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Mirthless   Listen
Mirthless

adjective
1.
Lacking mirth.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Mirthless" Quotes from Famous Books



... one blow for freedom, took it with a virtuous shudder from the hands of their daughters. I was pronounced unwholesome and depraved; even my personal character was torn into shreds. How odd it all seems!" she added, with a light, mirthless laugh. "It was you who put into their hands the weapon with which to scourge me. Their trim, self-satisfied little sentences of condemnation are emasculated versions of your judgment. It is you whom I have to thank for the closing ...
— Berenice • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... glance at the mirthless face of the reverend gentleman beside her, she added, "And on the dome of the college shall be a colossal statue of Father Burke, in solid gold. He has not uttered a word in half ...
— The Pines of Lory • John Ames Mitchell

... can do that, I'll keep my mouth shut," chuckled Hank in his mirthless way; "but if I don't get some money pretty quick, I'm going to make trouble fer somebody, I ...
— The Boy Scouts of the Eagle Patrol • Howard Payson

... and now sit I, As Philomela (on a thorn, Turned out of nature's livery), Mirthless, alone, and all forlorn: Only she sings not, while my sorrows can Breathe forth such notes as fit ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 2 (of 4) • Various

... Kirkwood, come!" its mirthless accents rallied him. "Have you no welcome for me?—you, who have been permitted to live the quarter of a century without making my acquaintance? Surely, now, it's high time we were learning something of one another, ...
— The Black Bag • Louis Joseph Vance

... usual dry, mirthless laugh, he greeted Dan with forced effusiveness, urging him to take a chair, declaring that he hardly knew him, that he thought he was at Gordon's Mills fishing. Then he entered at once into a glowing description of the splendid prayer meeting they had held ...
— The Calling Of Dan Matthews • Harold Bell Wright

... puzzlement, surprise, and understanding. At times a passion wrote itself on the face of the Indian, and a sympathy on the face of La Flitche. Again, by look and gesture, St. Vincent was referred to, and once a sober, mirthless laugh shaped the ...
— A Daughter of the Snows • Jack London

... you I am," he repeated with a mirthless laugh. "Don't you suppose I ought to know? I want to get out of bullet range every time I'm shot at. And—if anybody ever turns coward, I prefer that it should be trooper Ormond, not trooper Berkley. And that is the ...
— Ailsa Paige • Robert W. Chambers

... was as mirthless as the cackle of a guinea hen. "But I 'm going to die hard, believe me! And if I go down, if they think they can throw me on that, I 'm going to take a few of my ...
— Never-Fail Blake • Arthur Stringer

... and sought him. Three of them overtook him within a rod of the station. The Kid turned and showed his teeth in that brilliant but mirthless smile that usually preceded his deeds of insolence and violence, and his pursuers fell back without making it necessary for him even ...
— Roads of Destiny • O. Henry

... laugh of ribald coquetry, turned to answer him. "You yourself never loved. You never love!" On this the other women joined, and such a mirthless, hard, soulless laughter rang through the room that it almost made me faint to hear. It seemed ...
— Dracula • Bram Stoker

... shadowy distinctness, his angle of vision twisted and maimed by the demon of the bottle. The candlestick loomed strangely forth from the still grayness; the bottle took form; the yellowed paper glimmered on the table. Carl stirred and a spasm of mirthless laughter ...
— Diane of the Green Van • Leona Dalrymple

... done for their material condition. The possibility of amusement only begins when we have reached the level of the well fed. Great Gaster will let no one enjoy play who is hungry. Would it be possible, one asks in curiosity, to stop the noisy and mirthless laughter of these girls with a hot supper of chops fresh from the grill? Would they, if they were first well fed, incline their hearts to rest, reflection, instruction, and a little music? The cheap excursions, the school feasts, ...
— As We Are and As We May Be • Sir Walter Besant

... overworked phrase, "frozen with amazement." Before him stood the most dangerous man in Europe; a man who had done murder and worse; a man only in name, a demon in nature. His long black eyes half-closed, his perfectly chiselled ivory face expressionless, and his blood-red lips parted in a mirthless smile, Antony Ferrara watched Cairn—Cairn whom he had sought to murder by means ...
— Brood of the Witch-Queen • Sax Rohmer

... transit with a mirthless chuckle. "You're right," he said, "dead right. You simply don't know me any more, my dear—you musn't; you can't afford to any more than I ...
— The Fortune Hunter • Louis Joseph Vance

