"Spiteful" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... and to eat at Jezebel's table, while all the rest of the people were perishing. What could be before the country, and him, too, but utter starvation, and hopeless ruin? And all this while his life was in the hands of a weak and capricious tyrant, who might murder him any moment, and of a wicked and spiteful queen, who certainly would murder him, if she found out that he had helped and saved the prophets of the Lord. Who so miserable as he? But on that day, Obadiah found that his alms and prayers had gone up before God, ...
— Town and Country Sermons • Charles Kingsley
... without any seemingly adequate reason; shopkeepers became flippant, disobliging, and careless of custom; cabmen shouted derisive or denunciatory language after their rapidly retreating fares; in short, everybody was in a discontented, almost spiteful humour, with the exception of those few aggressively cheerful persons who are in the habit of always making the best of everything, even bad weather. Down the long wide vista of the Cromwell Road, Kensington, the fog had it all its own way; it swept on ...
— Stories By English Authors: London • Various
... a short time after that that Tudor tried the same trick on him, the bullets pattering about him like spiteful rain, thudding into the palm trunks, or glancing off in whining ricochets. The last bullet of all, making a double ricochet from two different trees and losing most of its momentum, struck Sheldon a sharp blow on the forehead and ...
— Adventure • Jack London
... account themselves fortunate to be forgiven for Christ's sake. Faugh! it is all so unreal and so stupid. This kind of God is no God at all. The theologian may call Him infinite, but in practice He is finite. He may call Him a God of love, but in practice He is spiteful and silly. I shall have something to say presently about the twin problems of pain and evil; but what so-called orthodoxy has to say is not only no solution of them, it is demonstrably false to ...
— The New Theology • R. J. Campbell
... The spiteful tart looked in at all the windows. Built upon a height, it commanded the town. The mere sight of it made everybody ill, and its former admirers had nothing but curses for it now. Unhappily, nothing they could say or do made it any smaller; still formidable, it was ...
— Good Cheer Stories Every Child Should Know • Various
... shows a slavish spirit. Not so. St. Peter did not wish to encourage a slavish spirit in Jews and Christians. He told them that they were free: but that they were not to use that belief as a cloak of maliciousness—of spiteful, bitter, and turbulent conduct. And as a fact, those who have done most for true freedom, in all ages, have not been the violent, noisy, bitter, rebellious spirits, who have cried, 'We are the masters, ...
— Discipline and Other Sermons • Charles Kingsley
... Arabin should have in any way mentioned her name in connexion with that of Mr. Slope was overpowering; and the spiteful ill-nature of the archdeacon in repeating the charge to her made her wish to leave his house almost before the day had broken. One thing was certain: nothing should make her stay there beyond the following morning, and nothing should make ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... of the living force cast into the slough of satire. No doubt, either indignant or loving rebuke has its end and does its work, but I fear that wit, while rousing the admiration of the spiteful or the like witty, comes in only to destroy its dignity. At the same time, I am not sure whether there might not be such a judicious combination of the elements as ...
— England's Antiphon • George MacDonald
... the use of the word in this case. Poor child, the care that I have taken of her has, as may be imagined, made her an object of jealousy, but the general opinion entertained as to my character has prevented any spiteful gossip. If no one understands the apparent caprice that has led me to make an allowance to La Fosseuse, so that she can live without being compelled to work, nobody has any doubts as to her character. I have watched over her with friendly care, and every one knows that I should never hesitate to ...
— The Country Doctor • Honore de Balzac
... Millar were cousins, and had once been the closest of friends, but that was years ago, before some spiteful reports and ill-natured gossip had come between them, making only a little rift at first that soon widened into a chasm of coldness and alienation. Therefore this invitation surprised ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to 1901 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... be a bad idea," agreed Mrs. Bellmore; "but you know how arbitrary and inconsiderate ghosts can be. Maybe, like love, they are 'engendered in the eye.' One advantage of those who see ghosts is that their stories can't be disproved. By a spiteful eye, a Revolutionary knapsack might easily be construed to be a hod. Dear Mrs. Kinsolving, think no more of it. I am sure it ...
— Sixes and Sevens • O. Henry
... revealed the fact, that the boy had heedlessly spread his blanket over the entrance to the home of a colony of large black ants, and the little fellows, angry at his presumption, had attacked him, in the most spiteful manner, through the rents in his trousers. Patsey, awakened out of a sound sleep by their stings, and remembering Ned's adventure in the Organos mountains, had fancied himself the unfortunate victim of a like ...
— The Young Trail Hunters • Samuel Woodworth Cozzens
... out, to be free of him and his fate. No one can really be happy with such poison in the veins, and there can't possibly be deep-down, soul-satisfying enjoyment from revelling in another's misfortunes. Underneath my fury, when Milly said little veiled, spiteful things about Captain March, was pity for her, the kind of pity you have for an irritable ...
— Secret History Revealed By Lady Peggy O'Malley • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... the time much distressed on this score. As soon therefore as she caught this question, she gnashed her teeth with rage, and shouted: "You good-for-nothing spiteful fellow! It's all you who are at the bottom of this trouble; and do you still have the face to come ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... these times did not see so much of Vivie as before. Her warrior husband spent a good deal of 1912 at home as he had a Hounslow command. He had come to realize—some spiteful person had told him—who Vivie's mother had been, and told Honoria in accents of finality that the "Aunt Vivie" nonsense must be dropped and Vivie must not come to the house. At the most, if she must meet her friend ...
— Mrs. Warren's Daughter - A Story of the Woman's Movement • Sir Harry Johnston
... leaving her house and deserting her husband on her own account, and without consulting her parents. If my darling girl had come to see her kind and admirable mother, she would not have given me this cruel pain I feel!—You do not know the world; it is malignantly spiteful. People will perhaps say that your husband sent you back to your parents. Children brought up as you were, on your mother's lap, remain artless; maidenly passion like yours for Wenceslas, unfortunately, makes ...
— Poor Relations • Honore de Balzac
... will overleap barriers before which its grandmother of ninety-three stopped, out of breath. They are also much more vexed by the disrespect of the young people who have gone by them, than they are by the spiteful yelping of the old whom they have left behind; this is only natural, for these young folks make them feel their age, and then it is their turn ...
— Clerambault - The Story Of An Independent Spirit During The War • Rolland, Romain
... Luc; "I have more fear of the king present than absent, for I fear he comes to play me some spiteful tricks." ...
— Chicot the Jester - [An abridged translation of "La dame de Monsoreau"] • Alexandre Dumas
... sartinly. But I'll never read like thee," he added, despairingly. "Drattle th' old witch; why didn't she give I some schooling?" He spoke with spiteful emphasis, and Abel, too well used to his rough language to notice the uncivil reference to his mother, said with some ...
