essay #2 from "Science and Hebrew Tradition" • Thomas Henry Huxley
... not help feeling hurt and sorry at the half-sneer she saw in the look and manner of the others, as well as in William's words. She wished for no better than to go away; but as she did so, her bosom swelled, and the tears started, and her breath came quicker. ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Elizabeth Wetherell
... Because it's a stupid, stubborn reason. Oh, I heard you talking with the second mate. You're afraid the other captains will sneer at you because you didn't come back with a full ship. You want to live up to our silly reputation even if you do have to beat and starve men and drive me mad ...
— The Atlantic Book of Modern Plays • Various
... to my estate without a touch of a sneer, when we were alone; but with strangers, he rang the ...
— Kidnapped • Robert Louis Stevenson
... think of that, isn't it?" asked McGregor, with a sneer. "A revolution won't run on high ...
— A Man of Mark • Anthony Hope
... said Mrs. Willoughby, with a sneer at the folly of the creature. 'He seems to look upon Mallinson and himself as the two figures which tell the weather in a Swiss clock. When one comes out of his box the other goes in. I catch your trick, you see,' and her ...
— The Philanderers • A.E.W. Mason
... was possessed of almost arbitrary power, and when the liberty and personal independence of individuals were in no way considered or regarded; days when the severity of our criminal laws drew down from a French philosopher the sneer, that a history of England was a history of the executioner; when the doomed were sent out of the world in bands of twenty, and even thirty, at a time, at Tyburn or at "Execution dock;" and when, in the then unhealthy tone of public morals, criminals famous for their deeds of violence and rapine, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXIX. January, 1844. Vol. LV. • Various
... speech the skipper had gradually recovered the control of his temper; the tremulous tones of anger in his voice were succeeded by those of bitter sarcasm; and the manifest sneer with which he concluded made my ...
— The Rover's Secret - A Tale of the Pirate Cays and Lagoons of Cuba • Harry Collingwood
... she continued speaking he would have done so. But she remained silent, and sat looking at him, saying with her eyes the same thing that she had already spoken with her words. Thus he was driven to speak. "I don't know," said he, "whether you intend that for a sneer." ...
— The Claverings • Anthony Trollope
... replied with a sneer, "then prithee what does this bespeak, and this, and this?" and he showed in turn the scratches and bruises on the various parts ...
— Heiress of Haddon • William E. Doubleday
... that gun! Why the blazes couldn't you have come home and brought me a bit of peat from the pit? A fine hunter you are! I might as well have married the devil.—And his wife turned from him with a sneer. ...
— Seven Icelandic Short Stories • Various
... pointing to the enemy's fortress, he added: "There will be found plenty of lodging for those who come too late for any other." Saluting his Majesty very courteously, the soldier withdrew, understanding thoroughly the indirect sneer at the valour of his troops; he went back to his regiment, summoned his officers and men, and repeated to them the King's word. One and all agreed that they would, in fact, seek their night's lodging just where the King had indicated. Impossible as the feat appeared, ...
— Spanish Life in Town and Country • L. Higgin and Eugene E. Street
... been less beautiful—if Envy's self could have found aught else to sneer at—he might have felt his affection heightened by the prettiness of this mimic hand, now vaguely portrayed, now lost, now stealing forth again, and glimmering to-and-fro with every pulse of emotion that throbbed within her heart. But, seeing her otherwise ...
— Masterpieces of Mystery - Riddle Stories • Various
... down as if he had never seen her before, then summarised his resentful impression of her attitude in an open sneer. "Does, eh? Well, that's a ...
— The Fortune Hunter • Louis Joseph Vance
... It is the common trick of unprincipled women to affect to despise those who conduct themselves with propriety. Prudence they term coldness; fortitude, insensibility; and regard to the rights of others, prejudice. By this perversion of terms they would laugh or sneer virtue out of countenance; and, by robbing her of all praise, they would deprive her of all immediate motive. Conscious of their own degradation, they would lower every thing, and every body, to their own standard: ...
— Tales And Novels, Vol. 8 • Maria Edgeworth
... a fool if he drowns then," retorted the girl with a sneer. "He can get across easy enough if he finds ...
— North, South and Over the Sea • M.E. Francis (Mrs. Francis Blundell)
... behind our backs, had you?" he said, with a sneer. And her heart leapt with hot pain. She knew she was free—she had broken away from him. ...
