"Vex" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... to additional rudeness. Finding that he had endured trivial insults to himself with an even temper, the deceased now thought proper to turn his brutality upon the young woman that accompanied him. He pursued them; he endeavoured in various manners to harass and vex them; they had sought in vain to shake him off. The young woman was considerably terrified. The accused expostulated with their persecutor, and asked him how he could be so barbarous as to persist in frightening a woman? ...
— Caleb Williams - Things As They Are • William Godwin
... said I; "have your own way, if you like. I'll not spare you if you do anything to vex me; only remember, my good fellow, that whatever I may say will only be said ...
— The Cruise of the "Esmeralda" • Harry Collingwood
... experience; though, as I say, more like a bit of delirium than actual life. Happily, you know all about it; I shall never have to tell you the absurd story. But I mustn't forget that other thing which really did surprise and vex you—my bit of foolish plagiarism. I have so wanted to talk to you about it. You have ...
— Our Friend the Charlatan • George Gissing
... to-day. Sire, I must acknowledge another great fault to you. I have grievously offended against you to-day, in that I contradicted you, and withstood your wise and pious words. Ah, my husband, it was not done to spite you, but only to vex and annoy the haughty priest. For I must confess to you, my king, I hate this Bishop of Winchester—ay, yet more—I have a dread of him; for my foreboding heart tells me that he is my enemy, that he is watching each of my looks, each of ...
— Henry VIII And His Court • Louise Muhlbach
... be drawn towards the game against the wind, otherwise the beast would scent them and fly away. There are also many tame eagles, so trained as to take hares, roe-bucks, deers, and foxes; and some of these will even seize upon wolves, and vex them so grievously, that the men may take them without danger. For the conduct of the imperial hunt, there are two great officers called Ciurco, or masters of the game, who are brothers, named ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 1 • Robert Kerr
... generations, an impossibility? The Three Estates can, by management, be set against each other; the Third will, as heretofore, join with the King; will, out of mere spite and self-interest, be eager to tax and vex the other two. The other two are thus delivered bound into our hands, that we may fleece them likewise. Whereupon, money being got, and the Three Estates all in quarrel, dismiss them, and let the future go as it can! As good Archbishop ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... she has herself a cough much worse than any she ever had before, subject as she has always been to bad ones. She writes in good humour and cheerful spirits, however. The negotiation between them and Adlestrop so happily over, indeed, what can have power to vex her materially? ...
— Jane Austen, Her Life and Letters - A Family Record • William Austen-Leigh and Richard Arthur Austen-Leigh
... our welcome Guest shall hear But sounds of peace and joy; No angry echo vex thine ear, Fair Daughter of Savoy Once more! the land of arms and arts, Of glory, grace, romance; Her love lies warm in all our hearts God bless her! VIVE ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... daughter, you vex me. You must listen. If no trouble comes, well! If it does, are you any the worse for knowing that there are many on whom you can rely? Very well; look! This is ...
— Sunrise • William Black
... it was by all confess'd, His character was not the best— To fill the prisoner's box. As judge between these vermin, A monkey graced the ermine; And truly other gifts of Themis[7] Did scarcely seem his; For while each party plead his cause, Appealing boldly to the laws, And much the question vex'd, Our monkey sat perplex'd. Their words and wrath expended, Their strife at length was ended; When, by their malice taught, The judge this judgment brought: 'Your characters, my friends, I long have known, As on this trial clearly shown; ...
— The Fables of La Fontaine - A New Edition, With Notes • Jean de La Fontaine
... "No—no—my dear Damaris, don't vex yourself I entreat you. I was in clover, luxuriously comfortable. You've allotted me a fascinating room and perfect dream of a bed. I feel an ungrateful wretch for so much as mentioning this matter to you after the way in which you have indulged me. Only something rather extraordinary really ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... hypocrisy. When a professional beggar fell on his knees at the Rectory gate and pretended to pray, he was at once ejected by the Rector with every mark of indignation and contumely. But the weak and suffering always made a special appeal to him. Though it was easy to vex and exasperate him, he could always put away his own troubles in presence of his own children or of any who needed his help. He had that intense power of sympathy which enabled him to understand and reach ...
