"Defy" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... go all over London," said Leander, "and you won't find a coiffure, though I say it, to set closer and defy detection more naturally than the one you've got on; selected from the best imported foreign hair in the market, I ...
— The Tinted Venus - A Farcical Romance • F. Anstey
... of company, while I sat in my chair, leaning my face towards them; and when I was engaged with one set, the coachmen would gently drive the others round my table. I have passed many an afternoon very agreeably in these conversations. But I defy the treasurer, or his two informers (I will name them, and let them make the best of it) Clustril and Drunlo, to prove that any person ever came to me incognito, except the secretary Reldresal, who was sent by express command of his imperial majesty, as I have before related. I should ...
— Gulliver's Travels - into several remote nations of the world • Jonathan Swift
... folk, so that when any one was in danger or difficulty, it was to Tom Hickathrift he must turn. It chanced that about this time many idle and rebellious persons drew themselves together in and about the Isle of Ely, and set themselves to defy the ...
— Young Folks Treasury, Volume 2 (of 12) • Various
... unsupported, by the blessing of God, I shall do my duty. I see well enough all the adverse indications. But I am sustained by a deep and a conscientious sense of duty; and while supported by that feeling, and while such great interests are at stake, I defy auguries, and ask no omen but my ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster
... undaunted, he replied, 'She'll never be a boy!' Nevertheless Maurice was developing a species of conscience, rendering him trustworthy and obedient out of sight, better, in fact, alone with his own honour and his mother's commands, than with any authority that he could defy. He knew when his father meant to be obeyed, and Gilbert managed him easily; but he warred with Lucy, ruled Sophy, and had no chivalry for any one but little Albinia, nor obedience except for his mother, and was a terror to maid-servants and elder children. With much of promise, ...
— The Young Step-Mother • Charlotte M. Yonge
... to defy all common sense because its dictates were not the same for everybody. But he marched away, back to the cubbyhole in which he had awakened. Angrily, he donned the heat-suit that had not protected him adequately before, but had certainly saved his life. ...
— Sand Doom • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... in the triumphs of soft peace, I reign; And, from my walls, defy the powers of Spain; With pomp and sports my love I celebrate, While they keep distance, and attend my state.— Parent to her, whose eyes my soul enthral, [To ABEN. Whom I, in hope, already father ...
— The Works Of John Dryden, Volume 4 (of 18) - Almanzor And Almahide, Marriage-a-la-Mode, The Assignation • John Dryden
... if you really speak the truth?" she murmured. "If I thought you still believed in me, how happy I should be. I would face my enemies, and defy them." ...
— The Sign of Silence • William Le Queux
... peculiar character of the rock, which seems to defy the strongest explosive we can get. Now I understand you used a powder in your giant ...
— Tom Swift and his Big Tunnel - or, The Hidden City of the Andes • Victor Appleton
... that morning, and as a punishment Miss Nelson had decided that she was not to go in the carriage to meet her brothers at the railway station. The little girl had stared, bridled, drawn herself up in her haughtiest style, and determined openly to defy ...
— The Children of Wilton Chase • Mrs. L. T. Meade
... Israel said, Have ye seen this man that is come up? surely to defy Israel is he come up; and it shall be, that the man who killeth him, the King will enrich him with great riches, and will give him his daughter, and make his father's house free ...
— Heroes Every Child Should Know • Hamilton Wright Mabie
... to one of the first isles they reached. On this spot Villegagnon told the eager crowd who surrounded him that he had determined to form the first settlement of the new colony. Here, at the entrance of the harbour, and surrounded by water, they might defy the attacks of enemies from without, or the Portuguese or natives who might venture to dispute their possession of the country. From this they might extend to others on either side, and then form a settlement on the shore, thus advancing till they had brought under ...
— Villegagnon - A Tale of the Huguenot Persecution • W.H.G. Kingston
... remain—here a Mohammedan, there a Christian, yonder a Judean.... From my door I study these men, the children of those in life at my going into exile. Their ardor is not diminished. To kiss a stone in which tradition has planted a saying of God, they will defy the terrors of the Desert, heat, thirst, famine, disease, death. I bring them an old idea in a new relation—God, giver of life and power to Son and Prophet—God, alone entitled to worship—God, a principle of ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 1 • Lew. Wallace
... more, and I am blest; Fly quick, ye seconds; quick ye moments, fly: Soon shall I put my hunger to the test, And all the host of miseries defy. ...
— Poetic Sketches • Thomas Gent
... art and ornament; they looked on them with exulting pride, not only because they thought them, by their vastness and gorgeousness, fit places for public worship and dwellings worthy of their kings, but because these constructions, in their towering grandeur, their massive solidity, bid fair to defy time and outlast the nations which raised them, and which thus felt assured of leaving behind them traces of their existence, memorials of their greatness. That a few defaced, dismantled, moss-grown or sand-choked fragments of these mighty buildings would one day be the ...
— Chaldea - From the Earliest Times to the Rise of Assyria • Znade A. Ragozin
... 'Twixt man and spiders, 'tis in vain to lie; I hate thee, stand off, if thou dost come nigh me, I'll crush thee with my foot; I do defy thee. ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... Newman, laughing, "don't do anything wrong. Leave me to myself, rather, or defy me, out and out. I wouldn't lay any load ...
— The American • Henry James
... sea for training nearly so much as their British rivals did. Still, the French fleet, though at anchor (and so unable to change its position quickly to suit the changes of the fight) looked as if it could defy even Nelson himself. For it was drawn up across the bay with no spot left unguarded between it and the land at either end of the line; and it was so close in shore that its admirals never thought anybody would try to work his ...
