"Villain" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... not even any villain in the story—for even Major Basil, the husband of the lady who next, and really, comforted the unfortunate Edward—even Major Basil was not a villain in this piece. He was a slack, loose, shiftless sort of fellow—but he did not ...
— The Good Soldier • Ford Madox Ford
... said Madame Granson, "du Bousquier is not only a monster, he is a villain. When a man has done a wrong like that, he ought to pay the indemnity. Isn't it his place rather than ours to look after the girl?—who, to tell you the truth, seems to me rather questionable; there are plenty of better men in Alencon than that cynic du Bousquier. A girl must be depraved, indeed, ...
— An Old Maid • Honore de Balzac
... exclaimed Ham, in a broken voice, 'it ain't no fault of yourn—and I am far from laying of it to you—but his name is Steerforth, and he's a damned villain!' ...
— David Copperfield • Charles Dickens
... stoutly. "The domned villain doped me last night, and must ha' put me aboard wid the crew he shipped for you. What for, I don't know. He had yer full ...
— The Grain Ship • Morgan Robertson
... stairs heard all the rascals had said, an', with a yell of delight, he raised his rifle an' drew a bead on my mother. But the ole man was too quick for him. With a bound like a painter, he sprang across the floor, an', grabbin' the villain by the throat, lifted him from his feet, and throwed him down into the cellar, an' in an instant shut the door, an' fastened it with a heavy bar of wood. Then, takin' down his rifle, he said to us, a'most ...
— Frank, the Young Naturalist • Harry Castlemon
... with long lank hair, like Mawworm's, who, in consequence of some derangement of his wires, hovered about the couch like a vulture, and gave medical opinions in the air. He was almost as good as Low, though the latter was great at all times—a decided brute and villain, beyond all possibility of mistake. Low was especially fine at the last, when, hearing the doctor and the valet say, 'The Emperor is dead!' he pulled out his watch, and wound up the piece (not the watch) by exclaiming, with characteristic brutality, 'Ha! ...
— Pictures from Italy • Charles Dickens
... this. And the King and the hidalgos answered and said, Yea, we swear it. And the Cid said, If ye knew of this thing, or gave command that it should be done, may you die even such a death as your brother the King Don Sancho, by the hand of a villain whom you trust; one who is not a hidalgo, from another land, not a Castillian; and the King and the knights who were with him said Amen. And the king's colour changed; and the Cid repeated the oath unto him a second time, and the King and the twelve knights said Amen ...
— Chronicle Of The Cid • Various
... thrilled our soul with their bold attitude, array of deadly engines and incomparable costume, to-day look somewhat pallidly; the extreme hard favour of the heroine strikes me, I had almost said with pain; the villain's scowl no longer thrills me like a trumpet; and the scenes themselves, those once unparalleled landscapes, seem the efforts of a prentice hand. So much of fault we find; but on the other side the impartial critic rejoices to remark the presence of a great unity ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume 9 • Robert Louis Stevenson
... as if it were a duty I owed myself to return him to the condition in which I found him, which was to be easily contrived by my binding him in his sleep and dragging him to the deck and leaving him to stupefy alongside the body of the giant Joam Barros. "Peace!" cried I to myself with a shiver; "villain that thou art to harbour such thoughts! Thou art a hundred-fold worse than the wretch against whom Satan is setting thee plotting to think thus vilely." I gulped down this bolus of conscience with the help of a draught of wine, ...
— The Frozen Pirate • W. Clark Russell
... she added reflectively, "that of the cursing, since for every word I gave back two. Moreover I told the hoary villain of a high-priest to make report to his goddess that long after she was dead in the world, I would live on, for the spirit of prophecy was on me in that hour. Yet the curse fell in its season, since in her day, doubt it or not, Aphrodite had ...
— She and Allan • H. Rider Haggard
... here and unhurt, I trust," Albert replied. "The villain released her and ran off, and I saw her figure sway, and ran forward just in time to save her from falling. I think ...
— A March on London • G. A. Henty
... things into his own hands, to show his independence and to fight for his own individuality. It was what he himself would have done if—then the thought of Annie Hogg cut across his tenderness and behind Annie her father, that fat, smiling, red-faced scoundrel, the worst villain in the town. At the sudden realisation that there was now a link between himself and that man, and that that link had been forged by his own son, tenderness and affection fled. He could only entertain one emotion at a time, and immediately he was ...
— The Cathedral • Hugh Walpole
... making way through the bushes. The moment after, a huge wolf-like animal rushed round the projecting angle of the cliff, and sprang upon the carcase of the bighorn. At the same instant a voice reached my ears—"Off there, Wolf! off, villain dog! Don't you see that the creature is killed—no thanks to you, sirrah?" Good heavens! it was the voice ...
— The Wild Huntress - Love in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid
... pray'r) Melantheus, son of Dolius, at that fount Met them; the chosen goats of ev'ry flock, With two assistants, from the field he drove, The suitors' supper. He, seeing them both, In surly accent boorish, such as fired Ulysses with resentment, thus began. 260 Ay—this is well—The villain leads the vile— Thus evermore the Gods join like to like. Thou clumsy swine-herd, whither would'st conduct This morsel-hunting mendicant obscene, Defiler base of banquets? many a post Shall he rub smooth that props him while he begs Lean alms, ...
— The Odyssey of Homer • Homer
... brother had been sent up to the Mahdi, the villain would have endeavoured to force him to change his religion. Edgar would never have done that, and in that case it is pretty certain that they would have chopped his head off. As it is, the chief of these Arabs who took him evidently ...
— The Dash for Khartoum - A Tale of Nile Expedition • George Alfred Henty
... "He was a villain." she said. "He deserved it, but I am a murderess, and you won't—" Her hands gripped him, a new light shone ...
— The Missing Link • Edward Dyson
... they sat by the lake so late that afternoon that Frederick R. Woods finally sent for them to come to dinner—hadn't he told her then that only women and children cared for sweet wines? Of course he had—the villain! ...
— The Eagle's Shadow • James Branch Cabell
... could be worse nonsense—save it be an American critic's doctrine that "Conrad denounces pessimism." "Lord Jim" no more raises a moral issue than "The Titan." It is, if anything, a devastating exposure of a moral issue. Its villain is almost heroic; its hero, judged by his peers, is ...
