"Bravado" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... as the little urchin with his tin sword. The centre figure of the High Sheriff, with his tattered and faded finery of office, is equally clever; but the skill with which the artist has contrived to express his forced mirth, and mopstick bravado, is still more forcible. The troubled countenance of the Lord Mayor is an excellent portrait of the indignation of little authority when perturbed by men of greater place. The faces of the turnkey and the sergeant ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 12, No. 336 Saturday, October 18, 1828 • Various
... was dared; and in a panic at sight of the mysteriously arriving troops, Von Kluck retreated from the Ourcq to the Aisne. It was when he heard how the trick had been played and won by sheer bravado, that he cried out in rage, "How could I count on such a coup? Not another military governor in a hundred would have risked throwing his whole force sixty kilometres from its base. How should I guess ...
— Everyman's Land • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... to Henry as having refused with a species of bravado. "He told me," says Sir John Wallop, "that he had announced previously that he would consent to no such interview, unless your Highness were also comprised in the same; and if it were so condescended that your Highness and he should be then together, yet you two should go after such a sort ...
— The Reign of Henry the Eighth, Volume 1 (of 3) • James Anthony Froude
... double canoe, in which were twenty or thirty people, appeared in sight. Our friends on board seemed much alarmed, telling us that these were their enemies. Two of them, the one with a spear, and the other with a stone-hatchet in his hand, mounted the arm- chests on the poop, and there, in a kind of bravado, bid those enemies defiance; while the others, who were on board, took to their canoe and went ashore, probably to secure ...
— A Voyage Towards the South Pole and Round the World, Volume 1 • James Cook
... my horrid little girl, who doesn't even want to marry.... If that's the truth, it would account for the Stephen Lumley business. Nan wouldn't stay on in London, to see them together. If Lumley caught her at that psychological moment, she'd very likely go off with him, out of mere desperation and bravado. That would be so terribly like Nan.... What a desperate, wry, cursed business life is.... On the other hand, she may just be going about with Lumley on her own terms not his. It's her own affair whichever way it is; what we've got to do is to contradict the stories Rosalind ...
— Dangerous Ages • Rose Macaulay
... every German institution in turn, the case is the same; and it is not a case of mere bloodshed or military bravado. The duel, for example, can legitimately be called a barbaric thing, but the word is here used in another sense. There are duels in Germany; but so there are in France, Italy, Belgium, Spain; indeed, there are duels wherever there are dentists, newspapers, ...
— New York Times, Current History, Vol 1, Issue 1 - From the Beginning to March, 1915 With Index • Various
... There was bravado here on his part, and nervousness to be discerned beneath it; for it is most certain that her reverie was not exactly as he would have it. Her chin was in her hand, her caught other hand lay idle in his own; ...
— Rest Harrow - A Comedy of Resolution • Maurice Hewlett
... this fooling," said the officer, with an attempt at bravado. "It's your turn, I'll admit; but ...
— Action Front • Boyd Cable (Ernest Andrew Ewart)
... 'This is mere bravado, Edgar,' was the grave answer, in a tone not disconcerted, but full of repression, and with a pale but steady countenance. 'Gloss it over as you will, a correspondence such as you have begun is unjustifiable. It risks damaging for ever the ...
— The Pillars of the House, V1 • Charlotte M. Yonge
... this last announced with shabby bravado as he stepped over the body in the doorway. "We are rid of that damned watch for a time. They won't return within half an hour at least. I have the dory moored amidships. If we are lively, this dirty job will be over in no time ...
— The False Faces • Vance, Louis Joseph
... his helpers in the work he wanted done. The man seemed to know instinctively where to put his hands on needed supplies, and the result was a virtual cage of strong oak bars enclosing the wireless room, and braces of oak to bar the single door. Thorpe was not assuming any bravado in his feeling of safety, but he was doing what he had done in many other tight corners, and he prepared his defences ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, June, 1930 • Various
... a marked contrast in their appearance that morning. Ralph Mainwaring betrayed a nervous excitement very unusual in one of his phlegmatic temperament; his face alternately flushed and paled, and though much of the old defiant bravado remained, yet he awaited the opening of proceedings with visible impatience. Nor was Mr. Whitney less excited, his manner revealing both agitation and anxiety. On the part of Harold Mainwaring and his counsel, however, there was no ...
— That Mainwaring Affair • Maynard Barbour
... once more. Both the Queen and the Prince saw the aim, as well as heard the shot, on this occasion, and she stooped, he pulling her down that the ball might pass over her head. In another moment the man, who still leant against the railing, pistols in hand, with much bravado and without any attempt to escape, was seized by a bystander. In the middle of the consternation and wrath of the gathering crowd, the Queen and the Prince went on to the Duchess of Kent that they might be the first ...
