"Ungracious" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... given us a delicious dinner, Marchesa," said Mrs. Wilding as the coffee appeared. "You mustn't think me captious in my remarks—indeed it would be most ungracious to look a gift-dinner in the—What are you laughing at, Sir John? I suppose I've done something awful with my ...
— The Cook's Decameron: A Study in Taste: - Containing Over Two Hundred Recipes For Italian Dishes • Mrs. W. G. Waters
... her in a second to hold her coat. The way in which she turned her back on him so that he might lift it on was peculiarly ungracious. ...
— Married Life - The True Romance • May Edginton
... he replied. 'I met him in France, and you know when one is abroad it is an ungracious task to reject the advances of one's countryman, otherwise I think I should have avoided his society—less upon my own account than because I am sure the acquaintance would be a source of continual though groundless uneasiness to my mother. ...
— The Purcell Papers - Volume I. (of III.) • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
... 3rd of December, 1780, the commissary department was left vacant by the resignation of Colonel Polk. At the earnest solicitation of General Greene, Colonel Davie was induced to accept the position, an ungracious and troublesome office at any time, but then attended with peculiar difficulties, as the country had been lately devastated and stripped of its usual resources by a large ...
— Sketches of Western North Carolina, Historical and Biographical • C. L. Hunter
... concerned. The sacrifice is, to risk being thought unkind, ungrateful, by you, and of losing your friendship. This is the only danger I am running, really; so don't fear for me, and please forgive me if you can. Just at the moment I must seem (as well as ungracious) a little mysterious, not because I want to be mysterious, but because it is forced on me by circumstances. I hate it, and soon I hope I shall be able to be as frank and open with you as I was at first, when I saw how good you were about taking an interest in my sister Saidee. I think, as far ...
— The Golden Silence • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... Then feeling that her tone was ungracious, she tried to make amends. "It was nice of you ...
— The Tin Soldier • Temple Bailey
... I shall the effect of this good lesson keep, As watchman to my heart. But, good my brother, Do not, as some ungracious pastors do, Show me the steep and thorny way to heaven Whilst, like a puff'd and reckless libertine,[70] Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads, And recks not ...
— Hamlet • William Shakespeare
... about the neck, said, "You wish to see Mademoiselle Le Marchant?" And then I noticed that the little ormer shell curls about this little lady's face were not all gray, but mixed gray and brown, and that this little face was, if anything, still more frigidly ungracious than the last, a regular little martinet of a face, and I knew that it must be another of ...
— Carette of Sark • John Oxenham
... my suspicions, and even this examination could not be called a palpation, for I put no weight upon the abdomen. The patient was very dissatisfied because I would not allow him food. I said, "No. you can't eat until your bowels move." "How soon will they move!" he asked in an irritating and ungracious manner, to which I replied, "Your God only knows, and He ...
— Appendicitis: The Etiology, Hygenic and Dietetic Treatment • John H. Tilden, M.D.
... feelings of the others, but there could be no mistake in what she read in Huntington's black countenance. She was not only frightened, but surprised and pained. For all his coarseness and crudity, she had until to-day believed him to be innately gentle, with only a rough and ungracious exterior. She had seen him always tender with Claire, whom undoubtedly he loved with all the best there was in him. But now she perceived the other side of his character, which she had indeed divined at first, but which she had firmly, on account of Claire, refused to acknowledge. ...
— The Heart of Thunder Mountain • Edfrid A. Bingham
... contrasted with the "man's joy" is illustrated from the experiences of Moses in conducting the children of Israel out of Egypt (Exodus xvii). His achievement savors of disrelish because of the grumbling unbelief of the people, and because of the ungracious irritation into which he has been betrayed even when taxing his God-given power to the utmost in their behalf. He must hold steadily to his majesty as a prophet or he cannot control and so serve the ...
— Selections from the Poems and Plays of Robert Browning • Robert Browning
... the Scripture calls faciem et vultum domini, the face of the Lord, whereof the prophets speak much; who ever sees not the face of the Lord knows Him not, but sees only His back,—that is, an angry and ungracious God. ...
— The Epistles of St. Peter and St. Jude Preached and Explained • Martin Luther
... for mastery of the sorrel and told Andy to go over and help him get saddled, Andy said nothing of having had his services refused, but went. This time, Blink also said nothing, but accepted in ungracious surrender the assistance thus thrust upon him. For on the range-land, unless one is in a mind to roll his bed and ride away, one does not question when the leader commands. Andy's attitude was still that ...
— The Happy Family • Bertha Muzzy Bower
... that makes me feel easy. There's a good chance of their pulling through, now you're not with them, Plunger," was Baldry's ungracious ...
— The Hero of Garside School • J. Harwood Panting
... struck aback at this unexpected turn that he knew not upon the instant what reply to make. "Friend," said he, at last, "I thank thee extremely for thy offer, and, though I would not be ungracious, it is yet borne in upon me to testify to thee that as to the stone itself and the fortune—of which thou speakest, and of which I very well know the history—I have no inclination to receive either the one or the other, both the fruits of theft, rapine, and murder. The jewel I have myself beheld ...
— The Ruby of Kishmoor • Howard Pyle
... heard the unkind remark of Stella Latham but felt sorry that one of their mates should be so rude and ungracious. ...