— Victorian Worthies - Sixteen Biographies • George Henry Blore
... had some scenes enough to make one die of laughter; still without quarrelling. Her father, who was then alive, was the friend and relative of people that I love with all my heart, and that I would not vex for all the world. So I allowed the emigres who surrounded us to cry out as they would, without ever drawing the sword.' De Maistre thought he never came across a head so completely turned wrong as Madame de Stael's, the infallible consequence, as he took it to ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol. 2 of 3) - Essay 4: Joseph de Maistre • John Morley
... a mirth beyond all these: This picture has so vex'd me I'me half mad. To spite it therefore I'le sing any song Thy selfe shalt tune: say then, what mirth ...
— Old English Plays, Vol. I - A Collection of Old English Plays • Various
... German affairs. An agreement was signed practically assuring the independence of the Swiss district of Neuchatel, which had revolted from Prussia in 1848. Three days later, on May 8, a protocol was signed concerning the Danish succession. This intricate problem continued to vex the souls of diplomats. Lord Palmerston, when interrogated about it, said that there were only three persons who understood the Danish succession. One was the Queen Dowager of Denmark, the second was God Almighty, and the third was a German professor, but he had gone mad. While attempting to ...
— A History of the Nineteenth Century, Year by Year - Volume Two (of Three) • Edwin Emerson
... Pergamos, where I have more temples to rifle, and then, overflowing with wealth, I'll back to Rome.' And he moved away towards the Temple, muttering to himself: 'What care I for Varro the Proconsul? He cannot stay me in my career, armed as I am with mandate from Nero. He will vex and threaten should he know I have that woman. But it must end there. Acratus is supreme in this expedition, and cannot be interfered ...
— Saronia - A Romance of Ancient Ephesus • Richard Short
... life been money instead of nature, I have no hesitation in saying that by this time I would have been a rich man. But it is not the things I have done that vex me so much as the things I have not done. I feel that I could have accomplished so much more. I had the will, ...
— Captains of Industry - or, Men of Business Who Did Something Besides Making Money • James Parton
... different leaders ambitiously contending for pre-eminence and power; or to persons of other descriptions whose fortunes have been interesting to the human passions, have, in turn, divided mankind into parties, inflamed them with mutual animosity, and rendered them much more disposed to vex and oppress each other than to co-operate for their common good. So strong is this propensity of mankind to fall into mutual animosities, that where no substantial occasion presents itself, the most frivolous and fanciful distinctions have been sufficient to kindle their unfriendly passions ...
— The Federalist Papers
... the Soul, Whether discursive or intuitive; [C] 120 Hence cheerfulness for acts of daily life, Emotions which best foresight need not fear, Most worthy then of trust when most intense Hence, amid ills that vex and wrongs that crush Our hearts—if here the words of Holy Writ 125 May with fit reverence be applied—that peace Which passeth understanding, that repose In moral judgments which from this pure source Must come, or will by man ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. III • William Wordsworth
... no sanction to slavery by the admission of new slave States. Nowhere under the Constitution can the Nation by legislation or otherwise, support slavery, hunt slaves, or hold property in man.... As slavery is banished from the national jurisdiction, it will cease to vex our national politics. It may linger in the States as a local institution; but it will no longer engender national animosities when it no longer demands ...
— The Anti-Slavery Crusade - Volume 28 In The Chronicles Of America Series • Jesse Macy
... have met with. Not leaving England till the 22nd of July 1860, he was too late to take part in the principal action, the taking of the Taku Forts, which were assaulted on the 21st August. He writes to his mother from Hong-Kong, "I am rather late for the amusement, which will not vex you." He arrived at Tientsin on September 26th, and marched with Sir Hope Grant's force to Pekin. The following is his description of the only part he was allowed to take before ...
— General Gordon - A Christian Hero • Seton Churchill
... not that thou shouldst vex my shade With cheek all wan and blighted brow: But, O, to-day be love's full tribute paid, While the swift ...
— The Elegies of Tibullus • Tibullus
... your tearing from your mother's hands the letter she thought she had a right to see, and burning it, as you own, before her face; your refusal to see the man, who is so willing to obey you for the sake of your unhappy friend, and this purely to vex your mother; can you think, my dear, upon this brief recapitulation of hardly one half of the faulty particulars you give, that these faults are excusable in one who so ...
