"Undemonstrative" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... our pride, our treasure, Care-free child of a kingly race. Undemonstrative? Yes, in a measure, But every movement replete with grace. Whiles we mocked at the monkeys' tricks Or pored apart on the apteryx; These could yield but a passing pleasure; Yours ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, Feb. 19, 1919 • Various
... solitude, and used to absolute authority. He loved Bram after his own fashion, but his vocabulary of affectionate words was not a large one. Bram, however, understood him; he had been quite satisfied with his short and undemonstrative greeting,— ...
— The Bow of Orange Ribbon - A Romance of New York • Amelia E. Barr
... Bulgarian friend the scout Dobri Petroff, who is so well known that he can easily be found, and will probably be able to lead you to him. Now, only one word for myself: don't forget a message to Bella—say—say—bah! You English are such an undemonstrative set that I don't like to put it in words, but—you ought to know what to say, and when you've said it, just add, like a good fellow, that I would have said a great deal more if I had had the saying ...
— In the Track of the Troops • R.M. Ballantyne
... when he had attained his thirtieth year, Otis married Ruth Cunningham, the daughter of an influential Boston merchant. The lady, from all accounts, was undemonstrative and devoid of her husband's patriotic ardor, traits that did not tend to domestic felicity or lead, on the wife's part, to a commanding influence over her vehement and somewhat eccentric husband. The fruit of the union was one ...
— James Otis The Pre-Revolutionist • John Clark Ridpath
... their intimacy ripened there were times when, not only his whole demeanour, but his very nature seemed to change; when he craved for dimness and quiet; and when he would work upon the Tenor with little caressing ways that won his heart and drew from him, although he was habitually undemonstrative, expressions of tenderness ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... his quiet, undemonstrative way. He chose my own particular easy chair for himself, and stuck to it. An ordinary cat I should have shot out, but Thomas Henry was not the cat one chivvies. Had I made it clear to him that I objected ...
— Sketches in Lavender, Blue and Green • Jerome K. Jerome
... attention. I then rode forward and reported to General Thomas, whom I found waiting for me at the place he had selected for the Twenty-third Corps in the defensive line about Nashville. He greeted me in his usual cordial but undemonstrative way, congratulated me, and said I had done "well." I have often thought that I may not have shown due appreciation of his kindness at that moment, for I did not then feel very grateful to him; but he gave no indication that he ...
— Forty-Six Years in the Army • John M. Schofield
... pervades all France. It is simple, undemonstrative heroism, the ardent desire of a race to last in spite of all. What more imperturbable confidence in its immortality could be manifested than by this mother and daughter calmly discussing the durability of their family linen, within actual range of Teuton ...
— With Those Who Wait • Frances Wilson Huard
... to say that he is undemonstrative," explained the girl, flaming red. "I should think that if he—oh, but I am glad he does not speak!" she interrupted herself, vehemently, remembering her brother's peril. ...
— A Man of Two Countries • Alice Harriman
... description is quite masterly—worthy, I am inclined to say, of Flaubert. But unless you are familiar with the quiet, undemonstrative nature of the scenery described, you can hardly estimate the perfect justice of the sentiment and phrasing with which ...
— The House of Cobwebs and Other Stories • George Gissing
... miniature plaything. Now, the engine shrieked in hysterics of such intensity, that it seemed desirable that the men who had her in charge should hold her feet, slap her hands, and bring her to; now, burrowed into tunnels with a stubborn and undemonstrative energy so confusing that the train seemed to be flying back into leagues of darkness. Here, were station after station, swallowed up by the express without stopping; here, stations where it fired itself in like a volley of cannon-balls, ...
— The Lazy Tour of Two Idle Apprentices • Charles Dickens
... friends, although their people are generally so undemonstrative, endeavoured by every means in their power to show their gratitude to us for the service we had rendered them. When we offered to pay for the canoe, which we were anxious to retain, Maono entreated ...
— On the Banks of the Amazon • W.H.G. Kingston
... am the same." His speech came now hurriedly and with difficulty: "And whatever comes to me or to you, Dick, remember I shall never change to you—remember that, Dick, to you I shall never change." His breath was coming in quick gasps. The younger boy gazed at his usually so undemonstrative brother. Suddenly he threw his arms about his neck, crying in a broken voice, "You won't, Barney, I know you won't. If you ever do I don't want ...
— The Doctor - A Tale Of The Rockies • Ralph Connor
... reflections was her blindness to the real state of her own feelings. Now everything was clear to her of the manner in which George Iredale had steadily grown into her daily life, and how her own friendly liking for him had already ripened into something warmer. He was so quiet, so undemonstrative, so good and kind. She saw now how she had grown accustomed to look for and abide by his decisions in matters which required more consideration than she could give—matters which were beyond her. She understood the strong, reliant nature which underlaid the quiet ...
— The Hound From The North • Ridgwell Cullum
... due to his habitual conscientiousness of his own intention than to any fear that she would not fully respond to it. Indeed, with his conservative ideas of proper feminine self-restraint, Louise's calm passivity and undemonstrative attitude were a proof of her superiority; had she blushed overmuch, cried, or thrown herself into his arms, he would have doubted the wisdom of so easy a selection. It was true he had known her scarcely three weeks; if he chose to be content ...
— A Phyllis of the Sierras • Bret Harte
... expression of his grief over America's inferiority in the foot-path line to the "mellow England" which in one brief month had won him for her own. Now I know very little of Holyoke, Mass., of my own knowledge. As a lecture-town I can say of it that its people are polite, but extremely undemonstrative, and that the lecturer is expected to furnish the refreshments. It is quite likely that the English lady was right, and that there are ...
— Jersey Street and Jersey Lane - Urban and Suburban Sketches • H. C. Bunner
... head gave me a glimpse of his eyes behind the glasses. He looked as if he wished I'd change the subject. In his dry, undemonstrative way, I think he liked me. Or at least he liked me when I wasn't trying to make him think about things outside his safe and secure little framework. But I didn't give in. If men of science are not going to take up the evidence and work it over, then where ...
— Sense from Thought Divide • Mark Irvin Clifton
... sir," replied Ned, settling himself into a comfortable, easy position in the cross-trees, somewhat to the secret trepidation of Miss Stanhope, who was watching his movements with a great deal of undemonstrative interest, and who every moment dreaded that the young man's careless attitude, coupled with the pitching of the ship, would result in a fall. Nothing of the kind, however, happened; and ...
— The Missing Merchantman • Harry Collingwood
... Whitman has light blue eyes, a florid complexion, a fleecy beard now grey, and a quite peculiar sort of magnetism about him in relation to those with whom he comes in contact. His ordinary appearance is masculine and cheerful: he never shows depression of spirits, and is sufficiently undemonstrative, and even somewhat silent in company. He has always been carried by predilection towards the society of the common people; but is not the less for that open to refined and artistic impressions—fond of operatic and other good music, and discerning in works of art. ...
— Poems By Walt Whitman • Walt Whitman
... and Lucia sat alone, and very dreary. At Maurice's entrance she rose quickly; but kept her eyes averted so that his paleness did not strike her as it had done others. She coloured vividly, with a mixture of shame, pride, and gladness, at his coming; but she only said "Good morning," in a low undemonstrative tone, and they ...
— A Canadian Heroine - A Novel, Volume 3 (of 3) • Mrs. Harry Coghill
... the apparent backwardness of Jarvis. Actual service had changed his views very decidedly. When Zeb appeared he had watched the course of this bashful suitor with interest which had rapidly ripened into warm but undemonstrative goodwill. The young fellow had taken pains to relieve the older man, had carried his tools for him, and more than once with his strong hands had almost rubbed the rheumatism out of the indomitable cobbler's leg. He had received but slight thanks, and had acted as if he didn't care for ...
— Taken Alive • E. P. Roe
... trait of Chinese character, and one fostered, if not generated, by Buddhistic teaching, is an undemonstrative fondness for animals, or, I might rather say, a passive admission of their right to considerate treatment, and strangely enough animals, both wild and domesticated, appear to comprehend this sentiment, for while greatly scared ...
— Life and sport in China - Second Edition • Oliver G. Ready
... far as that was concerned Marion did not know it; they were a very undemonstrative people. Uncle Reuben had told her once that she need not do it, that they had not expected it of her; and Aunt Hannah had added, "No more they didn't." But Marion had hushed them both by a decided sentence, to the effect that it was nothing more than ordinary justice and decency. ...
— The Chautauqua Girls At Home • Pansy, AKA Isabella M. Alden
... undemonstrative in all her domestic relations she always was, and I question if to any other of her family than myself she ever confided her secret hopes or fears. And to me even she was so undemonstrative that I never remember ...
— The Autobiography of a Journalist, Volume I • Stillman, William James
... nature, with that highest of all qualities, judgment, always sane and prompt; who never drags his anchors for any wind of opinion or fortune, but grips all the closer to the reality of things. He seems one of those calm, undemonstrative men whom we love and admire without asking to know why, crediting them with the capacity of great things, without any test of actual achievement, because we feel that their manhood is a constant quality, and no mere accident of circumstance and opportunity. ...
— Among My Books - First Series • James Russell Lowell
... calves. "They've took down the shed back of the meetin'-house. Said 'twas fallin' to pieces. Might 'a' come down on the heads of the hosses. Goin' to put up a new one." Then, as his steed recommenced its modest substitute for a trot, unseen of the Grangers he permitted himself an undemonstrative chuckle. "They can sorter divide that piece of news between 'em," he said to his companion, who had been the silent auditor of the conversation. A moment of indecision on the part of the Grangers ...
— A Christmas Accident and Other Stories • Annie Eliot Trumbull
... peculiar. The spiritual and social isolation of the townsman is therefore the source of the outward impassiveness of the Puritan, as well as of the intensity of his inner experience: the continued impact of noble or priestly contempt had crusted his nature with a manner that was rigid and resistant and undemonstrative, beneath which smouldered the explosive forces of thwarted ambition and the sense of unrecognized intellectual and moral excellence. Conscious of a worth which society ignored, he transformed his qualities into virtues, and erected his virtues into social ...
— Beginnings of the American People • Carl Lotus Becker
... Marseilles buffet, on the journey out, I had met an Englishman, almost his counterpart in features—but somehow very different! This old fellow had nothing of the other's alert, autocratic self-sufficiency. He was quiet and undemonstrative, without looking, as it were, insulated against shocks and foreign substances. He was certainly no Frenchman. His eyes, indeed, were brown, but hazel-brown, and gentle—not the red-brown sensual eye of the Frenchman. An American? But was ever an ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... mislaid her glasses, worked her shuttle at hazard in and out of that picture of intricate pattern called Life, and having tangled and knotted together the crimson thread of passion, the golden thread of youth and the honest brown of a deep, undemonstrative love, she left the disentanglement of the muddle in the hands ...
— The Hawk of Egypt • Joan Conquest
... portray the ministrations of such a person. She belonged to no association—had no compensation. She commanded respect, for she was lady-like and well educated; so quiet and undemonstrative, that her presence was hardly noticed, except by the smiling faces of the wounded as she passed. While she supervised the cooking of the meats and soups and coffee, all nice things were made and ...
— Woman's Work in the Civil War - A Record of Heroism, Patriotism, and Patience • Linus Pierpont Brockett
... a hand through Clemence's arm as she spoke and the two sisters squeezed down the narrow staircase, glad in their English, undemonstrative fashion of the close contact which an inherent shyness would have forbidden except in this accidental fashion. Across the oil- clothed passage they went, into the red-walled dining-room, where the other members of the family ...
— A College Girl • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... authorizing the Parliament to punish, according to the ordinances, those who should refuse to obey, and to make use, if need were, of the services of the soldiery. Thus persecuted and condemned for their mere faith, undemonstrative as it was, the Vaudians confined themselves to asking that it might be examined and its errors pointed out. Those of Merindol and those of Cabriere in the countship of Venasque drew up their profession of faith and sent it to the king and to two bishops of the province, ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume IV. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... would stand for hours, when talking, his right elbow on a mantel-piece, if there was one near, his fingers going through their strange palmistry; and in this manner, never once stirring from his position, he would not unfrequently protract his discourse till long past midnight. An inexhaustible, undemonstrative, noiseless, passionless man, scarcely evident to you by physical qualities, and impressing you, for the most part, as a creature of ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 21, July, 1859 • Various
... most retiring. Gravitation never decks itself in rainbows, nor does it vaunt its undoubted strength in thunder. It is content to make little show, because it is very strong; yet you have always to reckon with it. It is undemonstrative, but it is always there. The love of Esther and Henry was like that. It has made little show in this history, but few readers can have missed its presence in the atmosphere. It might go for weeks without its festival; but there it was all the time, ready for any service, staunch for any ...
— Young Lives • Richard Le Gallienne
... manly character, gaining force with growth, and though slow to discern between good and evil, always firm to the duty when it was once perceived, and thus rising with the elevation of the standard. The undemonstrative temper and tardiness in adopting extra habits of religious observance and profession, which had disappointed Honor, struck the clergyman as evidences both of sincerity and evenness of development, proving the sterling reality of what ...
— Hopes and Fears - scenes from the life of a spinster • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Sefton, "I love a woman, and with all the greater fire because I am naturally undemonstrative and self-centred. The stream comes with an increased rush when it has to break through the ice. I love a woman, I say, and I am determined to have her. You know ...
— Before the Dawn - A Story of the Fall of Richmond • Joseph Alexander Altsheler
... take the little girl into their family. But "ANYTHING but the Putneys!" said Aunt Harriet, a great many times. They were related only by marriage to her, and she had her own opinion of them as a stiffnecked, cold-hearted, undemonstrative, and hard set of New Englanders. "I boarded near them one summer when you were a baby, Frances, and I shall never forget the way they were treating some children visiting there! ... Oh, no, I don't mean they abused them or beat ...
— Understood Betsy • Dorothy Canfield
... who made so many trips, and exhibited a reckless familiarity with the officers; the officers themselves, now so modest and undemonstrative, a few hours later so all-powerful and important,—these are among the reminiscences of most Californians, and these are to be remembered among the experiences of our friend. Yet he feels, as we all do, that his past experience will ...
— Urban Sketches • Bret Harte
... striking and brilliant exhibitions of the aurora, the more undemonstrative and by far the most important and vital operations have been disregarded. The former may not be observed, except occasionally, and fitfully, can only be present when favoring meteorological conditions admit of its disclosure. The latter, more unobtrusive and even invisible ...
— New and Original Theories of the Great Physical Forces • Henry Raymond Rogers
... except when he had the toothache. And now, also, the custom of years made it impossible for him to be miserable for long. He had had no real talk with Maggie since the inquest. Maggie came into his study that afternoon. Their conversation was very quiet and undemonstrative; it happened to be one of the most important conversations in both their lives, and, often afterwards, Paul looked back to it, trying to retrace in it the sentences and movements with which it had been ...
— The Captives • Hugh Walpole
... eyes and ran down her cheeks. Her mother's passion for this hateful stranger was stronger than her mother-love, that silent, undemonstrative love in which Susie had believed as she believed that the sun would rise each morning over there in the Bad Lands, to warm her when she was cold. She buried her face in her mother's lap and ...
— 'Me-Smith' • Caroline Lockhart
... bygone days, and the Terror at a later time, had familiarized them with extremes of joy and anguish in such a sort that, amid the perils of life, they preserved their dignity and coolness, a capacity for sincere but undemonstrative affection which never disturbed their well-bred self-possession, and a dignity of demeanor which a younger generation has done very ill ...
— A Woman of Thirty • Honore de Balzac
... in a new-made grave in bleak and dreary Woodland. She thought how her own bairns would be as motherless and forlorn as the child before her, and yet not quite, either, for they had a father who loved them in his own quiet undemonstrative way. This should have consoled her in the sorrows she had conjured up, but, like a woman, she thought of the father helpless and lonely when she had gone, with the children huddled cheerlessly about him, and a veil of tears came between her and ...
— The Uncalled - A Novel • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... was "half out of her mind over the distressing affair" had prepared him to encounter a weeping, red-eyed, heart-broken creature of the most excitable type. He found instead a pale, serious-faced, undemonstrative girl of somewhat uncertain age—sweet of voice, soft of step, quiet of demeanour—who was either one of those persons who repress all external evidence of internal fires, and bear their crosses in silence, or was as cold-blooded as a fish ...
— Cleek: the Man of the Forty Faces • Thomas W. Hanshew
... path. Mrs. Ford stood in the parlor as she entered, upright, pale, and rigid. Each read the other's countenance. Lizzie went towards her slowly and giddily. She must of course kiss her patroness. She took her listless hand and bent towards her stern lips. Habitually Mrs. Ford was the most undemonstrative of women. But as Lizzie looked closer into her face, she read the signs of a grief infinitely more potent than her own. The formal kiss gave way: the young girl leaned her head on the old woman's shoulder and burst into sobs. Mrs. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 89, March, 1865 • Various
... retirin', which made him some times in company a little awkwud in his manners, and most offish where he wanted to please most. But he had a good mind, and his heart wuz pure gold, and he loved Rosy with the deep earnest love, such undemonstrative men often cherish for the one woman in the world for them. His calm gray eyes would light up with the pure light of deathless love when they rested on the sweet face of little Rosy. And he wuz always ...
— Samantha at the St. Louis Exposition • Marietta Holley
... Hence, those whom, from being brought nearest to them, he loved specially, he loved without that outbreak of show which is often found in persons who love but a few, and whose love is defiled with partisanship. He loved quietly and constantly, in a fashion as active as undemonstrative. He was always glad to be near those he specially loved; beyond that, the signs of his love were practical—it came out in ministration, in doing things for them. There are those who, without loving, desire to be loved, because they love ...
— A Rough Shaking • George MacDonald
... direction of the pavilion. Boys stood up and clapped frantically, not a few seizing their neighbours and pummelling them with clenched fists on the back. Pennybet, sitting beside Doe, shook hands with him and with a couple of undemonstrative old gentlemen, whom he had never seen before. They seemed a little overawed, as he wrung ...
— Tell England - A Study in a Generation • Ernest Raymond
... care that it should survive their college days; for he had an odd liking for Mark, in spite of a tolerably clear insight into his character. Mark had a way of inspiring friendships without much effort on his part, and this undemonstrative, self-contained man felt an affection for him which was stronger than he ever allowed himself ...
— The Giant's Robe • F. Anstey
... shall be a great comfort to him, but he cannot care much about having any very long conversations with me—he that has seen so many lands, and known so many great and clever people, and read so many books. He has always been most undemonstrative to me. At his age, no doubt, he does not care much for the foolish endearments of lovers; so, with an easy conscience, I devote myself, for my short space, to the boys, to Barbara, to Vick, and the jackdaw. Once, indeed—just once—I have a little ...
— Nancy - A Novel • Rhoda Broughton
... was gazing at the chateau, I had a feeling that the man at the other table was gazing at me. I glanced at him, but seemed to have been mistaken. He was looking absently at the sky over my head. I now took thought of what a very silent, motionless, undemonstrative man this was. He was thin and oldish, and of moderate stature, with a narrow face, pale eyes, and a very long nose. He was dressed in dull brown cloth, and was in all respects—save his length of nose—one of those persons ...
— The Bright Face of Danger • Robert Neilson Stephens
... child. Well nursed and carefully guarded as I had always been, it was the first time in my life I ever knew the meaning of that rare thing, tenderness. A quality different from kindliness, affectionateness, or benevolence; a quality which can exist only in strong, deep, and undemonstrative natures, and therefore in its perfection is oftenest found in men. John Halifax had it more than any one, woman or man, that ...
— John Halifax, Gentleman • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
... for his host's unapproachableness by the society of his daughter, a young lady born indeed in Italy, but who had been educated in a Catholic family in England; so that here was another relation—the first female one—to whom he had been introduced. She was a quiet, shy, undemonstrative young woman, with a fine bloom and other charms which she kept as much in the background as possible, with maiden reserve. (There is a Catholic priest ...
— The Ancestral Footstep (fragment) - Outlines of an English Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... undemonstrative, easy, and gentle. When you are under his command you don't notice him, you don't think about him—unless you are a soldier, and then you ...
— Sir John French - An Authentic Biography • Cecil Chisholm
... changes of our national habits will soon have made as remote from us as if they were foreign or ancient. Already, alas! even in farmhouses, backlog and forestick are obsolescent words, and close-mouthed stoves chill the spirit while they bake the flesh with their grim and undemonstrative hospitality. Already are the railroads displacing the companionable cheer of crackling walnut with the dogged self-complacency and sullen virtue of anthracite. Even where wood survives, he is too often shut in the dreary madhouse cell of an airtight, round ...
— The Function Of The Poet And Other Essays • James Russell Lowell
... a peculiar effect upon the soldiers. Even those who were usually undemonstrative gave vent to their feelings in hearty curses on the rebellion, and every thing connected with it. The wish was freely expressed that Lee might intercept us, and bring on the final battle between civilization and barbarism. Up to this ...
— In The Ranks - From the Wilderness to Appomattox Court House • R. E. McBride
... sorrow bravely from him, in outward appearance at any rate. What it might be doing for him inwardly, he alone could tell. These apparently calm, undemonstrative natures, that show a quiet exterior to the world, may have a fire consuming their heartstrings. He did not go near the wedding; but neither did he shut himself up indoors, as one indulging lamentation ...
— Verner's Pride • Mrs. Henry Wood
... in the delivery of his argument. He made a deep impression, not only on the members of the Senate but on all who had the privilege of listening to him. His manner was quiet and undemonstrative, with no gestures, and with no attempt at loud talk. His language expressed his meaning with precision. There was no deficiency and no redundancy. He seldom used a word more or a word less than ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Volume 2 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... the north of England to fetch the children, their father being too busy with preparations for his own departure to be able conveniently to take them to Dover himself. There were some tears shed at parting with "papa," for the children loved him truly, and believed in his love for them, quiet and undemonstrative though his manner was. There were some tears, too, shed at parting with "nurse," who, having conscientiously spoilt them all, was now getting past work, and was to retire to her married daughter's; there were ...
— Grandmother Dear - A Book for Boys and Girls • Mrs. Molesworth
... than the horse; but I have never found a person, who was well acquainted with both animals, who hesitated to place the mongrel in the intellectual grade above the pure-blood animal. There is, it is true, a decided difference in the mental qualities of the two creatures. The mule is relatively undemonstrative, its emotions being sufficiently expressed by an occasional bray—a mode of utterance which he has inherited from the humbler side of his house in a singularly unchanged way. Even in the best humor it appears sullen, and lacks those playful capers ...
— Domesticated Animals - Their Relation to Man and to his Advancement in Civilization • Nathaniel Southgate Shaler
... rude surroundings, ingenious, innocent, mischievous, with no thought of the buffeting he is to get from a world that has a good many worse places for a boy than the hearth of an old farmhouse, and the sweet, though undemonstrative, affection of ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... off. He wondered what his silent, undemonstrative father would do. He had always felt that he was a man of deep ...
— The Victim - A romance of the Real Jefferson Davis • Thomas Dixon
... from one's family." And what she had found in her own home did not as yet make up to her for all she had left behind. Even her husband, though uniformly kind in language and behavior, was of a singularly cold and undemonstrative disposition; and it almost seemed as if the gayety which he exhibited at her balls were an effort so foreign to his nature that he indemnified himself by unpardonable boorishness on other occasions. The Count de Provence had but ...
— The Life of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France • Charles Duke Yonge
... he rejoined them, but he remained as silent and undemonstrative as ever, so they took their departure without further ceremony and ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces Out West • Edith Van Dyne
... anything more. That is settled," said he, taking up his cap, as if in preparation for departure. Dolly was a little bewildered by the quiet, decided manner, just like what she remembered of Mr. Shubrick; unobtrusive and undemonstrative, but if he moved, moving straight to his goal. She ...
— The End of a Coil • Susan Warner
... her willing to take her son to some hiding-place in Europe; but since that could not be, and perhaps was not best, she had thoroughly settled it in her mind that he should accept of her offer and live at her expense the undemonstrative life of an oyster in the social and moral ooze of the obscurest mud-bank he could find. In this way the terrible world might be led to eventually leave off talking and thinking of the Haldane family—a consummation that appeared ...
— A Knight Of The Nineteenth Century • E. P. Roe
... Gordon arrived on the spot, with his interpreter. He was on foot, in undress, apparently unarmed, and, as usual, exceedingly cool, quiet, and undemonstrative. Directly he approached the leading company, he ordered his interpreter to direct every man who refused to embark to step to the front. One man only advanced. General Gordon drew his revolver from an inside breast-pocket, presented it at the soldier's head, and desired the interpreter to direct ...
— General Gordon - A Christian Hero • Seton Churchill
... Miss Halcombe, looking brighter, sharper, and readier than ever, by contrast with the undemonstrative old lady at her side, "what will you ...
— The Woman in White • Wilkie Collins
... their rough wooden houses in camp we found a battalion which had won—the same undemonstrative type as the one that had lost; the same simplicity and kindly hospitality, which gives life at the front a charm in the midst of its tragedy, from these men of one of the dependable line regiments. This colonel knew the other colonel, and he said about the other what his fellow-officers ...
— My Year of the War • Frederick Palmer
... so undemonstrative, bent down, took the pistol from his hand, put it back into the drawer, and, slightly blushing, kissed the old ...
— Bunch Grass - A Chronicle of Life on a Cattle Ranch • Horace Annesley Vachell
... charge he was committed being directed by the governor to deliver up his prisoner to the authorities at the first port at which he could touch, charged with rebellion and heresy. Captain Dupre merely replied that he would do his duty, as far as he had the power. He was a silent undemonstrative man, not given unnecessarily to express his opinions. He had never shown a disposition to disregard the orders of the governor, who was, therefore, persuaded that he would carry them out on the present occasion. With sad hearts those ...
— Villegagnon - A Tale of the Huguenot Persecution • W.H.G. Kingston
... as arose at their appearance! The Plynck was so surprised that she crowed like a rooster; and then apologized to everybody (half-laughing and half-crying) for being so unladylike. The Teacup fluttered, the Snimmy sniffed; and the Snimmy's wife—that grim, undemonstrative woman—rushed out from the prose-bush and gathered her darling, and Sara, too, ...
— The Garden of the Plynck • Karle Wilson Baker
... thing which had been done to him. A very evil thing had been done. He did feel that the absolute happiness which had been his for the last few days had perished and gone from him. He was a man undemonstrative, and silent in expressing his own feelings, but one who revelled inwardly in his own feelings of contentment when he was content. His wife had been to him all that he had dreamt that a woman should be. She had filled up his cup with ...
— Kept in the Dark • Anthony Trollope
... Individual Elephants vary in temperament far more than do rhinoceroses or hippopotami, and the variations are wide. In a wild state, elephants are quiet and undemonstrative, almost to the point of dullness. They do not domineer, or hector, or quarrel, save when a rogue develops in the ranks, and sets out to make things interesting by the commission of lawless acts. A professional rogue is about everything that an orthodox elephant should not be, and he soon makes ...
— The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals • William T. Hornaday
... adding that Mr. Parsons was a person of sudden and strong fancies, and that if he were to take a fancy to Wilbur, the desired result would be apt to follow. Selma quickly decided that Mr. Parsons must be made to like her, for she feared lest Wilbur's quiet, undemonstrative manner would fail to attract him. Evidently he admired the self-confidence and manly assertion of Gregory Williams, and would be liable to regard Wilbur as lacking in force and enterprise. The reflection that she would thus be working—as necessarily she would—for the eternal progress of ...
— Unleavened Bread • Robert Grant
... kiss him—they were not given to demonstrations, this pair—then decided it were kinder to him, less suggestive of what they anticipated, not to deviate from their undemonstrative marital routine. ...
— Judith Of The Plains • Marie Manning
... yet did not hinder her from taking an absorbing interest in the preparation of her own and Evelyn's mourning garments. She was careful that they should be of the deepest black, the finest quality, the most fashionable cut; to all of which the bereaved child—a silent undemonstrative mourner—was supremely indifferent. Her mother noted it with surprise, for Evelyn was a child of decided opinions and wont to be ...
— The Two Elsies - A Sequel to Elsie at Nantucket, Book 10 • Martha Finley
... Betty, so'll I," promised Bobby, putting an awkward arm around Betty's neck. Bobby was as undemonstrative as a boy and rarely kissed any one. "What in the wide world are we going to ...
— Betty Gordon in Washington • Alice B. Emerson
... which could be interpreted into an expression of regard for his brother fired his soul with feelings of aversion and anger till he was well-nigh distracted. Nor was Ralph any less disturbed. In his undemonstrative way he watched Nick, and suffered the acutest pangs of jealousy at what he believed was Aim-sa's marked preference. But the woman continued to stir the fire she had kindled with a childlike naivete which was less of the ...
— In the Brooding Wild • Ridgwell Cullum
... Mrs. Cathcart are with her, Sir Richard." Winter leant down, loosening the rug. His usual, undemonstrative speech took on a loftiness of tone. "Mrs. William Ormiston and her daughter have driven over with Mrs. Cathcart."—The butler was not without remembrance of that dinner on the day following Dickie's birth. Socially he had never considered Lady ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... quick and nervous, with an energy in it that betokened decision of character, but ill sustained by the stammering speech; for in society he was the shyest and most undemonstrative of men. To a single friend whom he trusted, he would pour out his inmost heart; but let two or three be gathered together, above all, introduce a stranger, and he instantly became a quiet, unobtrusive listener, though never a moody or ...
— Poems of Henry Timrod • Henry Timrod
... he would betray more lover-like impatience and intensity. Were all lovers as calm and undemonstrative? ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to 1901 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... greatly honor and love the undemonstrative woman, who, they well know, would make any sacrifices for their well-being. Each week the informal gatherings at her rooms, where various useful topics are discussed, are eagerly looked forward to. Chief of all, Miss Mitchell's own bright and sensible talk ...
— Lives of Girls Who Became Famous • Sarah Knowles Bolton
... shoot each other in plain clothes Natural genius for combining pleasure with business Not very disagreeable, or would not be if it were play People hardly ever do know where to be born until it is too late Spider-web is stronger than a cable Undemonstrative affection Very busy about nothing Wearisome part is the waiting on the people who do the work Why did n't the people who were sleepy go to bed? Willing to do any amount of work if it is called play Willing to repent if he could think ...
— Widger's Quotations of Charles D. Warner • David Widger
... her rippling hair. The cosy atmosphere of the room made her forgetful of the severity of the wintry atmosphere outside. Margaret's pretty figure and dark head appearing above the buffet-counter were certainly great assets to the free-refreshment-room. Her aunt, who was a conscientiously undemonstrative woman, felt proud of her niece. She more than once that evening thought to herself what pleasure the girl's beauty would give to the men. It was unfortunately against her principles to allow Margaret to even guess how much she both approved ...
— There was a King in Egypt • Norma Lorimer
... hair with silver, and on her brow there were traces of a sorrow patiently borne, but none the less deeply felt. She had never recovered from the loss of her son. Her daughter Mary had inherited something of her father's self-contained, undemonstrative manner; but Ben had been impulsive and affectionate, and had always been very near his mother's heart. To feel that he had passed from her sight was a great sorrow; but it was a greater still not to know where he was. He might be suffering ...
— Ben, the Luggage Boy; - or, Among the Wharves • Horatio Alger
... favour; and the manner in which Eve had centred her childish affections in Philip, who had made her his especial favourite, was even more prejudicial to his interests in that quarter. Hitherto, indeed, Sylvester's vague dislike had been so undemonstrative and immaterial that he would hardly have owned to it as such, and far less would he have acknowledged that he was, however unconsciously, feeling for a peg on which to hang it, for ground to support it; and yet from the ...
— A Comedy of Masks - A Novel • Ernest Dowson and Arthur Moore
... thick, straight, black hair; black, horizontal eyes; low forehead, somewhat compensated by its breadth; beardless; of the middle height, but thick-set; broad, muscular chest; small hands and feet; incurious; unambitious; impassive; undemonstrative; with a dull imagination and little superstition; with no definite idea of a Supreme Being, few tribes having a name for God, though one for the "Demon;" with no belief in a future state; and, excepting ...
— The Andes and the Amazon - Across the Continent of South America • James Orton
... good side of it was that it set her at liberty to attend to her mother at times when she would have been otherwise occupied with her baby; but Bell required very little from any one: she was easily pleased, unexacting, and methodical even in her dotage; preserving the quiet, undemonstrative habits of her earlier life now that the faculty of reason, which had been at the basis of the formation of such habits, was gone. She took great delight in watching the baby, and was pleased to have it in her care for a short time; ...
— Sylvia's Lovers, Vol. III • Elizabeth Gaskell
... of an ending to a letter she would have expected from the girl he loved, for the boy, though most undemonstrative, had been intense and taken his affections seriously always. But one can never tell, and the girl was probably quite young. But who was she? The signature gave no clew; the date was two years before, ...
— The Militants - Stories of Some Parsons, Soldiers, and Other Fighters in the World • Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews
... of the Improvement Circle before I went away was a kind of surprise party to me. Several original poems were read, addressed to me personally. I am afraid that I received it all in a dumb, undemonstrative way, for I could not make it seem real that I was the person meant, or that I was going away at all. But I treasured those tributes of sympathy afterwards, under the strange, spacious skies where I ...
— A New England Girlhood • Lucy Larcom
... fired in rapid succession from a battery of artillery close at hand! The noise seemed to stimulate the religious enthusiasm, and the general excitement had a wonderful effect on a Russian friend who accompanied me. When in his normal condition that gentleman was a quiet, undemonstrative person, devoted to science, an ardent adherent of Western civilisation in general and of Darwinism in particular, and a thorough sceptic with regard to all forms of religious belief; but the influence of the surroundings ...
— Russia • Donald Mackenzie Wallace
... a very affectionate and devoted household, clannish to a degree, and undemonstrative, as mountaineers often are. The deep well of their love did not foam and ripple like a brook, but the water was always there, to draw upon at will. "The shallows murmur, but the deeps are dumb." It was so in the ...
— Holiday Stories for Young People • Various
... lives to the wonderful presence of mind, superior tact and persuasiveness of this grave, good man. Besides being a minister, he had filled many positions of trust in the South. Yet Dr. Le Grand was both unassuming and undemonstrative. He looked for and expected a clashing of races on election day in Wilmington, but that which took place on the 10th of November was far more than he was prepared to grapple with. The dawn of that fatal day ...
— Hanover; Or The Persecution of the Lowly - A Story of the Wilmington Massacre. • David Bryant Fulton
... woman is more sensible than her American cousin. The Americans who now visit London are apt to be so plain and undemonstrative in dress that they are called shabby. Perhaps alarmed at the comments once made on their loudness of dress, the American woman has toned down, and finds herself less gay than she sees is fashionable at the ...
— Manners and Social Usages • Mrs. John M. E. W. Sherwood
... depression which came over me, and the care which he took to disperse it by speaking to me soon afterwards with especial kindness. He kept up his delightful, affectionate manner towards us all his life. I sometimes wonder that he could do so, with such an undemonstrative race as we are; but I hope he knew how much we delighted in his loving words and manner. How often, when a man, I have wished when my father was behind my chair, that he would pass his hand over my hair, as he used to do when I was a boy. He allowed his grown-up children to laugh with and at him, ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume I • Francis Darwin
... of men who knew John Baronet and just wouldn't let his son get away without a handshake. I was flushed with the pleasure of such a reception and was doing my best to act well, when a man grasped my hand with a grip unlike any other hand I had ever felt, so firm, so full of friendship, and yet so undemonstrative, that I instinctively returned the clasp. He was a man of some thirty years, small beside me, and there was nothing unusual in his face or dress or manner to attract my attention. A stranger might not turn to him a second time in a crowd, unless they had once spoken ...
— The Price of the Prairie - A Story of Kansas • Margaret Hill McCarter
... trouble this cost him he did not discover until afterwards; but, in fact, he had rarely met with a woman who, by her own personal qualities, was so well fitted to inspire feelings of both friendship and respect as this quiet undemonstrative Mrs. Costello. ...
— A Canadian Heroine, Volume 1 - A Novel • Mrs. Harry Coghill
... naturally the first resort of the incomparable Paul Morphy, and he greatly preferred it to any other chess room he ever saw, he even went so far as to say it was "very nice," which was a great deal from him, the most undemonstrative young man we ever met with. Certainly nothing else in London, from St. Paul's, Westminster Abbey and the Tower to our Picture Galleries and Crystal Palace, not even the Duke of Wellington's Equestrian Statue, elicited such praise from him as "very nice," ...
— Chess History and Reminiscences • H. E. Bird
... undemonstrative in bearing and speech, but he stood up stiffly, and his voice was a trifle strained. "That is what I have been trying to make clear, and I can only give you my word that I did not," he said. "If I had had more courage I would have told you that ...
— Alton of Somasco • Harold Bindloss
... could reverence the old national piety, however little he may have been able to practise it. It is the more valuable for this, that it is almost the only poem in which either of our two great national poets has described Scottish character on the side of that grave, deep, though undemonstrative reverence, which has been an intrinsic element ...
— Robert Burns • Principal Shairp
... SIDE.—We have thus far spoken of shyness as a defect. But there is another way of looking at it; for even shyness has its bright side, and contains an element of good. Shy men and shy races are ungraceful and undemonstrative, because, as regards society at large, they are comparatively unsociable. They do not possess those elegancies of manner acquired by free intercourse, which distinguish the social races, because their tendency is to shun society rather than to seek it. They are shy in the presence of strangers, ...
— Searchlights on Health - The Science of Eugenics • B. G. Jefferis and J. L. Nichols
... Usually so undemonstrative, Phil was taken aback at Jim's behaviour; and Jim, immediately ashamed for his outward show of emotion, sat down beside Phil and looked at the floor between ...
— The Spoilers of the Valley • Robert Watson
... purpose? That was the puzzle. Yet that there was something on her mind which she wished to communicate to him he knew well; for it had at last happened that Hilda had changed in some degree from her cool and undemonstrative manner. He encountered sometimes—or thought that he encountered—an earnest glance which she threw at him, on greeting him, full of meaning, which told him this most plainly. It seemed to him to say: Wait, wait, wait; when the time comes. I have that to say ...
— The Cryptogram - A Novel • James De Mille
... O'Neil; but any suspicion that Natalie was unwelcome disappeared when she reached the dock. Her mother's dark eyes were bright with unshed tears of gladness, her face was transfigured, she showed the strong, repressed emotion of an undemonstrative nature as they embraced. Natalie clung to her, laughing, crying, bombarding her with questions, begging forgiveness, and babbling of her adventures. Their resemblance was striking, and in point of beauty there seemed little to choose between them. They might have been nearly of an age, ...
— The Iron Trail • Rex Beach
... discuss art and look at his work; he invited him to first-class little dinners, and introduced him to one or two men worth knowing; in short, it was not long before the two were fond of each other in undemonstrative man fashion. The studio was the sort of place Gowan liked to drop into when time hung heavily on his hands, and consequently hardly a week passed without his having at least once or twice dropped into ...
— Vagabondia - 1884 • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... to-morrow; and others would like to be able to rise up comfortably drunk Christmas morning," the superintendent had suggested. Mr. Mulrady had just signed a number of checks indicating his largess to those devoted adherents with the same unostentatious, undemonstrative, matter-of-fact manner that distinguished his ordinary business. The men had received it with something of the same manner. A half-humorous "Thank you, sir"—as if to show that, with their patron, they tolerated this deference to a popular custom, but were a little ...
— A Millionaire of Rough-and-Ready • Bret Harte
... Romeo and Hamlet, in his story of Palemon and Arcite. Among the poetic material which existed in England at the close of the sixteenth century was the old, long-neglected, domestic love, quiet, undemonstrative, essentially unsinging, of the early Northern (as indeed also of the Greek and Hindoo) epics; a domestic love which, in a social condition more closely resembling our own than any other, even than that of the Italian ...
— Euphorion - Being Studies of the Antique and the Mediaeval in the - Renaissance - Vol. II • Vernon Lee
... how it was that when people were married they could be so blind to romance; and was quite certain that if he ever took to wife that dear impossible Fancy, he and she would never be so dreadfully practical and undemonstrative of the Passion as his father and mother were. The most extraordinary thing was, that all the fathers and mothers he knew were just as undemonstrative as ...
— Under the Greenwood Tree • Thomas Hardy
... a white robe through the open door. Ethelyn was very pretty in her cool, cambric dress, with a bunch of sweet English violets in her hair; and at sight of her the man usually so grave and quiet, and undemonstrative with those of the opposite sex, felt all his reserve give way, and there was a world of tenderness in his voice and a misty look in his eye, as he bent over her, giving her the second kiss he had ever given to her, and asking, "How is ...
— Ethelyn's Mistake • Mary Jane Holmes
... quickly as possible and get on with more important matters, but at the time it had a certain effect upon us all, not excluding the King George. Scorning the menaces that lurked about her path she carried on the pursuit of the cod and haddock in her old undemonstrative fashion, for she was a British ship from stem to stern and conscious of the tradition ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, January 28th, 1920 • Various
... to elapse before the result could be known; but Robert Chalmers Fordyce—by the way, I think we know him well enough now to call him Robin, which was the name his mother had given him on his third birthday—and his household, being Scottish and undemonstrative, made little or no reference ...
— The Right Stuff - Some Episodes in the Career of a North Briton • Ian Hay
... stunned and dazed as he tried to realize the whole truth. He sat down in the midst of dressing, and for one moment buried his face in his hands. Balsamides looked on quietly. He knew how much even that simple action meant in a man of Paul's proud and undemonstrative temper. In a few seconds Paul rose from his seat and completed ...
— Paul Patoff • F. Marion Crawford
... round taxes the powers of two horses. I can go anywhere for five miles round at any hour without fear; for if any one was minded to fire a shot at me, his life would not be worth ten minutes' purchase. The undemonstrative affection of the people is my sole gain from all these changes, except the radiant 'Good-day, M. Benassis,' that every one gives me as I pass. You will understand, of course, that the wealth incidentally ...
— The Country Doctor • Honore de Balzac
... was beginning to enjoy the play. As a rule undemonstrative, he was when moved capable of intense feeling, and the girl knew it. She saw a light in his eyes that she recognized; a light that she remembered well, for once when they were boy and girl together she had dared him to kiss her, and had ...
— Sundown Slim • Henry Hubert Knibbs
... her share of the estate somewhat modified her grief in this instance. She had but slightly known her father; he had been home but seldom, and for brief visits. He was an austere man, very fine-looking, but silent and undemonstrative. She should not miss him so much, still his death was such a shock—as she was fond of repeating to her friends; she should never recover from the effects of two such ...
— Hubert's Wife - A Story for You • Minnie Mary Lee
... you'll be so good as not to mind, now you are here. I shall have it all right and tidy in a very little time. I ought not to have been so backward." Giles spoke quite anxiously for one of his undemonstrative temperament; for he feared that if the Melburys once were back in their own house they would not be ...
— The Woodlanders • Thomas Hardy
... easy-going man; but, after the way of a large percentage of the Western stock, he was undemonstrative. He nodded, turned toward the door to obey, and paused irresolutely. The look he gave back to Saxon was almost dog-like in gratitude and all-brotherly in love. She felt it, and in ...
— The Valley of the Moon • Jack London
... turned upon the representation of Adrienne, and on the applause of the fashionable audience, usually rather undemonstrative. ...
— Zibeline, Complete • Phillipe de Massa
... back involuntarily. He found conversation with detectives as lively as playing at skittles with bombshells. They got on his nerves terribly, these undemonstrative gentlemen with no sense ...
— The Grey Wig: Stories and Novelettes • Israel Zangwill
... reason of Cecilia's extraordinary introduction to them than through General Harran's letter—and Bob and his sister were already grateful for their friendship. They were a quiet quartet, devoted to each other in their undemonstrative fashion; Norah was on a kind of boyish footing with Jim, the huge silent brother who was a major, with three medal ribbons to his credit, and with Wally Meadows, his inseparable chum, who had been almost brought up with the brother ...
— Back To Billabong • Mary Grant Bruce
... as unemotional as he is undemonstrative. For a moment Howard, always slow of speech and action, was too nonplussed to know what to do, deeply sorry as he felt for his wife. Then he leaned over and patted her hand—the hand that was scarcely less rough and scarred than his ...
— The Old Gray Homestead • Frances Parkinson Keyes
... the words, that he does not want to be taken at a false valuation. The Island brogue is a notice that the user of it meets you man to man. So it reflected Mac, and it reflected his people, unspoiled, unvarnished, true as steel, full of rigid honesty; but undemonstrative, with the wells of affection hidden, yet full to the top, of pure, bright, ...
— The City and the World and Other Stories • Francis Clement Kelley
... giving to the momentary lull its full value, she acquiesced, finding in Eric's society enjoyment and resources altogether unexpected. Instinctively they seemed to comprehend each other's character, and while both were taciturn and undemonstrative, a warm affection ...
— Macaria • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... several years gone by. His hair was perfect silver, without a dark thread in the whole of it; his nose, though it had a scarlet tip, by no means indicated the jollity of which a red nose is the generally admitted symbol. He was a subdued, undemonstrative old man, who would doubtless drink a glass of liquor, now and then, and probably more than was good for him,—not, however, with a purpose of undue exhilaration, but in the hope of bringing his spirits up to the ordinary level of the world's cheerfulness. ...
— The Blithedale Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... is little mention in the early part of her life. Mrs. Grimke appears to have been a very devout woman, of rather narrow views, and undemonstrative in her affections. She was, however, intelligent, and had a taste for reading, especially theological works. Her son Thomas speaks of her as having read Stratton's book on the priesthood, and inferring from its implications the sect to which the author belonged. The oldest ...
— The Grimke Sisters - Sarah and Angelina Grimke: The First American Women Advocates of - Abolition and Woman's Rights • Catherine H. Birney
... I had been noisy and blustering in my intercourse with them at the beginning, and had done what seemed to be regarded as the "regulation" amount of cursing and swearing, they would probably have given me credit for military aptitude at least; but a systematic adherence to a quiet and undemonstrative manner evidently told against me, at first, in their opinion. Through my army life I met more or less of the same conduct when assigned to a new command; but when men learned that discipline would ...
— Military Reminiscences of the Civil War V1 • Jacob Dolson Cox
... were devoid of grace and ornament, they were not missed, for neither of its occupants had ever been accustomed to such things. The years which passed so uneventfully only cemented the union and increased the sense of mutual dependence. They would have been regarded as exceedingly matter-of-fact and undemonstrative, but they were kind to each other and understood each other. Feeling that they were slowly yet surely getting ahead, they looked forward to an old age of rest and a sufficiency for their simple needs. Then, before he could ...
— He Fell in Love with His Wife • Edward P. Roe
... Leo wondered whether all accepted lovers were as undemonstrative as her own, and she would have been happier had he occasionally forgotten professional aspirations, in the charm of her presence; but her confidence in the purity and fidelity of his affection was unshaken, even by the ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... also unfolded themselves. The Dominican, Father Bevis, awoke in Clarice a certain amount of liking, not unmixed with rather timorous respect. But he was a grave, silent, undemonstrative man, who gave no encouragement to anything like personal affection, though he was not harsh nor unkind. The Franciscan, Father Miles, was of a type common in his day. The man and the priest were two different characters. Father Miles in ...
— A Forgotten Hero - Not for Him • Emily Sarah Holt
... which was not stopped; that his name and Duncan's were mingled generously in the cheering, the painter remembered little of the game. The exhibition of human passions which the sight of it drew from an undemonstrative race: the shouting, the comments wrung from hardy spirits off their guard, the joy and the sorrow,—such things interested him more. High above the turmoil Coniston, as through the ages, looked down ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... the honour of taking Miss Granger in to dinner, and did his utmost to render himself agreeable to her in a quiet undemonstrative way, and to take the gauge of her mental powers. She received his attentions graciously enough—indeed it would not have been easy for any one to be ungracious to Marmaduke Lovel when he cared to please—but he could see very clearly that she suspected the state ...
— The Lovels of Arden • M. E. Braddon
... passionate sense of injury in a man habitually so undemonstrative, so little disposed to call attention to himself, had in it something at once of the touching and the terrible. Bernard, for an instant, felt almost bewildered; he asked himself whether he had not, after all, been a monster ...
— Confidence • Henry James
... hint and departed, saying only, "Good-by, Lizabeth," with a nod, half-encouraging, half-admonitory, which Elizabeth silently returned. That was all the parting between mother and daughter; they neither kissed nor shook hands, which undemonstrative farewell ...
— Mistress and Maid • Dinah Craik (aka: Miss Mulock)
... said Diana, putting her white hand on my head. "You shall," repeated Mary, in the tone of undemonstrative sincerity ...
— Jane Eyre - an Autobiography • Charlotte Bronte
... his lightning-flashes of candid garrulity, "Friendship is but a name. I love no one—not even my brothers; Joseph perhaps a little. Still, if I do love him, it is from habit, because he is the eldest of us. Duroc? Ay, him, if any one, I love in a sort—but why? He suits me; he is cool, undemonstrative, unfeeling—has no weak affections—never embraces any ...
— Complete Prose Works - Specimen Days and Collect, November Boughs and Goodbye My Fancy • Walt Whitman
... lighter, happier mood, and to see Nell dreamily turning a ring round and round the third finger of her left hand and watching the west. Every day both mother and daughter appeared farther removed from the past darkly threatening days. Belding was hearty in his affections, but undemonstrative. If there was any sentiment in his make-up it had an outlet in his memory of Blanco Diablo and a longing to see him. Often Belding stopped his work to gaze out over the desert toward the west. When he thought ...
— Desert Gold • Zane Grey
... ever. On Sunday, the 20th of December, he came to bid us good-bye and to arrive at an understanding with me concerning what I had said to him the Sunday before. Grannie, strange to say, never suspected that there was likely to be anything between us. Harold was so undemonstrative, and had always come and gone as he liked at Caddagat: she overlooked the possibility of his being a lover, and in our intercourse allowed us almost the freedom of ...
— My Brilliant Career • Miles Franklin
... rights of that matter what they may, it was soon remarked that Ken was no longer the careless and merry fellow he used to be; on the contrary, he appeared grave, moody, averse from general society, and habitually taciturn and undemonstrative even in the company of his most intimate friends. Evidently something had happened to him, or he had done something. What? Had he committed a murder? or joined the Nihilists? or was his unsuccessful love affair at the bottom ...
— David Poindexter's Disappearance and Other Tales • Julian Hawthorne
... damp hand over his brow. The dog, strangely undemonstrative, advanced and placed a sleek head against Gregg's knee, its pointed muzzle down, its tail hanging dispiritedly. Vaguely wondering what the trader's favorite lead-dog was doing among the boulders on the Point, Harlan patted the animal's ...
— Where the Sun Swings North • Barrett Willoughby
... unseemly jokes in his presence; that few felt quite at ease in his company,—oppressed by his bearing, and awed by his prodigious respectability and grave solemnity. Not that he was arrogant and haughty, like a Roman cardinal or an Oxford Don; he was simply dignified and undemonstrative, like a man absorbed with weighty responsibilities. I doubt if he could unbend at the dinner-table like Disraeli and Palmerston, or tell stories like Sydney Smith, or drink too much wine with jolly companions, ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume X • John Lord
... could retreat, her father had seen her. He called her over. To her astonishment he insisted on introducing her to his friend, Jim Laramie, of whom he was making as much as it was possible to make of a wholly undemonstrative man. ...
— Laramie Holds the Range • Frank H. Spearman
... his present conscious self, as a thing that was and would be, not as a thing that had to become. Naturally the pivot had worn a socket, and such socket is sure to be a sore. His friends notwithstanding gave him credit for great imperturbability; but in such willfully undemonstrative men the evil burrows the more insidiously that it is masked by ...
— Mary Marston • George MacDonald
... according to Mr. Standish James O'Grady it was much better, seen and listened to, than read. Writing, in his "All Ireland Review," of its production, he puts it on record "I never saw an audience so attentive and at the same time so undemonstrative. It was like being in church." The audience probably felt the dignity of conception back of the insufficiency of execution in the play and its ineffectiveness of presentation. The story that Mr. Martyn dreamed to carry over ...
— Irish Plays and Playwrights • Cornelius Weygandt
... happy, but in a very different way; for, while Fanny was quiet and undemonstrative, Lucy seemed wild with joy, and danced gayly about the house—now in the kitchen, where the cake was making; now in the chamber where the plain sewing was done, and then flitting to her own room in quest of Valencia, who was sent on divers errands, the little lady thinking ...
— The Rector of St. Mark's • Mary J. Holmes
... pleased my assailant, as I don't think he has a great deal to lose, and might have made a little capital out of me if he could have got a laugh out of the Member or either of the dummies,—I beg their pardon again, I mean the two undemonstrative boarders. But I will tell you, Beloved, just what I think ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... as well have stayed where he was, for the parting between these two was as undemonstrative as their meeting had been. But when the young men had gone a few steps down the pavement, John turned back again to the door ...
— Allison Bain - By a Way she knew not • Margaret Murray Robertson
... waking her even by a whisper. She would awaken soon enough to thirst and hunger, perhaps, and then what was he to do? If that looked-for help would only come now—while she still slept. For it was part of his boyish fancy that if he could deliver her asleep and undemonstrative of fear and suffering, he would be less blameful, and she less mindful of her trouble. If it did not come—but he would not think of that yet! If she was thirsty meantime—well, it might rain, and there was always the dew which they used to brush off the ...
— A Waif of the Plains • Bret Harte
... instincts had been, to a certain degree, gratified. The boy had seemed so entirely his; had responded so splendidly to his efforts for him. They had grown so close together during the past years in their silent, undemonstrative fashion. Could it be possible that he ...
— A Son of the Hills • Harriet T. Comstock
... nodded, and burst out laughing. Marmaduke, who had set him down as a cool, undemonstrative man, was surprised at his hilarity for a moment, but presently joined in it. Whilst they were both laughing a hansom appeared, and Conolly, ...
— The Irrational Knot - Being the Second Novel of His Nonage • George Bernard Shaw
... a woman of strong character, very dignified, honest almost to an extreme, and perfectly self-controlled where control was necessary. She possessed very strong affections, but her self-control was such that she was undemonstrative. ...
— Maria Mitchell: Life, Letters, and Journals • Maria Mitchell
... to Mather now, telling him what to do about the mortgage," he continued in his methodical, undemonstrative manner. As he sat down at the desk and drew pen and paper towards him, he paused a moment. "You will see to the nurses,—they should have two. The doctors may decide on an operation. Have the ...
— Together • Robert Herrick (1868-1938)
... retorted, carelessly; "it is an arrangement for mutual convenience. But remember," she added, lifting her index finger in playful threat, "that we are extremely well-bred and undemonstrative." ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 10 • Various
... was the dryest, deadest, most formal, and most orthodox screed ever written on the subject. He was a very reserved man, and his natural inhibition was large in quantity and steel-like in quality. He had but few friends. He was too undemonstrative, too frigid. He had no vices, nor had any one ever discovered any temptations. Tobacco he detested, beer he abhorred, and he was never known to drink anything stronger than an occasional ...
— The Strength of the Strong • Jack London
... homeward voyage had almost come to an end, and I had never heard her voice in song since she was a child. Open and unreserved as she was by nature, in this particular she had schooled herself to be as reticent and undemonstrative as she accused me ...
— Daybreak: A Romance of an Old World • James Cowan
... throats, answered by gluttonous mumblings from goats that had been fortunate enough to snatch a morsel of the delectable vegetable. Down from the tips and up from the bob-pit they came, singly and in sets, undemonstrative matrons with weak-kneed twins at their heels, skittish kids and bearded veterans, and joined the anxious, eager, ...
— The Gold-Stealers - A Story of Waddy • Edward Dyson
... without any of the celebration usual in such cases. The death of the Judge, the fact that Julianna had no other immediate relatives to act as her protectors, and that my own father, whose affection for me has always been of a rather cold and undemonstrative type, approved not only of my choice of a wife, but also of my plan for an immediate marriage, argued against delay. Furthermore, Julianna herself, with a sad but charming little smile, again and ...
— The Blue Wall - A Story of Strangeness and Struggle • Richard Washburn Child |
