"Irritate" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... us, but we know you would not take advantage of that. If we are wrong we will make amends; if you are wrong we know that you will. Let us not play tricks in secret to gain points, we civilized nations, but be frank with each other. Let us not try to irritate each other or to influence our people, but to realize how much we have in common and that our only purpose ...
— The Last Shot • Frederick Palmer
... the champagne was good—than was from any point of view to have been desired. He was rapidly drifting beyond any tacit dissuasion of mine. He was feverish and rash, and all attempt to direct would now simply irritate him. As we rose from the table he caught my troubled look. Passing his arm for a moment into mine, "This is the great night!" he strangely and softly said; "the night and the crisis that ...
— A Passionate Pilgrim • Henry James
... around for his slippers, takes them up and goes out.) Now we can talk, my little THEA. Do you remember how I used to pull your hair when we met on the stairs, and say I would scorch it off? Seeing people with copious hair always does irritate me. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 100, April 25, 1891 • Various
... virulence. In the course of the unimportant operations following the defeat of the Turks, during which the squadron maintained a strict blockade of Oczakow, Jones was sent on a number of trivial enterprises by Potemkin, whose language was carefully chosen to irritate the fiery Scotchman. On one occasion he commanded Jones "to receive him (the Capitan Pacha) courageously, and drive him back. I require that this be done without loss of time; if not, you will be ...
— Paul Jones • Hutchins Hapgood
... carrotted arteries, under the keystone of the arch of the aorta, and not rush madly into the abominable cavity and eclipse the semi-lunar dandelions, nor, still worse, play the dickens with the pneumogastric nerve and auxiliary artery, reverse the doododen, upset the flamingo, irritate the high-old-glossus, and be for ever lost in the receptaculum chyli. No, no, but, ...
— A Collection of College Words and Customs • Benjamin Homer Hall
... the servant-mistress of Jean-Jacques Rouget, so energetically termed a "slut" by the respectable Madame Hochon. Everybody knew it was too ticklish a subject with Max, ever to speak of it unless he began it; and hitherto he had never begun it. To risk his anger or irritate him was altogether too dangerous; so that even his best friends had never joked him about the Rabouilleuse. When they talked of his liaison with the girl before Major Potel and Captain Renard, with whom he lived on intimate ...
— The Celibates - Includes: Pierrette, The Vicar of Tours, and The Two Brothers • Honore de Balzac
... give particular individuals the private assistance they ask for, in such a way as to discourage and irritate them, but it is not necessary. It can be done in such a manner, that the pupil will see the propriety of it, and acquiesce pleasantly ...
— The Teacher - Or, Moral Influences Employed in the Instruction and - Government of the Young • Jacob Abbott
... catechetical instruction, privileges of mendicants and indulgences, the council took up the thorny question of justification. Discussion was postponed for some months out of consideration for the emperor, who feared it might irritate the Protestants, and only gave his consent to it in the hope that some ambiguous form acceptable to that party, might be found. How deeply the solifidian doctrine had penetrated into the very bosom of ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith
... many scores against the present juniors. As sophomores, the winter before, they had never missed an opportunity to annoy and irritate the freshmen in a hundred disagreeable ways. "The Black Monks of Asia" still rankled in their memories. Moreover, was not Julia Crosby, the junior captain? She was the same mischievous sophomore who had created so much havoc at the Christmas ball. She was always playing unkind ...
— Grace Harlowe's Sophomore Year at High School • Jessie Graham Flower
... for some reason, seemed to irritate Mr. Fritz exceedingly. He thrust his hands deeply into his pockets, and began to stalk up and down the floor with a ...
— Ilka on the Hill-Top and Other Stories • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... not; but decent behaviour can, and it's silly to start mingling classes until you've done that. You rub each other the wrong way over little things that don't really matter, but that irritate like blazes. I've talked about it with mother. She used to think I was the sort of chap who'd do what Uncle Peter did. Uncle Peter frightened me off ...
— Changing Winds - A Novel • St. John G. Ervine
... zealous in the admonishing of recalcitrant church-goers and rounding up of possible Sunday-school recruits, they crossed to the island at low tide; and in their best district visitor manner—too often a sparkling blend of condescension and familiarity, warranted to irritate—severally demanded entrance to the first two of the black cottages.—The Inn they avoided. Refined gentlewomen can hardly be expected, even in the interests of religion, to risk pollution by visiting a common tavern, more particularly when a company ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... to intensify, to make worse; to exasperate means to provoke, to irritate. "To aggravate the horrors of the scene." "His remarks exasperated me." "His conduct aggravates me" should be "His conduct annoys (or displeases, or irritates, ...
— Slips of Speech • John H. Bechtel
... herself, thought him innocent, and considered the anger of the czar as excessive and unjust. Every means was tried to save him, and the first opportunity taken to intercede in his favour. But, so far from succeeding, it served only to irritate the emperor the more, who forbade all persons, even the empress, to speak for the prisoner, and, above all, to present any petition on the subject, under the pain of ...
— Heads and Tales • Various
... solid advantage. It was undertaken at too late a period to save Burgoyne, and though the passes in the Highlands were acquired, they could not be retained. The British had reduced to ashes every village and almost every house within their power, but this wanton and useless destruction served to irritate without tending to subdue. A keenness was given to the resentment of the injured, which outlived the contest between the ...
— Life And Times Of Washington, Volume 2 • John Frederick Schroeder and Benson John Lossing
... not only this persiflage, which was soon made to reach her ear, but also the reproaches of Lady Cecilia, who said, "I should have warned you, Helen, not to irritate that man's relentless vanity; now ...
— Helen • Maria Edgeworth
... to do. She acquired now an awkward habit of gazing at him with passionate intensity. He would raise his eyes and find the great moon-faced spectacles fixed upon him with a beseeching, reproachful glare in the light of them. This would irritate him ...
— Jeremy • Hugh Walpole
... remained cool. Self-possession in his science he knew to be half the battle. But he felt in him now a slow, swelling anger. The smiling flash in Jean's eyes began to irritate him; the fearless, taunting gleam of his teeth, his audacious confidence, put him on edge. Twice again he struck out swiftly, but Jean had come and gone like a dart. His lithe body, fifty pounds lighter than Howland's, seemed to be that of a boy dodging him in some tantalizing sport. ...
— The Danger Trail • James Oliver Curwood
... of that 'huge and powerful brute, how to approach and handle it, at what times it becomes fiercest and most gentle, on what occasions it utters its several cries, and what sounds made by others soothe or irritate it.'[50] If he resolutely guards himself against the danger of passing from one illusion to another, he may still remember that he is not the only man in the constituency who has reasoned and is reasoning about politics. If he does personal canvassing ...
— Human Nature In Politics - Third Edition • Graham Wallas
... young wife to irritate Cupid so he went out and sat on the door-step, contemplating flight, by continual neglect ...
