|
|
|
More "Impertinent" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... surprise and annoy him was to find that The Inexpressible, which, though well-known to be a stupid, was generally considered a decent paper, had taken the enemy's side, and published some very impertinent paragraphs about him. Afterwards he discovered that he had been the victim of a principle. The Inexpressible and Blunder and Bluster had a little private quarrel of their own, and the former felt bound to ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2, May, 1851 • Various
... me!" exclaimed this impertinent young hussy (while "The Voices of the Moonlight" moaned and mourned their mysterious regrets and despairs at the far end of the drawing-room). "Don't tell me! Honnor Cunyngham is far too good-looking ...
— Prince Fortunatus • William Black
... it, rose-coloured socks, and white buckskin boots, who was lying almost at full length in a wide deck-chair against cushions, with a panama hat tilted so far down over his eyes that its brim rested delicately upon his well-cut, rather impertinent short nose. From his lips curled gently pale smoke ...
— Bella Donna - A Novel • Robert Hichens
... send, if I were not too shy, the same message to "Haly" that she (though I do not deserve it, not I!) has sent through her sister to me. My best love to yourself—to your Mother my kindest regards—to your small, fat, impertinent, ignorant brother my hatred. ...
— The Life and Letters of Lewis Carroll • Stuart Dodgson Collingwood
... none but the initiated could have found the top of, or guessed the use of, or having once examined, could have ever got back again into their mahogany nests without assistance. Everything was jammed into the tightest cases, fitted into the narrowest corners, fenced up behind the most impertinent cushions, and screwed into the acutest angles, to prevent its philosophical composure from being disturbed by the rolling of the sea. Such extraordinary precautions were taken in every instance to save room, and keep the thing compact; and so much practical navigation ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens
... exhausted though terribly tried by the unjust criticism from many sources, by the piques and prides of new-made Generals who felt able to command armies though they could not command their own tempers; by the impertinent Buell who failed to move into East Tennessee and stop the Confederate depredations against loyal citizens; and by the unappreciative McClellan who was too young to understand the President's fatherly solicitude, and who ...
— Life of Abraham Lincoln - Little Blue Book Ten Cent Pocket Series No. 324 • John Hugh Bowers
... Look then upon Horace, who liv'd under an Emperor in the beginnings of a Monarchy (the most dangerous time in the world to laugh) who is there whom he has not satiriz'd by name? Fabius the great Talker, Tigellius the Fantastick, Nasidienus the Impertinent, Nomentanus the Debauchee, and whoever came at his Quill's end. They may answer that these are fictitious Names: an excellent Answer indeed! As if those whom he attack'd were no better known; ...
— An Essay on Satire, Particularly on the Dunciad • Walter Harte
... whereupon Bacon, in his anxiety, sent Yelverton in person to try to conciliate Buckingham and the King, enjoining him to lie so hard and so unblushingly as to declare that Bacon had never hindered, but had in "many ways furthered the marriage;" that all he had done had been to check Coke's "impertinent carriage" in the matter, which he wished had "more nearly resembled the Earl of Buckingham's ...
— The Curious Case of Lady Purbeck - A Scandal of the XVIIth Century • Thomas Longueville
... the midst of which harangued and swore a flute-like voice, which escaped from beneath a heavy armor, complete from casque to spurs. The individual who had thus screwed a whole outfit upon his body, was so hidden by his warlike accoutrements that nothing was to be seen of his person save an impertinent, red, snub nose, a rosy mouth, and bold eyes. His belt was full of daggers and poniards, a huge sword on his hip, a rusted cross-bow at his left, and a vast jug of wine in front of him, without reckoning on his right, a fat wench with ...
— Notre-Dame de Paris - The Hunchback of Notre Dame • Victor Hugo
... all know, of course, that the modern newspaper man is not a peeping Tom, an impertinent individual, who pries into the affairs of others. Mr. Hale honorably represents an honorable profession. I have known him personally for a number of years and I'll vouch for him. He was sent here by his city editor to cover our reunion. That he comes here ...
— Death Points a Finger • Will Levinrew
... enraptured, he saw the moon peek over the buildings in the next street. He softly got up and turned off the impertinent gas. Beyond a startled glance over her shoulder she made no objection. He was utterly fascinated by the movements of the bright head, now raised, now lowered, now turned towards the window in the ...
— The Deaves Affair • Hulbert Footner
... discourteous, inurbane, rude, uncivil, disrespectful, saucy, insolent, impertinent, churlish, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... Lucia to a seance, if we do," she said. "Dear me! How late it is: there was such a long wait between the tableaux. But we must keep our eyes on Georgie, and be careful how we answer his impertinent questions. He is sure to ask some. About getting that woman down again, Robert. It might be fool-hardy, for we've had an escape, and shouldn't put our heads into the same noose again. On the other hand, it would disarm suspicion for ever, if, after a few months, I asked her ...
— Queen Lucia • E. F. Benson
... full of kindnesses toward me, and I love him tenderly. But it is pitiable to see his weakness for Madame du Barri, who is the silliest and most impertinent creature that it is possible to conceive. She has played with us every evening at Marly,[2] and she has twice been seated next to me; but she has not spoken to me, and I have not attempted to engage in conversation with her; but, when ...
— The Life of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France • Charles Duke Yonge
... some of those impertinent people you speak of," answered LISIDEIUS [i.e., Sir CHARLES SEDLEY], "who, to my knowledge, are already so provided, either way, that they can produce not only a Panegyric upon the Victory: but, if need be, a Funeral Elegy upon the Duke, and, after they have crowned ...
— An English Garner - Critical Essays & Literary Fragments • Edited by Professor Arber and Thomas Seccombe
... You bless me with this promise. —How can you, lady, suffer this impertinent Afflict you ...
— A Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. II • Various
... that I could touch the key-note of her life. But no; she was as chilling to me as ever; nothing warmed her—nothing elicited from her the slightest spark. Sometimes she looked at me a little wonderingly, as if I were talking in some style unusual to me; as if my remarks were, in a manner, impertinent; but, in the end, I left her ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 3 • Various
... the moment; but I'm sorry that I took even a moment's notice of it. Why should one be ruffled because others are unfeeling and impertinent; it is ...
— Julian Home • Dean Frederic W. Farrar
... ship actually gave chase and sent a broadside after our impertinent piece of baggage the waterman fairly danced with delight and led her a merry chase down the bay until we were opposite Annapolis. Then with a flirt of her sail we bade them good-bye and ran for the mouth of the Severn. Gaining that, we soon passed the charred hulk of the Peggy ...
— The Tory Maid • Herbert Baird Stimpson
... of course. Assuming Mr. Medland asked me, and I'm sure nothing could be further from his thoughts, I'm afraid I should have to decline the honour. Wasn't it impertinent of Dick? It's lucky Mary didn't hear him. But, my dear, you must get up. All sorts of things are going on. It's ...
— Half a Hero - A Novel • Anthony Hope
... admits you is perpetually turning and creaking, and you march through the institution with a herd of fellow-gazers. There is nothing left to discover or describe, and originality of attitude is completely impossible. This is often very annoying; you can only turn your back on your impertinent playfellow and curse his want of delicacy. But this is not the fault of Venice; it is the fault of the rest of the world. The fault of Venice is that, though she is easy to admire, she is not so easy to live ...
— Italian Hours • Henry James
... Martha Lacey's sense of humor was not keen, but suddenly the mental picture of Judge Trent's shrewd, thin countenance, as it might appear in pillowed slumber surmounted by the high hat, overwhelmed her and she laughed silently. Then she frowned with reddening cheeks. "Hannah's impertinent," she murmured. ...
— The Opened Shutters • Clara Louise Burnham
... question impulsively without realizing how it might sound, coming from a total stranger. The girl's slim figure stiffened and her chin went up. Then—perhaps something in his expression told her he had not meant to be impertinent—her face cleared. ...
— Shoe-Bar Stratton • Joseph Bushnell Ames
... these impertinent, opulent Americans!" was the burden of his maledictions. "As for that damned, insolent bounder, I will never have him in the house again. Understand that! I know him. I've heard Shirley talk of him. The man's a blackguard. And if I ever catch him alone in your company after this, ...
— The Knave of Diamonds • Ethel May Dell
... address myself now personally to you, Mr. Clifton, I scarcely know. The world perhaps would call my views extravagant, my pretensions impertinent, and my plan absurd.—The world must do its will—In the progress toward truth, I have presumed to think you several steps behind me. I have proposed to myself in some sort to be your instructress. I have repeated my plan to the person whom you perhaps may consider as your rival; I have required ...
— Anna St. Ives • Thomas Holcroft
... Poem is so thoroughly established in the world, that it would be superfluous, if not impertinent, to endeavour any panegyric upon it. King Charles II. whom the judicious part of mankind will readily acknowledge to be a sovereign judge of wit, was so great an admirer of it, that he would often pleasantly quote it in his conversation. However, ...
— Hudibras • Samuel Butler
... dowdy and stupid in the far-back time when seventeen-year-old Phyllis was "growin' up as pretty as a picture," the tired, twenty-five-year-old, workaday face in the green glass was dreadful. What made her feel worst—and she entertained the thought with a whimsical consciousness of its impertinent vanity—was that she'd had so much more raw material than Eva! And the world had given Eva a chance because her father was rich. And she, Phyllis, was condemned to be tidy and accurate, and no more, just because she had ...
— The Rose Garden Husband • Margaret Widdemer
... Kitty, a little farther off, stood staring and smiling. But the Elf was not a bit frightened. He sat swinging his little legs, with his tongue in his left cheek and his left eye looking down with a half-winking, impertinent air. ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf (Vol 2 of 17) - Folk-Lore, Fables, And Fairy Tales • Various
... to think that his pale face had grown scarlet. This Schmielke was certainly held in high esteem by everybody, and of course it would not be wise to quarrel with a representative of the Prussian Government. Still, it was very impertinent of him even to think of Mrs. Tiralla, of that educated woman, the daughter of a schoolmaster, extremely impertinent. Really, you couldn't help laughing at it. And he gave an ...
— Absolution • Clara Viebig
... then, Mr Jones, in what regard I must hold a benefactor, to whom I owe the preservation of my life, and of those dear children, for whose sake alone my life is valuable. Do not, therefore, think me impertinent, Mr Jones (since I must esteem one for whom I know Mr Allworthy hath so much value), if I beg you not to converse with these wicked women. You are a young gentleman, and do not know half their artful wiles. Do not be angry ...
— The History of Tom Jones, a foundling • Henry Fielding
... for hoping that three weeks later there would be a bonfire on the campus and a midnight parade to celebrate a victory over Jefferson, the ancient and honored foe of Ridgley. If, on the other hand, Wilton showed an impertinent disregard for the best line that Ridgley could assemble and carried their impertinence to such an extreme as to romp home with the victory, the situation looked black as ink, and the tense atmosphere that accompanies forlorn ...
— The Mark of the Knife • Clayton H. Ernst
... party of pleasure, but the reverse, as it would compel her to be for some hours in the company of a man she had so much reason to detest, sat in the stern sheets, with the fat clergyman directly in front, and forming an impenetrable rampart against the impertinent gallantries of the coxcomb Gregorio. She wore no jewels or ornaments, and from her pensive and serious expression of countenance, might have passed for an Athenian tribute-maiden whom the annual ship was about to carry to the den of ...
— An Old Sailor's Yarns • Nathaniel Ames
... gone, you'll get another—that's of a damn'd impertinent landlady. Sure, she has a right to her parlour; and hav'n't I brought her cash enough to swallow up the Red Cow's rent for these ...
— John Bull - The Englishman's Fireside: A Comedy, in Five Acts • George Colman
... sudden thought he sat up in jealous rage. No-man's land? Yes, but the entire orchestra of fifty-two men were with her—and he hated the horn-player, for had he not intercepted poisonous glances between Luga and that impertinent jackanapes? In his torture Pobloff groaned aloud and wondered how he had reached his home: he could remember nothing after the ebon music had devoured his band. How did it come about? Why was he not drawn within the fatal whirlpool of sound? Or ...
— Melomaniacs • James Huneker
... sovereign is secured by a well regulated standing army. It is in such countries only, that the public safety does not require that the sovereign should be trusted with any discretionary power, for suppressing even the impertinent wantonness of ...
— An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations • Adam Smith
... Feast, or the Power of Sound, as it is called, was written and printed in 1697. As it was designed for music (it was set by Jeremiah Clarke), the closing lines of every strophe are repeated by way of chorus. I have removed these repetitions as impertinent to the effect of the poem in print, and as interrupting the rushing vehemency of the narrative. The incident described is the ...
— Lyra Heroica - A Book of Verse for Boys • Various
... to render myself agreeable and useful to all around me; by a tender compassionate friendly behaviour; avoiding all trifling and impertinent stories; remembering that ...
— Religion in Earnest - A Memorial of Mrs. Mary Lyth, of York • John Lyth
... two later this is answered by a letter signed M. G. W., who was a colored grocer of Yates Street (Lester & Gibbs). He was a clever writer, and handled the gentleman, Mr. Sharpstone, without gloves, saying some very pertinent as well as impertinent things, taking especial exception to the reference of Mr. Sharpstone to the peculiar ...
— Some Reminiscences of old Victoria • Edgar Fawcett
... the steps, he said he would go over and warn the men to get away from the street. So the patrolmen followed, and Sergeant Aucoin asked the smaller fellow, Pierce, if he lived there. The answer was short and impertinent, the black saying he did not, and with that both Pierce and Robinson drew up to ...
— Mob Rule in New Orleans • Ida B. Wells-Barnett
... silence; then "Come," I said, "I am going to be impertinent! I am in a mood to ask questions, and to ...
— The Thread of Gold • Arthur Christopher Benson
... Wenna being married to Mr. Trelyon, and how happy and pleased and pretty she would look as they went walking together! And then how proud he would be to have so nice a wife! and he would joke about her and be very impertinent, but he would simply worship her all the same, and do everything he could to please her. And he would take her away and show her all the beautiful places abroad; and he would have a yacht, too; and he would give her a fine house in London. And don't you think ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, April 1875, Vol. XV., No. 88 • Various
... read nearly all that are to be found in print of Mr. Southey's authorities, and some that he does not mention; but Mr. Southey had been so faithful as well as judicious in the use he has made of his authors, that it would have been absurd, if not impertinent, to have neglected his guidance. From the time of the King's arrival in Brazil, or rather of his leaving Lisbon, I am answerable for all I have stated: it is little, but I hope that little ...
— Journal of a Voyage to Brazil - And Residence There During Part of the Years 1821, 1822, 1823 • Maria Graham
... Walden, composedly, though his blood began to tingle hotly through his veins with rising indignation— "Why should she? Her family papers are all in order, and no doubt she considered your application both ignorant and impertinent." ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli
... That's what's helped me to make up my mind that he shall see no more of Terry." He reached out and tapped Tabs' hand, taking it for granted that he was his ally. "The sight's becoming far too normal—wild beasts everywhere, sunning themselves in impertinent freedom, as if they were house-cats. Nobody's shocked at it any longer. Terry isn't. Lloyd George isn't—at least he pretends he isn't for fear the wild beasts may lose him an election. No one makes a stand. It's left for private individuals ...
— The Kingdom Round the Corner - A Novel • Coningsby Dawson
... impertinent speech. He only saw in the stranger a man on whom he would like to bestow all the happiness that was triumphant in his soul. So full of love was he that he could not bear it alone. And he said: "I am no worm to be trodden under foot. I am that Son of Man who ...
— I.N.R.I. - A prisoner's Story of the Cross • Peter Rosegger
... Majesty escorted by Richelieu, one's old friend in a sense: "Is Trajan pleased?" whispered Voltaire to his Richelieu; overheard by Trajan,—who answered in words nothing, but in a visible glance of the eyes did answer, "Impertinent Lackey!"—Trajan being a man unready with speech; and disliking trouble with the people whom he paid for keeping his boots in polish. O my winged Voltaire, to what dunghill Bubbly-Jocks (COQS D'INDE) you do stoop with homage, constrained by their ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XVI. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—The Ten Years of Peace.—1746-1756. • Thomas Carlyle
... "You haven't the least right to think that or say it," she said coldly. "It's strange if I can't help a friend choose a few house furnishings without impertinent comment." ...
— Desert Conquest - or, Precious Waters • A. M. Chisholm
... that he was ever known to speak was when he was in a raging passion. He then vented his wrath against an impertinent Frnchman, in some broken but decidedly strong expressions of his native tongue. Richard has been called "a spendid savage," having most of the faults and most of the ...
— The Leading Facts of English History • D.H. Montgomery
... be impertinent for me to remark, in reference to this admirable and delightful letter, that its writer here exemplifies the best feelings about Hawthorne's art without quite knowing it. We see him bubbling glad ejaculations in the true style of an Omar Khayyam who has ...
— Memories of Hawthorne • Rose Hawthorne Lathrop
... the crowd was becoming impertinent, when at an opportune moment the chief appeared. To my astonishment I recognised him as a man who had often visited me at Gondokoro, to whom I had given many ...
— The Albert N'Yanza, Great Basin of the Nile • Sir Samuel White Baker
... the silly, impertinent fellow mean, thought I; but the ale was now before me, and I hastened to drink, for my weakness was great, and my mind was full of dark thoughts, the remains of the indescribable horror of the preceding night. It may kill me, thought I, as I drank deep, but who cares, anything is ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow
... for me, on the very brink of the grave, to say aught but the truth; and I love you too deeply, too fervently, to be impertinent. You do not know me, lady. In my heart I have reared an altar to worship at, and that shrine for three years has been thy dearly loved form. How dearly and passionately I have loved-what a chastening influence it has produced upon my life, my comrades, who know ...
— The Heart's Secret - The Fortunes of a Soldier, A Story of Love and the Low Latitudes • Maturin Murray
... who often yields to the temptations of "Hyperbole" in this sense of the word, lays down the law against impertinent decorations, in the rhetorical instruction of Pandarus to Troilus, about Troilus's letter to Cressida (B. ...
