"Churlish" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... again aroused, for from this time he managed to be with me, on one pretence or another until noon. Moreover, his manner grew each moment more churlish, his hints plainer; until I could scarcely avoid noticing the one or the other. About mid-day, having followed me for the twentieth time into the street, he came to the point by asking me rudely if I did ...
— Under the Red Robe • Stanley Weyman
... slayer of the Medusa might destroy the dragon which guarded it, and then rob him of his treasures. He therefore refused to grant the hospitality which the hero demanded, whereupon Perseus, exasperated at the churlish repulse, produced from his wallet the head of the Medusa, and holding it towards the king, transformed him into a stony mountain. Beard and hair erected themselves into forests; shoulders, hands, and limbs ...
— Myths and Legends of Ancient Greece and Rome • E.M. Berens
... pack. We travelled very brisk for eight or ten miles; when the Major's feet grew sore, and he very weary, and the Indian steered too much north-eastwardly. The Major desired to encamp; upon which the Indian asked to carry his gun, but he refused; and then the Indian grew churlish, and pressed us to keep on, telling us there were Ottawa Indians in those woods, and they would scalp us if we lay out; but go to his cabin, and we would ...
— The Farmer Boy, and How He Became Commander-In-Chief • Morrison Heady
... time he went on living his lonely sulky kind of life, drinking a great deal more than was good for him in his own churlish manner, and laughing to scorn any attempt at remonstrance from his wife or Mrs. Tadman. Some few times Ellen had endeavoured to awaken him to the evil consequences that must needs ensue from his intemperate habits, feeling that it would be a sin on her part to suffer him to ...
— Fenton's Quest • M. E. Braddon
... surrounded, the studious mystery with which the brightest jewel that England possesses is secluded from the admiring gaze. See with what rigour your walks are circumscribed, and your movement restrained at the beck of yonder churlish Foster. Consider all this, and judge for yourself ...
— Kenilworth • Sir Walter Scott
... of me," he repeated absently. "But I have got into churlish, bachelor habits—that can hardly be helped, living alone, or on board ship, as I do—and I have pretty well forgotten how to provide adequately for the ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... adolescence, her girlhood, her childhood, breast-infancy, and the silent dark of her mother's womb, and, still back, through the silence and the dark of the time when she, Josephine, was not yet born, to the light and life of a previous living, when she had been a churlish, suspicious, and embittered old man, by name Jean-Claude Bourdon, who had served his time in the Seventh Artillery at Besancon, and who died at the age of seventy, long bedridden. Yes, and did not Colonel de Rochas in turn hypnotize this shade of Jean-Claude ...
— The Jacket (The Star-Rover) • Jack London
... Pan with his rude pipe began the country wealth t' advance, To boast of cattle, flocks of sheep, and goats on hills that dance, With much more of this churlish kind, That quite transported Midas' mind, And held him wrapt ...
— Lyrics from the Song-Books of the Elizabethan Age • Various
... Sub-acid and gentler Herbs: The Mordicant and pungent, and such as repress or discuss Flatulency (revive the Spirits, and aid Concoction;) with such as abate, and take off the keenness, mollify and reconcile the more harsh and churlish: The mild and insipid, animated with piquant and brisk: The Astringent and Binders, with such as are Laxative and Deobstruct: The over-sluggish, raw, and unactive, with those that are Eupeptic, and promote Concoction: ...
— Acetaria: A Discourse of Sallets • John Evelyn
... better known as Plymouth Bay where the Pilgrims landed fifteen years later—there instead of Port Royal, where even Lescarbot's "Ordre de Bon- Temps" could not overcome the evil reports in France concerning a "churlish wilderness"! Or if Champlain, instead of seeking later the Rock of Quebec—whose rugged charms he could not forget even in the presence of the site of Boston or in the streets of Paris—had laid the foundations of his faith and his courage on the Susquehanna, for ...
— The French in the Heart of America • John Finley
... bulging, powerful forehead, like that of Socrates or Verlaine; and, under a little black nose, blunt as a churlish assent, a pair of large hanging and symmetrical chops, which made his head a sort of massive, obstinate, pensive and three-cornered menace. He was beautiful after the manner of a beautiful, natural monster that has complied strictly with the laws of its species. And ...
— Our Friend the Dog • Maurice Maeterlinck
... actor, and the composer, challenged admiration and won it in large measure at the Manhattan performances. From the ordinary theatrical point of view it would not be easy to pick a quarrel with the drama. It would be almost churlish when there is so much to be grateful for, to pick flaws in M. Massenet's score. In the first place, compared with the vast volume of stuff poured forth by his younger colleagues of Italy, and even by some of his confrres of France, it makes appeal for approval by its ...
— Chapters of Opera • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... ostentatious friends; for he thought a good companion emphatically the greatest benefactor. I know there are people in the world who cannot feel grateful unless the favour has been done them at the cost of pain and difficulty. But this is a churlish disposition. A man may send you six sheets of letter-paper covered with the most entertaining gossip, or you may pass half an hour pleasantly, perhaps profitably, over an article of his; do you think the ...
— Virginibus Puerisque • Robert Louis Stevenson
... come before you"; whereunto I said, Amen, and asked him how his lordship could answer before God and man for what he had done to a wretched man like myself and to my child? But he answered, saying, Why had I come with her? And when I told him of the rude people here, item, of the churlish miller's man, he said that it was not his fault, and threatened the people all around with his fist, for they were making a great noise. Thereupon he commanded my child to get down and to follow him, and ...
— The Amber Witch • Wilhelm Meinhold
... she must get a feeling to live upon, for she was not a woman who could live without loving. He wanted to prove to himself the wrong he felt. What did she hide in her heart? Where did it go? Even Frank had his churlish delicacies; he never reminded her of how much she had once loved him. For that Marie ...
— O Pioneers! • Willa Cather
... been some churlish cavilling in some quarters because the School Management Committee of the London School Board passed a requisition in November last, sanctioning the purchase of an articulated skeleton for the Belleville Road School, at the very reasonable ...
