"Shrug" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... was a shrug with his palms extended and a short, disclamatory "Ah." He started to resume his walk, but turned to ...
— Madame Delphine • George W. Cable
... practical influence, though less obvious, is not, as I believe, less certain. I have heard educated men speak with an ill-disguised contempt of the studies of the naturalist, and ask, not without a shrug, "What is the use of knowing all about these miserable animals—what bearing ...
— Science & Education • Thomas H. Huxley
... fine shrug of disgust; "he have gone to Berlin. Tomorrow night late, his comrade will come—tomorrow night. So you are safe. And you are ze true knight—so! You will r-rescue Mam'selle," and she placed her two hands on Tom's shoulders, ...
— Tom Slade with the Boys Over There • Percy K. Fitzhugh
... Upon these occasions, no one knows what to say, or whither to direct his looks. The parents, and especially the fond mother, looks sharply round for the so-evidently merited applause, as an actor of the name of MUNDEN, whom I recollect thirty years ago, used, when he had treated us to a witty shrug of his shoulders, or twist of his chin, to turn his face up to the gallery for the clap. If I had to declare on my oath which have been the most disagreeable moments of my life, I verily believe, that, after due consideration, I should fix upon those, in which parents, whom I have respected, ...
— Advice to Young Men • William Cobbett
... marriage having been consummated, he obtained, with the Queen's consent, an audience of the King, for the purpose of soliciting his sanction to his continuing in his situation. On submitting his suit to the King, His Majesty merely gave a shrug of the shoulders, and turned to converse with the Duc d'Aiguillon, who at that moment entered the room. The Abbe stood stupefied, and the Queen, seeing the crestfallen humour of her tutor, laughed and cheered ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... question &c (doubt) 485; differ in opinion, disagree; say no &c 536; refuse assent, refuse to admit; cavil, protest, raise one's voice against, repudiate; contradict &c (deny) 536. have no notion of, differ toto caelo [Lat.]; revolt at, revolt from the idea. shake the head, shrug the shoulders; look askance, look askant^. secede; recant &c 607. Adj. dissenting &c v.; negative &c 536; dissident, dissentient; unconsenting &c (refusing) 764; non-content, nonjuring^; protestant, recusant; unconvinced, unconverted. unavowed, unacknowledged; out of the question. ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... us up as hopeless, with a resigned shrug of his shoulders. He vanished into his lair, consulted a superior officer, and after a long delay returned with the news that we must pay ten centimes, probably as a penance for our mulish stupidity ...
— My Friend the Chauffeur • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... faltered, with a little shrug of the shoulders, "I can hardly tell you. The phrase seemed to come out of its own accord. I have felt from the beginning that it was in pain and—starved, though why I felt this never occurred ...
— Three More John Silence Stories • Algernon Blackwood
... that the earnestness which was awakened in those days is dying out in these. The richer classes of every country are tempted from time to time to fits of laziness—fits of frivolity and luxury, surfeits, in which men say, with a shrug and a yawn—"Why be very much in earnest? Why take so much trouble? Somebody must always be rich, why should not I? Somebody must enjoy the money, why should not I? At all events, things will last my time." And that such a surfeit has fallen upon the rich of this land, is a fact; for ...
— All Saints' Day and Other Sermons • Charles Kingsley
... if you will, to the Lord Constantine," he admitted, with a careless shrug; "but her message was for his ear only. He took her aside, and they ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. 6, No. 5, April, 1896 • Various
... a shrug of the shoulders and a peculiar gesticulation with his hand, as if he were throwing something away, while he looked at them both sidewise through his half-closed eyes: "You are fatigue so soon? You vant to go ...
— Cormorant Crag - A Tale of the Smuggling Days • George Manville Fenn
... into life with a shrug of his powerful shoulders. "It's just like you, Brick, to spoil a festibul-day with your low idees! Why don't you keep them idees for a rainy day? Just lay up them regrets and hankerings for the first rainy day, and then be of a piece with the heavens and earth. 'If you can't stay cheerful ...
— Lahoma • John Breckenridge Ellis
... I ask: "How much do those poor coolies earn a day, who take the place of carts?" You shrug and smile. "Eighteen coppers. Something less than eight cents in your money. They are not badly paid. They do ...
— Profiles from China • Eunice Tietjens
... not omit the ancestors of Punch and Judy, who lived in these early times, though probably under different names. But however they were called, they were just as queer-looking a family; and their arms would move, their shoulders shrug, their eyes roll, and their feet cut as strange capers as those of their descendants; and I have no doubt afforded the little ones, and perhaps some older persons, as much pleasure then ...
— Harper's Young People, March 16, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... only answer to that was a shrug. She was, as I think I have said, a very shrewd person. I have since had reason to believe that she could, if she had chosen, have relieved my mind very considerably, but at the moment she thought it was the spur I needed, and she was not going to lessen the ...
