"Wry" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... moment with a little wry smile. "In my case they were serious. There was a woman of hysterical temperament with a diseased imagination. I was overworked and a trifle overwrought, and had a glass of brandy too much at a certain committee lunch. Then there was a rather ...
— The Greater Power • Harold Bindloss
... upon comparison be found remarkably distinct." Beattie also had commented on "that wonderfully penetrating and plastic faculty, which is capable of representing every species of character, not as our ordinary poets do, by a high shoulder, a wry mouth, or gigantic stature, but by hitting off, with a delicate hand, the distinguishing feature, and that in such a manner as makes it easily known from all others whatsoever, however similar to a superficial eye." (Quoted in Drake's "Memorials of Shakespeare," 1828, p. 255.) Richard Cumberland ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... rather a fowling for the people's delight, or their fooling. For, as Aristotle says rightly, the moving of laughter is a fault in comedy, a kind of turpitude that depraves some part of a man's nature without a disease. As a wry face without pain moves laughter, or a deformed vizard, or a rude clown dressed in a lady's habit and using her actions; we dislike and scorn such representations which made the ancient philosophers ever think laughter unfitting ...
— Discoveries and Some Poems • Ben Jonson
... with a wry self-scornful smile that she recalled, later that day, the emotions of the ride home. If at any time before they got to the house, her father had repeated the old servant's question, "Are you home to stay, Mary?" she would, she ...
— Mary Wollaston • Henry Kitchell Webster
... would preach that to the factory inspectors," said Mr. Clarke, with a wry smile. "Between the poor mothers who are constantly trying to get the children into the factory, and the inspectors who are trying to keep them out, I ...
— Calvary Alley • Alice Hegan Rice
... her, and bless her; here goes—ugh!" and his gratitude ended in a wry face; for the beer was muddy, and had a strange, medicinal twang ...
— The Cloister and the Hearth • Charles Reade
... along.... But she's beginning to cry 'sour grapes' already. Do you know what she said to Cupido yesterday? That she had come here with the idea of living all by herself, just to get away from people; and when the barber spoke to her of society in Alcira, she made a wry face, as much as to say the place was filled with no-accounts. That's what the women were talking most about last night. You can see why! She has always been the favorite of so ...
— The Torrent - Entre Naranjos • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... his course was interrupted not by a highwayman, but a river, whereon embarking, he began to catch salmon in a most surprisingly rapid manner, but just as he was about to haul in his fish it escaped from the hook, and the salmon, making wry faces at him, very impertinently exclaimed, "Sure, you wouldn't catch a poor, ignorant, Irish salmon?" He then snapped his pistols at the insolent fish—then his carriage breaks down, and he is suddenly transferred from the river to the road; thieves seize upon him and bind his ...
— Handy Andy, Volume One - A Tale of Irish Life, in Two Volumes • Samuel Lover
... rubbish and ore very dexterously; excepting one unlucky little chap, who, from the beginning, had his head, somehow or other, turned the wrong way upon his shoulders; and I could never manage, all the night, to set it right again: it was in vain I flattered myself that his wry neck would escape observation; for, as he was one of the wheelbarrow boys, he was a conspicuous figure in the piece; and, whenever he appeared, wheeling or emptying his barrow, I to my mortification heard repeated ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth
... When they spied her peeping: Came towards her hobbling, Flying, running, leaping, Puffing and blowing, Chuckling, clapping, crowing, Clucking and gobbling, Mopping and mowing, Full of airs and graces, Pulling wry faces, Demure grimaces, Cat-like and rat-like, Ratel and wombat-like, Snail-paced in a hurry, Parrot-voiced and whistler, Helter-skelter, hurry-skurry, Chattering like magpies, Fluttering like pigeons, ...
— Poems • Christina G. Rossetti
... I then, sunk in tone, "I am merest mimicker and counterfeit! - Though thinking, I AM I AND WHAT I DO I DO MYSELF ALONE." —The cynic twist of the page thereat unknit Back to its normal figure, having wrought its purport wry, The Mage's mirror left the window-square, And the stained moon and drift retook ...
— Moments of Vision • Thomas Hardy
... had never tasted schiedam before, though he took his diluted with water, made wry faces at what he considered its nauseous taste, but he said nothing for fear of offending the captain and crew of the sloop. At length he declared that he ...
