"Churl" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... see if wayfarers were there to share the meal with him and his family. "There he goes," was the saying about any one who passed the door at any time without coming in to take a spoon—"there he goes; I'll warrant he's a miser at home to be so much of a churl abroad" The very gipsy claimed the cleanest bed in a Glenman's house whenever he came that way, and his gossip paid handsomely ...
— John Splendid - The Tale of a Poor Gentleman, and the Little Wars of Lorn • Neil Munro
... the crafty, "I will not slay thee! For all the king's gold I will never betray thee!" "Then why dost thou turn so pale, O churl, And then again black as the earth?" said the Earl. More pale and more faithful Was Thora, the fairest ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... that would ricochet From the tufts of grasses before them, yet— Like bold Antaeus—would each time bring New life from the earth, barely touched by his wing; And the swallow and martlet that always knew The straightest way home. Here a Saxon churl drew His breath—tapped his forehead—an idea had ...
— Complete Poetical Works of Bret Harte • Bret Harte
... Turquine. "Sir Knight," said Sir Launcelot, "bide while I drink, for I am athirst." "Nay," said Sir Turquine, "thou shalt not drink until thou quenchest thy thirst in Paradise." "Ha!" cried Sir Launcelot, "thou art a foul churl and no true knight. For when thou wert athirst, I let thee drink; and now that I am athirst, thou deniest ...
— The Story of the Champions of the Round Table • Howard Pyle
... count the same as war), they ceased shooting. So that was smoothed over, and we gave our beaters ale to wash down their anger. They were excusable! We—they had sweated to show our guests good sport, and our reward was a flight of hunting-arrows which no man loves, and worse, a churl's jibe over hard-fought, fair-lost Hastings fight. So, before the next beat, Hugh and I assembled and called the beaters over by name, to steady them. The greater part we knew, but among the Netherfield men I saw an old, old man, in the dress of ...
— Rewards and Fairies • Rudyard Kipling
... was in the vein of my father's talk no doubt. But I think that for once I may have been eloquent. And in the midst of my demand for ideals in politics that were wider and deeper than artful buying and selling, that looked beyond a vulgar aggression and a churl's dread and hatred of foreign things, while I struggled to say how great and noble a thing empire might be, I saw Rachel's face. This, it was manifest, was a new kind of talk to her. Her dark eyes were alight with a ...
— The Passionate Friends • Herbert George Wells
... pays every body their own, cannot be an honest man, when he does not discharge the good offices that are incumbent on a friendly, kind, and generous person: for, faith the prophet Isaiah, chap. XXXII. ver. 7, 8. The instruments of a churl are evil: he deviseth wicked devices to destroy the poor with lying words, even when the needy speaketh right. But the liberal soul deviseth liberal things, and by liberal things shall he stand. It is certainly honest to do every thing the law requires; but should we throw ...
— The Life and Most Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of - York, Mariner (1801) • Daniel Defoe
... the professors of the gentle art their good fortune in having lived in such times, and shared in such assemblies. As hospitality was the first of social virtues, so inhospitality was the worst of vices; the unpopularity of a churl descended to ...
— A Popular History of Ireland - From the earliest period to the emancipation of the Catholics • Thomas D'Arcy McGee
... "radius;" But, Cabby, it is clear, Thinks quite otherwise. I fear The controversy's growing rather "taydious." Whether by night or day, A fair fare the fare should pay, And Cabby should not overcharge unduly; But this is what riles me, When churl Cabby will not see A would-be fare, ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Volume 102, April 2, 1892 • Various
... said his uncle, coolly. "Let me think this over again. After all, we are of the same stock, although your father always flouted me for a mean-spirited churl. Poor Gavan, we may ...
— The Doomsman • Van Tassel Sutphen
... seen pure in the lowest artisan. Oh, how much better it would be that those folk of whom I speak were neighbors, and to have your confine at Galluzzo and at Trespiano,[3] than to have them within, and to endure the stench of the churl of Aguglione,[4] and of him of Signa, who already has his eye ...
— The Divine Comedy, Volume 3, Paradise [Paradiso] • Dante Alighieri
... of Crecy is memorable for several reasons, but chiefly because Feudalism and Chivalry there received their death-blow. The yeomanry of England there showed themselves superior to the chivalry of France. "The churl had struck down the noble; the bondsman proved more than a match, in sheer hard fighting, for the knight. From the day of Crecy, Feudalism tottered slowly but surely to its grave." The battles of ...
— A General History for Colleges and High Schools • P. V. N. Myers
... was gone out of Nabal, and his wife had told him these things, that his heart died within him, and he became as a stone. And it came to pass, about ten days after, that the Lord smote Nabal, that he died." One can imagine the picture for oneself. The rich churl sitting there in the midst of all his slaves and his wealth as one thunderstruck, helpless and speechless, till one of those mysterious attacks, which we still rightly call a stroke, and a visitation of God, ends him miserably. ...
— True Words for Brave Men • Charles Kingsley
... Emperor had hearkened this a great while, he said to the knight: "Hast thou heard it of yonder churl how he prayeth that his wife may be delivered of her child, and another while prayeth that she may not be delivered? Certes, he is worser than a thief. For every man ought to have pity of women, more especially of ...