— Janice Day, The Young Homemaker • Helen Beecher Long
... make a favorable impression. A lady dislikes to receive from a man with whom she has but a slight acquaintance a bow accompanied by a broad smile, as though he were on the most familiar terms with her. It is far better to err on the other side, and to give one of those stiff, ungracious bows which some men indulge in. Those gentlemen who smile with their eyes instead of their mouths give the most charming bows. As for men who bow charmingly at one time, and with excessive hauteur at others, according as they feel in a good or bad humor, they need never ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 11, No. 24, March, 1873 • Various
... himself appears to ask his old enemy Dal Segno to give singing-lessons to his dear son. The Italian teacher is very rude and ungracious, Laemml's blood rises also and a fierce quarrel ensues, which is interrupted by the arrival of the Prince. Having heard their complaints, he decides that the quarrel is to be settled by a singing competition in which Howora, Dal Segno's ...
— The Standard Operaglass - Detailed Plots of One Hundred and Fifty-one Celebrated Operas • Charles Annesley
... Mona and his wife; and honour to the kind hospitable Celts in general! How different is the reception of this despised race of the wandering stranger from that of —-. However, I am a Saxon myself, and the Saxons have no doubt their virtues; a pity that they should be all uncouth and ungracious ones! ...
— The Pocket George Borrow • George Borrow
... I bade farewell to my dear Aunt Milly and Captain Bridgeman, received a very ungracious salute from granny, who appeared to think, as she kissed me, that her lips were touching something poisonous, and set off with my mother in the coach ...
— Percival Keene • Frederick Marryat
... protested no more, for there was an indescribable something about Mr. Fortescue which would have made it difficult to contradict him, even had I been disposed to take so ungrateful and ungracious ...
— Mr. Fortescue • William Westall
... population; the manufacturing interests, which had begun to be ingeniously and effectively pursued here, notwithstanding the repressive hostility of England to their introduction; and the distinctive qualities of our farmers, sea-men, professional men, and village politicians. But it is ungracious to ask for more than there is in this compact and most admirable volume. It is written with a severely good taste, in a spirit of candor and generosity, with stern fidelity to truth in relating things honorable and humiliating; and it will surely excite to wide and ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 93, July, 1865 • Various
... that such a noble-minded man as Maurice could make an observation so ungracious, so ungenerous, and one which in his heart he knew was so unjust, to the woman he loved? Yet it would be difficult to find a lover who is incapable of doing the same. Why is it that men, even the best, are at times stirred by an irresistible prompting, themselves, to wound the being whom ...
— Fairy Fingers - A Novel • Anna Cora Mowatt Ritchie
... the moment he shut the door. "Psha!" said I, with an air of carelessness, but it would not do: every ungracious syllable I had utter'd crowded back into my imagination. I reflected, I had no right over the poor Franciscan, but to deny him; I consider'd his grey hairs—his courteous figure seem'd to re-enter and gently ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume 19 - Travel and Adventure • Various
... of the results obtained on board the "Challenger" I sent this statement to "Nature," in which journal it appeared the following week, without any further note or comment than was needful to explain the circumstances. In thus allowing judgment to go by default, I am afraid I showed a reckless and ungracious disregard for the feelings of the believers in my infallibility. No doubt I ought to have hedged and fenced and attenuated the effect of Sir Wyville Thomson's brief note in every possible way. Or perhaps I ought to have suppressed the note altogether, on the ground that it was ...
— Collected Essays, Volume V - Science and Christian Tradition: Essays • T. H. Huxley
... how many sons have you Who call you mother, whom you never knew! But most of them who that relation plead Are such ungracious youths as wish you dead; They gape at rich revenues which you hold, And fain would nibble at your grandame ...
— The Borough • George Crabbe
... ungracious in one who has received a hundred favors from his patron to speak in any but a reverential manner of his elders; but the present writer has had descendants of his own, whom he has brought up with as little as possible of the servility at present exacted by parents from children ...
— The History of Henry Esmond, Esq. • W. M. Thackeray
... ungracious than to speak disrespectfully of the publications of those laborious and earnest workers who have preceded us, and who for that very sufficient reason did not know quite so much as we do. We admire ...
— The Book-Collector • William Carew Hazlitt
... graceful, are neglected from sheer necessity. Carelessness in the points of association connected with sentiment (and all personal civilities and attention have this root) grows upon one like carelessness in dress, until an entire community may get to be as ungracious in deportment, as ...
— Recollections of Europe • J. Fenimore Cooper
... and satisfaction the young man took the paper, glanced at it, and folded it to put in his pocket. Mrs. Brewer was regarding him, and he felt that his silence must seem ungracious. ...
— Eve's Ransom • George Gissing
... be under the ungracious necessity of shaking him off. I can't tell you how sick I am, Harry, at the loss of ...
— The Hunt Ball Mystery • Magnay, William
... over Thought and Art, was conscious of a personality that transcended their own and dwarfed their activities. There was no bitterness in Mrs. Wilcox; there was not even criticism; she was lovable, and no ungracious or uncharitable word had passed her lips. Yet she and daily life were out of focus: one or the other must show blurred. And at lunch she seemed more out of focus than usual, and nearer the line that divides life from a life that ...
— Howards End • E. M. Forster
... is in no way an exception. The lives of moralistic people are not beautiful to behold. They are apt to be conventional, legalistic, and maintainers of the status quo. Because they have no sense of deliverance themselves, they are apt to be ungracious in relation to others. Because they live by the law, they do not show the fruit of the Spirit: namely, the love, joy, peace, and long-suffering which should mark the followers of Christ. They reveal how impossible it is for a human being to be a ...
— Herein is Love • Reuel L. Howe
... But it is ungracious to talk of oneself—except so far as shall answer some points you touch on. It would in many respects be very delightful to me to walk again with you over those old Places; in other respects sad:—but the pleasure would have the upper hand if one had not again ...