— The Rainbow • D. H. (David Herbert) Lawrence
... the world must also be yours. The good of his church in general, and that of your own family in particular; and O, my son, if you would be rich in comfort, follow the Lord fully, and follow him openly; and if you would do it so as to suffer the least from the sneer of the world, do ...
— The Power of Faith - Exemplified In The Life And Writings Of The Late Mrs. Isabella Graham. • Isabella Graham
... made an impious use of the threatenings of the Old Testament, proclaimed an equality of rank and a community of goods, defended their cause with fire and sword, and indulged in barbarous atrocities. On the other hand, the enemies of the Reformation asked the reformer, with a malicious sneer, if he did not know that it was easier to kindle a fire than to extinguish it. Shocked at these excesses, alarmed at the thought that they might check the progress of the Gospel, Luther hesitated no longer, no longer temporized; he inveighed ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 9 • Various
... sprang into Valentin's eyes; he strode towards the priest with clenched hands. "And, perhaps," he cried, with a blasting sneer, "perhaps he was also thinking of leaving all his ...
— The Innocence of Father Brown • G. K. Chesterton
... always sneering at Tono-Bungay! As though it was some sort of swindle. It was perfec'ly legitimate trade, perfec'ly legitimate. Good value and a good article.... When I come up here and tell you plans and exchange idees—you sneer at me. You do. You don't see—it's a big thing. It's a big thing. You got to get used to new circumstances. You got to face what lies before us. You got to ...
— Tono Bungay • H. G. Wells
... determined; "let them wink, point, nod, sneer, speak of the conceit which is humbled, of the pride which has had a fall—I care not; it is a penance due to my folly, and I will endure it with patience. But if she also, my benefactress, if she also should think me sordid and ...
— The Abbot • Sir Walter Scott
... Sir Robert's levee, Tells with a sneer the tidings heavy: 'Why, if he died without his shoes,' Cries Bob, 'I'm sorry for the news: Oh, were the wretch but living still, And in his place my good friend Will! Or had a mitre on his ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan
... will find it difficult to settle," replied the stranger with a sneer, "in spite of his ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... I'll fire. Say yer prayers now, if yer mean ter; but I reckon the prayers of a Yank ain't of much account," replied Joe with a sneer. ...
— The Young Lieutenant - or, The Adventures of an Army Officer • Oliver Optic
... youth, but not austere in age; Calm, but not cold, and cheerful though a sage; Too true to flatter and too kind to sneer, And only just when seemingly severe; So gently blending courtesy and art That wisdom's lips ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... that crowns and blesses a brave struggle,—of that all-for-the-best-ness that comes of the heart's clearings-up. Only Adelaide broke the silence; with her gaze fixed full on Withers, and a triumphant sneer crowning her happy lips, she uttered one word ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. II., November, 1858., No. XIII. • Various
... your gods in Hellas have their price," was the retort, with an ill-concealed sneer. "Do not trust them. Take ten talents from me ...
— A Victor of Salamis • William Stearns Davis
... glanced past her at the middle-aged maid, and surprised a peculiar expression on the face of the woman. She had been looking straight at him, and her lips were almost curled into a sneer, while her eyes were flashing ...
— The Brand of Silence - A Detective Story • Harrington Strong
... in the face, that pretty self-satisfied-looking face, to fling him to the ground, and kick him, in a blind fury of passion. But the words that he wanted would not come; he knew, and it tortured him the more to know, that he was saying the wrong thing, as with a sneer, he replied. ...
— Sanine • Michael Artzibashef
... impulse, and, yes, honest affection and generous flashes. And I? Well, I found I could buy with my money what otherwise I must have gone without, but the shadow never counted for the substance with me. The fawning favour, which held its sneer in check, filled me with disgust, and I would have been a ...
— The Place Beyond the Winds • Harriet T. Comstock
... palace of Alcina! I broke off at the end of my last paragraph to attend my charmer; and here again am I detesting myself for want of resolution; and detesting myself still more for having made a resolution, for having undertaken that which I am so eternally tempted to renounce. Your sneer and your laugh are both ready—I know you, Fairfax—'The gentleman is sounding a retreat! The enterprise is too difficult!'—No—tell you no, no, no,—But I am almost afraid ...