— Voyages and Travels of Count Funnibos and Baron Stilkin • William H. G. Kingston
... deformed body against her bosom for a while, then relaxing her arms, turned towards the small window in the eaves. "My dear," she answered with a wry smile, "it had to come, you see, and now we must go through ...
— Hetty Wesley • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... like a little baked apple, all wrinkled up; but it's right sweet. Ugh!" added Horace, making a wry face; "you better look out when they're green: they pucker your mouth up a good deal ...
— Captain Horace • Sophie May
... these pillaging soldiers. The ages of their warriors are distinguished by the space of ground which their coffin occupies. The women, bathed in tears, come to throw themselves around these mausoleums. Their gestures, wry faces, and harmonious sobs, form a very ridiculous spectacle. A traveller should never pass before these tombs, without depositing there his staff; and, after a short prayer, he raises around the tomb heaps of stones, which are evidences ...
— Perils and Captivity • Charlotte-Adelaide [nee Picard] Dard
... enough in some of the miller's garments; but he was none the worse for his bath in the river. He, too, had been dosed with hot tea by Aunt Alvirah, though he made a wry face ...
— Ruth Fielding in Moving Pictures - Or Helping The Dormitory Fund • Alice Emerson
... prize. Captain Schank ordered me to proceed on board and take possession. I felt, I must confess, almost as surprised as a mouse would do at conquering a lion. The French captain, however, with becoming politeness though with somewhat a wry face, presented me with his sword, and we found ourselves in possession of a forty-four gun frigate, measuring upwards of one thousand tons, and a crew of three hundred and fifty men. Besides Frenchmen, there were on board several Englishmen, who formed part of the crew of an Indiaman the frigate ...
— Ben Burton - Born and Bred at Sea • W. H. G. Kingston
... him from making something of a wry face as he hastily answered, "By all means." He beckoned discreetly to Robin Turgis, who, making a wide circle round Master Franois, stole to the king's side, received from him another coin and hastened away to bring the drink ...
— If I Were King • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... the side caught him under the chin, and his mates hauled him on board again by the head, as it were. He was wont to make a jest of it afterward, saying that he was not likely to be hanged twice, but he had a wry neck ...
— Havelok The Dane - A Legend of Old Grimsby and Lincoln • Charles Whistler
... intruders by the scuff of the neck back into the sea—hundreds, thousands, of half-naked, tawny-skinned savages welcoming the white men back to the islands discovered by them. Chief among the visitors to the ship was Koah, a little, old, emaciated, shifty-eyed priest with a wry neck and a scaly, leprous skin, who at once led the small boats ashore, driving the throngs back with a magic wand and drawing a mystic circle with his wizard stick round a piece of ground near the Morai, or burying-place, where the white men could erect their tents beside ...
— Vikings of the Pacific - The Adventures of the Explorers who Came from the West, Eastward • Agnes C. Laut
... her in amazement. How mad she was; it amused him to see her. She had always been so very refined, but now she could never make a wry face again when his father rapped out an oath or two. Besides, he never meant any harm by it, but she was furious to-day—ugh! He put his arm round her waist and said jokingly, "H'm, the Pani is in a bad ...
— Absolution • Clara Viebig
... declared himself perfectly reassured concerning the intentions of his august host; he thanked Messieurs Comtois and Bourguignon for the devotion of which each in turn had given him a proof, and begged them to wait upon him in their turn. The two servants made wry faces, but obeyed. It will be understood that the happy disposition in which Buvat now was became more blissful under the influence of a good dinner. Buvat ate all the eatables, drank all the drinkables, ...
— The Conspirators - The Chevalier d'Harmental • Alexandre Dumas (Pere)
... Corporal, with a wry face; "Well, Sir, if I had had the dressing of you—been half way to Yorkshire by this. Man's a worm; and when a doctor gets un on his hook, he is sure to angle for the devil ...
— Eugene Aram, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... believe it," rejoined Little, with a wry smile. "True, though, Miss, and he said he'd look in on us again before ...
— Gold Out of Celebes • Aylward Edward Dingle
... to any other party,"—Janet laughed—"unless you'd call the church fair at Old Chester a party, and I don't. I call it a nightmare." She made a wry face as ...