— Letters of Edward FitzGerald - in two volumes, Vol. 1 • Edward FitzGerald
... was ungracious enough, but the price more than I had dared to hope for. Feeling pretty sure that in his lordship's temper a word of thanks would merely invite him to consign my several members to perdition, I bowed and left him. Twenty minutes later I was on the ...
— The Laird's Luck • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... grass, where Robin Cockscroft had laid him; he had tossed the old sail off, perhaps in a dream, and he threatened to roll down upon the granny. The contrast between his young, beautiful face, white raiment, and readiness to roll, and the ancient woman's weary age (which it would be ungracious to describe), and scarlet shawl which she could not spare, and satisfaction to lie still—as the best thing left her now to do—this difference between them was enough to take anybody's notice, ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore
... Stanhope be civil to the Pope, and to kneel down while the Host was being carried through the streets. His tutor, though, had better not. With wonderful artistic insight, the earl perceives that the fitting attitude for Mr Harte is simple, ungracious honesty.[370] ...
— English Travellers of the Renaissance • Clare Howard
... London to the number of sixty thousand. And they had a captain called Water Tyler, and with him in company was Jack Straw and John Ball: these three were chief sovereign captains, but the head of all was Water Tyler, and he was indeed a tiler of houses, an ungracious patron. When these unhappy men began thus to stir, they of London, except such as were of their band, were greatly affrayed. Then the mayor of London and the rich men of the city took counsel together, and when they saw the people thus coming on every side, they caused the gates of the city ...
— Chronicle and Romance (The Harvard Classics Series) • Jean Froissart, Thomas Malory, Raphael Holinshed
... here a family party? Is that not sufficiently evident by the somewhat ungracious things ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue
... this change, ungracious, irksome, cold? Whence this new grandeur that mine eyes behold?— The widening distance that I daily see? Has wealth done this? Then wealth's a foe to me! Foe to my rights, that leaves a powerful few The paths of ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 4, September, 1850 • Various
... respects to my dear aunt," Felix answered, perfectly impenetrable to his ungracious reception, and perfectly comfortable ...
— My Lady's Money • Wilkie Collins
... useful backing. It would have been possible to call together a group consisting of men who had been members of the national organization which would have excluded all these and included the Bishops;[10] but Redmond probably felt it would be ungracious to do this. His chief desire was to avoid all recognition of party and still more of partisan machinery. His conclusion was to do nothing; and it was a conclusion to which he was prone at all times when he did not see his way clear. This temperamental disinclination ...
— John Redmond's Last Years • Stephen Gwynn
... protested, half-mollified, with her parting nod. "Don't—for pity's sake!—talk about it," she added, rudely, to Norma, as Norma began some consolatory murmur on the stairs. But when they were before her own fire, waiting for the expected girls, she made Norma a rather ungracious confidence. ...
— The Beloved Woman • Kathleen Norris
... if I saw any advantage for Riette in the plan, which I do not, I am too selfish to consent to it. Well, well, I have other reasons; I will tell them to your mother one of these days. I am sorry Madame de Sainfoy should have thought of it, as it seems ungracious to refuse. But I was miserable enough without Riette last year, when she spent those weeks at the Convent at Sonnay. By the by, the good nuns did not find her so ignorant. She knows her religion, she can dance and ...
— Angelot - A Story of the First Empire • Eleanor Price
... doubtless not uncongenial; while to others, it could not fail to be at least curiously interesting, from the warm air of florid cordiality, contrasting itself with one knows not what kind of aguish sallowness of saving discretion lurking behind it. Ungracious critics might have thought that the manner flushed the man, something in the same fictitious way that the vest flushed the cheek. And though his teeth were singularly good, those same ungracious ones might have hinted that they were too good to be true; or rather, were not so good as they ...
— The Confidence-Man • Herman Melville
... continual expectation of trouble. She was forever trying short cuts and getting snared in the fallen logs. Once she had been scraped from her saddle by an overhanging bough, and now, in attempting to find an easier path down a slippery ridge, her horse had fallen with her. Ward was ungracious ...
— They of the High Trails • Hamlin Garland
... Majesties were most amiable," said Mr. Jefferson, dryly, "and your reception was as unlike the ungracious notice which King George took of Mr. Adams and myself in '86 at Buckingham Palace as possible. But, come, I want to show you a view of the gardens," he went on, pushing back the heavy drapery and drawing the two gentlemen into ...
— Calvert of Strathore • Carter Goodloe
... my remark called for so ungracious a reply. To look at you one could hardly imagine a cruel ...
— Molly Bawn • Margaret Wolfe Hamilton
... at the turning of the street where her mother lives. She smiles, undecided, declares herself well again, and begs to return to our house on the heights. This did not precisely enter into my plans, I confess. However, it would look very ungracious to refuse. ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... "Said he so? the ungracious, headstrong fellow!" said Eustace, looking back wistfully. "And what to do! To ride back myself might be the means of getting the whole troop late in starting, and disorderly—yet, to leave him!" Eustace looked at John Ingram's comely and stolid face, and then almost smiled at himself for seeking ...