— Carette of Sark • John Oxenham
... soon known in the house what had become of Augustus. When Belle heard of it, she gave a shrug, and exclaimed, ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. 5, Issue 2, February, 1864 • Various
... With a shrug she turned away and shut the door. She sat down on the edge of her bed, very still. In that little passage of wits she had won, she could win in many such; but the full hideousness of things had come ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... door after her. For a moment he remained as though undecided whether to follow or not. His face had softened with her absence. Finally, however, he turned away with a little shrug of the shoulders, threw himself into his easy-chair ...
— The Zeppelin's Passenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... eyes hast thou yet art blind, thine ears are stuffed and stopped, despite their length: and, oh, the foolishness thou countest faith! Say this as silvery as tongue can troll—the anger of the man may be endured, the shrug, the disappointed eyes of him are not so bad to bear— but here's the plague, that all this trouble comes of telling truth, which truth, by when it reaches him, looks false, seems to be just the thing it would supplant, nor recognizable ...
— Introduction to Robert Browning • Hiram Corson
... A shrug—"hem—why, sir, but that was a great sarmon you praiched on last Sunda', plaise you honor. Faitha, sir, there was mighty fine discoorsin' in ...
— Valentine M'Clutchy, The Irish Agent - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton
... reply was a shrug of the shoulders, the foreign substitute for a Burleigh shake of the head; leaving us to infer that we must not make too sure of coming off with a whole skin. Knowing well enough that all apprehensions of that kind were imaginary, we had been only ...
— Rambles in the Islands of Corsica and Sardinia - with Notices of their History, Antiquities, and Present Condition. • Thomas Forester
... true that at first they may shrug their shoulders, and laugh us to scorn; but when they have left us, and, being alone, reflect a little on what we have told them, you will see them flutter back like decoyed birds, saying to us, 'We should like to hear you speak again about those things which you brought before us the other ...
— The Spirit of St. Francis de Sales • Jean Pierre Camus
... Harmon—Sir John Harmon. It is unusual, I suppose," he said quietly, with a slight shrug, "coming at this late hour. I ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science September 1930 • Various
... to you, when your tears are dried, and when you no longer believe what young Niafer once believed; and when, remembering young Niafer's desires and her intentions as to the disposal of her life, you will shrug withered shoulders. To go on living will remain desirable. The dilapidations of life will no longer move you deeply. Shrugging, you will say of sorrow, 'What is it?' for you will know grief also to be impermanent. And your ...
— Figures of Earth • James Branch Cabell
... "But what will you?" with a little shrug. "It is not every day that our Principal makes a birthday! As for me, I am glad I bought ...
— The Madcap of the School • Angela Brazil
... old man uttered a sound very like a snore. Mr Armstrong gave an imperceptible shrug of his shoulders and inwardly meditated a retreat, when the sound came through the darkness again. There was something in it which brought the tutor suddenly to his feet. He struck a match ...
— Roger Ingleton, Minor • Talbot Baines Reed
... Michael's, said, With many a shrug and shaking of the head, Surely some demon must possess the lad, Who showed more wit than ever schoolboy had, And learned his Trivium thus without the rod; But Alcuin said it was the grace ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... cold, strange gaze of my guardian, talked only what was inevitable, and that in low tones; for whenever Milly for a moment raised her voice, Uncle Silas would wince, place his thin white fingers quickly over his ear, and look as if a pain had pierced his brain, and then shrug and smile piteously into vacancy. When Uncle Silas, therefore, was not in the talking vein himself—and that was not often—you may suppose there was very little spoken ...
— Uncle Silas - A Tale of Bartram-Haugh • J.S. Le Fanu
... she would say, tossing the poor man's list aside, with a despairing shrug of her shoulders, "all these entrees are as old as the hills. I am sure Adam must have had stewed pigeons with green peas, and chicken a la Marengo—they are the very ABC of cookery. Do, pray, strike out something a little newer. Let me see; I copied the menu of a dinner at St. ...
— The Lovels of Arden • M. E. Braddon
... get what you want," she repeated. "Well?" she conceded, with a shrug of mock resignation. But the four other men here cut in with ...
— The Riverman • Stewart Edward White
... She gave a little shrug of her shoulders, but the spirit of badinage had vanished both from her face and from her voice. 'It didn't take long to lose most of one's illusions. It is one thing to meet people as Lord Durwent's daughter, and quite ...
— The Parts Men Play • Arthur Beverley Baxter
... Sometimes it happens that the woman is strong enough to defend herself, and conquers a peace; but ordinarily when you hear a scream in the Moslem quarter of the city and ask the reason, it will be said to you with an indifferent shrug of the shoulder, "that is only some man ...
— The Women of the Arabs • Henry Harris Jessup
... was instantaneous and uncanny. His Saxon-Dutch nature was in instant revolt against influences so foreign and unnatural. Arenta was unconsciously in sympathy with him; for she said with a shrug of her pretty shoulders, as she looked around, "I have always bad dreams after a visit to this room. Do these things have a life of their own? Look at the creature on that corner shelf! What a serene disdain is in his smile! He seems to gaze into the very depths of your soul. I see that ...