— Phyllis - A Twin • Dorothy Whitehill
... the strongest fortifications of reinforced concrete, our military authorities promptly acquired. Must we be ashamed of this instrument of destruction and take from the lips of the "cultured world" the wry reproach that from "Faust" and the Ninth Symphony we have sunk our national pride to the 42-centimeter guns? No! Only firm will and determination to achieve, that is to say, German power, distinguishes the host of warriors ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War, Vol 2, No. 1, April, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... Cairo Story of the First Lunatic Story of the Second Lunatic Story of the Retired Sage and His Pupil, Related to the Sultan by the Second Lunatic Story of the Broken-backed Schoolmaster Story of the Wry-mouthed Schoolmaster Story of the Sisters and the Sultana Their Mother Story of the Bang-eater and the Cauzee Story of the Bang-eater and His Wife The Sultan and the Traveller Mhamood Al Hyjemmee ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Complete • Anonymous
... drew up the engagement in duplicate. Ashmead then borrowed the music and came back to the inn triumphant. He waved the agreement over his head, then submitted it to her. She glanced at it, made a wry face, and said, "Two months! I never dreamed of ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade
... Khiftan civilization—by courtesy so called!" Tortha Karf pulled a wry face. "I suppose the intra-family enmities of the Hvadka Dynasty have reached critical mass again. They'll fool around till they blast themselves ...
— Police Operation • H. Beam Piper
... a second. "There isn't any good in so much of it, all at once," he said, using almost exactly the same words which Kate had used to him about the port wine. There may have been good produced by the small quantity to which he listened, as there is good from the physic which children take with wry faces, most ...
— Can You Forgive Her? • Anthony Trollope
... the mayor, a wry smile beginning to twist at the corners of his mouth, "that I may have the militia and the people and the politicians well out of it, but considering the mess, as it concerns me, myself, I'm only beginning to be good ...
— All-Wool Morrison • Holman Day
... Philippina made a wry face. Jason Philip, however, was little inclined to play the role of an avenging power: he had something new on the ...
— The Goose Man • Jacob Wassermann
... three-mile pray'rs, an' half-mile graces, Wi' weel-spread looves, an' lang, wry faces; Grunt up a solemn, lengthen'd groan, And damn a' parties but your own; I'll warrant they ye're nae deceiver, A steady, ...
— Poems And Songs Of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... sea-sickness is for many people hard to bear; and the rough life that must be led is little suitable for the nobility":[27] which, of all babyish utterances that ever fell from any public man, may surely bear the bell. Scarcely disembarked, he followed his victor, with such wry face as we may fancy, through the streets of holiday London. And then the doors closed upon his last day of garish life for more than a quarter of a century. After a boyhood passed in the dissipations of a luxurious court or in the camp of war, his ears ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 3 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... wry face. He wanted the Seals. It was a long-cherished desire. A teacher of law under the Empire, he gave, in cafes, lessons that were appreciated. He had the sense of chicanery. Having begun his political fortune with ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... the song was begun, however, the besieged replied with the second line; and so long as they were able to do this, they were safe. The two antagonists were the best hands in the country for a song, and their stock seemed inexhaustible. Once or twice the flaxdresser made a wry face, frowned, and turned to the women with a disappointed look. The grave-digger sang something so old that his adversary had forgotten it, or perhaps had never known it; but instantly the good woman took up the ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 444 - Volume 18, New Series, July 3, 1852 • Various
... sleep this off somewhere," murmured the professor with a wry smile. "Mustn't let it get ahead of me. Mustn't make any more mistakes. This needs ...
— The Window-Gazer • Isabel Ecclestone Mackay
... and then made a wry face on account of the pain in his leg. "That leaves Arnold in a pickle. 'Taint the height o' military etiquette to resign under fire. I wish Arnold ...
— Rodney, the Ranger - With Daniel Morgan on Trail and Battlefield • John V. Lane
... cutting. As his voice was unheeded, he came scolding down the tree, jumped off one of the lower limbs, and took refuge in a young pine that stood near by. From time to time he came out on the top of the limb nearest to us, and, with a wry face, fierce whiskers, and violent gestures, directed a torrent of abuse at the axemen who were delivering death-blows to ...
— Wild Life on the Rockies • Enos A. Mills
... his lips and swallowed three or four times. He sat afterward making a wry face, his full eyes blinking. But gradually a faint bit of colour made his pasty cheeks something less dead-white, and the powerful raw corn whiskey injected into his blood a ...