— Life of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen V.1. • Sarah Tytler
... statements, and the indifference with which she neglected to improve any strong points in her own favor—the indifference, as every heart perceived, of despairing grief. Then came the manners on the hostile side—the haggard consciousness of guilt, the drooping tone, the bravado and fierce strut which sought to dissemble all this. Not one amongst all the witnesses, assembled on that side, had (by all agreement) the bold natural tone of conscious uprightness. Hence it could not be surprising ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey
... window with a bang, and came down into the room below by a step-ladder. Then he took the bride by the hand, the young people of both sexes followed, and they all began to sing and chatter merrily, while the matrons sang in piercing voices, and shrieked with laughter in derision and bravado at those without who ...
— The Devil's Pool • George Sand
... contradicted, and the rumour circulated that it was a young merchant who had come into the enormous fortune and married the great ballet dancer, and that at the wedding the drunken young fool had burned seventy thousand roubles at a candle out of pure bravado. ...
— The Idiot • (AKA Feodor Dostoevsky) Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... the sofa in the small, shelved breakfast-room, and she shot these words at Edwin Clayhanger, who was standing near her. The singular words were certainly uttered out of bravado: they were a challenge to adventure. She thought: "It is madness for me to say such a thing." But such a thing had, nevertheless, come quite glibly out of her mouth, and she knew not why. If Edwin Clayhanger was ...
— Hilda Lessways • Arnold Bennett
... of later Rome—the Rome foredoomed to see Victor Emmanuel in the Quirinal, the Rome of abortive councils and unheeded anathemas. It rises there, gorgeous and useless, on its miasmatic site, with an air of conscious bravado—a florid advertisement of the superabundance of faith. Within it's magnificent, and its magnificence has no shabby spots—a rare thing in Rome. Marble and mosaic, alabaster and malachite, lapis and porphyry, incrust it from pavement to cornice and flash back their polished lights ...
— Italian Hours • Henry James
... he would, throw aside his trappings and wash from his face the paint which was to show the passion that he played. The thing takes hold and will not be thrown aside; it seems to seek revenge for the light assumption and punishes the bravado that feigned without feeling by a feeling which is not feint. She was now, for the moment if you will, but yet now, in earnest. Some wave of recollection or of fancy had come over her and transformed her jest. ...
— Simon Dale • Anthony Hope
... replied, "a cigarette. Henson handed it over to me. I don't deny that I was terribly frightened, I smoked the cigarette out of bravado." ...
— The Crimson Blind • Fred M. White
... mixture of prompt decision, far-sighted cunning, and mountebank bravado in this speech, staggered me for a moment—and only for a moment. The one question to consider was, whether I was justified or not in possessing myself of the means of establishing Laura's identity at the cost of allowing the scoundrel who had robbed her of it to ...
— The Woman in White • Wilkie Collins
... of her bravado, and her shots were the indication of her desperation. The memory of the wan face of Prebol brought down by her bullet was now ...
— The River Prophet • Raymond S. Spears
... scene, altogether,—Sartoris a huddled heap, cursing and snarling in his chair, the man Reggie and the woman Cora standing by, with uneasy grins on their faces, trying to carry it off in a spirit of false bravado. To the right of them stood Bentwood, now quite sober and shaking, and Richford sullen and despairing. Beatrice was in the shadow behind Mark Ventmore. Mary moved forward, ...
— The Slave of Silence • Fred M. White
... breathlessly. "Ah! that explains the foreign language—and I do not know Spanish." Then facing him again with an air and look that made him cower, in spite of his bravado, she sternly asked: "Why are ...
— True Love's Reward • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... Marguerite Blakeney at last, quietly, and without that touch of bravado which had characterised her attitude all along, "Chauvelin, my friend, shall we try to understand one another. It seems that my wits have become rusty by contact with this damp climate. Now, tell me, you are very anxious ...
— The Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... at the window, watching for Mr. Bolingbroke's return. "Here comes Mr. Bolingbroke!—How melancholy he looks!—Oh, my dear Griselda," cried she, stopping Mrs. Bolingbroke's hand as it ran gaily over the keys, "this is no time for mirth or bravado: let ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. 6 • Maria Edgeworth
... alone, Gabriella," begged Charley piteously. "I'd rather face bullets than Jane in an attack." His bravado had deserted him, and he appeared positively craven. The stiffness seemed to have gone not only out of his character, but out of his clothes also. Even his collar ...
— Life and Gabriella - The Story of a Woman's Courage • Ellen Glasgow
... returned with the shank of a ham and a loaf of bread. His fear was ill-disguised. The presence of the outlaw, if discovered, would bring him trouble; and Doble was so unruly he might out of sheer ennui or bravado let it be known ...