— Punch, Or the London Charivari, Vol. 102, Feb. 13, 1892 • Various
... recognized the desolated cities, the wasted fields, and the rivers polluted with blood, of this geometrical measurement, as the honorable member of Europe called England? In that condition, what should we think of Sweden, Denmark, or Holland, or whatever power afforded us a churlish and treacherous hospitality, if they should invite us to join the standard of our king, our laws, and our religion,—if they should give us a direct promise of protection,—if, after all this, taking advantage of our deplorable situation, ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. V. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... thrown around a boat pulled by the nose while you are sitting in her all day. The Rob Roy, with mast down, and tied by a tow-rope, was like an eagle limping with clipped pinion and a chained foot. Still, for the man not churlish, there is scarcely any time or place or person wholly devoid of interest, if he is determined to find ...
— The Voyage Alone in the Yawl "Rob Roy" • John MacGregor
... desecrated the tombs of the kings. It is said that when the tomb of Draco the Great was opened, that king presented an appearance as black as ebony and so majestic that those who profaned his corpse fled in terror. According to other accounts, these churlish men insulted him by putting a pipe in his mouth and derisively offering him a glass ...
— Penguin Island • Anatole France
... counteract the tendency to tears which returned with night and solitude. She was most frightened when Sir Christopher approached her. The Baronet's eye was brighter and his step more elastic than ever, and it seemed to him that only the most leaden or churlish souls could be otherwise than brisk and exulting in a world where everything went so well. Dear old gentleman! he had gone through life a little flushed with the power of his will, and now his latest plan ...
— Scenes of Clerical Life • George Eliot
... excitation. He was to leave early. He would not listen to the project of her accompanying him as far as Knype, where the Loop Line joined the main. She might go to Bursley Station and no further. When she rebelled he disclosed the merest hint of his sullen-churlish side, and she at once yielded. During breakfast she did not cry, but the aspect of her face made ...
— The Old Wives' Tale • Arnold Bennett
... Thalabi, "there is, I am persuaded, no one so churlish as to refuse to do aught that he may be requested to do, with the object of amusing your guests at this hospitable and ...
— Tales of the Caliph • H. N. Crellin
... I learn how much longer I was to have of him. Strange that a little boy can give so much pain. I dropped his hand and walked on in silence, and presently I did my most churlish to hurt him by ending the story abruptly in a very cruel way. "Ten years have elapsed," said I, "since I last spoke, and our two heroes, now gay young men, are revisiting the wrecked island of their childhood. 'Did we wreck ourselves,' said one, 'or was there someone ...
— The Little White Bird - or Adventures In Kensington Gardens • J. M. Barrie
... turned away, hurt. This churlish attitude on the part of one returning to God's country on one of God's own mornings surprised and ...
— The Coming of Bill • P. G. Wodehouse
... their security; for they were always expected to be solemnly, not improperly, intoxicated by the end of supper; no wise fuddled, but muddled; for the graceful superstition of the day suspected severe sobriety at solemnities as churlish and ungracious. ...
— Love Me Little, Love Me Long • Charles Reade
... meeting of Methodists, held at Carnarvon, and were that day expected to return; "and if they should not be so civil as they ought to be," he begged, on the part of all the young people, that I would not take it amiss. The parents returned with churlish faces, and "Dym Sassenach" (no English) in answer to all my addresses. I saw how matters stood; and so, taking an affectionate leave of my kind and interesting young hosts, I went my way; for, though they spoke warmly to their parents in my behalf, and often excused the manner ...
— Confessions of an English Opium-Eater • Thomas De Quincey
... thus have occasionally enjoyed, he was for seven long years a prisoner in the asylum, tantalised by continual expectations held out to him of approaching release. One person only—the nephew of his churlish jailer—acted the part of the Good Samaritan towards him, cheered his solitude, wrote for him, and transmitted the letters of complaint or entreaty which he addressed to his friends, and which would otherwise have been suppressed ...
— Roman Mosaics - Or, Studies in Rome and Its Neighbourhood • Hugh Macmillan
... can you forgive me for this that I have done? And how can I now help you out of this miserable dog's work? Methinks that on the cold frosty nights when you are out there, minding this churlish farmer's sheep, it will not be easily that I shall lie in my warm bed. But how to help it, I do not know. Haply the law was made for vagabond thieves and cattle lifters, but it still is law, and in my place I could not well ...
— The Thirsty Sword • Robert Leighton
... now solicited again by the bottle. His moral triumph or failure literally consists in his finding the right name for the case. If he says that it is a case of not wasting good liquor already poured out, or a case of not being churlish and unsociable when in the midst of friends, or a case of learning something at last about a brand of whiskey which he never met before, or a case of celebrating a public holiday, or a case of stimulating himself to a more energetic resolve in favor of abstinence than any he has ever yet made, ...
— Talks To Teachers On Psychology; And To Students On Some Of Life's Ideals • William James
... on certain conditions, which I would inform him of. He then asserted that it was a friendly gift, and made use of this phrase in the newspapers after the second concert, without giving me the most remote hint on the subject. As Maelzel is a rude, churlish man, entirely devoid of education or cultivation, it is easy to conceive the tenor of his conduct to me during this time, which still further irritated me. Who could bear to be forced to bestow a friendly gift on such a man? I was offered an opportunity to send the work ...
— Beethoven's Letters 1790-1826, Volume 1 of 2 • Lady Wallace
... my very heart will break, Quoth she, to hear this churlish bird thus speak Of Love, and of his holy services; Now, God of Love! thou help me in some wise, That vengeance on this Cuckoo ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. II. • William Wordsworth
... the king. After perusing the petition the Lords declared their approval of its being sent to the king, and courteously acknowledged the action of the citizens in first submitting it to the judgment of their lordships.(735) It was otherwise with the Commons, who again returned a churlish reply. The deputation was given to understand that the House had been put to some inconvenience in giving them an audience, being busily engaged at the time in pressing business. The petition, however, ...
