"Disdainful" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... first at one, then at another. He floundered, stupefied. Here was this loving girl, clinging to him as though he might vanish, and he had left her that morning a disdainful beauty. Then here was this Meagre Shanks with his mysterious ten minutes, and here was this dumfounding product of those ten minutes. Driscoll ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle
... angry? Things of your tender mould should be most gentle. Why should you frown? Good gods, what a set anger Have you forc'd into your face! Come, I must temper you. What a coy smile was there, and a disdainful! How like an ominous flash it broke out from you! Defend me, love! Sweet, ...
— Characteristics of Women - Moral, Poetical, and Historical • Anna Jameson
... systematic rehabilitation? To ape the garb of worthy men, to stand thus, tricked out in the dress of a remote civilization from which he had thrust himself forever, before the woman he perhaps had wronged, and with so easy and disdainful a bearing, seemed to Ringfield the summit of senseless folly and contemptible weakness. Subjected during the rest of the evening to the cynical, amused and imperturbable gaze of this man, whom, in spite of his Christianity, he hated, Ringfield made but a sorry chairman. His French ...
— Ringfield - A Novel • Susie Frances Harrison
... and at last he hears steps in the anteroom. Here is the Commendatore, in his hat and overcoat. He closes the door behind him, gathers up the papers lying on the table, and says to Benedetto, with a disdainful air: ...
— The Saint • Antonio Fogazzaro
... medley of old styles, some foreign, some native, all inappropriate. Take the case of Mayfair. Mayfair has for some years been in a state of transition. The old Mayfair, grim and sombre, with its air of selfish privacy and hauteur and leisure, its plain bricked facades, so disdainful of show—was it not redolent of the century in which it came to being? Its wide pavements and narrow roads between—could not one see in them the time when by day gentlemen and ladies went out afoot, needing no vehicle ...
— Yet Again • Max Beerbohm
... crowd had had its fill of roughing, but Sunday was evidently to be the real day. There would have been, of course, nothing on the Nevsky, if properly policed, and I have been unable to understand how the old Government, unless overconfident of its autocratic power and disdainful of the people, could have let things go on. But though half the regiments in Petrograd were on the point of revolt and their sympathy with the people was evident even to a foreigner, Sunday was mismanaged like the days before. It was even worse. The powers that were had, as early ...
— World's War Events, Vol. II • Various
... somehow or other my intimacy with them was always strained and soon ended of itself. Once, indeed, I did have a friend. But I was already a tyrant at heart; I wanted to exercise unbounded sway over him; I tried to instil into him a contempt for his surroundings; I required of him a disdainful and complete break with those surroundings. I frightened him with my passionate affection; I reduced him to tears, to hysterics. He was a simple and devoted soul; but when he devoted himself to me entirely I began to hate ...
— Notes from the Underground • Feodor Dostoevsky
... of his mother who, seized with anxious fears, was watching his every movement, and he handed her the fatal sheet, with the half-sorrowful, half-disdainful exclamation: ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... blackness, that were only relieved from being too intense by the scarlet hood of an opera cloak, that was drawn over them. "A sister," I thought to myself, "it is too modern for his mother," and I took a step nearer to see if I could trace any likeness in the chiselled features of this disdainful brunette, to the more characteristic ones of the careless gentleman who had stood but a few moments before in my presence. As I did so, I was struck with the distance with which the picture stood out from the wall, ...
— A Strange Disappearance • Anna Katharine Green
... fete, a procession passing through the quarter which is not so virtuous as our own, so our mousmes tell us, with a disdainful toss of the head. Nevertheless, from the heights on which we dwell, seen thus in a bird's-eye view, by the uncertain light of the stars, this district has a singularly chaste air, and the concert going on therein, ...
— Madame Chrysantheme • Pierre Loti
... subject to sickness, and kept in almost total ignorance by his incompetent preceptors. The gloom and pride and stoicism of his temperament were augmented by this unnatural discipline. His spirit did not break, but took a haughtier and more disdainful tone. He became familiar with misfortunes. He learned to brood over and intensify his passions. Every circumstance of his life seemed strung up to a tragic pitch. This at least is the impression which remains upon our mind after reading in his memoirs the narrative ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds
... manifesto of a man who disgorges his bile and restrains himself no more, because he has nothing more to hope. The letter, bold and bitter in style, was besides so full of ability and artifice, that it was extremely pleasant to read, without finding approvers; so true it is that a wise and disdainful silence is difficult to ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XIV., His Court and The Regency, Complete • Duc de Saint-Simon
... the little one obeyed. He caught them in his arms and set them down. The girl sat still, staring at him with reproachful, with disdainful eyes. ...
— Indian Summer • William D. Howells
... look back on the fray, Through the mellowing magic of time the phantoms emerging to day! Grasping too much for self, unjust to his rival in strife, Each foe with good conscience and honour advances; war to the knife! Lo, where with feebler hand the Stuart essays him to guide The disdainful coursers of Henry, the Tudor car in its pride! For he saw not the past was past; nor the swirl and inrush of the tide, A nation arising in manhood; its will would no more be denied. They would share in the labour and peril ...
— The Visions of England - Lyrics on leading men and events in English History • Francis T. Palgrave
... Her disdainful eyes wandered to the farther end of the portico, where Alfred Branch, in his natty suit of white grasscloth, plucked at his ebon whiskers with untanned fingers, and talked society ...
— At Last • Marion Harland
... had increased immeasurably in public esteem. There were only three;—an old jeweller who had been visiting his branch shops in America, and two demi-mondaines from the rue de la Paix, the most timid and well-behaved persons aboard, vestals with bright eyes and disdainful noses who held themselves stiffly aloof in this ...
— The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... McGuire you can make folks SEE what you are talking about. Perhaps it's because you can paint pictures with a brush. Or—or perhaps it's because you've got such a wonderful command of words."(Miss Dorothy stumbled a little precipitately into this sentence—she had not failed to see the disdainful movement of the man's head and shoulders at the mention of his pictures.) "Whatever it is," she hurried on, "you've got it. I saw it first years ago, with—with your son, when I used to see him at father's. He would sit and talk to me by the hour about the woods and fields and mountains, ...
— Dawn • Eleanor H. Porter
... up at him curiously, with a half-disdainful smile, and was just on the point of saying, 'But suppose the man of my own choice won't propose to me?' However, as the words rose to her lips, she felt there was a point at which even she should yield to convention: and there were plenty ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen
... which were scribbled as fast as pen could go, thwartwise on the paper, because he could not stop to set it straight? Dare I pen, even for my own eyes, the venerable truth that an artist is born and not made? It seems not superfluous, in times which have heard disdainful criticism of Scott, on the ground that he had no artistic conscience, that he scribbled without a thought of style, that he never elaborated his scheme before beginning—as Flaubert, of course you know, invariably did. ...
