"Coward" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... that the American forces at Ft. Schuyler were ready to co-operate in the battle. His subordinate officers, however, retorted that they "came to fight, not to see others fight" and finally accused Herkimer of being a "Tory and a coward." Gen. Herkimer, thoroughly enraged, gave ...
— The Greatest Highway in the World • Anonymous
... However much he attributed this answer of the shaman to inspiration from those on high, it appeared to him dangerous. Tyope felt very uneasy, but he was no coward. In case the worst had really happened, if the Tehuas had anticipated and surrounded him, he still inclined to the conviction that concentration of his forces and a rapid onslaught on the foes in his rear would not only save him, but secure a reasonable number of coveted trophies. ...
— The Delight Makers • Adolf Bandelier
... think him a coward, for you must remember he was hardly sixteen years old at the time, and that this was the first affair of the sort he had encountered. Afterwards, as you shall learn, he showed that he could exhibit ...
— Stolen Treasure • Howard Pyle
... a man first of her own race, and he made her go! Would she have gone if a coward asked her, think you? Sahib—women are good—at the other end of things! We will ride and fetch her. Ha! I saw! My eyes are old, but they bear witness yet!—Now, food, sahib—for the love of Allah, food, before my belt-plate and my ...
— Rung Ho! • Talbot Mundy
... the irritation of a nervous thread, a slight congestion, a small disturbance in the imperfect and delicate functions of our living machinery, can turn the most lighthearted of men into a melancholy one, and make a coward of the bravest! Then, I go to bed, and I wait for sleep as a man might wait for the executioner. I wait for its coming with dread, and my heart beats and my legs tremble, while my whole body shivers beneath the warmth of the bedclothes, until the moment ...
— Masterpieces of Mystery, Vol. 1 (of 4) - Ghost Stories • Various
... was because he was a coward, and had not the moral courage to go to sleep with a lie on his soul, for fear he might wake up and see an angel with a fiery sword standing by his bedside. And I must sorrowfully acknowledge this seemed a truer view of the case than believing the boy was really impressed with the heinousness ...
— Seven Little Australians • Ethel Sybil Turner
... such a coward," I cried, hurrying down stairs, while the poor little Rhymester, afraid to be left alone ...
— The Wallypug in London • G. E. Farrow
... it if a man called you a coward. Don't try my woman's friendship for you too far. You insult me by ...
— The Love Affairs of an Old Maid • Lilian Bell
... he gave himself up, the coward—the lying turn-tale! The treacherous dog! Swearing it off on me to save a few years of his miserable life out of jail. See here!" stopping suddenly before Mr. Pinkerton, "That traitor made me swear I would ...
— Jim Cummings • Frank Pinkerton
... one mile; and, clearly, this was not like flying from danger as a coward, but fleeing from attempted crime, as a brother and a Christian. Julian snatched at him to catch him as he passed: and, failing in this, rushed after him. It was a race for life! and they went like the wind, for two hundred yards, along ...
— The Complete Prose Works of Martin Farquhar Tupper • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... is a sin to wish bad luck to an enemy," the widow remarked. "I will do penance for it. Still, I would strew flowers on his grave with the greatest pleasure, and that is the truth. Black-hearted, that he is! The coward couldn't speak up for his own mother, and cheats you out of your share by deceit and trickery. My cousin had a pretty fortune of her own, but unluckily for you, nothing was said in the marriage-contract about anything that she might ...
— Father Goriot • Honore de Balzac
... of him, convey an impression of feeble, unpractical piety that one is loth to associate with a malicious impostor. In addition to this, one of the witnesses against him, Tyrell, was a manifest knave and coward; another, Mainy, as conspicuous a fool; while the rest were servant-maids—all of them interested in exonerating themselves from the stigma of having been adherents of a lost cause, at the expense of a ringleader ...
— Elizabethan Demonology • Thomas Alfred Spalding
... and the next day at three o'clock, instead of seeing me herself, sent me ten guineas in a note, by her French maitre d'hotel; which chinked as they slided from side to side, and proclaimed me a pauper! My heart almost burst with indignation! Yet, coward that I was! I wanted the fortitude to refuse the polluted paper! I thought it would be an affront, and still fed myself with the vain hope of procuring from her that countenance to my own labours which I imagined they deserved, ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... in his life. He had to escape regeneration. To do that, he was willing to take any chance, coward though he was—even if it meant that he had to become ...
— Divinity • William Morrison
... frightened!" exclaimed her father. "The daughter of all the Dantons that ever fought and fell, turn coward! ...
— Kate Danton, or, Captain Danton's Daughters - A Novel • May Agnes Fleming
... coward. Yet was he undecided. He gazed into the gulf on either side and ran his eyes along the knife-edge he must travel. Then ...
— The House of Pride • Jack London
... evil; just as a pebble on a railway can stagger the Scotch express. It is enough for the great martyrs and criminals of the French revolution, that they have surprised for all time the secret weakness of the strong. They have awakened and set leaping and quivering in his crypt for ever the coward ...
— Tremendous Trifles • G. K. Chesterton
... withal, whose days are summer bright, * Whom maids e'er greet with smiling lips' delight; Whom spicey breezes fan in every site * And wins whate'er he wills, that happy wight White blooded coward heart ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... socially they should not give a false showing of themselves or of their means. The proudest spirit acknowledges the limitations of poverty with dignified truthfulness; it is the moral coward who seeks to hide these limitations by a greater display than his circumstances warrant. And he reaps as he sows. His "entertainments" fill an idle hour for the class of visitors who gravitate mainly to the supper-room, while the giver of the feast, ...
— Etiquette • Agnes H. Morton
... make the guns safe,' he cried to his men—he was not all a coward, poor fellow—and as they ran for it he picked up the spikes and the hammer. Tap! tap! tap! one gun was spiked. Tap! tap! tap! another. Then we heard the Russians beginning ...
— For The Honor Of France - 1891 • Thomas A. Janvier
... been cut, lying in the bottom of the deep arroyo. He rode down and recovered the tool, in no hurry now, for he was quite certain that the fence-cutter would not have another. He would discover his loss when he came to the fence, and then, if he was not entirely the coward and sneak that his actions seemed to brand him, he would have recourse ...