— The Lances of Lynwood • Charlotte M. Yonge
... than once spoken of the disgusting air of patronage which he assumed toward me, and of his frequent officious interference withy my will. This interference often took the ungracious character of advice; advice not openly given, but hinted or insinuated. I received it with a repugnance which gained strength as I grew in years. Yet, at this distant day, let me do him the simple justice to acknowledge that I can recall no occasion when the suggestions ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 2 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... next, that if our ultimate condition must be that of entire subjection and surrender to and harmony with the Divine Will, how sad it is that our consecration is so slow, so protracted, so ungracious; that we take so much time to reach the point where we are altogether the Lord's. People can read the mystery of conversion in the parable of the dry bones in Ezekiel; but there is consecration in the story, too. Little by little we see the dead man coming into the place of blessing; ...
— Memoranda Sacra • J. Rendel Harris
... of that, sir. That is your most ungracious trait. It is true that you yourself have introduced into our house young men of every class of society. It is true that you have never guarded me against them:—but then in a short time, when you began to remark that I felt some affection towards ...
— Debts of Honor • Maurus Jokai
... girl almost wanted to go home with them; but no one invited her, and she would not have been so silly or ungracious as to plead homesickness, for she really wasn't homesick ...
— A Little Girl of Long Ago • Amanda Millie Douglas
... A delightful day, and a magnificent country! They too thought of journeying to Cosenza, and, in short, would I allow them to share my carriage? Now this was annoying; I much preferred to be alone with my thoughts; but it seemed ungracious to refuse. After a glance at their smiling faces, I answered that whatever room remained in the vehicle was at their service—on the natural understanding that they shared the expense; and to this, with the best grace in the world, they at once agreed. ...
— By the Ionian Sea - Notes of a Ramble in Southern Italy • George Gissing
... the villagers and accustomed summer people, Phyllis bade her "Good morning!" But, to the astonishment of both girls, instead of replying in an equally pleasant manner, she stared at them both up and down for a moment, then turned away with only an ungracious nod. The indignant pair left her severely alone after that, except for a furtive glance or two when she was looking the other way. But when they had at last ascertained that old Mrs. Selby had, after all, no wool of the shade required, Leslie hurried Phyllis out with ...
— The Dragon's Secret • Augusta Huiell Seaman
... without noticing the somewhat ungracious form of invitation. "It war me," he said, "dropped in, not finding ye downstairs. Let's have ...
— Cressy • Bret Harte
... all—a strange melange of rage at Butler's perfidy and insolence, and utter disgust with me; though he said, frankly enough, that he would rather see his kinswoman wedded to twenty rebels than to one Butler. With which he slammed his pen to an ungracious finish, ending with a complaint to heaven that the world had used him so shabbily at such ...
— The Reckoning • Robert W. Chambers
... against his many excellences of temper and character, one or two must be glanced at by any one essaying to present to the public, however imperfectly, a just account of this very eminent person. The failing in question formed the chief subject of vituperation—vituperation of the dead!—by the ungracious parties to whom brief reference has just been made; and consists, in short, in the excessive eagerness to accumulate money, by which it was alleged that the late Sir William Follett was characterised. This charge is ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 363, January, 1846 • Various
... that it will not be considered ungracious in me that I oppose the wish of any lady. But when she so far misunderstands her duty as to want to go to working on the roads and making rails and serving in the militia and going into the army, I want to protect her against it. I do not think that sort of employment ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume IV • Various
... the ungracious bloom Of rich apparel where it glow'd before,— For Vanity has faded all to gloom, And lofty Pride has stiffen'd to the core, For impious Life to tremble at its doom,— Set for a warning token evermore, Whereon, as now, the giddy and the wise Shall gaze ...
— The Poetical Works of Thomas Hood • Thomas Hood
... be our conduct? Shall we attempt to repair the breaches, and fortify the ruins? A hopeless and ungracious undertaking! Or shall we leave them to moulder away by time and accident—a sure but distant and thankless consummation; or, shall we not rather cut away at once the isthmus that remains, allow free course to the current which has been artificially impeded, and float upon the mingling ...
— The Land-War In Ireland (1870) - A History For The Times • James Godkin
... old. At rare intervals came the flash and outbreak of a fiery mind; but the years were years of lassitude. His patriotic song, Le Rhin Allemand, is of 1841. In 1852 the Academy received him. "Musset s'absente trop," observed an Academician; the ungracious reply, "Il s'absinthe trop," told the truth, and it was a piteous decline. In 1857, attended by the pious Sister ...
— A History of French Literature - Short Histories of the Literatures of the World: II. • Edward Dowden
... from Tony that you are coming with us on the yachting cruise this winter, and I want to thank you for your invitation to El Castillo de Ruiz. I was so afraid you had not forgiven me for being so rude to you, and dreaded lest you had decided to have nothing further to do with such an ungracious person as Myra Rostrevor." ...
— Bandit Love • Juanita Savage
... men did, to whom this ungracious office belonged; and meanwhile other chief-constructors proceeded to make the bridges; and thus they made them:—They put together fifty-oared galleys and triremes, three hundred and sixty to be under the bridge towards the Euxine Sea, and three hundred and fourteen to be under the other, the ...
— The History Of Herodotus - Volume 2 (of 2) • Herodotus
... graciousness, or intelligence, are not being called into play by common business or acquaintanceship. There, in the train, they sit in the elemental, native dreariness of their more practical, ungracious demand on life; not bad in any way, oh no; nor actively repulsive, but trite, empty, everyday, in the sense of what everyday often, alas! really is, but certainly no day or hour or minute, in a ...
— Hortus Vitae - Essays on the Gardening of Life • Violet Paget, AKA Vernon Lee
... destined to cause a serious estrangement between the monarch and his Castilian subjects. Their first purpose was easily accomplished. While the Cardinal awaited him near Roa, the King avoided him by proceeding directly to Tordesillas to visit his mother. This ungracious and unmerited snub was applauded by Martyr, who dismissed the incident with almost flippant mention; nor did he afterwards touch upon the aged Cardinal's death which occurred simultaneously with the reception of the ...