— London and the Kingdom - Volume II • Reginald R. Sharpe
... fright: Philemon whisper'd to his wife, "These men are—Saints—I'll lay my life!" The strangers overheard, and said, "You're in the right—but be'nt afraid: No hurt shall come to you or yours: But for that pack of churlish boors, Not fit to live on Christian ground, They and their village shall be drown'd; Whilst you shall see your cottage rise, And grow a church before your eyes." Scarce had they spoke, when fair and soft, The roof began to mount aloft; Aloft rose ev'ry beam and rafter; The heavy ...
— The Poems of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Volume I (of 2) • Jonathan Swift
... might reveal the very discovery he was eagerly seeking. Besides there could be no danger; both he and Sexton were armed, and apparently the invitation was innocently extended. To refuse to accept would be churlish. ...
— The Case and The Girl • Randall Parrish
... B. Grover Eliphalet made no attempt to speak to Putney though he leaned over the side and shook his umbrella at the launch as it drew away. The Governor told Perky to produce food and invited Eliphalet and the detective to supper. The officer, churlish from his bath in the bay and his enforced appearance in jumper and overalls during the drying of his garments, replied to a polite inquiry that his name was Briggs but that his credentials had been lost in his ...
— Blacksheep! Blacksheep! • Meredith Nicholson
... however, be supposed that they dined tete-a-tete; no, no— the corporal and his wife were not so churlish as that. The dinner party consisted of a chosen set, the most particular friends of the corporal. Mr Short, first officer and boatswain, Mr William Spurey, Mr and Mrs Salisbury; and last, although not the least important person ...
— Snarley-yow - or The Dog Fiend • Frederick Marryat
... ask ye when we want ye,' said she, and shut the door in my face. Annoyed at the churlish rebuff, I turned my back and walked home. All evening, though I tried to think of other things, my mind would still turn to the apparition at the window and the rudeness of the woman. I determined to say nothing about the former to my wife, for she is a nervous, highly strung ...
— Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... receptive, as though he listened to brilliant suggestions. He had a nice courtesy, and Miss Hinsdale felt continually that she was cleverer than usual this evening, and no one took his silence to be churlish, though they all innocently wondered why he did not talk more; however, it was probable that a man who had been so interestingly and terribly shot would be rather silent ...
— The Gentleman From Indiana • Booth Tarkington
... Lucius, And Lucullus, two Flattering Lords. Appemantus, a Churlish Philosopher. Sempronius another flattering Lord. Alcibiades, an Athenian Captaine. Poet. Painter. Ieweller. Merchant. Certaine Theeues. Flaminius, one of Tymons Seruants. Seruilius, another. Caphis. Varro. Philo. Titus. Lucius. Hortensis Seuerall ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... don't exactly mean that—but I cannot accept your theory. Excuse me, I cannot help if I seem a bit rude or churlish. ...
— The King of the Dark Chamber • Rabindranath Tagore (trans.)
... lips, say they, burnt with another name! Bethink thee, faint heart, there is not a man in all this city but would count death a small price to pay for my favours; and I ask of thee one little service, and thou shalt name thine own reward. Surely 'tis churlish ...
— The Gathering of Brother Hilarius • Michael Fairless
... large sum. John o' the Scales had often had twice as much from him, but the churlish fellow started ...
— Tales From Scottish Ballads • Elizabeth W. Grierson
... a horseman was seen walking out of one of the by-streets, and coming our way. He no sooner caught sight of two travellers going in his own direction, than he spurred forward to join us; being alone, and probably wishing company. As it would have been churlish to refuse to travel in company with one thus situated, we pulled up, walking our horses until the stranger joined us; when, to our surprise, it turned out to be Jason Newcome. The pedagogue was as much astonished when he recognised ...
— Satanstoe • James Fenimore Cooper
... this lady? Fortune forbid my outside have not charm'd her! She made good view of me; indeed, so much That, methought, her eyes had lost her tongue, For she did speak in starts distractedly. She loves me, sure: the cunning of her passion Invites me in this churlish messenger. None of my lord's ring! why, he sent her none. I am the man. If it be so, as 't is, Poor lady, she were better love a dream. Disguise, I see thou art a wickedness, Wherein the pregnant enemy does ...
— Twelfth Night; or, What You Will • William Shakespeare [Hudson edition]
... soul moved. Only the old woman who had been ill-treated by the Red Fox for so many years—only she, of all the crowd, gave any answer, and she for one instant turned her face toward him. With a churlish gesture the old man pushed the bread over toward her and with hesitating, trembling fingers she ...
— The Trail of the Lonesome Pine • John Fox, Jr.
... no checking churlish taunts to feare us, We have no grumbling at our purse expence: We seeke no misers favour to forbeare us, We use no houshold wranglings and offence: We have no cocke to over crowe ...
— The Bride • Samuel Rowlands et al
... off to visit the vessel; but the moment I came alongside, I repented my being there, for the rude and churlish manner in which we were received distressed me considerably. In the first place, an order was given that none but the chief himself should be allowed to come on board; consequently his wives and daughters were obliged to remain in the canoe. The captain ...
— A Narrative of a Nine Months' Residence in New Zealand in 1827 • Augustus Earle
... if not audible to all the Pnyx. Quickly he warmed. His gestures became dramatic. His voice rose to a trumpet-call. He swept his hearers with him as dry leaves before the blast. "When he began to weave his words, one might have deemed him churlish, nay a fool, but when from his chest came his deep voice, and words like unto flakes of winter snow, then who could with him contend?" Thus Homer of Odysseus the Guileful, thus as truly of Themistocles ...
— A Victor of Salamis • William Stearns Davis
... very great, and he had three thousand sheep, and a thousand goats: and he was shearing his sheep in Carmel. Now the name of the man was Nabal; and the name of his wife Abigail: and she was a woman of good understanding, and of a beautiful countenance: but the man was churlish and evil in his doings; and he was of the house of Caleb." Caleb was Joshua's friend, who had conquered all that land in Joshua's time. Nabal, therefore, had all the pride of a man of most ancient and noble family—and no shame to him if he had had a noble, courteous, and generous heart therewith, ...