— Gunsight Pass - How Oil Came to the Cattle Country and Brought a New West • William MacLeod Raine
... picked up a large stone and sent it crashing, jumping, tearing down the hillside straight at him. All his bravado vanished like a wink. Up went his flag, and away he went over the logs and rocks of the great hillside; where presently I heard his mother running in a great circle till she found him with her nose, thanks to the wood wires and ...
— Types of Children's Literature • Edited by Walter Barnes
... wonderful, Mr. President, how entirely you have read my thoughts," said Benedetto, in his softest voice and most polite manner. "This is, indeed, the reason why I begged you to alter the order of the questions." The public astonishment had reached its height. There was no longer any deceit or bravado in the manner of the accused. The audience felt that a startling revelation was to follow this ...
— The Count of Monte Cristo • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... The object of the raid is yet a mystery. Time alone will develop the plan, if plan there was. Moving on with such a force, far from all support—at the very time, too, that Bragg's army was falling back and scattering—makes the affair look like one of simple bravado, as if the leader was willing to be captured, provided he could end his career in a blaze of excitement created by his dash and daring. But it is useless to speculate now. Broken into squads, some few of his men will doubtless escape across the river, ...
— History of Morgan's Cavalry • Basil W. Duke
... Bradley. He has rendered me so many kind services already that I am sure I might count upon him again, but this is a thing I should like to do for myself. I would not have my thanks chilled by even the passage from my heart to his." There was something like bravado in the glance that rested lightly on Bradley with this. One would have said that parley of hearts between them was not a thing that as a rule she courted. "I can only offer you my thanks, poor things to which we can give ...
— Hilda - A Story of Calcutta • Sara Jeannette Duncan
... had immediately dropped his arm, had shrugged his shoulders indifferently, and laughed scornfully. Now he remarked to Alix, with some bravado: ...
— Sisters • Kathleen Norris
... carry him so far as to make the venture; Kit Smallbones observed that he had a wife and children, and could not afford to risk his good right hand on a wandering soldier's bravado; Edmund was heard saying, "Nay, nay, Steve, don't be such a fool," but Stephen was declaring he would not have the fellow say that English lads hung back from what rogues of France ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... himself. For they badly needed a leader, these children; and Daddy just missed filling the position. He was too 'clever,' his imagination neither wild nor silly enough, for children. And he felt it. He threw off rhymes and stories for them in a spirit of bravado rather—an expression of disappointment. Yet there was passion in them too—concealed. The public missed the heart he showed them in his ...
— A Prisoner in Fairyland • Algernon Blackwood
... reconciliation, a white satin slipper, entirely covered with large diamonds. The count invited the King of Spain to visit his Mexican territories, assuring him that the hoofs of his majesty's horse should touch nothing but solid silver from Vera Cruz to the capital. This might be a bravado; but a more certain proof of his wealth exists in the fact, that he caused two ships of the line, of the largest size, to be constructed in Havana at his expense, made of mahogany and cedar, and presented them to the king. The present ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon de la Barca
... man, Hubert Long now carried a small pistol in his coat pocket, but being also a fearless, independent individual, he admitted all callers and exposed himself daily to the public. It wasn't entirely personal bravado, however. He knew from his years of intense, discreet research that the goon squads rarely made their attacks in the public eye. When they liquidated him he fervently hoped they would make this mistake and prove his point concerning ...
— The Deadly Daughters • Winston K. Marks
... that the tippin' sides wuz done through a mistake, and he wuz tryin' to cover it up with a mantilly of bravado and boastfulness. I agin kep' silence for quite a spell, and my next words, so fur as I remember 'em, wuz, "Where ...
— Samantha at Coney Island - and a Thousand Other Islands • Marietta Holley
... him began uttering, by means of his organs of speech, the most fearful blasphemies, words embodying conceptions which, had they come into his mind, he might indeed have borne with patience before this, or uttered in bravado, but which now filled him with inexpressible loathing, and a terror to which he had hitherto been quite a stranger. He had always in his heart believed in a God, but he now believed with a reality and intensity utterly ...
— Callista • John Henry Cardinal Newman
... she had ruined her life for a silly, shallow man, and that her false step had been foolish, base, and, indeed, accidental. The future seemed threatening; but she sought to dissipate her fears by obstinate bravado. ...
— Sanine • Michael Artzibashef
... he wrote home to his mother, "and believe me, there is something charming in the sound"—a bit of bravado which shows that Washington had not yet quite outgrown his boyhood. No doubt the bullets sounded much less charmingly five weeks later when he and his men, brought to bay in a rude fortification which he named Fort Necessity, were surrounded by a superior ...
— American Men of Action • Burton E. Stevenson
... very quickly upon his long walk. He could not but feel, notwithstanding his little bravado of indifference, that it was a very important decision, which he had made irrevocable by thus publishing it. For some time it had been a certainty in his mind; but nothing seems a certainty until it has been said, and now that it had been said, the thought that he had absolutely delivered himself ...