— Flag and Fleet - How the British Navy Won the Freedom of the Seas • William Wood
... his voice. You will always find in his cabin some newspaper, some book, some token of advance in education. When he questions you about the old country he astonishes you by the extent of his knowledge. I defy you not to feel that he is superior to the race from whence he has sprung in England or in Ireland. To me I confess that the manliness of such a man is very charming. He is dirty, and, perhaps, squalid. His children are sick and he is without comforts. His wife is pale, and you think ...
— Volume 1 • Anthony Trollope
... will, lambies, so I will. You just keep on a steppin' backwards and I'll do it, too, and first we know we'll get to that nice pantry where we stayed last night. I've got the key to that, even if 'tis rusty from not bein' often used, and I'll defy anybody to ...
— Jessica, the Heiress • Evelyn Raymond
... frightful fact in her soul! Away there beyond those trees lay her unhappy brother, in the lonely house, now haunted indeed. Perhaps he lay there dead! The horrors of the morning, or his own hand, might have slain him. She must go to him. She would defy the very sun, and go in the face of the universe. Was he not her brother?—Was there no help anywhere? no mantle for this sense of soul-nakedness that had made her feel as if her awful secret might be read a mile away, lying crimson and livid in ...
— Thomas Wingfold, Curate • George MacDonald
... spite she had) that England should make war against this King; and, as King Henry was a mere puppet in anybody's hands who knew how to manage his feebleness, she easily carried her point with him. But, the Parliament were determined to give him no money for such a war. So, to defy the Parliament, he packed up thirty large casks of silver—I don't know how he got so much; I dare say he screwed it out of the miserable Jews—and put them aboard ship, and went away himself to carry war into France: accompanied by his mother and his brother Richard, Earl of Cornwall, who ...
— A Child's History of England • Charles Dickens
... ranchhouse while the other hired men, as was their custom, loitered to smoke their after-dinner cigarettes in the moist coolness of the patio. For the building was on the Spanish-Mexican style. The walls were heavy enough to defy the most biting cold of winter and the most searching sun in summer. And they marched in a wide circle around an interior court which was bordered with a clumsy arcade of 'dobe pillars. By daylight the defects in ...
— Alcatraz • Max Brand
... a note of this: If you question Jesus in the effort to trip Him, you throw yourself down; but if you question Jesus in order to know and do His will, you may confidently stand upon your feet and defy anything that threatens your peace, ...
— "Say Fellows—" - Fifty Practical Talks with Boys on Life's Big Issues • Wade C. Smith
... very quickly that it might easily be mistaken for a quadruped. When at sea and fishing, it comes to the surface for the purpose of breathing with such a spring, and dives again so instantaneously, that I defy any one at first sight to be sure that it was not a fish leaping ...
— A Naturalist's Voyage Round the World - The Voyage Of The Beagle • Charles Darwin
... people on the Enchanted Island," said he, "and there are thousands upon thousands who obey this unknown king. But if you think we dare defy them I am willing to go on. Perhaps our boldness will lead them into torturing me, or starving me to death; and at the very least I ought to find much trouble and privation in the Kingdom ...
— The Enchanted Island of Yew • L. Frank Baum
... have just been living through days that defy imagination. I should never have thought that men could stand it. Not a second has passed but my life has been in danger, and yet not a hair of my ...
— America's War for Humanity • Thomas Herbert Russell
... the Doge will not be popular: did I ever write for popularity? I defy you to show a work of mine (except a tale or two) of a popular style or complexion. It appears to me that there is room for a different style of the drama; neither a servile following of the old drama, which is a grossly erroneous ...
— Life of Lord Byron, With His Letters And Journals, Vol. 5 (of 6) • (Lord Byron) George Gordon Byron
... cloak, Captain Courtier, which can even defy the camera. Let us inhale the gratifying odour, suggestive of truffles frying in oil, which is the hall-mark of your true cafe, and is as ambergris in the nostrils of the ...
— The Orchard of Tears • Sax Rohmer
... scions, in anger array'd, Once defy'd a proud monarch and built a new nation; 'Gainst their brothers of Britain unsheath'd the sharp blade That hath ne'er met defeat nor endur'd desecration; So must we in this hour Show our valour and pow'r, And dispel the black perils that over us low'r: Whilst the sons ...
— Writings in the United Amateur, 1915-1922 • Howard Phillips Lovecraft
... knees, thou mayest be turned to hobnails. [They fight. CADE falls.] O! I am slain. Famine, and no other, hath slain me: let ten thousand devils come against me, and give me but the ten meals I have lost, and I'd defy them all. Wither, garden; and be henceforth a burying-place to all that do dwell in this house, because the unconquered soul of Cade ...
— Highways & Byways in Sussex • E.V. Lucas
... confess that the reverse was the case; and that while no man ever did less to free himself than I did, my adversary retained his grasp to the end, and had surely, but for a strange interposition, effected my ruin. How relief came, and from what quarter, I might defy the most ingenious person, after reading my memoirs to this point, to say; and this not so much by reason of any subtle device, as because the hand of Providence was ...
— A Gentleman of France • Stanley Weyman
... face. It would be rather tedious to pull out, one by one, all the sheep and lambs of our poet's flock of sonnets, and to enumerate the varieties of their bleat; and though, by studying the subject half his lifetime, a man might classify them by their main characteristics, he would find they defy a perfect classification, as they often blend different qualities. Some of them have a uniform expression of calm and beautiful feeling. Others breathe ardent and almost hopeful passion. Others again show him jealous, despondent, ...
