"Unbecoming" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... His mood was tranquilly amorous. The vial in his pocket was full of golden grains. Presently, he would fashion a ring. Then, heigh-ho for the parson! He smiled contentedly over his vision of the buxom Widow Brown. Her placid charms would soothe his declining years. A tempestuous passion would be unbecoming at his age. But the companionship of this gentle and agreeable woman would be both fitting and pleasant. Really, Uncle Dick mused, it was time he settled down. One should be sedate ...
— Heart of the Blue Ridge • Waldron Baily
... "I have not a thought," he writes to the minister at Genoa, "on any subject separated from the immediate object of my command, nor a wish to be employed on any other service. So far the allies," he continues, with no unbecoming self-assertion, "are fortunate, if I may be allowed the expression, in having an officer of this character." He felt this singleness of mind, which is so rare a gift, to be the more important, from his very consciousness that the difficulty of his task approached ...
— The Life of Nelson, Vol. I (of 2) - The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain • A. T. (Alfred Thayer) Mahan
... you, my dear father, of the affair, it is so shocking. The chill of the first hearing has not left me. I am excited body and mind, and you know how faithfully I have tried to school myself against excitement—it is unbecoming—only the weak suffer it. Rather than trust myself to the narrative—though as yet there are no details—I plucked a notice from a wall while coming, and as it was the first I had of the news, and contains all I know, I brought ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 2 • Lew. Wallace
... gallows brought, Look high, or strut, or entertain a thought That tends to tempt him to forget that fate, To which for sin he destin'd was of late, And could not then at all delivered be, But by another's death and misery? Pride is the unbecoming'st thing of all: Besides, 'tis the forerunner of a fall. He that is proud, soon in the dirt will lie, But honour followeth humility. Let each then count his brother as his better, Let each esteem himself another's debtor. ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... it sits upon a Companion in Pleasure, not a Man of Design and Intrigue. To vary with every Humour in this Manner, cannot be agreeable, except it comes from a Man's own Temper and natural Complection; to do it out of an Ambition to excel that Way, is the most fruitless and unbecoming Prostitution imaginable. To put on an artful Part to obtain no other End but an unjust Praise from the Undiscerning, is of all Endeavours the most despicable. A Man must be sincerely pleased to become Pleasure, or not to interrupt ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... Boccaccio, however, did not hold this liberal view consistently. The ground of his apostasy lay partly in the mobility of his character, partly in the still powerful and widespread prejudice that classical pursuits were unbecoming in a theologian. To these reasons must be added the warning given him in the name of the dead Pietro Petroni by the monk Gioacchino Ciani to give up his pagan studies under pain of early death. He accordingly determined to abandon them, and was only brought back from this cowardly resolve ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... 800 With all the thriftles games that may be found; With mumming and with masking all around, With dice, with cards, with balliards farre unfit, [Balliards, billiards.] With shuttelcocks, misseeming manlie wit, [Misseeming, unbecoming.] With courtizans, and costly riotize, 805 Whereof still somewhat to his share did rize: Ne, them to pleasure, would he sometimes scorne A pandares coate (so basely was he borne); Thereto he could fine loving verses frame, And play the poet oft. But ah! for shame, ...
— The Poetical Works of Edmund Spenser, Volume 5 • Edmund Spenser
... her dress. It was a neutral color and like a uniform. After all, she had physical charm and it was sometimes irksome to wear unbecoming clothes. Then the lofty room, with its varnished desks and benches, looked bleak; her life was passed in bare class-rooms and echoing stone corridors. This would not have mattered had she been able to follow her bent and take the line she had once marked out; but she could not. ...
— The Lure of the North • Harold Bindloss
... the strife extended from the servants to the masters, and Abraham vainly called his nephew Lot to account for his unbecoming behavior, Abraham decided he would have to part from his kinsman, though he should have to compel Lot thereto by force. Lot thereupon separated himself not from Abraham alone, but from the God of Abraham also, and he betook himself to a district in which immorality and sin reigned ...
— The Legends of the Jews Volume 1 • Louis Ginzberg
... speak for the child, if I may, madam," Deta said, after giving Heidi a little blow for her unbecoming answer. "The child has never been in such a fine house and does not know how to behave. I hope the lady will forgive her manners. She is called Adelheid after her mother, who was ...
— Heidi - (Gift Edition) • Johanna Spyri
... "That's no way to look at things. It's unbecoming of a man of your importance to cherish animosity for an insignificant chap like I am. If we can't be friends, you might at least be big enough to ...
— Mixed Faces • Roy Norton
... great deal of motion, and made to run on with exactness for a hundred years or more, (were due care taken to preserve it in good order,) completely deranged, because Fashion says that motion is ungraceful or unbecoming—what, in a physical point of view, can ...
— The Young Woman's Guide • William A. Alcott
... take away a portion, without injury to the goodly fabric.—Behold!" and the Reverend Jonas lifted, with the cook's long knife (which he snatched in unbecoming haste from the girdle), the paste of the edge of the gigantic pie, and stole a weighty slice of ...
— The Buccaneer - A Tale • Mrs. S. C. Hall
... proposed a walk in the fields; but the two elder ladies were afraid of damp, and dirt, and had only very unbecoming calashes to put on over their caps; so they declined, and I was again his companion in a turn which he said he was obliged to take to see after his men. He strode along, either wholly forgetting my existence, or soothed into silence by his pipe—and yet it was not silence exactly. ...
— Cranford • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... operating in connection with the influence of habit, the people were strongly inclined to have a dance. Mr. B. told them that dancing was a bad practice—and a very childish, barbarous amusement, and he thought it was wholly unbecoming freemen. He hoped therefore that they would dispense with it. The negroes could not exactly agree with their manager—and said they did not like to be disappointed in their expected sport. Mr. B. finally proposed to them that he would get the Moravian minister, Rev. Mr. Harvey, to ride out ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... Potts," responded Merril. "You may possibly persuade the men to make themselves disagreeable for pity's sake, but it is quite too much to expect that a woman would deliberately put herself in an unbecoming light, if it were to save ...
— Potts's Painless Cure - 1898 • Edward Bellamy
... blouse, was a tin horn. At this moment a lady came to the door and looked out. She was not the lady of the fireplace,—a glance told him that,—yet she was quite different from the one who bought vegetables. She was tall and dark, and wore unbecoming smoked glasses. She took no notice of him, but turned and went back into the shop. James Mandeville dismounted ...
— The Pleasant Street Partnership - A Neighborhood Story • Mary F. Leonard
... handsome men, saw we there, but never did I behold a man of equal dignity with him who is now at the door of the portal." Then said Arthur: "If walking thou didst enter here, return thou running. It is unbecoming to keep such a man as thou sayest he is in the wind and the rain." Said Kay: "By the hand of my friend, if thou wouldst follow my counsel, thou wouldst not break through the laws of the court because ...
— Bulfinch's Mythology • Thomas Bulfinch
... irritably, "don't you observe that Henrietta is looking out of the window again? I am bound, Miss, to direct your attention to the fact that I consider such a thing decidedly unbecoming ...
— The Poor Plutocrats • Maurus Jokai
... place the next day with a ceremony not unbecoming in itself, though, unsuited to his high rank. Dan Francesca Bargia, Archbishop of Cosenza, acted as chief mourner at St. Peter's, where the body was buried in the chapel of Santa Maria ...
— The Borgias - Celebrated Crimes • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... young sects, there exists among the Molokanye a system of severe moral supervision. If a member has been guilty of drunkenness or any act unbecoming a Christian, he is first admonished by the Presbyter in private or before the congregation; and if this does not produce the desired effect, he is excluded for a longer or shorter period from the meetings and from all intercourse with the members. In extreme cases expulsion is resorted ...