— Epic and Romance - Essays on Medieval Literature • W. P. Ker
... Byron "was surprised one day by a Doctor and a Lawyer almost forcing themselves at the same time into my room. I did not know," he adds, "till afterwards the real object of their visit. I thought their questions singular, frivolous, and somewhat importunate, if not impertinent: but what should I have thought, if I had known that they were sent to provide proofs of my insanity?" Lady Byron, in her Remarks on Mr. Moore's Life, etc. (Life, pp. 661-663), says that Dr. Baillie (vide post, p. 412, note 2), whom she consulted ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron
... him, and perching herself upon the arm of the chair, turned up his nose with an impertinent finger. "Badness," she said, "why did you tell me that Molly looked like a ...
— Three Little Cousins • Amy E. Blanchard
... this evenin', Robert," said Abner placidly, for he was so given to interesting himself in the affairs of his neighbors that he did not realize that his curiosity was displayed in an impertinent manner. "Of course I want to sell all I can. You've got considerable money comin' back to you. Don't you want ...
— Robert Coverdale's Struggle - Or, On The Wave Of Success • Horatio, Jr. Alger
... introduce their fingers into private pies without permission from the chief cook. How the dance went Debby hardly knew, for the conversation fell upon books, and in the interest of her favorite theme she found even the "grand square" an impertinent interruption, while her own deficiencies became almost as great as her partner's; yet, when the music ended with a flourish, and her last curtsy was successfully achieved, she longed to begin all over again, and ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, August, 1863, No. 70 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various
... city to-day," returned Saidie calmly. How odious they were, these Englishwomen, with their short skirts and big boots, and red, hot faces, with great black straw houses over them, and their curt manners, and the impertinent way they ...
— Six Women • Victoria Cross
... little to do; and as it never suited me to reside there, there was never any one to look after him. However, I make no complaint. Here they are intolerable—intolerable, self-sufficient, impertinent upstarts, full of crotchets of their own; and the bishop is a weak, timid fool; as for me, I never go inside a church. I can't; I should be insulted if I did. It has however gone so far now that I shall take permission to bring the ...
— The Bertrams • Anthony Trollope
... paved way, with or without houses, has been extended to roads lined with houses, whether paved or unpaved. 'Impertinent' signified at first irrelevant, alien to the purpose in hand: through which it has come to mean, meddling, intrusive, unmannerly, ...
— A System Of Logic, Ratiocinative And Inductive • John Stuart Mill
... him, gentlemen, in your midst; question him boldly; have no fear of importunity, chatter, or impertinent questions. You need not be afraid that he will take possession of you and expect you to devote yourself entirely to him, so that you ...
— Emile • Jean-Jacques Rousseau
... Between ourselves—you are an impertinent jackanapes, and presume upon the credit of your uncle. No one by ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... women," they still cried. Fanny opened the doors for these persons as wide as possible when they came, and shut them with a bang when they went, astonishing them with a satirical politeness, or confounding them with an impertinent silence. The important creditors held meetings to agree what should be done, and effected an arrangement by which his property was left in his hands for three years, to arrange for the benefit of his creditors. The arrangement proved that his ...
— The Morgesons • Elizabeth Stoddard
... an office to which in the course of years he had become much accustomed, sat down and wrote a letter to Mr. George Grenville in behalf of his friend and servant. "Though I am sensible I have no pretensions for asking you a favour,... yet I flatter myself I shall not be thought quite impertinent in interceding for a person, who I can answer has neither been to blame nor any way deserved punishment, and therefore I think you, Sir, will be ready to save him from prejudice. The person I mean is ...
— The Eve of the Revolution - A Chronicle of the Breach with England, Volume 11 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Carl Becker
... was much hurt at Mr Borthwick's most impertinent manner of putting the question with respect to the title of King Consort, and much satisfied with Sir Robert's answer.[5] The title of King is open assuredly to many difficulties, and would perhaps ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Vol 2 (of 3), 1844-1853 • Queen Victoria
... is the more commonly used, has unfortunately two meanings, a true and a false; and, again unfortunately, the false prevails in vulgar use. To "idealise" in the true sense is to disengage an "idea" of all that is trivial or impertinent or transient or disturbing, and present it to men in its clearest outline, so that its own proper form shines in on the intelligence, as you would wipe away from a discovered statue all stains or accretions of mud or moss or ...
— Poetry • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... conditions. Almost everyday brought with it some new cause of uneasiness and complaint. Sentinels were posted beneath Napoleon's windows and before his doors. This order was, however, doubtless given to prevent his being annoyed by impertinent curiosity. The French were certainly precluded from all free communication with the inhabitants of the island; but this precaution was of unquestionable necessity for the security of the Emperor's person. Las Cases complains that the passwords were perpetually changed, ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... remember, my old friend, that I told you all this at the time. You thought, too, that it was singularly impertinent, on my part, thus to flare up in advance, because, certainly a millionaire does not give his daughter to a ruined nobleman in the pay of Marcolet, the patent-broker, to a poor devil of an inventor, who is building the castles of his future ...
— Other People's Money • Emile Gaboriau
... many with a violence that lends conviction, but all in vain. The thing remains as secret, as recondite, as baffling as ever. Good Bostonians regard attempts to solve the problem as not only futile but impertinent—almost blasphemous—accepting it as a factor in the general inscrutability which veils the world, and are content to ...
— White Ashes • Sidney R. Kennedy and Alden C. Noble
... things in Helen Starratt's life didn't go very far beyond half-tipsy maids and impertinent ...
— Broken to the Plow • Charles Caldwell Dobie
... letters, he summarised his Continental experience after this wise: inns, cold, damp, dark, dismal, dirty; landlords equally disobliging and rapacious; servants awkward, sluttish, and slothful; postillions lazy, lounging, greedy, and impertinent. With this last class of delinquents after much experience he was bound to admit the following dilemma:—If you chide them for lingering, they will contrive to delay you the longer. If you chastise them with sword, cane, cudgel, or horsewhip ...
— Travels Through France and Italy • Tobias Smollett
... to have made but little use of the life of Dr. King, prefixed to his works, in three vols. 1776; to which it may not be impertinent to refer the reader. His talent for humour ought to be praised in the highest terms. In that, at least, he yielded to none ...
— Lives of the Poets, Vol. 1 • Samuel Johnson
... wrote a short note to the old man, telling him that if he did not hear in eight days, silence would be taken as the last refusal. The answer was simply a letter from Frau Wieck, acknowledging Schumann's "impertinent letter," and saying that Wieck would not hold ...
— The Love Affairs of Great Musicians, Volume 2 • Rupert Hughes
... now you are impertinent! Do you mean to go any further? We are a fighting race, we Brodies. Oh, you may laugh, sir! But 'tis no child's play to jest us on our Deacon, or, for that matter, on our Deacon's chamber either. It was his father's before him: ...
— The Plays of W. E. Henley and R. L. Stevenson
... I am so impertinent as to talk about myself like this. I have gone through a good deal of mental pain these last few weeks, and somehow I can't help showing you something of my real thoughts. Just because you are one of the few ...
— New Grub Street • George Gissing
... signal. He stooped to fasten a bootlace, and Rama, who was making for the gateway in the high wall forming the fourth side of the courtyard, called impatiently to him to hasten. The servant's tone was impertinent, and ...
— The Elephant God • Gordon Casserly
... I've been awfully impertinent," said Patricia, hurriedly rising, "but to a woman there is a note of interrogation behind every bachelor—especially nice bachelors—and the more 'confirmed' he is, ...
— The Keepers of the King's Peace • Edgar Wallace
... OREGON Aug. 18, 1903. MY DEAR, DEAR MARK TWAIN,—May a little girl write and tell you how dearly she loves and admires your writings? Well, I do and I want to tell you your ownself. Don't think me too impertinent for indeed I don't mean to be that! I have read everything of yours that I could get and parts that touch me I have read over and over again. They seem such dear friends to me, so like real live human beings ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... principle admitted of general application. For example, astrological books were to be licensed by John Booker, who could by no means see his way to pass the prognostications of his rival Lilly without "many impertinent obliterations," which made ...
— Life of John Milton • Richard Garnett
... was cut short by the sudden discharge of the pewter mug, which, however, fell harmlessly on the panel of the closing door as the impertinent Corrie sped forth to ...
— Gascoyne, the Sandal-Wood Trader • R.M. Ballantyne
... undoubtedly heard." At this remark the scoundrel turned on the other side, with his back toward me, and said, while yawning: "What I want? I want to sleep. Will you be good enough to keep the mosquitoes away for two hours?" Within five minutes I had my servant kick this impertinent and ungrateful wretch out of my park. If all of the low class think as this fellow, I fear our charitable efforts in their behalf will ...
— Mother Earth, Vol. 1 No. 1, March 1906 • Various
... drooped. The cord of his gymnasium swung uselessly above his head; he tottered no more along the corridors of the hospital. He had ceased to be the pet of the medical profession. His malady was obstinate and impertinent; it could neither be explained nor driven away; and as all the deep theories propounded respecting it, or carried into practical operation for its removal, proved to be mere elaborate fancies, or useless experiments, the medical ...
— A Tramp's Wallet - stored by an English goldsmith during his wanderings in Germany and France • William Duthie
... what to do. She could not decline to know the Prince without making some explanation to Millicent. She also could not flatter him so much. She must just be icily cold, and if he should be further impertinent she ...
— His Hour • Elinor Glyn
... to Miss Vincent. She knew that Mrs. Vincent thought Nelson too free in her way of speaking, and she did not like any of her rather impertinent ...
— Rosy • Mrs. Molesworth
... was still dreamily beautiful, and I should have been enchanted with the adventure (for I had fretted and complained a good deal, because we had no excuse for camping out) had it not been for that impertinent headache, which, you remember, always would visit me at the most ...
— The Shirley Letters from California Mines in 1851-52 • Louise Amelia Knapp Smith Clappe
... he took up a stick, went to his wife, whom he found still crying, and shutting the door, belaboured her so soundly, that she cried out, "Enough, husband, enough, forbear, and I will never ask the question more." Upon this, perceiving that she repented of her impertinent curiosity, he desisted; and opening the door, her friends came in, were glad to find her cured of her obstinacy, and complimented her husband upon this happy expedient to bring ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Complete • Anonymous
... never have a chance at a cathedral," he would reply. "And, besides, it always seems to me so material and so impertinent to build a little structure of stone and wood in which to ...
— A Mountain Woman and Others • (AKA Elia Wilkinson) Elia W. Peattie
... however, remains quite unembittered. In spite of all the demands, "She seemed to think that, apart from one or two exceptions, the Germans in occupation behaved very much as any army in such circumstances would have done. Indeed, she added that when the English arrived, some of them were so impertinent ... that people thought that they used to get on better with the Germans." I have quoted part of the last clause, as it seems fair to do so. For me it illustrates the general experience that the present discomfort tends by its vividness to seem greater than past discomforts which were ...
— The Better Germany in War Time - Being some Facts towards Fellowship • Harold Picton
... Serko when my strolls take me in the direction of the Beehive. He always shows himself disposed to chat with me, though, it is true, he does so in a tone of impertinent frivolity. We converse upon all sorts of subjects, but rarely of my position. Recrimination thereanent is useless and only subjects me ...
— Facing the Flag • Jules Verne
... common stock of enjoyment. The condition of our naval service is, in some respects, improved since Erskine was a member of it; but then all knowledge beyond that of the conduct of a ship, was deemed unnecessary, impertinent, and even adverse to the attainment of nautical skill. The intercourse of the officers even on the shore, was confined almost entirely to one another, for not to speak of the uncouthness of their habits, which made them as incapable of mingling in society ...
— A Sketch of the Life of the late Henry Cooper - Barrister-at-Law, of the Norfolk Circuit; as also, of his Father • William Cooper
... deal of trouble among servants arises from impertinent interferences and petty tyrannical exactions on the part of employers. Now the authority of the master and mistress of a house in regard to their domestics extends simply to the things they have contracted to do and the hours during which they have contracted to serve; otherwise than this, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 84, October, 1864 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... fine fellow, you will have the kindness to leave us to ourselves, and not to meddle with what does not concern you. If you were a brother or father of hers, the case might have been different. As it is, I can only consider you an impertinent meddler." ...
— Mary Barton • Elizabeth Gaskell
... LOWTHER'S is in his heart, and makes him go out of his way to help the wayward Member for North Westmeath. Mr. GINNELL, whose soft spot seems to be higher up, wanted to show that he did not approve of Mr. MACPHERSON, and called him an impertinent Minister. Ordered to withdraw the expression, he substituted "impudent." That would not do either, and there seemed danger of a deadlock and another expulsion until Mr. LOWTHER suggested that "incorrect" was a Parliamentary epithet which ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, February 28, 1917 • Various
... Churchill answered. He spoke a few words to her; about my aunt; about the way her machine ran—that sort of thing. He behaved toward her as if she were an indulged child, impertinent with licence and welcome enough. He himself looked rather like the short-sighted, but indulgent and very meagre lion that peers at the unicorn ...
— The Inheritors • Joseph Conrad
... crazy old New England conscience! If you were all Spanish, you'd look as innocent as a madonna for a week, and if you were my kind of Californian you'd cheek it and make your elders feel that they were impertinent for taking you ...
— The Californians • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... rolls of clay, ties them with paper, and then bakes it in the oven like a pudding. The servant is an Italian with a long duck's bill of a nose and quick little black eyes. He makes our negro women giggle like anything. It's evident he is fearfully impertinent. And, what do you think?—he hooks Mrs. Winscombe into her stays! Mother says that that isn't anything, really; Mrs. Winscombe is a lady of the court, and the most extraordinary happenings go on there. You see, mother knows ...
— The Three Black Pennys - A Novel • Joseph Hergesheimer
... splendor under the garb often is concealed poverty. 2. Of affectation of the young fop in the face impertinent an was seen smile. 3. Has been scattered Bible English the of millions by hundreds of the earth over the face. 4. To the end with no small difficulty of the journey at last through deep roads we after much fatigue came. 5. At the distance a flood of flame from the line from thirty iron mouths ...
— Higher Lessons in English • Alonzo Reed and Brainerd Kellogg
... the volcanic earth, the strewn ruin of all things, the prostrate handiwork of man mingled with the indignant bowels of the earth, and from a burrowed hole a POILU laughing out at us in impertinent greeting, with a gaiety which is more ...
— Defenders of Democracy • Militia of Mercy
... I suppose that Meynell—your precious guardian—my very amiable cousin—allows himself to make all kinds of impertinent statements about me. Well, you'll understand some day that there's no such bad judge of men as a clergyman. When he's not ignorant he's prejudiced—and when ...
— The Case of Richard Meynell • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... a day or two, by the arrival of Skelton, a well-dressed, languid, impertinent London tuft-hunter, a good deal faded, with a somewhat sallow and puffy face, charged with a pleasant combination at once of meanness, insolence, and sensuality—just such a person as Sir Wynston's parasite might have been ...
— The Evil Guest • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... Under-plots, and our Stage as much crowded with such Actors, as there's little or no occasion for; especially at one time. Then the Matter, and Discourse of our Plays is very often incoherent and impertinent as to the main Design; nothing being more common than to meet with two or three whole Scenes in a Play, which wou'd have fitted any other part of the Play ev'n as well as that; and perhaps any Play else. Thus some appear to swear out a Scene or two, others to talk ...
— Prefaces to Terence's Comedies and Plautus's Comedies (1694) • Lawrence Echard
... day lamenting that he grew old, when a shallow impertinent young fellow said to him, "What would you give to be as young as I am?"—"By the powers," replied Quin, "I would even submit to ...
— The Jest Book - The Choicest Anecdotes and Sayings • Mark Lemon
... hero, turning to his companion, "just hear these awful men! Did you ever hear anything like it? Why, they are really impertinent. Come, dear, we will go away and not talk with them further. It's a disgrace to be seen in their society a minute. Some of our friends might see us talking to these men and think they were our friends. Just ...
— Cad Metti, The Female Detective Strategist - Dudie Dunne Again in the Field • Harlan Page Halsey
... say nice things to me," acknowledged Constance, "but there is one deficiency you have overlooked. We do not love each other, and that is fatal to Aunt Gertrude's rather impertinent plans. It renders even a discussion of the matter impossible. I ...
— Five Thousand an Hour - How Johnny Gamble Won the Heiress • George Randolph Chester
... out of an engagement, she paid various flying visits to Nunsmere, bringing with her an echo of comic opera and an odor of Peau d'Espagne. She dawned on Septimus's horizon like a mischievous and impertinent planet, so different from Zora, the great fixed star of his heaven, yet so pretty, so twinkling, so artlessly and so obviously revolving round some twopenny-halfpenny sun of her own, that he took ...
— Septimus • William J. Locke
... you could not have been here oftener. This has been an unusually brilliant season. Really, many of the young people have lost their heads—or their hearts. I often wonder if these midshipmen have sweethearts at home." This daring—and impertinent—remark ...
— Dave Darrin's Second Year at Annapolis - Or, Two Midshipmen as Naval Academy "Youngsters" • H. Irving Hancock
... Clerk Jobson returning in great haste and in a most villanous temper. The will-making, even the illness of Gaffer Rutledge, had proved to be a "bam," that is to say, a hoax. The clerk's language became so impertinent towards Miss Vernon, that, if she had not prevented him, Frank would certainly have ...
— Red Cap Tales - Stolen from the Treasure Chest of the Wizard of the North • Samuel Rutherford Crockett
... grateful warmth; or in watching the dace that darted to and fro in the fish-pond at the bottom of the garden, with here and there a great sulky pike hanging midway down the water in silent state, as if it mocked at their impertinent friskings. I had more pleasure in these busy-idle diversions than in all the sweet flavors of peaches, nectarines, oranges, and such like common baits of children. Here John slyly deposited back upon the plate a bunch of grapes, which, not unobserved by Alice, ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Vol. V (of X) - Great Britain and Ireland III • Various
... think me very curious and impertinent; but Paris is about the most dangerous capital a high-spirited and generous young gentleman could visit without a Mentor. If you have not an experienced friend as a companion ...