— The Maid of Maiden Lane • Amelia E. Barr
... weed—he called it a weed—because it was like gold, which was the god they really worshipped, although that god was known among them by many names. Mavovo, who was not at all interested in the affair, replied with a shrug that it might be so, though for his part he believed the true reason to be that the plant produced some medicine which gave courage or strength. Zulus, I may say, do not care for flowers unless they bear a fruit ...
— Allan and the Holy Flower • H. Rider Haggard
... little Frenchy shrug of the shoulders, and said: "It would be treason to my country to advise you to do so, sir; but if you permit us to go, surely you cannot blame me for going. I very much prefer to stay, but only absolute ...
— Doctor Jones' Picnic • S. E. Chapman
... how. But my prophesying was answered by scoffs, jeers, supercilious smiles. Outside of the Cafe of the Nouvelle Athenes, Monet was a laughing-stock. Manet was bad enough; but when it came to Monet, words were inadequate to express sufficient contempt. A shrug of the shoulders or a pitying look, which clearly meant, "Art thou most of madman or simpleton, or, maybe, impudent charlatan who would attract attention to himself by professing ...
— Modern Painting • George Moore
... shoulders in a shrug. "It's the sort of thing he does. I suppose we'll learn when we ...
— Ultima Thule • Dallas McCord Reynolds
... soon realised that she could afford to smile and shrug her scraggy shoulders at the insolence of those "horrid Engleesh." She found herself in a land of Goshen, where there were many rich plums to be gathered by far-reaching and unscrupulous hands such as hers. If she could not love the enemy, she could at least ...
— Love Romances of the Aristocracy • Thornton Hall
... a trifle angrily. He looked as if he might mean most anything. She replied demurely with a provoking shrug of ...
— Chicken Little Jane on the Big John • Lily Munsell Ritchie
... that ideal, see;" pointing to the grate. "Do you think I shall cry after a pinch of ashes?" looking her full in the face. Then, with a shrug of annoyance. "You have roused poor Olive's curiosity; she must hear of this miserable discovery of ours, or yours—bah," stamping her foot angrily, "my pride is hurt ...
— Madeline Payne, the Detective's Daughter • Lawrence L. Lynch
... shoulder-shrugs and eyebrow-elevations, because it was "not exactly the thing to get out, you know"; but if it wasn't to get out, why did he let it out? and so from my dark corner I watched him as a cat does a mouse, and the lamp-light shone full upon him, and I understood every word and shrug, and I am going to tell it all to the world. I translated that the holy father had been "skylarking" in a boat, and in gay society had forgotten his vows of frugality and abstinence and general mortification of the flesh, and had become, not very drunk, but ...
— Gala-days • Gail Hamilton
... height of the prow is to insure protection for the passengers when going under bridges, but its peculiar halberd shape is a thing not one of the five thousand gondoliers in Venice can explain. If you ask your gondolier he will swear a pious oath, shrug his fine shoulders, and say, "Mon Dieu, Signore! how should I know?—it has always been so." The ignorance and superstition of the picturesque gondolier, with his fluttering blue hatband and gorgeous sash, are most enchanting. His lack of knowledge is like the ignorance of childhood, when life ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 4 (of 14) - Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Painters • Elbert Hubbard
... to undertake a fresh martyrdom, and this time it was for themselves. Leagued against them was half—quite half—of their sex. Vanity and prettiness, dalliance and dependence were their characteristics. With a shrug of half-bared shoulders they dismissed all those who, painfully, nobly, gravely, were fighting to restore woman's connection with reality—to put her back, somehow, into the procession; to make, by new methods, the "coming lady" as essential to the commonwealth as ...
— The Precipice • Elia Wilkinson Peattie
... his wife's exclamation implied, and even more. For, after a vast amount of fencing and an elaborate disquisition on the state of parties in the colony, Sir Robert Perry decisively refused the dissolution the Governor offered, and ended by saying, with eyebrows raised and the slightest shrug of his shoulders, ...
— Half a Hero - A Novel • Anthony Hope
... With a shrug of his thick shoulders, the stranger uninvited came forward and helped himself to a chair, and, with the air of one introducing a person of some importance, said, "I am Vodell—Jake Vodell. You have heard of me, ...
— Helen of the Old House • Harold Bell Wright
... with a deprecatory shrug of the shoulders, and busied himself with the girths of his saddle. At the touch and the sight of the buckles, his eyes became grave and earnest. And it is not only Frenchmen who cherish this cult of the horse, making ...
— The Isle of Unrest • Henry Seton Merriman
... week of such a dull, sentimentalizing mode of existence,' said Aunt Sarah, with a significant shrug ...
— Continental Monthly, Volume 5, Issue 4 • Various
... last to leave the engine-room, blew the main charges by the switch installed aft; Lieutenant Crutchley blew the auxiliary charges in the forward six-inch magazine from the conning-tower. Those on board felt the old ship shrug as the explosive tore the bottom plates and the bulk-heads from her; she sank about six feet and lay upon the bottom of the ...
