"Impudence" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... sententious Englishmen were altogether taken aback by the Italian's impudence; but Zouch settled ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley
... said the steward. "A sorry jade enow! But I don't know but she will serve our turn better than the cow. There was a requisition, as they have the impudence to call it, from the Parliament lot that took off all our horses, except old grey Dobbin and the colt, and this beast may come in handy to draw the wood. So I'll take her, and you may think yourself well off, and thank my Lady I'm so easy with you. 'Be not hard on the orphans,' ...
— Under the Storm - Steadfast's Charge • Charlotte M. Yonge
... impudence to be asking such personal questions as that," Mrs. M'Crawney retorted lightly, with a smile which showed her good-looking when she was not peevish. "But it is better I'm feeling in myself, which is sure to come to the outside ...
— A Countess from Canada - A Story of Life in the Backwoods • Bessie Marchant
... No question of the right or wrong of the arrest was discussed—justification was not considered. It was an overwhelmingly insolent invasion—and worst of all, a successful invasion, by one who had nothing but cool impudence, not even a budding reputation to justify his assault on the lifelong prestige of the Gap clan. Gale Morgan strode and rode the streets of Sleepy Cat looking ...
— Nan of Music Mountain • Frank H. Spearman
... sinner," is such pride that it made me feel uncomfortable. When the pope took the title "holiness," the head of the Eastern church, in pique, called himself "The servant of God's servants." So you publicly expatiate on your sinfulness from pique of Solovyov, who has the impudence to call himself orthodox. But does a word like orthodoxy, Judaism, or Catholicism contain any implication of exceptional personal merit or virtue? To my thinking everybody is bound to call himself orthodox if he has that word inscribed on his passport. ...
— Letters of Anton Chekhov • Anton Chekhov
... By my use of the word reputed, the reader must not be led to think that Mr. Bertram's money-bags were unreal. They were solid, and true as the coffers of the Bank of England. He was no Colonel Waugh, rich only by means of his rich impudence. It is not destined that he shall fall brilliantly, bringing down with him a world of ruins. He will not levant to Spain or elsewhere. His wealth is of the old-fashioned sort, and will abide at any rate such ...
— The Bertrams • Anthony Trollope
... white men of his acquaintance were Hudson Bay officials, this constituted a slurring piece of impudence that demanded instant retribution. ...
— The Wilderness Trail • Frank Williams
... leggins, moccasins, and several shirts. He then began to put on vests, one after another, and one of them had the marks of a bullet, just above the pocket, with the stain of blood. In the pocket was a one-dollar Tallahassee Bank note, and the rascal had the impudence to ask me to give him silver coin for that dollar. He had evidently killed the wearer, and was disappointed because the pocket contained a paper dollar instead of one in silver. In due time he was dressed with turban and ostrich-feathers, and mounted ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... writings of the ancients, and not to rest in their sole authority, or take all upon trust from them, provided the plagues of judging and pronouncing against them be away; such as are envy, bitterness, precipitation, impudence, and scurrilous scoffing. For to all the observations of the ancients we have our own experience, which if we will use and apply, we have better means to pronounce. It is true they opened the gates, and made ...
— Discoveries and Some Poems • Ben Jonson
... shade of plum. "Weener, youre a thief, a petty, cadging, sly, larcenous, pilfering, bloody thief. You take the Daily Intelligencer's honest dollars without a qualm, aye, with a smirk on your imbecile face, proposing with the cool impudence of the born embezzler to return no value for them. Weener, you forget yourself. The Intelligencer picked you out of a gutter, a nauseous, dungspattered and thoroughly fitting gutter, and pays you well, mark that, you feebleminded counterfeit ...
— Greener Than You Think • Ward Moore
... least emotion, and affecting a total ignorance of the matter, he opened two or three of the nuts himself, signified that he was satisfied of the fact, and then went on shore and sent off a quantity of plantains and bananas. The ingenuity and the impudence of fraud are not solely ...
— Narrative of the Voyages Round The World, • A. Kippis
... But I do not think that a man can travel through the States with his eyes open and not admit the fact. Many things will conspire to induce him to shut his eyes and admit no conclusion favorable to the Americans. Men and women will sometimes be impudent to him; the better his coat, the greater the impudence. He will be pelted with the braggadocio of equality. The corns of his Old World conservatism will be trampled on hourly by the purposely vicious herd of uncouth democracy. The fact that he is paymaster will go for nothing, ...
— Volume 1 • Anthony Trollope
... as obstinate as mules,' said Mr Prothero; 'I can't think who you turn after. And then to have the impudence to say I was a Papist! Why, I'd rather be a Methody preacher any day. And you to encourage her, brother Jonathan. You ought to be ...
— Gladys, the Reaper • Anne Beale
... collection which extends beyond isolated types of speech and families, although it preserves throughout the scientific method of Indo-Germanic philology. It was a double refreshment to me, as out of conscientiousness I had looked at and skimmed through L.'s perverse books. What determined impudence there ...
— Chips From A German Workshop. Vol. III. • F. Max Mueller
... of the disinterested statesman, combining virtues before which those falsely attributed to Washington paled and expired; and as the only man fit to fill the Executive Chair. Genet accepted all this as gospel, fortunately, perhaps, for the country; for his own excesses and impudence, his final threat to appeal from the President to the people, ruined him with the cooling heads of the Republican party, and finally lost him even the support ...