— Anna St. Ives • Thomas Holcroft
... the other one cried, "That Mary would venture there now." "Then wager and lose!" with a sneer, he replied, "I'll warrant she'd fancy a ghost by her side, And faint if she saw ...
— Apparitions; or, The Mystery of Ghosts, Hobgoblins, and Haunted Houses Developed • Joseph Taylor
... me into trouble!" thought the stranger, trying in vain to smooth down the corners of the offending organ, which in spite of him would curve with what Hagar called a sneer, and from which there finally broke a merry laugh, sadly at variance with the suffering expression ...
— Maggie Miller • Mary J. Holmes
... lingering minutes; but presently the obdurate knot gave way, and, turning to gather up her shawl, there, close behind her, so close that his hot breath seemed to sear her cheek, stood her husband, clear in the moonlight, with a sneer on his face, and the lurid glow of drunkenness, that made a savage brute of a bad man, gleaming in his deep-set eyes. Hitty neither shrieked nor ran; despair nerved her,—despair turned ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various
... of Baudelaire aggravated the course of the disease. No longer is it the grand barbaric face of Gautier; now it is the clean shaven face of the mock priest, the slow, cold eyes and the sharp, cunning sneer of the cynical libertine who will be tempted that he may better know the worthlessness of temptation. "Les Fleurs du Mal!" beautiful flowers, beautiful in sublime decay. What great record is yours, and were Hell a reality how ...
— Confessions of a Young Man • George Moore
... the evening, had attempted to join him. Three or four comrades in arms, one journalist from some fracas buff magazine, some woman he'd never met before, and Zen knew how she'd ever got herself into the club. A snarl had driven some away, or a growl or sneer. This one, he decided, called for an angered scowl, particularly in view of the tone of voice which only brought home doubly how his planning of a full two ...
— Frigid Fracas • Dallas McCord Reynolds
... face was under a cloud of gloom, a frown on the forehead and a sneer on the lips, but it was something more than the expression which repelled Mary. For she felt that no matter how she wooed him, she could never win the sympathy of this darkly handsome, cruel youth; he was aloof from her, and ...
— Riders of the Silences • John Frederick
... with ease: Should such a man, too fond to rule alone, Bear, like the Turk, no brother near the throne, View him with scornful, yet with jealous eyes, And hate for arts that caused himself to rise; Damn with faint praise, assent with civil leer, And without sneering, teach the rest to sneer; Willing to wound, and yet afraid to strike, Just hint a fault, and hesitate dislike; Alike reserved to blame, or to commend, A timorous foe, and a suspicious friend; Dreading e'en fools, by flatterers besieged, And so obliging, that he ne'er obliged; Like ...
— English Poets of the Eighteenth Century • Selected and Edited with an Introduction by Ernest Bernbaum
... all his being there voluntarily, one might have seen by the pallor of his face that he was half afraid. There, in the shadow, just beyond the rim of his own lantern light, was the desk where Jim Ellison used to sit—and sneer at him. Did Colonel Witham recall that? Perhaps. He lifted the lantern and let the light fall on the spot. The place was ...
— The Rival Campers Ashore - The Mystery of the Mill • Ruel Perley Smith
... to spare a woman because she is English? My good Raoul, you amuse me," replied the Sheik, with an ugly sneer. ...
— The Sheik - A Novel • E. M. Hull
... of this opinion regarding Louis, people were the more suspicious of Marie Antoinette. Some of them, in coarse language, criticized her assumed infidelities; others, with a polite sneer, affected to defend her. But the result of it all was dangerous to both, especially as France was already verging toward the deluge which Louis XV. had cynically predicted would ...
— Famous Affinities of History, Vol 1-4, Complete - The Romance of Devotion • Lyndon Orr
... in modern poetry is due to Johann Heinrich Voss, a man of genius, an admirable metrist, and, Schlegel's sneer to the contrary notwithstanding, hitherto the best translator of Homer. His "Odyssey," (1783,) his "Iliad," (1791,) and his "Luise," (1795,) were confessedly Goethe's teachers in this kind of verse. The "Hermann and Dorothea" of the latter (1798) was the first true poem written in modern ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, Issue 15, January, 1859 • Various
... weeps at the story of suffering, that shudders at the picture of wrong, brings down its inspiration "from God, who is our home." To quarrel, then, with the class of minds that instinctively attack abuses, is not only profitless but senseless; to sneer at the sentiments which are the springs of all just and virtuous actions, is merely a display of unthinking levity, or of want of ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... Laroque, in a vicious sneer. "Not till the job's done! D'ye think I'm going to spend half an hour cracking a safe and take a chance of missing any bets? We've got the coin all right, but there ought to be one or two of Sonnino's sparklers lying around in some of these ...