— A Woman of the World - Her Counsel to Other People's Sons and Daughters • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... unchanged and stir up the walls of the intestines to contract; hence they are useful in small quantities in helping to keep the bowels regular. But, like any other stimulus, too much of it will irritate and disturb the digestion, and cause diarrhea; so that it is not best to eat more than one-fifth of our total bread in the form of brown bread. Dyspeptics who live on brown bread, or on so-called "health foods," are simply ...
— A Handbook of Health • Woods Hutchinson
... don't insist, don't irritate me or I shall spite myself.... I cannot bear to take any ...
— Clair de Lune - A Play in Two Acts and Six Scenes • Michael Strange
... into the next room, where he found some of his friends who had come to follow the funeral. The Bohemians desisted as regards Jacques, whom, however, they loved in brotherly fashion, from all those consolations which only serve to irritate grief. Without uttering one of those remarks so hard to frame and so painful to listen to, they silently shook their friend by the ...
— Bohemians of the Latin Quarter • Henry Murger
... men,' said Trombin at last, 'but we are both fencing-masters, and it will not be prudent to irritate us, or, as I may say, to drive us to extremities. You had better go your way quietly ...
— Stradella • F(rancis) Marion Crawford
... by the mind's overaction, but the mind also needed some healing process. Some gentle hand should soothe the overstrained chords of thought, and touch them just sufficiently to stimulate their action with gentlest suasion, while it carefully avoided all that might irritate or weary. And such help and healing was found for Burke, or, haply, from bodily debility, mental weakness might have developed itself into mental malady; and the irritability of weakness, to which cultivated minds are often most subjected, might have ended, even for a ...
— An Illustrated History of Ireland from AD 400 to 1800 • Mary Frances Cusack
... should hear any portion of it?" she interrupted, hoping to irritate him, and thus lessen the strain imposed by ...
— The Silent Barrier • Louis Tracy
... I am growing old, and all my senses are becoming duller—fear along with the rest. You have tried to cheat me of the money I have demanded, and it has tried my patience. In fact, it has set my nerves quite on edge. Pray do not irritate me again. I know you must have that paper, and I know why. The price I offer is a moderate one compared with the unpleasantness that may occur to you if you do not get it. Never mind what occurrence. I know that you have come here prepared to pay that price. The morning is getting on. ...
— The Unspeakable Gentleman • John P. Marquand
... desire to slap him for his suddenly acquired society veneer which had such power to irritate her, and a desire to weep the bitterest and most scalding tears for the completeness of his defection. She could not help wondering, sometimes, if he had, by any most uncanny chance, heard of that Episode at the January Cotillion; and knew that Mr. Bennet had Kissed her and ...
— The Heart of Arethusa • Francis Barton Fox
... symbol [Hebrew: MTSPTS], which is nothing else than the name of God, [Hebrew: YHWH]. St. Jerome,[52] a celebrated father of the early church, contends that the prophet Jeremiah used this kind of writing, and not to irritate the king of Babylon against the Hebrews, for king, [Hebrew: BBL], said [Hebrew: SHSHK]. But some, also, among the Jews, declare that these words ...
— Mysticism and its Results - Being an Inquiry into the Uses and Abuses of Secrecy • John Delafield
... which John Locke, fresh from the perusal of Harrington, wrote out in the quiet of his study for governing little frontier communities the like of which he had never seen,—all had little effect but to irritate those who were already on the ground and discourage others from going there. In 1667, there were no inhabitants in Carolina south of Albemarle Sound; in 1672 scarcely more than four hundred. Not silk and almonds but provisions ...
— Beginnings of the American People • Carl Lotus Becker
... another minute he would have sent the servant to fetch the "preparation," and I should have lost the story. At the risk of his taking offense, I begged him not to move just then, unless he wished me to spoil his likeness. This alarmed, but fortunately did not irritate him. He returned to his seat, and I resumed the subject of the stuffed poodle, asking him boldly to tell me the story with which the dog was connected. The demand seemed to impress him with no very favorable opinion of my intellectual tastes; but he complied with it, ...
— After Dark • Wilkie Collins
... next place, I don't think the sergeant would care for it. The whole business must be painful to him, and he won't care to be obliged every day of his life to be staring at something that would remind him of Simpkins. In the third place, it would almost certainly irritate Simpkins ...
— The Simpkins Plot • George A. Birmingham
... other details of like nature which, no matter how true they were, are no business for free men to concern themselves about or report to you. If they went unnoticed, they would do you no harm, but when heard they might irritate you even against your will: and that ought by no means to happen, especially in a ruler of the people. Now many believe that from this cause large numbers unjustly perish, some without a trial and others by some unwarranted condemnation of a court. They will ...
— Dio's Rome, Vol. 4 • Cassius Dio
... Germany that stimulation of the nipples by an electrical cupping apparatus brought about contraction of the pregnant uterus. At an earlier period it was recommended to irritate the nipple in order to excite the uterus to parturient action. Simpson, while pointing out that this was scarcely adequate to produce the effect desired, thought that placing a child to the breast after labor had begun might increase ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 4 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... bread." With the words, he walked to the door and held it open. It was impossible to mistake the unspoken order, and there was something in the concentrated yet controlled passion of Robert Worth which even the haughty priest did not care to irritate beyond its bounds. ...
— Remember the Alamo • Amelia E. Barr
... and he for one proposed to ignore them). "May I ask what were your words when you—you have given us Mr. Loring's—were communicating the General's message to him? Were they, for example, carefully chosen? Did you observe courtesy of manner, avoiding all that could irritate, or——" ...
— A Wounded Name • Charles King
... a gentleman to whom I, on my side, had no feelings but those of respect and good will! I pray you smooth him down again, by all wise methods, into at least good-natured indifference to me. He may depend upon it I could not mean to irritate him; there lay no gain for me in that! Nor is there anything of business left now between us. It is doubly and trebly evident those Stereotype Plates are not to him worth their prime cost here, still less, their prime cost plus any vestige ...
— The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1834-1872, Vol II. • Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson
... fool. They all do it, they all sell themselves. Love is childish prattle and nonsense. Don't irritate me." ...
— The Comedienne • Wladyslaw Reymont
... Dante is! But how sickening are the Commentators, Benvenuto da Imola, Schartazzini and the rest of them! They won't let the poet say that the sun shone or the night was dark without seeing some hidden and mystic meaning in it. They always seem to chercher midi a quatorze heures, and irritate me beyond measure. There is invention enough in Dante without all their embroidery. But this grubbing and grouting seems to be infectious among Dante scholars—they ...
— Some Diversions of a Man of Letters • Edmund William Gosse
... which will grow pro re nata. Its growth will not be helped or forwarded by any a priori system. Any such system would be attended with all the evils of defective foresight, and would both fetter and irritate. ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol. 3 of 3) - Essay 9: The Expansion of England • John Morley
... motion; no two stones strike the wheel in exactly the same way, no two waves produce pulses in the air of exactly the same character, no two leaves rustle in precisely the same way. The disturbances which reach the ear from carriage, waves, and leaves are irregular both in time and strength, and irritate the ear, causing the ...
