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Squabble   Listen
verb
Squabble  v. i.  (past & past part. squabbled; pres. part. squabbling)  
1.
To contend for superiority in an unseemly manner; to scuffle; to struggle; to wrangle; to quarrel.
2.
To debate peevishly; to dispute. "The sense of these propositions is very plain, though logicians might squabble a whole day whether they should rank them under negative or affirmative."
Synonyms: To dispute; contend; scuffle; wrangle; quarrel; struggle.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Squabble" Quotes from Famous Books



... the narrow lanes, defying bailiffs, and cutting down burghers at their doors. Now a mob of clerks plunged into the Jewry and wiped off the memory of bills and bonds by sacking a Hebrew house or two. Now a tavern squabble between scholar and townsman widened into a general broil, and the academical bell of St. Mary's vied with the town bell of St. Martin's in clanging to arms. Every phase of ecclesiastical controversy or political strife was preluded by some fierce outbreak in this turbulent, surging mob. When England ...
— History of the English People, Volume I (of 8) - Early England, 449-1071; Foreign Kings, 1071-1204; The Charter, 1204-1216 • John Richard Green

... and you'll regret it for ever if you miss the opportunity.' Now Sir Jib Boom was between seventy and eighty, and he and Captain Cuttwater had met each other nearly every day for the last twenty years, and had never met without a squabble. ...
— The Three Clerks • Anthony Trollope

... neighbourhood of Lhassa. He was said to have taken many lives, and, finding his own in danger in his country, had come to settle on our side of the border, marrying different wives, whom he constantly beat and in turn banished from under his roof. It was owing to his latest family squabble that he came into my employ; his abnormal strength, valuable for carrying loads, was to me his only recommendation. In camp he went by the name ...
— In the Forbidden Land • Arnold Henry Savage Landor

... as regards length and strength, and "not in it" with a good solid stick. In the hands of a hasty, hot-tempered individual they may lead to the shedding of blood over some trivial, senseless squabble. The hollowing out of the cane, to make the scabbard, renders them ...
— Broad-Sword and Single-Stick • R. G. Allanson-Winn

... not go into the details of the controversy, which really degenerated into a sectarian squabble.[16] The only discussion of the subject that approached fairness was by an anonymous writer,[17] who professed himself impartial and of a different religious persuasion from Jollie. To be sure, he was a man who believed in possession by spirits. ...
— A History of Witchcraft in England from 1558 to 1718 • Wallace Notestein

... to you all," she began. "There are some things in this school that aren't always quite what they ought to be, and it's rather hard for juniors to fight their own battles. Sometimes you squabble among yourselves—oh, I know!—and sometimes you get it hot from the seniors or the Transition. Well, we're going to help you. Each of us means to take on one or more of you and be a sort of fairy godmother to you, and responsible for seeing you're ...
— The Jolliest School of All • Angela Brazil

... he killed two of Sweyn's men who had assisted in the burning of Thorbiorn's relative, Frakok, or Frakark, in Kildonan. Jarl Ragnvald with difficulty reconciles Thorbiorn and Sweyn, and they start for a joint raid. Soon, however, they squabble over the spoils, and Thorbiorn puts his wife Ingirid, Sweyn's sister, away, a ...
— Sutherland and Caithness in Saga-Time - or, The Jarls and The Freskyns • James Gray

... dear," replied the jeweller, "I know you to be a good woman, and won't have a squabble with you about this paltry chest. The giver of the warning is a box-maker, to whom I am about to sell this cursed chest that I wish never again to see in my house, and for this one he will sell me two pretty little ones, in which there ...
— Droll Stories, Volume 1 • Honore de Balzac

... associate, was a notorious drunkard; and that the mistress with whom he lived for many years, and whom he even passed off as his wife, was also addicted to drinking; nay, Lord Elcho is said to have witnessed a tipsy squabble between the Young Pretender and Miss Walkenshaw, the lady in question, across the table of a low Paris tavern. The reports of the many spies whom the English Government set everywhere on his traces are constant and unanimous in one item ...
— The Countess of Albany • Violet Paget (AKA Vernon Lee)

... both cases, before an offender can be reinstated he must kill a fowl and swallow a drop or two of its blood with turmeric. Women commonly get the lobe of the ear torn through the heavy ear-rings which they wear; and in a squabble another woman will often seize the ear-ring maliciously in order to tear the ear. A woman injured in this way is put out of caste for a year in Janjgir. To grow turmeric or garlic is also an offence against caste, but a man is permitted to do this ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume II • R. V. Russell

... to our camp; and marketing upon a large scale was conducted without a squabble. The two good men, Shooli and Gimoro, who were daily visitors, assured me that there was only one feeling throughout the country, of gratitude and good-will. This was a great reward to me for the many difficulties ...
— Ismailia • Samuel W. Baker

... first time, the work of Luther came to Hutten's attention. The disturbances at Wittenberg were in the beginning treated by all as a mere squabble of the monks. To Leo the Tenth this discussion had no further interest than this: "Brother Martin," being a scholar, was most probably right. To Hutten, who cared nothing for doctrinal points, it had no significance; the more monkish strifes the better—"the sooner would the enemies ...
— The Story of the Innumerable Company, and Other Sketches • David Starr Jordan

