"Boaster" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... story untold; A worm deemed an idol if covered with gold. A dog in a gutter—a God on a throne: In slander electric—in justice a drone: A parrot in promise, and frail as a shade; A hooded immortal in life's masquerade; A sham-lacquered bauble, a bubble, a breath: A boaster in ...
— The Death of Saul and other Eisteddfod Prize Poems and Miscellaneous Verses • J. C. Manning
... "and I am willing to own that my people have many ways, of which, as an honest man, I can't approve. It is one of their customs to write in books what they have done and seen, instead of telling them in their villages, where the lie can be given to the face of a cowardly boaster, and the brave soldier can call on his comrades to witness for the truth of his words. In consequence of this bad fashion, a man, who is too conscientious to misspend his days among the women, in learning the names of black marks, ...
— The Last of the Mohicans • James Fenimore Cooper
... Of the garrulous old women, Glad belief he gave unto them That the Doe on Ro-a-no-ak Was in truth the Pale-Face Maiden Wrung from him by cruel magic. He was not a gabbling boaster, He could think and act in silence; And alone he roamed the island Seeking this White Doe to capture, So that he might tame and keep her Near him to assuage ...
— The White Doe - The Fate of Virginia Dare • Sallie Southall Cotten
... in his own mind, "a man must cut his coat according to his cloth; I will try to get away as fast as I can." On this the giant said to him, "Go, little ragamuffin, and fetch me a jug of water." "Had I not better bring the well itself at once, and the spring too?" asked the boaster, and went with the pitcher to the water. "What! the well and the spring too," growled the giant in his beard, for he was rather clownish and stupid, and began to be afraid. "That knave is not a fool, he has a wizard in his body. Be on thy guard, old Hans, this is no serving-man ...
— Household Tales by Brothers Grimm • Grimm Brothers
... Uncle Sam, United States; the largest boaster of liberty and owner of slaves. Unrizzest, applied to dough or bread; heavy, most unrisen, or most incapable ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell
... all my delicate management destroyed! known all over the country! I'm off! and yet to have travelled so far, and not to have one glimpse of her! but then to be pointed at as a poor devil in love, a silly inconsistent boaster! no, that wont do—but then I may see her—yes, I'll see her once—just once—for three minutes, or three minutes and a half at most—no longer positively—Ponder, Ponder! (enter Ponder) ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor - Vol I, No. 2, February 1810 • Samuel James Arnold
... foremost in the race, sat down, followed by his companion George, who, maugre his great apprehensions, could not forbear laughing heartily at the sudden melting away of the big-mouthed valour of this cowardly boaster. ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby
... printing house which would entirely overshadow his own. This secrecy which was practiced also prevented any one from informing Franklin of the Governor's real character, as a vain, unreliable, gasconading boaster. ...
— Benjamin Franklin, A Picture of the Struggles of Our Infant Nation One Hundred Years Ago - American Pioneers and Patriots Series • John S. C. Abbott
... my honour, he also had us served with a bird three times as large as Cleonymus,(1) and called the Boaster. ...
— The Acharnians • Aristophanes
... boaster! and what is it you know? Why, nothing at all except to go out to merry-makings and lick your lips there. We'll soon see ...
— Russian Fairy Tales - A Choice Collection of Muscovite Folk-lore • W. R. S. Ralston
... it? If you be a great man, flattery and envy are killing you; if you be poor, every one is trampling upon and despising you; after having become an inventor, if you exalt your head and seek for praise, you will be called a boaster and a coxcomb; if you lead a godly life and resort to the church and the altar, you will be called a hypocrite; if you do not, then you are an infidel or a heretic; if you be merry, you will be called a buffoon; if you are silent, you will ...
— The Sleeping Bard - or, Visions of the World, Death, and Hell • Ellis Wynne
... Ceres, meaning, "bearer of lovely children." The Toxotes. A Syrian archer in the "Thesmophoriazusae." The Great King's Eye. Mock name given to an ambassador from Persia in the Acharnians. Kompolakuthes. Bully-boaster: with a play on ...
— A Handbook to the Works of Browning (6th ed.) • Mrs. Sutherland Orr
... in England; and we can quite excuse him in his rage over the foolishness and greed of most of his companions. There was little nonsense about Smith in action, though he need not turn his hand on any man of that age as a boaster. ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... Solepa and Sipi stood by me, and together we sprang overboard into the white surf ... Give me some more grog, dear friend of my heart. I am no boaster, nor am I a liar; but when I think of that swim to the shore through the rolling seas with those two women, my belly cleaves to my backbone and I become faint.... For the current was against us, and neither Sipi nor Solepa were ...
— By Rock and Pool on an Austral Shore, and Other Stories • Louis Becke
... fop and a worshipful justice, a griping rook and a grave citizen, a worthy lawyer and an errant pickpocket, a reverend non-conformist and a canting mountebank, all blended together to compose an oglio of impertinence." There is a delightful sketch of one named "Captain All-man-sir," as big a boaster as Falstaff, and a more delicately etched portrait of the Town Wit, who is summed up as the "jack-pudding of society" in the judgment of all wise men, but an incomparable wit in his own. The peroration ...
— Inns and Taverns of Old London • Henry C. Shelley
... dare th' unknown, precarious sea, And down the unbounded winds adventurous roam, Searching the world's horizons for a home, A haven for the heart of liberty:— Boaster of freedom, found no longer free, What vaporous phantom from time's ocean-foam Blurs the translucence of th' eternal dome Where sang the burning ...
— Iolaeus - The man that was a ghost • James A. Mackereth
... boy of twenty, or thereabouts, active, loud-voiced, a boaster, and the cowardliest of the cowardly. He will steal at every opportunity. He clings to his gun most affectionately; is always excessively anxious if a screw gets loose, or if a flint will not strike fire, yet I doubt that he would be able to fire his gun at an enemy from excessive trembling. ...
— How I Found Livingstone • Sir Henry M. Stanley
... or why we wandered. It was their thought that Old Kinoos had lost the sight of his eyes from age; nor did Old Kinoos say otherwise, nor did I, his daughter. Old Kinoos is a brave man, but Old Kinoos was never a boaster. And now, when I tell thee of how his blindness came to be, thou wilt know, beyond question, that the daughter of Kinoos cannot mother the children of a coward such as thou ...