— De Orbe Novo, Volume 1 (of 2) - The Eight Decades of Peter Martyr D'Anghera • Trans. by Francis Augustus MacNutt
... ungracious boy? henceforth ne'er look on me. Thou art violently carried away from grace: there is a devil haunts thee, in the likeness of a fat old man; a tun of man is thy companion. Why dost thou converse with that trunk of humours, that bolting-hutch of beastliness, ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... stand upon neither Faith nor Troth in the City, Lady. I have known an Heiress married and bedded, and yet with the Advice of the wiser Magistrates, has been unmarried and consummated anew with another, so it stands with our Interest: 'tis Law by Magna Charta. Nay, had you married my ungracious Nephew, we might by this our Magna Charta have hang'd ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. II • Aphra Behn
... to ask a great deal of you, and remind you of a promise you once made." There was a little tremor in her voice. "You will not think it ungracious if I say there is no one else who can do what seems so necessary, and ask you if you do not consider that you owe something to my father. It is hard for me, not because I ...
— Thurston of Orchard Valley • Harold Bindloss
... informed his cousin of the success of her commands—that Mr. Constantine was at liberty. This assurance, though imparted with so ungracious an air, laid her head with less distraction on her pillow, and as she stepped into Sir Robert's carriage next day, enabled her with more ease to deck her lips with smiles. She felt that the penetrating eyes of Mr. Somerset were never withdrawn from her face. Offended with his perverseness, ...
— Thaddeus of Warsaw • Jane Porter
... that to 'attempt to upset morality' by the help of the physical sciences is about as rational or as possible as to 'attempt to upset Euclid by the help of the Rig Veda.' Now on Professor Huxley's principles, this last sentence, though it sounds very weighty, is, if so ungracious a word may be allowed me, nothing short of nonsense. It would be the lowest depth of immorality, he says, to believe in God, when we see that there is no physical evidence to justify the belief. And physical science in this way he admits—he indeed ...
— Is Life Worth Living? • William Hurrell Mallock
... pleasure of the meeting with her nephew—and would have done so, had he not yielded to it by consenting to a transfer of bank-shares (in his favor) which involved great liabilities. She would not listen to an explanation of the risk, and considered it ungracious to look the gift-horse in the mouth. "It had been a capital investment," she said, and she remained absolutely opposed to the sale of the shares. Her nephew had to accept the gift as it was—so that instead of relieving anxiety it created a new one. However, having come to give her ...
— Philip Gilbert Hamerton • Philip Gilbert Hamerton et al
... last-quoted observation, but he would have known better than to go back, even if himself, and not his father, had been the first comer of his line from the north. He had married an English Christian, and, having none of the Scotch accent, was ungracious enough to be ashamed of his blood. He was desirous to obliterate alike the Hebrew and Caledonian vestiges in his name, and signed himself E. M. Crotchet, which by degrees induced the majority of his neighbours to think that his name was ...
— Crotchet Castle • Thomas Love Peacock
... o'clock last night an ugly fellow, Of skinny exterior and most ungracious manner, Was thrown with a total loss of gravity From the flapping doors ...
— Song Book of Quong Lee of Limehouse • Thomas Burke
... back for the third time to my desk. The one person who might be trusted to find the answer to those questions was Mr. Playmore. I wrote him a full and careful account of all that had happened; I begged him to forgive and forget my ungracious reception of the advice which he had so kindly offered to me; and I promised beforehand to do nothing without first consulting his opinion in the new ...
— The Law and the Lady • Wilkie Collins
... about me," was the ungracious response of his comrade. "I cut my eye-teeth a good while before you did, even though you may be a few years older. I'll take care of myself, you may depend upon it, and of you, too, if you get yourself into a scrape, which ...
— Ilka on the Hill-Top and Other Stories • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... that, in the time of Cicero, dancing was not held in good repute among the Romans, but I prefer to consider his ungracious dictum (in De Ami citia, I think,) "Nemo sobrius saltat"—no sober man dances—as merely the spiteful and envious fling of a man who could not himself dance, and am disposed to congratulate the golden youth of the Eternal City on ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Volume 8 - Epigrams, On With the Dance, Negligible Tales • Ambrose Bierce
... tone of this ungracious speech had the effect of putting the party at its ease. Lady Cressage seated herself beside her friend on the sofa, and gently, abstractedly, patted one of her hands. Thorpe remained on his feet, looking down at the pair with satisfied ...
— The Market-Place • Harold Frederic
... which shall always be a dear and proud recollection to me, came to be broken, —who snapped the three-fold cord,—whether yourself (but I know that was not the case) grew ashamed of your former companions,—or whether (which is by much the more probable) some ungracious bookseller was author of the separation,—I cannot tell;—but wanting the support of your friendly elm, (I speak for myself,) my vine has, since that time, put forth few or no fruits; the sap (if ever it had any) has become, in a manner, dried up and extinct; and you will find your old ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb IV - Poems and Plays • Charles and Mary Lamb
... well, yet she had prayed that there would have been some kindly relentings towards her; but there seemed none. So she answered him sadly, and the two sat down to their gloomy, silent breakfast. And thus it was all that day. Mr. Greylston still mute and ungracious; his sister shrank away from him. In that mood she scarcely knew him; and her face was grave, and her voice so sad, even the servants wondered what was the matter. Margaret Greylston had fully overcome all angry, reproachful feelings against her brother. So far her soul ...