— Old French Romances • William Morris
... not in haste I would stay a while to teach you manners, you foul-mouthed churl," muttered ...
— Red Eve • H. Rider Haggard
... among the dead, Antilochus; strength and beauty are no more; we welter all in the same gloom, one no better than another; the shades of Trojans fear me not, Achaeans pay me no reverence; each may say what he will; a man is a ghost, 'or be he churl, or be he peer.' It irks me; I would fain be a ...
— Works, V1 • Lucian of Samosata
... his daughter's hand to seek! No word the fierce knight spake But ope'd the door, And, scowling, said—"No Saxon churl shall make Rowena wife; and dare he woo her more, Upon him, would Sir ...
— Rowena & Harold - A Romance in Rhyme of an Olden Time, of Hastyngs and Normanhurst • Wm. Stephen Pryer
... and woful, like my own soul. I cannot help thinking of the sea; how the waves run and toss their arms about,—and the wind plays on those great harps, made by the shrouds and masts of ships. Winter is here in earnest! Whew! How the old churl whistles and threshes the snow! Sleet and rain are falling too. Already the trees are bearded with icicles; and the two broad branches of yonder pine look like the white mustache ...
— Hyperion • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... That villain churl whose office 'twas to bring My food, I bade taste first; but meanwhile thought: "Not here I find my ...
— The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini • Benvenuto Cellini
... But he did not upbraid the ungracious driver; he only swung his two canes a little more briskly, and kept breast of the horses all the way, entering the town side by side with the inhospitable vehicles—a running reproach to the churl on ...
— A New England Girlhood • Lucy Larcom
... bow and arrows, in a russet gown, and brought wild geese in his hand, and it was on the morn after Candlemas day; but King Arthur knew him not. Sir, said Merlin unto the king, will ye give me a gift? Wherefore, said King Arthur, should I give thee a gift, churl? Sir, said Merlin, ye were better to give me a gift that is not in your hand than to lose great riches, for here in the same place where the great battle was, is great treasure hid in the earth. Who told thee so, churl? said Arthur. ...
— Le Morte D'Arthur, Volume I (of II) - King Arthur and of his Noble Knights of the Round Table • Thomas Malory
... have it so, be it as you please. I have offended: you have a right to punish me, and play the churl to-night; ...
— The Disowned, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... What right have I to lead, if I can't follow? I'm not like our friend Courtier who believes in Liberty. I never have, I never shall. Liberty? What is Liberty? But only those who conform to authority have the right to wield authority. A man is a churl who enforces laws, when he himself has not the strength to observe them. I will not be one of whom it can be said: 'He ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... but damn for one poor spot of earth; And when your children find your judgment such, They'll scorn their sires, and wish themselves born Dutch; Each haughty poet will infer with ease, How much his wit must under-write to please. As some strong churl would, brandishing, advance The monumental sword that conquered France; So you, by judging this, your judgment teach, Thus far you like, that is, thus far you reach. Since then the vote of full two thousand ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Vol. 6 (of 18) - Limberham; Oedipus; Troilus and Cressida; The Spanish Friar • John Dryden
... midnight hate one who shirks his turn; notwithstanding you swear you are afraid of the fumes of wine by night. Dispel gloominess from your forehead: the modest man generally carries the look of a sullen one; the reserved, of a churl. ...
— The Works of Horace • Horace
... find a much frequented ruin gone! it was actually gone! not a trace of it; but the spot where it had stood for ages, turfed, planted with young spruce trees, and fenced off with post and rail! The exasperated people now launched forth an immensity of fulminations against the churl Sir Roger, and a certain number of them resolved to come and seat themselves in the street of the hamlet and there dine; but a terrific thunderstorm, which seemed in league with Sir Roger, soon routed them, drenched them through, and ...
— International Miscellany of Literature, Art and Science, Vol. 1, - No. 3, Oct. 1, 1850 • Various
... consciousness know that thou servest mammon, not God. If thy hope of well-being in time to come, rests upon thy houses, or lands, or business, or money in store, and not upon the living God, be thou friendly and kind with the overflowings of thy possessions, or a churl whom no man loves, thou art equally a server of mammon. If the loss of thy goods would take from thee the joy of thy life; if it would tear thy heart that the men thou hadst feasted should hold forth to thee the two fingers instead of the whole ...
— Paul Faber, Surgeon • George MacDonald
... Let churl or shepherd change his sky, And labour in the city dark, Where there is neither air nor room— How often will the exile sigh To hear again the unwearied lark, And see the ...
— Robert F. Murray - his poems with a memoir by Andrew Lang • Robert F. Murray
... seems probable, not widely known as an expression of sexual love; it would appear to have been a refinement of love only practiced by the more cultivated classes. In the old ballad of Glasgerion the lady suspected that her secret visitor was only a churl, and not the knight he pretended to be, because when he came in his master's place to spend the night with her he kissed her neither coming nor going, but simply got her with child. It is only under a comparatively ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 4 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... of Cadiz, who has been contracted to Julia, now married to a rich old churl, Francisco, in order to gain her, mans a galley, which has been captured from the Turks, with some forty or fifty attendants disguised as ferocious Ottomans; and whilst she, her husband and a party of friends are taking a pleasure trip ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. III • Aphra Behn
... like Gunnar, helped their tenants and neighbours, often, as we see in Gunnar's case, till they had neither hay nor food enough left for their own household, and had to buy or borrow from those that had. Then, too, it was that the churl's nature came out in Otkell and others, who having enough and to spare, would not part with their ...