— A Country Gentleman and his Family • Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant
... the whole, such success attended his legislation, that every thing bore suddenly a new face in England: robberies and iniquities of all kinds were repressed by the punishment or reformation of the criminals [r]: and so exact was the general police, that Alfred, it is said, hung up, by way of bravado, golden bracelets near the highways; and no man dared to touch them [s]. Yet, amidst these rigours of justice, this great prince preserved the most sacred regard to the liberty of his people; and it ...
— The History of England, Volume I • David Hume
... whose unit swelled the host to crush out that brave old life, took from the scene inspiration enough to slay a merciful President in his unsuspecting leisure. Booth never referred to John Brown's death in bravado; possibly at that gallows began some such terrible purpose as he ...
— The Life, Crime and Capture of John Wilkes Booth • George Alfred Townsend
... of observation may be of value. She and A rowed ashore over the runners trailing in the water and with great difficulty succeeded in hacking off a few runners of the sprayed Grass. I thought her undertaking this hazard an absurd piece of bravado—she might just as well ...
— Greener Than You Think • Ward Moore
... day before arrived from the south-east, having joined the fishing tribe while they were at our present camp. These men of the south-east had a remarkable peculiarity of countenance, occasioned by high cheek-bones and compressed noses. We imagined we had met their bravado very successfully, for soon after they had been chased from our camp part of them crossed the country to the eastward, as if returning whence they came. They passed us at no great distance, but did not venture to make further ...
— Three Expeditions into the Interior of Eastern Australia, Vol 1 (of 2) • Thomas Mitchell
... there was almost an air of bravado in her glance. She had meant to tell him all; had begged him to listen, but since he preferred to question her before these men, and at the probable suggestion ...
— The Bondwoman • Marah Ellis Ryan
... concealed here too?" And forgetting that he was leaving a way of escape free, he rushed in the direction from which the sound came, and lunged at the tapestry-covered partition with his sword. Meantime the chevalier, dropping all his airs of bravado, sprang from one end of the room to the other like a cat pursued by a dog; but rapid as were his movements, the duke perceived his flight, and dashed after him at the risk of breaking both his own neck and the chevalier's by a chase through unfamiliar rooms and ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - LA CONSTANTIN—1660 • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... commanded the deliberate and cordial support of the community at large. There is a meretricious air over both; and there is apparent a popular inclination to condone rather than to take pride in these faits accomplis. The one excursion was a product of sportsmanlike bravado, fed on boyish exuberance, fomented for mercenary objects by certain business interests and place-hunting politicians, and incited by meretricious newspapers with a view to increase their circulation. The other was set afoot by interested businessmen, backed by politicians, seconded by newspapers, ...
— An Inquiry Into The Nature Of Peace And The Terms Of Its Perpetuation • Thorstein Veblen
... of bravado, but with a slightly accelerated heartbeat, Tunnygate thrust himself through the hole in the hedge and looked scornfully about the Appleboy lawn. A fierce rage worked through his veins. A lawn! What effrontery! What business had these condescending second-raters to presume to improve a ...
— Tutt and Mr. Tutt • Arthur Train
... Yiieh people spoke the same language; in which case the members of the ruling Wu caste who fled to Japan in 473 B.C. were probably not of the same race as the "savages around them." As an act of bravado, in 481, the King of Wu made five condemned centurions cut their own throats before the Tsin envoy, in order to show what effectively stern discipline he kept, In 484 the King of Yiieh had already committed a similar act of bravado; ...
— Ancient China Simplified • Edward Harper Parker
... than I can be sure of," he said. "I've been full of bravado with Paula, telling her how soon I was going to be back in harness again; cock-sure and domineering as ever, so that she'd better make hay while the sun shone. But it was I, nevertheless, who made her go home so that she could start to ...
— Mary Wollaston • Henry Kitchell Webster
... her hat on, rubbed her face, dusted and smoothed her dress, she stood looking at the burning furze. Restored to her town plumage, to her wonted bravado, she was more than ever like that old ...
— Tatterdemalion • John Galsworthy
... bravado was as much as we saw of the enemy at Virgin Bay; for next day we were recalled to headquarters, and gladly left that post to the care of the infantry. When we came to Rivas, we found many rumors about the enemy, but it was certain only that a bungo with natives from the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 26, December, 1859 • Various
... the dismal news. Would she become hysterical and go all to pieces? Would the prospect of a week of propinquity be too much for her, even though thick walls intervened to put them into separate worlds? Or, worst of all, would she reveal an uncomfortable spirit of bravado, rashly casting discretion to the winds in order to show him that she was not the timid, beaten coward he might suspect her of being? She had once said to me that she loathed a coward. I have always wondered how it felt to ...