— The Further Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard
... getting in the least angry, tilted back his chair and sucked his cigar, merely saying with a sneer: ...
— His Masterpiece • Emile Zola
... With a sneer Mrs. Livingstone replied, "I wonder what you can do! Will you bring to your assistance some one of ...
— 'Lena Rivers • Mary J. Holmes
... outset of the campaign a Democratic newspaper declared that Harrison would be more at home "in a log cabin, drinking hard cider and skinning coons, than living in the White House as President." The Whigs instantly took up the sneer and made the log cabin the emblem of their party. All over the country log cabins (erected at some crossroads, or on the village common, or on some vacant city lot) became the Whig headquarters. On the door was a coon skin; a leather latch string was always hanging out as a sign of hospitality, ...
— A School History of the United States • John Bach McMaster
... who has been accustomed to face death meets it at last with a gentle sneer on his lip, as one who is vanquished by an enemy whom he knows to be in ...
— Master Tales of Mystery, Volume 3 • Collected and Arranged by Francis J. Reynolds
... brought the water with you in a bottle," said Shasha, the war-doctor, with a sneer in his voice. He was evidently thinking ...
— Kafir Stories - Seven Short Stories • William Charles Scully
... fashioned unuttered entreaties,— Went, and came again in a year at the time of the meeting, Haggard and wan of face, and wasted with passion and sorrow. Dead in his eyes was the careless smile of old, and its phantom Haunted his lips in a sneer of restless, incredulous mocking. Day by day he came to the outer skirts of the circle, Dwelling on her, where she knelt by the white-haired exhorter, her father, With his hollow looks, and ...
— Poems • William D. Howells
... chance of picking up a smattering before we get home again; but I never knew any 'cabin young gentlemen' turn out sailors," answered the mate, with a sneer. "A man is not worth anything unless he comes in at the 'hawse holes,' to ...
— Owen Hartley; or, Ups and Downs - A Tale of Land and Sea • William H. G. Kingston
... the know." To flaunt the fact that we have had all the last books from Germany is simply vulgar; like flaunting the fact that we have had all the last bonnets from Paris. To introduce into philosophical discussions a sneer at a creed's antiquity is like introducing a sneer at a lady's age. It is caddish because it is irrelevant. The pure modernist is merely a snob; he cannot bear to be a month behind the fashion Similarly I find that I have tried in these pages to express the real ...
— All Things Considered • G. K. Chesterton
... of such a person, though only lately," said Mowbray. "Reginald Scrogie Mowbray was his name. I have reason to consider his alliance with my family as undoubted, though you seem to mention it with a sneer, sir. I believe Mr. S. Mowbray regulated his family settlements very much upon the idea that his heir was ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott
... occasion. There were artists present who then for the first time were to get their impression of a great singer, prepared of course to believe that that reputation had been exaggerated. Among these was Rachel, who sat enjoying the humiliation of decayed grandeur with a cynical and bitter sneer on her face, drawing the attention of the theatre by her exhibition ...
— Great Singers, First Series - Faustina Bordoni To Henrietta Sontag • George T. Ferris
... be so proud, for you are not the King's but old Graham's daughter." It is certain, that his legitimate daughter, the Countess of Berkshire and Suffolk, was extremely like the Duchess, and that he often said with a sneer, "Well, well, kings are great men, they make free with whom they please! All I can say is, that I am sure the same man begot those two women." The Duchess often went to weep over her father's body at Paris: one of the ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole
... who uses his balmorals to tread on your toes with much frequency and an unmistakeable emphasis may prove a fast friend in adversity, but meanwhile your adversity has not arrived and your toes are tender. The daily sneer or growl at your remarks is not to be made amends for by a possible eulogy or defence of your understanding against depredators who may not present themselves, and on an occasion which may never arise. I cannot submit to a chronic state ...
— Impressions of Theophrastus Such • George Eliot
... his knees, but he could not make him pray. And Kedzie fell back from him. She was afraid to pose as a saint worthy of genuflection. Connery re-entered the conflict with a sneer: ...