— World's War Events, Volume III • Various
... a sharp cry of pain from a sick-looking girl whose arm is being brutally wrenched by a rough man, and if she stops for a moment she catches his muttered threats in response to the girl's pleading "that it is too bad a night for street work." She sees a passing policeman shrug his shoulders as he crosses the street, and she vaguely knows that the sick girl has put herself beyond the protection of the law, and that the rough man has an understanding with the officer on the beat. She has been told that certain streets ...
— A New Conscience And An Ancient Evil • Jane Addams
... along the next week end—or the next, either. The suggestion simply is unthinkable. Such digressions may be all right for the leisure class or for invalids; but for adults, live ones, strong and playing the game? A shrug and a tolerant smile end the discussion, as, hands still in his pockets, an after-dinner cigar firm between his teeth, Sandford saunters back across the dozen feet of sod separating his own domicile from that of his ...
— A Breath of Prairie and other stories • Will Lillibridge
... broken heart. She was buried at the expense of the woman of whom her destroyer had rented the little apartment on Sixth Avenue, where she had passed her happiest days and her last. The rich merchant's son heard of her death with a half sigh and then a shrug; but if ever the blood of a human being lay upon the head of another, that of poor Mary R—lies upon the head of the rich merchant's son, and will be required ...
— The Secrets Of The Great City • Edward Winslow Martin
... shrug his shoulders, indeed, when he came back to himself, and smile at these dreams of the future which he indulged in hours of vacuous idleness; but this self-contempt of a man who catches himself in the very act of flagrant ...
— The Cathedral • Joris-Karl Huysmans
... events and hears and answers prayer. But many, Catholic and Protestant alike, believe that the energy of God, in response to man's appeal, is applied through the ordinary machinery of nature's laws. Modern thought is pervaded with the conception of nature's rigour. I have seen good Catholics shrug their shoulders at the wonders narrated by Marie Catherine de Saint Augustin. But others, and these not only the ignorant, think that this attitude shows the lack of a deeper faith. Must God and his saints, they ask, be ...
— A Canadian Manor and Its Seigneurs - The Story of a Hundred Years, 1761-1861 • George M. Wrong
... he had been. But since he held it beneath his dignity to assume the part of the jealous master, he abandoned the search for her secrets with a shrug. The secrets could be of no great importance. No one knew better than himself the moderateness of her desires, no lover, in calm possession of his beloved, had so little to ...
— The Indian Lily and Other Stories • Hermann Sudermann
... first months of his stay in Rome. He answered with a shrug of his shoulders those who asked for his pictures with evident innuendo. He had come there not to paint but to study; that was what the State was paying him for. And he spent more than half a year drawing, always drawing ...
— Woman Triumphant - (La Maja Desnuda) • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... purple; eyes that told tales of sorrow and, yes! of degradation. The crowd stood round her, sullen and apathetic; poor, miserable wretches like herself, staring at her antics with lack-lustre eyes and an ever-recurrent contemptuous shrug of the shoulders. ...
— The League of the Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... the sarcasm, and noticed it by one of those smiles so peculiar to him—a shake of the head and shrug of the shoulders, while he uttered "Que voulez-vous, Sire, chacun a son vingt Mars?" referring to the unexpected arrival ...
— The Idler in France • Marguerite Gardiner
... the famine of Palestine, that he once upon a time was admitted to supper with the Emperor? We know Alexius Comnenus—-he is willing to discharge, at the highest cost, such obligations as are incurred to men like this Hereward; and, believe me, I think that I see the wily despot shrug his shoulders in derision, when one morning he is saluted with the news of a battle in Palestine lost by the crusaders in which his old acquaintance has fallen a dead man. I will not insult thee, by telling thee how easy it might be to acquire the favour of a gentlewoman in waiting ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott
... her perplexity, it seemed as though her task was first to guess the identity of the sender. Who could have written to her? It was unheard of, a think for wondering jest, if only her lips had been steady and her heart beating with normal pulsation. With a shrug, she turned back from the seal to the address. She felt that some curious mistake had been made, that the letter was not for her at all, but for some other Jenny Blanchard, of whom she had never until now heard. Then, casting such a fantastic thought aside with another impatient ...
— Nocturne • Frank Swinnerton
... with a faint shrug: "Mr. President, there is nothing to be done. He has the fleet, he has the broadcasting ...
— The Adventurer • Cyril M. Kornbluth
... of fear crept into Urrea's eyes, as the two antagonists stared at each other. But it was only for a few minutes. Then he looked away with a shrug and ...
— The Texan Scouts - A Story of the Alamo and Goliad • Joseph A. Altsheler
... be offended!" Mrs. Daney cried, with a deprecatory shrug. "I'm sure I find this a most difficult matter to discuss, and I assure you, I do not desire ...
