"Ill-natured" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... he was a success. He was a good bear, but then, it was objected, he was an objectless bear—a bear that meant nothing, signified nothing, simply stood there, snarling over his shoulder at nothing, and was painfully and manifestly a boorish and ill-natured intruder upon the fair page. All hands said that none were satisfied; they hated badly to give him up, and yet they hated as much to have him there when there was no point to him. But presently Harte took a pencil and drew two simple lines under his feet, and behold he was a magnificent ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... 'Let me put you on your guard. You have very little command of your primitive feelings, and they bring you into danger. I should be sorry to think that an unpleasant story I have heard whispered was anything more than ill-natured scandal, but it's as well to warn you that other people have a taste ...
— The Whirlpool • George Gissing
... profession. The older dramatists awoke to the fact that their popularity was endangered by the young stranger who had set up his tent in their midst, and one veteran uttered without delay a rancorous protest. Robert Greene, who died on September 3, 1592, wrote on his deathbed an ill-natured farewell to life, entitled 'A Groats-worth of Wit bought with a Million of Repentance.' Addressing three brother dramatists—Marlowe, Nash, and Peele or Lodge—he bade them beware of puppets 'that speak from our mouths,' and of 'antics garnished in our colours.' ...
— A Life of William Shakespeare - with portraits and facsimiles • Sidney Lee
... the confession was made, and Edgar reported it to his wife—then Catherine was ready to jump for joy. In vain Edgar strove to look wise, and tell her to be reasonable. In vain he represented all the objections that must be urged against her out-of-the-way scheme, as he was ill-natured enough to call it. She would ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 3, August, 1850. • Various
... to think how I decay, And you win grace from Time. Perhaps ill-natured folks would say ...
— Ionica • William Cory (AKA William Johnson)
... but failure for the ill-natured, unsociable, disgusting tramp who is known to be ignorant, lazy, shiftless, a spendthrift, a liar, and an all-around crook. Such a worthless man will make a complete failure of life because he is so dis-qualified ...
— Certain Success • Norval A. Hawkins
... gentleman and not ill-natured. But he was a soldier and had received his orders. He hesitated between the instincts of the two conditions. And what time he did so there came a clatter of hoofs without to resolve him. It was ...
— Mistress Wilding • Rafael Sabatini
... hasn't his reason, one can't be angry. Were I to be harsh with him, it would be of no use. I prefer to agree with him and get him to bed; then, at least, it's over at once and I'm quiet. Besides, he isn't ill-natured, he loves me very much. You could see that just a moment ago when he was desperate to give me a kiss. That's quite nice of him. There are plenty of men, you know, who after drinking a bit don't come straight home but stay out chasing women. Oh, he may fool around with ...
— L'Assommoir • Emile Zola
... from being as nattle and querulous as the famous ill-natured grumbler so racily pictured by Benjamin Preston, of Bradford; but, like most of the dwellers upon earth, she was a little bit touched with the same complaint. When the rain was over, we came away. I cannot say that the weather ever "cleared up" that day; for, at the end of every shower, ...
— Home-Life of the Lancashire Factory Folk during the Cotton Famine • Edwin Waugh
... a boyish freak, perpetrated rather in thoughtlessness than malice: but the tone of the answer, however simple the words, manifestly breathed revenge. Richard de Clare was not an ill-natured boy. But he had been taught from his babyhood that a Jew was the scum of the earth, and that to speak contumeliously to such was so far from being wrong, that it absolutely savoured of piety. Jews had crucified Christ. To have aided one ...
— Earl Hubert's Daughter - The Polishing of the Pearl - A Tale of the 13th Century • Emily Sarah Holt
... suspend your last finishing strokes till you have attended to, and discovered the operations of their inferior passions, appetites, and humors. A man's general character may be that of the honestest man of the world: do not dispute it; you might be thought envious or ill-natured; but, at the same time, do not take this probity upon trust to such a degree as to put your life, fortune, or reputation in his power. This honest man may happen to be your rival in power, in interest, or in love; three passions that often put honesty ...
— The PG Edition of Chesterfield's Letters to His Son • The Earl of Chesterfield
... doctor, when he paid that three hundred pounds for his son, buckled to his work again, though he had for twelve months talked of giving up the midwifery. He buckled to again, to the great disgust of Dr. Duggin, who at this time said very ill-natured things about ...
— Phineas Finn - The Irish Member • Anthony Trollope
... of a 'her'—was an enchanted princess or something like that, and I wasn't far wrong, as you will see. But I didn't finish my sentence, for Peterkin, who was sitting next me, gave me a sort of little kick, not to hurt, of course, and whispered, 'I'll tell you afterwards.' So I felt it would be ill-natured to tease him, and I didn't say any more, and luckily the others hadn't noticed what I had begun. Blanchie was on her knees in front of the fire toasting for us, and Elf was putting lumps of sugar into the cups, to ...