— Clarissa, Volume 3 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... knave," replied the prince, "and in the plot to vex and provoke me." He then gave him a box on the ear, which knocked him down; and after having stamped upon him for some time, he tied the well-rope under his arms, and plunged him several times into ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments vol. 2 • Anon.
... for long almost alone among poets in his freedom from Weltschmerz, from regret and desire for worlds lost or impossible. In the later and stupider corruption of the Empire, sadness and anger began to vex even his careless muse. She had piped in her time to much wild dancing, but could not sing to a waltz of mushroom speculators and decorated capitalists. "Le Sang de la Coupe" contains a very powerful ...
— Essays in Little • Andrew Lang
... for you. You can't think how much mischief your yesterday's visit has done. It's a thousand pities, I declare, that ever you said a word about your marriage to Sir Sampson. But of course I don't mean to blame you, Mary. You know you couldn't help it; so don't vex yourself, for you know that will not make the thing any better now. Only if Sir Sampson should die—to be sure I must always think it was that that killed him; and I'm sure it at will soon kill me too-such a ...
— Marriage • Susan Edmonstone Ferrier
... ever seen in the back kitchen, and that if her father loved her he would give the young man some employment. Now the gentleman of the house was exceedingly fond of his gay young daughter, and did not want to vex her; so he went into the back kitchen and questioned Jack as ...
— English Fairy Tales • Flora Annie Steel
... 1805, Mr. Crabbe resumed the charge of his own parish of Muston, he found some changes to vex him, and not the less because he had too much reason to suspect that his long absence from his incumbency had been, partly at least, the cause of them. His cure had been served by respectable and diligent clergymen, but they had been often changed, and some of them had never resided ...
— Crabbe, (George) - English Men of Letters Series • Alfred Ainger
... Bacon: "The true atheist is he whose hands are cauterized by holy things." She thought of her distant youth. The world was not so humorous then, but it had been more important. For a moment she respected her companion, and determined to vex him ...
— The Longest Journey • E. M. Forster
... thing in the world for a woman to be single-minded, in the limited sense of concentration, I mean. Focus your wits on Siddle to-day. I don't suggest any plan. I leave that to your own intelligence. Vex ...
— The Postmaster's Daughter • Louis Tracy
... his hand, and looking up into his face, "Uncle," she said, "we wish you to remain, surely you will not vex us by a ...
— The Young Lord and Other Tales - to which is added Victorine Durocher • Camilla Toulmin
... heartless coquette of the pleasure-seeking world. She stood in the shadow of gray walls, a grating over her head, with deep, soulful, girlish eyes lifted in piteous appeal; and in each of these characters an unfathomed depth remained to vex and ...
— The Light of the Star - A Novel • Hamlin Garland
... which there are more in the "Inferno" than in the other sections of the poem. His peculiar quality is a certain blending of mordant realism with a high and penetrating beauty. There is no need in reading him to vex oneself with symbolic interpretations. He is at his best, when from behind his scholastic philosophy, bursts forth, in direct personal betrayal, his pride, his humility, his ...
— One Hundred Best Books • John Cowper Powys
... king of spades He kiss'd the maids, Which vex'd the queen full sore; The queen of spades She beat those maids And turn'd them out of door; The knave of spades Grieved for those jades, And did for them implore; The queen so gent, She did relent, And vow'd she'd ne'er ...
— Harry's Ladder to Learning - Horn-Book, Picture-Book, Nursery Songs, Nursery Tales, - Harry's Simple Stories, Country Walks • Anonymous
... "Vex not his ghost: O, let him pass! he hates him That would upon the rack of this tough ...
— Essays of Robert Louis Stevenson • Robert Louis Stevenson
... warmth of accent which had in them much, that, under other circumstances and at other times, would have been sorely offensive to the sturdy woodman; whose spirit, anything in the guise of rebuke would have been calculated to vex. But he was burdened with thoughts at the moment, which, in a sufficiently meritorial character, humbled him with a scourge ...
— Guy Rivers: A Tale of Georgia • William Gilmore Simms
... night, when the silence lies Around me, broad and deep, And dreams of earth, and dreams of heaven, That vex ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 385. November, 1847. • Various
... great deal, and I have a very great deal to forgive myself, too. I know well how much I vex you at every turn." ...