— Love of Life - and Other Stories • Jack London
... supernaturalism which was the life and hope of blessed saints and martyrs in bygone ages, and which in "their contests with mail-clad infidelity was like the pebble which the shepherd of Israel hurled against the disdainful boaster who defied the power of Israel's God." And he was thus brought into close sympathy with the realism of the Fathers, who felt that all that is valuable in theology must radiate from the recognition of Almighty power in ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume VI • John Lord
... nineteen years of work and resignation, now when you grow old, with two beautiful children, you should dream of remaining at the mercy of an avaricious monk or a year of frost. In listening to you, an idea has come to me. If I was the boaster of old, I should say that it was an idea from above; but I wholly believe that it is a fortunate idea. What has become of ...
— A Romance of the West Indies • Eugene Sue
... great sight to see four or five of Captain Barclay's waggons going down Marischal Street. The houses shook, the inhabitants were alarmed, and nervous people thought the houses would tumble down. Captain Barclay could not tolerate a boaster or puppy in any shape. A few years before his death he happened to be in the coffee-room, Market Street, Aberdeen, one evening along with some of his friends. A fast young man took out L20 and boasted he would run a mile in a certain time: he was ...
— Cattle and Cattle-breeders • William M'Combie
... appealing with his groans to the Gods. The Horse in a short space of time, broken-winded with running, is sent to the farm. There the Ass espying him laden with dung, thus jeered him: "Where are your former trappings, vain boaster, who have now fallen into the misery which you treated with ...
— The Fables of Phdrus - Literally translated into English prose with notes • Phaedrus
... in desperate pursuit of a reputation for being able to comprehend and speak as no one else could, and before all wanted to be thought a valuable citizen. As a result of this and because he was the greatest boaster alive and thought no one equal to himself, but in his words and life alike looked down on all and would not live as any one else did, he was wearisome and burdensome, and was consequently both envied and hated even by those very persons ...
— Dio's Rome • Cassius Dio
... it then, thou boaster, say "When thou hadst to thy box sneaked off, "Beneath his feet protecting lay, "And saved him from a ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... by Victor and Helene and by the very small Victor who was now nearly a year old. Victor and Helene had heard of the threats of vengeance, but knowing Rene, they had smiled. Was not Rene a great boaster? And the very young Victor, who knew nothing of the threats, thought his big uncle a very brave figure in his blue capote, his red muffler, and his white stocking cap ...
— Connie Morgan in the Fur Country • James B. Hendryx
... friend, you must not attach too much importance to what you have heard. Paul is a mere boy, and, of course, a boaster." ...
— The Champdoce Mystery • Emile Gaboriau
... then, all this ado about a bunch of empty threats cast at us by the Duke of Babbiano? If you were indeed the soldier you would have us think you, would you come here and say, 'I will not die this way, or that'? Confess yourself a boaster when you tell us that you are ready to die in ...
— Love-at-Arms • Raphael Sabatini
... taken up the jest of his lawless crew, which coincided with his own intended purpose, and had sworn that he would turn the household out of bed without regard to pretty protests or formality of warrant. He would raise the question forthwith, in jest and earnest, and worry Nell about the boaster. ...
— Mistress Nell - A Merry Tale of a Merry Time • George C. Hazelton, Jr.
... frenzy utter'd that he would escape The billows, even in the Gods' despight. Neptune that speech vain-glorious hearing, grasp'd 610 His trident, and the huge Gyraean rock Smiting indignant, dash'd it half away; Part stood, and part, on which the boaster sat When, first, the brainsick fury seiz'd him, fell, Bearing him with it down into the gulphs Of Ocean, where he drank the brine, and died. But thy own brother in his barks escaped That fate, by Juno saved; yet when, at length, He should have gain'd Malea's craggy shore, Then, by ...
— The Odyssey of Homer • Homer
... have paid the bet, but he would have stood by what he had said, and everybody would have believed him. By declaring him the winner of the bet she has cut the matter short, and she has avoided a judgment by which she would have been dishonoured. The inconsiderate boaster was guilty of a double mistake for which he paid the penalty of his life, but his adversary was as much wanting in delicacy, for in such matters rightly-minded men do not venture upon betting. If the one who says yes is imprudent, the one who says no is a dupe. ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... all very good, but he is so awkward and stupid that he constantly stumbles into trouble, thereby causing his acquaintances much unnecessary discomfiture and himself no end of embarrassment. He is, furthermore, a terrific boaster, as you will learn when you read of his many declarations of the pummeling he would give the ferocious Robber Fly, if ever he chanced to meet that devouring assassin. What Buster actually does when the unexpected encounter takes place will afford you a good laugh at his expense, and, finally, ...
— The Tale of Tommy Fox • Arthur Scott Bailey
... Little boaster, vagrant king, Neither north nor south is yours, You've no kingdom that endures! Wandering every fall and spring, With your ruby crown so slender, Are you only ...
— Songs Out of Doors • Henry Van Dyke
... the seer o' ferlies, That sits on the stane at his door, And tells about bogles, and mair lies Than tongue ever utter'd before. And there will be Bauldy, the boaster, Sae ready wi' hands and wi' tongue; Proud Paty and silly Sam Foster, Wha quarrel wi' ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel , Volume I. - The Songs of Scotland of the past half century • Various
... the judge who condemned you would believe you a boaster, or out of your mind did they hear you say this, for ...
— Pixy's Holiday Journey • George Lang
... daughter," said the King, "and bid her hatch them out for me. If she succeeds she shall have a bag of money for her pains, but if she fails you shall be beaten as a vain boaster." ...
— Tales of Folk and Fairies • Katharine Pyle
... to see that you are no boaster, Saduko," said Panda. "Would that more of the Zulus were like you in that matter, for then I must not listen to so many loud songs about little things. At least, Bangu was killed and his proud tribe humbled, ...
— Child of Storm • H. Rider Haggard
... honesty—tongues that are not used to say what the mind does not mean, and hearts that feel a little for others, as well as for themselves. A true-hearted girl could die for such a husband! while the boaster, and the double-tongued suitor gets to be as hateful to the sight, as ...
