"Provoking" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... spell, which was a sleepless one, I was no better in the morning and again had to ride. The others pulled away for five miles with a good helping wind, but in a provoking light. The camp was made where the one-hundred-mile mound was judged to be. We spent longer over lunch, hoping that the clouds would clear. At last we moved on, or rather I was moved on. After two miles the surface became heavier. My eyes were better now on account of ...
— The Home of the Blizzard • Douglas Mawson
... multiply or systematize a given force; this we may see done by the bar, or beam, or wheel, without wonder. But to war with that living fury of waters, to bare its breast, moment after moment, against the unwearied enmity of ocean,—the subtle, fitful, implacable smiting of the black waves, provoking each other on, endlessly, all the infinite march of the Atlantic rolling on behind them to their help,—and still to strike them back into a wreath of smoke and futile foam, and win its way against them, and keep its charge of life from them;—does any other ...
— The Harbours of England • John Ruskin
... remembering it. A wrong had been done her not to be obscured even by economics, the great obscurer. She had been won and not wooed. (The very beasts have their privileges!) She had been defrauded of how many teasing and provoking prerogatives, aloofnesses, and surrenders, and her body, if not her mind, resented ...
— Here are Ladies • James Stephens
... Provoking melodist! why canst thou breathe us No thrilling harmony, no charming pathos, No cheerful song of love without its bathos? The Furies take thee,— Blast thy obstreperous mirth, thy foolish chatter,— Gag thee, exhaust thy breath, and stop thy clatter, And change thee to a beast, thou senseless ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various
... her hour in her empty churn; when the stiff backed man has hammered or sawed till his arms are broken, or till his employers are tired; when the gilt lamb has ba-ad, the obstinate pig squeaked, and the provoking cuckoo cried cuckoo, till no one in the house can endure the noise; what remains to be done?—Wo betide the unlucky little philosopher, who should think of inquiring why the woman churned, or how the bird cried cuckoo; for it is ten to one that in prosecuting such an inquiry, just when he is upon ...
— Practical Education, Volume I • Maria Edgeworth
... pig, and at a third for a steak of sturgeon or a baked pudding with onions, and who can sit down to table at any hour, as though they had never had a meal in their lives, and can devour fish of all sorts, and guzzle and chew it with a view to provoking further appetite—these, I say, are the folk who enjoy heaven's most favoured gift. To attain such a celestial condition the great folk of whom I have spoken would sacrifice half their serfs and half their mortgaged and non-mortgaged ...
— Dead Souls • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... glad if you and your friend the Colonel's son would dine with me this evening. No dinner-party, but just to meet your three preceptors and a Mr—dear me, what was his name? Really, gentlemen, I am so deeply immersed in my studies that names escape me in a most provoking manner. A gentleman resident in the town here—a Sanskrit scholar, and friend of Mr Morris. Dear me! What was his name? There was something familiar about it, and I made a mental note, memoria technica, to be sure, yes—what ...
— Glyn Severn's Schooldays • George Manville Fenn
... "It is provoking, dear," said Mrs. Wilkinson to her, "and I am sure you will think it very uncivil, but Arthur went off to Oxford yesterday. And it was uncivil. I am sure he needs not have ...
— The Bertrams • Anthony Trollope
... wonderfully in her coaxing, half-pettish behavior to the provoking old woman—talkative and reticent by fits and starts, now whining and now laughing—who has been to seek out Romeo, and brought back news of him. In As You Like It, Rosalind's bright humor ripples and laughs like a silver brook through the glades of Ardennes, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 11, No. 24, March, 1873 • Various
... prominent, his gray-blue eyes looked one full in the face. He spoke without gestures, with an air of authority and conviction; his voice serious, harsh, a little monotonous; amplifying his phrases to press home in every possible way a rigorous reasoning; provoking discussion; always appealing to the logic of his hearers; sometimes difficult to follow, because his discourse was so rich in ideas; but always holding attention by the penetration of his surveys as well as by his ...
— Foch the Man - A Life of the Supreme Commander of the Allied Armies • Clara E. Laughlin
... listener a glance of provoking disdain, then laughed heartily, as if the ludicrousness of the picture in her mind ...
— Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ • Lew Wallace
... many delightful hours, as, when he was able to write to her, he explained to Madame Hanska. In his pride and satisfaction, he showed it to many friends, Madame Carraud being among the number; but she, with her usual rather provoking common-sense, refused to share his enthusiasm, and suggested that it might have been written as a practical joke. To this insinuation Balzac gave no credence; he naturally found it easy to believe in one more ...
— Honore de Balzac, His Life and Writings • Mary F. Sandars
... office, fresh and buoyant after his long trip, his laugh as hearty and mirth-provoking as ever. After shaking hands with all, he threw himself into ...
— Aladdin & Co. - A Romance of Yankee Magic • Herbert Quick
... to do in the town, d'you see, and the order was given for every one to be on board by three o'clock in time for muster before starting. Moreover, I would rather escape, as you can imagine, while Madame Prune is still enjoying her siesta; I should be afraid of being drawn into some corner, or of provoking some heartrending ...
— Madame Chrysantheme • Pierre Loti
... two years of the bank's history were solidly successful, and "Jim" and "Nellie" were the head and front of all good works and the provoking cause of most of the fun. No one ...
— Main-Travelled Roads • Hamlin Garland
... in it. Where could she have dropped it? No, she had not dropped it, of that she was certain. She had taken pains to keep the book tightly closed. She meant to have given the note to Petty directly after luncheon. How provoking! Maybe Petty had seen her catch it up and had come for it herself. She would go and ask her. As she turned to make her intention known to the others there was a snap overhead. The heat had burned Aileen's string before the fudge had begun to boil and pail and contents ...
— A Dixie School Girl • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... privilege of expressing freely their opinions of the merits of the long-suffering mummers, which they usually did in a loud voice. Kathleen had made a careful study of the conditions prevailing in the theatre at that period, and the little play was most mirth provoking from beginning to end. ...
— Grace Harlowe's Problem • Jessie Graham Flower
... powerful, and has in all good society faded away in simple obedience to a turn of fashion which proscribes it as ungentlemanly! For a long period Acts condemning it were read at stated periods in the churches,[20] and one of these described it as likely, by provoking God's wrath, to 'increase the many calamities these nations now labour under.' How curiously characteristic is the restriction in common usage of the term 'immoral' to a single vice, so that a man who ...
