"Shy" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... "I see you are shy," returned he, with encreasing gentleness, "I see you cannot be easy with me; and when I consider how little you are accustomed to me, I do not wonder. But pray take courage; I think it necessary ...
— Cecilia Volume 1 • Frances Burney
... came to me, my darling, whom I despaired of ever seeing again—she came shy and coy, I thought, but love was shining from her ...
— The Birthright • Joseph Hocking
... One day when I was humming a favorite chant, I think it was "Babylon's a-Fallin'," a porpoise jumped higher than the bowsprit. Had the Spray been going a little faster she would have scooped him in. The sea-birds sailed around rather shy. ...
— Sailing Alone Around The World • Joshua Slocum
... I must be a tough looking customer," grinned the boy, again climbing the fence and starting along the track. He fought shy of villages during daylight, fearing that he might be arrested for vagrancy and locked up. That would ...
— The Circus Boys In Dixie Land • Edgar B. P. Darlington
... though; and a well-to-do look through it all. Miss Quackenboss Fleda recognised as an old friend, gilt beads and all. Catherine Douglass had grown up to a pretty girl during the five years since Fleda had left Queechy, and gave her a greeting, half-smiling, half-shy. There was a little more affluence about the flow of her drapery, and the pink ribbon round her neck was confined by a little dainty Jew's-harp of a brooch; she had her mother's pinch of the nose too. Then there ...
— Queechy, Volume I • Elizabeth Wetherell
... natural kindness, which I shall not easily forget, a bunch of sweet-smelling marjoram. The acknowledgement which the miserable creature attempted to make for the seasonable aid, convinced me that he was something better than he seemed. A shy and half-formed bow—the impulse of a heart and mind once cultivated, though covered now with weeds and noxious growths—redeemed him from the common herd of thieves. In the calendar his age was stated ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 54, No. 335, September 1843 • Various
... on the little finger of her left hand; it was much too large, and she removed it and balanced it for a moment doubtfully in the palm of her right hand. She was smiling, and her face was lit with shy and tender thoughts. She cast a quick glance to the left and right as though fearful that people passing in the street would observe her, and then slipped the ring over the fourth finger of her left ...
— The Lion and the Unicorn and Other Stories • Richard Harding Davis
... soil is warm with rain, And through the wood the shy wind steals, Rich with the pine and the poplar smell,— And the joyous soul like a dancer, reels Through ...
— The Spirit of Sweetwater • Hamlin Garland
... conscious that her name was being flung from lip to lip with a laugh and a jest, that, no matter how innocent her words or her actions might be, an evil meaning was twisted out of them and applauded. Even her uncle laughed and seemed to agree when Heriot declared that a woman who was shy in her love affairs was always the most dangerous, and suggested that Mrs. Dearmer must look to her laurels now that Mistress Lanison had taken the field against her. To deny the insinuations, or to resent them, ...
— The Brown Mask • Percy J. Brebner
... at Miss Meadows, and Miss Meadows tried to look at Jack Rabbit, but was quite shy and modest at being praised before everybody in that way. Then Mr. 'Coon brought her a nice little low chair, and she sat down, and they all asked her to tell about her great adventure, because they said they were tired of hearing their ...
— Hollow Tree Nights and Days • Albert Bigelow Paine
... slight cold. He half halted, intending to ask Phillida to sit down with him on a seat partly screened by a bush at each end; but there were many people passing, and the two went on and mounted the steps to the circular asphalted space at the top of the knoll. Phillida, shy of what she felt must come, began to ask about the great buildings in view, and he named for her the lofty Dakota Flats rising from a rather naked plain to the westward, the low southern facade of the Art Museum to the northward, to the east the somber front ...
— The Faith Doctor - A Story of New York • Edward Eggleston
... Sea-warrior, let not his heart be downcast. Who wotteth but that these two desires, the desire of his heart, and the desire of a heart for him, may not be one and the same desire, so that he shall be fully satisfied?" As she spoke she looked sidelong at Hallblithe, with shy and wheedling eyes; and he wondered at her word, and a new hope sprang up in his heart that he was presently to be brought face to face with the Hostage, and that this was that love, sweeter than their ...
— The Story of the Glittering Plain - or the Land of Living Men • William Morris
... shy birds Will be at their fluting, And the morning planet Rise above the garden; 10 For there is a measure ...
— Sappho: One Hundred Lyrics • Bliss Carman
... German aeroplanes flew over us every morning at sunrise, but now we had a dozen aeroplanes to their one and theirs were rather shy. Our guns had ranged up and down the whole front and we had all begun to get confident and to think that it was only a matter of a few days until we would be on the high road ...