— The Room in the Dragon Volant • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... evacuated by all male animals, and even the consul himself was not suffered to remain in it. Before they began their ceremonies, every corner and lurking place in the house was carefully searched, and no caution omitted to prevent all possibility of being discovered by impertinent curiosity, or disturbed by presumptive intrusion. But these cautions were not all the guard that was placed around them; The laws of the Romans made it death for any man to be present ...
— Sketches of the Fair Sex, in All Parts of the World • Anonymous
... startled her into that rush to the door annihilated her dignity at a blow. So did I finish my sandwiches beneath her invisible but eloquent fire. What affair of mine was the cake? And what sort of impertinent, meddlesome person was I, shrieking out my suggestions to people with whom I had no acquaintance? These were the things that her nose and her neck said to me the whole length of the Exchange. I had nothing but my own weakness ...
— Lady Baltimore • Owen Wister
... Some of this useful talent our hero had, however, acquired during his military service, and on this gross provocation it began seriously to arise. 'Look ye, sir; I came here for my own accommodation, and not to answer impertinent questions. Either say you can, or cannot, get me what I want; I shall pursue my course ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... on the stairs-head, don't give yourself all this trouble. God knows my heart, I meant no affront: but, since you seem to take my freedom amiss, I beg you will not acquaint Mr. Lovelace with it; for he perhaps will think me bold and impertinent. ...
— Clarissa, Volume 4 (of 9) - History Of A Young Lady • Samuel Richardson
... converse. So it undoubtedly does, and the air of refinement, native to the New Brunswicker, is never so strongly visible as when contrasted with the new-caught emigrant. Rudeness and vulgarity in glaring forms one never meets from them; odd and inquisitive ways may be thought impertinent, and require both time and patience to be ...
— Sketches And Tales Illustrative Of Life In The Backwoods Of New Brunswick • Mrs. F. Beavan
... I brought a symphony with me, which they played, and I took a violin part. The orchestra is enough to throw any one into fits. That young puppy Langenmantl was all courtesy, but his face looked as impertinent as ever; he said to me, "I was rather afraid you might have escaped us, or been offended by our jokes the other evening." "By no means," said I coolly; "you are still very young; but I advise you to be more cautious in future, for I am not accustomed to such jokes. ...
— The Letters of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, V.1. • Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
... relation of Carlos Montfort? Not his sister? You don't mean it. Why, I was at school with Carlos, the first school I ever went to. An old priest kept it, in Plaza Nero. Carlos was a good fellow, and gave me the biggest licking once—I'm very glad we met, Miss Montfort. And—I don't mean to be impertinent, I'm sure you know that; but—what are you ...
— Rita • Laura E. Richards
... Miss Frances. Stamped my foot! And I got mad, and was impertinent, and talked like a gutter girl to a sure-enough lady. ...
— How It Happened • Kate Langley Bosher
... screamed the impertinent young Irishman, and the story was all over Connemara and Joyce's Country in ...
— The Fitz-Boodle Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... animals slaughtered in sacrifice. The position of the fingers, Fig. 80, is also given as one of Quintilian's oratorical gestures by the words "Duo quoque medii sub pollicem veniunt," and is said by him to be vehement and connected with reproach or argument. In the present case, as a response to an impertinent or disagreeable petition, it simply means, "instead of giving what you ask, I will give you nothing but what is vile and useless, ...
— Sign Language Among North American Indians Compared With That Among Other Peoples And Deaf-Mutes • Garrick Mallery
... Methinks it is strange that people do not strive to forget their forlorn little identities, in such situations, instead of thrusting them forward into the dazzle of a great renown, where, if noticed, they cannot but be deemed impertinent. ...
— Our Old Home - A Series of English Sketches • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... disappeared at the rear of the house, Colonel Currie came round the front. He was smoking a cheroot, the slowly curling smoke from which, as also his whole gait and mien, was suggestive of peaceful proprietorship. He paused to examine his bed of spring wallflowers, stooped to uproot an impertinent dandelion which had taken root in his otherwise irreproachable turf, gathered a fine auricula and placed it in his button-hole. Then he took a contented survey of his fruit trees, until his eyes finally ...
— The Harmsworth Magazine, v. 1, 1898-1899, No. 2 • Various
... company of men soon became impertinent and almost hostile. A few harsh words reached Francine's ear, and after a word said to her mistress the girl retreated into the embrasure of a window. Marie rose, turned towards the insolent group, and gave them a look full of dignity and even disdain. ...
— The Chouans • Honore de Balzac
... and would have caned him heartily; but perceiving my intention, he took to his heels and vanished. Of all the people I have ever seen, the hostlers, postilions, and other fellows hanging about the post-houses in Italy, are the most greedy, impertinent, and provoking. Happy are those travellers who have phlegm enough to disregard their insolence and importunity: for this is not so disagreeable as their revenge is dangerous. An English gentleman at Florence told me, that one of those fellows, whom he had struck for ...
— Travels Through France and Italy • Tobias Smollett
... tendency from Erasmus Darwin, who stammered. (My father related a Johnsonian answer of Erasmus Darwin's: "Don't you find it very inconvenient stammering, Dr. Darwin?" "No, sir, because I have time to think before I speak, and don't ask impertinent questions.") ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume I • Francis Darwin
... ex-governess from a new angle—a more illuminating than agreeable one, at which she no longer figured as pitiful, her little assumptions and sillinesses calling for the chivalrous forbearance of persons more happily placed; but as actively impertinent, an usurper of authority and privileges altogether outside her office and her scope. She was greedy—not a pretty word yet a true one, covering both her manner of eating and her speech. Registering which facts Damaris was sensible of almost physical repulsion, as ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... to confuse the archaeologist with the mere collector of ignoble trifles, equally pleased with an unusual postage stamp or a scarce example of an Italian primitive. Nor should the impertinent curiosity of local antiquaries, which sees in every disused chalk-pit traces of Roman civilisation, be compared with the rare predilection requisite for a nobler pursuit. The archaeologist preserves for us those objects which time has forgotten and passing fashion rejected; in the museums he buries ...
— Masques & Phases • Robert Ross
... magistrate, and committed a barrister in petty sessions for contempt of court. An action was brought against him, but the Chief Baron raised so many legal exceptions, that it had finally to be abandoned through the fraternal law-moulding. This action was pending in the civil court, when a lawyer was very impertinent to the Chief Baron in the criminal. Instead of committing him, the Chief Baron ...
— The Reminiscences of an Irish Land Agent • S.M. Hussey
... her pretty invalid's gown of lace, stood silently at the music-room door, watching them. Her thick, dark hair was braided, and looped up under a black bow behind; and she looked like a curious and impertinent schoolgirl peeping at them there through the crack of the door, bending forward, her joined hands ...
— The Fighting Chance • Robert W. Chambers
... had in 1868 just become notorious for his grossly impertinent and indecent reply to the President of the Tribunal at the trial of Prince Peter Bonaparte for shooting Victor Noir. Grousset was the principal witness, and when asked the usual first question of French law, "Witness, are you the husband, wife, father, mother, ...
— The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke V1 • Stephen Gwynn
... Sets sober folk smiling; The tipsy and wise ones Are ready to spit In the beards of the pushing Impertinent strangers! But many are willing To drink without payment, And so when our peasants Go back to the birch-tree 20 A crowd presses round them. The first to come forward, A lean discharged deacon, With legs like two matches, Lets forth a great mouthful Of indistinct ...
— Who Can Be Happy And Free In Russia? • Nicholas Nekrassov
... which disposes of all things, Differently regulated this thing. With lank-sided coursers, Lineal descendants from Rosinante, With ploughmen in the dress of postilions, Blockheads of impertinent nature; Our carriages sticking fast a hundred times in the road, We went along with gravity at a leisurely pace, Knocking against the crags. The atmosphere in uproar with loud thunder, The rain-torrents streaming over the Earth Threatened mankind with the Day of Judgment [VERY BAD WEATHER], ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... esteemed the greatest mischief a man can do to those whom he loves, to raise men's expectations of them too high by undue and impertinent commendations.—SPRAT. ...
— Many Thoughts of Many Minds - A Treasury of Quotations from the Literature of Every Land and Every Age • Various
... of them carelessly greeted the august conductor. This impertinent youth was Paul Ford, a solicitor's clerk, who often went to Moorthorne because his employer had a branch office there, ...
— The Matador of the Five Towns and Other Stories • Arnold Bennett
... at the woods," said Mr. Clifford. He had once owned a neighboring lot, and his pecan trees had been fenced around to protect them from the impertinent swine; but now the party were going into ...
— Dotty Dimple Out West • Sophie May
... London correspondent, therefore, could whisper the sudden disappearance of a sparkling blade, who, after blazing awhile at Whitehall, had unaccountably vanished like a meteor from its horizon; nor had the depredation of swindlers, or the frequent intrusion of impertinent hangers-on compelled the owners of manorial houses to shut their doors on uninvited guests. The jovial coarse hospitality of those times delighted in a crowded board; the extensive household daily required ample provision, ...
— The Loyalists, Vol. 1-3 - An Historical Novel • Jane West
... been awfully impertinent," said Patricia, hurriedly rising, "but to a woman there is a note of interrogation behind every bachelor—especially nice bachelors—and the more 'confirmed' he is, the bigger the ...
— The Keepers of the King's Peace • Edgar Wallace
... honesty is intended. Nor are his words altogether without reason; for many persons declare openly that nothing will be done. If the alliance of England, therefore, appear of importance to your Highness, it would be well for you to write to the Dean of the Faculty, directing him to close an impertinent discussion, and require an answer to the question asked as quickly as possible."[271] The tone of this letter proves, with sufficient clearness, the true feelings of the French government; but at the moment the alternative suggested by the grand master might not be ventured. Francis could not ...
— The Reign of Henry the Eighth, Volume 1 (of 3) • James Anthony Froude
... by the sudden discharge of the pewter mug, which, however, fell harmlessly on the panel of the closing door as the impertinent Corrie sped forth to ...
— Gascoyne, the Sandal-Wood Trader • R.M. Ballantyne
... didn't," contradicted Jeff flatly. "You don't care a hang about me. You've never noticed me before. We're not friends. You've always disliked me. But you want the credit of bringing me into the fold. It's damned impertinent of you." ...
— The Vision Spendid • William MacLeod Raine
... blesses the whole human fam- 103:9 ily. As in the beginning, however, this libera- tion does not scientifically show itself in a knowledge of both good and evil, for the latter is unreal. 103:12 On the other hand, Mind-science is wholly separate from any half-way impertinent knowledge, because Mind- science is of God and demonstrates the divine Principle, 103:15 working out the purposes of good only. The maximum of good is the infinite God and His idea, the All-in-all. ...
— Science and Health With Key to the Scriptures • Mary Baker Eddy
... wisdom teacheth, and thus I argued: "Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners: I am a sinner; I want to be saved: he will save me." There is no presumption in taking God at his word: not to do so is very impertinent: I did it, and I ...
— Personal Recollections • Charlotte Elizabeth
... gentleman was puzzled. He went in and sat down to watch, feeling rather disturbed. Presently the fun began again: the children clapped their hands, the people laughed, and every one looked over at the house, in what he thought a very impertinent way. This made him angry; and out he rushed a second time, saying, as he marched across ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag VI - An Old-Fashioned Thanksgiving, Etc. • Louisa M. Alcott
... place, these proceedings seemed to him exceedingly impertinent, for what possible right did Clive imagine he had to come playing the fool like this, sighing in the dark and blowing kisses like a baby to ...
— The Bittermeads Mystery • E. R. Punshon
... invited them to the grand religious festival of his tribe. When they arrived, they found the village alive with preparation, and troops of women busied in sweeping the great circular area where the ceremonies were to take place. But as the noisy and impertinent guests showed a disposition to undue merriment, the chief shut them all in his wigwam, lest their Gentile eyes should profane the mysteries. Here, immured in darkness, they listened to the howls, yelpings, and ...
— Pioneers Of France In The New World • Francis Parkman, Jr.
... adopt a certain tone and to use certain phrases, which may or may not be justified. I yielded to the temptation. I was wrong, but I was also victimised. This morning, with a moment's torture under the impertinent tongue of a rascally impresario, I paid for all the spurious confidence which I have felt and for all the proud words I have uttered. I came to-day in order to lay at your feet my thanks for the unique humiliation which I ...
— The Lion's Share • E. Arnold Bennett
... appear to many who shall win their way thus far into this book, a work of impertinent supererogation to describe at large an American packet-ship, together with the mode of living on board a regular Liner, considering that there are some three or four of these departing every week from Liverpool, London, and Havre, ...
— Impressions of America - During the years 1833, 1834 and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Tyrone Power
... some of your explanations are more difficult than the things themselves. May I be as impertinent as I like on my birthday?" she asked suddenly, again looking up ...
— The Seaboard Parish Volume 1 • George MacDonald
... and a white cloth waved from it by an unseen hand. He wondered was it a signal. He stooped to fasten a bootlace, and Rama, who was making for the gateway in the high wall forming the fourth side of the courtyard, called impatiently to him to hasten. The servant's tone was impertinent, and Dermot looked up ...
— The Elephant God • Gordon Casserly
... each other's throats, publicly burnt each other, committed without a scruple and even as a duty, the greatest crimes, and shed torrents of blood. For what? To strengthen, support, or propagate the impertinent conjectures of some enthusiasts, or to give validity to the cheats of impostors, in the name of a being, who exists only in their imagination, and who has made himself known only by the ravages, disputes, ...
— Good Sense - 1772 • Paul Henri Thiry, Baron D'Holbach
... speaking on such a subject to a brother clergyman had been so unpleasant to him that he had been unable to introduce it till the last five minutes before his departure. "I hope you will not put it down as an impertinent interference," ...
— Framley Parsonage • Anthony Trollope
... the dead. The house supply of wax tapers was in the submerged cellar. So she took the lantern from its nail and set it on the floor at the head of the two pallets, and it threw scattered spots of lustre on Rice's white forehead and Maria's hair. This humble shrouded torch, impertinent as it looked when the lily-white moonlight lay across it, yet reminded beholders of a stable, and a Child born in a stable who had taught the race to turn every sorrow ...
— Old Kaskaskia • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... shewing a broad Blade, and cherishing a fierce Pair of Whiskers. Good Manners must certainly die with Chivalry; for what keeps all the pert Puppies about Town in Awe, but the Fear of being call'd to Account? Don't you know that there are a Set of impertinent Wretches, who are always disturbing publick Assemblies with Riots and Quarrels, only upon a presumption of being hinder'd from fighting, by the Crowd? There will be no end of such Grievances, if this Law takes Place. Besides, Sir, I hope it will be consider'd, ...
— The Theater (1720) • Sir John Falstaffe
... Veal persisted in her request, and told Mrs. Bargrave, she must not deny her: and she would have her tell her brother all their conversation, when she had opportunity. Dear Mrs. Veal, says Mrs. Bargrave, this seems so impertinent, that I cannot tell how to comply with it; and what a mortifying story will our conversation be to a young gentleman? Why, says Mrs. Bargrave, it is much better, methinks, to do it yourself. No, says Mrs. Veal, though it seems impertinent to you now, you will see more reason for it hereafter. Mrs. ...
— The Best Ghost Stories • Various
... not quite so impertinent, and clever speeches of that sort never occur to me until you say them. But I told Miss Drummond that I could not consent to spoil her lovely dress in that way; and then she laughed and gave in, and owned she knew nothing about fashions, and that her sister Grace always ordered ...
— Not Like Other Girls • Rosa N. Carey
... ignoring the fact that there was no Habeas Corpus Act in Prussia. We can easily understand how repulsive this was to a man who, like Bismarck, wished nothing more than that his countrymen should copy, not the details of the English Constitution, but the proud self-reliance which would regard as impertinent ...
— Bismarck and the Foundation of the German Empire • James Wycliffe Headlam
... although not impertinent to the main subject, which is Quincy Market. After having perambulated the principal markets of the other leading American cities, I must pronounce it facile princeps among New-World markets. A walk through it ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 101, March, 1866 • Various
... time been seen by me to-day. They are decidedly the most graceful of sea-birds; and, from the exquisite purity of their plumage when settled on a piece of ice or snow, it required a practised eye to detect them. Not so the voracious and impertinent mollies—the Procellaria of naturalists. Their very ugliness appeared to give them security, and they are, in the North, what the vulture and carrion crow are in more ...
— Stray Leaves from an Arctic Journal; • Sherard Osborn
... thought fit to send his boat on board of me, with only the cockswain, in her, who was a very dirty ragged fellow: As soon as he was brought to me, he asked whence I came, whither I was bound, and many other questions, which I thought equally impertinent, at the same time pulling out a book, and pen and ink, that he might set down the answers; but as I was impatient to save him this trouble, he was desired immediately to walk over the ship's side, and put off his boat, with which he was ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 12 • Robert Kerr
... and shrewd, but they always let the cat out of the bag. The thing to do is to flatter him in some way. A woman could find out all he knows in ten minutes." He turned to Clara and smiled. There was something infinitely impertinent in the fixed, animal-like stare of his eyes. "We do take you into our plans, your father and me, eh?" he said. "You must be careful not to give us away when ...
— Poor White • Sherwood Anderson
... had, I certainly should not show them to you, impertinent person! There are a few little souvenirs in that desk, but nothing ...
— Rose in Bloom - A Sequel to "Eight Cousins" • Louisa May Alcott
... talents superiorly vain, Was trotting, with consequence, over the plain, A worm, in his progress remarkably slow, Cried—"Bless your good worship wherever you go; I hope your great mightiness won't take it ill, I pay my respects with a hearty good-will." With a look of contempt, and impertinent pride, "Begone, you vile reptile," his antship replied; "Go—go, and lament your contemptible state, But first—look at me—see my limbs how complete; I guide all my motions with freedom and ease, Run backward and ...
— MacMillan's Reading Books - Book V • Anonymous
... thereof joined together in the same commission. Yea, so individual and inseparable are power and exercise, that under exercise, power and authority is derived: as, "Go, disciple ye all nations, baptizing them," &c., Matt. xxviii. 18, 19. 3. How vain, idle, impertinent, and ridiculous is it to fancy and dream of such a power as shall never be drawn into act by them ...