— The Deerslayer • James Fenimore Cooper
... supposed that the mines of Peru were upon his plantation; and that in comparison with his the influence of the President of the United States was nothing. I was a full twelvemonth before I was convinced that he was a boaster and a fabulist; and I was another twelvemonth before I could persuade myself that he was one of the most selfish, indolent, and obstinate of human beings. He was delighted to have me always at his ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth
... Whig, who says in the Upper House, that whatever may be the distresses of the people, they shall not be gratified at the cost of one of the despotic privileges of the aristocracy. Go to!—I will have none of him. As to Lesborough, he is a fool and a boaster—who is always puffing his own vanity with the windiest pair of oratorical bellows that ever were made by air and brass, for the purpose of sound and smoke, 'signifying nothing.' Go to!—I will have none ...
— Pelham, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... "Now, thou boaster," I said, "wilt thou lead the way into yonder reeds, or shall I?" And I made as though I would lead ...
— Cleopatra • H. Rider Haggard
... response: "Telemachos, thou boaster, if each suitor would bestow upon him such a gift as I will make, he would not come here again very soon." With that he seized a footstool and held it up where all could see it. The beggar approached him with a pitiful story of wanderings and hardships. Antinoos spurned him saying: "What ...
— Odysseus, the Hero of Ithaca - Adapted from the Third Book of the Primary Schools of Athens, Greece • Homer
... MacDougall drew on his fur coat and mittens and quitted the cabin. He would find a certain long haired Indian he had seen that day, and prove to his brother that he was not simply a boaster. ...
— The Trail of a Sourdough - Life in Alaska • May Kellogg Sullivan
... of Gryphon, brother of Aquilant; but the faithless fair one took up with Mart[a]no, a most impudent boaster and a coward. Being at Damascus during a tournament in which Gryphon was the victor, Martano stole the armor of Gryphon, arrayed himself in it, took the prizes, and then decamped with the lady. Aquilant happened to see them, bound them, and took them back to Damascus, where Martano was ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer
... The brave Eumedes. (From the loins he came Of noble Dolon, and to war he brought The borrowed lustre of his grandsire's name, The strength and spirit of his sire of fame, Who for his meed, when offering to explore The Danaan camp, Pelides' car would claim. Poor fool! Tydides paid the boaster's score, And for Achilles' steeds he hankers ...
— The Aeneid of Virgil - Translated into English Verse by E. Fairfax Taylor • Virgil
... th' outside. Whin he's dhrunk he makes th' bluff to his own heart. Dhrink turns him inside out as well as upside down, an' while he's congratulatin' himsilf on th' fine man he is, th' neighbors know him f'r a boaster, a cow'rd, an' something iv a liar. That th' ladies see an' hate. They do not know that there is wan thing an' on'y wan thing to be said in favor iv dhrink, an' that is that it has caused manny a lady to be loved that otherwise ...
— Mr. Dooley Says • Finley Dunne
... dwarf, even among puppets, and his dress invariably consists of black knee-breeches and white stockings, a very long, full-skirted black coat, and a three-cornered hat. His individual traits are displayed in all his characters, and he is ever a coward, a boaster, and a liar; a glutton and avaricious, but withal of an agreeable bonhomie that wins the heart. To tell the truth, I care little for the plays in which he has no part and I have learned to think a certain trick of his—lifting his leg rigidly to a horizontal line, by way of emphasis, ...
— Venetian Life • W. D. Howells
... a bird flew forth on the right hand, an eagle of lofty flight, and the host of the Achaians shouted thereat, encouraged by the omen, but renowned Hector answered: "Aias, thou blundering boaster, what sayest thou! Would that indeed I were for ever as surely the son of aegis-bearing Zeus, and that my mother were lady Hera, and that I were held in such honour as Apollo and Athene, as verily ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer (Lang, Leaf, Myers trans.)
... hell for leather, and when I come to the river the whole thing was roaring and foaming like a waterfall. My horse, and he was a good one, couldn't make it. But I did. And when I come to it on the return trip with the doctor, he gave one look and folded his arms. 'Mark,' he said, 'I'm no boaster, but my life is not without value. I think it's my duty not to attempt this crossing.' 'Jim,' I said, 'if you don't your soul will be scotched. Don't you know it? Folks'll point at you as the doctor that didn't dare.' 'It's not ...
— The Spread Eagle and Other Stories • Gouverneur Morris
... says John Foster, "can never be said to belong to himself; since if he dared to assert that he did, the puny force of some cause, about as powerful as a spider, may make a seizure of the unhappy boaster the very next minute, and contemptuously exhibit the futility of the determination by which he was to have proved the independence of his understanding and will. He belongs to whatever can make capture of him; and one thing after another vindicates its right ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden
... a wastrel and a boaster, but for all that Isak could bear him no grudge; he himself was too relieved at finding his neighbour in the house that evening instead of a stranger. Isak had the peasant's coolness of mind, his few feelings, stability, stubbornness; he chatted with Brede and nodded at his shallowness. "Another ...
— Growth of the Soil • Knut Hamsun
... not checked, he smiles inwardly, and moralizes on the weakness of human nature. But the man who never jumps is not usually of a benevolent nature, and it is almost certain that he will make up a little story against the boaster. ...
— Hunting Sketches • Anthony Trollope
... sham gentility. He bears on his very brow the newest flunky-stamp. The poor young fellow, after all, is no villain; he has no kind of connexion with the horrid rascal SIR EMERSOM TENNENT alludes to—with the blackguard. That he is a boaster, a talker, an idiot, a nincompoop; that he scatters "words, words, words," as Polonius did of old; that he is bombastic, wordy, prosy, nonsensical, and a fool, no one will deny. But he is no rogue, though he ...
— Notes and Queries, No. 209, October 29 1853 • Various
... Tom Ross wuz right when he said the way them Greeks an' Trojans fought was plumb foolish. Do you think that me, Sol Hyde, is goin' to take a tin pan an' go beatin' on it down thar among the bushes, an' callin' on the biggest boaster o' all the savages to come out an' fight me? No, sir; I wouldn't go fifty yards before I'd tumble over, with a ...