... the cardinal, "three men placed hors de combat in a cabaret squabble! You don't do your work by halves. And pray ...
— The Three Musketeers • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... expected to control him as they pleased. Admiral Blanco, however, insisted on reversing our positions, offering his services as second in command, in which arrangement I gladly acquiesced. This insignificant squabble would not be worth narrating, but for its bearing on subsequent events; as well as enabling me to confer a pleasing testimony to the patriotic disinterestedness of Admiral Blanco, who is still one of the brightest ...
— Narrative of Services in the Liberation of Chili, Peru and Brazil, - from Spanish and Portuguese Domination, Volume 1 • Thomas Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald

... taken into custody by Chinese police, Ned turned to the window and looked out on the court. He understood, too, that his own arrest would mean a long delay in prison while his identity was being established. So he thought best to keep out of the squabble the hot-headed officer had ...
— Boy Scouts on Motorcycles - With the Flying Squadron • G. Harvey Ralphson

... true. We meet twice a week, usually at his house, to squabble over his method of Latin pronunciation and his construction of the ablative case. He's got a theory of the ablative absolute," said Warren with a scowl, "fit to fetch Tacitus howling ...
— Average Jones • Samuel Hopkins Adams

... apron-bibs, and even childish pinafores, is anyone likely to doubt? Schoolgirls can be patriots as well as rebels, and the seminary can vie with the college, or possibly outdo it, occasion given. Ask Juliette Adam whether the bread-and-butter misses of France in the year 1847 did not squabble over the obstinacy of King Louis Philippe and the greed of M. Guizot, the claims of Louis Napoleon and the theories of Louis Blanc, of Odilon Barrot, and Ledru-Rollin? And I who write, have I not seen a North Antrim Sunday-school ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves

... had had another squabble after Mr. Sponge's departure in the morning, Mr. Jog reproving Mrs. Jog for the interest she seemed to take in Mr. Sponge, as shown by her going to the door to see him amble away on the piebald hack. Mrs. Jog justified herself on the score of Gustavus James, with whom she ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees

... what it means then, Jack—some tough guys been out there on the gulf keepin' a close watch on the schooner that came up the coast loaded to the gun'ls with case goods, an' crept in with small boats to make a big haul! Listen to 'em squabble, will you, boy? What wouldn't I give for daylight so's to see that boss shindy—shootin' keeps a'goin' on like the old days over there—wow! They must be a bunch o' rotten marksmen, or the whole lot'd be wiped out afore this time. What're we a'goin' ...
— Eagles of the Sky - With Jack Ralston Along the Air Lanes • Ambrose Newcomb

... third to their table, saying, "as he and his master only serve a president's wife, he cannot presume to compare himself with us, who serve Princesses and Duchesses." The rejected footman called another fellow to his aid, and a violent squabble ensued. The commissaire was called: he found that they served three brothers, the sons of a rich merchant at Rouen; two of them had bought companies in the French Guards; one of the two had an intrigue with the wife of Duc d'Abret, and the other with the Duchesse de Luxembourg, while ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre

... now in all these "understandings," engagements, and so-called alliances is personal rather than national. So far as England is concerned, they led to a squabble and a split in George's administration. It would hardly be worth while to go into a minute history of the quarrel between Townshend and Stanhope, Sunderland and Walpole. Sunderland, a man of great ability and ambition, ...
— A History of the Four Georges, Volume I (of 4) • Justin McCarthy

... upon a letter for him and wanted to read it. But as he recognised his father's writing—the envelope had had much redirection in varying scripts—and as her letters were always sealed to him, he refused to open it in her presence. He was not in the mood for a squabble with her. The fact that his father had managed to pierce his inaccessibility had unnerved him, the mere sight of the letter almost making him tremble. He put it in his pocket; it was imperative he should be alone when reading it. Cleo ...
— Cleo The Magnificent - The Muse of the Real • Louis Zangwill

... at last, after every sordid circumstance of intrigue and squabble and jealousy, one after another of the organisations he joined broke down. Half gratefully and half mournfully he disengaged himself, not because he did not believe in his principles, but because he saw that the difficulties were insuperable. ...
— At Large • Arthur Christopher Benson

... devotion, Joyce," I said, smiling. "Do you remember how Tommy and I used to squabble as to which of us should eventually ...
— A Rogue by Compulsion • Victor Bridges

... pilgrimage. Occasionally she has the company of her tall and indifferent boy. She enjoys the society of her relations, and indulges as oft as may be in exhilarating misunderstandings with them. Without a vehement squabble now and again life would be intolerably insipid. Anger, accompanied by fluent abuse, is to her a kind of spiritual blood-letting for the casement of her suddenly plethoric temperament. But such is of her frailty. Proof of her ...
— Tropic Days • E. J. Banfield

... rich, who had grown riotous in the long peace, obstructed the thing, and in some squabble a stone struck the priest on the head and he lost his memory. He saw piled in front of him frogs and elephants, monkeys and giraffes, toadstools and sharks, all the ugly things of the universe which he had collected to do honour to God. ...
— Alarms and Discursions • G. K. Chesterton

