"Grouch" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... was here on Friday.... Somehow I feel uneasy.... He has a way of smiling too brilliantly.... I suppose, after these experiences I'll remain a suspicious grouch all my life—but his papers were in order... I don't know just why I don't care for that type of man.... You're bound for somewhere or other via ...
— In Secret • Robert W. Chambers
... like water and spirits ran high. They joyfully toasted Wynne, and later on the news that Merriton imparted to them. In vain Dacre Wynne's low spirits were apparent. He must get over his grouch, that was all. Then once again the spirit of evil descended upon the gathering and it was Stark who precipitated its flight. "By the way, Nigel," he asked suddenly, "isn't there some ghost story or other pertaining to your district? Give us ...
— The Riddle of the Frozen Flame • Mary E. Hanshew
... external to himself and his food and drink penetrates to his intelligence he makes a flurried fool of himself, rushing madly and frantically here and there in a hysterical effort either to destroy or get away from the cause of disturbance. He is the incarnation of a living and perpetual Grouch. ...
— The Land of Footprints • Stewart Edward White
... you'd get over it. I think even the Judge will get over it. I don't believe he'd care anyhow, if it wasn't for his old grouch ...
— The Readjustment • Will Irwin
... his own discomfiture at Maria Theresa's coldness with numerous visits to the grill. The result was a morning "grouch," an afternoon headache, and a twilight bitterness which kept him permanently ...
— The Ghost Breaker - A Novel Based Upon the Play • Charles Goddard
... 'Got a grouch tonight, haven't you? You seem all flittered up about something. What's the trouble? Sore about my not showing up at your apartment? I'll explain that ...
— The Little Nugget • P.G. Wodehouse
... next town every man in the show had a grouch and a Katzenjammer, and their hair was so sore it was murder and suicide combined ...
— Peck's Bad Boy at the Circus • George W. Peck
... world's record for the standing broad grin. There isn't a minute of the day that fails to find him glad that he's alive. Nobody ever saw him with a "grouch," or suffering from an attack of the "blues." Nobody ever heard him mention "hard luck" in connection with one of his failures. The worse the breaks of the game, the gloomier the outlook, the wider his grin. ...
— Laugh and Live • Douglas Fairbanks
... go to sleep and forget them both, and the trains and the cars and the man in the park and Miss Stein, who still had against her a "grouch." If only she could forget even big, blundering Ursus, who wanted to treat her to oyster stews that he couldn't afford and take her to a dance hall next Sunday! And Sadie, too, who knew such strange and awful things about the world and life, ...
— Winnie Childs - The Shop Girl • C. N. Williamson
... You ought to thank the old grouch for calling you up. He put two secret service men on the train with Flynn? Just like Hite. You'll have to admit that it takes a newspaper man to ...
— Death Points a Finger • Will Levinrew
... of stable odors, rice powder and cosmetics; at night she had to accompany her daughter and her granddaughter on walks, and to cafes and theatres, on the hunt and capture of the kid, as it was put by the travelling salesman who suffered from his stomach,—a fellow half humorist and half grouch. When they were in the house Celia and Irene, the daughter and the granddaughter of Dona Violante, kept bickering at all hours; perhaps this continuous state of irritation derived from the close quarters in which they lived; perhaps so much passing as sisters in the eyes of others had convinced ...
— The Quest • Pio Baroja
... limit," said Melissa flatly. "The worst grouch I've ever seen, Mr. Bingle, even if he is your own flesh and blood uncle. He's almost as bad as ...
— Mr. Bingle • George Barr McCutcheon
... mean Harold, of course," said Harriet. "He's gone around all winter with a grouch and a face a mile long. What's the matter with ...
— The Efficiency Expert • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... right. You've got a grouch. Come with me and walk it off," Neil said uneasily, but he did not press the invitation, and his friend had little more to say. His silence was perhaps the most unusual thing about his behaviour, which ...
— The Wishing Moon • Louise Elizabeth Dutton
... been decent," mused Tom, on his way back, after settling the score, "he could have shown us the way through his hay field, and we might have gotten into the Hall on time. The old grouch!" ...
— Tom Fairfield's Pluck and Luck • Allen Chapman
... get over your grouch," a third adjured him. "You are worse than O'Brien was, the morning after he was shoved in kink. Were you in Cape ...
— On the Firing Line • Anna Chapin Ray and Hamilton Brock Fuller
... the Centipede fixed that! Don't you see? This was their seat! They leaned out of this place as I leaned out just now, and they gripped the ankles of any poor devil they had a grouch against. It ...