— The Everlasting Whisper • Jackson Gregory
... the black baby, but Charley made a wry face and said "Pah!" That amused Flora, and she ran after Charley and insisted upon his kissing Dinah, but before she knew it, Charley caught her in his arms and left a kiss on the tip of her nose. He did not mean to leave it there, he was trying to put it on her cheek, but the ...
— Baby Pitcher's Trials - Little Pitcher Stories • Mrs. May
... making hideous grimaces at me, and performing the most antic homage, as if they thought I expected reverence, and meant to humour me like a maniac. But ever, as soon as one cast his eyes on the shadow behind me, he made a wry face, partly of pity, partly of contempt, and looked ashamed, as if he had been caught doing something inhuman; then, throwing down his handful of gold, and ceasing all his grimaces, he stood aside ...
— Phantastes - A Faerie Romance for Men and Women • George MacDonald
... at the top corner of the table, so that I saw their faces well. Madgett, the Home Secretary, a smaller man with wrinkled eyebrows and a frozen smile on his thin wry mouth, came next to Carton; he contributed little to the discussion save intelligent comments, and when the electric lights above glowed out, the shadows deepened queerly in his eye-sockets and gave him the quizzical expression of an ironical goblin. ...
— In the Days of the Comet • H. G. Wells
... got it all," said Mrs. Ford with a wry smile, "just running about twenty feet from ...
— The Outdoor Girls at Bluff Point - Or a Wreck and a Rescue • Laura Lee Hope
... old, hump-backed, wry-necked chap hoisting his face up as if trying to look into a basket on ...
— Bart Ridgeley - A Story of Northern Ohio • A. G. Riddle
... scents and sounds, and within a cool doorway, before which the shadow of a barber's pole rested on the cobbles, reclined Captain John Barker—a little wry-necked gentleman, with a prodigious hump between his shoulders, and legs that dangled two inches off the floor. His wig was being curled by an apprentice at the back of the shop, and his natural scalp shone as bare as a billiard-ball; but two patches of brindled grey hair stuck out from his brow ...
— The Blue Pavilions • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... unwillingly, and with a wry face, drank the mixture. As he gave her back the glass, his eye rested on a picture that had been hidden before by the curtain; it was a ship and some small boats at sea. In a moment the something that he had been trying to remember ...
— Charlie Scott - or, There's Time Enough • Unknown
... for Mr. Brook, which the coachman emptied at a draught; but after having done so he made a wry face, and looked ...
— Run to Earth - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... you know. I shall not decide whether you or Dent must inherit this; decide for yourselves; I imagine you will end it in the quarrel. How black it is, and what black sermons flew out of it—ravens, instead of white doves, of the Holy Spirit. He was the friend of Jonathan Edwards." She made a wry face as he put the box back into the closet; and she laughed again as she locked ...
— The Mettle of the Pasture • James Lane Allen
... work rehearsing the little play. "We'd give that up, Mamsie," cried Polly, though Joel made a wry face as he agreed to it, "but the ...
— The Adventures of Joel Pepper • Margaret Sidney
... make a few wry faces, as she does when swallowing magnesia, but the dose will go down. There is some credit due to a wife who improves the intellect of her husband; aye, and there is some pride in it also. Girls should marry. Matrimony is like an old oak; age gives durability ...
— She Would Be a Soldier - The Plains of Chippewa • Mordecai Manuel Noah
... stood over her, holding a small glass to her lips. Tessie drank it obediently, made a wry little face, coughed, wiped her eyes, and sat up. She looked from one to the other, like a trapped little animal. She put a hand to her ...
— One Basket • Edna Ferber
... he, with a wry smile, "'tis the women that have the tongues, and that can't he stopped from usin' them. Even the boss ...
— King Coal - A Novel • Upton Sinclair
... this domesticating of their art? We are not told of the wry face they made when, with ideals in their souls, they were set to compose chair-seats for the Pompadour. Her preference was for Boucher. Perhaps his revenge showed itself by treating the bourgeoise courtisane to a bit of ...
— The Tapestry Book • Helen Churchill Candee
... they object to the smell in the office; and we've had to take to cigarets. See! [She opens the box and takes out a cigaret, which she lights. She offers him one; but he shakes his head with a wry face. She settles herself comfortably in her chair, ...