— The Divine Right of Church Government • Sundry Ministers Of Christ Within The City Of London
... me this the next day, and I could see she thought I had been bragging of my family. So I recounted all the conversation I had had with him, as nearly as I could recollect, and set down the question to an impertinent irony. But I have since changed my mind: I now judge that he could not believe any poor person would joke about poverty. I never found one of those people who go about begging for charities believe me when I told ...
— The Vicar's Daughter • George MacDonald
... man to choose what he will do or not do, there is no adequate science of him. If there is a science of him, there is no free choice, and the praise or blame with which we regard one another are impertinent ...
— Short Studies on Great Subjects • James Anthony Froude
... exhibition of the human species on undress parade. True, there were hundreds of appreciative tributes from readers who spoke only out of a heart's gratitude; but there were nearly as great a number who came with a compliment, and added a petition, or a demand, or a suggestion, usually unwarranted, often impertinent. Politicians, public speakers, aspiring writers, actors, elocutionists, singers, inventors (most of them he had never seen or heard of) cheerfully asked him for a recommendation as to their abilities ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... If we row a little way up we shall see this ceremony at the Burning Ghauts. There are funeral pyres of wood where the relatives are carrying out the last offices for the dead. Some prowling pariah dogs, of the lean yellow breed, and a few impertinent crows are hovering about, hoping that some scraps may fall to their share. The dead bodies are rolled up in white and red cloth and lie with their feet in the ...
— Round the Wonderful World • G. E. Mitton
... my noble friend!—I love and admire you for the generous conclusion of your last more than I can express. Though I began this letter with impertinent raillery, knowing that you always loved to indulge my mad vein; yet never was there a heart that more glowed with friendly love, than ...
— Clarissa, Volume 1 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... returned he told me it would leave that evening, and would save much time. He spoke to our skipper, who was not willing to release us without our paying him the whole passage money, namely two ducatoons apiece. Many words passed and hard enough they were on both sides, in which the skipper was very impertinent, yet not altogether in the wrong. We went aboard, and his passion having subsided, we satisfied him with two ducats,[468] and took our goods to the packet boat. We went ashore to enter our names, according to the custom; my comrade giving his acknowledged ...
— Journal of Jasper Danckaerts, 1679-1680 • Jasper Danckaerts
... empire enough to furnish all the Courts in Europe with attendants, courtiers, and valets? Do you not believe that with a nod, with a single nod, I might have them all prostrated before my throne? What can, then, have occasioned this impertinent delay?" ...
— Memoirs of the Court of St. Cloud, Complete - Being Secret Letters from a Gentleman at Paris to a Nobleman in London • Lewis Goldsmith
... do not mean to be impertinent. In that case I should be obliged to speak to my nephew," said Lady Randolph. She had not intended to quarrel with Jock. It was only the vacancy of the morning, and her desire for movement of some sort, that had brought her to this; and now she ...
— Sir Tom • Mrs. Oliphant
... is larger, that's all—a fraction more than one hundred and six carats, but it has neither the coloring nor the cutting of this." There was a pause. "Would it be impertinent if I ask ...
— The Diamond Master • Jacques Futrelle
... temperatures, all degrees of light and shade have been volunteered, many with a violence that lends conviction, but all in vain. The thing remains as secret, as recondite, as baffling as ever. Good Bostonians regard attempts to solve the problem as not only futile but impertinent—almost blasphemous—accepting it as a factor in the general inscrutability which veils the world, and are content to let ...
— White Ashes • Sidney R. Kennedy and Alden C. Noble
... to the ears, and felt thankful to the darkness, which prevented it from being seen. After this, he desisted, and remained perfectly still, fearing even to renew the conversation, lest he should seem impertinent to these ladies, to whom, at first, he had thought himself rather condescending ...
— The Queen's Necklace • Alexandre Dumas pere
... went toward the stairs. Since the day when he had shown it for the first time to Beryl Van Tuyn and Arabian he had not seen either of them. Nor had he had a word from them. This had not troubled him. Already he was at work on another sitter, a dancer in the Russian ballet, talented, decadent, impertinent, and, so Garstin believed, marked out for early death in a madhouse—altogether quite an interesting study. But now, looking at ...
— December Love • Robert Hichens
... less genuine for having been expressed in the slang of a humorous period? Had they been permanently separated by judicious guardians, and had she been obliged to obliterate his image from her lightly-beating little heart? Bernard had felt sure at Baden that, beneath her contemptuous airs and that impertinent consciousness of the difficulties of conquest by which a pretty American girl attests her allegiance to a civilization in which young women occupy the highest place—he had felt sure that Blanche had a high appreciation of her handsome Englishman, ...
— Confidence • Henry James
... hear that," I exclaimed. "That's the worst news I have had yet. I did hope that we were far enough from the line of travel to escape these scourges. How did you get rid of him? Was he impertinent?" ...
— Rudder Grange • Frank R. Stockton
... barber, who had the same suspicion as the curate, asked Don Quixote what would be his advice as to the measures that he said ought to be adopted; for perhaps it might prove to be one that would have to be added to the list of the many impertinent suggestions that people were in the habit of offering ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... the Duchessa, "and in rather tragical circumstances. But at that time he was anonymous. Why—if you won't think my curiosity impertinent—why Francois Villon?" ...
— The Cardinal's Snuff-Box • Henry Harland
... to one of those middle-class families which were called indifferently, in the impertinent language of the last century, the high bourgeoise or the petty nobility. This family had inherited from the brothers Paclet the fief of Tirechappe, which was dependent upon the Bishop of Paris, ...
— Notre-Dame de Paris - The Hunchback of Notre Dame • Victor Hugo
... about his former idle habits,—frequenting of democratic oratory, public-houses, and fondness for bad company and strolling actors. Meek and easily cowed, Charlotte only opened her lips to say she knew that he had taken home Mr. Calcott's parcel. But this brought down a storm on her for being impertinent enough to defend him, and she sat trembling till it had subsided; and Martha retreating, left her to weep unrestrainedly over her wild fancies, and the world's cruelty and injustice towards one whom, as she was now ready to declare, she loved ...
— Dynevor Terrace (Vol. I) - or, The Clue of Life • Charlotte M. Yonge
... to pry into the private affairs of others by asking what their profits are, what things cost, whether Melissa ever had a beau, and why Amarette never got married? All such questions are extremely impertinent and are likely ...
— Searchlights on Health - The Science of Eugenics • B. G. Jefferis and J. L. Nichols
... on such conditions. Almost everyday brought with it some new cause of uneasiness and complaint. Sentinels were posted beneath Napoleon's windows and before his doors. This order was, however, doubtless given to prevent his being annoyed by impertinent curiosity. The French were certainly precluded from all free communication with the inhabitants of the island; but this precaution was of unquestionable necessity for the security of the Emperor's person. Las Cases complains that the passwords ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... doubtless as it should be, in a romance; but the unfortunate publication of Mrs. Carlyle's letters and journals introduced a jarring note of reality. A jungle of controversial writings has since grown up around the domestic relations of the Carlyles,—impertinent, deplorable writings, which serve no purpose but to make us cry, "Enough, let them rest in peace!" Both had sharp tongues, and probably both ...
— Outlines of English and American Literature • William J. Long
... if she considered this a very impertinent question, the woman replied, with a slight toss ...
— Wired Love - A Romance of Dots and Dashes • Ella Cheever Thayer
... should be glad of our meal, the pompous and (though true) most unsatisfactory answer was, 'It will be ready when it is ready!' If we had dared to remonstrate any further, we should have been told to proceed on our journey, as being too impertinent. The hosts are most ungracious and disagreeable in their manners; their houses and their persons are often filthily dirty; the want of the accommodation of forks, knives, and spoons is common; and I am sure no cottage or hovel ...
— Life of Charles Darwin • G. T. (George Thomas) Bettany
... heed to this impertinent boy. His eye was fixed on a distant black speck that was becoming more and more pronounced out there amidst the grays and greens of the windy and sunlit sea. Occasionally it disappeared altogether, as a cloud of rain swept across ...
— Macleod of Dare • William Black
... that very impertinent?" Edith asked, wonderingly. "What concern could it possibly be to the clerks ...
— Looking Backward - 2000-1887 • Edward Bellamy
... his trouble. There are fewer than thirty Greek authors worth inquiring for; they exist, beyond doubt, and beyond doubt they may, by attention, patience, and skill, be brought to light. * * With a smaller sum than is annually expended on the appointment of some silly and impertinent young envoy, we might restore all, or nearly all those writers of immortal name, whose disappearance has been the regret of genius for four entire centuries. In my opinion, a few thousand pounds, laid out on such an undertaking, ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 70, March 1, 1851 • Various
... as he was concerned. What did surprise and annoy him was to find that The Inexpressible, which, though well-known to be a stupid, was generally considered a decent paper, had taken the enemy's side, and published some very impertinent paragraphs about him. Afterwards he discovered that he had been the victim of a principle. The Inexpressible and Blunder and Bluster had a little private quarrel of their own, and the former felt bound to attack every thing in any way ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2, May, 1851 • Various
... Fort all that was wanted in the matter of an outfit, therefore it was determined upon that the party should proceed next to Monterey, where they knew they could purchase the articles that were actually required. While en route, and when within thirty miles of this last-named town, an impertinent order was received from Gen. Castro, the Mexican commander of the territory. The purport of this order was, that Fremont and his party must immediately vacate the country without further notice, or else the gallant general would be obliged to drive them out. It was late in ...
— The Life and Adventures of Kit Carson, the Nestor of the Rocky Mountains, from Facts Narrated by Himself • De Witt C. Peters
... look at the troops encamped on the space in front of the Serapeum. The whole street was like a crowded fair; and Alexander had several times to follow Agatha and her escort out into the roadway, quitting the shelter of the arcade, to escape a party of rioters or the impertinent ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... depresso supercilio, crudelitatem tibi non placere. Some think to bear it by speaking a great word, and being peremptory; and go on, and take by admittance, that which they cannot make good. Some, whatsoever is beyond their reach, will seem to despise, or make light of it, as impertinent or curious; and so would have their ignorance seem judgment. Some are never without a difference, and commonly by amusing men with a subtilty, blanch the matter; of whom A. Gellius saith, Hominem delirum, qui verborum minutiis rerum frangit pondera. Of which kind also, Plato, in his ...
— Essays - The Essays Or Counsels, Civil And Moral, Of Francis Ld. - Verulam Viscount St. Albans • Francis Bacon
... unembittered. In spite of all the demands, "She seemed to think that, apart from one or two exceptions, the Germans in occupation behaved very much as any army in such circumstances would have done. Indeed, she added that when the English arrived, some of them were so impertinent ... that people thought that they used to get on better with the Germans." I have quoted part of the last clause, as it seems fair to do so. For me it illustrates the general experience that the present discomfort tends ...
— The Better Germany in War Time - Being some Facts towards Fellowship • Harold Picton
... Stevenson too has his lovers among those who have accompanied him on his Inland Voyage, or through the fastnesses of the Cevennes in the wake of Modestine. He is loved by those that never saw his face; and one who has sealed that dizzy height of ambition may well be content, without the impertinent assurance that, when the Japanese have taken London and revised the contents of the British Museum, the yellow scribes whom they shall set to produce a new edition of the Biographie Universelle will include in their entries ...
— Robert Louis Stevenson • Walter Raleigh
... it was the habit then more than later to draw inferences from foreign facts; there had not yet accumulated that great swelling volume of home testimony which made reference to experience outside of America unnecessary and rather impertinent. His remedy for the existing evil is the elevation of slaves to the rank of tenants, not in a sudden emancipation, but in the gradual selection of the most capable, and he finds his most satisfactory example in the experiment made thirty years before by the Chancellor of Poland. The appeal is ...
— Noah Webster - American Men of Letters • Horace E. Scudder
... rage, did advance to the door pointed out, and put his head inside, and there, on beholding a group of young ladies of all ages, from eight to fourteen, and no little brother, and finding all eyes turned upon himself as an impertinent intruder, he drew his head back quickly, and was met with a loud laugh from Jane, which so annoyed him, that without stopping to think, he ran off to his own room as fast as he could. The voice of Mary Roscoe however reached him as he ran along the gallery, uttering ...
— Brotherly Love - Shewing That As Merely Human It May Not Always Be Depended Upon • Mrs. Sherwood
... there was no doubt about it, I had done the right thing, and was glad. I was grateful to Taylor for having given me the opportunity. Perhaps I should have been grateful to the person whose brutal and impertinent frankness had piqued me into grasping that opportunity, but I ...
— The Rise of Roscoe Paine • Joseph C. Lincoln
... was short and stout and florid, with an impertinent-looking moustache, and hair that was very smooth and oily save for two tight curls, which looked like the horns of a young goat, on each side of the centre parting. I hated him cordially, and had to control ...
— Castles in the Air • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... New England conscience! If you were all Spanish, you'd look as innocent as a madonna for a week, and if you were my kind of Californian you'd cheek it and make your elders feel that they were impertinent for taking you ...
— The Californians • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... you should grant me the use of Grace Church for a solemn service (a marriage, a baptism, or a funeral, as the case may be), and as it is desirable that the feelings of the parties should be protected as far as possible from the impertinent intrusion and disturbance of a crowd from the streets and lanes of the city, I beg that no one may be admitted within the doors of the church during the very few moments that we expect to be there, but our invited friends only,"—it would certainly, ...
— A Unique Story of a Marvellous Career. Life of Hon. Phineas T. • Joel Benton
... grave face, and he was divided between vexation and a sort of reluctant admiration of her coolness. She was bold and forward, not to say impertinent, but she seemed wholly unconscious of it, and, after all, she was from one of the wildest parts of Idaho. He kindly excused much of her conduct on the ...
— The Candidate - A Political Romance • Joseph Alexander Altsheler
... come to Wingham this summer, Forget the world's trouble and strife, Our program will sure be a hummer, We'll give you the time of your life. We'll make no untimely suggestions, Concerning the length of your stay, Nor ask you impertinent questions About ...
— War Rhymes • Abner Cosens
... have behaved, had the young ladies been more courageous, must be doubtful; but such an invitation for attack could not be resisted; and Harriet was soon assailed by half a dozen children, headed by a stout woman and a great boy, all clamorous, and impertinent in look, though not absolutely in word.—More and more frightened, she immediately promised them money, and taking out her purse, gave them a shilling, and begged them not to want more, or to use her ill.—She was then able to walk, though but slowly, and was moving away—but ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... praise, and what to blame, as if they had been suffered to feel and to express their own feelings naturally? In reading an interesting play, or beautiful poem, how often has a man of taste and genius execrated the impertinent commentator, who interrupts him by obtruding his ostentatious notes—"The reader will observe the beauty of this thought." "This is one of the finest passages in any author, ancient or modern." "The sense of this line, which all former annotators have mistaken, is obviously restored ...
— Practical Education, Volume I • Maria Edgeworth
... with an impertinent little toss of her bobbed-off black hair, said: "Oh, Pen, why do you waste your time on a commonplace architect? He will never satisfy you—not in a thousand years. Bye-bye, I'll see you at the party." Then away she went, her eyes challenging Seraphine who stands for all ...
— Possessed • Cleveland Moffett
... Though if any Truly knowing Chymists shall Think fit in a civil and rational way to shew him any truth touching the matter in Dispute That he yet discernes not, Carneades will not refuse either to admit, or to own a Conviction: yet if any impertinent Person shall, either to get Himself a Name, or for what other end soever, wilfully or carelesly mistake the State of the Controversie, or the sence of his Arguments, or shall rail instead of arguing, as hath been done of Late in Print by divers Chymists;[1] or lastly, ...
— The Sceptical Chymist • Robert Boyle
... Peterkin, laughing. "It is really too bad that a fellow can't have a little tete-a-tete with a friend but you and Ralph must be thrusting your impertinent ...
— The Gorilla Hunters • R.M. Ballantyne
... the Bishop, following closely Tilly's pretty penmanship; "'Concerning that part of me called the soul or spirit which is immortal, I will it back again to its Maker, leaving it to Him to do as He pleases with, without asking any impertinent questions or making any ...
— The Bishop of Cottontown - A Story of the Southern Cotton Mills • John Trotwood Moore
... own story, and it would be impertinent to guess at the feelings of those intrepid travelers when they found themselves forestalled. Nevertheless they had achieved the purpose they had set themselves, and the fact that they could not claim the reward of priority ...
— The Voyages of Captain Scott - Retold from 'The Voyage of the "Discovery"' and 'Scott's - Last Expedition' • Charles Turley
... Stadtholder in Elysium, a string breaks with hideous sound, and the whole effect of his composition is destroyed. A smile jumped instantaneously to the protruding lip of the learned Laurentius, and mocked his mishap: the son of the brewer observed the impertinent smile, and anger gave him courage—the broken string is instantly replaced. The artist rushes full speed into the allegretto—and under the pressure of his hands, burning with rage and genius, the chord breaks ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 334, August 1843 • Various
... Sound, as it is called, was written and printed in 1697. As it was designed for music (it was set by Jeremiah Clarke), the closing lines of every strophe are repeated by way of chorus. I have removed these repetitions as impertinent to the effect of the poem in print, and as interrupting the rushing vehemency of the narrative. The incident described is the burning ...
— Lyra Heroica - A Book of Verse for Boys • Various
... I find they all believe the impertinent creature is breeding—that's pure! it will soon reach ...
— The Man Of The World (1792) • Charles Macklin
... that I have nothing to say—which won't prevent you from coming back in an hour and standing in exactly the same ridiculous position you now occupy, and asking me exactly the same unmannerly questions, and taking the same impertinent snapshots at my house and ...
— The Green Mouse • Robert W. Chambers
... Only one slight incident disturbed a little our devotions. One of the Flibustiers, taking an indecent posture during the Elevation, was reprimanded by Captain Daniel. Instead of correcting himself, he made some impertinent answer, accompanied with an execrable oath, which was paid on the spot by the Captain, who pistolled him in the head, swearing before God that he would do the same to the first man who failed in respect for the Holy Sacrifice. The cur ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 59, September, 1862 • Various
... my merit. It might well have been with me as it is with you; but, as a rule, I think that where there is a secret it had better be kept. No one, at any rate, should allow it to be wormed out of him by the impertinent assiduity of others. If there be anything affecting your wife which you do not wish all the world on this side of the water to know, do not tell it to any one on this side ...
— Dr. Wortle's School • Anthony Trollope
... valuable in many respects, especially for its account of the contemporary stage. In describing an actor or actress he had few equals—witness his skilful portrait of Nokes, and his admirably graphic vignette of Mrs. Verbruggen as that "finish'd Impertinent," Melantha, in ...
— Fielding - (English Men of Letters Series) • Austin Dobson
... the old gentleman, 'education a great thing: a very great thing! I never had any. I admire it the more in others. A very fine thing. Yes, yes. Tell me more of your history. Let me hear it all. No impertinent curiosity—no, no, no.' ...
— The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby • Charles Dickens
... London tradesman. He had attended school with Frederick, and was now working in the same shop and at the same business with him. He was possessed of a robust physical appearance, somewhat coarsely featured;—of a bold, but humorous disposition—at times impertinent, and even repulsive in his manner. Frederick had really never considered him as a confidential friend; but their long acquaintance with each other, and the many associations of their united course ...
— The Black-Sealed Letter - Or, The Misfortunes of a Canadian Cockney. • Andrew Learmont Spedon
... and the greatest favourite he ever had, used to sign himself in his letters to his royal master, His Majesty's 'dog and slave,' and used to address his majesty as 'his Sowship.' His majesty was the worst rider ever seen, and thought himself the best. He was one of the most impertinent talkers (in the broadest Scotch) ever heard, and boasted of being unanswerable in all manner of argument. He wrote some of the most wearisome treatises ever read—among others, a book upon witchcraft, in which he was a devout ...
— A Child's History of England • Charles Dickens
... Master seems to get under your skin. I'll soon show you how impertinent you are.(He has the foils brought and gives one to Nicole). There. Demonstration: The line of the body. When your opponent thrusts in quarte, you need only do this, and when they thrust in tierce, you need ...
— The Middle Class Gentleman - (Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme) • Moliere
... their minds at rest on that subject, and my point of view of girls was taken entirely from them. I can remember very well my pause of dawning doubt and surprise when a girl first informed me she thought a man who told her she was pretty was impertinent. What bewildered me still more on that occasion was that this particular girl was so extremely beautiful that to talk about anything else but her beauty was a waste of time. It made all other topics trivial, and yet she seemed quite sincere in what she ...
— Captain Macklin • Richard Harding Davis
... abridgment like Florian's, but not so skilfully executed; and the version published by Miss Smirke in 1818, to accompany her brother's plates, was merely a patchwork production made out of former translations. On the latest, Mr. A. J. Duffield's, it would be in every sense of the word impertinent in me to offer an opinion here. I had not even seen it when the present undertaking was proposed to me, and since then I may say vidi tantum, having for obvious reasons resisted the temptation which Mr. ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... front, with large white collars, two little frills to form the short sleeves, large, bare, clean, white arms, and short white aprons not reaching to the knees. They had no caps, and such a circumference of hoops! quite Yankeeish in their style; and most careless, flirtatious-looking and impertinent in their manners. We were quite disgusted with them; and even papa could not defend any one of them. We were naturally very badly waited upon; they sailing majestically about the room instead of rushing to get what we wanted, ...
— First Impressions of the New World - On Two Travellers from the Old in the Autumn of 1858 • Isabella Strange Trotter
... freedom I have ta'en, An' if impertinent I've been, Impute it not, good sir, in ane Whase heart ne'er wrang'd ye, But to his utmost would befriend Ought that belang'd ...
— Robert Burns - How To Know Him • William Allan Neilson
... neither the first lover, nor the virtuous model son who here and there occurs, lays claim to much significance. The servant- world—the crafty valet, the stern house-steward, the old vigilant tutor, the rural slave redolent of garlic, the impertinent page—forms a transition to the very numerous professional parts. A standing figure among these is the jester (-parasitus-) who, in return for permission to feast at the table of the rich, has to entertain the guests with drolleries and charades, or, according to circumstances, to let the ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen
... you profited at all by this lesson on inoculating?" he asked the girl, and he added a remark which was so vulgar and impertinent that he would not have dared to use the expression in a variety theatre or any other low place ...
— Dr. Dumany's Wife • Mr Jkai
... silly impertinent fellow mean? thought I; but the ale was now before me, and I hastened to drink, for my weakness was great, and my mind was full of dark thoughts, the remains of the indescribable horror of the preceding ...
— Isopel Berners - The History of certain doings in a Staffordshire Dingle, July, 1825 • George Borrow
... crocheting a shawl in such light as she could get from a blue-shaded night-lamp that hung in the middle of the great whitewashed room within. She looked up from her work long enough to challenge me with a shrewd, impertinent look of inquiry, demanded to know if I had any lead-pencils about my person, and, receiving a polite ...
— The Long Day - The Story of a New York Working Girl As Told by Herself • Dorothy Richardson
... cleanness—unseemly, for it was such that he paid no heed to the Lord, but immediately disobeyed his positive command. The moral position the man took was that which displeased the Lord, made him angry. He saw in him positive and rampant self-will and disobedience, an impertinent assurance and self-satisfaction. Filled, not with pure delight, or the child-like merriment that might well burst forth, mingled with tears, at such deliverance; filled, not with gratitude, but gratification, the keener that he had been so long an object ...
— Unspoken Sermons - Series I., II., and II. • George MacDonald
... this public indifference even congenial to one conscious of the inexhaustible resources and the unconquerable power of his mind. The eagle loves the awful solitude of her sublime cliffs, which remove her far from the importunate chattering and impertinent intrusion of magpies and daws; but it is truly a misfortune to the country that the imperial bird should sleep on her lonely eyrie, and leave the supreme dominion to region ...
— Discourse of the Life and Character of the Hon. Littleton Waller Tazewell • Hugh Blair Grigsby
... that tore my bosom at that moment! Thou witnessedst my efforts to repel the testimony of my ears! It was in vain that you dwelt upon the confusion which my unlooked-for summons excited in you; the tardiness with which a suitable excuse occurred to you; your resentment that my impertinent intrusion had put an end to that charming interview: A disappointment for which you endeavoured to compensate yourself, by the frequency ...
— Wieland; or The Transformation - An American Tale • Charles Brockden Brown
... despairing Porthos; who, as they were going along, said to his friend, "Take care, my good D'Artagnan, not to compromise the dignity of a man such as I am with the arrogance of this Percerin, who will, I expect, be very impertinent; for I give you notice, my friend, that if he is wanting in respect I ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... being married to Mr. Trelyon, and how happy and pleased and pretty she would look as they went walking together! And then how proud he would be to have so nice a wife! and he would joke about her and be very impertinent, but he would simply worship her all the same, and do everything he could to please her. And he would take her away and show her all the beautiful places abroad; and he would have a yacht, too; and he would give her a fine ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, April 1875, Vol. XV., No. 88 • Various
... itself in spite of me on small and impertinent matters—a sure symptom of failing mental health. My presence here is only one of several attempts that I have made to live idly since my father's death. They have all failed. Work has become necessary to me. I will go to ...
— Cashel Byron's Profession • George Bernard Shaw
... they set very little store upon metre as a dividing line between poetry and prose, and no store at all upon rhyme. I am tempted to-day to go farther, and to maintain that, the larger, the sublimer, your subject is, the more impertinent rhyme becomes to it: and that this impertinence increases in a sort of geometrical progression as you advance from monosyllabic to dissyllabic and on to trisyllabic rhyme. Let me put this by a ...
— On The Art of Reading • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... the other members of the company. He found them genial enough, even somewhat boisterous, with the single exception of Mr. Lane, who maintained a dignified and rather gloomy silence, such as became one of his recognized professional standing, after having favored the newcomer with a long, impertinent stare, apparently expressing disapproval. The manager was outwardly in most excellent humor, narrating several stories, at which all, excepting the reserved comedian, laughed quite heartily. At the conclusion of the repast, Albrecht condescended ...
— Beth Norvell - A Romance of the West • Randall Parrish
... all of us and had a very good sermon of a stranger, and so I and the young company to walk first to Graye's Inn Walks, where great store of gallants, but above all the ladies that I there saw, or ever did see, Mrs. Frances Butler (Monsieur L'Impertinent's sister) is the greatest beauty. Then we went to Islington, where at the great house I entertained them as well as I could, and so home with them, and so to my own home and to bed. Pall, who went this day to a child's christening of ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... else,—namely, these fine people were always in an agony to seem finer than they were; and the more airs a gentleman or a lady gave him or her self, the more important they became. Joe, the dog's-meat man, had indeed got into society entirely from a knack of saying impertinent things to everybody; and the smartest exclusives of the place, who seldom visited any one where there was not a silver teapot, used to think Joe had a great deal in him because he trundled his cart with his head in the air, and one day gave the very beadle ...
— Paul Clifford, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... be home twenty-four hours after you," said Cornish, as he bade Joan good-bye at the station. "And you need believe no rumours and fear no gossip. If people ask impertinent ...
— Roden's Corner • Henry Seton Merriman
... sunshine on the torpid snake, it put him into immediate motion. He now took off his spectacles, as if to indulge himself with a view of me by the naked eye; and after a scrutinizing look, which, in another place and person, I should probably have resented as impertinent, but which here seemed part of his profession, he rose from his seat and ushered me into another apartment. This room was probably his place of reception for criminals of a more exalted order; for it was lined ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXII. - June, 1843.,Vol. LIII. • Various
... whom they converse. So it undoubtedly does, and the air of refinement, native to the New Brunswicker, is never so strongly visible as when contrasted with the new-caught emigrant. Rudeness and vulgarity in glaring forms one never meets from them; odd and inquisitive ways may be thought impertinent, and require both time and ...
— Sketches And Tales Illustrative Of Life In The Backwoods Of New Brunswick • Mrs. F. Beavan
... and as touchy in the temper of its wearers. To pull a guardsman by his coat-tail would be as unpardonable an offence as to tread on a lady's skirt; and to offer an opinion upon a lancer's cap might be considered as impertinent as to criticise a lady's bonnet. Having, however, been bold enough to commit offences of the latter description, we will now venture to brave the wrath of the whole of Her Majesty's forces, horse, foot, and artillery, while we read those gallant gentlemen ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 363, January, 1846 • Various
... a young duchess in her anger. After the pictures, she had twisted her hair on top of her head in shining coils, and the dress she wore was a quaint mull that had been her grandmother's, a thing of creamy folds and laces that swept the floor. Launcelot felt suddenly very crude and impertinent to be dictating to this very stately young lady. But her next remark made her a child again, and brought ...
— Judy • Temple Bailey
... I lit a cigarette and strolled forward. Either the fellow had fancied that he knew her or he had behaved in a confoundedly impertinent way. The latter hypothesis seemed, on the whole, the more likely, and I felt a lively desire to drop ...
— The Firefly Of France • Marion Polk Angellotti
... I thought when I told them they could not get him that they would go away, but when they asked me if he was not there, of course I could not tell them a story; so I said I declined to answer impertinent questions. You know poor Charlie was at that moment lying curled up under the bed in the boys' room with a roll of carpet a foot thick around him, and it was as hot as an oven. Well, they insisted on going through the house, and I let them go all through the lower stories; but when they started ...
— The Burial of the Guns • Thomas Nelson Page
... "Ross, would you tell me something about her? Arethusa's mother, I mean. But if you'd rather not.... I've no sort of wish to arouse any memories which might hurt; but I can't help feeling, dear, that I would like to know something about her. I've never asked you before, because it seemed impertinent; but I really do not mean it at ...
— The Heart of Arethusa • Francis Barton Fox
... her in. What can the impertinent flirt want with me? She knows I hate her too for being of the other party: however, I'll be as civil to her as I can. [Enter Miss STITCH.] Dear miss! your servant; this ...
— Miscellanies, Volume 2 (from Works, Volume 12) • Henry Fielding
... vivid world the watchful monkey ever ready to swoop down upon the tempting tail-feathers of his hereditary foe: one sees the canny parrot ever prepared for his rapid attack, and ever eager to make him pay with five joints of his tail for his impertinent interference with an unoffending fellow-citizen of the ...
— Science in Arcady • Grant Allen
... pardon, Phyllis. Be so good as to keep Harriet out of my way. Yes; I had a letter—a most impertinent one, I think. Civilized human beings ...
— The Hallam Succession • Amelia Edith Barr
... calmly, but my heart was thumping with excitement and resentment. The apprehension of the untried is apt to be sharp at such moments, and I looked for them to turn their backs upon me for an impertinent provincial. Indeed, I think they would have, all save Comyn, had it not been for Fox himself. He lighted a pipe, smiled, and began easily, quite ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... though my bulk be small.' By such quaint speeches does he excite our smiles. And yet, by a very human touch, he is represented as furiously resenting any slighting allusion, by any one else, to his stature. In the pourparlers before battle Prince Balthezar grows impertinent. But we will quote the lines, and so ...
— The Growth of English Drama • Arnold Wynne
... meet you all alone this longful time," said Jonas; "and I'm very wishful to ask you a question, Bill. You mustn't think me impertinent nor nothing like that. You and me be very good friends and long may we remain so; but I've took careful note of your character, and you know me just so well, so you'll understand, please, I be asking in a very gentlemanly spirit and ...
— The Torch and Other Tales • Eden Phillpotts
... interest in religion," she made an excuse to run away into the chamber of Mrs. Morrow, Mrs. Ferret's mother, who was an invalid—Mrs. Ferret said "invaleed," for the sake of emphasis. The old lady never asked impertinent questions, never talked about "shcripcherral" or "ee-vangelical" views, but nevertheless breathed an atmosphere of scriptural patience and evangelical fortitude and Christian victory over the world's tribulations. Little Katy couldn't have defined, the difference between the two in ...
— The Mystery of Metropolisville • Edward Eggleston
... marked line drawn between wealth and pretension on the one hand, poverty and impertinent assumption on the other, than in the dominions of the Czar. Birth, place, power, are all duly honoured, and that sometimes to a degree which would astonish a British nobleman, accustomed all his life to high society. I remember once travelling ...
— Canada and the Canadians - Volume I • Sir Richard Henry Bonnycastle
... palace, all the court were astonished at the change. She, who had annoyed everybody by the impertinent, tasteless, or downright foolish things she uttered, now charmed everybody by her wit, her pleasantness, and her exceeding good sense. The king himself began to come to her apartment, and ask her advice in state affairs. Her mother, and ...
— The Fairy Book - The Best Popular Stories Selected and Rendered Anew • Dinah Maria Mulock (AKA Miss Mulock)
... avoid me on his part. He surely knew my face, and whether he knew it or not, a man who sees another approaching him, ought, at least, to wait for him. We were the only ones in the corridor at the time and there could be no doubt he did not wish to speak to me. I did not dream of such impertinent treatment from a man, whom I had cordially received at my apartments; why should he insult me? He could have no other excuse than a desire to avoid an awkward interview, during which questions might be asked, which he did not care to answer. But why? This second mystery troubled ...
— The Confession of a Child of The Century • Alfred de Musset
... shabbiness of the house where the gambler lived. A moment after he spoke, he realized the question was highly impertinent, but by then it was too late: "I don't understand, Max. If you make so much money gambling, why do you live in a place like this? ...
— Starman's Quest • Robert Silverberg
... device, a young page of the court passing by threw a stone so exactly to a hair that he hit the pitcher and broke it to pieces. Whereupon the old woman, who had no hair on her tongue, turned to the page, full of wrath, and exclaimed, "Ah, you impertinent young dog, you mule, you gallows-rope, you spindle-legs! Ill luck to you! May you be pierced by a Catalan lance! May a thousand ills befall you and something more to boot, you thief, ...
— Stories from Pentamerone • Giambattista Basile
... in the vestibule, the chief magistrate of Roubaix being very busy. Deputy-mayors, adjoints, were coming and going, and liveried officials bustled about, glancing at me from time to time, but without any impertinent curiosity. Impertinent curiosity, by the way, we rarely meet with in France. People seem of opinion that everybody must be the best judge of his or her own business. I was finally ushered into the council chamber, ...
— In the Heart of the Vosges - And Other Sketches by a "Devious Traveller" • Matilda Betham-Edwards
... to one's spiritual economy what full pockets were to one's domestic. And yet, with her, Rowland never felt, as with Mrs. Hudson, that undercurrent of reproach and bitterness toward himself, that impertinent implication that he had defrauded her of happiness. Was this justice, in Miss Garland, or was it mercy? The answer would have been difficult, for she had almost let Rowland feel before leaving Rome that she liked him well enough to forgive him an injury. It was partly, Rowland ...
— Roderick Hudson • Henry James
... my own mind a very pretty return for all his favours to me. Nor was I the only person in the house to whom the worthy gentleman was uncivil. He ordered the fair Lischen hither and thither, made impertinent love to her, abused her soups, quarrelled with her omelettes, and grudged the money which was laid out for his maintenance; so that our hostess detested him as much as, I think, without vanity, she ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... fair retort on Major General Tryon. That officer had addressed a letter to him enclosing the bills brought into Parliament, and containing, to use the language of General Washington himself, "the more extraordinary and impertinent request" that their contents should be communicated through him to the army. General Washington now acknowledged the receipt of this letter, and, in return, enclosed to Governor Tryon copies of the resolution just mentioned, ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 2 (of 5) • John Marshall
... mystic communities in Russia, in art and in pictures, but which one seldom meets with in public life. Here at New Athos breathes a true Christianity. It was strange how even the undying curiosity of the Russian had been conquered; for here I was not asked the thousand and one impertinent questions that it is usually my lot to smile over and answer. There was even a restraint in asking me necessary questions lest they ...
— A Tramp's Sketches • Stephen Graham
... is a western view of tradition; it is yours, too; it was yours first; it was your gift to us. And is it impertinent to ask, when your sensibilities are shocked at some departure from the conventional in our western law, that you search the tradition of your own history to know in what spirit and by what method the gods of the elder days met ...
— Modern American Prose Selections • Various
... matter of an outfit, therefore it was determined upon that the party should proceed next to Monterey, where they knew they could purchase the articles that were actually required. While en route, and when within thirty miles of this last-named town, an impertinent order was received from Gen. Castro, the Mexican commander of the territory. The purport of this order was, that Fremont and his party must immediately vacate the country without further notice, or else the gallant general would be obliged to drive them out. It was late in the afternoon when ...
— The Life and Adventures of Kit Carson, the Nestor of the Rocky Mountains, from Facts Narrated by Himself • De Witt C. Peters
... Charley, with some diffidence; "but, if it's not an impertinent question, do you think he ever tries to kiss ...
— Guy Livingstone; - or, 'Thorough' • George A. Lawrence
... mouthful of betel-nut. Taking the pipe and tobacco from his master he sat down cross-legged beside the companion. Barry eyed him for an instant with anger and disgust. He returned the look with an impertinent grin, and then coolly spat out a stream of the acrid scarlet juice half-way across the ...
— Edward Barry - South Sea Pearler • Louis Becke
... waiting for me in the city—in the big city where I may be expected," he blurted. "I haven't dared to send any." He hesitated, and then gave way to his impulse. "Miss Polly, I haven't any right to trouble you with my affairs. I may seem impertinent. But you are a girl! Does a girl usually sit down and think over all the difficulties—when she doesn't ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... across at her during that long evening, I felt that it was impertinent to probe her heart with my wonderings and surmises. I knew instinctively just how carefully she was hiding her hurt from all human eyes. I knew how her fierce pride was bearing up under the cruelty of it. I felt how she had rushed from the humiliation one man had brought her to the waiting ...
— The Love Affairs of an Old Maid • Lilian Bell
... tried to win the king. As might have been expected, the Covenanters failed. He was exceedingly wroth. He branded the Covenant as treason and the Covenanters as traitors. "I will die," said he, "before I grant their impertinent demands; they must be crushed; put them down with ...
— Sketches of the Covenanters • J. C. McFeeters
... not taken very long. The lady was of French extraction, had an only brother in the service of the East India Company, and, being an orphan, was the ward of the Marquis of Downshire,—circumstances on which gossips like Hogg made impertinent remarks. It is fair, however, to 'the Shepherd' to say that he speaks enthusiastically both of Mrs. Scott's appearance ('one of the most beautiful and handsome creatures I ever saw in my life'; 'a perfect beauty') and of her character ...
— Sir Walter Scott - Famous Scots Series • George Saintsbury
... quick temper that accompanies kindness of heart. With her the hand, as well as the heart, had a part in the first impulse. And then she shared the prevalent opinion of her time as to the proper way of bringing up children. She endured two or three impertinent sallies without a word; but at the fourth she seized the mocking child, took down her skirts, and administered to her, notwithstanding her twelve years, the soundest whipping she had ever received. The mulattress made a great outcry and told her sister-in-law, ...
— Germinie Lacerteux • Edmond and Jules de Goncourt
... in her pretty invalid's gown of lace, stood silently at the music-room door, watching them. Her thick, dark hair was braided, and looped up under a black bow behind; and she looked like a curious and impertinent schoolgirl peeping at them there through the crack of the door, bending forward, her joined ...
— The Fighting Chance • Robert W. Chambers
... pertinent part of my report on "the state of the Union" to express my admiration for the diligence, the good temper, and the full comprehension of public duty which has already been manifested by both the Houses; and I hope that it may not be deemed an impertinent intrusion of myself into the picture if I say with how much and how constant satisfaction I have availed myself of the privilege of putting my time and energy at their disposal alike ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... in some respects—brilliantly clever, I admit. And I don't say that he has ever committed any acts of violence, or ever willingly injured anybody. But, for all that, he is mad, if ever a man were mad yet. Forgive me if the inquiry is impertinent. What can your motive possibly be for wanting ...
— The Law and the Lady • Wilkie Collins
... may be supposed that Pansa would have exhibited more than this single one from a solitary friend. This is a more probable meaning than that Paratus solicited in this way the patronage of Pansa; for it would have been a bad method to gain it by disfiguring his walls in so impertinent a manner. We do not indeed mean to deny that adulatory inscriptions were sometimes written on the houses or doors of powerful or popular men or pretty women. A verse of Plautus bears testimony to such a custom (Impleantur meae foreis elogiorum ...
— Museum of Antiquity - A Description of Ancient Life • L. W. Yaggy
... remembered all that he had suffered at her hands. It was impertinent of her to ask such a question, but since she chose to do so she should have an answer. Doubtless she supposed that he was in love with herself, doubtless her conduct was premeditated and aimed at the repression of his hopes. He would show her that there were other women ...
— The People Of The Mist • H. Rider Haggard
... Herkimer, his men, lately over-timid, were now over-bold. His officers demanded to be led at once to the fort. Two of them, Cox and Paris by name, were impertinent in their demands, ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 1 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... me how it happened. Her husband had fled with the cattle when the enemy came along. The soldiers asked her for money. They said such a fine house must contain a great deal of money, and when she refused they became most impertinent. The finding of a packet of dynamite in the coach-house afforded a fine excuse. The dynamite was used by Basson for the making of wells. On finding the packet they shouted 'Hurrah!' and rushed off with it to the camp ...
— On Commando • Dietlof Van Warmelo
... fortune rather than my merit. It might well have been with me as it is with you; but, as a rule, I think that where there is a secret it had better be kept. No one, at any rate, should allow it to be wormed out of him by the impertinent assiduity of others. If there be anything affecting your wife which you do not wish all the world on this side of the water to know, do not tell it to any one on this side ...
— Dr. Wortle's School • Anthony Trollope
... nation showered on the heads of the gallant chiefs, who had led their ships to victory; but before long she was again on a cruise down channel. Rounding Ushant, she steered to the southward, boldly standing along the French coast, and making what the French probably considered a very impertinent examination ...
— Ronald Morton, or the Fire Ships - A Story of the Last Naval War • W.H.G. Kingston
... idea of my having, after all these days of official reserve that she had placed between us, startled her into that rush to the door annihilated her dignity at a blow. So did I finish my sandwiches beneath her invisible but eloquent fire. What affair of mine was the cake? And what sort of impertinent, meddlesome person was I, shrieking out my suggestions to people with whom I had no acquaintance? These were the things that her nose and her neck said to me the whole length of the Exchange. I had nothing but my own weakness to thank; it was my interest in weddings ...
— Lady Baltimore • Owen Wister
... of Veilbye came to see me this morning. He has a new coachman, Niels Bruus, brother to the owner of Ingvorstrup. Neils is lazy and impertinent. The rector wanted him arrested, but he had no witnesses to back up his complaint. I advised him to get rid of the man somehow, or else to get along with him the best he could until the latter's time was up. The rector was somewhat hasty at ...
— The Most Interesting Stories of All Nations • Julian Hawthorne
... of French life, especially in Paris, are beyond praise. In the most natural and graphic style imaginable, he dashes off a portrait typifying a class, and in a page gives the value of a volume of the much-vaunted "Physiologies." And this he does, like all he does, in a sparkling, well-bred, impertinent style, peculiar to ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 379, May, 1847 • Various
... that. And in this matter I do not think your impertinent orderly will venture to put Montmartre into the comparison. This soil is of a substance not unknown upon the earth." And speaking very slowly, the professor said: "It contains 70 per cent. of tellurium, and 30 per ...
— Off on a Comet • Jules Verne
... A taint of personal pique, awakened by the fancied necessity for putting her devotedness to Nevil to proof, asked her if she would then be the official housekeeper to whom Captain Baskelett bowed low with affected respect and impertinent affability, ironically praising her abroad as a wonder among women, that could at one time have played the deuce in the family, had she ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... life he did not like to be used with too great consideration of his years, and he did not think that he and his wife were so old that they need be treated as if they were going on a golden wedding journey, and heaped with all sorts of impertinent prophecies of their enjoying it so much and being so much the better for the little outing! Under his breath, he confounded this lady for her impudence; but he schooled himself to let her rejoice at their going on a Hanseatic boat, because ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... them round; cannot you make your doctrines the same way? My-de'-seh, you will think me impertinent; but the reason I speak is because I wish very much that you and my cousins would not be offended with each other. To tell you the truth, my-de'-seh, I hoped to use you ...
— The Grandissimes • George Washington Cable
... architecturally incoherent. He showed so little regard for unity that he did not hesitate to halt his novel for half a hundred pages while he set before the reader the totally extraneous novelette of "The Curious Impertinent," which he happened to find lying idle in his desk. How little he was a master of mere style may be felt at once by comparing his plays with those of Calderon. Yet these technical considerations do not count against the value of ...
— A Manual of the Art of Fiction • Clayton Hamilton
... to whistle in an impertinent manner. He clearly placed no great faith in the financial prospects ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 15, - No. 86, February, 1875 • Various
... an impertinent race," says Goethe, "that to keep one's self above water one must have Haare auf den Zahnen, and at times be rude." Such a judgment prepares one for much, but not for ...
— Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician - Volume 1-2, Complete • Frederick Niecks
... my dear marquis, I have, of course, only to make my adieux, and relieve you from so impertinent an intrusion." ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 3, February, 1851 • Various
... was not so much her beauty that made John stare at her with expanding eyes and mouth as she drove up in an open carriage, then walked down the long path from the gate to the church. He had seen beauty before; but never that look and air of a race far above his own, of light impertinent pride, never a lissome daintily stepping figure, and a head carried as if it bore a star rather than a bridal wreath. He had not dreamed of anything alive resembling this, and he knew she was not an angel. After she had entered the church ...
— The Bell in the Fog and Other Stories • Gertrude Atherton
... the sake of our passed loves, I shall free thee from thy present reproach, and make thee mine for ever. Glaphyra told this dream to several women of her acquaintance, and died soon after. I thought this story might not be impertinent in this place, wherein I speak of those kings: Besides that the example deserves to be taken notice of, as it contains a most certain proof of the immortality of the soul, and of Divine Providence. ...
— The Coverley Papers • Various
... Alfred Domett now appears on the scene with a satirical poem, inspired by an impertinent criticism on his friend. I give ...
— Life and Letters of Robert Browning • Mrs. Sutherland Orr
... biographer has given a tolerable selection of Brummell's hits, some of which, however, were so intolerably impertinent, that he must have either thoroughly "known his man," or he must have smoothed down their severity by some remarkable tone of voice or pleasantry of visage. Without those palliations, it is not easy to comprehend his occasional rudeness even to friends. One day, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 55, No. 344, June, 1844 • Various
... Madelon, getting rather red. She had resented the stare, and did not want to be talked to; her one idea now was to get to Spa unnoticed. But she had ill-chosen her travelling companion—the Countess was a lady whose impertinent curiosity was rarely baffled. ...
— My Little Lady • Eleanor Frances Poynter
... person of rank; the hall door was opened, and Owen, availing himself of that opportunity, entered the hall. Such a visitor, however, was too remarkable to escape notice. The hand of the menial was rudely placed against his breast; and, as the usual impertinent interrogatories were put to him, the pampered ruffian kept pushing him back, until the afflicted man stood upon the upper step leading to ...
— Phelim O'toole's Courtship and Other Stories • William Carleton
... things are preliminary, although not impertinent to the main subject, which is Quincy Market. After having perambulated the principal markets of the other leading American cities, I must pronounce it facile princeps among New-World markets. A walk through it is equal to a dose of dandelion syrup in the way of exciting an appetite ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 101, March, 1866 • Various
... him there to take leave of him, I had to make use of a back entrance to the hotel in order to avoid numerous impertinent questions. Dumba himself was followed at every step by reporters, who among other things often chased him for hours on end ...
— My Three Years in America • Johann Heinrich Andreas Hermann Albrecht Graf von Bernstorff
... breakfast the crows were most amusing and impertinent. Every door and window was open, and they were perched on the top of the punkah, or on the iron crossbars supporting the roof, watching their opportunity to pounce down and carry off the bits left on our plates. They did not seem to mind the ...
— A Voyage in the 'Sunbeam' • Annie Allnut Brassey
... love of those around you. If kind and true and helpful to them, and you maintain your own self-respect in all your words and actions, they must value and respect you. Your writing is good. It is inexpedient to repeat the impertinent assertions of those who have not sufficient powers of discernment between the painstaking replies to our thousands of correspondents and what they are pleased ...
— The Girl's Own Paper, Vol. VIII. No. 358, November 6, 1886. • Various
... ingenii ratione habit, major videtur esse gloria fabulam formare penits novam, qum veterem, utcunque mutatam, de novo exhibere. (Poet. Prael. v. ii. p. 164.) Where, having first put a wrong construction on the word comnmnia, he employs it to introduce an impertinent criticism. For where does the poet prefer the glory of refitting old subjects to that of inventing new ones? The contrary is implied in what he urges about the superiour difficulty of the latter, from ...
— The Life Of Johnson, Volume 3 of 6 • Boswell
... presented his passports before seeking her favor? How had he dared to make himself so much at home in her drawing room, with his impertinent insouciance and his Sultan airs? How had he gone about, indifferent, independent, ignoring when he pleased, courting no one's favor, and yet, be—nobody ...
— The Diamond Coterie • Lawrence L. Lynch
... household; and in the vicarage itself all was excitement and expectation, the old cook concocting every dainty she could think of in a kitchen heated up to furnace-heat; Mr Asplin mowing the lawn in hot haste, because the daisies would spring up in impertinent fashion in the hot dry weather; Mrs Asplin flying from one room to another, patting cushions into shape, and artfully placing little tables over worn spots on the carpet; and Miss Esther laying out clean towels, and flicking infinitesimal ...
— More About Peggy • Mrs G. de Horne Vaizey
... with a grave face, and he was divided between vexation and a sort of reluctant admiration of her coolness. She was bold and forward, not to say impertinent, but she seemed wholly unconscious of it, and, after all, she was from one of the wildest parts of Idaho. He kindly excused much of her conduct on ...
— The Candidate - A Political Romance • Joseph Alexander Altsheler
... know what you say, boy!" he returned fiercely. "When you have passed through as much hell-fire as I have and have rested as sweetly with a corpse for a pillow, you will learn to curb your impertinent tongue when you ...
— The Purple Land • W. H. Hudson
... two Dutch captains of their forts, and plenty of men armed with shot and darts; but our pinnace was well provided, and had two good fowlers[428] at her head. She lay a good space aboard the curracurra, desiring the Dutchmen to take this for a warning to leave off their impertinent scoffs, or we should teach them better manners in a worse way the next time. So they went away, promising to do so ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. VIII. • Robert Kerr
... might have utilized it better by giving us more of the harmless and ill-treated cousin's happy hunts, and less of the disputes over his accumulated quarry. This, however, means simply the old, and generally rather impertinent, suggestion to the artist that he shall do with his art something different from that which he has himself chosen to do. It is, or should be, sufficient that Le Cousin Pons is a very agreeable book, more pathetic if less "grimy," than its ...
— Poor Relations • Honore de Balzac
... was very amusing! The whole committee would stand around and laugh while the 'boys,' as they called them, had a chance, which consisted in my being asked the most impertinent questions by a lot of objectionable little bounders whom they constantly referred to as 'the greatest institution of our glorious country,' at times allowing also that the ...
— L. P. M. - The End of the Great War • J. Stewart Barney
... first place, these proceedings seemed to him exceedingly impertinent, for what possible right did Clive imagine he had to come playing the fool like this, sighing in the dark and blowing kisses like ...
— The Bittermeads Mystery • E. R. Punshon
... request, and told Mrs. Bargrave, she must not deny her: and she would have her tell her brother all their conversation, when she had opportunity. Dear Mrs. Veal, says Mrs. Bargrave, this seems so impertinent, that I cannot tell how to comply with it; and what a mortifying story will our conversation be to a young gentleman? Why, says Mrs. Bargrave, it is much better, methinks, to do it yourself. No, says Mrs. Veal, though it seems ...
— The Best Ghost Stories • Various
... the powerful feelings of private Friendship. I should have written you an Answer sooner but the peevish nominal Saint who scrap'd an Acquaintance with me at Baltimore the last Winter, has followd me even to this place. I think he is the most impertinent & troublesome Visitant I ever had. I am so thoroughly disgusted at the Creature that I have taken every Method that could be devisd to prevent my being ever plagud with him again. He seems at length to be about ...
— The Original Writings of Samuel Adams, Volume 4 • Samuel Adams
... Thou witnessedst my efforts to repel the testimony of my ears! It was in vain that you dwelt upon the confusion which my unlooked-for summons excited in you; the tardiness with which a suitable excuse occurred to you; your resentment that my impertinent intrusion had put an end to that charming interview: A disappointment for which you endeavoured to compensate yourself, by the frequency ...
— Wieland; or The Transformation - An American Tale • Charles Brockden Brown
... with due respect, as the prop of a hero. With this leg, which is fitted with a very handsome boot, he reviews his troops next Sunday, putting his best foot foremost; for generally he merely wears an unadorned wooden leg. The shoemaker, a Spaniard, whom I can recommend to all customers as the most impertinent individual I ever encountered, was arguing, in a blustering manner, with a gentleman who had brought a message from the general, desiring some alteration in the boot: and wound up by muttering, as the messenger left the shop, "He shall either wear it as it is, or review the ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon de la Barca
... the papers following those in your hands, when I say, that they must needs appear impertinent to such judges, after what you know, I dare say, your ladyship will not insist upon them: yet I will not scruple briefly to mention what ...
— Pamela (Vol. II.) • Samuel Richardson
... could help me so much if you would! Next time you come, you must tell me something about those old French rhymes that have come into fashion of late! They say a pretty thing so much more prettily for their quaint, antique, courtly liberty! The triolet now—how deliriously impertinent it is! Is ...
— Home Again • George MacDonald
... this last incident, though it may seem of no importance in your eyes, in the hope that your superior ability may be able to explain it. My own poor faculties, I confess, are quite unable to penetrate Mr. Pedgift's meaning. All I know is that he has no right to accuse me of any such impertinent feeling as curiosity in relation to a lady whom I ardently esteem and admire. I dare not put it in ...
— Armadale • Wilkie Collins
... ventured to have spoken to her thus had he been her attendant. She instinctively looked round in the hopes that he might still be following, but she could not see him. She therefore went on, trusting that her silence would induce the impertinent stranger to allow ...
— Won from the Waves • W.H.G. Kingston
... are engaged to marry Miss Landis? Or is that an impertinent question?" Without pause the girl answered herself: "Of course it is; only I couldn't help asking. Please ...
— The Bandbox • Louis Joseph Vance
... goes on to make mention of divers interviews between the crew and the natives in the voyage up the river; but as they would be impertinent to my history, I shall pass over them in silence, except the following dry joke, played off by the old commodore and his schoolfellow Robert Juet, which does such vast credit to their experimental philosophy that I cannot refrain from inserting it. "Our master ...
— Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete • Washington Irving
... but my heart was thumping with excitement and resentment. The apprehension of the untried is apt to be sharp at such moments, and I looked for them to turn their backs upon me for an impertinent provincial. Indeed, I think they would have, all save Comyn, had it not been for Fox himself. He lighted a pipe, smiled, and began easily, quite dispassionately, to ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... is not a religion which analyses God with impertinent speculation. It isn't a religion which takes up much of His time. It's a religion which teaches men to carry on stoutly and to say, "I've tried to do my bit as best I know how. I guess God knows it. If I 'go west' to-day, He'll remember that I played the game. So I guess ...
— The Glory of the Trenches • Coningsby Dawson
... "Only an impertinent speech of that little simian, Vixen Lestrange. I forget what she said, but it left the impression of an acquaintance between Bab, as she called her, and some working fellow the child ...
— There & Back • George MacDonald
... that each of the alleged consequences flows inevitably and logically from these established facts. Ignorance, hypothesis, assumption of facts, sophisms, begging the question, and the like, are wholly impertinent in any such discussion. Were they even tolerable in the field of metaphysical discussion, they must, by the rules of the Positive Philosophy itself, banishing all but ascertained facts from the halls of science, be excluded from this discussion of an alleged general law of nature. But when ...
— Fables of Infidelity and Facts of Faith - Being an Examination of the Evidences of Infidelity • Robert Patterson
... would be impossible for me, on the very brink of the grave, to say aught but the truth; and I love you too deeply, too fervently, to be impertinent. You do not know me, lady. In my heart I have reared an altar to worship at, and that shrine for three years has been thy dearly loved form. How dearly and passionately I have loved-what a chastening influence it has produced upon my life, my comrades, who know not yet the cause, could tell you. ...
— The Heart's Secret - The Fortunes of a Soldier, A Story of Love and the Low Latitudes • Maturin Murray
... people are at all likely to come here. I saw Mr Shuffler yesterday, and asked if that house which he has to let in The Terrace were yet taken, but he said, 'not that he knew of;' he had 'heard of nobody coming'—had I? I assure you he was quite impertinent about it. He would not have spoken to me so uncivilly had poor dear papa been alive, I know! But it is always the way with that class of people:—they only look upon you in the light of how ...
— She and I, Volume 1 • John Conroy Hutcheson
... not praise him for my benefit. It is quite apparent how you both feel toward Doctor Bayliss. I am not blind. I have seen how you have thrown him in my company, and made opportunities for me to meet him. Oh, of course, I can see! I did not believe it at first. It was too absurd, too outrageously impertinent. I COULDN'T believe it. ...
— Kent Knowles: Quahaug • Joseph C. Lincoln
... Who was the impertinent German that dared to fall in love with a Queen of England? We do not know. But there can be no doubt that the Queen of England whom he adored was the gay and beautiful Eleanor of Poitou, the Queen of Henry II., who filled the heart ...
— Chips From A German Workshop. Vol. III. • F. Max Mueller
... a few minutes to address some postcards. And that reminds me—Fitzroy sent a most impertinent message ...
— Cynthia's Chauffeur • Louis Tracy
... of a contrary transformation. For instance, the fumes of self-conceit mounted to Saint Anthony's head when he learned what immense veneration and adoration had been paid to him by all Christendom; and he who here below withstood the most terrible temptations was now quite an impertinent rascal and dissolute gallows-bird, who vied with his pig in rolling himself in the mud. The chaste Susanna, from having been excessively vain of her virtue, which she thought indomitable, came to a shameful fall, and she who once so gloriously resisted the two old men, was a victim to ...
— The Essays of "George Eliot" - Complete • George Eliot
... the ship hauled her wind, spread every sail, and seemed determined to ascertain our character and business in those seas. Captain Moncrieff, with perfect propriety, resolved, if possible, to prevent the gratification of such impertinent curiosity. The British cruiser sailed remarkably well; and if we had been under her lee, our voyage would have ended before it was fairly begun. But we made short tacks to windward, shooting into the wind's eye ...
— Jack in the Forecastle • John Sherburne Sleeper
... being avowedly exceptional) as Shakespeare. Now, though the personal interest may be not illegitimate and sometimes great, the impersonal is certainly greater. Thanks to industrious prying, not always deserving the adjective impertinent, we know a great deal about Balzac; and it is by no means difficult to apply some of the knowledge to aid the study of his creation. But in reading the creation itself you never need this knowledge; it never forces itself on you. The hundreds, and almost ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 2 - To the Close of the 19th Century • George Saintsbury
... mastering his anger with admirable determination, he merely said, "Evson, you must be beside yourself this morning; it is very rarely, indeed, that a new boy is so far gone in disobedience as this. I have no hesitation in saying that you are the most audacious and impertinent new boy with whom I have ever had to deal. I must cane you in my room after detention, to which you will of ...
— St. Winifred's - The World of School • Frederic W. Farrar
... do you make them your business?" Mr. Fentolin persisted. "If indeed the course which I steer is a harmless one," he continued, with a strange new glitter in his eyes, "then you are an impertinent stranger to whom my doors cannot any longer be open. If you have taken advantage of my hospitality to spy upon me and my actions, if indeed you have a mission here, then you can carry it with you ...
— The Vanished Messenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... depending, it might be proposed to enact, that the said militia should be exercised on the Lord's day, commonly called Sunday, and praying that no clause for such purpose might pass into a law. Though nothing could be more ridiculously fanatic and impertinent than a declaration of such a scruple against a practice so laudable and necesssary, in a country where that day of the week is generally spent in merry-making, riot, and debauchery, the house paid so much regard to the squeamish consciences of those puritanical ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... Grahame," she added, "and therefore I do not hesitate to express the pleasure you have given me by thus promising to think upon my advice. I began to fear that you would be displeased at my interference, deeming my advice impertinent and needless. I have endeavoured to impress upon Lilla the necessity of a temporary absence from home, and have in part succeeded; and having Lady Helen's sanction to speak with you, I could ...
— The Mother's Recompense, Volume I. - A Sequel to Home Influence in Two Volumes. • Grace Aguilar
... worth inquiring for; they exist, beyond doubt, and beyond doubt they may, by attention, patience, and skill, be brought to light. * * With a smaller sum than is annually expended on the appointment of some silly and impertinent young envoy, we might restore all, or nearly all those writers of immortal name, whose disappearance has been the regret of genius for four entire centuries. In my opinion, a few thousand pounds, laid out on such an undertaking, would be laid out as creditably as on a Persian carpet ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 70, March 1, 1851 • Various
... Small Beer and Quenching their Thirst, whatever they might pretend to the Contrary. What was remarkable is, that to have laid Hold of those Truths to any one's Prejudice, and made use of those Confessions afterwards out of their Temples, would have been counted very impertinent; and Every body thought it a heinous Affront to be call'd Thirsty, tho' you had seen him drink Small Beer by whole Gallons. The chief Topicks of their Preachers was the great Evil of Thirst, and the Folly there was in quenching it. They exhorted their Hearers to resist the Temptations ...
— A Letter to Dion • Bernard Mandeville
... remarkable in the Laws of the French Academy, except their forbidding any Member to write in their Defence, which it is probable will be thought worth observing here. For if our Society should pretend to answer every impertinent Thing that will be written against them, they would be finely set to Work. If therefore they should happen to be daily pelted at, the shortest way will be to despise their Opponents, and to consider themselves as Persons above the Reach of ...
— Reflections on Dr. Swift's Letter to Harley (1712) and The British Academy (1712) • John Oldmixon
... her face at court; Morality was held a standing jest, And Faith a necessary fraud at best. Courtiers, their monarch ever in their view, Possess'd great talents, and abused them too; 600 Whate'er was light, impertinent, and vain, Whate'er was loose, indecent, and profane, (So ripe was Folly, Folly to acquit) Stood all absolved in that poor bauble, Wit. In gratitude, alas! but little read, He let his father's servants beg their bread— His father's faithful servants, ...
— Poetical Works • Charles Churchill
... reminded me that I had heard of some one's dying in the night, and his sister's arriving in the morning. This must be she, I thought. I pitied her with all my heart. What could I say or do? Words always seem impertinent at such times; I did not know the man; the woman was neither interesting in herself nor graceful in her grief; yet, having known a sister's sorrow myself, I could have not leave her alone with her trouble in that strange place, without a word. So, ...
— Hospital Sketches • Louisa May Alcott
... twenty times, that if I were disposed to think of a second marriage, which I do not believe I ever shall, the present sentiments I am possessed of, would never be reversed by any offer he could make me; yet will he still persist in his impertinent declarations.' ...
— Life's Progress Through The Passions - Or, The Adventures of Natura • Eliza Fowler Haywood
... three looked for the fragments of Henrik's broken bun, which the good fellow with an expression of contentment dispatched on its natural way; then Fanny produced a couple of secreted apples which she had "sneaked" for him. I found it remarkable beyond words that this impertinent child's thoughts ran in the ...
— Debts of Honor • Maurus Jokai
... better to have me as a dear son-in-law and friend than as a stranger and an enemy, for I am a good friend and a bad enemy. I know there has been some talk of love between Suzanne and the English foundling at your place; but I can overlook that, although you may tell the lad that if he is impertinent to me again as he was the other day, he will not for the second time get off with a whipping only. Be so good as to give your answer to the bearer, who will pass it on to those that can find me, for I am travelling about on business, and ...
— Swallow • H. Rider Haggard
... Ronald. He laid his hand quietly on her knee. "Mrs. Denvers," he said, "I am afraid you thought me awfully impertinent when I suggested your marrying me the other day. It wasn't very ingenious of me, I admit. But what can you expect from a nonentity? Not brains, surely! I am not going to repeat the blunder. I know ...
— The Swindler and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... very often spend the whole night rambling about the city, inventing and carrying into execution the most impertinent, practical jokes. One of our favourite pleasures was to unmoor the patricians' gondolas, and to let them float at random along the canals, enjoying by anticipation all the curses that gondoliers would not fail ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... moment, Mr. Webb," she interrupted. "I dare say my questions seem impertinent, but they have a purpose back of them. My mother and I are looking for a private secretary for a charitable concern which we are going to organize shortly. We desire some one who is educated, who ...
— The Voice in the Fog • Harold MacGrath
... one a man would leap a steeple from, gallop down any steep lull to avoid him; forsake his meat, sleep, nature itself, with all her benefits, to shun him. A mere impertinent; one that touched neither heaven nor earth in his discourse. He opened an entry into a fair room, but shut it again presently. I spoke to him of garlic, he answered asparagus; consulted him of marriage, he tells me of hanging, as if they went by ...
— Discoveries and Some Poems • Ben Jonson
... patches of dazzling snow sent down mimic showers of diamond drops, and the moisture thawed from them made dark stains upon the grey masonry. A redbreast skipped about the furrows made in the white carpet by the carriage wheels, paused, turned his tiny impertinent head, and glanced up at the ramparts with a squint, as though to tell the time of day by the sun and the shadows of the projecting eaves. From the paved court of the stables, where all had been hurry and confusion on the previous night, ...
— Greifenstein • F. Marion Crawford
... Christopher Query having been troubled with a certain Distemper in my Tongue, which shewed it self in impertinent and superfluous Interrogatories, have not asked one unnecessary Question since my Perusal of the ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... exemplified in the pressure put upon her by her mother, Marie-Therese, to treat with more consideration the king's mistress, Madame du Barry, who, the dauphine wrote to her mother, "is the silliest and most impertinent creature imaginable." The consent of Louis XV to the partition of Poland was purchased by the promise of his daughter-in-law to assume the same attitude toward Madame du Barry that her mother had formerly condescended to with respect to Madame du Pompadour. "Louis XV was touched ...
— Paris from the Earliest Period to the Present Day; Volume 1 • William Walton
... going anywheres unless David goes along," she said, with an impertinent ring in her voice, and with a conviction that she was administering a stab and a rebuke. She had come prepared to watch her husband and Mrs. Lafirme, her heart swelling with jealous suspicion as she looked constantly from one to the other, endeavoring to detect signs ...
— At Fault • Kate Chopin
... Marguerite, "to place yourself unreservedly in Mr. Harley's hands? Shall you flirt with the captain if he thinks your doing so will add to the humorous or dramatic interest of his story? Will you permit your children to make impertinent remarks to every one aboard ship; to pick up sailors' slang and use it at the dining-table—in short, to make themselves obnoxiously clever at all times, in order that Mr. Harley's critics may ...
— A Rebellious Heroine • John Kendrick Bangs
... the generation to whom our labors are addressed. Is it wholly unnecessary to place at this moment before the bar of England so noble a model for imitation so sublime an ideal for serious contemplation as that offered in the person of the Earl of Mansfield? Is it impertinent to warn our lawyers, that, without confirmed habits of industry, temperance, self-subjugation, unsullied honor, vast knowledge, enlightened and lofty views of their difficult yet fascinating profession, and a love of the eternal principles of truth and justice, ...
— International Miscellany of Literature, Art and Science, Vol. 1, - No. 3, Oct. 1, 1850 • Various
... and perhaps repentant. She was on her lover's arm, in her best clothes, and going out to have a dinner given to her. And her lover had told her that he had ever so many things,—ever so many things to say to her! But she would ask no impertinent questions in the first hour of her bliss. It was so pleasant to walk with him up to Pentonville;—so joyous to turn into a gay enclosure, half public-house and half tea-garden; so pleasant to hear him order the good things, which in his company would ...
— The Way We Live Now • Anthony Trollope
... be getting a taste of the lonesomeness here of nights pretty soon," Mackenzie said, feeling himself in an awkward, yet not unpleasant situation with this frank girl's rather impertinent question still burning in his heart. "Dad's going to leave me to take charge ...
— The Flockmaster of Poison Creek • George W. Ogden
... so that the discovery of a new comet, the detection of a new species, the invention of a new chemical compound, each becomes a lesson of the most beautiful and impressive kind in the art of reasoning. And it would be superfluous and impertinent for me here to point out how valuable such lessons are in the way of mental discipline, apart from the fruit they bear in other ways. But here again the relation to the judgments we have to form in the moral, political, practical ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol. 3 of 3) - Essay 1: On Popular Culture • John Morley
... will philosophy be? I find you all very impertinent to speak with this arrogance in front of me, and impudently to give the name of science to things that one should not even honor with the name of art, and that cannot be classified except under the name of ...
— The Middle Class Gentleman - (Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme) • Moliere
... "In that case," she rejoined, "you had better specially engage a troupe and select those I like sung for my benefit; for on this occasion you can't be so impertinent as to make use of their expense to ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... jealously and wakefully the Protectorate Government guarded those lonely trails. And there are folk who saw the hundred-man safaris that came down from that way every week or so, carrying old ivory, said to be acquired in the way of trade. But that is really all government business, and looks impertinent ...
— The Ivory Trail • Talbot Mundy
... his head to enter by its shy, squat, fifteenth-century doorway. It is a fact that the very policeman at the entrance to Dean's Yard did not know its name, and the curator assures me that the Post Office has made frequent mistakes in delivering his letters. So my warning is not quite impertinent. ...
— From a Cornish Window - A New Edition • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... again, for thou must know that he is wroth with her because, he having written some verses in which he praised the great Gustavus, she did not write to him, she who, as thou knowest, has written to a hundred impertinent apes. I might complain, with far more reason; but, so long as kings, queens, princes, and princesses do me only that sort of harm, I shall never complain. The chancellor [Seguier, at whose house the Academy met] had forgotten to have the portrait of this princess, ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume V. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... the chances were that a lecturer on Pope began by asking the, perhaps not impertinent, question, 'Was he a poet?' And the method had its merits, for the question once asked, it was easy for the lecturer, like an incendiary who has just fired a haystack, to steal away amidst the cracklings of a familiar controversy. ...
— Obiter Dicta - Second Series • Augustine Birrell
... told me this the next day, and I could see she thought I had been bragging of my family. So I recounted all the conversation I had had with him, as nearly as I could recollect, and set down the question to an impertinent irony. But I have since changed my mind: I now judge that he could not believe any poor person would joke about poverty. I never found one of those people who go about begging for charities believe me when I told him the simple truth that I could not afford ...
— The Vicar's Daughter • George MacDonald
... nature and purpose of their existence but the fact that, after prolonged inquiry, they found it impossible to understand them themselves. It was time, we felt, to abandon these mere outposts of the unintelligible to the aggressions of an impertinent curiosity, and to retire to the citadel. There, happily, we are safe. Even the unhallowed inquisitiveness of M. Esquiroz recoils baffled from the parson's wife. Disdainful of all artificial adjuncts of mystery, to all appearance a woman like other women, packing her little sick-baskets, ...
— Modern Women and What is Said of Them - A Reprint of A Series of Articles in the Saturday Review (1868) • Anonymous
... account, I hope I shall be excused in taking up any room in your valuable paper, with a view of answering a question, which to him must be of the utmost importance. - But if he is not, I think his question not only impertinent, but a gross affront to the understanding of the public. We have lost the constitutional right which the Commons of America in their several Assemblies have ever before possessed, of giving and granting their own money, as much of it as they please, and no more; and appropriating it for the support ...
— The Writings of Samuel Adams, volume II (1770 - 1773) - collected and edited by Harry Alonso Cushing • Samuel Adams
... III. Sc. 1. the widow is called impertinent and ignorant by a lawyer of whom she demands back her fee, on his returning her brief and declining to plead for her. This draws from her ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 194, July 16, 1853 • Various
... a Frenchman, I conclude the wonder raised by the connexion may spread beyond my own private circle; but no wonder upon earth can ever arrive near my own in having found such a character from that nation. This is a prejudice certainly, impertinent and very John Bullish, and very arrogant but I only share it with all my countrymen, and therefore must needs forgive both them and myself. I am convinced, however, from your tender solicitude for me in all ways, that you will be glad to ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 3 • Madame D'Arblay
... winter on a housetop. They would be more in keeping in a glass case before a Nuernberg clock. Above all, at night, when the children are abed, and even grown people are snoring under quilts, does it not seem impertinent to leave these ginger-bread figures winking and tinkling to the stars and the rolling moon? The gargoyles may fitly enough twist their ape-like heads; fitly enough may the potentate bestride his charger, like a centurion ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... me what they please, and you may be impertinent enough to repeat to me what they say, but let me tell you I am not a very old man after all. I am ...
— The Hand of Ethelberta • Thomas Hardy
... here." But that which annoyed him most of all, was the intrusion of our countrymen into his lodgings, and into the room even where he was eating, to which they gained access through the king's servants. Disgusted at their impertinent curiosity he would sometimes rise from table, and leave the room in a rage. To prevent this intrusion, he strictly charged his domestics not to admit any persons whatever let their rank be what it might. ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 574 - Vol. XX, No. 574. Saturday, November 3, 1832 • Various
... a brief hour since you wrote me you were eighteen and had entered Vassar. Having no children of my own to stand as milestones on life's highway, and keeping a very young heart in my breast all these years, it seems at times little less than impertinent in the children I have known to develop so rapidly ...
— A Woman of the World - Her Counsel to Other People's Sons and Daughters • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... offended by her companion's impertinent tone. She started to turn off the power and apply the brake. She would ...
— The Motor Girls • Margaret Penrose
... make you a confession. During these six days I had some thoughts of working, the only thing I could think of being a job as a waitress. But when a vision of ham and pert females and more impertinent males came to me my courage oozed away, and I did not even try. I don't think I'll ever work again. Did you ever read Yeats' story 'Where ...
— An Anarchist Woman • Hutchins Hapgood
... an envelope addressed to "Miss Barbara Thurston," looking at her searchingly as he did so. Bab colored hotly under his almost impertinent scrutiny as she reached out her hand for the envelope. She had an uncomfortable feeling at that moment that perhaps Peter Dillon knew as much about the contents of the ...
— The Automobile Girls At Washington • Laura Dent Crane
... in the year 787. The Franks, having heard that a council at Constantinople had ordained the adoration of images, assembled, in the year 794, by order of Charles, son of Pepin, afterwards named Charlemagne, a very numerous council. In this council the second council of Nice is spoken of as an impertinent and arrogant synod held in Greece for the promotion of the worship of pictures. This council, held at Frankfort, was composed of three hundred clergymen from England, Italy, France and Germany. Aventin, Hinemar and Regina ...
— The Christian Foundation, Or, Scientific and Religious Journal, Volume I, No. 12, December, 1880 • Various
... along, a Welsh woman threw herself at the king's feet, and made a complaint against the bishop of the place, which was explained to the king by an interpreter. The woman, immediate attention not being paid to her petition, with violent gesticulation, and a loud and impertinent voice, exclaimed repeatedly, "Revenge us this day, Lechlavar! revenge us and the nation in this man!" On being chidden and driven away by those who understood the British language, she more vehemently and ...
— The Itinerary of Archibishop Baldwin through Wales • Giraldus Cambrensis
... mixture of awkwardness, fatuity and stiffness the most curious and the most exhilarating.... In his general aspect," adds this merciless critic, "he recalls the circus-rider, minus the latter's flexibility: skin-tight garments, simpering mouth, smile of a dancing-girl, attempt to be impertinent and irresistible which ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, August, 1878 • Various
... when over and over again, in great things and in small, two paths lie before him to choose, always chooses the truer and better of the two? When Felix attempts to interfere in the conduct of his election, even while resenting the interference as impertinent, he sets himself honestly to attempt to arrest the wrong. He buys Christian's secret; but it is to reveal it to her whom it enables, if so she shall choose, to dislodge himself from the position which has been ...
— The Ethics of George Eliot's Works • John Crombie Brown
... kirk, even now, is applied to quite as impertinent a purpose as when Satan and the witches used it as a dancing-hall; for it is divided in the midst by a wall of stone masonry, and each compartment has been converted into a family burial-place. The name on one of the monuments is Crawfurd; the other bore no inscription. It ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors - Vol. II Great Britain And Ireland, Part Two • Francis W. Halsey
... stop to hear me say 'Come in,' but just burst open the door and drive in like a gust of wind promiscuous." But, in self-defence, I must explain that my defective manners in this particular were entirely due to my old friend himself, who, from earliest infancy, had trained me in all manner of impertinent familiarities. It was traditional that I cried to go to him whilst I was still in arms; that I made attacks of an aggravated character upon his brass buttons before I could walk alone; and I could ...
— The Story of the White-Rock Cove • Anonymous
... this impertinent and inquisitive. What do you suppose is an interviewer's business? Did you ever see an oyster opened? Yes? Well, an interviewer's business is the same thing. His man is his oyster, which he, not with sword, but with pencil and note-book, must open. ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... smarting inflicted by the critiques of Jeffrey on her husband's works. Her—'And I hope, Mr. Jeffrey, Mr. Constable paid you well for your Article' (Jeffrey dining with her that day), had a depth of simple satire in it that ever, an Edinburgh Reviewer could hardly exceed. It was, one must add, impertinent and in bad taste. 'You are very good ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 2 • Grace & Philip Wharton
... architects,—and whether there was a place for him remained to be proved. He was willing to work hard, and to hope long; but he grew a little tired of it sometimes, and so—He checked himself suddenly. "As if," thought Sharley, "he were tired of talking so long to me! He thought my question impertinent." She hid her face in her drooping hair, and wished herself a ...
— Men, Women, and Ghosts • Elizabeth Stuart Phelps
... you still at home in the Farm? Rumors, whose faces I cannot fairly see, pass by me sometimes, breathing your name and others. But I have long ago turned rumor out-of-doors as an impostor and impertinent person, who apes the manners and appearance of its betters. I shall receive none as from you, however loudly they may shout your name, except they show ...
— Early Letters of George Wm. Curtis • G. W. Curtis, ed. George Willis Cooke
... last, "there's no doubt about it. I am about to be very impertinent. If you like you shall turn me out of your house, with or without kicks, as seems best to you. Barbara needs a nurse, and it seems to me you ought to know it; because in a way it's a reflection ...
— The Penalty • Gouverneur Morris
... little, and beheld the first signs of rising anger in the set of his lips. But she didn't know the full fierceness of his inward struggle,—an almost resistless desire to spring at once and smite those impertinent tones from the breed's lips. But he knew that he must take care—for Virginia's sake—and avoid a fight as long as it was humanly possible ...
— The Snowshoe Trail • Edison Marshall
... susceptible, you must be more careful than ever to prevent her having access to him; otherwise she might easily contrive to revive all those impressions in his mind which we are so anxious to avoid. What confidence can be placed in any promise to reform on her part, the impertinent scrawl I enclose will best prove [in reference, no doubt, to an enclosed note]. I send it merely to show you how fully I am justified in the precautions I have already adopted with regard to her. On this occasion, however, I did not answer like a Sarastro, ...
— Beethoven's Letters 1790-1826, Volume 1 of 2 • Lady Wallace
... or glance, could reduce to the lawliness of the most profound respect those rash and forward persons who presume to deviate from the rules of politeness. I spoke like a queen, but was treated like a maidservant. The Hircanian, without even deigning to speak to me, told his black eunuch that I was impertinent, but that he thought me handsome. He ordered him to take care of me, and to put me under the regimen of favorites, that so my complexion being improved, I might be the more worthy of his favors when he should be at leisure to honor me with them. I told him that rather than ...
— Library of the World's Best Mystery and Detective Stories • Edited by Julian Hawthorne
... of this woman's choice. There was method, too, in their salutation. Some rumour must have got about of my preference for the older and simpler habits, and there was no drinking wine to my health after the new and (as I considered) impertinent manner. Decorously, each lord and lady there came forward, and each in turn spilt a goblet at my feet; and when I called any up, whether man or woman, to receive tit-bits from my platter, it was eaten simply and thankfully, ...
— The Lost Continent • C. J. Cutcliffe Hyne
... very little to do; and as it never suited me to reside there, there was never any one to look after him. However, I make no complaint. Here they are intolerable—intolerable, self-sufficient, impertinent upstarts, full of crotchets of their own; and the bishop is a weak, timid fool; as for me, I never go inside a church. I can't; I should be insulted if I did. It has however gone so far now that I shall take permission to bring the matter before ...
— The Bertrams • Anthony Trollope
... discharge that boy before supper-time, there will be trouble," said the major when the steward presented himself. "He is stupid, careless, and impertinent. He had the presumption to tell me that he did not cook the onions, and it was not his fault that they were not ...
— All Adrift - or The Goldwing Club • Oliver Optic
... "Sir, Your impertinent letter was delivered to me yesterday. As I am not accustomed to receive such from any man, nor would have taken the same language from you personally, without letting you feel some marks of my resentment, I would advise you to be cautious in writing me a second of the same tenor. But ...
— The True George Washington [10th Ed.] • Paul Leicester Ford
... quite happy now. He had not only filled the impertinent children with fear, but he had done a smart thing on his very first day as constable. He drew himself up, and returned the notebook ...
— The Slowcoach • E. V. Lucas
... were better for you not to be making a disturbance here before the house; for if you persist in being impertinent, you shall be dragged in at once, and there you shall be lashed ...
— The Comedies of Terence - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Notes • Publius Terentius Afer, (AKA) Terence
... disconnected; adrift, isolated, insular; extraneous, strange, alien, foreign, outlandish, exotic. not comparable, incommensurable, heterogeneous; unconformable &c 83. irrelevant, inapplicable; not pertinent, not to the, purpose; impertinent, inapposite, beside the mark, a propos de bottes [Fr.]; aside from the purpose, away from the purpose, foreign to the purpose, beside the purpose, beside the question, beside the transaction, beside the point; misplaced &c (intrusive) 24; traveling out of the ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... man to rove and wander from the care and observation of that part of himself, which is rational, and overruling. See therefore in the whole series and connection of thy thoughts, that thou be careful to prevent whatsoever is idle and impertinent: but especially, whatsoever is curious and malicious: and thou must use thyself to think only of such things, of which if a man upon a sudden should ask thee, what it is that thou art now thinking, thou mayest answer This, and That, freely and boldly, that so by thy ...
— Meditations • Marcus Aurelius
... easily repaired. Your chief offence was against yourself, and that was irreparable. No other person with his forgiveness can mediate between you and yourself. Until you have been in such a fix, you can't imagine, perhaps, how curiously impertinent it sounds to hear talk about somebody else forgiving you for ruining yourself. It ...
— Dr. Heidenhoff's Process • Edward Bellamy
... beauty among the Americans of Pennsylvania, where, to a stock mainly Anglo-Saxon, is added a delicious strain of Gallic race; or you see her again among the Cape Dutch women who have had French Huguenot great grandparents. It is perhaps rather impertinent continuing this analysis of her charm, seeing that she lives and flourishes more than ever, twenty years after the opening of my story; not very different in outward appearance at 48, as Lady Armstrong—for of course, as you guess already, she married Major—afterwards ...
— Mrs. Warren's Daughter - A Story of the Woman's Movement • Sir Harry Johnston
... Lord Coke is well worth quotation: "And seeing we are to treat of matters of game, and hunting, let us (to the end we may proceed the more chearfully) recreate ourselves with the excellent description of Dido's Doe of the Forest wounded with a deadly arrow sticken in her, and not impertinent to our purpose: ...
— Bibliomania; or Book-Madness - A Bibliographical Romance • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... previously been an orderly at brigade headquarters. Feeling his newly acquired importance, he spurred his horse around among the guns, calling out, "Let 'em have it!" and the like, until, seeing our disgust at his impertinent encouragement, and that we preferred a chance to let him have it, he departed. Our next visitor came in a different guise, and by a hint of another kind was quickly disposed of. He, a man of unusually large size, with sword dangling at his ...
— The Story of a Cannoneer Under Stonewall Jackson • Edward A. Moore
... mud. When a fellow stuck like a bur, that there was no shaking him off, he used to be mighty inquisitive about the health of his uncles and aunts in the country; he could call them all by their names, for he knew everybody, and could talk to them in their own way. The extremely impertinent he would send away to see some strange sight, as the Dragon of Hockley the Hole, or bid him call the 30th of next February. Now and then you would see him in the kitchen, weighing the beef and butter, paying ready money, that the maids might ...
— The History of John Bull • John Arbuthnot
... to end and over and over again, turned from white to red before his eyes; and when he cast a glance upon the stage, it seemed incalculably far away, and he found the voices and gestures of the actors to the last degree impertinent ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 4 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... my departure, I endured much lecturing, which I considered as exceedingly useless, and consequently little less than impertinent. The lawyer reminded me of my youth, and warned me against the knavery of mankind, who he affirmed are universally prone to prey upon one another. This, miracles out of the question, must be the creed of a lawyer. I had a better opinion of my fellow bipeds, of whom I yet knew but little, and heard ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... for Poppy and dolly were hidden again, and the old gentleman was puzzled. He went in and sat down to watch, feeling rather disturbed. Presently the fun began again: the children clapped their hands, the people laughed, and every one looked over at the house, in what he thought a very impertinent way. This made him angry; and out he rushed a second time, saying, as he marched across ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag VI - An Old-Fashioned Thanksgiving, Etc. • Louisa M. Alcott
... people do not strive to forget their forlorn little identities, in such situations, instead of thrusting them forward into the dazzle of a great renown, where, if noticed, they cannot but be deemed impertinent. ...
— Our Old Home - A Series of English Sketches • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... has some of the same qualities as that of William of Malmesbury (q.v.). He rejects the legend of the Trojan descent of the early Britons, and animadverts severely on what he calls "the impudent and impertinent lies" of Geoffrey of Monmouth (q.v.). His record of contemporary ...
— A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature • John W. Cousin
... they all believe the impertinent creature is breeding—that's pure! it will soon reach my lady's ears, ...
— The Man Of The World (1792) • Charles Macklin
... it: I was in hopes it would have been sore enough at least to prevent your making impertinent remarks upon anybody ...
— Young Folks Treasury, Volume 3 (of 12) - Classic Tales And Old-Fashioned Stories • Various
... no circuit, one thing was settled in my mind; he was a Yankee, and a very impertinent Yankee too. I felt humbled, my pride was hurt, and Mohawk was beaten. To continue this trotting contest was humiliating; I yielded, therefore, before the victory was palpable, ...
— The Clockmaker • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... for years excluded, and a large majority in each association refused to receive into their fellowship those who advocated or contributed to its objects. Hyper-Calvinism, ignorance and avarice cooperated in making the very name "missions" odious, ministerial education an impertinent human effort to supplant a spirit-called and spirit-endowed ministry, Sunday-schools and prayer-meetings as human institutions, the aim of which was to interfere with the divine order, and the receiving of salaries for ministerial ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 3 - "Banks" to "Bassoon" • Various
... gentle languor of unembarrassed leisure was mingled with the dignity of queenly state—with her burning eyes so tempered in their brilliancy that they seemed ready at the same instant to bid defiance to impertinent intrusion, and to bestow gracious condescension upon suppliant timidity—with every feature glowing with that proper pride which is not arrogance, and that proper kindliness which is not humility—there was probably in all Rome no noble matron ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 6, No. 1, July, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... forbid you to do it! You despise me, perhaps, and think I'm feeble. But you're mistaken. You are ungrateful and impertinent and contemptible, but I will save you in order to save Irma and our name. There is going to be such a row in this town that you and he'll be sorry you came to it. I shall shrink from nothing, for my blood is up. It is unwise of you to laugh. I forbid you to marry Carella, ...
— Where Angels Fear to Tread • E. M. Forster
... employed, may surely be trusted to the discretion of the employers, whose interest it so much concerns. The affected anxiety of the lawgiver, lest they should employ an improper person, is evidently as impertinent as it is oppressive. ...
— An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations • Adam Smith
... to anger her. "I know where I have business. I need no admonitions from you as to what places I enter. You are impertinent, insulting. ...
— Nan of Music Mountain • Frank H. Spearman
... freely his impressions of our civilization. His letters from New York appear to have been especially full, and, in offering the present synopsis of these to the American reader, it will not be impertinent to note certain peculiarities of the Altrurian attitude which the temperament of the writer has somewhat modified. He is entangled in his social sophistries regarding all the competitive civilizations; he cannot apparently do full justice to the superior heroism of charity ...
— Through the Eye of the Needle - A Romance • W. D. Howells
... drowning man. This text then is written to the church of Christ, by which it is exhorted to faith and prayer; but it speaks not a word of a woman's meeting, and therefore it is fooling with the word to suggest it. I cannot therefore, while I see this impertinent dealing, but think our argumentator dotes, or takes upon him to be a head of those he thinks to rule over. The woman's letter to me also seems to import the same, when they say, "Mr. K. would desire to know what objections you have against it (his arguments), ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... sleeves, large, bare, clean, white arms, and short white aprons not reaching to the knees. They had no caps, and such a circumference of hoops! quite Yankeeish in their style; and most careless, flirtatious-looking and impertinent in their manners. We were quite disgusted with them; and even papa could not defend any one of them. We were naturally very badly waited upon; they sailing majestically about the room instead of rushing to get what we wanted, as the niggers at Newport did. Men-servants ...
— First Impressions of the New World - On Two Travellers from the Old in the Autumn of 1858 • Isabella Strange Trotter
... is both ridiculous and impertinent," continued Mrs. van Cannan furiously. "And I can tell you that I will not stand that sort of thing from any one in my house," she added, with the air of one dismissing a servant: "You may ...
— Blue Aloes - Stories of South Africa • Cynthia Stockley
Copyright © 2025 e-Free Translation.com
|
|
|
