"Bad-tempered" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... old daughter Amelia, the only member of the family with which the reader is not acquainted; and Tom, grown into a lazy, bad-tempered and slouching young man. Old ...
— The Silver Lining - A Guernsey Story • John Roussel
... upon the polished floor of the broad hall and Mrs. Peyton Stewart, Peggy's aunt by marriage, stood in the doorway. Under one arm she carried her French poodle. Stooping she placed it upon the floor with the care which suggested a degree of fragility entirely belied by the bad-tempered little beast's first move, for as Peggy advanced with extended hand to greet her aunt, Toinette made a wild dash for the Persian cat, which onset was met by one dignified slap of the Sultana's paw, which left its red ...
— Peggy Stewart at School • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... player takes the name of a part of a coach, as the axle, the door, the box, the reins, the whip, the wheels, the horn; or of some one connected with it, as the driver, the guard, the ostlers, the landlord, the bad-tempered passenger, the cheerful passenger, the passenger who made puns, the old lady with the bundle, and the horses—wheelers and leaders. One player then tells a story about the coach, bringing in as many of these people and things as he can, and as often. Whenever a person or thing ...
— What Shall We Do Now?: Five Hundred Games and Pastimes • Dorothy Canfield Fisher
... "Murphy, you're a bad-tempered little stickler to rules that don't mean a cuss. There isn't another train within a hundred miles or so, except west; there won't be one this way ...
— The Return of Blue Pete • Luke Allan
... and he knew her well enough to realise how rigorously she would treat him. Only a kind of grunt came from his contracted throat, though he still tried to treat the matter in a jesting way. "Isn't she bad-tempered to-day!" he resumed at last, turning towards Gerard. "What have you done to her that I find her in such ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... inclined over the violin was fascinating, and, while resting between the pieces of that interminable programme she was, in her white dress and with her brown hands reposing in her lap, the very image of dreamy innocence. The mature, bad-tempered woman at the piano might have been her mother, though there was not the slightest resemblance between them. All I am certain of in their personal relation to each other is that cruel pinch on the upper part of the arm. That I am sure I have ...
— Victory • Joseph Conrad
... sighed when he thought of the ugly disposition of his beautiful daughter. Of course no one cared very much for her society, and she sat in her room all day long, refusing to join the others in their sports and games, and becoming more moody and bad-tempered the older she grew. ...
— The Surprising Adventures of the Magical Monarch of Mo and His People • L. Frank Baum
... being stocked with them, and those born there (mixed breeds for the most part) turn out well, and have good colors, are good tempered and willing to work, and are of medium size. Those brought from China are small, very strong, good goers, treacherous, quarrelsome, and bad-tempered. Some horses of good colors are brought from Japon. They have well-shaped bodies, thick hair, large fetlocks, large legs and front hoofs, which makes them look like draft-horses. Their heads are rather large, and their mouths hard. They run but slowly, ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XVI, 1609 • H.E. Blair
... such a bad-tempered man that I'm afraid he will hurt you for this," said she, stepping hastily to the door, where she drew in the latch-string, thus locking the humble cabin against intruders. When she sat down, with her scared look and her ...
— Camp-fire and Wigwam • Edward Sylvester Ellis
... says. Two days last week he didn't go to business, and his temper was that 'orrible!' Nancy had a habit of facetiously quoting vulgarities; this from an acquaintance of theirs who often supplied them with mirth. 'I suppose the gout does make one bad-tempered.' ...
— In the Year of Jubilee • George Gissing
... thy warning, young jackanapes!" retorted Zabastes, pausing in his walk and leaning on his staff while he peered with his small, black, bad-tempered eyes at the speaker- "Thou art methinks somewhat over well-informed for a little lacquey! What knowest thou of His Majesty's humors? Hast been his fly-i'-the-ear or cast-off sandal-string? I pray thee extend not thy range of learning ...
— Ardath - The Story of a Dead Self • Marie Corelli
... had annoyances outside, serious annoyances, and they have made me bad-tempered, so much so that I have been unpleasant and aggressive in my ...
— A Comedy of Marriage & Other Tales • Guy De Maupassant
... Saxton looked bad-tempered. Then Mrs. Corey bustled with her face and yearned at Milt, "Do tell me: what is the theme of the ...