— Mrs. Warren's Profession • George Bernard Shaw
... wry face at himself in the opposite mirror and shrugged his shoulders. Down the 'phone he said with excessive amiability, "Nothing. I'm ...
— The Kingdom Round the Corner - A Novel • Coningsby Dawson
... know first as last," said he, "for we have had enough trouble about that house. It was let last year for ninety; we're asking seventy because it is the house in which Mr. Minchin was shot dead. Still want to see it?" inquired the house-agent, with a wry smile. ...
— The Shadow of the Rope • E. W. Hornung
... her prisms, and made her look through a bit of tourmaline, and in every way conceivable to him strewed the path of learning with flowers—then she began to feel a little interest in the place and left off making wry faces at the dirt ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 17, - No. 97, January, 1876 • Various
... time will do," he said, bending over the papers spread out before him—the papers in the case of the General Traction Company resisting the payment of its taxes. A noisome odor seemed to be rising from the typewritten sheets. He made a wry face and flung the papers aside with a gesture of disgust. "They never do anything honest," he said to himself. "From the stock-jobbing owners down to the nickel-filching conductors they steal—steal—steal!" And then he wondered at, laughed at, his heat. What did it matter? An ant pilfering ...
— The Grain Of Dust - A Novel • David Graham Phillips
... most of the incidents relating to Gregg's party embraced in this chapter.] and Buck went in different directions to find water. Wood returned first with a bucketful, brackish and poor. Buck soon after arrived with a supply that looked much better, but when Gregg sampled it he made a wry face and asked Buck where he found it. He replied that he dipped it out of a smooth lake about a half mile distant. It was good plain salt water; they had discovered the mythical bay—or supposed they had. They credulously named it ...
— A Backward Glance at Eighty • Charles A. Murdock
... small, bare room Colonel Boyce sat himself down on a pallet bed and made a wry face at his son. "My poor, dear boy," he said, and shifted uneasily, and looked round at the stained walls and shivered. "It's damp, I ...
— The Highwayman • H.C. Bailey
... these little chits would do so well. Ugh, how disagreeable it is!' And mamma took her dose with a wry face, feeling that Aunt Betsey was siding with ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag • Louisa M. Alcott
... together, the awnings were spread, the mainbrace spliced, and other preparations made for passing the night. An extra allowance was served out to induce the men to swallow the quinine mixed with it; for though some made wry faces, their love of grog induced them to overcome their objection ...
— The Three Commanders • W.H.G. Kingston
... times to his bosom in convulsions of transport which shook his whole frame, sobbed hysterically, and at length, in the emphatic language of Scripture, lifted up his voice and wept aloud. Colonel Mannering had recourse to his handkerchief; Pleydell made wry faces, and wiped the glasses of his spectacles; and honest Dinmont, after two loud blubbering explosions, exclaimed, 'Deil's in the man! he's garr'd me do that I haena done since ...
— Guy Mannering, or The Astrologer, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... to the others with a wry grin. "Whew—that was a narrow squeak! I must say their ray is a gentlemenly sort of thing. It either kills you, or doesn't injure you at ...
— The Black Star Passes • John W Campbell
... establissements of Samara. There it was a pleasant effervescing drink, with only the slightest tinge of acidity; here it was a "still" liquid, strongly resembling very thin and very sour butter-milk. My Russian friend made a wry face on first tasting it, and I felt inclined at first to do likewise, but noticing that his grimaces made an unfavourable impression on the audience, I restrained my facial muscles, and looked as if I liked it. Very soon I really came to like it, and learned to "drink ...
— Russia • Donald Mackenzie Wallace
... n. A wry (and thoroughly unoffical) name for IBM's internal VNET system, deriving from its common use by IBMers to voice pointed criticism of IBM management that would be ...
— THE JARGON FILE, VERSION 2.9.10
... Velvet-paw ran up one of the apple-trees and began to eat an apple; it looked very good, for it had a bright red cheek, but it was hard and sour, not being ripe. "I do not like these big, sour berries," said she, making wry faces as she tried to get the bad taste out of her mouth by wiping her tongue on her fore-paw. Nimble had found some ripe currants; so he only laughed at poor Velvet for the ...