— Kindred of the Dust • Peter B. Kyne
... remarked another with a shrug. It was a saying to which Mackay had become accustomed. For it was one of the shameless proverbs ...
— The Black-Bearded Barbarian (George Leslie Mackay) • Mary Esther Miller MacGregor, AKA Marion Keith
... wife never took to that ould dog," Says he, wid a shrug av his slats, "So we've got us a new dog from Galway, And och, he's the divil ...
— The Dog's Book of Verse • Various
... likely a man my Lord Barkeley of all the world is, to do such a thing as this. Here I spoke with Sir W. Coventry, who tells me plainly that to all future complaints of lack of money he will answer but with the shrug of his shoulder; which methought did come to my heart, to see him to begin to abandon the King's affairs, and let them sink or swim, so he do his owne part, which I confess I believe he do beyond any officer the King hath, but unless he do endeavour to make others do theirs, ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... sort of amiable, restrained affability; he was never pre-occupied, and was always satisfied with everything; but on the other hand he was never ecstatic over anything. Every excess, even in a good feeling, jarred upon him; 'that's savage, savage,' he would say with a faint shrug, half closing his golden eyes. Marvellous were those eyes of Fustov's! They invariably expressed sympathy, good-will, even devotion. It was only at a later period that I noticed that the expression of his eyes resulted solely from their setting, that it never changed, even when he was sipping his ...
— The Jew And Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... Geyt, with just the shadow of a shrug, was all sweet reasonableness. She smiled more suavely than ever. "Surely, Lina," she remonstrated, in her frankest and most convincing tone, "I must know best what is good for dear Ettie, when I have been watching her daily for more ...
— Hilda Wade - A Woman With Tenacity Of Purpose • Grant Allen
... answered Mulberry with a shrug of his shoulders" she would take it quite as a matter of course; but still if you dont care to ask her, why not scribble her a note describing your position and I'll send one of the maids up with it; why she would ...
— Daisy Ashford: Her Book • Daisy Ashford
... in the midst of a small knot of fishermen, every now and then answering their questions with a gesture, a shrug of the shoulders, or shake of the head; but chiefly regarding my recovery and waiting, as I could ...
— Dead Man's Rock • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... a pity he did not write in pencil," said he, throwing them down again with a shrug of disappointment. "As you have no doubt frequently observed, Watson, the impression usually goes through—a fact which has dissolved many a happy marriage. However, I can find no trace here. I rejoice, however, to perceive that ...
— The Return of Sherlock Holmes • Arthur Conan Doyle
... shrug his shoulders, remain silent for a moment as if weighing his career beside his love for her, and smile suddenly and say, gently, "No. It's ended. Please, it's ended and forgotten." A laugh, a bit too casual, would leave the thing on the proper plane. Later there would be times when he could grow ...
— Erik Dorn • Ben Hecht
... of a moment. Why, then, did he hesitate? Why not pluck it forth and disappear on the morrow? The admiral had not made a copy, and without the key he might dig up Corsica till the crack of doom. The flame on the taper crept down. The man gave a quick movement to his shoulders; it was the shrug, not of impatience but of resignation. He saw the lock through the haze of a conjured face. He shut his eyes, but the vision remained. Slowly he drew his fingers ...
— A Splendid Hazard • Harold MacGrath
... in saying "two," for the under-searcher now continued the examination, and Anson's eyes were screwed-up and twinkled again upon seeing the man give up at the end of another two minutes and shrug his shoulders. ...
— A Dash from Diamond City • George Manville Fenn
... people answers the cry of distress that is heard all over this bountiful land by a shrug, and a nod to the master to drop a few more crumbs, as if the people were hungry dogs under ...
— Confiscation, An Outline • William Greenwood
... regular day," said the servant, with a contemptuous shrug of the shoulders, as he measured the ...
— Frederick The Great and His Family • L. Muhlbach
... him with a shrug, and hugging her ankles] I should soon get tired of that. Besides, if it happened to you, I should be alone. I could not sit still then. And at last it ...
— Back to Methuselah • George Bernard Shaw
... I can tell you," said Kilsip, with a shrug of his shoulders. "It's down in the book as being bought for medicinal ...
— The Mystery of a Hansom Cab • Fergus Hume
... TERRY and for Mr. TERRY only, then there is nothing more to be said; Mr. PINERO's ideal is realised. But if the author did not intend Mr. TERRY's impersonation, then he must be content to sacrifice the ideal to the real, shrug his shoulders, and pocket his profits. Yet, as if making an appeal to the public to judge between the auctorial abstract and the representational concrete, Mr. PINERO not only publishes his playbook, but sells ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101, December 5, 1891 • Various
... shook hands at last, Down seat by seat the signal passed. To simple ways like ours unused, Half solemnized and half amused, With long-drawn breath and shrug, my guest His sense of glad relief expressed. Outside, the hills lay warm in sun; The cattle in the meadow-run Stood half-leg deep; a single bird The green repose above us stirred. "What part or lot have you," he said, "In these dull rites of drowsy-head? Is silence ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... careless shrug, the other turned and went back to the automobile, where he spoke in a low tone to ...