... you don't squabble with her. Your aunt ought to have sent for me five days ago, instead of which she lets a sick, nervous, half-crazy child dance and sing ...
— The Madigans • Miriam Michelson

... COURTNEY down on him like cartload of bricks; declined to put Motion, declaring it abuse of forms of House. This rather depressing. In good old times there would have been an outburst of indignation in Irish camp; Chairman's ruling challenged, and squabble agreeably occupied rest of evening. But times changed. No Irish present to back TANNER, who, with despairing look round, subsided, and business went forward without ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100., February 7, 1891 • Various

... the impulse as far as it is compatible with his reasoned interests—often, to be sure, without regard for that limit. The average man or woman is always at open discord with some one; the great majority could not live without oft-recurrent squabble. Speak in confidence with any one you like, and get him to tell you how many cases of coldness, alienation, or downright enmity, between friends and kinsfolk, his memory registers; the number will be considerable, ...
— The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft • George Gissing

... each taking all he could for himself. But Devilshoof having secured the medallion, made off with it. He was no sooner gone than a dark woman wrapped in a cloak came into the street and, when she was right in the midst of the squabble, she dropped her cloak and revealed herself as Queen of the band. All the gipsies were amazed and not very comfortable either!—because, strange to say, this gipsy queen did not approve of the maraudings of ...
— Operas Every Child Should Know - Descriptions of the Text and Music of Some of the Most Famous Masterpieces • Mary Schell Hoke Bacon

... indifference to mere 'theological subtleties.' To him Paul's preaching and the Jews' passionate denials of it seemed only a squabble about 'words and names.' Probably he had gathered his impression from Paul's eager accusers, who would charge him with giving the ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: The Acts • Alexander Maclaren

... below seventy degrees of frost, and the blizzards blowing, always blowing, against his devoted back. And they found him holding his precious chick balanced upon his big feet, and pressing it maternally, or paternally (for both sexes squabble for the privilege) against a bald patch in his breast. And when at last he simply must go and eat something in the open leads near by, he just puts the child down on the ice, and twenty chickless Emperors rush to pick it up. And they fight over it, and so tear it that sometimes ...
— The Worst Journey in the World, Volumes 1 and 2 - Antarctic 1910-1913 • Apsley Cherry-Garrard

... against the Turks. How far he was led by his desire for posing as a hero, and how far by a certain vigorous Viking spirit that was certainly in him, will never be known. The Greeks welcomed him and made him a leader, and for a few months he found himself in the midst of a wretched squabble of lies, selfishness, insincerity, cowardice, and intrigue, instead of the heroic struggle for liberty which he had anticipated. He died of fever, in Missolonghi, in 1824. One of his last poems, written there on his thirty-sixth ...
— English Literature - Its History and Its Significance for the Life of the English Speaking World • William J. Long

... the railway scheme was blocked, if not utterly ruined. It was the one weak link in the chain, and your father was aware of it and had taken what measures he could to guard against the danger; but Fate, circumstances, were too much for him. A silly squabble, so silly as to be almost childish, between some squatters on the border and the discontented natives, upset all his carefully laid plans, and turned a gigantic success, at its very ...
— At Love's Cost • Charles Garvice

... scramble they had—these three little boys and three little girls! How they laughed and jumped and knocked their heads together in picking up the cherries, yet never quarreled—for there were such heaps, it would have been ridiculous to squabble over them; and besides, whenever they began to quarrel, Brownie always ran away. Now he was the merriest of the lot; ran up and down the tree like a cat, helped to pick up the cherries, and was first-rate ...
— The Adventures of A Brownie - As Told to My Child by Miss Mulock • Miss Mulock

... the prosperity of the University, is there a corner of Europe where men of science will not laugh when they hear that the prosperity of the University of Saint Andrews is to be promoted by expelling Sir David Brewster on account of a theological squabble? The professors of Edinburgh know better than this Presbytery how the prosperity of a seat of learning is to be promoted. There the Academic Senate is almost unanimous in favour of the bill. And indeed it is quite certain that, unless this bill, or some similar bill, be passed, a new ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 4 (of 4) - Lord Macaulay's Speeches • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... delightfully warm spring night, and there on the platform of Stickney's store, where the softened light from within shone upon them through a huge window, the boys had gathered. They were chatting, jesting, chaffing one another, and occasionally playing pranks, which once or twice started a squabble. As Rackliff sauntered up Chub Tuttle was complaining that nearly a pint of peanuts had been stolen ...
— Rival Pitchers of Oakdale • Morgan Scott

... the broad sea. Only a millionth part of the surface of the unsubmerged earth knew the populous abodes of man. And the lonely sea, inhospitable to stable homes of men, was thrice the area of the land. Were men intended, then, to congregate in few places, to squabble and to bicker and breed the discontents that led to injustice, hatred, and war? What a mystery it all was! But Nature was neither false nor little, however ...
— The Call of the Canyon • Zane Grey

... saying that since the Chinese had had no one to minister to them the Dominicans assumed that responsibility, but in a letter [105] from the Licentiate Gaspar de Ayala to Philip II, dated from Manila, July 15, 1589, full details of the squabble are given. From this source we learn that the Augustinians had a convent in the village of Tondo in the Chinese district. There they had ministered to the natives in their own language, but had rather neglected their Chinese-speaking parishioners. Consequently after the arrival of the Dominicans ...
— Doctrina Christiana • Anonymous