— The story of Burnt Njal - From the Icelandic of the Njals Saga • Anonymous
... laugh at winter when we hear The grim old churl about our dwellings rave: Thou, from that "ruler of the inverted year," Shalt pluck the knotty sceptre Cowper gave, And pull him from his sledge, and drag him in, And melt the icicles ...
— Poems • William Cullen Bryant
... at her—the churl reappeared. He muttered a fearful oath, and seizing her by the ...
— Serge Panine, Complete • Georges Ohnet
... at this. "You are a witless churl to bid me heed the gods!" said he. "I spare or kill to please myself and none other. But where is your ...
— Old Greek Folk Stories Told Anew • Josephine Preston Peabody
... would probably be immediately accepted by very many of our readers. Brother Jonathan thinks and talks of cotton, and flour, and dollars, and the ups and downs of stocks. Poetry doesn't pay: he can not appreciate, and does not care for it. "Let me get something for myself," he says, like the churl in Theocritus. "Let the gods whom he invokes reward the poet. What do we want with more verse? We have Milton and Shakspeare (whether we read them or not). He is the poet for me who asks me for nothing;" and so the poor Muses wither (or as Jonathan himself might say, wilt) ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 3, August, 1850. • Various
... wanted to come out of the distillery, he found the entrance barred by the dog. Almira had laid herself down across the threshold and showed him her white teeth. "Indeed, so now you won't let me come out, you churl? Very well, I can wait here till the women return. I can find a little place to rest on." And so saying he threw himself on the heap of rose leaves Noemi had turned out. "Ah, what a good ...
— Timar's Two Worlds • Mr Jkai
... as an angry flush covered his face; "who sayeth 'must' to the son of Henry the Emperor? Who sayeth 'must' to the grandson of Barbarossa? Stand off, churl of Kapparon! To me, Sicilians all! To me, sons of the Prophet!" and, breaking away from the grasp of the burly knight, young Frederick of Hohenstaufen dashed across the small stone bridge that led to the marble pavilion in the little lake. ...
— Historic Boys - Their Endeavours, Their Achievements, and Their Times • Elbridge Streeter Brooks
... our laws better than you do, churl! Due division of spoil is just and fair; but we cast lots for what cannot ...
— The Continental Classics, Volume XVIII., Mystery Tales • Various
... price. Faithfully and merrily then shall all men keep the holidays of the Church in peace of body and joy of heart. And man shall help man, and the saints in heaven shall be glad, because men no more fear each other; and the churl shall be ashamed, and shall hide his churlishness till it be gone, and he be no more a churl; and fellowship shall be established in ...
— A Dream of John Ball, A King's Lesson • William Morris
... sure choose to be as I am, tortured still with cares and fears; but out of peevishness, and not out of truth." That which St. Austin said of himself here in this place, I may truly say to thee, thou discontented wretch, thou covetous niggard, thou churl, thou ambitious and swelling toad, 'tis not want but peevishness which is the cause of thy woes; settle thine affection, thou ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior
... But we bring them to dinn-er, Our master dare we not see. Bend your bows," said Little John, "Make all yon press to stand! The foremost monk, his life and his death Is clos-ed in my hand! Abide, churl monk," said Little John, "No farther that thou gone; If thou dost, by dere-worthy God, Thy death is in my hond. And evil thrift on thy head," said Little John, "Right under thy hat's bond, For thou hast made our master wroth, He ...
— A Bundle of Ballads • Various
... what he wanted. See how fair it was in the still night! He was glad and exultant that it was his again. Was he too a curmudgeon then? Harry did not perceive how any reasonable person could say such a thing. A man may value what is his own without being a miser or a churl. ...
— Tristram of Blent - An Episode in the Story of an Ancient House • Anthony Hope
... to go to concerts and theatres to pay for these pleasures. Many a poor fellow who has become a defaulter has to thank for it the lady who first asked him to take her to Delmonico's to supper. He was ashamed to tell her that he was poor, and he stole that he might not seem a churl. ...
— Manners and Social Usages • Mrs. John M. E. W. Sherwood
... orator, and another with Captain Anything, and another with Lord Willbewill, and another with that notorious villain Clip-promise, by whose doings so much of the king's coin had been abused, and another with that so angry and so ill-conditioned churl old Mr. Prejudice, with his sixty deaf men under him. Dear Mr. Wet-eyes, with his rope upon his head, will have a fit congregation one winter night, and Captain Self-denial another. We shall have another painful ...
— Bunyan Characters - Third Series - The Holy War • Alexander Whyte
... change her sect. And ae day at the spae-well below the craig at Gilsland, she was seeing a very bonny family o' bairns—they belonged to ane MacCrosky—and she broke out—'Is not it an odd like thing that ilka waf carlfe [*Every insignificant churl] in the country has a son and heir, and that the house of Ellangowan is without male succession?' There was a gipsy wife stood ahint and heard her—a muckle sture [*Strong] fearsome-looking wife she was as ever I set een on.—'Wha is it,' says she, 'that dare say the house of Ellangowan ...