— General Science • Bertha M. Clark
... word more on the subject. You are not to suppose this or that. Be wise do not irritate and annoy a woman like me. It were better to please me than to preach ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... divisions broke out. Washington, in a General Order of August, 1776, says: 'It is with great concern that the general understands that jealousies have arisen among the troops from the different provinces, and reflections are frequently thrown out which can only tend to irritate each other and injure the noble cause in which ...
— The Loyalists of America and Their Times, Vol. 2 of 2 - From 1620-1816 • Edgerton Ryerson
... Massachusetts charter seemed in danger. But the Puritan magistrates were shrewd, and months were frittered away to no purpose. Presently the Dutch made war upon England, and the king felt it to be unwise to irritate the people of Massachusetts beyond endurance. The turbulent state of English politics which followed still further absorbed his attention, and New England had another respite of several years. [Sidenote: ...
— The Beginnings of New England - Or the Puritan Theocracy in its Relations to Civil and Religious Liberty • John Fiske
... animals originated with AElian and Pliny, who had probably an opportunity of seeing, what may at any time be observed, that when a captive elephant is picketed beside a post, the domestic animals, goats, sheep, and cattle, will annoy and irritate him by their audacity in making free with his provender; but this is an evidence in itself of the little instinctive dread which such comparatively puny creatures entertain of one so ...
— Sketches of the Natural History of Ceylon • J. Emerson Tennent
... nature being quite incapable of deceit, Janice very quickly perceived that his chief motive was not so much the lover's desire to be near, as it was to keep watch of her. Had the fellow deliberately planned to irritate the girl, he could have hit upon nothing more certain to enrage her, and a week had barely elapsed when ...
— Janice Meredith • Paul Leicester Ford
... the beaters who were sent in advance to surround the forest. My troops must not be allowed to disturb this sacred retreat, and irritate its ...
— Sakoontala or The Lost Ring - An Indian Drama • Kalidasa
... treaty of Tienstin it was stipulated that the French Government should have the right to protect missionaries in China. For a time that seemed to work well. But the many complaints made through the French consuls, and the punishments inflicted on Mandarins at their demand, served to irritate the Mandarins and the populace. The indiscretion of some French missionaries, who interposed to protect converts not always deserving of protection, and who flaunted the flag of France in the faces of the Mandarins in their own courts, increased the irritation. Some of the ...
— Donahoe's Magazine, Volume 15, No. 1, January 1886 • Various
... feel then like me!" said Henrik; "with you, sisters, I am ever calm and happy; but I don't know how it is, but now for some time other people often plague and irritate me——" ...
— The Home • Fredrika Bremer
... as much as they irritate you, Bathurst. Well, here we are; now we will have a quiet cheroot and a peg, to quiet our nerves after all that din, before we turn in. Let us get off our coats and collars, and make ourselves comfortable; it is a proof of the bestial stupidity of mankind that they ...
— Rujub, the Juggler • G. A. Henty
... reside, or those in authority under it, with applications in unimportant cases. Husband their good dispositions for occasions of some moment, and let all representations to them be couched in the most temperate and friendly terms, never indulging in any case whatever a single expression which may irritate. ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... violence of priests be carried! I attacked only gross abuses—the deceit of the monks of Aix-la-Chapelle, Cologne, and Liege, where they are worse than cannibals. I wished to inculcate true Christian duties among my fellow-citizens, and the attempt was sufficient to irritate the selfish ...
— The Life and Adventures of Baron Trenck - Vol. 2 (of 2) • Baron Trenck
... am told, showed the MS. corrected in Seward's handwriting. Lord Lyons is menaced with passports. Is this man mad? Can Seward for a moment believe that Wikoff knows Europe, or has any influence? He may know the low resorts there. Can Seward be fool enough to irritate England, and entangle this country? Even my anglophobia cannot stand it. Wrote about it warning letters to New York, to Barney, ...
— Diary from March 4, 1861, to November 12, 1862 • Adam Gurowski
... shall speak before all to Chilo, and write a letter home that I have gone to Beneventum. I shall have no messengers hereafter but you. Remember this, and do not irritate ...
— Quo Vadis - A Narrative of the Time of Nero • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... that after some dozen years or more of Socialist propaganda there should still be considerable bitterness existing between trade unionists and Socialists. The cause of the unpopularity of the Socialists was not due to any desire on their part to irritate trade unionists, but arose out of the stupid prejudices of the spokesmen and leaders of the trade unionists themselves. Socialists are staunch trade unionists. The New trade unionism is evidence of this, for ...
— British Socialism - An Examination of Its Doctrines, Policy, Aims and Practical Proposals • J. Ellis Barker
... down his blankets and made his bed. He took off his boots and coat as he had done in the park, stretched himself out on the seat, and slept at once the sleep of contentment. For the first time in his life the jarring of the train did not make his head ache nor its perpetual rubble-double irritate and unnerve him. He slept like a child as the train bore him onward, passing into sleep like a child, full of tenderness and love, slept dreamlessly and heavily, undisturbed, with the photo against his heart and the rose in his fingers and about his hands the hand-clasp of friends and on his cheeks ...
— The Workingman's Paradise - An Australian Labour Novel • John Miller
... smoking a peculiarly mellow and unctuous cigar on deck when I got there. I don't believe he smoked it because he enjoyed it. He did not look as if he enjoyed it. I believe he smoked it merely to show how well he was feeling, and to irritate people who ...
— Diary of a Pilgrimage • Jerome K. Jerome
... and the little one and Maria, but he had a feeling as if he were beginning the traversing of a circle which would in the end bring him back, rather than of departure. It was as if he were about to circumnavigate life itself. Suddenly, however, his forehead contracted. Material matters began to irritate him. He thought of Maria, and how slight a provision he had made for her. His life was already insured for the benefit of Ida. Ida would have that and her widow's share. Little Evelyn would also have her share of his tiny estate, which consisted of nothing more than ...
— By the Light of the Soul - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... himself by following her closely. The night was already dark, the way irregular and confusing. She was but a dim shadow, advancing confidently, and now and then in their descent, he reached out and touched her to make sure of her presence. This action seemed to irritate for she turned once, and ...
— The Case and The Girl • Randall Parrish
... on ashes'! Very little imagination will realise the force of that picture. The gritty cinders will irritate the lips and tongue, will dry up the moisture of the mouth, will interfere with the breathing, and there will be no nourishment in a sackful ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Isaiah and Jeremiah • Alexander Maclaren
... woman has a horror of being convinced of anything; when you try to persuade her she immediately submits to being led astray and continues to play the role which nature gave her. In her view, to allow herself to be won over is to grant a favor, but exact arguments irritate and confound her; in order to guide her you must employ the power which she herself so frequently employs and which lies in an appeal to sensibility. It is therefore in his wife, and not in himself, that a ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac
... endless day. As night approached Pierre stopped frequently, propping himself with legs far apart; sometimes he laughed. Invariably this horrible sound shocked Willard into a keener sense of the surroundings, and it grew to irritate him, for the Frenchman's mental wanderings increased with the darkness. What made him rouse one with his awful laughter? These spells of walking insensibility were pleasanter far. At last the big man fell. To Willard's mechanical ...