... for this life blossomed with fair arts, That for some paltry leagues of stolen land, Or some poor squabble of contending marts, Murder shall smudge out with its reeking hand Man's faith and fanes alike; And man be man no more—but a brute brain, A primal horror mailed and fanged to strike, And bring ...
— A Jongleur Strayed - Verses on Love and Other Matters Sacred and Profane • Richard Le Gallienne

... vagaries of public feeling during the war unless they bear constantly in mind that the war in its entire magnitude did not exist for the average civilian. He could not conceive even a battle, much less a campaign. To the suburbs the war was nothing but a suburban squabble. To the miner and navvy it was only a series of bayonet fights between German champions and English ones. The enormity of it was quite beyond most of us. Its episodes had to be reduced to the dimensions of a railway accident or a shipwreck before it could produce any ...
— Heartbreak House • George Bernard Shaw

... idea of making his wrongs known to the captain, unless as a last desperate resource. He could not bring himself to make Marian the subject of a vulgar squabble. No, it was to herself alone he would appeal; it was in the natural instinct of her own heart that he ...
— Fenton's Quest • M. E. Braddon

... witness, who said a good deal out the salmon good and bad, he asked whether they were obliged to make ould soldiers of any of them. Bearcroft asked for an explanation of the words, which Scott would not give him. He then asked the judge, who answered that he did not know. After a squabble, the phrase was explained; but nearly every other question produced a similar scene. The jury were astonished that neither judge nor Bearcroft understood what they all understood so well, and they inferred from Bearcroft's ignorance that he had a rotten cause. The consequence ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Vol. 56, No. 346, August, 1844 • Various

... two sharply contrasted pictures, the world's ideal of a king and His ideal. The upper room was a strange place, and the eve of Calvary was a still stranger time, for disciples to squabble about pre-eminence. The Master was absorbed in the thought of His Cross, the servants were quarrelling about their places in His Kingdom. Perhaps it was the foot-washing that brought about the unseemly strife that arose among them, each desiring to hand on the menial office to ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren

... mixed audience. Whereas in a private conversation a man is glad to receive any new information, no one likes to be told in public that he ought to have known this or that, or that every schoolboy knows it. Then follows generally a squabble, and the best pleader is sure to have the laughter on his side, however ignorant he may be of the subject that is being discussed. But Dr. Prichard was an excellent president and moderator, and though he had unruly spirits ...
— My Autobiography - A Fragment • F. Max Mueller

... my lad. Didn't I trust you, and send you in among my choice grapes, and ripe figs, and things. There, say no more about it. Gardeners don't grow fruit to satisfy their mouths, but their eyes, and their minds, my lad. Eat away. Don't let a squabble with a schoolboy who hasn't learned manners spoil your supper. We've never had any children; but if we had, Grant, I don't think they would be ...
— Brownsmith's Boy - A Romance in a Garden • George Manville Fenn

... lover at the foot, Pin was but a poor climber, and, as she clung trembling to her branch, needed so much prompting in her lines—even then to repeat them with such feeble emphasis—that Laura invariably lost patience with her and the love-scene ended in a squabble. Passing behind a wooden fence which was a tangle of passion-flower, she opened the door of the fowl-house, and out strutted the mother-hen followed by her pretty brood. Laura had given each of the chicks a name, and she now took Napoleon and Garibaldi ...
— The Getting of Wisdom • Henry Handel Richardson

... earthquake and such other phenomena as are customary. Instead, nothing is changed except that the woman who was talking to me a moment since now lies at my feet in a very untidy condition. You conceive, madame, I used to tease her about that twisted little-finger, in the days before we began to squabble: and it annoys me that Thragnar should not have omitted even Lisa's crooked little-finger on her left hand. Yes, such painstaking carefulness worries me. For you conceive also, madame, it would be more or less awkward if I had made an error, and if the appearance were in reality what ...
— Jurgen - A Comedy of Justice • James Branch Cabell

... players, though only a small percentage is criticism. More people would recognize each of thirty popular performers than could identify even one of the great in other branches of art or in science. A recent squabble about a couple of actresses has been the subject of greater fuss than would be caused by the discovery of the lost books of Livy, of a picture by Apelles, of the MS. of an unknown opera by Beethoven, of a method of making accumulators out of papier-mache, ...
— Our Stage and Its Critics • "E.F.S." of "The Westminster Gazette"

... quarrel between Aristotelian professors on one side and professors favouring the experimental method on the other. But this position was attacked and carried by a very simple statement. If the divine guidance of the Church is such that it can be dragged into a professorial squabble, and made the tool of a faction in bringing about a most disastrous condemnation of a proved truth, how did the Church at that time differ from any human organization sunk into decrepitude, managed nominally by simpletons, but really by schemers? If that argument ...
— History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom • Andrew Dickson White

... better of his judgment, and he abused the fellow in terms more violent, if possible, than those he had addressed to the master of the slave ship. He had some difficulty to avoid getting into a very serious squabble, as many of the other dealers came out and joined in the yell now raised against him. As he passed along the street, it was like running the gauntlet; for he was saluted by vituperations on all sides, and it was perhaps only by preserving a menacing attitude ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 13, No. 374 • Various