— Peterkin • Mary Louisa Molesworth
... nerves, and leave a person wholly unfit for any home duty, he would also be saying what very few people would deny; and then his case would be made out. If he should say that it is wrong to breathe bad air and fill the stomach with unwholesome dainties, so as to make one restless, ill-natured, and irritable for days after, he would also say what few would deny, and his preaching might have some hope ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 89, March, 1865 • Various
... "It's that ill-natured Miss Kitty Cat," Spot exclaimed. "She has a big family of kittens. And she's terribly touchy about anybody's coming near them. Although she's keeping them in my basket, she hasn't even invited me to have a look at them.... I only hope," he ...
— The Tale of Miss Kitty Cat - Slumber-Town Tales • Arthur Scott Bailey
... old gentleman considerably changed. There were, occasionally, flashes of his former customary, sarcastic pungency; now and again he would rouse himself to be ill-natured, antagonistic, and self-willed. But old age and illness had sadly told upon him; and he was content for the most part to express his humour by little shrugs, shakes of the head, and an irritable manner he had lately acquired of rubbing ...
— The Bertrams • Anthony Trollope
... know, Mr Sneer well, may be omitted, if it should meet with any ill-natured opposition; for which reason, I shall not print off my dedication till after the ...
— Miscellanies, Volume 2 (from Works, Volume 12) • Henry Fielding
... nothing to report except to my favour. Your absence has been commented upon, and made known at high quarters, and suspicion has arisen in consequence. Your return as one of the Parliamentary forces will now put an end to all ill-natured remarks. My dear Edward, you have done me a service. As my secretary, and having been known to have been a follower of the Beverleys, your absence was considered strange, and it was intimated at high quarters that you ...
— The Children of the New Forest • Captain Marryat
... Republic in sentiments favorable to the allies of his Majesty. It is in conformity with these views, and for the good of the common cause, and only for this transient object, that the commission, for the origin of which you imagine a thousand ill-natured motives, and which, finally, you refuse to accept, has been ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. IX • Various
... on the steps of her house, which in summer were so crowded with sketchers, and would have kissed her hand to him had not Diva been following close behind, for even on Christmas Day poor Diva was capable of finding something ill-natured to say about the most tender and womanly action ... and Miss Mapp let herself into her house with only a little ...
— Miss Mapp • Edward Frederic Benson
... come to that. It always does if the man is in earnest. Girls will accept men simply because they think it ill-natured to return the compliment of an ...
— Phineas Redux • Anthony Trollope
... weather was as still as ever; the sea a glassy calm, with a hot glaring sun, and sharks stalking about. "All ill-natured," says honest Livingstone, "and in this I am sorry ...
— The Personal Life Of David Livingstone • William Garden Blaikie
... different editions of that useful and valuable book, two in quarto, two in octavo, and two in a lesser form, now lie, like lumber, in the hand of Mr. Vaillant, bookseller, the effects of Mr. Pope's ill-natured criticism. ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume V: Miscellaneous Pieces • Samuel Johnson
... putty," she remarked aloud to herself. "The thing is, I've had my time and don't want to pay for it. Blondes go quicker than dark women; you ought to last a long while, Linda." Mrs. Condon had turned, and her tone was again almost complaining, almost ill-natured. Linda considered this information with a troubled face. It was quite clear that it made her mother cross. "I've seen men stop and look at you right now, too, and you nothing more than a slip fourteen years old. Of course, when I was ...
— Linda Condon • Joseph Hergesheimer
... easily the ill-natured gossip of a small town can rouse the angry contempt of the masses for everything which is beyond or above them. In a wider sphere Urbain would have shone by his many gifts, but, cooped up as he was within the walls of a little town and deprived of air and space, all that might ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... that he was as good as the Miss Schlegels. Obscurely wounded in his pride, he tried to wound them in return. They were probably not ladies. Would real ladies have asked him to tea? They were certainly ill-natured and cold. At each step his feeling of superiority increased. Would a real lady have talked about stealing an umbrella? Perhaps they were thieves after all, and if he had gone into the house they could have clapped a chloroformed ...
— Howards End • E. M. Forster
... November day, (with my Catawbas blighted,) a rather ill-natured pleasure in reading how the Duke of Rutland, in the beginning of the last century, was compelled to "keep up fires from Lady-day to Michaelmas behind his sloped walls," in order to insure the ripening of his grapes; yet winter grapes ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 77, March, 1864 • Various
... thought it was some preparation for a fancy-dress ball." Rupert's comment on this ill-natured speech was (for ...
— The Lady of the Shroud • Bram Stoker
... right in an intensely Oxonian way. I daresay his papers, if he has left any, include some satires that may be published without too destructive results fifty years hence. He was, I believe, not in the least an ill-natured man: very much the opposite, I should say; but he would not suffer ...
— Pygmalion • George Bernard Shaw
... preface to the play says, "I confess I have given [yielded] too much to the people in it, and am ashamed for them as well as for myself, that I have pleased them at so cheap a rate," he takes care to add, "not that there is anything here that I would not defend to an ill-natured judge." The plot was from Calderon, and the author, rebutting the charge of plagiarism, tells us that the king ("without whose command they should no longer be troubled with anything of mine") had already answered for him by saying, ...