— The Conqueror • Gertrude Franklin Atherton
... following. And though so be, that no man can tell utterly the number of the twigs, and of the harms that come of pride, yet will I shew a part of them, as ye shall understand. There is inobedience, vaunting, hypocrisy, despite, arrogance, impudence, swelling of hearte, insolence, elation, impatience, strife, contumacy, presumption, irreverence, pertinacity, vain- glory and many another twig that I cannot tell nor ...
— The Canterbury Tales and Other Poems • Geoffrey Chaucer
... as customers went in and out. It was the handsomest building he had seen in his walk, next to that of the cathedral. "The new civilization versus the old," murmured Kenelm. As he so murmured, a hand was laid on his arm with a sort of timid impudence. He looked down and saw a young face, but it had survived the look of youth; it was worn and hard, and the bloom on it was not that of Nature's giving. "Are you kind to-night?" ...
— Kenelm Chillingly, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... The unconscionable impudence of the bare suggestion fetched a gasp from both men. Plug Ivory's assumption of dignity crumbled immediately. The years rolled back. He felt one of those old-time fits of rage come bristling up the back ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 5, June 1905 • Various
... was started, the neighbourhood was open; there was a suburban look about the locality; but entire rows of new dwellings now surround the school; the part in which it stands is densely populated; all grades of men, women, and children inhabit it; "civilisation"—rags, impudence, dirt, and sharpness, for they mean civilisation—has long prevailed in the immediate neighbourhood; a fine new brewery almost shakes hands with the building on one side; the "Sailor's Home" beershop ...
— Our Churches and Chapels • Atticus
... a mountainous man, about thirty-five years old; and he had impudence ingrained with his brawny meat and muscles, and his tongue, let loose, would run like a mill-stream. His head rose a little above his ears, and was huge of girth in a horizontal measure. His hair was a sort of wolf's gray, was clipped all over within an ...
— Summerfield - or, Life on a Farm • Day Kellogg Lee
... it, and offered the hero twenty pounds for his trouble. 'Zounds, Madam,' says he, 'you offer nothing. It cost the gentleman who took it forty pounds for his coach, equipage, and other expenses to Windsor.' His impudence increased with success, and in the geniality of his cups he was wont to boast his amazing rogueries: 'hinting not without vanity at the poor Understandings of the Greatest Part of Mankind, and his ...
— A Book of Scoundrels • Charles Whibley
... said. "It's just some other fellow's impudence. I'll kick him for you if I get the chance. You're ...
— The Keeper of the Door • Ethel M. Dell
... who looked very serious all the while, and who, we could easily perceive, was more than ordinarily affected with it: when being eager, and hardly suffering me to make an end—"I know all this, master," says he, "and a great deal more; but I han't the impudence to talk thus to my wife, when God and my own conscience knows, and my wife will be an undeniable evidence against me, that I have lived as if I never heard of God, or a future state, or any thing about it; and to talk of my repenting, alas! (and with that he fetched a deep sigh; ...
— The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe (1808) • Daniel Defoe
... you think I might take him? (She listens.) Glang, you young scald: if I had you here Id teach you manners. (She listens.) Thats enough now. Back wid you to bed; and be thankful Im not there to put me slipper across you. (She rings off.) The impudence! (To Mitchener.) Bless you, me childher, may you be happy, she says. (To Balsquith, going to his side of the room.) Give dear, old Mich me ...
— Press Cuttings • George Bernard Shaw
... 370.—Cf. Ibid., the letter of M. Chapron.—Ibid., 372. Speech by M. A. Vaublanc.—Moore, "Journal during a Residence in France," I. 25 (Aug. 10). The impudence of the people in the galleries was intolerable. There was "a loud and universal peal of laughter from all the galleries" on the reading of a letter, in which a deputy wrote that he was threatened with decapitation.—" Fifty members were shouting at ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 3 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 2 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... store of British sand (gunpowder), and plenty of pills (musket-balls), which we will bestow upon you very generously. We see that you have got the Feejees and Tongas with you, but we hope you will not have the folly and impudence to attack us until you have collected the whole world ...
— The Cannibal Islands - Captain Cook's Adventure in the South Seas • R.M. Ballantyne
... warm some white wine and to ask them for a few 'Li-T'ung' pills compounded with goat's blood, but Hsi Jen clasped his hand tight. "My troubling you is of no matter," she smiled, "but were I to put ever so many people to inconvenience, they'll bear me a grudge for my impudence. Not a soul, it's clear enough, knows anything about it now, but were you to make such a bustle as to bring it to people's notice, you'll be in an awkward fix, and so will I. The proper thing, therefore, is for you to send a page to-morrow ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... never have suspected his connection with Mr. Rickman, the Junior Journalist, the obscure writer of brilliant paragraphs, a fellow destitute of reverence and decency and everything except consummate impudence, a disconcerting humour and a startling style. But he was still more distantly related to Mr. Rickman the young man about town. And that made four. Besides these four there was a fifth, the serene and perfect intelligence, who from some height immeasurably far above them sat in judgement ...