— True Words for Brave Men • Charles Kingsley
... himself that he was a churlish brute; but for the life of him he could not get out any pretty speeches worthy of ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... churlish objection to the circumnavigation of the globe, for the purposes of art, of study, and benevolence, so that the man is first domesticated, or does not go abroad with the hope of finding somewhat greater than he knows. He who travels to be amused, or to get somewhat ...
— Essays • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... no more the guest. No longer in the mighty kitchens are prepared the prodigious supply of meats destined for the support of the poor or the entertainment of the traveller. No kindly porter stands at the gate, to bid the stranger enter and partake of the munificent abbot's hospitality, but a churlish guard bids him hie away, and menaces him if he tarries with his halbert. Closed are the buttery-hatches and the pantries; and the daily dole of bread hath ceased. Closed, also, to the brethren is the refectory. The cellarer's office is ended. The strong ale which he brewed in October, ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... proposal was made with so frank and manly a mien, and the air of the free-trader, as he leaned beyond the gunwale of his boat, was so superior to his pursuit, that, unwilling to seem churlish, or to be outdone in courtesy, he reluctantly consented, and laid his palm within that the other offered. The smuggler profited by the junction to draw the boats nearer, and, to the amazement of all who witnessed the action, he stepped boldly into the yawl, and was seated, ...
— The Water-Witch or, The Skimmer of the Seas • James Fenimore Cooper
... 'What a churlish dog it is! Now had you, Master Dick, proposed to me that we should go down and pass a week at a certain small thatched cottage on the banks of the Ban, where a Presbyterian minister with eight olive branches vegetates, discussing tough mutton and tougher theology on Sundays, and getting ...
— Lord Kilgobbin • Charles Lever
... not anything to show less fair: Patient were he of soul who could pass by A twenty minutes' wait amidst the cry Of churlish clowns who worn cord jackets wear, Without one single, solitary swear. The low, unmeaning grunt, the needless lie, The prompt "next platform" (which is all my eye), The choky waiting-room, the smoky air; Refreshment-bars where nothing ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 102, May 7, 1892 • Various
... to cuff him was cooled by a sudden frost. He said as carelessly as possible: "You are a churlish fool; but it is likely you have seen Robert Sans-Peur in Nidaros. He was there shortly before we ...
— The Thrall of Leif the Lucky • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz
... when the person you thus served came to know it was you who rendered the service, he did not feel thankful, he did not think it handsome of you, thus to repair any little harm he might have done you before, but became churlish and sore and cross-grained, and with a wretched false pride said that because he had offended you once he resented your taking the liberty of befriending him now, would you not think that person an ungrateful fellow; ungrateful not only to you his ...
— Kenelm Chillingly, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... refusal, and that the facts did not come to light till after his death. He kept an exact account of his salary, of his share of the profits accruing from the trade in salt, and of those presents which, according to the fashion of the East, it would be churlish to refuse. Out of the sum arising from these resources, he defrayed the expenses of his situation. The surplus he divided among a few attached friends who had accompanied him to India. He always boasted, and as far as we can judge, he boasted ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... name of this Society, and in the name of my fellow-countrymen generally, I here solemnly protest against the perpetration of any more acts of useless and churlish Vandalism, in the needless destruction and removal of our Scottish antiquarian remains. The hearts of all leal Scotsmen, overflowing as they do with a love of their native land, must ever deplore the unnecessary demolition of ...
— Archaeological Essays, Vol. 1 • James Y. Simpson
... churlish soul may plead A favor to a dying foe, I'll ask thee, Stuyvesant, ere I bleed, Let me once more on my gray steed Thrice round the timbered enceinte go: Fire, ...
— Tales of the Chesapeake • George Alfred Townsend
... it he knew that he had grown somewhat churlish; that men who did not understand his unsociable ways and extreme reticence looked at him askance. But what of it? How little such things mattered! The tragedy was his and the silence was his, and he had never asked anyone ...
— The Rhodesian • Gertrude Page
... well appointed troop," Archie said looking at the men, who were drawn up in order, "and not to be despised. Their leader looks an honest fellow; and if the lady means honestly it were churlish indeed, to refuse her aid when she ventures to break with her family and to declare for Scotland. No; methinks that, with your permission, I will run the risk, such as it may be, and will join this band with my own. I will keep a sharp watch over them at the first fight, ...
— In Freedom's Cause • G. A. Henty
... which it was that they were inflamed to undertake so many great labours. There are others, of little and narrow minds, either always despairing of everything, or else malcontent, envious, ill-tempered, churlish, calumnious, and morose; others devoted to amatory pleasures, others petulant, others audacious, wanton, intemperate, or idle, never continuing in the same opinion; on which account there is never any interruption to the annoyances to ...
— The Academic Questions • M. T. Cicero
... the visits he paid to the cottage of the once prejudiced and churlish Sullivan, now no longer so, for the practical lesson of kindness he had learned from the untutored Indian was not lost upon him. It was made the means of bringing him to a knowledge of his own sinfulness in the sight of God, and his deficiencies in duty toward his fellow ...
— Choice Readings for the Home Circle • Anonymous
... so that I might be nearer and in better light: a proceeding which turned the sacristan from a servant of God into an ugly brawler. A gift of money, however, returned him to his rightful status; but he is a churlish fellow. I mention the circumstance because it is isolated in my Venetian wanderings. No other sacristan ever suggested that the whole church was not equally free or resented any ...
— A Wanderer in Venice • E.V. Lucas
... clear everything. She did not scruple to accept it in the spirit of affection in which it was offered. It would have been churlish and ...
— The Imaginary Marriage • Henry St. John Cooper
... and the friar. The bard was a freeman born, a skilled weaver of courteous phrases, not a churlish taeog. The monk or friar might be a serf. They worked like serfs, and ennobled labour. The Church condemned serfdom, and we find chapters giving their ...