— Russia • Donald Mackenzie Wallace
... prating about him when he is at stool Two opinions alike, no more than two hairs Two principal guiding reins are reward and punishment Tyrannic sourness not to endure a form contrary to one's own Tyrannical authority physicians usurp over poor creatures Unbecoming rudeness to carp at everything Under fortune's favour, to prepare myself for her disgrace Universal judgments that I see so common, signify nothing Unjust judges of their actions, as they are of ours Unjust to exact ...
— Quotes and Images From The Works of Michel De Montaigne • Michel De Montaigne
... medium did not move from her position. Dr. Greene, on one occasion, while the so-called spirit was moving around, asked it to shake hands. This request being granted, he firmly grasped the hand, and found the spirit to be the medium herself, who struggled in a very unbecoming way to free herself. While Dr. Greene thus secured the medium, Dr. Gerrish quickly drew the screen aside, and discovered the apparel of the lady in a heap at the foot of her stool, and still pinned to the floor. ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant
... as those representing a gentleman in black, corpulent with tea and water, in the laudable act of summarily reforming a family, feeble and pinched with beer. The gentleman in black distended by wind would then conduct himself with the most unbecoming levity, while the beery family, growing beerier, would frantically try to tear themselves away from his ministration. Some of the inscriptions accompanying the banners were of a highly determined character, as ...
— The Uncommercial Traveller • Charles Dickens
... come, the snow five and a half feet deep—the greatest depth of snow within the memory of the "oldest inhabitant"—the mercury full ten degrees below zero. I had just changed my dress for the fifth time, and sister Anna was offering me this consolation, "I must say, Clara, that that is the most unbecoming dress you have, you look like a perfect scare-crow," when the sound of sleigh-bells coming up the avenue, sent my heart up in my throat, and myself quicker than lightning down to the "hall-door," there to welcome—not ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 6 June 1848 • Various
... things are sometimes done, but rarely; and even then it is usual to have the service in a private room. One old lady, a woman perfectly competent to decide on such a point, told me frankly:—"We never do it, except by way of a frolic, or when in a humour which induces people to do many other silly and unbecoming things. Why should we go to the restaurateurs to eat? We have our own houses and servants as well as the English, or even you Americans"—it may be supposed I laughed—"and certainly the French are not so devoid of good ...
— Recollections of Europe • J. Fenimore Cooper
... providence; her spirits struggled up to their normal high level, and once more she was the happiest of women. It was another fortnight before she could leave the house, but the languor was a new and pleasant sensation and not unbecoming the weather. Warner read aloud instead of to himself, and they wondered that they had never discovered this firm subtle link in comradeship before. The rainy summer is the winter of the tropics, and they felt ...
— The Gorgeous Isle - A Romance; Scene: Nevis, B.W.I. 1842 • Gertrude Atherton
... the first Act of the first Play between Questenberg, Max, and Octavio Piccolomini. If we except the Scene of the setting sun in the Robbers, I know of no part in Schiller's Plays which equals the whole of the first Scene of the fifth Act of the concluding Play. It 50 would be unbecoming in me to be more diffuse on this subject. A Translator stands connected with the original Author by a certain law of subordination, which makes it more decorous to point out excellencies than defects: indeed he is not likely to be a fair judge ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... country; but that an absence of almost four years from my family and private affairs, more than seven months of which I have waited to know their pleasure respecting me here, has so exceedingly embarrassed and distressed me, that I hope I shall not be deemed guilty of an unbecoming impatience in pressing to know, if Congress have any further commands for me, and in what manner my past transactions, as their agent and commissioner, are to be adjusted and closed. I have heretofore written repeatedly and ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. I • Various
... to abstain from dancing, singing, music and unbecoming shows, and from the use of garlands, scents, ...
— The Buddhist Catechism • Henry S. Olcott
... another, but all alike all over the world, and women not far behind them. It was not for me to dispute this point (though I was not yet persuaded of it), both because my lord was a Judge, and must know more about it, and also that being a man myself I might seem to be defending myself in an unbecoming manner. Therefore I made a low bow, and went; in doubt as to which had the ...
— Lorna Doone - A Romance of Exmoor • R. D. Blackmore
... the seas And some of them were good and some were not; In German, P & O's and Genoese, But the Khedive's was the worst one of the lot. We never got a moment's peace in her For everybody'd howl or pray or bellow; She threw us on our heads or on our knees, And turned us all an unbecoming yellow." ...
— Adventures and Letters • Richard Harding Davis
... of a senator, should possess a ship fit for sea service, containing more than three hundred amphorae. This size was considered sufficient for conveying the produce of their lands: all traffic appeared unbecoming a senator. This contest, maintained with the warmest opposition, procured the hatred of the nobility to Flaminius, the advocate of the law; but the favour of the people, and afterwards a second consulship. For these reasons, thinking that they would detain him in the city by falsifying ...
— The History of Rome; Books Nine to Twenty-Six • Titus Livius
... privileged to look in behind the veil of the family circle, we are more convinced than ever that fraternal affection an all the boasted nobility of sisterly love dwindle down to a series of petty quarrels and jealousies as painful as they are unchristian and unbecoming. The reserve, or rather the hypocrisy of politeness, put on before strangers, is no criterion of the inward domestic life. Some one has said of ladies, "A point yielded or a pardon begged in public means so many hair-pullings behind the scenes." But this is too sweeping; there are noble, ...
— Alvira: the Heroine of Vesuvius • A. J. O'Reilly
... doctrine is appropriate and necessary. It is a warning that our eyes are not closed to the schemes on foot for the suppression of republican government on this continent. While our present necessity compels us, as of course, to act with great circumspection, yet it would be unbecoming our dignity to quietly ignore the spoliation of Mexico. It is often said that President Lincoln, in his letter accepting the Baltimore nomination, has repudiated this resolution. These ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol 6, No 5, November 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... this unfailing candour captious; to resent the note of authority, equally clear whether she write to Pope or Cardinal; to suspect Catherine, in a word, of assuming that very judicial attitude which she constantly deprecates as unbecoming to us poor mortals. And perhaps the very frequency of her plea for tolerance and forbearance suggests a conscious weakness. Like most brilliant and ardent people, she was probably by nature of a ...
— Letters of Catherine Benincasa • Catherine Benincasa
... which produce a diffused light. A soft thin pink silk as a lining for a silk or cretonne shade is always successful, and if a delicate pink, never clashes with the colours on the outside. A white silk lining is cold and unbecoming. A dark shade unlined, or a light coloured shade unlined, even if pink, unless the silk is shirred very full, will not give a ...
— The Art of Interior Decoration • Grace Wood
... of one of the royal palaces—are by no means observable for that quiet reserve and modest diffidence that distinguish the fair among our own young countrywomen; but it must be admitted they are remarkable for the manner in which, they walk alone, in my judgment a most masculine and unbecoming practice. Woman was not made to live alone, and I shall contend that she was not made to walk alone. At the same time, I confess here is a certain charm in the manner in which these ladies place a hand in each pocket of their aprons, and balance their bodies, as they move like duchesses ...
— Homeward Bound - or, The Chase • James Fenimore Cooper
... recently been guilty of conduct grossly unbecoming a soldier. But you've served your guard house period, and you'll be busy, for many weeks yet to come, in working out the fines imposed against you. For breaches of discipline it is the intent of the authorities to provide sufficient punishment. It is not, however, the purpose ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys as Sergeants - or, Handling Their First Real Commands • H. Irving Hancock
... the purpose of improving social life, but does not concern itself with perfection in theoretical speculation and knowledge, which leads the soul to eternal life. The divine law embraces both the parts upon which human perfection depends, conduct and theory. It embraces the becoming and unbecoming (practice), and the true and untrue (theory). As the Psalmist has it, "The Law of the Lord is perfect, restoring the ...
— A History of Mediaeval Jewish Philosophy • Isaac Husik
... these acts of wrong constitute conduct unbecoming a gentleman, a man of honor, or a professor in Harvard University, and justly entitle me to redress at your hands. This appeal has not been made hastily or without a patient and long-protracted effort to secure justice in other ways. Dr. ...
— A Public Appeal for Redress to the Corporation and Overseers of Harvard University - Professor Royce's Libel • Francis Ellingwood Abbot
... famous William Penn—"the arch-Quaker," whom he conceives Mr. Macaulay to have treated with an injustice which, if it did not result from deliberate prejudice, was at all events chargeable to unbecoming negligence of inquiry. The cause thus asserted he defends in fifty pages of not unreasonable argument, and supports by the liberal quotation of accepted authorities. Unfortunately, the character of the controversy is such ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 3, February, 1851 • Various
... Union Square, several Knickerbocker ladies organized a kitchen upon the old Dutch model, and presided there in the costumes of their grandmothers. Mrs. Briggs was placed upon the committee of management, but declined to serve, on account of the unbecoming costume she was invited to wear, and because she considered it unladylike to sit in a kitchen. But Mrs. Briggs preserved her caste, and benefited the Sanitary Commission much more than she would have done by her presence, by sending a cheque for ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe
... his is the most delicate of human minds; through the cumbrous formalities of his century there shines a certain quickness and sensibility; he even condescends to be lively after a stately fashion, and to indulge in a little 'raillying,' only guarding himself rather too carefully against unbecoming levity. Indeed, though a man of the world at the present day would be as much astonished at his elaborate manners as at his laced coat and sword, he would admit that Sir Charles was by no means wanting in tact; his talk is weighted ...
— Hours in a Library, Volume I. (of III.) • Leslie Stephen
... educated middle-class—divined at once that he was self-taught, and risen from the ranks. Both Cuningham and Watson were shabbily dressed; but it was an artistic and metropolitan shabbiness. Fenwick's country clothes were clumsy and unbecoming; and his manner seemed to fit him as awkwardly as his coat. The sympathy of both the older artists did but go out to him the ...
— Fenwick's Career • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... there was a sensation—I will only whisper this—of a slightly rarified official atmosphere at this meeting, I saw no one caper. But it must be borne in mind that most of the people there were officials and wives of officials, serving a great empire, so perhaps it might be unbecoming for such to laugh and play; and I take it there is even a limit to the degree of a smile when you are on the official ladder, that it is then seemly, even expedient, to walk with a certain dignity of pace—so you show the sweep of the modern skirt ...
— From Edinburgh to India & Burmah • William G. Burn Murdoch
... persuasion, no argument, could induce him, at this moment especially, to change his religion. And, sir, I will add myself—yes, I will say for myself, dear papa, and for Reilly too, that if from any unbecoming motive—if for the sake of love itself, I felt satisfied that he could give up and abandon his religion, I would despise him. I should feel at once that his heart was hollow, and that he was unworthy either of my love ...
— Willy Reilly - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... that Mr. Dormant should have allowed the old gentleman to make this will. If he knew the intention, my Father said, it would have shown a more proper sense of his responsibility if he had dissuaded the testator from so unbecoming a disposition. That was long before any legal question arose; and now Mr. Dormant came into his fortune, and began to make handsome gifts to missionary societies, and to his own meeting in the town. If I ...
— Father and Son • Edmund Gosse
... guest makes a stay of a few weeks in some spot to which he has been attracted by its natural beauty: he idles and watches the inhabitants as they go about their daily business; and at the end he deems it not unbecoming to record his opinion that they are intelligent, civil, honest, and sober—or the reverse. He mistakes. It is he who has been on probation during these weeks—his intelligence, his civility, his honesty, his sobriety. For my part, I look forward to a time when Visitors' ...
— From a Cornish Window - A New Edition • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... bodice. The old woman saw her daughter's shoeless feet. She looked at her searchingly, her face darkening and hardening from annoyance to real anger and distrust. 'Wilhelmine,' she said harshly, 'explain your extraordinary appearance. Where have you been, and why do you come home in this strange and unbecoming manner?' ...
— A German Pompadour - Being the Extraordinary History of Wilhelmine van Graevenitz, - Landhofmeisterin of Wirtemberg • Marie Hay
... Marcoline. I was struck with astonishment on seeing her, for she was completely changed, not so much by the pretty dress she had on as by the contented expression of her face, which made her look quite another person. Good humour had vanquished unbecoming rage, and the gentleness born of happiness made her features breathe forth love. I could scarcely believe that this charming creature before me was the same who had dealt such a vigorous blow to my brother, a priest, and a sacred being in the eyes of the ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... astonishment, that he has but eleven cents in his pocket. Of course, he has coppered and won. But why—tell me why, could he not have given me the sentiment, which I had a right to expect from him? He bears the stamp of a bad Kopper; a regular old Nick, and has done that unbecoming thing so often that it is becoming monotonous And General X——— and Mr. K——— are types of a large class who come before me to take acknowledgments and the like, for whom I have no liking; who ...
— Punchinello, Vol.1, No. 4, April 23, 1870 • Various
... boy, as I told you before, I don't believe the first word of all this. 'Cause it's impossible, you know, for any man of our race to do anything unbecoming of a Lytton and a gentleman. And I think a man's family ought to stand by him in a case like this. So I not only came myself, but I fotch Charley, and if I had had another son I would a-fotched him too. ...
— Victor's Triumph - Sequel to A Beautiful Fiend • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... to see if one of the children had awakened and got out of bed. All the evening, while she had changed the skin-tight sleeves of the eighties to the balloon ones of the nineties in an old waist which she had had before her marriage and had never worn because it was unbecoming, her thoughts had been of Harry, whom she had punished for some act of flagrant rebellion during the afternoon. Now she was eager to comfort him if he was awake and unhappy, or merely to cuddle and kiss him if he was ...
— Virginia • Ellen Glasgow
... ascetic face was dyed with an unbecoming flush. "Oh!" And then the barriers fell with a crash and she hurried on, the words tumbling over one another, as her memory, its inhibitions shattered, swept back into the dark vortex of her secret past. "Oh, Mary! You don't know! ...
— Black Oxen • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... territorial of these gentlemen; the whilk, as may befall honourable soldados, they had reason sufficient to conceal while serving as private gentlemen in a regiment, though disdaining to receive halberds, as unbecoming their birth. He that aligned himself forenenst me was styled the Chevalier d'Herblay; and, the word ...
— Old Friends - Essays in Epistolary Parody • Andrew Lang
... his rue—whether for lady fair or for towering prospects stricken down—with a tinge of wan melancholy not unbecoming to a gentle aquilinity of profile, softened by the grace of adolescence. His instinctive aristocracy of manners and taste would have availed him little with his new associates had he been a whit less manly. But as he shirked no part of the universal hardship, ...
— Judith Of The Plains • Marie Manning
... experience had varnished her self-esteem with a glaze of cynicism sufficiently consistent to protect it against any but the strongest attack. She believed in no man's protestations. She distrusted every man's motives as far as herself was concerned. This attitude of mind was not unbecoming in her for the simple reason that it destroyed none of her graciousness as regards other human relations besides that of love. That men should seek her in matrimony from a selfish motive was as much to be expected as that flies should ...
— The Blazed Trail • Stewart Edward White
... towards me was a kindly one. This has been manifested in multitudes of ways, on innumerably occasions, and under the most various circumstances. And while there are some who treat me at times in an unbecoming manner, the majority of the corps have ever treated me as I would desire to be treated. I mean, of course, by this assertion that they have treated me as I expected and really desired them to treat me, so long as they were prejudiced. They have held certain opinions more or less prejudicial to ...
— Henry Ossian Flipper, The Colored Cadet at West Point • Henry Ossian Flipper
... resignation. He took entire command. You had to execute his order whether it was possible or not. And there was only one form of marching in his manual of tactics, and that was the double-quick. When he called for soothing syrup, did you venture to throw out any remarks about certain services unbecoming to an officer and a gentleman? No; you got up and got it! If he ordered his pap bottle, and it wasn't warm, did you talk back? Not you; you went to work and warmed it. You even descended so far in your menial office as to take a suck at that warm, insipid stuff ...
— Public Speaking • Irvah Lester Winter
... gingham," said Jane. "A child gets tired of sewing on one color. It's only natural she should long for a change; besides she'd look like a charity child always wearing the same brown with a white apron. And it's dreadful unbecoming ...
— Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... be considered as directing myself to the generality of the world: for, Sir, I have the pleasure to say, that your conduct in your family is unexceptionable; and the pride to think that mine is no disgrace to it. No one hears a word from your mouth unbecoming the character of a polite gentleman; and I shall always be very regardful of what falls from mine. Your temper, Sir, is equal and kind to all your servants, and they love you, as well as awfully respect you: and well does your beautiful ...
— Pamela (Vol. II.) • Samuel Richardson
... octave, which caused an extraordinary effect. People spoke only of this cadence; it was the event of the evening wherever he played. This success wounded his feelings of artistic probity; he considered it unbecoming that people should be more taken up with the skill of the executant than with the beauties of the music, ...
— Famous Violinists of To-day and Yesterday • Henry C. Lahee
... face which sometimes disappoints expectation. But there is that in it which I have seen in no other, but which I can imagine to have been common to the Romans of old, the dignity that arises from self-control—an expression which seems removed from the elation of joy, the depression of sorrow—not unbecoming to one who has known great vicissitudes of Fortune, and is prepared alike for her frowns or ...
— The Parisians, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... all, and felt by us all, confines him to the chamber of private grief, while the Senate is occupied with the public manifestations of a respect and sorrow which a national loss inspires. In the absence of that Senator, and as the member of this body longest here, it is not unfitting or unbecoming in me to second the motion which has been made for extending the last honors of the Senate to him who, forty-five years ago, was a member of this body, who, at the time of his death, was among the oldest ...
— Life and Public Services of John Quincy Adams - Sixth President of the Unied States • William H. Seward
... of these arts, or conduct unbecoming a samurai, was mercilessly punished. When Hayama Muneyori retired to his province without accompanying the army sent to attack O-U, he was severely censured and deprived of his estates. Cognate instances might be multiplied. In the year 1193, the first case of the vendetta occurred in Japan. Yoritomo ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... and the gay Widow and your correspondent, when upon the floor, were the cynosure of all eyes. The dance continued until the Colonel ordered a double tattoo sounded, so that we could hear it. Several intruders were put out, for conduct unbecoming gentlemen. The ball was strictly private, as no commissioned officers were ...
— Incidents of the War: Humorous, Pathetic, and Descriptive • Alf Burnett
... constitution of the State contains nothing that can be thought either unworthy of the majesty of princes or unbecoming; and so far is it from lessening its imperial rights, that it rather adds stability and grandeur to them. For, if it be more deeply considered, such a constitution has a great perfection which all others ...
— Donahoe's Magazine, Volume 15, No. 1, January 1886 • Various
... reader here obtains a just conception of the holy character of God it will give him an understanding of the true nature of Christianity and the manner of life of a Christian. A gentleman once asked me if it was wrong or unbecoming to a Christian to attend the present day street carnivals. We replied in about these words: "If you gain a true conception of the holiness of the Almighty you will not need to ...
— The Gospel Day • Charles Ebert Orr
... coming down to luncheon. She made up her mind about the menu of the pleasant little meal she would set before him, and in imagination rehearsed the scene in which she would at length succumb to his passionate entreaties. It was evidently discreet not to surrender with unbecoming eagerness. But no letter came. A week went by. She began to think that Dick had no sense of humour. A second week passed, and then a third. Perhaps it was because she had nothing to do that Master Dick absorbed a quite unmerited degree of her attention. It was ...
— The Explorer • W. Somerset Maugham
... men and women. They kept a sharp eye on the doings at the inn. They called to order the tellers of evil tales; and they banished from Herrnhut all who disobeyed the laws, or conducted themselves in an unbecoming, frivolous ...
— History of the Moravian Church • J. E. Hutton
... parish in one of the large manufacturing towns, and who had no inherited interest in the Cumbrian folk and their ways, had only a very faint idea, and that a distinctly depreciatory one, of what these mythical predecessors of his, with their strange social status and unbecoming occupations, might be like. But there were one or two old men still lingering in the dale who could have told him a great deal about them, whose memory went back to the days when the relative social importance of the dale parsons was exactly expressed by the characteristic Westmoreland ...
— Robert Elsmere • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... worth in return; and then the lugger is Guernsey built, and carries a good King George's commission. In my part of the world we never take gold unless we sell something of equal valie. Gifts and begging we look upon as mean and unbecoming, and the next thing to going on to the town as a pauper; though if I can sarve you lawfully, like, I'm just as willing to work for your money as for that of any other man. I've no preference for ...
— The Wing-and-Wing - Le Feu-Follet • J. Fenimore Cooper
... depend on him, seek him for guidance, direction, and protection, and submit to his will with patience and resignation of soul. It gives the law, not only to his words and actions, but to his very thoughts and purposes; so that he dares not entertain any which are unbecoming the presence of that God by whom all our thoughts are legible. It crushes all pride and haughtiness, both in a man's heart and carriage, and gives him an humble state of mind before God and men. It regulates the passions, and brings ...
— The Book of Religions • John Hayward
... avarice," I think his lordship meant what he wrote, and if he practised what he preached, shall not quarrel with him. As an occupation in declining years, I declare I think saving is useful, amusing, and not unbecoming. It must be a perpetual amusement. It is a game that can be played by day, by night, at home and abroad, and at which you must win in the long run. I am tired and want a cab. The fare to my house, ...
— Roundabout Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... day we had scarcely any idea of what had happened. A certain sense of shame, which was not unbecoming, held us aloof from one another: and yet I easily won access to Friederike's family, and from that time forward was daily a welcome guest, when for some hours I would linger in unconcealed intimate intercourse with the same domestic circle ...
— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner
... for a daughter of Ireland to study economics. The breeze brought warm and subtle wafts from the machinery; it also blew wisps of hair into Fanny Fitz's eyes and over her nose, in a manner much revered in fiction, but in real life usually unbecoming and always exasperating. She leaned back on the bench and wondered whether the satisfaction of crowing over Mr. Gunning compensated her for abandoning the tranquil security of the ...
— All on the Irish Shore - Irish Sketches • E. Somerville and Martin Ross
... wife lodged under the same roof, but that was all. "They never saw each other, one never met them in the same carriage; they are never met in the same house; nor, with very good reason, are they ever together in public." Strong emotions would have seemed odd and even "ridiculous;" in any event unbecoming; it would have been as unacceptable as an earnest remark "aside" in the general current of light conversation. Each has a duty to all, and for a couple to entertain each other is isolation; in company there is no right to the ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 1 (of 6) - The Ancient Regime • Hippolyte A. Taine
... remedies for the body, nor is it good for health either. You may now and then take some cheap herb,—such as poor men may,—and this is done sometimes. But to buy drugs, to hunt up doctors, to take doses, is unbecoming to religion and hostile to purity." His success in winning men to the monastic life was almost phenomenal. It was said that "mothers hid their sons, wives their husbands, and companions their friends, lest they be persuaded by his eloquent message to enter the cloister." ...
— A Short History of Monks and Monasteries • Alfred Wesley Wishart
... become a beast. She plied the young man with two or three cups in succession of that fiery liquor, and I also bitterly swallowed half a cupfull at the importunity of the youth; at last, the shameless harlot likewise got beastly drunk, and took very unbecoming liberties with that vile youth; and the mean wretch also, in his intoxication, having become regardless, began to be disrespectful, and ...
— Bagh O Bahar, Or Tales of the Four Darweshes • Mir Amman of Dihli
... this, and stood covered with confusion; she could not help blushing, and was unable to conceal her tears. However, this reproach perfectly reformed her, and she became sensible how unbecoming was a tyrannizing temper. It has been observed, that to be sensible of our errors is half the work of reformation. So it happened with Cleopatra, who with the assistance of her mother's prudent counsels, became an ...
— The Looking-Glass for the Mind - or Intellectual Mirror • M. Berquin
... replied with a hissing, "What do you mean by one wife only? Why do not you ask, whether we live with one harlot? What is a wife but a harlot? By our laws it is not allowable to commit fornication with more than one woman; but still we do not hold it dishonorable or unbecoming to do so with more; yet out of our own houses we glory in the one among another: thus we rejoice in the license we take, and the pleasure attending it, more than polygamists. Why is a plurality of wives denied us, when yet it has been granted, and at this day is granted in the whole world about us? ...
— The Delights of Wisdom Pertaining to Conjugial Love • Emanuel Swedenborg
... to praise the politeness, as well as the hospitality, of Attila. The King of the Huns held a long and familiar conversation with Maximin; but his civility was interrupted by rude expressions and haughty reproaches; and he was provoked, by a motive of interest, to support, with unbecoming zeal, the private claims of his secretary Constantius. "The Emperor," said Attila, "has long promised him a rich wife: Constantius must not be disappointed; nor should a Roman emperor deserve the name of liar." On the third day the ambassadors were dismissed: the freedom of several ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 4 • Various
... she had already lost her maidenhead, informed one of his friends that his wife was no virgin. When this reached the ears of Theodora, she ordered the servants to hoist him up, like a boy at school, upbraiding him with having behaved too saucily and having taken an unbecoming oath. She then had him severely flogged on the bare back, and advised him to restrain his talkative tongue ...
— The Secret History of the Court of Justinian • Procopius
... confidence. Old Battle, who had a deep fellow feeling for his master, must needs imitate the affection he displayed for the fishmonger, and to that end began to make free with his horse, which, after sundry friendly bites of the mane, and otherwise exhibiting himself in a manner very much unbecoming a horse of such good morals, reared and had done serious damage with the bones of the other, but for the interposition of his master, who separated them with the stock of his big whip. Peace being restored, the animals were removed to a respectful distance, ...
— The Life and Adventures of Maj. Roger Sherman Potter • "Pheleg Van Trusedale"
... nemiksita. Unalterable nesxangxebla. Unanimity unuanimeco. Unanimous unuvocxa, unuanima. Unanimously unuvocxe, unuanime. Unassuming neafektema, modesta. Unavailing malutila. Unawares senatente. Unbar malbari, malfermi. Unbearable netolerebla. Unbecoming malkonvena. Unbelief malkredeco. Unbeliever malkredulo. Unbend (relax) distri, amuzi, cedi. Unbending (resolute) decidega, neceda. Unbiased senpartia. Unblushing (shameless) senhonta. Unbosom (to disclose) malkasxi. Unbound (of books, etc.) nebindita. Unbounded senlima. Unbridle ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes
... Geoffrin, whose great enemy she was. When Horace Walpole first entered into the society of the Marquise, she was stone blind, and old; but retained not only her wit, and her memory, but her passions. Passions, like artificial flowers, are unbecoming to age: and those of the witty, atheistical Marquise are almost revolting. Scandal still attached her name to that of Henault, of whom Voltaire wrote the ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 2 • Grace & Philip Wharton
... well known to everybody as though he had gone about all that time carrying it on his shoulders. Naturally after this he couldn't remain in the place. He was universally condemned for the brutal violence, so unbecoming a man in his delicate position; some maintained he had been disgracefully drunk at the time; others criticised his want of tact. Even Schomberg was very much annoyed. "He is a very nice young man," he said argumentatively to me, "but the lieutenant is a first-rate fellow too. He dines every night ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad
... repair the walls of their hovels. In Greece, even the very poorest retired to their houses and ate with closed doors; the Egyptians felt no repugnance at eating and drinking in the open air, declaring that unbecoming and improper acts should be performed in secret, but seemly acts in public. The first blind alley they came to, a recess between two hovels, the doorstep of a house or temple, any of these seemed to them a perfectly natural place to dine ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 9 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... like a winter's wave, that this big, brusk, bizarre woman before him was Maria Louisa, the second wife of Napoleon. He knew her history: wedded at nineteen to Napoleon—the mother of L'Aiglon at twenty—married again in unbecoming haste to Count Niepperg Nobody, with whom she had been on very intimate terms, as soon as word arrived of Napoleon's death at Saint Helena, and now raising a goodly brood of Nobodies! The artist grew faint before this daughter of kings who had made a mesalliance with Genius—he excused himself and ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 6 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Artists • Elbert Hubbard
... sacred story tells us, that Isaac made them a feast, and they did eat and drink." A covenant is a binder of affection, to assure it, but it is a loosner of affection, to express it. And their hearts are most free to one another, which are most bound to one another. How unbecoming is it, that they who swear together, should be so strange as scarce to speak together? That which unites, ought also ...
— The Covenants And The Covenanters - Covenants, Sermons, and Documents of the Covenanted Reformation • Various
... at elbows, down at the elbows, down in the world. inglorious; nameless, renownless[obs3]; obscure; unknown to fame; unnoticed, unnoted[obs3], unhonored, unglorified[obs3]. shameful; disgraceful, discreditable, disreputable; despicable; questionable; unbecoming, unworthy; derogatory; degrading, humiliating, infra dignitatem[Lat], dedecorous[obs3]; scandalous, infamous, too bad, unmentionable; ribald, opprobrious; errant, shocking, outrageous, notorious. ignominious, scrubby, dirty, abject, vile, beggarly, pitiful, low, mean, shabby base &c. (dishonorable) ...
— Roget's Thesaurus • Peter Mark Roget
... Aristotle and St. Thomas had but one word for our English two, physical and natural. Desires that are not physical, not natural nor necessary to man in his animal capacity, may be highly natural and becoming to man as he is a reasonable being, or they may be highly unbecoming. These psychical desires, called by St. Thomas not natural, take in at once the noblest and the basest ...
— Moral Philosophy • Joseph Rickaby, S. J.
... think it very unbecoming and very ugly, and never could see any good reason why you, and mamma, and Mathilde should ...
— Lost in the Backwoods • Catharine Parr Traill
... a little philosophising, unbecoming of our Scribe, on men and names and how they act and react upon each other. Also, a page about his misgivings and the effort he made to persuade Khalid not to appear before the Boss. But skipping over these, "we reach the Tammany Wigwam and ...
— The Book of Khalid • Ameen Rihani
... Lane answered, with cunning simplicity. '"It's unbecoming," said he, "in a man to brawl over the ...
— Bulldog And Butterfly - From "Schwartz" by David Christie Murray • David Christie Murray
... Jacob Worse began to take part in the conversation, the attache felt that the reins were slipping out of his hands. Worse went at it hammer and tongs; not that he raised his voice, or used unbecoming expressions, but his views were so subversive and so original, that the others were forthwith reduced to silence. At the first onset he brushed aside all the nonsense about Norwegian women, and that sort of thing, and went on boldly to ...
— Garman and Worse - A Norwegian Novel • Alexander Lange Kielland
... English blood boiled up, and for the first and last time I spoke sharply to my friend. I believe I made a certain allusion to an injunction of S. Paul, and told him plainly that I thought such conduct unbecoming in a gentleman and ...
— In Troubadour-Land - A Ramble in Provence and Languedoc • S. Baring-Gould
... not strange that she should have regarded Wycherley with favor. His figure was commanding, his countenance strikingly handsome, his look and deportment full of grace and dignity. He had, as Pope said long after, "the true nobleman look," the look which seems to indicate superiority, and a not unbecoming consciousness of superiority. His hair indeed, as he says in one of his poems, was prematurely gray. But in that age of periwigs this misfortune was of little importance. The Duchess admired him, and proceeded to make ...
— Critical and Historical Essays, Volume III (of 3) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... blushing excessively as she spoke, 'will you do me justice, and believe that though I cannot—I do not choose—to give explanations of my conduct, I have not acted in the unbecoming ...
— North and South • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... the happy settlers roared with laughter at the joke, They recognized a gentlemanly fellow pulling stroke: 'Twas Robinson—a convict, in an unbecoming frock! Condemned to ...
— The Book of Humorous Verse • Various
... fallen from the lips of the learned counsel, and as it commends itself entirely to my own judgment in the matter, I am glad to inform Mr Cruden, if he be still in court, that he will quit it to-day clear of the slightest imputation on his character unbecoming ...
— Reginald Cruden - A Tale of City Life • Talbot Baines Reed
... the lords of the lake and of the river, some of them absolutely handsome, their costume being in the highest degree chivalric; many, unluckily, are clad in a mixed fashion, half Indian, half American,—grotesque, but unbecoming when compared with the gaudily turbaned and kilted Creek, or the plumed and painted Winnebago, who, leaning on his rifle beneath a forest tree, and listening with a keen, unwearying aspect for the coming tread of his foe or his prey, looks like ...
— Impressions of America - During the years 1833, 1834 and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Tyrone Power
... my eldest son, George Hubert, has by conduct unbecoming to a gentleman and a Pendyce, proved himself unworthy of my confidence, and forasmuch as to my regret I am unable to cut the entail of my estate, I hereby declare that he shall in no way participate in any division of ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... and, slipping it in my bosom, (for her back was towards me,) Here, said I, (having a bean in my hand,) is one of them; but it has not stirred. No, to be sure, said she, and turned upon me a most wicked jest, unbecoming the mouth of a woman, about planting, etc. When I came in, I hied to my ...
— Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded • Samuel Richardson
... little vortex. I will look down upon the transactions of courts and ministers, like an etherial being from a superior element. There I shall hope to see your lordship outstrip your contemporaries, and tower above the pigmies of the day. To repeat an idea before delivered, might be unbecoming in a fine writer, but it is characteristic and beautiful under the personage of a preceptor. The fitnesses which nature bestowed upon your frame would not have done alone. But joined with the lessons I have taught you, they cannot fail, unless I grossly flatter myself, ...
— Four Early Pamphlets • William Godwin
... think the nature of it deserving their attention."—Butler's Analogy, p. 84. "In all points, more deserving the approbation of their readers."—Keepsake, 1830. "But to give way to childish sensations was unbecoming our nature."—Lempriere's Dict., n. Zeno. "The following extracts are deserving the serious perusal of all."—The Friend, Vol. v, p. 135. "No inquiry into wisdom, however superficial, is undeserving attention."—Bulwer's Disowned, ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... lady's hair. Maria Theresa looked sternly at the reflection of her little maid of honor's face in the glass. She saw how Charlotte's hands trembled and this increased her ill-humor. Again she raised her eyes to her own image, and saw plainly that anger was unbecoming to her. The flush on her face was not rosy, but purple; and the scowl upon her brow was fast deepening into a wrinkle. Her bosom heaved with a ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... receive the communion—the vicegerent of God must drink the blood of the Lamb. But still the pope remains sacred; he cannot, like other mortals, make use of his earthly feet; he must not, like them, approach the altar. Sitting upon his throne, he has partaken of the holy wafer, and, as it was unbecoming his dignity to descend to the altar in order to come to Christ, the latter must decide to ...
— The Daughter of an Empress • Louise Muhlbach
... Mr. Dusautoy once called to ask for my support for a vestry meeting, but I make it a rule never to meddle with parish skirmishes. I believe there was a very unbecoming scene, and that Mr. Dusautoy was ...
— The Young Step-Mother • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Earl of Albemarle: "The peers rose as the queen entered, and remained standing until she took her seat in a crimson and gilt chair immediately in front of her counsel. Her appearance was anything but prepossessing. She wore a black dress with a high ruff, an unbecoming gipsy hat with a huge bow in front, the whole surmounted by a plume of ostrich feathers. Nature had given her light hair, blue eyes, a fair complexion, and a good-humoured expression of countenance; but these characteristics were marred by painted ...
— English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the Nineteenth Century. - How they Illustrated and Interpreted their Times. • Graham Everitt
... speaking of her to Lord Harvey, at a time when any exaggeration was open to an easy refutation, and writing in a spirit most likely to provoke it, does not scruple to say, with a tone of dignified haughtiness not unbecoming the situation of a filial champion on behalf of an insulted mother, that by birth and descent she was not below that young lady, (one of the two beautiful Miss Lepels,) whom his lordship had selected from all the choir of court beauties as the future mother ...
— Biographical Essays • Thomas de Quincey
... vehemence is both unbecoming and displeasing; and in future you would do well to recollect that, as a child submitted to my guidance by your mother's desire, it is disrespectful both to her and to me to insist upon a course at variance with our judgment ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... said, "I will answer you frankly. The man whom I punished last night, I punished because I have proved him to be guilty of conduct unbecoming to a gentleman. I punished him because he broke the one social law which in my country, at any rate, may not be ...
— The Lost Ambassador - The Search For The Missing Delora • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... It may be unbecoming to talk about one's self, but as, on the one side, some have done me the honor to ask what I think of certain problems,—while, on the other side, I have been more than once accused of busying myself, in a rather unscientific way, with certain vague investigations,—I ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 19, June, 1891 • Various
... name, and asked whether he could be of any use, but he did not receive encouragement. Lady Markland sent her thanks, and was quite well ("she says," the old butler explained, with a shake of the head, so that no one might believe he agreed in anything so unbecoming). The Honourable John had been telegraphed for, her husband's uncle, and everything was being done; so that there was no need to trouble Mr. Warrender. He went back, scarcely solaced by his walk. He wanted to be doing something. Not Plato; in the circumstances ...
— A Country Gentleman and his Family • Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant
... the dowager had a difficult game to play. It was unbecoming her to encourage the strife, and it was against her wishes to suppress it; she therefore moralized with the peer, and ...
— Precaution • James Fenimore Cooper
... through life. A fair price paid for work done, either by a child or an adult, is far preferable to what is called charity. It at once promotes industry, and encourages a spirit of honest independence, which is far removed from unbecoming pride, as it is from mean and sneaking servility. Benevolence is the peculiar glory of woman; and we hope that all our fair readers will ever bear in mind, that real benevolence will seek to enable the objects of its regard to secure their due share of the comforts of life, by the ...
— The Ladies' Work-Table Book • Anonymous
... whole interest to work among the noblemen and lawyers of his party. His son's case looked exceedingly ill, owing to the former assault before witnesses, and the unbecoming expressions made use of by him on that occasion, as well as from the present assault, which George did not deny, and for which no moving cause or motive could be made ...
— The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner • James Hogg
... cheerful air of animal as well as spiritual confidence; a gallant bearing, curiously reminding one of a certain illustrious duke, as I have seen him walking some dozen years ago by a lady's side, with no unbecoming oblivion of his time of life. I observed, also, that he no longer committed himself in scornful criticisms, or, indeed, in any criticisms whatever, at least as far as I knew. He had found out that he could, at least, afford ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 2, July, 1850. • Various
... tells you that your gown does not fit, that you dress your hair in such an unbecoming manner, that your management of your household is not what it should be, she takes an unwarrantable liberty. If traced back, the source of these remarks would be found in a large percentage of instances, in a disagreeable temper, captious humors, and a spirit that ...
— The Secret of a Happy Home (1896) • Marion Harland
... the repugnance, and the remorse which attend the first crime speedily fade, and on every repetition the habit of evil grows stronger. A process of the same kind passes over our judgments. Few things are more curious than to observe how the eye accommodates itself to a new fashion of dress, however unbecoming; how speedily men, or at least women, will adopt a new and artificial standard and instinctively and unconsciously admire or blame according to this standard and not according to any genuine sense of beauty or the reverse. Few persons, however pure may be their natural ...
— The Map of Life - Conduct and Character • William Edward Hartpole Lecky
... and truthful man, I would have confidence in him, if he were a man worthy of trust. Since he first made advances, by asking me to do for him things which were good, what a wonder it is that so unreasonably he should molest a man. I confess that I acted in a manner unbecoming my position; but let him say what he will, I have said ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume X, 1597-1599 • E. H. Blair
... at the table with Thrym on one side of him and Loki on the other. Then the feast began. Thor, not noticing that what he did was unbecoming to a refined maiden, ate eight salmon right away. Loki nudged him and pressed his foot, but he did not heed Loki. After the salmon he ate a ...
— The Children of Odin - The Book of Northern Myths • Padraic Colum
... Any emotion is unbecoming. Pride is merely ridiculous. It resides in the youthful-minded, however old. In residing in these young people, it resisted the touch that would have combined them and, through its opposition, made one of them ill and the other grey. To be proud! How splendid ...
— The Paliser case • Edgar Saltus
... compassion. I fled to other friends for consolation. I retold the story of the poppy. They did not appear supremely interested. I grew excited. They were surprised and pained. They looked at me curiously. "It ill-befits your dignity to squabble over poppies," they said. "It is unbecoming." ...
— Revolution and Other Essays • Jack London
... at Bona on defenceless Christians, and your unbecoming disregard of the demands I made yesterday, in the name of the Prince Regent of England, the fleet under my orders has given you a signal chastisement, by the total destruction of your navy storehouses and arsenal, with half your batteries. As England does not make war for the ...
— The Pirate City - An Algerine Tale • R.M. Ballantyne
... Birkendelly a good deal. He retired by himself and examined the ring, and could see nothing in it unbecoming a Christian to wear. It was a chased gold ring, with a bright emerald, which last had a red foil, in some lights giving it a purple gleam, and inside was engraven "Elegit," much defaced, but that his sister could not see; therefore he could not comprehend her vehement ...
— The Great English Short-Story Writers, Vol. 1 • Various
... she was able to pay for a tutor, to prepare the two boys for school. The tutor had a cork leg, which was a source of serious trouble to me, for it stuck out straight behind when we knelt down to family prayers—conduct which struck me as irreverent and unbecoming, but which I always felt a desire to imitate. After about a year my mother found a house which she thought would suit her scheme, namely, to obtain permission from Dr. Vaughan, the then head-master of Harrow, to take some boys into her house, and so gain means of education for her own son. ...
— Annie Besant - An Autobiography • Annie Besant
... went on, "that you will follow my advice. Your cause is mine. You will soon perceive the interest I take in your situation, almost unexampled in judicial records. For the moment I will give you a letter to my notary, who will pay to your order fifty francs every ten days. It would be unbecoming for you to come here to receive alms. If you are Colonel Chabert, you ought to be at no man's mercy. I shall record these advances as a loan; you have estates to recover; you ...
— Colonel Chabert • Honore de Balzac
... her sister arrived at Welckley's 's the next Saturday evening, they found poor Schneidekoupon in a temper very unbecoming ...
— Democracy An American Novel • Henry Adams
... given no explanation, save that "things were different." Perhaps our Rita is growing up, inside as well as outside? Certainly the pretty airs and graces have given way to a womanly and thoughtful look not at all unbecoming to ...
— Rita • Laura E. Richards
... commander, not only without envy, but with high gratification, under whom they all served with cordial confidence and enthusiasm, cannot have been esteemed by them unfit for the distinction. If these great soldiers then and always acclaimed him worthy to be their leader, it is unbecoming for others, and especially for men who are not ...
— Ulysses S. Grant • Walter Allen
... proper to request D'Aigremont to present a memorial to the King, in which he requested his Majesty to grant him a benefice. Louis XIV. did not approve of the liberty thus taken by his chairman, and said to him, in a very angry tone, 'D'Aigremont, you have been made to do a very unbecoming act, and I am sure there must be simony in the case.'—'No, Sire, there is not the least ceremony in the case, I assure you,' answered the poor man, in great consternation; 'the abbe only said he would give me a hundred Louis.'—'D'Aigremont,' said ...
— Memoirs Of The Court Of Marie Antoinette, Queen Of France, Complete • Madame Campan
... sensitive to her own good looks; she was jealous of pretty women; she was vain, and susceptible to flattery; she was irritable when crossed; she gave way to sallies of petulance and anger; she occasionally used language unbecoming her station and authority; she could dissimulate and hide her thoughts: but her nature was not hypocritical, or false, or mean. She was just, honest, and straightforward in her ordinary dealings; she was patriotic, ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume VIII • John Lord
... Caroline moving with heavy dignity, but keeping up her head as she had been taught in her youth. Nothing was more unbecoming than ducking the head and sticking out the back. Sophia went slowly, holding to the balustrade, so very slowly that Henrietta did not attempt to start. She said softly to Rose, 'How slowly she goes. I've never noticed ...
— THE MISSES MALLETT • E. H. YOUNG
... occasion, when I candidly remarked that von Papen and Boy-Ed came back to the Fatherland for certain unbecoming acts, some of which I enumerated, a Frau Hauptmann jumped to her feet and, after the customary brilliant manner of German argument, shrieked that I was a liar. She declared that their Zeitung had said nothing about the charges I mentioned, therefore ...
— The Land of Deepening Shadow - Germany-at-War • D. Thomas Curtin
... with sincere pleasure that I take my pen in hand to compliment you upon the successful manner in which you have rendered your services as taxidermist upon my late owl Alice. Death in the animal kingdom is all too often regarded with an unbecoming levity or, at least, a careless lack of sympathetic appreciation, and it is with genuine feelings of gratitude that I pen these lines upon the occasion of the receipt of the sample of the excellent manner in which you have performed ...
— Perfect Behavior - A Guide for Ladies and Gentlemen in all Social Crises • Donald Ogden Stewart
... many words tending to the same point,)—if, I say, that is the sole good, what else will there be for you to follow? And, on the other hand, if nothing is evil except what is disgraceful, dishonourable, unbecoming, wrong, flagitious, and base, (to make this also manifest by giving it many names,) what else will there be which you can say ...
— The Academic Questions • M. T. Cicero
... at a Distance, by curtisying; and gave Opportunity to that Friend to shew her Charms to the same Advantage in returning the Salutation. Here that Action is as proper and graceful, as it is at Church unbecoming and impertinent. By the way, I must take the Liberty to observe that I did not see any one who is usually so full of Civilities at Church, offer at any such Indecorum during any Part of the Action ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... lady who interprets literally the Scotch invitation "come into the fire," and who spoils the backs of library novels by holding them too near the comfortable hearth, she it is who suffers from the ignoble and unbecoming liberties that winter takes with the human countenance. Happier and wiser is she who studies the always living and popular Dutch roll rather than the Grecian bend, and who blooms with continual health and good temper. Our changeful climate affords so few opportunities of learning ...
— Lost Leaders • Andrew Lang
... found expression in him. Gallant, gracious, generous, tender-hearted in victory and cheerful in defeat (as we had soon to learn, alas!), even his enemies confessed this young Stuart a worthy leader of men. Usually suffused with a gentle pensiveness not unbecoming, the ardour of his welcome had given him on this occasion the martial bearing of a heroic young Achilles. With flushed cheek and sparkling ...
— A Daughter of Raasay - A Tale of the '45 • William MacLeod Raine
... everything good upon earth. Only the most intellectual of men have any right to beauty, to the beautiful; only in them can goodness escape being weakness. Pulchrum est paucorum hominum:[30] goodness is a privilege. Nothing could be more unbecoming to them than uncouth manners or a pessimistic look, or an eye that sees ugliness—or indignation against the general aspect of things. Indignation is the privilege of the Chandala; so is pessimism. "The world is perfect"—so prompts the instinct of the intellectual, ...
— The Antichrist • F. W. Nietzsche
... their books and newspapers when they desired it quiet. If she had known that Mr. Castrani was at that moment lying on the lounge in the morning-room, the door of which was slightly ajar, she might have dismissed that unbecoming frown, and put her troubles aside. Mr. Trevlyn entered, just as she had for the twentieth time that day arrived at the conclusion that she was the most sorely afflicted woman in the world, and his first words did not tend to ...
— The Fatal Glove • Clara Augusta Jones Trask
... also the act of setting apart for sacred use that which is to be used in the services of the Church. Reverential instinct teaches that it is unbecoming to transfer from the shop to the Altar or Church articles designed for holy use without first being set apart for such purpose. Hence it is usual to bless by some appropriate service Altar furniture, ...
— The American Church Dictionary and Cyclopedia • William James Miller
... that the latter gentleman viewed our new member as a kind of rival in the affections of Jack Redburn, and besides this, he had more than once hinted to me, in secret, that although he had no doubt Mr. Pickwick was a very worthy man, still he did consider that some of his exploits were unbecoming a gentleman of his years and gravity. Over and above these grounds of distrust, it is one of his fixed opinions, that the law never can by possibility do anything wrong; he therefore looks upon Mr. Pickwick as one who has justly suffered in purse ...
— Master Humphrey's Clock • Charles Dickens
... Bending over hot stoves and boiling gravies is not very beneficial to one's complexion, and 'Lena's cheeks, neck, forehead, and nose were of a purplish red—her hair was tucked back in a manner exceedingly unbecoming, while the broad check-apron, which came nearly to her feet, tended in nowise to improve her appearance. She felt it keenly, and after returning Durward's salutation, she broke away before Anna or John, Jr., who were both ...
— 'Lena Rivers • Mary J. Holmes
... I am absolutely against the pastor. Nobody ought to say such things, for they are dangerous and unbecoming. Even Niemeyer would not have ...
— The German Classics Of The Nineteenth And Twentieth Centuries, Volume 12 • Various
... swiftly. I promised to send Tah-li the new hair ornaments, but there are no hair ornaments worn now. The old jewels are laid aside, the jade and pearls are things of the past. The hair is puffed and knotted in a way most unbecoming to the face. It is neither of the East nor of the West, but a half-caste thing, that brands its wearer as ...
— My Lady of the Chinese Courtyard • Elizabeth Cooper
... others at a little distance, formed the flanks. Major Denham rode on his right hand, dressed in his British uniform, with loose Turkish trousers, a red turban, red boots, with a white bornouse over all, as a shade from the sun, and this, though not strictly according to orders, was by no means an unbecoming dress. Boo Khaloom was mounted on a beautiful white Tunisian horse, a present from the bashaw, the peak and rear of the saddle covered with gold, and his housings were of scarlet cloth, with a border of gold six inches broad. His ...
— Lander's Travels - The Travels of Richard Lander into the Interior of Africa • Robert Huish
... looking if you sit in front of me. It's a heathenish custom, this shrouding of one's self in black, and so unbecoming. Lily, get Lizzie Bettie a glass of iced tea, or would you rather have lemonade?" And Mrs. Deford stopped fanning long enough to put her lorgnette to her eyes and look at her latest visitor critically. She had on a new dress and looked better in it then anything she ...
— Miss Gibbie Gault • Kate Langley Bosher
... Ferris, stepping up to be admired. The men's decorations consisted of garlands draped across their shoulders and tied with huge bows of ribbon. On their heads they wore classic wreaths which Daisy and Hal had made, and which were really not unbecoming. The procession formed in the hall, and went out across the lawn to the May ...
— Patty's Suitors • Carolyn Wells
... dost use thy left hand in no fair fashion 'midst the jests and wine: thou dost filch away the napkins of the heedless. Dost thou think this a joke? it flies thee, stupid fool, how coarse a thing and unbecoming 'tis! Dost not credit me? credit thy brother Pollio who would willingly give a talent to divert thee from thy thefts: for he is a lad skilled in pleasantries and facetiousness. Wherefore, either expect hendecasyllables three hundred, or return ...
— The Carmina of Caius Valerius Catullus • Caius Valerius Catullus
... the reign of Edward, to the see of Glocester, and made no scruple of accepting the episcopal office; but he refused to be consecrated in the episcopal habit, the cymar and rochet, which had formerly, he said, been abused to superstition, and which were thereby rendered unbecoming a true Christian. Cranmer and Ridley were surprised at this objection, which opposed the received practice, and even the established laws; and though young Edward, desirous of promoting a man so celebrated for his ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part D. - From Elizabeth to James I. • David Hume
... blouse, refusing to crush it beneath cloak or shawl, and appearing over and over again in the pink of a bygone age, so that it might appear in its first beauty for Ned's inspection? Oh, it was hard to have planned so well, and then to be discovered with ruffled hair, flushed cheeks, and unbecoming attire! Lilias was only the more picturesque for her working attire, and was even now shaking hands with the visitor, and welcoming him in pretty, winsome fashion, as the other girls shook down skirts and aprons, and took furtive peeps in ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... Mr. Beckford writes to Mr. Pitt. "I hear that Admiral Hawke says, the land-general has acted in a very unbecoming manner, and will declare his sentiments to Parliament. I hope he will: that, if possible, the mystery may be unravelled. I have often lamented the fatality attending conjunct commands. The French avoid them in all their expeditions; ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2 • Horace Walpole
... whatsoever came to his notice which was irregular or unbecoming or perverse his eye did not spare;[232] but as the hail scatters the untimely figs from the fig-trees,[233] and as the wind the dust from the face of the earth,[234] so did he strive with all ...
— St. Bernard of Clairvaux's Life of St. Malachy of Armagh • H. J. Lawlor
... say, I know you not." No child of God, no heavenly inheritance. We sometimes give something to those that are not our children, but not our lands. O do not flatter yourselves with a portion among the sons, unless you live like sons. When we see a king's son play with a beggar, this is unbecoming; so if you be the king's children, live like the king's children. If you be risen with Christ, set your affections on things above, and not on things below. When you come together, talk of what your Father promised ...
— Miscellaneous Pieces • John Bunyan |