— Jan of the Windmill • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... across the room buried itself in the opposite wall. Then there were several shots fired at the door. One man found a little hole in the chinking, between two of the logs, and putting his revolver through, fired again and again, sending spits of hot flame and sharp spiteful reverberations through ...
— Bricks Without Straw • Albion W. Tourgee
... other, for there were many things which had occurred between him and Nellie about which he was by no means anxious Ailleen, least of any one, should know. But Nellie had a temper, and was somewhat prone to spiteful retaliations, and, without counting the cost to herself, might say enough to make the immediate future rather unsettled, if not actually painful, ...
— Colonial Born - A tale of the Queensland bush • G. Firth Scott
... matters, and at a distance from the seat of active operations, yet he must needs take upon himself the full control of all the troops of the province, without seeming to trouble his mind as to what might be the wishes and opinions of him who was in fact their true leader. Whether from a spiteful desire to perplex the object of his dislike, or natural fickleness of character, every letter from him brought with it some new plan. To-day, he ordered this; to-morrow, he ordered that; and, the next day, upset the other two by something quite different from ...
— The Farmer Boy, and How He Became Commander-In-Chief • Morrison Heady
... peering eyes, of the prelate, suit admirably with his disposition. They mark him out as a lower kind of Saint Dominic, differing from the fierce and gloomy enthusiast who founded the Inquisition, as we might imagine the familiar imp of a spiteful witch to differ from an archangel of darkness. When we read His Grace's judgments, when we read the report which he drew up, setting forth that he had sent some separatists to prison, and imploring the royal ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... of the new term the weather was doubtful, and seemed to take a spiteful pleasure in being particularly wet on hockey afternoons. Day after day, disappointed girls would watch the streaming rain and lament the lack of practice. To give them some form of exercise they were assembled in the gymnasium, and held rival displays of Indian clubs, Morris dancing, or even skipping. ...
— A Popular Schoolgirl • Angela Brazil
... concealed themselves among some rocks, I barricaded them in, and went on with my hunting. On arriving in camp I sent men back to try and catch the cubs; in this they succeeded, and brought them to me. They were about the size of half grown cats, and more spiteful vicious little devils cannot be imagined; they were, however, very handsome, with immense heads and paws. For two or three days they refused all food; but at the end of that time they fed quite ravenously from the hand. They soon became very ...
— Natural History of the Mammalia of India and Ceylon • Robert A. Sterndale
... passage of the Dunciad meant to be poetic and not ironic and spiteful, he has "the panting gales" of a garden he describes. Match me such an absurdity among the "conceits" of the ...
— Hearts of Controversy • Alice Meynell
... see that God was around them, about their path and about their bed, and spying out all their ways; and in the light of His presence, they dare not be frivolous, dare not be ignorant, dare not be mean, dare not be spiteful, dare ...
— The Water of Life and Other Sermons • Charles Kingsley
... long white Dominican tunic and scapulary, kneeling with bowed head before a crucifix. It might have been any ordinary Fra Girolamo, who had nothing worse to confess than thinking of wrong things when he was singing in coro, or feeling a spiteful joy when Fra Benedetto dropped the ink over his own miniatures in the breviary he was illuminating—who had no higher thought than that of climbing safely into Paradise up the narrow ladder of prayer, fasting, ...
— Romola • George Eliot
... of uneasiness as she went back to her seat. Absalom's father was very influential and, as all the township knew, very spiteful. He could send Miss Margaret away, and he would do it, if she offended his only child, Absalom. Tillie thought she could not bear it at all if Miss Margaret were sent away. Poor Miss Margaret did not seem to realize her own danger. Tillie felt tempted to warn her. It was only ...
— Tillie: A Mennonite Maid - A Story of the Pennsylvania Dutch • Helen Reimensnyder Martin
... comforted; the sick to be fed and doctored; the poor to be helped; the idle to be rebuked with a persuasive smile; the angry to be coaxed by a humorous word; the evil to be reproved by a fearless friendliness; the spiteful to be hushed by a still, commanding presence. She never seemed to remember that she was the daughter of old Joe Lajeunesse the blacksmith, yet she never seemed to forget it. She was the wife of the Seigneur, and she was the daughter of the smithy-man too. She sat in the smithy-man's doorway with ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... The Childe, like the Mariner, advances through an atmosphere and scenery of steadily gathering menace; the "starved ignoble" Nature, "peevish and dejected" among her scrub of thistle and dock, grows malignant; to the barren waste succeed the spiteful little river with its drenched despairing willows, the blood-trampled mire and wrecked torture-engine, the poisonous herbage and palsied oak, and finally the mountains, ignoble as the plain—"mere ugly heights and heaps," ranged ...
— Robert Browning • C. H. Herford
... "That's spiteful in you, doctor, to speak in that way. What would you say if you were called on to endure all that I have gone through ...
— Framley Parsonage • Anthony Trollope
... from the castle were very terrible to her, for the other women of the household, quick to perceive that she no longer repelled him, had lost that awe that had hitherto kept them at a distance from her, and treated her with a familiarity, sometimes coarse, sometimes spiteful, always hateful and degrading. Even old Ursel had become half- pitying, half-patronizing; and the old Baroness, though not molesting her, took not the slightest notice ...
— The Dove in the Eagle's Nest • Charlotte M. Yonge
... She might have guessed it. A "Conchy," as they would call him in the Press: all the spiteful screamers who had never risked a scratch, themselves, denouncing him as a coward. The local Dogberrys of the tribunals would fire off their little stock of gibes and platitudes upon him, propound with ...
— All Roads Lead to Calvary • Jerome K. Jerome
... Mount Vernon he lent General Charles Lee—of Monmouth fame—L15, and "to Ditto lent him on the Road from Phila to Cambridge at different times" L9.12 more, a total of L24.12. In later years Lee intrigued against Washington and said many spiteful things about him, but he never returned the loan. The account stood until 1786, when it was settled by ...
— George Washington: Farmer • Paul Leland Haworth
... after the battle. I need not say that it is as impudent a forgery as Fingal. The author of the Memoirs of Dundee says that Lord Leven was scared by the sight of the highland weapons, and set the example of flight. This is a spiteful falsehood. That Leven behaved remarkably well is proved by Mackay's Letters, ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 3 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... was the time of the year when the flies and manifold sort of vermin, flying, crawling, hopping, hungry, and ever biting, were in the full rampancy of their young vigor. It was not only spiteful enemies in human form, that sent crashing shells and piercing bullets, but every kind of nipping, boring, sucking, and stinging creatures in the air and on the earth, that our brave soldiers, and especially our wounded, had to face. Even to the swallowing of a mouthful of coffee, or ...