— Guy Mannering • Sir Walter Scott
... everywhere Was hammer laid to hoof, and the hot hiss And bustling whistle of the youth who scour'd His master's armor; and of such a one He ask'd, "What means the tumult in the town?" Who told him, scouring still, "The sparrow-hawk!" Then riding close behind an ancient churl, Who, smitten by the dusty sloping beam, Went sweating underneath a sack of corn, Ask'd yet once more what meant the hubbub here? Who answer'd gruffly, "Ugh! ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 5 • Charles Sylvester
... midnight, Huish and the captain appeared upon the quarter-deck with flushed faces and uneven steps, the former laden with bottles, the latter with two tin mugs. Herrick silently passed them by. They hailed him in thick voices, he made no answer; they cursed him for a churl, he paid no heed although his belly quivered with disgust and rage. He closed-to the door of the house behind him, and cast himself on a locker in the cabin—not to sleep, he thought—rather to think and to despair. Yet ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XIX (of 25) - The Ebb-Tide; Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... the borough in the True Blue interest,—Audley Egerton and Randal Leslie; and Levy,—chief among the barons to whom modern society grants a seignorie of pillage, which, had a baron of old ever ventured to arrogate, burgess and citizen, socman and bocman, villein and churl, would have burned him alive in his castle; the Duke di Serrano, still fondly clinging to his title of Doctor and pet name of Riccabocca; Jemima, not yet with the airs of a duchess, but robed in very thick silks, as the chrysalis state of a duchess; Violante, too, ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... long-tailed chat reached us from a bushy hollow not far away. So far as I could determine, this fellow is as garrulous a churl and bully as his yellow-breasted cousin so well known in the East. (Afterwards I found the chats quite numerous at Boulder.) At length we scaled the cliffs, and presently stood on the edge of the mesa, which we found to be a somewhat ...
— Birds of the Rockies • Leander Sylvester Keyser
... reproach, and shame of religion to all that know him: it can hardly have a good word in all that end of the town where he dwells, through him. Thus say the common people, that know him, "A saint abroad and a devil at home." His poor family find it so: he is such a churl, such a railer at, and so unreasonable with his servants, that they neither know how to do for or ...
— The Riches of Bunyan • Jeremiah Rev. Chaplin
... Major Bridgenorth, turning from his daughter to her lover,—"you sir, have well repaid the liberal confidence which I placed in you with so little reserve. You I have to thank also for some lessons, which may teach me to rest satisfied with the churl's blood which nature has poured into my veins, and with the rude nurture which ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott
... likeness, and shake the pillared rottenness of the world! Leave not thy sounding words in air, write them in marble, and teach the coming age heroic truths! Up, and wake the echoes of Time! Rich in deepest lore, die not the bed-rid churl of knowledge, leaving the survivors unblest! Set, set as thou didst rise in pomp and gladness! Dart like the sunflower one broad, golden flash of light; and ere thou ascendest thy native sky, show us ...
— Table-Talk - Essays on Men and Manners • William Hazlitt
... Boncoeur called to him privily, And when he knew his lord's intent, Clad like a churl therefrom he ...
— Poems By The Way & Love Is Enough • William Morris
... "Fetch the English churl, and ask him if he knows who these are," said the Dane. "Then shall we see if this is a question of ...
— King Olaf's Kinsman - A Story of the Last Saxon Struggle against the Danes in - the Days of Ironside and Cnut • Charles Whistler
... leave of Messire Gawain, and Messire Gawain saith that he holdeth himself a churl in that he hath not asked him of his name. But the knight said, "Fair Sir, I pray you of love that you ask not my name until such time as I shall ask you ...
— High History of the Holy Graal • Unknown
... I understood their happiness well. Mrs. Edson was not quite so buoyant with spirits as usual; but she conversed with Rufus in her charming style. I was quite indignant to hear so much eloquence and refinement wasted on a churl like him, and just malicious enough to think the fair speaker would have preferred to say her pretty things in the ear of one who could have better appreciated their worth and beauty, namely, Col. Malcome. He is really a splendid man, though I hardly relish the power he seems to exercise ...
— Eventide - A Series of Tales and Poems • Effie Afton
... stall, And read, as he'd devour it all; Which when the stall-man did espy, Soon to the boy I heard him call, "You, Sir, you never buy a book, Therefore in one you shall not look." The boy pass'd slowly on, and with a sigh He wish'd he never had been taught to read, Then of the old churl's books he ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb
... said, 'O my lord, this is [too] much; thou hast brought enough for half a score men and I am alone; but belike thou wilt eat with me.' 'Eat by thyself,' replied Ali; 'I am full.' 'O my lord,' rejoined the Christian, 'the wise say, "He who eats not with his guest is a base-born churl."' ...
— The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume IV • Anonymous
... from Baeda. In one place he stops to explain his theory of government, his wish for a thicker population, his conception of national welfare as consisting in a due balance of the priest, the thegn, and the churl. The mention of Nero spurs him to an outbreak on the abuses of power. The cold Providence of Boethius gives way to an enthusiastic acknowledgement of the goodness of God. As he writes, his large-hearted nature flings off its royal mantle, and he talks as a man to men. "Do not blame ...