— Friends and Neighbors - or Two Ways of Living in the World • Anonymous
... doesn't seem to me the most heart-stirring thing in the world. Don't they ride faster than that?" At this moment Tony with the hounds at his heels was trotting across the park at a huntsman's usual pace from covert to covert. The Senator was certainly ungracious. Nothing that he saw produced from him a ...
— The American Senator • Anthony Trollope
... interruption. But sewing did not always hinder thinking. And then, certainly, the room did seem very empty, and very still; and the clock, which she never heard the rest of the week, kept ticking an ungracious reminder that she was alone. Ellen would sometimes forget it, in the intense interest of some nice little piece of repair which must be exquisitely done in a wrist-band or a glove; and then perhaps Margery would softly open the ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Elizabeth Wetherell
... very well satisfied with the fruits of this apparently ungracious refusal. She went to the city less frequently than before, and only when it was necessary. This, he decided, was significant. It could have ...
— Quill's Window • George Barr McCutcheon
... she nodded her head and glided softly away. She knew her chance of learning the secret was gone for the moment, and she had too much of the guile of the savage woman to spoil her chances by loitering about unnecessarily while her lord was in his present ungracious humor. ...
— The Great Taboo • Grant Allen
... scarcely able to wash a floor decently, talked of service with contempt, unless tempted to change their resolution by the offer of twelve dollars a month. To endeavour to undeceive them was a useless and ungracious task. After having tried it with several without success, I left it to time and bitter experience to restore them to their sober senses. In spite of the remonstrances of the captain, and the dread of the cholera, they all rushed ...
— Roughing it in the Bush • Susanna Moodie
... for us only as their historians permit them, as their biographers saw, or imagined them. Would Petrarch ever have permitted Laura to do an ungracious act, or anything which, to his masculine understanding, seemed unfeminine; and would Dante have mentioned it had Beatrice been guilty of one? A man can no more understand a woman from the reading of books than he ...
— The Broad Highway • Jeffery Farnol
... of bread. Before gobbling it up, as most dogs are in the habit of doing, I bowed my head and wagged my tail, in token of thanks, and he understood, and smiled pleasantly. I really did not want the bread at all, but felt it would be ungracious to refuse, so I ate it slowly, in order that he might see that I only did it out of politeness. He understood this also, and seemed quite willing to let me stay in his shop, so I sat down, with my face to the door, to show that I only asked his protection. ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments • Andrew Lang.
... be made at once for the celebration of this most desired union at the holy church of St. Denis. We wondered much at Your Grace's first missive, in which you so peremptorily desired us not to move in this matter till your return; and we wondered more at Your Lordship's ungracious reply to our answer in which we consented to the delay Your ...
— Yolanda: Maid of Burgundy • Charles Major
... like," returned Mrs. Adair, with an ungracious shrug of the shoulders. "But there is a reason, I suppose. I don't understand why you ...
— The Four Feathers • A. E. W. Mason
... to enter the hall when they were there, he took refuge with some of the groups of gentlemen, where the two girls would not be likely to approach him unless they had something of great importance to communicate to their ungracious friend. ...
— Which? - or, Between Two Women • Ernest Daudet
... embarrassment by his rudeness. Once his hostess, a simple unpretending woman desirous only of pleasing her distinguished guest, said, "Oh, Mr Borrow, I have read your books with so much pleasure!" "Pray, what books do you mean, madam? Do you mean my account books?" was the ungracious retort. He then rose from the table, fretting and fuming and walked up and down the dining-room among the servants "during the whole of the dinner, and afterwards wandered about the rooms and passage, till the carriage could be ordered for our return home." ...
— The Life of George Borrow • Herbert Jenkins
... Madeline had promised that she would meet him that evening;—or rather had not so promised. When asked to do so she had not refused, but even while not refusing had reminded him that her mother would be there. Her manner to him had, he thought, been cold, though she had not been ungracious. Upon the whole, he could not make up his mind to expect success. "Then he must have been a fool!" the reader learned in such matters will say. The reader learned in such matters is, I think, right. In that ...
— Orley Farm • Anthony Trollope
... learn this for the first time!" cried the king springing up from his couch, "my friends must be deaf, and blind and dull indeed, if still I have any, and my servants and emissaries too! I cannot bear this haughty ungracious fellow, but I will invite him tomorrow morning—nay I will invite him to-day, to a festive entertainment, and send him the four handsomest horses that I have brought with me from ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... the latter official that everything depended. So far all was satisfactory; but if the Director (who was supreme in authority over the prison, not answerable even to the Governor) chose to be ungracious, they might go back whence they had come without even attempting that bold stroke in the hope of which they had paid this visit. They had dared, however, show no signs of their consuming anxiety. With smiling thanks they bade good-bye to the Governor ...
— The Castle Of The Shadows • Alice Muriel Williamson
... influence over all seemed shed. The friends invited strove to show their joy, In wishing happiness without alloy To that young couple, who, in youthful bloom, Were the admired of all in that large room. But, Oh! I shrink! 'Tis my ungracious task From bliss like this to tear away the mask! On such occasions wine's oft made to flow— As if it were the source ...
— The Emigrant Mechanic and Other Tales In Verse - Together With Numerous Songs Upon Canadian Subjects • Thomas Cowherd
... at the time to care to enter the store and endure Josie's vapid advances; and through the thin partition there came to him their comments on Betty's ungracious behaviour. ...