... to work off the hollow, mirthless laugh dodge on me," I said, "because it won't do. You're a blackguard, and ...
— Not George Washington - An Autobiographical Novel • P. G. Wodehouse

... The mirthless, bilious cackle of Jankiel interrupted. "I know a thing or two," he exclaimed; "I knew that you, Abraham, would not easily agree to it. I shall manage that ...
— An Obscure Apostle - A Dramatic Story • Eliza Orzeszko

... flit down the aisle, saw her jump up the little ladder onto the stage, watched her vanish into the swirl of the dance. He reached for a cigarette, opened his case, and found it empty. He uttered a mirthless, Byronic laugh. The thing seemed to ...
— The Little Warrior - (U.K. Title: Jill the Reckless) • P. G. Wodehouse

... reply. "I should like to see the ranch. I may—I will—That is, if I—" He stopped as if not knowing how to finish, and with a gesture of hopelessness turned away to stand silently looking back toward the town, while his face was dark with painful memories, and his lips curved in that mirthless, self-mocking smile. ...
— When A Man's A Man • Harold Bell Wright

... I say, Tom. I'm only a plain man, and my tongue will say what comes uppermost! But it ain't from the soul, Tom, it ain't from the soul," said Peter, punning feebly, and letting a mirthless smile play over his sallow features. "You know Mr. ...
— The Grey Wig: Stories and Novelettes • Israel Zangwill

... leveled the revolver, grinning with the mirthless lust of battle, and fired over the top of the table. The guns dropped from the hands of huge Diaz. He caught at his throat and staggered back the full length of the room, crashing against the wall. When he pitched forward on his face he was dead ...
— Riders of the Silences • John Frederick

... rather made me pause. But sanity asserting its sway at once I left the verandah after giving him a mirthless smile. In a few strides I found myself in the dining room, now cleared and empty. But during that short time various thoughts occurred to me, such as: that Giles had been making fun of me, expecting some amusement at my ...
— The Shadow-Line - A Confession • Joseph Conrad

... A fleeting contortion, like mirthless ridicule, touched her lips as she saw him, with head lowered, cut more savagely into the piece of wood. She noticed, ...
— No Clue - A Mystery Story • James Hay

... mirthless, mocking laugh. It is astonishing, sometimes, how deeply a man may be hurt through his vanity. Rosemary had turned away, and he ...
— Master of the Vineyard • Myrtle Reed

... towards him, laughed a low, noiseless, mirthless laugh for a moment, and then said, in a hollow, far-away voice that had no lungs behind it: "I am done with ...
— The Face And The Mask • Robert Barr

... was cloudy and moonless. In the dense gloom within I could distinctly feel that a woman was lying on her face on the carpet below the bed—clasping and tearing her long dishevelled hair with desperate fingers. Blood was tricking down her fair brow, and she was now laughing a hard, harsh, mirthless laugh, now bursting into violent wringing sobs, now rending her bodice and striking at her bare bosom, as the wind roared in through the open window, and the rain poured in torrents and soaked her through ...
— The Hungry Stones And Other Stories • Rabindranath Tagore

... foreign territory on such a mission." Longorio again bent his brilliant eyes upon Alaire. "I see that you are concerned for his safety. You would not desire him to come to trouble, eh? He has done you favors; he is your friend, as I am. Well"—a mirthless smile exposed his splendid white teeth—"we must think of that. Now I will ...
— Heart of the Sunset • Rex Beach

... feebly, an unfriendly, unresponsive, mirthless smile, as was his wont when he was in the presence of people ...
— Changing Winds - A Novel • St. John G. Ervine

... these cayuses. I'd like to have them all tied up here for a while. I've got a few things to say to them. They'd have to listen whether they wanted to or not if they were all in the same fix that fellow is," he added with a short, mirthless laugh. ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in Montana • Frank Gee Patchin

... chap gave one of those mirthless laughs. He was looking anxious and worried, like a man who has done the murder all right but can't think what the deuce to ...
— My Man Jeeves • P. G. Wodehouse

... worse.... Yet he was not Harleston; there never was but one equal to Harleston, and that one was lost to her. She shut her lips tightly and a far-away look came into her eyes. And now Harleston, too, was lost to her; and—she lifted her hands resignedly, and laughed a mirthless laugh. As she came back to reality, she met Marston's curiously courteous glance with ...
— The Cab of the Sleeping Horse • John Reed Scott

... that her central idea was all right, which was true, since it was a love story, but that it had not been properly developed and that she needed to study. She thanked me for my counsel and said she would rewrite it. I wish it might be printed just as it was, however, for it is indeed a sodden and mirthless world in which we live ...
— Threads of Grey and Gold • Myrtle Reed

... hoarsely. He gave her a mirthless smile, and spying the crap-dealer leaving his bankrupt table, called him over ...
— The Spoilers • Rex Beach

... she had laughed—that same peculiar mirthless little laugh—when he drove past her and splashed her with mud on the road. "It never seems to occur to you that I may have some little wants of my own, Dan," she said; "you ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand

... he replied, gazing steadily at her without feeling or resentment and speaking slowly, "yes, I'm an 'ign'rant, savage, stupid brute,'" deliberately accenting each word as he repeated the stinging phrase, "—but—what's the use?" he finished with a mirthless laugh. "Anyhow," he added, glancing again at the cat and Skinny's futile efforts to catch it, "I ain't interferin' this time, at least, with that ...
— The Ramblin' Kid • Earl Wayland Bowman

... where formerly he had seen a blank wall, he saw an open door! Passing this, he discovered himself in the cave of the golden dragon. Ho-Pin, dressed in a perfectly fitting morning coat and its usual accompaniments, received him with a mirthless smile. ...
— The Yellow Claw • Sax Rohmer

... mirthless grin, "You're a prisoner. And you're goin' to stay here until the cops let Dimitri Mirov go. It's up to you how fast ...
— Tom Swift and the Electronic Hydrolung • Victor Appleton

... piteous tale with tears and passion, protesting that he had succumbed only before the combined attack of twenty armed men, and exhibiting his wounds. But the girl gave a brief and mirthless laugh. ...
— Jason • Justus Miles Forman

... the other day," said Dunlavey after he had become seated. He smiled with his lips, his eyes glittering again. "I'll say that we got acquainted then. There ain't no need for us to shake hands now." He showed his teeth in a mirthless grin. "I didn't know you then, but I know you now. ...
— The Coming of the Law • Charles Alden Seltzer

... shall be dead then," says she, with a rather mirthless laugh this time. "Do you know that you and Aunt Jane are the only two people in all London ...
— A Little Rebel - A Novel • Margaret Wolfe Hungerford

... with wild laughter, and, laughing, eyed with mirthless merriment the look of horror with which Janet was regarding her. "Ha, ha, ha!" she screamed, "it's to be a clean sweep o' the Gourlays! Ha, ha, ha! it's to be a ...
— The House with the Green Shutters • George Douglas Brown

... his hand, as one drowning grips anything offered—gripped till he winced. She laughed a loud mirthless laugh, that came pouring like a sob from ...
— The Quest of the Silver Fleece - A Novel • W. E. B. Du Bois

... liked to rest after his labors and find amusement in a circle of friends, and his guests, understanding his wish, tried to enliven him and amuse themselves. But their gaiety seemed to Prince Andrew mirthless and tiresome. Speranski's high-pitched voice struck him unpleasantly, and the incessant laughter grated on him like a false note. Prince Andrew did not laugh and feared that he would be a damper on the spirits of the company, but no one took any ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy

... with a mirthless grin. "I am to accept the brief custody of this gem as a recognition of my personal integrity. I see, I see. Well, I would appreciate the courtesy more if I could indorse its incaution. However," he added abruptly, ...
— The Flaw in the Sapphire • Charles M. Snyder

... answers, in a strange, mirthless tone, while there is a smile on her dry lips. "You must care for him so much that he cannot help loving you. Oh, my darling, the only joy of all this ...
— Floyd Grandon's Honor • Amanda Minnie Douglas

... in the high cracked voice rang from the bare walls and bare floors as he tossed the scalps from him, and sat down, laughing silently in painful, mirthless fashion, his toothless jaw quivering, and his shaking hands groping for the arms ...
— His "Day In Court" - 1895 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)

... he replied with quiet conviction. "He wouldn't pay. He said he wouldn't, last time. And he meant it.... You'd better have let me blow out my brains while I was about it, Ann"—with, a mirthless laugh. ...
— The Vision of Desire • Margaret Pedler

... face in the clock could only speak as well as goggle its eyes!" he said, with a mirthless smile. "We should learn something then. What's the idea of it all—the rolling eyes, the moon, the stars, and a verse as lugubrious as a Presbyterian sermon on infant damnation. The whole ...
— The Moon Rock • Arthur J. Rees

... Van Lennop! Ah, that was it. She remembered now. She had broken down his prejudice; she had partially won him over; she had been the "hit" of the evening; further conquests were in sight and within easy reach if she played her cards right. And Essie Tisdale—her long upper lip stretched in its mirthless smile—she would not have her feelings this ...
— The Lady Doc • Caroline Lockhart

... surprise, yes? You carry your meddling outside of your newspaper work, eh? I leave behind me an old wife in the morning and in the evening, presto! I find a young bride. Wonderful!—but wonderful!" He laughed an unmusical and mirthless laugh. ...
— Dawn O'Hara, The Girl Who Laughed • Edna Ferber

... she got nothing but wind and chaff and heavy laughter, the laughter of yokels at old jokes, a mirthless and primitive sound like the cries ...
— Main Street • Sinclair Lewis

... want to be crazy—I don't know what I want," said Helena petulantly. Her chin went into her hands, and she stared wide-eyed at the breaking surf. "I wonder what it all means?" she murmured, with a mirthless little laugh. ...
— The Miracle Man • Frank L. Packard

... jolly good mind," said Plummer, "to do it myself!" He uttered a short, mirthless laugh. "Well, anyway," he said recklessly, "I'll jolly well go downstairs ...
— A Damsel in Distress • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse

... suddenly laughed. It was a dry, mirthless sort of laugh. "Looks like the Negroes are getting all the latest notions of progress, too. I must have put ...
— Stubble • George Looms

... a dry, mirthless laugh. For a long time they tramped in silence. Then Diana said, "We've been out ...
— The Enchanted Canyon • Honore Willsie Morrow

... at her use of this last word—the same little mirthless laugh that she had uttered before—Jacqueline went away, followed by the admiring glances of the other girls, who from behind the bars of their cage noted the brilliant plumage of this bird who was at liberty. She ...
— Jacqueline, Complete • (Mme. Blanc) Th. Bentzon

... neither man made any move toward shaking hands, although it was obvious that they were acquainted, at least. The great detective's tone when he greeted his visitor was as distinctly ironical as the latter's was uneasy, although he replied with a mirthless chuckle, which was intended ...
— The Crevice • William John Burns and Isabel Ostrander

... in the direction of the committee tent. Only when the black mass had packed itself in solid phalanges about that ring, inside which, just a year ago, he had stood in very different circumstances, and was at length still, a wintry smile played for a moment about his lips. He laughed a mirthless laugh. ...
— Bob, Son of Battle • Alfred Ollivant

... wrong with him. A deadly evenness. That's why I read him here. The noise of this place breaks the rhythm. He's tolerable here." Soames took up the book and glanced through the pages. He laughed. Soames's laugh was a short, single, and mirthless sound from the throat, unaccompanied by any movement of the face or brightening of the eyes. "What a period!" he uttered, laying the book down. And, "What ...
— Enoch Soames - A Memory of the Eighteen-nineties • Max Beerbohm

... the boy flushed at the disagreeable ring of it. The sound was not loud but flat and mirthless, the syllables distinct and evenly spaced. His white even teeth remained tight-closed and showed in flashing contrast to his swarthy face and black mustache. Morrow's face wore none of the active malignancy that stamps the features of those uncontrolled desperadoes who ...
— The Settling of the Sage • Hal G. Evarts

... from the judge's lips—words that branded De Ganache with unutterable infamy—the miserable man looked around him like an animal at bay; and then, a madness coming upon him, he broke out into peal after peal of harsh, mirthless laughter—laughter that seemed to come from the grave and beyond; and, laughing thus, they led him away. When he was gone De Mouchy pointed to Ferrieres as he ...
— Orrain - A Romance • S. Levett-Yeats

... for being worried," suggested Bart, with an attempt at a laugh that was rather mirthless. "Maybe he's ...
— Frank Roscoe's Secret • Allen Chapman

... Melicent," the Jew said, "I make no songs, no protestations, no phrases. My deeds must speak for me. Concede that I have laboured tirelessly." He paused, his gaze lifted, and his lips smiled. His eyes stayed mirthless. "This mad Callistion's hate of you, and of the Demetrios who had abandoned her, was my first stepping-stone. By my advice a tiny wire was fastened very tightly around the fetlock of a certain horse, between the foot and the heel, and the hair was smoothed over this wire. ...
— Domnei • James Branch Cabell et al

... Oxford there was a world of skull-breaking; and at Ipswich the festival was celebrated by some loss of life. Canterbury especially distinguished itself by its violent opposition to the municipal order to be mirthless. There was a combat there, which was most rudely maintained, and in which the mayor got pummelled until he was as senseless as a pocket of hops. The mob mauled him terribly, broke all his windows, as well as his bones, and, as ...
— Christmas: Its Origin and Associations - Together with Its Historical Events and Festive Celebrations During Nineteen Centuries • William Francis Dawson

... exultantly conscious that a new duty and a new delight had come to me: some great thing, given of God—a work to do, a happiness to cherish. And that night he came and went in my dreams—but glorified: his smile not mirthless, his grave, gray eyes not overcast, his face not flabby and flushed, his voice not slow and sad, but vibrant with fine, live purpose. My waking thought was the wish that the man of the hills might be the man of my vision; ...
— Doctor Luke of the Labrador • Norman Duncan

... laughed again her caustic, mirthless laugh. "No! My acquaintance with Brennerstadt is of a less amusing nature. When I go there, I merely go to be ill, and as soon as I am partially recovered, I come back—to this." There was inexpressible ...
— The Top of the World • Ethel M. Dell

... talkin' about." Sarah paused to laugh in mirthless discordance. "Watch for the babies to come. They come faster than wages raise ...
— The Valley of the Moon • Jack London

... thousands were congregated, the air was thick with the vermilion dust. From the water's edge up the steps to the palaces and temples and houses at the top, the terraces swarmed with thousands of people, and the talk and mirthless laughter rose and fell like the continuous clamour from ...
— From Edinburgh to India & Burmah • William G. Burn Murdoch

... the news," he replied with a quick, mirthless laugh, wholly unlike his usual light-hearted gaiety. "He had to ask me where to find Jeanne, for I alone knew where she was. As for Armand, they'll not worry about him whilst I am here. Another reason why I must bide a while longer. But in the meanwhile, dear, I pray you find Mademoiselle ...
— El Dorado • Baroness Orczy

... All laughed. Mirthless high malicious laughter. Armstrong looked round at his classmates, silly glee in profile. In a moment they will laugh more loudly, aware of my lack of rule and of ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce

... far as I am concerned,"—she said, with a little mirthless laugh—"Only I think you behaved very oddly this afternoon. Do you really mean that you object to Bridge on Sundays, or was it only a ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli

... passion clamoured in my breast, For mirthless laughter, and I laughed; In mine the phantom's cold hand pressed A cup, and in self's spite I quaffed. It clung like slime; 'twas black like ink: Death is less ...
— Successful Recitations • Various

... has happened to me," he said with a hard, mirthless laugh, "for out of the most perfect beauty I have only succeeded in ...
— Ziska - The Problem of a Wicked Soul • Marie Corelli

... a hard, mirthless fashion. "That cured me. The Lee family is from Missouri. When I talk next time I'll have ...
— Brand Blotters • William MacLeod Raine

... a mirthless fashion; but he was too miserable to be amused. While the men talked, black jealousy had crept around the old magnolia and linked arms with him. Twice in the same evening this name had crossed him. Who the devil was this Jim Byrd? ...
— Princess • Mary Greenway McClelland

... the last few months provided him with sustenance. It was of course a trifle, but it tipped the beam, as trifles often do, and the man who was tired of all it symbolized straightened himself with a little mirthless laugh. ...
— Winston of the Prairie • Harold Bindloss

... days he had been fighting the desert; and in the serene calm of his eyes was the identical indomitability that had been in them when he had set forth. As he peered westward the strong lines around his mouth relaxed, his lips opened a trifle, and a mirthless smile wreathed them. He patted the shoulder of the black horse, and the dead dust ballooned from the animal's coat and ...
— 'Drag' Harlan • Charles Alden Seltzer

... ill in my life, so I have no idea how the role of invalid would suit me," she answered with a mirthless laugh, thinking how very pleasant a stroll in the woods would have been after her long, hard day of ...
— A Countess from Canada - A Story of Life in the Backwoods • Bessie Marchant

... with a sharp spasm of laughter, mirthless, but consciously expressive of all the familiar processes of self-effacement ...
— At a Winter's Fire • Bernard Edward J. Capes



Words linked to "Mirthless" :   joyless



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