— A Fool and His Money • George Barr McCutcheon
... of life and death. I am good for nothing but writing; and if you take that resource away,—you know what the book says about mischief and Satan and idle hands! and you certainly will take it away, if you do not speak peaceably unto me. All that I said before was only bravado,—just to keep a bold front to the foe. I can confide to you under the rose, that, though without are fightings, within are fears. Pope, was it, who used to look around upon the missives hurled at him, and say, "These are my amusement"? But they are not mine. I want ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 75, January, 1864 • Various
... to "notices to quit," and was able to extract their import from any verbiage whatever, so he drank by and to himself, and immediately sauntered out of town, with an air of bravado in his carriage, and a very lonesome look in ...
— Romance of California Life • John Habberton
... Wharton would have felt perfectly easy on the subject but for some odd bits of manner on Wilkins's part during the last forty-eight hours—whenever, in fact, the two men had run across each other in the House—marked by a sort of new and insolent good humour, that puzzled him. But there is a bravado of defeat. Yes!—he thought ...
— Marcella • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... which he had fallen. At least to the casual eye he seemed the same rich and powerful personage. An expert might have got at a good part of the truth from his somber eyes and haggard face, from the subtle transformation of the former look of serene pride into the bravado of pretense. And as, in a general way, the facts of his fall were known far and wide, all his acquaintances understood that his seeming of undiminished success was simply the familiar "bluff." Its advantage to him with them lay in its raising a doubt as to just what degree of disaster ...
— The Grain Of Dust - A Novel • David Graham Phillips
... being the most severe punishment Anthony Pye had ever undergone. Anne, even the stormy-souled Anne she was at that moment, could not have punished any child cruelly. But the pointer nipped keenly and finally Anthony's bravado failed him; he winced and the tears came ...
— Anne Of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... Chemical National Bank knows the amount of H2O that collateral will show on analysis. When he sat on my table he held one hand with the other to keep both from shaking. Whiskey. He had a spurious air of lightness and bravado about him that deceived no one, but was useful in his borrowing because it was so pitifully and ...
— Options • O. Henry
... which one strives to find some other way to an end than a hard and repugnant one, gave it up. He went up the avenue, holding his head up, digging his toes into the pine-needles, with an air of stubborn boyish bravado, yet all the time the nervous trembling never ceased. However, half-way up the avenue he came into one of those warmer currents which sometimes linger so mysteriously among trees, seeming like ...
— Jerome, A Poor Man - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... that this was a mere bravado, in the full confidence that no one would be found sufficiently foolhardy to engage to follow the example. It is needless to say, that the promise of laughing aloud could not have been performed; so that any one might have safely accepted the challenge, conditioning ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 1 • Robert Kerr
... treated as bravado by those who believed in his guilt and as vindication by those ...
— An American Suffragette • Isaac N. Stevens
... the famous Lord Baltimore he left Naples a few days after my friends, and travelled about Italy in his usual way. Three years later he paid for his British bravado with his life. He committed the wild imprudence of traversing the Maremma in August, and was ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... while we believed that some unpleasant incident must have occurred, we did not press her for the story of it. Then, you came, and without mincing your words you told the whole brutal truth; and you uttered it with a spirit of brutality and bravado that would be unbelievable under any other circumstances. And when, in your own self-abasement for what you had done, you confessed to the acts of which you were guilty toward Miss Langdon, you received, at Duncan's hands, the blow ...
— The Last Woman • Ross Beeckman
... made White Calf chief of his people and kept him so. He stood silent for a moment, his arms folded across his breast with that dramatic instinct never absent from the Indian's mind. When he spoke, the scorn and bravado in his voice were apparent, and his words were understood though his speech ...
— The Girl at the Halfway House • Emerson Hough
... not walk, so they carried him down to the lodge, and there, while waiting for a doctor to come, he sat looking death in the face, with the same desperate bravado that had marked his conduct all ...
— A Noble Woman • Ann S. Stephens
... we are again—the worst of us!" said the Duchess, presently, with a sigh of bravado, as she handed Lord Lackington his cup of tea and sank back in her chair ...
— Lady Rose's Daughter • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... It had been bravado with him up to the time that he knew this girl was coming out. After that, curiosity and a sense of fair play, mingled, had ensued. Then a new feeling had come after he had met the girl herself—pity, and ...
— The Sagebrusher - A Story of the West • Emerson Hough
... agreed, that the point of the coast which was signalized by the ridiculous bravado of Caligula, somewhat redeemed by the erection of a lighthouse, was Itium, afterwards called Gessoriacum, and Bononia (Boulogne), a town belonging to the Gaulish tribe of the Morini; where Julius Caesar embarked on his expedition, and which became the usual place of departure ...