— Among My Books - First Series • James Russell Lowell
... late Phebe sometimes calls us in the morning,' Jacinth used to say. 'There's nothing that would vex her more than laziness, and it is very tiresome. But then, very likely, she'd get us some prim maid that would be ill-natured and crabbed, and perhaps not really as ...
— Robin Redbreast - A Story for Girls • Mary Louisa Molesworth
... believe that the old usurer may not, after all, have had that grim reception in the other world which Shakspeare's squib foreboded for him. By-the-by, till I grew somewhat familiar with Warwickshire pronunciation, I never understood that the point of those ill-natured lines was a pun. "'Oho!' quoth the Devil, ''tis my John a' Combe!'"—that ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 11, No. 63, January, 1863 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... be no doubt that a great lack of discretion had been shown by the Court. Ill-natured tittle-tattle, which should have been instantly nipped in the bud, had been allowed to assume disgraceful proportions; and the Throne itself had become involved in the personal malignities of the palace. A particularly awkward question had been raised by the position ...
— Queen Victoria • Lytton Strachey
... made his appearance, conducted by Siliavka and three soldiers. The poor Jew was in a state of stupefaction, and could hardly move his legs. Siliavka went by me to the camp, and soon returned with a rope in his hands. His coarse but not ill-natured face wore a look of strange, exasperated commiseration. At the sight of the rope the Jew flung up his arms, sat down, and burst into sobs. The soldiers stood silently about him, and stared grimly at ...
— The Jew And Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... McKinstry to Indian Spring and her interrupted studies was an event whose effects were not entirely confined to the school. The broken engagement itself seemed of little moment in the general estimation compared to her resumption of her old footing as a scholar. A few ill-natured elders of her own sex, and naturally exempt from the discriminating retort of Mr. McKinstry's "shot-gun," alleged that the Seminary at Sacramento had declined to receive her, but the majority accepted her return with local pride as a practical compliment ...
— Cressy • Bret Harte
... dozed a quarter of an hour, when the obnoxious vociferations arose again. They were fierce, ill-natured, and shrill. I arose again, vexed beyond endurance. All was quiet in a moment. I am not given to profanity; I deem it foolish and wicked; but on this occasion, after stretching my body like a sheeted ghost, ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, June 1844 - Volume 23, Number 6 • Various
... not always so impotent as you seem to suppose it; men of the best sense may be misled by it, or, by their not inquiring after truth, may never come at it; and the vulgar, as they are less apt to be good than ill-natured, often mistake malice for wit, and have an uncharitable joy in commending it. Now, when this is the case, is not a tame silence, upon being satirically libelled, as liable to be thought guilt or stupidity, as to be the result of innocence or temper?—Self-defence is a very natural ...
— Calamities and Quarrels of Authors • Isaac D'Israeli
... our past entertainment and company, Sir John gave us such an account of Sir Hargrave as let me know that he is a very dangerous and enterprising man. He says that, laughing and light as he is in company, he is malicious, ill-natured, and designing, and sticks at nothing to carry a point on which he has once set his heart. He has ruined, Sir John says, three young creatures ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VII • Various
... of opposition seemed to deepen what was at first merely an ordinary liking into an absorbing passion. It was perfectly useless to reason with her; she disbelieved all the stories to his discredit, which were abundant, and treated those who repeated them as prejudiced and ill-natured. ...
— Zoe • Evelyn Whitaker
... scraps of gossip retailed by one person to another and from one set to another. The French Press took it up, and so did the English Press. In spite of my happy disposition and my contempt for ill-natured tales, I began to feel irritated. Injustice has always roused me to revolt, and injustice was certainly having its fling. I could not do a thing that ...
— My Double Life - The Memoirs of Sarah Bernhardt • Sarah Bernhardt
... strange and novel seemed the idea that the company stood with faces expressive of nothing but a dumb, dull wonder. Only some of the ladies (as Chichikov did not fail to remark) exchanged meaning, ill-natured winks and a series of sarcastic smiles: which circumstance still further increased his confusion. That Nozdrev was a notorious liar every one, of course, knew, and that he should have given vent to an idiotic outburst of this sort had surprised no one; but a dead soul—well, ...
— Dead Souls • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... here last night, and is but just gone from me. She came up to me with my sister. They would not trust my aunt without this ill-natured witness. When she entered my chamber, I told her, that this visit was a high favour to a poor prisoner, in her hard confinement. I kissed her hand. She, kindly saluting me, said, Why this distance to your aunt, my dear, ...
— Clarissa, Volume 1 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... serpent waking up in the depths of their hearts; they heard the low hissings of angry pride; they were jealous of Felix's happiness, and would gladly have given their prettiest jewel to do him some harm; but instead of being hostile to the countess, these kind, ill-natured women surrounded her, showed her the utmost friendship, and praised her to me. Sufficiently aware of their intentions, Felix watched their relations with Marie, and warned her to distrust them. They all suspected ...
— A Daughter of Eve • Honore de Balzac
... not always treat Kathleen well, any more than he did anybody else. He was ill-natured with her and he played tricks on her that were not pleasant at all, and yet he wanted to be always with her. Perhaps it was partly because she was more kind to him than anybody else, except Ellen. For nobody else liked him. And if he was bad-tempered and unkind to other ...