— The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft • George Gissing
... reluctant, and he stared straight before him as if unwilling to meet all the watching eyes that followed their progress. But the bride walked proudly and firmly, her head held high with even the suspicion of an upward, disdainful curve to her beautiful mouth, the ghost of a defiant smile. To all who saw her she was a splendid spectacle ...
— The Lamp in the Desert • Ethel M. Dell
... and try to correct some of his inaccuracies, but he never attempted it again. Old Russell listened attentively and respectfully, but when the lecture was over he dismissed the subject with a superior shake of the head and the disdainful remark, "Well, sir, I have heerd tell of people who think with you." Never a bit though did he make any change in his own peculiar rendering of the Bible ...
— The Parish Clerk (1907) • Peter Hampson Ditchfield
... absurd," said Rosalind Merton, sidling up to Maggie and casting some disdainful glances at poor Priscilla, "the conceit of some people! Of all forms of conceit, preserve me ...
— A Sweet Girl Graduate • Mrs. L.T. Meade
... anti-critical, barren, and petty orthodoxy, of the St. Sulpice type; a hollow and superficial imitation full of affectation and exaggeration, like Neo-Catholicism; and an arid and heartless philosophy, crabbed and disdainful, like the University, make up the sum of French culture. Jesus Christ is nowhere to be found. I have been inclined to think that He would come to us from Germany; not that I suppose He would be an individual, but a spirit. And when we use ...
— Recollections of My Youth • Ernest Renan
... shoot; she whets her tusks to bite; While he who sits to judge the fight Treads on the palm with foot so white, Disdainful, And sweetly floating in the air Wanton he spreads his fragrant hair, Like Ganymede ...
— Odes and Carmen Saeculare of Horace • Horace
... which the punt was moored, he became aware of a singularly delightful human being awaiting him on the bank. She stood with her legs very wide apart, her hands behind her back, and her head a little on one side, watching his gestures with an expression of disdainful interest. She had black hair and brown legs and a buff short frock and very intelligent eyes. And when he had reached a sufficient ...
— The History of Mr. Polly • H. G. Wells
... against Vanderbilt's merging of railroads, the middle class found itself quite helpless. In rapid succession he put through one combination after another, and caused theft after theft to be legalized, utterly disdainful of criticism or opposition. In State after State he bought the repeal of old laws, or the passage of new laws, until he was vested with authority to connect various railroads that he had secured ...
— Great Fortunes from Railroads • Gustavus Myers
... impertinent curiosity, but received me with all the obliging civility possible. I know no European court, where the ladies would have behaved themselves in so polite a manner to such a stranger. I believe, upon the whole, there were two hundred women, and yet none of those disdainful smiles, and satirical whispers, that never fail in our assemblies, when any body appears that is not dressed exactly in the fashion. They repeated over and over to me; "UZELLE, PEK UZELLE," which is nothing but, Charming, very Charming.—The ...
— Letters of the Right Honourable Lady M—y W—y M—e • Lady Mary Wortley Montague
... all the world but he had quite forsworn! For me, that I may surely keep mine oath, I will be married to a wealtlly widow Ere three days pass, which hath as long lov'd me As I have lov'd this proud disdainful haggard. And so farewell, Signior Lucentio. Kindness in women, not their beauteous looks, Shall win my love; and so I take my leave, In resolution ...
— The Taming of the Shrew • William Shakespeare [Craig, Oxford edition]
... stern, sudden words with which the elders repressed the juniors who, impulsively, would have broken forth again. "Wait! Wait, you fellows!" was the cry, for on a sudden half a dozen stalwart gray coats had sprung from the door, regardless of the corporal on duty, disdainful of demerit, had hurled themselves on wet-eyed Harris, had heaved him up on their shoulders, with pinioned, arm-locked, helpless legs, and frantic, impotently battling fists, and borne him struggling up the ...
— Tonio, Son of the Sierras - A Story of the Apache War • Charles King
... expression on her face made him pause. She had risen and stood facing him, her eyes blazing resentment, her lips curled in a disdainful smile. ...
— The Substitute Prisoner • Max Marcin
... realism, which was too strange for the palate of their day, and is now too familiar, perhaps. It is a peculiar fate, and would form the scheme of a pretty study in the history of literature. But in whatever she did she left the stamp of a talent like no other, and of a personality disdainful of literary environment. In a time when most of us had to write like Tennyson, or Longfellow, or Browning, she never would write ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... gesture of surprise; he laughed with an air of disdainful confidence; and then drew from the casket a magnificent gold net-work for the hair, all encrusted with carbuncles. After making it sparkle in the lamp-light, he deposited the second trinket also at the feet of Meroe. Redoubling his ironical respect, ...
— The Brass Bell - or, The Chariot of Death • Eugene Sue
... private liberty by emptying the prisons of Paris, certain agents of Marat made a notable effort in behalf of the 'moral unity of France.' To this effort the melodramatic historians of the French Revolution have done scant justice. Mr. Carlyle, for example, alludes to it only in a casual half-disdainful way, which would be almost comical were the theme less ghastly. 'At Reims,' he observes, 'about eight persons were killed—and two were afterwards hanged for doing it.' The contest of this curious passage plainly shows that he imagined these 'eight persons' (more or less) to have been ...
— France and the Republic - A Record of Things Seen and Learned in the French Provinces - During the 'Centennial' Year 1889 • William Henry Hurlbert
... up Streeter, from his seat in the wagon. "If I thought he'd be worth his salt, now, I'd take him myself; but—well, look at him this minute," he finished, with a disdainful shrug. ...
— Just David • Eleanor H. Porter
... NATIONS.—In some districts the barbarian invaders and the Roman provincials were kept apart for a long time by the bitter antagonism of race, and a sense of injury on the one hand and a feeling of disdainful superiority on the other. But for the most part the Teutonic intruders and the Latin-speaking inhabitants of Italy, Spain, and Gaul very soon began freely to mingle their blood by family alliances. It is quite impossible to say what proportion the Teutons bore to the Romans. Of course ...
— A General History for Colleges and High Schools • P. V. N. Myers
... know that, Mr. Balderby," the cashier answered; "if I am any judge of human nature, Henry Dunbar will hate us because of that very crime of his own, knowing that we are in the secret, and will be all the more disagreeable and disdainful in his intercourse with us. He will carry it off with a high hand, ...