— The White Waterfall • James Francis Dwyer
... slower breathing. But not all investigators have got these results; and, anyway, it would be impossible to generalize to the extent of asserting that slow heart beat always gave a pleasant state of feeling, and rapid heart beat an unpleasant; for there is slow heart beat during a "morning grouch", and rapid during joyful expectation. Or, in regard to breathing, try this experiment: hasten your breathing and see whether a feeling of pleasantness results; slacken it and see whether unpleasantness results. The fact is that pleasantness can go with a wide range of organic states, ...
— Psychology - A Study Of Mental Life • Robert S. Woodworth
... to preserve one's dignity when suffering a reprimand in public; but when you are handicapped by a shabby bath-robe, a three days' growth of beard, and a grouch that gives you the expression of a bandit, and the public happens to be the one being on earth whom you are most anxious to please, the situation ...
— Quin • Alice Hegan Rice
... why they ain't in other places. It minds me iv what happened wanst in me cousin Terence's fam'ly. They was livin' down near Healey's slough in wan iv thim ol' Doherty's houses,—not Doherty that ye know, th' j'iner, a good man whin he don't dhrink. No, 'twas an ol' grouch iv a man be th' name iv Malachi Doherty that used to keep five-day notices in his thrunk, an' ownded his own privit justice iv th' peace. Me cousin Terence was as dacint a man as iver shoed a hor-rse; an his wife was a good woman, too, though I niver took much to ...
— Mr. Dooley in Peace and in War • Finley Peter Dunne
... that the ton rate had been jumped a couple of cents. And now it had been almost doubled. No wonder he wanted a confab with Marcus T. on the subject. And, from where I stood, it looked like he ought to have it, grouch ...
— The House of Torchy • Sewell Ford
... pityingly. "Go and apologize and make friends again, Terry. You've got a grouch, that's all. These women have the virtue of humanity, with less of its faults than any folks I ever saw. As for patience—they'd have pitched us over the cliffs the first day we lit among 'em, if they ...
— Herland • Charlotte Perkins Stetson Gilman
... he didn't seem to care so much today. Watching practice had brought back the smart, and being liked or disliked seemed a little thing beside the bigger trouble. Still, he thought, if Roy was right perhaps he had better meet fellows half-way. There was no use in being a grouch. As a starter and in order to test the accuracy of Roy's statement, he decided that he would drop in on Carl Bennett, who roomed in Number 3. Bennett was a chap he rather respected and, while they had never been very close ...
— Left Guard Gilbert • Ralph Henry Barbour
... a grouch, eh, what? He's getting a bit squiffy, if you ask me," suggested Norvil Thayre to the group centered where the punch-bowl was being administered. Norvil Thayre was not having a grouch. If he had ever had a grouch he had kept his ...
— Destiny • Charles Neville Buck
... whom I never spoke to—it is strictly against rules for a prisoner to speak with a visitor—and never knowingly saw, though I understand she was wont to sit on the stage during the Sunday exercises. She is thus quoted: "Julian Hawthorne is nothing more than an old grouch. A short time ago this old man told me himself that he was getting plenty to eat and had no complaint to make of his own or anybody else's treatment in the prison.... When he says such things as he is reported to have said, he should be made to prove them, or keep his mouth shut." Warden Moyer ...
— The Subterranean Brotherhood • Julian Hawthorne
... little sick of your wood-carving, while you stuck around by your lonesome and watched him—eh?" Danglar's tones were jocularly facetious. "Don't grouch, Skeeny! We're not killing for fun—it doesn't pay. Supposing anything had broken wrong up the Avenue—eh? We wouldn't have had our friend the Sparrow there for the next ...
— The White Moll • Frank L. Packard
... of steam and every bit of confidence we've got into it and make it win. That goes for me, and for the principals, and right down through to the last girl in the chorus. Every night there'll be a new audience out there that you will have to fight—shake up out of the grouch they get when they pay for their tickets; persuade to laugh and loosen up and come ...
— The Real Adventure • Henry Kitchell Webster
... has made the difference in these two men? Their thoughts have made the difference. The grouch has, for years, entertained grouchy thoughts. The sunshiny man has cultivated the habit of seeing the bright side of things. That's ...
— Crayon and Character: Truth Made Clear Through Eye and Ear - Or, Ten-Minute Talks with Colored Chalks • B.J. Griswold
... "Oh, that's your grouch, is it?" cried Martin. "Forgive me; here's my pouch, old chap; or wait, here's something altogether finer than anything you've been accustomed to. I was at old Kingston's last night, and the old boy would have me load up with his finest. You know I've been working with him this summer. Awfully ...
— Corporal Cameron • Ralph Connor
... He must be getting queer like all other hermits he had ever heard of. It occurred to him that possibly Marion Rose was not really feather-brained, but that the trouble was in himself, because he was getting a chronic grouch. ...
— The Lookout Man • B. M. Bower |