— The Divine Fire • May Sinclair
... room, half empty at this season, gave her up bodily to what seemed to Lucy the intolerable impudence of the ...
— The Immortal Moment - The Story of Kitty Tailleur • May Sinclair
... friends (Joel Benton), himself a poet, in an article tracing the vicissitudes of this poem, shows pardonable indignation at the "impudence and hardihood of the unmannered meddler" who tacked on the "heaven's gate" ...
— Our Friend John Burroughs • Clara Barrus
... directors, whose incomes it did not touch. So when in the autumn the rumour went round that the Ballance Ministry meant to abolish the Property Tax and bring forward Bills embodying a Progressive Land Tax, and Progressive Income Tax, the proposal was thought to represent the audacity of impudence or desperation. When the rumour proved true, it was predicted that the farmers throughout the length and breath of the country would rise in wrath and terror, scared by the very name of Land Tax. Nevertheless Parliament passed the Bills, with the addition of a light Absentee Tax. The smaller ...
— The Long White Cloud • William Pember Reeves
... school." His manner towards Solomon was of a corresponding condescension. But it took a great deal to overawe Solomon, who, with the national humor, possessed the national Chutzpah, which is variously translated enterprise, audacity, brazen impudence and cheek. ...
— Children of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... me badly,—I tell you, Dalton, this Rosecouleur is a devil. Condescend to him! be haughty and—what do you call it?—urbane to him! I defy you to do it, with all your impudence. Why, his valet, that shadow that glides after him, is too much for me. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Number 9, July, 1858 • Various
... The impudence and thinly veiled hostility in the man's tone were unmistakable. Hazeltine hesitated, seemed about to speak, and then silently led ...
— Cap'n Eri • Joseph Crosby Lincoln
... was the man the creatures dared to personate! I hate the whole thing, Sutherland. It is full of impudence and irreverence. Perhaps the wretched beings may want another thousand years' damnation, because of the injury done to their character by the homage of men who ...
— David Elginbrod • George MacDonald
... not like many people, but when she gave her heart to a friend it was without stipulations. Dick was a man's man. Essentially he was masculine, virile, dominant. But the force of him was usually masked either by his gay impudence or his sunny friendliness. Women were drawn to his flashing smile because they sensed ...
— A Daughter of the Dons - A Story of New Mexico Today • William MacLeod Raine
... a little gymnastic skill, and was not much of a feat, anyhow. On getting on to the pavement, I found myself in the presence of a sort of night watchman, who was bawling the hours through the street, and who asked me insolently what I was doing there. I thrashed him for his impudence, and the gentle exercise did me good, as it set my blood well in circulation again. Before getting back to the inn, I stopped under a street lamp, opened my pocket-book, and saw with pleasure that my million was not wet. The leather was thick, and the clasp firm; moreover, I had enveloped ...
— The Man With The Broken Ear • Edmond About
... thrown away upon the mere chance of a snoring companion! 'Besides, Charles,' quoth he, 'I cannot endure to share my little cabin with others; they will use my towels, and combs, and brushes, like that confounded rascal who slept in the same berth with me coming from New South Wales, who had the impudence to clean his teeth with my toothbrush. Here I shall be all alone, happy and comfortable as a prince, and Duchess shall sleep in the after-berth, and be my queen.' And so we parted," continued Captain Charles. ...
— Roughing it in the Bush • Susanna Moodie
... Madame de Bergenheim," thought Lambernier, with the barefaced impudence of his kind; "if I were to tell him what I know, my vengeance would be in good hands, without my taking the trouble ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... fundamental. Modesty is not indeed the last word of love, but it is the necessary foundation for all love's most exquisite audacities, the foundation which alone gives worth and sweetness to what Senancour calls its "delicious impudence."[74] Without modesty we could not have, nor rightly value at its true worth, that bold and pure candor which is at once the final revelation of love and the seal of ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 1 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... and that wittily, handled the juggle of religion, and withal discover'd with what impudence and ignorance priests pretend to be inspir'd: But are not our wrangling pleaders possest with the same frenzy? who cant it? These wounds I receiv'd in defence of your liberty; this eye was lost in your service; lend ...
— The Satyricon • Petronius Arbiter
... L. S. E. not to attach his name to a work that would give him a notoriety for impudence and slander which no future penitence could by any possibility remove. How far it was wise to sanction with the authority of your Lordship's name, the work of an author who had not the rashness to reveal his own, remains for the effects it will ...
— The Baptist Magazine, Vol. 27, January, 1835 • Various
... just come into the service, treating me in this manner! I can tell you, sir, that you will not be three days longer in the service—no, sir, not three days; for either you leave the service or I do. Of all the impudence, of all the insolence, of all the contempt I have heard of, this beats all—and from such a little animal as you. Consider yourself as under an arrest, sir, till the captain comes on board, and your conduct is reported; go down below, ...
— Percival Keene • Frederick Marryat
... "But the impudence of you, to do it right here!" she goes on. "No one but you, Torchy, would have thought of that." . . . . ...
— Wilt Thou Torchy • Sewell Ford
... up in his throat, and his strength almost wasted by the excitement. He felt as one feels when he has just escaped a peril which menaced him with instant death. It was singular that the soldier had not fired, but the fact that he did not convinced Tom that there is an amazing power in impudence. ...