— History of the English People, Volume I (of 8) - Early England, 449-1071; Foreign Kings, 1071-1204; The Charter, 1204-1216 • John Richard Green
... cousin of the house. He and M. le Comte are as thick as thieves. Before we came to Paris they lodged together. So when M. le Comte came here he brought M. de Grammont. Dare I speak ill of Monsieur's cousin, Felix? For I would say, at the risk of a broken head, that he is a sour-faced churl. You cannot deny it. You ...
— Helmet of Navarre • Bertha Runkle
... this; mamma never could have intended it! The Hartleys were different, of course. She was willing to acknowledge that she had been in the wrong about them; but this lout, this oaf, this villainous-looking churl,—to expect a lady to sit at the same table with him: it was too much! She would ask if she might not dine in her own room after this, as apparently it was only at dinner that ...
— Queen Hildegarde • Laura Elizabeth Howe Richards
... is in his name some Ron...Ronte... Or...Oronte... No. Ge...Geronte. Yes, Geronte, that's my miser's name. I have it now; it is the old churl I mean. Well, to come back to our story. Our people wished to leave this town to-day, and my lover would have lost me through his lack of money if, in order to wrench some out of his father, he had not made use of a clever servant he has. As ...
— The Impostures of Scapin • Moliere
... came alone of all their peers Alive to earth: Helenor, now in spring-tide of his years: Bond-maid Licymnia privily to that Maeonian king Had borne the lad, and sent him forth to Troy's beleaguering With arms forbidden, sheathless sword and churl's unpainted shield. But when he saw himself amidst the thousand-sworded field Of Turnus, Latins on each side, behind, and full in face, E'en as a wild beast hedged about by girdle of the chase 550 Rages against the point and edge, and, knowing ...
— The AEneids of Virgil - Done into English Verse • Virgil
... neighbouring baron. Had he not cause to distrust that baron, and to believe that means neither fair nor honourable might be employed by his enemy to wipe out the feud? What if this self-styled harper should turn out to be no minstrel after all, but a hired assassin, a follower of that base churl, his hated foe! To suspect was to believe. In his excited, drink-clouded brain wrath sprang up, fully armed. He would speedily put an end to that treacherous scheme; his enemies should learn that if one can plot, another ...
— Stories of the Border Marches • John Lang and Jean Lang
... and shame of religion to all that know him: it can hardly have a good word in that end of the town where he dwells, through him—a saint abroad, and a devil at home! His poor family find it so. He is such a churl; such a railer at and so unreasonable with his servants, that they neither know how to do for him nor speak of him. Men that have any dealings with him say it is better to deal with a Turk than with him, for fairer dealings they shall ...
— Talkers - With Illustrations • John Bate
... the keyhole, outside which she waited and listened. It was long before he would reply, and when he did it was to say sternly at her from within: 'I am ashamed of you! It will ruin me! A miserable boor! a churl! a clown! It will degrade me in the eyes of all the gentlemen ...
— Life's Little Ironies - A set of tales with some colloquial sketches entitled A Few Crusted Characters • Thomas Hardy
... gods, also dwelt for a time among men as "Rig", and had human offspring, his son Thrall being the ancestor of the Thralls, his son Churl of churls, and Jarl ...
— Myths of Babylonia and Assyria • Donald A. Mackenzie
... its towers of beryl, Tourmaline, hyacinth, topaz and pearl, Free to the King if he have but the pass-word, Free to the veriest low-born churl. ...
— Masters of the Guild • L. Lamprey
... is a good deal about how much you have to pay for a churl, and how much for an earl, and so on, leaving out only the slaves; for all the free people of England in Saxon times were divided into earls and churls; that is, noblemen and agricultural laborers or yeomanry; these were the two estates besides the church, always a class by itself. ...
— Popular Law-making • Frederic Jesup Stimson
... immense body of water, saying that if any one would go before and show him the way he would be the first to follow. The soldiers and courtiers hesitated at this suggestion, and looked at one another with doubt and dread. But standing among the crowd was one Brithmar, a churl or serf, who was nicknamed Budde, or Pudding, from his stoutness. He was a native of the island of Ely and doubtless familiar with its waters, and when the courtiers held back he stepped forward and said he would go before and show ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 9 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality. Scandinavian. • Charles Morris
... have valued it as what newspapers describe as a most desirable residence, a most eligible investment. If she ever had a child—a son, though she shuddered at the idea,—he would be the young Squire, the heir of Ashpound. In the meantime, Gervase Norgate was not a churl: he did not dream of stinting his wife in her perquisites, though he was not fond of her, and they now no longer lived comfortably together. She might have out his mother's carriage every day, or she might have another built ...
— Girlhood and Womanhood - The Story of some Fortunes and Misfortunes • Sarah Tytler
... doctors were not believed in; even empirics had to praise their wares with much wit, and Morrison himself must have mounted a bank and dressed in Astleyian costume in order to find a customer; sack and small-beer were harmless, when homes were not comfortable enough to keep earl or churl by the fireside, and 'out-of-doors' was the proper drawing-room for a man: in short, sickness came in with civilization, indisposition with immoral habits, fevers with fine gentlemanliness, gout with greediness, and valetudinarianism—there is no Anglo-Saxon word for that—with ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 1 • Grace Wharton and Philip Wharton
... cool, but also as an act of homage. Here and in the woods adjoining youths and maidens for three hundred years had walked and made love, for, though the existing house was new, it stood on the site of a far older building. Dead men and women, lord and churl, gone to indistinguishable dust, or even beyond that—gone perhaps, into vapour and gas, which had been blown to New Zealand, and become men and women again—had burned with passion here, and vowed a union which was to last beyond the Judgment Day. They ...