— The Red Watch - With the First Canadian Division in Flanders • J. A. Currie
... confusion of the young lady herself, and the possible displeasure of her brother. Mr. Morton Berkeley's manners to me after that were again, as they always had been, respectful and rather reserved; the subject of our "fight" was never again alluded to, and he remained to me a gentle, shy, courteous ...
— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble
... a sly Little twinkle in your eye; And your whisperingly shy Little laugh is simply an Internal shout of glee That betrays the fallacy You'd ...
— Songs of Friendship • James Whitcomb Riley
... that row whistling?" growled a voice from the far end of the room; "because I'd like to shy a boot ...
— The Adventures of a Three-Guinea Watch • Talbot Baines Reed
... lady of Castlewood found the sad, lonely, little occupant of this gallery busy over his great book, which he laid down when he was aware that a stranger was at hand. And, knowing who that person must be, the lad stood up and bowed before her, performing a shy obeisance to the mistress of ...
— The History of Henry Esmond, Esq. • W. M. Thackeray
... wilt conquer all hearts with thy prevailing gentleness, and I will show the world what Shakespear's women were!—Some gallants set their hearts on princesses; others descend in imagination to women of quality; others are mad after opera-singers. For my part, I am shy even of actresses, and should not think of leaving my card with Madame Vestris. I am for none of these bonnes fortunes; but for a list of humble beauties, servant-maids and shepherd-girls, with their red elbows, ...
— Table-Talk - Essays on Men and Manners • William Hazlitt
... when I discovered that she knew a little English I could have hugged her. We spread our cold supper on the top of my dress suit case, put our one candle in the center, and proceeded to feast. Little Miss Izy was not as shy as she looked, and what she lacked in vocabulary she made up in enthusiasm. We got into a gale of laughter over our efforts to understand each other, and she was as curious about my costume as I was about hers. She watched ...
— Lady of the Decoration • Frances Little
... charm that most distinguished Agnes—the artless expression of goodness and purity which instantly attracted everyone who approached her. She looked by many years younger than she really was. With her fair complexion and her shy manner, it seemed only natural to speak of her as 'a girl,' although she was now really advancing towards thirty years of age. She lived alone with an old nurse devoted to her, on a modest little income which was just enough ...
— The Haunted Hotel - A Mystery of Modern Venice • Wilkie Collins
... raising his eyes to his captor with a singularly new and shy admiration in them, "mebbee not so much of WOT you said, ez HOW you said it, and it's kinder bothered me, sittin' here, that I ain't bin actin' to you boys quite on the square. I've said to myself, 'Collinson, thar ...
— In a Hollow of the Hills • Bret Harte
... Tricotrin. "He is as serious as an English adaptation of a French farce." He went on, under his breath, "You mustn't judge him by his manner, I can see that he has turned a little shy. Believe me, he is the King ...
— A Chair on The Boulevard • Leonard Merrick
... belief that the king belongs to the people as well as the people to the king." Before leaving the exhibition he recurred to the subject, again expressing his deep regret. "I hope that none of you believe," said he, "that I am the sort of man who is shy of being seen among the people. I have no grounds whatever for such ...
— Buchanan's Journal of Man, November 1887 - Volume 1, Number 10 • Various
... it is until they get there. That's the way to catch the snippy ones. Let's don't even tell Miss Judy. It might make her kind of shy. Just let 'em all get to dancin' an' kinder warmed up an' then when we got 'em where they can't back out without bein' mighty rude we'll up an' make speeches an' let the county know how we stand for that girl an' what she is an' how proud we are ...
— The Comings of Cousin Ann • Emma Speed Sampson
... students of sociology, Professor Letourneau has long stood in the first rank. He approaches the great study of man free from bias and shy of generalisations. To collect, scrutinise, and appraise facts is ...
— The Industries of Animals • Frederic Houssay
... admit. The high bank with green slopes is covered with churches, white buildings and gleaming gold crosses. Something tranquil about Tobolsk! Blue, red and green roofs look shy from their cozy nests of trees. It must be very exciting to live here when all is normal. Good God! I see from the deck the fine foggish veil of dust and gossips hanging over the town. They must still play "preference" here, or ...
— Rescuing the Czar - Two authentic Diaries arranged and translated • James P. Smythe
... again, with never a shy or a snort—the horse knowing the rider, and the man the noble beast; the lizards wheetling merrily, and the paroquets on the tree-tops waking up to chatter with satisfaction. Then into the beaten track along by the sea-shore, the horse increasing his stride at every minute, the spume ...
— Captain Brand of the "Centipede" • H. A. (Henry Augustus) Wise
... Ironbark, with broad lanceolate, but not cordate, glaucous leaves, and very dark bark, formed the forest. An arborescent Acacia, in dense thickets, intercepted our course several times. Bronze-winged pigeons were very numerous, but exceedingly shy. ...