— Lady Mary and her Nurse • Catharine Parr Traill
... He became a drunkard, and was known as a man with a "grievance against the Government". Captain Frere, having had occasion for him in some capacity, had become in a manner his patron, and had got him the command of a schooner trading from Sydney. On getting this command—not without some wry faces on the part of the owner resident in Hobart Town—Blunt had taken the temperance pledge for the space of twelve months, and was a miserable dog in consequence. He was, however, a faithful henchman, for he hoped by Frere's means to get some "Government ...
— For the Term of His Natural Life • Marcus Clarke
... (To his young colleague, motioning him to serve Gloria.) This side, Jo. (He takes a special portion of salad from the service table and puts it beside Mrs. Clandon's plate. In doing so he observes that Dolly is making a wry face.) Only a bit of watercress, miss, got in by mistake. (He takes her salad away.) Thank you, miss. (To the young waiter, admonishing him to serve Dolly afresh.) Jo. (Resuming.) Mostly members of the Church of ...
— You Never Can Tell • [George] Bernard Shaw
... tailor, who set up for oculist, and was knighted by Queen Anne. This quack was employed both by Queen Anne and George I. Sir William could not read. He professed to cure wens, wry-necks and ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer
... and, in less time than it takes to tell it, down came Harry, fully twenty feet, on to the grass at his brother's and cousin's feet, where he remained, looking very white, frightened, and confused; when all at once he got up, and making a wry ...
— Hollowdell Grange - Holiday Hours in a Country Home • George Manville Fenn
... that I was, I would mark with pain the blush on Mrs. Manners's cheek, and clinch my fists as she tried to pass this off as a joke of her husband's. But Dolly, who sat next me at a side table, would make a wry little face ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... is clothed. With the ancients, and not less with the elder dramatists of England and France, both comedy and tragedy were considered as kinds of poetry. They neither sought in comedy to make us laugh merely, much less to make us laugh by wry faces, accidents of jargon, slang phrases for the day, or the clothing of commonplace morals in metaphors drawn from the shops or mechanic occupations of their characters; nor did they condescend in tragedy to wheedle away the applause of the spectators, ...
— Biographia Literaria • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... Since I cannot be a Russian, I became a Slavophil." He smiled a wry smile with the effort of one who feels he has made a ...
— The Possessed - or, The Devils • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... wit displayed itself in several practical jokes upon the commodore, with whom he knew it was dangerous to tamper in any other way. Being without the sphere of his vision, he securely pilfered his tobacco, drank his rumbo, made wry faces, and, to use the vulgar phrase, cocked his eye at him, to the no small entertainment of the spectators, Mr. Pickle himself not excepted, who gave evident tokens of uncommon satisfaction at the dexterity ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett
... the Laos, also a neighboring people, but inhuman. While he was begging charity from those most hard-hearted people, the king of Sian had introduced as king of Camboxa one Prauncar, nicknamed "Boca tuerta el Traydor" [i.e., "Wry-mouth, the Traitor"], brother of the conquered king. This event did not hinder the aid that the Spaniards were bringing, under the name of an embassy. They reached the city of Chordumulo, eighty leguas' ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XVI, 1609 • H.E. Blair
... his departure, by some article of clothing—a scarf, a spur, left by some fatal chance, and there comes a stroke of the dagger that severs the web so gallantly woven by their golden delights. But when one is full of days, he should not make a wry face at death, and the sword of a husband is a pleasant death for a gallant, if there be pleasant deaths. So may be will finish the merry ...
— Droll Stories, Volume 1 • Honore de Balzac
... repast with wry faces. When they had finished, one of the warriors, whom they had noticed before on account of his comparative height and the magnificence of his decorations, came up to them and addressed them, to their great surprise, ...
— Captain Jinks, Hero • Ernest Crosby
... facets. [4] I answered that this feature of the diamond was not so great a beauty as his Excellency supposed, but came from the point having been cropped. At these words my prince, who perceive that I was speaking the truth, made a wry face, and bade me give good heed to valuing the stone, and saying what I thought it worth. I reckoned that, since Landi had offered it to me for 17,000 crowns, the Duke might have got it for 15,000 at the highest; so, noticing that he would take it ill ...
— The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini • Benvenuto Cellini
... towel was fastened under her chin. The wives and youngsters sat down. First a drop to each; all drank to the health of the little first-communicant; they touched glasses. Father poured out and Horieneke had to drink too: she put the stuff to her lips, pulled a wry face and pushed the glass away. The boys dipped and soaked the bread in their coffee; and the wives started talking about their young days and about clothes and the old ways and the fine weather and the fruit-crop. Mother did nothing but ...