— Pardners • Rex Beach
... I am sanguine enough to expect I shall irritate Englishmen. Your Englishman is far too cock-sure of the natural superiority of Britons to Foreigners, the natural superiority of England to Abroad, ever to be irritated by even the gentlest criticism. He accepts it all with lordly indifference. He brushes it aside as the elephant ...
— Post-Prandial Philosophy • Grant Allen
... condiments weaken and irritate his nerves and derange the circulation. Thus, indirectly, they affect the sexual system, which suffers through sympathy with the other organs. But a more direct injury is done. Flesh, condiments, eggs, tea, coffee, chocolate, and all stimulants, ...
— Plain Facts for Old and Young • John Harvey Kellogg
... prick and irritate Mayenne he preserved an air of unshakable composure; but when Mayenne recovered patience and himself began to prick, Lucas's guard broke down. His voice rose a key, as it had done when I called him fool; and ...
— Helmet of Navarre • Bertha Runkle
... Phil: will you please remember that your jokes are apt to irritate people who are not accustomed to us, and that your father is our ...
— You Never Can Tell • [George] Bernard Shaw
... me to have schooled himself into a kind of tender patience; and this attitude, I am ashamed to say, used to irritate me considerably, because it seemed to me to be so much power wasted on accepting defeat, which ...
— The Altar Fire • Arthur Christopher Benson
... I went mooning along, thinking hard things about the world in general, and my little corner of it in particular. The country was beginning to irritate me, and I knew that if something didn't break loose pretty soon I'd be off somewhere. Riding over to little buttes, and not meeting a soul on the way or seeing anything but a bare rock when you get there, grows monotonous in time, ...
— The Range Dwellers • B. M. Bower
... intercourse. But the British government has never been celebrated for courtesy in its intercourse with weaker powers. The chancellor Kaunitz entreated them, in their communications, to respect the sex and temper of the queen, and not to irritate her by demeanor so overbearing. The emperor himself entered a remonstrance against the discourtesy which characterized their intercourse. Even the queen, unwilling to break off friendly relations with her unpolished allies, ...
— The Empire of Austria; Its Rise and Present Power • John S. C. Abbott
... she didn't irritate me. That's the effect she has upon me now. I have tried everything upon her; I really have been quite merciless. But it is of no use whatever; she is absolutely GLUED. I have passed, in consequence, into the exasperated ...
— Washington Square • Henry James
... praise, used with opportunity, and not vulgar, is that which doth the good. Solomon saith, He that praiseth his friend aloud, rising early, it shall be to him no better than a curse. Too much magnifying of man or matter, doth irritate contradiction, and procure envy and scorn. To praise a man's self, cannot be decent, except it be in rare cases; but to praise a man's office or profession, he may do it with good grace, and with a kind of magnanimity. The cardinals of Rome, which are theologues, ...
— Essays - The Essays Or Counsels, Civil And Moral, Of Francis Ld. - Verulam Viscount St. Albans • Francis Bacon
... obey, monsieur, since I don't command. What would be the use? It would only irritate her and drive her to some coup de tete. She is very clever, like her mother; she would waste no time about it. As a child—when I was happy, or supposed I was—she studied drawing and painting with first-class ...
— The American • Henry James
... armed at the same time with magnanimous Patroclus, marched orderly, till they rushed upon the Trojans, with high hopes. Immediately they were poured out, like unto wasps dwelling by the road-side, which silly boys are wont to irritate, incessantly harassing them, possessing cells by the way-side; and cause a common evil to many. And if by chance any traveller, passing by, unintentionally disturb them, then they, possessing a valiant ...
— The Iliad of Homer (1873) • Homer
... voice seemed to irritate the other man, and Alice Deringham was conscious of a faint amusement as she glanced at them. Deringham in his tweed travelling attire, which, worn with apparent carelessness, seemed to hang with every fold just where it should be, was wholly at his ease, ...
— Alton of Somasco • Harold Bindloss
... person distinguished and praised for this quality will not needlessly offend others, because they may retaliate; and besides, it ruffles his own temper. He likes to enjoy a perfect calm, and to live in an interchange of kind offices. He suffers few things to irritate or annoy him. He has a fine oiliness in his disposition, which smooths the waves of passion as they rise. He does not enter into the quarrels or enmities of others; bears their calamities with patience; he listens to the din and clang of war, the earthquake and the hurricane ...
— The Spirit of the Age - Contemporary Portraits • William Hazlitt
... the Consul meant by that, for it was Lucien who had negotiated the San Ildefonso treaty which gave Louisiana to France. This speech of his brother's seemed to irritate Joseph still more, and he ...
— The Rose of Old St. Louis • Mary Dillon
... you gain by your resistance to the new measures? It will only irritate the Government, and will determine it to pursue its system of repression, while at present you are offered an opportunity to prove that the Jews are not enemies of culture and deserve ...
— History of the Jews in Russia and Poland. Volume II • S.M. Dubnow
... and constantly sought to find a reason that could possibly irritate an ignorant and exasperated peasant to the point of taking the life of this man, I have found none. He was unhappily addicted to drink, it is said, but he must have had a large majority of the inhabitants of Ireland of ...
— The Letters of "Norah" on her Tour Through Ireland • Margaret Dixon McDougall
... love. But how are young people to get really acquainted? They meet under unreal conditions. They see each other in society, in Sunday dress and with Sunday manners. They doubtless do not mean to deceive each other, but there is little to draw out the real self. There is nothing to disturb or irritate, nothing to prove the honesty, the neatness, the industry, the persistence, the business ability; nothing to disclose the true ideas in matters of serious import, of health, religion, duties of husbands and wives, the government of the home; and too often the intimacy of marriage ...
— What a Young Woman Ought to Know • Mary Wood-Allen
... Mrs. Wiley sharply. "I won't have street mutts wandering around the house to irritate poor little Kiki. Nasty smelly common mongrels with fleas. Indeed not. I'm surprised at you, ...
— Old Mr. Wiley • Fanny Greye La Spina
... highest to the lowest, were puppets in the hands of the Secretary of State for the Colonies. At the same time, the outward trappings of a constitutional system, intended to amuse the colonists, served no other end than to irritate and exasperate men who had penetration enough to detect the mockery, and whose self-respect made them abhor ...
— The Story of the Upper Canada Rebellion, Volume 1 • John Charles Dent
... cries against this attempt on the part of a power they believed at its last gasp, and which, while pretending to seek peace, thought of nothing less than the invasion of Great Britain. The effect of our failure was to bind closer, and to irritate more and more ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XIV., His Court and The Regency, Complete • Duc de Saint-Simon
... but what's that? Brady wouldn't hear to it. He said it was nonsense, me talking of going over there and getting in people's way. Of course, I'd probably faint the first time I saw a mutilated dead body, and that would irritate the army. They'd have to stop everything while they gave me smelling salts. I suppose I'd get used to seeing 'em dead all over the place, just as everybody does,—even the worst of cowards. I'm not a coward, Anne. I drive my racing-car at ninety ...