— Journal of an Overland Expedition in Australia • Ludwig Leichhardt
... others, but not much. They make the same signs of friendship, and their language seems to be one; but the others had proas, and these canoes. On the sides of some of these we saw the figures of several fish neatly cut, and these last were not so shy as the others. ...
— Early Australian Voyages • John Pinkerton
... smooth-faced and looked like a good-natured country bumpkin in his peasant garb, all decorated with dust. He was modest, half-shy, and the nuns who peered at him from behind the arras as he walked down the hallway of the Convent caused his countenance to ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 6 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Artists • Elbert Hubbard
... scavenger by choice, preferring his own kill, but being on the whole a lazy dog, is apt to fall into carrion eating because it is easier. The red fox and bobcat, a little pressed by hunger, will eat of any other animal's kill, but will not ordinarily touch what dies of itself, and are exceedingly shy of food that has ...
— The Land of Little Rain • Mary Austin
... him trace the wayward brook Amid the forest mysteries, Where at themselves shy aspens look, Or where, with many a gurgling crook, It croons ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 105, July 1866 • Various
... she divined from his half troubled look at her, and the shy modesty of his manner, that he was wondering whether he had actually babbled last night, or in a mild delirium dreamed the whole thing. Not from her might he find out. Her easy, matter-of-fact way made any such passage ...
— Aurora the Magnificent • Gertrude Hall
... could see that it was not a rowdy street either. He looked up at a lamp on the first corner he came to, and read Pleasant Avenue on it; then he said that the witch was in it. He dramatised a scene of meeting those girls, and was very glib in it, and they were rather shy, and Miss Dudley kept behind Amanda Grier, who nudged her with her elbow when Lemuel said he had come round to see if anybody had robbed them of their books on the way home after he ...
— The Minister's Charge • William D. Howells
... recorded in the last chapter, Mrs. Tibbs had been very shy of young-lady boarders. Her present inmates were all lords of the creation, and she availed herself of the opportunity of their assemblage at the dinner-table, to announce the expected arrival of Mrs. Bloss. The gentlemen received the communication with stoical indifference, and Mrs. ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... before the advancing event. They could talk of it in private and express their dissatisfaction with it, and that was all they could do. It would not be a matter much further turned over between them at best. They would be shy of any affair of sentiment in terms of speech, and from one that affected a member of the family, self-respect would help to pull them the other way. Mrs Murchison might remember it in the list of things which roused her vain indignation; John Murchison would put it away ...
— The Imperialist • (a.k.a. Mrs. Everard Cotes) Sara Jeannette Duncan
... the entire company standin' pat. Scraggsy, you're a hero, and what you propose proves that you're considerable of a singed cat—better'n you look. We'll go freebootin' down on the Gold Coast. There's war, red war, breakin' loose down there, and we'll shy in our horseshoe with the strongest side and pry loose a fortune somewhere. I'm for a life of wild adventure, and now that we've got the ship and the funds and the crew, let's go to it. There's a deal of fine liquor in the wardroom, and I suggest that ...
— Captain Scraggs - or, The Green-Pea Pirates • Peter B. Kyne
... felt drawn in two different ways; for she had inherited something of her father's recklessness and love of pleasure, though her mother, who died when Clare was young, had been a shy Puritan. Clare was kept at school much longer than usual; and when she insisted on coming home she found herself puzzled by her father's way of living. Young men, and particularly army officers, frequented ...
— Brandon of the Engineers • Harold Bindloss
... with you, Imogene; but you'll find, as you live along, that your contemporaries are always young. Mr. Colville is very much improved. He used to be painfully shy, but he put on a bold front, and now the bold front seems to have become ...
— Indian Summer • William D. Howells
... several drawing-rooms,' she says. 'I saw ladies who were so shy that they couldn't utter a word before me, but who suddenly put a ribbon round my wrist to measure it'—you know, of course, by ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, January 28, 1914 • Various
... jaded. It filled him with a reverence that was not far short of worship. He felt it impossible to think of her as performing the ordinary acts of a mortal world. He had the feeling that she moved on higher levels—that she was a creature too shy and perfect to be made the instrument of passion. She should be guarded in her purity like a vestal virgin, so that her straight young body might be forever valiant and her eyes might never learn ...
— The Kingdom Round the Corner - A Novel • Coningsby Dawson
... call it; for we see that she is going to some slight merry-making, as she carries in her hands the shoes which are to cover those stockingless feet. She, too, is entirely at her ease and unconscious of her costume, except for a shy suspicion that it becomes her, and she, it. Her waist is of its natural size and in its proper place. Her shoulders are covered, and her arms have free play; and although her bodice is cut rather low, the rising chemise and the falling kerchief redeem ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various
... six months before, and Columbine was out of mourning now. She had come into the Spear Point community like a shy bird, a little slip of a thing, upright as a dart, with a fashion of holding her head that kept all familiarity at bay. But the shyness had all gone now. The girlish immaturity was fast vanishing in soft curves and tender lines. And the beauty ...