— The Soldier Boy; or, Tom Somers in the Army - A Story of the Great Rebellion • Oliver Optic
... being shy or morose. But this was because I masked my troubles, though quite unconsciously, under a camouflage of sarcasm and sallies of wit, or, at least, what seemed to pass for wit among my immature acquaintances. With grown-ups, I was at times inclined to be pert, my degree of impudence depending no doubt upon how ill at ease I was and how perfectly at ease I wished to appear. Because of the constant need for appearing happier than I really was, I developed a knack for saying things in an amusing, sometimes an epigrammatic, way. ...
— A Mind That Found Itself - An Autobiography • Clifford Whittingham Beers
... stop at the "Corner" yesterday? 'Twarn't neighbourly to go on right away like that. But it all come, I reckon, of Britisher pride and impudence.' ...
— Cedar Creek - From the Shanty to the Settlement • Elizabeth Hely Walshe
... of the Lani," Alexander said suddenly. "They're a special case, a very special case." He glared at his cousin. "Damn your impudence," he said without beat. "I sent for you—not ...
— The Lani People • J. F. Bone
... book to the public for the purpose of putting money into his own pocket. Often enough it is only a cloak for covering the obscurity, incompetence and insignificance of the critic. It is incredible what impudence these fellows will show, and what literary trickery they will venture to commit, as soon as they know they are safe under the shadow of anonymity. Let me recommend a general Anti-criticism, a ...
— The Art of Literature • Arthur Schopenhauer
... Rossetti was in his later years, he had at one time been very different, and could bring himself in touch with the lower orders of London in a way such as was only known to his most intimate friends. With all her impudence, and I may say insolence, Mrs. Gudgeon was a great favourite with the police, who were the constant butts ...
— Aylwin • Theodore Watts-Dunton
... exclaimed, looking up and catching sight of young Spickle. "Have you the impudence to follow me here? Didn't I tell you that I ...
— Prairie Farmer, Vol. 56: No. 4, January 26, 1884 - A Weekly Journal for the Farm, Orchard and Fireside • Various
... unusual zeal that day. He was a very droll fellow, a striking type of the Southerner, whom it was difficult to look at with a serious face, and whom no one with any sense of humour could really dislike, notwithstanding his immense vanity and his immeasurable impudence. He had a thick black beard, a long, sharp nose, dark eyes full of mischievous mirth, and cheeks the colour of red wine. He wore a stiff new blouse with a red collar—the badge of his office—and a straw hat like a beehive. The whole of ...
— Two Summers in Guyenne • Edward Harrison Barker
... put a title to your name, played the heir of a great fortune, and entered into near relations with my family. An impudence which the avenging arm of ...
— The Son of Monte-Cristo, Volume II (of 2) • Alexandre Dumas pere
... all was tight, and held water. Nothing could disturb that part of the case. But next came the retaliatory conquest, by means of arts and letters. How was this to be dealt with? What shadow or dream of a correspondency could be made out there? What impudence could face that? Already, in Pope's ears, sounded the trumpet of recall; and Pope mused a, little: but 'No,' he said in effect, 'I will not turn back. Why should I? It is but one astounding falsehood that is wanted to set me free.' I will venture to say that ...
— Theological Essays and Other Papers v2 • Thomas de Quincey
... name is prettier than Conigherazzo," said Ercole. "It is Lira—Erre Gheraffe fonne Lira." (Herr Graf von Lira, I suppose he meant. And he has the impudence to assert that singing has taught him to pronounce German.) "And that means," he continued, "Il Conte di ...
— A Roman Singer • F. Marion Crawford
... suddenly espied the old woman whose handling of the roller-towel had so impressed me. "Where," I shouted, addressing her, "where is the wounded man?" "Took away," was the laconic reply. "Took away!" I said; "and who has had the impudence ...
— Mad Shepherds - and Other Human Studies • L. P. Jacks
... Forbear your Impudence, you curs'd old Thief; This Moment leave my Fort, and to your Country. Let me hear no more of your hellish Clamour, Or to D——n I will blow you all, And feast the Devil with one ...
— Ponteach - The Savages of America • Robert Rogers
... as he was rowing home. "I never heard of such impudence before. He actually seemed to think that I would take as a passenger a common fisherman's boy. I haven't ...
— Robert Coverdale's Struggle - Or, On The Wave Of Success • Horatio, Jr. Alger
... is that so?" cried the virago, advancing on Bess with the evident purpose of using her broad, parboiled palm on the visitor, just as she would use it on one of her own children. "I'll l'arn ye not to come here with your impudence!" ...
— Nan Sherwood's Winter Holidays • Annie Roe Carr
... them and some tyranny as odious as can be furnished by the records of history or by the invention of poets. This prattling of theirs hardly deserves the name of sophistry. It is nothing but plain impudence. Have these gentlemen never heard, in the whole circle of the worlds of theory and practice, of anything between the despotism of the monarch and the despotism of the multitude? Have they never heard of a monarchy directed by laws, controlled and balanced by the great hereditary wealth and ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. III. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... remark, or any other made by a college prof, quite as unintelligible as it was unimportant, laughed with careless impudence in the old man's face; and Mrs. Draper, for all her keenness, could make nothing of it. It sounded, however, so quite like a dictum which she herself would have liked to make, that she cross-questioned Sylvia afterwards ...