— The Forest Runners - A Story of the Great War Trail in Early Kentucky • Joseph A. Altsheler
... kaross and nothing less. So enough of Umslopogaas, the Woodpecker. Almost I wish that you had not lent him the charm, for then the King's men would have made an end of him, who knows too much and like some silly boaster, may shout out the truth when his axe is aloft and he is full of the beer of battle. For in battle he will live and in battle he will die, Macumazahn, as perhaps you may ...
— She and Allan • H. Rider Haggard
... my ungracious speech. It was my first field, sir, and I am wont to speak of it too boastingly. I shall become more modest, I hope, when I shall have a better right to be a boaster." ...
— Fort Lafayette or, Love and Secession • Benjamin Wood
... forces work out our deliverance in common. But if so, we must set out with minds prepared, since to-day either a glorious death awaits us or the achievement of a deed of noblest emprise in the rescue of so many Hellene lives. Maybe it is God who leads us thus, God who chooses to humble the proud boaster, boasting as though he were exceedingly wise, but for us, the beginning of whose every act is by heaven's grace, that same God reserves a higher grade of honour. One duty I would recall to you, to apply your minds to the execution ...
— Anabasis • Xenophon
... arguing and boasting that he knew many and various tricks. Another among the bystanders said: "I know how to play a trick which will make whomsoever I like pull off his breeches." The first man— the boaster—said: "You won't make me pull off mine, and I bet you a pair of hose on it." He who proposed the game, having accepted the offer, produced breeches and drew them across the face of him who bet the pair of hose and ...
— The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci, Complete • Leonardo Da Vinci
... serves your cousin, the swaggering boaster. I will find a way to revenge myself on him ...
— Cyrano de Bergerac • Edmond Rostand
... scene, so young, so foreign, and so obviously foolish, Dellwig, certain now of success, told his friend on the very first Sunday night that the brick-kiln was now a mere matter of weeks. Always a boaster, he could not resist boasting a little too soon. Besides, he felt very sure; and the friend, too, had taken it for granted, when he heard of the impending young mistress, that the thing was as good ...
— The Benefactress • Elizabeth Beauchamp
... to go back to battle with the shadows—the obsession of shadows which had grown in my mind as my strength grew. When I was smiling in Leddy's muzzle, as they say I did, I was just smiling exultantly at the millions that had called me a weakling, and saying, like some boaster, 'Could you do this, millions?' I—I—well, Mary, I—I have told you what I never was quite able ...
— Over the Pass • Frederick Palmer
... of conversing with the politest and most learned gentry of different nations, that I will discourse with you in two or three languages, if you please, when I have the happiness to see you. There's a learned boaster for you, my dear friend! (if the knowledge of different languages makes one learned.)—But I shall bring you an heart as entirely English ...
— Pamela (Vol. II.) • Samuel Richardson
... have said, however, Jim was a great boaster and blusterer, glorying in the marvelous and dangerous. Had he lived in the heroic age, I have no doubt he would have regaled the ears of his listeners with blood curdling stories of his battles with giants, his fights ...
— History of Kershaw's Brigade • D. Augustus Dickert
... have had some boast to make, pointing to their own condition to prove their statements. I have heard of half a dozen men lying dead, or dying, at a street corner, victims to a single sword, yet was there never a corpse to be found in the morning. Your easy boaster is ever a ...
— Princess Maritza • Percy Brebner
... is true!" whispered the lithe boaster, with a gleeful quiver from head to foot. "Listen! First—purely, of course, for love of Anna—I have conspired with the General to marry her to Kincaid. And, second, also purely for love of her, I have conspired with Irby to keep her and Kincaid ...
— Kincaid's Battery • George W. Cable
... bequeath me much in the hour when death came on him, sahib. I am no boaster, as he knew. Remember, then, to tell me if I fail at any time in what is due. I ...
— Rung Ho! • Talbot Mundy
... marched, and with him The boaster brought six thousand Switzers bold, Audacious were their looks, their faces grim, Strong castles on the Alpine clifts they hold, Their shares and coulters broke, to armors trim They change that metal, cast in warlike mould, And with this band late herds and flocks that guide, ...
— Jerusalem Delivered • Torquato Tasso
... boaster, He the marvellous story-teller, He the traveller and the talker, He the friend of old Nokomis, Made a bow for Hiawatha; From a branch of ash he made it, From an oak-bough made the arrows, Tipped with flint, and winged with feathers, And the cord he ...
— The Song Of Hiawatha • Henry W. Longfellow
... people:* "Look here, O Nicholas-god! Perhaps my neighbour, little Michael, has been slandering me to you, or perhaps he will do so. If he does, don't believe him. I have done him no ill, and wish him none. He is a worthless boaster and a babbler. He does not really honour you, and merely plays the hypocrite. But I honour you from my heart; and, behold, I place a taper before you!" Sometimes incidents occur which display a still more curious blending of the two religions. Thus a Tcheremiss, on one occasion, in consequence ...
— Russia • Donald Mackenzie Wallace
... fierce, in accents bold, Like the rude ballad-monger's chaunt of old; "The fall of Priam, the great Trojan King! Of the right noble Trojan War, I sing!" Where ends this Boaster, who, with voice of thunder, Wakes Expectation, all agape with wonder? The mountains labour! hush'd are all the spheres! And, oh ridiculous! a mouse appears. How much more modestly begins HIS song, Who labours, or imagines, ...
— The Art Of Poetry An Epistle To The Pisos - Q. Horatii Flacci Epistola Ad Pisones, De Arte Poetica. • Horace
... Lion sneered. "If you think you can take us with you that far then why not to Jerusalem? The words of a boaster are a mask of doubt. Hah! Take us to Jerusalem! ...
— The Lion of Petra • Talbot Mundy
... Spot couldn't help hearing what the Rooster said. And he hadn't even heart enough to answer that impertinent boaster. ...
— The Tale of Old Dog Spot • Arthur Scott Bailey
... the other. "I don't know how it is, Frank; but it strikes me that I'd like to cut in on that boaster in this thing. If we managed to find out what makes that fearful booming in the mountain, and told about it before he got a chance to blow his horn, he'd feel cheap, ...
