"Wry" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... was dark; and the prison lamps in the yard, and the candles in the prison windows faintly shining behind many sorts of wry old curtain and blind, had not the air of making it lighter. A few people loitered about, but the greater part of the population was within doors. The old man, taking the right-hand side of the yard, turned in at the third or fourth doorway, and began to ascend the stairs. 'They are ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... not deter the boys from helping themselves to big swigs from the jug, smoothing out their wry faces with draughts of sugar water. Cousin Wilson refused to participate as he busied himself with his work. The sight of a tin cup made Alfred fearful that he would spill his sugar. He also declined. After the custom that had prevailed in the tavern ...
— Watch Yourself Go By • Al. G. Field
... earliest days; he sucked and threw up his milk, while the nurse blessed it for a pretty dear, slept, and sucked again. He crowed in the morning like a cock, screamed when he was washed, stared at the candle, and made wry faces with the wind. Six months passed in these innocent amusements, and then he was put into shorts. But I ought here to have remarked, that Mrs Easy did not find herself equal to nursing her own infant, and it was necessary to look out for ...
— Mr. Midshipman Easy • Captain Frederick Marryat
... of to an Americanism is that of Gill, in 1621,—"Sed et ab Americanis nonnulla mutuamur, ut MAIZ et KANOA." Since then, English literature, not without many previous wry faces, has adopted or taken back many words from this side of the water. The more the matter is looked into, the more it appears that we have no peculiar dialect of our own, and that men here, as elsewhere, have modified language or invented phrases to ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 25, November, 1859 • Various
... who sat in the Corner, and often made wry Faces at the sudden Attack of Rheumatick Pains, with which he was often afflicted, objected strongly to Mr. Harlowe's arbitrary Usage of such a Wife, as being very unnatural. "Nay, Sir, (said Miss Gibson) I think Clarissa gives a very good Account of Mr. Harlowe's Behaviour, in a ...
— Remarks on Clarissa (1749) • Sarah Fielding
... wry face. "No, she isn't grateful. People never are grateful for that sort of thing. And she doesn't even know she's different! I've had to train her without her own knowledge! But she's chameleon-like, in some ...
— Patty and Azalea • Carolyn Wells
... now to be done? Why, clearly make the best of the matter, eat the chop and leave the sherry. So I commenced eating the chop, which was by this time nearly cold. After eating a few morsels I looked at the sherry: "I may as well take a glass," said I. So with a wry face I poured myself out ...
— Wild Wales - Its People, Language and Scenery • George Borrow
... with considerable spirit for the proofs upon which Mrs. Wainwright named Coleman a monster, and had made a wry face over her completely conventional reply. He had told her categorically his opinion of ...
— Active Service • Stephen Crane
... himself up to love and labor with a Celtic intensity that Garry found appalling. He planned endlessly to one purpose: Joan's happiness, Joan's pleasure, Joan's future with him. The memory of the ragged money laid aside for Don he dismissed with a wry smile, gritting his teeth. What mattered in the face of the splendid fact that he was so joyously, ...
— Kenny • Leona Dalrymple
... sport of this lottery (which was the favorite diversion of Augustus, who introduced it) consisted in the inequality, and sometimes the incongruity, of the prizes, the nature and amount of which were specified within the tablets. For instance, the poet, with a wry face, drew one of his own poems (no physician ever less willingly swallowed his own draught); the warrior drew a case of bodkins, which gave rise to certain novel witticisms relative to Hercules and the distaff; the widow Fulvia obtained a large drinking-cup; ...
— The Last Days of Pompeii • Edward George Bulwer-Lytton
... spaniels to act as chaperons—it would have taken an army to guard Mary alone—and to tell you the truth our old chaperons needed watching more than any of us. It was scandalous. Each of them had a touch of gout, and when they made wry faces it was a standing inquiry among us whether they were leering at each other or felt a twinge—whether it was their feet or ...
— When Knighthood Was in Flower • Charles Major
... to ask how he was feeling. Prince Andrew answered all his questions reluctantly but reasonably, and then said he wanted a bolster placed under him as he was uncomfortable and in great pain. The doctor and valet lifted the cloak with which he was covered and, making wry faces at the noisome smell of mortifying flesh that came from the wound, began examining that dreadful place. The doctor was very much displeased about something and made a change in the dressings, turning the wounded man over so that he groaned again and grew unconscious ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... (cf. Clark and Clerk), which represents Mid. Eng. stirk, a heifer. In the cow with the crumpled horn we have a derivative of Mid. Eng. crum, crooked, whence the names Crum and Crump. Ludwig's German Dict. (1715) explains krumm as "crump, crooked, wry." The name Crook generally has the same meaning, the Ger. Krummbein corresponding to our Cruikshank or Crookshanks. It is possible that Glegg and Gleig are Mid. Eng. gleg, skilful, ...
— The Romance of Names • Ernest Weekley
... Borria. That is to say, I have just given myself away to the Manila navy station, not to speak of the commander of a gunboat, not far from us, off the coast of Mindanao. It seems"—he made a wry face—"Peter Moore is not popular with the authorities for deserting a certain ...
— Peter the Brazen - A Mystery Story of Modern China • George F. Worts
... in the drawing-room. He fancied that his great grandfather, Andrei, was looking out from his frame with contempt on his feeble descendant. "So much for you! You float in shallow water!"[A] the wry lips seemed to be saying to him. "Is it possible," he thought, "that I cannot gain mastery over myself; that I am going to yield to this—this trifling affair!" (Men who are seriously wounded in a battle always think their wounds "a mere trifle;" when a man can deceive himself ...
— Liza - "A nest of nobles" • Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
... makes me squirm to think how delighted I was to know we had actually begun our case. Hawkins hired a lawyer, I believe, and pretended he was going to put up a defence, but I bought him off and we got our decree by default. Then, gentlemen"—Dillingham paused with a wry face—"I had the inestimable privilege ...