— A Short History of Wales • Owen M. Edwards
... was one man in the mess who would have naught to do with our philosophy—a churlish, ill-tempered, unphilosophical, superstitious old bear of a quarter-gunner; a believer in Tophet, for which he was accordingly preparing himself. Priming was his name; but methinks I have spoken of ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... scorned and mocked the youth, calling him Beaumains, because his hands were large and fair, and putting him into the kitchen, where he had served for twelve months as a scullion, and, in spite of all his churlish treatment, had faithfully obeyed Sir Key. But Sir Lancelot and Sir Gawain were angered when they saw Sir Key so churlish to a youth that had so worshipful a bearing, and ofttimes had they ...
— The Legends Of King Arthur And His Knights • James Knowles
... unfair to his tenderness. I do not think so. For his churlishness is really very trying and painful, even to the man's wife, though a moment's tenderness will make her and you forget it. The man really is churlish, and much more often than he is tender. His demeanour is merely just to his character. So, when a writer annoys you for ten pages and then enchants you for ten lines, you must not explode against his style. You must not say that his style won't let his matter "come out." You must ...
— LITERARY TASTE • ARNOLD BENNETT
... but he was ashamed to seem churlish to so hospitable a man; and he was curious to see that wondrous bed; and beside, he was hungry and weary: yet he shrank from the man, he knew not why; for, though his voice was gentle, it was dry and husky like a ...
— The Ontario Readers - Third Book • Ontario Ministry of Education
... sent us back his sword And doth renounce our service. Now, by heaven! He thus hath rid us of a churlish man, Who insolently sought ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... old Sir Thomas Erpingham; A good soft pillow for that good white head Were better than a churlish turf of France. ...
— East Anglia - Personal Recollections and Historical Associations • J. Ewing Ritchie
... this, the House of Lords has made provision for the appearance of lovely woman, which contrasts most favourably with the curmudgeon and churlish arrangements of the House of Commons. In the House of Commons women have to hide themselves, as though they were in a Mahommedan country, behind a grille—where, invisible, suffocated, and crowded, they are permitted to see—themselves unseen—the gambollings of their male companions below. In ...
— Sketches In The House (1893) • T. P. O'Connor
... however, had this advantage over the spendthrift in the legend, that, if he was in similar distress, he could not impute it to his own imprudence. His misery had been bequeathed to him by his father, and, joined to his high blood, and to a title which the courteous might give or the churlish withhold at their pleasure, it was the whole inheritance he had derived from his ancestry. Perhaps this melancholy yet consolatory reflection crossed the mind of the unfortunate young nobleman with a breathing of comfort. Favourable ...
— Bride of Lammermoor • Sir Walter Scott
... to survey Where rougher climes a nobler race display; Where the bleak Swiss their stormy mansion tread, And force a churlish soil for scanty bread, Yet still, e'en here, Content can spread a charm, Redress the clime, and all its rage disarm. Though poor the peasant's hut his feast though small, He sees his little lot, the lot of all; ...
— Translations of German Poetry in American Magazines 1741-1810 • Edward Ziegler Davis
... pleased to say, it is decent for a priest "to be sober and sad;" "a judge to be incorrupted, solitary, and unacquainted with courtiers or courtly entertainments... without plait or wrinkle, sour in look and churlish in speech; contrariwise a courtly gentleman to be lofty and curious in countenance, yet sometimes a creeper and a curry favell with his superiors." "And in a prince it is decent to go slowly and to march with leisure, and with a certain grandity rather than gravity; as our ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin
... be taken with the simplicity of nature; in general I despised it; but, owing to my circumstances at the time, I was deeply affected by the manner of this poor woman's welcome. The weaver continued in a churlish mood throughout the evening, apparently dissatisfied with what his wife had done in entertaining me, and spoke to her in a manner so crusty that I thought proper to rebuke him, for the woman was comely in her person, ...
— The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner • James Hogg
... men going up and down the house as if on errands: but he called to mind what the Friend had said to him, and he did not so much as turn himself toward the hall; for he said: 'Belike these men are outlaws and Wolves of the Holy Places, yet by seeming they are good fellows and nought churlish, nor have I to do with taking up the feud against them. I will abide the morning. Yet meseemeth that she drew me ...
— The Roots of the Mountains • William Morris
... have done if Melinette had not been there to calm him down. She represented to him what a powerful enchanter Grumedan was, and how, if he were provoked, he might avenge himself upon the Princess, since he was the most unjust and churlish of all the enchanters, and had often before had to be punished by the Fairy Queen for some of his ill-deeds. Once he had been imprisoned in a tree, and was only released when it was blown down by a furious wind; another time ...
— The Green Fairy Book • Various
... the words before I regretted them. It was a foolish speech and a churlish one as well. She pretended not to notice it, however, but bade her maid go down to the concierge's office, and take the bag to the room that had been allotted to her. The girl disappeared, and when she had gone Miss ...
— My Strangest Case • Guy Boothby
... from the effects of Baptiste's tyranny, which he had been able to establish by a very simple and quiet process. Instead of cowering at the fierce glance, or recoiling at the rude remonstrances of the churlish patron, he had chosen his time, when the latter was in one of his hottest ebullitions of anger, and when maledictions and menaces flowed out of his mouth in torrents, coolly to place himself on the very spot that the other had proscribed, where he maintained his ground with a quietness ...
— The Headsman - The Abbaye des Vignerons • James Fenimore Cooper
... shaped himself like to the horse that the fellow followed, and so stood before the fellow: presently the fellow took hold of him and got on his back, but long had he not rid, but with a stumble he hurled this churlish clown to the ground, that he almost broke his neck; yet took he not this for a sufficient revenge for the cross-answers he had received, but stood still and let the fellow ...