— The Sonnets, Triumphs, and Other Poems of Petrarch • Petrarch
... for water to the head Was never known to fly, Your flabby face will not grow red, Nor will your washy eye. Live long as you can bear these woes, Whilst bigots thus defy sense, Till watery Death's last Veto shows Life's quite ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, March 25, 1893 • Various
... ethics of Christ, Pilgrim traditions, and the U. S. Constitution seemed paramount to the opinions of Florida legislators, and the highest officials of the American Missionary Association decided to defy and test the law. That the denomination stands back of them may be reasonably inferred from the resolution passed by the last Triennial National Council. Let the American Missionary Association have the sinews of war with which to ...
— The American Missionary - Volume 50, No. 6, June 1896 • Various
... Bastard," he said savagely, addressing Noie, who had translated them. "I have felt thee fighting against me for long, and now thou causest this Inkosazana to defy me. It was thou who didst work upon that old woman, thine aunt, to command that the white witch should be brought hither, and because as yet I dared not disobey, I made a terrible journey to bring ...
— The Ghost Kings • H. Rider Haggard
... persons could complain in truth that they had been overlooked. Thereby New York society and the American press became greatly excited. Cooper was ever a frank friend or an open enemy. A critic wrote of him and this time: "He had the courage to defy the majority and confound the press, from a heavy sense of duty, with ungrateful truths. With his manly, strong sense of right and wrong he had a high regard for courage in men and purity in women, but, with his keen ...
— James Fenimore Cooper • Mary E. Phillips
... I say, monsieur," Louis declared, leaning toward me, and speaking in a low, earnest whisper. "The cafe below, the streets throughout this region, are peopled by his creatures. In an hour he could lead an army which would defy the whole of the gendarmes in Paris. This quarter of the city is his absolutely to do with what he wills. Do you believe that you would have a chance if he thought that she had looked twice at you,—she—Susette—the only ...
— The Lost Ambassador - The Search For The Missing Delora • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... not put myself into a situation to justify a charge of adultery, till I had, from conviction, shaken off the fetters which bound me to Mr. Venables.—While I lived with him, I defy the voice of calumny to sully what is termed the fair fame of woman.—Neglected by my husband, I never encouraged a lover; and preserved with scrupulous care, what is termed my honour, at the expence of my peace, till he, ...
— Posthumous Works - of the Author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman • Mary Wollstonecraft
... sphere, and supposed the possession of the philosopher's stone to be, not only the means of wealth, but of health and happiness; and the instrument by which man could command the services of superior beings, control the elements to his will, defy the obstructions of time and space, and acquire the most intimate knowledge of all the secrets of the universe. Wild and visionary as they were, they were not without their uses; if it were only for having purged the superstitions of Europe of the dark and disgusting forms with which the monks ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay
... one, as that of Pliny's on the Emperor Trajan. Such a preface is ringing an alarum bell for an author. If we look closer into the characters of these masters of ceremony, who thus sport with and defy the judgment of their reader, and who, by their extravagant panegyric, do considerable injury to the cause of taste, we discover that some accidental occurrence has occasioned this vehement affection for the author, and which, ...
— Literary Character of Men of Genius - Drawn from Their Own Feelings and Confessions • Isaac D'Israeli
... should I guess he'd grovel in the mire So deep, this parson perch'd on fortune's top, A man with snug appointments, children, wife, And money to defy the ills of life? If such a man prove such a Philistine, What shall of us poor copyists be said? Of me, who drive the quill and rule the line, A man engaged and shortly to be wed, With family in prospect—and so forth? [More vehemently. O, if I only ...
— Love's Comedy • Henrik Ibsen
... Goths would ere long impatiently abandon their protracted blockade, to stretch their ravages over the rich and unprotected fields of Southern Italy. But the same blind confidence in the lost terrors of the Roman name, the same fierce and reckless determination to defy the Goths to the very last, sustained the sinking courage and suppressed the despondent emotions of the great mass of the suffering people, from the beggar who prowled for garbage, to the patrician who sighed over his new and unwelcome ...
— Antonina • Wilkie Collins
... might the king resembled his sire. He had a son named Marutta, endowed with energy, and resembling Vasava himself. This earth clad in oceans; felt herself drawn towards him. He always[5] used to defy the lord of the celestials; and O son of Pandu, Vasava also defied Marutta. And Marutta,—master of Earth—was pure and possessed of perfections. And in spite of his striving, Sakra could not prevail over him. And incapable of controlling him, he riding on the horse, ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 4 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... he would plead guilty to theft and attempt to kill, and defy his captors to do their worst; but when meanness and cowardice were proved against him, he seemed ashamed ...
— Romance of California Life • John Habberton
... nook by accident; and at once perceive its value as a place of shelter and refuge. I sit down on the deck with my haversack beside me. I wedge myself securely, my feet against one side of the passage, my back against the other. I tuck my waterproof round me and feel that I may defy fate ...
— A Padre in France • George A. Birmingham
... hydrogen are just the thing. There are white men in the Solomons who stake all upon boracic acid, and others who are prejudiced in favour of lysol. I also have the weakness of a panacea. It is California. I defy any man to get a Solomon Island ...
— The Cruise of the Snark • Jack London
... that the party separated at an early hour—a good, sober, reasonable hour for such an occasion—somewhere before midnight. The horses were harnessed; the ladies were packed in the sleighs with furs so thick and plentiful as to defy the cold; the gentlemen seized their reins and cracked their whips; the horses snorted, plunged, and dashed away over the white plains in different directions, while the merry sleigh-bells sounded fainter and fainter in the ...