— The Duke Of Chimney Butte • G. W. Ogden
... Wyn was no coward; she had shown that the time she and Bessie Lavine were spilled out of their canoes in the middle of the lake. But she had not lived, like Polly, in the woods with few ...
— Wyn's Camping Days - or, The Outing of the Go-Ahead Club • Amy Bell Marlowe
... of a coward would keep out of sight when he saw a head coming down on him in such tempting style as mine. I can't ...
— The Cave in the Mountain • Lieut. R. H. Jayne
... so the under-sheriff and justice thrived for some time. But one day the under-sheriff served his patent automatic warrant on a young man who refused to come down. The officer then drew one of those large baritone instruments that generally has a coward at one end and a corpse at the other. He pointed this at the young man and assessed a fine of $50 and costs. Instead of paying this fine, the youth, who was quite nimble, but unarmed, knocked the bogus officer down with the butt end of his ...
— Remarks • Bill Nye
... each other. Long and long they looked, and the heart of each was elated. "I comprehend," Demetrios said. He clapped spurs to his horse and fled as a coward would have fled. This was one occasion in his life when he overcame his pride, and should in ...
— Domnei • James Branch Cabell et al
... court. Two executioners with pinafores reversed, led me in. Under the shade of an umbrella, I perceived my Bride, supported by the Bride of the Pirate-Colonel. The President (having reproved a little female ensign for tittering, on a matter of Life or Death) called upon me to plead, "Coward or no Coward, Guilty or not Guilty?" I pleaded in a firm tone, "No Coward and Not Guilty." (The little female ensign being again reproved by the President for misconduct, mutinied, left the ...
— The Trial of William Tinkling - Written by Himself at the Age of 8 Years • Charles Dickens
... Captain made for each Mess, laid this Storm for a while; but that which at first pacify'd these turbulent Spirits, was what blew them up again: For when they were all drunk, the Boatswain said the Captain was a Coward, and took a Merchant-man for a Man of War: That his Fear had magnified the Object, and deprived them of the Means of either taking others, or defending themselves. This he said in the Captain's Hearing, who, without returning ...
— A Voyage to Cacklogallinia - With a Description of the Religion, Policy, Customs and Manners of That Country • Captain Samuel Brunt
... an unblushing face of innocence. Montoni, you are a villain! If there is treachery in this affair, look to yourself as the author of it. IF—do I say? I—whom you have wronged with unexampled baseness, whom you have injured almost beyond redress! But why do I use words?—Come on, coward, and receive ...
— The Mysteries of Udolpho • Ann Radcliffe
... was the Secretary of the Festival Committee which had been formed for the celebration of Liszt's Artist-Jubilee in November 1873 at Budapest, had in their name invited Liszt to take part in this.] Nevertheless I could not suit myself to the role of a coward; I will therefore endeavor to surmount my fear and to make myself worthy to share with my brave compatriots in the joy they ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 2: "From Rome to the End" • Franz Liszt; letters collected by La Mara and translated
... Mary, taking long horseback rides with her, and going to see her whenever he pleases, I don't know how I keep from killing him. He isn't fit to be in the same town with her. I know the man, went to school with him. He's a cad and a coward and a big fat fool. He has some money— that is, his father has—and a smearing of education, but he's coarse and common and not to be trusted. Van Orm was a gentleman at least, and if ...
— Miss Gibbie Gault • Kate Langley Bosher
... he WARN'T a coward. Not by a blame' sight. There ain't a coward amongst them Shepherdsons—not a one. And there ain't no cowards amongst the Grangerfords either. Why, that old man kep' up his end in a fight one day for half an hour against three Grangerfords, and come out winner. They was all a-horseback; he lit off ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... delivering "a low attack that could not be answered." Accusation summarised by other Members with yell of "Coward!" ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, July 8, 1914 • Various
... had taken the veil, could not refuse visits, some of which must have been as a second entering of iron into this proud woman's soul. The coward Gaston, when passing through Moulins, sought an interview. Richelieu, also, whose emissary received the following message: "Tell your master, that my tears reply for me and that I am his humble ...
— East of Paris - Sketches in the Gatinais, Bourbonnais, and Champagne • Matilda Betham-Edwards
... within her to cause her to falter or stand abashed. But the tired man, in the poor fellow, cried out to this strong, brave creature to aid him understandingly where his own knowledge and slowness of nature made him a coward. And so they stood looking in ...
— Janet of the Dunes • Harriet T. Comstock
... I did! I fully intended to, but found myself too great a coward. I dare not—I cannot risk losing her. I am fearful that if she knew it she would throw me ...
— The Garies and Their Friends • Frank J. Webb
... of blood. He himself must go,—or the man. Then he remembered that she was the man's wife, and that it behoved him to spare the man for her sake. Then, when he came to think in earnest of self-destruction, he told himself that it was a coward's refuge. He took to his classics for consolation, and read the philosophy of Cicero, and the history of Livy, and the war chronicles of Caesar. They did him good,—in the same way that the making of many shoes would have done him good had he been ...
— An Old Man's Love • Anthony Trollope
... these very words: "Thou traitor, I don't care what becomes of thee." I replied, "Very well, Friend Franchise" (we gave him that nickname in our party); "you are a coward" (I told a lie, for he was certainly a brave man), "and I am a priest; but dueling is not allowed us." M. de Brissac threatened to cudgel him, and he to kick Brissac. The President, fearing these words would end in blows, got ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... "You coward, to take advantage of two girls driven to you by the storm. I didn't think the man lived that would ...
— The Highgrader • William MacLeod Raine
... condemn myself out of my own mouth, by allowing the absolute nature of justifying grace and the impossibility of the elect ever falling from the faith, or the glorious end to which they were called; and then he said, this granted, self-destruction was the act of a hero, and none but a coward would shrink from it, to suffer a hundred times more every day and night ...