— The Bent Twig • Dorothy Canfield
... go out and play with other chickens of his age, but persisted in hanging around the kitchen. One morning, when Aunt Jane went into the breakfast-room, she found him on the table, helping himself from a dish of stewed potatoes. Such impudence could no longer be tolerated: so the saucy little cripple was banished to the barnyard to ...
— The Nursery, No. 106, October, 1875. Vol. XVIII. - A Monthly Magazine for Youngest Readers • Various
... these contend, Can surly Virtue hope to fix a friend? Slaves that with serious impudence beguile, And lie without a blush, without a smile, Exalt each trifle, every vice adore, Your taste in snuff, your judgment in a whore, Can Balbo's eloquence applaud, and swear 150 He gropes his breeches with ...
— Poetical Works of Johnson, Parnell, Gray, and Smollett - With Memoirs, Critical Dissertations, and Explanatory Notes • Samuel Johnson, Thomas Parnell, Thomas Gray, and Tobias Smollett
... only one person in Sanstead House who would enter a room like that. I was amused. The impudence of the thing tickled me. It seemed so foreign to Mr Fisher's usual cautious methods. This strolling in and helping oneself was certainly kidnapping de luxe. In the small hours I could have understood it; but at ...
— The Little Nugget • P.G. Wodehouse
... views, sir, and—your impudence! You're in the right, and I am in the wrong" (this admission with a more ill-used tone than ever). "It's the race-horses. Ring the bell. What sawneys you young fellows are! it used not to take six minutes to ring a bell when I was ...
— A Perilous Secret • Charles Reade
... Confucius, then about to appear. At the same time he wrote to Borrow drawing his attention to one of the ballads written in German Romany jib, and enquiring if it were worth anything. Whilst deprecating his "impudence" in writing a Romany gili and telling, as a pupil might a master, of his interest in and his association with the gypsies, he continues: "My dear Mr Borrow, for all this you are entirely responsible. More than twenty years ago your books had an incredible ...
— The Life of George Borrow • Herbert Jenkins
... adventure of the preceding evening. He had been obliged to undergo a lustration of near an hour, before he could be put to bed. He was just risen, when the message was delivered. "Zounds!" cried the peer, "he is, is he? And so this fellow, whom nobody knows, has the impudence to snub me! By my title, and all the blood of my ancestors, he is not worthy of my sword. I will have him assassinated. I will hire some blackguards to seize him, and bind him in my presence, and I will bastinado him with my own hand. Furies and curses! I do not know what to do. Oh, this confounded ...
— Damon and Delia - A Tale • William Godwin
... the construction of the first sixty miles compels admiration, if only for its impudence. In the first place the contractors, Van Hattum and Co., were to build the line at a cost to be mutually agreed upon by them and the railway company, and they were to receive as remuneration 11 per cent. upon the amount of the specification. But should they ...
— The Transvaal from Within - A Private Record of Public Affairs • J. P. Fitzpatrick
... hear?' I hissed. The fellow's impudence passed all bounds. It was as bad as his croaking. 'Begone!' I added. 'I suppose you are afraid that he will kill me, and you will lose ...
— Under the Red Robe • Stanley Weyman
... Latin Church. Being as orthodox as he was barbarous, he rejoiced mightily at the fall of the Greeks, and sent an embassy of congratulation to the new Latin Emperor. Weak as he was upon his unstable throne, Baldwin actually had the folly and impudence to assault these ambassadors, to treat them as rebels, and to send a message to their master that, before his servants could be received at the Byzantine court, he must first deserve pardon by touching with his forehead the footstool of ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume VI. • Various
... for your impudence yet, young fellow. You're a high and mighty, you are, breaking the rules giving ...
— Ralph on the Overland Express - The Trials and Triumphs of a Young Engineer • Allen Chapman
... forgot her fears. She was so lonely, you know, and the stranger did not look at all like a bear. So, with a little appealing Bah, she ran forward clumsily, straight up to the tall stranger's side, paused a moment at the alien smell, and then, with a cool impudence only possible at the age of twenty-five hours, began to help herself to a dinner of fresh milk. The tall stranger turned her great dark head far around, sniffed doubtfully for a few seconds, and fell to licking the presumptuous ...
— Children of the Wild • Charles G. D. Roberts
... boldness.' In the trial scene, no less than in the scenes of altercation with Brachiano and Flamineo, Webster clearly intended her to pass for a magnificent vixen, a beautiful and queenly termagant. Her boldness is the audacity of impudence, which does not condescend to entertain the thought of guilt. Her egotism is so hard and so profound that the very victims whom she sacrifices to ambition seem in her sight justly punished. Of Camillo and Isabella, her husband and his wife, ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Second Series • John Addington Symonds
... said to myself when I was alone once more, "this is the most extraordinary case upon which I have ever been engaged. My respect for Mr. Hayle's readiness of resource, to say nothing of his impudence, is increasing by leaps and bounds. The man is not to be met every day who can rob his partners of upwards of a hundred and seventy thousand pounds, and then invite the detective who is sent after ...