— The Young Fur Traders • R.M. Ballantyne
... was neither pity nor remorse in his heart. For the time at least he hated her. She had dared to defy him, she had twitted him with his gaming, she had refused him—in favor of Elia. He told himself all this, and, as he looked down at the still figure, he told himself it served her right, and that she would know better in the future. ...
— The One-Way Trail - A story of the cattle country • Ridgwell Cullum
... daughter, to see you; come here and fulfil your duty, by showing obedience to the will of your father. I will teach your mother how to behave, and, to defy her more fully, here is Martine, whom I have brought back to take her old ...
— The Learned Women • Moliere (Poquelin)
... signs, "Here they are; we have found them," "Four big fellows," "Come on," etc. When they come opposite the Caribou, the first hunter lets off a short "yelp." The Caribou spring to the opposite side of the ring, and then line up to defy this new noise; but do not understand it, so gaze as they prance about in fear. The hunters draw their bows together, and make as though each lets fly an arrow. The first Caribou drops, the others turn in fear and run around about half of the ring, heads low, and not dancing; then they ...
— Woodland Tales • Ernest Seton-Thompson
... deprived her of a husband whom she despised, and of a home which his presence had made insupportable. But she soon roused herself to face her new lack of responsibility, and to enjoy it. At first, she moved cautiously. There were numerous sympathisers who urged her to defy the world, such as it is, and to show herself everywhere entirely careless of what people might say. Such conduct might possibly have been successful, but the Divorcee foresaw a possible risk to her reputation, and abstained. She began, therefore, by making her public appearances infrequent. ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 99., October 11, 1890 • Various
... figures and animal-like fragments of modems (his friends with tails, wings, etc.), hastily wash his hands, trot along in front of them to his place of business, and in a brief space of time turn out some complicated legal instrument with which it would defy the sharpest critic to ...
— Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... classical robe, but her speech is always delightfully musical. She has beautiful cadences, that haunt the memory like some old Volkslied. In spite of a careless confusion between "thou" and "you," I defy anybody to read "Heraclitus," to take only one instance, without a sense of pleasure which will compel him to learn the two verses by heart. But the Muse is pathetic, playful, and patriotic, too, when the occasion fits, and, whatever she sings, ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100. February 21, 1891 • Various
... commissions, by an unwritten but generally accepted custom, French and German are the only languages used. (Latterly the representatives of the United States of America, with the individualistic courage that becomes them, have shown a disposition to rebel against this custom and defy it; but the close of the Zurich meeting left it uncertain whether in this particular the New World will be able to prevail over the Old.) In the dignified speech-making of the General Assembly the recurrent changes of language, if a little disconcerting at first, can be ...
— The Unity of Civilization • Various
... bearing never so arrogant, the Jewish race, though a mere handful of men, offered war to the mistress of the world. With little military organization or training, divided by factions and torn asunder by internal dissensions, they yet dared to defy the mighty power of Rome. They defeated the ill-starred expedition of Cestius Gallus, and inflicted upon the Roman arms the most terrible disgrace they had ever endured in the East. But the triumph ...
— With the British Army in The Holy Land • Henry Osmond Lock
... and all that he had done, if man were only something more than man, if devil's luck and devil's power would come to his whistle, if the seed of his nature could defy the iron stricture of the flesh, reaching its height, shooting up into a terrible upas-tree—so for the moment Baldry saw himself. Into his voice came a deep and sonorous note, his black eyes glowed; he began to gesture with his hand, stately as a Spaniard. And then, chancing ...
— Sir Mortimer • Mary Johnston
... worthy Canadian," I resumed. "If such an animal is in existence, if it inhabits the depths of the ocean, if it frequents the strata lying miles below the surface of the water, it must necessarily possess an organisation the strength of which would defy all comparison." ...
— Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea • Jules Verne
... "Shall he defy the authority of the court, or shall one man hold six of you at bay? Close in upon him and seize him. You, Baddlesmere, why ...
— Sir Nigel • Arthur Conan Doyle
... quotes Prisot, Finch, and Wingate. Hale cites nobody. The court, in Woolston's case, cite Hale. Wood cites Woolston's case. Blackstone quotes Woolston's case and Hale. And Lord Mansfield, like Hale, ventures it on his own authority. Here I might defy the best read lawyer to produce another scrip of authority for this judiciary forgery; and I might go on further to show, how some of the Anglo-Saxon priests interpolated into the text of Alfred's laws, the 20th, 21st, 22nd, and 23rd chapters of Exodus, and the 15th of the Acts of the Apostles, ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... describe the trail as it was to the North Rim in those days, words prove weak. The first twelve miles we had already traveled are too well known to need description; the remaining twenty—all rebuilt since that time—defy it. Sometimes the trail ran along in the creek bed for yards and yards. This made it impassable during the spring freshets. Arizona horses are trained to drink at every opportunity for fear there may never be another chance, and our mounts had learned their ...
— I Married a Ranger • Dama Margaret Smith
... remained unbroken. Her shrillest tones were lost in an echoless space, even as the smoke of her fire had faded into pure ether. She stretched out her clenched fists as if to defy the pillared austerities of ...
— Frontier Stories • Bret Harte
... ready-made—whatever scraps he may have stolen at the feast of languages—it is clear that he was an imperial creator of language, and lived while his mother-tongue was still plastic. Having a mint of phrases in his own brain, well might he speak with the contempt he does of those "fools who for a tricksy word defy the matter;" that is, slight or disregard it. He never needed to do that. Words were "correspondent to his command, and, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XXVI., December, 1880. • Various
... these regions is a round fur cap; but Edith had a peculiar affection for the Cree Indian headdress, and, upon the present occasion, wore one which was lined with fur and accommodated with ear-pieces, to defy the winter cold. The child's general appearance was somewhat rotund. Painters would probably have said there was a little too much breadth, perhaps, in the picture. Her pointed cap, however, with the little bow of ...