— The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner • James Hogg
... Queen ELIZABETH II of the UK (since 6 February 1952) head of government: Lieutenant Governor and Commander in Chief Vice-Admiral Sir John COWARD (since NA 1994) and Bailiff Mr. Graham Martyn DOREY (since February 1992) cabinet: Advisory and Finance Committee (other committees) appointed by the Assembly of the States elections: none; the queen is a hereditary monarch; lieutenant ...
— The 1997 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... sale in his book-store. During the popular excitement on this subject, in 1834, he was told that his store was about to be attacked by an infuriated rabble, and he had better remove all such publications from the window. "Dost thou think I am such a coward as to forsake my principles, or conceal them, at the bidding of a mob?" said he. Presently, another messenger came to announce that the mob were already in progress, at the distance of a few streets. He was ...
— Isaac T. Hopper • L. Maria Child
... little time taken to recover his lost equanimity, Wanhope went on: "I don't know whether you knew that Ormond had rather a peculiar dread of death." We none of us could affirm that we did, and again Wanhope resumed: "I shouldn't say that he was a coward above other men I believe he was rather below the average in cowardice. But the thought of death weighed upon him. You find this much more commonly among the Russians, if we are to believe their novelists, than among Americans. ...
— Questionable Shapes • William Dean Howells
... we?' She went on crying: 'You have ruined my chances in life!' And I pitied her very much. 'It's nothing,' I said; 'things will come all right. Or,' I continued, 'you can go into a convent.' And she began to insult me. 'You are a stupid fool, Mitia! a coward!'" ...
— Creatures That Once Were Men • Maxim Gorky
... a comedian convulse thousands with his delineations of the weaknesses of humanity in the inimitable "Rip Van Winkle." I saw him make laughter hold its sides, as he impersonated the coward in "The Rivals;" and I said: I would rather have the power of Joseph Jefferson, to make the world laugh, and to drive care and trouble from weary brains and sorrow from heavy hearts, than to wear the blood-stained laurels of military glory, or to be President of the United ...
— Gov. Bob. Taylor's Tales • Robert L. Taylor
... so and so; and you get another star for your breast; and all the world sings your praises. And who is to court-martial a great hero for reckless waste of human life? Who is to tell him that he is a cruel-hearted coward? Who is to take him to the fields he has saturated with blood, and compel him to count the corpses; or to take him to the homesteads he has ruined throughout the land, and ask the women and sons and the daughters what they think ...
— Sunrise • William Black
... at the cold-blooded tone in which these men discussed the killing of the boys, but Ted only smiled, for he knew that Burk was at heart a coward, and that he did not care to rush, nor would he stand a rush should ...
— Ted Strong in Montana - With Lariat and Spur • Edward C. Taylor
... such solitude. His heart, during those first weeks at Ellisland, (p. 097) entirely sank within him, and he saw all men and life coloured by his own despondency. This is the entry in his commonplace book on the first Sunday he spent alone at Ellisland:—"I am such a coward in life, so tired of the service, that I would almost at any time, with Milton's Adam, 'gladly lay me in my mother's lap, and be at peace.' But a wife and children bind me to struggle with the stream, till some sudden squall shall overset the silly vessel, or in the listless return of years ...
— Robert Burns • Principal Shairp
... are! How can there be atonement? You cannot wipe things out—on earth. We are of the earth. Records remain. If a man plays the fool, the coward, and the criminal, he must expect to wear the fool's cap, the white feather, and the leg-chain until his life's end. And now, please, let us change the subject. We have been bookish long enough." She rose with a gesture ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... "Come back, miscreant! coward!" shouted Woodburn, dismounting, and leaping forward to the place where the other had disappeared—"come back, and decide your fate ...
— The Rangers - [Subtitle: The Tory's Daughter] • D. P. Thompson
... tears, O Rome! began to flow; So sad the scene! What then must Perseus feel, To see Jove's race attend the victor's wheel: To see the slaves of his worst foes increase, From such a source!—An emperor's embrace! He sicken'd soon to death; and, what is worse, He well deserv'd, and felt, the coward's curse; Unpitied, scorn'd, insulted his last hour, Far, far from home, and in a vassal's power: His pale cheek rested on his shameful chain, No friend to mourn, no flatterer to feign; No suit retards, no ...
— The Poetical Works of Edward Young, Volume 2 • Edward Young
... for God's sake!" he said passionately. "I must not dream of it,—I dare not! I become the slave of my own imagined rapture,—the coward who falls conquered and trembling before his own desire of delight! Rather let me strive to be glad that she, my angel-love, is so far removed from my unworthiness,— let her, if she be near me now, read my thoughts, and see in them how dear, how sacred is ...
— Ardath - The Story of a Dead Self • Marie Corelli
... magnates deem themselves, I would not, while the mountains can yield one free spot for my footstep, change my place in the world's many grades for theirs. To the brave, there is but one sort of plebeian, and that is the coward. But you, sage Rienzi," continued the Knight, in a gayer tone, "I have seen in more stirring scenes than the ...
— Rienzi • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... an awful coward, I'm afraid," Dolly said, as the camp was approached. "Will you tell Miss Eleanor what happened; everything! I'm afraid that if I told her myself I wouldn't put in what I ...
— The Camp Fire Girls at Long Lake - Bessie King in Summer Camp • Jane L. Stewart
... he isn't a coward or a fool and he knew that I'm not a coward or a fool either. He thought Ally had nobody but me. She'll have nobody but you when I'm gone. You mustn't let her see you think her awful. You mustn't think it. She isn't. She's as good as gold. Steven Rowcliffe said ...
— The Three Sisters • May Sinclair
... man enough to take the responsibility for your words and actions on your own shoulders? Are you ashamed to wear a present I gave you, while you expect me to wear yours? You're a coward! And you imagine ...
— Married • August Strindberg
... had proved often enough that she was no coward, but even the brave turn poltroon when they fight without a sense of justification. Her pride told her that she ought to cross over to Lady Clifton-Wyatt and demand that she speak up. But her sense of guilt robbed her of her courage. And that oath she had given to Mr. Verrinder ...