— The Eyes of the World • Harold Bell Wright
... shrug the thought away and smile at his own nervousness, when he heard that unmistakable sound of a foot pressing the floor. And then he remembered that he had left his gun belt far from the bed. In a burning moment that ...
— Black Jack • Max Brand
... and seeing how he trembled, Granger knew that he had not answered truly. With a shrug of his shoulders, twisting round on his heel, he had said sneeringly, "On the Last Chance River we don't run away from loneliness as though the hangman were behind us. If we did, we should ...
— Murder Point - A Tale of Keewatin • Coningsby Dawson
... not?' said Ancrum, with a shrug, 'if life's long enough'—and he absently lifted and let fall a book which lay on the table beside him; it was Newman's 'Dream of Gerontius'—'if life's long enough, and—happy enough! Well, so you've been learning French, I can hear. ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... would exchange the particular torture we writhe under, for any other which should visit a different part of the frame. They listened to the account the emigrants gave of their motives for leaving their native land, with a shrug almost of disdain—"Return," they said, "return to your island, whose sea breezes, and division from the continent gives some promise of health; if Pestilence among you has slain its hundreds, with us it has slain its thousands. Are you not even now more numerous than we are?—A year ago you would ...
— The Last Man • Mary Shelley
... heresy as a sharpener of hatred and an awakener of indefinable suspicion. Scepticism had been born into the world, almost more hateful than heresy, because it had the manners of good society and contented itself with a smile, a shrug, an almost imperceptible lift of the eyebrow,—a kind of reasoning especially exasperating to disputants of the old school, who still cared about victory, even when they did not about the principles ...
— Among My Books - First Series • James Russell Lowell
... spoiled your looks, for all Mrs More said," he added, as he touched with his long forefinger one of the little rings that clustered round Shenac's head. "Come, now, a'n't there something I've got that you want?" he asked as Shenac turned away with an impatient shrug. ...
— Shenac's Work at Home • Margaret Murray Robertson
... needed girls around for such a trifle as that!" returned Thorny, with a shrug, though he groaned inwardly at the prospect before him, as most of us do on such occasions. "I wouldn't take Bab at any price; she'd only get into some scrape and upset the whole plan. Betty is the chicken for me,—a real little ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, July 1878, No. 9 • Various
... ere he sleeps, his little flock must tell. From the fire-side with many a shrug he hies, Glad if the full-orb'd moon salute ...
— Apparitions; or, The Mystery of Ghosts, Hobgoblins, and Haunted Houses Developed • Joseph Taylor
... malt tune turn rusk romp salt flute churn stung long waltz plume hurt pluck song swan glue curl drunk strong wasp droop deck chill for sheath gloom neck drill corn shell loop next quill fork shorn hoof text skill form shout roof desk spill sort shrub proof nest frill torch shrug ...
— McGuffey's Eclectic Spelling Book • W. H. McGuffey
... past him, and he knows them not. Gold collars ought to be saluted, but he does not do it; he does not say to them: "God loke yow Lordes!" But then his air is so absent, so strange, that instead of quarrelling with him people shrug their shoulders, and say: He is "a fole"; he is mad.[638] Mad! the word recurs again and again under his pen, the idea presents itself incessantly to his mind, under every shape, as though he were possessed by it: "fole," "frantyk," ...
— A Literary History of the English People - From the Origins to the Renaissance • Jean Jules Jusserand
... people!' said the French staff officer, eyeing the brigadier shaking with laughter on his prancing charger. And he could only heave his shoulders up in an ear-embracing shrug of non-comprehension when the laughing brigadier tried to explain to him (as I explained to ...
— Between the Lines • Boyd Cable
... room leaning on Pauline's arm, nor, in passing, did she bestow a glance on her husband. Prince Michael indulged in an ostentatious shrug, and might have said something had not Alec's gaze dwelt on him steadily. It is to be presumed that, not for the first time, ...
— A Son of the Immortals • Louis Tracy
... The Carwitchet who—" Tom assented with a shrug. "We needn't go farther, as she's my guest. Just my luck. I met them at Buxton, thought them uncommonly good company—in fact, Carwitchet laid me under a great obligation about a horse I was nearly let in for buying—and gave them a general ...
— The Lock And Key Library - Classic Mystery And Detective Stories, Modern English • Various
... let the means excuse the end. She neither liked nor was accustomed to see her enterprises balked,—to see doors remain closed in her face. Doors indeed had a habit of flying open at her approach. Besides, the fellow's manner,—his initial stare and silence, his tone when he spoke, his shrug, his exhortation to patience, and something too in the conduct of his back as he departed,—hadn't it lacked I don't know what of becoming deference? to satisfy her amour-propre, at any rate, that the mistake, if there was a mistake, sprang from ...