— The Tidal Wave and Other Stories • Ethel May Dell
... sons of the house appeared, and with them Tom Southam, Jack's roommate at college. Jack had the same merry blue eyes and sunny smile as his sister, and Judith forgot to be shy with him. Thomas was a cheery youth, whose chief interest at the dinner-table was the food, and Judith gave him scant attention. But Tim, the elder brother, who had been in the Flying Corps and had several enemy machines to his credit, ...
— Judy of York Hill • Ethel Hume Patterson Bennett
... en some eggs, en some butter, ter town. Brer Fox year 'im comin', he did, en w'at do he do but go en lay down in de road front er de waggin. Mr. Man, he druv 'long, he did, cluckin' ter de hoss en hummin' ter hisse'f, en w'en dey git mos' up ter Brer Fox, de hoss, he shy, he did, en Mr. Man, he tuck'n holler Wo! en de hoss, he tuck'n wo'd. Den Mr. Man, he look down, en he see Brer Fox layin' out dar on de groun' des like he cole en stiff, en w'en Mr. Man see dis, ...
— Nights With Uncle Remus - Myths and Legends of the Old Plantation • Joel Chandler Harris
... and to triumph shy, Fair Victory named him from the polar sky. Fanes to the gods, to men he manners gave; Rest to the sword, and respite to the brave; So high could ne'er Herculean power aspire: The god should bend his looks to the Tarpeian fire." [Footnote: ...
— The Old Roman World • John Lord
... thought of that. Something to make her gun-shy and camera-shy. It's curious about her. In some ways she's a timid girl. She's afraid of ...
— Tish, The Chronicle of Her Escapades and Excursions • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... "You're shy, rather than over, at that. And two hundred thousand would build a number of miles of ordinary railroad, wouldn't it? But that isn't all. The cliffs along that canyon are shale-topped and shale-undermined, the shale alternating with ...
— Empire Builders • Francis Lynde
... the weather cleared and settled, cold and rasping. I took the rifle and looked about for game, but the snow was now so deep that walking far in it was out of the question. I did not see the track or sign of any living thing save a single whisky-jack, but even he was shy and kept well out ...
— The Long Labrador Trail • Dillon Wallace
... nearest corner as was possible. He said afterwards that he hadn't the courage to thank me. I brought him to bay at last, and came to know him very well; and then I discovered how the nervousness, the bashfulness, the mauvaise honte, which made him so shy and retiring in private, stood him in wonderful stead on the stage. The nervous man became the fretful and capricious tyrant of mock tragedy; the bashful man warmed at the foot-lights with passion and power. The manner which in society was a drawback and ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 80, June, 1864 • Various
... were brought by shy maidens to the youths of their choice, asking them to hull rice. There were daily entertainments which deserved some such name as "hulling bee"—at any rate, we all enjoyed them hugely. The girls brought with them plenty of good ...
— Indian Boyhood • [AKA Ohiyesa], Charles A. Eastman
... Tattiana was her name, Nor by her sister's brilliancy Nor by her beauty she became The cynosure of every eye. Shy, silent did the maid appear As in the timid forest deer, Even beneath her parents' roof Stood as estranged from all aloof, Nearest and dearest knew not how To fawn upon and love express; A child devoid of childishness To romp and play she ne'er would go: Oft staring ...
— Eugene Oneguine [Onegin] - A Romance of Russian Life in Verse • Aleksandr Sergeevich Pushkin
... called Hagar and her child. Can we not see them in the gray of the morning? The father, the mother, the child,—the patriarch, aged, but not bowed by age, still retaining the vigour of manhood—the boy shy, yet half-defying—the mother! In such an hour, all distinctions of rank and station would be forgotten, and all the feelings of the woman be roused. Then and there Hagar might well forget that she was Sarah's bondmaid, and only ...
— Notable Women of Olden Time • Anonymous
... liable to attack than an inland place, formed the depot for the tin trade, and the ingots were no doubt shipped near the site of Richborough. We may regard it, in fact, as a sort of prehistoric Hong-Kong or Zanzibar, a trading island, where merchants might traffic at ease with the shy ...
— Science in Arcady • Grant Allen
... he knows his end is at hand as well as you or I; but, so far from thinking it a loss, he believes it to be a great gain. He is old and stiff, and you have made the game so scarce and shy, that better shots than him find it hard to get a livelihood. Now he thinks he shall travel where it will always be good hunting ; Where no wicked or unjust Indians can go; and where he shall meet all his tribe together agin. Theres not much loss in ...