— Charles Carleton Coffin - War Correspondent, Traveller, Author, and Statesman • William Elliot Griffis
... "'I say! How spiteful you are! Do you believe a poor little woman of the people such as I am—nothing at all—could have for three years kept on my hands the Comte de L——, Minister, a great personage, a man of fashion, wealthy and seductive, if she had not taken a little ...
— The works of Guy de Maupassant, Vol. 5 (of 8) - Une Vie and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant 1850-1893
... George, uneasily, "Confound Lady-day, and every day of the sort—there, don't you be so spiteful, old man—why if he isn't all of a tremble. Poor old man." He went to his ...
— It Is Never Too Late to Mend • Charles Reade
... on the face of the earth; if ever there was a devil in a human bein', there's one in that misshapen but sugary little vagabone. His father was bad enough when he was alive, and worse than he ought to be, may God forgive him now, but this spiteful skinflint, that's a curse to the poor of the country, as he is their hatred, what could tempt you to ax him to stand for any ...
— Phelim O'toole's Courtship and Other Stories • William Carleton
... cat and dog, so is the hostility which divides the residents of these two towns. So the conversation became at once spirited, and eventually spiteful. ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 32, June, 1860 • Various
... Sigismund Borlsover, a sinister eighteenth-century ancestor, who, according to legend, built and worshipped in the ugly pagan temple that overlooked the lake. At another time Saunders believed the spirit to belong to a man whom Eustace had once employed as a laboratory assistant, "a black-haired spiteful little brute," he said, "who died cursing his doctor because the fellow couldn't help him to live to settle some paltry ...
— Masterpieces of Mystery, Vol. 1 (of 4) - Ghost Stories • Various
... bodies of troops, smoke-fringed. In the lane was a blood-stained crowd streaming to the rear. The wounded men were cursing, groaning, and wailing. In the air, always, was a mighty swell of sound that it seemed could sway the earth. With the courageous words of the artillery and the spiteful sentences of the musketry mingled red cheers. And from this region of noises came the steady ...
— The Red Badge of Courage - An Episode of the American Civil War • Stephen Crane
... to abuse the gods. Their station is a sanctuary from all irreverence and reproach; they are seated on high, that we may only look up to them with respect; their defects are not to be seen, or not to be touched by malicious or wanton wits, by spiteful or scornful tongues: the diminution of their credit is a public mischief, and the State itself doth suffer in their becoming objects of scorn; not only themselves are vilified and degraded, but the great affairs they manage ...
— Sermons on Evil-Speaking • Isaac Barrow
... radiant thought. At truth let not the wicked scorner mock, O Thou, that breath'dst in me a spark divine. The lying tongue's deceit with silence blight, Protect me from its venom, Thou, my Rock, And show the spiteful sland'rer by this sign That Thou dost shield me ...
— Jewish Literature and Other Essays • Gustav Karpeles
... window to bury itself with a spiteful thud in the wall above the hearth. Both men and the woman came to their feet with astonished ...
— The Roof Tree • Charles Neville Buck
... "For shame, you spiteful Pequod! to rivet your treacherous appeal with so sharply pointed an illustration! Scissors, indeed! I will be revenged by cutting all your work after a biased fashion. How would it suit you, reverend sir, to take the rivet out of my tongue, ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... room in St. James's Street, over a very late breakfast, with his two friends, Captain Fooks and Lieutenant Cox, when a little annoyance of a similar kind fell upon him;—a worse annoyance, indeed, than that which had come from Mr. Horsball, for Mr. Horsball had not been spiteful enough to call upon him. There came a knock at his door, and young Mr. Moggs was ushered into the room. Now Mr. Moggs was the son of Booby and Moggs, the well-known bootmakers of Old Bond Street; and the boots they had made for Ralph Newton had been infinite in number, ...
— Ralph the Heir • Anthony Trollope
... under a penalty of 100 Pounds, unless you are a servant." These unsympathetic Natives made no effort to defend the Act itself, but attempted to bluff the meeting with the supposed danger of "reprisals by spiteful Boers, who, they said, will be more vindictive if Natives dared to appeal to the King, over the heads of the Boer Government." But the meeting would not be bluffed. One speaker especially remarked that the Act embodied ...
— Native Life in South Africa, Before and Since • Solomon Tshekisho Plaatje
... water the satisfaction of accounting himself still de jure, and though he lived till 1735, he never failed each half-year to enter his salary and fees as sub-librarian as being still unpaid. He was perhaps a little spiteful and vindictive, but none the less a fine old fellow. I will write down as specimens of his humour a prayer of his and an apology, and then leave him alone. ...
— In the Name of the Bodleian and Other Essays • Augustine Birrell
... situation, or with whom he could take credit for his coolness: and the curb of silence, while it exasperated his temper, augmented a hundredfold the contempt in which he held the unconscious companions among whom chance and his mission had thrown him. A spiteful desire to show that contempt sparkled in his eyes as he took his seat at the table this evening; but for a minute or two after he had begun his ...
— The Long Night • Stanley Weyman
... Harry, there's that spiteful devil still alongside, and with a most onchristian longing to make a breakfast off of your old shipmate, I'll go bail! Couldn't we contrive somehow to put a stopper ...
— For Treasure Bound • Harry Collingwood
... The spiteful Light will lead me to no happiness. To morrow is Antonio's, and perhaps Guides him to my undoing;— oh that I could meet This Rival, ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. I (of 6) • Aphra Behn
... You mustn't touch a prince, miss!" cried the nurse in a tone of the last horror, gripping Pollyooly's wrist tightly. "Besides, he'd hurt you. He's a very nasty, spiteful little boy." ...
— Happy Pollyooly - The Rich Little Poor Girl • Edgar Jepson
... bestowed on them by a spiteful fairy makes the matter worse: they are incredibly prolific. All they write is poor, and the spiteful fairy, spiteful to us, has granted them the faculty to write thus, without any trouble, for ever. Up to this day Lydgate's works have baffled the attempts of the most ...
— A Literary History of the English People - From the Origins to the Renaissance • Jean Jules Jusserand
... conciliatory language, recommended as "the humble opinion of the electors and estates that the Imperial Roman Majesty would submit this great and important matter to a number of highly learned, sensible, honest, conciliating, and not spiteful persons, to deliberate on, and to consider, the writing [the Augustana], as far as necessary, enumerating, on the one hand, whatsoever therein was found to be in conformity and harmony with the Gospel, God's Word, and the holy Christian Church, but, on the other hand, refuting with the true foundation ...