— My Strangest Case • Guy Boothby
... Anglo-Indian is only too familiar, loveth not great altitudes, hence does not occur in any of the higher hill stations. Almora is the one place in the hills where he appears to be common. There he displays all the shameless impudence of his brethren ...
— Birds of the Indian Hills • Douglas Dewar
... ornament but served to center the attention upon the charms that so loudly professed to scorn them. It was worldliness speaking in the quiet voice of religion. It was vulgarity advertising itself in terms of good taste. She had made modesty the handmaiden of blatant immodesty, and the daring impudence of it all fairly ...
— The Eyes of the World • Harold Bell Wright
... you, Madam, I cannot put up with Mistress Lucy's impudence. There'll be no law and order amongst the young gentlewomen, over whom you are pleased to set me, if this young woman is to put me at defiance. Vanity and thinking of nought but gew-gaws and finery and looking out for admiration, don't go to make a bower-woman such as ...
— Penshurst Castle - In the Days of Sir Philip Sidney • Emma Marshall
... a man, not that of a pack-horse, and I'm as free as you are, even if my father did leave me poor!" Not satisfied with swearing, he lifted up his leg from time to time and filled the road with an obscene noise and a filthy stench. Giton laughed at his impudence and imitated every explosion with his lips, {but Eumolpus relapsed into his usual vein, ...
— The Satyricon, Complete • Petronius Arbiter
... very just suspicion that Don Tacon was acting. He had formed, indeed, a perfectly just estimate of his consummate impudence and roguery, but still it was difficult to account for the reason ...
— Ronald Morton, or the Fire Ships - A Story of the Last Naval War • W.H.G. Kingston
... collected later by L'Estrange, and is accepted by North in his 'Examen,' to prove that, by some of his friends, Godfrey was reckoned 'missing' in the afternoon of the fatal Saturday.** But no such evidence was wanted when Hill, Berry, and Green were tried.*** The prosecution, with reckless impudence, mingled Bedloe's and Prance's contradictory lies, and accused Bedloe's 'Jesuits,' Walsh and Le Fevre, in company with Prance's priests, Gerald and Kelly.**** Bedloe, in his story before the jury, involved ...
— The Valet's Tragedy and Other Stories • Andrew Lang
... the night before had haunted Davy's elbow with his obsequious "Yes, sirs," "No, sirs," and "Beg pardon, sirs"; but the morning had brought him knowledge of Davy's penury, and with that wisdom had come impudence if not dignity. ...
— Capt'n Davy's Honeymoon - 1893 • Hall Caine
... my outraged feelings had so overcome me that I was shouting at the Miser, who stood stock still saying nothing, for the suddenness, to say nothing of the impudence, of my attack seemed ...
— The Tale of Lal - A Fantasy • Raymond Paton
... after which, to out-do their murmurings, he said, that he wondered Whitehall was not yet consumed by fire from heaven, since such rakes as Rochester, Killegrew, and Sidney were suffered there, who had the impudence to assert that all married men in the city were cuckolds, and all their wives painted. This conduct endeared him so much to the cits, and made him so welcome at their clubs, that at last he grew sick of their ...
— The Memoirs of Count Grammont, Complete • Anthony Hamilton
... time by not going through his castle, but subsequently it turned out that the Deb had, with infinite consideration, wished us to remain in order to rest ourselves after our long journey. This may have been merely said to shelter the Wandipore man, who had the impudence to send one evening to us saying, that the Deb and Durmah were coming to Wandipore next morning, and that we were to meet them there, and return the same evening to Punukha. This turned out untrue. Pemberton was at last compelled to write to the Deb, and the consequence was ...
— Journals of Travels in Assam, Burma, Bhootan, Afghanistan and The - Neighbouring Countries • William Griffith
... through the opening of the curtains, she turned and seeing me standing at the door, said to her maid, "See who stands at the door." So the maid came up to me and said, "O old man, hast thou no shame, or do gray hairs and impudence go together?" "O my mistress," answered I, "I confess to the gray hairs, but as for unmannerliness, I think not to be guilty of it." "And what can be more unmannerly," rejoined her mistress, "than to intrude thyself upon a house other than thy house and gaze on a harem other than ...
— The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume IV • Anonymous
... her, so quick to strike With beak and wing and claw alike: Then how the proud lip quivered, how The dark frown marked her angry brow! When Rama saw her cheek aglow With passion, he rebuked the crow. But bold in impudence the bird, With no respect for Rama's word, Fearless again at Sita flew: Then Rama's wrath to fury grew. The hero of the mighty arm Spoke o'er a shaft the mystic charm, Laid the dire weapon on his bow And launched it at the shameless ...
— The Ramayana • VALMIKI
... campaigns, and conquering the enemy with the greatest ease in after-dinner speeches. But events are apt to be in disgusting discrepancy with the anticipations of the most ingenious tacticians; the difficulties of the expedition are ridiculously at variance with able calculations; the enemy has the impudence not to fall into confusion as had been reasonably expected of him; the mind of the gallant general begins to be distracted by news of intrigues against him at home, and, notwithstanding the handsome compliments he paid to Providence as his undoubted patron ...
— Scenes of Clerical Life • George Eliot
... voyage by describing the "Stormy Petrel," as it seems you all called him on shipboard. I let you down lightly; said that out of charity you'd employed the man to do secretarial work, to which he was entirely unsuited, but that he was thoroughly at home as chauffeur. I enlarged a little on his impudence, and remarked that I shouldn't be surprised if he had the cheek to turn up at the dance, pretending to ...