— Ungava • R.M. Ballantyne
... bush-whacker," I said, and invited the Maluka to come and see me defy him. But when I found myself face to face with over six feet of brawny quizzing, wrathful-looking Scotchman, all my courage slipped away, and edging closer to the Maluka, I held out my hand to the bushman, murmuring lamely: ...
— We of the Never-Never • Jeanie "Mrs. Aeneas" Gunn
... what motive has he for hiding his identity? Has he been banished, is he an outcast of society that he should have selected this place above all others? Am I not in the power of an evildoer anxious to ensure impunity for his crimes and to defy the law by seeking refuge in this undiscoverable burrow? I have the right of supposing anything in the case of this suspicious foreigner, ...
— Facing the Flag • Jules Verne
... constantly on the increase. He is now going to Dresden, to see at his feet all the princes of Germany; and he will then hasten northward, to gain new victories and humiliate the only man in the world who still dares to defy him, the Emperor Alexander ...
— NAPOLEON AND BLUCHER • L. Muhlbach
... no matter to what country she belonged, St. Maxime has secured double immortality—first, in the saints' calendar; secondly, in the mausoleum of Auxerre. Alike these tombs and frescoes, with the sepulchres of the Pharaohs, seem able to defy the encroachments of Time. ...
— The Roof of France • Matilda Betham-Edwards
... I trust, understood that I meant yes; and so I do. In the mean time, I send you the most delicious poem upon earth. If you don't know what it is all about, or why; at least you will find glorious similes about every thing in the world, and I defy you to discover three bad verses in the whole stack. Dryden was but the prototype of the Botanic Garden in his charming Flower and Leaf; and if he had less meaning, it is true he had more plan: and I ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole, V4 • Horace Walpole
... the Darling, in which it builds a nest of small sticks, varying in length from eight inches to three, and in thickness, from that of a quill to that of the thumb. The fabric is so firm and compact as almost to defy destruction except by fire. The animals live in communities, and have passages leading into apartments in the centre of the mound or pyramid, which might consist of three or four wheelbarrows full of the sticks, are about ...
— Expedition into Central Australia • Charles Sturt
... have no benches or not enough to sit on. They squat on dirty floors and eat dirty food. They are permitted to throw the leavings of their food and spit where they like, sit how they like and smoke everywhere. The closets attached to these places defy description. I have not the power adequately to describe them without committing a breach of the laws of decent speech. Disinfecting powder, ashes, or disinfecting fluids are unknown. The army of flies buzzing about them warns you against their use. But ...
— Third class in Indian railways • Mahatma Gandhi
... he called thee!" she said slowly and as if speaking to an invisible presence. "And he said at thy call he would give up the world, and suffer death and torture and shame for thee!... Then so be it! And I do defy thee, O man of Galilee! even I, Dea Flavia Augusta, of the imperial House of Caesar! For that man whom I hate and despise, for that man who has defied and shamed me, for that man whose heart and allegiance thou hast filched from Caesar, for him will I do thee battle ... and ...
— "Unto Caesar" • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... sir, you air a Child of Freedom, and your proud answer to the Tyrant is, that your bright home is in the Settin' Sun. And, sir, if any man denies this fact, though it be the British Lion himself, I defy him. Let me have him here!"—smiting the table, and causing the inkstand to skip—"here, upon this sacred altar! Here, upon the ancestral ashes cemented with the glorious blood poured out like water on the plains of Chickabiddy Lick. Alone I ...
— Jack and Jill • Louisa May Alcott
... this Mountain; nor as yet even loud dishonour. Gifts it boasts not, nor graces, of speaking or of thinking; solely this one gift of assured faith, of audacity that will defy the Earth and the Heavens. Foremost here are the Cordelier Trio: hot Merlin from Thionville, hot Bazire, Attorneys both; Chabot, disfrocked Capuchin, skilful in agio. Lawyer Lacroix, who wore once as subaltern ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... he assume a primordial molecular arrangement of which all the phenomena of the universe are the consequences, and the more completely is he thereby at the mercy of the teleologist, who can always defy him to disprove that this primordial molecular arrangement was not intended to evolve the phenomena of the universe." (The "Genealogy of Animals" ('The Academy,' 1869), reprinted in ...
— The Reception of the 'Origin of Species' • Thomas Henry Huxley
... respect me, and will not seek my ruin, to insult me when I shall have fallen, as you said just now, whilst uttering your blasphemies against love, such as I understand it. That is my idea of love. And now you will tell me, perhaps, that my love will despise me; I defy him to do so, unless he be the vilest of men, and my heart assures me that it is not such a man I would choose. A look from me will repay him for the sacrifices he makes, or will inspire him with the virtues which he would never ...
— Ten Years Later • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... devil turned out to be what the Romans call 'babilano', and we impotent. The duchess told me as much on the occasion of my third visit. She did not give me the information in a complaining tone, or as if she was fain to be consoled, but merely to defy her confessor, who had threatened her with excommunication if she went on telling people about her husband's condition, or if she tried to ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... strong for him. He stood alone on the continent of Europe face to face with the man who was subjugating it. His army was broken in pieces, and perhaps an invasion of his own empire was at hand. Should he make terms with this man whose career had so revolted him?—or should he defy him and accept the risk of an invasion, which, by offering freedom to the serfs and independence to the Poles, might give the invader the immediate support of millions of his own subjects? Then added to the conflict with his old self, there was the irresistible ...