— The Path of Life • Stijn Streuvels
... easy thing to do," said Uncle Dan, setting down his glass of claret, with a wry face. He felt sure that the wine had been ...
— A Venetian June • Anna Fuller
... She made a wry pucker with her mouth, as though to advertise her ignorance of dressmaking. That she was frightened and bewildered, and that she was bravely striving to hide it, was quite ...
— The Sea-Wolf • Jack London
... to prevent it? You, too, my good Hermann, will be made to feel his lash. He will spit in your face when he meets you in the streets; and woe be to you should you venture to shrug your shoulders or to make a wry mouth. Look, my friend! this is all that your lovesuit, your prospects, and your mighty ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... cigarette, he strolled to the window at the end of the hall near his own door and, parting the curtains, looked out. Through the black fretwork of the acacias showed the thin crescent of the new moon, clean and sharp as a knife-blade. He made a wry face. He had seen the new moon through both ...
— Juggernaut • Alice Campbell
... only meal that day at her own table, kindly invited them to close it with another. The offer required no pressing, and in a few minutes the two were comfortably seated, and engaged in an employment that was only interrupted by an occasional wry face from the captain, who moved his body in evident pain. These interruptions, however, interfered but little with the principal business in hand; and the captain had got happily through with this important duty, before the surgeon returned to announce ...
— The Spy • James Fenimore Cooper
... the prospect of that flat, and all that it had come to mean; but—let me acknowledge it honestly—it was balm and relief to know that I could have a means of escape, and that at culminating moments of weariness, when everything seemed wry and disappointing, and the whole weight of seven storeys seemed to be pressing down on my brains, I could bang my door, turn the key, and fly off to peace and beauty, and a healing pandering ...
— The Lady of the Basement Flat • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... his sleep gaping and stretching backward his hind legs. Mae Munroe yawned, extending her arms at full length before her; regarded her fair ringed fingers and the four dimples across the back of each hand; reached for a cigarette and with the wry face of nausea tossed it back into its box; swung to a sitting posture on the side of the sofa, the dog springing from the curve of her arm to the floor, ...
— Every Soul Hath Its Song • Fannie Hurst
... next bloody-minded pirate," cried Ringan, and the next with a very wry face stood up. One of the others would have joined in, but, crying, "For shame, a fair field," I beat down ...
— Salute to Adventurers • John Buchan
... Nicholas Hogben said, 'sold 'un clear away.' He made a wry face, winked one eye, and drawing up the right corner of his mouth, displayed square, huge teeth. The young Poins making no question, he repeated twice: 'Clear away. Right ...
— Privy Seal - His Last Venture • Ford Madox Ford
... wartime. But explain why some people want to play with trip- hammers and loaded guns. We know they do. And so, though aware that there were spy-hunting listeners all around, a mad desire to utter the forbidden tongue obsessed me. Wry faces from Marie, emphasized by repeated pinches at each threatened outbreak, brought me back to ...
— In the Claws of the German Eagle • Albert Rhys Williams
... wry face at mention of his address. "We sort of belong to what they call the floating population now. Home with us means any old place where Mother happens to set her rocking chair. We've turned the ranch over to my daughter ...
— Georgina of the Rainbows • Annie Fellows Johnston
... Street for the rest of her life; especially since the offer was accompanied with no drawbacks, except the one trifle, that Esther must marry. That was an undoubtedly bitter pill to swallow; but the colonel swallowed it, and hardly made a wry face. He would be glad to get away from Major Street himself. So he ate his oysters, as I said, grimly; was certainly courteous, if also cool; and Pitt even succeeded in making the conversation flow passably well, which ...
— A Red Wallflower • Susan Warner
... hundreds. That in itself would signify nothing—and if I must take help from somebody I would rather take it from Celia Madden than anybody else I know—but this is the point, Mr. Thorpe. I do not eat the bread of dependence gracefully. I pull wry faces over it, and I don't try very much to disguise them. That is my fault. Yes—oh yes, I know it is a fault—but I am as I am. And if Miss Madden doesn't mind—why"—she concluded with a mirthless, uncertain laugh—"why on ...