— My Friend Prospero • Henry Harland
... ladder running up beside the iron pillar through an opening in the roof, and Dick, with a shrug of the shoulders, complied. He emerged upon a small platform, apparently protruding into vacancy. Far underneath he saw the clearing, and two airplanes on the tarmac, the aviators looking like beetles from that height. He looked out to sea and saw no signs ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, October, 1930 • Various
... other, with a melancholy smile and shrug of the shoulders. "There is no harm, really, but only in the eyes of the English. We are caught, and we cannot complain, for we have had true delight: and we have known, since the alarm came last night, that we might have to pay for ...
— It Happened in Egypt • C. N. Williamson & A. M. Williamson
... I like the impossible? But, yes, I am famished, indeed, for the good dinner of Marta, my housekeeper," he answered, with a shrug of his ...
— Jessica, the Heiress • Evelyn Raymond
... one spoke. Sigurd questioned with his eyes, and Rolf answered by a shrug. Once, as Helga offered to approach the Black One, Sigurd made a warning gesture. They waited in dead silence. While the voices of the other men came to them faintly, and the insects chirped about their feet, and the birds called ...
— The Thrall of Leif the Lucky • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz
... "Oh, that!" A shrug of his shoulders and a wry smile expressed his indifference to such a result. "Did he ...
— The Letter of the Contract • Basil King
... said Adolphus, with a shrug, "your father is an officer, and he cannot now leave his post. Are you going to take your mother ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. II., November, 1858., No. XIII. • Various
... said, with a contemptuous shrug of his shoulders. "Well, I am not surprised. I was making every effort possible, as soon as I heard through spies that you were alive, to ...
— Gil the Gunner - The Youngest Officer in the East • George Manville Fenn
... pale. He would content himself with a shrug of the shoulders—the shrug of the brute who knows that he is ...
— Fighting France • Stephane Lauzanne
... he answered, with a slight shrug of the shoulders, "but I fear she will excite too much remark by her wild antics. I do not like to ...
— Ernest Linwood - or, The Inner Life of the Author • Caroline Lee Hentz
... kilometers from Bordeaux, in the little vineyard of Monsieur Emile Lapierre—"landowner." In 1901 Lapierre was a happy and contented man, making a good living out of his modest farm. To-day he is—well, if you understand the language of the Gironde, he will tell you with a shrug of his broad shoulders that he might have been a Monte Cristo had not le bon Dieu willed it otherwise. For did he not almost have five hundred million dollars—two and a half milliards of francs—in his very hands? Hein? But he did! Does M'sieu' ...
— True Stories of Crime From the District Attorney's Office • Arthur Train
... Gray to accompany the General and herself, but that Mr. Gray had complained of indisposition, having suffered greatly from headache, on account of inhaling so much smoke at the warehouse fire; and, of course, Fanchon would not leave him. (Miss Carewe permitted herself the slightest shrug of the shoulders.) ...
— The Two Vanrevels • Booth Tarkington
... shoulders and made play with his clawlike hands, as if he understood me not. It was a lie, for I knew that he and the English tongue were sufficiently acquainted. I told him as much, and he shot at me a most venomous glance, but continued to shrug, gesticulate, and jabber in Italian. At last I saw nothing better to do than to take him, still by the collar, to the edge of the garden next the churchyard, and with the toe of my boot to send him tumbling among the graves. I watched him pick himself up, set his attire to rights, and go away ...
— To Have and To Hold • Mary Johnston
... and a shrug was Sato's answer. "It's well all are not so keen," he said, with a frank acknowledgment that he ...
— The War Terror • Arthur B. Reeve
... lie!" cried Ambrose scornfully. An expectant look in Watusk's eye arrested him from saying more. "He's trying to find out how much Nesis told me," he thought. Aloud he said, with a shrug like Watusk himself: "Well, I'll be glad ...
— The Fur Bringers - A Story of the Canadian Northwest • Hulbert Footner
... down the paper with a shrug. The article did not commend itself to him, save as the means of making a precis of the case. The theory of the bell appeared excessively weak, and he could not understand a man being so foolish as ...
— The Secret Passage • Fergus Hume
... of the place every evening. And while you are listening to the music you can enjoy such food as is to be found nowhere else in San Francisco, for it is distinctly Heidelbergian. We asked for the recipe that they considered the very best in the restaurant, and Hirsch, with a shrug of his shoulders, said: "Oh, we have so many fine dishes." We finally got him to select the one prized above all others and this is what Chef ...
— Bohemian San Francisco - Its restaurants and their most famous recipes—The elegant art of dining. • Clarence E. Edwords
... a genial shrug, "so much cheaper for me. But do not talk on the beach, dere's good boy, or you make ...
— A Master of Fortune • Cutcliffe Hyne
... glance that traveled to her left hand in search of the telltale solitaire. Even though his search was not rewarded, he felt certain that the hand concealed in the folds of her dress wore the fatal ring. Of course, mused he, with a shrug, he might have guessed it. No such beauty as this was wandering unclaimed about the world. Well, her fiance, whoever he might be, was a lucky devil! Without doubt, confound his impudence, his arm had traveled the pathway of that band of leather ...