... roused him from his garret, where He heard the daily squabble; And lo, in human form, he stands Before ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 1 (of 2) • John Roby

... well-bred to squabble here, Or insult back to render; But may you wither soon, my dear, Although so young ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke

... altercation, disagreement, dispute, brawl, affray, fray, variance, bickering, contention, wrangle, spat, tiff, squabble, broil, dissension. ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming

... strange," I reflected, "how men can go on worrying themselves about Rome and Canterbury four hundred years after the discovery that the earth moved, and involuntarily a comparison rose up in my mind of a squabble between two departments in an office after the firm has gone bankrupt.... But how to get all these vagrant thoughts into a sheet of paper? St. Paul himself could not proselytize within such limitations, and apparently what I wrote was not sufficient to lead my correspondent out ...
— Memoirs of My Dead Life • George Moore

... life, and the native is invariably loud voiced. No bargain is concluded without an apparent squabble, and every tradesman in the street calls his wares, while drivers of vehicles are incessant in their cries of warning to foot-passengers. All the sounds are not unmusical, however, for from the minarets comes the "muezzin's" ...
— Peeps at Many Lands: Egypt • R. Talbot Kelly

... office, the editorial sanctum. Martin's first impression was of the disorder and cluttered confusion of the room. Next he noticed a bewhiskered, youthful-looking man, sitting at a roll- top desk, who regarded him curiously. Martin marvelled at the calm repose of his face. It was evident that the squabble with the printer ...
— Martin Eden • Jack London

... Anne's accession, she had flung herself with ardour into politics. To dominate was her favourite passion. And she imagined that she could decide affairs of State as easily as she directed a petty intrigue, or suppressed a squabble within the interior of the royal household. Instead of using the absolute sway she had over the Queen with tact and moderation, she exercised it with an imprudent audacity. Her party predilections were diametrically opposed to those of Anne, who was sincerely ...
— Political Women, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Sutherland Menzies

... interrupted me and said: "I am not at all interested in any squabble or quarrel between General Pershing and General Wood. The only thing I am interested in is winning this war. I selected General Pershing for this task and I intend to back him up ...
— Woodrow Wilson as I Know Him • Joseph P. Tumulty

... friends of Mr. Van Buren, and ready to take the field for him,—these very gentlemen voted not to exclude territory that might be obtained by conquest. They were willing to bring in the territory, and then have a squabble and controversy whether it should be slave or free territory. I was of opinion that the true and safe policy was, to shut out the whole question by getting no territory, and thereby keep off all controversy. The territory ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster

... take it," said he, "and better on the causeway than on Madame Brown's parlour floor. It's a gentleman's policy, I would think, to have the squabble in the open air, and save the women the likely sight ...
— John Splendid - The Tale of a Poor Gentleman, and the Little Wars of Lorn • Neil Munro

... squabble between some soldiers and civilians on the opposite side of the way, and a group of men in blouses were looking on. Barty stood leaning against a lamp-post, and ...
— The Martian • George Du Maurier

... Ga's head back with one hand by a grip of his queue, and with the other hand, from behind, reaching over and driving the knife into his body. Twice had he driven it in. There in the court room, with closed eyes, Ah Cho saw the killing acted over again—the squabble, the vile words bandied back and forth, the filth and insult flung upon venerable ancestors, the curses laid upon unbegotten generations, the leap of Ah San, the grip on the queue of Chung Ga, the knife ...
— When God Laughs and Other Stories • Jack London

... do, being sore as a galled horse just now. But listen, Allan, and you, too, predicant Quatermain; there are other and more important reasons than this petty squabble why I should be glad if you could go away for a while. I must take counsel with my countrymen about certain secret matters which have to do with our welfare and future, and, of course they would not like it if all the while there ...
— Marie - An Episode in The Life of the late Allan Quatermain • H. Rider Haggard

... group of Russians in whom the people I have talked with have confidence. Kolchak, Denikin, Yudenvitch, Trepov, the despicable hordes of Russian emigrees who haunt the Grand Hotel, Stockholm; the Socithans House, Helsingfors; the offices of the peace commission in Paris, and squabble among themselves as to how the Russian situation shall be solved; all equally fail to find many supporters in Petrograd.) Those with whom I have talked recognize that revolution, did it succeed in developing a strong ...
— The Bullitt Mission to Russia • William C. Bullitt

... means peace, and war will be averted, unless he is overruled by the disunion portion of his party. We all know the irrepressible conflict is going on in their camp.... Then, throw aside this petty squabble about how you are to get along with your pledges before election; meet the issues as they are presented; do what duty, honor, and patriotism require, and appeal to the people to sustain you. Peace is the only policy that can save the country ...
— Stephen A. Douglas - A Study in American Politics • Allen Johnson

... balm to Ida's resentment; it drew a part of the sting from her defeat and compelled Mr. Farange perceptibly to lower his crest. He was unable to produce the money or to raise it in any way; so that after a squabble scarcely less public and scarcely more decent than the original shock of battle his only issue from his predicament was a compromise proposed by his legal advisers and ...
— What Maisie Knew • Henry James