— A Short History of Russia • Mary Platt Parmele
... the dark eclipse,— When the pygmy heir of a giant name Dimmed the face of the land with shame,— Speak the truth with indignant lips, Call him little whom men called great, Scoff at him, scorn him, deny him, Point to the blood on his robe of state, Fling back his bribes and defy him! ...
— The Poems of Henry Van Dyke • Henry Van Dyke
... first monarchs of the Brunswick dynasty; huge charts, which subsequent discoveries have antiquated; dusty maps of Mexico, dim as dreams; and soundings of the Bay of Panama! The long passages hung with buckets, appended, in idle row to walls, whose substance might defy any, short of the last conflagration; with vast ranges of cellarage under all, where dollars and pieces-of-eight once lay, 'an unsunned heap,' for Mammon to have solaced his solitary heart withal—long since dissipated, or scattered into air ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... Morals. "The Roman Empire, says the Historian, MUST have sunk, though the Goths had not invaded it. Why? Because the Roman Virtue was sunk." Could I be assured that America would remain virtuous, I would venture to defy the utmost Efforts of Enemies to subjugate her. You will allow me to remind you, that the Morals of that City which has born so great a Share in the American Contest, depend much upon the Vigilance of the respectable Body of Magistrates of which you ...
— The Writings of Samuel Adams, vol. III. • Samuel Adams
... is a universal edict which enslaves, in a sense, every particle of matter in the cosmos. The man who attempts to defy the "injustice" of that law by ignoring the consequences of its enforcement will find himself punished rather severely. It may be unjust that a bird can fly under its own muscle power, but a man who tries to correct that injustice by leaping out of a skyscraper window ...
— The Highest Treason • Randall Garrett
... with dull bewilderment. He knew, in a vague way, that every word the teacher spoke to the child, no less than those useless caresses, was "siding along with the scholar ag'in' the parent," and yet he could not definitely have stated just how. He was quite sure that she would not dare so to defy him did she not know that she had the whip-handle in the fact that she did not want her "job" next year, and that the Board could not, except for definite offenses, break their contract with her. It was only in view of these considerations that she played her game of "plaguing" him by ...
— Tillie: A Mennonite Maid - A Story of the Pennsylvania Dutch • Helen Reimensnyder Martin
... defy me still?" cried Sir Pertolepe, jovial of voice, "must ye to the whip in sooth? Ho, Ralph—Otho, strip me this stubborn jade—so!—Ha! verily Cuthbert, hast shrewd eyes, 'tis a dainty rogue. Come," said he smiling down into the ...
— Beltane The Smith • Jeffery Farnol
... Misunderstandings, sometimes sufferings and persecutions. To defend your country? Weariness, wounds and often death. To do good? Annoyance, ingratitude, even resentment. Self-sacrifice enters into all the essential actions of humanity. I defy the closest calculators to maintain their position in the world without ever appealing to aught but their calculations. True, those who know how to make their "pile" are rated as men of ability. But look a little closer. How ...
— The Simple Life • Charles Wagner
... people, "What saith this man to the corpse?" "Arise, youth! Open thine eyes! Breathe freely! Arise, I say unto thee—arise!" Did this stranger dare to defy God's own decree? ...
— Mystic Christianity • Yogi Ramacharaka
... had taken the second-floor front of Number Seven, three months before, Ashe Marson had realized that he must forego those morning exercises which had become a second nature to him, or else defy London's unwritten law and brave London's mockery. He had not hesitated long. Physical fitness was his gospel. On the subject of exercise he was confessedly a crank. He decided ...
— Something New • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... pack of gossips! Who sent for you? Go, send your husbands here, If they have courage to defy the order. ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. III • Kuno Francke (Editor-in-Chief)
... profane, there is not one so little likely to disturb the tranquil current of such reminiscences. "As it was of old, so is it now," enjoying a delightful permanency in all its habits and customs, which no changes elsewhere disturb or affect; and in this respect I defy O'Connell and all the tail to refuse it ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Vol. 2 • Charles James Lever
... repentance. As long as I was able to go out I always went to church, and I have never failed to say my prayers. I have not ceased all my life to do my duty and to behave myself like a virtuous housewife. I defy any living soul to slander me. And of all the poor people who have come to my door, not one can complain that I sent them away without giving them something. Now, I should like to know how ...
— The Basket of Flowers • Christoph von Schmid
... sorrows vast—Love's iv'ried hand hath stole Griefs turgid stream, which o'er thee it doth roll, That hand which good on all but me bestows. Not only quiet and sweet rest I fly, But from myself and thought, whose vain pursuit On pinion'd fancy doth my soul transport: The multitude I did so long defy, Now as my hope and refuge I salute, So much I tremble ...
— The Sonnets, Triumphs, and Other Poems of Petrarch • Petrarch
... deal with them, and that is to seize their goods. I believe you are socialist about property, as you are about everything else. You want to pull everything down, from the Queen to the laws of marriage, all for the good of humanity, and I tell you that your ideas will be your ruin. Defy custom and it will crush you. You are running your head against a brick wall, and one day you will find ...
— Beatrice • H. Rider Haggard
... a second and third summons in the same words. We both looked round for the Nevil, but keener eyes would have sought for him in vain; at the first sound of voices he had plunged into the dark woods above us, where a footman, knowing the country, might defy any pursuit. Peace and joy go with him! By remaining he would only have ruined himself, without profiting ...
— Border and Bastille • George A. Lawrence
... foreign nations should inundate us with useful produce of every description, and ask nothing in return; that our importations should be infinite, and our exportations nothing. Imagine all this, and still I defy you to prove that we will ...