— We Can't Have Everything • Rupert Hughes
... coming to a halt and putting several questions to the sentry, who replied in tones that positively quavered with apprehension. During this time the personage never took his eyes off the two friends, and Frobisher was on the point of losing his temper when the unknown, with a distinctly perceptible sneer, turned his back rudely and, with a curt command to his waiting attendants, stalked ...
— A Chinese Command - A Story of Adventure in Eastern Seas • Harry Collingwood
... consolations. My madness was not as mad as this dark street. This is a prettier witches' night than the one I aspired to. I am amused and my amusement is an insult that inspires me. If one cannot become God, one can at least sit and sneer happily at the ...
— Fantazius Mallare - A Mysterious Oath • Ben Hecht
... treasures a purse made out of a sow's ear and a whistle made from a pig's tail. I saw my opportunity at once. The eccentric old man, by acquiring two such extraordinary objets d'art had indulged himself in a sneer at the world's proverbial wisdom. I would come to the rescue of our threatened stock of experience by gathering the facts that upheld it. I would make it, besides, more than the selfish hobby of the private collector who gives the world only a very little ...
— The Patient Observer - And His Friends • Simeon Strunsky
... it up and join Don Giovanni and his party," returned Del Ferice, with a sneer. "He says if a change comes he will make the best of it. Of course, ...
— Saracinesca • F. Marion Crawford
... lips that had lied and stormed and accused against God's people, compressed now in his father's fingers—they seemed to sneer even now, and to writhe under the soft oil; the hands that had been laid on God's portion, that had torn the vessels from the altar and the cloth of gold from the treasury—those too were signed now, and lay ...
— The King's Achievement • Robert Hugh Benson
... tremendous operations in London were three definite motives. First of all, he really loved England. He felt that the theater there had a dignity and a distinction far removed from theatrical production in America. There was no sneer of "commercialism" about it. To be identified with the stage in England was something to be proud of. He often said that he would rather make fifteen pounds in London than fifteen thousand dollars in America. It summed up his whole attitude ...
— Charles Frohman: Manager and Man • Isaac Frederick Marcosson and Daniel Frohman
... the other one cried, "That Mary would venture there now." "Then wager and lose!" with a sneer he replied, "I'll warrant she'd fancy a ghost by her side, "And faint if she ...
— Poems • Robert Southey
... been curious, sir, about the great unknown beyond thirty," he said. "You are in a good way to have your curiosity satisfied." And then I could not mistake the slight sneer that curved his upper lip. There must have been a trace of disrespect in his tone or manner which escaped me, for Alvarez turned ...
— The Lost Continent • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... that the sun's going is from the end of the heaven, and his circuit to the ends of it, has given edge to many a sneer at its supposed assertion that the sun went round the earth. It teaches a higher truth—that the sun itself obeys the law it enforces on the planets, and flies in an orbit of its own, from one end of heaven in Argo to the ...
— Recreations in Astronomy - With Directions for Practical Experiments and Telescopic Work • Henry Warren
... customer, but he won't help you much, mistress,' he said with a sneer. 'I've something here as'll settle him fast enough.' With that he stretched out his hand towards the bundle on ...
— Fifty-Two Stories For Girls • Various
... proceeded some distance Rathburn called a halt. "Ever been in this country before?" he demanded with a sneer. ...
— The Coyote - A Western Story • James Roberts
... at the pipe, found that it was out, and passed it over to Zilla, who took the sneer at the white man off her lips in order to pucker them about the pipe-stem. Ebbits seemed sinking back into his senility with the tale untold, ...
— Love of Life - and Other Stories • Jack London
... at scholarship," continues the owl, with a sneer on her venerable face. "I read a ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... danger that awaited him there, but it only allured him the more, as the candle does the moth whose wings it has singed. Birnie, who, in all their vicissitudes and wanderings, their ups and downs, retained the same tacit, immovable demeanour, received with a sneer the orders at last to march back upon the French capital. "You would never have left it, if you had taken my advice," he said, and ...
— Night and Morning, Volume 3 • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... face and starting eyes of the woman, and the open-mouthed dumbfoundedness of the old man, and the sudden tender fearfulness in the face of the girl; and because, in that moment, all these seemed very safe, and accustomed, and, somehow, dear, Buzz curled his mouth into the sneer of the tough guy and spoke out of the corner ...