— The Sources and Analogues of 'A Midsummer-night's Dream' • Compiled by Frank Sidgwick
... because Ronsard lends himself so superbly as an amateur to treatment by the amateur, that any attempt to approach him more closely seems to be tinged with rancour or ingratitude. There is something churlish in the determination to be most on one's guard against the engaging graces of the amateur, a sense that one is behaving like the hero of a Gissing novel; but the choice is not large. One must regard Ronsard either as a charming country gentleman, or as a great historical figure ...
— Aspects of Literature • J. Middleton Murry
... attested copy of all the writings; I send you 45 kreutzers. How could you possibly accept such a proposal from our churlish landlord when accompanied by a threat? Where was your good ...
— Beethoven's Letters 1790-1826 Vol. 2 • Lady Wallace
... the object of all her care, solicitude and affection. She will see nothing but by him, and through him. If he is a man of sense and virtue, she will sympathize in his sorrows, divert his fatigue, and share his pleasures. If she becomes the property of a churlish or negligent husband, she will suit his taste also, for she will not long survive his unkindness."—SIR ...
— Practical Suggestions for Mother and Housewife • Marion Mills Miller
... Brooke Hamilton. It is unfortunate we know so little of him. His great-niece, Miss Susanna Hamilton, lives at Hamilton Arms. She is the last of the Hamilton family. Unfortunately for the college, she became incensed at the churlish behavior toward her of a member of the Board whose estate adjoined hers. This was many years ago. She had been on the verge of turning over to the college a great deal of interesting data regarding Brooke Hamilton which was private family history. Doctor Burns, then ...
— Marjorie Dean, College Sophomore • Pauline Lester
... for instance, that I am invited to stay with a great man, and suppose that I have a talent for drawing; I may sketch his house and his rooms, himself and his family, if he does not object—and it seems to me that it would be churlish and affected of him to object—I may write descriptive letters from the place, giving an account of his domestic ways, his wife and family, his rooms, his books, his garden, his talk. I do not see that there is any reasonable objection to my showing ...
— The Altar Fire • Arthur Christopher Benson
... *orbit Hath more power than wot any man. Mine is the drowning in the sea so wan; Mine is the prison in the darke cote*, *cell Mine the strangling and hanging by the throat, The murmur, and the churlish rebelling, The groyning*, and the privy poisoning. *discontent I do vengeance and plein* correction, *full I dwell in the sign of the lion. Mine is the ruin of the highe halls, The falling of the towers and the walls Upon the miner or the ...
— The Canterbury Tales and Other Poems • Geoffrey Chaucer
... that he had more than once encouraged the hope now frankly expressed. Indulging a correspondent frankness, he might explain that Peak's position was so distasteful to him that it disturbed the future with many kinds of uncertainty. But this would be churlish. He must treat his guest as a gentleman, so long as nothing compelled him to take ...
— Born in Exile • George Gissing
... his hand! Is this a paw, think you, To hold a tender hand in? fie, for shame! A nobleman so churlish! Look, I ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VIII (4th edition) • Various
... himself so squalid and unkempt. Surely he whom thou servest must be an ungrateful master. Tell me his name, if thou wilt, and answer me truly if this be indeed the land of Ithaca to which I am come, as I heard from a man whom I met by the way. He seemed a churlish fellow, and would not stay to answer my questions; for I was fain to ask him concerning a friend whom I once entertained in my house, a native of Ithaca, as he told me, and a son of one Laertes. Many ...
— Stories from the Odyssey • H. L. Havell
... half-hour we had wandered in the park. The sunshot glades hung out an invitation it would have been churlish to refuse. And so in and out of the tall bracken, under the spreading oaks, close to the gentle-eyed deer, we had roamed for a while at will, carelessly, letting the world slip. Sir Peter and his lady taking ...
— The Brother of Daphne • Dornford Yates
... Tchuktchi costume is becoming, but these people wore shapeless rags, matted with dirt, and their appearance suggested years of inactivity and bodily neglect. I noticed, however with satisfaction that their churlish greeting was not unmingled with fear, although they obstinately refused the food and shelter begged for by means of signs, pointing, at the same time, to a black banner flapping mournfully over the nearest hut. This I knew (from my experiences at Oumwaidjik in 1896) to be the Tchuktchi ...
— From Paris to New York by Land • Harry de Windt
... all seemed to make a lovelier picture than the cheerful beauty of prosperous Normandy, or the olive-groves and orange-gardens of Provence. Arthur Young thought the Limousin the most beautiful part of France. Unhappily for the cultivator, these gracious conformations belonged to a harsh and churlish soil. For him the roll of the chalk and the massing of the granite would have been well exchanged for the fat loams of level Picardy. The soil of the Limousin was declared by its inhabitants to be the most ungrateful in the whole kingdom, returning no more than four net for one of ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol. 2 of 3) - Turgot • John Morley
... without food, and his usual meals are of the simplest kind. It is true that when he mixes with his fellow-men his heart expands and he does not refuse the wine cup or the generous food placed before him. His is no churlish spirit to turn away from the good things kind Heaven has provided for man. God sends us trials, but He intends us to enjoy what He has in His loving mercy given us in this world, and never throws temptations to sin in our way, ...
— Count Ulrich of Lindburg - A Tale of the Reformation in Germany • W.H.G. Kingston
... Sheriff-Substitute. He gave us his card and invited us to sup with him on the spot, very neatly, very gracefully, as Frenchmen can do these things. It was for the credit of Landrecies, said he; and although we knew very well how little credit we could do the place, we must have been churlish fellows to refuse an invitation so ...
— An Inland Voyage • Robert Louis Stevenson
... step, and of doubtful legality; but the Bishop characteristically declared that he would chance the illegality, feeling sure that, when the Vicar and Churchwardens invited a lay-reader to speak, no one would be churlish enough to raise legal objections. The result proved that the Bishop was perfectly right, and the Diocese of London has now a band of licensed lay-preachers who render the clergy a great deal of valuable ...