— Historical Introductions to the Symbolical Books of the Evangelical Lutheran Church • Friedrich Bente
... "Well, sir, suttunly I think I must have shut one eye; but how the dinghy got loose is more than I can say, unless them spiteful niggers cut us adrift. But you get aboard. We ...
— Middy and Ensign • G. Manville Fenn
... "O spiteful voice, must you spoil even such appetite as I have for this fork-tongued spotty food? You by day and Rima by night—what shall ...
— Green Mansions - A Romance of the Tropical Forest • W. H. Hudson
... long breath, glad it was over. He really had little reason to quarrel about the globe, bent or unbent; he never used it. It sat in his study year in and year out, its dusty twinkle brightened at long intervals by old Rose's spiteful rag. ...
— Birthright - A Novel • T.S. Stribling
... face of the valley, but all the central portion remained veiled from view. Suddenly, as I watched, the brown cloud beneath me was rent asunder here and there by little spits of fire, and it was curious to observe how those quick, spiteful darts of flame swept the full length of my vista. I could distinguish no reports,—it was too far away,—but realized that the opposing pickets had caught sight of each other through the gloom. Then a big gun boomed almost directly opposite me, its flame seeming like a red-hot ...
— My Lady of the North • Randall Parrish
... had been binding fagots. As they scampered along, some one seized upon them from behind and nipped their ears sharply. "Fie, ugly Captain Jack!" cried they; "so thou art at work again! one may easily see that!" and they would have pursued their spiteful enemy; but he was already gone, and they were now ...
— Funny Big Socks - Being the Fifth Book of the Series • Sarah L. Barrow
... will. I 'll fetch this friend, and give him to your mercy; Nay, he shall die, if you will take him from me; For your repose, I'll quit my heart's best jewel; But would not have him torn away by villains, And spiteful villainy. ...
— Venice Preserved - A Tragedy in Five Acts • Thomas Otway
... the altar are the drums, hollow trunks, whose upper end is carved to represent a human face with wide, grinning mouth, and deep, round and hollow eyes. Rammed in aslant, leaning in all directions, they stand like clumsy, malicious demons, spiteful and brutal, as if holding their bellies with rude, immoderate laughter at their own hugeness and the puniness of mankind, at his miserable humanity, compared to the solemn repose of the great tree. In front of these are figures cut roughly out of logs, short-legged, with ...
— Two Years with the Natives in the Western Pacific • Felix Speiser
... so like a spiteful, green-eyed cat, that I seemed to hear the words hissed out; and as the man whose ear approached her lips was one of the famous gossips of London, I could imagine, too, how the story would spread and grow. Milly would certainly tell Prince and Princess Sanzanow, also, ...
— Secret History Revealed By Lady Peggy O'Malley • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... have these lovers thee aguilt?* *offended, sinned against Dispiteous* Day, thine be the pains of hell! *cruel, spiteful For many a lover hast thou slain, and wilt; Thy peering in will nowhere let them dwell: What! proff'rest thou thy light here for to sell? Go sell it them that smalle seales grave!* *cut devices on We will thee not, us needs ...
— The Canterbury Tales and Other Poems • Geoffrey Chaucer
... are cultivating the manly virtues, too," said Lady Anne. "Let me see: there are twenty young ladies in your class, and not a spiteful one among them. I have never heard ...
— Mary Gray • Katharine Tynan
... their lives as woven on the loom of spiteful fates, whom they endeavored to humor by calling euphonious names. The materialist supposes that his life is the creature of circumstances, a rudderless ship in a current, mere flotsam and jetsam on the wave. The Christian knows that the path of his life ...
— Love to the Uttermost - Expositions of John XIII.-XXI. • F. B. Meyer
... brain ran strange thoughts. I recollected his words in Stretton Street regarding his spiteful wife when I had been called in to listen to his matrimonial troubles. But husband and wife now appeared to be on quite amicable ...
— The Stretton Street Affair • William Le Queux
... assume in that premise. I don't in mine. It is notorious that women love babies, while you have only the spiteful saying of a very uncertain ...
— The Iron Game - A Tale of the War • Henry Francis Keenan
... plays, my young friend," said Carl, with a hauteur new but not exceedingly impressive to Plain Smith. "He takes up all these new stunts, all this new philosophy and stuff they have in London and Paris. There's something besides Shakespeare and the Bible!" he added, intending to be spiteful. It may be stated that he did ...
— The Trail of the Hawk - A Comedy of the Seriousness of Life • Sinclair Lewis
... morning had trembled at his frown, and had very properly deemed themselves unworthy to braid his tail, now swept by him with swaggering insolence, as if to compensate in their new-found freedom for the years of social enslavement they had been subjected to. Leers and shrugs and spiteful whispers circulated extensively. But the enraptured Mien-yaun, blind to everything except his own overwhelming happiness, saw and heard ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, No. 20, June, 1859 • Various
... case with a spiteful snap. "Don't fool yourself that it's devotion to the common weal that drives you ahead! Don't make a pretty picture of yourself as working to the last in heroic service of your fellow-man! You know, as I know, that if you dropped out this minute, American jurisprudence ...
— The Squirrel-Cage • Dorothy Canfield
... charge, I knew that as a matter of fact the disagreeable duty was invariably assigned to the attendants. Consequently Jekyll-Hyde's eagerness to assume an obligation he usually shirked gave me the feeling that his motives were spiteful. For that reason I preferred to entrust myself to the uncertain mercies of a regular attendant; and I said so, but in vain. "If you will keep your mouth shut, I'll be able to do this job quicker," ...
— A Mind That Found Itself - An Autobiography • Clifford Whittingham Beers
... the course, notwithstanding the extra trouble she incurred, and this, also, she laid up against Harry. Her husband was opposed to any change, not being so spiteful as his wife, but allowed her ...
— The Tin Box - and What it Contained • Horatio Alger
... their own affairs, in the midst of all this, as best they may. They are wonderfully like human creatures,—forget all that is going on if they don't see it, however dreadful; and never think what is to happen to-morrow. They are spiteful or loving, and indolent or painstaking, and orderly or licentious, with no thought whatever of the lava or the flood which may break over them any day; and evaporate them into air-bubbles, or wash them into a solution of salts. ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin
... of Heart o' Dreams territory the Governor, Archie and Leary got in readiness for their dash across the bridge and over the barricade. The purl of water eager for its entrance into the bay struck upon Archie's ear with a spiteful insistence. ...
— Blacksheep! Blacksheep! • Meredith Nicholson
... dreaded publicity, would implore in a whisper; but who that has not had them can know the torture of chilblains inside thick boots, where they cannot be got at? As soon as the chilblains went, the Saturday concerts left off, and it seemed as though Fate had nothing better to do than to be spiteful. ...