— Cheerful—By Request • Edna Ferber
... examine what was left of the trail Billy thanked Heaven that Deane had placed Isobel on the sledge before he left camp. There was nothing to betray her presence. Walker had unlaced their outfit, and Billy was busy preparing a meal when Bucky returned. There was a sneer on ...
— Isobel • James Oliver Curwood
... him to drive with more care. He was obliged to slacken his pace before he could understand what I said. When he had heard me repeat my injunction, which I did with no little vehemence, he looked at me first in astonishment, then with a sneer, and was raising his whip to lash the horses forward with fresh fury. Olivia caught him by the arm, and I immediately called with a voice of thunder, 'By G——, Sir, if you either injure or terrify the lady, I will pull you ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... genteel contempt upon the preachers whose religion had converted Kingswood colliers, and turned Cornwall wreckers into honest men; and the formally pious spoke of the worshippers at this new shrine of faith with a serene sneer, and classed them as a parcel of fiercely ejaculating, hymn-singing nonentities. But there was vitality at the core of their creed, and its fuller triumphs were but a question of time. In 1817, Methodism became dissatisfied ...
— Our Churches and Chapels • Atticus
... said Thorn, with the same sneer. "You have rid yourself of a gentleman's means of protection, ...
— Queechy, Volume I • Elizabeth Wetherell
... the beginning of a series of interviews, to be carried on during his absence. Mr. Dexter was an impulsive man. Without giving himself time for reflection, he strode into the parlor, and said with a cutting sneer— ...
— The Hand But Not the Heart - or, The Life-Trials of Jessie Loring • T. S. Arthur
... gone with his disciples into the garden of Gethsemane. There, in the darkness and loneliness of night, the full anguish of his situation rushed upon his spirit. He shrank from the rude scenes that opened before him,—from the mocker's sneer and the ruler's scourge; from the glare of impatient revenge, and the weeping eyes of helpless friendship; from the insignia of imposture and of shame; and from the protracted, thirsty, torturing death. He shrank from these,—he ...
— The Crown of Thorns - A Token for the Sorrowing • E. H. Chapin
... say something, and, I suppose, in rather an awkward and confused manner, when with a sneer on his face, the bear of a judge bellowed out, "Mr. Casberd told us, that the jury at Devizes were influenced by your persuasive eloquence! I see nothing of it here!" This insult roused me; I began now to speak as loud as his lordship, and demanded to be ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 2 • Henry Hunt
... broke into a slight sneer of incredulity. "My dear brother, you do right to say this—any man in your situation would say the same. But I know that my uncle took every pains to ascertain if the report of a private marriage ...
— Night and Morning, Volume 1 • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... the Prince. If you should happen to be on the avenue near the Castle gate at twelve o'clock, you will see the beauty and chivalry of Graustark. The soldiers are not the only ones who are on parade." There was an unmistakable sneer ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... to prevent him. He waited with a sneer on his lips while Archie returned and took ...
— Rosa Mundi and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... of a half-playful sneer graduates into one of great ferocity when, together with a heavily frowning brow and fierce eye, the canine tooth is exposed. A Bengalee boy was accused before Mr. Scott of some misdeed. The delinquent did not ...
— The Expression of Emotion in Man and Animals • Charles Darwin
... comparisons; at that time they were always crowding on my imagination. So I struggled on there for two years. The work did not progress much in spite of all my efforts. I began to be tired of it, my friend bored me; I had come to sneer at him, and he stifled me like a featherbed; his want of faith had changed into a dumb resentment; a feeling of hostility had laid hold of both of us; we could scarcely now speak of anything; he quietly but incessantly tried to show me that he was not under my influence; my ...
— Rudin • Ivan Turgenev
... crowded with delegates to two conventions then being held, for the purpose of nominating candidates by the opposing parties for the office of Governor of the Commonwealth; a part of the machinery to which our institutions give rise, and those who affect to sneer at these preliminary movements, do not understand the true theory and practice of republicanism, where action, to be effective, must begin in the will of the people, and to be beneficially operative it must continue in concurrence with that will. Notwithstanding the presence of two antagonistic ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 5 November 1848 • Various
... those untiring exertions, that zeal which has never wavered, that hope so steadfast, since it is that of an Englishwoman for her husband, that patience under misconstruction, that forgiveness for the sneer of jealousy, and that pity for the malicious, which you have so pre-eminently displayed, may yet, by God's help, one day reap its reward in the accomplishment of your wishes, is the fervent ...