— A Book of Prefaces • H. L. Mencken
... was gone out, so we had the villain up to the Admiral with the greater satisfaction, as he was a lodger in one of the Admiral's ...
— The Young Step-Mother • Charlotte M. Yonge
... violin." These lovers of music and poetry furnish much amusement to the native mountaineers, one of whom, Cain Smallin, becomes one of the prominent characters in the latter part of the book. It is worthy of note that in this character and his brother, who turns out to be a villain, Lanier anticipated some of the sketches by Charles Egbert Craddock. The merry party of hunters retire to Sterling's house, where they enjoy the blessings of good friendship and of music and high thought. They, with other friends from all parts ...
— Sidney Lanier • Edwin Mims
... of an infinitely greater blank, across which you may conceive me to have stretched my canvas for the first frank portrait of my friend. The whole truth cannot harm him now. I shall paint in every wart. Raffles was a villain, when all is written; it is no service to his memory to glaze the fact; yet I have done so myself before to-day. I have omitted whole heinous episodes. I have dwelt unduly on the redeeming side. And this I may do again, ...
— A Thief in the Night • E. W. Hornung
... to himself, "is a cunning scamp, a villain who has speculated in the forage supplied to our cavalry. To acquit him is to let a traitor escape, to be false to the fatherland, to devote the army to defeat." And in a flash Gamelin could see the Hussars of the Republic, mounted on stumbling horses, sabred by the enemy's cavalry.... ...
— The Gods are Athirst • Anatole France
... moment succeeded, during which half of a large mountain was removed from the scenery, and a piece of forest shoved up to the ambitious wood that had been aspiring to overtop the Alps. At length a young lady, whom I had just seen butchered in a most horrid manner by a villain, came from the side of the stage with a smile, which, while it displayed her white teeth, wrought the rouge upon her face into very perceptible corrugations, and made a lowly courtesy. She walked with measured step three or four times ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, February 1844 - Volume 23, Number 2 • Various
... (continu'd he to his Friend) how long is it since I have been so happy in so good and generous a Brother-in-Law? Some Months before Sir Henry our Father dy'd, who gave us his latest Blessing, except that which his last Breath bequeath'd and sigh'd after you. O undutiful and ungrateful Villain that I am, to so kind, and so indulgent, and so merciful a Father: (cry'd Miles) But Heaven, I fear, has farther Punishments in Store for so profligate a Wretch and so disobedient a Son.—But your Name, Sir, if ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn - Volume V • Aphra Behn
... Staff good-humouredly. "It's class, if the illustrators are to be believed. Don't you ever read modern fiction? In emergencies like these the hero always takes a cold bath and changes his clothes before sallying forth to put a crimp in the villain's plans. Just the same as me. Only I'm going to shed ...
— The Bandbox • Louis Joseph Vance
... said he, addressing himself to Clarence Hervey, whom, in the confusion of his mind, he mistook for the colonel, the first object of his jealousy. "Colonel Lawless," cried his lordship, "you are a villain. I ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. III - Belinda • Maria Edgeworth
... toward her home. "In the meantime I am going back to give the baby his bath," she thought. She glanced at the watch on her gloved wrist. And a man who looked like a detective, or a villain in the "movies," looked after her in an ...
— His Second Wife • Ernest Poole
... the earth over them, to make it look just like solid ground. He then put his horn to his mouth, and blew such a loud and long tantivy, that the giant awoke and came towards Jack, roaring like thunder: "You saucy villain, you shall pay dearly for breaking my rest; I will broil you for my breakfast." He had scarcely spoken these words, when he came advancing one step farther; but then he tumbled headlong into the pit, and his ...
— Fairy Tales Every Child Should Know • Various
... a plausible villain who ruined her—spent every sou and left her with a mountain of debt and a month-old baby. Poor Grace died and he married again. I tried to get the baby, but he held it as a hostage. I could never trace the child after it was two ...
— The Green Rust • Edgar Wallace
... an hour I won't say a word," Clinton declared, "unless it's some word just drawn out of my bosom by the sight of that villain. Come!" ...
— Fran • John Breckenridge Ellis
... devil of great wealth, and she neglected her poor—therefore honest—lover temporarily. She learned the fearful joys of a limousined life, and was lured into a false marriage which nearly proved her ruin. The villain got a fellow-demon to pretend to be a minister, put on false hair, reversed his collar, and read the wedding ceremony; and the heroine was taken to ...
— We Can't Have Everything • Rupert Hughes
... to hear your Penitence! Forgive me, Madam, I will be a Villain, forget my Vows of Love, made to Lucretia. And sacrifice both her, and those to Interest. Oh, how I hate this ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn - Volume IV. • Aphra Behn
... rest on all you who call out only to blight a trusting, innocent, loving virgin's affections, and then discard her. You deserve to be horsewhipped by her father, cowhided by her brothers, branded villain by her mother, cursed by herself, and sent to ...
— Searchlights on Health: Light on Dark Corners • B.G. Jefferis
... in American houses supply hot air and are termed "registers." Mr. Sidebotham had meanwhile found the paper he was looking for. He held it in front of him and tapped it once or twice with the back of his right hand as if it were a stage letter and himself the villain of ...
— The Empty House And Other Ghost Stories • Algernon Blackwood
... talk I can do absolutely nothing else; and since then I have been poorly enough, otherwise I should have answered your letter long before this, for I enjoy extremely discussing such points as those in your last note. But what a villain you are to heap gratuitous insults on my ELASTIC theory: you might as well call the virtue of a lady elastic, as the virtue of a theory accommodating in its favours. Whatever you may say, I feel that my theory does ...
— More Letters of Charles Darwin - Volume I (of II) • Charles Darwin
... and inborn villain, would have respected her at that moment. I put her hand on my arm and led her away gently past the ruined chapel, and down ...
— The Two Destinies • Wilkie Collins
... distressing, the rascally little scape-grace in the steeple was evidently exerting himself to the utmost. Every now and then one might catch a glimpse of the scoundrel through the smoke. There he sat in the belfry upon the belfry-man, who was lying flat upon his back. In his teeth the villain held the bell-rope, which he kept jerking about with his head, raising such a clatter that my ears ring again even to think of it. On his lap lay the big fiddle, at which he was scraping, out of all time and tune, with both hands, making a great ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 4 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... said, "is admirable as art and fiction. But it is fiction. I have no hope that you will change it. I think you would make a mistake to do so. You could not have the situation, if the truth were painted. Your audience will not have the villain as the injured man." ...