— The Map of Life - Conduct and Character • William Edward Hartpole Lecky
... written (Eccles. 4:12), "if a man prevail against one, two shall withstand him." And so it was that Christ went out into the desert, as to a field of battle, to be tempted there by the devil. Hence Ambrose says on Luke 4:1, that "Christ was led into the desert for the purpose of provoking the devil. For had he," i.e. the devil, "not fought, He," i.e. Christ, "would not have conquered." He adds other reasons, saying that "Christ in doing this set forth the mystery of Adam's delivery from exile," ...
— Summa Theologica, Part III (Tertia Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas
... me at Panshanger that Palmerston said all the difficulties of the Belgian question came from Matuscewitz, who was insolent and obstinate, and astute in making objections; that it was the more provoking as he had been recalled some time ago (the Greek business being settled, for which he came), and Palmerston and some of the others had asked the Emperor to allow him to stay here, on account of his usefulness in drawing up the minutes of the proceedings of the Conference; that ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. II • Charles C. F. Greville
... that conduced to the belief that certain caves were inhabited by gods and spirits, was that strange sounds at times issued from them. These were caused by currents of air entering some of the apertures and vibrating through the passages, provoking notes as if these galleries were organ pipes. This is the explanation of the AEolian cavern of Terni, supposed to be the abode of spirits; and a cave near Eisenach was long reported to be an entrance to hell, because of the moans and sighs that ...
— Castles and Cave Dwellings of Europe • Sabine Baring-Gould
... and cutlasses. It proved to be the most serious quarrel that had occurred. Lieutenant-Colonel Carr, commander of the Twenty-Ninth, which, Hutchinson said, was composed of such bad fellows that discipline could not restrain them, made a complaint to the Lieutenant-Governor relative to the provoking conduct of the rope-maker which brought on the affray; and thus this affair became the occasion of political consultation, which tended to intensify the animosity ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 12, No. 73, November, 1863 • Various
... simply can't. Charlie's got a man from Milwaukee coming here to-night, and I've got to feed him. Isn't it too provoking? I've got to sit and listen to those two, clattering commissions and percentages and all, when I might be hearing Sheldon Corthell talk art and poetry and stained glass. I declare, I never have ...
— The Pit • Frank Norris
... bread? George Sand: the woman wasn't respectable. In short, whomsoever I named, who had pursued with undeviating perseverance a worthy career, my young friends had their objections ready. No one had ever been so poor, so ill educated, so utterly without power to help herself, as they; and, provoking as these objections were, I felt that they had force. My young friends were not great geniuses: they were ordinary women, who should enter the ordinary walks of life with the ordinary steadfastness and devotion of men in the same paths; nothing ...
— A Practical Illustration of Woman's Right to Labor - A Letter from Marie E. Zakrzewska, M.D. Late of Berlin, Prussia • Marie E. Zakrzewska
... giving out," exclaimed Jane. "Isn't that provoking? With us it is one continuous round ...
— The Meadow-Brook Girls by the Sea - Or The Loss of The Lonesome Bar • Janet Aldridge
... kingdom.—The nation, as a nation, seemed to pay no attention to Hosea's pleadings. They went right on living their selfish and greedy and lustful lives. And in B.C. 721, as a result of provoking the Assyrian king Shalmanezer to a fresh attack, the land was again invaded and the city of Samaria was captured and sacked. Thousands of the northern Hebrews were carried away as exiles to other lands and never returned. The northern kingdom ...
— Hebrew Life and Times • Harold B. Hunting
... arrests attention is that with the ludicrous. In this the genius of Hood seemed to hold a very festival of antics, oddity, and mirth; all his faculties seemed to rant and riot in the Saturnalia of comic incongruity. And it is difficult to say whether, in provoking laughter, his pen or his pencil is the more effective instrument. The mere illustrations of the subject-matter are in themselves irresistible. They reach at once and directly the instinctive sense of the ludicrous, and over them youth and age cachinnate together. We have seen a ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 6, No. 37, November, 1860 • Various
... Such patience proved provoking, especially as what could be detected of the tunes, in the snatches heard, indicated to her father's enraged feelings a stubborn attachment to that people from whom he was trying to wean her; so even this little comfort was sternly denied her; and, while strength was gradually giving ...
— Elizabeth: The Disinherited Daugheter • E. Ben Ez-er
... that such wonderful handicraft had not considered that the head was entirely out of proportion with the paw; and yet, if the former were larger or the latter smaller, surely they would not fit well in the places they were intended to ornament. What a provoking dilemma, to be sure—and at such a time, for, glancing suddenly up, she saw Iddilcar's dark, repulsive features bent upon her with a terrible intentness. All her former loathing surged back over her heart with tenfold force, sickening her with its ...
— The Lion's Brood • Duffield Osborne
... not jest with sacred things, and remember of what parentage you come," cries my lady. Beatrix was ordering her ribbons, and adjusting her tucker, and performing a dozen provoking pretty ceremonies, before the glass. The girl was no hypocrite at least. She never at that time could be brought to think but of the world and her beauty; and seemed to have no more sense of devotion than some people have of music, ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... her mother would have preferred conversation. So she took up a book, and began, without any perception of the sense of what she was reading, but her thoughts dwelling partly on her brother, and partly on her aunt's provoking ways. She read on through a whole chapter, then closing the book hastily, exclaimed, "I must go and see what Aunt Geoffrey is doing ...
— Henrietta's Wish • Charlotte M. Yonge
... alarm—beg pardon, annoyance I meant to say—which this horrible outrage must have occasioned; excessively disagreeable this sort of thing to a lady at any time, but at a period like this more than usually provoking. However, we have the villain safe enough. Very lucky I happened to be in the way. Perhaps your ladyship would like to ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth
... training for man. Wherefore did God give to man the powers for contending with scientific difficulties? Wherefore did he lay a secret train of continual occasions, that should rise, by relays, through scores of generations, for provoking and developing those activities in man's intellect, if, after all, he is to send a messenger of his own, more than human, to intercept and strangle all these great purposes? This is to mistake the ...
— The Notebook of an English Opium-Eater • Thomas de Quincey
... black hair curving in natural waves, dark-bordered Irish grey eyes fringed with long, thick lashes, a rose-tinted complexion, a pouting, red-lipped mouth and a small nose with the most fascinating, provoking suspicion of a tip-tilt. She was as small and daintily-fashioned as her hostess; and Wargrave thought it marvellous that their forgotten outpost on the face of the mountains should hold two such pretty women at the same time. His comrade Burke was ...