— A Room With A View • E. M. Forster
... the people's cockade, and put on the White Hog colour, and also a black one, and vowed they were cocksure of shutting us up. They brought in the Big Hog from his hunting, and he is in the mess, too. At the end they all followed Madame Veto home, shouting everything to vex us patriots. I am a patriot," he added winking. "It is an outrage on the nation. We must go to Versailles. We must bring the Big Hog into our bosoms, away from the Bad ...
— The False Chevalier - or, The Lifeguard of Marie Antoinette • William Douw Lighthall
... no boot to follow him now: let him e'en go and hang. Prithee, help to truss me a little: he does so vex me— ...
— Every Man In His Humor - (The Anglicized Edition) • Ben Jonson
... like that! It's like going to your mother, and saying you're going to try to be a good boy, and not vex ...
— Mary Marston • George MacDonald
... cease, for why should I prolong My notes, and vex a Singer with a Song? Oh thou with pen perpetual in thy fist! Dubbed for thy sins a stark Miscellanist, So pleased the printer's orders to perform For Messrs. Longman, Hurst and Rees and Orme. Go—Get thee hence to Paternoster ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Vol. 7. - Poetry • George Gordon Byron
... think such an issue will ever be forced to the front again. That was a moral question as well as political. Other matters vex the people of today—money matters mostly—in which more diplomacy ...
— The Daughter of a Republican • Bernie Babcock
... cried out upon him: Cease, 30 Leave me in peace: Fear not that I should crave Aught thou mayst have. Leave me in peace, yea trouble me no more, Lest I arise and chase thee from my door. What, shall I not be let Alone, that thou dost vex me yet? ...
— Goblin Market, The Prince's Progress, and Other Poems • Christina Rossetti
... thou hast thy Will, And will to boot, and will in over-plus; More than enough am I that vex thee still, To thy sweet will making addition thus. Wilt thou, whose will is large and spacious, {420b} Not once vouchsafe to hide my will in thine? Shall will in others seem right gracious, And in my will no fair acceptance shine? The sea, all water, yet receives ...
— A Life of William Shakespeare - with portraits and facsimiles • Sidney Lee
... should you forget me? Joking apart, have you given up all right over this girl? if not, I beg her from you. It is my business to arrange for her. In whatever becomes yours I have the right to share, but in this case I see your sister has entire possession. Still, I shall not vex myself much if ...
— The Poison Tree - A Tale of Hindu Life in Bengal • Bankim Chandra Chatterjee
... the weather-beaten board nailed to the old beech tree warning us in faded lettering as we pass beneath it of the penalties awaiting trespassers were to be superseded by a notice headed "Verboten!" What essential difference would there be—that a wise man need vex his soul concerning? We should no longer call it England. That would be all. The sweep of the hills would not be changed; the path would still wind through the woodland. Yet just for a name we are ready to face ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 4, July, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... 'Do not vex yourself,' said the horse, when he had heard the story; 'jump up, and we will go and look for the things.' And Jose mounted ...
— The Orange Fairy Book • Andrew Lang
... some distance to find him," replied Edward; "and it would vex me to return without seeing him. Has he a wife, or any one that I ...
— The Children of the New Forest • Captain Marryat
... Golf! Where the "bunkers" vex by the sea; But the days of Tennis and Croquet Will ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 99., Nov. 1, 1890 • Various
... slavery.— To this, how small the other! Yet 'twas great. Ah, not in vain those long delays, those groans Wrung from thy patient soul by obstacle, The work of peevish man; these were the checks From that Hand guiding, that led thee all the way. He willed thy soul should vex at tyranny; Thine ear should ring with murdered women's shrieks, That torturing famine should thy footsteps clog; That captive's broken hearts should ache thine own. And Slavery—that villain plausible— That thief Gehazi!—He stripped before thine eyes And showed ...
— Laura Secord, the heroine of 1812. - A Drama. And Other Poems. • Sarah Anne Curzon
... he concluded. "True. You see, Monsieur, he could vex me in two or three ways, so could I him. But, on the whole, it is better each to mind his business, and to maintain ...