— From the Housetops • George Barr McCutcheon
... daughter on the vile plebeian who was recommended by his caprice. Without regard to her birth or age, her body, as high as the neck, was enclosed in a sack with several cats, who were pricked with pins to irritate their fury against their unfortunate fellow-captive. In his last hours the emperor testified a wish to forgive and be forgiven, a just anxiety for the fate of John his son and successor, who, at the age of eight years, was condemned to the ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 6 • Edward Gibbon
... true, that the accused herself was not to be reconciled to the sheriffs doctrine so easily. He reminded her that, if she used her tongue with so much license, she must expose herself to suspicions, and that should coincidences happen to irritate her neighbours, she, might suffer harm at a time when there was no one to protect her. He therefore requested her to be more cautious in her language for her own sake, professing, at the same time, his belief that her words and intentions were perfectly harmless, and that ...
— Letters On Demonology And Witchcraft • Sir Walter Scott
... some particular organ. This is very plainly seen in diseases involving the stomach or intestines, where habitual excesses in eating lead, sooner or later, to consequent inflammation, disease, and death. This is also true of the lungs; merely living in an atmosphere full of dust will irritate the lungs to such a degree as to cause inflammation. Cancer is presumably the result of local inflammation, although the cause of the original suppuration is unknown. Similarly, appendicitis starts from some irritating cause, resulting ...
— Rural Hygiene • Henry N. Ogden
... husband, who, raising his head at the first remark of the Indian, now saw in his fierce, flashing eyes, angry gestures, and awful contortions of visage, that which boded the sudden fulfillment of his threat: "Don't irritate him, and git murdered for your pains, Dorothy! Why can't you be ...
— Ella Barnwell - A Historical Romance of Border Life • Emerson Bennett
... would ride Lethe to-night. The other horses were too comfortable. They served to irritate the bandit passions, not to subdue them. She panted for some one, something, to break ...
— Garrison's Finish - A Romance of the Race-Course • W. B. M. Ferguson
... addition to the stimulating agent caffeine, tea and coffee contain a bitter, astringent substance, known as tannin. On account of the tannin these beverages tend to retard digestion and to irritate the lining of the stomach—effects that may be largely obviated by methods of preparing tea and coffee which dissolve little of the tannin. (They should be made without continued boiling or steeping.) The caffeine may do harm ...
— Physiology and Hygiene for Secondary Schools • Francis M. Walters, A.M.
... on, master snarling, snapping, and swearing, making himself, I must confess, as much of a blaggard as any I ever see; and my lady employing her time betwigst him and the shevalliay, doing every think to irritate master, and flatter the Frenchmn. Desert came: and by this time, Miss was stock-still with fright, the chevaleer half tipsy with pleasure and gratafied vannaty, my lady puffickly raygent with smiles ...
— Memoirs of Mr. Charles J. Yellowplush - The Yellowplush Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... well back, so that the sulphur fumes wouldn't irritate your own nostrils, and so that when the bubbles from the boiling broke they wouldn't spatter you, and with the finest kind of intuition and the most delicate aim you'd select the tenderest place in your intended victim's anatomy for your spear-point." He smiled ironically at ...
— Ben Blair - The Story of a Plainsman • Will Lillibridge
... pleasantly and effectively on. It twinkles through the thoughts and gives to language a sparkle and a nicety that cause it to appeal to the artistic sense. It gives to discourse a piquancy that stimulates but does not irritate. It is the flavor that gives to speech its undulatory quality, and redeems it from desert sameness. It pervades the motives and gives direction as well as a pleasing fertility to all behavior. It is pervasive ...
— The Vitalized School • Francis B. Pearson
... now enter, bearing pikes with ticklers on the ends. These will be brushed across the bull's nose as the picadors rush past him on noisy motor-cycles. The noise of the motor-cycles is counted on to irritate the bull quite as much as the ticklers, as he will probably be trying ...
— Love Conquers All • Robert C. Benchley
... I can tell why the god is wroth against us, and willing I am to tell it, but perhaps I may irritate the king who rules over all the Argives, and in his anger he may do evil to me. Promise me, therefore, your protection, and I will declare why this plague has come ...
— The Story of Troy • Michael Clarke
... had Constance seen the old autocrat suffering from nervousness; it was doubtful whether anyone at any time had enjoyed the privilege. Strange to say, this abnormal state of things did not irritate Lady Ogram's temper; she was remarkably mild, and for once in her life seemed to feel it no indignity to stand in need of moral support. Long before the time for Miss Tomalin's arrival, she established herself on her throne amid the ...
— Our Friend the Charlatan • George Gissing
... him as long as possible to help him catch the idea, and would often say, "When I go out, I mean to find a good place where I can go to school, for I intend to obtain a good education." At times he would appear very religious, and talk and pray in our meetings; but, should anything irritate him, he perhaps would fly into a rage beyond all self-control, in which, if he could, he would kill a man as quickly as he would a fly. Still, an officer of the needed prudence and skill, by studying his infirmity and managing with due discretion, would have but little trouble with him, and ...
— The Prison Chaplaincy, And Its Experiences • Hosea Quinby
... a visible change in the manners of the Atheling toward his page, for his vanity had been piqued by this trifling circumstance, of which the artful Brithric took advantage to irritate his mind against Wilfrid. He now addressed him only in the language of imperious command, and not unfrequently ...
— The Children's Portion • Various
... was a man of the world and could cover two pages of note-paper without saying anything that could irritate a woman. Like everything he said, what he wrote was just right. He did not protest that he could not use his motor car himself, and he did not apologise for taking the liberty of offering her the use of it; he did not even ask for an answer, as if ...
— Fair Margaret - A Portrait • Francis Marion Crawford
... would be nearer the truth to say that they have never heard of England, or of Ireland either, than to say that their first emotional movement is a desire to come to the rescue of either of them. It is perfectly true that the more monomaniac sort of Sinn Feiner might sometimes irritate this innocent and isolated American spirit by being pro-Irish. It is equally true that a traditional Bostonian or Virginian might irritate it by being pro-English. The only difference is that large ...
— What I Saw in America • G. K. Chesterton
... traveler, "irritate the hippopotamus in the water, since an adventure happened which came near proving fatal to the men. They were going in a small canoe, to kill one of these animals in a river, where there were some eight or ten feet of water. After they ...
— Stories about Animals: with Pictures to Match • Francis C. Woodworth
... young horse has a tendency to shy, how carefully the trainer seeks to win him away from the habit. But if a poor little boy has a hasty temper, you may find his mother taking the greatest pains to irritate that temper. If the little fellow have some physical or mental defect, you have seen parents who never miss an opportunity of throwing it in the boy's face; parents who seem to exult in the thought that they know the place where a touch will always cause to wince,—the sensitive, unprotected ...