— The Revolution in Tanner's Lane • Mark Rutherford
... with the welcome due to a kinsman of the Imperial house, and to a representative of the good cause of absolutism. He was received by Metternich with great interest, and his fortunes were taken under the protection of the Austrian Court. In due time, it was hoped this savage and ignorant churl would do yeoman's service to Austrian principles in the Peninsula. But the Regency and the new Constitution of Portugal had not to wait for the tardy operation of Metternich's covert hostility. The soldiery who had risen at Miguel's bidding in 1823 now proclaimed him King, and deserted to Spanish ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe
... which some do call The Emerald of the Virtues Mystical." And they who thronged the hall of judgment were Astonished at the stranger who could dare Ask such a boon; and some base mouths did curl With sneers, churl whispering to his fellow churl, "Who could have deemed the man so covetous, So void of shame in his great greed?" For thus It shall be ever underneath the sun, Each man believing that high hearts are none Whose own is as the dust ...
— The Poems of William Watson • William Watson
... alien world. That is not his pride; it is his humility. It is often his joy, but often also his misery: he must dree his weird. His necessary solitude of spirit is not luxury, nor the gesture of a churl: it is his sacrifice, it is the condition on which he lives. He must be content to seem boorish to the general in order to be tender to his duty. He has invisible guests at the table of his heart: those places are reserved against all comers. He must be their host first of all, ...
— Plum Pudding - Of Divers Ingredients, Discreetly Blended & Seasoned • Christopher Morley
... is come of high lineage, And was of a lady born, And ill it beseems thee, a false churl's son, To carry ...
— The Book of Brave Old Ballads • Unknown
... I am shamed to think my sovereign's son should wait, Through a churl's ignorance, without ...
— The Poems of Emma Lazarus - Vol. I (of II.), Narrative, Lyric, and Dramatic • Emma Lazarus
... The churl that wants another's fare Deserves at least to lose his share. As through the stream a Dog convey'd A piece of meat, he spied his shade In the clear mirror of the flood, And thinking it was flesh and blood, Snapp'd to deprive him of the treat:— ...
— The Fables of Phdrus - Literally translated into English prose with notes • Phaedrus
... blade could be drawn, Rothgar had stepped in front of his royal foster-brother with a savage sweep of his handless arm. "Do not waste your point on the churl, King," he said in his bull's voice. "If you want to play this game further, deal with me, for I also believe that you ...
— The Ward of King Canute • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz
... to a man of strong domestic tendencies, to know himself the object of the exclusive attachment of a strong-minded and noble-hearted woman: and when, in addition to this, her society affords the delight of mental accomplishment and personal beauty, such as Hester's, he must be a churl indeed if he does not greatly enjoy the present, and indulge in sweet anticipations for the future. Hope also brought the whole power of his will to bear upon his circumstances. He dwelt upon all the happiest features ...
— Deerbrook • Harriet Martineau
... He is no churl nor trifler, And his viceroy is none,— Love-without-weakness,— Of Genius sire and son. And his will is not thwarted; The seeds of land and sea Are the atoms of his body bright, And his ...
— Poems - Household Edition • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... sit with clown or churl Nor feel himself disgraced thereby; But he who has but small esteem Husbands that ...
— Poems with Power to Strengthen the Soul • Various
... am Covetousness, begotten of an old churl, in a leather bag: and, might I now obtain my wish, this house, you, and all, should turn to gold, that I might lock you safe into my chest: ...
— Dr. Faustus • Christopher Marlowe
... nephew! the son of Sualtam and Dectera of Dun Dalgan! and comest hither without chariots and horsemen and a prince's retinue and guard. Nay, thou art a churl and a liar to boot, and hie thee hence now with wings at thy heels or verily with sore blows I shall beat ...
— The Coming of Cuculain • Standish O'Grady
... sought, on occasions of unwonted cheerfulness, to please him with certain charming tricks of attire; and sometimes, with only a white rose-bud gleaming through the braided shadows of her hair, lighted herself up as with a star; then, not a carping churl, not an envious coquette in Hendrik, but confessed to the prettiness ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 12, October, 1858 • Various
... to view— Of wanton waste and reckless gambling, What darker paths shall he pursue With sacrilegious step and shambling? What coarse defiance, haply, hurl At lights beyond his comprehension— An attitudinising churl ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 102, Jan. 9, 1892 • Various
... the boon so sweetly That I had been a churl Had I repulsed the homage Of this gentle, timid girl; With bright illuminations I decked the manuscript, And in my choicest paints and inks My brush and ...
— The Love Affairs of a Bibliomaniac • Eugene Field
... child, till her father had told her she might love, it would have been another thing! But this headstrong girl seemed to think she had as good a right to be happy in her own way as a peasant! True, the man of her choice was not a reprobate: he was not even a low-born, unmannerly churl: Don Fernando de Velasquez stood foremost among the young cavaliers of Spain, in gallantry and in that nobility of mind which, should ever accompany gentle birth. But yet it was in that very gentle birth that ...