— Fairies and Folk of Ireland • William Henry Frost
... tobacco-smoke preceded and followed him, and much stale incense from the fragrant weed exhaled itself from his well-worn corduroys. "I ha' not nivver seed him afore," he remarked after a gruff by no means-ill-natured greeting, signifying the stranger by a duck of the ...
— "Seth" • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... compressed her lips and slightly tossed her head. It was the attitude of not ill-natured contempt from which ...
— Tommy and Co. • Jerome K. Jerome
... be sure, sir, you did put her a little out Of countenance the last time she came. Yet you were neither rough, nor cruel, nor ill-natured, but still, when a lady changes colour, we imagine her feelings are ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 1 • Madame D'Arblay
... took particular care of those sick with fevers and of women in childbirth. She was also closely associated in their myth with their culture-hero Bochica, the story being that on one occasion, when an ill-natured divinity had inundated the plain of Bogota, Bochica appeared to the distressed inhabitants in company with Cuchaviva, and cleaving the mountains with a blow of his golden sceptre, opened a passage for the waters into ...
— American Hero-Myths - A Study in the Native Religions of the Western Continent • Daniel G. Brinton
... find some occasion for praising mine." How quickly his thoughts expressed the ill-natured sentiment. But his eyes were on the page before him, and he ...
— Choice Readings for the Home Circle • Anonymous
... nails were trimmed with punctilious care, and shone with a pink lustre that was positively charming. He was evidently an amiable man, for he smiled to himself over his tea,—he had a trick of smiling,—ill-natured people said he did it on purpose, in order to widen his mouth and make it more in pro-portion to the size of his face. Such remarks, however, emanated only from the spiteful and envious who could not succeed in winning the social popularity ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... brought him letters, but none arrived, and he began to fear those he had written home had been lost. Not that he was very anxious to leave the ship, as he had already succeeded in overcoming the prejudices of his messmates, and even the most ill-natured had to acknowledge that he was not a bad fellow, although he might be somewhat mean-spirited. John Langton had from the first stood his friend in a judicious way. He had not defended him in his presence when attacked, seeing how wisely Owen was conducting ...
— Owen Hartley; or, Ups and Downs - A Tale of Land and Sea • William H. G. Kingston
... great-aunt had a cancer that was to be taken out. The other was suffering from a nervous affection, which rendered her a confirmed invalid. She was a most peculiar woman, and was a clairvoyant and somnambulist of the most decided kind. Though not ill-natured, she was full of caprices that would have exhausted the patience of ...
— A Practical Illustration of Woman's Right to Labor - A Letter from Marie E. Zakrzewska, M.D. Late of Berlin, Prussia • Marie E. Zakrzewska
... Sarcastic joke Replete with malice spiteful, The people vile Politely smile And vote me quite delightful! Now, when a wight Sits up all night Ill-natured jokes devising, And all his wiles Are met with smiles, It's hard, there's no disguising! Oh, don't the days seem lank and long When all goes right and nothing goes wrong, And isn't your life extremely flat With ...
— Songs of a Savoyard • W. S. Gilbert
... was the rejoinder. "It takes my breath away to argue with you up this hill. I am not too ill-natured to give up my own bed to Miss Sefton. Let us hurry on, there's a good boy, or they will ...
— Our Bessie • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... clergyman of the Establishment, but as open a contemner of decency as Wilkes himself. For some years, his poetry had proved as bad as his sermons, his time being spent in low dissipation. An ill-natured criticism on his writings called forth his energies, and he started, all at once, a giant in numbers, with all the fire of Dryden and all the harmony of Pope. Imagination, wit, strength, and sense, were crowded into his compositions; but he was careless of both matter ...
— A Modern History, From the Time of Luther to the Fall of Napoleon - For the Use of Schools and Colleges • John Lord
... was perpetually being lectured on her carriage and behavior; if she stooped or rounded her shoulders her cousin would call to her to be as erect as herself (Sylvie was rigid as a soldier presenting arms to his colonel); sometimes indeed the ill-natured old maid enforced the order by slaps on the back to make the girl ...
— The Celibates - Includes: Pierrette, The Vicar of Tours, and The Two Brothers • Honore de Balzac
... exposing them to the world. Compassion is expressed, and yet in a tone that betrays a secret exultation. Faults are descried and magnified; no sympathy is felt for the sufferer, but a vulgar curiosity bruits the ill-natured rumor, and many hearts must hence ...
— The Young Maiden • A. B. (Artemas Bowers) Muzzey
... The majority of Ueberhells were accused of presumption and arrogance, of opiniativeness and pugnacity. Many had made themselves disagreeable to their neighbours by their caustic criticisms and ill-natured complaints, at the same time bringing misfortune upon themselves by a most curious exhibition ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... my veracity," interrupted Miss Egerton; "I do assure you I should have been more correct had I been more severe; for her Indian ladyship is as ill-natured as she is ill-bred, and is as presumptuous as ignorant; in short she is a fit mamma for the delectable Miss Dundas, whose description you shall have in two questions. Can you imagine Socrates in his wife's petticoats? Can you imagine a pedant, a scold, and a coquette in one ...