— The Pioneers • James Fenimore Cooper
... birch, most shy and ladylike of trees, 50 Her poverty, as best she may, retrieves, And hints at her foregone gentilities With some saved relics of her wealth of leaves; The swamp-oak, with his royal purple on, Glares red ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell
... a great contrast between the two children. Rachel Herrick is a shy child, with a delicate, refined face, lighted by wonderful gray eyes like Bronson's. I do not understand her. She seems afraid of me, and I confess I am equally afraid of her. Even Rachel Percival does not get on with her very well, although she has bravely tried. The child spends ...
— The Love Affairs of an Old Maid • Lilian Bell
... long time he was inclined to be shy of her, often baring his teeth at her approach, and it was a much longer time before the female made friends with us. But by careful kindness, by never eating without sharing our meat with them, and by feeding them from our hands, we finally won the confidence ...
— Pellucidar • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... a dearth of booty. The Spaniards were getting shy of keeping too many valuables where they could be taken. So negotiations, emphasized by piecemeal destruction, went on till sickness and the lateness of the season put the English in a sorry fix. The sack of the city had yielded much less than that of San Domingo; and the men, who were ...
— Elizabethan Sea Dogs • William Wood
... summer day and my greenery yon; and, maybe, too, of the first time they ever ate 'finnan haddie' and 'John's Delight.' More than that, it will give us the freedom of speech with son, as it wouldn't were they sitting by. He's aye shy, ...
— Dorothy's Travels • Evelyn Raymond
... smiles, One sweetly shy, one proud, elate, Two loves passed down the long, wide aisles, Will they ever forget the ...
— Poems: Patriotic, Religious, Miscellaneous • Abram J. Ryan, (Father Ryan)
... these two tenses, which is denied likewise, they [the foregoing examples] are all one [; i.e., exactly equivalent]"—Id. "Both these tenses may represent a futurity, implied by the dependence of the clause."—Id. "Cry, cries, crying, cried, crier, decrial; Shy, shier, shiest, shily, shiness; Fly, flies, flying, flier, high-flier; Sly, slier, sliest, slily, sliness; Spy, spies, spying, spied, espial; Dry, drier, driest, drily, driness."—Cobb, Webster, and Chalmers ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... empty out her whole budget of warnings. "Even professional people like father, all our friends and acquaintances, our relations on both sides of the house would begin to drop us, and fight shy of us. What people that had any pretensions to being gentle-folks would care to be mixed up with our brother-in-law the linen-draper? And it is not as if the temptation were great; I cannot see wherein the attraction lies; but instead of letting it beset you, please ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Sarah Tytler
... crime. Some time after nightfall a carter was driving home by Factory Road, when just as he was nearing Long Bridge one of his horses shied so violently that he barely escaped being thrown from his seat. As he had never known the animal to shy like this before, he was curious enough to get down and look about him for the cause. Dark Hollow is never light, but it is impenetrable after dark, and not being able to see anything, he knelt down in the road and began to feel about with his hand. ...
— Dark Hollow • Anna Katharine Green
... into the lab. Karen was there alone, setting up an apparatus for the next attempt at heat treatment. A smock covered her into shapelessness, and her spectacular hair was bound up in a kerchief, but she still looked good. Lancaster, a shy man, was more susceptible to her than he wanted ...
— Security • Poul William Anderson
... her head a little on one side, as though she were trying to read his character. "You seemed shy, different from most men. Are ...
— People of Position • Stanley Portal Hyatt
... the Paramo, on the summit of the Cordilleras, thirteen thousand feet above the level of the sea. We caught sight of numbers of wild asses, which inhabit this mountainous region. The hoof of the animal is divided like that of a pig. They are very shy, so that even the Indians are seldom able to approach near enough to kill them; and they are also very ...
— In New Granada - Heroes and Patriots • W.H.G. Kingston
... soon as I gets him on shore, I means to try what I can do. I don't fear him, nor his master, nor anything else, 'cause I'm a Christian, and was baptised Peter; and I tells you all, that be he a dog, or be he a devil, I'll have a shy at him as soon as I can, and if I don't, I hope I may ...
— Snarleyyow • Captain Frederick Marryat
... kiss a new love put forth its strength, not the pale beatitude of his dream, with its sweet wistfulness, its shy desires. That was large and vague and insubstantial, permeating like an odor the humdrum purlieus of the day. This was savage, triumphant, that leaped like flame from his heart to his mouth, that burned blood-red on the black night. It swept away hesitation, ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... noted for their preaching, and would often go up into the pulpits of the churches, where large crowds gathered to hear them, the Bishop even inviting St. Francis to preach in the cathedral. Now, among the brethren there was one called Ruffino, who was very shy and nervous and felt he simply couldn't preach and face a great crowd of people, all staring at him and waiting for his words. Now, St. Francis hated that any of his Friars should give in to themselves about anything. ...