— Fifteen Chapters of Autobiography • George William Erskine Russell
... considered churlish to refuse them, and Edmund had no thought of doing so, for he needed money, and these things in those days were ...
— The Dragon and the Raven - or, The Days of King Alfred • G. A. Henty
... been churlish to have refused the member's request; besides, the errand would take him partly on his way. He opened the door of the landaulet and stepped in, and as the door swung to behind him, he found he was not ...
— The Secret House • Edgar Wallace
... to be particularly unsocial, as there is no Ordinary, or united company, but each person has his own mess, and is under no obligation to hold any intercourse with any one. A liberal and full-minded man, however, who loves to talk, will break through this churlish and unsocial restraint. Johnson and an Irish gentleman got into a dispute concerning the cause of some part of mankind being black. 'Why, Sir, said (Johnson,) it has been accounted for in three ways: either by supposing that they ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... storm, induced him to seek a temporary refuge there; at the same time, he counselled Ovando to delay for a few days the departure of the fleet, then riding in the harbor, which was destined to carry Bobadilla and the rebels with their ill-gotten treasures back to Spain. The churlish governor, however, not only refused Columbus admittance, but gave orders for the instant departure of the vessels. The apprehensions of the experienced mariner were fully justified by the event. Scarcely had the Spanish fleet quitted its moorings, before one of those tremendous hurricanes ...
— The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella The Catholic, V2 • William H. Prescott
... suggest what may be, although that may be is, as we all know, next to impossible, particularly now when nature has fortified this pleasant lodge even as would a garrison of some hundred men. Come, be not so churlish in thy favors, good my liege; give her the pledge she demands, and be sure its fulfilment will never ...
— The Days of Bruce Vol 1 - A Story from Scottish History • Grace Aguilar
... very shortly that he did not know his grandson, that he did not wish to know him, and that they had nothing to do with one another in any way. It was a churlish letter. He seemed to think that I wanted to marry Mr. Hine," and she laughed as she spoke, "and that I was trying to find out what we should have to live upon. I suppose that it was natural he should think so. And I am so glad that I wrote. For he told me that although Mr. Hine must eventually ...
— Running Water • A. E. W. Mason
... you let me have my own way to such an extent, who knows what an awful domestic tyrant I may become! No, dear—we must go tonight—there's no help for it. You see we've accepted the invitation, and it's no use being churlish. Besides, after all"—he gazed at her admiringly—"I want them to see my Norwegian rose! Come ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... sudden passion, "why should a woman's whole life be spoiled, and other lives be darkened and made sad, just by the angry, churlish, sullen ...
— The White Ladies of Worcester - A Romance of the Twelfth Century • Florence L. Barclay
... the hardship she has to endure—coarse fare, and churlish treatment at the hands of those who should love her most—the little agricultural girl still retains some of that natural inclination towards the pretty and romantic inherent in the sex. In the spring she makes daisy chains, and ...
— The Toilers of the Field • Richard Jefferies
... become of your churlish, morose temper, Geoffrey?" said he to me one day, at dinner; "why, boy, you are greatly changed of late. From a sulky, impertinent, vindictive lad, you have become ...
— The Monctons: A Novel, Volume I • Susanna Moodie
... state, the rudiments of all true virtue; which, striking deep its roots, though feeble perhaps and lowly in its beginnings, silently progressive; and almost insensibly maturing, yet will shortly, even in the bleak and churlish temperature of this world, lift up its head and spread abroad its branches, bearing abundant fruits; precious fruits of refreshment and consolation, of which the boasted products of philosophy are but sickly imitations, void of fragrance and of ...
— A Practical View of the Prevailing Religious System of Professed Christians, in the Middle and Higher Classes in this Country, Contrasted with Real Christianity. • William Wilberforce
... not, but sore need will there be that I should have it, nor never did knight refuse to do the thing I asked nor deny me any boon I demanded of him. Now God grant you be not the most churlish." ...
— High History of the Holy Graal • Unknown
... on every side decisive proofs how far and wide admiration for their genius has sunk in the hearts of man. What is it that attracts strangers from every part of the world into this distant land, and has more than compensated a remote situation and a churlish soil, and given to our own Northern Isle a splendour unknown to the regions of the sun? What is it which has brought together this mighty assemblage, and united the ardent and the generous from every part of the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 347, September, 1844 • Various
... his readers. The abstinence from any central story in Tristram is one of those dubious pieces of artifice which may possibly show the artist's independence of the usual attractions of story-telling, but may also suggest to the churlish the question whether his invention would have supplied him with any story to tell; and the continual asides and halts and parenthetic divagations in the Journey are not quite free from the same suggestion. In fact if you "can see ...
— The English Novel • George Saintsbury
... our aid To others in distress, We often thus are made The means of happiness. The churlish, unkind man His neighbor's death may cause, And have to help his family, Through ...
— Aesop, in Rhyme - Old Friends in a New Dress • Marmaduke Park
... merely because Ingram had entered it. He would go to this dinner on the Tuesday evening, and Sheila would accompany him. First, he asked her. Much as she would have preferred not visiting these particular people, she cheerfully acquiesced: she was not going to be churlish or inconsiderate on the very eve of her dramatic coup. Then he went to Mrs. Lorraine and said he had persuaded Sheila to come with him; and the young American lady and her mamma were good enough to say how glad they were she had come to this decision. ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII. No. 31. October, 1873. • Various
... evil and the good; The struggle o'er, this one sweet faith have I— Though life and death be dimly understood, She loved me; I loved her; love cannot die; Go then thy way with thine accustomed cheer, Nor heed my churlish ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 2 (of 4) • Various
... a man sometimes met with in society, whose business, when he talks, seems to be the administration of rebuke, in a spirit and with a tone of voice churlish and sarcastic, by which he would stop the increase of knowledge, check the development of mind, and arrest the growth of heroic souls. He is far from amiable in his disposition, or happy in his temper. He is a knotty piece of humanity, which rubs itself against the even surface of other portions, ...