— The Recreations of A Country Parson • A. K. H. Boyd
... the bone will be pressed against or even worn into. This means headache, severe, easily going on to the kind known as sick-headache. The nerves which move the eyes in various directions lie next to the pituitary. If, in its expansion, it moves sufficiently outward, it may press upon, irritate them or paralyze, and so evolve various eye disturbances in association with the headache. No one can overrate this conception of migraine, for a number of men of genius have suffered from sick-headache and ...
— The Glands Regulating Personality • Louis Berman, M.D.
... a year older and wiser," said the widow, meditatively; "and you have learned, I hope, not to irritate a man needlessly. I never irritated Corwin in all my ...
— David Poindexter's Disappearance and Other Tales • Julian Hawthorne
... use of analogy and illustration, may sometimes dazzle and confuse the minds it seeks to convince. In regard to opponents, it is not content with mere dialectic victory, but insinuates the subtle sting of wit to vex and irritate the sore places ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 8, No. 46, August, 1861 • Various
... the soul of Ireland was left for Irishmen to love. He could work and fight for Ireland better in London than in Dublin. And again, the Irishman in England can make havoc in his turn; he can harry the English, he can spite, and irritate and triumph and get his own back in a thousand ways. Living in England he would be ...
— The Tree of Heaven • May Sinclair
... spirit. If these laws had been strictly enforced, the American Revolution would probably have come sooner than it did. In point of fact they were seldom strictly enforced, because so long as the French were a power in America the British government felt that it could not afford to irritate the colonists. In spite of laws to the contrary, the carrying-trade between the different colonies was almost monopolized by vessels owned, built, and manned in New England; and the smuggling of foreign goods into Boston and ...
— The War of Independence • John Fiske
... seemed that high blood pressure has caused the left ventricle to act with such force as to irritate this mitral valve, and later develop from such irritation a sclerosis or narrowing, and stenosis occurs. It has been suggested that, though lime may be of advantage in heart weakness, as will be stated later, if the blood is overfull of calcium ions the valvular irritations ...
— DISTURBANCES OF THE HEART • OLIVER T. OSBORNE, A.M., M.D.
... some who think that no prisoner, while undergoing his sentence, should be allowed to feel any pleasure in the occupation in which he may be engaged; and hence they advocate the crank, shot drill, and other aimless tasks, which serve but to irritate, and do not the least good to the heart, from whence all our actions spring. For a short term of probation, no doubt, the task should be irksome; but when this is over and it should not be prolonged work should be given which would tend to call out the best feelings, restore self-respect, ...
— Prisoners Their Own Warders - A Record of the Convict Prison at Singapore in the Straits - Settlements Established 1825 • J. F. A. McNair
... boar and two full-grown sows, and were in chase of others. We came up with them when they were engaged with a fine young boar which had sheltered and come to bay in a clump of thorny scrub (wild Irishman, so called). Neither dogs nor men could reach him, and the only plan was to irritate him till he bolted. This was difficult, but at length successful, and the beast made a rush straight for us. However, he was bent on defence rather than offence, and we escaped his tusks. Legge was first mounted and away with one of the dogs in chase, ...
— Five Years in New Zealand - 1859 to 1864 • Robert B. Booth
... veree kind, veree good," I murmured, half ashamed of my disguise, though it was assumed for the purpose of rescuing her. "Your sympathy goes to my heart." Then as a deep growl of impatience rose from the room at my side, I motioned her to go and not irritate the man who seemed to have such ...
— A Strange Disappearance • Anna Katharine Green
... side of Angelica, and attempted to encourage her in vain, now rose in the air; and the monster, whose attention was diverted by a shadow on the water of a couple of great wings dashing round and above him, presently felt a spear on his Deck; but only to irritate him, for it could not pierce the skin. In vain Ruggiero tried to do so a hundred times. The combat was of no more effect than that of the fly with the mastiff, when it dashes against his eyes and mouth, and at last comes once too often within the ...
— Stories from the Italian Poets: With Lives of the Writers, Vol. 2 • Leigh Hunt
... words,—the verbal expression of worry about or towards individuals. The mother wishes her son would do differently. Can the boy's actions be changed? Then go to work to change them—not to worry over them. If they cannot be changed, why nag him, why irritate him, why make a bad matter worse? Nagging, like worry, never once did one iota of good; it has caused infinite harm, as it sets up an irritation between those whose love might overcome the difficulty if it were let alone. Nagging is the constant irritation of a wound, the rubbing ...
— Quit Your Worrying! • George Wharton James
... to-do over it, and it would have had a good effect with the nation; but no, he wouldn't hear of such a thing. He had something like a religious passion for royal grant; he seemed to look upon it as a sort of sacred swag, and one could not irritate him in any way so quickly and so surely as by an attack upon that venerable institution. If I ventured to cautiously hint that there was not another respectable family in England that would humble itself to hold out the hat—however, that is as far as I ever got; he always cut ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... He earnestly beseeches the Romans, that when he should be exposed in the amphitheatre, they would not, by their kind but unseasonable intercession, deprive him of the crown of glory; and he declares his resolution to provoke and irritate the wild beasts which might be employed as the instruments of his death. Some stories are related of the courage of martyrs, who actually performed what Ignatius had intended; who exasperated the fury of the lions, pressed the executioner to hasten his office, cheerfully leaped ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... once. Among causes of inflammation may be mentioned a stone in the frog, causing a traumatic thrush; a badly fitting harness or saddle, causing ulcers of the skin; decomposing manure and urine in a stable, which, by their vapors, irritate the air tubes and lungs and cause ...
— Special Report on Diseases of the Horse • United States Department of Agriculture
... out late at his job—it's an uncertain business, reporting—we used to discuss it with the tolerance of fond people, and smile over his weaknesses, and say that he was incorrigible. All the same, it continued to irritate me. Sometimes I could see that he hurt her, when in his impatient way he swung round to devastate her opinions with those sly and unanswerable phrases that placed everything once and for always in a ridiculous light. What a devilish gift he had, that man, of humiliating one! And he did it always ...
— The Tale Of Mr. Peter Brown - Chelsea Justice - From "The New Decameron", Volume III. • V. Sackville West
... nearly come. He did not again speak intelligibly to any of them. In his last hours he suffered considerably, and his own thoughts seemed to irritate him. But when he did mutter a few words, they seemed to refer to trivial matters—little plagues which dying men feel as keenly as those who are full of life. To the last he preferred George either to his niece or to ...
— The Bertrams • Anthony Trollope
... only human nature to be more keenly sensitive to the thorns than to the roses of every institution, and that the thorns should irritate one against the existing state of things. The old government officials, when they came into direct contact with the governed population, showed themselves to be pedantic, and estranged from the practical working of life by their occupation at the ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. X. • Kuno Francke
... me. His father, and especially his mother, exhibited the utmost degree of emotion and made the strongest appeals without effect. Now we must try different tactics. All must be quiet and nothing occur to confuse or irritate him." ...