— The Benefactress • Elizabeth Beauchamp
... "and I watched your face while Enva spoke. How did you like her doctrine? Of course you may do as you please—if you can please. You may silence discontent, you may suppress spiteful innuendos and even sulky looks, you may put down mutiny, by sheer terror. Can you? You may command me to go with you whenever you go out; you may take the same means to make me complain of unkindness as to ...
— Across the Zodiac • Percy Greg
... had sufficient provocation to rail at the public, as Ben Jonson did at the audience in the Prologues to his plays, I think I should do it in good set terms, nearly as follows:—There is not a more mean, stupid, dastardly, pitiful, selfish, spiteful, envious, ungrateful animal than the Public. It is the greatest of cowards, for it is afraid of itself. From its unwieldy, overgrown dimensions, it dreads the least opposition to it, and shakes like isinglass at the touch of ...
— Table-Talk - Essays on Men and Manners • William Hazlitt
... failings, Kenneth. You haven't always the courage of your convictions. What you are thinking is that I am a spiteful little cat. Why don't you say it out ...
— The Price • Francis Lynde
... rumour,' replied Marcian, 'springing from vulgar gossip, and from the spiteful anger of the lady sister of Maximus, who hoped to inherit what has fallen to her niece. Let your valorous magnificence be assured that there is no truth in it. Can you imagine that I, whose mission is known to you, should have looked on at such an audacity? I think your perspicuity ...
— Veranilda • George Gissing
... spiteful old Nettle-aunt frown'd on their love; But Daffy, who laugh'd at her power, A Shepherd's-purse slipp'd in the nurse's Fox-glove, Then up Jacob's-ladder he crept to his love, And stole to the ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... a spiteful repartee, I must confess, but was provoked by many ill-natured remarks previously made by this renegade, and had the good effect of ...
— Memories - A Record of Personal Experience and Adventure During Four Years of War • Fannie A. (Mrs.) Beers
... Their spiteful exasperation with the loiterers mounts higher and higher. Tirloir the Grumbler takes the lead and expands. This is where he comes in. With his little pointed gesticulations he goads and spurs the anger ...
— Under Fire - The Story of a Squad • Henri Barbusse
... there are many who will contend that I have some selfish or spiteful motive in writing thus strongly in condemnation of the waltz. Many will doubtless claim that the waltz is very moral and healthful, is indulged in by the best people of every land, seemingly tolerated by all, and that he who raises his voice ...
— From the Ball-Room to Hell • T. A. Faulkner
... hain't habitually suited to one another," said Will. "Whatever one of 'em is fur the tother's ag'in'. Looks like they go to bed spiteful and wake up acr'monious. 'Tain't like as if Jed was the breed of feller that beats his wife, or that Marthy was the kind that looks out of the corner of her eye at ...
— Scattergood Baines • Clarence Budington Kelland
... to the contemplation of their own virtues. But there are many fair-minded men of both political parties, or of neither, who, while acquitting those Liberal members who supported Home Rule in 1886 and opposed Coercion in 1887 of the sordid or spiteful motives with which the virulence of journalism credits them, have nevertheless been surprised at the apparent swiftness and completeness of the change in their opinions. It would be idle to deny that, in startling the minds of steady-going people, ...
— Handbook of Home Rule (1887) • W. E. Gladstone et al.
... adolescence, of course, had obtained its affections: a reward I should have greatly valued, and looked upon as far outweighing all the trouble I had had with it, had not poor Snap's grateful feelings exposed him to many a harsh word and many a spiteful kick and pinch from his owner, and were he not now in danger of being 'put away' in consequence, or transferred to some rough, stony- hearted master. But how could I help it? I could not make the dog hate me by cruel treatment, and she would not ...
— Agnes Grey • Anne Bronte
... electricity are the latest wonders of 1883; but just three-and-forty years back, one of our townsmen, Mr. Henry Shaw, had invented an "electro-galvanic railway carriage and tender," which formed one of the attractions of this Exhibition. It went very well until injured by (it is supposed) some spiteful nincompoop who, not having the brain to invent anything himself, tried to prevent others doing so. The next Exhibition, or, to be more strictly correct, "Exposition of Art and Manufactures," was held in the old ...
— Showell's Dictionary of Birmingham - A History And Guide Arranged Alphabetically • Thomas T. Harman and Walter Showell
... disagreeable buzzing, as if a great many huge flies, or gigantic mosquitoes, or those insects which we call dor bugs, and pinching dogs, were darting about. And, as her eyes grew more accustomed to the imperfect light, she saw a crowd of ugly little shapes, with bats' wings, looking abominably spiteful, and armed with terribly long stings in their tails. It was one of these that had stung Epimetheus. Nor was it a great while before Pandora herself began to scream, in no less pain and affright than her playfellow, and making ...
— Myths That Every Child Should Know - A Selection Of The Classic Myths Of All Times For Young People • Various
... I thought then. You were not innocent, but guilty. You were just a plain, ordinary sneak, Madalena, because you were jealous and spiteful." ...
— The Second Latchkey • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson
... in such a position invariably look as if he were on the stool of repentance, expiating some misdeed of unutterable shame? He has sat by the same woman before, when it was only a strong flirtation; more eyes, curious and spiteful, were upon him then, and he met them with perfect self-possession. Now that he is in his right, why does he look blushingly uneasy, as if he would call on the curtains to hide him, and the cushions to cover him? Have any mortals existed so good, or great, ...
— Guy Livingstone; - or, 'Thorough' • George A. Lawrence
... in the growing heat. Each had the stupidly gaping mouth of the ignoramus who judges painting, and between them they indulged in all the asinine ideas, all the preposterous reflections, all the stupid spiteful jeers that the sight of an original work can possibly elicit ...
— His Masterpiece • Emile Zola
... certain, however, that the Neolithic men were not of Aryan blood. They are commonly spoken of by the name of Ugrians,[7] the "ogres"[8] of our folk-lore; which has also handed down, in the spiteful Brownie of the wood and the crafty Pixie of the cavern, dimly-remembered traditions of their physical and mental characteristics. Indeed it is not impossible that their blood may still be found in the remoter corners of our land, whither they ...
— Early Britain—Roman Britain • Edward Conybeare
... the Madam. She also was of the yellow variety with the suspicious and spiteful look of an undersized black Belgian police dog. A moment ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States - Volume II. Arkansas Narratives. Part I • Work Projects Administration
... them. The two sisters were ready to burst with spite when they saw Beauty dressed like a princess, and looking so very charming. All the kindness that she showed them was of no use; for they were vexed more than ever when she told them how happy she lived at the palace of the beast. The spiteful creatures went by themselves into the garden, where they cried to ...