— Free Air • Sinclair Lewis
... can't get what I like, why, I can do without it. I don't mind sitting down to burnt steak, with canned peaches and store cake for a thrilling little dessert afterwards, but I do draw the line at having to sympathize with Zilla because she's so rotten bad-tempered that the cook has quit, and she's been so busy sitting in a dirty lace negligee all afternoon, reading about some brave manly Western hero, that she hasn't had time to do any cooking. You're always talking about 'morals'—meaning ...
— Babbitt • Sinclair Lewis
... easy to be bad-tempered over this saddening business; one has to be pitiful. As my memory travels over England, and follows the tracks that I trod, I seem to see a line of dead faces, that start into life if I linger by them, and mop and mow at me in bitterness because I put out no saving hand. So many and many ...
— The Ethics of Drink and Other Social Questions - Joints In Our Social Armour • James Runciman
... your writing that you were in some unusual frame of mind, either tired, or—or—" he looked again, and closely, at the writing,—"or in a temper less delightfully calm and seraphic than usual. Yes, it looks actually a bad-tempered hand. Valentine's!" Then he laughed, and tossed the note carelessly into the fire that was crackling upon the hearth. Rip lay ...
— Flames • Robert Smythe Hichens
... we had had a poor summer and a dry winter, and the Unionists started trouble cutting my horses' throats, and burning woodsheds and firing the only good grass on my run that I could rely upon. I didn't say much about it, but I have no doubt that it made me bad-tempered and less pleasant to live with.... That was just before the time Biddy went away. Afterwards, the sales I'd counted on turned out badly—cattle too poor for want of grass to stand the droving and the worst luck in ...
— Lady Bridget in the Never-Never Land • Rosa Praed
... Help On Getting Away from Yourself Travel Work Farewells! The "Butters" Age that Dyes Women in Love Pompous Pride in Literary "Lions" Seaside Piers Visitors The Unimpassioned English Relations Polite Conversation Awful Warnings It's oh, to be out of England—now that Spring is here Bad-tempered People Polite Masks The Might-have-been Autumn Sowing What You Really Reap Autumn Determination Two Lives Backward and Forward When? The Futile Thought The London Season Christmas The New Year February Tub-thumpers I Wonder If . . . ...
— Over the Fireside with Silent Friends • Richard King
... Dieu!" exclaimed the doctor with a slight impatience. "These afflicted ones, these peculiar ones—they are still capable of something. Many times have I seen it; the old, old tottering grandmere, the crazy aunt, the bad-tempered husband, even the inebriate, can find, when they are guided, work which suits and maintains them. Even when the mind is shaken, if it is only a little, just a little, to care for others, a bird or a cat, or a sick person, this will ...
— Ringfield - A Novel • Susie Frances Harrison
... "He is always bad-tempered when we come to the Court," she said. "For all its grandeur it is not a hospitable house. Jennings will have to go without his ...
— Mary Gray • Katharine Tynan
... it was. The knowledge that thousands of other places, no whit less happy than themselves, or even more happy, were in existence would have made the Ulians quite bad-tempered. And beyond doubt they were in need of no other cause to excite their anger, for had they ...
— The Flamp, The Ameliorator, and The Schoolboy's Apprentice • E. V. Lucas
... think I saw, could not be prevented from gadding on the streets, and therefore had been placed here. Another young woman was a schoolmistress who would not get out of bed and refused to work. When she came to the Home she was very insolent and bad-tempered, and would do nothing. Now, I was informed, she rises with the lark, at 6.30 indeed, and works like a Trojan. I could not help wondering whether these excellent habits would survive her departure from the Home. Another lady, who had been sentenced for thefts, was ...
— Regeneration • H. Rider Haggard
... he stroked her beautiful hair as if she had been some soft but irritable animal. He said he was sure her dear little head was aching because she was so bad-tempered; he implored her not to eat too much cake, and promised to call again another day, when he hoped to find her better. So he left her, and went home with a dead weight at ...
— Audrey Craven • May Sinclair
... a somewhat eccentric, keen-mannered, matter-of-fact, English-minded—gentleman; good-natured evidently, bad-tempered evidently, hating humbug of all sorts, shrewd, perhaps a little selfish, highly intellectual, the powers of the mind not brought out with any delight in their manifestation, or intention of display, ...
— The Life of John Ruskin • W. G. Collingwood
... held out her hand; "Oh, Allan, I am so very bad-tempered. I seem always determined to quarrel," she said, with a laugh ...