— Holidays at the Grange or A Week's Delight - Games and Stories for Parlor and Fireside • Emily Mayer Higgins
... the singer of all the world—ah, why did she not say so then!" said the churl. "What would I not do for her! Money—no, it is nothing, but the Lajeunesse, I myself would give my horse to ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... apparel with me, old churl, Come change thy apparel with mine; Here is a piece of good broad gold, Go ...
— Six Centuries of English Poetry - Tennyson to Chaucer • James Baldwin
... surely come?" he said to himself; "cowardice was not wont to be his fault—at least he was bold enough in the Park.—Perhaps yonder churl may not have carried my message? But no—he is a sturdy knave— one of those would prize their master's honour above their life.—Look to the palfrey, Lutin, and see thou let him not loose, and cast thy falcon glance down every avenue to mark if any one ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott
... Christopher, with a look of great delight, "that was all as one, as the very 'dentical words I put to the boy myself, when he telled me his story. But, ma'am, that was what I couldn't get out of him, neither, rightly, for he is a churl—the big boy that was stuck in the chimney, I mean; for when I put the question to him about the wig, laughing like, he wouldn't take it laughing like at all; but would only make answer to us like a bear, 'He saved my life, that's all I know'; and ...
— The Parent's Assistant • Maria Edgeworth
... other, you crooked churl," replied one of the crippled beggars. "The Sheriff is returned from London with his daughter, and the folk are giving him a welcome, such as you will never have from the city! Stand back, for there is no room for you there. Four of us as it is are too many, and we have come here ...
— Robin Hood • Paul Creswick
... bought Olaf, and gave for him a good tunic or cloak. The man was named Reas, his wife Rekon, & their son Rekoni. There tarried Olaf long and it fared well with him, and always was he mightily beloved by the churl. Six winters did Olaf sojourn ...
— The Sagas of Olaf Tryggvason and of Harald The Tyrant (Harald Haardraade) • Snorri Sturluson
... rising from his evening fall To her, for her, he mourns, he calls, he cries; The nightingale so when her children small Some churl takes before their parents' eyes, Alone, dismayed, quite bare of comforts all, Tires with complaints the seas, the shores, the skies, Till in sweet sleep against the morning bright She fall at last; so mourned, so slept ...
— Jerusalem Delivered • Torquato Tasso
... the bonder, "Make one or other choice speedily, or what counsel is that big churl giving thee who stands there before thee; is it not so that he will ...
— The Story of Grettir The Strong • Translated by Eirikr Magnusson and William Morris
... forehead, without hands, without feet, without tongues, lived as an example of the danger which attended the commission of petty crimes, and as a warning to all men who had the misfortune of holding no higher position than that of a churl.[29] Wealthy people might do wrong with impunity. It has been clearly shown that there was one law for the rich, and another for the poor, in England during the four centuries ...
— Bygone Punishments • William Andrews
... words of the churl Beorn, who had been taken prisoner, as the messenger had told us, ...
— Alfgar the Dane or the Second Chronicle of Aescendune • A. D. Crake
... polite and obsequious prisoner, Lieutenant Preville. "If we could but fall in with two or three more fat prizes we should be able to set up as independent gentlemen when we get back home again, and I should be able to regain the lands of the McAllisters from the southern churl who has dared ...
— Marmaduke Merry - A Tale of Naval Adventures in Bygone Days • William H. G. Kingston
... would be no more called bountiful, or the churl called liberal: flattery and cringing to the evil great would be at an end. The people would have sense to see the truth about right and wrong, and courage to speak it. Men would then be held for what they really were, and honoured and despised ...
— Sermons on National Subjects • Charles Kingsley
... threshold of a modest 'career,' of a sort, after all," he thought, "and she will never give it up for me. Would she be willing to combine me with the career, and how would it work? I shouldn't be churl enough to mind her singing now and then, but it seems to me I couldn't stand 'tours.' Besides, hers is such a childlike, winsome, fragrant little gift it ought not to be exploited like a ...
— Ladies-In-Waiting • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... sad matron of a sedate look and christian walking, in habit dun beseeming her megrims and wrinkled visage, nor did her hortative want of it effect for incontinently Punch Costello was of them all embraided and they reclaimed the churl with civil rudeness some and shaked him with menace of blandishments others whiles they all chode with him, a murrain seize the dolt, what a devil he would be at, thou chuff, thou puny, thou got in peasestraw, thou losel, thou chitterling, ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... that in reading Spenser he was thrown into a paroxysm of delight over the expression "sea-shouldering whales." The churl would not give a second thought to the phrase, or, indeed, a first one; but the man of appreciation finds in it a source of pleasure. Arlo Bates speaks with enthusiasm of the word "highly" as used in the Gettysburg Speech, and the teacher's work reaches a high point of ...
— The Reconstructed School • Francis B. Pearson
... for a knave, With his sins in the sod! And death for the brave, With his glory up to God! And joy for the girl, And ease for the churl! But the great game of war For our lord ...