— Flood Tide • Sara Ware Bassett
... jeweller, from the look of it), the seal of which was engraved with the three letters: U. S. S. On such occasions, anyone observing him closely could have remarked that he carried his head higher than usual, and whenever he was asked what these initial letters signified, he would simply shrug his shoulders and say that he had got the ring from a comrade in his student days, and really did not know what the ...
— The Day of Wrath • Maurus Jokai
... "Oh," with a shrug. "I don't know that he was calling on me. He did not ask for me when he came. And you and Daddy were here all the time. Besides, merely because I am engaged isn't any reason why I should retire from the world altogether, is it? ...
— Cap'n Dan's Daughter • Joseph C. Lincoln
... more of him than any other man we know," Kitty said, with a shrug. "Andy Buckton, with his Presbyterian bringing-up, may be an exception, but he is about the only one in our crowd. They are all bad, I tell you, and a woman may as well make up her mind to it and hope marriage will cure ...
— The Desired Woman • Will N. Harben
... into the chair. His eyes were very tired. "A dream, nothing more. A fantasy. It took me fifteen years to learn what a dream it was. Not even a suspicion at first—only a vague puzzlement, things happening that I couldn't quite grasp. Easy to shrug off, until it got too obvious. Not a matter of wrong decisions, really. The decisions were right, but they were in the wrong places. Something about Starship Project shifting, changing somehow. Something being lost. Slowly. ...
— Martyr • Alan Edward Nourse
... wore a puzzled, almost a harried, expression. Claire moved away. Her mother gave a shrug and renewed her efforts to drag further finery from the mysterious depths of the treasure-box. Her daughter cast a last incurious glance back. The glow on Mrs. Robson's face, which Claire had mistaken for youth, seemed now a thing hectic and unpleasant, ...
— The Blood Red Dawn • Charles Caldwell Dobie
... There was a smile on every face when one of the detectives looked in. He glanced to the other side of the carriage and saw a dark-haired young man in an ulster, and a pretty girl taking leave of her lover. Erica's face entirely hid Herr Haeberlien's from view and the man passed on with a shrug and a smile. She had contrived to readjust his wig, and with many last words, managed to spin out the remaining time, till at last the welcome signal of ...
— We Two • Edna Lyall
... nothing but stare vacantly, but presently a look of intelligence flashed into his eyes. Then he gave a shrug, as if he was disgusted with himself, which was followed by an ...
— Weapons of Mystery • Joseph Hocking
... the woman who posed for him. By a slight movement of her eyes, without turning her head, she could look him fairly in the face. Presently as he continued to gaze at her so intently, she laughed; and, with a little shrug of her shoulders and a pretense as of being cold, said, "When you look at me that way, I feel as though you had ...
— The Eyes of the World • Harold Bell Wright
... would have liked to go with them—it was, besides, her duty. But she had not been asked to fulfil it. She hesitated a moment, and in that moment Jacqueline had disappeared. After consideration, the 'promeneuse' went on with her crochet, with a shrug of her shoulders which meant: "She ...
— Jacqueline, Complete • (Mme. Blanc) Th. Bentzon
... what that shrug meant. He searched his mind for a plan and found none. Better die fighting than yield, or risk the vengeance of Friedrich von Stein. If he could get the doctor away from the desk where he controlled the blue-white flame there might be a chance to do something. Von Stein was by far ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, November, 1930 • Various
... the persons to whom they belong; I lay them down. I know how to arrange a room; I make the beds; I colour the inlaid floors of the apartments; I watch a sick person through the night and day (a shrug) for so much a day (a shrug), and for the night also (a shrug); I agree as to the price with those persons who employ me, for five francs the night, eight francs for the twenty-four hours, when they do not feed me; besides, I watch the ...
— Chambers' Edinburgh Journal, No. 421, New Series, Jan. 24, 1852 • Various
... There was no appeal from her tone, and with a slight shrug he recovered his composure, took her hand, which he kissed with a practised air, and calling out from the threshold: "I say, Newland, if you can persuade the Countess to stop in town of course you're included in the supper," left the room ...
— The Age of Innocence • Edith Wharton
... Jose, with a shrug of the shoulders, "is just what is bothering me. However, we shall soon discover. Our men have had time to hide themselves, and the guide is getting fidgety. But I say, Jack, I ...
— At the Point of the Sword • Herbert Hayens
... With a shrug, and a stealthy glance round him, Captain Lake started up. The instinct of the lonely and gloomy man unconsciously drew him towards the light, and he approached. A bat, attracted thither like himself, was flitting ...
— Wylder's Hand • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... she answered, with a pretty little shrug. "But it's a long way, don't you think? A hundred ...
— The Girl in the Golden Atom • Raymond King Cummings |