— The Room in the Dragon Volant • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... sent me (a considerable payment for a box on my benefit night)? I am sorry you were alarmed on Monday. You alarmed us all; you looked so exceedingly ill that I feared something very serious had occurred to distress and vex you. Thank you for your critique upon my Constance; both my mother and myself were much delighted with it; it was every way acceptable to me, for the censure I knew to be deserved, and the praise I hoped was so, and they were blended in ...
— Records of a Girlhood • Frances Anne Kemble
... began again to be haunted with sprites, by the magic and curious arts of the Lady Margaret, who raised up the ghost of Richard, Duke of York, second son to King Edward IV., to walk and vex ...
— Letters on England • Voltaire
... laid in the odoriferous channel, the larva goes to the end, as far as it can go, and makes no further movement. Does not this placid quiescence point to the absence of a sense of smell? The resinous flavour, so strange to the grub which has always lived in oak, ought to vex it, to trouble it; and the disagreeable impression ought to be revealed by a certain commotion, by certain attempts to get away. Well, nothing of the kind happens: once the larva has found the right position in the groove, it does not stir. I do more: I set before ...
— The Glow-Worm and Other Beetles • Jean Henri Fabre
... answer, and sat down. The nymphs with scorn beheld their foes; When the defendant's counsel rose, And, what no lawyer ever lack'd, With impudence own'd all the fact; But, what the gentlest heart would vex, Laid all the fault on t'other sex. That modern love is no such thing As what those ancient poets sing: A fire celestial, chaste, refined, Conceived and kindled in the mind; Which, having found an equal flame, Unites, and both become the same, In different breasts together ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift
... said to it in a familiar style, "See, now, as you have been very good to me to-day, you shall be treated well; you shall have candles all night; I will love you; I will pray to you." If on the contrary, any thing happened to vex the lady, she had the candles put out, ordered her servants not to pay any homage to the poor image, and loaded it herself with ...
— The Mirror Of Literature, Amusement, And Instruction, No. 391 - Vol. 14, No. 391, Saturday, September 26, 1829 • Various
... certainly send her away, if she knew how 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 ...
— Robin Redbreast - A Story for Girls • Mary Louisa Molesworth
... And an eye shall vex thee, looking ancient kindness on thy pain. Turn thee, turn thee on thy pillow; get thee to thy ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 3 - Sorrow and Consolation • Various
... delights to see Vex'd Nature wear a kindred gloom; Not that she smiled in vain to me, When gaily prank'd in summer's bloom Nay, much I loved, at even-tide, Through Brahan's lonely woods to stray. To mark thy peaceful billows glide, And watch the ...
— My Schools and Schoolmasters - or The Story of my Education. • Hugh Miller
... Montsou. He pretended not to interest himself in anything, so as not to vex either the workers or the masters. During the strike he took his walks at night, to prevent himself from being compromised by the miners. He obtained promotion, and was replaced ...
— A Zola Dictionary • J. G. Patterson
... resolving to put an end to the conversation, exclaimed, "Troth and I'll have a kiss from your lips, this day, and, if you vex me much more, another this night too;" and as he spoke, with a face of good-humor and affection, he contrived to suit the action to the word, after which Letty sprang beyond his reach, but pausing a moment ere she disappeared. "Jerry, listen," she proceeded, "don't let ...
— The Tithe-Proctor - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton
... cost the library a sum out of all proportion to their value; that they accumulate so rapidly (much faster, in fact, than books) as to outrun the means at the disposal of any library to deal with them; in short, that they cost more than they come to, if bound, and if unbound, they vex the soul of the librarian ...
— A Book for All Readers • Ainsworth Rand Spofford
... weapons than the Comitia and its temporary leaders, that the authority of the senate might yield to a slow process of attrition, but would never be engulfed by any cataclysmic outburst of popular hostility. It was no part of the statesman's task to pry into the future and vex himself with the query whether a new and permanent headship of the State might not be created, to play the all-pervading part which destiny had assigned to the senate. The senate's power had not vanished, it was not even vanishing. It was a solid fact, fully accepted by the ...
— A History of Rome, Vol 1 - During the late Republic and early Principate • A H.J. Greenidge
... road to death is life, the gate of life is death, We who wake shall sleep, we shall wax who wane; Let us not vex our souls for stoppage of a breath, The fall of a ...