— Sophisms of the Protectionists • Frederic Bastiat
... attitude of the typical learner must frequently be one of hesitancy and self-distrust if not of fear, though conditions were so varied as almost to defy classification. One type of apprentice was expected to learn merely by observation and imitation. Another was practically the chore boy of the worker who was assigned to teach him. A third was under ...
— The Psychology of Management - The Function of the Mind in Determining, Teaching and - Installing Methods of Least Waste • L. M. Gilbreth
... DID you get that boy?" he demanded. "Who taught him to play like that? I've been trying to find out from him, but I'd defy Sherlock Holmes himself to make head or tail of the sort of lingo he talks, about mountain homes and the Orchestra of Life! Father, what DOES ...
— Just David • Eleanor H. Porter
... by mountain scenery defy analysis. They may be classified and labelled, but not explained. I turn to my library of books by mountain-lovers—climbers, artists, poets, scientists. Though we are solitaries in our communion with the Deity, though we worship in great spaces ...
— Mountain Meditations - and some subjects of the day and the war • L. Lind-af-Hageby
... dimly, the same star that led Goethe and Schiller on, in the storm and stress period of their time. We smile now as we recall how Schiller stood on the street corners of Leipzig, wearing a dressing-gown by day to defy custom; but the youth of Athens did the same in the last days of Greece. In fact then the darlings of the gilded world struck attitudes of abandon in order to look like the Spartans. They refused to cut their ...
— Woman as Decoration • Emily Burbank
... We can trick him into telling us. You think I do not know what is on your mind, Haljan? There is a secret code of signals arranged between Dean and Grantline. I have forced Dean to confess it. Without torture! Prince helped me in that. He persuaded Dean not to defy me. A very persuasive fellow, George Prince. More diplomatic than I am. I give ...
— Brigands of the Moon • Ray Cummings
... have again passed away, disclosing gradually new properties of the magnet to the ardent and eager pursuit of human curiosity, still stimulated by constant observation of the phenomena connected with this metallic substance, dug from the bowels of the earth, yet seeming more and more to elude or defy all the ordinary laws of matter. Thus, in the process of observation to ascertain the horizontal variation of the needle from its polar direction, it was found that it differed in intensity in the different regions of the earth and the seas; that ...
— Memoir of the Life of John Quincy Adams. • Josiah Quincy
... the loam of the prairies: up to that Valley and Piedmont stretch throughout the State navigable rivers, like fingers of the Ocean-hand, ready to bear to all marts the produce of the soil, the superb vein of gold, and the iron which, unlocked from mountain-barriers, could defy competition. But in her castle Virginia is still, a sleeping beauty awaiting the hero whose kiss shall recall her to life. Comparing what free labor has done for the granite rock called Massachusetts, and what slave labor has done for the enchanted garden ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 54, April, 1862 • Various
... the 'Household Album' with mine, however," said Jack; "and I defy an A.R.A. to have had more difficulty in securing ...
— Six to Sixteen - A Story for Girls • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... have a decided superiority over the spinster class. I defy any man breathing,—let him be half police-magistrate, half chancellor,—to find out the figure of a young lady's dower. On your first introduction to the house, some kind friend whispers, 'Go it, old boy; forty thousand, not a penny less.' A few weeks later, as the siege ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 1 (of 2) • Charles Lever
... wait! till, banished, driven, ye fear to meet the face of Heaven;—till ye are slaughtered, wait. But no! your kindling hearts gainsay the thought. Hark! hear that bloodhound's bay! Yon blazing village see! Rise, countrymen! Awake! Defy the haughty Dane! Your battlecry be Freedom! We will do or ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick
... these: "Now I shouldn't be surprised if she found herself out of conceit with this beano before we start. She's like that, you know. In such a case it's up to you to do something. You and Lancelot between you. That's an irresistible pair. I defy a gentlewoman, and a mother, to lose heart. Come in when you can. Tell us tales of far Cashmere. Sing us songs of Araby. I won't promise to join in the chorus—if you have choruses; but I shall revel in my quiet way. Now don't forget. I count upon ...
— Love and Lucy • Maurice Henry Hewlett
... they will try me," he said, "they must try me. If they say they will punish me, they must punish me. But if they say that in peace and mercy they will spare me expulsion, I disdain and cast away their mercy, and I ask if they will come to such a trial and expel me. I defy them. I have constituents to go to, and they will have something to say if this House expels me, nor will it be long before the gentlemen will see me here again." The fight went on for nearly a fortnight, and on February 7 the whole subject was finally laid on the table. The sturdy, dogged fighter, ...
— Hero Tales From American History • Henry Cabot Lodge, and Theodore Roosevelt
... foolish pencil, man; and think of your position. You can defy the laws made by men; but there are other laws to reckon with. Do you know that youre going ...
— The Doctor's Dilemma • George Bernard Shaw
... thyself in that certainty of faith; let that be thy comfort, Christ will protect thee, vindicate thee, thou art one of his flock, he will triumph over the law, vanquish death, overcome the devil, and destroy hell. If he say thou art none of the elect, no believer, reject him, defy him, thou hast thought otherwise, and mayst so be resolved again; comfort thyself; this persuasion cannot come from the devil, and much less can it be grounded from thyself? men are liars, and why shouldst thou distrust? A denying Peter, a persecuting ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior
... Ambrose had made her niece should she stay was a room cut off from the rest of the house, large, private—a room in which she could play, read, think, defy the world, a fortress as well as a sanctuary. Rooms, she knew, became more like worlds than rooms at the age of twenty-four. Her judgment was correct, and when she shut the door Rachel entered an enchanted place, where the poets sang and things fell into their right proportions. Some days after ...