— The Fortune Hunter • Louis Joseph Vance
... lettre de cachet lying upon the bureau. When Louvois had finished writing, Courtin, with some emotion, asked him what that lettre de cachet was? Louvois told him its purpose. Courtin remarked that it was surely an ungracious act, for that, even if the report were true, the King might be content to go no further than advising her to be more circumspect. He begged and entreated him to tell the King so on his part before acting upon the lettre de cachet; and that, if the King would not believe his words, he ...
— Political Women, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Sutherland Menzies
... I, you ruin all by this condescension on a speech and air so ungracious. If this is all you get by it, never, never, my lord, fall out again. O Charlotte! If you are not generous, you come off ...
— The History of Sir Charles Grandison, Volume 4 (of 7) • Samuel Richardson
... was accepted because the only alternatives were a rigorous exaction of the whole amount stated to be due on each claim, which might in some instances be exaggerated by design, in other over-rated through error, and which, therefore, it would have been both ungracious and unjust to have insisted on; or a settlement by a mixed commission, to which the French negotiators were very averse, and which experience in other cases had shewn to be dilatory and often wholly inadequate to ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Andrew Jackson • Andrew Jackson
... the weather, which, to say the least, has been rather ungracious since we have been here; as if one ever expected to find any thing but smoke, and darkness, and fog in London. The authentic air with which they lament the existence of these things at present would almost persuade one that in general London was a ...
— Sunny Memories Of Foreign Lands, Volume 1 (of 2) • Harriet Elizabeth (Beecher) Stowe
... kindness, and yet it hurt him. He could have accepted it more readily from anybody else. On the other hand, he remembered that she had known him only as a track-grader, and that he was, as a matter of fact, nothing else. He could not send the order back without appearing ungracious or disposed to assert that he was of her own station. Then another thought ...
— The Gold Trail • Harold Bindloss
... arranged. Mackay, a curious morbid fellow, who had thrown himself into Unitarianism and charity mainly out of opposition to an orthodox and bourgeois family, and who had a great idea of his own social powers, was somewhat grudging and ungracious through it all. But Elsmere's proposals were much too good to be refused. He offered to bring to the undertaking his time, his clergyman's experience, and as much money as might be wanted. Wardlaw listened to him cautiously ...
— Robert Elsmere • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... a privileged subject, used to come to the manse on the Saturdays for a meal of meat; and so it fell out that as, by some neglect of mine, no steps had been taken to regulate the disposal of the victual that constituted the means of the augmentation, some of the heritors, in an ungracious temper, sent what they called the tithe-ball (the Lord knows it was not the fiftieth!) to the manse, where I had no place to put it. This fell out on a Saturday night, when I was busy with my sermon, thinking ...
— The Annals of the Parish • John Galt
... not to tell the Foreys of their hopeful relative's ungracious behaviour. Clare had left them. When Mrs. Doria went to her room her daughter was there, gazing down at something in her ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... less magnanimous than Lionel, did this misanthropical man follow his ungracious cousin. "Ha!" cried Darrell, suddenly, as, approaching the threshold, he saw Mr. Fairthorn at the dining-room window occupied in nibbing a pen upon an ivory thumb-stall—"I have hit it! That abominable Fairthorn has been shedding its prickles! How could I trust flesh ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... to France to examine the work of the Frenchwomen only, it would be ungracious, as well as a disappointment to many readers, not to give the names at least of some of the many American women who live in France or who spend a part of the year there and are working as hard as if this great afflicted ...
— The Living Present • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... friend, and hast ever wronged the spirit that generously confided in thee; if thou art a lover, and hast ever given one unmerited pang to that true heart that now lies cold and still beneath thy feet; then be sure that every unkind look, every ungracious word, every ungentle action, will come thronging back upon thy memory; then be sure that thou wilt lie down sorrowing and ...
— The Christian Home • Samuel Philips
... be more fascinating and infectious than the mirthful ingenuousness which accompanied and seemed to mitigate this ungracious speech, and the consul was greatly amused, albeit conscious that it was only an attitude, and perhaps somewhat worn in sentiment. He knew that during the war of the rebellion, and directly after it, Great Britain was the resort of certain Americans from the West as well as from the South ...
— A Protegee of Jack Hamlin's and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... the receipt, and muttered some ungracious thanks. Old Matthew eyed him queerly, and, catching a whiff of brandy, pulled out his gold watch. The action may have been involuntary. The hour was half-past ten in ...
— Hetty Wesley • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... her niece that I meant to call for her soon again, for the Doctor thought it would do both of us good to take a walk every day. She looked somewhat encouraged by this; and I hoped that the plan would have the twofold effect of making her think it would be ungracious to refuse to accompany me a second time, and of keeping her from crying lest she should again be ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 110, December, 1866 - A Magazine of Literature, Science, Art, and Politics • Various
... rather not," she said at last, avoiding his eyes instinctively. "Please don't think me ungracious. I know you mean ...
— The Swindler and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... is not very apt to love the English people, as a whole, on whatever length of acquaintance. I fancy that they would value our regard, and even reciprocate it in their ungracious way, if we could give it to them in spite of all rebuffs; but they are beset by a curious and inevitable infelicity, which compels them, as it were, to keep up what they seem to consider a wholesome bitterness of feeling between themselves and all other nationalities, ...
— Our Old Home - A Series of English Sketches • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... affection, of parents towards their several children, is many times unequal; and sometimes unworthy; especially in the mothers; as Solomon saith, A wise son rejoiceth the father, but an ungracious son shames the mother. A man shall see, where there is a house full of children, one or two of the eldest respected, and the youngest made wantons; but in the midst, some that are as it were forgotten, ...