— Thaddeus of Warsaw • Jane Porter
... my position," moaned Mrs. Durant. "I should not hesitate a moment, but the world is so ill-natured about stepmothers that one has to be over-careful, and with daughters of my own, I'm afraid people—perhaps my own husband—would think I was trying to sacrifice ...
— Wanted—A Match Maker • Paul Leicester Ford
... trifling accident of an old lady being killed, a shoulder or two dislocated, and about half a dozen legs and arms 8broken, belonging to people who were not at all known in high life, nothing worthy of notice may be said to have happened on these occasions. 'Tis true, some ill-natured remarks appeared in one of the public papers, on the "conduct of coachmen entrusting the reins to young practitioners, and thus endangering the lives of his majesty's subjects;" but these passed off like other philanthropic suggestions of ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... this opinion in the most amiable manner. He filled his friend's glass, and begged him not to say ill-natured things ...
— Little Novels • Wilkie Collins
... you yourself are poverty-stricken in your own country, with nothing at home to live on, you want to have every one else put in the same list. There is nothing strange in that: it is characteristic of poor beggars to be ill-natured, and ...
— Amphitryo, Asinaria, Aulularia, Bacchides, Captivi • Plautus Titus Maccius
... she saw him when the news was brought to us. Edith is not ill-natured. She would not be prone to make a story against ...
— The Landleaguers • Anthony Trollope
... the hand as I came in, and presented me to his lady, a stout fair-haired woman, in light blue satin; then to his daughter, a tall, thin, dark-eyed girl, with beetle-brows, looking very ill-natured, and about eighteen. ...
— The History of Samuel Titmarsh - and the Great Hoggarty Diamond • William Makepeace Thackeray
... detailed account of how a young man, Kaminski, had been killed. It was here he first heard all the facts of the case which was exciting the interest of all Petersburg. The story was this: Some officers were eating oysters and, as usual, drinking very much, when one of them said something ill-natured about the regiment to which Kaminski belonged, and Kaminski called him a liar. The other hit Kaminski. The next day they fought. Kaminski was wounded in the stomach and died two hours later. The murderer and the seconds were arrested, but it was said that though ...
— Resurrection • Count Leo Tolstoy
... entirely gone. "I had no right to lose my temper, and I'm sorry I spoke so unkindly. The truth is, Miss Cullen, the girl I care for is in love with another man, and so I'm bitter and ill-natured in these days." ...
— Master Tales of Mystery, Volume 3 • Collected and Arranged by Francis J. Reynolds
... gathered round this verse what I may call rather an ill-natured controversy, because there is no real ground for it; and the objections taken seem rather of a desire to find out something against the narrative at any price, than to make the best of it. The verse, when duly translated, implies that an "expanse"—the setting of ...
— Creation and Its Records • B.H. Baden-Powell
... his passions. The least opposition would rouse his anger, and he made no efforts to subdue himself. He had no one who could love him. If he was playing with others, he would every moment be getting irritated. As he grew older, his passions increased, and he became so ill-natured that every one avoided him. One day, as he was talking with another man, he became so enraged at some little provocation, that he seized a club, and with one blow laid the man lifeless at his feet. He was seized and imprisoned. ...
— The Child at Home - The Principles of Filial Duty, Familiarly Illustrated • John S.C. Abbott
... you know I lived in a room?" I inquired in surprise, with the uncomfortable feeling that I had been the subject of ill-natured gossip. ...
— The Long Day - The Story of a New York Working Girl As Told by Herself • Dorothy Richardson
... neither worse nor better," he reflected. "The time will come, I hope, when I shall have risen high enough to be wholly indifferent to such ill-natured sneers." ...
— Risen from the Ranks - Harry Walton's Success • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... ten letters, as it may happen, before I return one: but such a part I will bear in it, as shall let you know our opinion of your proceedings, and relations of things. And as you wish to be found fault with, you shall freely have it (though not in a splenetic or ill-natured way), as often as you give occasion. Now, Pamela, I have two views in this. One is to see how a man of my brother's spirit, who has not denied himself any genteel liberties (for it must be owned he never was a common town rake, and had always a dignity ...
— Pamela (Vol. II.) • Samuel Richardson
... that kind of wit which was becoming her circle, to the end that she might not appear silly before strangers; she was more ill-natured than proud, had more pride than real grandeur, and more show than substance; she loved money too well to be liberal, and her own interest too well to be impartial; she was more constant than passionate as a lover, more implacable than cruel, and more mindful of injuries ...
— The Memoirs of Cardinal de Retz, Complete • Jean Francois Paul de Gondi, Cardinal de Retz
... Ben, Graciella was quite uneasy. She had met him only once since their quarrel, and had meant to bow to him politely, but with dignity, to show that she bore no malice; but he had ostentatiously avoided her glance. If he chose to be ill-natured, she had thought, and preferred her enmity to her friendship, her conscience was at least clear. She had been willing to forget his rudeness and be a friend to him. She could have been his true friend, if nothing more; and he would need friends, unless ...