— Stray Leaves from an Arctic Journal; • Sherard Osborn
... boy says his word for justice and for right, or does his simple duty in a simple, straightforward way, regardless of consequences or of the world's far too-ready sneer or frown, the stamp of the hero may be seen; and however humble his condition or contracted his sphere there is in him the mettle and the possibilities that may make him, even though he know it not, a ...
— Historic Boys - Their Endeavours, Their Achievements, and Their Times • Elbridge Streeter Brooks
... Excellency had to become prince of the provinces, on strength of the signed and sealed documents addressed to the late Prince of Orange; that he had further alluded to the efforts then on foot to make him Duke of Gelderland; adding with a sneer, that Zeeland was all agog on the subject, while in that province there were individuals very desirous of becoming ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... to sneer at our hero. He made several efforts to get Jack's place, even offering to do the work for less money, but his offer was ...
— Jack of the Pony Express • Frank V. Webster
... change is altogether to its advantage. To me this is a very great disappointment. I have always had a very high opinion of the intellectual values of the leading divines of both the Anglican and Catholic communions. The self-styled Intelligentsia of Great Britain is all too prone to sneer at their equipment; but I do not see how any impartial person can deny that Father Bernard Vaughn is in mental energy, vigour of expression, richness of thought and variety of information fully the equal of such an influential lay publicist as Mr. Horatio Bottomley. ...
— War and the Future • H. G. Wells
... I love thee? How else could I borrow Pride from man's slander, and strength from my sorrow? Laugh when they sneer at the fanatic's bride, Knowing no bliss, save to toil and ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 2 (of 4) • Various
... than the Battle of Aliscans, which has been so fully dealt with above. It is interesting to compare advocates of the two, and see how German critics usually extol the improvements made by the German poet, while the French sneer at his preachments and waterings-down. But we need say nothing more than that if Wolfram's fame rested on Willehalm, the notice of him here would probably not go beyond a couple ...
— The Flourishing of Romance and the Rise of Allegory - (Periods of European Literature, vol. II) • George Saintsbury
... was swept, and Antoine was preparing to go, when the other, who had been eyeing the prisoner suspiciously, stopped and said with a sharp sneer, "Does the citizen ...
— Melchior's Dream and Other Tales • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... rejoined D'Effernay, with a little sneer. "Some love affair; some girl or another who pursues him, that he ...
— The International Weekly Miscellany, Volume I. No. 9. - Of Literature, Art, and Science, August 26, 1850 • Various
... TO-MORROW in words just as hard, although their opinions of to-morrow may contradict their opinions of to-day.' They are fearless of personal consequences. As free men, they will think, as free men they will speak, and as such they will act, regardless of the jibe and sneer of those who accuse them of change, of inconsistency, of being mutable and unstable of purpose. The point to the march of improvement, the advance in the actualities of life, and ask, 'When every thing else is on the move, shall ...
— Wild Northern Scenes - Sporting Adventures with the Rifle and the Rod • S. H. Hammond
... tie is that which binds souls and sympathies together—the voice, that is heard only by the ear of affection—the look, that only one can understand—the silent thrill of happiness or of anguish, communicated by a smile or by a sigh! The world may sneer at, or may condemn; yet most true it is, that they who love with the most purity and the most truth, draw nearest to that great Spirit who is ...
— The Buccaneer - A Tale • Mrs. S. C. Hall
... following words: "Truth began to be obscured and literature to fade; supernatural religions sprang up on all sides, and many eminent scholars failed to oppose their advance, until Han Yu, the cotton-clothed, arose and blasted them with his derisive sneer." ...
— The Civilization Of China • Herbert A. Giles
... this question of prayer is simply one of fact. We know that God answers prayer, not only because He said He would, but because He does. From my own experience I am as certain of it as of my existence. I think that many who sneer or doubt in regard to prayer are very unfair. I ask you, is it scientific for men to say, 'Nothing is true save what we have seen and know ourselves?' How that would limit one's knowledge. If some facts are discovered ...
— Opening a Chestnut Burr • Edward Payson Roe |