— The Confessions of Artemas Quibble • Arthur Train
... new face of things upon the demolition of that which went before. Smoothly and pleasantly Mr. Stackpole went on compounding this cup of entertainment for himself and his hearers, smacking his lips over it, and all the more, Fleda thought, when they made wry faces; throwing in a little truth, a good deal of fallacy, a great deal of perversion and misrepresentation; while Mrs. Evelyn listened and smiled, and half parried and half assented to his positions; ...
— Queechy, Volume II • Elizabeth Wetherell
... real ship: it was all one; real, I must have instantly felt, it could not be: but at a sight so incredible my heart set to beating in my bosom as though I must surely die, and feebly waving the cane oar about my head, I staggered to my knees, and thence with wry mouth toppled flat. ...
— The Purple Cloud • M.P. Shiel
... Jack, with a wry face, "and here's where I have to do some tall but truthful explaining to a man who isn't in the least likely to believe a word I say. I can guess what Mr. Mayhew is thinking, and is going to ...
— The Submarine Boys and the Middies • Victor G. Durham
... there masques? Hear you me, Jessica: Lock up my doors, and when you hear the drum, And the vile squealing of the wry-neck'd fife, Clamber not you up to the casements then, Nor thrust your head into the public street To gaze on Christian fools with varnish'd faces; But stop my house's ears- I mean my casements; Let not the sound of shallow fopp'ry ...
— The Merchant of Venice • William Shakespeare [Craig, Oxford edition]
... tree and Chicken Little soon had an apron full. It was too wet to linger and they had started back, when Chicken Little stopped still and made a wry face. "Katy Halford, we haven't fed ...
— Chicken Little Jane on the Big John • Lily Munsell Ritchie
... is the duty of this Kyu[u]bei to see to its performance." He had O'Naka more in mind than the master of Tamiya. O'Mino might yet be the goose to lay golden eggs. A goose of such plumage! Kyu[u]bei made a wry face in the ...
— The Yotsuya Kwaidan or O'Iwa Inari - Tales of the Tokugawa, Volume 1 (of 2) • James S. De Benneville
... fit that emphasized so forcibly the change in him. But though he listened with apparent attention his mind was very obviously elsewhere, and he sat staring into the fire, mechanically flicking ash from his cigarette. Conversation languished and at length Miss Craven gave it up, with a wry face, and sat also silent, drumming with her fingers on the arm of the chair. Her thoughts, in quest of his, wandered far away until the sudden ringing of the telephone beside her ...
— The Shadow of the East • E. M. Hull
... to be sharpened more and more: which is also a great matter. For the Senses (being the main guides of childhood, because therein the mind doth not as yet raise up itself to an abstracted contemplation of things) evermore seek their own objects, and if they be away, they grow dull, and wry themselves hither and thither out of a weariness of themselves: but when their objects are present, they grow merry, wax lively, and willingly suffer themselves to be fastened upon them, till the thing be sufficiently discerned. This Book then will do ...
— The Orbis Pictus • John Amos Comenius
... thought to herself with a somewhat wry smile, that it would have made the very slightest difference had she refused point-blank. Since he had decided that she was to travel in his car, travel in it she would, willy-nilly. But as a matter of fact, she was so tired that she was only too thankful to sink back on to the soft, luxurious ...
— The Splendid Folly • Margaret Pedler
... A wry smile wrinkled one side of the trailer's set face. "I'm no fool, your Honor. I know when I've got enough. I don't mind being shot in the back and mobbed and wallered in the dirt—that's all in the day's work; but when it comes to having women pop in on me with ...
— They of the High Trails • Hamlin Garland
... glamour of the world. It would be bandied about in gossip over the tea-tables, in the street, at the Clubs, in the Press. Sir Chichester ought to be happy, at all events. The thought struck her with a wry humour, and brought a smile to her lips. He would accomplish his dream. Without effort, without a letter or a telephone call, or a rebuff, he would have such publicity as he could hardly have hoped for. "Who is ...
— The Summons • A.E.W. Mason
... everybody supposed that probably he had had badgering enough by this time, and meant to decamp quietly. All present were making wry faces, in order to check their bursting laughter, until Mr. Schnackenberger were clear of the room; that done, each prepared to give free vent to his mirth and high compliments to Mr. Von Pilsen, upon the fine style in which he had 'done execution upon Cawdor.' Decamping, however, entered ...
— The Uncollected Writings of Thomas de Quincey, Vol. 2 - With a Preface and Annotations by James Hogg • Thomas de Quincey
... has been with me I sometimes play to her upon this violin. For Antonia is fond of it—very fond of it." As the Councillor uttered these words with visible signs of emotion, I felt encouraged to hazard the question, "Will you not play it to me, Councillor." Krespel made a wry face, and falling into his drawling, singing way, said, "No, my good sir!" and that was an end of the matter. Then I had to look at all sorts of rare curiosities, the greater part of them childish trifles; at last thrusting his ...
— Weird Tales. Vol. I • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... said Shif'less Sol, with a wry smile. "Seems to me this is about the longest footrace I ever run. Sometimes I like to run, but I like to run only when I like it, and when I don't like it I don't like for anybody to make me do it. But here goes, anyhow. I'll keep on runnin' ...
— The Border Watch - A Story of the Great Chief's Last Stand • Joseph A. Altsheler
... recovering his nerve. He even made a wry face as he went on to answer the question put ...
— Fred Fenton on the Crew - or, The Young Oarsmen of Riverport School • Allen Chapman
... on his future volumes, which, I understand, alarms the subscribers. It was in a paper which I do not take, and therefore I have not yet seen it, nor can I say what it is. I hope that by this time you have ceased to make wry faces about your vinegar, and that you have received it safe and good. You say that I have been dished up to you as an anti-federalist, and ask me if it be just. My opinion was never worthy enough of notice, to merit ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... assist at the conference?" said Jack Wentworth. "My brother, I understand, is a friend of yours, and your brother—is a—hem—friend of mine," the diplomatist added, scarcely able to avoid making a wry face over the statement. Wodehouse came in behind, looking an inch or two taller for that acknowledgment, and sat down, confronting his sisters, who were standing on the defensive. The heir, too, had a strong sense of property, as was natural, and the disarrangement ...
— The Perpetual Curate • Mrs [Margaret] Oliphant
... strange thing to be told is that there is no possibility of breeding horses in this country, as hath often been proved by trial. For even when a great blood-mare here has been covered by a great blood-horse, the produce is nothing but a wretched wry-legged weed, not fit ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo, Volume 2 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... remained as impassive as the Chinaman's own. He sniffed of the draught, made a wry face and tossed it, glass and all, over the side into the sea. Then he turned on his heel and went into the foc'sle. Wong went aft, followed by most of ...
— The Blood Ship • Norman Springer
... stimuli. In such cases, however, there is no conscious control of the movements, the bodily organs merely responding in a definite way whenever the proper stimulus is present. The eye, for instance, must wink when any foreign matter affects it; wry movements of the face must accompany the bitter taste; and the body must start at a sudden noise. At other times, bodily movements may be produced in a more spontaneous way. Here the physical energy stored within the system gives rise to bodily activity and causes those ...
— Ontario Normal School Manuals: Science of Education • Ontario Ministry of Education
... labours," he replied, making a wry face, for he too was vain. "My labours for the good of others, also indigestion and the draughts in this accursed tower where I sit staring at the stars, which give me rheumatism. I have got both of them now, and must take some medicine," and filling two goblets from a flask, he handed her ...
— Morning Star • H. Rider Haggard
... big fellow, with a wry face and a catch in his gruff voice. "I can feel already the pine-needles beginning to stick out all ...
— The Magic Soap Bubble • David Cory
... corporate activities; and the congregation was so anxious to wound the minister's feelings as little as possible that the grant in aid of the East Elgin Mission was embodied in a motion to increase Dr Drummond's salary by two hundred and fifty dollars a year. The Doctor with a wry joke, swallowed his gilded pill, but no coating could dissimulate its bitterness, and his chagrin was plain for long. The issue with which we are immediately concerned is that three months later Knox Church Mission called to minister to it the Reverend Hugh Finlay, a young man from Dumfriesshire ...
— The Imperialist • (a.k.a. Mrs. Everard Cotes) Sara Jeannette Duncan
... was far too famished to be particular. The pottage gave forth a most appetizing odor, and the Prince hastily plunged in his spoon and began to eat. He had not taken a fair taste before he stopped eating with a terribly wry face. The soup was bitterer ...
— Prince Vance - The Story of a Prince with a Court in His Box • Eleanor Putnam
... admiral having tasted our grog, which is a mixture of brandy and water, desired to taste of the brandy itself, which he called e vai no Bretannee, British water, and drank off a small glass full, without making a wry face. Both he and his Otaheitean majesty were extremely cheerful and happy, and appeared to like our way of living, and our cookery ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 14 • Robert Kerr
... which song there is to be observed an invention that nothing relishes of the barbarian. Those that paint these people dying after this manner, represent the prisoner spitting in the faces of his executioners and making wry mouths at them. And 'tis most certain, that to the very last gasp, they never cease to brave and defy them both in word and gesture. In plain truth, these men are very savage in comparison of us; of necessity, they must either be absolutely so or else we ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne
... advantage, if we are to fight it in the proposed shape, that we are at once rid of all the details of oaths, securities, &c., for I conclude the consciences of the Roman Catholic Peers will, if the declaration be omitted, be disposed to swallow the Oath of Supremacy without a single wry face, which will be a most useful example to the other Catholics, and will of itself go far to bring the priests into order. Plunket does not apprehend any jealousy of the limited measure from Ireland, as he thinks that they will consider it as a stepping-stone, ...
— Memoirs of the Court of George IV. 1820-1830 (Vol 1) - From the Original Family Documents • Duke of Buckingham and Chandos
... retain faith, spight, wreathe, wrath, broth, froth, breath, sooth, worth, light, wight, and the like, whose primitives are either entirely obsolete, or seldom occur. Perhaps they are derived from fey or foy, spry, wry, wreak, brew, mow, fry, ...
— A Grammar of the English Tongue • Samuel Johnson
... which he told me he always drank before he went abroad. He recommended me to a Dram of it at the same time, with so much Heartiness, that I could not forbear drinking it. As soon as I had got it down, I found it very unpalatable; upon which the Knight observing that I [had] made several wry Faces, told me that he knew I should not like it at first, but that it was the best thing in the World against the Stone ...
— The Spectator, Volume 2. • Addison and Steele
... well as your spotty butterflies," answered the woman jealously. "That's nonsense, though. Don't mind me, Ban," she added with a wry smile. "Plain colors are right for you. Browns, or blues, or reds, if they're not too bright. And you've tied it very well. Did it take you long ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... me you were a friend of my poor, dear Mr. Budd, whose shoe you are unworthy to touch, and who had the heart and soul for the noble profession you disgrace," cut in the widow, the moment Biddy gave her a chance, by pausing to make a wry face as she pronounced the word "ugly." "I now believe you capasided them poor Mexicans, in order to get their money; and the moment we cast anchor in a road-side, I'll go ashore, and complain of you for ...
— Jack Tier or The Florida Reef • James Fenimore Cooper
... Sykes with a wry grin. "You see, I knew right away Vidac was doing something funny way back—" He paused to sip his tea. "Way back before we landed on Roald." He grinned broadly at the people seated around the table in the dining room of the ...
— The Space Pioneers • Carey Rockwell
... but that she had everything she could be wishing, gowns, and white shoes, and lace veils—seure you never wos seeing such a beauty—and a stafell—trosy they do call it in London—good enough for my Lady Nugent, and a goold watch and chains, and rings and bracelets, ach un wry! ...
— Gladys, the Reaper • Anne Beale
... [Shoemaker's company make wry faces and pretend not to be listening; the people are interested and drop pennies into the old woman's bank. The women are moved to tears and wipe their eyes ...
— Lucky Pehr • August Strindberg
... you would be so kind, darling. Green borle. [Edstaston, still suspicious, shakes his head and keeps his pistols ready.] Reach it myself. [He reaches behind him up to the table, and snatches at the green bottle, from which he takes a copious draught. Its effect is appalling. His wry faces and agonized belchings are so heartrending that they almost upset Edstaston. When the victim at last staggers to his feet, he is a pale fragile nobleman, aged and quite sober, extremely dignified in manner ...
— Great Catherine • George Bernard Shaw
... by some article of clothing—a scarf, a spur, left by some fatal chance, and there comes a stroke of the dagger that severs the web so gallantly woven by their golden delights. But when one is full of days, he should not make a wry face at death, and the sword of a husband is a pleasant death for a gallant, if there be pleasant deaths. So may be will finish the merry amours ...
— Droll Stories, Volume 1 • Honore de Balzac
... as the correspondent would say, caught nothing more from this paragraph than the words "Civil Guard," "tulisan," "San Diego," and "St. Francis," so, observing the wry face of the alferez and the bellicose gestures of the preacher, they deduced that the latter was reprehending him for not running down the tulisanes. San Diego and St. Francis would be commissioned in this duty and justly so, as ...
— The Social Cancer - A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... it brief, we wish to enjoy the product of the sacrifices of the past fifty years. If you recall your Marx"—he twisted his face here in wry amusement—"the idea was that the State was to wither away once Socialism was established. Instead of withering away, it has become increasingly strong. This was explained by the early Bolsheviks in a fairly reasonable manner. Socialism presupposes a highly industrialized economy. It's not ...
— Combat • Dallas McCord Reynolds
... the timid Dowsabel had decreed; and she had directed that the keys of the outer doors should be brought to her; and by day they were laid in her sight upon the chimney ledge, whilst at night they were placed beneath her pillow. Kate made a wry face, but did not otherwise protest. Time was passing quietly by, and there seemed little probability that their tranquillity ...
— The Lost Treasure of Trevlyn - A Story of the Days of the Gunpowder Plot • Evelyn Everett-Green
... Dick made a wry face as he bravely pressed his hand on the lower part of his right side. "Dick couldn't ...
— The Desired Woman • Will N. Harben
... but solitude in the nursery; for there, Mrs Chick and Miss Tox were enjoying a social evening, so much to the disgust of Miss Susan Nipper, that that young lady embraced every opportunity of making wry faces behind the door. Her feelings were so much excited on the occasion, that she found it indispensable to afford them this relief, even without having the comfort of any audience or sympathy whatever. As the knight-errants of ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens
... You could make him believe whatever you chose. For instance, I picked up a tomato in monsieur le cure's garden the other day; I told him it was a fine red apple, and he bit into it like a glutton. If you had seen the wry face he made! Mon Dieu, how ...
— The Devil's Pool • George Sand
... think of details, "and these others shall be the tasters! They have big bellies, that will hold many potions without crowding. Let them swallow a little of each medicine in the chest now, for the sake of practise! Let them learn not to make a wry face when the taste of cess-pools rests ...
— King—of the Khyber Rifles • Talbot Mundy
... however people may disapprove of looking forward too far, it is difficult to help it when they become parents. Your mistress could tell you, if she would own the truth, that she sees her son's manly beauty already under that little wry mouth, and that odd button of a nose. Why may not I just as well fancy ...
— Deerbrook • Harriet Martineau
... with a wry grin. "Whew—that was a narrow squeak! I must say their ray is a gentlemenly sort of thing. It either kills you, or doesn't injure you at all. There it ...
— The Black Star Passes • John W Campbell
... liking. Beside all this, she was so prideful that, had she been of the blood royal of France, it had been overweening; and when she went abroad, she gave herself so many airs that she did nought but make wry faces, as if there came to her a stench from whomsoever she saw or met. But, letting be many other vexatious and tiresome fashions of hers, it chanced one day that she came back to the house, where Fresco was, and seating herself ...
— The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio • Giovanni Boccaccio
... you be not disposed to play, be either a sharper or a dupe, you cannot be admitted a second time to their assemblies. I was no sooner presented to the lady than she offered me cards; and on my excusing myself, because I really could not play, she made a very wry face, turned from me, and said to another lady in my hearing, that she wondered how any foreigner could have the impertinence to come to her house for no other purpose than to make an apology for not playing. My Spanish conductor, unfortunately for himself, had not ...
— The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume I (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz
... thicket, a trained eye, such as his, might mark a spot where bushes had been often parted with extreme care not to do them injury and thus reveal the fact that through them lay a thoroughfare. Noting this with a wry smile of malicious satisfaction, he ...
— In Old Kentucky • Edward Marshall and Charles T. Dazey
... a volunteer regiment camping in Virginia came across a private on the outskirts of the camp, painfully munching on something. His face was wry and his lips seemed to move only with ...
— Toaster's Handbook - Jokes, Stories, and Quotations • Peggy Edmund & Harold W. Williams, compilers
... pellet between my finger and thumb; then, gently swaying the bushes, I induced the bantlings to open their mouths, when I dropped the morsel into one of the tiny throats. You ought to have seen the wry face baby made as it gulped down the new kind of food, which had such an odd taste. It was plain that the callow nestling was able to distinguish this morsel from the palatable diet it had been accustomed to. Possibly it ...
— Our Bird Comrades • Leander S. (Leander Sylvester) Keyser
... the less inclined than his fellows to let a sleeping dog lie. He had been drinking deeply, for your Biscayans are potent topers, and in the course of his cups he discovered that it irritated him to see that quiet, silent figure perched there in the window with its wry body as still as if it had been snipped out of cardboard, with its comical long nose poked over a book, with its colorless puckered lips moving, as if the reader muttered to himself the meaning of what he read, and tasted an unclean pleasure in so doing. So Pinto pulled himself to his feet, ...
— The Duke's Motto - A Melodrama • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... thirty at table every day, the dishes were delicate without undue profusion, the conversation gay and animated without any improprieties. I noticed that whenever the Marquis d'Argens chanced to let slip any equivocal expressions, all the ladies made wry faces, and the chaplain hastened to turn the conversation. This chaplain had nothing jesuitical in his appearance; he dressed in the costume of an ordinary priest, and I should never had known him if the Marquis d'Argens had not warned me. However, I did not allow his presence to act ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... my own experience, being somewhat conceited on the subject just now, because I have a gardener who lets me keep old-fashioned plants in the greenhouse, understands that my cherries are grown for the blackbirds, and sees me gather a bunch of my own grapes without making a wry face. But your admirable article of yesterday causes me to abandon my purpose; the more willingly, because among all the letters you have hitherto published there is not one from any head of a household which contains a complaint worth notice. All the masters or mistresses whose letters are thoughtful ...
— A Letter Book - Selected with an Introduction on the History and Art of Letter-Writing • George Saintsbury
... disappeared into his mouth immediately. Once he abstracted a small bottle of turpentine from the pocket of our medical officer. He drew the cork, held it first to one nostril, then to the other, made a wry face, recorked it, and returned ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 6 • Charles H. Sylvester
... say, don't," cried Sydney, with a wry face and a shudder; "it's horrid. I declare, when I'm a doctor, I'll never give ...
— Syd Belton - The Boy who would not go to Sea • George Manville Fenn
... wry smile, "'tis the women that have the tongues, and that can't he stopped from usin' them. Even ...
— King Coal - A Novel • Upton Sinclair
... at this moment being dummy, had strolled across from the other table to see that everybody was comfortable and provided with sustenance in times of stress, and here was clearly the proper opportunity for Miss Mapp to take a spoonful of this attempt at red-currant fool, and with a wry face, hastily (but not too hastily) smothered in smiles, to push the revolting compound away from her. But the one spoonful that she took was so delicious and exhilarating, that she was positively unable to be good for Isabel. Instead, she drank her cup to the dregs in an absent manner, while considering ...
— Miss Mapp • Edward Frederic Benson
... Indian; it was hard for her to make admissions about her husband. But then—we were like two errant school-girls, who had been caught m an escapade! "I don't know what I'm going to do about him," she said, with a wry smile. "He really won't listen—I can't make any impression ...
— Sylvia's Marriage • Upton Sinclair
... now finally dismated, and so cruelly handled as to have, it seemed, no use for a heart any more. Better let feeling die than be betrayed by diffidence into the denial of its true allegiance, or into expressions of the inner life false and wry as the strange laughter which the doomed suitors in Ithaca could not control. Though it stifled feeling, the creed of Cleanthes exalted the intellect, which was all that now remained to me unimpaired; ...
— Apologia Diffidentis • W. Compton Leith
... to take up his burden. First of all, however, he deliberately removed the handkerchief and looked it in the face. The dead man lay stiff and staring, with open eyes and a wry mouth. Hands and face were livid, a light froth had gathered on his lips. He looked to have suffered horribly—as much in mind as body: the agony must have bitten deep into him for the final peace of death never to have come. Now Prosper knew very little of ...
— The Forest Lovers • Maurice Hewlett
... been used for very many cases for which it is totally inapplicable, e.g. for the division of the muscles of the back in spinal curvature. Still there remain several deformities for the relief of which subcutaneous tenotomy is a most important remedy; chief among these are Wry Neck and Club-foot. ...
— A Manual of the Operations of Surgery - For the Use of Senior Students, House Surgeons, and Junior Practitioners • Joseph Bell
... every goblin When they spied her peeping: 330 Came towards her hobbling, Flying, running, leaping, Puffing and blowing, Chuckling, clapping, crowing, Clucking and gobbling, Mopping and mowing, Full of airs and graces, Pulling wry faces, Demure grimaces, Cat-like and rat-like, 340 Ratel- and wombat-like, Snail-paced in a hurry, Parrot-voiced and whistler, Helter skelter, hurry skurry, Chattering like magpies, Fluttering like pigeons, Gliding like fishes,— ...
— Goblin Market, The Prince's Progress, and Other Poems • Christina Rossetti
... coincidence provoked. But he was necessary to France, and all men knew it. At the first sitting of the provisional Consuls, Ducos had said to him: "It is useless to vote about the presidence; it belongs to you of right"; and, despite the wry face pulled by Sieyes, the general at once took the chair. Scarcely less remarkable than the lack of energy in statesmen was the confusion of thought in the populace. Mme. Reinhard tells us that after the coup d'etat people believed they had returned to the first days of liberty. What wonder, ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... Man Hatton stood over her, holding a small glass to her lips. Tessie drank it obediently, made a wry little face, coughed, wiped her eyes, and sat up. She looked from one to the other, like a trapped little animal. She put a hand to her ...
— One Basket • Edna Ferber
... With a wry face I turned to Thuvan Dihn. My companion but shook his head disconsolately and walked to one of the windows upon the far ...
— Warlord of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... it is. Make a wry path through your fields, and still you'll walk in it! I never ought to ha' got in the habit of lending you that key. What's the good of a key if a man can never keep it in his pocket? When I lived up at Mr. Daniel Mortimer's, the ...
— Fated to Be Free • Jean Ingelow
... different epoch. They travel by steam conveyance, yet with such a baggage of old Asiatic thoughts and superstitions as might check the locomotive in its course. Whatever is thought within the circuit of the Great Wall; what the wry-eyed, spectacled schoolmaster teaches in the hamlets round Pekin; religions so old that our language looks a halfling boy alongside; philosophy so wise that our best philosophers find things therein to wonder at; all this travelled alongside of me for thousands of miles over plain ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 2 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... them to break out, Lucifer and his counsellors returned to the palace, and sat down again, according to their rank, upon their fiery thrones. After silence had been called and the place cleared, a huge, wry-shouldered devil, placed a back-load of fresh prisoners before the bar. "Is this the road to Paradise," said one, (for they all pretended not to know where they were.) "Or if this be Purgatory," said another, "we have with us an authority, under the hand of the Pope, to go ...
— The Sleeping Bard - or, Visions of the World, Death, and Hell • Ellis Wynne
... out and glittered in the pale moonlight; while my lord of Hereford watched with wry face. Stuteley and Warrenton counted ...
— Robin Hood • Paul Creswick
... these things—at least, I've forgotten," said Jolyon with a wry smile. He himself had had to wait for death to grant him a divorce from the first Mrs. Jolyon. "Do you wish me to see ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... for the authoritative interference of the manager, they would have tossed him in a blanket. I was confounded by this sad turn of affairs, the manager was incensed, the players very merry; and the poor forlorn poet, with great patience, but a somewhat wry face, took the comedy, thrust it into his bosom, muttering, "It is not right to cast pearls before swine," and sadly quitted the place without another word. I was so mortified and ashamed that I could ...
— The Exemplary Novels of Cervantes • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... it slowly, making a wry face, for, true Gaul that he was, only two kinds of stimulants appealed to his palate, liqueurs and wines. He found it as good as ...
— The Man on the Box • Harold MacGrath
... a wry face. And she devoted the rest of the afternoon to what she realized, at the parting, was the vain task of mollifying Del. She knew that thenceforth she and Adelaide would drift apart; and she was sorry, for she liked her—liked to talk with her, liked to go about ...
— The Second Generation • David Graham Phillips
... to do," said Uncle Dan, setting down his glass of claret, with a wry face. He felt sure that the wine had been kept ...
— A Venetian June • Anna Fuller
... "that's nothing to do with me; Eugene will see to that. He will get the money advanced by a banker in Paris. You see, I selected an appointment bringing in a good income. Eugene at first made a wry face, saying one must be rich to occupy such posts, to which influential men were usually nominated. I persisted, however, and he yielded. To be a receiver of taxes one need not know either Greek or Latin. I shall have a representative, like Monsieur Peirotte, and he will ...
— The Fortune of the Rougons • Emile Zola
... a glass, but having only put it to his mouth, made a wry face, and returned it, saying "Bad! bad! poor punch indeed!—not a drop of ...
— Cecilia vol. 2 - Memoirs of an Heiress • Frances (Fanny) Burney (Madame d'Arblay)
... its inspiring bounties, Can qualify himself in several counties. What I have promised, thou may'st rest assured Shall faithfully and gladly be procured. Nay, I'm already better than my word, New plates and knives adorn the jovial board: And, lest you at their sight shouldst make wry faces The girl has scour'd the pots, and wash'd the glasses Ta'en care so excellently well to clean 'em, That thou may'st see thine own dear picture in 'em. Moreover, due provision has been made, That conversation may not be betray'd; ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift
... sidling back a pace or two, with a very unaccountable wrench of his wry face, that he does not regard the transaction as being made more promising ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... philosophical poet. He might have offered as amiable and as gallant a defence of the Muses, as my uncle Toby, in the honest simplicity of his heart, did of the army. He might have said at once, instead of making a parcel of wry faces over the matter, that Burns had written Tam o'Shanter, and that that alone was enough; that he could hardly have described the excesses of mad, hairbrained, roaring mirth and convivial indulgence, which are the soul of it, if he himself had not "drunk full ofter of the ...
— Lectures on the English Poets - Delivered at the Surrey Institution • William Hazlitt
... some little advances in order that you might complete your studies. Now, now, don't thank me! It was purely impersonal. You seemed bright. I have often thought we gentle people of the South ought to do more to encourage our black folk—not—not as social equals—" Here the old gentleman made a wry mouth as if he ...
— Birthright - A Novel • T.S. Stribling
... pulled a wry face. "I've seen quite enough of the wings, and the green-room, and all the rest of it. You might take Baby, just to show him the real thing, and put him off it once ...
— Winding Paths • Gertrude Page
... to himself as he left the telephone-box. "Now, if I were a story-book detective I should assume that the murderer was either a South American or had travelled in South America. It looked the kind of thing a woman might carry in her garter. And a veiled woman called on him that night"—he made a wry face. "Foyle, my lad, you're assuming things. That way madness lies. The dagger might have been bought anywhere as a curiosity, and the veiled woman may have been a purely ...
— The Grell Mystery • Frank Froest
... straightening the distorted members by the force of traction; in other cases the muscles or tendons must be cut across on the side to which the body or limbs are bent to allow of such straightening. Thus, the muscles on the concave side of a wry neck or the cords behind the shank bones of a contracted limb may be cut to allow of these parts being brought into the passages, and there will still be wanting the methods demanded for bringing up missing limbs or head, for which see ...
— Special Report on Diseases of Cattle • U.S. Department of Agriculture
... surprising, Colonel," Bart Stanton said with a wry smile. "If a human being had gone on a ten-year rampage of robbery and murder, showing himself as callously indifferent to human life and property as you and I would be to the life and property of a cockroach, and if, in addition, he proved impossible to catch, such a person would ...
— Anything You Can Do ... • Gordon Randall Garrett
... in convulsions of transport, which shook his whole frame, sobbed hysterically, and, at length, in the emphatic language of Scripture, lifted up his voice and wept aloud. Colonel Mannering had recourse to his handkerchief; Pleydell made wry faces, and wiped the glasses of his spectacles; and honest Dinmont, after two loud blubbering explosions, exclaimed, "Deil's in the man! he's garr'd me do that I haena done since my ...
— Guy Mannering • Sir Walter Scott
... Town shou'd be so refin'd to admit of nothing but what is Natural, we can't expect that ever he will gratifie us with another Tragedy. Durfey and Motteux wou'd write no more Farces; Guildon and Tom. Brown, &c. wou'd be the Saints with wry Mouthes and scrue'd Faces: Mr. Guildon indeed has Philosophy enough to support himself under such a Calamity, and knows a Method to prevent starving; for who can think that he who writ Blunt's Life can be at a loss for a decent dispatch of his own? 'Tis a deplorable ...
— A Letter to A.H. Esq.; Concerning the Stage (1698) and The - Occasional Paper No. IX (1698) • Anonymous
... of his occiput. There he tugged and crowed, while his care-taker bent over his labour, circumspect in every movement, nor once forgetting the precious thing on his back, who was evidently delighted with his new style of being nursed, and only now and then made a wry face at some movement of the human machine too abrupt for his comfort. Evidently he took it all as intended solely ...
— Salted With Fire • George MacDonald
... small room panelled with black oak, and furnished with a few cases of ancient tomes. The attorney and the divine were seated at a table, with a big square-built bottle and long-stemmed glasses before them, and Master Potts, with a wry grimace, excused himself from rising on his respected ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... out some of the hot coffee laced with brandy into the cup that was screwed on the top of the thermos flask. Advancing to the man whom I supported, he put it to his lips. He tasted and made a wry face, but presently he began to sip, and ultimately swallowed it all. The effect of the stimulant was wonderful, for in a few minutes he came to life completely and was even able to sit up ...
— When the World Shook - Being an Account of the Great Adventure of Bastin, Bickley and Arbuthnot • H. Rider Haggard
... crumpled paper packet which was handed to him, and lit it. He made a wry face, never before ...
— The Rough Road • William John Locke
... decorum, and only waited long enough for her to finish her work before joyously undoing it. She caught the laughing, admiring eyes of a boy sitting across from her and sought to conceal her pleasure in her unmanageable wealth of hair by a wry little face, and then the eyes of both strayed out to the trees that had scented that breeze for them, looking with frank longing at the campus which stretched before them in all its May glory that sunny afternoon. He remembered having met this boy and girl strolling in the ...
— Lifted Masks - Stories • Susan Glaspell
... listened in breathless silence, keeping his eye fixed steadily all the time upon the clean copy of the score. Only once he made a wry face to himself, and that was in the chorus to the debate in the Fijian Parliament on the proposal to leave off the practice of obligatory cannibalism. The conservative party were of opinion that if you began by burying instead of eating your deceased wife, you might end ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen
... you like it, Jack!" said Harry with a wry face, "but I can't say that I do. You may be used to the ...
— The Hilltop Boys on Lost Island • Cyril Burleigh
... modesty!" put in Raoul with a wry laugh. "If it pleases you to represent that the whole thing was accidental and you don't deserve to be promoted sergeant for tonight's work, at least ...
— The Westcotes • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... patient to be stript to his shirt, and then entirely baring the arm, he began to stretch and examine it, in such a manner that the tortures he put him to caused Jones to make several wry faces; which the surgeon observing, greatly wondered at, crying, "What is the matter, sir? I am sure it is impossible I should hurt you." And then holding forth the broken arm, he began a long and very learned lecture of anatomy, in which simple and double ...
— The History of Tom Jones, a foundling • Henry Fielding
... a wry face at the name; the Nelsons were a family of Methodists who lived across the way. Methodists are people who take life seriously as a rule, and Helen thought the Nelsons were very ...
— King Midas • Upton Sinclair
... storms; and sea-sickness is for many people hard to bear; and the rough life that must be led is little suitable for the nobility:" (1) which, of all babyish utterances that ever fell from any public man, may surely bear the bell. Scarcely disembarked, he followed his victor, with such wry face as we may fancy, through the streets of holiday London. And then the doors closed upon his last day of garish life for more than a quarter of a century. After a boyhood passed in the dissipations of a luxurious court or in the camp of war, his ears still stunned and his ...
— Familiar Studies of Men & Books • Robert Louis Stevenson
... cases; but he found the success of the remedy so increased the frequency of the complaint, that he was compelled to give up his medical treatment; for as long as he had the Specific, his men were constantly making wry faces ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 13, - Issue 352, January 17, 1829 • Various
... trying to help her, talking nonsense with a tact that ignored her equivocal position. She was grateful to him, but even his chivalry hurt. She watched him under her thick lashes as he went back to the Sheik and sat down beside him, refusing his host's proffered cigarettes with a wry face of disgust and a laughing reference to a "perverted palate," as he searched for his own. The hatred she had been prepared to give him had died away during dinner—only the jealousy remained, and ...
— The Sheik - A Novel • E. M. Hull
... said, holding out the cup of his flask. She drank with a wry little face, and coughed. "I put a little whisky in it," ...
— Uncanny Tales • Various
... explain why some people want to play with trip- hammers and loaded guns. We know they do. And so, though aware that there were spy-hunting listeners all around, a mad desire to utter the forbidden tongue obsessed me. Wry faces from Marie, emphasized by repeated pinches at each threatened outbreak, brought me back to my senses ...
— In the Claws of the German Eagle • Albert Rhys Williams
... and squeak! No, not half so good as bubble and squeak. English beef and good cabbage. But foreign rank and title!—foreign cabbage and beef!—foreign bubble and foreign squeak!" And the squire made a wry face, and spat forth his disgust ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... Grumpy Weasel made a wry face, as if he did not care to have anybody speak of Mr. Meadow Mouse as a friend of his. And he did not quit the stone wall until he had seen Mr. Meadow Mouse ...
— The Tale of Grumpy Weasel - Sleepy-Time Tales • Arthur Scott Bailey
... suppose it isn't any use my trying to bully you into marrying me at once," said Tony, with a shrug, a sigh, and a wry smile. "But you know I'm tremendously in love with you, darling, and I can't help feeling jealous of the fellows who still go on dancing attendance on you although you are engaged to me. I'm haunted by the fear of ...
— Bandit Love • Juanita Savage
... his sleep gaping and stretching backward his hind legs. Mae Munroe yawned, extending her arms at full length before her; regarded her fair ringed fingers and the four dimples across the back of each hand; reached for a cigarette and with the wry face of nausea tossed it back into its box; swung to a sitting posture on the side of the sofa, the dog springing from the curve of her arm to ...
— Every Soul Hath Its Song • Fannie Hurst
... Sitting up, he glanced round the room for signs of his master's return, and, seeing none, grunted again in wonder. A tankard was on the floor beside him, and he drank the flat remains from last night's measure with a wry face. Then he pushed open the door of his master's room ...
— Princess Maritza • Percy Brebner
... the servants?" persisted Nan. "They'll hardly allow my arrival at Mallow in the early hours of the morning to pass without comment! I really think, Peter," she added with a wry smile, "that it would have been simpler all round if you'd allowed me ...
— The Moon out of Reach • Margaret Pedler
... Oh-I-Am the Wizard went over Three-Tree Common, his shoe became unstringed, and he bent down to refasten it. Then he saw Wry-Face, the gnome, hiding among the bracken and looking as mischievous as anything. In one hand he held a white fluff-feather. Now these feathers are as light as anything, and will blow in the wind; and whatever they are placed under, whether light or heavy, they are ...
— The Book of Stories for the Storyteller • Fanny E. Coe
... good your making wry faces!" shouted the Captain, for he had no great affection for him, thinking that a former soldier should rather have become a thief ...
— Creatures That Once Were Men • Maxim Gorky
... indeed, on this point Sir Anthony Carlisle relates the following anecdote:—"The most Northern races of mankind," says he, "were found to be unacquainted with the taste of sweets, and their infants made wry faces and sputtered out sugar with disgust, but the little urchins grinned with ecstasy at the sight of a bit of whale's blubber." In the same way the Arab is a date-eater and the Kaffir is a milk consumer. ...
— The Art of Living in Australia • Philip E. Muskett (?-1909)
... passed down the little narrow room, but when she came to the critical spot, the supposed meeting ground, her desire to laugh conflicting with the effort to pull a long face, caused such a wry contortion of her plump visage that seriousness deserted them once more, and they bubbled over in mirth that would have been boisterous had it not been prudently ...
— What Necessity Knows • Lily Dougall
... comedy; that is rather a fowling for the people's delight, or their fooling. For, as Aristotle says rightly, the moving of laughter is a fault in comedy, a kind of turpitude that depraves some part of a man's nature without a disease. As a wry face without pain moves laughter, or a deformed vizard, or a rude clown dressed in a lady's habit and using her actions; we dislike and scorn such representations which made the ancient philosophers ever think laughter unfitting in ...
— Discoveries and Some Poems • Ben Jonson
... drawing-room he noted that it was tightly closed. And it ought to have pleased him to see how his enemy had taken his exclusion from the party to heart, and had shut himself away from any sign or sound of it. But, although he smiled cynically, he wasn't altogether pleased. And presently he made a wry mouth, as if he were taking something unpleasant; and he began to hustle Freddie and Euphemia so as to get away from that closed door as ...
— The Spread Eagle and Other Stories • Gouverneur Morris
... The girl made a wry grimace. "I like any one so long as they don't do me no harm," she replied evasively. "She wouldn't stand at that, either, if she had the mind. How did you ...
— Little Folks (October 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various
... unheeded, he came scolding down the tree, jumped off one of the lower limbs, and took refuge in a young pine that stood near by. From time to time he came out on the top of the limb nearest to us, and, with a wry face, fierce whiskers, and violent gestures, directed a torrent of abuse at the axemen who were delivering death-blows to ...
— Wild Life on the Rockies • Enos A. Mills
... tents and load pack-horses. And another gun fired at ten o'clock meant "March." With all these guns, and a fourth at sundown, I saw an unhappy time ahead for my Indians. Truly, I think the sound makes them sick. They all pulled wry faces now, and I had my jest at their expense, ours being a most happy little family, so amiably did the Mohican and Oneidas foregather; and also, there being among them a Sagamore and a Chief of the noble Oneida clan, ...
— The Hidden Children • Robert W. Chambers
... beef tea, Paul took the cup from her hand. Jack made a wry face at Laurel, indicating that they would have to watch Paul and the pretty new nurse. Then he took the chair nearest Mr. Starr. The can of "red paint" had been safely hidden in a locker ...
— The Motor Girls On Cedar Lake - The Hermit of Fern Island • Margaret Penrose
... The young man never glanced towards their carriage as he passed, but mademoiselle, who was still a few steps behind, made a wry face ...
— The Mischief Maker • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... the bears to drink a glass to Mrs Howard's health, and had told the steward to put down to my account the slings and cocktails they might consume. Mrs Dobleton, whose husband is secretary to a temperance society, pulled a wry face or two at what she doubtless thought an encouragement to vice; but for my part I have no such scruples. It always gives me pleasure to find myself thrown by chance among these rough and wild, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 349, November, 1844 • Various
... a wry face. 'I hire a country-boat and go down the river from Thursday to Sunday, and the amiable Dormer goes with me if ...
— Under the Deodars • Rudyard Kipling
... interrupted, "the man fancies that he is not good eating, you make so many wry and out-of-the-way contortions. A sign is a jury-mast for the tongue, and every seaman ought to know how to practise them, in case he should be wrecked on a savage and unknown coast. Old Joe Bunk had a dictionary of them, and in calm weather ...
— Homeward Bound - or, The Chase • James Fenimore Cooper
... thousands a year, and I only a few hundreds. That in itself would signify nothing—and if I must take help from somebody I would rather take it from Celia Madden than anybody else I know—but this is the point, Mr. Thorpe. I do not eat the bread of dependence gracefully. I pull wry faces over it, and I don't try very much to disguise them. That is my fault. Yes—oh yes, I know it is a fault—but I am as I am. And if Miss Madden doesn't mind—why"—she concluded with a mirthless, uncertain laugh—"why on ...
— The Market-Place • Harold Frederic
... making a wry face; "but if he begins any of his 'aw—aw,' on the way down, I'll not answer for ...
— We Ten - Or, The Story of the Roses • Lyda Farrington Kraus
... gravely. "I think I should not have been here now if you had not taken care of me, and I'm very grateful. Still"—and he glanced down with a wry smile at his knee, which was bent a trifle—"it was unfortunate you and the doctor did not get me earlier. There are disadvantages in ...
— Alton of Somasco • Harold Bindloss
... with many wry faces a proposal involving a delay of five whole days, he was fain to admit that no better course occurred to him just then; and as both Rose and Mrs. Maylie sided very strongly with Mr. Brownlow, that gentleman's ...
— Oliver Twist • Charles Dickens
... smiled a wry, twisted smile. "I'm sorry," he lied. "I don't see how it happened. It ...
— Shelled by an Unseen Foe • James Fiske
... filled a glass for Mr. Brook, which the coachman emptied at a draught; but after having done so he made a wry face, and looked ...
— Run to Earth - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... The old tales are very sportive, but rather monotonous. They turn on three jokes only: the despair of the cuckold, the cries of the beaten, the wry faces of the hanged. The first is amusing, the second laughable, the third, as crown of all, makes people split their sides. And the three have one point in common: it is the weak ...
— La Sorciere: The Witch of the Middle Ages • Jules Michelet |