— The Lightning Conductor Discovers America • C. N. (Charles Norris) Williamson and A. M. (Alice Muriel)
... Jack," he said, "what are you dreaming of? Is it not enough that this man, Neergard, holds us up once? Do I understand that he has the impudence to do it again with your connivance? Are you going to let him sandbag us into electing him? Is that the sort of hold-up you stand for? Well, then, I tell you I'll never vote for him. I'd rather see these lakes and streams of ours dry up; I'd rather see the last pheasant snared and the last ...
— The Younger Set • Robert W. Chambers
... of a Virginian woman, who wrote to her correspondent in 1777, that when "General Washington throws off the Hero and takes up the chatty agreeable Companion—he can be down right impudent sometimes—such impudence, Fanny, as you ...
— The True George Washington [10th Ed.] • Paul Leicester Ford
... occasionally wrote "those kind." William Dean Howells reviewed the book in the Atlantic, which was of itself a distinction, whether the review was favorable or otherwise. It was favorable on the whole, favorable to the humor of the book, its "delicious impudence," the charm of its good-natured irony. ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... runaway midshipman, who, if you belonged to my ship, instead of marrying Donna Agnes, I would marry you to the gunner's daughter, by God! Two midshipmen sporting plain clothes in the best society in Palermo, and having the impudence to ask a post-captain to dine with them! To ask me, and address me as Tartar, and my dear fellow! you infernal young scamps!" continued Captain Tartar, now boiling with rage, and striking his fist on the table so as to set ...
— Mr. Midshipman Easy • Captain Frederick Marryat
... there must be in the heart of every bard of Nature's making, a certain modest sensibility, mixed with a kind of pride, that will ever keep him out of the way of those windfalls of fortune which frequently light on hardy impudence and foot-licking servility. It is not easy to imagine a more helpless state than his whose poetic fancy unfits him for the world, and whose character as a scholar gives him some pretensions to the politesse of life—yet is as poor ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... and Mr. Tupman, form the Corresponding Society of the club, and they travel over England together, meeting with many laughable adventures. They are accompanied by Samuel Weller, Mr. Pickwick's servant, an inimitable compound of cool impudence, quaint humor, and fidelity. The Pickwickians have accepted the invitation of Mr. Wardle, of Manor Farm, Dingley Dell, to be present at the marriage of his daughter, Isabella, to Mr. Trundle. Among the guests are also Mr. Bob ...
— The Ontario Readers: The High School Reader, 1886 • Ministry of Education
... complete success. Poulain repaired to the Arsenal Library, looked out a grotesque case in some of Desplein's records of extraordinary cures, and fitted the details to Mme. Cibot, modestly attributing the success of the treatment to the great surgeon, in whose steps (he said) he walked. Such is the impudence of beginners in Paris. Everything is made to serve as a ladder by which to climb upon the scene; and as everything, even the rungs of a ladder, will wear out in time, the new members of every profession are at a loss to find the right ...
— Cousin Pons • Honore de Balzac
... Fonseca who made any figure in the world, were two bad men, well furnished with impudence, but very indifferently provided with talents or abilities. The first of these, Americus Vespucius, was made chief pilot of Spain by the interest of his patron, and had all the journals of discoveries communicated to him, from which he constructed very elegant maps, in which he exerted his ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. III. • Robert Kerr
... of the prisoner, Iskender followed his captors on a parallel line among the orange-trees. He heard the howls of derision with which the women hailed the appearance of the boaster, and their demand that he should be well beaten to reward his impudence. Iskender drew close to them and ...
— The Valley of the Kings • Marmaduke Pickthall
... days to pass, thinking that perhaps the Greeks would come to their senses and flee. "But on the fifth day, seeing that they were not departed, but as it seemed to him, were full of impudence and folly, he grew angry, and sent against them the Medes and the Cissians, giving them a command that they should take these Greeks alive and bring them before him. But when these men came up and fell upon the Greeks, many of them were ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 8 • Charles H. Sylvester
... shoulder-length dark curls.... Dundee sighed. How easy it was for a beautiful woman to deceive men with a pair of wide, velvety black eyes! But he'd bet the women had not been quite so thoroughly taken in by her cuddly childishness, her odd mixture of demureness and youthful impudence! ...
— Murder at Bridge • Anne Austin
... disrespectful things of his visitors. "You brutes! You apes! You miserable, white-skinned creatures! How dare you come into my garden and knock me on the head with that awful basket and then fall on my toes and cause me pain and suffering? How dare you, I say? Don't you know you will be punished for your impudence? Don't you know the Boolooroo of the Blues will have revenge? I can have you patched for this insult, and I will—just as sure as I'm the Royal Boolooroo ...
— Sky Island - Being the further exciting adventures of Trot and Cap'n - Bill after their visit to the sea fairies • L. Frank Baum
... His impudence at once irritated her and provoked her admiration. She knew by instinct how false he was, and how a lie was as common with him as the truth; but his submission to her father, his indifference to his imprisonment, ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... impudence that you should come here to-night,' cried Bobbie, his voice hoarse with passion. 'You're using these wretched women as a shield, because you know that as long as Lucy sticks to you, there are people who ...