— Talkers - With Illustrations • John Bate
... a somewhat harsh and cynical man who had seen life and did not like it, had by constant hourly practice become with me almost second nature—indeed, I should have had some difficulty in returning to the easy and thoughtless abandon of my former self. I had studied the art of being churlish till I really WAS churlish; I had to act the chief character in a drama, and I knew my part thoroughly well. I sat quietly puffing at my cigar and thinking of nothing in particular—for, as far as my plans went, I had done with thought, ...
— Vendetta - A Story of One Forgotten • Marie Corelli
... that if parents carry it lovingly towards their children, mixing their mercies with loving rebukes, and their loving rebukes with fatherly and motherly compassions, they are more likely to save their children than by being churlish and severe to them. Even if these things do not save them, if their mercy do them no good, yet it will greatly ease them at the day of death to consider, I have done by love as much as I could to save and ...
— Bunyan • James Anthony Froude
... a churlish horseman of the band, Who little deference for his lord confest, His lance uplifting, wounded overhand The unhappy suppliant in his dainty breast. Zerbino, who the cruel action scanned, Was deeply stirred, the rather that, opprest And livid with the blow the churl had sped, ...
— Orlando Furioso • Lodovico Ariosto
... breakfast next morning with a little curiosity and a great deal of painful feeling. He had been inhospitable to his brother, and a revulsion had happened such as happens invariably when a generous man is forced by external circumstances to show himself churlish. Though his good sense and his pride alike prevented him from changing his resolution of the previous night, still his heart had relented toward Jack, and he felt sorry and half ashamed to meet the brother to whom he had shown so much temper and so little kindness. It was much ...
— The Perpetual Curate • Mrs [Margaret] Oliphant
... maiden," said Gwenhwyvar, "and ask the dwarf who that knight is." Then the maiden went up to the dwarf; and the dwarf waited for the maiden, when he saw her coming towards him. And the maiden inquired of the dwarf who the knight was. "I will not tell thee," he answered. "Since thou art so churlish as not to tell me," said she, "I will ask him himself." "Thou shalt not ask him, by my faith," said he. "Wherefore?" said she. "Because thou art not of honour sufficient to befit thee to speak to my Lord." Then the maiden turned her horse's head ...
— The Mabinogion • Lady Charlotte Guest
... everything. When, the next morning after her arrival, Mandy Meacham shook her by the shoulder and bade her get up, the room was humming with the roar of mill whistles, and the gray dawn leaking in at its one window in a churlish, chary fashion, reminded her that they were under the shadow of a mountain instead of living ...
— The Power and the Glory • Grace MacGowan Cooke
... question provoked an astonishingly churlish answer. I was shortly bidden to give my mind to other than worldly things; and with that he began a homily, which lasted for many a weary mile, upon the vanities of the world and the glories of Paradise—a homily of the very tritest, upon subjects whereupon I, myself, could have dilated ...
— The Strolling Saint • Raphael Sabatini
... dressed in the picturesque native costume, advances to offer us the national drink of Italy, sweet vermouth that is frothed up with a little fizzing water in a narrow tumbler; and though carriage exercise is not liable to produce thirst, yet we cannot be so churlish as to refuse the draught, especially as the delay allows us to take our farewell look at the Bay of Naples. For here we have reached the peak of the rocky saddle that divides the two famous gulfs; and before us we now behold the ...
— The Naples Riviera • Herbert M. Vaughan
... at the audacity of this speech. And again he was looking at her. There was a funny little smile twitching the corners of her mouth. Her beauty was irresistible. Even the iron barrier of his churlish avoidance was severely shaken. She was hard to withstand, this witch with her friendly eyes and frank ...
— The Odds - And Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... Blackmoor, and it therefore became necessary to find Mrs Durbeyfield. She had told him she was not now at Marlott, but had been curiously reticent as to her actual address, and the only course was to go to Marlott and inquire for it. The farmer who had been so churlish with Tess was quite smooth-tongued to Clare, and lent him a horse and man to drive him towards Marlott, the gig he had arrived in being sent back to Emminster; for the limit of a day's journey with ...
— Tess of the d'Urbervilles - A Pure Woman • Thomas Hardy
... flocks over the fell-sides, and, at the 'back-end', on dark, winter afternoons, driving them home again, down the broad bridle-path that led over the 'raise'. They had been a race of few words, 'keeping themselves to themselves', as the phrase goes; beholden to no man, filled with a dogged, churlish pride—an upright, old-fashioned race, stubborn, long-lived, rude ...
— Victorian Short Stories • Various
... eventful day in Vazon Forest. There were the same trees, the same glades and streams, as on the well-remembered Midsummer day of the preceding year; but nature and man alike were in a different mood. The trees were leafless and churlish, the glades ragged and colourless; the turbid, dusky streams bore but small resemblance to the limpid rivulets of June; the native youths were absent, engaged in military service; the maidens, headed by Suzanne Falla, had indeed an appearance of mirth, but there was a hollow ...
— The Forest of Vazon - A Guernsey Legend Of The Eighth Century • Anonymous
... to interest me; and conscious that my somewhat frigid attitude was churlish, if she was really what she professed to be—namely, a friend of Lady Coverly's—I endeavored in turn to display an intelligent interest in the history ...
— The Green Eyes of Bast • Sax Rohmer
... the Salisbury, less churlish than Matthews, at once put two pinnaces and seventy-six men at the Council's disposal. A small expedition of eleven gallivats under Stanton was also fitted out, and a battery erected by the Portuguese at Surey to hinder provisions coming into Bombay, was ...
— The Pirates of Malabar, and An Englishwoman in India Two Hundred Years Ago • John Biddulph
... Nor the wronged Lippino; and not a word I Say of a scrap of Fra Angelico's; But are you too fine, Taddeo Gaddi, 205 To grant me a taste of your intonaco, Some Jerome that seeks the heaven with a sad eye? Not a churlish saint, ...
— Selections from the Poems and Plays of Robert Browning • Robert Browning |