— The Saddle Boys of the Rockies - Lost on Thunder Mountain • James Carson
... inquire about him in St. Augustine: people thought well of his knowledge and ability, though they agree that he is a brag and a boaster." ...
— Down South - or, Yacht Adventure in Florida • Oliver Optic
... Family—superhuman beings, infinitely remote—the great landlord of the neighbourhood stood as a symbol of temporal power to the whole district. The budding socialist of the taproom might sneer, and make threat that the time was coming when he, the boaster, and Challis, the landlord, would have equal rights; but in public the socialist kow-towed to his master with a submission no less obsequious than that of the humblest ...
— The Wonder • J. D. Beresford
... a horseman came to the little village. He was a strange man, great in size, dressed in buckskin, very brown of countenance and with long hair, tied as the western Indians would wear it. He was something of a genial boaster, was this man, and he was known up and down the Texas border as the Ring Tailed Panther although his right name was Martin Palmer. But he had lived long among the Osage, Kiowa and Pawnee Indians, and he was renowned throughout all the Southwestern country for his bravery, skill and ...
— The Texan Star - The Story of a Great Fight for Liberty • Joseph A. Altsheler
... forests of the Bull Run Mountains became gradually visible in the faint light of the eastern sky, and the men at last discovered whither their general was leading them. With the knowledge, which spread quickly through the ranks, that they were making for the communications of the boaster Pope, the regiments stepped out with renewed energy. "There was no need for speech, no breath to spare if there had been—only the shuffling tramp of marching feet, the rumbling of wheels, the creak and clank of harness and accoutrements, ...
— Stonewall Jackson And The American Civil War • G. F. R. Henderson
... much more excusable) is Gascon. The Gascons are the natives of Gascony, a province in the south of France. It is proverbial among other Frenchmen that the Gascons are always boasting, and even in English we sometimes use the word Gascon to describe a great boaster, while gasconade is now a common ...
— Stories That Words Tell Us • Elizabeth O'Neill
... laugh!" said his mother, in distress. "Geoffrey Cliffe is not a man to be trusted. You and I know that of old. He is a boaster, and—" ...
— The Marriage of William Ashe • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... tragedies. From this depth of nothingness Turgenef, however, soon rises to at least the semblance of strength; and while Rudin is at bottom as impotent as Tchulkaturin, he at least pretends to strength. Rudin, then, is the hero of phrases, the boaster; he promises marvels, he charms, he captivates; but it all ends in words, and Rudin perishes as needlessly as he lived needlessly. In "Fathers and Sons," however, Bazarof is no longer a talker; he already rises to ...
— Lectures on Russian Literature - Pushkin, Gogol, Turgenef, Tolstoy • Ivan Panin
... is a great boaster and likes to brag of how smart he is and how brave he is, came with the rest of the ...
— The Adventures of Prickly Porky • Thornton W. Burgess
... kindled declared this Joan, who called herself the Maid, to be a liar, a plague, a deceiver of the people, a sorceress, superstitious, a blasphemer of God, presumptuous, a misbeliever in the faith of Christ, a boaster, idolatress, cruel, dissolute, a witch of devils, apostate, schismatic, and heretic. It was a heavy crime-sheet for a mere girl, and there was no knowing into what a monster she might grow up. So the Bishop of Beauvais could not well hesitate in pronouncing the final ...
— Essays in Rebellion • Henry W. Nevinson
... his men, as instructed by the agent, were over at the village of Two Lance, a long mile away, rounding up their pony herd to prevent the warriors making an assault on Red Dog's more distant township. A shot rang out from somewhere among the agency buildings, and the days of the boaster were numbered. Back, bearing the body, scurried the trio of friends, and in less than an hour, in fury and transport and grief and rage, the women were tearing their hair and prodding themselves with knives, while the warriors, singing the death-song, were painting ...
— Under Fire • Charles King
... dollars cash in hand paid, he would pass the night alone in the haunted house. A score of other darkies contributed, and the required amount was raised. It was not, however, to be delivered to the courageous Sam until his reappearance after the vigil. With this understanding the boaster betook himself to the haunted house ...
— Jokes For All Occasions - Selected and Edited by One of America's Foremost Public Speakers • Anonymous
... city whether the Gods will or no, and that Zeus with his thunder shall not stay him, for that the thunder is but as the sun at noon. And on his shield he hath a man bearing a torch, and these words, 'I WILL BURN THIS CITY.' Who now shall stand against this boaster and fear not?" ...
— Stories from the Greek Tragedians • Alfred Church
... dead, any more than his master Pythagoras had done; and he begged him to show himself. Then there was a slight earthquake shock, and a beautiful youth stood before him, nine feet in height, wearing a Thessalian cloak. He did not look like a boaster, as some men had thought him, and his expression, if grim, was not unpleasant. No words could describe his beauty, which surpassed anything imaginable. Meanwhile he had grown to be twenty feet high, and his beauty increased in proportion. His hair he had never cut. Apollonius was allowed ...
— Greek and Roman Ghost Stories • Lacy Collison-Morley
... performed the same work. What they did you may judge of, when I tell you that, while two hundred and seventy-three Englishmen fell that day, only eighty-eight Americans were killed. I will not talk of what I myself performed, for I despise a boaster, but I did my share of ...
— Who Spoke Next • Eliza Lee Follen
... you is the rhetorician that can discourse of all arts and sciences?" There came forward a sage hight Ibrahim bin Siyyr and said to her, "Think me not like the rest." Quoth she, "It is the more assured to me that thou wilt be beaten, for that thou art a boaster; and Allah will help me to victory over thee, that I may strip thee of thy clothes. So, if thou sentest one to fetch thee wherewithal to cover thyself, 'twould be well for thee." Cried he, "By Allah, I will assuredly conquer thee and make thee a byword among the peoples, generation after ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... make them more humble, but also when they are in fear and dejection to raise them up again and give them confidence. Thus Cyrus talked big in perils and on battle-fields, though at other times he was no boaster. And the second Antigonus, though he was on all other occasions modest and far from vanity, yet in the sea-fight off Cos, when one of his friends said to him, "See you not how many more ships the enemy have got than we have?" answered, "How many do you make me equal to then?" ...