— Poems • Christina G. Rossetti
... while the slow isicle hangs At the stifle thatch, and Winter's frosty pangs Benumme the year, blithe as of old let us Mid noise and war, of peace and mirth discusse. This portion thou wert born for. Why should we Vex at the time's ridiculous miserie? An age that thus hath fooled itself, and will, Spite of thy teeth and mine, persist so still. Let's sit then at this fire; and, while wee steal A revell in the Town, let others seal, Purchase, and cheat, and who can let them pay, Till those black deeds bring ...
— Spare Hours • John Brown
... have a country-house (who can say how soon?) you may look for grottoes, and cascades, and fountains; nay if you vex me by contradiction, perhaps I may go the length of a temple—so provoke me not, for you see of what ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott
... and life becomes like a journey barefooted among thorns and briers and prickles. "Though sometimes small evils," says Richard Sharp, "like invisible insects, inflict great pain, and a single hair may stop a vast machine, yet the chief secret of comfort lies in not suffering trifles to vex us; and in prudently cultivating and under-growth of small pleasures, since very few great ones, alas! are let ...
— How to Get on in the World - A Ladder to Practical Success • Major A.R. Calhoon
... is you have set Lysander on to vex me with mock praises; and your other lover Demetrius, who used almost to spurn me with his foot, have you not bid him call me Goddess, Nymph, rare, precious, and celestial? He would not speak thus to me, whom he hates, if you did not set him on to make ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb
... are significant, for by 1653 the first generation of native-born New Englanders had indeed come upon the scene to vex the Puritan fathers. How different from that of the first settlers must have been the outlook of those who had never been in England. They had never been oppressed by bishop or king; had never felt the insidious ...
— Beginnings of the American People • Carl Lotus Becker
... take mine with it. Listen, Ana. I kept you here, not to vex the Princess or you, but for a good reason. You know that it is the custom of the royal dynasties of Egypt for kings, or those who will be kings, to wed their near kin in order that the blood may ...
— Moon of Israel • H. Rider Haggard
... can see, I can feel that it is true; I feel displeased, and at the same time delighted. M. de la Marche seems insipid and prim since I have known Bernard. Bernard alone seems as proud, as passionate, as bold as myself—and as weak as myself; for he cries like a child when I vex him, and here I am crying, too, as I think ...
— Mauprat • George Sand
... the rare faculty, above all other people on earth, of knowing where to place their care, whilst others vex and torture themselves and at length must despair. Such must be the consequence of unbelief, which has no God and would provide for itself. But faith understands this word Peter quotes from the Scriptures: "Because he careth for you." It joyfully meditates thereon and does and suffers faithfully. ...
— Epistle Sermons, Vol. III - Trinity Sunday to Advent • Martin Luther
... two or three, had appeared from behind the rocks of the hills, and the heart of Wee Willie Winkie sank within him, for just in this manner were the Goblins wont to steal out and vex Curdie's soul. Thus had they played in Curdie's garden, he had seen the picture, and thus had they frightened the Princess's nurse. He heard them talking to each other, and recognized with joy the bastard Pushto that he had picked up from one of his father's grooms lately dismissed. People ...
— Kipling Stories and Poems Every Child Should Know, Book II • Rudyard Kipling
... for ever, and if we measure their duration not by our own few swift years, but by the life of nations and races of men. It is, I imagine, a sense capable of cultivation, and enables us to look upon many of man's doings that would otherwise vex and pain us, and, as some say, destroy all the pleasure of our lives, not exactly as an illusion, as if we were Japanese and had seen a fox in the morning, but at all events in what we call ...
— Afoot in England • W.H. Hudson
... her ears, nor tread on her paw, Lest I should provoke her to use her sharp claw; I never will vex her, nor make her displeased, For Pussy can't bear to ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 1 (of 4) • Various
... discord between capital and labor is fundamentally born of the belief of some that wealth is as socially right in all important matters as it is socially powerful and the faith of others that the social problems that vex men and women would pass with the destruction of wealth's artificial social advantages. Each group confines itself to the territory of experience where everything has to do with matters of human relationship, and each group insists ...