— The Explorer • W. Somerset Maugham
... did not prescribe this treatment of the case as "a true remedy, but only as a palliative; because for the moment only weak medicines could be employed, from which, however, but small effect could be anticipated." As to recalling the Cardinal, "as they had the impudence to propose to his Majesty," the Duke most decidedly advised against the step. In the mean time, and before it should be practicable to proceed "to that vigorous chastisement already indicated," he advised separating the nobles as much ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... him from the hurricane deck, I heard a collier who had not yet left the ship give him some impudence, and look jauntily to the men for approval; but the smile was not off his cheeks when the new mate hit him such a terrific blow on the head with a spy-glass he held that the fellow reeled through the open bulwarks right into ...
— The Iron Pirate - A Plain Tale of Strange Happenings on the Sea • Max Pemberton
... keep them out of their rights, I'd best go and tell my young gentlemen," said the stranger, with cool impudence. ...
— Night and Morning, Volume 4 • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... Herron to Olivia, who happened to, be nearest him. "He fancies impudence is wit. He's devoid of moral sense or even of decency. He's a traitor to his class and shouldn't ...
— The Cost • David Graham Phillips
... Virginius says, "Long speeches have been invented for matters of a doubtful nature. Accordingly I shall neither waste time in dwelling on the guilt of this man before you, from whose cruelty ye have rescued yourselves by force of arms, nor shall I suffer him to add impudence to his other enormous crimes in defending himself. Wherefore, Appius Claudius, I remit to you the accumulated impious and nefarious deeds you have had the effrontery to commit for the last two years; with respect to ...
— The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 • Titus Livius
... and annoying her unmercifully. After the warm and delightful friendship of several months, after luncheons and teas, opera and concerts in the greatest harmony, Derrick Foster had had the daring, the impudence, to imply—to insinuate— ...
— Harriet and the Piper - (Norris Volume XI) • Kathleen Norris
... impudence. "You'll swish me, I suppose, to improve my morals? Wish I had as many sovereigns as I've had swishings. They would keep me in clover ...
— The Rocks of Valpre • Ethel May Dell
... lake—all this happened at our house by Lake George. We had never been alone together for any length of time before. In the boat I talked to him. I was very kind about it, I think, and he took it admirably, but he didn't believe me a bit. He had the impudence to tell me that I misunderstood Alice's nature. When I hinted at his prospects—I knew he had scarcely anything of his own—he said that if she loved him he could make himself a position in the world. I dare say that was true, with his abilities ...
— The Woman in Black • Edmund Clerihew Bentley
... people by promises and threats: "Suadendo de coelestis regni beatitudine, comminando de oeterno supplicio inferni."34 The rival mendicant orders, the Franciscans and the Dominicans, acquired great riches and power by the traffic in indulgences. They even had the impudence to affirm that the members of their orders were privileged above all other men in the next world. Milton alludes to those who credited these monstrous assumptions: "And they who, to be sure of Paradise, Dying, put on the weeds of Dominic, Or in Franciscan ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger
... dropped from it on to the floor of the wagon when I gave the book to Scipio. At any rate, they had seen it, and it was evident "Brother Beecher" was getting me into a scrape. I felt indignant at the impudence of the fellow, but determined to keep cool, and, a little sarcastically, replied to the latter part of ...
— Among the Pines - or, South in Secession Time • James R. Gilmore
... candor and the boldness with which this young girl approached the terrible subject. To enable her to speak with such energy and in such a tone, she must either be possessed of unsurpassed impudence, or—he had ...
— The Clique of Gold • Emile Gaboriau
... name very often while gambling? And did you not bet a short time ago at Big Draw that you would cross the Golden Crest and lure my daughter to a fate worse than death? You know it is true, and yet you have the impudence to stand here and ...
— Glen of the High North • H. A. Cody
... to visit the Confederate prisoners. He was asked if he knew any. Slightly, he said; but he was going this time by request; he had any quantity of messages to deliver to Colonel —— from Miss Sarah Morgan. "How can that be possible, since you are not acquainted with her?" Ada demanded. He had the impudence to say that the young lady I have already mentioned had requested him to deliver them for her, since she found it impossible. Fortunately for me, I have two friends left. Feeling the indelicacy ...
— A Confederate Girl's Diary • Sarah Morgan Dawson
... sensible, for we drank Sir Candy's good health and the downfall of his enemies till we could stand no longer ourselves. And little did I think at the time, or till long after, how I was harbouring my poor master's greatest of enemies myself. This fellow had the impudence, after coming to see the chicken-yard, to get me to introduce him to my son Jason; little more than the man that never was born did I guess at his meaning by this visit: he gets him a correct list fairly drawn out from my son Jason of all my master's debts, and goes straight round to the ...
— Castle Rackrent • Maria Edgeworth
... supercilious silence, is equally in the power of him that is hardened by villany, and inspirited by innocence. The wall of brass which Horace erects upon a clear conscience, may be sometimes raised by impudence or power; and we should always wish to preserve the dignity of virtue by adorning her with graces which ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D, In Nine Volumes - Volume the Third: The Rambler, Vol. II • Samuel Johnson |