— Essays - The Essays Or Counsels, Civil And Moral, Of Francis Ld. - Verulam Viscount St. Albans • Francis Bacon
... the honour of being the first to abolish the unhospitable, troublesome, and ungracious custom of giving vails to servants[228]. JOHNSON. 'Sir, you abolished vails, because you were too poor to be able to ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... spit and entered the creek which led into the harbour. There was something unusually piquant to her in the thought of that greeting with the man, whose response to it had been so unwilling, almost ungracious. ...
— Jeanne of the Marshes • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... have found the little piece of paper you put into my Harold's hat. I never knew it was there until to-day. Thank God I did not know, for had I seen it after your visit, I should certainly, in my mad, ungracious, evil pride, have returned it ...
— How It All Came Round • L. T. Meade
... questions asked. His speech was almost a different tongue from theirs; he was thirty-five, he had dogs and a man-servant, instead of the usual equipment of mother, sisters, and "hired girl," and he seemed eternally bored and ungracious. This was enough for the Los Lobos girls, and for most of ...
— The Heart of Rachael • Kathleen Norris
... the end, and when, next day towards noon, my husband came with drowsy eyes to make a kind of ungracious apology, saying he supposed the doctor had been ...
— The Woman Thou Gavest Me - Being the Story of Mary O'Neill • Hall Caine
... at her side, thinking swift thoughts. It seemed ungracious to tell her of his loathing for the Buckeye comedies, those blasphemous caricatures of worth-while screen art. It would not be fair. And perhaps here was a quick way to discharge his debt and be free of obligation to the girl. Of course he would always feel a warm gratitude for her trusting ...
— Merton of the Movies • Harry Leon Wilson
... young people, for the most part, more gentle, more reasonable, and more considerate than old. And, summing up, in a general way, my experience of different ranks (which extends, let me premise, all the way down from peers to publicans), I have met with most of my formal and ungracious receptions among rich people of uncertain social standing; the highest classes and the lowest among my employers almost always contrive—in widely different ways, of course—to make me feel at home as soon as I ...
— Stories By English Authors: France • Various
... whose personal morals were lax. "What do you want, Prince?" were the dry words with which he greeted Jozef Poniatowski, when the gay officer came into his camp to offer his sword to the Rising; and it is said that this ungracious reception, widely different from Kosciuszko's usual address, was due to the fact that he, whose own private life was blameless, was of too Puritan a temper to be able to overlook certain ...
— Kosciuszko - A Biography • Monica Mary Gardner
... proceeded solely from a dread of ridicule, which formed a principal feature of Mr. Walpole's character, and which, carried, as in his case, to excess, must be called a principal weakness. "This accounts for the ungracious language in which he so often replies to the importunities of her anxious affection; a language so foreign to his heart, and so contrary to his ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole
... February drew near. For he was in constant communication with Barclay, and was perfectly apprised of all the details of the crime which was to be perpetrated on that day. He was generally considered as a man of sturdy and even ungracious integrity. But to such a degree had his sense of right and wrong been perverted by his zeal for the interests of his family, and by his respect for the lessons of his priests, that he did not, as he has himself ingenuously ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 4 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... walked up demurely and took my hand. Her words were in abrupt contrast. "Where are her things going, Miss Bentley?" I wondered that pretty lips could be so ungracious. It was not temper which appeared on them, but ...
— Daisy • Elizabeth Wetherell
... with the fondness of orphans of the same blood. They had no superficial resemblances, Arthur being small, clerical, freckled, and red-haired, with a staid face and dress and a stunted, ill-fed look, like the growth of an ungracious soil; Elk, straight and tall, with the breeding and clothing of a metropolitan man, with black eyes and black hair and a small "imperial" goatee upon his nether lip; with an adventurous nature and experience giving intonation to his regular face, and the ...
— Tales of the Chesapeake • George Alfred Townsend
... after the accident, had she been able to do so. But she was not able to do so without an exercise of a species of authority which was distasteful to her, and which was very seldom heard, seen, or felt within the limits of Surbiton Cottage. It would moreover have been very ungracious to snub Charley's manuscript, just when Charley had made himself such a hero; and she had, therefore, been obliged to read it. But now that it was done, she hurried Katie off to ...
— The Three Clerks • Anthony Trollope
... which her own steps had not yet trodden. Since her mother died not a thought had been given to herself, all was for her father and her sister. In her own eyes she was herself very plain, and she knew that her manner was often ungracious when she would most wish to be gracious. She saw her face as the glass reflected it, but she did not see the changing play of expression which gave it its charm—the infinite pity, the sympathy, the sweet womanliness which drew towards her all who were ...
— Beyond the City • Arthur Conan Doyle
... to the ungracious treatment he received, which can only be accounted for by his having refused a seat in Parliament, coupled with conditions to which his conscience would not allow him to accede, and from his diffidence in not putting forward his ...
— Memoirs and Correspondence of Admiral Lord de Saumarez. Vol II • Sir John Ross
... half laughing; 'but the hearts of all honest men lie near together, on whatever side they draw their swords. God have mercy on whosoever may fall to-morrow! I trow, Jamie, thou couldst not sing that rough rhyme of Agincourt. I was bashful and ungracious enough to loathe the very sound of it when I came home in my pride of youth; but I would lief hear it once more. Or, stay—Yorkshiremen always have voices;' and raising his tone, he unspeakably gratified Trenton and Kitson by the request; ...
— The Caged Lion • Charlotte M. Yonge |