— Rural Problems of Today • Ernest R. Groves
... leaving Jack speechless with astonishment. "She hasn't done that for years," he said; "it's just the way she used to do when we were first friends. If she got in a temper about anything she would rush away and hide herself and cry for hours. What could I have said to vex her, about her marrying, or having some one courting her; there couldn't be anything in that to vex her." Jack thought for some time, sitting upon a stile the better to give his mind to it. Finally he gave up the problem ...
— Facing Death - The Hero of the Vaughan Pit. A Tale of the Coal Mines • G. A. Henty
... been broken for several minutes. Poor little Jean had been trying to keep very brave and quiet, since Grace explained to her how much her noisy grief would vex Geordie. But Elsie, who had returned to her post at Geordie's head, and was seated silently there, now gave a smothered sob, which seemed to fall on Geordie's ear. He opened his blue eyes, and looking wistfully about, said in a faint whisper, ...
— Geordie's Tryst - A Tale of Scottish Life • Mrs. Milne Rae
... Jim was just going to let out when he looked up and saw Miss Falkland looking at him, with her beautiful eyes so full of pity and surprise that he could have had his hand chopped off, so he told me afterwards, rather than vex her for a moment. So he shut up his mouth and ground his teeth together, for it was no joke in the way of pain, and the blood began to run like a ...
— Robbery Under Arms • Thomas Alexander Browne, AKA Rolf Boldrewood
... she said. "Come, Lole, when a thing's to be done, the best way is to do it and not fuss nor fret. I ought not to have said that; I knew it would vex dear mamma; but papa provokes me so with his solemn directions, as if the whole house did not always hold its breath when he is in the study. Come, Lole, let's do this work as well as we can." Amy's sunshiny disposition matches her quick ...
— Holiday Stories for Young People • Various
... tractable or open to conviction as I could wish, I must remember perfection is not the lot of humanity. And as long as we can regard those we love, and to whom we are closely allied, with profound and very unshaken esteem, it is a small thing that they should vex us occasionally by, what appear to us, unreasonable and headstrong notions. You, my dear Miss Wooler, know full as well as I do the value of sisters' affection to each other; there is nothing like it in this world, I believe, when they are nearly equal in age, and similar in ...
— Charlotte Bronte and Her Circle • Clement K. Shorter
... him pass. Vex not his parting spirit, Nor on the rack of this rough world Stretch him ...
— Table-Talk - Essays on Men and Manners • William Hazlitt
... Vex not, maidens, nor regret Thus to part with Margaret. Charms like yours can never stay Long within doors; and ...
— The Works of Charles Lamb in Four Volumes, Volume 4 • Charles Lamb
... difference, that the Cinghalese are soft, inert, passive cowards: but your Kandyan is a ferocious little bloody coward, full of mischief as a monkey, grinning with desperation, laughing like a hyena, or chattering if you vex him, and never to be trusted for a moment. The reader now understands why we described the Ceylonese man as a tiger-cat in his noblest division: for, after all, these dangerous gentlemen in the peach-stone are a more promising ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 337, November, 1843 • Various
... of his staff were present. I recall the circumstances very well, for a conversation in which the general asked me confidentially certain questions, was incautiously repeated by some one who was present and returned to vex me after many years. I returned to my own camp about nine or half past nine, much cast down over the doctor's diagnosis of my case. I mention all this to show how secretly the preparations for the ...
— Personal Recollections of a Cavalryman - With Custer's Michigan Cavalry Brigade in the Civil War • J. H. (James Harvey) Kidd
... great Redeemer he was Born; But Sir! the Bays, they are so much their due; They'l wear, inspite of impudence and you; You are so hateful cruel and unjust, To Load that Sex, with ugly brand of Lust: Those whome deserved Slights and losses vex, Invent new Sins, and throw 'em on that Sex; Whose thrifty wickedness the Sex forsakes, He on these beauteous Fields a Sodom makes: He ne're assaults but where the Walls are slight, True Bullies will with none but Cowards fight. A vertuous ...
— The Pleasures of a Single Life, or, The Miseries Of Matrimony • Anonymous
... no doubt he will come round, with you. Do try and not vex him more than you can help, Bob. You know how much we all ...