— The Colonel's Dream • Charles W. Chesnutt
... disappeared. Bonaparte however, was still harassed by secret suspicion, and the painful impressions produced by Junot were either not entirely effaced or were revived after our arrival in Paris. We reached the capital before Josephine returned. The recollection of the past; the ill-natured reports ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... receiving it from every body; but the very mention of such a dishonourable peace, was received with as much indignation, as Mrs Blackaire did the motion of a reference. And indeed, I began to think myself ill-natured, to offer to take from them, in a town where there are so few diversions, so entertaining an amusement. I know that my peaceable disposition already gives me a very ill figure, and that 'tis publicly whispered as a piece of impertinent pride in me, that I have hitherto been saucily civil ...
— Letters of the Right Honourable Lady M—y W—y M—e • Lady Mary Wortley Montague
... love her, they say. Many a poor girl's sweetheart has been false through her—and I thought she was cruel and ill-natured. Know you the servants that wait on her? Would you dare to ask one for me, if he thinks she would deign to see a poor girl who would crave the favour to be allowed to speak to her ...
— A Lady of Quality • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... rest of Avonsbridge, had long-known Dr. Grey's history; how he had married early, or (ill-natured report said) been married by, a widow lady, very handsome, and some years older than himself. However, the sharpest insinuations ever made against their domestic bliss were that she visited a good deal, ...
— Christian's Mistake • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
... his own hair at Oxford, it must have exposed him to ridicule. Graves, the author of The Spiritual Quixote, tells us that Shenstone had the courage to wear his own hair, though 'it often exposed him to the ill-natured remarks of people who had not half his sense. After I was elected at All Souls, where there was often a party of loungers in the gateway, on my expostulating with Mr. Shenstone for not visiting me so often as usual, he said, "he was ashamed to face ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... himself. The Tweelers were utterly routed and went away not knowing whether there were any letters for them or not. Several valets and ladies' maids exchanged lively but ineffectual compliments with the face in the post office window. Then came Sir Griffin. Rex looked on with interest. What the ill-natured brute behind the grating said, Rex couldn't hear, but Sir Griffin burst out with a roar, "Damnation!" that made everybody jump. Then he stuck his head as far as he could get it in at the little window and shouted — in fluent German, awfully pronounced ...
— In the Quarter • Robert W. Chambers
... the discontent in the army, and, by making the men impatient and ill-natured, increased the bitterness of their quarrels. The army finally advanced, however, as far as Bethany, with a forlorn hope of being strong enough, when they should arrive there, to attack Jerusalem; but this ...
— Richard I - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... next caught her eye, And its friendly assistance she therefore would try.— "Dear water," she said, "do extinguish this fire, "Which will not (although 'tis my ardent desire) "Consume yonder crab-stick, which, obstinate too, "With beating that cur will have nothing to do; "And the dog, as ill-natured, you see, as the rest, "Refuses to bite this young obstinate beast; "So here I'm compelled, most reluctant, to stay, "And here may remain till the break of the day." The water regardless of all that was said, Lay perfectly still,—not ...
— The Remarkable Adventures of an Old Woman and Her Pig - An Ancient Tale in a Modern Dress • Anonymous
... homo," and had come from the municipality of Arpinum, and had taunted him with being a king, because he had usurped authority over life and death in regard to Lentulus and the other conspirators. He answers this very finely, and does so without an ill-natured word to young Torquatus, whom, from respect to his father, he desires to spare. "Do not," he says, "in future call me a foreigner, lest you be answered with severity, nor a king, lest you be laughed at—unless, indeed, you think it king-like so to live ...
— Life of Cicero - Volume One • Anthony Trollope
... in the presence of witnesses, 'For since I desired to marry for the reasons of which I told you, you persuaded me to choose Apuleius in preference to all others, since you had a great admiration for him and were eager through me to become yet more intimate with him. But now that certain ill-natured persons have brought accusations against us and attempt to dissuade you, Apuleius has suddenly become a magician and has bewitched me to love him. Come to me, then, while I am still in ...
— The Apologia and Florida of Apuleius of Madaura • Lucius Apuleius
... has been suppressed. Many think it too ill-natured for Burns to have written; but my father says it has the true Burns ring and is ...
— An Orkney Maid • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... out in my advancement in the army, and shortly afterwards I was preferred to the rank of a lieutenant in my regiment, and ordered to Gibraltar. I noticed that Amelia's sister, Miss Betty, who had said many ill-natured things of our marriage, ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol IV. • Editors: Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton
... lose; To heaven's great praise did for religion fly, To make us starve our poor in charity. In ev'ry port they plant their fruitful train, To get a race of true-born Englishmen; Whose children will, when riper years they see, Be as ill-natured, and as proud as we; Call themselves English, foreigners despise, Be surly like us all, and ...