— Henry Dunbar - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... and disdainful laughs that burst from the restrained seamen were a sufficient pledge of their indifference to so trifling a danger. Borroughcliffe noted their hardened boldness, and taking the supper bell, which was lying near him, he rang it, for a minute, ...
— The Pilot • J. Fenimore Cooper
... hall the two men were standing; Marcion, with disdainful eyes and sneering lips, taunting the unbidden guest; John, silent, quiet, patient, while the wondering slaves looked on in dismay. He lifted his searching gaze to the haggard face ...
— The Blue Flower, and Others • Henry van Dyke
... so close that he forced her back a step on the marsh path. Her disdainful eyes had drawn him to her, for, like all men, he could be drawn by the woman who scorned him, and mesmerized by the sheer repulse. By great effort, Jinnie had escaped from Maudlin's insults for many months, but he had never ...
— Rose O'Paradise • Grace Miller White
... her in her hiding-place. Isobel did not know about the pumps—she thought Jerry had retreated there from shyness. A disdainful smile curled her pretty lips. She had had moments, since the debate, when her conscience had bothered her, the more so because Jerry had not told what had happened; but, as is sometimes the way, after such moments, she had hardened her heart all the more toward Jerry. She ...
— Highacres • Jane Abbott
... would place in his harem or graciously pass on to one of his children; but when, on the other hand, an even distant relative of the Pharaoh was asked in marriage for some king on the banks of the Tigris or Euphrates, the request was met with a disdainful negative: the daughters of the Sun were of too noble a race to stoop to such alliances, and they would count it a humiliation to be sent in marriage ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 4 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... order could be carried out the door flew open. A tall young woman, barely more than twenty years of age, stood in the doorway, her head thrown back, cheeks flushed, her look proud and disdainful. In her right ...
— Dave Darrin After The Mine Layers • H. Irving Hancock
... I praise thy Ports, or mention make Of the vast mound, that binds the Lucrine Lake? Or the disdainful sea, that, shut from thence, Roars round the structure, and invades the fence; There, where secure the Julian waters glide, Or where Avernus' jaws admit the ...
— The Art Of Poetry An Epistle To The Pisos - Q. Horatii Flacci Epistola Ad Pisones, De Arte Poetica. • Horace
... some sort of human height, in some cooler, brighter atmosphere than that of the crowded valleys. For in this music there beat a faster pulse, moved a lighter, fierier, prouder body, sounded a more ironic and disdainful laughter, breathed a rarer air than had beat and moved and sounded and breathed in music. It made drunken with pleasant sound, with full rich harmonies, with exuberant dance and waltz movements. It seemed to adumbrate the ...
— Musical Portraits - Interpretations of Twenty Modern Composers • Paul Rosenfeld
... apply the burning tobacco to the lobe of her husband's ear. With a yell the latter flung his feet from the club-kerb and sat up in his chair. When he turned, Jonah was placidly smoking in the distance, while Daphne met her victim's accusing eye with a disdainful stare, her hands empty in her lap. The table, at which I was writing, shook ...
— The Brother of Daphne • Dornford Yates
... unfortunate affair that he made proposal to Adela Miranda. And now he cannot help thinking it had something to do with her abrupt and disdainful rejection of him, though the young lady's little concealed disgust, coupled with her brother's indignation, had no reference to the physical deformity. But for his blind passion he might have perceived this. Fancying it so, however, it is not strange that he goes ...
— The Lone Ranche • Captain Mayne Reid
... the least overawed by the hostile glances of the statesmen. On the contrary, his lips perceptibly curled, in a half-disdainful smile, as he took the big hand which the President extended to him. As soon as Cosmo Versal had sunk into the embrace of a large easy chair, ...
— The Second Deluge • Garrett P. Serviss
... stand the glamor of greatness, the temptations that come with riches, the white light that beats upon a throne, much better than do Eve's fair daughters. As a man becomes great, he respects more and more the cumulative wisdom of the world, becomes obedient; as a woman becomes great she grows disdainful and rebellious. Thus it is that while in the common walks of life woman is infinitely purer than man, as we ascend into the higher realms, whether in art, letters or statecraft, we discover a tendency to reverse this law ...
— Volume 1 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann
... violent a blow that the casket fell to the ground, she seized it, flung it into the middle of the fire, and stood with her back to the chimney in a threatening attitude before either of the agents recovered from their surprise. The scorn which flamed from her eyes, her pale brow, her disdainful lips, were even more insulting than the haughty action which treated Corentin as though he were a venomous reptile. Old d'Hauteserre felt himself once more a cavalier; all his blood rushed to his face, and he grieved that he had no ...
— An Historical Mystery • Honore de Balzac
... with very conflicting emotions. Addressing himself to the judges, he said,—"Standing where I do, I do not think that the claims of the name in which this project was attempted can possibly fall humiliated by the disdainful expressions of the Procureur General. You make remarks upon the weakness of the means employed, of the poverty of the whole enterprise, which made all hope of success ridiculous. Well, if success is anything, I will say to you ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 7, No. 44, June, 1861 • Various
... flushed deeply; the defensive pride of her sex was up in arms in an instant. She cast one disdainful look at Moody, without troubling herself to express her contempt in words. "Stand out of my way, sir!"—that was all she said ...
— My Lady's Money • Wilkie Collins
... suspicions, accusations and noisy procedure, and on enough of the like continually accumulating, the Officer could not but look with disdainful indignation; perhaps disdainfully express the same in words, and 'soon after fly over ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... after she received "the Crouch," once Willoughby and still Willoughby to the "nuts" who frequented the stalls of the Alhambra. She received that tall and voluptuous young woman, with her haughty face and her disdainful airs, and she bore with her horrible proprietorship of Louth. And finally she broke it to Lord ...
— December Love • Robert Hichens
... did not possess—an organising spirit and a militant if somewhat blundering will, entirely applied to the revival of Christian society in France. However, though the young priest learnt a good deal by associating with him, he nevertheless remained a sentimental dreamer, whose imagination, disdainful of political requirements, straightway winged its flight to the future abode of universal happiness; whereas the Viscount aspired to complete the downfall of the liberal ideas of 1789 by utilising the disillusion and anger of the democracy ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... the breach Germain had made on his own account, was still plenteous enough to produce its effect. The widow did not look unaware of its presence, and the suitors cast disdainful glances in its direction. ...
— The Devil's Pool • George Sand
... commanded and the sensation created by this inopportune and unheralded arrival: deliberately Number One mounted the dais and posed himself in the throne-like chair. Then, as his look read face after face, he smiled with twitching and disdainful nostrils. ...
— Red Masquerade • Louis Joseph Vance
... Romans, having obtained the dominion of the world, sent legates or deputies to the Britons to demand of them hostages and tribute, which they received from all other countries and islands; but they, fierce, disdainful, and haughty, ...
— History Of The Britons (Historia Brittonum) • Nennius
... wrung from the chiefs, but because I felt that if properly handled in that open country our force was of sufficient fighting strength to repel any ordinary attack from ill-armed savages, my long border experience rendering me a bit disdainful of Indian courage and resourcefulness. So it was that my restless mind dwelt rather upon other matters more directly personal. I could not put away the thought of the half-seen girl flitting about amid the dusk of the Pottawattomie ...
— When Wilderness Was King - A Tale of the Illinois Country • Randall Parrish
... her trifling notice of me than I can quite account for. It was a distinction. She was so indescribably handsome—so passively disdainful. I think if she had listened to me with even the faintest intimation of caring whether I spoke in this tone or not, with even a flash of momentary resentment, I might have rushed into a ...
— Wylder's Hand • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... rosy; and although her underlip, like that of all princes of the House of Austria, protruded slightly beyond the other, it was eminently lovely in its smile, but as profoundly disdainful ...
— The Three Musketeers • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... mock their useful toil, Their homely joys, and destiny obscure; Nor Grandeur hear, with a disdainful smile, The short and simple annals ...
— Poems And Songs Of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... A number of disdainful doctors met on October 16, 1846, in the amphitheater of the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, to see a young medical student try to demonstrate that a patient upon whom a surgical operation was to be performed could be rendered insensible to pain. The sufferer ...
— True to His Home - A Tale of the Boyhood of Franklin • Hezekiah Butterworth
... through the wickets. Indeed, when, after two strokes, he had at last gained position for the "middle arch," he met Gerald coming the other way. Gerald shot for his ball; hit it; and then, with a disdainful air, knocked Bobby away out of bounds across the lawn. This was quite within the rules, but it made Bobby angry just the same. As he trudged doggedly away after his ball, he felt himself very much alone under what he thought must be the ...
— The Adventures of Bobby Orde • Stewart Edward White
... Alston had a very poor opinion of Miss Meredyth. He did not deny her loveliness. He could not; no man in his senses and gifted with eyesight could. But the placid prettiness of Marjorie appealed to him far more than the cold, disdainful beauty of the young woman he had called ungenerous, and who had in her ...
— The Imaginary Marriage • Henry St. John Cooper
... tact which prevented him from intruding upon me when I was occupied. He was as quick as any cultured civilised cosmopolitan to see if he was not wanted. He developed a certain cleanliness; he told me, with an air of disdainful superiority, that he had been to the public baths. I gave him an old suit of mine and a pair of boots. He very seldom asked for anything; once and again he would point to something and say that he would like to have it; if I said that he could not he expressed ...
— The Secret City • Hugh Walpole
... so nice as the things Mother's sending them," said Muriel, turning over the toys in a rather disdainful manner. ...
— The Nicest Girl in the School - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil
... you will see that what appeared true was in reality false, what seemed graceful in contour was distorted; here an eye which you thought was looking at you quite straight now mocks you from the glass in manifest obliquity; the mouth, which you thought had a pleasant expression, now looks as disdainful as can be. And so all through your work you will be startled; you will doubt the mirror. Doubt it not; your work is false. If you will be convinced show it to some competent artist, and he will confirm the judgment of the impartial mirror. Experience will soon teach you to put such reliance ...
— Crayon Portraiture • Jerome A. Barhydt
... should be greatly disappointed in not finding this phenomenon even partially comprehended by the powers that be. It is truly a melancholy thing to meet in the highest quarters so little sympathy with the noblest efforts of the popular mind, and to witness the cold neglect and even disdainful suspicion with which the most useful and valuable devices are often received, or rather, we should say, haughtily disregarded and rejected. Seldom or never do we find these inventions appreciated according ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. III, No IV, April 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... had refused to let any cause remove her from Northwold, until after an event which it was hoped would render James less disdainful of his inheritance. But—'Was there ever anything more contrary?' exclaimed Jane, as she prepared to set out the table for a grand tea. 'There's Master James as pleased and proud of that there little ...
— Dynevor Terrace (Vol. II) • Charlotte M. Yonge
... the inhabitants of Southwark complained that "the Knight Marshal's men were very unneighbourly and disdainful among them," with every indication that a prolonged insurrection would endure. However, the matter was brought to the attention of the lord chamberlain, and such edict went forth as assured the inhabitants ...
— Dickens' London • Francis Miltoun
... the best blood of the defeated aristocracy is still called Kensington Gore. Men of Hammersmith will not fail to remember that the very name of Kensington originated from the lips of their hero. For at the great banquet of reconciliation held after the war, when the disdainful oligarchs declined to join in the songs of the men of the Broadway (which are to this day of a rude and popular character), the great Republican leader, with his rough humour, said the words which ...
— The Napoleon of Notting Hill • Gilbert K. Chesterton
... of August, 1715, the Earl of Mar attended the levee of King George. One can easily suppose how cold, if not disdainful, must have been his reception; but it is not easy to divine with what secret emotions, the subject on the eve of an insurrection could have offered his obeisance to the Monarch. Grave in expression, with a heavy German countenance, hating all show, and husbanding ...
— Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745. - Volume I. • Mrs. Thomson
... the world is that proud, disdainful calm which will give neither sigh nor tear. It was not that he killed poor Hamilton, but that he never seemed to care! Ah, there is that evil demon of his life,—that cold, stoical pride, which haunts him like a fate! But I know he does feel; I know he is not as hard ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 26, December, 1859 • Various
... Borgia and Catharine de Medici, when the dreadful boundary line between innocence and guilt was passed, and the lost creatures stood upon the lonely outer side? Only horrible, vengeful joys, and treacherous delights were left for these miserable women. With what disdainful bitterness they must have watched the frivolous vanities, the petty deceptions, the paltry sins of ordinary offenders. Perhaps they took a horrible pride in the enormity of their wickedness; in this "Divinity of Hell," which made them ...
— Lady Audley's Secret • Mary Elizabeth Braddon
... A disdainful silence followed. "Didn't yuh hear what I said?" Uncle Henry inquired, ...
— The Bad Man • Charles Hanson Towne
... Street, watched the party disappear among the hills across the river. The encounter had stirred him. He already hated the Morgans, at least all except the blue-eyed girl, and she, it was not difficult to divine from her expression, was, at least, disdainful of her morning rival. ...
— Nan of Music Mountain • Frank H. Spearman
... the waiter. The Rhamda began talking. I noted the poise in his manner; it was not evil, rather was it calm—and calculating. He made an indication. The young man drew back. He smiled; it was feeble and weary, but for all of that disdainful. Though one had a pity for his forlornness, there was still an ...
— The Blind Spot • Austin Hall and Homer Eon Flint
... of small cord where it hung with divers other odds and ends. For a moment she watched me, scowling and fierce-eyed, then as I approached her with the cords in my hands, she turned on her heel with a swirl of her embroidered coat-skirts and strode away, mighty proud and disdainful. ...
— Martin Conisby's Vengeance • Jeffery Farnol
... the kind of case with which we are accustomed to deal,' said Merton. 'But you have not answered my question. Are there any weak points in the defence? To Venus she is cold, of Bacchus she is disdainful.' ...
— The Disentanglers • Andrew Lang
... stale, but the children were too hungry to be disdainful. At home they would have scorned such a supper with infinite disgust, but now ...
— Little Folks - A Magazine for the Young (Date of issue unknown) • Various
... degree. His features, marked and prominent, wore a cast of habitual thought, strangely tinctured with ferocity; and the general expression of his otherwise not unhandsome countenance was repellent and disdainful. At the first glance he might have been taken for one of the swarthy natives of the soil; but though time and constant exposure to scorching suns had given to his complexion a dusky hue, still there were wanting the quick, black, penetrating ...
— Wacousta: A Tale of the Pontiac Conspiracy (Complete) • John Richardson
... be with disdainful smile You greet this comment from a stranger, Your pleasure-paths pursuing while A siren voice discounts the danger, Until, some day, in sadder rhyme You rue ...
— Poems - Vol. IV • Hattie Howard
... There had never been many words between her and her own family as to the inheritance. As she had been reticent to her father so had he to her. The idea in the attorney's house at Hereford was that she was stubborn, conceited, and disdainful. It may be that in regard to her stepmother there was something of this, but, let that be as it might, there had been but little confidence between them as to matters at Llanfeare. It was, no doubt, supposed by her father that she was to be her ...
— Cousin Henry • Anthony Trollope
... inscrutably after one comprehensive, disdainful look at Mary Gowd's suit, hat, gloves and shoes. Now she sat up, her ...
— Cheerful—By Request • Edna Ferber
... presumptuous self-assertion, the curse and plague-spot of the perverted soul. Alcibiades in politics and Byron in literature are among its most conspicuous examples. Their defiance of rule was not the confident daring which comes from the vision of genius, but the disdainful audacity which springs from its wilfulness. Alcibiades, a name closely connected with those events which resulted in the ruin of the Athenian empire, was perhaps the most variously accomplished of all those young men of genius who have squandered their genius ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 93, July, 1865 • Various
... were discouraged by the disdainful demeanor and grudging disposition of the Supreme Council, and irritated by the arbitrariness of its decrees and the indefensible way in which it applied principles that were propounded as sacred. ...
— The Inside Story Of The Peace Conference • Emile Joseph Dillon
... A remote, disdainful pity for me shone out of her dim smile; then she exclaimed in a voice that I hear at this moment: "It's my life!" As I stood at the door ...
— Embarrassments • Henry James
... dare not, for my safety is part of the price, and is more to you than it is to myself! You may threaten, M. de Tavannes, you may bluster, and shout and point to the window"—and he mocked, with a disdainful mimicry, the other's gesture—"but my safety is more to you than to me! And ...
— Count Hannibal - A Romance of the Court of France • Stanley J. Weyman
... with disdainful incredulity. She did not see how Faith could be tired after a day of such ease. She herself was as fresh and wide ...
— The Beggar Man • Ruby Mildred Ayres
... life had belonged to him. Once before he had seen that dark, powerful face over the sights of his rifle, and he could not shoot because his one shot must be for another. Again had that lofty, haughty figure stood before him, calm, disdainful, arrogant, and he yielded to a ...
— The Spirit of the Border - A Romance of the Early Settlers in the Ohio Valley • Zane Grey
... moved through game and dance with a slow yet free grace; she spoke seldom, and in a low, bell-like monotone, containing no hint of any possible emotional development, and for the rest, her shadow of a disdainful smile seemed to stand her in good stead. Clearly as she stood out from among her companions from the first, at the close of the evening she assumed a ...
— Lodusky • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... inferiority, either physical or mental, is apt to affect the personality unfavorably. It does not necessarily produce humble behavior; far from that, it often leads to a nervous assertiveness. An apparently disdainful individual is often really shy and unsure of himself. Put a man where he can see he is equal to his job and at the same time is accomplishing something worth while, and you often see ...
— Psychology - A Study Of Mental Life • Robert S. Woodworth
... walking up to me, stood still, in spite of all I could do to make them continue the work. After waiting a while they proceeded to wriggle themselves out of the ropes, and galloped off, loudly neighing to each other, and flinging up their disdainful heels so as to send a shower of dirt over me. Left alone in this unceremonious fashion, I presently began to think that they knew more about the work than I did, and that, finding me indisposed to release ...
— A Crystal Age • W. H. Hudson
... the harmless writer of this column are generally reduced (in their final ecstasy of anger) to calling him "brilliant;" which has long ago in our journalism become a mere expression of contempt. But I am afraid that even this disdainful phrase does me too much honour. I am more and more convinced that I suffer, not from a shiny or showy impertinence, but from a simplicity that verges upon imbecility. I think more and more that I must be very dull, and that everybody else in the modern world must be very ...
— All Things Considered • G. K. Chesterton
... talking brilliantly with some of the company, quite away from me. She had a bright, disdainful look, when I chanced to glance that way, new to her, but quite befitting—ah me! ah me!—some lady one might dream of, of high, ...
— Vesty of the Basins • Sarah P. McLean Greene
... of society, for the sufferings of the obscure. If the successful adventurer, Lesable, and the handsome Maze are the objects of his veiled irony, he maintains, or feels a sorrowful, though somewhat disdainful tenderness, for poor old Savon, the old copying clerk of the Ministry of Marine, who is the drudge of the office and whose colleagues laugh at him because his wife deceived him, ...
— Une Vie, A Piece of String and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant
... first time the day on which he had come to Pisa, at the moment when his mind was full of wistful thoughts regarding the new life to begin for him to-morrow, and he gazed curiously at the crowd of bustling scholars as they came from their classes. There was something in Flavian a shade disdainful, as he stood isolated from the others for a moment, explained in part by his stature and the distinction of the low, broad forehead; though there was pleasantness also for the newcomer in the roving blue eyes which seemed somehow to take a ...
— Marius the Epicurean, Volume One • Walter Horatio Pater
... for the stockings and undergarments was easier because she wanted the least expensive, but when she stated that she only wanted to purchase two pairs of stockings and two chemises, Mlle. Virginie became just as disdainful as her employer, and it was as though she was conferring a favor that she condescended to try some shoes on Perrine, and the black straw hat which completed the wardrobe ...
— Nobody's Girl - (En Famille) • Hector Malot
... bed lies he Anointed with oblivion; Ah, ah, 'tis plain he walketh free Protected by some mightier one. But Varus! thou shalt suffer yet! Thou shalt re-seek these longing arms, And ne'er from me re-alienate Thy mind, enthrall'd by Marsan charms. A cup more powerful I for thee Will soon prepare, disdainful wretch! Ere shall the sky sink 'neath the sea, And that shall o'er the earth out-stretch, Than with my love thou shalt not burn, Like pitch, which in these flames I throw." Not with mild words their bosoms stern To melt, as erst, the boy sought ...
— Targum • George Borrow
... his growing audience of guests, clerks and bell-hops could answer his questions, Mr. Congdon swept the whole company with a fierce, disdainful glare and began mobilizing the entire day watch of porters and bell-boys to convey his luggage to his room. One of the young gentlemen was engaged at the moment in winking at the girl attendant at the cigar counter when the agitated traveler thrust the point of an enormous umbrella into his ...
— Blacksheep! Blacksheep! • Meredith Nicholson
... offered Margaret of Valois in marriage. The young king had replied, through Malicorne, "that they were both young, and that therefore about eight years hence that matter might be better talked of," "which disdainful answer," the English ambassador wrote from the French court, "is accepted here in very ill part, and is thought not to be done without the counsel ...
— History of the Rise of the Huguenots - Volume 2 • Henry Baird
... filed past the porter's door, the citoyenne Remacle, leaning on her broom, looked at her lodger with the eyes of virtue beholding crime in the clutches of the law. Little Josephine, dainty and disdainful, held back Mouton by his collar when the dog tried to fawn on the friend who had often given him a lump of sugar. A gaping crowd filled ...
— The Gods are Athirst • Anatole France
... my first sensation was utter contempt for myself, an inward despair which was akin to rage; the second was disdainful indignation against the nun, upon whom I passed the severe judgment which I thought she deserved, and which was the only way I had to soothe my grief. Such behaviour proclaimed her to be the most impudent of women, and entirely wanting in good sense; ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... Zouweleh, with its crying children, its veiled women, its cake-sellers, its fruiterers, its turbaned Ethiopians, its black Nubians, and almost fair Egyptians; one can visit the bazaars, or on a market morning spend an hour at Shareh-el-Gamaleyeh, watching the disdainful camels pass, soft-footed, along the shadowy streets, and the flat-nosed African negroes, with their almost purple-black skins, their bulging eyes, in which yellow lights are caught, and their huge hands with turned-back thumbs, count their gains, or yell their disappointment over a bargain ...
— The Spell of Egypt • Robert Hichens
... I beheld a face lean and brown, and with lank, black hair; eyes, dark and of a strange brilliance, looked at me from beneath a steep prominence of brow; I saw a somewhat high-bridged nose with thin, nervous nostrils, a long, cleft chin, and a disdainful mouth. ...
— The Broad Highway • Jeffery Farnol
... peremptory summons. The old master mariner brought his bulk with dignity into the room, and his wife, reaching up to that superior height, too slight for the task, ministered to the overcoat of the big figure which was making, all unconsciously, disdainful noises in its throat. It would have been worse than useless for me to interfere. The pair would have repelled me. This was a domestic rite. Once in his struggle with his coat the dominant figure glanced down at ...
— London River • H. M. Tomlinson
... orchids, notice him? Perhaps! The chauffeur at that moment increased the speed of the big car; but as it dashed past, the crimson mouth of the beautiful girl tightened and hardened into a straight line and those wonderful starlike eyes shone suddenly with a light as hard as steel. Disdainful, contemptuous; albeit, perhaps, passionate! Then she, orchids, shining car ...
— A Man and His Money • Frederic Stewart Isham
... Metropolisville that I meant to tell you in this chapter. Nor yet about the wooing of Charlton. For in his case, true love ran smoothly. Too smoothly for the interest of this history. If Miss Minorkey had repelled his suit, if she had steadfastly remained cold, disdainful, exacting, it would have been better, maybe, for me who have to tell the story, and for you who have to read it. But disdainful she never was, and she did not remain cold. The enthusiasm of her lover was contagious, and she came to write ...
— The Mystery of Metropolisville • Edward Eggleston
... brother, Sir Robert Bowes, Warden of the Marches, who seems to have acted as head of the family. Sir Robert turned out to be more hostile to the perilous alliance proposed for his niece than even her father; and Knox wrote that 'his disdainful, yea, despiteful words have so pierced my heart that my life is bitter unto me.' When Knox was about to have 'declared his heart' in the whole matter, Sir Robert interrupted him with, 'Away with your rhetorical reasons! for I will not be persuaded with them.' Knox, ...
— John Knox • A. Taylor Innes
... in church, but however far away she might place herself, she was more conscious than she liked to be of Louie's conspicuous figure and hat thrown out against a particular pillar which the girl affected. The sharp uplifted profile with its disdainful expression drew her eyes against their will. She was also constantly aware of the impression Louie made upon the crowd, of the way in which she was stared at and remarked upon. Whenever she passed in or out of the church, people turned, ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... Merecour," he repeated, still delaying. "Have you heard why she looked so disdainful at the ...
— The False Chevalier - or, The Lifeguard of Marie Antoinette • William Douw Lighthall
... an instant to hear the girl's words and the disdainful laughter from lips in a savage face thrust close ...
— Astounding Stories, March, 1931 • Various
... of her garments were of lawn, The lining purple silk, with gilt stars drawn; Her wide sleeves green, and bordered with a grove, Where Venus in her naked glory strove To please the careless and disdainful eyes Of proud Adonis, that before her lies; Her kirtle blue, whereon was many a stain, Made with the ...
— The Book-Bills of Narcissus - An Account Rendered by Richard Le Gallienne • Le Gallienne, Richard
... form or other study boys would particularly sympathise with his late associates. Since the previous evening he had been cool with Duncan, and the rest had long rather despised him as a boy who'd do anything to be popular; so he sat there silent, looking as disdainful as he could, and not touching the tea, for which he felt disinclined after the recent potations. But the contemptuous exterior hid a self-reproving heart, and he felt how far more noble Owen and Montagu were than he. How gladly would he have changed places with them! how ...
— Eric • Frederic William Farrar
... other beau comes in, we ceases this refrain. He pitches his rifle to the landlord over the bar, an' calls for a Baldface whiskey toddy. He takes four or five drinks, contemplatin' us meanwhile a heap disdainful. Then he arches his back, bends his elbows, begins a war-song, an' goes dancin' stiff-laig like a Injun, in front of the bar. This is how this extravagant party sings. It's what Colonel Sterett, yere, to whom I repeats it former, calls ...
— Wolfville Days • Alfred Henry Lewis
... the canvas by the hand of Lely, breathing a spell on the picture, almost as powerful as that which had dwelt around the exquisite original. Over the high carved mantelpiece was suspended the portrait of Sir Reginald. It had been painted in early youth; the features were beautiful, disdainful,—with a fierceness breaking through the courtly air. The eyes were very fine, black as midnight, and piercing as those of Caesar Borgia, as seen in Raphael's wonderful picture in the Borghese Palace at Rome. They seemed to fascinate the gazer—to rivet his glances—to follow him whithersoever ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth
... opening which he found to be Spanish; travels, histories, and a romance—subjects exactly suited to the worthy Pedro's tastes. They were strangely battered, and stained as with salt water. How he had obtained them Lawrence would not say. The priest saw the books, but turned away from them with a disdainful glance, as if he could take no interest in subjects of a character so trivial. The contrast between the two strangers was very great. Pedro Alvarez was in figure more like an English sailor than a Spaniard. ...
— Ronald Morton, or the Fire Ships - A Story of the Last Naval War • W.H.G. Kingston
... harmonic texture, and in the cumulative effect of the climaxes and crescendi. He conveys an impression of extended tone-spaces, of a largeness, complexity, and solidity of structure, which are peculiar to his own music, and which presuppose a rather disdainful view of the limitations of mere strings and hammers; yet it is all playable: its demands are formidable, but ...
— Edward MacDowell • Lawrence Gilman
... sacrificed! He who can thus coldly think may do great deeds perhaps, but his life will never be beautiful nor happy, nor a blessing to others;" and unconsciously she folded her hands and looked sadly at Fink, whose face wore a hard and disdainful expression. ...
— Debit and Credit - Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag • Gustav Freytag
... the young woman, as her companion joined her. The light from the corner disclosed the speaker's wrathful features, disdainful lips, palpitating nostrils, eyes darting terrible glances. "Nan! Do you think, ruffian, that you are ...
— The Man on the Box • Harold MacGrath
... he clasped my neck; He kissed my face, and said: "Disdainful soul, Blessed be she who bore thee in ...
— Divine Comedy, Longfellow's Translation, Hell • Dante Alighieri
... and timely information had been given by a farmer at the royal headquarters; but such was the obstinate infatuation, that no officer of rank would condescent to give him a hearing. The consequences may be imagined. Colonel Walpole, an Englishman, full of courage, but presumptuously disdainful of the enemy, led a division upon one of the two roads, having no scouts, nor taking any sort of precaution. Suddenly he found his line of march crossed by the enemy in great strength: he refused to halt or to retire; was shot through ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey
... hailing distance of the great entrance to the park. The gates were supported by massive pillars, on which crouched huge stone griffins. Tembarom felt that they stared savagely over his head as he was driven toward them as for inspection, and in disdainful silence allowed to pass between them as they stood on guard, apparently with the haughtiest ...
— T. Tembarom • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... and laughed; a cold laugh, disdainful, yet not bitter. "You wanted that before, my lord; yet you neglected the opportunity my folly gave you. I thank you—you, after God—for that ...
— The Lion's Skin • Rafael Sabatini
... the jewelled hilt of his scimitar lying on the cushion by his side. He glanced around, as if to see whether anyone present dared to question the fidelity he had professed. But there was neither movement nor remark among his listeners, and with a disdainful little smile of ...
— Tales of Destiny • Edmund Mitchell
... "young people have much satisfaction in being proud: when they come to my age, they may find they would have been happier if they had been less disdainful." ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 12, No. 32, November, 1873 • Various
... poor Beverly Calhoun, no longer a disdainful heroine, gazed piteously out into the shadows, expecting the murderous blade of the driver to meet her as she did so. Pauloff had swung from the box of the coach and was peering first into the woodland below and then upon the rocks to the left. ...
— Beverly of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... value your master just as much as I do you; tell him he may go about his business;" and after this fine speech she turned her head away from me and walked off. Marinette, too, imitating her mistress, said, with a disdainful sneer, "Begone, you low fellow," and then left me; so that your fortune and mine are very ...
— The Love-Tiff • Moliere
... men and women stood; there was no room for chairs, nor for half that desired admittance. In the very front stood the only woman whose superb physique carried her through that trying day without smelling-salts or a friendly shoulder. She was a woman with the eyes of an angel, disdainful of men, the mouth of insatiety, the hair and skin of a Lorelei, and a patrician profile. Her figure was long, slender, and voluptuous. Every man within the bar offered her his chair, but she refused to sit while other women stood; and few were the regrets at the more ample ...
— The Conqueror • Gertrude Franklin Atherton
... winter. The memories and the methods of one season were tided over to another. Gertrude was still "gay"—perhaps gayer—and a little more openly impatient with her husband, and a little more openly disdainful of him. Young men swarmed and fluttered, and those who had "never tried it on" before seemed inclined to try it ...
— On the Stairs • Henry B. Fuller
... stay in Paris the duke had avenged the death of Maximilien by killing his son's adversary, and he had planned for Etienne an alliance with the heiress of a branch of the house of Grandlieu,—a tall and disdainful beauty, who was flattered by the prospect of some day bearing the title of Duchesse d'Herouville. The duke expected to oblige his son to marry her. On learning from d'Artagnon that Etienne was in love with the daughter of a miserable physician, he was only the more ...
— The Hated Son • Honore de Balzac
... draw their eyes inwardly and accurately fasten them upon some object, such are by their inclinations very malicious, vain-glorious, slothful, unfaithful, envious, false and contentious. They whose eyes are addicted to blood-shot, are naturally proud, disdainful, cruel, without shame, perfidious and much inclined to superstition. But he whose eyes are neither too little nor too big, and inclined to black, do signify a man mild, peaceable, honest, witty, and of a good understanding; and one ...
— The Works of Aristotle the Famous Philosopher • Anonymous
... this?" When Queen Budur heard her words, she sat down in the same place and said, "O my beloved, what is this thou sayest?" She replied, "What I say is that I never saw any so proud of himself as thou. Is every fair one so disdainful? I say not this to incline thee to me; I say it only of my fear for thee from King Armanus; because he purposeth, unless thou go in unto me this very night, and do away my maidenhead, to strip thee ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... and there a column of marching soldiers, or statuesque guard. And there were women too, a-plenty—laughing girls, grouped together, ready for any frolic; housewives on way to market; and occasionally a dainty dame, with high-heeled shoe and flounced petticoat, picking her way through the throng, disdainful of the glances of those about. Everywhere there was a new face, a strange costume, a glimpse ...
— Beyond the Frontier • Randall Parrish
... birdlike brain, inflated and empty as any cracknel, he held his tongue, and silently resigned himself to let her go on to the bitter end. But this determined silence exasperated Madame, seemed to her more insulting, more disdainful than anything. Her sharp voice became discordant, and growing higher and shriller, stung and buzzed, like the ceaseless teasing of a fly, till at last her enraged husband in his turn, burst ...
— Artists' Wives • Alphonse Daudet
... mine. Even as of yore, I struggle, burn and pine. Laura transports me, I am still the same. All meekness here, all pride she there became, Now harsh, now kind, now cruel, now benign; Here honor clothed her, there a grace divine; Now gentle, now disdainful of my flame. Here sweetly did she sing; there sat awhile; There she turned back, she lingered in this spot. Here with her splendid eyes my heart she clove. She uttered there a word, and here did smile. Here she changed color. Ah, in such ...
— The Poems of Emma Lazarus - Vol. II. (of II.), Jewish Poems: Translations • Emma Lazarus
... cellars and offices were thus occupied, bands were parading the gorgeous saloons and gazing with wonderment on their decorations and furniture. Some grimy ruffians had thrown themselves with disdainful delight on the satin couches and the state beds: others rifled the cabinets with an idea that they must be full of money, and finding little in their way, had strewn their contents—papers and books and works of art ...
— Sybil - or the Two Nations • Benjamin Disraeli
... his pocket-book a bank note, which he handed to the gendarme. "Now," demanded he, crushing Gevrol with one disdainful glance, "what thinks the ...
— The Widow Lerouge - The Lerouge Case • Emile Gaboriau
... days, and Irene in grey silk shot with palest green. He looked, sideways, at Fleur's face. Rather colourless-no light, no eagerness! That love affair was preying on her—a bad business! He looked beyond, at his wife's face, rather more touched up than usual, a little disdainful—not that she had any business to disdain, so far as he could see. She was taking Profond's defection with curious quietude; or was his "small" voyage just a blind? If so, he should refuse to see it! Having promenaded round the pitch ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... yet his waist very long, he appeared to much greater advantage on horseback than on foot; in all ways it is war, and war only, he is fitted for. His manner in society is constrained without being timid; it is disdainful when he is on his guard, and vulgar when he is at ease; his air of disdain suits him best, and so he is not sparing in the use of it. He took pleasure already in the part of embarrassing people by saying ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VII (of X)—Continental Europe I • Various
... as to women are the greatest influences on both. As he stood there, slowly interpreting to Ida, by graceful allusive signs, the words of the service, one could not think that behind his impassive face there was any feeling for the man or for the woman. He had that disdainful smile which men acquire who are all their lives aloof from the hopes of the hearthstone and acknowledge no ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... humility till some one makes way. The distinction peculiar to a well-bred woman betrays itself, especially in the way she holds her shawl or cloak crossed over her bosom. Even as she walks she has a little air of serene dignity, like Raphael's Madonnas in their frames. Her aspect, at once quiet and disdainful, makes the most insolent ...
— Another Study of Woman • Honore de Balzac
... a man devotes himself to study, and becomes learned, yet is disdainful with those less educated than himself, and is not particular in his dealings with his fellows, then the people say of him, "Woe to the father who allowed him to study God's law; woe to those who instructed him; how censurable is his conduct; how loathsome are his ways! 'Tis of such an one the ...
— Hebraic Literature; Translations from the Talmud, Midrashim and - Kabbala • Various
... when he basely fled the field, A Spartan born, his Spartan mother killed; Then, stretching forth his bloody sword, she cried (Her teeth fierce gnashing with disdainful pride), "Fly, cursed offspring, to the shades below, Where proud Euro'tas shall no longer flow For timid hinds like thee! Fly, trembling slave, Abandoned wretch, to Pluto's darkest cave! For I so vile a monster never ...
— Mosaics of Grecian History • Marcius Willson and Robert Pierpont Willson
... Felice replied, absently. She was not thinking of Suzette. She had forgotten even the stranger, whose disdainful eyes, fixed upon herself, had moved her sweet nature to something like a rebellious anger. Her thoughts were on the beautiful young mother of alien race, whose name, for some reason, she was forbidden to speak. ...
— Shapes that Haunt the Dusk • Various
... perplexity, but I couldn't help laughing as he walked away surrounded by the "troops," with Dutch leading the way—Dutch fully conscious that he had vindicated himself and disposed to be rather disdainful of his comrades. ...
— Lady Larkspur • Meredith Nicholson
... repeated Angelina, in a disdainful tone. "Oh, detain me not in this cruel manner!—I want no Tenby oysters, I want no Welsh rabbits; only let me be gone—I am all impatience to see a dear friend. Oh, if you have any feeling, any humanity, detain me not!" cried she, clasping ...
— Tales And Novels, Volume 1 • Maria Edgeworth
... retainers generally, with legitimate claims to her consideration, she was all kindly courtesy, and they were devoted to her; but she met the aspiring parvenu, seeking her acquaintance on false pretences of equality, with that disdainful civility which is more exasperating than positive rudeness because a lady is only rude ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... slaughter, in cold blood, continued for some two minutes. Jennka, who had at first been looking on with her customary malicious, disdainful air, suddenly could not stand it; she began to squeal savagely, threw herself upon the housekeeper, clutched her by the hair, tore off her chignon and began to vociferate in ...
— Yama (The Pit) • Alexandra Kuprin
... About him altogether—the countenance, the form, the bearing—there was that which woke a vague, profound, and singular interest, an interest somewhat mingled with awe, but not altogether uncalculated to produce that affection which belongs to admiration, save when the sudden frown or disdainful lip repelled the gentler impulse and tended rather to excite fear, or to irritate ...
— Pausanias, the Spartan - The Haunted and the Haunters, An Unfinished Historical Romance • Lord Lytton |