— The Lives Of The Twelve Caesars, Complete - To Which Are Added, His Lives Of The Grammarians, Rhetoricians, And Poets • C. Suetonius Tranquillus
... exorbitant demands he was driven by the persistent vigour of Bonaparte's assaults. The little Corsican proved himself an expert in diplomatic wiles, now enticing the Imperialist on to slippery ground, and occasionally shocking him by calculated outbursts of indignation or bravado. After many days spent in intellectual fencing, the discussions were narrowed down to Mainz, Mantua, Venice, and the Ionian Isles. On the fate of these islands a stormy discussion arose, Cobenzl stipulating for their complete independence, while Bonaparte passionately claimed them ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... satisfaction of seeing the Brazilian in the church; for Crevel, now so entirely the husband, had invited him out of bravado. And the Baron's presence at the breakfast astonished no one. All these men of wit and of the world were familiar with the meanness of passion, ...
— Poor Relations • Honore de Balzac
... same time there was no air of bravado or insolence about that graceful pose and the quiet manner in which he was regarding them. Instead of that, the moonshiner was a living interrogation point, everything about him seeming to speak the question ...
— Frank Merriwell Down South • Burt L. Standish
... them into the boat, we thought there would then be no fear of our getting them and ourselves off. Though we wished to have kept this matter a close secret, it yet got to the ears of the Hollanders, who considered it a mere bravado, and did not therefore reveal it. The 21st November the Gentiles [Gentoos] held a solemn feast, which they celebrate three times a-year, always when the new moon happens on a Monday. At this time all the men and ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. VIII. • Robert Kerr
... was slung and ready. The gang on the other side were gesticulating, with random tugs at the line. There was something whimsical in the way the proposers of the project shrank the one behind the other, with assumed bravado and covert glances at each ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 10 • Various
... to no one," the plucky boy in the boat made answer, and with a parting shot and a laughing "Farvl!" he leaped from the sinking boat into the dancing Maelar water. Striking boldly out, he swam twice round the boat in sheer bravado, defying the enemy; now ducking to escape the pursuing stream, or now, while floating on his back, sending a return shot with telling force against the men at the pump—for he still clung to his ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... bravado, at the first smell of gunpowder, Thornton Rush threw down his firearms in a panic and ran as if from a sweeping tempest of fire and brimstone. Sleeping by day in hollow logs, traveling by night with haste and stealth, he made his way to ...
— Hubert's Wife - A Story for You • Minnie Mary Lee
... little sleep. Now he was at the bed of a little half-breed child, smoothing the straight black locks from the narrow brow; now at the cot of some hulking trapper, who wept at the pain, but died finally with a grin of bravado on his lips; now in a foul tepee, where some grave Pawnee wrapped his mantle about him, and gazed with prophetic and unflinching eyes into the land of ...
— A Mountain Woman and Others • (AKA Elia Wilkinson) Elia W. Peattie
... great deal of that sort of thing in Burns, and it is unsatisfactory, not because it is bacchanalian poetry, but because it has not that accent of sincerity which bacchanalian poetry, to do it justice, very often has. There is something in it of bravado, something which makes us feel that we have not the man speaking to us with his real voice: ...
— Selections from the Prose Works of Matthew Arnold • Matthew Arnold
... against him with an army, he should shut his gates, and we should find him at the door of his citadel with his drawn sword." There was "no mistake about that 'ere," as Sam Weller would say. However, most of us thought it was merely bravado, as our progress was not molested at all; this, however, was afterwards accounted for by the Khan's having called in all his fighting-men to ...
— Campaign of the Indus • T.W.E. Holdsworth
... in which she had given her own share in the action she gave Diane's. Shading her eyes with the hand-screen, she was able to watch his play of feature, and note how the first forced smile of bravado faded into ...
— The Inner Shrine • Basil King
... quite capable of dropping from the yard, passing under the ship's bottom, and coming up on the other side. A few days later the young officer actually did leap from the yardarm, the ship going fast through the water—not, however, as bravado, but to aid a seaman who had fallen overboard, and whom ...
— Types of Naval Officers - Drawn from the History of the British Navy • A. T. Mahan
... agitations upon such encounters did not last long. They blew off in a few thundering claps of bravado and defiance in the second parlour of the Phoenix, where he washed his hands and readjusted his wig and ruffles, and strutted forth, squaring his elbows, and nodding and winking at the sympathising waiters in the inn hall; and with ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... sauntering along with a pair of boots, his fingers thrust through the string of the parcel, whistling with an air of bravado. Now and again he makes a grimace and moves cautiously—when his trousers rub the sensitive spots of his body. He has had a bad day. In the morning he was passing a smithy, and allowed the splendid display of energy within, half in the firelight and ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo
... thing: it asked little of them, and they answered with little, and yet it ridiculed their offering. Such a paradox they could not understand, and therefore sank into listless indifference, or shiftlessness, or reckless bravado. There were, however, some—such as Josie, Jim, and Ben—to whom War, Hell, and Slavery were but childhood tales, whose young appetites had been whetted to an edge by school and story and half-awakened thought. Ill could they be content, ...