— The True-Born Englishman - A Satire • Daniel Defoe
... the next thing to be done is to move away from this house. Mr. Haynes most fortunately is as glad to have it now as he would have been when we took it. Lord Brackenshaw's agent is to arrange everything with him to the best advantage for us: Bazley, you know; not at all an ill-natured man." ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot
... occasion, when she had let some warmer speech than usual glance off, he chose to take it as a snub, and, pretending to be offended, betook himself to masculine society and smoking. Bluebell was alone all day, a prey to the ill-natured watchfulness of her two enemies, whose quickened observation and exultant faces proved they had noticed the cessation of his attentions. Once or twice he passed her without a word or look, regardless of the innocent surprise in her eyes. "Perhaps ...
— Bluebell - A Novel • Mrs. George Croft Huddleston
... Polly," said Aunt Emma, "you're always telling tales. Jane's my cook, Milly, and Polly doesn't like cats, so you see he tries to make Jane believe that our old cat steals the meat out of the larder. Good-bye, Polly, good-bye. You're an ill-natured old bird, but I'm very fond of ...
— Milly and Olly • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... and verse there was a tacit protest against the old order, and that it was felt is shown by the bitterness of ridicule and taunt and insult with which, both publicly and privately, this most amiable youth was attacked, who, at that time, had never said an ill-natured word of anybody, and who was always most generous in his treatment of his ...
— Literary and Social Essays • George William Curtis
... him-but he is to be forgiven in so good a cause! It is the first person he ever deceived! I am preparing a new folio for heads of the heroes that are to bloom in mezzo-tinto from this war. At present my chief study is West Indian history. You would not think me very ill-natured if you knew all I feel at the cruelty and villany of European settlers: but this very morning I found that part of the purchase of Maryland from the savage proprietors (for we do not massacre, we are such good Christians as only to cheat) was a quantity ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2 • Horace Walpole
... the curtain went up, he called together the members of his troupe, and encouraged them to do their best. La Roulante went up to him, and to his great amazement said a few conciliatory words. As Gudel was by no means ill-natured, he shook hands with her. The giantess turned her face toward ...
— The Son of Monte Cristo • Jules Lermina
... a vast deal of poetry by heart, fortunately for the understanding of the rising generation, does not rage with such violence as formerly. Dr. Johnson successfully laughed at infants lisping out, "Angels and ministers of grace, defend us." His reproof was rather ill-natured, when he begged two children who were produced, to repeat some lines to him, "Can't the pretty dears repeat them both together?" But this reproof has probably prevented many exhibitions ...
— Practical Education, Volume I • Maria Edgeworth
... unaided efforts has risen to the position she now occupies. How often shall I be obliged to impress upon you that it is the spirit, not the letter, that is of importance? As secretary of the Society for the Practice of Moderation, Mrs. Marsh can afford to disregard the ill-natured sneers of those who may have enjoyed greater advantages in early life than she. It is not by wholesale abuse of others, Virginia, that you will persuade me of your innocence. On your own showing, you have written to Mr. Spence, and ...
— A Romantic Young Lady • Robert Grant
... which past improvements have sprung, and from the discussion of which future ameliorations are likely to flow, than any other of the newer works which have come under our eye. Where so many excellences exist, we are not ill-natured enough to magnify a ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - April 1843 • Various
... Europe, a series of letters, entitled Notions of the Americans, by a Travelling Bachelor, in which he gave a favorable account of the working of our institutions, and vindicated his country from various flippant and ill-natured misrepresentations of foreigners. It is rather too measured in style, but is written from a mind full of the subject, and from a memory wonderfully stored with particulars. Although twenty-four years have elapsed ...
— Precaution • James Fenimore Cooper
... it was altogether what you call malice, so much as the Lester idea of fun,' said Ellen, recovering herself after her outpouring. 'A very odd notion I always thought it was; and Mary and Louisa are not really ill-natured, and cannot wish to do the harm they might have done, if I did not know Griff ...
— Chantry House • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Wood and Aubrey the debt I owe to them, especially to Wood, and ask his pardon for occasional ill-natured remarks about him, as ill-natured nearly as his own about most ...
— The Life and Times of John Wilkins • Patrick A. Wright-Henderson
... boys of that kind often grow up, a rambling, heedless varlet, tossed about in all quarters of the world, meeting with more perils and wonders than did Sinbad the Sailor, without growing a whit more wise, prudent, or ill-natured. Under every misfortune he comforted himself with a quid of tobacco, and the truly philosophic maxim that "it will be all the same thing a hundred years hence." He was skilled in the art of carving ...
— Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete • Washington Irving
... intersecting; adverse, baffling, contrary, perverse; petulant, peevish, cynical, surly, unamiable, inaffable, crabbed, crusty, captious, fractious, churlish, vixenish, querulous, fretful, choleric, touchy, waspish, morose, sullen, ill-natured, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... might bestow some fatal gift on the baby princess, had no sooner risen from table than she went and concealed herself behind the tapestry-hangings, in order that she might speak the last, and be able to neutralize, if possible, any mischief the ill-natured hag might intend doing. ...
— Bo-Peep Story Books • Anonymous
... big, fat, red-faced, and slow; Paul was slender, awkward, and ill-natured; Jack was quick, and bright, and so little that he might have hidden himself in ...