— Held Fast For England - A Tale of the Siege of Gibraltar (1779-83) • G. A. Henty
... I care for him particularly, the King, you know; I never knew him, and I daresay he wasn't very much different from other men. But they are bad people. They are cruel to poor girls. They torment and vex and abuse me in every kind of way; they want to stop me following my trade. I have no other trade. You may be sure, if I had, I should not be doing what I do.... What is it they want? They are so hard on poor humble folks, the milkman, the charcoalman, the water carrier, the laundress. ...
— The Gods are Athirst • Anatole France
... hour of push and pelf, Where nought unsordid seems to last, Vex not thy miserable self, But search the fallows ...
— Old Familiar Faces • Theodore Watts-Dunton
... ghost shall dare appear 5 To vex with shrieks this quiet grove; But shepherd lads assemble here, And melting ...
— The Poetical Works of William Collins - With a Memoir • William Collins
... spake, and Hera took her slender hand and gently smiling, replied: "Perform this task, Cytherea, straightway, as thou sayest; and be not angry or contend with thy boy; he will cease hereafter to vex thee." ...
— The Argonautica • Apollonius Rhodius
... commentators plain, Who with no deep researches vex the brain, Who from the dark and doubtful love to run, And hold their glimmering taper to ...
— Familiar Quotations • Various
... bear to hear aught of King of England," was the answer. "If you love me, good Arthur, vex him ...
— The Lances of Lynwood • Charlotte M. Yonge
... we are of the whole designs of the Deity, we cannot wonder if some things, nay, if many things, are to our faculties inscrutable. But we assuredly have no right to say that those difficulties which try and vex us are incapable of a solution, any more than we have to say, that those cases in which as yet we can see no trace of design, are not equally the result of intelligence, and equally conducive to a fixed and useful purpose with those in which we have been able ...
— The Fallen Star; and, A Dissertation on the Origin of Evil • E. L. Bulwer; and, Lord Brougham
... that something might have occurred to vex you, which you might not like to mention to him,' said Mrs. Edmonstone, ...
— The Heir of Redclyffe • Charlotte M. Yonge
... three hours to the stream that bore the little Indian fleet. His triumph of the night before increased his boldness, and he resolved to return the following night and annoy further the detachment by the river. It would serve his cause, and it would be a pleasure to vex the dogmatic European colonel. ...
— The Keepers of the Trail - A Story of the Great Woods • Joseph A. Altsheler
... chanced to blow that day Was easterly, and rather strong, too: It loved to see the galling way That clothes vex those whom they belong to: "Now watch me," cried this spell of weather, "I'll rid ...
— Fables for the Frivolous • Guy Whitmore Carryl
... Hussy! you inconsiderate Jade! had you been hang'd, it would not have vex'd me, for that might have been your Misfortune; but to do such a mad thing by Choice; The Wench is ...
— The Beggar's Opera • John Gay
... not write any more, or I shall say something savage that you won't like. I am in one of my tempers to-night. I want a husband to vex, or a child to beat, or something of that sort. Do you ever like to see the summer insects kill themselves in the candle? I do, sometimes. Good-night, Mrs. Jezebel The longer you can leave me here the better. The air agrees with me, ...
— Armadale • Wilkie Collins
... suddenness and warmth of her caress had been, I knew, a mere monkeyish trick, designed to vex the religious scruples of Mere Marguerite. I knew not what to say to the stately woman who remained confronting me with downcast eyes and lips that moved dumbly as though in prayer. As the door closed after my wife's retreating figure, the nun looked up; there was a slight ...
— Vendetta - A Story of One Forgotten • Marie Corelli
... that Martha was wrong or unreasonable in thinking that Mary should have helped her. Jesus did not say she was wrong; he only reminded Martha that she ought not to let things fret and vex her. "Martha, Martha, thou art anxious and troubled about many things." It was not her serving that he reproved, but the fret that she allowed to ...
— Personal Friendships of Jesus • J. R. Miller
... first be physiological affinity). We shall go through life as comrades go, hand in hand, Hester and I; and great happiness will be ours. And because of all this I say you have no right to challenge my happiness, and vex my days, and feel for me as ...
— The Kempton-Wace Letters • Jack London
... cured, and it was true, for there's juist ae man in the land fit for 't, and they micht as weel try tae get the mune oot o' heaven. Sae a' said naethin' tae vex Tammas's hert, for it's ...
— Stories by English Authors: Scotland • Various |