— The Market-Place • Harold Frederic
... wry smile at Kit, and a touch of cynic humor, "you had right in going. The lieutenant would have had no pleasure in adding me to his elopement, and, as we hear,—your stolen trail carried you to ...
— The Treasure Trail - A Romance of the Land of Gold and Sunshine • Marah Ellis Ryan
... a wry face over the tea. It tasted flat, and she could well imagine the long-boiling kettle from which the water with which it had been made ...
— The Hermit of Far End • Margaret Pedler
... Zack, "hooray for family Art! I say, Blyth, which chalk do I begin with—the white or the black? The black—eh? Do I start with the what's his name's wry face? and if so, where am I to begin? With his eyes, or his nose, or his mouth, or the top of his head, or the bottom of ...
— Hide and Seek • Wilkie Collins
... thick, dark liquids from one bottle to the other and restore the bottles to their usual places in the cupboard. Time went on and I think that it was Ellen who had next to take a dose from the Bottle. It was then remarked that she neither shed tears nor made the usual wry faces. Nor yet did she appear in haste to seize and swallow the draught of consolatory coffee from the Old Squire's sympathetic hand. "Why, Nellie girl, you are getting to be quite brave," was his approving comment; and Ellen, with ...
— When Life Was Young - At the Old Farm in Maine • C. A. Stephens
... in practice at his age, with no connection, I did not at the moment enquire. Neither did Paragot. It was Paragot's easy way to leap to ends and let the means take care of themselves. He drained his glass meditatively and then with a wry face spat on ...
— The Beloved Vagabond • William J. Locke
... replied his companion with a wry smile, as he limped towards the scoring board. "You only want five ...
— With Haig on the Somme • D. H. Parry
... revel in the gin and rum, out of compliment to the guest, whose national drink it was; but Iskender was not deceived by their hilarity. Sitting at the opposite end of the room to his patron, he saw the wry faces which were turned away at every sip. Elias, quite beside himself with adulation, and intoxicated already by the success of his facetious sallies, drank and ...
— The Valley of the Kings • Marmaduke Pickthall
... would not be enough. There is bad blood on your hands; and nothing but good blood can cleanse them. Money is no use. Take it away. [She turns to Cusins]. Dolly: you must write another letter for me to the papers. [He makes a wry face]. Yes: I know you don't like it; but it must be done. The starvation this winter is beating us: everybody is unemployed. The General says we must close this shelter if we cant get more money. I force the collections ...
— Major Barbara • George Bernard Shaw
... different epoch. They travel by steam conveyance, yet with such a baggage of old Asiatic thoughts and superstitions as might check the locomotive in its course. Whatever is thought within the circuit of the Great Wall; what the wry-eyed, spectacled schoolmaster teaches in the hamlets round Pekin; religions so old that our language looks a halfling boy alongside; philosophy so wise that our best philosophers find things therein to wonder at; all this travelled alongside of me for thousands of miles over plain and mountain. ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 2 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... down the corners of his mouth in a wry deprecatory smile, eyes us obliquely under a crumpled brow, shrugs his shoulders, and shows us the ...
— A Modern Utopia • H. G. Wells
... walked apart a few paces, and, making a wry face, heroically swallowed the bitter draught, after which Mrs. Savine, ...
— Thurston of Orchard Valley • Harold Bindloss
... girl was running from the very queer-looking boy, and both were laughing loudly. When they saw the children sitting at the table they both stopped suddenly. The queer-looking girl turned and made a wry face at the very queer-looking boy. At this both burst out laughing, and suddenly ...
— Little Mr. Thimblefinger and His Queer Country • Joel Chandler Harris
... hemp-dresser made a wry face, contracted his brow, and turned toward the expectant housewives with a baffled air. The grave-digger was singing something so old that his adversary had forgotten it, or perhaps had never even heard it; but instantly the good gossips chanted the victorious ...
— The Devil's Pool • George Sand
... the business," Frank observed, and Jimmie made a wry face. "If this little nuisance hadn't seen the fuse burning, we ...
— Boy Scouts on Motorcycles - With the Flying Squadron • G. Harvey Ralphson
... bills, and trying to make five dollars do the work of fifteen," answered Ruth, with a wry smile. "Money ...
— The Moving Picture Girls - First Appearances in Photo Dramas • Laura Lee Hope |