— The Book of Stories for the Storyteller • Fanny E. Coe
... What, is my son Valentine gone? What, is he sneaked off, and would not see his brother? There's an unnatural whelp! There's an ill-natured dog! What, were you here too, madam, and could not keep him? Could neither love, nor duty, nor natural affection oblige him? Odsbud, madam, have no more to say to him, he is not worth your consideration. The rogue has not a drachm of generous love about him—all ...
— Love for Love • William Congreve
... iceberg, and of his comfortable home in the vicinity of the north pole, and of the little cubs whom he left rolling in the eternal snows. In fact, he is a bear of sentiment. But, O, those unsentimental monkeys the ugly, grinning, aping, chattering, ill-natured, mischievous, and queer little brutes. Annie does not love the monkeys. Their ugliness shocks her pure, instinctive delicacy of taste, and makes her mind unquiet, because it bears a wild and dark resemblance to humanity. But here is a little ...
— Little Annie's Ramble (From "Twice Told Tales") • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... an extraordinary sobriety and an indefatigable industry, and so, from an enemy, became one of his most zealous admirers, and told his friends and relations that Lycurgus was not that morose and ill-natured man they had formerly taken him for, but the one mild and gentle character of the world. And thus did Lycurgus, for chastisement of his fault, make of a wild and passionate young man one of the ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... she, "I know you don't think so; I know you think me very ill-natured;-don't you, ...
— Evelina • Fanny Burney
... to tell you of an ill-natured story that has reached my ears. Not to discuss it; I know it is untrue. Your two brothers—do you know that ...
— The Crown of Life • George Gissing
... says a beau, And sneers at some ill-natured wit below; But faith, if we should tell but half we know, There's many a spruce young fellow in this place, Wou'd never presume to show his face; Women are not so weak, what e'er men prate; How many tip-top beaux have had the fate, T'enjoy from mama's ...
— The Palmy Days of Nance Oldfield • Edward Robins
... often well disposed natures who, after troubles, express themselves in the manner described. It very frequently happens that suspects, especially those under arrest, alter completely in the course of time, become sullen, coarse, passionate, ill-natured, show themselves defiant and resentful to even the best-willed approach, and exhibit even a kind of courage in not offering any defense and in keeping silent. Such phenomena require the most obvious ...
— Robin Hood • J. Walker McSpadden
... "at homes," the butcher, the dean's wife, the wives of the canons, the Polchester climate, bills, clothes, other women's clothes—over all these rocks of peril in the sea of daily life her barque happily floated. Some ill-natured people thought her stupid, but in her younger days she had liked Trollope's novels in the Cornhill, disapproved placidly of "Jane Eyre," and admired Tennyson, so that she could not be ...
— Jeremy • Hugh Walpole
... excitement of a moving crowd. The lane between chairs and tribune was thronged with the poor of the town and peasants from the country, who would have no seats and must press for places to see the procession; but there was no ill-natured pushing, and gentlest care was taken not to crush the toddling, star-eyed children who tumbled under people's feet. Soldiers laughed and edged their way past clinging groups of pretty girls. Civil guards, looking as if they had stepped ...
— The Car of Destiny • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... candid all the time. I shock people here if I simply say I don't like any one. If you want to say anything against anybody you must begin by saying—'Of course, he means awfully well,' and after that you may imply that he is the greatest scoundrel unhung. Sir Edmund is not at all ill-natured, and he can discuss people quite simply—not as if he wished to defend his own reputation for charity all the time. He won't allow that Adela Delaport Green is a humbug: he says she is simply a happy ...
— Great Possessions • Mrs. Wilfrid Ward
... very intimate with us, and amused us with lively descriptions and stories of most of the great people whom we saw upon the terrace. I liked her more and more every minute. Her gossip without being ill-natured, was extremely diverting to me, who had been so long out of the great world. I thought what life she would give to our ...
— Carmilla • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... ... of the king's flight ... the king himself, who alone could have told us fully, maintained always rigorous silence, and nowhere drops the least hint. So that the small fact has come down to us involved in a great bulk of fabulous cobwebs, mostly of an ill-natured character, set a-going by Voltaire, Valori, and others."—Carlyle's Frederick the Great, 1862, ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron
... happened that Mary, when she left the synagogue and proceeded homewards, was scoffed at by her ill-natured neighbours, who gave her to understand that she might take herself off, and the sooner the better. She said nothing, but bade her ...
— I.N.R.I. - A prisoner's Story of the Cross • Peter Rosegger
... warned a domino who had taken no part in the ill-natured discussion. "I believe you can be heard clear ...
— Marjorie Dean, College Sophomore • Pauline Lester
... appear in neighbouring paragraphs. Who was Plank? And the papers told people with more or less inaccuracy, humour, or sarcasm. What was he trying to do? The papers tried to tell that, too, making a pretty close guess, with comments good-natured or ill-natured according to circumstances over which somebody ought to have some control. What was Harrington trying to do to Plank—if he was trying to do anything? They told that pretty clearly. What was Quarrier going to do to Plank? That, also, they explained ...
— The Fighting Chance • Robert W. Chambers |