— Taken Alive • E. P. Roe
... seemed specially to irritate the elements. The illuminations were extinguished by a terrific torrent that sent the people pattering away into the black, starless night, gleaming with rain and fire; and to-night when the imperial band attempted to play "Sang an Aegir" again, the heavens fell, and audience and ...
— Without Prejudice • Israel Zangwill
... She irritates you, and you irritate her. The mere presence of a child sets your teeth on edge. (Crosses, ...
— The Black Cat - A Play in Three Acts • John Todhunter
... of how much I owe Him, and apply myself diligently to the work He has given me to do; I bear patiently with those I dislike, with troubles that irritate me; when I am weak I call upon Him, when timid I draw near to Him, when sinful I implore pardon, and strive to do my ...
— Gold Dust - A Collection of Golden Counsels for the Sanctification of Daily Life • E. L. E. B.
... angry flush rose to Frank's face. The man's manner was enough to irritate any high spirited boy. But Frank Chester was not given to what Bill Barnes called "flying off the handle." He calmly took another card from his pocket and in a rather sharp voice, though his tones were ...
— The Boy Aviators in Africa • Captain Wilbur Lawton
... the cry of human beings myself,' said his mate, 'and I'm rather glad I do not; it would only irritate me. Perhaps ...
— Mrs. Overtheway's Remembrances • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... several very flat hives which may be separated. Bees, in such habitations, must not be visited before their combs are securely fixed in the frames, otherwise, by falling out, they may kill or hurt them, as also irritate them to that degree that the observer cannot escape stinging, which is always painful, and sometimes dangerous: but they soon become accustomed to their situation, and in some measure tamed by it; and, in three days, we may begin to operate on the hive, to open it, remove part of the combs, and ...
— New observations on the natural history of bees • Francis Huber
... you should have left the role to Sarah; she would have played it with the voice you wish in the love scenes; I cannot do any better. You irritate me too much: I have had enough of it!" And she ran off, sobbing, into the little guignol, where she had an ...
— My Double Life - The Memoirs of Sarah Bernhardt • Sarah Bernhardt
... there's nothing we can do right now but mark time. Irritate the Arabs a bit. Keep them ...
— Border, Breed Nor Birth • Dallas McCord Reynolds
... I would not operate one without wearing tight-fitting clothes. When grinding dry materials, great clouds of dust may be given off. Some of these particles, like the dust from alfalfa or from dried-out spoiled (moldy) hay, can severely irritate lungs, eyes, throat and nasal passages. A face mask, or better, an army surplus gas mask with built-in goggles, may be in order. And you'll probably want to take ...
— Organic Gardener's Composting • Steve Solomon
... when victory was within his grasp was enough to irritate any commander who valued his aim and plan," observed Mr. Jackson Harmar, agreeing with Smith in the remarks which he had just made. "I suppose, if Washington had been completely successful at Germantown, the British would have been driven ...
— The Old Bell Of Independence; Or, Philadelphia In 1776 • Henry C. Watson
... and in which, according to the standing manners of Bengal, he would recommend oblivion as the best remedy, and would end by remarking, that retrospect could have no advantage, and could serve only to irritate and keep alive animosities; and by this kind of equitable, candid, and judge-like proceeding, they hoped the whole complaint would calmly fade away, the sufferers remain in the possession of their patience, ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. X. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... hour," cried his wife passionately; and her husband, seeing that advice would only irritate her ...
— The Basket of Flowers • Christoph von Schmid
... with Malays so long and so close that the extreme deliberation and deviousness of their mental proceedings had ceased to irritate him much. To-night, perhaps, he was less prone to impatience than ever. He was disposed, if not to listen to Babalatchi, then to let him talk. It was evident to him that the man had something to say, and he hoped that from the talk a ray of light would shoot through the thick blackness of inexplicable ...
— An Outcast of the Islands • Joseph Conrad
... the table. All were so used to the lady's tactless remarks that they only amused. They had long lost the power to irritate. ...
— The Elephant God • Gordon Casserly
... dry, but should receive a rough washing at once; they should then be kept in soak in plain water until a convenient time for washing,—at least once every day,—when they should be washed in hot suds and boiled at least fifteen minutes. Afterward they should be very thoroughly rinsed or they may irritate the skin, and ironed without starch or blueing. They should ...
— The Care and Feeding of Children - A Catechism for the Use of Mothers and Children's Nurses • L. Emmett Holt
... know better how to irritate them," with a laugh. "They will not take any particular interest in you when they set eyes on me. Homo sum! I am the man they are looking for. They will find plenty of me. I shall be a syndicate in myself; where they expect to find one man, ...
— Arms and the Woman • Harold MacGrath
... the advantages, just or unjust, of the wealthier classes without abatement. I do hope wise men will not attempt to fight the working men on the head of this notorious injustice. Any such step will only precipitate the action of the newly enfranchised classes, and irritate them into acting hastily; when what we ought to desire should be that they should act warily and little for many years to come, until education and habit may make them the ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 23 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... into less caustic mood. Perhaps she had not expected the Baron to shine in an emergency. Her calmness seemed to irritate him, though he was most anxious to ...
— The Wheel O' Fortune • Louis Tracy
... advice given by Bismarck to the Prince not long after his acceptance of the crown of Bulgaria: "Play the dead (faire mort). . . . Let yourself be driven gently by the stream, and keep yourself, as hitherto, above water. Your greatest ally is time—force of habit. Avoid everything that might irritate your enemies. Unless you give them provocation, they cannot do you much harm, and in course of time the world will become accustomed to see you on the ...
— The Development of the European Nations, 1870-1914 (5th ed.) • John Holland Rose
... frequently make little objection to the second operation. Bleeding is rarely troublesome if the portion be at once fairly removed, but if in the patient's struggles the hook should slip before the cut is complete, the partially detached portion will irritate the fauces, cause coughing and attempts to vomit, and sometimes a ...
— A Manual of the Operations of Surgery - For the Use of Senior Students, House Surgeons, and Junior Practitioners • Joseph Bell
... from the mother-in-law, who was a sort of spy over all she said or did; and she thought Howel would be kinder to her when he was at a distance from their kith and kin, whose propinquity seemed to irritate him. ...
— Gladys, the Reaper • Anne Beale
... seems to like things better the way they are—God knows why, my antic friend! If it were my question between you and a year studying abroad! Not that you haven't your own subtle attractions, Ollie." Ted has hoped to irritate Oliver into argument by the closing remark, but the latter only ...
— Young People's Pride • Stephen Vincent Benet
... who were accustomed to luxuries have suffered from their absence. Meat of some kind is, however, to be obtained by any person who likes to pay for it about twice its normal value. So afraid is the Government of doing anything which may irritate the population, that, contrary to all precedent, the garrison and the wounded alone are fed with salt meat. What the result of M. Thiers' mission will be, it is almost impossible to say. The Government will be anxious to treat, and probably it will put forward feelers to-morrow to see how ...