— Stories of the Saints by Candle-Light • Vera C. Barclay
... but he never made his successors' mistake of despising her. He cultivated good relations, but he rejected the idea of an alliance, because, as he said, "the English constitution is not compatible with treaties of assured continuity." In other words, he fought shy of British democracy, which he felt to be an incalculable factor. This threw ...
— The War and Democracy • R.W. Seton-Watson, J. Dover Wilson, Alfred E. Zimmern,
... flashed a shy look into the beaming, inquisitive face. "I don't know," she confessed, soberly. "I have not even seen him for such a long time; but—but, I guess, he is more to me ...
— Bob Hampton of Placer • Randall Parrish
... mild and gentle, soft-spoken and shy. They had all adopted Brazilian clothes. The hut of the chief was extremely clean and neat inside, the few utensils that were visible being ...
— Across Unknown South America • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... shy type. He'll be along after a while. You know, I think he kinda likes you; when you quit transmitting out there, Johnny was like a cat on a hot skillet. Finally decided to go back and have a look for himself, but I told him you probably had a hot game ...
— Tight Squeeze • Dean Charles Ing
... that had always shone there. He turned and led his flock to the fold, and when he had done so he sat down on the hillside and played upon his harp; and the music was as beautiful as silence, so that shy creatures did not fear, but crept around to listen. The pale moon rose up, and the stars shone down ...
— Child Stories from the Masters - Being a Few Modest Interpretations of Some Phases of the - Master Works Done in a Child Way • Maud Menefee
... startle, stagger; shake one's faith, shake one's belief, stagger one's faith, stagger one's belief. Adj. unbelieving; skeptical, sceptical. [transitive] incredulous as to, skeptical as to; distrustful as to, shy as to, suspicious of; doubting &c. v. doubtful &c. (uncertain) 475; disputable; unworthy of, undeserving of belief &c. 484; questionable; suspect, suspicious; open to suspicion, open to doubt; staggering, hard to believe, incredible, unbelievable, not to be ...
— Roget's Thesaurus • Peter Mark Roget
... birds, white and gray, and with very long legs. Jack took his rifle and tried to creep up on them, but they were too shy, and soared ...
— The Voyage of the Rattletrap • Hayden Carruth
... acknowledged the smartest girl in Westfield, but perhaps for that very reason she had held aloof from manhood until now. At least no youth in her neighborhood had ever impressed her as her equal. Neither did Babcock so impress her; but he was different from the rest. He was not shy and unexpressive; he was buoyant and self-reliant, and yet he seemed to appreciate her quality ...
— Unleavened Bread • Robert Grant
... said Dr. Duchesne, "that this activity still exists, and the proof of it, as I said before, is that he is trying now to forget it, and avoid thinking of it. You will find that he will fight shy of any allusion to it, and will be cunning enough to dodge it ...
— A Millionaire of Rough-and-Ready • Bret Harte
... herself from the bare narration presented to her, that she read it not at all in the words, but in the voice, the face, the manner of the raconteur. She was amused, she was touched, she was impressed by his studiously matter-of-fact version of his enterprise. He put forward with the shy, prudish shamefacedness of the New Englander the sound financial basis of his undertaking, as its main claim on his interest, as its main value. "I heard so much about forestry being nothing but a rich man's plaything," he said. "I just got my back up, ...
— The Bent Twig • Dorothy Canfield
... Miss Clara—not that I was afraid of her, but that I did not exactly know what was expected of me, and Mrs Wilson gave us no further introduction to each other. I was not so shy, however, as not to wish Mrs Wilson would leave us together, for then, I thought, we should get on well enough; but such was not her intent. Desirous of being agreeable, however—as far as I knew how, ...
— Wilfrid Cumbermede • George MacDonald
... gentry assumed the character of a poor cripple, and stationed himself as a beggar, sweeping the crossing near the habitation of his shy cock, who, conceiving himself safe after three days voluntary imprisonment, was seized by the supposed Beggar, who threw away his broom to ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... Frances Burney was born. Nothing in her childhood indicated that she would, while still a young woman, have secured for herself an honorable and permanent place among English writers. She was shy and silent. Her brothers and sisters called her a dunce, and not without some show of reason; for at eight years old she did not know ...
— Critical and Historical Essays, Volume III (of 3) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... forms in the order Campanulaceae are many flowers of great value in the garden, including Single, Double, and Cup and Saucer strains of the popular Canterbury Bell (C. medium). The impression that some Campanulas are shy growers and require exceptionally careful treatment may arise from the frail habit of certain varieties, or from the fact that some of them occasionally fail to bloom within twelve months from date of sowing. The idea ...