— Plutarch's Morals • Plutarch
... was a wild, uncontrolled boy, who spent most of his time in the street, played truant three days out of five, was a great boaster, and sneered at anything like goodness. He was vastly amusing, however, and generally was surrounded by a crowd of admiring lads who thought him quite a hero. He had completely fascinated Louis, who was blind to his faults and attached great weight ...
— A Dear Little Girl • Amy E. Blanchard
... double numbers in his own fortress, and making them all prisoners without the loss of a man, that, although your report may be sanctioned by Sir George Prevost, it seems to me that the people of England will be incredulous until they see the exterminating boaster a prisoner in London. We find in a cover by General Sheaffe, that the first report of the cannon taken was one-third short of the real number. I shall hardly sleep until I have the satisfaction of hearing particulars ...
— The Life and Correspondence of Sir Isaac Brock • Ferdinand Brock Tupper
... hard," he said. "But the Sioux are not yet acquainted with the full merits of a long range repeating rifle, nor do they understand how well I can shoot. I'm as good a marksman as there is in the West, if I do say it myself, and lest you may think me a boaster, Will, I'll soon ...
— The Great Sioux Trail - A Story of Mountain and Plain • Joseph Altsheler
... Indians, who seem to have understood this cowardly boaster, received his story with shouts of laughter. But Knight was very glad to make off with his gun and ammunition, and leave them to settle the affair among themselves. When he came to the prairies ...
— Stories Of Ohio - 1897 • William Dean Howells
... experimenting when Collinson overtook him in the hollow. He evaded this by post-dating his discovery of the richness of the ore until he had reached Marysville. But he found some difficulty in recounting his good fortune: he was naturally no boaster, he had no desire to impress Collinson with his penetration, nor the undaunted energy he had displayed in getting up his company and opening the mine, so that he was actually embarrassed by his own understatement; and under the grave, patient eyes ...
— In a Hollow of the Hills • Bret Harte
... all they who come lie in the dust before me. Now, therefore, I pray you rebuke me no more till you see me beaten or a recreant, and then bid me go from you." "There shall soon meet thee a knight who shall repay thee all thy deeds, thou boaster," answered she, "for, save King Arthur, he is the man of most worship in the world." "It will be the greater honour to encounter him," said ...
— The Legends Of King Arthur And His Knights • James Knowles
... you, you boaster!" Siebenburg shouted contemptuously after the Swiss, and then turned to Biberli and the maid with a patronising question; but the former, without even opening his lips in reply, hastened to the door and, with a significant gesture, ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... empty business, which pleases nobody but the boaster, and I have no disposition to boast of what the Democratic Party has accomplished. It has merely done its duty. It has merely fulfilled its explicit promises. But there can be no violation of good taste in calling attention to the manner in which those promises ...
— President Wilson's Addresses • Woodrow Wilson
... from the boaster, and he determined to silence him once for all. The next time he began to speak, he had barely said "Kerrump!" when the Crane had him by the leg. He croaked and struggled in vain, and in another moment he would have gone down ...
— Wigwam Evenings - Sioux Folk Tales Retold • Charles Alexander Eastman and Elaine Goodale Eastman
... the great boaster, He the marvelous story-teller, He the traveler and the talker, He the friend of old Nokomis, Made a bow for Hiawatha; From a branch of ash he made it, From an oak bough made the arrows, Tipped with flint, and winged with feathers, And the cord he ...
— The New McGuffey Fourth Reader • William H. McGuffey
... threatens his enemies, and vaunts his own importance. This is not common in the heroes of romance, who are usually as remarkable for their modesty of language as for their prowess; and still more seldom does, in real life, a vain-glorious boaster vindicate by his actions the threats of his tongue. It is true, that men of a fervent and glowing character are apt to strain their speech beyond the modesty of ordinary conversation, and display, in their language, the fire which glows in their bosoms; ...
— The Works Of John Dryden, Volume 4 (of 18) - Almanzor And Almahide, Marriage-a-la-Mode, The Assignation • John Dryden
... that I was both a coward and a boaster; but I have frequently remarked that the quality which we call cowardice in a child, is no more than implying a greater sense of danger, and consequently a superior intellect. We are all naturally ...
— Frank Mildmay • Captain Frederick Marryat
... to war, sword in hand, are worth ten thousand archers in a surprise. Where is Menneville, that boaster, that braggart, who was to come back either dead ...
— Ten Years Later - Chapters 1-104 • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... (pryer) Cortaplumas (penknife) Chupaflores (humming-bird) Destripaterrones (navvy) Lavamanos (wash-hand stand) Limpiabotas (boot-black) Matamoros (boaster) Mondadientes (toothpick) Papahueros (ninny) Papamoscas (ninny) Papanatas (ninny) Paracaidas (parachute) Paraguas (umbrella) Pelagatos (ragamuffin) Pintamonas (slap-dasher or bad partner) Sacacorchos (corkscrew) Salvavidas ...
— Pitman's Commercial Spanish Grammar (2nd ed.) • C. A. Toledano
... Entellus, thus: "My soul is still the same, Unmov'd with fear, and mov'd with martial fame; But my chill blood is curdled in my veins, And scarce the shadow of a man remains. O could I turn to that fair prime again, That prime of which this boaster is so vain, The brave, who this decrepid age defies, Should feel my ...
— The Aeneid • Virgil
... culminating in the deplorable mental and moral expressions contained in the speeches, messages and telegrams of William II. He was a perfect type of the miles gloriosus, not a harmless but an irritating and dangerous boaster, who succeeded in piling up more loathing and hatred against his country than the most active and intelligently managed enemy propaganda could possibly ...
— Peaceless Europe • Francesco Saverio Nitti
... the Moor was a conceited coxcomb and a barefaced boaster, and ere long began to suspect that he was an arrant coward. He was, however, good-humoured and chatty, and Ted, being in these respects like-minded, rather took a fancy to him, ...