... My heart was thumping furiously; I felt bewildered and feverish; I sate up in the bed and looked about the room. A broad flood of moonlight came in through the curtainless window; everything was as I had last seen it; and though the domestic squabble in the back lane was, unhappily for me, allayed, I yet could hear a pleasant fellow singing, on his way home, the then popular comic ditty called, 'Murphy Delany.' Taking advantage of this diversion I lay ...
— J. S. Le Fanu's Ghostly Tales, Volume 1 • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu

... rubbish is thrown into it, and pigs, hens, and cows, wander at will all over it. I asked the doctor this morning if it was not very unhealthy, but he said that fortunately such places became septic filters. I think he said they breed all sorts of bacteria and they have a squabble among themselves, and by fighting against each other keep things all right. If the Austrian and German bacteria would only do the same it would save a lot of trouble. Round the cesspits are barns and pig-houses, &c. A lot of barns. Instead of stacking ...
— Letters from France • Isaac Alexander Mack

... signify low spirit, ill-breeding, and bad manners; and thence misbecometh any wise, any honest, any honourable person. It agreeth to children, who are unapt and unaccustomed to deal in matters considerable, to squabble; to women of meanest rank (apt, by nature, or custom, to be transported with passion) to scold. In our modern languages it is termed villainy, as being proper for rustic boors, or men of coarsest education and employment; who, having their minds debased by being conversant in ...
— Sermons on Evil-Speaking • Isaac Barrow

... wit, was asked, because of his jokes; and Mrs. Butt, on whom he practises; and Potter, who is asked because everybody else asks him; and Mr. Ranville Ranville of the Foreign Office, who might give some news of the Spanish squabble; and Botherby, who has suddenly sprung up into note because he is intimate with the French Revolution, and visits Ledru-Rollin and Lamartine. And these, with a couple more who are amis de la maison, made ...
— A Little Dinner at Timmins's • William Makepeace Thackeray

... I will rather sue to be despis'd, then to deceiue so good a Commander, with so slight, so drunken, and so indiscreet an Officer. Drunke? And speake Parrat? And squabble? Swagger? Sweare? And discourse Fustian with ones owne shadow? Oh thou invisible spirit of Wine, if thou hast no name to be knowne by, let ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare

... not fellows who come to us like paupers to wag your tongues at us." "We crave thy pardon, O Fakir,"[FN170] rejoined they, "and our heads are between thy hands." The ladies laughed consumedly at the squabble; and, making peace between the Kalandars and the Porter, seated the new guests before meat and they ate. Then they sat together, and the portress served them with drink; and, as the cup went round merrily, quoth the Porter ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton

... do to her only for her dead mother's sake. And no she had nobody to protect her. Ernest was dead and Harry, who was in the church decorating business, was nearly always down somewhere in the country. Besides, the invariable squabble for money on Saturday nights had begun to weary her unspeakably. She always gave her entire wages—seven shillings—and Harry always sent up what he could but the trouble was to get any money from her ...
— Dubliners • James Joyce

... said Mrs. Peckinpaw, who was a very old woman and who never spoke to Miss Peckham because of some neighborhood squabble which had happened so long before that neither of them remembered what ...
— Janice Day, The Young Homemaker • Helen Beecher Long

... difference, dissension, misunderstanding, cross purposes, odds, brouillerie [Fr.]; division, split, rupture, disruption, division in the camp, house divided against itself, disunion, breach; schism &c (dissent) 489; feud, faction. quarrel, dispute, tiff, tracasserie^, squabble, altercation, barney [Slang], demele, snarl, spat, towrow^, words, high words; wrangling &c v.; jangle, brabble^, cross questions and crooked answers, snip-snap; family jars. polemics; litigation; strife &c (contention) 720; warfare &c 722; outbreak, open rupture, declaration ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget

... mighty Chow!" cried Confucius. "An' will ye hear the poets squabble! Egad! A ladies' day could hardly introduce into our ...
— A House-Boat on the Styx • John Kendrick Bangs

... the international marriage market. Newspaper humourists stood together as one man in advocating a revision of the tariff upward on all foreign purchases coming under the head of the sons of old masters. As I have said before I did not follow the course of the nasty squabble very closely, and was quite indifferent as to the result. I have a vague recollection of some one telling me that a divorce had been granted, but that is all. There was also something said about ...
— A Fool and His Money • George Barr McCutcheon

... boys love rows, my boyhood liked a squabble; But at this hour I wish to part in peace, Leaving such to the literary rabble; Whether my verse's fame be doomed to cease While the right hand which wrote it still is able, Or of some centuries to take a lease, The grass upon my grave will grow as long, And sigh to midnight winds, ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron

... mastery; but over Congress; over hunger and disease; over lukewarm friends, or smiling foes in his own camp, whom his great spirit had to meet and master. When the struggle was over, and our important chiefs who had conducted it began to squabble and accuse each other in their own defence before the nation—what charges and counter-charges were brought; what pretexts of delay were urged; what piteous excuses were put forward that this fleet arrived too ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray

... see with steady clearness. And while his eyes were still closed, he had felt, tasted, and smelled. He knew his two brothers and his two sisters very well. He had begun to romp with them in a feeble, awkward way, and even to squabble, his little throat vibrating with a queer rasping noise (the forerunner of the growl), as he worked himself into a passion. And long before his eyes had opened he had learned by touch, taste, and smell to know his mother—a fount of warmth and liquid food and tenderness. She possessed a gentle, caressing ...
— White Fang • Jack London

... swamp lying over there," observed Phil. "And I warrant you he can tell what makes every sound you hear. One comes from some kind of bird squawking; another I happen to know is a night heron looking for a supper along the water's edge; then I suppose coons squabble when they meet, trailing over half sunken logs; a bobcat calls to its mate; the owls tune up; chuckwillswidows, the same birds that we call whippoorwills up North, you know, keep a whooping all the time; and there are all ...
— Chums in Dixie - or The Strange Cruise of a Motorboat • St. George Rathborne

... a thing they detest. They'd take in a nice, fat, old fellow, whose heart was so big it made his body grow to hold it, and who meant to do all the good with his money that his money would do, and not leave it for anybody to squabble ...
— Reels and Spindles - A Story of Mill Life • Evelyn Raymond

... and at all times the heart of Europe. His hysteria has made Europe hysterical, while his sober national sense at critical moments has held the whole continent to good behaviour. For a half-dozen centuries there was never a squabble at any remote part of Europe in which France did not stand ready and willing to take a hand on the slightest opportunity. That policy, as pursued particularly by Louis XIV and the Bonapartes, made a heavy drain in brawn and brain on the vitality ...
— The Seigneurs of Old Canada: - A Chronicle of New-World Feudalism • William Bennett Munro

... Mr Briggs reproved him; and Cecilia, taking advantage of the squabble, stole back to the music-room. Here, in a few minutes, Mrs Panton, a lady who frequently visited at the house, approached Cecilia, followed by a gentleman, whom she had never before seen, but who was so evidently charmed with her, that he ...
— Cecilia vol. 2 - Memoirs of an Heiress • Frances (Fanny) Burney (Madame d'Arblay)

... crept away without leave from the learned professor, and had got into difficulties. Oh, didn't I just love you for it! There's a Miss Frost here who tries to teach me; but, bless you! she can't knock much learning into me. She is as terrified of me as she can be, is old Frosty. She and I had a squabble in the passage; she said I was not to come in because I had my red dress on. You know, it's only a year since father died, and mother is in deep mourning still; but I will wear red—it is my sort of mourning. I suppose we can all do as we please. Well, when I discovered ...
— A Modern Tomboy - A Story for Girls • L. T. Meade

... controversialist ventures to ask some questions about the share which women have had in bringing about the great wars known to history, he draws on himself more and more hysterical abuse. What a strange being is this! Her life is one long squabble, she is the most reckless and violent of fighters, and yet she is always crying out that Men are brutal and bloodthirsty, and that she and her sisters would introduce the elements of peace and goodwill to political relations. We may have a harmless laugh at the literary shrew so ...
— Side Lights • James Runciman

... prepared to admit this, what do we prove ourselves to be? Baboons!' I laughed, but again Karl only smiled—this time, with deadly embarrassment. I discovered afterwards through Bulow that in some youthful squabble he had had the word 'Baboon-face' hurled at him. It soon became impossible to hide the fact that Ritter felt himself grossly insulted by 'the doctor,' as he called him, and he left my house foaming with rage, not to set foot in it again for years. After a few ...
— My Life, Volume II • Richard Wagner

... about matters you had no business to meddle with, and it was supposed that I had given you instructions; you meddled in Madame de Bentinck's affairs, which was certainly not in your province. Then you have the most ridiculous squabble in the world with that Jew. You created a fearful uproar all through the city. The matter of the Saxon bills is so well known in Saxony that grave complaints have been made to me about them. For my part, I kept peace in my household ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume VI. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot

... her lost delight, and Polly gravely poked at the mess, which was quite spoilt. But her attention was speedily diverted by the squabble going on in the corner; for Fanny, forgetful of her young-ladyism and her sixteen years, had boxed Tom's ears, and Tom, resenting the insult, had forcibly seated her in the coal-hod, where he held her with one hand while he returned ...
— An Old-fashioned Girl • Louisa May Alcott

... that, sir, I can't say. All I learned was that it was the result of some faculty squabble in one of the science departments; the grounds for the dismissal were insubordination and contempt ...
— Ministry of Disturbance • Henry Beam Piper

... pleasant cousins of the heroine of that story, and the same generosity towards the public in regard to their family affairs. Before they had been in the cabin an hour, we felt as if we knew every one of them. There was a great squabble as to where and how they should sleep; and when this was over, the revelations of the nature of their beds and their peculiar habits of sleep continued to pierce the thin deal partitions of the adjoining state-rooms. When all the possible trivialities ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... into the village green, and sat on the stocks with a hat that gave him the air of a fugitive from the treadmill; because he sat on the stocks—with that hat, and a cross face under it—he had been forced into the most discreditable squabble with a clodhopper, and was now limping home, at war with gods and men;—ergo, (this is a moral that will bear repetition)—ergo, when you walk in a rich man's grounds, be contented to enjoy what is yours, namely, the prospect;—I dare ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 3, February, 1851 • Various