— The Culture of Vegetables and Flowers From Seeds and Roots, 16th Edition • Sutton and Sons
... different," the girl said. "Why, the first time I saw him he was as shy as shy could be. It was quite hard work getting on with him. Now he seems ...
— One of the 28th • G. A. Henty
... about California lions, California tigers, California leopards, California hyenas, California camels, and California hippopotami. He furthermore declared he had, on one occasion, seen a California elephant, "at a great distance," but it was "very shy," and he would not permit himself to doubt that California giraffes existed somewhere in the neighborhood of ...
— The Humbugs of the World • P. T. Barnum
... smart young creature with a nice blue coat, fond of town, I should say, but quite at home in the country. She also is inspecting two bloaters. But these two are very shy. In fact they are not really bloaters at all; they are rather a pair of nice-mannered fresh herrings, not long mated. The male had something to do with that war, I should think; the coupe would help him ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, November 17, 1920 • Various
... round, red Mr. Sun had crept out of bed, and he had fully made up his mind that he would be back in the Green Forest before Mr. Sun had climbed very far up in the blue, blue sky. You see, big as he is and strong as he is, Buster Bear is very shy and bashful, and he has no desire to meet Farmer Brown, or Farmer Brown's boy, or any other of those two-legged creatures called men. It seems funny but he actually is afraid of them. And he had a feeling that he was a great deal more likely to meet ...
— The Adventures of Buster Bear • Thornton W. Burgess
... a very shy man," said the shameless T. X., "difficult to a fault, and rather apt to underrate my social attractions. I have come to you now because you know everybody—by the way, how long have you had ...
— The Clue of the Twisted Candle • Edgar Wallace
... the house and go out the other way," Mr. Chamberlain remarked coolly, "it will oblige me. My horse is loose in the yard, and I'm afraid you'll scare him off. He's shy with strangers." ...
— The Stolen Singer • Martha Idell Fletcher Bellinger
... bashfulness where Ludovic was concerned. She was not at all shy of referring to him and his dilatory courtship. Indeed, it seemed ...
— Chronicles of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... blizzard Buried every green blade and bent to earth Great trees and slender saplings Under a thick weight of snow. To our door came the thrushes That we thought were gone,— Shy thrushes, that had turned their backs Upon us in summer and slipped Into the depth of the woods,— And whitethroats and tree sparrows, Unafraid, waiting for food. Even now the stillness is alive With the ...
— A Little Window • Jean M. Snyder
... majority and minority. The world has an instinct for recognizing its own, and recoils from certain qualities when exemplified in books, with the same disgust or defective sympathy as would have governed it in real life. From qualities for instance of childlike simplicity, of shy profundity, or of inspired self-communion, the world does and must turn away its face towards grosser, bolder, more determined, or more intelligible expressions of character and intellect; and not otherwise in literature, nor at all less in literature, than it does, ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 11 • Various
... ought to do: to you most freely. You know me, both head and heart, and I will make what deductions your reasons may dictate to me. I can think of no other person (for your travelling companion)—what wonder? For the last years, I have been shy of all new acquaintance. ...
— Biographia Epistolaris, Volume 1. • Coleridge, ed. Turnbull
... time the two vessels fought shy of each other, manoeuvring for a windward position. Towards three o'clock in the afternoon, the Americans gained this advantage, and at once shortened sail, and edged down toward the enemy. As the ships drew near, a sailor was seen to climb into the rigging of the Englishman, ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 2 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot
... it," replied Bob gleefully. "I'd always rather fight than run away, Harry, lad—at least, when it's anything like a fair match; so let's rouse up the pop-gun and have a shy at 'em." ...
— For Treasure Bound • Harry Collingwood
... that's all, till I get the steam up right, and make the paddles work? Won't I have a lark of the rael Kentuck breed? Won't I trip up a policeman's heels, thunder the knockers of the street doors, and ring the bells and leave no card? Won't I have a shy at a lamp, and then off hot foot to the hotel? Won't I say, 'Waiter, how ...
— The Attache - or, Sam Slick in England, Complete • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... the Minister and the gentlemen at the English hotel used to be rather shy of us two Irish noblemen, and questioned our pretensions to rank. The Minister was a lord's son, it is true, but he was likewise a grocer's grandson; and so I told him at Count Lobkowitz's masquerade. My uncle, like a noble gentleman as he was, knew the pedigree of ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... Nathaniel's my enthusiasm for Sebastian had been cooling continuously. Admiring his greatness still, I had doubts as to his goodness. That day I felt I positively mistrusted him. I wondered what his passage of arms with Hilda might mean. Yet, somehow, I was shy of alluding to ...