— The Pirate City - An Algerine Tale • R.M. Ballantyne
... principles of the great and comprehensive problem he had started out to solve, and plodded steadily along the path that he had marked out, ignoring the almost universal scientific disbelief in his ultimate success. "Dreamer," "fool," "boaster" were among the appellations bestowed upon him by unbelieving critics. Ridicule was heaped upon him in the public prints, and mathematics were called into service by learned men to settle the point forever that he was attempting the ...
— Edison, His Life and Inventions • Frank Lewis Dyer and Thomas Commerford Martin
... 'Strik, strik, ye proud boaster, your honour is gone, Your lands we will plunder, ...
— Ballads of Scottish Tradition and Romance - Popular Ballads of the Olden Times - Third Series • Various
... drawing his knife from its sheath, flashed it before the assembled natives; "nay, no liar am I, neither a boaster; and by the gods of my mother's land I shall make this Parma give me more grog to drink before the night comes, else shall this knife eat into his heart. Come ye ...
— Rodman The Boatsteerer And Other Stories - 1898 • Louis Becke
... praise. Ah!" he exclaimed suddenly, "the thought has just occurred to me of a way by which you can obtain confirmation of my story; and, as I value your good opinion and would not be regarded as a boaster and a liar, I entreat you to take it. I heard you tell the eight men who were rowers in my boat when I was captured, to call upon you today, that you might do something ...
— A Knight of the White Cross • G.A. Henty
... servant, Rabshakeh, to summon Hezekiah to submit, and warning him and his people, that their God could no more protect them than the gods of the conquered nations had saved their worshippers. In answer to the prayer of Hezekiah, came, by the mouth of Isaiah, an assurance that the boaster who insulted the living God, was only an instrument in His Hands, unable to go one step against His will. Not one arrow should he shoot against the holy city, but he should hear a rumour, a blast should be sent on him, ...
— The Chosen People - A Compendium Of Sacred And Church History For School-Children • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... figurative term, taken from a braggadocio or boaster; it applies to any thing that is hollow or deceitful: for instance, when some potatoes that grow unusually large are cut in two, an empty space is found in the centra, and that potato is termed boast, ...
— Willy Reilly - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... fear. I am no boaster. But we cannot fight him here in Roan Kiti, which is open to the sea, and never can we make it a strong fort, for here we have no falat,{*} nor yet any great forest trees. But at Tokolme are many ...
— The Call Of The South - 1908 • Louis Becke
... for a saint, and you would be a demon! You are a boaster! No; there is no man quite cunning enough, bold enough, thus to insinuate himself into the confidence and respect of men. It would be a frightful defiance cast ...
— Mysteries of Paris, V3 • Eugene Sue
... now be obeyed; while Usop, in consequence of his cowardly flight (for so they deem it), from the want of energy he has displayed, has lost character as well as wealth, and would scarce find ten men in Bruni to follow him. Unluckily for himself, he was a great boaster in the days of his prosperity; and now the contrast of his past boasting with his present cowardice is drawn with a sneer. 'His mouth was brave,' they exclaim, 'but his heart timid.' 'He should have ...
— The Expedition to Borneo of H.M.S. Dido - For the Suppression of Piracy • Henry Keppel
... in the conversation, you know. She is no boaster. No sir-ee! She's the modestest, gentlest, sweetest little lady I ever saw. I just love her! Well, I answered a lot of letters for her, and she liked the way I did it, and she liked me, I guess, for she said she only hoped Miss Crowell would suit ...
— Vicky Van • Carolyn Wells
... and carried him along; the old man also, a little in the rear, followed them in silent grief. When they brought Hatim before Naufal, he asked, 'Who has seized and brought him here?' A worthless, hard-hearted [boaster] answered, 'Who could have performed such a deed except myself? This achievement belongs to my name, and I have planted the standard [of glory] in the sky.' Another vaunting fellow clamoured, 'I searched ...
— Bagh O Bahar, Or Tales of the Four Darweshes • Mir Amman of Dihli
... And you can see it too. Say, tell me, little girl, fate has pitched us together in a stormy sea, surely it is for me to aid you with all the loving care and help I can bestow. Believe me, I am no idle boaster. I do not even say that my protection will be worth as much as that of our faithful old Joe, but, such as it is, it is yours, whether you take me with it or no, for as long ...
— The Night Riders - A Romance of Early Montana • Ridgwell Cullum
... lean our left shoulder on thine—our right on the Crutch. The time will come when thou wilt be, O Son of the Morning! even like unto the shadow by thy side! Was he not once a mountaineer? If he be a vainglorious boaster, give him the lie, Ben-y-glo and thy brotherhood—ye who so often heard our shouts mixed with the red-deer's belling—tossed back in exultation by Echo, Omnipresent ...
— Recreations of Christopher North, Volume 2 • John Wilson
... it A noble bird, that laves its graceful form, And bathes its rosy bosom in the light. Look! how it swells and rears its snowy crest With haughty grandeur; while the blue expanse, In smiling patience lets the boaster pass, And swell his train with all the lazy vapours That hover in the air: an easy prey To the gigantic phantom, whose curl'd wing, Sweeps in these worthless triflers of the sky, And wraps them in ...
— Elegies and Other Small Poems • Matilda Betham
... trying to awe you with the fierce words of a boaster and a bully? Test me, by looking back a little, and discovering what I have abstained from for the sake of my purpose, since I have been here. A word or two from my lips, in answer to the questions with which I have been baited, ...
— Basil • Wilkie Collins
... it would be more appropriate after my death than while I am alive. That boaster moreover has a peacock's plume on his helmet, and at the very outset I made a vow to obtain three of them and afterward as many fingers of the ...
— The Knights of the Cross • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... the prisoners. On the surface. "You are eager for death." The mystery of the Launces. "You are the Countess of Denby!" "Save your denials for use before a German court." Dave invited on deck. "You are a good boaster." Something to interest him. ...
— Dave Darrin After The Mine Layers • H. Irving Hancock
... woman? He does but follow the analogy of all nature. Look at the Red Indian, in that blissful state of nature from which (so philosophers inform those who choose to believe them) we all sprang. Which is the boaster, the strutter, the bedizener of his sinful carcase with feathers and beads, fox-tails and bears' claws,—the brave, or his poor little squaw? An Australian settler's wife bestows on some poor slaving gin a cast-off French bonnet; before she has gone a hundred yards, ...