— Mr. Pat's Little Girl - A Story of the Arden Foresters • Mary F. Leonard
... by her aunt, and it was agreed that they should go to Countess Monaco's for the harmless purpose, as they expressed it, of "just walking through the rooms," leaving thereafter as soon as practicable for the ball; and Mrs. Stanmore, who was good-hearted if bad-tempered, trusted "dear Maud would think no more of what she had said in a moment of irritation, but that they would be better friends than ...
— M. or N. "Similia similibus curantur." • G.J. Whyte-Melville
... That cured the little thing, and when Carl came home, he found it quite well again. One day, just after he got back, Mrs. Montague drove up to the house with a canary cage carefully done up in a shawl. She said that a bad-tempered housemaid, in cleaning the cage that morning, had gotten angry with the bird and struck it, breaking its leg. She was very much annoyed with the girl for her cruelty, and had dismissed her, and now she wanted Carl to take her bird and nurse it, as ...
— Beautiful Joe - An Autobiography of a Dog • by Marshall Saunders
... opinions differ, Carrie said the child was bad-tempered, but it made up for that defect by its looks, for it was—in ...
— The Diary of a Nobody • George Grossmith and Weedon Grossmith
... Household Words an "Apology for Fox-hunting," which, at the time I wrote it, received the approbation, by quotation, of almost every sporting journal in the country. It will be seen that it contains a sentence very similar to one to be found in Mr. Rarey's "Horse Training"—"A bad-tempered man ...
— A New Illustrated Edition of J. S. Rarey's Art of Taming Horses • J. S. Rarey
... forms no part of our nature. It is a parasite, feeding upon human life, and destroying it. It is hideous and disgusting. There can be no beauty where it is. The prettiest woman is made repulsive by it. Children are made fretful, impatient, and bad-tempered by it. Men are degraded and made reckless by it. There is little modesty where dirt is,—for dirty is indecency. There can be little purity of mind where the person is impure; for the body is the temple of the soul, and must be cleansed and purified to be worthy of ...
— Thrift • Samuel Smiles
... the general's hand. "I can't stay away any longer from my dear, bad-tempered, old dad," he read in a breaking voice; then he added hesitatingly, "I don't reckon she's right about ...
— The Voice of the People • Ellen Glasgow
... troubled her of late, for he had been strangely bad-tempered and variable in his moods. She had become more or less accustomed to his eccentricities of behaviour and speech, but this was something different, indefinable. One day he would be extraordinarily kind and considerate, the next almost brutal, either ...
— The Hippodrome • Rachel Hayward
... termagant, dragon, scold, Xantippe; porcupine; spitfire; fire eater &c. (blusterer) 887; fury &c. (violent person) 173. V. be irascible &c. adj.; have a temper &c. n., have a devil in one; fire up &c. (be angry) 900. Adj. irascible; bad-tempered, ill-tempered; irritable, susceptible; excitable &c. 825; thin-skinned &c. (sensitive) 822; fretful, fidgety; on the fret. hasty, overhasty, quick, warm, hot, testy, touchy, techy[obs3], tetchy; like touchwood, like tinder; huffy,; pettish, petulant; waspish, snappish, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... flattering tale, the preacher comes forth under a divine compulsion to "cry aloud and spare not," but because his digestion is upset, or his temporal concerns are awry, or even because his personal ambitions have been disappointed and himself unappreciated. There is such a thing as bad-tempered, ill-natured preaching, in which the weapons of the Bible armoury are borrowed for the expression of the preacher's chagrin and spite. In a literal sense every word he speaks may be true, but the spirit of the message destroys all possible good effects ...
— The Message and the Man: - Some Essentials of Effective Preaching • J. Dodd Jackson
... In his eyes that stony glare which English people have when they're afraid someone may be wanting to know them; chicken-claws under his chin, like you see in the necks of elderly bull dogs; a snobbish nose; a bad-tempered mouth; age anywhere between sixty and a hundred. Altogether one of those men who must write to the Times or go ...
— Set in Silver • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson
... "Bad-tempered men make them vicious, mother," Allis said; "and I believe that Shandy's punishment was the visitation of Providence, if ...
— Thoroughbreds • W. A. Fraser
... had keen instincts." At times, nevertheless, it would make them run away. Ellen knew Harry as a good slave, a good man, a good Christian, sound in his probity, not at all inclined to be roguish,—as most niggers are—a little given to drink, but never bad-tempered. Her honest opinion is that such a pattern of worthy nature and moral firmness would not disgrace itself by running away, unless induced by white "Buckra." She thinks she heard a lumbering and shuffling somewhere about the pen, shortly after midnight. ...
— Our World, or, The Slaveholders Daughter • F. Colburn Adams
... and have some breakfast with us, it's just coming in. May I introduce my daughter, Lady Moors and—and Lord Moors?" The girl took my hand, and the young man bowed from his place; but if that poor old man had known, peace was not to be made so easily between two such bad-tempered women as Mrs. Thrall and myself. We expressed some very stiff sentiments in regard to the weather, and the prospect of the yacht getting off with the next tide, and my husband joined in with that manly gentleness of his, but we did not sit down, much less offer to stay ...
— Through the Eye of the Needle - A Romance • W. D. Howells
... was the youngest of the sisters—a pretty child of fifteen; a trifle spoiled and bad-tempered, otherwise characterless enough. So now we may pass on to the personage who considered himself of chief consequence in the house—Mr. Thomas Beresford, the only son, who now stood at the window, thrumming on the panes, ...
— The Beautiful Wretch; The Pupil of Aurelius; and The Four Macnicols • William Black
... This consisted of five beings, almost equally dear to her heart—an educated bullfinch, to which she had taken an affection because it could no longer whistle or draw water, and which was afflicted with a swollen neck; a quiet and exceedingly timid little dog, called Roska; a bad-tempered cat, named Matros; a dark-complexioned, lively little girl of nine, with very large eyes and a sharp nose, whose name was Shurochka[A]; and an elderly lady of about fifty-five, who wore a white cap and a short, cinnamon-colored katsaveika[B] ...
— Liza - "A nest of nobles" • Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
... his face was unusually sallow in tint, and there was a dark, upright line between his brows which his relations knew and—dreaded. The genial, sunshiny individual of a few evenings back had disappeared, and a decidedly bad-tempered young man ...
— Under False Pretences - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... straightened himself, took an unsteady step forward toward the door, and it was then that they all realized how exceedingly drunk the man was. He had come to the dinner in a state of partial intoxication, which merely made him bad-tempered, but now the spirits that he had partaken of so plentifully was burning ...
— The Riddle of the Frozen Flame • Mary E. Hanshew
... bad-tempered," explained master and man eagerly together. Phyllis began to see that she had bought a family pet as much for Wallis as for Allan. She left them adoring the dog with that reverent emotion which only very ugly bull-dogs can wake in a man's breast, ...
— The Rose Garden Husband • Margaret Widdemer
... together in silence; but Quashy, who had overheard, the conversation, and was of a remarkably combative disposition, though the reverse of bad-tempered or quarrelsome, could ...
— The Rover of the Andes - A Tale of Adventure on South America • R.M. Ballantyne
... flush piteously, as with terror, before his insolent gaze. But I decided finally his was merely the ascendency of the strong over the weak—of the bully over his victims, who serve him more loyally because he kicks them. The bad-tempered have the best of it in this vile world. I cannot tell you how I grew to pity that poor girl. Living in her daily presence, I marked the thousand and one trials of which her life was made up, all borne with the same sweetness and good-humour. I discovered that she had a bed-ridden ...
— The Grey Wig: Stories and Novelettes • Israel Zangwill
... days at No. 2, Baker Street, waiting for the return of Miss Bacon or for some message which might explain her absence, but nothing and no one came. On the morning of the third day she found that the stout and bad-tempered man had carried out his vague threats. The place had been taken possession of, already they were removing the typewriters and tables under the direction of a bailiff. Even the plate bearing Miss Bacon's name had vanished, and boards announcing ...
— To Love • Margaret Peterson
... or heredity a bad-tempered woman, merely one of straw, who after the first two months of every quarter invariably found herself in a corner which one injudicious move ...
— Leonie of the Jungle • Joan Conquest
... Baizley was the most objectionable "tough" that Frosty Hollow could boast. He was a bad-tempered bully, cruel in his propensities, and delighting to interfere in all the innocent amusements of the village youngsters. He was a loutish tyrant, and Ted had suffered various petty annoyances at ...
— The Raid From Beausejour; And How The Carter Boys Lifted The Mortgage • Charles G. D. Roberts
... Bronti and Fiddy in particular, but all the dogs that ever I had. The reason is, that the dog is the very fondest creature that breathes; and any but a really ill-tempered dog may be managed by means of this fondness; while, as I before remarked, a really bad-tempered one should not be kept to be punished, ...
— Kindness to Animals - Or, The Sin of Cruelty Exposed and Rebuked • Charlotte Elizabeth
... odours that caused the others to hold their noses and open the schoolroom windows, top and bottom. He had a philosophical mind and a love of argument, and would thrash out questions for the sheer fun of debate in a growling sort of tone that was not really bad-tempered, ...
— A harum-scarum schoolgirl • Angela Brazil
... there was Celeste, radiant with a wonderful piece of news which she alone was to impart to her sister; there were Peggy and Maria, shot up suddenly into two amazingly-gawky girls; there was Master Castleman Lysle, the only son of the house, with his black-eyed and bad-tempered French governess. And finally there was Aunt Varina, palpitating with various agitations, not daring to whisper to anyone else the fears which this sudden home-coming inspired in her. Bishop Chilton and his wife were away, but a ...
— Sylvia's Marriage • Upton Sinclair
... with MacFee at the head, and a dozen troopers pounding behind, weary, hungry, bad-tempered, ready to exact payment ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... grouped themselves all round, fluttering their big fans and whispering to each other, and Don Pedro and the Grand Inquisitor stood laughing at the entrance. Even the Duchess—the Camerera-Mayor as she was called—a thin, hard-featured woman with a yellow ruff, did not look quite so bad-tempered as usual, and something like a chill smile flitted across her wrinkled face and twitched ...
— A House of Pomegranates • Oscar Wilde
... diligently but laboriously, completing the fair copy in March of that year (1856). But my illness and the strain of work had reduced me to a state of unusual irritability, and I can remember how extremely bad-tempered I was when our friends the Wesendoncks came in that evening to pay a sort of congratulatory visit on the completion of my score. I expressed my opinion of this way of sympathising with my work with such extraordinary bitterness that the poor insulted visitors departed abruptly in great ...
— My Life, Volume II • Richard Wagner
... way, would bluntly acknowledge that she was "as cross as a bear." Let us quietly take hold of ourselves and ask ourselves the plain question, "Are we nervous, or cross?" If the latter, we know how to remedy it. A well person has no right to be so abominably bad-tempered or moody that he cannot keep people from finding it out. If you are nervous, there is some reason for it. Perhaps you did not sleep well last night; perhaps you are suffering from dyspepsia; but in any case ...
— The Secret of a Happy Home (1896) • Marion Harland
... independence, Aunt Nancy possessed a considerable fund of humor, and it stood her in good stead now. She contrived to thoroughly interest the Tories, and it was not long before they were in the most jovial frame of mind imaginable. They had expected to find a bad-tempered, ill-conditioned woman; and they were agreeably surprised when they found, instead, a woman who could match their rude jests, and make ...
— Stories Of Georgia - 1896 • Joel Chandler Harris
... to me that I might now be in a really dangerous place. For it is one thing surprising a Bear that has no family responsibilities, and another stirring up a bad-tempered old mother ...
— Johnny Bear - And Other Stories From Lives of the Hunted • E. T. Seton
... the body of twenty and the sense of ten. I am putting it very badly, but—but I was hateful years ago too. I think one always is, perhaps. I remember at school there were self-righteous little girls; they were narrow and intolerant, easily shocked, and rather bad-tempered. The others were absurdly vain, sentimental, sly. All that comes away afterwards if one ...
— Olive in Italy • Moray Dalton
... whose proper name was Peter Rose, had also the nickname of King Pewee. He was about fourteen years old, square built and active, of great strength for his size, and very proud of the fact that no boy in town cared to attack him. He was not bad-tempered, but he loved to be master, and there were a set of flatterers who followed him, like jackals about ...
— The Hoosier School-boy • Edward Eggleston
... had prepared very valuable gifts for the two sisters. These gifts were two enormous diamonds that could light the whole universe. When God heard the prayer of the fairy, he descended to earth disguised as a beggar. On learning for himself how bad-tempered Buwan was, and how sweet and kind-hearted Araw, God gave the older sister her diamond as a reward. Buwan was greatly angered by this favoritism on the part of the Almighty, so she went to the heavenly kingdom and stole one of ...
— Filipino Popular Tales • Dean S. Fansler
... aloof from everybody; he had no friends, he was harsh to the children, and was often bad-tempered. Rosa Tiralla was the only child to whom he spoke kindly; but she was quite different to the other children, much better bred. You could see that she had a nice mother, who was of good family. The schoolmaster ...
— Absolution • Clara Viebig
... have only a deaf tourist and two tired climbers, who seem sleepy and bad-tempered, at ...
— The Girl From Keller's - Sadie's Conquest • Harold Bindloss
... him cheerfully, ignoring his mood, and he had replied irritably, like a bad-tempered child who resents some unnecessary claim upon its attention. But she did not observe him closely. Had she done so, she might have noticed a curious glazing of the eyes as they lifted to follow her—shining and ...
— The Window-Gazer • Isabel Ecclestone Mackay
... all, Toni, you needn't repulse me as if I were a snake. You are a child, after all, and a jolly bad-tempered one at that!" It was the first time he had ever used such a tone, and the girl's ...
— The Making of a Soul • Kathlyn Rhodes
... surprised if she'll be able to use it again,' he said consolingly—'the mandolin, I mean. Besides, what's the good of it anyway? I say, Mother, are all foreigners bad-tempered?' ...
— Love at Second Sight • Ada Leverson
... following his advent the new servant was the cause of considerable discussion, and, regrettably, of not a little controversy, among the members of the household of Greenwood. The squire maintained that "the fellow is a bad-tempered, lazy, deceitful rogue, in need of much watching." Mrs. Meredith, on the contrary, invariably praised the man, and promptly suppressed her husband whenever he began to rail against him. To Janice, with the violent prejudices of youth still unmodified by experience and reason, Charles was almost ...
— Janice Meredith • Paul Leicester Ford
... striven to prove the prisoner bad-tempered. She did not need to prove anything of the sort concerning John Borg. They all knew his terrible fits of anger; they all knew that his temper was proverbial in the community; that it had prevented him having friends and had made him many enemies. Was it not very probable, therefore, that the masked ...
— A Daughter of the Snows • Jack London
... to be regretted," she said. "I ought to be glad that a little thing can stir me—some people need catastrophe. If it had not been for that sudden fear, I might have been bad-tempered and spoiled the day for ...
— The Native Born - or, The Rajah's People • I. A. R. Wylie
... lived under the same roof, but, as is often the case where there are step-parents, they were treated very differently. The lady's own daughter was bad-tempered, disobedient, vain, and of a tell-tale disposition: yet she was made much of, praised, and caressed. The step-children were treated very harshly: the boy, kind-hearted and obliging, was made to do all sorts of hard unpleasant work, was constantly scolded, and looked upon as ...
— Fairy Tales of the Slav Peasants and Herdsmen • Alexander Chodsko
... mother and I heard quite a different story. Boatman's chances grew very small, and Boatman's vices were so magnified that I could not sleep for fear. And when I told my sweetheart he only laughed, and said he knew the old horse now a good deal better than his master, and though he was a bad-tempered old brute there was not a horse in the colony could touch him, once you took him the right way. It was like a woman to be so full of fears and forebodings, and this morning, now that I seemed to have good ground for them, my fears redoubled, and Ben and I, in our excitement, fairly raced those ...
— The Moving Finger • Mary Gaunt
... just at the door stood Samson. I laid my ears back and snapped at him. 'Stand back,' said the master, 'and keep out of her way; you've done a bad day's work for this filly.' He growled out something about a vicious brute. 'Hark ye,' said the father, 'a bad-tempered man will never make a good-tempered horse. You've not learned your trade yet, Samson.' Then he led me into my box, took off the saddle and bridle with his own hands, and tied me up; then he called for a pail of warm water and a sponge, took off his coat, and while the stable-man ...
— Black Beauty • Anna Sewell
... remarked the little school teacher, with a sigh. "Captain Wegg was always kind to me; but the neighbors as a rule thought him moody and bad-tempered." After a pause she added: "He was not as kind to his son as to me. But I think his life was an unhappy one, and we have no right to reprove his memory too ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces at Millville • Edith Van Dyne
... make nervous, bad-tempered horses; rough and noisy cattle-men, fidgety cows; ill-trained dogs and savage shepherds, sheep wild and difficult to approach; so does the bad-tempered, impatient, or slovenly master make men with the same bad qualities, when a smile or a kind word will bring out all that is good in a man ...
— Grain and Chaff from an English Manor • Arthur H. Savory
... event enough to ripple the most sensitive memory. Then the whimsical Fates do something different, find it interesting, and proceed to do something else. So, though Timmins had been accustomed all his life to managing bulls, good-tempered and bad-tempered alike, and had never had the ugliest of them presume to turn upon him, he was not astonished now by the apparition of Smith's bull, a wide-horned, carrot-red, white-faced Hereford, charging down upon him in thunderous ...
— Kings in Exile • Sir Charles George Douglas Roberts
... that Crowded Owl following us? He's been hanging round us all the afternoon. He's up to something. Don't you remember the captain told us he was a bad-tempered fellow?" ...
— A Jolly Fellowship • Frank R. Stockton
... know whether I dare to meet him," says Atli, "he is bad-tempered, and may be that I shall let another's ...
— The story of Burnt Njal - From the Icelandic of the Njals Saga • Anonymous
... another direction. Holm became so light on his legs one might have thought he was treading on needles; when the derrick swung round over the quay and the chain came rattling down, he ran right back to the granary. Pelle wanted to take him on board, but he would not hear of it. "It looks a bad-tempered monster," he said: "look how it ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo
... the East, one watches with admiration the part a donkey plays in the economy of those primitive lands. All the work is reserved for that industrious animal, and little play falls to his share. The camel is always bad-tempered, and when overladen lies down, refusing to move until relieved of its burden. The Turk is lazy and selfish, the native women pass their time in chattering and giggling, the children play and squabble, the ubiquitous dog sleeps in the sun; but from daybreak to midnight the little mouse-colored ...
— The Ways of Men • Eliot Gregory
... willing to work should be prevented from earning even a day's victuals by the bad temper of a gardener. But his mistress did not want to send the man away. She had found him scrupulously honest, as is many a bad-tempered man, and she did not like changes. The cook on her part had taken such a fancy to Clare that she did not want him set to garden-work; she would have him at once into the house, and begin training ...
— A Rough Shaking • George MacDonald
... Tucker limousine with an O.D. paint job and the single-starred flag of a brigadier general was approaching, horning impatiently. In the back seat MacLeod could see a heavy-shouldered figure with the face of a bad-tempered great Dane—General Daniel Nayland, the military commander of Tonto Basin. The inside guards jumped to attention and saluted; the barrier shot up as though rocket-propelled, and the car slid through; the barrier slammed down behind it. On the other side, the guards ...
— The Mercenaries • Henry Beam Piper
... and cheerful. Autolycus repeats the burden of an old song with the truth that "a merry heart goes all the day, but your sad ones tires a mile a!" and what he says any one may notice, not only in ourselves, but in the inferior animals also. A sulky dog, and a bad-tempered horse, wear themselves out with half the labor that kindly creatures do. An unkindly cow will not give down her milk, and a sour sheep will not fatten; nay, even certain fowls and geese, to those who observe, will evidence ...
— Brave Men and Women - Their Struggles, Failures, And Triumphs • O.E. Fuller
... A person always ready to fight is certain of the greatest consideration amongst his or her family circle. The lazy grow tired of contending with him; the timid coax and flatter him; and as almost every one is timid or lazy, a bad-tempered man is sure to have his own way. It is he who commands, and all the others obey. If he is a gourmand, he has' what he likes for dinner; and the tastes of all the rest are subservient to him. She (we playfully transfer the gender, as a bad temper is of both sexes) has the ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... a wagon well, Shomolekae needed to be able to manage sixteen oxen all at once, and keep them walking in a straight line. He needed to know which were the bad-tempered ones and which were the good, and which pulled best in one part of the span and which in another; and how to keep them all pulling together and not lunging at ...
— The Book of Missionary Heroes • Basil Mathews
... protruding blue eyes were red-rimmed and somewhat bloodshot, in moments of emotion they shone with a curious red glint, and his florid face flushed a deeper red. In these moments Mr. Manley had a feeling that he was dealing with a bad-tempered red bull. His employer made very much the same impression on other people, but few of them had the impression of bullness so clear and so complete as did Mr. Manley. Lady Loudwater, on the other hand, felt always, whether her husband was ...
— The Loudwater Mystery • Edgar Jepson
... by before Rosy-Lilly saw another chance to assail McWha's forbidding defences. This time she made what her innocent heart conceived to be a tremendous bid for the bad-tempered woodsman's favour. Incidentally, too, she revealed a secret which the Boss and Walley Johnson had been guarding with guilty solicitude ever since her coming ...
— The Backwoodsmen • Charles G. D. Roberts
... vessels have vanished! Compared to the vast liquid plains of the Pacific, the Mediterranean is a mere lake, but it's an unpredictable lake with fickle waves, today kindly and affectionate to those frail single-masters drifting between a double ultramarine of sky and water, tomorrow bad-tempered and turbulent, agitated by the winds, demolishing the strongest ships beneath sudden waves that smash down ...
— 20000 Leagues Under the Seas • Jules Verne
... a good deal changed. Sometimes he's moody and even bad-tempered, poor fellow, and he's fearfully sensitive. I'm trying my best ...
— In the Wilderness • Robert Hichens
... chose Les Artaud,' said the priest, breaking into another smile. 'You are very bad-tempered this morning, La Teuse. Are we not happy here? We have got all we want, and our life is as peaceful ...
— Abbe Mouret's Transgression - La Faute De L'abbe Mouret • Emile Zola
... a horse who displays temper on such occasions is naturally regarded as a nuisance and danger by the rest of the field. Besides, it must be remembered that nothing tends to spoil the nerves of any rider, man or woman, more than attempting to hunt in a big country like Leicestershire on a bad-tempered horse, and especially on a refuser which has a tendency to rear. On no account should a lady ride a roarer, although the artful dealer may assure her that the "whistle" which the animal makes, will be a secret unknown to any one except herself and ...
— The Horsewoman - A Practical Guide to Side-Saddle Riding, 2nd. Ed. • Alice M. Hayes
... and I said, 'No,' because my mistress had instructed me how to answer this question, if it was asked me. She taught me on ship-board what to say if I was taken to court. My mistress was an opium smoker, and she and her husband had awful quarrels, which made her bad-tempered, and then she would beat me for no reason. I used to get so tired working hard, and then she would beat me. She beat me with thick sticks of fire-wood. She would lay me on the bench, lift my clothes, and beat me on the back. Another day she would beat me thus ...
— Heathen Slaves and Christian Rulers • Elizabeth Wheeler Andrew and Katharine Caroline Bushnell
... kept the one small store at the Flats, lived in the one frame house that the place boasted, and was reputed to be worth an amount of money which, in half-breed eyes, was a colossal fortune. Old Auguste was black and ugly and notoriously bad-tempered. But ...
— Further Chronicles of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... lodgers," ses Joseph, who was looking very bad-tempered. "I should like to know wot right he 'as to come 'ere to welcome me ...
— Short Cruises • W.W. Jacobs
... my violence," Frere went on. "I'm bad-tempered, and I didn't like my wife interfering. Women, don't you know, don't see these things—don't understand these scoundrels." North again bowed. "Why, d—n it, how savage you look! Quite ghastly, bigod! I must have said most outrageous things. Forget and forgive, you know. ...
— For the Term of His Natural Life • Marcus Clarke
... doe and a fawn, came picking their way cautiously along the edge of the gully, sometimes flattening their ears, sometimes necks outstretched, ears forward, peering ahead at the young and bad-tempered pig. ...
— The Danger Mark • Robert W. Chambers
... not endure the dog, a fat, cross beast who snarled and yelped at her when she made his toilet, and who lay on his back with all his legs in the air and a most idiotic expression of countenance when he wanted something to eat, which was about a dozen times a day. The cook was bad-tempered, the old coachman was deaf, and Esther the only one who ever took any notice of the ...
— Little Women • Louisa May Alcott
... people in the street seemed no longer to look at her and her equipage at all. Worst of all, something of the meaning of this managed to penetrate her own mind. She caught now and again a dim glimpse of herself as others must have been seeing her for years—as a stupid, ugly, boastful, and bad-tempered old nuisance. And it was always as if she saw this in a mirror held ...
— The Damnation of Theron Ware • Harold Frederic
... want to warn you that I am a bad-tempered man. You can write home if you like and tell them that you met me coming out of the German Embassy and the Russian Embassy and the Italian Embassy, with a list of prices in my hands for different pieces of information. Is that ...
— The Mischief Maker • E. Phillips Oppenheim |