— The Cup of Fury - A Novel of Cities and Shipyards • Rupert Hughes
... dock Warrington had mapped out his campaign. Fair play from either of these men was not to be entertained for a moment. One was naturally a brute and the other was a coward. They would not hesitate at any means to defeat him. And he knew what defeat would mean at their hands: ...
— Parrot & Co. • Harold MacGrath
... He was horrid. But I don't wish you to meet him again just now. He is no coward, and he might ...
— The Strange Case of Mortimer Fenley • Louis Tracy
... coward of me. I want to temporise—put off the inevitable. But it's no good. Angels have to be faced. That's the demand they ...
— Angels & Ministers • Laurence Housman
... as he was going under another name, he wanted people to believe they had legalised their union, and to respect Lalage accordingly. Had he not belonged to a family of position, he might have seen himself as a coward or a cad; but the Griersons were essentially of the Victorian age, and so he was able to quiet his conscience with platitudes; whilst under the seeming calmness with which Lalage had accepted his proposal, she was too glad of any change from the nightmare of the ...
— People of Position • Stanley Portal Hyatt
... of the unwashed patriots dashed through the Bar towards Somerset House, full of vague notions of riot, and perhaps (delicious thought!) plunder. But at St. Mary's, Commissioner Mayne and his men in the blue tail-coats received the roughs in battle array, and at the first charge the coward ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... the live Walker. His consort, with the solicitude of an affectionate wife, together with some friends, advised him to go to Canada, lest he should be abducted. Walker said that he had nothing to fear from such a pack of coward blood-hounds; but if he did go, he would hurl back such thunder across the great lakes, that would cause them to tremble in their strong holds. Said he, "I will stand my ground. Somebody must die in ...
— Walker's Appeal, with a Brief Sketch of His Life - And Also Garnet's Address to the Slaves of the United States of America • David Walker and Henry Highland Garnet
... anniversary of the passing of Napoleon centers attention anew on one of the baffling figures of all time—a man at once attractive and repulsive; a soldier of infinite courage who on at least one occasion acted the coward; a master strategist who, to the last, seemed never to fully grasp that strategy by which he ...
— Heart and Soul • Victor Mapes (AKA Maveric Post)
... James's person, his lack of courage on certain occasions (he was by no means a constant coward), and the feebleness of his limbs might be attributed to pre-natal influences; he was injured before he was born by the sufferings of his mother at the time of Riccio's murder. His deep dissimulation he ...
— A Short History of Scotland • Andrew Lang
... even to the end of my days I shall be a coward and a weakling, or it may be I am too young, and have as yet no trust in my hands to defend me from such an one as does violence without a cause. But come now, ye who are mightier men than I, essay the bow and let us make an end ...
— DONE INTO ENGLISH PROSE • S. H. BUTCHER, M.A.
... discomfiture of Manassas, I with my own hands did buckle on his armour, trusting in the great Comforter for strength according to my need. For truly the memory of a brave son dead in his shroud were a greater staff of my declining years than a coward, though his days might be long in the land and he should get much goods. It is not till our earthen vessels are broken that we find and truly possess the treasure that was laid up in them. Migravi in animam meam, I have sought refuge in ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various
... can he think to gain by shewing himself to the world in a vizor, and by concealing his true being from the people? Praise a humpback for his stature, he has reason to take it for an affront: if you are a coward, and men commend you for your valour, is it of you they speak? They take you for another. I should like him as well who glorifies himself in the compliments and congees that are made him as if he were ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne
... "Coward!" cried the general, trying to control the anger the man's insolent reply provoked in him. "Last night was as clear as day, yet it cost me three hundred francs in actual robbery and over a thousand in future damages. You will leave my service unless you do better. All wrong-doing deserves some ...
— Sons of the Soil • Honore de Balzac
... iniurious: your selfe being alreadie, of any that I know in our time, the most excellent Poet. Forsooth by your Princely pursefauours and countenance, making in maner what ye list, the poore man rich, the lewd well learned, the coward couragious, and vile both noble and valiant. Then for imitation no lesse, your person as a most cunning counterfaitor liuely representing Venus in countenance, in life Diana, Pallas for gouernement, and Iuno in ...
— The Arte of English Poesie • George Puttenham
... lived too sparing, nor too largely spent; But overlook'd his hinds; their pay was just, 920 And ready, for he scorn'd to go on trust: Slow to resolve, but in performance quick; So true, that he was awkward at a trick. For little souls on little shifts rely, And coward arts of mean expedients try; The noble mind will dare do anything but lie. False friends, his deadliest foes, could find no way But shows of honest bluntness, to betray: That unsuspected plainness he believed; He looked into himself, ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol I - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden
... went up to him and made a profound obeisance, saying: "Pray do not leave us, sir. Will you not take a seat?" She looked like a drowning person clutching at him for support—the little coward! ...
— The Home and the World • Rabindranath Tagore
... offer us in its stead? The principle of intelligent purpose and design. This, he says, is not open to the objections which apply to the Aristotelian principles and methods. It is as if one said the coward is a better man than the brave warrior, because the latter is open to the danger of being captured, wounded or killed, whereas the former is not so liable. The answer obviously would be that the only way the coward ...
— A History of Mediaeval Jewish Philosophy • Isaac Husik
... from her father, and he from his, and so on until the time of that Thorolf Erlandsson who sailed with Bjarni Grimulfsson and went down into the sea by his side singing, for he feared nothing but to be a coward." ...
— Days of the Discoverers • L. Lamprey
... send?" Jim asked again. "There's nobody there to bring her, and nobody here to go after her. It's an awfully long way from here to Ohio. A little six-year-old girl can't come alone. I couldn't go back myself. I may be a coward, but the Almighty made me as I am. I can't go back to Cloverdale and see only a grave—I can stay here and remember, and maybe do a kind of a man's part, but I can't go back." He bowed his ...
— Winning the Wilderness • Margaret Hill McCarter
... to him. As I said before, a word from him and the slaughter would have ceased. But he refused to give that word. He insisted that the integrity of society was assailed; that he was not sufficiently a coward to desert his post; and that it was manifestly just that a few should be martyred for the ultimate welfare of the many. Nevertheless this blood was upon his head, and he sank into deeper and deeper gloom. I was likewise whelmed with the ...
— Moon-Face and Other Stories • Jack London
... is implored to moderate the martial eagerness of the poet. The original collector here showed lack of discrimination. At no time, however, was Ares a popular God in Greece; in Homer he is a braggart and coward. ...
— The Homeric Hymns - A New Prose Translation; and Essays, Literary and Mythological • Andrew Lang
... persists that he is a well-wisher to Pope!!! He has, then, edited an "assassin" and a "coward" wittingly, as well as lovingly. In my former letter I have remarked upon the editor's forgetfulness of Pope's benevolence. But where he mentions his faults it is "with sorrow"—his tears drop, but they do not blot them out. The "recording angel" differs from ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. 6 (of 6) - With his Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... Napoleon, and the bibliopolist is in a great funk. I lack some part of his instinct. I have done Gourgaud no wrong: every word imputed to him exists in the papers submitted to me as historical documents[28], and I should have been a shameful coward if I had shunned using them. At my years it is somewhat late for an affair of honour, and as a reasonable man I would avoid such an arbitrament, but will not plead privilege of literature. The country shall not be disgraced in my person, ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott
... for honest poverty, That hangs his head, and a' that? The coward-slave, we pass him by; We dare be poor for a' that! For a' that, and a' that, Our toils obscure, and a' that; The rank is but the guinea stamp, The man's the ...
— Elson Grammer School Literature, Book Four. • William H. Elson and Christine Keck
... Brigade, leaving the terrified Hicks to wait in the lane, where, because of his alarm, he had no time to wonder at the bravado of his behemoth comrades. However, finding that Bildad had disappeared, and believing he had taken Caesar Napoleon into the house, the sunny Hicks, who was far from a coward otherwise, but who had an unreasonable dread of dogs, little or big, was about to wax courageous, and join his team-mates, when a wild shout ...
— T. Haviland Hicks Senior • J. Raymond Elderdice
... care and worry: Never mind the 'if' and 'but' (words for coward lips). Put them out with 'fear' and 'doubt,' in the pack with 'hurry,' While we stroll like vagabonds forth to trails, ...
— Poems of Purpose • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... That is exactly what I am going to do, until I show up the villainy of this man you are talking to. He was the concocter of it, and he knows it. She never had brains enough to think of it. He was too much of a coward to carry it through himself, and so he set her to do ...
— A Woman Intervenes • Robert Barr
... he die like a craven, Begging those torturing fiends for his life? Was there a soldier who carried the Seven Flinched like a coward or fled from the strife? No, by the blood of our Custer, no quailing! There in the midst of the devils they close, Hemmed in by thousands, but ever assailing, Fighting like tigers, all bayed ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For • Various
... not what you came into this room to announce to me, Alice. So please say whatever it is you wish and be through. I am going out for a little walk before lunch." In any event Sally was no coward! ...
— The Campfire Girls on the Field of Honor • Margaret Vandercook
... arise in favour of drunkenness, as that it would enable you to face a degree of cold, or contagion, else menacing to life, a duty would arise, pro hac vice, of getting drunk. We had an amiable friend who suffered under the infirmity of cowardice; an awful coward he was when sober; but, when very drunk, he had courage enough for the Seven Champions of Christendom. Therefore, in an emergency, where he knew himself suddenly loaded with the responsibility of defending a family, we approved highly of his getting drunk. But to violate ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 57, No. 351, January 1845 • Various
... room she gave him to me with an apology for doing so, since I shrank from witnessing the operation. What must Dr. E. think I am made of if I can't bear to see a child's gums lanced? However, it is my own fault that he thinks me such a coward, for I made mother think me one. It was very embarrassing to hold baby and have the doctor's face so close to mine. I really wonder mother should not see how ...
— Stepping Heavenward • Mrs. E. Prentiss
... his life; but when the confessor went to her and beseeched her, in the name of Our Blessed Lord, to have mercy on the unhappy man, she replied with petulance, "that she could not, and that many had been condemned to the wheel who did not deserve it so much as this coward." ...
— The South of France—East Half • Charles Bertram Black
... sister!" interjected Le Gardeur. "I am a coward when I think of her, and I shame to come into ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... long discussion. Wayne called the sulking scout a damned coward, which consoled him somewhat, but didn't help matters. Ray had been around the rifle-pits taking observations. Presently he returned, leading Dandy up near the fire,—the one sheltered light ...
— Marion's Faith. • Charles King
... however, reassured him. He instantly knew himself to be the better man. His captive's obvious terror of his pop-gun almost persuaded him that he held in his hand some formidable death-dealing instrument. As a matter of fact Mr. Percival Jones was temperamentally an abject coward. ...
— More William • Richmal Crompton
... first shall rise to gang awa, [go] A cuckold, coward loun is he! [rascal] Wha first beside his chair shall fa', He is ...
— Robert Burns - How To Know Him • William Allan Neilson
... Jim's face to see how the shorter guide took it. He realized that Jim was at least no coward, even though he might fear the wrath of such a forest bully as the ex-logger, and present lawless poacher Cale Martin; for he had shut his teeth hard together, and there was a grim expression on his face, as if he did not ...
— The Boy Scouts in the Maine Woods - The New Test for the Silver Fox Patrol • Herbert Carter
... thought. "Bang! And it's all over. Is it a wise or a stupid thing to shoot oneself? Is suicide a cowardly act? Then I suppose that I am a coward!" ...
— Sanine • Michael Artzibashef
... frozen but dissolves with tempering, And yields at last to every light impression? Things out of hope are compass'd oft with venturing, Chiefly in love, whose leave exceeds commission: 568 Affection faints not like a pale-fac'd coward, But then woos best when most ...
— Venus and Adonis • William Shakespeare
... Wood-Sun thou wottest our battle and the way wherein we fare: That oft at the battle's beginning the helm and the hauberk we bear; Lest the shaft of the fleeing coward or the bow at adventure bent Should slay us ere the need be, ere our might be given and spent. Yet oft ere the fight is over, and Doom hath scattered the foe, No leader of the people by his war-gear shall ye know, But by his ...
— The House of the Wolfings - A Tale of the House of the Wolfings and All the Kindreds of the Mark Written in Prose and in Verse • William Morris
... too, it was very chivalrous and orderly perhaps, for him to hate De Wilton, and to seek to supplant him in his lady's love; but, to slip a bundle of forged letters into his bureau, was cowardly as well as malignant. Now, Marmion is not represented as a coward, nor as at all afraid of De Wilton; on the contrary, and it is certainly the most absurd part of the story, he fights him fairly and valiantly after all, and overcomes him by mere force of arms, as he might have done at the beginning, without having ...
— Early Reviews of English Poets • John Louis Haney
... blessing of God upon our opportunity, intending to have preached the Word of the Lord unto them there present;[1] but the constable coming in prevented us; so that I was taken and forced to depart the room. But had I been minded to have played the coward, I could have escaped, and kept out of his hands. For when I was come to my friend's house, there was whispering that that day I should be taken, for there was a warrant out to take me; which when my friend heard, he being somewhat timorous, ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... a coward and a blackguard, Andrew Jackson!" Vincent exclaimed, white with auger. "You are a disgrace ...
— With Lee in Virginia - A Story of the American Civil War • G. A. Henty
... delicate, feeble boy; not good at work; womanish in his ways; inclined to go in for petty bullying, until a boy showed fight, when he discovered himself to be an arrant coward. Four or five years later I met him at the university. His greeting was cool. My next affair was with a boy who was about my age (13), strong, full-blooded, coarse, always in 'hot water.' He was the son of the headmaster of one of the best-known public schools. It was reported that two brothers ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 4 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... had left that room a moment before, with every appearance of being frightened. She had told the old one there was a robber in the house, and the venerable invalid was a howling coward—I tell you this because ...
— Cobwebs From an Empty Skull • Ambrose Bierce (AKA: Dod Grile)
... death." Her wistful tone rang out into the room. "But that would be murder," she continued. "We should have to call it murder, shouldn't we? And that is a fearful word. I could never quite forget it. I should always ask myself if I were right, if I had the right to judge. I am a coward. The work ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... to do this himself, but he told them that they must on no account go to war with the Sioux. He warned them that their Great Father, the king of France, would be very angry with them if they disobeyed his commands. Had they not known him so well, the Indians would have despised La Verendrye as a coward for refusing to revenge himself upon the Sioux for the death of his son; but they knew that, whatever his reason might be, it was not due to any fear of the Sioux. As time went on, they thought that ...
— Pathfinders of the Great Plains - A Chronicle of La Verendrye and his Sons • Lawrence J. Burpee
... when I think o't, Its pride, and a' the lave o't, Fie, fie on silly coward man, That he should be the ...
— The Heir of Redclyffe • Charlotte M. Yonge
... can you be such a coward?" he cried, seizing the outstretched arm of the bully so fiercely ...
— Dick Lionheart • Mary Rowles Jarvis
... your face, the length of your moustache and the pattern of your cane—all these are very properly regulated for you by laws of fashion, which you could never dream of breaking. You may break every moral law there is—or rather, was—and still remain a man. You may be a bully, a cad, a coward and a fool, in the poor heart and brains of you; but so long as you wear the mock regimentals of contemporary manhood, and are above all things plain and undistinguished enough, your reputation for manhood will be secure. There is nothing so dangerous to ...
— Prose Fancies (Second Series) • Richard Le Gallienne
... complaining grief Cast off all care; be mindful only of pleasure Creed which views life as a short pilgrimage to the grave Does happiness consist then in possession Happiness has nothing to do with our outward circumstances In our country it needs more courage to be a coward Observe a due proportion in all things One must enjoy the time while it is here Pilgrimage to the grave, and death as the only true life Robes cut as to leave the right breast uncovered The priests are my opponents, my masters Time is clever in the healing art ...
— Quotations From Georg Ebers • David Widger
... hate the very name he bore, and frightened them by making use of it. Miserable pictures, one upon the other, rose before him—dark judgments, which he had never dreamed of or anticipated; and he stood like a stricken coward, and he yearned for the silence and concealment of the grave. Ay—the grave! Delightful haven to pigeon-hearted malefactors—inconsistent criminals, who fear the puny look of mortal man, and, unabashed, stalk beneath the eternal and the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXIX. January, 1844. Vol. LV. • Various
... But thou hast made a clever discovery, so that thou mayst never die, if thou wilt persuade the wife that is thine from time to time to die for thee: and then reproachest thou thy friends who are not willing to do this, thyself being a coward? Hold thy peace, and consider, if thou lovest thy life, that all love theirs; but if thou shalt speak evil against us, thou shalt hear many ...
— The Tragedies of Euripides, Volume I. • Euripides
... when the ice was breaking up. Besides, he had once or twice been involved in savage fights about disputed mining claims, and knew how men looked when they bore a heavy strain. He thought the stranger was afraid but was not a coward. ...
— Carmen's Messenger • Harold Bindloss
... "Coward?" he echoed, in genuine surprise. "'Twill be some lie that he has told you with the others. In what, pray, was I ...
— The Sea-Hawk • Raphael Sabatini
... of the night, of the inanimate and imponderable black walls, and of herself, were exquisitely and abnormally keen. She saw him there, bowed under his burden, gloomy and wroth and sick with himself because the man in him despised the coward. Men of his stamp were seldom or never cowards. Their lives did not breed cowardice or baseness. Joan knew the burning in her breast—that thing which inflamed and swept through her like a wind of ...
— The Border Legion • Zane Grey
... nauseous elf, Who judging only from its wretched self, Feebly attempted, petulant and vain, The "Origin of Evil" to explain. A mighty Genius at this elf displeas'd, With a strong critick grasp the urchin squeez'd. For thirty years its coward spleen it kept, Till in the duat the mighty Genius slept; Then stunk and fretted in expiring snuff, And blink'd at JOHNSON ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... latter added, fiercely; "and before these men I denounce you as a coward—a coward who fears to raise ...
— Vergilius - A Tale of the Coming of Christ • Irving Bacheller
... with a view of strengthening her position, made her cousin Theodahad partner of her throne (not, as sometimes stated, her husband, for his wife was still living). The choice was unfortunate. Theodahad, notwithstanding a varnish of literary culture, was a coward and a scoundrel. He fostered the disaffection of the Goths, and either by his orders or with his permission, Amalasuntha was imprisoned on an island in the Tuscan lake of Bolsena, where in the spring of 535 she was murdered ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... blood. He had been struck by the white man, and blood alone must atone for the aggression. Unless that should wipe out the disgrace he could never again hold up his head among his people—they would call him a coward, and say a white man struck the Big Eagle and he dared not ...
— The Great Salt Lake Trail • Colonel Henry Inman
... look, such as is to be seen only in pale blue eyes;—a look of unyielding hatred and obstinacy; a look which, combined with the evident weakness of character displayed in his features, suggested rather the subtle treachery of a coward than the fierce ...
— The Watchers of the Plains - A Tale of the Western Prairies • Ridgewell Cullum
... of course; else you wouldn't be afraid. You think that I'd go straight off and murder him. Perhaps he told you that it would come quite natural to a man like me—a ruffian like me—to smash him up. That comes of being a coward. People run my profession down; not because there is a bad one or two in it—there's plenty of bad bishops, if you come to that—but because they're afraid of us. You may make yourself easy about your friend. I am ...
— Cashel Byron's Profession • George Bernard Shaw
... is set, The field to be won; What foes have you met, What work have you done? To courage alone Does victory come; To coward and ...
— Brave Men and Women - Their Struggles, Failures, And Triumphs • O.E. Fuller
... the brute!" she cried; "he will come in. He dared to lay his hands upon me. See, he is here! Oh, that Marco had been in the house! He should have beaten him, the dog, the coward, to oppose a woman's ...
— The New Tenant • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... father and mother... of the good times we had at home... of the sweet influences of a happy childhood, and the inestimable joy of belonging to a country that stands for fair play and fair dealing, where the coward and the bully are despised, and the honest and brave and ...
— Three Times and Out • Nellie L. McClung
... established many and memorable bonds of sympathy. He took the allegiance of his followers and the penalties of his masters in equal good part. He was not the boy to glory in his scrapes, but he was the boy to get into them, and once in, no fear of punishment could make a tell-tale, a cheat, or a coward of him. ...
— The Adventures of a Three-Guinea Watch • Talbot Baines Reed
... business, to whom I did on purpose tell him my mind freely, and let him see that it must be a wiser man than Holmes (in these very words) that shall do me any hurt while I do my duty. I to remember him of Holmes's words against Sir J. Minnes, that he was a knave, rogue, coward, and that he will kick him and pull him by the ears, which he remembered all of them and may have occasion to do it hereafter to his owne shame to suffer them to be spoke in his presence without any reply but what I did ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... it was time for him to do something. He was not a bit afraid of a coward, but he realized that he and the boy in the tree together were no match for the big, vicious fellow just beyond him. The boy in the tree looked honest and decent; the man after him looked just what he was—a tramp and perhaps worse. Frank ...
— The Boys of Bellwood School • Frank V. Webster
... seemed to be shaken by these words. But I instantly thought of Marie. I said to myself, 'She is alone—perhaps in despair. How can I save myself, wretched tempter and coward that I am, and leave her in remorse and grief?' And then it seemed to me as though a Voice came from the altar itself, so sweet and penetrating that it overpowered the voice of the preacher and the movements of my companions. I heard nothing in the chapel but It alone. 'She is saved!' It ...
— Helbeck of Bannisdale, Vol. II • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... the fact that it would be the act of a coward," exclaimed Tom at last, his teeth chattering with cold, "I would let go of your arm and give up the job of supporting you in this ice water for talking about Grace like that. Of course she has ...
— Grace Harlowe's Sophomore Year at High School • Jessie Graham Flower
... separation, yet unwilling to disobey Bimba, he used to come stealthily and lie lurking in the bushes, watching, to catch sight of Aranyani. And sometimes, seizing his opportunity, when he knew that her father was away, he would creep out, trembling like a coward, and speak to her. And Aranyani, displeased at him for coming to see her without her father's knowledge or permission, and not reciprocating his passion in the least, yet partly out of pity, and partly out of kindness arising from recollection of his playing with ...
— Bubbles of the Foam • Unknown
... her two children. Her humble or servile spirit, confronted with this wild, independent nature, made Salome adore her man, and she deceived herself into considering him a tremendous, energetic fellow, though he was in all truth a coward and a tramp. The bully had seen just how matters stood, and whenever it pleased him he would stamp into the house and demand the pay that Salome earned by sewing at the machine, at five centimos per two yards. Unresistingly she handed him the product ...
— The Quest • Pio Baroja
... to turn her capital to account, after investing a part of it in the Funds, which were then selling at eighty francs. A passion often changes the whole character in a moment; an indiscreet person becomes a diplomatist, a coward is suddenly brave. Hate made this prodigal woman a miser. Chance and luck might serve the project of vengeance, still undefined and confused, which she would now mature in her mind. She fell asleep, muttering to herself, "To-morrow!" By an unexplained phenomenon, the effects of ...
— The Marriage Contract • Honore de Balzac
... say that I can do all these things, chief," Tom said; "but I can do my best. And, anyhow, I think I can promise that if we should be attacked you shall see no signs of my being afraid, whatever I may feel. I am only a boy yet, but I hope I am not a coward." ...
— In The Heart Of The Rockies • G. A. Henty
... coward enough to watch her, an hour afterwards, on the old well staircase, where he had once seen Florence in the moonlight, toiling up with Paul? Or was he in the dark by accident, when, looking up, he saw her coming, with a light, from the room where Florence lay, and marked ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens
... declare that he must have been a fool and a coward. Yet he could read and understand Shakespeare. He knew much,—by far too much,—of Byron's poetry by heart. He was a deep critic, often writing down his criticisms in a lengthy journal which he kept. He could write quickly, and with understanding; and I may declare that men at ...
— The Small House at Allington • Anthony Trollope
... me," said Helen, recovering a measure of her courage. She believed that this strange man was a coward. But why should he be ...
— The Girl from Sunset Ranch - Alone in a Great City • Amy Bell Marlowe
... patiently for one of you to give me some explanation, though I see plainly enough that I have been disobeyed by you, my son, as well as by my old servant, in whom I thought I could place confidence. Marcus, my son, do not disgrace yourself further by behaving like a coward. Speak ...
— Marcus: the Young Centurion • George Manville Fenn
... every fresh delicious draught of knowledge.... Death, beautiful, wise, kind death; when will you come and tell me what I want to know? I courted you once and many a time, brave old Death, only to give rest to the weary. That was a coward's wish, and so you would not come. I ran you close in Afghanistan, old Death, and at Sobraon too, I was not far behind you; and I thought I had you safe among that jungle grass at Aliwal; but you slipped through my hand—I was not ...
— Two Years Ago, Volume II. • Charles Kingsley
... without kirk or blessing. I am the man that clasped a dead woman's hand whom I never owned as wife, and watched afar off the babe that I never dared to call mine own. I am the father of Winifred Oharteris, coward before man, castaway before God. Of my sin two know besides my Maker—the father that begot you, whose false friend I was in the days that were, and Walter Skirving, the father of the first Winifred whose eyes this hand closed under the ...
— The Lilac Sunbonnet • S.R. Crockett
... which the Queen of France may not become visible to the hate of the people, and behind which she may be secure against the attacks of her enemies!" cried Marie Antoinette. "No, sir, I cannot accept this! It shall at least be seen that I am no coward, and that I will not hide myself from those who come ...
— Marie Antoinette And Her Son • Louise Muhlbach
... in criminating this retirement from every-day political conflicts which is, to say the least, very short-sighted. Extreme radicalism spurns the comparative inactivity, and says, "Lo, a sluggard!" Extreme conservatism spurns it, and says, "Lo, a coward!" It is only too true that cowards and sluggards both may take shelter under a shield of indifference; but it is equally true that any reasonably acute mind, if only charitably disposed, can readily distinguish between an inactivity which springs ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 80, June, 1864 • Various
... poor devil who had been in the same position as himself. That was why these rifle shots were so full of a significance for him, quite different from that caused yesterday by the rattle and the crash of the raging battle. Truly, one need not be a coward to feel an icy shudder at the thought of ten or twenty rifle barrels directed ...
— The Coming Conquest of England • August Niemann
... several glasses of beer. "In vino-veritas," is a true saying. Blackall when sober might pass for a very brave fellow: his true character came out when he was drunk, and he showed himself an arrant coward, as he had done on this occasion. The boys who remained with him looked very foolish, and some of them felt heartily ashamed of their leader. Some resolved to break from him altogether, but he had thrown ...
— Ernest Bracebridge - School Days • William H. G. Kingston
... no respect for his years; compared with her average American past as he understood it, his social place was much higher, but, she was not in the least awed by it; in spite of his war record she was making him behave like a coward. He was in a false position, and if he had any one but himself to blame he had not her. He read her equal knowledge of these facts in the clear eyes that made him flush ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... man, who is the counterfeit's example, his original, and that which he employs his industry and pains to imitate and copy. Is it therefore my fault if the cheat, by his wit and endeavours, makes himself so like me, that consequently I cannot avoid resembling him? Consider, pray, the valiant and the coward, the wealthy merchant and the bankrupt; the politician and the fool; they are the same in many things, and differ but in one alone. The valiant man holds up his hand, looks confidently round about him, wears a sword, courts ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Volume II • Theophilus Cibber
... as damn'd as Thou, 'Twas Death to plead it. Artless Absolon The Bloody Banner to display so soon: Such killing Beams from thy young Day-break shot; What will the Noon be, if the Morn's so hot? Yes, dreadful Heir, the Coward Hebron awe. So the young Lion tries his tender Paw. At a poor Herd of feeble Heifers flies, Ere the rough Bear, tusk'd Boar, or spotted Leopard dies. Thus flusht, great Sir, thy strength in Israel try: When their Cow'd Sanedrims shall prostrate lye, And to thy feet their slavish Necks ...
— Anti-Achitophel (1682) - Three Verse Replies to Absalom and Achitophel by John Dryden • Elkanah Settle et al.
... stared at the hill-side opposite, with its zigzag path through the vines marked by the figures of zealous pedestrians, and then he said suddenly: "If I asked you not to come and see our show you would set me down as a fantastical coward." ...
— The Mountebank • William J. Locke
... success.' Every student of biography knows how frequently men have been restrained from doing evil, or inspired to lofty achievement, by the honour in which a cherished memory has compelled them to hold the names they are allowed to bear. Every schoolboy knows the story of the Grecian coward whose name was Alexander. His cowardice seemed the more contemptible because of his distinguished name; and his commander, Alexander the Great, ordered him either to change his name or ...
— Mushrooms on the Moor • Frank Boreham
... me in to the C.O. here. He told me. Oh, the Army's a nice thing, I can tell you. I was expecting to get my stripe over that raid when I got hit with a bullet in my leg, and here I am charged with a coward's trick. I suppose they'll prove it I suppose they've got what they call evidence. I only hope they'll shoot me quick and have done with it I don't ...
— Our Casualty And Other Stories - 1918 • James Owen Hannay, AKA George A. Birmingham
... then be strong through coward fearsomeness. Yet call I others what I was myself. For when their coming roused me from my sleep, And I went hurrying to my sister's aid, Into the last, remote, and inmost room, One of them seizes me with powerful hand, And hurls me to the ground. And coward, I, I fall a-swooning, when I should have ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VI. • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... words," answered Duncan with measureless contempt in his tone, "you are a miserable coward, a white-livered wretch, whose life wouldn't be worth saving if it were in danger. Go back to your bed! Go to sleep! or go to hell, damn you, for the ...
— A Captain in the Ranks - A Romance of Affairs • George Cary Eggleston |