— The Junior Classics, Volume 1 • Willam Patten
... More spiteful comments were made on Noreen by the Englishwomen on the train, and the girl could not help remarking their contemptuous glances at her and ...
— The Elephant God • Gordon Casserly
... Baxter may be thoroughly relied on for whatever he vouches as a fact known to himself; otherwise, cum grano. Edwards has to be put into the witness- box and cross-examined unmercifully, not as a wilful liar, but as an incredibly spiteful collector of gossip for the Presbyterians. After all, many of the so-called ribaldries and profanities reported by him of the Army Sectaries turn out innocent enough, or only very rough jokes, as when a soldier ...
— The Life of John Milton Vol. 3 1643-1649 • David Masson
... our Chevalier equips himself after one of his spiteful tilting-matches, it would not be easy to say. But very hard for him, if ever after he goes about in the lists, swordless and disarmed, at the mercy of any ...
— Mardi: and A Voyage Thither, Vol. I (of 2) • Herman Melville
... lying hid under a greatness of mind and views. When I turn over the table of contents of that immense correspondence of Napoleon which reveals the entire man in spite of the prudence of the editors, I find continually the name of Madame de Stael, joined to rigorous measures of spiteful epithets. "I write to the Minister of Police to finish with that mad Madame de Stael," he wrote on the 20th April, 1807, to the Count Regnault St. Jean d'Angely, who had apologized for his correspondence with the illustrious outlaw. "She is not to be suffered to leave Geneva, unless she ...
— Worlds Best Histories - France Vol 7 • M. Guizot and Madame Guizot De Witt
... a true woman," he said, laughing, "for I see you can be spiteful. The tuning has ...
— Stories By English Authors: Germany • Various
... buttercup-runners. The women did not fail to tell her how awkward she was. By-and-by Dolly bounced forward, and, with a flush on her cheek, took the place next to the men. They teased her too, you see, but there was no spiteful malice in their tongues. There are some natures which, naturally meek, if much condemned, defy that condemnation, and willingly give it ground of justification by open guilt. The women accused her of too free a carriage with ...
— The Life of the Fields • Richard Jefferies
... are the best-natured, kindest people in the world, and though they do not know as much as the English [he was not referring to the Colony], they have not their fiendish, spiteful dispositions, and if you go amongst them and speak their language, however badly, they would go through fire and water to do you a kindness." Later, when in Portugal, he heartily wished himself "back ...
— The Life of George Borrow • Herbert Jenkins
... morning had the young man been such as he could respect. Neither his doctrine, nor the behavior of the church to himself, would have kept him away. Had he followed his inclination he would have gone to the church, only that would have looked spiteful. His late congregation would easily excuse his non-attendance with them; they would even pitifully explain to each other why he could not appear just yet; but to go to church would be in their eyes unpardonable—a declaration of ...
— Paul Faber, Surgeon • George MacDonald
... heart of man alone be dull, And the mind of man be spiteful, When all above is beautiful, And all ...
— Fringilla: Some Tales In Verse • Richard Doddridge Blackmore
... pig to pay his fine. This theory afforded the Shimerdas great satisfaction, apparently. For weeks afterward, whenever Jake and I met Antonia on her way to the post-office, or going along the road with her work-team, she would clap her hands and call to us in a spiteful, crowing voice: ...
— My Antonia • Willa Cather
... and the English had their Boggarts and Robin Goodfellow and Lubberkin—all of them beings of the same description: house and farm spirits, who liked to live amongst men, and who sometimes did hard, rough work out of good-nature, and sometimes were spiteful and mischievous, especially to those who teased them, or spoke of them disrespectfully, or tried to see them when they did not wish to be seen. To the same family belongs the Danish Nis, a house spirit of whom many curious legends ...
— Fairy Tales; Their Origin and Meaning • John Thackray Bunce
... at that moment looked so ill, so small and spiteful, that Jane's heart gave a sudden wrench of pity. It was a cruel, brutal thing, she felt, in her to stop him on the edge of the grave and demand his money. She put her hand to his forehead: it was cold and clammy. "Don't wrong ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 20, August 1877 • Various
... dare To trade and traffic with Macbeth In riddles and affairs of death; And I, the mistress of your charms, The close contriver of all harms, Was never call'd to bear my part, Or show the glory of our art? And, which is worse, all you have done Hath been but for a wayward son, Spiteful and wrathful; who, as others do, Loves for his own ends, not for you. But make amends now: get you gone, And at the pit of Acheron Meet me i' the morning: thither he Will come to know his destiny. Your vessels and your spells provide, Your charms, and everything beside. ...
— Macbeth • William Shakespeare [Collins edition]
... of spiteful pleasure to answer: "She was dressed to go to Burrell Court and spend a day with Mrs. Burrell. When she sent Mr. Burrell word the day she would come the carriage ...
— A Singer from the Sea • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... no joke. It's no use saying so," and I beheld Charley and Isa in the midst of a violent quarrel. "I've looked on at plenty of your dodges, sucking up to Aunt Charlotte to get taken out with her; but when it comes to playing spiteful tricks on my sister I ...
— More Bywords • Charlotte M. Yonge
... was fond of him I wouldn't be ashamed to let him know, you can tell the world that. And I wouldn't keep him trottin' about like a little pet dog till I got tired of him and give him up for the sake of a greenhorn who"—her voice lowered to a spiteful hiss—"kissed you the first time he ...
— Trailin'! • Max Brand
... akin to it. Their conversation reverted to their unhappy position, and to the difficulty of making an immediate change. For not only was the dower-house in an untenantable state, but the weather was very much against them. The gray weather, the gloomy sky, the monotonous rains, the melting snow, the spiteful east wind,—by all this enmity of the elements, as well as by the enmity in the household, the poor bereaved lady ...
— The Squire of Sandal-Side - A Pastoral Romance • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... said, he took his mantle's foremost part, And gan the same together fold and wrap; Then spake again with fell and spiteful heart, So lions roar enclosed in train or trap, "Thou proud despiser of inconstant mart, I bring thee war and peace closed in this lap, Take quickly one, thou hast no time to muse; If peace, we rest, we fight, ...
— Jerusalem Delivered • Torquato Tasso
... of the giant children spoke to one another, an undertone to that clangorous melody of the smiths. His tide of doubt ebbed. He heard the giant voices; he heard their movements about him still. It was real, surely it was real—as real as spiteful acts! More real, for these great things, it may be, are the coming things, and the littleness, bestiality, and infirmity of men are the things that go. He opened his eyes. "Done," cried one of the two ironworkers, and they ...
— The Food of the Gods and How It Came to Earth • H.G. Wells
... to be highly exasperating to Ibsen, who had set out to be a realist, and was convicted by the spiteful hand of history of having been an idealist of the rose-water class. No wonder that he never touched the sequence of modern events ...
— Henrik Ibsen • Edmund Gosse
... in the grass! And you call yourself a sister. What do you want? To make trouble between us? You're spiteful because I love my wife! You may rest assured that I wouldn't change her for anybody. For thirty years I've slaved for my family, labored till I sweated blood, and I thought of marriage only when I'd provided for the whole family. For thirty years ...
— Plays • Alexander Ostrovsky
... this a time for quarreling among ourselves? There may be millions at stake, for all we know, and you would set us at loggerheads in a fit of spleen, like a little peevish boy. I'm ashamed of you! Get your horse and ride off the sulks. If you feel spiteful, take it out on Johnson. Get yourself a pack outfit and ...
— Copper Streak Trail • Eugene Manlove Rhodes
... he heary when Jordan roll.) fear de Lord, An' let your days be long. ) Roll, Jordan, roll Jordan, spiteful boast Be heard up-on ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 2, August, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... of her right hand, which she dazzled my sight with as she flashed it. When we had listened a long hour to this music, the Princess gazed on me as if to mark the effect of a charm, and I saw disappointment on her lovely face, and she bit her lip and looked spiteful, saying, 'Thou art far gone in the use of magic, and wary, O girl!' Then she laughed unnaturally, and called slaves to bring in sweet drinks to us, and I drank with her, and became less wary, and she fondled me more, calling me tender names, heaping ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... beamed approval. "To tell you the truth, Toni, I hadn't time for much lunch. We're supposed to shut at one, you know, but of course we don't get off at once, and to-day everything went wrong! At the last minute I upset a box of ribbons, and the spiteful things all went and got unrolled, and then that odious little Jackson—you know, the shopwalker I told you about—came and slanged me ...
— The Making of a Soul • Kathlyn Rhodes
... cock, from his bright unfaded plumage, looked like a new arrival. The hen resented every advance of the male. In vain he strutted around her and displayed his fine feathers; every now and then she would make at him in a most spiteful manner. He followed her to the ground, poured into her ear a fine, half-suppressed warble, offered her a worm, flew back to the tree again with a great spread of plumage, hopped around her on the branches, chirruped, chattered, flew gallantly at an intruder, and was back in an instant ...
— Wake-Robin • John Burroughs
... sufferers; persons of this kind were not likely to be exposed to charges of disloyal conduct if they were actively loyal. Obscure and ignorant men are much more likely to have become the innocent victims of spiteful accusers or vile agents of police. Doubtless this might happen; but that does not of itself condemn Lincoln for having maintained an extreme form of martial law. The particular kind of oppression that is likely to have occurred is one against which ...
— Abraham Lincoln • Lord Charnwood
... Dunciad, despite Mr. Ruskin's judgment of that poem as 'the most absolutely chiselled and monumental work "exacted" in our country.'[24] It is impossible to concur in this estimate. The imagery of the poem serves only to disgust, and the spiteful attacks made in it on forgotten men want the largeness of purpose that lifts satire above what is of temporary interest, making it a ...
— The Age of Pope - (1700-1744) • John Dennis
... is not a mathematician, an augur, and a soothsayer. The very patriarch himself, when he came into Egypt, was by some said to worship Serapis, and by others to worship Christ. As a race of men, they are seditious, vain, and spiteful; as a body, wealthy and prosperous, of whom nobody lives in idleness. Some blow glass, some make paper, and others linen. There is work for the lame and work for the blind; even those who have lost the use of their hands do not live in idleness. ...
— History Of Egypt From 330 B.C. To The Present Time, Volume 11 (of 12) • S. Rappoport
... to look so spiteful, master; you are not the great man you thought you were; you are nobody now, and so you will find ere long. So, march out, if you please: I wants to ...
— Night and Morning, Volume 1 • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... at sight of the weapon, but the spiteful crackle of its mechanism was too quick for him. A faintly luminous ray struck him full in the breast and stopped him in his tracks. A thrill of intense cold chased up his spine and a thunderbolt crashed in his brain. The captain caught his stiffened ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, December 1930 • Various
... was born at Arpinum on the 3rd of January 106 B.C. His mother, Helvia, is said to have been of good family. His father was by some said to have been descended from Attius Tullius, the Volscian host of Coriolanus, while spiteful persons declared him to have been a fuller; in any case he was a Roman knight with property at Arpinum and a house in Rome. His health was weak, and he generally lived at Arpinum, where he devoted himself to literary pursuits. ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 3 - "Chitral" to "Cincinnati" • Various
... neighbouring prince called Fiachna Duv, and he was the ruler of the Dal Fiatach. For a long time he had been at enmity and spiteful warfare with Fiachna Finn; and to this Fiachna Duv there was born in the same night a daughter, and this girl was named Duv Laca of the ...
— Irish Fairy Tales • James Stephens
... the way I figure it out. That's the worst of the whole business." She admitted this with darkened brow. "Mrs. Belden's tongue is hung in the middle and loose at both ends—and that Moore girl is spiteful mean." She could not keep the contempt out of her voice. "She saw us start off, and she is sure to follow it up and find out what happened on the way home; even if they don't see ...
— The Forester's Daughter - A Romance of the Bear-Tooth Range • Hamlin Garland
... Mr. Dockwrath remained at home in the bosom of his family, saying all manner of spiteful things against Lady Mason, and on the next day he went up to town and called on Round and Crook. That one day he waited in order that Mr. Mason might have time to write; but Mr. Mason had written on the very day of the visit to Groby Park, and Mr. Round junior ...
— Orley Farm • Anthony Trollope
... would be fashionable dressmakers. The synagogue would persecute those who were larger than it, the professional priests would prate of spiritualities to an applausive animal world, the press would be run in the interests of capitalists and politicians, the little writers would grow spiteful against those who did not call them great, the managers of the national theatre would advance their mistresses to leading parts. Yes, the ox would come and drink the water, and Jeshurun would wax fat and kick. "For that which is crooked cannot be made straight." ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... at the moment by some demon of mischief; or whether he had the idea of trying to make Oscar's peace for him, before Oscar returned—was more than I could say at the time. I ought to have stopped it—I know. But my temper was in a flame. I was as spiteful as a cat and as fierce as a bear. I said to myself (in your English idiom), She wants taking down a peg; quite right, Mr. Nugent; do it. Shocking! shameful! no words are bad enough for me: give it me ...
— Poor Miss Finch • Wilkie Collins
... attention to mere spiteful criticism, but seek, as for gold and precious stones, the chastening advice of friends. Do not be offended if your friends say an unpleasant thing of you. And here we are at the Bible again: "Faithful are the wounds of a friend; but the kisses of ...
— The Young Man and the World • Albert J. Beveridge
... fall on his sleek black wings and his dear gray head. I try to kiss him; but he makes such a spiteful peck at my nose, that I have to give up the idea. Thus one of my good-byes is over. By the time that they are all ended, and we have returned to the house, I am drowned in tears, and my appearance for the day is ...
— Nancy - A Novel • Rhoda Broughton
... of Junius. I consider him to have been the most agreeable man I ever met. He was far more brilliant in conversation than Rogers; and his animated, bustling manner formed an agreeable contrast with the spiteful calmness of his corpse-like companion. He was extremely irritable, and even passionate; and in his moments of anger he would splutter and stutter like a maniac in his anxiety to give utterance to the flow of thoughts which crowded his ...
— The Bed-Book of Happiness • Harold Begbie
... The spiteful terrier, which had meanwhile evinced an unpleasant interest in the thickness of my pantaloons, added his yelping to the clamor, and Mr. B., pointing to the clouds, thought we had better hasten homewards. So we bade farewell to Hannah and her ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, No. 19, May, 1859 • Various
... seriously. "But I'm very sorry about that fellow Parks. He's a spiteful and dangerous man. I don't like ...
— Son Philip • George Manville Fenn
... my painful perch—now looking down at the spiteful creatures beneath—now bending my eyes across the great corn-field, in hopes of seeing some one. At times the idea crossed my mind, that even upon the morrow I might ...
— The Hunters' Feast - Conversations Around the Camp Fire • Mayne Reid
... he said, gloomily; "that is some of their accursed work. Have I not cause to detest them? They are spiteful, vengeful, implacable." ...
— Rabbi and Priest - A Story • Milton Goldsmith
... these lonely deeps in the bosom of the hills have witnessed before Saxon or Dane replaced the Celt; who in turn, for all his fierce and arrogant ways, went, by night, in fear and trembling of those spiteful little men he himself displaced, and whose vengeance or pitiful gratitude is perpetuated in the first romances of our childhood. Though their living homes were in the primeval forests of the Britain that was, their last long resting places were under ...
— Seaward Sussex - The South Downs from End to End • Edric Holmes
... disasters of the thousand years which had elapsed since Sun Tzu's death would, upon examination, be found to uphold and corroborate, in every particular, the maxims contained in his book. Tu Mu's somewhat spiteful charge against Ts'ao Kung ...
— The Art of War • Sun Tzu
... say? How shall I complain? I am still living, writing, preaching, and lecturing daily; [and] yet there are found such spiteful men, not only among the adversaries, but also false brethren that profess to be on our side, as dare to cite my writings and doctrine directly against myself, and let me look on and listen, although they know well that I teach otherwise, and as wish to adorn their venom with my labor, and under ...
— The Smalcald Articles • Martin Luther
... memorable night of his wife and heir's coming home. The young man stood listening in sullen anger, the red blood mounting to his very temples. His Cousin Inez had managed during the past two weeks to make his existence as thoroughly uncomfortable as a thoroughly jealous and spiteful woman can. He had flown at last to his aunt for comfort, and this is ...
— A Terrible Secret • May Agnes Fleming
... fire, and to reinforce that of the flag-officer. The upper batteries, like all the others, were silent while the ships lay in front of them; but as soon as the Hartford and Iroquois moved up they returned to their guns, and followed the rear of the fleet with a spiteful fire till out ...
— The Gulf and Inland Waters - The Navy in the Civil War. Volume 3. • A. T. Mahan
... told all of us," added another. "Why, I never saw such a spiteful old hag in my life, promising me a drunken, abusive husband, when I am engaged to the dearest fellow ...
— Dainty's Cruel Rivals - The Fatal Birthday • Mrs. Alex McVeigh Miller
... spoiled by undue harshness, than by undue gentleness. More good work is lost from want of appreciation than from too much of it; and certainly it is not the function of friendship to do the critic's work. Unless carefully repressed, such a spirit becomes censorious, or, worse still, spiteful, and has often been the means of losing a friend. It is possible to be kind, without giving crooked counsel, or oily flattery; and it is possible to be true, without magnifying faults, ...
— Friendship • Hugh Black
... say that no one has yet been born that never yielded, more or less, to the sway of this passion. Everybody gets angry. The child sulks, the little girl calls names and makes faces, the boy fights and throws stones; the maiden waxes huffy, spiteful, and won't speak, and the irascible male fumes, rages, and says and does things that become him not in the least. Even pious folks have their tiffs and tilts. All flesh is frail, and anger has an easy time of it; not because ...
— Explanation of Catholic Morals - A Concise, Reasoned, and Popular Exposition of Catholic Morals • John H. Stapleton
... fear of the police, and that though she knew herself to be absolutely innocent of any wrong-doing. She felt sure that the fact that she was German would cause suspicion. The worst would be believed of her. She remembered with dismay the letter some wicked, spiteful person had written to her mistress—and then, with infinite comfort, she suddenly remembered that this same dear mistress was only a little over two miles off. She, Anna, would not wish to disturb her on her wedding ...
— Good Old Anna • Marie Belloc Lowndes
... said, "when a letter was received from Richard Horton, saying that you were on board the Thetis. Mr. Wilks tells me it was an abominably spiteful letter, and I am sure the squire thinks so, too, from the tone in which he spoke this afternoon about his nephew; but I can quite forgive him, for, if it had not been for his letter, we should ...
— With Wolfe in Canada - The Winning of a Continent • G. A. Henty
... how it bore upon his theory of a spiteful element in his companion. Of course Blanche was silly; but, equally of course, this young lady's perception of it was quickened by Blanche's having married a rich man whom she herself might ...
— Confidence • Henry James
... softening from the terrible to the tender, "tell me, my dear boy, why you fancy you do not love me. You see, madam, that I encourage sincerity—and like, at all times, the truth to be spoken out. Why don't you love me, Ralph dear?" pinching my ear with a spiteful violence, that was meant for gracious playfulness in the eyes of the lady, and an intelligible hint for ...
— Rattlin the Reefer • Edward Howard
... water," commented Talbot after a short conversation. "He says we have treated him like a brother and a true comrade in arms; which means that I did; you fellows, confound your spiteful souls, wanted to throw him overboard a dozen times. And now he says to follow him, and he'll get ...
— Gold • Stewart White
... her discourse, which was sensible, spirited, and gay. Her frank and sprightly demeanour excited his own confidence and good-humour; and he described to her the characters of those females who had honoured them with such a spiteful mark of distinction, in terms so replete with humorous satire, that she seemed to listen with particular complacency of attention, and distinguished every nymph thus ridiculed with such a significant glance as overwhelmed her with chagrin and mortification. ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett |
