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Squabble   /skwˈɑbəl/   Listen
Squabble

noun
1.
A quarrel about petty points.  Synonyms: bicker, bickering, fuss, pettifoggery, spat, tiff.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Squabble" Quotes from Famous Books



... largely into street life, and the native is invariably loud voiced. No bargain is concluded without an apparent squabble, and every tradesman in the street calls his wares, while drivers of vehicles are incessant in their cries of warning to foot-passengers. All the sounds are not unmusical, however, for from the minarets comes ...
— Peeps at Many Lands: Egypt • R. Talbot Kelly

... the works and the government of the Church;[39] and the name "spiritual possessions" has been so exclusively applied to worldly possessions that now no one understands it to mean anything else, and this has gone so far that men regard neither the spiritual nor the external Church any more, and they squabble and quarrel about temporal possessions like the heathen, and say, they do it for the sake of the Church and of spiritual possessions. Such perversion and misuse of words and things has come from the Canon Law and human statutes, to ...
— Works of Martin Luther - With Introductions and Notes (Volume I) • Martin Luther

... "We'll get into it and row up to Calcutta in half the time it would take the ship. Each of us merchants has his own budgero, and instead of putting our men in buttons with our arms and all that nonsense, we give them colored sashes—and don't our women squabble about the colors, my boy, ...
— In Clive's Command - A Story of the Fight for India • Herbert Strang

... at me triumphantly. For my own part I must confess I was disappointed. A cat-and-dog squabble between a rustic Lothario and some local virago did not excite me so intensely as it seemed to excite ...
— The Green Eyes of Bast • Sax Rohmer

... those who had supplies of their own, kept sober and peaceful, while the higher order of the human race at Big Stone Hole, after the manner of their kind, began to squabble. It was natural for them to do so, perhaps, for the weather was so hot, and the liquors, for the most part, more so; and under these circumstances men do not always cast about them long for a casus belli. ...
— Stories by English Authors: Africa • Various

... Garth, poet and physician, who was alive at this time (died in 1719), satirized a squabble among the doctors in his poem ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele

... from me?" he shouted. "If it is some merchants' squabble, you can save your breath, for I am ...
— Salute to Adventurers • John Buchan

... like a giant above all human affairs for the next two decades, and the speech of Mars is blunt and plain. He will say to us all: "Get your houses in order. If you squabble among yourselves, waste time, litigate, muddle, snatch profits and shirk obligations, I will certainly come down upon you again. I have taken all your men between eighteen and fifty, and killed and maimed such as I pleased; millions of them. I have ...
— What is Coming? • H. G. Wells

... man, and you'll regret it for ever if you miss the opportunity.' Now Sir Jib Boom was between seventy and eighty, and he and Captain Cuttwater had met each other nearly every day for the last twenty years, and had never met without a squabble. ...
— The Three Clerks • Anthony Trollope

... reply he included some such phrase as this: 'If we are not prepared to admit this, what do we prove ourselves to be? Baboons!' I laughed, but again Karl only smiled—this time, with deadly embarrassment. I discovered afterwards through Bulow that in some youthful squabble he had had the word 'Baboon-face' hurled at him. It soon became impossible to hide the fact that Ritter felt himself grossly insulted by 'the doctor,' as he called him, and he left my house foaming ...
— My Life, Volume II • Richard Wagner

... be patriots as well as rebels, and the seminary can vie with the college, or possibly outdo it, occasion given. Ask Juliette Adam whether the bread-and-butter misses of France in the year 1847 did not squabble over the obstinacy of King Louis Philippe and the greed of M. Guizot, the claims of Louis Napoleon and the theories of Louis Blanc, of Odilon Barrot, and Ledru-Rollin? And I who write, have I not seen a North Antrim Sunday-school wrecked in a faction-fight between the Orange and the Green? Lord! ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves

... on each clause of the bill, amounts to this:—Is the measure proposed required by the necessities of India? I cannot consent totally to lose sight of the real wants of the people who are the objects of it, and to hunt after every matter of party squabble that may be started on the several provisions. On the question of the duration of the commission I am clear and decided. Can I, can any one who has taken the smallest trouble to be informed concerning the affairs of India, ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... there," observed Phil. "And I warrant you he can tell what makes every sound you hear. One comes from some kind of bird squawking; another I happen to know is a night heron looking for a supper along the water's edge; then I suppose coons squabble when they meet, trailing over half sunken logs; a bobcat calls to its mate; the owls tune up; chuckwillswidows, the same birds that we call whippoorwills up North, you know, keep a whooping all the time; and there ...
— Chums in Dixie - or The Strange Cruise of a Motorboat • St. George Rathborne

... former toddy is mentioned, though she still shudders at the remembrance of sour-sop. She is the business-man of the party; and while philosophy and highest considerations occupy the others, with an occasional squabble over virtue and the rights of man, she changes lodgings, hires carts, transports baggage, and, knowing half-a-dozen words of Spanish, makes herself clearly comprehensible to everybody. We have found a Spanish steamer for Can Grande; but she rows thither in a boat and secures ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 23, September, 1859 • Various

... verbal strife followed by strained or severed relations: wrangle or squabble: to dispute angrily." This is connected to hatred ...
— The Key To Peace • A. Marie Miles

... her only for her dead mother's sake. And no she had nobody to protect her. Ernest was dead and Harry, who was in the church decorating business, was nearly always down somewhere in the country. Besides, the invariable squabble for money on Saturday nights had begun to weary her unspeakably. She always gave her entire wages—seven shillings—and Harry always sent up what he could but the trouble was to get any money from her father. He said she used ...
— Dubliners • James Joyce

... I have described had just occurred between us two; though, I am happy to be able to state, this was our first and last quarrel, Ned and I remaining the closest chums ever after and never subsequently having even a word squabble. ...
— Crown and Anchor - Under the Pen'ant • John Conroy Hutcheson

... Muellner's (the author of 'Guilt'), and much less of Goethe, and Schiller, and Wieland, than I could wish. I only know them through the medium of English, French, and Italian translations. Of the real language I know absolutely nothing,—except oaths learnt from postilions and officers in a squabble. I can swear in German potently, when I like—'Sacrament—Verfluchter—Hundsfott'—and so forth; but I have little ...
— Life of Lord Byron, With His Letters And Journals, Vol. 5 (of 6) • (Lord Byron) George Gordon Byron

... were. Then I shouldn't mind it so much. But when he isn't cross, he is one of the jolliest boys I have ever known. That's the worst of it, for I miss him so, when we squabble. When we are on terms, I don't care about anybody else; and so, when we are off, ...
— Phebe, Her Profession - A Sequel to Teddy: Her Book • Anna Chapin Ray

... and roads they wrought, For the needs of the soil within; A time to squabble in court, A time ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling

... fear, his wife merrily declared, of being circumvented by Mrs. Dugdale. The brother and sister, she had already discovered, seemed on as pleasant terms as fire and water, since, as Harrie punningly averred, one invariably "put out" the other. They did not squabble—Nathanael Harper never squabbled—but they always met with a gentle hissing, like water sprinkled on coals. Agatha, who was quite new to these harmless fraternalities, always occurring in large families, was ...
— Agatha's Husband - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik (AKA: Dinah Maria Mulock)

... clearly chargeable. Both parties then proceeded to swear affidavits. The Attorney-General and Solicitor-General, the two great law-officers of the crown, were retained on opposite sides, and took fees—not for an Imperial prosecution, but as petty Queen's Counsel in an inter-parochial squabble. ...
— Ginx's Baby • Edward Jenkins

... preservation; but it would not hold good, and it was a mere piece of truckling on my part when I suggested that longitudinal belts of the world were cooled one after the other. I shall very much like to see Agassiz's letter, whenever you receive one. I have written a long letter; but a squabble with or about Hooker always does me a world of good, and we have been at it many a long year. I cannot understand whether he attacks me as a wriggler or a hammerer, but I am very sure that a deal of wriggling has to ...
— More Letters of Charles Darwin - Volume I (of II) • Charles Darwin

... king's ministers, conditions were not infrequently exacted of the crown. Thus in 1785, on the occasion of a gift of eighteen million livres, the suppression of the works of Voltaire was demanded. And once at least, as late as 1750, on the occasion of a squabble between the church and the court, the clergy had refused to make any grant whatsoever. The total amount of the Free Gift voted during the reign of Louis XVI. was 65,800,000 livres, or less than ...
— The Eve of the French Revolution • Edward J. Lowell

... you'll git it, Mr. Winston, er Sam Hayes will find out why. This yere 'Independence' outfit is no favorites o' mine, an' if the whole difficulty turns out ter be nothin' but a minin' squabble, the jury ain't likely ter be very hard on yer. That's my way o' figgerin' on it, from what little I know." He glanced keenly about, seeking to gain a clearer idea of their immediate surroundings. "Maybe you an' Swanson better mosey ...
— Beth Norvell - A Romance of the West • Randall Parrish

... did not squabble for money, in this world of ours, the dishonest men would get it all; and I do not see that the cause of virtue would be much improved. No,—we must use the means which we have. If we were to carry your argument home, we might give away every shilling of revenue which the church has; and I ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope

... We fix it up and agree to try over ag'in, and then, fust thing we know, we're right into the middle of another squabble. I want Marthy, and I guess Marthy wants me, but we want each other like we was five year back and not like we ...
— Scattergood Baines • Clarence Budington Kelland

... juncture as exists now, when law and right are really controverted on sustainable or plausible grounds, and a naval commander may at any moment fire off the first cannon of a terrible contest. If I remember it correctly, it was a mere diplomatic squabble, in which the British ministers, with the politic generosity which they are in the habit of showing towards their official subordinates, had tried to browbeat us for the purpose of sustaining an ambassador ...
— Our Old Home - A Series of English Sketches • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... I believe he means peace, and war will be averted, unless he is overruled by the disunion portion of his party. We all know the irrepressible conflict is going on in their camp.... Then, throw aside this petty squabble about how you are to get along with your pledges before election; meet the issues as they are presented; do what duty, honor, and patriotism require, and appeal to the people to sustain you. Peace is the only policy that can save the ...
— Stephen A. Douglas - A Study in American Politics • Allen Johnson

... were first yesterday!" The usual morning fight for precedence was on, waiting for arbitration by tia Picores, with her cannonading voice and formidable obscenities. But Dolores had not joined the squabble—she even missed the place her basket held, by rights, in the line. Something on the bridge had caught her eye; and, in fact, over the side rails of that structure the head and shoulders of a straggler could be seen advancing ...
— Mayflower (Flor de mayo) • Vicente Blasco Ibanez

... squabble between Hohenlo and Edward Norris had been more unlucky for Leicester than any other incident during the year, for its result was to turn the hatred of both parties against himself. Yet the Earl of all men, was originally least to blame for the transaction. It has been seen that Sir Philip Sidney ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... quarrel between Aristotelian professors on one side and professors favouring the experimental method on the other. But this position was attacked and carried by a very simple statement. If the divine guidance of the Church is such that it can be dragged into a professorial squabble, and made the tool of a faction in bringing about a most disastrous condemnation of a proved truth, how did the Church at that time differ from any human organization sunk into decrepitude, managed nominally ...
— History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom • Andrew Dickson White

... offender can be reinstated he must kill a fowl and swallow a drop or two of its blood with turmeric. Women commonly get the lobe of the ear torn through the heavy ear-rings which they wear; and in a squabble another woman will often seize the ear-ring maliciously in order to tear the ear. A woman injured in this way is put out of caste for a year in Janjgir. To grow turmeric or garlic is also an offence against caste, but a man is permitted to do this for his own use and not ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume II • R. V. Russell

... Edgar?' and your friend Bland? I suppose you are involved in some literary squabble. The only way is to despise all brothers of the quill. I suppose you won't allow me to be an author, but I contemn you all, you ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. I. (of VI.) - With his Letters and Journals. • Thomas Moore

... thing they detest. They'd take in a nice, fat, old fellow, whose heart was so big it made his body grow to hold it, and who meant to do all the good with his money that his money would do, and not leave it for anybody to squabble ...
— Reels and Spindles - A Story of Mill Life • Evelyn Raymond

... though they were fresh from a profitable campaign. "Every Sepoy is a Sirdar at least, and every Sowar a Rajah!" was the envious comment of the peaceable citizens who endured their insolence, and before this last palace-squabble, it had been a bright dream of Gerrard's to embody the civil inhabitants into some kind of militia, and with their help and that of the guard to reduce the army sternly to its proper place. Accordingly, he devoted an interview ...
— The Path to Honour • Sydney C. Grier

... squabble among themselves and fly away Out of the temple, refusing to agree, Then The Most Wanton Birds in all the World They shall be named for ...
— Lysistrata • Aristophanes

... for the stake, the three girls followed. Even Corinne felt that she had done wrong in allowing this squabble to continue in the ...
— A Little Miss Nobody - Or, With the Girls of Pinewood Hall • Amy Bell Marlowe

... what it meant to be "taken up" by Mrs. Minchin, I might not have thought the comparison a good omen for my friendship with Matilda. To be hotly taken up by Mrs. Minchin meant an equally hot quarrel at no very distant date. The squabble with the bride was not slow to come, but Matilda and I fell out first. I think she was tyrannical, and I know I was peevish. My Ayah spoilt me; I spoke very broken English, and by no means understood all that the Bullers said to me; besides ...
— Six to Sixteen - A Story for Girls • Juliana Horatia Ewing

... dropped in. In the tactful manner of their kind they buzzed with the one absorbing topic. Some were vastly amused. Some were sympathetic. One and all they were consumed with curiosity for detailed inside information on the Free Gold squabble. One note rang consistently in their gossipy song: The Free Gold Company was going to lose a pot of money in some manner, as a consequence of the affair. Mr. Wagstaff had put some surprising sort of spoke in the company's wheel. They had that from their husbands who trafficked ...
— North of Fifty-Three • Bertrand W. Sinclair

... they had—these three little boys and three little girls! How they laughed and jumped and knocked their heads together in picking up the cherries, yet never quarreled—for there were such heaps, it would have been ridiculous to squabble over them; and besides, whenever they began to quarrel, Brownie always ran away. Now he was the merriest of the lot; ran up and down the tree like a cat, helped to pick up the cherries, and was first-rate at filling the ...
— The Adventures of A Brownie - As Told to My Child by Miss Mulock • Miss Mulock

... 12 was still at Mira's service, but she couldn't bear the house, she said, and so the ladies moved their furniture into an abandoned bachelor den next to Flight's, and for a few days all went merrily. Then there came a servants' squabble, and their cook differed with Mrs. Flight's maid-of-all-work, and, refusing arbitration, was impudent to her employers. Mrs. Plodder was an Amazon in whom there was no weakness. She discharged the cook and sent her back to Braska. ...
— Under Fire • Charles King

... the nickname of "King." Brutus, in his character of quaestor, has to decide the dispute, which in the hands of the principals degenerates, as disputes so conducted generally do, into a personal squabble. Persius leads off with some oriental flattery of the general and his suite. Brutus is "Asia's sun," and they the "propitious stars," all but ...
— Horace • Theodore Martin

... and then ran to the side of the vessel, still keeping his eye on his master, but returned in a moment and seated himself again by him, now supporting his head, now wiping his forehead and talking to him all the while in the most soothing tones. There had been a matrimonial squabble of a very ludicrous kind in the cabin, between the little German tailor and his little wife. He had secured two beds, one for himself and one for her. This had struck the little woman as a very cruel action; she insisted upon their having but one, and assured ...
— Biographia Literaria • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... (Nietzsche), we begin to perceive that personal bitterness and animosity are out of the question here. We feel we are on a higher plane, and that we must not judge these two men as if they were a couple of little business people who had had a suburban squabble. ...
— The Case Of Wagner, Nietzsche Contra Wagner, and Selected Aphorisms. • Friedrich Nietzsche.

... the whole nobility and clergy and genthry of all the counthry-side into a great dinner and ball given in Billy's honour. But lo! and behould ye, doesn't it turn up at this ball, too, that Billy had a squabble with the King of France's son and struck him, and the ball was stopped by the King's ordhers, and the people sent home, and Billy taken prisoner, and there was poor Jack now left all alone. The King of France, ...
— Tales of Wonder Every Child Should Know • Various

... take it," said he, "and better on the causeway than on Madame Brown's parlour floor. It's a gentleman's policy, I would think, to have the squabble in the open air, and save the women the likely ...
— John Splendid - The Tale of a Poor Gentleman, and the Little Wars of Lorn • Neil Munro

... those queer creatures, immediately follow the discovery. The gabble and laughter and hurrying from the houses to the hedge, the hasty scrambling through the little wicket gates, all occurs with a flutter and noisy squabble that suggest ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens

... from an indulgence, and does not need one; Christ demands this true repentance from every one." Luther's attitude provoked spirited discussion throughout the Germanics, and the more discussion, the more interest and excitement. The pope, who had dismissed the subject at first as a mere squabble among the monks, was moved at length to summon Luther to Rome to answer for the Theses, but the elector of Saxony intervened and prevailed upon the pope not to ...
— A Political and Social History of Modern Europe V.1. • Carlton J. H. Hayes

... and proceeded to execute his master's commands. On passing the kitchen, he "just looked in a little," and the sight of Leffie's bright eyes and rosy lips made him forgetful of his promise. Going up to her, he announced his intention of kissing her. A violent squabble ensued, in which the large china dish which Leffie held in her hand was broken, two pickle jars thrown down, chairs upset, the baby scalded, and the dog Tasso's tail nearly crushed! At last Aunt Dilsey, the head ...
— Tempest and Sunshine • Mary J. Holmes

... very quietly in the House of Commons, and the Opposition are beginning to squabble among themselves, some wishing to create delay, and others not choosing to join in these tricks, when they know it is useless. The Duke came here the night before last, but I was not at home. He talked ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William - IV, Volume 1 (of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville

... the priest, who all this while had stood with head on one side, eyes aslant, and the air and attitude of a stranger who having stumbled on a family squabble politely awaits its termination. ...
— Sir John Constantine • Prosper Paleologus Constantine

... at this speech, for suddenly the picture of the sordid squabble, the dirty and miserable tragedy of the life I had left for a while, came before my eyes; and I had, as it were, a vision of all my longings for rest and peace in the past, and I loathed the idea of going back to it again. But the old man chuckled ...
— News from Nowhere - or An Epoch of Rest, being some chapters from A Utopian Romance • William Morris

... yet fully prepared, notwithstanding, to meet all our possible ones. Up started, however, almost ere he had done speaking, a friend of the Justices, and made so angry a speech in their defence, that the meeting threatened to fall into two parties, and explode in a squabble. I rose in the extremity, and, though unhappily no orator, addressed my townsfolk in a few homely sentences. Cholera, I reminded them, was too evidently of neither party; and the magistrates were, I was sure, nearly as much frightened as we were. ...
— My Schools and Schoolmasters - or The Story of my Education. • Hugh Miller

... want of memory, forgot the squabble five minutes afterwards, and even forgot that she knew her antagonist at all. She would ask to be introduced, or even come up sweetly and introduce herself within half an hour of the battle. But Madame Plume forgot nothing; ...
— A Prisoner in Fairyland • Algernon Blackwood

... boys love rows, my boyhood liked a squabble; But at this hour I wish to part in peace, Leaving such to the literary rabble; Whether my verse's fame be doomed to cease While the right hand which wrote it still is able, Or of some centuries to take a lease, The grass ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron

... Saying this, Donald drew his claymore, and rushed headlong on to the rescue, calling on Tozy Brozy to follow him; but Tozy Brozy's feelings and impulses carried him in a totally different direction. Fearing that his friend's interference in the squabble might have the effect of directing some of the blows his way, he fairly took to his heels, leaving Donald to do by himself what to himself seemed needful in the case. In the meantime, too much engrossed by the duty before him to mind much whether his friend ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume 2 - Historical, Traditional, and Imaginative • Alexander Leighton

... me and said: "I am not at all interested in any squabble or quarrel between General Pershing and General Wood. The only thing I am interested in is winning this war. I selected General Pershing for this task and I intend to back him up ...
— Woodrow Wilson as I Know Him • Joseph P. Tumulty

... learned to consider nothing strange in this citizen squabble. Come, speak as a friend, and I promise on my honour not to repeat ...
— My Sword's My Fortune - A Story of Old France • Herbert Hayens

... in upon her self-arraignment. "Don't squabble, girls. The day is altogether too perfect. None of you are really cross. Now, ...
— Madge Morton, Captain of the Merry Maid • Amy D. V. Chalmers

... vulgar apprehension, the Frenchman dances, the German smokes, the Spaniard serenades; and on all hands it is agreed that the Irishman fights. Naturally bellicose, his practice is pugnacious: antagonism is his salient and distinctive quality. Born in a squabble, he dies in a shindy: in his cradle he squeals a challenge; his latest groan is a sound of defiance. Pike and pistol are manifest in his well-developed bump of combativeness; his name is FIGHT, there can be no mistake about it. From ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 378, April, 1847 • Various

... it down as such," said I, to prevent argument, "and for God's sake don't let us squabble any more. If you're right again, we may as well turn-to and get at the cache without further dawdling. You have a spade, ...
— The Recipe for Diamonds • Charles John Cutcliffe Wright Hyne

... and nasty, far below similar conveyances in any continental city with which we are acquainted. Greater fault still is to be found with the drivers, a large proportion of whom are so prone to overreach, that it is hardly possible to settle for their fares without a squabble. Our experience leads us to say, that at an average a stranger pays 30 per cent. above the proper sum, besides having his temper in almost every instance ruffled to some extent by the sense of having no adequate protection from the rudeness of this class of men. For ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 432 - Volume 17, New Series, April 10, 1852 • Various

... that know me call me the rain-maker. They may be right. They may be wrong. I'm not going to squabble about it. You can call me what you please. I ...
— Little Mr. Thimblefinger and His Queer Country • Joel Chandler Harris

... wondered why she couldn't go and do something else if she hated them so much. Ada and I play a game every morning when we walk in the town: We take sides and one has the Germans and one the English, and then see which of us can count the most. Of course we don't always know them apart, and then we squabble for little families that pass by, and Ada is sure they are Germans,—you know how sure Ada always is if she feels a little doubtful!—but yesterday there were Cook's tourists as thick as ants and so she had no chance at all. Miss Winter writes that she will be ready to ...
— Betty Leicester - A Story For Girls • Sarah Orne Jewett

... nothing but praise for the way in which Bismarck created his Versailles masterpiece. That there was a political squabble behind the curtain, in Bavaria, was to ...
— Blood and Iron - Origin of German Empire As Revealed by Character of Its - Founder, Bismarck • John Hubert Greusel

... was more bitter, so much more love than lovers ever give had to be taken back. Besides, it had no dignity, and a lover's quarrel always has. A lover's quarrel always springs from a more serious cause, and has an air of romantic tragedy. This had no grace of the kind. It was a poor shabby little squabble." ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... is trumpery enough, and in itself wholly insufficient to cause a war between two great nations. It began by a squabble about the holy places at Jerusalem, as to the rights of the ...
— Jack Archer • G. A. Henty

... present self with the little girl Ellen had known. Like Jane Eyre, she "drew her own picture faithfully without softening one defect. She omitted no hard line, smoothed away no displeasing irregularity." She had squabbled, that very afternoon, if it is possible to squabble when only one party does the squabbling, all the way down to Ellen's about various quite unimportant dates in William's life. The incident was almost as much a part of her day's routine as eating her breakfast. ...
— The Third Miss Symons • Flora Macdonald Mayor

... and resumed his leisurely scratching, prospected his ribs for a few seconds, and then made a sudden dash at Ammona, the orang, grappled with him through the bars, snatched away a little fur, and maintained a fierce scratching and snapping squabble for half a ...
— The Missing Link • Edward Dyson

... It is as well, however, to be prepared for contingencies. For example, four or five sparrows will combine to attack a larger bird which has a piece of bread. As soon as they get the bread the sparrows themselves begin to squabble for its possession; and perhaps two or three will set on the one that has hold of it and force him to give it up. Such is Nature—a theatre of vast, unceasing conflict. Men and nations all come ...
— War Letters of a Public-School Boy • Henry Paul Mainwaring Jones

... just as she had been represented, with the addition of being very kindly disposed toward me; but between her and Mr. Bull there existed a sort of chronic squabble that led to frequent passages of wit. Mr. Bull opened the ball, that morning, by observing, with a half wink at me, that 'he see she hadn't been kerried off yet,' which referred to a previously expressed objection on the part of Miss Friggs ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol IV, Issue VI, December 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various

... here without exceeding in talk! Have you not read what is writ over the door? surely it befitteth not fellows who come to us like paupers to wag your tongues at us." "We crave thy pardon, O Fakir,"[FN170] rejoined they, "and our heads are between thy hands." The ladies laughed consumedly at the squabble; and, making peace between the Kalandars and the Porter, seated the new guests before meat and they ate. Then they sat together, and the portress served them with drink; and, as the cup went round merrily, quoth the Porter ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton

... as a whole, is radically tainted by a vicious principle. It professes to justify the ways of God to man, to account for sin and death, and it tells you that the whole originated in a political event; in a court squabble as to a particular act of patronage and the due or undue promotion of an eldest son. Satan may have been wrong, but on Milton's theory he had an arguable case at least. There was something arbitrary in the promotion; there were little symptoms of a job; in Paradise ...
— English Critical Essays - Nineteenth Century • Various

... weather the voters were warm, and in hot weather they were steaming. The contest went on before elections, and was kept up with just as much energy after elections. No vote could settle it, and no success could quiet it. It was in the nature of a political squabble, covering the whole State, dividing districts, counties, cities, towns, villages, settlements, beats, crossroads groceries, and families. It was a knock-down-and-drag-out fight, in which hair pulling, gouging, and biting ...
— Stories Of Georgia - 1896 • Joel Chandler Harris

... better now," said Bob, who, in his interest in the Malay's proceedings, had forgotten all about the squabble with Tom Long. "Ugh! the dirty brute! Chewing tobacco's bad enough; but as for that— I'd just like to get the armourer's tongs and fetch that out of your mouth, and ...
— Middy and Ensign • G. Manville Fenn

... and Middleton's, Chicago, and the following week at Burton's Museum, Milwaukee; but when we made the next jump I found that White was not along. They had had a family squabble, the other apex of the triangle being a circus grafter who "shibbolethed" at some of the "brace games," which at that time had police protection, so far as that could be given. He had interfered between the couple, and was, I ...
— The Miracle Mongers, an Expos • Harry Houdini

... the first time, the work of Luther came to Hutten's attention. The disturbances at Wittenberg were in the beginning treated by all as a mere squabble of the monks. To Leo the Tenth this discussion had no further interest than this: "Brother Martin," being a scholar, was most probably right. To Hutten, who cared nothing for doctrinal points, it had no significance; the more monkish strifes the better—"the ...
— The Story of the Innumerable Company, and Other Sketches • David Starr Jordan

... friends (said the melancholy gentleman), was not this an extremely hard case? To be thus abused, and reviled, and scouted, for merely desiring to be allowed to live in peace, and to have nothing to do with a squabble in which I did not feel in any way interested. But this was not all. I was lampooned, caricatured, and paragraphed in the newspapers, in a thousand different ways. In the first, I was satirized as the fair dealer; in the second, I was represented as a wolf in sheep's clothing; and in the ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume VI • Various

... Gerard be! He's coarse-grained, like his carved black cross-bow stock. Ha, look now, while we squabble with him, look! Well done, now—is not this ...
— Browning's England - A Study in English Influences in Browning • Helen Archibald Clarke

... the jeweller, "I know you to be a good woman, and won't have a squabble with you about this paltry chest. The giver of the warning is a box-maker, to whom I am about to sell this cursed chest that I wish never again to see in my house, and for this one he will sell me two pretty little ones, in which there will not ...
— Droll Stories, Volume 1 • Honore de Balzac

... sue to be despis'd, then to deceiue so good a Commander, with so slight, so drunken, and so indiscreet an Officer. Drunke? And speake Parrat? And squabble? Swagger? Sweare? And discourse Fustian with ones owne shadow? Oh thou invisible spirit of Wine, if thou hast no name to be knowne by, let vs call ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare

... one worm or a spider," said she, with a sigh. How she longed for a good scamper with her sisters! "I am sure that we should never squabble now," said the poor, lonely ...
— Dick and His Cat and Other Tales • Various

... did, for he had come to the end of his patience. One man steps out of a carriage, picks up a handkerchief, and lives to wear a Crown. Another takes the same step; it lands him in a low squabble from which he may extricate himself with safety, but scarcely with an accession of credit. Sir George belonged to the inner circle of fashion, to which neither rank nor wealth, nor parts, nor power, of necessity admitted. In the sphere in which he moved, men seldom ...
— The Castle Inn • Stanley John Weyman

... was a highly amusing incident about Miss Mapp's cupboard," he said. "And wasn't Mrs. Plaistow down on her like a knife about it? Our fair friends, you know, have a pretty sharp eye for each other's little failings. They've no sooner finished one squabble than they begin another, the pert little fairies. They can't sit and enjoy themselves like two old cronies I could tell you of, and feel at peace with ...
— Miss Mapp • Edward Frederic Benson

... shall have to go through to-day, this being, let me tell you, an arithmetical day. Besides, I could scarcely take upon myself to warrant the absolute correctness of those very precise fractions people sometimes go into. Even our learned friends squabble now and then as to which is right or wrong over the 100th part of a grain, more or less, in making out their balance, and you and I will not offer to decide between them. I always think we have accomplished wonders in getting even ...
— The History of a Mouthful of Bread - And its effect on the organization of men and animals • Jean Mace

... and torn with dissensions, the Nationalists were not in a position where they could effectively demand guarantees from Lord Rosebery or enter into any definite arrangement with him. They kept up their squalid squabble and indulged their personal rivalries, but a disgusted country had practically withdrawn all support from them, and an Irish race which in the heyday of Parnell was so proud to contribute to their war-chest, now buttoned up its pockets and ...
— Ireland Since Parnell • Daniel Desmond Sheehan

... to wail over her lost delight, and Polly gravely poked at the mess, which was quite spoilt. But her attention was speedily diverted by the squabble going on in the corner; for Fanny, forgetful of her young-ladyism and her sixteen years, had boxed Tom's ears, and Tom, resenting the insult, had forcibly seated her in the coal-hod, where he held her with one hand while he returned the compliment with the other. Both ...
— An Old-fashioned Girl • Louisa May Alcott

... the Shower Bath some other time," suggested Janice, apprehensive of starting another family squabble. "I don't know as I'd be able to hoe potatoes; but maybe there are other things I can do in the garden. I always had a ...
— Janice Day at Poketown • Helen Beecher Long

... girl you are, Bee," she said. "I suppose it's because you've lived alone with big people always that you're like that. I daresay you'll learn to tease too and to squabble, after ...
— Rosy • Mrs. Molesworth

... religion] for light. In tracing the course of events he is more conventional, finding rather small causes for large effects. The whole thing started, he assures us, in a quarrel of Augustinians and Dominicans over the spoils of indulgence-sales, "and this little squabble of monks in a corner of Saxony, produced more than a hundred years of discord, fury, and misfortune for thirty nations." "England separated from the pope because King Henry fell in love." The Swiss revolted because of the painful ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith

... screw loose. variance, difference, dissension, misunderstanding, cross purposes, odds, brouillerie [Fr.]; division, split, rupture, disruption, division in the camp, house divided against itself, disunion, breach; schism &c (dissent) 489; feud, faction. quarrel, dispute, tiff, tracasserie^, squabble, altercation, barney [Slang], demele, snarl, spat, towrow^, words, high words; wrangling &c v.; jangle, brabble^, cross questions and crooked answers, snip-snap; family jars. polemics; litigation; strife &c (contention) ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget

... to be despised than to deceive so good a commander with so slight, so drunken, and so indiscreet an officer. Drunk? and speak parrot? and squabble? swagger? swear? and discourse fustian with one's own shadow?—O thou invisible spirit of wine, if thou hast no name to be known by, ...
— Othello, the Moor of Venice • William Shakespeare

... of Great Britain. We looked from different points of view at the mounds and trenches which marked it as a strongly fortified position. For many centuries it played an important part in the history of England. At length, however, the jealousies of the laity and the clergy, a squabble like that of "town and gown," but with graver underlying causes, broke up the harmony and practically ended the existence of the place except as a monument of the past. It seems a pity that the headquarters of the Prince of Peace could not have managed to maintain tranquillity ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)

... N.E.D. as 'a brawl, wrangle, squabble' and marked obsolete. It seems to differ from its numerous synonyms by the suggestion of what we call a muddle: that is an active wrangling ...
— Society for Pure English Tract 4 - The Pronunciation of English Words Derived from the Latin • John Sargeaunt

... Bertrand his nephew conduct the caravan, dressed in rough boots (which hurt Bertrand's feet), blue hose, and coarse cloth frocks. The innocent paynims give them friendly welcome, though William is nearly discovered by his tell-tale disfigurement. A squabble, however, arises; but William, having effected his entrance, does not lose time. He blows his horn, and the knights springing from their casks, the town is taken. This Charroi de Nimes is one of the most spirited, but one of ...
— The Flourishing of Romance and the Rise of Allegory - (Periods of European Literature, vol. II) • George Saintsbury

... Graham, with scorn. "I say, Gyp—that's my banner!" Thereupon ensued a lively squabble, in which Tibby, who adored Graham, sided with him, and Isobel, in spite of Gyp's tearful pleading, refused to take part, so that the banner came down from the wall and went into Graham's pocket just as Mrs. Westley walked into ...
— Highacres • Jane Abbott

... an entrance into a "holy state of matrimony": it is as often as not the inauguration of a lifelong squabble, a corroding grudge, that causes more misery and degradation of character than a dozen entirely natural "desertions" and "betrayals." Yet the number of marriages effected more or less in this way must be enormous. When people say that ...
— Getting Married • George Bernard Shaw

... to Cordatus, dated April 15, 1537, Melanchthon was bold enough to state that he had made many corrections in his writings and was glad of the fact: "Multa ultro correxi in libellis meis et correxisse me gaudeo." (C. R. 3, 342.) In discussing the squabble between Cordatus and Melanchthon whether good works are necessary for salvation, Luther is reported by the former to have said, in 1536: "To Philip I leave the sciences and philosophy and nothing else. But I shall ...
— Historical Introductions to the Symbolical Books of the Evangelical Lutheran Church • Friedrich Bente

... do want to have my way this time. You see, we're going home day after to-morrow, and very likely we'll never see the Cliftons again, after we leave here. They don't come here every summer like we do. And I hate to spoil these two last days with a horrid squabble, when we six have been so nice and chummy and pleasant all the time we've been here. You needn't have much to do with Pauline, if you don't want to, but just for two days, can't you just be decently polite to her, and not say anything about ...
— Two Little Women • Carolyn Wells

... afraid," she told him ruefully. Then rising, she held out her hand. "Come! We mustn't quarrel again. I don't know why we always squabble!" ...
— The Awakening of Helena Richie • Margaret Deland

... cutting out the heart and tongue of the dead man and throwing them to a dog to be devoured. They thought that this in some way killed the wicked magician who had killed their friend. For example, it happened that in a squabble between two men about a horse a third man who tried to make peace between the disputants was mortally wounded by their spears and died in a few days. To us it might seem obvious that the peacemaker was killed by ...
— The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead, Volume I (of 3) • Sir James George Frazer

... of the guests, as they generally did; the gipsies, actors, and students were told to behave themselves decently; and the common people were given to understand that, though an ox would be roasted and wine would run from the gutter for them, they were nevertheless not to attempt to fight or squabble, as it would not be allowed. And every one asked his neighbour in amazement what was the meaning of ...
— A Hungarian Nabob • Maurus Jokai

... not in the least care about your son-in-law's visits; you brought him here—take him away again! If you have any authority in your family, it seems to me that you may very well insist on your wife's patching up this squabble. Tell the worthy old lady from me, that if I am unjustly charged with having caused a young couple to quarrel, with upsetting the unity of a family, and annexing both the father and the son-in-law, I will deserve ...
— Cousin Betty • Honore de Balzac

... the best form of government; infinitely better than the blundering inefficiencies of democratic rule. But throughout history, this elite, whether monarchy, oligarchy, dictatorship or junta, has been unable to perpetuate itself. Leaders die, the followers squabble for power, and chaos is close behind. With immortality, this last flaw would be corrected. There would be no discontinuity of leadership, for the leaders would ...
— Forever • Robert Sheckley

... this famous simile might apply with equal propriety—to a bad angel as to a good one, it may in like manner be employed to illustrate small quarrels as well as great—a little family squabble, in which two or three people are engaged, as well as a vast national dispute, argued on each side by the roaring throats of five hundred angry cannon. The poet means, in fact, that the Duke of Marlborough had an immense genius ...
— Catherine: A Story • William Makepeace Thackeray

... me first, if you do," answered one of them. "This is a boys' squabble, Jim Evans, ...
— Ralph on the Engine - The Young Fireman of the Limited Mail • Allen Chapman

... asks in that dialogue (which was spoken on the stage after 'The Poetaster' had given rise to a general squabble), how it came about that such a hubbub was made of that play, seeing that it was free from insults, only containing 'some salt' but 'neither tooth, nor gall,' whilst his antagonists, after all, had been the cause of whatever ...
— Shakspere And Montaigne • Jacob Feis

... won't go places, and he won't have people,—isn't nice to them, even in his own house," Bessie said sadly to Isabelle. "I suppose that marriage usually comes to that: the wife stands for bills and trouble, and the husband scolds. Most people squabble, don't they?" ...
— Together • Robert Herrick (1868-1938)

... air a thing we most gen'ally keep ill, They 're a cheap kind o' dust fer the eyes o' the people; A parcel o' delligits jest git together An' chat fer a spell o' the crops an' the weather, Then, comin' to order, they squabble awile An' let off the speeches they 're ferful 'll spile; Then—Resolve,—Thet we wunt hev an inch o' slave territory; That President Polk's holl perceedins air very tory; Thet the war 's a damned war, an' them thet enlist in it Should ...
— The Biglow Papers • James Russell Lowell

... was wrong. My understanding now is—though I knew nothing of it at the time—that they did charge for admittance at the Cooper Institute, and that they took in more than twice $200. I have made this explanation to you as a friend; but I wish no explanation made to our enemies. What they want is a squabble and a fuss; and that they can have if we explain; and they cannot have it if we don't. When I returned through New York from New England, I was told by the gentleman who sent me the check that a drunken vagabond in the club, having learned something about the $200, made the exhibition ...
— The Every-day Life of Abraham Lincoln • Francis Fisher Browne

... discontinued in the Runnymede country. The Major with all his pluck, with infinite cherry brandy, could not do it. Men who had a few weeks since been on very friendly terms, and who had called each other Dick and Harry when the squabble first began, were now talking of "punching" each other's heads. Special whips had been procured by men who intended to ride, and special bludgeons by the young farmers who intended that nobody should ride as long as Major Tifto kept the hounds. It was said that the ...
— The Duke's Children • Anthony Trollope

... about half an hour, during which, my situation was more horrible than I can depict, our conductors stopped at another churchyard; the door was now opened, and as each passed forward to escape, a terrific squabble ensued between the cargo and my two attendants, probably about the fare. A third time I strained every nerve to call out, but it was absolutely impossible; at length, however, their quarrel seemed to have been adjusted; the chairman shut the ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 14, Issue 390, September 19, 1829 • Various

... weakness, and in part for being choked up with bad actors. The two principal parts were destined to Mrs. Jordan and Mr. Bannister, but Mrs. J. has not come to terms with the managers, they have had some squabble, and Bannister shot some of his fingers off by the going off of a gun. So Miss Duncan had her part, and Mr. de Camp, a vulgar brother of Miss De Camp, took his. He is a fellow with the make of a jockey, and the air of a lamplighter. His part, the principal comic hope of the play, was most unluckily ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 5 • Edited by E. V. Lucas

... offensive to them as it could be. This has not yet been answered, but it will be, and in terms at least as strong as those in which it is couched. Their Ambassador, M. de St. Priest, appears to have had orders to behave in the most offensive manner possible. By great good luck in the first squabble that has occurred in consequence of this, between one of his servants and the mob of the Hague, his man has put himself completely in the wrong; so that when he presented a memorial complaining of the insult offered to a person in his service, he received for answer a letter enclosing copies ...
— Memoirs of the Courts and Cabinets of George the Third - From the Original Family Documents, Volume 1 (of 2) • The Duke of Buckingham and Chandos

... was no small balm to Ida's resentment; it drew a part of the sting from her defeat and compelled Mr. Farange perceptibly to lower his crest. He was unable to produce the money or to raise it in any way; so that after a squabble scarcely less public and scarcely more decent than the original shock of battle his only issue from his predicament was a compromise proposed by his legal advisers ...
— What Maisie Knew • Henry James

... also to the other, in spite of preconceived opinions derived from authority. Unfortunately the times were then hardly ripe for a calm and logical treatment of this question: prejudice in many cases took the place of argument, and the result was too often an undignified squabble instead of a scientific discussion. However, the dogmatism was not by any means all on one side. The disciples as usual went farther than the master, and their teaching when pushed to extremities resulted in a peculiarly dreary kind of materialism, ...
— The Antiquity of Man • Charles Lyell

... could for himself. But Devilshoof having secured the medallion, made off with it. He was no sooner gone than a dark woman wrapped in a cloak came into the street and, when she was right in the midst of the squabble, she dropped her cloak and revealed herself as Queen of the band. All the gipsies were amazed and not very comfortable either!—because, strange to say, this gipsy queen did not approve of the maraudings of her band; and when she caught them ...
— Operas Every Child Should Know - Descriptions of the Text and Music of Some of the Most Famous Masterpieces • Mary Schell Hoke Bacon

... slowly from the kitchen, as befitted a man of his superior character. He heard the row well enough, but considered it beneath him to hasten to a petty squabble. ...
— The House with the Green Shutters • George Douglas Brown

... lieutenancy on board the Royal yacht, the Victoria and Albert, then commanded by the late Adolphus Fitz-Clarence. But in the historically momentous year 1854 there was serious business to be done by Lieutenant—now Commander—Hobart. A diplomatic squabble between France and Russia about the Holy Places in Palestine developed into an angry quarrel between the Emperor Nicholas, France, and England. We went to war with Russia. A magnificent squadron of British first-rates was despatched ...
— Sketches From My Life - By The Late Admiral Hobart Pasha • Hobart Pasha

... supercilious indifference to mere 'theological subtleties.' To him Paul's preaching and the Jews' passionate denials of it seemed only a squabble about 'words and names.' Probably he had gathered his impression from Paul's eager accusers, who would charge him with giving the name ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: The Acts • Alexander Maclaren

... in opposition to Neal Dow and the orthodox Maine Law party. Thus the house will be divided—is, indeed, already divided—against itself. What then? The Scriptures say that such a house can't stand. It can't. And thus the Maine Law is crippled in a miserable squabble with fugitive slaves, Bloomers, and Abolitionists. How ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage

... much, I'm afraid," she told him ruefully. Then rising, she held out her hand. "Come! We mustn't quarrel again. I don't know why we always squabble!" ...
— The Awakening of Helena Richie • Margaret Deland

... said the Judge; "the trial will make the matter plain. That pompous, stupid Count was the cause of the squabble, and that rascal Gerwazy; but this is the business of the court. It is too bad that you were not in the castle at the supper, Father; you would have borne witness how fearfully ...
— Pan Tadeusz • Adam Mickiewicz

... feel for the offence. No fault was lightly passed over; not that punishment was inflicted for every misdemeanour, but it was always noticed, and the children were shown with grave gentleness where they were wrong; or when there was a squabble among them, the mother's question, 'Who will give up?' generally produced a chorus of 'I! I! I!' Withal 'mamma' was the very life of all the fun, and play, and jokes, enjoying all with spirits and merriment like the little ...
— Life of John Coleridge Patteson • Charlotte M. Yonge



Words linked to "Squabble" :   quarrel, fence, pettifog, row, argue, pettifoggery, fuss, run-in, dustup, words, spat, wrangle, contend, debate



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