— The Souls of Black Folk • W. E. B. Du Bois
... last crumbs of her pride. She tried to straighten, to smile with her old bravado. What was that story she ...
— One Basket • Edna Ferber
... thinking for a longer time than usual before resuming her needlework. So, it became decidedly his trade, this night work in which one risks receiving the bullets of Spain's carbineers!—He had begun for amusement, in bravado, like most of them, and as his friend Arrochkoa was beginning, in the same band as he; then, little by little, he had made a necessity of this continual adventure in dark nights; he deserted more and more, for this rude trade, the open air workshop of the carpenter where she had placed him as ...
— Ramuntcho • Pierre Loti
... party starts about nine o'clock, and the departure should be surrounded with joyous shouts of bravado. After you have mounted your mule, or been laboriously hoisted aboard, let your conscience guide you as to your actions up and down the trail. When you top out at the end of the day and it is your turn to be unloaded, weakly drag your feet out of the stirrups, make sure that the guide is planted ...
— I Married a Ranger • Dama Margaret Smith
... probably not have acknowledged it if he had, smiled the indulgent smile of a self-satisfied superior and uttered a few equivocal sentences. This was gall and wormwood to Sweetwater, but he kept his temper admirably and, with an air of bravado entirely assumed for the occasion, said to ...
— Agatha Webb • Anna Katharine Green
... the whip relaxed, and he fell back a little in sheer astonishment at the bravado of the girl, ordinarily so quiet and self-contained. He was speechless for a second, and then recovered breath enough to shout to the terrified Patty: "I won't use the whip till I hear whether you've got any excuse for your scandalous ...
— The Story Of Waitstill Baxter • By Kate Douglas Wiggin
... said to Bosinney; "you'd better come back to dinner with us." Into that invitation he put a strange bravado, a stranger pathos: "You, can't deceive me," his look and voice seemed saying, "but see—I trust you—I'm not afraid ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... look in the young girl's eyes made the woman quail in spite of her bravado. "I—I do not care for my father's wealth, but that he should curse me—oh, that is too much—too much. Oh, God, let me die here and now, that I may follow him to the Great White Throne and there kneel before him and tell him ...
— Mischievous Maid Faynie • Laura Jean Libbey
... bravado entirely suited the ship's company, for one of the men who had heard the doughty captain's speech called for three cheers, which were given with ...
— For Love of Country - A Story of Land and Sea in the Days of the Revolution • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... he confessed. "I want you just to sit up and lose that unnatural look. I am not really full of cheap bravado, but I am a philosopher. Something has happened to postpone—the end. Good luck to ...
— The Zeppelin's Passenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... petty thing to have been pleased with at such a time, but I confess to have felt a thrill of satisfaction when I saw, as the Cuban passed me, that he held a cigarette between his lips, not arrogantly nor with bravado, but with the nonchalance of a man who meets his punishment fearlessly, and who will let his enemies see that they can kill but can not ...
— Cuba in War Time • Richard Harding Davis
... prestige of Spain, they believed that nothing could be done against her except by surprise, and they trembled to see their admiral thus recklessly fling his cards upon the table. But he knew what he was doing. As with sagacious bravado he had sprung ashore at Santa Marta, and had mocked the Spanish fleet in Cartagena harbor, so now before he struck he exulted that his unfleshed host should hear him shout "En garde!" to the King of Spain; that they should listen ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1-20 • Various
... creature had no witness; he acted alone and in obscurity, as always; he clandestinely introduced himself into the solitude of my lodge to deposit on my forehead a hideous kiss! I ask any disinterested person, for what purpose? It was not from bravado—no one saw him; it was not from pleasure—the laws of nature opposed it; it was not from friendship—I have but one enemy in the world—it is he. It must, then, be acknowledged that there is a mystery there which my reason cannot penetrate! Then to what does this diabolical ...
— The Mysteries of Paris V2 • Eugene Sue
... tell you all, and you listen Just as you used at home, and you let my sobs and my silence Speak, when the words will not come—and you understand and forgive me. —Ah! no, no! but I write, with the wretched bravado of distance, What you must read unmoved by the ...
— Poems • William D. Howells
... was thronged as on a fair day at noon. Most of the shops, especially those that dealt in provisions, were open and full of vociferous customers, while every alehouse was a pandemonium. The street was choked with townspeople and soldiery; lanterns flickered and torches flamed; oath and jest, bravado ...
— The Yeoman Adventurer • George W. Gough
... No bravado, no unmeasured vehemence of tone, but spoken as it would have been had the very weapon of death gleamed in ...
— A Life's Morning • George Gissing
... surprised. At the sound of a footfall or the soft creak of a plank I felt that I might lose all control and leap up and brain him with the heavy bottle in my grasp. I had an insane desire to spring at his throat and throttle his infamous bravado, tumble him overboard and annihilate the last vestige of ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1920 • Various
... acknowledging his high position as a member of the noble house of Cigala, from which it seems the island had received many great benefits. Leaving Sicily he next came to Rome, into which he made a public entry, and was warmly received by Clement IX., before whom, in bravado, he drew and flourished his dreadful scimitar in token of his defiance of the enemies of the Church. At last, after touching at Venice and Turin, he arrived in Paris, where he was received by the king according ...
— Celebrated Claimants from Perkin Warbeck to Arthur Orton • Anonymous
... falling with increasing power, held one key; the drip from the eaves and the irregular gush from a broken waterspout played separate tunes. I am well used to the night-time bravado of mice, who fight duels and sometimes pull shoes about, of the pranks of squirrels and other little wood beasts about the floor, but the noise that made me sit up in the cot and reach over until I could clutch Bart by the arm belonged to neither of these. There was a swishing ...
— The Garden, You, and I • Mabel Osgood Wright
... bravado, determined to strike while the iron was hot. 'What the Daily Telephone lacks is just one ...
— Miss Cayley's Adventures • Grant Allen
... be exceedingly pretty, and, God willing, I ought once to get sight of it. By all one can hear, the Italians certainly will attack the Austrians, if they are not told to leave it alone; Victor Emmanuel speaks openly of it, just as he did last year, when one also thought it was a mere bravado. Things look in most directions very gloomy; my neighbour is creating dangers for himself by the constitutional Government he gives to Italy. The French say, "Sommes-nous moins que les Italiens pour avoir ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume III (of 3), 1854-1861 • Queen of Great Britain Victoria
... the poultry yard, mamma, where I have been diverting myself with the bravado of the old gander. I did not observe him till he came toward me very fiercely, when, to induce him to pursue me, I ran from him. He followed, till, supposing he had beaten me, he returned to the geese, who appeared to receive him with acclamations of joy, cackling very loud, and seeming actually ...
— Composition-Rhetoric • Stratton D. Brooks
... only not hear of surrender, but looked upon as useless any further negotiations in matters of belief. He could not understand why his friends were detained any longer at Augsburg, where they had nothing to expect but menace and bravado on the part of their opponents. On July 15 he wrote to them: 'You have rendered unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's.... May Christ confess us, as you have confessed Him.... Thus ...
— Life of Luther • Julius Koestlin
... the sword, and that, in accordance with the character of his mission, he was directed, in his audience with Ivan, to present the letter with one hand while he held his unsheathed saber in the other. The officers of the imperial household assured him that such bravado would inevitably ...
— The Empire of Russia • John S. C. Abbott
... Captain John S. Mosby. By his sprightly appearance and conversation he attracted considerable attention. He is slight, yet well formed; has a keen blue eye, and florid complexion; and displays no small amount of Southern bravado in his dress and manners. His gray plush hat is surmounted by a waving plume, which he tosses as he speaks in real Prussian style. He had a letter in his possession from General Stuart, recommending him to the kind regards ...
— Three Years in the Federal Cavalry • Willard Glazier
... the truth, there was a little bravado in this, mingled with the stern courage that habit and nature had both contributed to lend the serjeant. The veteran knew the feebleness of his garrison, and fancied that warlike cries, from himself, might counterbalance the yells that were now rising from ...
— Wyandotte • James Fenimore Cooper
... about your family, Dix," the captain interrupted irritably, "but just at the present moment I am more interested in what is going on in my ship. I begin to believe that Mr. Crawshay's voyage through the air wasn't altogether a piece of bravado, after all." ...
— The Box with Broken Seals • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... boastful spirit incited him to show the world that he at any rate had not been vanquished by the financial crisis, and that the Buongiovannis had nothing to hide and nothing to blush for. To tell the truth, some people asserted that this bravado had not originated with himself, but had been instilled into him without his knowledge by the quiet and innocent Celia, who wished to exhibit her happiness ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... In the morning he had tossed the ticket aside, scornful and outraged by such a poor gesture of bravado. But the night brought the old restlessness. He was driven by curiosity that he believed was professional and impersonal. It was natural enough that he should want to see how a woman of her stuff acted under sentence of death. But once in the theatre h e ...
— The Dark House • I. A. R. Wylie
... over the surface of things is attested by the general mental ineptitude for the study of solid geometry. Depth and height play little part in our physical perception. For most of us the third dimension is practically unknown beyond the reach of a few feet. A Beachey soaring aloft - why all the bravado of curve and loop? Sooner or later he will fall to his death. Ay, verily! but his is a joyous martyrdom making for the evolution of consciousness. Not always shall we crawl like flies ...
— The Fourth Dimensional Reaches of the Panama-Pacific International Exposition • Cora Lenore Williams |
