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More "Curt" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... in his hands. Chauvelin was riding dose beside him, but the two men had not exchanged one word since the moment when the small troop of some twenty mounted soldiers had filed up inside the courtyard, and Chauvelin, with a curt word of command, had ordered one of the troopers to take Armand's horse ...
— El Dorado • Baroness Orczy
... That strange, awful thought that her very own mother had been unjustly irritable held her tongue-tied. At length words, short, curt, came: ...
— Suzanna Stirs the Fire • Emily Calvin Blake
... with their leather-coloured skin, did not arouse any curiosity or interest in me. The middle-class merchant or clerk from the big towns is repugnant to me, whether well or ill. I would exchange a curt salute with those liverish parties and go my way ...
— Caesar or Nothing • Pio Baroja Baroja
... "Take my word, our 'curt jackets,' as you call them [HABITS ECOURTES, peculiar to the Prussian soldier at that time], are as good as your red heels, as the Hungarian pelisses, and the green frocks of the Roxelans [Russians]. We are ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XIX. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... be kept in after school by him. But though she hates mathematics,—my subject,—she works at it desperately so I can't keep her in. She sits on Mr. Duke's table and chats with him by the hour. But she passes me up with a curt, 'Good ...
— Prudence of the Parsonage • Ethel Hueston
... been saddened in the morning to learn that Mr. Ives' strenuous efforts to get permission for the men left behind to go soon, had met with a curt refusal from the Commandant at Frankfort. "When England returns our men, not before, and she had better be quick about it," said he. But how true is Rochefoucauld's cynical epigram—"Nous avons tous assez de force pour supporter les ...
— A War-time Journal, Germany 1914 and German Travel Notes • Harriet Julia Jephson
... and left us together, but at first he was almost curt in his effort to hide his sensibility to my beauty—as if that were a weakness!—and I was furiously shy, and felt somehow that I must hold ...
— The Bacillus of Beauty - A Romance of To-day • Harriet Stark
... made in the lower levels of the "Independence," his desperate struggle with Burke, the swearing out and serving of warrants, the sudden change in situation which had placed them legally in the wrong, the accident to the sheriff, the curt dismissal of his deputy, and the probable consequences. His voice grew deep as he proceeded, marking the intense interest with which they followed his recital. Then he unfolded briefly the plan adopted for relief. It was the impulsive ...
— Beth Norvell - A Romance of the West • Randall Parrish
... precisely a diary,—disjoined, full of curt, obscure phrases and irrelevant reflections,—for which reason it will not be reproduced here. Though Mr. Slocum pondered every syllable, and now and then turned back painfully to reconsider some doubtful passage, it is not presumed ...
— The Stillwater Tragedy • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... had been in ignorance of the failure and death of Archibald Fowler, she would probably have read the announcement in Madame's face as she watched her welcome the wife of his son. There was nothing offensive, nothing unkind, nothing curt; but, in some subtle way, the difference was emphasized between the eccentric daughter-in-law of a millionaire and an inexperienced young woman who must work for her living. For the welcome revealed at once to the observant eyes of Miss Smith the significant detail ...
— Life and Gabriella - The Story of a Woman's Courage • Ellen Glasgow
... time during and after lunch the high, insistent ring had summoned the Professor. He gave us the news as it came through to him in a few curt sentences. Such terrific items had never been registered in the world's history before. The great shadow was creeping up from the south like a rising tide of death. Egypt had gone through its delirium and was now comatose. Spain and Portugal, after a wild frenzy in which ...
— The Poison Belt • Arthur Conan Doyle
... to go out." It was clear that some new scheme must be devised, and on the 23d of June the king applied to certain members of his Cabinet. "We have now," he wrote, "as frequently before, had letters from Lubeck demanding in curt language the payment of her debt. You are aware that we have often, especially in Cabinet meetings, asked you to suggest some mode of meeting this requirement, and have never yet been able to elicit any tangible ...
— The Swedish Revolution Under Gustavus Vasa • Paul Barron Watson
... for bookish people, divines, both of the Establishment and out of it, printers and authors. Sometimes, indeed, the description is short enough, and tells one very little. To many readers, references so curt to people of whom they never heard, and whose names are recorded nowhere else, save on their mouldering grave-stones, may seem tedious and trivial, but for others they will have a strange fascination. Here are ...
— In the Name of the Bodleian and Other Essays • Augustine Birrell
... audibly that the other two looked at him in wonder. The momentary convulsion of his florid physiognomy seemed to strike them dumb. They exchanged a quick glance. Presently the clean-shaven man fired out another question in his curt, unceremonious manner: ...
— Victory • Joseph Conrad
... hope fell to earth. A curt note from a married sister of hers ... who first apologised for having read my letter.... But Mrs. Tighe was ...
— Tramping on Life - An Autobiographical Narrative • Harry Kemp
... manner was courteously military—that of an established superior indifferent to the deferential attitude he must needs enact. His curt nick of the head, for a response to the visitor's formal salutation, signified the requisite acknowledgment, like a city creditor's busy stroke of ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... river, whirlpool and all, in his stride; and he said kindly, "I'll carry you all over, if you like." Now, though the giant smiled and was very polite, the King knew enough of the ways of giants to think it wiser to have a hard and fast bargain. So he said, quite curt, "What's your pay?" ...
— English Fairy Tales • Flora Annie Steel
... miles from speculating on what was really happening, and when I received a curt uncharacteristic note from Paragot a fortnight later begging me to return to Paris at once, a day or two before the formal expiry of my visit, it only occurred to me ...
— The Beloved Vagabond • William J. Locke
... scarcely noticed her, and went on arguing in his curt, pugnacious way with the suitors, who looked at him as if ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various
... personal discussion less favourable than the noble minister for the colonies on this occasion. The simple truth evoked was, that while a committee of the house supposed that they were possessed of full and complete reports, they were supplied with only curt and crude extracts, calculated to place matters in the ministerial light, but not really affording the committee the opinions of those whose views they purported to be. This practice was, unfortunately, common with great officers of state; ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... whatever might be thought of his crusading enterprises. The party must not fall into the trap of playing the game of the Opposition. Then, with some supercilious praise of the "worthy sentiments" of Jasper Kimber's speech and a curt depreciation of its reasoning, he declared that: "No Government can be ruled by clamour. The path to be trodden by this Government will be lighted by principles of progress and civilisation, humanity and peace, the urbane power of reason, and the persuasive influence ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... them go, and then set off in another. He was stopped every few moments and all sorts of questions and comments concerning the fire and its cause were fired at him, but he put off some inquiries with a curt "Don't know" and others with nods or negatives, and threaded his way from one clump of townspeople to another. As he came close to the blackened and smoking billiard saloon, Ralph Hazeltine ...
— Cap'n Eri • Joseph Crosby Lincoln
... the tempest of the demoniac's wild and whirling words is the calm speech of Christ! He knows His authority, and His word is imperative, curt, and assured: 'Hold thy peace!' literally, 'Be muzzled,' as if the creature were a dangerous beast, whose raving and snapping must be stopped. Jesus wishes no acknowledgments from such lips. They who bear the vessels of the Lord must be clean. He had taught with authority, ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Mark • Alexander Maclaren
... and groaning and declaring that he felt very ill, and I went in quest of information. The corporal in command of the gendarmes was exceedingly curt with me at first, but after a time he unbent and condescended to tell me that my landlord had been denounced for permitting a Bonapartiste club to hold its sittings in his house. So far so good. Such denunciations were very frequent these days, and often ended unpleasantly ...
— Castles in the Air • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... last interview with Truda fresh in his recollection, asked curt questions. He was a man of direct mind. In less time than one might have supposed from the condition of poor Vaucher, he had elicited some outstanding facts—the note which Truda had sent to the Jewish quarter among them. The keeper of the stage- ...
— The Second Class Passenger • Perceval Gibbon
... went immediately to London after the interview with his lawyer in Beaminster, and from London, in a few days, he wrote to Cuthbert. The letter was curt, but not unfriendly. He wished, he said, to repair the injustice that had been done, and to restore to Cuthbert the inheritance that was his by right. He had already instructed his lawyers to take the necessary steps, and he was glad to think that Cuthbert and Nora would now be able to ...
— A True Friend - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... know within a minute of the appearance of each stranger what is his purpose there,—whether he be going or has just come, whether he is himself on the way or waiting for others, whether he should be treated with civility or with some curt command,—so that if his purport be honest all necessary assistance may be rendered him. As Lopez was walking up and down, with smiling face and leisurely pace, now reading an advertisement and now watching the contortions of some amazed passenger, a certain ...
— The Prime Minister • Anthony Trollope
... proof-readers seem to have grown weary of protest. They suffer in silence, correcting as little as they dare, while all around are appearing women's articles, which, had their authors been men, would either have met with curt refusal or been returned for ...
— Journalism for Women - A Practical Guide • E.A. Bennett
... Their commander wrote to Wayne to demand his intentions; Wayne responded that he thought they were made sufficiently evident by his successful battle with the savages. The Englishman wrote in resentment of this curt reply, complaining that Wayne's soldiers had approached within pistol shot of the fort, and threatening to fire upon them if the offence was repeated. Wayne responded by summoning him to abandon the fort; a summons which he of course refused ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume Four - Louisiana and the Northwest, 1791-1807 • Theodore Roosevelt
... well going up," murmured the mountaineer: there was a sinister innuendo in the curt comments of ...
— No Hero • E.W. Hornung
... the peculiar Putz method of square, mosaic-like paint areas which melt into a soft harmony of tender grays and greens. Stuck's "Nocturne" is affected and unconvincing and scarcely representative of this master's style. The many other men give a good account of themselves, particularly Curt Agthe, whose classic "Nude at the Spring" is of wonderful surface quality. Wenk has an Italian marine and Benno Becker a landscape from the same country. Ghler's "Castle Terrace" has a particularly fine sky and a true rococo atmosphere. Hans von Volkmann's "Field of Ripe Grain" is typical of ...
— The Galleries of the Exposition • Eugen Neuhaus
... mighty curt hail back in answer to Odda's summons; then our war horns blew, and the oars rose and fell, and we were grinding our bows alongside the great ship's quarter before they knew we were there. Alfred's men had yet somewhat to learn of fighting in a sea way, as it seemed, for we ...
— King Alfred's Viking - A Story of the First English Fleet • Charles W. Whistler
... bearing the strange but not inappropriate inscription, "Begone about your business." The story runs that, many years before, a crusty old bencher had promised the dial-maker to provide a motto for the then new dial. The messenger, however, arrived at an inopportune time, received the above curt dismissal in answer to his request, and conveyed it to his master as the ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, Old Series, Vol. 36—New Series, Vol. 10, July 1885 • Various
... He issued a curt command, and there was the sound of movement. Presently four men staggered in, one to each leg, each arm, of the most impressive giant Mars had ever produced—Tolto, to whom there was no god but the one divinity: and Princess Sira was she. Slow of perception, ...
— The Martian Cabal • Roman Frederick Starzl
... is my lady's diagnosis?" He had not noticed her curt reply, for he was thinking of something else and was not really interested in Lawrence as a ...
— Claire - The Blind Love of a Blind Hero, By a Blind Author • Leslie Burton Blades
... happen that the school is without a teacher?" Elizabeth asked with curiosity, ignoring the curt disposal of her services. She was accustomed to the ...
— The Wind Before the Dawn • Dell H. Munger
... most that we can hope is by many arrows, more or less far off on different sides, to indicate, in the course of time, for what target we are aiming, and after an hour's talk, back and forward, to convey the purport of a single principle or a single thought. And yet while the curt, pithy speaker misses the point entirely, a wordy, prolegomenous babbler will often add three new offences in the process of excusing one. It is really a most delicate affair. The world was made before the English language, and seemingly ...
— Harvard Classics Volume 28 - Essays English and American • Various
... no love lost between Bunker Hill and Professor Diffenderfer was evident by their curt greetings, but as they began to bandy words Denver became suddenly aware that he was the cause of their feud. He and his eight hundred dollars, a sum so small that a shoestring promoter would hardly notice it; and yet these two men with their superfluity of claims ...
— Silver and Gold - A Story of Luck and Love in a Western Mining Camp • Dane Coolidge
... Lynch's voice, curt and harsh, that broke the odd silence as he jerked his horse up and dismounted. "Get yore tools out an' don't ...
— Shoe-Bar Stratton • Joseph Bushnell Ames
... temper seemed to change, suddenly and completely. From the best-humoured and most careless fellow in the world, he became silent, thoughtful, irritable toward everyone except Dorothy. With Keene he was curt and impatient, avoiding him as much as possible, and when they were together, evidently struggling to keep down a deep dislike and rising anger. They had had sharp words when they were alone, I was sure, but Keene's coolness seemed to grow with ...
— The Blue Flower, and Others • Henry van Dyke
... Romish priest elevate the elements, he felt compelled to absent himself, and on the next Sunday to attend the service at a Congregational chapel. He had, in in the meantime, expostulated with Mr Lerew, both personally and by letter, but had received only a curt and unsatisfactory reply. He had afterwards heard, from undoubted authority, that the doctrine of purgatory was taught to the schoolchildren; that prayers for the dead were offered up, as also prayers to ...
— Clara Maynard - The True and the False - A Tale of the Times • W.H.G. Kingston
... inside one, you'd be as puzzled as a pig in a labyrinth, and not know how to get back to where you started from." And I remember Clement—who generally disputed a point, if possible—said, "How do you know she wouldn't get back, if you let her work out each train of thought in peace? The curt, clean-cut French style may suit some people, whose brains won't stretch far without getting tired; but others may have more sympathy with a Semitic ...
— Six to Sixteen - A Story for Girls • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... to exclude England from the war began on Thursday, July 29th. A note, sounding Sir Edward Grey on the question of British neutrality in the event of war was received, and a curt refusal to commit the British Empire to such a proposal was the reply. Sir Edward Grey, in a last determined effort to avoid a world-war, suggested to Germany, Austria, Serbia and Russia that the military operations commenced ...
— History of the World War - An Authentic Narrative of the World's Greatest War • Francis A. March and Richard J. Beamish
... ordered a child to do something, I don't remember what, and he answered me impertinently with a curt neay (no). I turned to his mother who was present and told her that the boy ought to ...
— My Friends the Savages - Notes and Observations of a Perak settler (Malay Peninsula) • Giovanni Battista Cerruti
... He took a few steps backward, eyes not moving. "Go to that locker," he said to the shorter of the men, indicating with a curt nod the place where space suits were stowed. "First draw your gun and lay it ...
— Hawk Carse • Anthony Gilmore
... house he saluted the Dragon-king, made a curt apology, and offered to return his son's sinews. The father, moved with grief at the sight of the proofs of the tragedy, said bitterly to Li Ching: "You have such a son and yet dare to deny his guilt, though you heard him haughtily admitting it! To-morrow ...
— Myths and Legends of China • E. T. C. Werner
... tone in addressing the Virginian was so different, so curt, that I supposed he took the weakest point to mean himself. But the others now showed me that I ...
— The Virginian - A Horseman Of The Plains • Owen Wister
... the scene in the second act between Hedda and Brack recalls the manner of the younger Dumas, even in its lightness and its wit. Yet we may doubt whether any of the modern French playwrights could have lent the same curt significance to this commonplace interview between a married demi-vierge and an homme-a-femmes;—of their own accord these French terms come to the end of the pen to ...
— Inquiries and Opinions • Brander Matthews
... would be some men's way," was the curt, almost indifferent, answer he received. Sweetwater was looking this way and that from the window beside him, and now, leaning out gave some directions to the driver which ...
— Initials Only • Anna Katharine Green
... the form of the phrase tells its own tale, when, in the midst of a detailed narrative, obviously of legendary origin, we come across a curt, dry entry in annalistic style, obviously copied from a written document. That is what we find in Livy (see Nitzsch, Die roemische Annalistik, Leipzig, 1873, 8vo), and in Gregory of Tours (see Loebell, Gregor von Tours, Leipzig, ...
— Introduction to the Study of History • Charles V. Langlois
... good a man of business to fall, as he said, into the trap, and make a present to that scamp Richard of more than the worth of the houses, and only Mr. Flight was ready to go to any cost to keep off the Salvation Army; but the answer was curt. Richard knew he had no chance with Mr. White, and did not care to ...
— Beechcroft at Rockstone • Charlotte M. Yonge
... come ridin' in these nights," he growled by way of explanation for his curt welcome. "Set up and eat a bite now ...
— When the West Was Young • Frederick R. Bechdolt
... from what you get at home," said Mrs. Jenkins, in her curt, snappish, but really not inhospitable way, as she handed the muffins to Roland. "I know what it is when things are left to servants, as they are at your place; they turn out uneatable—soddened things, with rancid butter, ...
— The Channings • Mrs. Henry Wood
... sleep was a poor thing that night, and he felt tired and worn when, as usual, he went early to the yard. He was there before Cotherstone; when Cotherstone came, no more than a curt nod was exchanged between them. They had never spoken to each other except on business since the angry scene of a few days before, and now Mallalieu, after a glance at some letters which had come in the previous evening, went off down the yard. He stayed there an hour: when he re-entered ...
— The Borough Treasurer • Joseph Smith Fletcher
... living-room one afternoon looking weary and untidy, and flung himself into an easy-chair, giving a curt nod of greeting to Gideon Birkenshaw, who had strolled down from the homestead to have ...
— Kiddie the Scout • Robert Leighton
... when they arrived, Megget gave a curt order for his own men to follow and galloped in the same direction the ranch ...
— Comrades of the Saddle - The Young Rough Riders of the Plains • Frank V. Webster
... news very pale and calmly. A brutal letter from John Osborne told her in a few curt lines that all engagements between the families were at an end, and old Joseph Sedley spoke with almost equal bitterness. No power on earth, he swore, would induce him to marry his daughter to the son ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VIII • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.
... the bell sharply, and when Jenny came, he amazed her by saying, "Bring me here from the cellar three bottles of whiskey." He spoke so curt and determined that for once Jenny only wondered, ...
— Scottish sketches • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... among themselves in lower tones. Only Abdullah, as a sometime dragoman, kept near the missionary, interrupting his speech with senseless scraps of English, all eagerness to translate for him the words of Mitri, till the latter stopped him with a curt "Be silent, fool!" And Iskender also hung upon the missionary, waiting an opportunity to inquire for the young Emir. On a pause he thrust in his question; when the missionary, who had been smiling at a joke of Mitri's, became of ...
— The Valley of the Kings • Marmaduke Pickthall
... in the excitement of the fight. At one time an officer rode up to him from another portion of the field and exclaimed, "General, I think the day is going against us!" To which Jackson replied in his usual curt manner, "If you think so, sir, you had better not say anything ...
— With Lee in Virginia - A Story of the American Civil War • G. A. Henty
... like, I swear. So modest is she and so pure, And somewhat saucy, too, to be sure. The light of the cheek, the lip's red bloom, I shall never forget to the day of doom! How me cast down her lovely eyes, Deep in my soul imprinted lies; How she spoke up, so curt and tart, Ah, that went right to ...
— Faust • Goethe
... agent on the eastern coast, handed over the note, and the Irishman stepped out of the little office already on his way to the world war. He took no pleasure in his resolution, but wandered slowly back toward the hotel with downward head. He would speak a curt farewell and step out of the lives of the two. It would be very simple unless McTee showed some exultation, but if he did—Here Harrigan refused to ...
— Harrigan • Max Brand
... few hirers of books who neither pay income-tax nor live on terms of dependent equality with those who pay it. I see at the counters people on whose foreheads it is written that they know themselves to be the salt of the earth. Their assured, curt voices, their proud carriage, their clothes, the similarity of their manners, all show that they belong to a caste and that the caste has been successful in the struggle for life. It is called the middle-class, but it ought to be called the upper-class, for nearly everything ...
— Books and Persons - Being Comments on a Past Epoch 1908-1911 • Arnold Bennett
... Brewster and you who have owned an attic. Thus "H's Fshg Tckl" jabberwocked one long, slim box. Another stunned you with "Cur Ted Slpg Pch." A cabalistic third hid its contents under "Sip Cov Pinky Rm." To say nothing of such curt yet intriguing fragments as "Blk Nt Drs" and "Sun Par Val." Once you had the code key they translated themselves simply enough into such homely items as Hosey's fishing tackle, canvas curtains for Ted's sleeping porch, slip covers ...
— Half Portions • Edna Ferber
... any precipices," answered Lynde, with a curt laugh. "I wish we had," he muttered to himself. "She has dragged me through that grove and over those stones, and, without preventing me, has not permitted me to breathe the least word of love to her. I don't know how she did it. That ...
— The Queen of Sheba & My Cousin the Colonel • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... silenced the wretch with a curt command; then, without another word, he walked straight ...
— El Dorado • Baroness Orczy
... words had been curt, no grace or kindness had he shown me of countenance. I felt in my heart that to him I was but a pawn in the game of battle. Now I seemed as far off as ever I was from my foolish dream of winning my spurs; nay, perchance never had I sunk lower in my own conceit. Till this hour I had ...
— A Monk of Fife • Andrew Lang
... stare of solemn amusement as Critturs born by some extraordinary vicissitude of nature to the use of a language that practically amounts to deafness and dumbness, never suffers his philosophical interest in them to affect his commercial efficiency; he drops them now and then a curt English phrase, or expressive Yankee idiom; he knows very well when they mean to buy and when they do not; and they equally wary and equally silent, unswayed by the glib allurements of a salesman, judge of price and quality for themselves, ...
— Suburban Sketches • W.D. Howells
... him. It was by no means his wish that the sharp detective and the man should come into contact with each other; all he wanted was to find out where he was at present, not that he should be meddled with. This he had fully explained in the first instance, and the other had acquiesced in his curt way. ...
— Elster's Folly • Mrs. Henry Wood
... an able man," was the commonplace reply, spoken bluntly, and accompanied by a look of irritation at the sarcastic question. Burr, conscious of the disapproval implied in the officer's curt answer, managed to change partners so as to ride abreast of the younger brother, Thomas, while Dupeister spurred forward and engaged John in discourse on stock-raising and the prospect of crops. With Thomas, ...
— A Dream of Empire - Or, The House of Blennerhassett • William Henry Venable
... much for your most interesting and generous letter, which reached me indirectly and was delayed; also for your most interesting and generous book, which I immediately sat down and read at a sitting; which in its turn so stimulated me that I immediately wrote a rapid and rather curt reply for my own little rag. I fear you will find the reply more controversial than I meant it to be; for your book is so packed with challenges that I could not but make my very short article a thing packed with mere repartees. But I do hope you will understand ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Maisie Ward
... through the hot summer streets in search of a situation. On the day when my appearance is most forlorn I find policemen always as officially polite as when I am dressed in my best. Other people of whom I inquire my way are sometimes curt, sometimes compassionate, seldom indifferent, and generally much nicer or not nearly as nice as they would be to a rich person. Poor old women to whom I speak often call ...
— The Woman Who Toils - Being the Experiences of Two Gentlewomen as Factory Girls • Mrs. John Van Vorst and Marie Van Vorst
... Queen Keasair and her companions, and along with it every discoverable tale or poem dealing with this event and those characters. After that, all that remains of the cycle of which Partholan was the protagonist. Thirdly, all that relates to Nemeth and his sons, their wars with curt Kical the bow-legged, and all that relates to the Fomoroh of the Nemedian epoch, then first moving dimly in the forefront of our history. After that, the great Fir-bolgic cycle, a cycle janus-faced, looking on one side to the mythological period and the wars of the gods, and on the other, ...
— Early Bardic Literature, Ireland • Standish O'Grady
... battle went on all day; and the prick of conscience, the fears of superstition, and the lingerings of religion ever grew fainter. Near nightfall he was at his post, at the Temple of Saturn. Pratinas was awaiting him. The Greek had only a few words of greeting, and the curt injunction:—"Draw your cloak up to shield your face, and follow me." Then they passed out from the Forum, forced their way through the crowded streets, and soon were through the Porta Ratumena, outside the walls, ...
— A Friend of Caesar - A Tale of the Fall of the Roman Republic. Time, 50-47 B.C. • William Stearns Davis
... scattered all along. This was splendid, and swept away all labor. Instead of reading the MS, I simply hunted out the pencil marks and made the emendations which they suggested. I reduced the boy battle to a curt paragraph; I finally concluded to cut the Sunday school speech down to the first two sentences, leaving no suggestion of satire, since the book is to be for boys and girls; I tamed the various obscenities until I judged that they no longer carried offense. So, at a single sitting ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... geometrical method is preeminently scientific, it is hardly a form suitable for philosophy. The Euclidean geometer can take it for granted that the reader understands what a line or plane, a solid or an angle is. For formality, a curt definition is sufficient. But the philosopher's fundamental terms and ideas are precisely those in need of most careful and elaborate elucidation—something which cannot be given in a formal definition or axiom. Also, in the geometrical form, the burden of the author's ...
— The Philosophy of Spinoza • Baruch de Spinoza
... of elocution and constant application of its principles to conversational utterances are requisite to refined speech. Errors in pronunciation, hasty and indistinct enunciation, the dropping out of entire syllables in curt phrasing, are common faults of careless people who know better, and who would be very much chagrined to find themselves accounted to be as ignorant as their speech ...
— Etiquette • Agnes H. Morton
... Tasman's discoveries in mystery. It is said that his discoveries were engraved on the map of the world which in 1648 was cut on the stone floor of the Amsterdam Town Hall. The full text of his log has only been quite recently published. His curt entries dealing with the appearance of the New Zealand coast and its natives seem usually truthful enough. The tribe which attacked his boat was afterwards nearly exterminated by invaders from the North Island. This would account for the almost utter absence among the Maoris of tradition ...
— The Long White Cloud • William Pember Reeves
... my part, but I accepted this curt dismissal very ill-humouredly. That Harley, for some reason of his own, wished to be alone, was evident enough, but I resented being excluded from his confidence, even temporarily. It would seem that he had formed a theory in the prosecution of which my cooeperation was not needed. And what with ...
— Bat Wing • Sax Rohmer
... was sent to the President by Gen. Pickett, recommending Gen. Roger A. Pryor for a cavalry command in North Carolina. But the President sent it to the Secretary of War with the curt remark that the command had already been disposed of to Col. Dearing, on Gen. Hoke's recommendation. Thus Gen. P. is again whistled down the wind, in spite of the efforts of even Mr. Hunter, and many other leading ...
— A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital • John Beauchamp Jones
... him, and slowly some of the fear left his face—though not all of it. He turned and left with a curt bow of his head, while Pietro added a few details that weren't exactly lies to Lomax's hasty cover-up, along with a grateful glance at the chemist. It seemed to work, for the time being—at least enough for Riggs to begin making nasty ...
— Let'em Breathe Space • Lester del Rey
... about issuing an order requesting a part of Gates' force. To secure these troops as if the suggestion came from Gates was a most delicate commission. Alexander Hamilton was dispatched to Gates' headquarters, armed, as a last resort, with a curt military order to the effect that he should turn over a portion of his army to Washington. Hamilton's orders were: "Bring the troops, but do not deliver this order unless you ...
— Little Journeys To the Homes of the Great, Volume 3 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard
... little way up the zigzag path. The day was superb. I found Mr. Tillington, in spite of his studiously languid and supercilious air, a most agreeable companion. He knew Europe. He was full of talk of Rome and the Romans. He had epigrammatic wit, curt, keen, and pointed. We sat down on a bench; he kept Lady Georgina and myself amused for an hour by his crisp sallies. Besides, he had been everywhere and seen everybody. Culture and agriculture seemed ...
— Miss Cayley's Adventures • Grant Allen
... "Letters, curt, reproachful, and sometimes almost insulting, came with absolute refusals to have the names of the writers used, or added to the swelling list already in hand. There was astonishment at the temerity of the writer in presenting ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... do," was the curt answer. "I expect to make acquaintances there who will be most useful. Did you get ...
— The Great Secret • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... letter, hundreds of the second, I wrote with painful care, pen carefully chosen, the one-inch margin down the left hand side of the paper first portioned off with dots. To three or four I received a curt reply, instructing me to call. But the shyness that had stood so in my way during the earlier half of my school days had now, I know not why, returned upon me, hampering me at every turn. A shy child ...
— Paul Kelver • Jerome Klapka, AKA Jerome K. Jerome
... Yeager low but imperative. Automatically his hands went into the air even as he slewed his head to find out who was voicing the curt command. A rope dropped over his arms and was jerked tight just below the knees. Very cautiously a man emerged from behind a clump of cholla. The first thing he did was to remove the automatic revolver from the cowpuncher's ...
— Steve Yeager • William MacLeod Raine
... I don't like it half as well as a dark one," replied Maria, in a sweet, curt little voice. Her father colored still more, and ...
— By the Light of the Soul - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... Commodore Hardy appeared off Stonington with a fleet of several vessels, headed by the seventy-four "Ramillies." Casting anchor near shore, he sent to the mayor and selectmen the following curt note: "Not wishing to destroy the unoffending inhabitants residing in the town of Stonington, one hour is granted them, from the receipt of this, to remove out of town." This message naturally caused great consternation; and, while messengers were sent in all directions ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 2 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot
... pondering, soon came to the conclusion that there were too many Boers for him, and that if those fifteen-pounders desired target practice they should find some other mark than the Natal Field Artillery. A few curt orders, and his whole force was making its way to the rear. There, out of range of those perilous guns, they halted, the telegraph wire was cut, a telephone attachment was made, and French whispered his troubles into the sympathetic ear of Ladysmith. He did not whisper in vain. What he had ...
— The Great Boer War • Arthur Conan Doyle
... to question Helena. They moved about her on tiptoe, stealthily. Yet neither subserved her. Her father's quiet 'H'm!' her mother's curt question, made her draw inwards like a snail which can never retreat far enough from condemning eyes. She made a careless pretence of eating. She was like a child which has done wrong, and will not be punished, but will be left with the humiliating ...
— The Trespasser • D.H. Lawrence
... he made a constrained recognition of Kate's presence, that embarrassed and curt as it was, had none of the ...
— Snow-Bound at Eagle's • Bret Harte
... have been curt the old man lifted his eyes from his book and looking kindly over his glasses continued: "The Wahoo isn't ablaze, Tom, but you know as well as I that the wage scale has been raised twice in the mines, and once in the glass factory and once in the smelter ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White
... observing her critically, and with apparently no intention of discontinuing their scrutiny. At which, in her present state of temper, Nattie turned very red and very angry. "I am not on exhibition," she thought, indignantly, and rising majestically, went towards him with the curt inquiry, ...
— Wired Love - A Romance of Dots and Dashes • Ella Cheever Thayer
... a certain day the droning of the mill told that its wheels had resumed their interrupted grinding, there might have been seen, within, the burly form of Colonel Witham, moving about as one with authority. Short, curt were his answers. There was little to be made out of him by Lawyer Estes or anyone else. What was his business was his—and nobody else's. There were the deeds, duly signed. If anyone had a better claim to the property, let him show it. As for the Ellison ...
— The Rival Campers Ashore - The Mystery of the Mill • Ruel Perley Smith
... Yet how curt is the version last quoted, and how blundering the sentence! Washington's spelling was always faulty, but it is not characteristic of him to write "abtain" for "abstain." This is one of many signs of haste, suggesting that his pen was ...
— George Washington's Rules of Civility - Traced to their Sources and Restored by Moncure D. Conway • Moncure D. Conway
... they were. “Wood-haulers,” they replied; “taking building logs down the road”; followed by “Who are you, and where are you going this late at night?” I told them who I was, and that I had now finished my journey, as I intended to stop there. I was immediately informed in a curt manner that they guessed I was rather “mixed” about staying there, if I had any stock along, for the stables were full, and the ranch, too; and they had no room for any additional people or stock. I told them that I had two teams standing ...
— The Great Salt Lake Trail • Colonel Henry Inman
... he was thinking, almost invariably dropped into a short, cold, curt, business manner. Yet he was humanely inclined in ...
— The Titan • Theodore Dreiser
... greeting was brief, almost curt, but unintentionally so, as one could easily see, for back in her eyes lurked an impatient hunger; she was not thinking of greetings. She murmured a quick word, and stood straight and tall with her eyes squarely ...
— The Quest of the Silver Fleece - A Novel • W. E. B. Du Bois
... For a moment he forgot to do anything whatever about it. But when, a few seconds later, that long, curling trunk of Bong's insinuated itself again and appropriated another bundle of the now precious hay, the outraged owner bestirred himself. With a curt roar, that was more of a cough or a grunt than a bellow, he lunged forward and strove to pin the intruding trunk to ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry
... blankets rolled and kit and dunnage bags packed, he received a curt summons from the sergeant-major to attend the Orderly-room. To the brisk word of command he was "quick-marched" "left-wheeled," and "halted" at "attention" before the desk of ...
— The Luck of the Mounted - A Tale of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police • Ralph S. Kendall
... to him regularly during his absence, curt, businesslike epistles, which always terminated on a grim note of irony: "Your faithful steward, N. V. West." He never varied this joke, and Babbacombe usually noted it with a faint frown. The fellow was not a bad sort, he was convinced, but ...
— The Swindler and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... a dark, sturdy young man with an aggressive jaw, who bowed without a smile and looked one rather hard in the face. Peter was a little frightened of him—these curt, brisk manners made him nervous always—and felt a desire to edge behind Hilary. He gathered that Hilary and Cheriton did not very much like one another. He knew what that slight nervous contraction ...
— The Lee Shore • Rose Macaulay
... of anguish, fever, revolt and despair as they were, during the few weeks preceding the day upon which she had promised to tell Prince Andras if she would consent to become his wife or not. It was a yes, almost as curt as another refusal, which fell at last from the lips of the Tzigana. But the Prince was not cool ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... Thus, the curt exchange of question and answer, which had taken place in the cottage at Passy, between two gentlemen artificially friendly to one another, led to no regrettable result. Lord Harry had been too readily angry: he remembered what was due to Mr. Mountjoy. Mr. Mountjoy had been too thoughtlessly abrupt: ...
— Blind Love • Wilkie Collins
... clashing against sword. These savage and simple people of the sixth century do not turn over their thoughts before concentrating them into words, and they do not speak except to tell their thoughts. Imagine what even Murray, in Chastelard, a somewhat curt speaker, would have said in place of Almachildes's one line, a whole conflict of love, hate, honour, ...
— Figures of Several Centuries • Arthur Symons
... his surprise with a ready, smiling acceptance of her tone, "I was wondering if I oughtn't to apologize to you—if I should ever see you again—for being so curt this morning. And then you spring up out of the ground before me. Well, so I will apologize. ...
— The Squirrel-Cage • Dorothy Canfield
... him in dread. He had so airily built up his program; and apprehension told him what this letter might contain! Presently he was conscious that Agnes' arm was slipped across his shoulder. She was sitting upon the arm of his chair, and had bent her cheek upon his head. So they read the curt message: ...
— The Making of Bobby Burnit - Being a Record of the Adventures of a Live American Young Man • George Randolph Chester
... the mill was unsatisfactory. The elder Gaspard was away, and young Pierre was curt and surly. The sight of Victorine riding familiarly, and with an evident joyous pride, by the side of one of the richest men in the country, and a young man at that,—and a young man, moreover, who looked and behaved as if he were in love with his companion,—how ...
— Between Whiles • Helen Hunt Jackson
... and from her humble lodging there had written an honest letter to her father, begging only to see her mother or Molly, promising to hold no communication with them if he refused. He had refused, in a curt note of three lines. From Wroote she returned to Louth, to face her trouble alone; for the preliminaries of selling the Lincoln business had brought old Wright's creditors about her husband's ears like a swarm of wasps. Until then they had waited with fair patience: but no sooner did he make ...
— Hetty Wesley • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... the language as French is not its only peculiarity. There is in the style, apart from grammar or vocabulary, a rude angularity, a rough dramatism like that of oral narrative; there is a want of proportion in the style of different parts, now over curt, now diffuse and wordy, with at times even a hammering reiteration; a constant recurrence of pet colloquial phrases (in which, however, other literary works of the age partake); a frequent change in the spelling of the same proper names, even when recurring ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... reflected the Baron wryly, in this damnable muddle he must still use Themar. To antagonize him now would be foolhardy. Wherefore, with a civil expression of regret at his loss of temper and certain curt instructions, he dismissed Themar, sullen and chastened, and betook himself to an open window, where he sat smoking thoughtfully until the house grew quiet and one by one the lights in the valley faded out. In the web which had engulfed one by one, himself, Themar, Granberry, Miss Westfall ...
— Diane of the Green Van • Leona Dalrymple
... stateroom alone, even in broad daylight; but 'twan't there the secret of her lay; there wan't nothin' in there to scare anybody. She was trimmed up, I tell you, just elegant. Real mahogany, none of your veneerin', but the real stuff; lace curt'ins to the berth, lace on the pillows, and a satin coverlid, rumpled up as though the cap'n had just turned out; and there was his slippers handy—the greatest-lookin' slippers for a man you ever saw. They ...
— In Exile and Other Stories • Mary Hallock Foote
... did not catch what. The abominable notary made a very curt bow to Madame Guerard. The Duc de Morny was very gracious, for the new-comer was so pretty. My godfather merely bent his head, as Madame Guerard was nothing to him. Aunt Rosine glanced at her from head to foot. ...
— My Double Life - The Memoirs of Sarah Bernhardt • Sarah Bernhardt
... "Go!" And upon Vespasian's enquiring "Where to?" the other had responded "to the devil." [Footnote: This sentiment is expressed in the Greek by "to the crows."] Now when Phoebus apologized for this speech the monarch did him no harm, in fact vouchsafed him no answer at all, save a curt "Go to the devil yourself!"—Again, when Vologaesus forwarded a letter to the emperor addressed as follows: "Arsaces, King of Kings, to Flavius Vespasian, Greeting," the recipient did not rebuke him but wrote a reply couched in the same ...
— Dio's Rome, Volume V., Books 61-76 (A.D. 54-211) • Cassius Dio
... room and remained invisible till just before dinner, when she came down with a grave and rather haughty countenance. To Mumford's remarks she replied with curt formality; he, prepared for this state of things, began conversing cheerfully with his wife, and Miss Derrick kept silence. After dinner, she passed out into ...
— The Paying Guest • George Gissing
... bandage was taken from his eyes he found himself in a great room of the Chateau. Before him stood Frontenac, in brilliant uniform, surrounded by the most glittering array of officers which Quebec could muster. The astonished envoy presented a letter from Phips. It was a curt demand in the name of King William of England for the unconditional surrender of all "forts and castles" in Canada, of Frontenac himself, and all his forces and supplies. On such conditions Phips ...
— The Conquest of New France - A Chronicle of the Colonial Wars, Volume 10 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • George M. Wrong
... the dates. You had promised to go, and you hadn't gone or notified the girl that you wouldn't go. Your apologetic telegram she had torn into halves and returned the following morning, together with a curt note to the effect that she could not value the friendship of a man who made and broke a promise so easily. It was all over. It was a dashed hard world. How the deuce do ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VIII (of X) • Various
... gentleman mumbled these curt phrases in a series of inarticulate jerks, as if his vocal apparatus were wound up and worked with a crank, but had grown so rusty that every now and then a wheel would catch on a cog. He did not stand still for a moment, ...
— Mercy Philbrick's Choice • Helen Hunt Jackson
... angry. He replied to Jenssen's friendly advances in curt monosyllables. To Meriem he did not speak, but on several occasions she discovered him glaring at her from beneath half closed lids—greedily. The look sent a shudder through her. She hugged Geeka closer to her breast ...
— The Son of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... business letter is either too wordy or too curt; it either loses the subject in a mass of words or loses the reader by offensive abruptness. Some letters gush upon the most ordinary of subjects; they are interspersed with friendly ejaculations such as "Now, my dear Mr. Jones," and give the impression that if one ever got ...
— How to Write Letters (Formerly The Book of Letters) - A Complete Guide to Correct Business and Personal Correspondence • Mary Owens Crowther
... to him reasonable, and he knew that his father was at least just. They had been friends, these two, always, in an underground sort of way, which was all that the relations of father and son in such days allowed. The old man was curt, obstinate, and even boisterous in his anger; but there was a kindliness beneath that the boy always perceived—a kindliness which permitted the son an exceptional freedom of speech, which he used always in the last resort and which he knew his father loved to hear him use. This, then, was ...
— Come Rack! Come Rope! • Robert Hugh Benson
... and judge. His stage-manager would rarely make suggestions during rehearsals unless beckoned to and asked by his manager. When the office-boy came in at rehearsal on some important business errand, he got a curt dismissal, or at most a brief consideration of the despatch, ...
— Charles Frohman: Manager and Man • Isaac Frederick Marcosson and Daniel Frohman
... the two prisoners differed greatly. Vaucheray was gloomy, silent, hard-faced. He cynically, in curt, sneering, almost defiant phrases, admitted the crimes of which he had formerly been guilty. But, with an inconsistency which puzzled everybody except Lupin, he denied any participation in the murder of Leonard the valet and violently accused Gilbert. His object, in thus ...
— The Crystal Stopper • Maurice LeBlanc
... voice Hollings began his story, and as he recounted it, Mr. Inspector jotted it down, merely pausing now and then to ask a curt question. ...
— Christopher and the Clockmakers • Sara Ware Bassett
... hot trail of another sort here," was the curt answer; "and I won't go until I have followed ...
— The Wilderness Trail • Frank Williams
... even now famous for its trade with Spain in that commodity. Nor had the King's physician forgotten the King's health; for we find a special entry amongst the royal disbursements of the sum of L10 7s., paid to Josephus Medicus for spices and electuaries. Yet Henri-curt-mantel[289] was careful of his physical well-being, and partook but sparingly of these luxuries. Fearing his tendency to corpulency, he threw the short cloak of his native Anjou round him at an earlier hour in the morning than suited the tastes of his courtiers, and took exercise either ...
— An Illustrated History of Ireland from AD 400 to 1800 • Mary Frances Cusack
... cleverness in using the French language, he had a decided brusqueness of manner and a curt turn of voice not in the least Gallic. True, the soft Virginian intonation marked every word, and his obeisance was as low as if Madame Roussillon had been a queen; but the light French ...
— Alice of Old Vincennes • Maurice Thompson
... shaken hands with him than have given him the curt nod she begrudged him. She looked past him to see Mrs. Dyckman, in whose arms she found herself smothered. Mrs. Dyckman, in her bride-fright, ...
— We Can't Have Everything • Rupert Hughes
... could utter the eager assurance that he was very far from thinking meanly of Percalus, the other bystanders, impatient at this whispered colloquy, seized his attention with a volley of questions, to which he gave but curt and not very relevant answers, so much had the lad's few sentences disturbed the calm tenor of his existing self-possession. Nor did he quite regain his presence of mind until he was once more summoned into the presence ...
— Pausanias, the Spartan - The Haunted and the Haunters, An Unfinished Historical Romance • Lord Lytton
... when repeated and amplified by the waiting-maid, naturally brought a favorable answer. It was a decisive moment for the double ambition hidden in Fraisier's mind. Bold as a petty provincial attorney, sharp, rough-spoken, and curt as he was, he felt as captains feel before the decisive battle of a campaign. As he went into the little drawing-room where Amelie was waiting for him, he felt a slight perspiration breaking out upon his forehead and down his back. Every sudorific hitherto employed had failed ...
— Poor Relations • Honore de Balzac
... prisoners, with one half of the captured slaves; and to send home the hostages he brought away from Gibraltar, if he might be granted leave to pass the entry. The Spaniard rejected all these terms, with a curt intimation that, if the pirates did not surrender within two more days, they should be compelled to do so at the ...
— On the Spanish Main - Or, Some English forays on the Isthmus of Darien. • John Masefield
... contact. The duchess was not feeling well; a wrangle with her was out of the question; besides, he would make himself hoarse. So he waited and waited, and re-read the princess' letter. At dinner he ate nothing; his replies were curt and surly. The Honorable Betty also ate nothing. She sat, wondering if her maid could pack five ...
— The Princess Elopes • Harold MacGrath
... morning the watch-house was surrounded by a furious mob. A riot followed, which was not easily suppressed. But another consequence followed. During the riot the Earl of Lonsdale was stopped in his carriage while passing to his own house, and annoyed by that experience he addressed some curt words to a Captain Cuthbert who was on duty with the soldiers. Of course a duel was the next step. After failing to injure each other at two attempts, the seconds intervened, and insisted that, as their quarrel had arisen through a mutual misconception, and as neither ...
— Inns and Taverns of Old London • Henry C. Shelley
... then the honour'd mould Wherein this trunk was fram'd, and in her hand The grandchild to her blood. But, out, affection! All bond and privilege of nature, break! Let it be virtuous to be obstinate.— What is that curt'sy worth? or those doves' eyes, Which can make gods forsworn?—I melt, and am not Of stronger earth than others.—My mother bows, As if Olympus to a molehill should In supplication nod: and my young boy Hath an aspect of intercession ...
— The Tragedy of Coriolanus • William Shakespeare [Collins edition]
... late in October, about three months after Jan of Ruffluck had first proclaimed the tidings of Glory Goldie's rise to royal honours, the engineer saw an uncommonly large gathering of people around the little old man. He intended to pass by with a curt greeting, as usual, but changed his mind and stopped to see what ...
— The Emperor of Portugalia • Selma Lagerlof
... this demonstration produced no effect upon the intrepid young Englishman, Sung-wan—for so the officer was named—gave a few curt orders to the men who were guarding him, and Frobisher was hurried from the room, conducted down several long, gloomy corridors, and finally thrust into a large cell. This, as soon as his eyes became accustomed ...
— A Chinese Command - A Story of Adventure in Eastern Seas • Harry Collingwood
... led the other. Their differences were a source of great embarrassment to the Government at Washington, and of harm to the Union cause. The President was in constant receipt of remonstrances and protests from the contesting parties, to one of which he made the following curt reply: ...
— The Every-day Life of Abraham Lincoln • Francis Fisher Browne
... before she could command her voice even to ask her companion whether he were tired. 'No,' he said; but the tone was more than half-sullen; and at the thought of the meeting between the brothers, poor Phoebe's heart seemed to die within her. Against their dark looks and curt sayings to one ...
— Hopes and Fears - scenes from the life of a spinster • Charlotte M. Yonge
... winters long Has bronzed and shrivelled sere her face and neck; Her locks are wild and grey, her teeth a wreck; Her foot is vast, her bowed leg spare and strong. A wide blue cloak, a squat and sturdy throng Of curt blue coats, a mutch without a speck, A white vest broidered black, her person deck, Nor seems their picked, stern, old-world quaintness wrong. Her great creel forehead-slung, she wanders nigh, Easing the heavy strap with gnarled, brown fingers, The spirit of traffic watchful in her ...
— Poems by William Ernest Henley • William Ernest Henley
... of his writing—the first answer to hisletters—should have come, after three long years, in the shape of this impersonal line, too curt to be called humble, yet confessing to a consciousness of the past by the studied avoidance of its language! As she read, her mind flashed back over what she had dreamed his letters would be, over the exquisite answers she had ...
— Tales Of Men And Ghosts • Edith Wharton
... trip round the world, and, I think, losing him again so soon made it almost worse for her than if they had never been reunited, especially as another and irreparable loss came upon her immediately after his departure. This was the sudden death of her mother, the news of which arrived one day in a curt note written by her father to Colonel Colquhoun, no previous intimation of illness having been sent to break the shock of the announcement. I can never be thankful enough for the happy chance which brought about that last accidental meeting of Evadne ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... belligerent myself. It was just a week after I came. One of his new tenants phoned in that Nesbitt must get the rubbish out of the alley back of his house or he would move out. Mr. Nesbitt tried to evade a promise, but the man was curt. 'You get that rubbish out to-day, or I ...
— Sunny Slopes • Ethel Hueston
... interrogatories from the British Government, stated officially his grievances against Austria, while Lord Malmesbury despatched Lord Cowley on a special mission to Vienna to mediate between Austria and France. In April, however, after a curt summons to the Sardinians to disarm had been disregarded, Austria invaded Piedmont, and Victor Emmanuel placed himself at the head of his army. The first engagement took place, with unfavourable results ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume III (of 3), 1854-1861 • Queen of Great Britain Victoria
... up behind Koupriane, he asked the question. In a few curt words, still hurrying on, Koupriane told the reporter he had just learned that the police had left the little Bohemian Katharina alone for a moment with the expiring officer. Katharina acted as housekeeper for Michael and Boris. She knew the secrets of them both. The first thing any ...
— The Secret of the Night • Gaston Leroux
... make himself agreeable now saying a few words to the dame, who generally gave him curt answers, and now addressing Nelly. As he had plenty to say for himself, she could not help being amused, and his conversation served to beguile the way over the somewhat dreary country they had to pass till the ...
— Michael Penguyne - Fisher Life on the Cornish Coast • William H. G. Kingston
... Sabatol ['God does not pay on a Saturday']—the wages of men's sins often linger in their payment, and I myself saw much established wickedness of long-standing prosperity. But a Frate Predicatore who wanted to move the people—how could he be moderate? He might have been a little less defiant and curt, though, to Lorenzo de' Medici, whose family had been the very makers of San Marco: was that quarrel ever made up? And our Lorenzo himself, with the dim outward eyes and the subtle inward vision, did he get over that ...
— Romola • George Eliot
... he answered. "It's all one. I suppose he's not come over." At this moment the mate came on deck with the carpenter, carrying a model ship which they had been making together in their spare time. They nodded to the stranger, who gave them a curt "How do?" as though they had parted from him only the night before. The mate growled at me for wasting time on deck when I should be at work. He sent me down to my usual job of getting the cabin ready for the breakfast of the gentlemen. ...
— Martin Hyde, The Duke's Messenger • John Masefield
... circumstance that, upon the return of the boats from their mission of rescue, the saloon party aboard the Thetis should almost immediately separate and retire to their respective cabins, with nothing more in the way of conversation than a few curt questions and answers. The fact is that they were powerfully impressed with the conviction that they had that night witnessed, and been in an indirect way assisting at, an occurrence that was destined to exercise an important influence ...
— The Cruise of the Thetis - A Tale of the Cuban Insurrection • Harry Collingwood
... said Chad, "is harder'n a diamond. He interduced me to what he called a shore-perplexus punch, and 'twas like being kicked twice by a mustang. He's playin' it low down on you, Curt. He ain't no sicker'n I am. I hate to say it, but the runt's workin' you ...
— Heart of the West • O. Henry
... never understand why he begged for that extra five minutes. Perhaps it was that he had some mad hope of persuading the bank manager to allow him to overdraw to that amount. If so, the refusal was a curt one, for he reappeared with a ghastly face ...
— A Duet • A. Conan Doyle
... Yuan Ki's room was a six-footer, a college graduate, and an athlete. Yuan Ki was much impressed. He secretly admired him, but was ungraciously curt to him. This was Yuan Ki's way of making the teacher "keep his distance." But the teacher seemed not to notice it. He was always kind to Yuan Ki, even as he was to ...
— "Say Fellows—" - Fifty Practical Talks with Boys on Life's Big Issues • Wade C. Smith
... early stages of the Galician campaign that when our troops, after sweeping away the resistance at Lwow and Jaroslau, loudly knocked at the doors of the fortress of Przemysl, they met with a stern rebuff. In reply to the summons of the Russians to surrender the keys the commandant wrote a curt and dignified note remarking that he considered it beyond his own dignity or the dignity of the Russian General to discuss the surrender of the fortress before it had exhausted all its powers of resistance. During the second invasion of Poland by the Austro-German armies the enemy's ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 2, May, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... All she had apparently vouchsafed her parent was the statement that she intended to re-marry, and the command to send Paul over; and Ralph reflected that his own betrothal to her had probably been announced to Mr. Spragg in the same curt fashion. ...
— The Custom of the Country • Edith Wharton
... somewhere in this million. There can be few hirers of books who neither pay income-tax nor live on terms of dependent equality with those who pay it. I see at the counters people on whose foreheads it is written that they know themselves to be the salt of the earth. Their assured, curt voices, their proud carriage, their clothes, the similarity of their manners, all show that they belong to a caste and that the caste has been successful in the struggle for life. It is called the ...
— Books and Persons - Being Comments on a Past Epoch 1908-1911 • Arnold Bennett
... dressed to-night,' whispered George II. to his wife, whom he had called up from the card-table to impart to her that important conviction. 'Lady Mary always dresses well,' was the cold and curt reply. ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 1 • Grace Wharton and Philip Wharton
... said McGee, with a curt nod; and the old fellow hastened to obey, only too eager to find favor in the sight of the ruler. "Take this hyar paper, an' look her over. Tell me wot hit sez, d'ye mind, an' on'y that, if yuh know wots good ...
— Chums in Dixie - or The Strange Cruise of a Motorboat • St. George Rathborne
... perquisition; but as the duke and ambassador had to submit, I thought it best to follow his example; besides, resistance would be useless. The Englishman, who prides himself on his strict adherence to the law of the land, is curt and rude in his manner, and the English officials cannot be compared to the French, who know how to combine politeness with the ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... stone floor of the wide kitchen at Heathknowes, where all the business of the house was transacted, fell with little raps of defiance, curt and dry. Her nose in the air told of contempt louder than any words. She laid down the porridge spurtle like a queen abdicating her sceptre. She tabled the plates like so many protests, signed and witnessed. She swept about the house with the ...
— The Dew of Their Youth • S. R. Crockett
... received no correction.' The question 'Wherefore?' is asked in very various tones, but none of them has in it the accent of true conviction; and there is a whole world of difference between the lowly petition, 'Show me wherefore Thou contendest with me,' and the curt, self-complacent brushing aside of God's merciful threatenings in the text. The last thing which most of us think of as the cause of our misfortunes is ourselves; and we resent as almost an insult the word, which if we were wise, we ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ezekiel, Daniel, and the Minor Prophets. St Matthew Chapters I to VIII • Alexander Maclaren
... The affections are strong and their foundations lie deep: but they are not—such affections seldom are—wide-spreading; nor do they show themselves on the surface. Indeed, there is little display of any of the amenities of life among this wild, rough population. Their accost is curt; their accent and tone of speech blunt and harsh. Something of this may, probably, be attributed to the freedom of mountain air and of isolated hill-side life; something be derived from their rough Norse ancestry. They ...
— The Life of Charlotte Bronte - Volume 1 • Elizabeth Gaskell
... acquiesce with a single word. I certainly hoped no curt objection would be made to the reading of any proposition which any member might deem it his duty to offer. As gentlemen differ from me in this respect, I will hand the paper to the Chair. I hope at least it may be permitted to ...
— A Report of the Debates and Proceedings in the Secret Sessions of the Conference Convention • Lucius Eugene Chittenden
... companies and the headquarters of the 27th Battalion. The transport, the "Ivernia,"[L] was a comfortable ship of 14,000 tons register belonging to the Cunard Line. The captain and officers at first displayed a rather cool and curt manner towards their new passengers but in the course of a day or two visibly thawed. The captain afterwards, in explanation, stated that from information he had received in regard to the Australians he had expected ...
— The 28th: A Record of War Service in the Australian Imperial Force, 1915-19, Vol. I • Herbert Brayley Collett
... days ago, arrived a chit asking us to explain a curt quotation from the report of the A.A.L.R.B.G.S., to ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, Feb. 12, 1919 • Various
... to a friend. "He seems so cool at excitable moments; he does not lose his head and rush his men into danger. In fact, he always looks before he leaps, and when he does leap, he makes us move—and the Boers too." Perhaps French was best summed-up one day by a trooper whom, in a curt word, he had just sentenced to barracks for some offence. "The General don't bark much," he remarked, "but, crikey, don't he know ...
— Sir John French - An Authentic Biography • Cecil Chisholm
... the eager assurance that he was very far from thinking meanly of Percalus, the other bystanders, impatient at this whispered colloquy, seized his attention with a volley of questions, to which he gave but curt and not very relevant answers, so much had the lad's few sentences disturbed the calm tenor of his existing self-possession. Nor did he quite regain his presence of mind until he was once more summoned into ...
— Pausanias, the Spartan - The Haunted and the Haunters, An Unfinished Historical Romance • Lord Lytton
... the fish was being removed, the door opened to admit a tall, thin woman, wearing outdoor costume, who passed quickly down the room and took the vacant place at the table, murmuring a curt apology to Mrs. Lawrence on her way. To Diana's astonishment she recognised in the ...
— The Splendid Folly • Margaret Pedler
... criss-crossed with field telegraph and telephone wires. Still more spectacular, everywhere there are traffic directions. And these directions are very large and very curt. "Motor- lorries dead slow," you see in immense characters in the midst of the foreign scene. And at all the awkward street corners in the towns a soldier directs the traffic. Not merely in the towns, but in many and many a rural road you come across a rival of the Strand. For the ...
— Over There • Arnold Bennett
... him was this: whilst in her hand she held the spindle, she flung out to a back-yard close by her lodge, where, after she had peeled off the barks of an old sycamore three several times, she very summarily, upon eight leaves which dropped from thence, wrote with the spindle-point some curt and briefly-couched verses, which she threw into the air, then said unto them, Search after them if you will; find them if you can; the fatal destinies of your marriage are ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... was virgo intacta, he declined and she went away. A fortnight or so later he received a letter from her in the country, making no reference to what had passed, but giving an account of her work with her Sunday-school class. He did not reply, and then came a curt note asking him to return her letter. My friend feels sure she was devoted to auto-erotic performances, but, having become attracted to him, came to the conclusion she would ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 3 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... looked at him in wonder. The momentary convulsion of his florid physiognomy seemed to strike them dumb. They exchanged a quick glance. Presently the clean-shaven man fired out another question in his curt, unceremonious manner: ...
— Victory • Joseph Conrad
... was the unanimous opinion, expressed without scruple. While from the back of the hall came the curt request to ...
— Australia Felix • Henry Handel Richardson
... genially; but there was something curt and official in his tone when he next spoke that took the Englishman slightly aback. "You must bare your breast over your heart and lungs," he said; and while Thorndyke was unbuttoning his shirt, he and the medical man went to the door and brought ...
— The Land of the Changing Sun • William N. Harben
... by, it is possible I was about to say. But, unwilling to smother the reader beneath a mountain of rhetorical flowers,—which accident might happen, should I resolve to be "equal to the occasion,"—I shall contain myself, and state, in the way of a curt preface, in plain prose, and directly to the point, that I entered a remarkably large and populous cemetery, no matter where, very early one morning,—in fact, you have the gate-keeper's word for it that I was the first person there,—that I climbed ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 6, Issue 35, September, 1860 • Various
... on my part, but I accepted this curt dismissal very ill-humouredly. That Harley, for some reason of his own, wished to be alone, was evident enough, but I resented being excluded from his confidence, even temporarily. It would seem that he had formed a theory in ...
— Bat Wing • Sax Rohmer
... doubtful—he could not have carried it out. His ship collided with a tree—an accident singularly frequent in the Zeppelin records—so disabling it that it could only limp home under half power. A rather curt telegram from his Imperial master is said to have been Count von Zeppelin's first intimation that he ...
— Aircraft and Submarines - The Story of the Invention, Development, and Present-Day - Uses of War's Newest Weapons • Willis J. Abbot
... citizen Chauvelin, the citizen Commissary would, no doubt, have given a curt refusal to a request to see a prisoner at this late hour of the evening. But Chauvelin was not a man to be denied, and whilst muttering various objections in his ill-kempt beard, Cuisinier, nevertheless, gave orders that the citizen was to be conducted ...
— The League of the Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... met Cowan. The two always nodded to each other, but to-night Neil's curt salutation went unheeded. Cowan, with troubled face, hurried by him and went up the ...
— Behind the Line • Ralph Henry Barbour
... is," said Captain Ross, equally curt, and silently thanking the fates that her ladyship was going home ...
— The Wings of the Morning • Louis Tracy
... military precision of the Colonel, both boys began to wonder at a quarter-past eleven why they had not been summoned, for the Colonel had said in his curt epistle to Glyn—which "looked cross," so the boy said—that he would be at ...
— Glyn Severn's Schooldays • George Manville Fenn
... the Pyrenees; but he would not leave his wife in Paris, lest some importunate creditor might reveal to her the secret of his horrible position. He therefore took her and the two children with him, refusing to allow her to take the tutor and scarcely permitting her to take a maid. His tone was curt and imperious; he seemed to have recovered some energy. This sudden journey, the cause of which escaped her penetration, alarmed Juana secretly. Her husband made it gaily. Obliged to occupy the same carriage, he ...
— Juana • Honore de Balzac
... charge. No public man ever came out of a personal discussion less favourable than the noble minister for the colonies on this occasion. The simple truth evoked was, that while a committee of the house supposed that they were possessed of full and complete reports, they were supplied with only curt and crude extracts, calculated to place matters in the ministerial light, but not really affording the committee the opinions of those whose views they purported to be. This practice was, unfortunately, common with great officers of state; but it seemed ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... grass, spotted with small one-story buildings. To the left was a single towering structure built of Titan crystal and on top of it was the largest atomic blaster he had ever seen. He turned to ask the guardsman about the gun but was motioned ahead with a curt, "No ...
— On the Trail of the Space Pirates • Carey Rockwell
... looked down at him emptily. "No," she said, "don't get up. I'm leaving, Major Mauser." He began to rise, to protest, but she said, her voice curt, "I have seen only one fracas on Telly in my entire life, and was so repelled that I vowed never to watch again. However, I am going to make an exception. I am going to follow this one, and if, as a result of your actions, even a single person meets death, I wish never to see you again. ...
— Frigid Fracas • Dallas McCord Reynolds
... with the curt and almost breathless impatience of haste, "but have I ever denied our bond of intimacy, Euan? Closer bond have I with no man. But it must be a comrade's bond between us.... I meant to make that plain to you—and doubtless, my heart being full—and I ...
— The Hidden Children • Robert W. Chambers
... appalling creation, still plunged and kicked violently to rid himself of it. The man who had stepped out of the depths of the wheat quickly crossed the road, unhitched the traces, drew back the vehicle, and, glancing at the traveler's dusty and disordered clothes, said, with curt sympathy:— ...
— A Sappho of Green Springs • Bret Harte
... by a stare, or gentleness by the softness of her gaze, by the set of the gracious curve of her lips, by the coldness or the sweetness of her smile. When Emilie meant to conquer a heart, her pure voice did not lack melody; but she could also give it a sort of curt clearness when she was minded to paralyze a partner's indiscreet tongue. Her colorless face and alabaster brow were like the limpid surface of a lake, which by turns is rippled by the impulse of a breeze and recovers its ...
— The Ball at Sceaux • Honore de Balzac
... delinquent debtors to stir up. A certain small shopkeeper of the China Bazaar was responsible to the concern for a few thousand rupees, wherewith he had been accommodated by Uncle Rajinda as a basis for certain operations in seersuckers and castor-oil, that had yielded no returns. So our Baboo, in a curt chit, (that is, note, or sheet of paper, as near as a Bengalee can come to the word,) bade the small speculator of China Bazaar come down ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I., No. 3, January 1858 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various
... Dave reined his horse that way and stopped at the shed door. The two talked for a minute and Dave rode on, passing Bud with a curt nod. Pop came over to where Bud stood leaning against ...
— Cow-Country • B. M. Bower
... but no movement was wasted. His face was intent, his glances sharp, and she liked the crisp, curt way in which he spoke to Carroll. The man's task was, in one sense, not important, but he was absorbed in it. Then while Carroll slipped the moorings, Vane ran up the headsails and springing aft seized the ...
— Vane of the Timberlands • Harold Bindloss
... so?" answered the Countess, with a curt laugh. "My Lady Foljambe is vastly pleasant, trow. Asking her caged bird's leave to set another bird in the cage! Well, little brown nightingale, what sayest? Art feared lest the old eagle bite, or canst trust the hooked beak for a ...
— The White Lady of Hazelwood - A Tale of the Fourteenth Century • Emily Sarah Holt
... during and after lunch the high, insistent ring had summoned the Professor. He gave us the news as it came through to him in a few curt sentences. Such terrific items had never been registered in the world's history before. The great shadow was creeping up from the south like a rising tide of death. Egypt had gone through its delirium and was now comatose. Spain and Portugal, after ...
— The Poison Belt • Arthur Conan Doyle
... a simple prayer to the Heavenly Father "who knoweth that ye have need of these things," asking that he might catch the eye of a generous traveller. He felt he had indeed been "led" to this plain, brown-faced, broad-shouldered lady, when he remembered how nearly, after her curt nod from a distance had engaged him, he had responded to the blandishments of a fussy little woman, with many more bags and rugs, and a parrot cage, who was now doling French coppers out of the window of the next compartment. "Seven pence 'apenny of this stuff ain't much for carrying all that along, ...
— The Rosary • Florence L. Barclay
... drily; and, shutting his teeth upon his inherent contempt for a liar, he swung away, acknowledging with a curt nod the civil "Good-arfternoon, sir," that ...
— The Bronze Bell • Louis Joseph Vance
... only interested in his immediate departure. The change had occurred with such abruptness, West was unable as yet to realize its full significance, but, with no attempt to combat her decision, left the room, closing the door behind him. In that moment his mood changed. The dismissal had been so curt, his pride rose in rebellion. Finding Sexton in the front hall, ...
— The Case and The Girl • Randall Parrish
... reckon," I said, kind of curt-like. And I did. Owen Blair hadn't a face a body could forget—that long face of his with its clean color and its eyes made to look love into a woman's. When I thought of Mark Foster's sallow skin ...
— Further Chronicles of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... admiral, offering to spare Maracaibo without ransom; to release his prisoners, with one half of the captured slaves; and to send home the hostages he brought away from Gibraltar, if he might be granted leave to pass the entry. The Spaniard rejected all these terms, with a curt intimation that, if the pirates did not surrender within two more days, they should be compelled to do so at ...
— On the Spanish Main - Or, Some English forays on the Isthmus of Darien. • John Masefield
... reply to your question as to what the religious views of the Brook Farmers are, I might, if I wished to be curt, say that they are such as you see by their lives. I am aware, however, that such a reply will not exactly suit you, and that you really mean what are their creeds, as, are they all Baptists, Trinitarians, ...
— Brook Farm • John Thomas Codman
... evening meal. To her he said briefly that Mistress Daisy had gone to her room, weary and with a headache, and would take no supper. I felt the smart of reproof to me in every word he uttered, and even more in his curt tone. I stood at the window with my back to him, looking through the dripping little panes at the scattered lights across the river, and not ceasing for an instant to think forebodingly of ...
— In the Valley • Harold Frederic
... and sawdust; a few pensive sailors stood about, gazing down at her with serious eyes. Sebright, bent double, circled slowly on a prowl of minute inspection. Suddenly straightening himself up, he pronounced a curt "She'll do"; and, without looking at us at all, went off busily ...
— Romance • Joseph Conrad and F.M. Hueffer
... 10th.—Entered new house on 4th curt. A great mercy. Hope it may be more a house of prayer than any we ...
— The Personal Life Of David Livingstone • William Garden Blaikie
... thought otherwisely, for he coolly informed the applicant that he was not Quartermaster, and declined to pay any attention to an order on that officer. Back to head-quarters travels 'Shylock,' with his dishonored order and his complaint. The paper is forthwith returned with a curt indorsement and the assurance that 'that will make it all right.' Thus fortified, he returned to the charge, and triumphantly displaying the back of the paper only to Dr. Smith, demanded his 'nigger.' Dr. Smith looked at the writing presented to him ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2 No 4, October, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... ideals, my point of view. I had no desire to feed my new-sprung contempt by watching him pump in vain for information to be used in his secret campaign against me. "No, thanks. Another day," I replied, and left him with a curt nod. I noted that he had failed to speak of my marriage, though he had not seen me since. "A sore subject with all the Langdons," thought I. "It must be very sore, indeed, to make a man who is all ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905 • Various
... they arrived, Megget gave a curt order for his own men to follow and galloped in the same direction the ranch ...
— Comrades of the Saddle - The Young Rough Riders of the Plains • Frank V. Webster
... at the door. Miss Brown dismissed him with a curt nod. He sank thankfully into his desk as Sid DuPree sprang forward to admit the newcomer—a new girl and her mother. From the shelter of his big geography, John surveyed the couple with that calmly critical stare which only a ...
— A Son of the City - A Story of Boy Life • Herman Gastrell Seely
... the glare of the mid-day sun, with those faces gathered round them, it appeared rather to add a grotesque horror to the scene. The dragoman salaamed and salaamed like some ungainly automatic doll, and then, as the chief rasped out a curt word or two, he fell suddenly upon his face, rubbing his forehead into the sand, and flapping upon it ...
— The Tragedy of The Korosko • Arthur Conan Doyle
... young student adieu in a few curt words, and made his way homeward through the sweet spring evening feeling half-ruffled, half-amused, as any other strong, unimaginative man might who has been menaced by a ...
— Round the Red Lamp - Being Facts and Fancies of Medical Life • Arthur Conan Doyle
... if looking for employment will ever again avail me aught. The frequent re pulses, half-promises, and curt noes, the cherished, deluded hopes, and fresh endeavours that always resulted in nothing had done my courage to death. As a last resource, I had applied for a place as debt collector, but I was too late, and, besides, I could not have found the fifty shillings demanded as security. There was ...
— Hunger • Knut Hamsun
... countries. Hatteras was always intent upon his maps, and said little; his taciturnity increased as the brig got more and more south; he often mounted the poop, and there with folded arms, and eyes lost in vacancy, he stood for hours. His orders, when he gave any, were curt and rough. Shandon kept a cold silence, and kept himself so much aloof by degrees that at last he had no relations with Hatteras except those exacted by the service; James Wall remained devoted to Shandon, ...
— The English at the North Pole - Part I of the Adventures of Captain Hatteras • Jules Verne
... superintendent took no notice whatever beyond a curt nod. She did not understand this, and a pain shot through her sensitive heart. Then she reflected that he might not have ...
— Reels and Spindles - A Story of Mill Life • Evelyn Raymond
... means," said be; "it is not for such a man as I am to steal a victory, 'Malo me fortunae poeniteat, quam victoria pudeat.'"—["I had rather complain of ill-fortune than be ashamed of victory." Quint. Curt, iv. 13]— ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne
... that we can hope, is by many arrows, more or less far off on different sides, to indicate, in the course of time, for what target we are aiming, and after an hour's talk, back and forward to convey the purport of a single principle or a single thought. And yet while the curt, pithy speaker misses the point entirely, a wordy, prolegomenous babbler will often add three new offences in the process of excusing one. It is really a most delicate affair. The world was made before the English language, and seemingly upon a different design. Suppose ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 2 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... help," said another, worn-out, when Maimon pleaded for only a few coppers. Yet he never acquired the beggar's servility, nay, was often himself the patron of some poorer hanger-on, for whom he would sacrifice his last glass of beer. Curt in his manners, he refused to lift his hat or embrace his acquaintances in cold blood. Nor would he wear a wig. Pure Reason ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... table sat a boy—one of those child veterans the big city develops. He had a long and extremely narrow head. His eyes were close together, sharp and shifty. His expression was sophisticated and cynical. "Well, sir!" he said with curt impudence, giving Feuerstein ...
— The Fortune Hunter • David Graham Phillips
... can have any now in the strict construction of the term orator, because we must not confuse the name orator with the words babbler and charlatan, for these can exist in any country, in all the regions of the inhabited world, among the cold and curt Englishmen as among the lively ...
— The Reign of Greed - Complete English Version of 'El Filibusterismo' • Jose Rizal
... LARRY [with curt sincerity]. Yes of course I do: why should I tell you lies about it? Nora Reilly was a person of very little consequence to me or anyone else outside this miserable little hole. But Mrs Tom Broadbent will be ...
— John Bull's Other Island • George Bernard Shaw
... these women, whom I had not seen until that day, to tell what we think and feel, to tell how it looks to us, who are the mothers of soldiers, and to whom even now the letter may be on its way with its curt inscription across the corner. I got my commission there to tell fearlessly and hopefully the story of ...
— The Next of Kin - Those who Wait and Wonder • Nellie L. McClung
... as to whether his resignation was desired, he was advised by the Chief of the bureau of insular affairs that the appointment of Mr. Francis Burton Harrison, who is a Tammany Hall democrat, as his successor had been sent to the Senate, [481] and three days after its confirmation received a curt request for his resignation to be effected in a week and a day. He was also requested to employ servants for Mr. Harrison. Spaniards who read on the public streets newspapers which printed this message were seen to tear them up ...
— The Philippines: Past and Present (vol. 1 of 2) • Dean C. Worcester
... Oscar now was. Accordingly, he felt an interest in him, but the sort of interest which alone he could take, checked by the apparent harshness that characterized him. The aspect of this gaunt young man, with a muddy skin and hair cropped like a clothes-brush, who was curt of speech and possessed a piercing eye and a gloomy vivaciousness, ...
— A Start in Life • Honore de Balzac
... not, you will spend together at the house of Eudemius," the old man persisted, and received a curt grunt of assent. Undeterred by lack of enthusiasm of his hearers, he settled to the discussion of a ...
— Nicanor - Teller of Tales - A Story of Roman Britain • C. Bryson Taylor
... that floated back to her, like a returning tide, the living colour and splendour of the beautiful head, the light of eyes that seemed to reflect such utterly other things than the mean things actually before them; and, above all, the high curt consideration of a manner that even at bad moments was a magnificent habit and of the very essence of the innumerable things—her beauty, her birth, her father and mother, her cousins and all her ancestors—that its possessor couldn't have ...
— In the Cage • Henry James
... Mrs. Blobbs's curt refusal to receive the lace only added fuel to the blazing thought that had flared up in Dalton's mind when he recalled the certificates. Holding on to them had caused one explosion. The mantilla might prove another such bomb. He dared not leave it at home and he could not carry it ...
— Felix O'Day • F. Hopkinson Smith
... Kars' eyes. The girl's final words shocked him momentarily out of his self-command. There was one other at least who held his breath for what was to follow that curt negative. But Bill Brudenell need ...
— The Triumph of John Kars - A Story of the Yukon • Ridgwell Cullum
... he be got to utter more than a monosyllable in his presence. Harvey's face would twitch, and his fingers clench of themselves as he touched his cap. And with my Aunt Caroline he was the same. He vouchsafed but a curt reply to all her questions, nor did her raptures over the stud soften him in the least. She would come tripping into the stable yard, daintily holding up her skirts, and crying, "Oh, Harvey, I have heard so much of Tanglefoot. I must see him before ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... hair, and the birdlike treble of his voice, have been often enough described, and I will only say of them here that, when he took me for a walk in the garden, I subconsciously felt them—I cannot tell why—to be formidable. He inquired as to my tastes and interests with a species of curt benignity; but to my interest in poetry he exhibited a most disconcerting indifference, and I felt during the whole of our interview that I was walking with a mild east wind. In this he was a marked contrast to Ruskin, Robert Browning, and certain others—especially to "Owen Meredith"—men between ...
— Memoirs of Life and Literature • W. H. Mallock
... of the town which were less openly engaged in business, legitimate, questionable, or beyond question, Harris inquired at many doors for lodgings for himself and wife, or for his wife alone. The response ranged from curt announcements that the inmates "ain't takin' boarders" to sympathetic assurances that if it were possible to find room for another it would be done, but the house was already crowded to suffocation. Great lines of washing in the back yards, and groups dirty children ...
— The Homesteaders - A Novel of the Canadian West • Robert J. C. Stead
... the will. For there was a will after all. Deborah, and Bart, who had witnessed it at the request of their master, told Mr. Pash of its existence, and he found it in one of the three safes in the cellar. It proved to be a short, curt document, such as no man in his senses would think of making when disposing of five thousand a year. Aaron was a clever business man, and Pash was professionally disgusted that he had left behind him such ...
— The Opal Serpent • Fergus Hume
... began to feel weak and ill, so that he had hardly enough energy to go on looking for the work which seemed so desperately hard to find. He was growing used now to the long waiting at the back of a shop on the chance that he would be taken on, and the curt dismissal. He walked to all parts of London in answer to the advertisements, and he came to know by sight men who applied as fruitlessly as himself. One or two tried to make friends with him, but he was too tired ...
— Of Human Bondage • W. Somerset Maugham
... basin of warm water simmering on the ashes; Sayre used it as a finger-bowl, dried his hands on his shirt, lighted his pipe, and then slowly drew from his hip pocket a flat leather pocket-book. "Curt," he said, "I'm not selfish. I'm perfectly willing to share glory with you. You ...
— The Gay Rebellion • Robert W. Chambers
... didn't make any comment, as I noticed that at supper, whenever you or I spoke of the Frasers, he answered in curt monosyllables." ...
— Tom Gerrard - 1904 • Louis Becke
... most extraordinary coincidence, a curt, business-like letter arrived in the evening post from Maris Tarnowsy, post-marked ...
— A Fool and His Money • George Barr McCutcheon
... sharply that the hand fell. "Yes, I am looking for you," he said, and his voice was unusually curt. "Come outside a minute, will you? I want to speak ...
— Greatheart • Ethel M. Dell
... the sentiments of Father Ugo, the reader ought not to be surprised that his reluctance to enter into a theological discussion with Amanda was great, and his answers to that indefatigable she bore rather curt and ironical. After a good deal of conversation about the weather, crops, the telegraph, railroads, thunder storms, electricity, and such other subjects as were suggested by the climate and state of the ...
— The Cross and the Shamrock • Hugh Quigley
... recall. Virtue she hath, and modest heed, Is piquant too, and sharp withal. Her cheek's soft light, her rosy lips, No length of time will e'er eclipse! Her downward glance in passing by, Deep in my heart is stamp'd for aye; How curt and sharp her answer too, To ecstasy ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... the company of cavalry at McClellan's headquarters. The thought of his presence sent the blood surging in scarlet waves to her face. There was no longer any question in her mind that she had wounded him too deeply for forgiveness. Her dismissal had been so cold, so curt, it had been an accusation of dishonor. She could see it clearly now. He had poured out his confession of utter love in a torrent of mad words and clasped her in his arms without thought or calculation, an act of instinctive resistless ...
— The Southerner - A Romance of the Real Lincoln • Thomas Dixon
... accumulated in the convents of every land. Then his teacher, Jerome, had been three years an anchorite on the heights of Camaldoli, where for more than four centuries the Thebaid had been revived; and Jerome, cold and curt on most religious themes, was warm with enthusiasm on this one. He had pored over the annals of St. John Baptist's abbey, round about which the hermit's caves were scattered, and told him the names of many a noble, and ...
— The Cloister and the Hearth • Charles Reade
... bowing graciously to right and left. Once she rose for an instant and addressed a curt sentence to the crowd, and in answer they cheered, a full-mouthed chorus of one ...
— The Prisoner • Alice Brown
... entering a subdued city, satiated with victory and peace. After him came Jess, now white from age, with her cart, and in it a woman carefully wrapped up,—the carrier leading the horse anxiously, and looking back. When he saw me, James (for his name was James Noble) made a curt and grotesque "boo," and said, "Maister John, this is the mistress; she's got a trouble in her breest,—some kind o' ...
— Rab and His Friends • John Brown, M. D.
... path. The day was superb. I found Mr. Tillington, in spite of his studiously languid and supercilious air, a most agreeable companion. He knew Europe. He was full of talk of Rome and the Romans. He had epigrammatic wit, curt, keen, and pointed. We sat down on a bench; he kept Lady Georgina and myself amused for an hour by his crisp sallies. Besides, he had been everywhere and seen everybody. Culture and agriculture ...
— Miss Cayley's Adventures • Grant Allen
... have liked to ask him his meaning, but felt that he had condescended enough. He bade the man a curt good-night, therefore, and turning away passed quickly into St. Aldate's Street. Thence it was but a step to the Mitre, where he found his baggage and ...
— The Castle Inn • Stanley John Weyman
... rules he laid down for her sex. Consequently that distant air she bore toward him filled him with satisfaction. It was quite enough for the present—for the present—that three times each day his perseverance and determination were rewarded by that curt little acknowledgment of her ...
— The Prodigal Judge • Vaughan Kester
... up with the vexed scowl on his face, and walked the room. In a minute the library door opened again, and a pale, thin, rigid, frozen-looking little woman, scantily clad, the weather being considered, entered, and dropped a curt, awkward ...
— The Ghost • William. D. O'Connor
... and then displeased and then she frowned and shrugged her shoulders as if she did not really care whether Mr. Jerry was there or not. She gave him rather a curt greeting when he joined them with ...
— Mary Rose of Mifflin • Frances R. Sterrett
... into the central chamber and the vessel gave a tremendous lurch as the power was again applied. It was soon spent, however, and after the final observation, the others waiting in breathless suspense for him to finish his calculations, he made his curt announcement. ...
— The Skylark of Space • Edward Elmer Smith and Lee Hawkins Garby
... rapid river of no great breadth. Here the driver stopped, and the two travellers descended from the vehicle. The priest exchanged a few words in a low voice with one of the servants who had leapt down from the box, and then turning to Vellacott he said in a curt manner— ...
— The Slave Of The Lamp • Henry Seton Merriman
... so curt and sharply sweet, my dear. Here I have been listening to marvellous accounts of your amiability ...
— Hope Mills - or Between Friend and Sweetheart • Amanda M. Douglas
... sporting companions, reminding him of bets which had not been paid, expressing astonishment which was child-like in its simplicity, and requesting an immediate settlement. These were generally short, curt, and altogether unpleasant. ...
— The Living Link • James De Mille
... removed and asked him if there was anything I could do for him about his wife and children. I'd never seen them—I arrested him at the bank, and, of course, he was never out of custody after that. He answered in a queer, curt way that his wife and children were being looked after. I heard, incidentally, that his wife had left home, or was from home—there was something mysterious about it—either as soon as he was arrested or before. Anyway, he said nothing, and from that moment ...
— The Paradise Mystery • J. S. Fletcher
... Tenway, will know within a minute of the appearance of each stranger what is his purpose there,—whether he be going or has just come, whether he is himself on the way or waiting for others, whether he should be treated with civility or with some curt command,—so that if his purport be honest all necessary assistance may be rendered him. As Lopez was walking up and down, with smiling face and leisurely pace, now reading an advertisement and now watching the contortions ...
— The Prime Minister • Anthony Trollope
... will he be to posterity? Some admirers have already answered the first question, perhaps as satisfactorily as it can be answered, by saying, "Daudet is simply Daudet." As for the second question, a whole school of critics is inclined to answer it and all similar queries with the curt statement, "That concerns posterity, not us." If, however, less evasive answers are insisted upon, let the following utterance, which might conceivably be more indefinite and oracular, suffice: Alphonse Daudet is one of those ...
— The Nabob • Alphonse Daudet
... the whole interview he plays a sorry part, and is evidently cowed by the hated authority and personality of the old man; while Samuel, on his side, is curt, stern, and takes the upper hand, as becomes God's messenger. The relative positions of the two men are the normal ones of their offices, and explain both Saul's revolt and the chronic impatience ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... 17th curt.stilo novo, I hold a coenobitical symposion at Monkbarns, and pray you to assist thereat, at four o'clock precisely. If my fair enemy, Miss Isabel, can and will honour us by accompanying you, my womankind will be but too proud to have the aid of such an auxiliary in the cause of resistance ...
— The Antiquary, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... Mills nodded a curt gesture of farewell, and left the room, and when he had gone Mr. Taynton sat down again in the chair by the table, and remained there some half hour. He knew well the soundness of his partner's reasoning; all he had said was ...
— The Blotting Book • E. F. Benson
... draw another breath of uncertainty on that score," was the curt rejoinder. "He is ...
— The Grafters • Francis Lynde
... gaol-life must signify. She had heard of death and the painful Question; and she had perceived something of the heroism that was needed to meet them; yet she had never before imagined what that life of confinement might be, until she had watched this man, whom she had known in the world as a curt and almost masterful gentleman, careful of his dress, particular of the deference that was due to him, now become this worn prisoner, careless of his appearance, who stroked his mouth continually, once or ...
— Come Rack! Come Rope! • Robert Hugh Benson
... quite boyishly eager for the hours to pass on Wednesday, and when at last it was time to start, dismissed his chauffeur with a curt sentence, and started off alone. The chauffeur, it may be mentioned, merely glanced after him, and with a shrug of his shoulders wondered "what the ...
— Winding Paths • Gertrude Page
... he now asks, with soul-harrowing indifference to all my counter inquiries." To bin," I reply, desperately, curt and indifferent, beginning to see through his game. " Bin, bin! bacalem." he says; supplementing the request with a coaxing smile. At the same moment my long-suffering digestive apparatus favors me with an ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle V1 • Thomas Stevens
... the marriage, Jack and his bride were out walking one day. A beautiful young woman crossed their path. Jack addressed her, but she gave him a very curt reply. ...
— Tales of Wonder Every Child Should Know • Various
... forewoman, had been in ignorance of the failure and death of Archibald Fowler, she would probably have read the announcement in Madame's face as she watched her welcome the wife of his son. There was nothing offensive, nothing unkind, nothing curt; but, in some subtle way, the difference was emphasized between the eccentric daughter-in-law of a millionaire and an inexperienced young woman who must work for her living. For the welcome revealed at once to the observant eyes of Miss Smith the significant ...
— Life and Gabriella - The Story of a Woman's Courage • Ellen Glasgow
... which reached me indirectly and was delayed; also for your most interesting and generous book, which I immediately sat down and read at a sitting; which in its turn so stimulated me that I immediately wrote a rapid and rather curt reply for my own little rag. I fear you will find the reply more controversial than I meant it to be; for your book is so packed with challenges that I could not but make my very short article a thing packed with mere repartees. But I do hope you will understand how warm ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Maisie Ward
... in the doorway as the full aroma of the place smote him, now entered at the curt suggestion of Sondheim, ...
— The Crimson Tide • Robert W. Chambers
... a child to do something, I don't remember what, and he answered me impertinently with a curt neay (no). I turned to his mother who was present and told her that the boy ought to have his ...
— My Friends the Savages - Notes and Observations of a Perak settler (Malay Peninsula) • Giovanni Battista Cerruti
... these curt words Frank let Buckskin have his head; and, accompanied by his chum, started at a full gallop over the level, in the direction of the spot where the dun-colored ...
— The Saddle Boys in the Grand Canyon - or The Hermit of the Cave • James Carson
... a Romish priest elevate the elements, he felt compelled to absent himself, and on the next Sunday to attend the service at a Congregational chapel. He had, in in the meantime, expostulated with Mr Lerew, both personally and by letter, but had received only a curt and unsatisfactory reply. He had afterwards heard, from undoubted authority, that the doctrine of purgatory was taught to the schoolchildren; that prayers for the dead were offered up, as also prayers ...
— Clara Maynard - The True and the False - A Tale of the Times • W.H.G. Kingston
... it, so that we may all live virtually as long as we like; which, of course, disposes once for all of a world to come. The Psalmist was not always complaisant or even temperate in his language, but he lived a long time ago and must be pardoned; his curt summary stands: "Dixit insipiens!" But the writer vows that if he were addicted to the pursuit of any branch of physical knowledge he would insist upon being called by the name of that branch. He would be a physiologist ...
— The Ascent of Denali (Mount McKinley) - A Narrative of the First Complete Ascent of the Highest - Peak in North America • Hudson Stuck
... in this country. No man—you apprehend me?—no man here bears a charmed life.' He stood there for a moment in the moonlight with his delicate hooked nose set a little askew, and his mica eyes glittering without a wink, then, with a curt Good-night, he strode off. I could see he was disturbed and considerably puzzled, which made me feel more hopeful than I had been for days. It was a great comfort to turn from that chap to my influential friend, the battered, twisted, ruined, tin-pot steamboat. I clambered on board. She rang ...
— Heart of Darkness • Joseph Conrad
... either by letter or in a personal interview, to any arrangements as to his career, etc., which involved expenditure of the trust moneys. When a somewhat rude and lengthy letter to them to that effect was met with a curt acknowledgment of its receipt and a reference to their previous decision, Mr. Knight's annoyance hardened into a permanent grievance against his son, whom he seemed to hold responsible for what he ...
— Love Eternal • H. Rider Haggard
... Ghazi," they told him in eager chorus, with a childish mingling of excitement and terror; and would fain have enlarged upon their own valour in pursuing the Taker of Life, but that Desmond's curt "chupraho"[34] checked them ...
— Captain Desmond, V.C. • Maud Diver
... a moment to wait that time, for the man who was selling lemonade answered Betsy's shy question with a stare and a curt, "Lord, no! What could a young one ...
— Understood Betsy • Dorothy Canfield
... her own way of living, that her rather snuggling friendliness with him was as honest as a boy's. Her surprise at her own mistake showed how genuine her intention of straightness really was. When he came, once or twice to see her, he called her Lily, and she called him "Curt," and they joked together like two playfellows,—except when he was too gloomy to joke. But it was his gloominess that made her feel sure there was nothing but friendliness in his calls. She was not curious ...
— The Vehement Flame • Margaret Wade Campbell Deland
... turned up here at the Turner place. I imagine Mrs. Turner knew what was in store for her when his rusty buggy came in sight around the corner of the barn. At any rate, she made no protest, and listened meekly to his curt statement that he held an overdue mortgage, with plenty of back interest owing, and it was time for her to go. She went. Neither she nor anyone else doubted Creed's rights in the matter, and, after all, I believe it got ...
— Humorous Ghost Stories • Dorothy Scarborough
... train; its attack upon the hacienda, and its repulse by the horse of Kentucky and Arkansas; the fall of Yell and Vaughan, the insolent mission, under a white flag, to inquire what General Taylor was waiting for; the curt reply "for General Santa Anna to surrender;" the junction, by this ruse, of the Mexican cavalry in our rear with their main army; the concentrated charge upon the American line; the overpowering of the battery of O'Brien; the fearful crisis; ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 3, August, 1850. • Various
... speak to Kesby when he passed his open office door. Kesby didn't need smiles or praise, he worked loyally just for the rare curt acknowledgement that he had done well. Three years of managing had made him a good lieutenant, completely faithful. When Bryce quit Union Transport Kesby would ...
— The Man Who Staked the Stars • Charles Dye
... who had given him rather curt greeting, and had followed the Duke around to the front of the house. The old man was tramping the porch from ...
— The Ramrodders - A Novel • Holman Day
... The note was curt, very much to the point, and signed by a single initial. "If you wear this to-morrow night I shall know what to expect." The date was ...
— Indian Tales • Rudyard Kipling
... Minnesota Everett T. Moore, University of California, Los Angeles Lawrence Clark Powell, William Andrews Clark Memorial Library James Sutherland, University College, London H.T. Swedenberg, Jr., University of California, Los Angeles Robert Vosper, William Andrews Clark Memorial Library Curt A. Zimansky, ...
— The Case of Mrs. Clive • Catherine Clive
... better have shaken hands with him than have given him the curt nod she begrudged him. She looked past him to see Mrs. Dyckman, in whose arms she found herself smothered. Mrs. Dyckman, in her bride-fright, ...
— We Can't Have Everything • Rupert Hughes
... honestly, that an aged man had rented the house for a month and had paid him in advance. What more could the agent say? Only one bit of puzzlement: why hadn't the blond stranger appeared? Who was he, in truth, and what had been his game? All this waiting and wondering, and then a curt telegram of the night before, saying, "Release her." So much the better. What his employer's motives were did not interest him half so much as the fact that he had a thousand francs in his pocket, and that all element of danger ...
— The Place of Honeymoons • Harold MacGrath
... two prisoners differed greatly. Vaucheray was gloomy, silent, hard-faced. He cynically, in curt, sneering, almost defiant phrases, admitted the crimes of which he had formerly been guilty. But, with an inconsistency which puzzled everybody except Lupin, he denied any participation in the murder of Leonard the valet and violently ...
— The Crystal Stopper • Maurice LeBlanc
... for the girl. She heard it flushing painfully, and, suddenly, with a curt handshake, ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... was the scene in the last chapter where Quayle, confronting his quarry, unmasked him. Quayle might have floundered in the earlier part of the story, but in his big scene he was exactly right. He was curt, crisp ...
— Something New • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... all sorts and kinds, but with a preference for bookish people, divines, both of the Establishment and out of it, printers and authors. Sometimes, indeed, the description is short enough, and tells one very little. To many readers, references so curt to people of whom they never heard, and whose names are recorded nowhere else, save on their mouldering grave-stones, may seem tedious and trivial, but for others they will have a strange fascination. Here ...
— In the Name of the Bodleian and Other Essays • Augustine Birrell
... at sea," he observed, finally, and stopped to drink a long draught. Lingard, bending over the table, had been listening with eager attention. Carter went on in his curt and ...
— The Rescue • Joseph Conrad
... his eyes over it, scribbled an answer on the back with a gold pencil which he extracted from his pocket, and dismissed the man with a curt nod. The envelope had fluttered to the table and lay there face up. Patty inadvertently glanced at the address, and as the truth flashed across her, she hid her head against the back of the stone seat in a gale ...
— Just Patty • Jean Webster
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