— Hilda Wade - A Woman With Tenacity Of Purpose • Grant Allen
... I saw him stagger an' fall. He'd fainted from overheat. I come as quick as I could. I got water in his hat and dashed it on him—look how wet it made him, but it revived him. He wanted to work on, but I made him stop and set down. He's timid and shy before you, but me 'n him are great friends, ain't we, Joe? He helped me hunt eggs the other day"—she was running on now in a tender, caressing tone—"and I gave him some of my pie. He could crawl to places I never got at before, and we raked in a peck that would have ...
— Dixie Hart • Will N. Harben
... many of my friends, people on whose side I, too, am to be found, retort with another word: reticence. It is a mistake, they say, to try to uncover these things; leave the sexual instincts alone, to grow up and develop in the shy solitude they love, and they will be sure to grow up and develop wholesomely. But, as a matter of fact, that is precisely what we can not and will not ever allow them to do. There are very few middle-aged men and women who can clearly recall ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 1 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... and now we are in Tyris rivulet! Part of a meadow is flooded; a herd of horses become shy from the snorting of the steamer's engine; they dash through the water in the meadow, and it spurts up all over them. It glitters there between the trees on the declivity: the Upsala students lie encamped there, and exercise themselves in the use ...
— Pictures of Sweden • Hans Christian Andersen
... very hot from midday to sunset, but the nights are comparatively cool. One afternoon we saw a great number of serpent-birds perched high up on a bulbous tree, and, as they are good to eat, stopped to shoot some. They were not at all shy and did not depart after several shots had been fired, but wheeled round and round as if to discover what was the cause of the strange noise. Ball, 3 and 5' shot were equally efficacious and more than a dozen fell ...
— A Journal of a Tour in the Congo Free State • Marcus Dorman
... of difficulties before my admittance to the Borda. And later I lived through many troublous years; years replete with struggles and mistakes,—I had many a Calvary to climb; I had to pay cruelly and in full for having been reared a sensitive, shy little creature, by force of will I had to recast and harden my physical as well as my moral being. One day, when I was about twenty-seven years of age, a circus director, after having seen my muscles that then had the elasticity and strength of steel, gave utterance, ...
— The Story of a Child • Pierre Loti
... on the fact of the girl's prominence as a feature of the season's end, to keep Densher in relation, for the rest of them, both to present and to past. "It's everything that has happened since that makes you naturally a little shy about her. You don't know what has happened since, but we do; we've seen it and followed it; we've a little been of it." The great thing for him, at this, as Kate gave it, was in fact quite irresistibly ...
— The Wings of the Dove, Volume II • Henry James
... pretty full of what is known among the civilised as "cheek," was almost overwhelmed by this public recognition of his prowess, and was about to retire with a half-shy expression, when the audience received the proposal with a burst ...
— The Walrus Hunters - A Romance of the Realms of Ice • R.M. Ballantyne
... won't present us with a racing stud," lisps the gunner, "but, by G——, they'll shy chaff enough at us to keep all the bloomin' horses between 'ere and 'ell, and the girls will send us a kid's feedin' bottle, as a mark of feelin' and esteem, every Valentine's Day for ten years to come, because of the glorious name we made for Australia on the ...
— Campaign Pictures of the War in South Africa (1899-1900) - Letters from the Front • A. G. Hales
... those of fashion, if the body has been starved of oxygen and deprived of sunlight, if the whole system has been kept on the rack, whether in the sweatshop, or in the furnace of affliction, what is the effect on the nervous system? Just what might have been expected. The sense-organs shy, like a frightened horse, at every shadow or fluttering leaf. The conducting wires break, and cross, and tangle in every imaginable fashion. The central exchange, half wild with hunger, or crazed with fatigue-toxins, ...
— Preventable Diseases • Woods Hutchinson
... although it does not possess the exquisite plumage of that bird. The long drooping feathers of the emu are brownish-black in color, and covered with hairy fibres. A full-grown bird is five or six feet in height. It never flies, but, like the ostrich, is a very swift runner, and as it is very shy, is difficult to capture. Its nest is a hole scraped in the ground, where it lays six or seven dark green eggs. Emus are much hunted by the Bushmen, as a fine clear oil is prepared from the skin, which is highly prized for its ...
— Harper's Young People, March 2, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... expediency of making it clearer came soon after with a visit from Mr. Evans, who brought his half-year's accounts of sales, and some small disappointment for him in those of Copperfield. "The accounts are rather shy, after Dombey, and what you said comes true after all. I am not sorry I cannot bring myself to care much for what opinions people may form; and I have a strong belief, that, if any of my books are read years hence, Dombey ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... was the first child and was, naturally, somewhat spoiled—a process which tended to increase my natural tendency to sentimentality. On the other hand, I was shy and undemonstrative with all except my nearest relatives, and with them as well after my seventh or eighth year. And here it may be well to describe my "mental type," as this is probably the most important factor in determining the direction of one's mental development. ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 5 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis |
