"Braggart" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... adventure during his life on the continent, which would not do to write down here, he was as little of a boaster as any man I ever met, and, while I am in the truth-telling business, I was as great a braggart of my inches as ever drew the long-bow—in that line, I mean. Gods! I flush up hot, even now, when I think of it. So I talked a great deal and found myself infinitely pleased with Brandon's conversational powers, ...
— When Knighthood Was in Flower • Charles Major
... between swayed now to the one and now to the other a large group. Fernando, I feel gladness in saying, had with him but two or three. And aside stood variations, individuals. Beltran the cook was such an one, a bold, mirthful, likable man. We had several dry thinkers, and a braggart and two or three who proved miserably villainous. We had weathercocks and men who faced forward, no matter what ...
— 1492 • Mary Johnston
... be appeased in this fashion. Something in Lagardere's carriage, something in his voice, convinced the little marquis that his enemy was speaking the truth, and that he was, indeed, a gentleman. "Braggart!" he cried, and, drawing his sword, he struck Lagardere across the breast with the flat ...
— The Duke's Motto - A Melodrama • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... war is included in them. He who is blinded by the semblance of power and cannot resolve to act, will never be able to make political preparations for the inevitable war with any success. "The braggart feebleness which travesties strength, the immoral claim which swaggers in the sanctity of historical right, the timidity which shelters its indecision behind empty and formal excuses, never were more despised than by the great Prussian King," so H. v. Treitschke tells us. "Old Fritz" ...
— Germany and the Next War • Friedrich von Bernhardi
... swaggering, braggart air, "we're going to give the rebels the almightiest thrashing they've had yet! To wade in their blood as deep as I've waded to-night in this mud and water, that's ...
— The Drummer Boy • John Trowbridge
... lady, was the talented Peire Vidal. On one occasion he caused himself to be sewn into a wolfskin and ran about the fields; but he was set upon by dogs and so badly mangled that he nearly succumbed to his wounds. He was an insufferable braggart, but never had any success in love. The prince of caricatures, however, was the German knight and minnesinger, Ulrich of Lichtenstein. He is responsible for a novel in prose, entitled The Service of Woman, which is faintly reminiscent of Goethe's ...
— The Evolution of Love • Emil Lucka
... observed in passing); and, placing these typified traits in juxtaposition in their conflict and contrast, struck the spark of comedy. Downright, as his name indicates, is "a plain squire"; Bobadill's humour is that of the braggart who is incidentally, and with delightfully comic effect, a coward; Brainworm's humour is the finding out of things to the end of fooling everybody: of course he is fooled in the end himself. But it was not Jonson's theories alone that made the success of "Every ...
— Cynthia's Revels • Ben Jonson
... persiflage as a testimony to the truth of their own praises. It is not then properly friendship at all when the one will not listen to the truth, and the other is prepared to lie. Nor would the servility of parasites in comedy have seemed humorous to us had there been no such things as braggart captains. "Is Thais really much obliged to me?" It would have been quite enough to answer "Much," but he must needs say "Immensely." Your servile flatterer always exaggerates what his victim wishes ...
— Treatises on Friendship and Old Age • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... Marrast, and receives the accolade from Beranger. The Gazette—the hypocritical Gazette de France—now yearns for republican state forms, universal franchise, primary meetings, et cetera. It is amusing to see how these disguised priestlings now play the bully-braggart in the language of Sans-culottism, how fiercely they coquet with the red Jacobin cap, yet are ever and anon afflicted with the thought that they might forgetfully have put on in its place the red cap of a prelate; they take for an instant from their heads their ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VI. • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... emphasize his words, shaggy Hanak whirled his knobby bludgeon above his head, and shied it frantically at the officer, who warded off the blow with his sword, and the same instant a young private transfixed the braggart so vigorously that the end of his bayonet stuck in ...
— The Day of Wrath • Maurus Jokai
... loud fierce knaves thy brethren quelled Ward off the wolves whose hides should line thy throne, Wert thou no coward, no recreant to the bone, No liar in spirit and soul and heartless heart, No slave, no traitor—nought of all thou art. A thing like thee, made big with braggart breath, Whose tongue shoots fire, whose promise poisons trust, Would cast a shieldless soldier forth to death And wreck three realms to sate his rancorous lust With ruin of them who have weighed and found him ...
— Locrine - A Tragedy • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... indicated that he was confident of victory. Confidence, however, was no new trait in von Herzmann. He always possessed it, but it stopped just short of blind egotism. Perhaps therein could be found the reason for his fame and his success. He was no blundering, egobefuddled braggart riding for a fall; he was a splendid pilot, a careful tactician, fearless when fearlessness was needed and cautious when caution would bring greater reward than blind valor. In short, his fame rested securely upon ability. He was one of the idols of his ...
— Aces Up • Covington Clarke
... the falsehood as valid testimony to their merit. That, however, is no friendship, in which one of the (so-called) friends does not want to hear the truth, and the other is ready to lie. The flattery of parasites on the stage would not seem amusing, were there not in the play braggart soldiers [Footnote: Latin, milites gloriosi. Miles Gloriosus is the title of one of the comedies of Plautus; and one of the stock characters of the ancient comedy is a conceited, swaggering, brainless soldier, who is perpetually boasting ...
— De Amicitia, Scipio's Dream • Marcus Tullius Ciceronis
... but fair," answered Prince John, "and it shall not be refused thee. If thou dost beat this braggart, Hubert, I will fill the bugle with ...
— Short Stories and Selections for Use in the Secondary Schools • Emilie Kip Baker
... be that!" said the man, with a braggart laugh and swagger. "I tell ye, mar, we're going to have the ...
— Cudjo's Cave • J. T. Trowbridge
... hand, in uncouth gestures, as if he would clutch him and shake him. He would often use invectives, which he took care should never appear printed in the official reports, and John Randolph in his braggart prime was never so imperiously insulting as was Mr. Stevens toward those whose political action he controlled. He was firm believer in the old maxim ascribed to the Jesuits, "The end justifies the means," and, while he set morality at defiance, he was an early ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore
... constantly checked by piles of fallen debris, and from one street we had to back the car out and go round by another way. At the end of a long street of ruined houses, many bearing the inscription of some braggart, "I did this," we found our wounded men. They were in a monastery near the bridge at which the Germans were directing their shells, several of which had already fallen into the building. There had been four wounded men there, ...
— A Surgeon in Belgium • Henry Sessions Souttar
... are so little calculated to excite pleasurable emotions in the beholder, or to become objects of human interest and affection. The kingbird is the best dressed member of the family, but he is a braggart; and, though always snubbing his neighbors, is an arrant coward, and shows the white feather at the slightest display of pluck in his antagonist. I have seen him turn tail to a swallow, and have known the little pewee in question to whip him beautifully. From the great-crested ...
— In the Catskills • John Burroughs
... at the time with M. de Saintonge, and he muttered, with a sneer, that it was not difficult to see the end, or that within the year the young braggart would sink to be a gaming-house bully. I said nothing, but I confess that I thought otherwise; the lad's disposition of his money and his provision for the future seeming to me so remarkable as to ...
— From the Memoirs of a Minister of France • Stanley Weyman
... abandon it to save himself. It had perhaps drifted ashore, and might be found; for himself, he abandoned his claim to the reward. Had he looked abashed or mortified, Jenny felt that she might have relented, but the braggart was as all-satisfied, as confident and boastful as ever. Nevertheless, as his eye seemed to seek hers, she was constrained, in mere politeness, to add her own to her father's condolences. "I suppose," she hesitated, in passing him, "that this is a mere nothing to you after ...
— Colonel Starbottle's Client and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... The braggart now regretted having told so many lies, for he did not know how to escape the monarch's proposal. After reflecting a short time, he plucked up courage and said "I will gladly accept the position of son-in-law you offer, and will try to ...
— Roumanian Fairy Tales • Various
... Toombs of Georgia played some such part to the Northern imagination as Phillips or Sumner to the Southern. He was regarded as the typical fire-eater and braggart. He was currently reported to have boasted that he would yet call the roll of his slaves at the foot of Bunker Hill monument. But in truth this ogre was made of much the same human clay as the Massachusetts ...
— The Negro and the Nation - A History of American Slavery and Enfranchisement • George S. Merriam
... headlines. The enemy had attacked in great strength from south of Arras to the Oise; but everywhere he had been repulsed and held in our battle-zone. The leading articles were confident, the notes by the various military critics were almost braggart. At last the German had been driven to an offensive, and the Allies would have the opportunity they had longed for of proving their superior fighting strength. It was, said one and all, the opening of the ...
— Mr. Standfast • John Buchan
... adhesion to their old master. Liberal promises, indeed, had been made by the emperor, in the name of his grandson Charles, who had already been made to assume the title of King of Castile. But the promises of the imperial braggart passed lightly with the more considerate Castilians, who knew how far they usually outstripped his performance, and who felt, on the other hand, that their true interests were connected with those of a prince, whose superior talents and personal relations all concurred to recommend ...
— The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella The Catholic, V3 • William H. Prescott
... one may suppose, three-score and upward. From the first scene we get this impression, and in the scene with Oswald it is repeatedly confirmed. His beard is grey. 'Ancient ruffian,' 'old fellow,' 'you stubborn ancient knave, you reverent braggart'—these are some of the expressions applied to him. 'Sir,' he says to Cornwall, 'I am too old to learn.' If his age is not remembered, we fail to realise the full beauty of his thoughtlessness of himself, his incessant care of ...
— Shakespearean Tragedy - Lectures on Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth • A. C. Bradley
... one day when I urged him to make haste and help save the topsails in a squall, "Oh, I'm no soft-horn to be hurried!" It was the time the bark lost her topgallant-mast and was cast on her beam-ends on the voyage to Antonina, already told; it was, in fact, no time for loafing, and this braggart at a decisive word hurried aloft with the rest to do his duty. What I said to him was meant for earnest, and it cowed him. It is only natural to think that he held a grudge against me forever after, and waited only for his opportunity; knowing, too, that I ...
— Voyage of the Liberdade • Captain Joshua Slocum
... very great. One day the Marechal de Villars traversed the Place Vendome in a fine coach, loaded with pages and lackeys, to make way for which the mob of stock-jobbers had some difficulty. The Marechal upon this harangued the people in his braggart manner from the carriage window, crying out against the iniquity of stock-jobbing, and the shame it cast upon all. Until this point he had been allowed to say on, but when he thought fit to add that his own hands were clean, and that he had never dabbled in shares, a voice ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... said she, 'but Those Above sent it to try if you were honest or a braggart?' After which he began to feel differently. And in due course they were married, and Ho-tai came to live in the house of the Chief Priest at Hawikuh, for her parents could not think of ...
— The Trail Book • Mary Austin et al
... of old men? No, Paul. De Brissac and I were on excellent terms. You ought to know me better. I do not climb into windows, especially when the door is always open for me. I am like my sword, loyal, frank, and honest; we scorn braggart's cunning, dark alleys, stealth; we look not at a man's back but into his face; we prefer sunshine to darkness. And listen," tapping his sword: "he who has done this thing, be he never so far away, yet shall this long sword of mine find him and ...
— The Grey Cloak • Harold MacGrath
... hoert de Flegn hosten," "He hears the flies coughing." If a man is full of great schemes, he is told, "In Gedanken foert de Bur ok in't Kutsch." "In thought the peasant, too, drives in a coach." A man who boasts is asked, "Pracher! haest ok Lues, oder schuppst di man so?" "Braggart! have you really lice, or do you only scratch yourself as if ...
— Chips From A German Workshop. Vol. III. • F. Max Mueller
... wisely bold. This that beckons is no mirage in the West; it is palpable fact. Say that I follow Burr—follow! overtake and pass him! He has a tarnished name and fifty years,—a supple rapier but a shrunken arm. He's daring; but I can be that and more. He plans; I can achieve. I am no dreamer and no braggart when I say that in the West I can play the Corsican. What can I do here? Become, perhaps, Governor of Virginia; wait until Mr. Jefferson is dead, and Mr. Madison is dead, and Mr. Monroe is dead, and then, if the world is yet ...
— Lewis Rand • Mary Johnston
... in the affairs of the old house-owner. To seek to maintain the old man's right to his own property is a matter of course, and I will undertake to do this and try to get yonder orator home Just see how the braggart is swinging his arms in Iras's service! As for Barine, it will be well to induce her to leave of her own free will a city where it will be made unpleasant for her. Try to persuade her to pursue this course. If I went to her with such a suggestion, I, who yesterday—No, ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... said Paul, with a smile—and when Paul smiled it was as if Eros's feathers had brushed the cheek of a Praxitelean Hermes; and then with an outburst half sincere, half braggart—"I've been on my own ...
— The Fortunate Youth • William J. Locke
... braggart!" Nejdanov almost shouted from above, but at this moment the door opened and, to his great astonishment, Markelov entered ...
— Virgin Soil • Ivan S. Turgenev
... Moth.] In the folios the direction is, enter Braggart and Moth, and at the beginning of every speech of Armado stands Brag, both in this and the foregoing scene between him and his boy. The other personages of this play are likewise noted by their characters as ...
— Johnson's Notes to Shakespeare Vol. I Comedies • Samuel Johnson
... satisfactorily, yet he could not forego an opportunity to indulge his pride by following up the threat he had hung over Agricola to kill whosoever should give Palmyre to a black man. He referred the subject and the would-be purchaser to him. It would open up to the old braggart a line of retreat, thought the planter of ...
— The Grandissimes • George Washington Cable
... perhaps have been more written about and fought over than those of Amerigo Vespucci. Some will have it that he went only two voyages, and say he was a braggart and a vainglorious fool if he said he went more. Others think that he went at least four voyages and probably six. And most people are now agreed that these last are right, and that he who gave his name to the great double Continent of America was no swaggering ...
— This Country Of Ours • H. E. Marshall Author: Henrietta Elizabeth Marshall
... Justice! . . Lo, between Him and the judgment-seat there rose The Sword of Menace, ever keen To smite the braggart War-Wolf's foes! ...
— With Zola in England • Ernest Alfred Vizetelly
... Henry A. Wise uttered "a motley compound of eloquence and folly, of braggart impudence and childish vanity, of self-laudation and Virginian narrow-mindedness." After him Hubbard, of Alabama, "began grunting against the tariff." Three days later Black, of Georgia, "poured forth his black bile" ...
— John Quincy Adams - American Statesmen Series • John. T. Morse
... to appear before him, and the prince entered the royal justice chamber with the air of a braggart, smiling contemptuously at the learned judges who were seated to right and left of his majesty, and defiantly ...
— Jewish Fairy Tales and Legends • Gertrude Landa
... God that on the wand'ring brine Thou and this braggart tongue of thine Had sunk beneath the main— Thy mast and planks, made fast in vain! Thee would I drive aboard once more, A slayer and a dastard, from ...
— Suppliant Maidens and Other Plays • AEschylus
... this sinful town, Care, if a liveried lord or smile or frown? Who cannot flatter, and detest who can, Tremble before a noble serving-man? O, my fair mistress, Truth! shall I quit thee For huffing, braggart, puffed nobility? Thou, who since yesterday hast rolled o'er all The busy, idle blockheads of the ball, Hast thou, oh, sun! beheld an emptier fort, Than such who swell this bladder of a Court? Now ...
— Essay on Man - Moral Essays and Satires • Alexander Pope
... the village yonder. I like thee, and will do thee good. Build on no man's favour but mine—not even on thine uncle's or Lord Crawford's, and say nothing of thy timely aid in this matter of the boar, for if a man makes boast that he has served a king in such a pinch, he must take the braggart humour for its ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VIII • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.
... I do not know. It was simply a farmhouse turned into a place for the wounded. On the road thither we called at many farms, and at every one men, women, and children came out to see us. Not one taunting word was uttered in our hearing, not one braggart sentence passed their lips. Men brought us cooling drinks, or moved us into more comfortable positions on the trolly. Women, with gentle fingers, shifted bandages, or washed wounds, or gave us little dainties that come so pleasant ...
— Campaign Pictures of the War in South Africa (1899-1900) - Letters from the Front • A. G. Hales
... fault is the ignorance of the Poet; not that he intended to be guilty of theft. That so it is, you will now be enabled to judge. The Colax is {a Play} of Menander's; in it there is Colax, a Parasite, and a braggart Captain: he does not deny that he has transferred these characters into his Eunuch from the Greek; but assuredly he does deny this, that he was aware that those pieces had been already translated into Latin. But if it is not permitted {us} to use ...
— The Comedies of Terence - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Notes • Publius Terentius Afer, (AKA) Terence
... painted without flattery. There he sat—Lilliputian on the great charger! At that moment Van Alen hated him—that Hop-o'-my-Thumb of another age, founder of a pigmy race, who, by his braggart will, had that night brought upon this one of his descendants the ...
— The Gay Cockade • Temple Bailey
... Spaniards dared to follow, Aremberg allowed himself to commit the grave error for which he was so deeply to atone. Disregarding the dictates of his own experience and the arrangements of his superior, he yielded to the braggart humor of his soldiers, which he had not, like Alva, learned ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... his guest with an equally distrustful air, since certain features in Chichikov's benevolence now struck him as a little open to question, and he had begin to think to himself: "After all, the devil only knows who he is—whether a braggart, like most of these spendthrifts, or a fellow who is lying merely in order to get some tea out of me." Finally, his circumspection, combined with a desire to test his guest, led him to remark that it might be ...
— Dead Souls • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... afterwards made a sort of apology, no doubt inspired by interested persons, for personal plus international reasons. They were high of heart, these dauntless confederates, in the early and middle stages of the captivity, and, indeed, they bore themselves with braggart defiance of public opinion, until many strong manifestations of inevitable trouble encompassed them, and, like all despots, who are invariably cowards, they lived in mortal terror lest this creature ...
— The Tragedy of St. Helena • Walter Runciman
... themselves mistaken in me, my dear relatives! They shall be forced some day to acknowledge that the Elector of Brandenburg is self-sustaining, and stands erect without the aid of foreign supports. You look at me doubtfully, and perhaps think me a braggart, promising great things which I may never be able to perform? It would seem so, indeed, now, for where are the means for accomplishing such aims? Wretched and in the process of dissolution is all about me, nowhere do I see determined ...
— The Youth of the Great Elector • L. Muhlbach
... experience with, Florio. There are several small but significant links of description between the Parolles of 1598 and the enlarged Armado of the same date. Both of these characters are represented as braggart soldiers and also as linguists, which evidently reflect Florio's quasi-military connection with Southampton and his ...
— Shakespeare's Lost Years in London, 1586-1592 • Arthur Acheson
... treated as merely so much oil, with which to lubricate the machinery of his great enterprise. She had heard, at various times, the embittered details of the disappearance of this money, little by little. Nearly a quarter of it, all told, had been appropriated by a sleek old braggart of a company-promoter, who had cozened Joel into the belief that London could be best approached through him. When at last this wretch was kicked downstairs, the effect had been only to make room for a fresh lot of bloodsuckers. There were so-called advertising agents, so-called journalists, ...
— The Market-Place • Harold Frederic
... unknown was popular. Nat was a great bully and braggart, and many of them had suffered insult at his hands. Therefore, when the beggar went to fetch his prize from the Sheriff's own hands, there was great cheering and applause. He found Monceux seated in a handsome booth, with his daughter and her maids, near ...
— Robin Hood • Paul Creswick
... rank exists between us, my lord," I answered, "and I claim the right to cross swords in an affair of honour with all save those of royal blood. Grant me the satisfaction I demand, or I will brand you as a braggart and a coward throughout every ...
— Adventures in Southern Seas - A Tale of the Sixteenth Century • George Forbes
... "packed like a hand-saw"—had kept at bay and put to flight now two, anon four, and then seven, and finally eleven of his assailants. We all can see, too, the roguish twinkle in Prince Hal's eyes as the braggart knight embellishes his lying tale with every fresh sentence, and are as nonplussed as he when, the plot discovered, Falstaff finds a way to take credit for his cowardice. Who would not forgive so cajoling ...
— Inns and Taverns of Old London • Henry C. Shelley
... braggart to a captive," he commented, quietly. Then he turned to Brilliana as one who had no further desire for treaty with a fellow ...
— The Lady of Loyalty House - A Novel • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... for this; but the last part of the curse comes on almost at once and makes him afraid to be alone after dark, while the second is not long delayed. On the eve of setting out once more for Norway, he quarrels with and slays a braggart named Thorbiorn; during the voyage itself he is the unintentional cause of a whole household of men being burnt to death; and lastly, by his own quarrelsome temper, and some "metaphysical aid," he misses the chance of clearing ...
— The Flourishing of Romance and the Rise of Allegory - (Periods of European Literature, vol. II) • George Saintsbury
... In all such matters, we of this country allow ourselves to be misrepresented by a comparatively few impudent people, with their own ends to serve. This book is somewhat open to like objections. Its title is too pretentious; its style is braggart, and tainted with the vulgarity of an English flash reporter; and yet this is tempered by a certain constraint, as if the writer could not but occasionally think how ill such a style was suited to his subject. The portrait is wretched, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various
... a train of causes that issued in the death of half a million of American citizens, and which covered the land with mourning from Maine to Florida, and from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean. This Jones is described by the free State men as a bully and a braggart, as only brave when he was not in danger, and as one of the most noisy and obstreperous of the pro-slavery leaders. Though living in Westport, Mo., he was made sheriff of Douglas county, fifty miles from his place ...
— Personal Recollections of Pardee Butler • Pardee Butler
... do you, and a sin, to conjure me for nought, for so many good knights be here within, that I should be held for a fool and a braggart and I put myself ...
— High History of the Holy Graal • Unknown
... neck of a bottle. Here, one had a mouth plugged with shot, and a beard as stiff as though it were made of rope. Another that he turned over was a German he had once heard speak at a diggers' meeting—a windy braggart of a man, with a quaint impediment in his speech. Well, poor soul! he would never mouth invectives or tickle the ribs of an audience again. His body was a very colander of wounds. Some had not bled either. It looked as though the soldiers had viciously gone ...
— Australia Felix • Henry Handel Richardson
... and my heart began to go pat pat, pat pat, so heavily that it seemed to jar against my ribs, while a curious series of thoughts ran through my brain, all of which were leavened by the same idea, that I had been playing the braggart, and offering to do things which ...
— Sail Ho! - A Boy at Sea • George Manville Fenn
... ago Mr. Edward Everett came up from the wilds of Devonshire to study law with Braggart and Pushem, in Chancery Lane. He was placed to board, by a prudent mother, with a ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 3, March, 1891 • Various
... to his own; but people do not stay to weigh their words when they mean to be angry; the colonists had taken their side; and, with what I own to be a natural spirit and ardour, were determined to have a trial of strength with the braggart domineering mother country. Breed's Hill became a mountain, as it were, which all men of the American Continent might behold, with Liberty, Victory, Glory, on its flaming summit. These dreaded troops could be withstood, then, by farmers and ploughmen. These famous officers could be outgeneralled ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... "Leadsman, you're a braggart!" said the miller. "We've known that for a long time; we knew it when you wrote to the paper saying the Great Man ...
— In Midsummer Days and Other Tales • August Strindberg
... noise of their boastings, with the shouting of their own braggart ineptitudes, they hypnotize themselves so thoroughly that they are quite unable to hear the counsel that sane wisdom ...
— Poise: How to Attain It • D. Starke
... bullies and boors. He shared their work and their sports, but he never stooped to their vulgarity. He very seldom drank with them, and they never heard him speak an oath. He could throw the stoutest in a wrestling match, and was ready, when brought to it, to whip any insolent braggart who made cruel use of his strength. He never flinched from hardship or danger, yet his heart was as soft and tender as a woman's. The great gentle giant had a feeling of sympathy for every living creature. He was not ashamed to rock a cradle, or to carry a pail of water or an armful of wood to ...
— The Every-day Life of Abraham Lincoln • Francis Fisher Browne
... I can set a braggart quailing with a quip, The upstart I can wither with a whim; He may wear a merry laugh upon his lip, But his laughter has an echo that is grim. When they've offered to the world in merry guise, Unpleasant truths are swallowed with a will - For he who'd make his fellow-creatures wise Should always ...
— Songs of a Savoyard • W. S. Gilbert
... presents of gold. On receiving the letter from Cortes, Narvaez turned it into ridicule, handing it about among his officers, speaking of us all as traitors whom he would put to death without mercy. He declared he would cut off and eat the ears of Cortes, and a great deal of such braggart nonsense, and of course made no answer to the letters. Just at this time Father Olmedo arrived, bringing with him the private letters and presents. He went in the first place to wait upon Narvaez, intending to assure ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. IV. • Robert Kerr
... people hardening to Spartan lineaments in the fire, iron men to meet disaster, worshippers of a discerned God of Laws, and just men too, thinking to do justice; he has Bull on the eye, the alternately braggart and poltroon, sweating in labour that he may gorge the fruits, graceless to a scoffer. And this is the creature to whose tail he is tied! Hereditary hatred is approved by critical disgust. Some spirited brilliancy, some persistent generosity (other than the guzzle's flash of it), ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... contemning subterfuge, chafing against the dictates of political expediency, and believing that quarrels between nations which cannot be accommodated without loss of self-respect on the one side or the other, had better be fought out in resolute and honourable war. He is the sworn foe of the bully or the braggart. Cruelty is hateful to him. The patriotic instinct nurtures in him a warm and generous humanity. His faith in the future of his nation depends on the confident hope that she will be true to herself, to her traditions, to her responsibilities, to the great virtues; ...
— Shakespeare and the Modern Stage - with Other Essays • Sir Sidney Lee
... shadow of a shipwright just passing away at the further end might be the shadow of Russian Peter himself. So, the doors of the great patent safe at last close upon me, and I take boat again: somehow, thinking as the oars dip, of braggart Pistol and his brood, and of the quiet monsters of the Yard, with their 'We don't particularly want to do it; but if it ...
— The Uncommercial Traveller • Charles Dickens
... mild a ruler am I to this people, Their tongues are all too bold—nor have they yet Been tamed to due submission, as they shall be. I must take order for the remedy; I will subdue this stubborn mood of theirs, This braggart spirit of freedom I will crush, I will proclaim a new law through ...
— Wilhelm Tell - Title: William Tell • Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller
... have eaten scores of dinners at Captain Bragg's charge, yet his hospitality is so insolent, that none of us who frequent his mahogany feel any obligation to our braggart entertainer. ...
— The Christmas Books • William Makepeace Thackeray
... Ireland,' or to provide for the contingency of a perseverance in the refusal of that legislature to right the people of Ireland." Accordingly, a large concourse of people assembled at the Corn-exchange, and were addressed by the demagogue in that braggart style which he well knew would win its way to their feelings. In his speech Mr. O'Connell intimated his intention of forming a new association, the exertions of which were to be directed to obtain for Ireland a greater share in the representation of the United Kingdom. ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... are not connected with me by blood. Winning over to-day the beauteous Damayanti of faultless features, I shall regard myself fortunate, indeed, since she it is that hath ever dwelt in my heart." Hearing these words of that incoherent braggart, Nala in anger desired to cut off his head with a scimitar. With a smile, however, though his eyes were red in anger, king Nala said, "Let us play. Why do you speak so now? Having vanquished me, you can say anything you like." Then the play commenced between Pushkara and Nala. And blessed ...
— Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa Bk. 3 Pt. 1 • Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa
... Tayoga," replied Willet with energy. "I'm no braggart, I hope, but you Iroquois don't call me Great Bear for nothing. My muscles are as hard as ever, and my wind's as good. I can lift more and carry more upon my shoulders than any other man in ...
— The Hunters of the Hills • Joseph Altsheler
... near the gates of Hades in the battle-field with calm indifference; and now, while he thus bewailed the sick and Tarautas with bitter lamentations, in his mind he saw no sick-bed, nor, indeed, the stunted form of the braggart hero of the arena, but the slender, graceful figure of a sweet girl, and a blackened, charred arm on which glittered ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... immediate interest or even knew what it was about. During the course of the Revolution there were thirty thousand Hessians in the British armies in America, and, as their owners, the German princelings, received L5 apiece for them it was a profitable arrangement for those phlegmatic, corpulent, and braggart personages. The Americans complained that the Hessians were brutal and tricky fighters; but in reality they merely carried out the ideals of their German Fatherland which remained behind the rest of Europe ...
— George Washington • William Roscoe Thayer
... miserly old governor, bidding him by all means rake and scrape together as much as he could, for that you would swill it all down your throat? Don't you remember, eh?—don't you remember?' O you good-for-nothing, miserable braggart! that was speaking like a ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... go ter the party with me, Sally?" He came insolently over, and stood waiting, ignoring her dismissal with the ease of braggart effrontery. She, in turn, stood rigid, wordless, pointing his way across the doorstep. Slowly, the drunken face lost its leering grin. The eyes blackened into a truculent and venomous scowl. He stepped over, and stood towering above ...
— The Call of the Cumberlands • Charles Neville Buck
... teach thee, young braggart, to play the Macedonian with me! I am no puny Persian, I warrant thee! What, man! have I not fought twenty years in the ring, and never lowered my arms once? And have I not received the rod from the editor's ...
— The Last Days of Pompeii • Edward George Bulwer-Lytton
... The braggart March stood in the season's door With his broad shoulders blocking up the way, Shaking the snow-flakes from the cloak he wore, And from the fringes of his kirtle gray. Near by him April stood with tearful face, With violets in her hands, and in her hair Pale, ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 3 (of 4) • Various
... I am convinced that there is not a grain of bad taste in the matter, and that there is a manly composure and courage in the proceeding deserving of the utmost respect. If Lemon were one of your braggart honest men, he would set a taint of bad taste upon that action as upon everything else he might say or do; but being what he is, I admire him for it greatly, and hold it to be a proof of an exalted nature and a true heart. Your idea of him, is mine. I am sure he is an excellent fellow. ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... size, but the most gentle and the most easily taught. Now if I were going to write about the tractability and aptitude to learn amongst those of India, AEthiopia, and Libya, I should probably appear to be concocting a tale and acting the braggart, or to be telling a falsehood respecting the nature of the animal founded on a mere report, all which it behoves a philosopher, and most of all one who is an ardent lover of truth, not to do. But what I have seen myself, and what others have described as having ...
— Sketches of the Natural History of Ceylon • J. Emerson Tennent
... taken from the life of tradesmen; there appear the— here also inevitable—"Fuller," then the "Ropemaker," the "Dyer," the "Salt-man," the "Female Weavers," the "Rascal"; other pieces give sketches of character, as the "Forgetful," the "Braggart," the "Man of 100,000 sesterces";(10) or pictures of other lands, the "Etruscan Woman," the "Gauls," the "Cretan," "Alexandria"; or descriptions of popular festivals, as the "Compitalia," the "Saturnalia," "Anna Perenna," ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen
... forlorn the Damsel, crowned with rue, Lactiferous spoils from vaccine dugs, who drew Of that corniculate beast whose tortuous horn Tossed to the clouds, in fierce vindictive scorn, The harrowing hound, whose braggart bark and stir Arched the lithe spine and reared the indignant fur Of Puss, that with verminicidal claw Struck the weird Rat, in whose insatiate maw Lay reeking malt, that erst in Ivan's courts we saw Robed in senescent garb that seems in sooth Too long a ...
— English as She is Wrote - Showing Curious Ways in which the English Language may be - made to Convey Ideas or obscure them. • Anonymous
... with stories of their own professional skill, while depreciating the services of others of the fraternity. Such unscrupulous quacks sought also to win over the patient's friends by little attentions, flatteries and innuendoes. Many, said this philosopher, recoil from a man of skill even, if he is a braggart. "When the doctor," he continues, "attended by a man known to the patient, and having a right of entry into the house, advances into the dwelling of the sick man, he should make his appearance in good clothes, with an inclination of the head; he should ...
— Primitive Psycho-Therapy and Quackery • Robert Means Lawrence
... men accustomed to war, sword in hand, are worth ten thousand archers in a surprise. Where is Menneville, that boaster, that braggart, who was to come back either ...
— Ten Years Later - Chapters 1-104 • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... have de skelps to hang up in my cabin to 'member you by.' Says he, 'Burlman Rennuls,' dat's me, you know, Bushie; 'Burlman Rennuls,' says he, 'you's 'tirely welcome to de skelps, ef you kin take 'em widout cuttin' an' spilin' de skin.' H-yah, h-yah, h-yah!" And the black braggart laughed as sincerely as if he were for the moment self-deceived into thinking that he was dealing in facts. But quickly recovering his lofty air, which had vanished while he laughed, the Fighting Negro thus proceeded with his observations upon the ...
— Burl • Morrison Heady
... him to round Riggs up down in the village—somewhere in a crowd. I want Riggs shown up as the coward, braggart, four-flush that he is. And insulted, slapped, ...
— The Man of the Forest • Zane Grey
... men Who sought to kindle flames of border war Have in confusion failed yet, once again, Their braggart plans ...
— Verses and Rhymes by the way • Nora Pembroke
... encouragement to our foes, and anon the hill-tops rang with a duel of pibrochs between him and a lad of our garrison, who got round on the top of the wall near the governor's house and strutted high shouldered up and down, blasting at the good braggart air of ...
— John Splendid - The Tale of a Poor Gentleman, and the Little Wars of Lorn • Neil Munro
... regular type," said Maxwell, with tacit enjoyment of the typicality of Pinney. "He hasn't the least chance in the world of working up into any controlling place in the paper. They don't know much in the Events office; but they do know Pinney. He's a great liar and a braggart, and he has no more notion of the immunities of private life than—Well, perhaps it's because he would as soon turn his life inside out as not, and in fact would rather. But he's very domestic, and very kind-hearted to his wife; it seems they have a baby now, and I've no doubt Pinney is a pattern ...
— The Quality of Mercy • W. D. Howells
... engaged in organizing a second army in the vicinity of Manassas and Fredericksburg under General John Pope, to operate against Richmond by the flank. General Pope from his infamous orders greatly incensed the people of the South, and from his vain boasting gained for himself the sobriquet of "Pope the Braggart." He ordered every citizen within his lines or living near them to either take the oath of allegiance to the United States or to be driven out of the country as an enemy of the Union. No one was to ...
— History of Kershaw's Brigade • D. Augustus Dickert
... made him confess that his own Casildea was more beautiful by far than the La Mancha knight's Dulcinea. Don Quixote suppressed a scornful smile that threatened to betray him, and controlled the feelings that the boasting errant's words provoked, while wondering at the braggart's audacity. He slyly expressed a doubt, however, that the valiant knight Don Quixote of La Mancha had let himself be vanquished by any living being. The Knight of the Grove then gave a description of Don Quixote which in every detail ...
— The Story of Don Quixote • Arvid Paulson, Clayton Edwards, and Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... it possible to imagine a more tragical destiny than theirs? Never consulted, always immolated, thrust into war, forced into crimes which they have never wished to commit. Any chance adventurer or braggart arrogantly claims the right to cloak with the name of the people the follies of his murderous rhetoric or the sordid interests he wishes to satisfy. The masses are everlastingly duped, everlastingly martyred; ...
— The Forerunners • Romain Rolland
... charms leads an Empress who in turn leads an empire. Half suspicious and wholly unconvinced, he questions and demands the exact number of invulnerables that can be placed in line; and is forthwith assured, with braggart Chinese choruses, that they are as locusts, that the whole earth swarms with them, that the movement is unconquerable. Still unconvinced, the false eunuch takes his departure, and then the Throne decrees and counter decrees in agonised Edicts. It is noticed, ...
— Indiscreet Letters From Peking • B. L. Putman Weale
... preliminary investigation, from which it appeared that it was possible to lie so flat between the rails that the train could pass over without touching, but to lie there was no joke! Kolya maintained stoutly that he would. At first they laughed at him, called him a little liar, a braggart, but that only egged him on. What piqued him most was that these boys of fifteen turned up their noses at him too superciliously, and were at first disposed to treat him as "a small boy," not fit to associate with them, and that was ...
— The Brothers Karamazov • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... convulsively torn by his cough, but at last they reached the house, and entered the great hall, where the myrmidons were assembled—all of whom rose on their appearance, and saluted them. There was Captain Bludder, with his braggart air, attended by some half-dozen Alsatian bullies; Lupo Vulp, with his crafty looks; and the tipstaves—all, in short, were present, excepting Clement Lanyere, and Sir Giles knew how to account for his absence. To the inquiries of Captain Bludder and his associates, ...
— The Star-Chamber, Volume 2 - An Historical Romance • W. Harrison Ainsworth
... braggart," said the glover in high wrath; "thy loves and thy battles are alike apocryphal. If thou must needs lie, which I think is thy nature, canst thou invent no falsehood that may at least do thee some credit? Do I not see through thee, as I could see the light through the horn of a base lantern? ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott
... wreath, or chain. None deigned to feed on broken fare, And none was false or stingy there. A piece of gold, the smallest pay, Was earned by labour for a day. On every arm were bracelets worn, And none was faithless or forsworn, A braggart or unkind. None lived upon another's wealth, None pined with dread or broken health, Or dark disease of mind. High-souled were all. The slanderous word, The boastful lie, were never heard. Each man was constant to his vows, And lived devoted to his spouse. No ...
— The Ramayana • VALMIKI
... chance to get acquainted with the playgrounds of the country. I've been too busy earning a holiday. But I've earned it all right." He turned to emphasize his boast with a nod toward Millicent. She blushed. His very chauffeur must redden at his braggart air, she thought. The Tudor castle grew dim in ...
— Life at High Tide - Harper's Novelettes • Various
... heroic treatment," said Uncle Teddy thoughtfully to Aunt Clara, as they wandered off by themselves in the moonlight, "but it took something like that to make any impression on him. He is the most insufferable little braggart that ever lived. I only hope the impression made ...
— The Campfire Girls on Ellen's Isle - The Trail of the Seven Cedars • Hildegard G. Frey
... "How now, braggart? What evil occupation brings thee about my house? What unlucky hankering, sirrah, brings thee, I say, a-robbing of my grounds and poultry-yards? Methinks thou hast but a sorry employment for ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby
... think the best of Lapham, but his mind was in a whirl of whatever thoughts were most injurious. He thought of him the night before in the company of those ladies and gentlemen, and he quivered in resentment of his vulgar, braggart, uncouth nature. He recognised his own allegiance to the exclusiveness to which he was born and bred, as a man perceives his duty to his country when her rights are invaded. His eye fell on the porter going about ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... were content to accept ideas that threw a pleasant glamour on life. But the coming of Jimmy Simpson altered this agreeable condition of mind. Jimmy was one of those masterful stupid boys who excel at games and physical contests, and triumph over intellectual problems by sheer braggart ignorance. From the first he regarded George with contempt, and when he heard him telling his stories he did ...
— The Ghost Ship • Richard Middleton
... This man was beginning to interest me. His rapid change of moods was fascinating, now the kindly philosopher, now the Teuton braggart, now the Hun incorporate. As he limped across the room to fetch his cigar case from the ...
— The Man with the Clubfoot • Valentine Williams
... the South—awake—awake! And strike for rights full dear as those For which our struggling sires did shake Earth's proudest throne—while freedom rose, Baptized in blood of braggart foes. Awake—that hour hath come again! Strike! as ye look to Heaven's high throne— Strike! for the Christian patriot's crown— Strike! in the name of Washington, Who taught you once to rend the chain, Smiles now from ...
— War Poetry of the South • Various
... sarcastically—but he did not make himself ridiculous. His amour propre was most intense. He appreciated fun, but did not care that it should be at his expense. He was grave, irritable and splenetic; but never comical. A braggart, a rough-rider, an aristocrat; but never a masquerader. That was ...
— Bricks Without Straw • Albion W. Tourgee
... at the latest. You remember that we have challenged the Count; to fight him is my affair, and I have sent a challenge. Since duelling is prohibited in Lithuania, I am going to the borders of the Grand Duchy of Warsaw; the Count, of course, is a braggart, but he does not lack courage, and will appear without fail at the appointed place. We will settle accounts; and, if God grants me his blessing, I will punish him, and then will swim over the Lososna, where the ranks of my brothers await me. I have heard that my father in his will bade ...
— Pan Tadeusz • Adam Mickiewicz
... contempt, forces the most modest man into a feeling of pride and self-consciousness. How can a tall man help thinking of his size, when dwarfs are constantly on tiptoe beside him?—Paracelsus was a braggart and a quack; so was Cardan; but it was their merits, and not their follies, which drew upon them that torrent of detraction and calumny, which compelled them so frequently to think and write concerning ...
— Literary Remains (1) • Coleridge
... Queenston Heights Sheaffe succeeded Brock in command of the British, and Smyth succeeded Van Rensselaer in command of the Americans. Sheaffe was a harsh martinet and a third-rate commander. Smyth, a notorious braggart, was no commander at all. He did, however, succeed in getting Sheaffe to conclude an armistice that fully equalled Prevost's in its disregard of British interests. After making the most of it for a month he ended it on November ...
— The War With the United States - A Chronicle of 1812 - Volume 14 (of 32) in the series Chronicles of Canada • William Wood
... like many other friends, is found most weak when most needed. In vain do we invoke his approved maxims, hitherto so glibly dealt out to silence all gainsayers; yet now, they are either found inapt or are forgotten wholly, until, after a paltry show of defence, braggart Philosophy fairly takes to his heels, and leaves us abandoned to the will of old mother Nature. Now, indeed, arrives the tug; and I, for my part, pity the man who, however savagely resolute, does not feel and own her power. The adieus of those one loves are, at best,—that ...
— Impressions of America - During the years 1833, 1834 and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Tyrone Power
... of the buoyant temperament and the professional pride of these people was furnished in the gay and braggart style in which they arrived at New York to join the enterprise. They were determined to regale and astonish the people of the "States" with the sight of a Canadian boat and a Canadian crew. They accordingly fitted up a large but light bark canoe, such as is used in the ...
— Astoria - Or, Anecdotes Of An Enterprise Beyond The Rocky Mountains • Washington Irving
... guilty, not the free; Suits tyrants, plunderers, but suits not me: Shall I, the terror of this sinful town, Care if a liveried lord or smile or frown? Who cannot flatter, and detest who can, Tremble before a noble serving-man? O my fair mistress, Truth! shall I quit thee 200 For huffing, braggart, puff'd nobility? Thou, who since yesterday hast roll'd o'er all The busy, idle blockheads of the ball, Hast thou, O Sun! beheld an emptier sort, Than such as swell this bladder of a court? Now pox on those who show a court in wax! It ought to bring ...
— The Poetical Works Of Alexander Pope, Vol. 1 • Alexander Pope et al
... has since occurred, you will be surprised to hear that I really had no fear of the machinations of Reardon. I knew him to be a great braggart, as I had said; and his threats against those who offended him were a standing jest in the village, for they had never in any instance been fulfilled. My taunt perhaps stung him into the accomplishment of his words to me; or his passion for Alice was so great as to urge him onward ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 3, July, 1851 • Various
... towards just this sort of record. Cunning, and the vanity which destroys cunning, often exist side by side. The criminal of a certain type almost worships himself; he is profoundly impressed with his own cleverness. He is a braggart; he swaggers; he defeats himself. A strange idiocy mingles with ...
— The Cruise of the Jasper B. • Don Marquis
... disgusted, and never spoke a word to her all night. The next morning we had made up our packs, and had already started, when we became aware that we had a dozen horsemen on our heels. The braggart Andalusians, who had been boasting they would murder every one who came near them, cut a pitiful figure at once. There was a general rout. El Dancaire, Garcia, a good-looking fellow from Ecija, who was called El Remendado, and Carmen herself, kept their wits ...
— Carmen • Prosper Merimee
... literature has sprung up about this Cagliostro of the sea. His record in the continental armies preceding his exile would fill a book by itself; and throughout all, Benyowsky appears in the same light, an unscrupulous braggart lying gloriously, but withal as ...
— Vikings of the Pacific - The Adventures of the Explorers who Came from the West, Eastward • Agnes C. Laut
... and though he had discovered that the professor was something of a humbug, and a good deal of a braggart, it had not for a moment occurred to him that he would prove dishonest. Even now he did not want to believe it, though he was nervously apprehensive ...
— The Young Musician - or, Fighting His Way • Horatio Alger
... there is no salvation but through Europe. Our salvation is here, if we have eyes to see it, and the salvation of Europe into the bargain; that is, if Europe is to be saved, which I rather doubt. Of course you'll call me a bird of freedom, a braggart, a waver of the stars and stripes; but I'm in the delightful position of not minding in the least what any one calls me. I haven't a mission; I don't want to preach; I have simply arrived at a state of mind; I have got Europe off my back. You have no idea how it ...
— The Point of View • Henry James
... or folly of the shallow-minded; so if you would not be thought so avoid boasting or affectations of any kind. The truly wise man is modest, and the braggart and coxcomb are valued ...
— Frost's Laws and By-Laws of American Society • Sarah Annie Frost
... sacred trust for knighthood and his king, And in the battle-field or tilting-yard He met his foe full-fronted, and struck hard. But now it seemed a foolish thing to throw One's whole life to the fortune of a blow. True valor breathes not in the braggart vaunt; True honor takes no shame from idle taunt; So let this wizard, if he wants to, scoff; Why should our hero have ...
— Gawayne And The Green Knight - A Fairy Tale • Charlton Miner Lewis
... married people who refused to sell out, if all that is stated in a Quebec paper of that period can be credited. No doubt the glories of war were uppermost in men's minds. It is possible to make war popular and the braggart tone of the Americans had doubtless contributed considerably to its popularity with ...
— The Rise of Canada, from Barbarism to Wealth and Civilisation - Volume 1 • Charles Roger
... Resident Magistrate the antechamber to the cell, and the cell the antechamber to the tomb. In all these ghastly and tragic dramas, enacted all over Ireland, Mr. Carson was the chief figure—self-confident, braggart, deliberate—winding the rope around his victim's neck with all the assured certainty of the British Empire, Mr. Balfour and the Resident ...
— Sketches In The House (1893) • T. P. O'Connor
... with but little dross to be purged away. In addition to all this he acquired for the moment what would now be called a European reputation. He was known in Paris as an assassin, and in England, thanks to the bullet letter, as a "fanfaron" and brave braggart. With these results he wended his way home much depressed in spirits, but not in the least discouraged, and ...
— George Washington, Vol. I • Henry Cabot Lodge
... jade? The braggart Lew, the simple Joe? And where the Irish servant maid That Jimmie Russell used to show? Charles Sweet, who tore the paper snow? Ben Harney's where? And Artie Hall? Nash Walker, Darktown's grandest beau? Into the night ...
— Something Else Again • Franklin P. Adams
... menti, l'ivrogne, dit-il, avec toute la grossierete du temps, je l'ai trompe plus de dix." (Gaillard, Rivalite, tom. iv. p. 240.) The anecdote has been repeated by other modern writers, I know not on what authority. Ferdinand was too shrewd a politician, to hazard his game by playing the braggart. ...
— The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella The Catholic, V3 • William H. Prescott
... suggested, and glorifying myself at being in the lucky way of doing and knowing everything. I told much to some special friends, some of whom wanted to find out my sources of such enjoyments; others thought I was a mere braggart. ...
— My Secret Life, Volumes I. to III. - 1888 Edition • Anonymous
... cold fact. Known all over the border. Gulden's no braggart. But he's been known to talk. He was a sailor—a pirate. Once he was shipwrecked. Starvation forced him to be a cannibal. He told this in California, and in Nevada camps. But no one believed him. A few years ago he got snowed-up in the mountains back of Lewiston. He had ...
— The Border Legion • Zane Grey
... raising, but is from foreign lands, or perhaps from the little island itself over the blue water?" he said, in a voice as remarkable for the softness and sweetness of its tones, as was his person for its rare proportions; "I may speak of these things, and be no braggart; for I have been down at both havens; that which is situate at the mouth of Thames, and is named after the capital of Old England, and that which is called 'Haven', with the addition of the word 'New'; ...
— The Last of the Mohicans • James Fenimore Cooper
... imaginative genius and extraordinary manual skill. A goldsmith and sculptor, he was also a soldier, and did service as a fighter and engineer in the wars of his time. Of high personal courage, he was a braggart and a ruffian, who used the dagger as freely as the tools of his craft. His many qualities and complex personality are revealed in his "Autobiography"—one of the most vivid and remarkable records ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol IX. • Edited by Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton
... braggart, has put it on record that his conception of history was more just than that of Hume, Robertson, Voltaire, and Gibbon. It is perfectly true that his conception was different from theirs, his execution was different, and he does not address the same class of readers. ...
— Studies in Early Victorian Literature • Frederic Harrison
... now, I challenge you to wrestle me at side-holds, catch-as-you-can and arm's end, the winner of two out of three falls to be acknowledged the best man, and Hugh Heffiner to be the judge. If you refuse to wrestle, I will brand you as a blower and a braggart—a fellow not fit to be accepted in the society of gentlemen. Your ...
— Frank Merriwell's Races • Burt L. Standish
... Charles IV (1788- 1808), boorish, foolish, easily duped. By his side sat his queen, a coarse sensuous woman "with a tongue like a fishwife's." Their heir was Prince Ferdinand, a conceited irresponsible young braggart in his early twenties. And their favorite, the true ruler of Spain, if Spain at this time could be said to have a ruler, was Godoy, a vain flashy adventurer, who was loved by the queen, shielded by the king, and envied by the heir. Under such a combination it is not strange ...
— A Political and Social History of Modern Europe V.1. • Carlton J. H. Hayes
... their people—the condition of their country would now be widely different from what it is; and surely their bishops might have been better employed in remedying the neglect of their subordinates, than in attending political meetings, and delivering postprandial orations, savouring more of the braggart boastings of a drunken drumboy, than of the deliberate opinions of a dignified ecclesiastic. In their zeal as politicians, the Roman Catholic clergy have forgotten their duties as priests; and they are now beginning to get a foretaste of the consequences: they became mob leaders at elections ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 55, No. 343, May 1844 • Various
... were known, Joseph Bumble proved to be somewhat of a braggart. He was forever boasting of his connection with the Bumblebee family. And Betsy couldn't say anything to him without his remarking that his cousin Buster Bumblebee's mother, the well-known Queen, thought ...
— The Tale of Betsy Butterfly - Tuck-Me-In Tales • Arthur Scott Bailey
... as it had been to Colonel Dewes that the last few weeks had taken their toll of him. There were dark, heavy pouches beneath his eyes, his manner was feverish, and when he talked at all it was with a boisterous and a somewhat braggart voice. ...
— The Broken Road • A. E. W. Mason
... he had sent his son in the command of the northern fleet, who, being young, he prayed the captain-major to aid him with his counsel. Thus were the viceroy and I abused by the false reports of a lying braggart. The letter to the sabander thanked him for refusing to allow the English to trade at Surat, willing him to continue the same conduct, which would do great service to the King of Portugal, and for which he should be rewarded. This day came sundry carts laden with provisions ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. VIII. • Robert Kerr
... midnight nap. Since Howe's time there had been a more decorous rule, and the taverns closed early. There were no roystering soldiers flinging their money about and singing songs in King George's honor, or ribald squibs about the rebels, and braggart rhymes as to what they would do with them by and by. Everything, this October night, was soft and silent. Even party people had gone home long ago, and heard the watchman sing out, "Twelve o'clock and all is well!" Only ...
— A Little Girl in Old Philadelphia • Amanda Minnie Douglas |