— An Unpardonable Liar • Gilbert Parker
... spell like that of an able actor. He excited temporary convictions that began to change as soon as the curtain fell. He was in fact a performer. That little midnight scene at the City Hotel had sounded the keynote of his character. He was no reckless villain of romance. If he instigated the robbery of the south-bound mail wagon, of which the writer of this little history has no shadow of doubt, he was so careful about it that no evidence which would satisfy a jury has been ...
— A Man for the Ages - A Story of the Builders of Democracy • Irving Bacheller
... the exigencies of the stage, could not fail to intervene at the critical moment in behalf of innocence and virtue, and the spectator never had the least occasion for anxiety. Not unnaturally there was a black-hearted villain in the piece; so very black-hearted that he seemed not to have a single good impulse from first to last. Yet he was, in the keeping of the stage Providence, as harmless as a blank cartridge, in spite of his deadly aims. He accomplished no more mischief, in fact, than if all ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... said to myself, "I am the hero of this play and I've got to get out of this mess somehow. If I could only find some papers incriminating the villain—that's you all would be well." So I—er—found them.... It's no good, Frepeau. Unless you ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, January 7, 1914 • Various
... as if Annette could have a real passion for him; one could not expect that at his age. If her mother wished, if the worldly advantage were manifestly great—perhaps! If not, refusal would be certain. Besides, he thought: 'I'm not a villain. I don't want to hurt her; and I don't want anything underhand. But I do want her, and I want a son! There's nothing for it but divorce—somehow—anyhow—divorce!' Under the shadow of the plane-trees, in the lamplight, he passed slowly ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... had not forgotten her reckless confidences at the opera, and recalled it to her, asking her whether she had yet discovered that hero of love for whom she was looking, who should be, according to her ideas, a villain like Bothwell, or ...
— Monsieur de Camors, Complete • Octave Feuillet
... itself. How about the killings where the murderer is never caught? The prisoners tried for murder are only a mere fraction of those who commit murder. True, and the more deliberate the murder, the greater, unfortunately, the chance of the villain getting away. Still, in cases merely of suspected murder, or in cases where no evidence is taken, it would be manifestly unfair arbitrarily to assign motives for the deed, if deed it was. No, one must start with the assumption, sufficiently accurate under all the circumstances, that ...
— Courts and Criminals • Arthur Train
... as Leicestershire, foxes are not "accidentally" killed, but when so, what bewailings over the "late lamented!" what anathemas upon the villain's head who is suspected of "vulpicide"! If it were not so serious a matter, one would be inclined to laugh over Anthony Trollope's description, in the "American Senator," of the old hunting farmer who moved himself and his dinner ...
— Practical Taxidermy • Montagu Browne
... trusted the Indian. However much they suspected rebellion, treacheries, and desertions, they practiced fidelities, though to varying degrees, and there was in each man's breast more or less of courage and good intent. They were prone to call one another villain, but actual villainy—save as jealousy, suspicion, and hatred are villainy—seems rarely to have been present. Even one who was judged a villain and shot for his villainy seems hardly to have deserved such fate. Jamestown peninsula turned out to be feverous; fantastic ...
— Pioneers of the Old South - A Chronicle of English Colonial Beginnings, Volume 5 In - The Chronicles Of America Series • Mary Johnston
... least interesting item of the cargo, and this was embarrassing. No hero likes to be neglected, it is fatal to his part. I had said my prayers and steeled myself to all sorts of fine endurance on the way up, and here, when it came to the crisis, no one was anxious to play the necessary villain. They just helped me ashore civilly enough, the captain nodded his head at me, muttering something in an indifferent tone to the functionary about a ghost who had wandered overseas and begged a passage up the canal; the ...
— Gulliver of Mars • Edwin L. Arnold
... the old villain's life, grey friar," said mad Ralph, parrying a stroke of Grimbeard's axe, but this was but a bootless boast, for the conflict was not one with knightly weapons, but with those of the forest. The train of Herstmonceux ...
— The House of Walderne - A Tale of the Cloister and the Forest in the Days of the Barons' Wars • A. D. Crake
... terrified, my darling? What have you been saying to her, you old villain?' and the ...
— Hypatia - or, New Foes with an Old Face • Charles Kingsley
... wrongs of making war, Newman asks, "Why does one murder make a villain, but the murder of thousands a hero?" And again, "Why do princes and statesmen, who would scorn to steal a shilling, make no difficulty ...
— Memoir and Letters of Francis W. Newman • Giberne Sieveking
... has elected to play villain in a new mystery play by Mr. WALTER HACKETT. Essential elements of the business as follows: Obstinate old millstone of a shipbuilder, Bransby, who simply will not give up shipbuilding for aeroplane making (and no wonder in these days!); nephew ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Sept. 5, 1917 • Various
... need no more evidence.... You, Senor, have seen this villain in Rio Medio, this villager identifies ...
— Romance • Joseph Conrad and F.M. Hueffer
... the gun-man, speaking slowly, "I've been a crook, but never once have I seen a guy got up like that villain in a movie picture. Say, mister, let's have ...
— The Book of All-Power • Edgar Wallace
... in effect, ye wise men, that only the wicked have suffered; but it is not so, for aforetime I have seen the honest poor man despised and the villain ...
— Ragnarok: The Age of Fire and Gravel • Ignatius Donnelly
... but I'm thinkin' 'bout the grief o' that villain, Blackstaffe, too. Oh, he'll be a terrible sorrowful man when the net's closed, an' he finds thar's nothin' in it. It will be the great big disappointment o' his life an' I 'low it will be some time afore Moses Blackstaffe ...
— The Eyes of the Woods - A story of the Ancient Wilderness • Joseph A. Altsheler
... this—that the Villain base Has insulted the hero's girl; It may be this—that he's brought disgrace On a wretchedly-acted Earl. I care not which it may chance to be, Only this do I chance to know— A cliff looks down at a canvas sea And some ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, February 18, 1893 • Various
... did it," he cried. "There's only one man in the camp villain enough to do it. It was that hound Damase, as sure ...
— The Young Woodsman - Life in the Forests of Canada • J. McDonald Oxley
... the people, democrat, plebeian, republican, proletary[obs3], proletaire[obs3], roturier[obs3], Mr. Snooks, bourgeois, epicier[Fr], Philistine, cockney; grisette[obs3], demimonde. peasant, countryman, boor, carle[obs3], churl; villain, villein; terrae filius[Latin: son of the land]; serf, kern[obs3], tyke, tike, chuff[obs3], ryot[obs3], fellah; longshoreman; swain, clown, hind; clod, clodhopper; hobnail, yokel, bog-trotter, bumpkin; plowman, plowboy[obs3]; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... "Haven't I always told you the man is a villain? Haven't I always told you he would murder her in her bed? Haven't I always ...
— The Mysterious Affair at Styles • Agatha Christie
... You hate us both. You know that you do. Is it part of a scheme? Lumley is investing money on your advice, I am allowing myself to be seen about with you more than is prudent—considering all things. Do you want to rake out the ashes of our domestic hearth—to play the part of—melodramatic villain? You are ingenious enough, ...
— The Malefactor • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... repeats the words, grinding his teeth. Quinton, the low scoundrel, the fast, fascinating man of bad reputation, the villain who has betrayed his wife, his angel, and dragged her to the lowest depths of degradation! She is beyond Philip's help now, ...
— When the Birds Begin to Sing • Winifred Graham
... Lancedale had gotten the upper hand, there was likely to be a revision of the Joyner-Graves attitude toward Pelton. In that case, the less he said to incriminate Russell Latterman, the better. Let Bayne be the villain, for ...
— Null-ABC • Henry Beam Piper and John Joseph McGuire
... "Robber and villain!" cried the Jew, "I will pay thee nothing—not one silver penny will I pay thee unless my daughter is ...
— The Literary World Seventh Reader • Various
... The villain slunk off, and finding some kindred spirits sacking a liquor-store not far off, he joined the orgy, seeking to drown his rage in rum, and he succeeded so effectually that he lay in the gutter soon after. ...
— Barriers Burned Away • E. P. Roe
... vessel. Does a man of probity live among us? he is a person of singular diffidence; we give him the name of a dull and fat-headed fellow. Does this man avoid every snare, and lay himself open to no ill-designing villain; since we live amid such a race, where keen envy and accusations are flourishing? Instead of a sensible and wary man, we call him a disguised and subtle fellow. And is any one more open, [and less reserved] than usual in such a degree as I often have presented myself ...
— The Works of Horace • Horace
... bush. Borele, hearing me advance, came on to see what it was, and suddenly protruded his horny nose within a few yards of me. Knowing well that a front shot would not prove deadly, I sprang to my feet and ran behind the bush. Upon this the villain charged, blowing loudly, and chased me round the bush. Had his activity been equal to his ugliness, my wanderings would have terminated here, but by my superior agility I had the ...
— Forest & Frontiers • G. A. Henty
... with a dagger at my throat make me seal deeds to convey my estate to him, would this give him any title? Just such a title, by his sword, has an unjust conqueror, who forces me into submission. The injury and the crime is equal, whether committed by the wearer of a crown, or some petty villain. The title of the offender, and the number of his followers, make no difference in the offence, unless it be to aggravate it. The only difference is, great robbers punish little ones, to keep them in their obedience; but the great ones are rewarded with laurels ...
— Two Treatises of Government • John Locke
... Conrad, "the young villain is more crafty than we gave him credit for. Instead of a rope he will have a challenge from the Count, and so die honourably like a man, in place of being strangled like the ...
— The Strong Arm • Robert Barr
... Chastellain's pious and horrified ejaculation over the extraordinary insolence of this big villain, who thus audaciously associated himself with his betters: "O glorious Majesty of God, think of such an outrageous and intolerable piece of villainy being committed before the eyes of a prince! For a low man to venture to come and stand side by ...
— Charles the Bold - Last Duke Of Burgundy, 1433-1477 • Ruth Putnam
... what a relief! Now for something primordial and savage, even though it were as bad as an Armenian massacre, to set the balance straight again. This order is too tame, this culture too second-rate, this goodness too uninspiring. This human drama without a villain or a pang; this community so refined that ice-cream soda-water is the utmost offering it can make to the brute animal in man; this city simmering in the tepid lakeside sun; this atrocious harmlessness of all things,—I cannot abide with them. Let me take my chances ...
— Talks To Teachers On Psychology; And To Students On Some Of Life's Ideals • William James
... give you a piece of intelligence that you perhaps already know—namely, that the ungodly arch-villain Voltaire has died miserably like a dog—just like a brute. This is his reward! You must long since have remarked that I do not like being here, for many reasons, which, however, do not signify as I am actually here. I ...
— The Letters of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, V.1. • Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
... is the beauty of it. Look at me. I have never succeeded in imitating that well-to-do, thoroughly worthy villain. I began too late. Take warning, Orsino. You are young. Grow fat and look on—then you will die happy. All the philosophy of life is there. Farinaceous food, money and a wife. That is the recipe. Since you have money you can purchase the ...
— Don Orsino • F. Marion Crawford
... lingered behind the band, played the villain after this pleasant parting, for they killed a Sioux. Hardly was the news of this outrage received at the fort ere three hundred warriors were on the trail of their whilom guests and friends, all clamoring for revenge. Among them was Track Maker, for he could not, as a warrior, remain ...
— Myths And Legends Of Our Own Land, Complete • Charles M. Skinner
... resolution to refrain from letting an impulsive expression of sympathy assume false meanings in her heart. On the other hand, Steve felt a boor for having sent the books. He was so used to being called cave man and told not to do this or say that that he now pictured himself an awkward villain who had best confine himself to writing checks and ...
— The Gorgeous Girl • Nalbro Bartley
... these pasty-faced, shifty-eyed, mealy-mouthed young slouchers from the depot worry me sometimes with their offensive virtue. They don't seem to have backbone enough to do anything but play cards and prowl round the married quarters. I believe I'd forgive that old villain on the spot if he turned up with any sort of explanation that I ...
— Life's Handicap • Rudyard Kipling
... despair he took sanctuary in S. Sophia, and assumed the garb of a monk. The perfidy of Apocaucus might have stopped at this point, and allowed events to follow their natural course. But though willing to act a villain's part, he wished to act it under the mask of a friend, to betray with a kiss. Accordingly he went to S. Sophia to express his sympathy with Gabalas, and played the part of a man overwhelmed with sorrow ...
— Byzantine Churches in Constantinople - Their History and Architecture • Alexander Van Millingen
... of encouragement—to the villain. "Kill him!"... "Shoot one to his kidneys!"... "Ahhhhh," as the villain hit the hero in the stomach.... "Muss his hair. Attaboy!"... "Kill the skunk!" And finally groans of despair when the ...
— The Plastic Age • Percy Marks
... the assassin cried, As Lincoln fell. O villain! who than he More lived to set both slave and tyrant free? Or so enrapt with plans of freedom died, That even thy treacherous deed shall glance aside And do the dead man's will by land and sea; Win bloodless battles, ...
— The Poets' Lincoln - Tributes in Verse to the Martyred President • Various
... lakhs of rupees the unfortunate Cashmeeries were handed over to the tender mercies of "the most thorough ruffian that ever was created — a villain from a kingdom down to a half-penny," and the "Paradise of the Indies," after remaining rather less than a week a British possession, was relinquished ...
— Diary of a Pedestrian in Cashmere and Thibet • by William Henry Knight
... Smithfield, the tournament ground just outside the city walls. It is said that the prince of Wales (afterwards Henry V.) witnessed the execution and offered the sufferer both life and a pension if he would recant; but in Walsingham's words, "the abandoned villain declined the prince's advice, and chose rather to be burned than to give reverence to the life-giving sacrament. So it befell that this mischievous fellow was burnt to ashes, and ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 2 - "Baconthorpe" to "Bankruptcy" • Various
... have detained you thus, and with a mile to walk this murky and unpleasant night. They say, too, that the streets are dangerous of late, haunted by dissolute night-revellers—that villain Clodius and his infamous co-mates. I tremble like a leaf if I but meet them in broad day—and what if you should fall in with them, when flushed with wine, and ripe for ...
— The Roman Traitor (Vol. 1 of 2) • Henry William Herbert
... was, in a measure, ready for them. One he grabbed in a clever jiu-jitsu hold and sent him hurtling through the air to crash in a heap in a far corner of the room. Leaping to his feet, he beat another to the floor. The third villain was of tougher fiber. Up and down the laboratory they battled, stumbling over broken furniture, now falling to the floor, where they rolled over and over, first one, then the other gaining the mastery, while the broken glass with which the floor was littered cut their ...
— The Master Mystery • Arthur B. Reeve and John W. Grey
... said, bitterly—"like a villain." She began to twist and torment her handkerchief as Ashe had seen her do once before, the small white teeth pressed upon the lower lip—then suddenly she turned ...
— The Marriage of William Ashe • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... persisted in refusing him information, and in a deadly rage he plunged his sword into her breast." Wallace clinched his hands over his face, and Halbert went on. "Before he aimed a second blow, I had broken from the men who held me, and thrown myself on her bosom; but all could not save her; the villain's sword had ...
— The Scottish Chiefs • Miss Jane Porter
... of a truth a merciful fashion which turns night into day. Yes, Margery, for one whose first desire is to forget many matters, this Paris is a place of delight. I have drunk deep of the wine-cup, but I would call any man villain who should say that I am drunk. Can I not write as well as ever another—and this I know, that if I sold myself it was not cheap. It has cost me my love, and whereas it was great the void is great to fill. Wherefore I say: 'Bring hither all that giveth ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... voice; he was irascible in temper, and was never the "philosopher" which those who least knew him credited him with being. In an angry letter published in his own newspaper he referred to the editor of The Daily Times as "that little villain, Raymond;" and replying to an offensive charge against him by The Evening Post, he began with, "You lie, villain, wilfully, wickedly, basely lie." Other passages at arms like these occasionally enlivened, if they did not disfigure, the editorial columns of The Tribune, over which Greeley ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 4 of 8 • Various
... time. To say that he was absorbed in his son is to state the case in the mildest imaginable form. The love in this old man's heart for his reckless, happy-souled offspring was of that higher order which stops at nothing. There is a love that worketh wonders, and the same love can make a villain of ...
— Tomaso's Fortune and Other Stories • Henry Seton Merriman
... and one must obey one's bookseller. I trust Murray will pass the Paddington Canal without being seduced by Payne and Mackinlay's example,—I say Payne and Mackinlay, supposing that the partnership held good. Drury, the villain, has not written to me; "I am never (as Mrs. Lumpkin [5] says to Tony) to be gratified with the monster's dear ...
— The Works of Lord Byron: Letters and Journals, Volume 2. • Lord Byron
... Kean would consent to appear in that character which he acted with such consummate skill, The Gentleman Villain, he practiced constantly before a glass, studying expression for a year and a half. When he appeared upon the stage, Byron, who went to see him with Moore, said he never looked upon so fearful and wicked a face. As the great actor went on to delineate the terrible consequences of ...
— Architects of Fate - or, Steps to Success and Power • Orison Swett Marden
... require either society or war for their Working, and the actions regarding these are thought to exclude rest; those of war entirely, because no one chooses war, nor prepares for war, for war's sake: he would indeed be thought a bloodthirsty villain who should make enemies of his friends to secure the existence of fighting and bloodshed. The Working also of the statesman excludes the idea of rest, and, beside the actual work of government, seeks for power and dignities or at least ...
— Ethics • Aristotle
... genial, that his impertinence was insulated. Certainly the master-carpenter was not unpopular, and people could not easily resist the grip of his physical influence, while mentally he was far indeed from being deficient. He looked as little like a villain as a man could, and yet—and yet—a nature like that of George Masson (even the little Clerk could see that) was not capable of being true beyond the minute in which he took his oath of fidelity. While the fit of willingness was on him he would be true; yet in reality there ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... have seen or heard anything of an Indian, an atrocious villain who has escaped from justice, and is supposed to have taken the path by this up the mountains?" asked ...
— Manco, the Peruvian Chief - An Englishman's Adventures in the Country of the Incas • W.H.G. Kingston
... would-be avenger long seeks in vain for the author of the wrong. But at last the dead woman's hairpin turns into a butterfly, and serves as a guide to vengeance by hovering above the place where the villain is hiding. ...
— Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things • Lafcadio Hearn
... has made her husband a brute, or, failing to save him, that she escape with untarnished honor from his polluting arms. What signifies the right to be a woman to her who must endure the daily contact of a social villain, if it be not to have all human virtue as her ally when she snaps the tie that binds her to him, and vindicates the Divine validity of marriage by breaking the fetters of the fatal sham? What is involved in ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... so keen a friend," he said; "but, Mr. Ogilvy, it is devil's work you are pleading. Am I to return to my people to act a living lie before them to the end of my days? Do you really think that God devastated a glen to give me a chance of becoming a villain? No, sir, I am in His hands, and I will do what ...
— The Little Minister • J.M. Barrie
... opinion," Patty continued solemnly, "it was plainly premeditated. He is undoubtedly a villain in disguise, and he used his acquaintance with Miss McKay as a cloak to elude detection. My theory is this: He got Priscilla's name out of the catalogue, and came here intending to murder her for her jools; but when he saw how big she was he was scared and so ...
— When Patty Went to College • Jean Webster
... fled to their rooms and knelt in overwhelming gratitude to thank the God they worshipped for the mercy vouchsafed to those so near to them. He—the two-faced villain—held in his pocket at that moment the letter with which he meant to crush the woman who had dared ...
— Marion's Faith. • Charles King
... Welcker, Plunkett, Brooks, and all The ghastly crew who always are begriming With villain couplets every page and wall, Might be arrested and ...
— Black Beetles in Amber • Ambrose Bierce
... his associates, whose penetration he dreads, whose scorn he fears will follow a true knowledge of his pursuits. Demand of him what he thinks of himself, he will shrink from the question. Approach the bedside of this villain at the moment he is dying; ask him if he would be willing to recommence, at the same price, a life of similar agitation? If he is ingenuous, he will avow that he has tasted neither repose nor happiness; that each crime filled him with inquietude—that ...
— The System of Nature, Vol. 1 • Baron D'Holbach
... one bother oneself, Miss O'Connor, when bothering won't help? When the war is over, I shall buy Tim Doolan, my soldier servant, out. He is a vile, drunken villain; but I understand him, and he understands me, and he blubbered so, when he carried me off the field, that I had to promise him that, if a French bullet did not carry him off, I would send for him when the ...
— Under Wellington's Command - A Tale of the Peninsular War • G. A. Henty
... stuff as the anathemas he constantly cast against the integrity of the orthodox clergy. The point that she grasped was that he believed the thing that he said. She had at first assumed that should he propose to institute polygamy she would know then, once for all, that he was a villain; but now this test deserted her. He was meditating this step, and it seemed that his arguments, if the facts on which he based them were admitted, had ...
— The Mormon Prophet • Lily Dougall
... told everything to the priest, and he has explained to her satisfaction wherein I am a fool,—a malicious, blaspheming, dangerous villain, and a stupendous ass. And he is right. Perhaps, in time,—a long time,—I may learn that insulting people's religion isn't ...
— The Pines of Lory • John Ames Mitchell
... him to the utmost. In vain my friends warned me. I turned from them, and quarreled with most of them. In my madness I refused to listen to the entreaties of my poor wife, and turned even against you. I can not bear to allude to those mournful days when you denounced that villain to his face before me; when I ordered you to beg his pardon or leave my roof forever; when you chose the latter alternative and became an outcast. My noble boy—my true-hearted son, that last look of yours, with all its reproach, is haunting my dying hours. If you were only near me now how peacefully ...
— Cord and Creese • James de Mille
... got to say to this?" demanded Captain Barber of the villain, in tones of righteous ...
— A Master Of Craft • W. W. Jacobs
... "Ye black-faced villain! 'T is the strength of the righteous you have felt this day. Blessed be the name of the Lord, who hath given me the victory! Lie there in your sins, and no ...
— Prisoners of Chance - The Story of What Befell Geoffrey Benteen, Borderman, - through His Love for a Lady of France • Randall Parrish
... ruffians always come to grief. When the lorn damsel, with a frantic screech, And cheeks as hueless as a brandy-peach, Cries, "Help, kyind Heaven!" and drops upon her knees On the green—baize,—beneath the (canvas) trees,— See to her side avenging Valor fly:— "Ha! Villain! Draw! Now, Terraitorr, yield or die!" When the poor hero flounders in despair, Some dear lost uncle turns up millionaire, Clasps the young scapegrace with paternal joy, Sobs on his neck, "My boy! ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... villain!" shrieked the old man. "It is on your account that I am in trouble. I dare not go ...
— Debit and Credit - Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag • Gustav Freytag
... in at last, and marched straight up to Riley, who let go his hold and backed off. "You mean, cowardly, pitiful villain!" broke out ...
— The Hoosier School-boy • Edward Eggleston
... from the doubtful; and since most have shown a disposition to revolt, say you are come to warn his Imperial Majesty against those dangerous men. Thus you will make those appear as traitors, who are labouring to represent you as a false villain. At the Imperial Court, a man is sure to be welcome with 40,000 ducats, and Friedland will be again as he was at the first."—"The advice is good," said Wallenstein, after a pause, "but let ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... little son stood by, and his mother, as the quickest way out of the difficulty, told him to run down to the cellar and whisper to his father to come and bind the robber. On his way the poor little fellow met the other villain, who had got rid of his host by some excuse, and was now coming up-stairs to help his comrade. Well, the sight of the boy running towards him made him suspicious, so he stopped him and took him back with him into the mill. When the soldier reached the room where he had left his comrade, he ...
— The Young Carpenters of Freiberg - A Tale of the Thirty Years' War • Anonymous
... by his speech and laughter, was in such despair with grief and shame, that she called him villain, traitor, and deceiver a thousand times over, and tried to throw herself out of bed to search for a knife in order to kill herself, since she was so unfortunate as to have lost her honour through a man whom she did not love, and who to be revenged ...
— The Tales Of The Heptameron, Vol. II. (of V.) • Margaret, Queen Of Navarre
... the indulgent mistress, were now no more. In vain she flattered herself that the injury she had done her husband would for ever remain one of those secrets which can only be disclosed at the last day. Vengeance pursued her steps, she was lost; the villain to whom she had sacrificed herself boasted of the favours he had received. The fatal report was conveyed to her injured husband. He refused to believe what he thought impossible, but honour obliged him to call the boaster to the field. The wretch received the challenge ...
— The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume I (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz
... islands known as Haabai. Had Melton known that this man Doyle was an escaped convict from Van Dieman's Land, he would at least have been careful; had he known that the man was, in addition, a treacherous and bloodthirsty villain, he would have hove-up anchor, and, sailing away, escaped his fate. But Doyle, in his note, enumerated the advantages that would accrue to him (Melton) by assisting the chief, and the seaman fell into the trap. "You must try," said the writer of the letter, "to send at ...
— The Adventure Of Elizabeth Morey, of New York - 1901 • Louis Becke
... it means too much. I will not take it as meaning what it used to mean." He did not know how to go on with his speech, or in truth what to say to her. Florence Burton was still present to his mind, and from minute to minute he told himself that he would not become a villain. But now it had come to that with him, that he would have given all that he had in the world that he had never gone to Stratton. He sat down by her in silence, looking away from her at the fire, swearing to himself that he would not become a villain, ...
— The Claverings • Anthony Trollope
... comfort of my age! Lured by a villain from her native home, Is cast, abandoned, on the world's wild stage, And doomed in scanty ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 3 - Sorrow and Consolation • Various
... from flyin' away with us. The first is to feed him to the sharks and the second is to treat him like a long-lost brother. I know he ought to be hove overboard, but I ain't got the heart to kill him in cold blood. Consequently, we got to let the villain live, an' if you go to beatin' him up, Mac, you'll make him sore an' he'll peach on us when we get to Honolulu. If us three could get back to San Francisco with clean hands, I'd say lick the beggar an' lick him for fair. But we got to remember that this mate was one o' the original filibuster ...
— Captain Scraggs - or, The Green-Pea Pirates • Peter B. Kyne
... the Speeches of the King in this Scene to his Ambassadors Cornelius and Voltimand, and to Laertes, and to Prince Hamlet, are entirely Fawning, and full of Dissimulation, and makes him well deserve the Character which the Prince afterwards gives him, of smiling, damn'd Villain, &c. when he is ...
— Some Remarks on the Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, Written by Mr. William Shakespeare (1736) • Anonymous
... price of his secrecy and of his assistance. The committee, incensed by the treachery and appalled by the danger, knew not what course to take. But Clive was more than Omichund's match in Omichund's own arts. The man, he said, was a villain. Any artifice which would defeat such knavery was justifiable. The best course would be to promise what was asked. Omichund would soon be at their mercy; and then they might punish him by withholding from him, not only the bribe which he now demanded, but ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... a tribe o' the Blackfeet, but his great enemy Rushin' River has sworn to scalp him if he gets hold of him, so we've done our best to hold him back—daddy an' me—for it would be of no use preachin' to such a double-dyed villain ...
— The Prairie Chief • R.M. Ballantyne
... ask you the minute I got here," answered Dixon; and Marcy judged, by the furtive manner in which he looked around to make sure there was no one within earshot, that he did not want anybody else to know what he had to say. "Has Rodney anything in common with that villain, Bud Goble?" ...
— True To His Colors • Harry Castlemon
... blackened by the suspicion of a still darker crime. She shuddered at the thought of the villain from whose snare she had been rescued: and yet, his image as he had been to her in the brief golden time when she believed him noble, and chivalrous, and true, haunted her lonely days, mixed itself with her troubled dreams, came between her ...
— Phantom Fortune, A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... scene before her. A soft flush came and went in her cheeks. She clutched the programme that had been given her at the door tightly in one hand. She had made no move to open it. She had no time to waste on programmes. Once, at a very exciting moment, when the villain was eavesdropping within a hand's distance of the handsome Earl of the piece, she grabbed Mr. Bennet's arm and squeezed it painfully, almost totally ...
— The Heart of Arethusa • Francis Barton Fox
... be a great favour. It will disarrange my most cherished plans for unmasking a villain if you make a sign ...
— Against Odds - A Detective Story • Lawrence L. Lynch
... of a mob, he has aspired to achieve renown by defaming women. He has incited the populace to asperse the good name of my honored mother, and by Heaven, he shall suffer for every opprobrious word that has fallen from the tongue of every base-born villain that ...
— Prince Eugene and His Times • L. Muhlbach
... "This is the villain who pretended to quarrel with his master and leave him," said the man who had knocked the Kaffir down. "I told Van Ormon to send him off with the others, but he was sure the fellow did not wish to assist them, and could not if he would. By his folly our game has been nearly lost. ...
— The Giraffe Hunters • Mayne Reid
... and an expression of bitter resentment overspread his face. "To me he was a villain and a scoundrel—the Kingdom of Heaven be his! It was through looking at him and listening to him that I became an actor. By his art he lured me from the parental home, he enticed me with the excitements of an actor's life, promised me all sorts of things—and ...
— The Schoolmaster and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... But most of all he blamed this unknown husband of hers, who, after consenting to a marriage, had chosen to insult and revile her. What he thought he did not choose to say, but to himself he registered a vow that, if he could ever find out this villain, he would avenge all Zillah's wrongs in his heart's blood, which vow brought to his heart a ...
— The Cryptogram - A Novel • James De Mille
... reached the establishment of that familiar merchant, "hand up that little box, you old villain! ...
— The Adventures of a Three-Guinea Watch • Talbot Baines Reed
... sure of this, that in the eye of God she is his widow. Herbert Fitzgerald was brought up as the heir to all that estate, and I cannot see that he can fairly be robbed of that right because another man has been a villain. The title he cannot have, I suppose, because the law won't give it him; but the property can be made over to him, and as far as I am concerned it shall be made over. No earthly consideration shall induce me to put my hand upon it, for ...
— Castle Richmond • Anthony Trollope
... lie well within their shallow incapacities, methinks, to impute to Francis Bacon, Barrister of Gray's Inn, Member of Parliament for Melcombe, Reversionary Clerk of the Star Chamber, the friend of the Earl of Essex—to impute to me, I say, these frothings of a villain player—this Shake—eh? What?" ...
— The Panchronicon • Harold Steele Mackaye
... had in his service, as you know already who have read this record of mine, a fellow named Maleotti that was of great use to his master—a brisk, insidious villain that was ever on good terms with all the world, and never on such good terms with a man as when he was minded to do him an ill turn, assuming, of course, that such ill turn was to his own advantage or in the service ...