— Two Years Ago, Volume I • Charles Kingsley
... destroyer! thou canst only kill the happy; they who are weary of existence thou sparest! (She glides towards the robbers.) Then do ye have mercy on me, disciples of murder! There lurks a bloodthirsty pity in your looks that is consoling to the wretched. Your master is a boaster ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... you make such an exordium, as the Cyclic writer of old: "I will sing the fate of Priam, and the noble war." What will this boaster produce worthy of all this gaping? The mountains are in labor, a ridiculous mouse will be brought forth. How much more to the purpose he, who attempts nothing improperly? "Sing for me, my muse, the man who, after the ...
— The Works of Horace • Horace
... a boaster and self-assertor, by nature; but it is so far true. For instance, we used to have a fair in our neighborhood—a very fine fair we thought it. You never saw such an one; but if you look at the engraving of Turner's "St. Catherine's Hill," you will ...
— The Ethics of the Dust • John Ruskin
... the world,—but he is a bit of a boaster. I dare say his ancestor was a Gascon, poor fellow!—and he affects to say that you can't choose a coat, or buy a horse, without his approval and advice,—that he can turn you round his finger. Now this hurts your consequence ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... cried his father more sternly. "The lad will be jist like yerself, too ready with his fists, whatever. A brave man will never be a boaster, Scotty, man." ...
— The Silver Maple • Marian Keith
... success. Every body was surprised, but as every body attributed it to long practice, they were not so much astonished as I was, who knew it was wholly owing to chance. It was a lucky hit, and I made the most of it; success made me arrogant, and boy-like, I became a boaster. ...
— The Attache - or, Sam Slick in England, Complete • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... permitted to pay for anything; expressage, laundry and all incidentals were as free as air. The question of money, nowadays impertinently thrust forth, was never hinted at in the olden time. It was considered bad form, and the luckless boaster of "how poor he was" would have been properly stared at as a boor as well as ...
— Historic Papers on the Causes of the Civil War • Mrs. Eugenia Dunlap Potts
... be afraid of?" asked another. "You are a little coward. Shut your eyes and go to sleep. See me! I am not afraid, if it is dark and gloomy. Oh, oh!" cried the boaster, for the owl had seized him and was carrying him away from home and his ...
— The Book of Nature Myths • Florence Holbrook
... ghastly! While the distemper's rank and deadly venom Shoots like a burning arrow 'cross his bowels, And drinks his marrow up.—Heard you that groan? It was his last.—See how the great Goliath, Just like a child that brawl'd itself to rest, Lies still.—What mean'st thou then, O mighty boaster! 280 To vaunt of nerves of thine? What means the bull, Unconscious of his strength, to play the coward, And flee before a feeble thing like man, That, knowing well the slackness of his arm, Trusts only in the well-invented knife? With study pale, and midnight ...
— The Poetical Works of Beattie, Blair, and Falconer - With Lives, Critical Dissertations, and Explanatory Notes • Rev. George Gilfillan [Ed.]
... called AEtopeia, that is an expressi of maners or mylde affeccions, and hath thre kyndes: of the whych the fyrst is a significacion or expression of maners somewhat longer, as of wittes, artes, vertues, vices. Thus we expresse Thraso a boaster, and Demea ...
— A Treatise of Schemes and Tropes • Richard Sherry
... greetings. She had much to tell about them both, but Jacob thought it was queer that she had more to say about Ole than about Peter; for while Ole was a straight-forward fellow, it could not be denied that he was a bit of a boaster. ...
— Lisbeth Longfrock • Hans Aanrud
... dares yon treacherous fiend to cast a stain on Satan's bravery? he who preys only on the defenceless—who sucks the blood of infants, and delights only in acts of ignoble cruelty and unequal contention. Away with the boaster who never joins in action, but, like a cormorant, hovers over the field, to feed upon the wounded, and overwhelm the dying. True bravery is as remote from rashness as from hesitation; let us counsel coolly, but let us execute our counselled ...
— The Poetical Works of Henry Kirke White - With a Memoir by Sir Harris Nicolas • Henry Kirke White
... "Ha, Loki, you boaster," he roared, "you lie in your words. Sindri, my brother, who would scorn to serve you, is the ...
— The Children of Odin - The Book of Northern Myths • Padraic Colum
... that it was the imagination of the spectator only that could find in their works that air of grandeur and dignity generally attributed to them. Raphael himself, he said, was very unequal, and many of his productions owed their glory only to tradition. Michael Angelo was a boaster, weakly vain of his knowledge of anatomy, and without a particle of grace. Real force of outline, grace of touch, and magic of colouring we must look for, he said, in the present age. Thence the conversation easily glided ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 62, No. 384, October 1847 • Various
... MacPherson, he was dumbfounded. Though no boaster, he knew he had done a magnificently heroic thing, and to get his mouth slapped for it was an exigency which he did not know what to do with. He had staggered against the boards from the force of the stroke, but it had not ...
— Earth's Enigmas - A Volume of Stories • Charles G. D. Roberts
... to learn; and he was not going to give up because of first impressions. He had not met Montagu Jerrold before, but had heard of him often during the last three or four months since the Englishman "blew into" Lucky Star City. He was a boaster as well as a waster, no doubt; for according to himself, he knew "everybody at home," from the King down the whole gamut of the British peerage. Also he "claimed" to be an Oxford man, and it was that which, in this emergency, had ...
— The Port of Adventure • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson
... feigned, simulated, mock. faltar fail, be missing, be lacking, give way. fallido, -a frustrated, amiss. fama f. reputation, report, rumor; es —— it is said. famoso, -a famous, renowned, notorious. fanal m. lantern, light, beacon. fanfarrn m. boaster, bully. fango m. mud, mire, slime. fantasa f. fancy, imagination, caprice, whim. fantasma m. f. phantom, ghost, specter, scarecrow. fantstico, -a fantastic, imaginary. farsa f. farce, humbug. ...
— El Estudiante de Salamanca and Other Selections • George Tyler Northup |