— Songs from Vagabondia • Bliss Carman and Richard Hovey
... invitation. The expression mai, or komo mai, this way, or come in, was the most common of salutations. The Hawaiian sat down to meat before an open door; he ate his food in the sight of all men, and it was only one who dared being denounced as a churl who would fail to invite with word and gesture the passer-by to come in and share with him. This gesture might be a sweeping, downward, or sidewise motion of the hand in which the palm faced and drew toward the speaker. This seems to have been ...
— Unwritten Literature of Hawaii - The Sacred Songs of the Hula • Nathaniel Bright Emerson
... recompense; for it was enough for the divine Julius to pension with a township the writer and glorifier of those conquests which he had achieved over the whole world. But now the spendthrift kindness of the populace squandered a kingdom on a churl. Nay, not even Africanus, when he rewarded the records of his deed, rose to the munificence of the Danes. For there the wage of that laborious volume was in mere gold, while here a few callow verses won a ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... thus console it; let me snatch from those lips one breath of that fragrance which never should be wasted on the low churl thy husband. ...
— The Lady of Lyons - or Love and Pride • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... description of what has happened. Mr. Carlyle is as one who does not hear the question. He draws its general moral lesson from the French Revolution, and with clangorous note warns all whom it concerns, from king to churl, that imposture must come to an end. But for the precise amount and kind of dissolution which the West owes to it, for the political meaning of it, as distinguished from its moral or its dramatic significance, we seek ...
— Critical Miscellanies, Vol. I - Essay 2: Carlyle • John Morley
... I understand. "Brethren," said Little JOHN, "Here are no more but we three; But we bring them to dinner, Our Master, dare we not see!" "Bend your bows!" said Little JOHN, "Make all yon press to stand! The foremost monk, his life and his death, Are closed in my hand. Abide, churl Monk!" said Little JOHN, "No further that thou go, If thou dost, by dear-worthy God! Thy death is in my hand! And evil thrift on thy head!" said Little JOHN, "Right under thy hat's band: For thou hast made our Master wroth, ...
— Fifteenth Century Prose and Verse • Various
... wonder you frown,— Och hone! widow machree; Faith, it ruins your looks, that same dirty black gown,— Och hone! widow machree. How altered your air, With that close cap you wear,— 'Tis destroying your hair, Which should be flowing free; Be no longer a churl Of its black silken curl,— Och hone! ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 6 • Charles H. Sylvester
... twice, after the engraver had actually begun work on it. It had been sold to Diabelli, who finally refused to return it again, as the engraver's work in each case was thrown away. This called out a sarcastic letter from Beethoven to Schindler, in which he refers to Diabelli as an arch-churl (Erzflegel), and threatens him (Diabelli), if he is ...
— Beethoven • George Alexander Fischer
... despising himself since all others despised him, scarce able to remain at the table, Felix was almost beside himself, and did not answer nor heed the remarks of the gentlemen sitting by him, who put him down as an ill-bred churl. ...
— After London - Wild England • Richard Jefferies
... faded On shores invaded, When shorewards waded The lords of fight; When churl and craven Saw hard on haven The wide-winged raven At mainmast height; When monks affrighted To windward sighted The birds full-flighted Of swift sea-kings; So earth turns paler When Storm the sailor Steers in with a roar in the race of ...
— Poems & Ballads (Second Series) - Swinburne's Poems Volume III • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... fierce and cruel of mien. "Will you not rather be made an earl, proud knave?" he asked. "Go home, fool; go, and be evermore a thrall and churl, [Footnote: An Ignorant laborer of the lowest rank.] as you have ever been; no other reward shall be yours. For very little I would lead you to the gallows for your ...
— The Junior Classics, V4 • Willam Patten (Editor)
... first time. "See yon two bowmen—mark their bearing! One is the youth who beat thy Squintoff, and t'other, an I mistake not, won the third prize at the butts. Both wear the same uniform—the colors of my house—yet wouldst not swear that the one was but a churl, and the other ...
— Burlesques • William Makepeace Thackeray
... restless Guadalquivir To my sire's estates he came, Woo'd and won me, how I shiver! Though my temples burn with shame. I, a proud and high-born lady, Daughter of an ancient race, 'Neath the vine and olive shade I Yielded to a churl's embrace. To a churl my vows were plighted, Well my madness he requited, Since, by priestly ties, united To the muleteer's child; And my prayers are wafted o'er him, That the bull may crush and gore him, Since ...
— Poems • Adam Lindsay Gordon
... "What a churl he was!" continued Madge, not heeding the words of Peverell; "I only asked him to keep the grave open till to-morrow, and he denied me! Only till to-morrow—for then, said I, the cold earth can cover us both. But he denied me! So I fell upon my knees, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. - Volume XIII, No. 376, Saturday, June 20, 1829. • Various
... a difference of twenty years between the brothers, yet, to look at them, it might have been more. Patrick, the younger, was florid and hearty; the elder, James, was unpopular—a gray, withered old churl, who carried written on his face the record of his life's failure. His conversation, when he made any, was cynical. When he came into a room where young people were enjoying themselves, playing cards or dancing, his shadow came before him and lay heavily on the merry-makers. Fortunately, ...
— An Isle in the Water • Katharine Tynan
... morning while breakfast was preparing, the churl renewed his hostilities, by telling us, with a malignant pleasure in his face, that he and his neighbors were making ready to go to South Carolina ...
— The Life of General Francis Marion • Mason Locke Weems |