— The Voyage Out • Virginia Woolf
... curse is executed in wrath, in jealousy, in anger, in fury; yea, the heavens and the earth shall be burned up with the fire of that jealousy in which the great God will come, when He cometh to curse the souls of sinners, and when He cometh to defy the ungodly, ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... contiguous to the eastern metallic regions, and its mineral development progressed naturally with the advantage of homemaking settlements, the power of common-law precedent would have governed its whole mining history. But California was one of these extraordinary historic exceptions that defy precedent and create original modes of life and law. And since the developers of the great precious metal mining of the Far West have, for the most part, swarmed out of the California hive, California ...
— California, Romantic and Resourceful • John F. Davis
... a paper of twenty-five questions, propounded by Cervantes himself, as to the principal events of his five years of imprisonment, and his treatment of his fellow-captives. Armed with this evidence, he was able to defy the traitor, and to return in honour to ...
— The True Story Book • Andrew Lang
... Black Lewin e'en am I, And, by my head, an ill man to defy. Now, motley rogue, wilt call me fool?" he roared, And roaring fierce, clapped ...
— The Geste of Duke Jocelyn • Jeffery Farnol
... is the way to measure her beauty. A plain girl in a simple dress, if she has only a pleasant voice, may seem almost a beauty in the rosy twilight. The nearer she comes to being handsome, the more ornament she will bear, and the more she may defy the sunshine ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... in discovering, and especially did he feel it when Prentiss came to reply to his address to the jury. So long accustomed to defy competition as a criminal lawyer, Hardin was not only surprised at the tact and masterly talent displayed by his adversary, but he was annoyed, and felt that to maintain his prestige as the great criminal lawyer of Kentucky, he must ...
— The Memories of Fifty Years • William H. Sparks
... trunks of the old trees. Everything favored my enterprise. I had effectually mystified my servant and the people of the Dragon Volant, and so dark was the night, that even had I alarmed the suspicions of all the tenants of the inn, I might safely defy their united curiosity, though posted at every ...
— The Room in the Dragon Volant • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... loyalty of the South a lasting disgrace and a permanent badge of dishonor is equally true and can not be denied. The leaders of the rebellion, being in power in all the ten States unreconstructed, still defy the authority of the United States to a great extent, and deny the-power of the loyal millions of the country, who have saved our nation's life against their treason and rebellion, to prescribe terms of settlement of this great ...
— History of the Thirty-Ninth Congress of the United States • Wiliam H. Barnes
... world as well as you, Blassemare. I'm sick of your tone of superiority and advice. I know when to respect and when to defy the world. A man can no more make a fortune without tact than he can lose one ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 2, January, 1851 • Various
... small wisdom, methinks, in putting on armour where we have no power to fight; it is but a dangerous temerity to defy the foe ...
— The Abbot • Sir Walter Scott
... "Who taught him to laugh at whatever is virtuous and decent, and fit and right in the nature of things? He is your own scholar, and I disclaim him. No, no, Master Blifil is my boy. Young as he is, that lad's notions of moral rectitude I defy you ...
— The History of Tom Jones, a foundling • Henry Fielding
... have that mood. But Conrad, he's given to brooding. And his habit at night when he stands staring up at the stars is to see (or conjure up rather) a dumb buffoon Fate, primeval, unfriendly and stupid, whom Man must defy. And Conrad defies it, but wearily, for he feels sick at heart,—because of his surety that Fate is ignoble, ...
— The Crow's Nest • Clarence Day, Jr.
... be helped," said Charley, "and once we are in our new home, we will stand some show of being able to defy them. I only wish we had the two rifles that were lost when the canoe upset. I wouldn't fear the outlaws at ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... these mystic visitors she would jeer at and defy, and stamp her feet, as if they had no rights in equity against her soul, having been on vicious errands when they met their ends, and bankrupts in the court of pity; but suddenly a helpless something would appear, and paralyze her with its little wail, like a babeless mother or ...
— The Entailed Hat - Or, Patty Cannon's Times • George Alfred Townsend
... nature as the painter of genius may produce. No such paradises are to be found in reality as have glowed on the canvas of Claude. In the most enchanting of natural landscapes, there will always be found a defect or an excess—many excesses and defects. While the component parts may defy, individually, the highest skill of the artist, the arrangement of these parts will always be susceptible of improvement. In short, no position can be attained on the wide surface of the natural earth, from which an artistical eye, looking steadily, will not find ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 2 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... ever visited Stamboul. In Stamboul there is with no exception the most conglomerate mixture of nondescript nationalities on the face of the earth. Not only are all nationalities represented but breeds of men that defy all pathological research, hideous in their conglomerate intermixtures. If an Albanian bandit, himself a mixture of Greek and Nubian mulatto, has issue by an Arab woman with French blood—find the genealogy. ...
— The Secrets of the German War Office • Dr. Armgaard Karl Graves
... Storm, Or with high Floods of Wine deform; Altho' Sir Oracle is he, Who is as wise, as wise can be, In one short minute we shall find The wise man gone, a fool behind. Courage, that is all nerve and heart, That dares confront Death's brandish'd dart, That dares to single Fight defy The stoutest Hector of the sky, Whose mettle ne'er was known to slack, Nor wou'd on thunder turn his back; How small a matter may controul, And sooth the fury of his soul! Shou'd this intrepid Mars, his clay Dilute with nerve-relaxing Tea, Thin broths, thin ...
— The Methodist - A Poem • Evan Lloyd |