— Diary of the Besieged Resident in Paris • Henry Labouchere
... was plain, but that did not make the least difference; if any, it was rather on the side of vanity, in being able without a handsome face, so to attract and engross her cousins. It was amusing, gratifying, flattering, to feel her power to play them off, and irritate the little feelings of jealousy which she had detected; and thoughtless as to the right or ...
— Henrietta's Wish • Charlotte M. Yonge
... frank biographer, and an honest one; she uses no sand-paper on me. I have, to this day, the same dull head in the matter of conundrums and perplexities which Susy had discovered in those long-gone days. Complexities annoy me; they irritate me; then this progressive feeling presently warms into anger. I cannot get far in the reading of the commonest and simplest contract—with its "parties of the first part," and "parties of the second part," and "parties of the third part,"—before ...
— Chapters from My Autobiography • Mark Twain
... not to his wish, but this only made me more determined to talk, and to talk to him above all others in London. The desire took hold of me to irritate him—to break down the imperturbable calm within which he moved and had his being; and I gathered myself together, and settled ...
— Sketches in Lavender, Blue and Green • Jerome K. Jerome
... it would only do harm. A superabundance of memorials is as bad as none at all. Beyond a certain point, they only irritate officials." ...
— Stories by English Authors: Orient • Various
... replied in most harsh and cutting words. This was no unusual thing. But it so happened that Edith's feelings were less under her control than usual, and she answered the unkindness with a gush of tears. This only tended to irritate her unfeeling husband, who ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 5 November 1848 • Various
... "You can't irritate me, Hull. I've been giving you the benefit of the doubt. I think you are falling into the commonest kind of error—doing evil and winking at evil in order that a good end may be gained. Now, listen. What are the things you reformers ...
— The Conflict • David Graham Phillips
... Lady (whose dog, a powerful and truculent Airedale, seems to have conceived a sudden and violent dislike for the nondescript). Yours must have done something to irritate him—he's generally such ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, April 30, 1919 • Various
... with Lord de Winter her plan of conduct was more easy. She had laid that down the preceding evening. To remain silent and dignified in his presence; from time to time to irritate him by affected disdain, by a contemptuous word; to provoke him to threats and violence which would produce a contrast with her own resignation—such was her plan. Felton would see all; perhaps he would say nothing, but he ...
— The Three Musketeers • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... Jen, Pao-yue seated himself on the edge of the couch. As he did so, he gave her a push, and inquired whether her sore place was any better. But thereupon he saw the occupant turn herself round, and exclaim: "What do you come again to irritate ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... between them and Shubin. And yet Turgenev's is but a sketch of an artist, compared with, let us say, the admirable figure of Roderick Hudson. The irresponsibility, alertness, the whimsicality and mobility of Shubin combine to charm and irritate the reader in the exact proportion that such a character affects him in actual life; there is not the least touch of exaggeration, and all the values are kept to a marvel. Looking at the minor characters, perhaps one may say that the husband, Stahov, will be the most suggestive, ...
— On the Eve • Ivan Turgenev
... public table, Dooly said something or did something to irritate Major Freeman Walker. The latter, remarking that he had borne with the liberties taken by Judge Dooly quite long enough, said he proposed to resent them then and there. The attack on his feelings had been made in public, and he proposed to resent it in public. Seizing a chair, ...
— Stories Of Georgia - 1896 • Joel Chandler Harris
... some improper diet, as the eating of an unusual article of food or of a larger amount than necessary. Such articles of diet as cucumbers, unripe or overripe fruit, an excessive amount of sweets, rich salads, heavy puddings, etc., may so irritate the stomach that an acute attack of ...
— Treatise on the Diseases of Women • Lydia E. Pinkham
... to let this vital point sink home. Only the same dull silence came in reply, and this continued taciturnity seemed to irritate Hovey. When he spoke again, his voice ...
— Harrigan • Max Brand
... was going to kill all who were in the town, but Kjartan, Gissur, and Hjalte, with the other Icelanders who had become Christians, went to him, and said, "King, thou must not fail from thy word—that however much any man may irritate thee, thou wilt forgive him if he turn from heathenism and become Christian. All the Icelanders here are willing to be baptized; and through them we may find means to bring Christianity into Iceland: ...
— Heimskringla - The Chronicle of the Kings of Norway • Snorri Sturluson
... mounds of earth were observed, scattered over an open glade in the forest. At the first glance, they appeared like dwelling places; and, knowing something of the habits of the Indians, Rodolph and two of his companions approached them warily, fearing to surprise and irritate the inhabitants. But after making a circuit, and ascertaining that these supposed huts had no doorways, they went up to them, and found them to be solid mounds, at the foot of which neatly plaited baskets, filled with ears of maize, were placed. These were eagerly seized upon; and a ...
— The Pilgrims of New England - A Tale Of The Early American Settlers • Mrs. J. B. Webb
... addressed to him through what she thought a secure channel, fell into the hands of her mother. It could not be but that the tenor of these intercepted letters, especially those of Ravenswood, should contain something to irritate the passions and fortify the obstinacy of her into whose hands they fell; but Lady Ashton's passions were too deep-rooted to require this fresh food. She burnt the papers as regularly as she perused them; and as they consumed into vapour and tinder, regarded them with a smile ...
— Bride of Lammermoor • Sir Walter Scott
... Shuster is a good second, and Pat—but I said I wouldn't mention them, anyhow at first. I'm sure Jack and I were never so irritating, except perhaps to Aunt Mary. But she was different. One somehow wanted to irritate her. She was born to ...
— The Lightning Conductor Discovers America • C. N. (Charles Norris) Williamson and A. M. (Alice Muriel)
... well understood. We had a lively summer, for the Indians kept things stirring, but after a summer of hard fighting we made them understand that the Great White Chief was a power that the Indians had better not irritate. November, '63, I returned with the command to Leavenworth. I had money in my pockets, for my pay had been $150 a month, and I was able to lay in an abundant supply of provisions ...
— An Autobiography of Buffalo Bill (Colonel W. F. Cody) • Buffalo Bill (William Frederick Cody)
... ordinary playgoer. Several actors and actresses whom we prefer to some of the popular favourites have been banished from London by the indifference of Londoners, and there are "stars" beloved in the theatres who irritate the observant because they have never learnt their art, and nevertheless triumph by ...
— Our Stage and Its Critics • "E.F.S." of "The Westminster Gazette"
... make inquiries; they only seemed to irritate him. "I am better already, now you have come to me." He said that, and led the way to a sheltered seat among the trees. In the later evening-time the Square was almost empty. Two middle-aged ladies, walking up ...
— Heart and Science - A Story of the Present Time • Wilkie Collins
... of paprika is decidedly better than the pungent pepper. This pepper is mildly sweet-flavored spice that does not irritate the delicate lining of the throat or stomach. Now, fully as important as the green appetizers are the dainty salads, lettuce, corn salad, endive, romaine, tomatoes, onions, cucumbers, cabbage and the cooked vegetables, ...
— Mrs. Wilson's Cook Book - Numerous New Recipes Based on Present Economic Conditions • Mary A. Wilson |