— The Jungle Girl • Gordon Casserly
... said she, "which are detestable things. You said you would not lose your black horse for the world because the lady you were to marry would ride upon it into your city of dreams. There's a saying that has a provoking prettiness. I claim ...
— Clementina • A.E.W. Mason
... were going at racing speed. No one could be long in a room alone with Sobrenski without being impressed by his overpowering personality. He affected her in a way that no one else ever did, in provoking her to futile outbursts of defiance and anger. She had never lost her head with anyone else, but he always made her incapable of reasoning, raging one minute, and cowed the next. Hitherto Emile had always been ...
— The Hippodrome • Rachel Hayward
... was followed by another, who placed his feet upon the stones, in the tracks that he had used and made. Thus each one did until Leland and Zeb were driven in and warned to do likewise. The former had no difficulty in obeying, but the latter, either through mistake or design, made several provoking blunders. He seemed to use his utmost endeavors to step into the tracks of those before him, but instead of succeeding, was sure to place his foot a good distance from it; and losing his foothold when about in the center of the stream, ...
— The Ranger - or The Fugitives of the Border • Edward S. Ellis
... he had so interested the boys in some of the suffering families of worthless men or widowed women, that it was agreed by the whole school that the teasing of any of the boys of these families about the holes in their trousers, or provoking fights with or between them, should entirely stop; indeed, as this suggestion came from Bert Sharp, who was fonder of fighting than any other boy in the town, the school ...
— Harper's Young People, October 19, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... tear-bomb down with the belief that there would be no necessity for his using it. Silence hung about the sloop, and he had decided there could be no one around, unless, when they clambered over the side, they should discover some poor chap who had succumbed to the provoking gas or else been stunned by a blow in the wild melee ...
— Eagles of the Sky - With Jack Ralston Along the Air Lanes • Ambrose Newcomb
... mazurka with the same huge officer; he moved gravely, as heavily as a dead carcase in a uniform, twitched his shoulders and his chest, stamped his feet very languidly—he felt fearfully disinclined to dance. She fluttered round him, provoking him by her beauty, her bare neck; her eyes glowed defiantly, her movements were passionate, while he became more and more indifferent, and held out his hands to her as graciously as ...
— The Party and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... into the country early on Monday morning for two days, which seemed unfortunate. Soon after, the captain and engineer went ashore, and I was left among a crowd of Chinamen and Malays without any possibility of being understood by any of them, to endure stifling heat and provoking uncertainty, much aggravated by the want of food, for another three hours. At last, when very nearly famished, and when my doubts as to the wisdom of this novel and impromptu expedition had become very serious indeed, a European boat appeared, moving with the long steady stroke of a man-of-war's ...
— The Golden Chersonese and the Way Thither • Isabella L. Bird (Mrs. Bishop)
... like,—impose your own terms on us: only bring along the money, too; the rest is easy for me. Our doors are much like those of a custom house: pay your fee, and they are open: if you can't, they are—(going into house and closing the door in his face with a provoking laugh) not open. ...
— Amphitryo, Asinaria, Aulularia, Bacchides, Captivi • Plautus Titus Maccius
... When this article had been read and discussed, young "Billy" Macintyre himself sent for Thyrsis. This was the "real thing", said he, with his genial bonhomie; the five hundred thousand subscribers of Macintyre's must surely have these mirth-provoking meditations. Also, the editors themselves needed badly to be stirred up by such live ideas; therefore would Thyrsis come to dinner next Friday evening, and, as "Billy" phrased it, "throw a little Socialism ...
— Love's Pilgrimage • Upton Sinclair
... and his way, when he came in and out all through the day, of pretending not to see the House to Let, was more provoking still. However, being quite resolved not to notice, I gave no sign whatever that I did notice. But, when evening came, and he showed in Jarber, and, when Jarber wouldn't be helped off with his cloak, and poked his cane into ...
— A House to Let • Charles Dickens
... faltered a little, as though even he were moved by the thought of her early death. Mrs. Foster glanced at him jealously, and he looked back at her with a provoking curve about his lips. For the moment there was more hatred than love in the regards exchanged between them. I saw it was useless to pursue ...
— The Doctor's Dilemma • Hesba Stretton
... State of Louisiana has not had a lawful Legislature; that its laws have been made by an unauthorized mob; that the President of the United States actively, and Congress, by non-action at least, have sustained and perpetuated this abnormal, illegal, wrongful condition of things, thereby justifying and provoking the indignant and violent protests of one portion of the people of that State, and inviting them to renewed and continued agitation and violence? Such action by us would be unjust to the claimant, a great wrong to the people who sent him here, and cruel ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 7, 1922 • Various
... beautiful little village, taking it by streets, and although I have been over but a small portion, I have ninety signatures. I met with but little opposition, and with kind wishes in abundance; with some amusing, some provoking, some pathetic, and some disgusting phases of human nature—with very agreeable disappointments, and very disagreeable ones. Very often some person would say to me, there is no use in calling at such a house; the man will not, and the woman ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various
... as any one the value of the slapstick as a mirth-provoking instrument. (All hail to the slapstick! it was well known at the Mermaid Tavern, we'll warrant.) But he prefers the rapier. Probably his Savage Portraits, splendidly truculent and slashing sonnets, are among the ...
— Shandygaff • Christopher Morley
... somewhat altered their usual appearance. After a short time the police returned; Meagher and his companions gave their real names on being interrogated, and they were at once arrested and taken in triumph to Thurles. The three friends bore their ill fortune with what their captors must have considered provoking nonchalance. Meagher smoked a cigar on the way to the station, and the trio chatted as gaily as if they were walking in safety on the free soil of America, instead of being helpless prisoners on their way to captivity ...
— Speeches from the Dock, Part I • Various
... height than the Contessa, and looked almost tall beside her, though I had thought of him as small. Her round, dimpled face seemed no older than his oval brown one, in this moment of his gravity, and the haughty air of a young prince which he wore now, consciously or unconsciously, had a certain provoking charm for a spoiled beauty used to conquest. The big blue stars which lit his face expressed a resolve not to yield to any blandishment, and this no doubt piqued Gaeta, before whom all the boys and youths ...
— The Princess Passes • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson
... having done so, it would be immodest of them to say it. Better material than any that their researches brought to light may still be lying near the surface, somewhere close at hand, waiting to be unearthed. Certainly this paper will not have been written in vain if it serves the purpose of provoking to the good work of discovery some of those who on the score both of quality and of quantity account what has been thus far done in the line of ...
— A Short History of the Book of Common Prayer • William Reed Huntington
... in medieval monastic houses, however, combined a preternatural ingenuity with an extremely exiguous sense of humour, and the sort of dumb pandemonium which went on at Eglentyne's dinner table must often have been more mirth-provoking than speech. The sister who desired fish would 'wag her hands displayed sidelings in manner of a fish tail'; she who wanted milk would 'draw her left little finger in manner of milking'; for mustard ...
— Medieval People • Eileen Edna Power
... brought a vivid color into Mr. Sewell's cheeks. To be interrupted so unceremoniously, in the midst of so very proper and ministerial a remark, was rather provoking, and he answered, with ...
— The Pearl of Orr's Island - A Story of the Coast of Maine • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... from men and cities"; and, last and best, the comparison of Satan, in the same poem, to an old man gathering sticks upon a winter's day. "The household image of old age, of human infirmity, and of domestic hearths, are all meant as a machinery for provoking and soliciting the fearful idea to which they are placed in collision, and as so ...
— Milton • Sir Walter Alexander Raleigh
... of the matter is that Ulpian is not coming home. Mr. Manton wished him to act as guardian for his daughter, who is in Europe, and Ulpian will sail in the next steamer for England, to attend to some business connected with the estate. It is too provoking, isn't it? He says it is impossible to tell when ...
— Vashti - or, Until Death Us Do Part • Augusta J. Evans Wilson
... while the relative value of other articles is greater; a greater quantity of money is given for other articles, and fewer of other articles are given for the same amount of money. This rise has the double effect of provoking the importation of foreign commodities, and of preventing the exportation of domestic commodities; inasmuch as the same enhancement of rates, which opens a good domestic market for the former, closes the foreign market to the latter; and ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I, No. 1, Nov. 1857 • Various
... provoking that I had not the pleasure of shaking you by the hand at Oxford when you did me the honour of coming so far to 'join in the shout.' I was told by a Fellow of University College that he had never witnessed such an outburst ...
— The Prose Works of William Wordsworth • William Wordsworth
... had learned once for all that her hair would not curl, she spent half an hour that morning braiding her auntie's ringlets down her back, and tying the cue with a pink ribbon like her own. But for all the little barber could do the flaxen cue would not lie flat. It was an old story, but very provoking. ...
— Jimmy, Lucy, and All • Sophie May
... of that self-examination which is by plain institution ... a qualification, of the communicants. Now these think it not enough to charge the churches, which require & expect such accounts, with exceedingly provoking the Lord. But of the tears dropt by holy souls on those occasions, they say with a scoff, 'whether they be for joy or grief, we are left in the dark.'" [Footnote: Collection of Some of the More Offensive Matters, p. 6.] But the ...
— The Emancipation of Massachusetts • Brooks Adams
... hopes which this fond forgiving creature had nurtured for one season, and carried on so resolutely to the next, were destined to be disappointed yet a second time, by a most provoking event, which occurred in the Newcome family. Ethel was called away suddenly from Paris by her father's third and last paralytic seizure. When she reached her home, Sir Brian could not recognise her. A few hours after her arrival, all the vanities of the world were over for ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... district quickly followed the example of another in desiring peace, in like manner would they follow an evil example in provoking hostilities. ...
— Ismailia • Samuel W. Baker
... packed him off to Naples to drown his sorrow in debauchery. I have come to the conclusion that she is more dangerous in her virtuous moods than in her vicious ones, and that she probably has a way of turning her back which is the most provoking thing in the world. She 's an actress, she could n't forego doing the thing dramatically, and it was the dramatic touch that made it fatal. I wished her, of course, to let him down easily; but she desired to have the curtain drop on an attitude, and her attitudes deprive inflammable young artists ...
— Roderick Hudson • Henry James
... wrapped up," he said; "it is all the same to me if we wait here one hour or ten;" and with the most provoking indifference he commenced to smoke, not even the manner in which the other drivers aspersed the reputation of his mother appearing to have the smallest effect. At last the proprietor, seeing it was useless ...
— Russia - As Seen and Described by Famous Writers • Various
... the Bishop of Dunkeld, Lord Loch-awe, and others, was so vehement, so persuasive, that had not Wallace been steadily principled not to involve his country in domestic war, he must have yielded to the affectionate eloquence of their pleading. But showing to them the public danger attendant on his provoking the wild ambition of the Cummins, and their multitudinous adherents, his arguments, which the sober judgment of his friends saw conclusive, at last ended the debate. He then rose, saying, "I have yet to perform my vow to our lamented Mar. I shall seek his daughter; and then, my brave companions, ...
— The Scottish Chiefs • Miss Jane Porter
... me out, but I have been outside the window and heard it all," cried she, dancing before them in the most provoking manner. "Arthur can only be a paid clerk, and Constance is going to be a governess and get forty guineas a year, and if Tom doesn't gain his exhibition he must turn bell-ringer to the college, for papa can't pay for ...
— The Channings • Mrs. Henry Wood
... Article XV., "No person in the Navy shall quarrel with any other person in the Navy, nor use provoking or reproachful words, gestures, or menaces, on pain of such punishment as ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... rarety; as juggling tricks, not for their use, but their abstruseness, are beheld with pleasure) by diverting the mind from its road of serious thoughts; by instilling gaiety and airiness of spirit; by provoking to such dispositions of spirit in way of emulation or complaisance; and by seasoning matters, otherwise distasteful or insipid, with an unusual, ...
— Sermons on Evil-Speaking • Isaac Barrow
... "mother doesn't mean you're not to defend yourself. Understand? By fighting, mother only means beginning fights, picking fights, provoking other boys to fight. We have to defend ourselves. It isn't right to pick a fight; that's ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol 31, No 2, June 1908 • Various
... him, "Wait till your oppressor voluntarily renounces oppression, or till it shall cease of itself." This cannot be; and those who tell us that capital is, by nature, unproductive, ought to know that they are provoking ...
— Sophisms of the Protectionists • Frederic Bastiat
... become efficient labourers in their station. From Government all that is asked is toleration for themselves and protection for their converts. The plan which they have laid for their own proceedings is perfectly prudent and unexceptionable, and there is as little fear of their provoking martyrdom as there would be of their shrinking from it, if the cause of God and man require the sacrifice. But the converts ought to be protected from violence, and all cramming with cow-dung prohibited on pain of ...
— The Life of William Carey • George Smith
... continued to ply her needle, without appearing to regard his presence. Her husband did not make another effort to induce her to suspend her labors; for, under existing circumstances, he was particularly desirous of not provoking her to use towards him the language of rebuke and censure. After sitting silent, for, perhaps half an hour, he rose from his chair, and walked three or four times backwards and forwards across the room, preparatory ...
— The Lights and Shadows of Real Life • T.S. Arthur
... Daisy, when in walked a friend of Miss Linnet's, so he went home instead. The next morning he started for school with the firm determination to be a good child, and I really believe he would have been had not that provoking little witch of a Daisy marched past him in a very independent manner, her saucy nose away up in the air, and a scornful look in the pretty blue eyes. It was more than flesh and blood could stand. All Tom's ...
— Twilight Stories • Various
... appeared, stirred up by emissaries of Colocatroni, who, though assuming the position of the rival of Mavrocordatos, was simply a brigand on a large scale in the Morca. Exasperation at this mutiny, and the vexation of having to abandon a cherished scheme, seem to have been the immediately provoking causes of a violent convulsive fit which, on the evening of the 15th, attacked the poet, and endangered his life. Next day he was better, but complained of weight in the head; and the doctors applying ...
— Byron • John Nichol
... her provoking days," whispered a girl, noting Nellie's puzzled face; "she will tease and annoy each teacher as much as possible all this afternoon—-she always does so when in these moods. Do not think her stupid, Miss Latimer; as the French master often says, 'It is not lack of ability, but lack of application.' ...
— Aunt Judith - The Story of a Loving Life • Grace Beaumont
... the Republicans took their departure. Even at this distance of time it is provoking to learn that they got back to Brest without meeting an enemy that had teeth to bite. The African climate, however, reduced the squadron to such a plight, that it was well for our frigates that they had not the chance ...
— Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay • George Otto Trevelyan
... fantastic garb, with something of drollery in its appearance, so as to aid the comic effect of his action, and armed with a dagger of lath, perhaps as symbolical that his use of weapons was but to the end of provoking his own defeat. Therewithal he was vastly given to cracking ribald and saucy jokes with and upon the Devil, and treating him in a style of coarse familiarity and mockery; and a part of his ordinary business was to bestride the Devil, and beat him ...
— Shakespeare: His Life, Art, And Characters, Volume I. • H. N. Hudson
... really ashamed of the congratulations which we receive. We are addressed as if we had made a voyage to Nova Zembla, and suffered five persecutions in Japan[1079].' And he afterwards remarked, that, 'to see a man come up with a formal air and a Latin line, when we had no fatigue and no danger, was provoking[1080].' I told him, he was not sensible of the danger, having lain under cover in the boat during the storm[1081]: he was like the chicken, that hides its head under its wing, ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 5 • Boswell
... damage, that you endeavoured to return it so roughly?" Tommy answered, "that he must own it did not do him any hurt, or give him any pain." "Why, then," said Mr Barlow, "I do not see the justice of your returning it in that manner." "But," said Tommy, "it is so provoking to be laughed at!" "There are two ways of remedying that," replied Mr Barlow, "either not doing such things as will expose you to ridicule, or by learning to bear it with a little more patience." "But," said Tommy, "I do not think that anybody ...
— The History of Sandford and Merton • Thomas Day
... be obtained in the neighborhood in sufficient numbers, owing to the wasteful way in which the Indians had killed where they wanted. They could not be restrained without alienating them, or, worse, provoking them to outrage. Including warriors and their families, fourteen thousand were now consuming provisions. In the condition of the roads, only water transport could meet the requirements; and that not by an occasional schooner running blockade, ...
— Sea Power in its Relations to the War of 1812 - Volume 2 • Alfred Thayer Mahan
... It is provoking that the inventory, minute as it is, should desert us at the most important point, and give insufficient data for estimating the size of the room. I conjecture that it was about 46 ft. long from the ...
— The Care of Books • John Willis Clark
... topics. The State of New York is eminently safe. Ever since the present able and distinguished Governor has held his place I have been called upon by the New England Society to respond for him. It is probably due to that element in the New Englander that he delights in provoking controversy. The Governor is a Democrat, and I am a Republican. Whatever he believes in I detest; whatever he admires I hate. The manner in which this toast is received leads me to believe that in the New ...
— Model Speeches for Practise • Grenville Kleiser
... hairs. Postern-bribe, a back-door bribe. Forked fee, a fee from both sides in a case; cp. Ben Jonson's Volpone: "Give forked counsel, take provoking gold on either hand". Eggs I'll not ...
— The Hesperides & Noble Numbers: Vol. 1 and 2 • Robert Herrick
... not lessened when I discovered that he alone of the party at table had left the house before the doors were closed; and for a moment I was inclined to have him followed and seized. But I could scarcely take a step so decisive without provoking inquiry; and I dared not at this stage let the King know of my negligence. I found myself, therefore, brought up short, in a state of exasperation and doubt difficult to describe; and the most minute search within the house and the closest examination of all concerned failing ...
— From the Memoirs of a Minister of France • Stanley Weyman
... and prettier, more provoking. Her child-mouth with its clever smile was bright as though his kiss ...
— The Branding Iron • Katharine Newlin Burt
... a turn of common-sense, which is the most provoking of all things sometimes; and she looked at him steadily, to follow up ...
— Springhaven - A Tale of the Great War • R. D. Blackmore
... light or propagated like sound, and increased, opposed, accumulated, and transmitted to another object. Moreover this principle, which is akin to a sixth sense, artificially acquired, may be employed for the cure of nervous affections, by provoking and directing salutary crises, thus bringing the healing ...
— Primitive Psycho-Therapy and Quackery • Robert Means Lawrence
... heathen. They are not satisfied, unless they can have some object before them, to which they can make their offerings and their prayers. Thus daily are they engaged in a service which, above all others, is the most offensive and provoking to a holy God—a service which has caused him to declare, that idolaters shall not enter the kingdom of heaven. This, too, is the service in which every person, who has never given himself to the Saviour, is engaged; and, of course, in which you are engaged if you have not given your hearts ...
— Dr. Scudder's Tales for Little Readers, About the Heathen. • Dr. John Scudder
... accusation, had been completely jerked out of the region of Grundy by Julius's splendid rendering of Tartini, and had felt disconcerted and ashamed; for Tishy was a thorough musician at heart. The consequence was an amende honorable to the young man, on whom—he having no idea whatever of its provoking cause—it produced the effect that might have been anticipated. Any young lady who wishes to enslave a young man will really do better work by showing an interest in himself than by any amount of fascination and allurement, on the lines ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... summon the master of the house from his bed, perhaps, for the sake of such an application, would be preposterous. I should be in more danger of provoking his anger than exciting his benevolence. This request might, surely, with more propriety be preferred to a passenger. I should, probably, meet several before I ...
— Arthur Mervyn - Or, Memoirs of the Year 1793 • Charles Brockden Brown
... Althea, how provoking you are!" cried Thornton, rising from his seat and confronting furiously his wife, "cannot you speak to a man; what have you to say, what are you ...
— Hubert's Wife - A Story for You • Minnie Mary Lee
... these words with that kind of low, dogged ridicule and scorn which so frequently accompany stupid and wanton brutality; and which are, besides, provoking, almost beyond endurance, when the mind is chafed by a consideration of ...
— The Black Prophet: A Tale Of Irish Famine • William Carleton
... this author is nowhere dull. "The Henriade" comes dangerously near that mark. It is a tasteless reproduction of Lucan's faults, with little reproduction of Lucan's virtues. Voltaire's comedies are bright and witty, but they are not laughter-provoking; and they do not possess the elemental and creative character of Shakspeare's or Moliere's work. His tragedies are better; but they do not avoid that cast of mechanical which seems necessarily to belong to poetry produced ...
— Classic French Course in English • William Cleaver Wilkinson
... He could have killed her. It was provoking, people would rather be hanged than read a manuscript. Yet what hopeless trash they will read in crowds, which was manuscript ...
— Peg Woffington • Charles Reade
... concerning the fineness of the day and the delightful view which Laurel Hill commanded of the surrounding country. She was no menial, he knew, and looking in her bright, black eyes he saw that she had far more mind than the dollish Nellie, who, as usual, was provoking J.C. to say all manner ...
— Cousin Maude • Mary J. Holmes
... I see!" He managed a rather provoking slur on the last word. "No, William." His eyes twinkled at her. "It isn't poison. What's the other thing ...
— The Ranch at the Wolverine • B. M. Bower
... detachments, when the sovereign whom it had been their duty to defend, seemed no longer to require their service. But the Swiss remained bravely at their posts around the royal staircase, though, as they abstained from provoking the rioters by any active opposition, which now seemed to have no object, they hoped that they might escape attack. But the mob and Santerre were bent on their destruction. Some of the insurgents tried ...
— The Life of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France • Charles Duke Yonge
... that of fair combat It happened, for example, that Lord Sanquhar, a Scottish nobleman, in fencing with a master of the noble science of defence, lost his eye by an unlucky thrust. The accident was provoking, but without remedy; nor did Lord Sanquhar think of it, unless with regret, until some years after, when he chanced to be in the French court. Henry the Great casually asked him, how he lost his eye? "By the thrust of ...
— Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, Vol. II (of 3) • Walter Scott
... affections of the eye, which clung to him through life, the dyspepsia producing fluctuation of spirits, and occasional hypochondria, which, it might have been thought, would seriously interfere with his success as a court favourite. "At one time he astonished the observer by his sanguine, bubbling, provoking, unreserved, quick, fiery or humorous, cheerful, even unrestrainedly gay manner, winning him by his hearty open advances where he felt himself attracted and encouraged to confidence; at other times he was all seriousness, placidity, self-possession, ...
— Lectures and Essays • Goldwin Smith
... "and I will admit that I was very provoking; but things were in a mess, and, besides, it was very inconvenient for me to be called away at that moment ...
— The Child of the Dawn • Arthur Christopher Benson
... niece," says he, "I prithee apprehend The water's water. Be thyself thy friend; Such beauty would the coldest husband warm, But your provoking tongue undoes the charm: Be silent, and complying; you'll soon find, Sir John, without a medecine, ...
— The Tatler, Volume 1, 1899 • George A. Aitken
... yet, but you will see him in the evening, when you will readily be able to judge for yourself. One thing you must do, and that is, from this time forth, not to pay any notice to him. All these cousins of yours don't venture to bring any taint upon themselves by provoking him." ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... care, as I thought, to have it arranged that my name should not be omitted when the new First Lord came into power. Little dreamed I that, in the melee of official patronage and personal favour which shortly afterwards took place at headquarters, my poor name would be dropped out altogether. The provoking consequence was, however, that I had the mortification of seeing sundry capital vacancies in India pass by, one after another, which, had I occupied even the very low place on the fresh list which I had ...
— The Lieutenant and Commander - Being Autobigraphical Sketches of His Own Career, from - Fragments of Voyages and Travels • Basil Hall
... able to sing at all. But I have not told you of my make up. I don't look at all pretty; the ugly curls I wear come from an old German print, and the staid, modest gown. But it is very provoking; I was singing well till that fiend began to argue. Don't make me ...
— Evelyn Innes • George Moore
... something of what sort of people are coming down the street, even on the darkest night, whenever the attendant link-boy heaves in sight with the farnooze. Some of these social indicators are the size of a Portland cement barrel, even in Persia; it is rather a smile-provoking thought to think what tremendous farnoozes would be seen lighting up the streets on gloomy evenings, were this same custom prevalent among ourselves; few of us but what could call to memory people whose farnoozes would be little smaller than brewery mash-tubs, and which would have to be ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle V1 • Thomas Stevens
... and beer, yet he did not eat. In the middle distance certain figures began insistently to stand out,—figures of women sitting alone wherever he looked he met a provoking gaze. One woman, a little farther away than the rest, seemed determinedly bent on getting a nod of recognition, and it was gradually borne in upon Hodder's consciousness that her features were familiar. In avoiding her eyes he studied the men at the next table,—or rather one of them, who loudly ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... no; it is impossible!' exclaimed the animated Juno. 'Provoking mortal!' continued the Goddess. 'Let me entreat ...
— Ixion In Heaven • Benjamin Disraeli
... be an act of revenge to keep silence with the intention of provoking the reviler to anger, but it would be praiseworthy to be silent, in order to give place to anger. Hence it is written (Ecclus. 8:4): "Strive not with a man that is full of tongue, and heap not ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... problem," said the provoking Rose: "when the nose without is as red as a lobster, what must be the temperature of the heart within, and ...
— What Katy Did At School • Susan Coolidge
... than singly, not that their joint force divides the air with greater ease, but because being matched one against the other, emulation kindles and inflames their courage; thus he thought, brave men, provoking one another to noble actions, would prove most serviceable and most resolute, ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... nerves still unstrung from the previous night I feebly protested against the notion, suggesting Observatory Hill, Jutogh, the Boileaugunge road—anything rather than the Jakko round. Kitty was angry and a little hurt, so I yielded from fear of provoking further misunderstanding, and we set out together towards Chota Simla. We walked a greater part of the way, and, according to our custom, cantered from a mile or so below the Convent to the stretch of ...
— The Best Ghost Stories • Various
... gudeman, and if he approves the match, it will make him hasten on the settlement, for really I am growing tired of this London, whar I am just like a fish out of the water. The Englishers are sae obstinate in their own way, that I can get them to do nothing like Christians; and, what is most provoking of all, their ways are very good when you know them; but they have no instink to teach a body how to learn them. Just this very morning, I told the lass to get a jiggot of mutton for the morn's dinner, and she said there was not such a thing to be had in ...
— The Ayrshire Legatees • John Galt
... gifts of Spring, Is there another can safely surpass This delicate, voluptuous thing— This dapple-green, plump-shouldered bass? Upon a damask napkin laid, What exhalations superfine Our gustatory nerves pervade, Provoking quenchless ...
— John Smith, U.S.A. • Eugene Field
... safe mode of shipment for the boxes of value, equipment, etc. I therefore caused a canoe to be used for this purpose and it answered admirably. I have to mention the loss of three of the cattle. One by death at the depot in consequence of previous over-exertion, and two by accidents of a most provoking and unlucky nature, but which could not ...
— Three Expeditions into the Interior of Eastern Australia, Vol 2 (of 2) • Thomas Mitchell
... she had. Now she would perfect herself. Barely a fortnight now before her engagement at the Folies Bergeres! What if—no, she must not think of that! But the thought insisted. What if she essayed for Paris that which again and again she had meant to graft on to her repertory—the Provoking Thimble? ...
— Zuleika Dobson - or, An Oxford Love Story • Max Beerbohm
... conservative counsels, and there by radical complaints,—by the over-cautious policy of one general, and the headlong haste of another,—by a too tender regard for slavery in some States, and by a too zealous anxiety for instant emancipation in others,—by fear of provoking opposition in one quarter, and by a blind defiance of all obstacles in another. Now what shall be done? Shall we hesitate, despond, despair? Never! For Heaven's sake, take off the muzzle. Use every weapon which the God of Battles has placed in our hands. Put forth ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XI., April, 1863, No. LXVI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics. • Various
... greatest care. He had taken away the knife, and in all probability had got rid of it long since. No one had seen him enter the house on the night in question, nor had any one seen him leave it again. I was nearly beside myself with vexation. To be so near my goal, and yet not be able to reach it, was provoking beyond endurance. But my lucky star was still in the ascendant, and good fortune was to ...
— My Strangest Case • Guy Boothby
... to do so without effort, or, it must be admitted, without malicious intent either. Here was a woman who could be an honour to a wealthy man, who could gratify his lust for display, and carry the convincing proofs of his great wealth right under the noses of the very best people, without ever provoking the usual comments of the spiteful and the envious. She was a creature, moreover, with a large circle of influential and distinguished friends, and she possessed that inimitable calmness of bearing in their company, beside which Sir Joseph's mental picture of the first Mrs. Bullion partook ...
— Too Old for Dolls - A Novel • Anthony Mario Ludovici
... her tracks, quietly reloading her silver- mounted .38. It had not been a difficult shot. The lion's head made an easier mark than a tomato-can swinging at the end of a string. There was a provoking, teasing, maddening smile upon her mouth and in her dark eyes. The would-be-rescuing knight felt the fire of his fiasco burn down to his soul. Here had been his chance, the chance that he had dreamed of; and Momus, and not Cupid, had presided over it. The satyrs in the wood were, ...
— Heart of the West • O. Henry
... he could have taken the spinster's old tales of Adele's regard for him and devotion to him at their highest truth, (which he never did, because of the girl's provoking familiarity and indifference,) he would have felt a great charm in his life cut off. Yet now he wanders in search of her with his heart upon his lip and a great fire in his brain. Not a little pride in affronting opinion may have kindled the glow of his ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 100, February, 1866 • Various
... the Governor's mercy. Complicity in the robbery of Seebrook was as nothing compared with the haunting fear that the man he had shot in the Congdon house had died from the wound. Unable to determine this question he was floundering in a veritable sea of crimes. The Governor was undressing with provoking indifference to ...
— Blacksheep! Blacksheep! • Meredith Nicholson
... had written to the Boston schoolmaster, begging him to "insinuate into the Scholars the Defiling and Provoking nature of such a Foolish Practice" as playing tricks ...
— Customs and Fashions in Old New England • Alice Morse Earle
... defrauded him of his stipulated recompense. Whereupon Hercules, coming with some seven ships, is said to have taken and sacked Troy; an event which is alluded to and recognised by Homer. "And thus we see," adds the author, "Troy already provoking the enmity or tempting the cupidity of the Greeks, in the generation before the celebrated war; and it may be easily conceived that if its power and opulence revived after this blow, it might again excite the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, No. 382, October 1847 • Various
... no trouble exactly. Things are so difficult just now. The fact is that I promised to go to tea with Miss Burnett this afternoon and now your father wants me to go with him to the Deanery. So provoking! Miss Burnett caught me in the street, where it's always so difficult to ...
— The Cathedral • Hugh Walpole
... used to poke fun at me over Mrs. Beaudesart; but the fact that they thought they knew my real standing, whereas they did n't, seemed to weigh so much in my favour as to make their banter anything but provoking. Yet my relations with the gentlewoman were painful enough. I'll tell you ...
— Such is Life • Joseph Furphy
... before him, pinched his sunken mouth, wiped the seam of his sleeve over his face and started grinding. Half-numbed sounds came trickling into the chill street from under the organ-cloth: a sad—once, perhaps, dance-provoking—tune, which now, false, dragging and twisted out of shape, was like a muddled crawling of sounds all jumbled up together; some came too soon, the others too late, as in a weariful dream; and, in between, a sighing and creaking which came from very deep down, at each third ...
— The Path of Life • Stijn Streuvels
... verses and ballads are come over, too bad to send you, if I had them, but I really have not. What is more provoking for the Duke of Dorset, an address is come over directly to the King (not as usual through the channel of the Lord Lieutenant), to assure him of their great loyalty, and apprehensions of being misrepresented. This is all I know, and you see, ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2 • Horace Walpole
... getting out of their way than he would in shunning a mad dog. The streets resounded with their profane psalm-singing, and ill fared it with the unlucky wight that ventured to remonstrate, or dared to find fault with their provoking use of meat on the prohibited days. He was likely to have a broken head for his pains, or be shut up in prison by judges who sympathized with the "new doctrines."[1245] The court, however, more correctly ascribing the disturbances that occurred on such occasions to the attacks ...
— The Rise of the Hugenots, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Henry Martyn Baird
... order to prevent the devastation which a winged serpent or dragon (a Wiber) was committing in the surrounding country. The stone was draped with scarlet cloth, to allure and excite the creature to a furor, scarlet being a colour most intolerably hateful and provoking to it. It was studded with iron spikes, that the reptile might wound or kill itself by beating itself against it. Its destruction, it is alleged, was effected by this artifice. It is said to have had two lurking places in the neighbourhood, ...
— Welsh Folk-Lore - a Collection of the Folk-Tales and Legends of North Wales • Elias Owen
... to be kindly received everywhere," replied Emma, "since she is long-suffering and kind herself, not easily provoked, and certainly not provoking, because she never ...
— Be Courteous • Mrs. M. H. Maxwell
... histrionic profession contemplated tragedy as his forte. He had inherited a wondrous voice, deep, sweet, and resonant, from his father, and had a face so plastic that it could be moulded at will to all the expressions of terror, malignity, and devotion, or anon into the most grotesque and mirth-provoking lines of comedy. His early love for reciting passages from "Spartacus," referred to by the Rev. Mr. Tufts, showed the bent of his mind, and when he became master of his own affairs he sought out Edwin Forrest and confided to him his ambition to go on the boards. ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson
... the long watches, and the privations Vasco had endured ended by provoking a violent fever, so that on leaving this country he had to be carried on the shoulders of slaves. All the others who were seriously ill, were likewise carried in hammocks, that is to say, in cotton nets. Others, who still had some strength, despite ...
— De Orbe Novo, Volume 1 (of 2) - The Eight Decades of Peter Martyr D'Anghera • Trans. by Francis Augustus MacNutt
... volcano; it is full of fire, wrath, and combustibles, and when this matter comes to be strongly agitated, the explosion is dreadful. With respect to the causes which produced the excess of feeling, they are beyond my reach, except one great cause, the provoking conduct of the Suliotes." ...
— The Life of Lord Byron • John Galt
... grew in Aunt Marcia's brain. Towns and villages were spreading up the river, and one day she was offered what seemed a fabulous sum for her old home of rocky woodlands. She was still shrewd, if she had come to fourscore, and offered them half, on her own terms, holding off with the most provoking indifference until they came to an agreement. Then she announced her intention of building a home for Floyd, who was to ...
— Floyd Grandon's Honor • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... the Gossip's Journal, provoking endless parliamentary wrangles, and perhaps helping to develop later on an editor. Memorable were the Young People's Conventions of 1886 and 1887, and Lylians will never forget the patriot Kromm, Spoopendyke Shreve, the poet laureate ...
— The Kirk on Rutgers Farm • Frederick Bruckbauer
... It was particularly provoking, because we were so well prepared for events—any events. Rupert prepared us. He had found a fat old book in the garret, bound in yellow leather, at the end of which were "Directions how to act with presence of mind in any emergency;" and he gave lectures out of this in ...
— A Great Emergency and Other Tales - A Great Emergency; A Very Ill-Tempered Family; Our Field; Madam Liberality • Juliana Horatia Gatty Ewing
... tell me where to go," he thought as he opened it; but it proved to be far more confusing than the Hole-keeper himself had been. In fact it was altogether the most ridiculous and provoking book Davy ...
— Davy and The Goblin - What Followed Reading 'Alice's Adventures in Wonderland' • Charles E. Carryl
... say something dreadful, very likely; though I hoped you would see it was better not But just tell me this before you begin. Are you successful, are you happy? It has been so provoking, not knowing ...
— Georgina's Reasons • Henry James
... Star, in his half-playful and suggestive way, chose to put it as though he regarded the article in the Pall Mall Magazine as a hoax, perpetrated by some clever, unscrupulous writer, intent on provoking both Mr Henley and his friends, and Stevenson's friends and admirers. This called forth a letter from one signing himself "A Lover of R. L. Stevenson," which is so good that we must ...
— Robert Louis Stevenson - a Record, an Estimate, and a Memorial • Alexander H. Japp
... dissipation, late hours, fashionable dressing, midnight feasting, exposures through excessive exertions and improper dress, etc., it can be shown most clearly that dancing has a direct influence in stimulating the passions and provoking unchaste desires, which too often lead to unchaste acts, and are in themselves violations of the requirements of strict morality, and productive of injury to both ...
— Plain Facts for Old and Young • John Harvey Kellogg
... sparkled. There was always something of the overgrown, provoking child in him, when he wanted to bear down an opinion or feeling that displeased him. She would have liked to go on walking and wrangling with him, for the great ceremony had excited her, and made it easier for her to talk. But at that moment Mrs. ...
— Eleanor • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... for the small pox was then warmly opposed as being highly improper. The character of the paper was spirited, and its tone that of religious scepticism. It was not long in attracting much of the public attention, and in provoking the resentment of the colonial Government and clergy. The Rev. Increase Mather having been claimed in the Courant as one of its supporters, came out with a long and wrathful contradiction of the assertion. 'I can well remember,' says that eminent and excellent ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No 3, September 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various |