— The God of Love • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... dramatization of Colonel Carter. On one occasion the actor was appearing in his native town, and remembered an old negro and his wife, who had been body servants in his father's household, with a couple of seats in the theatre. As it happened, he was playing the part of the villain, and was largely concerned with treasons, stratagems and spoils. From time to time he caught a glimpse of the ancient couple in the gallery, and judged from their fearsome countenance and popping eyes that they were ...
— Toaster's Handbook - Jokes, Stories, and Quotations • Peggy Edmund & Harold W. Williams, compilers
... haven't seen him from that day to this, the wicked villain; and, Mr. Anthony, he hasn't so much as written the poor dear ...
— The Plays of W. E. Henley and R. L. Stevenson
... ha! So you have decided to make your old uncle happy by marrying my neighbor's daughter. Gad! I remember my own wedding-day. Well, well; we won't talk about that now, but hark ye, you young villain, if you don't marry the girl, I cut ...
— Punchinello, Volume 2, No. 37, December 10, 1870 • Various
... that a moment's relaxation of grasp would enable his antagonist to turn the muzzle over his shoulder. Maximilian, on the other hand, now perfectly awake, and with the benefit of that self- possession which the other so entirely wanted, felt the nervous tremor in the villain's hands; and, profiting by this moment of indecision, made a desperate effort, released one arm, which he used with so much effect as immediately to liberate the other, and then intercepting the passage to the stairs, wheeled round upon his murderous enemy, ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey
... from his seat in fury. But just then, as he sprang up, the wire tore through his ear, and the red blood flowed down upon his fine white ruff, whereat the others burst out into a yell of laughter, which increased the villain's ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V2 • William Mienhold
... you young villain!" the councillor shouted. "Do you try to persuade me that the Prince of Orange would have intrusted documents of such importance to the first boy he met in the street? In the first place you must ...
— By Pike and Dyke: A Tale of the Rise of the Dutch Republic • G.A. Henty
... 'How do you dare?' and striking the desperado once, twice, upon the temple felled him like a beast upon the turf. For a moment the villain lay, as if he had received his death-blow; then he moved, raised himself, and was upon his feet again. At first he reeled and staggered, though not from brandy; and putting his hand to his hip he drew his knife. Roland ...
— The Four Canadian Highwaymen • Joseph Edmund Collins
... Marne listened, with tears in his eyes, to this recital, he exclaimed: "That villain of a director, I will be the ruin of him!" He forgot that it was the hospital he would ruin, and that he would thus put out perhaps a hundred patients, all as poor and as sick as poor Jacques, and whose condition, had he recollected ...
— Tales for Young and Old • Various
... abominable a crime as this impossible to him. Tingling with anger and shame, I went straight up that stair, the cards in my hand, and I taxed him with this lowest and meanest of all the crimes to which a villain could descend. ...
— Rodney Stone • Arthur Conan Doyle
... Italian—" "Frenchman, Frank," she interposed—"that foreigner, who ought to have been shot for insulting you, that Locateli, followed you to Paris and mixed up in your affairs! And you say he had you pushed out of the Opera? The intriguing villain! How did ...
— Melomaniacs • James Huneker
... demeanour, may always convince an assiduous admirer that his attentions are not well received, and at once and for ever stop all familiar advances. In case of insult, a wife should immediately make her husband acquainted therewith; as the only chance of safety to a villain lies in the concealment of such things by a lady from dread of consequences to her husband. From that moment he has her at advantage, and may very likely work on deliberately to the undermining of her character. He is thus enabled to play upon her fears, ...
— Routledge's Manual of Etiquette • George Routledge
... reversed; he sees the past sections of his life, however spacious heretofore, crowding up and narrowing into vanishing points to his immediate eye. And such also they become for the public. The villain, who walks, like AEneas at Carthage, shrouded in mist, is as little pursued by any bad report for his forgotten misdeeds as he is usually by remorse. In the process of losing their relation to any known and visible person, acts of fraud, robbery, murder, lose all distinct ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. II (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey
... you may find it out, for yet it lies Directly south a furlong from our palace! It may be known—hard-by an ancient stoop,[71] Where grew an oak in elder days decay'd; There will we that you watch; there shall you see A villain traitor mount out of a vault. Bring him to us; it is th'Earl Palurin. What is his fault, neither shall you inquire, Nor list we to disclose. These cursed eyes Have seen the flame, this heart hath felt the fire That cannot else be quench'd but with his blood. This must be done: this will ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VII (4th edition) • Various
... -stigen), to step down, descend. nedt, downwards. nej, no. nek|a (-ade, -at), to deny, refuse. nerifrn, from below. ner, see ned. nere, down. nick|a (-ade, -at), to nod. nidingsdd (-et,—), villainous deed. niding (-en, -ar), outlaw, villain. nidingsfunder, no sing., malicious artifices. nidingsstng (-en, -stnger), niding post, pillory. njuta (njt, njutit, njuten), to enjoy. nog, indeed, enough. noga, careful, carefully. nord (-en), ...
— Fritiofs Saga • Esaias Tegner
... the author of the lines I held in my hand. If they came from a credible person—but how could they do so and be written and posted up in the manner they were? An honest man does not seek any such roundabout way to strike his blow. Only a coward or a villain would take this method to arouse public curiosity, and perhaps ...
— The Mill Mystery • Anna Katharine Green
... The villain's only hold on her had been the letters, so he went to South Africa and was gored by an elephant, thus ...
— Bab: A Sub-Deb • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... Jewish writers as monotonously rebuke theirs. "You only have I known among all the families of the earth," says the message through Amos. "Therefore I will visit upon you all your iniquities." The Bible, as I have said before, is an anti-Semitic book. "Israel is the villain, not the hero, of his own story." Alone among epics, it is out for truth, not high heroics. To flout the Pharisees was not reserved for Jesus. "Behold, ye fast for strife and contention," said Isaiah, "and to smite with the fist of wickedness." While some German writers, not content with the great ...
— Chosen Peoples • Israel Zangwill
... character of a specious villain, in the regiment of Othello, who is so base as to hate his commander on mere suspicion, and to impose on his best friend. Of such characters, it is to be feared, there are thousands in the world, and the one in question may present to us a ...
— Customs and Fashions in Old New England • Alice Morse Earle |