... conventional, finding rather small causes for large effects. The whole thing started, he assures us, in a quarrel of Augustinians and Dominicans over the spoils of indulgence-sales, "and this little squabble of monks in a corner of Saxony, produced more than a hundred years of discord, fury, and misfortune for thirty nations." "England separated from the pope because King Henry fell in love." The Swiss revolted because of the painful impression produced by the Jetzer ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith

... which they snatched it from one another to try it; and the younger children fell a-crying, that the elder would not let them have it long enough. But as a little matter amuses children, and makes them squabble and fall out, my wife and I took no notice of their noise, which presently ceased, when the bigger ones supped with us, and my wife had given ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Complete • Anonymous

... various bustles: first, the driver came to be paid; then there was a squabble between Sam and Rebecca about the manner of carrying up his sister's trunk, which he would manage all his own way; and lastly, in walked Mr. Price himself, his own loud voice preceding him, as with something of the oath kind he kicked ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen

... as some momentary rush of passionate excitement, now slowly, as some depressing and gloomy notion succeeded; when suddenly my path was arrested by a long file of bullock cars which blocked up the way. Some chance squabble had arisen among the drivers, and to avoid the crowd and collision, I turned into a gateway which opened beside me, and soon found myself in a lawn handsomely planted and adorned with flowering shrubs ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 2 (of 2) • Charles Lever

... historic localities of Great Britain. We looked from different points of view at the mounds and trenches which marked it as a strongly fortified position. For many centuries it played an important part in the history of England. At length, however, the jealousies of the laity and the clergy, a squabble like that of "town and gown," but with graver underlying causes, broke up the harmony and practically ended the existence of the place except as a monument of the past. It seems a pity that the ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)

... Seniors, your admiration for them is entirely boundless. In one or two individual instances, it is true, it has been broken down by an unfortunate squabble with thick-set fellows in the Chapel aisle. A person who sits not far before you at prayers, and whose name you seek out very early, bears a strong resemblance to some portrait of Dr. Johnson; you have very much the same kind of ...
— Dream Life - A Fable Of The Seasons • Donald G. Mitchell

... my fault," said the Judge; "the trial will make the matter plain. That pompous, stupid Count was the cause of the squabble, and that rascal Gerwazy; but this is the business of the court. It is too bad that you were not in the castle at the supper, Father; you would have borne witness how ...
— Pan Tadeusz • Adam Mickiewicz

... cause of this our latest Insurrection—the word is big, much too big for the deed, and we should call it row, or riot, or squabble, in order to draw the fact down to its dimensions, but the ultimate blame for the trouble between the two countries does not fall ...
— The Insurrection in Dublin • James Stephens

... peacock,—seek no other object but the furtherance of their own designs, which are always petty even when not absolutely mean. There are obese women whose existence is a doze between dinner and tea. There are women with thin lips and pointed noses, who only live to squabble over domestic grievances and interfere in their neighbours' business. There are your murderous women with large almond eyes, fair white hands, and voluptuous red lips, who, deprived of the dagger or the poison-bowl, will slay a reputation ...
— A Romance of Two Worlds • Marie Corelli

... rising among the natives. General D—— became furious when Huntingdon told him what he had done, and threatened to arrest him. On young Carlton, the new A.D.C., taking sides with the commander of the artillery, and applauding the act, old D—— turned upon him like a lion. A violent squabble ensued, which resulted in Arthur Carlton resigning his appointment on the Staff, and expressed his determination to rejoin his ...
— Vellenaux - A Novel • Edmund William Forrest

... replied the questioner with alacrity; perhaps he feared he had wounded his friend's feelings, and dreaded lest there might ensue a squabble, for sparrows, it must be confessed, are easily affronted over trifles, though, as a rule, they are good-tempered little fellows enough, putting up with scanty fare and homely lodgings very contentedly ...
— Parables from Flowers • Gertrude P. Dyer

... It is a trial of speed, as if the female were to say, "Catch me and I am yours," and she scurries away with all her might and main, often with three or four dusky knights in hot pursuit. When she takes to cover in the grass, there is generally a squabble "down among the tickle-tops," or under the buttercups, and "Winterseeble" or "Conquedle" ...
— The Writings of John Burroughs • John Burroughs

... in with those who carried it on. Scenes of swaggering riot and roaring dissipation were, till this time, new to me; but I was no enemy to social life. Here, though I learnt to fill my glass, and to mix without fear in a drunken squabble, yet I went on with a high hand with my geometry, till the sun entered Virgo, a month which is always a carnival in my bosom, when a charming fillette, who lived next door to the school, overset my trigonometry, and set me off at a tangent from the spheres of my studies. I, however, ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham

... was "alone" after he had lost "that man" (Nietzsche), we begin to perceive that personal bitterness and animosity are out of the question here. We feel we are on a higher plane, and that we must not judge these two men as if they were a couple of little business people who had had a suburban squabble. ...
— The Case Of Wagner, Nietzsche Contra Wagner, and Selected Aphorisms. • Friedrich Nietzsche.



Words linked to "Squabble" :   argue, debate, bickering, niggle, fence, run-in, quarrel, dustup, pettifoggery, words, bicker, quibble, pettifog, row



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