"Evasive" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... "Don't be evasive with me, boy!" She rapped that out with an officer's snap. "He left a note for Merry—two words misspelled and a big blot—all foolishness about joining Morgan. Said you had been to Red Springs, and he was going ...
— Ride Proud, Rebel! • Andre Alice Norton
... suspicions; suspicions which, up to then, I had attributed solely to some aberration of fancy on my part. Then, again, when we questioned the skipper of the Pensacola relative to the Black Venus and the Vestale, how evasive were his replies!" ...
— The Congo Rovers - A Story of the Slave Squadron • Harry Collingwood
... winced a little under the manner in which this was spoken: but returned the fire by asking if the bishop was down lately in that quarter? The evasive way in which "the Father" replied having stimulated my curiosity as to the reason, little entreaty was necessary to persuade the doctor to relate the following anecdote, which was not relished the less by his superior, that it told ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Complete • Charles James Lever (1806-1872)
... of the travellers soon returned; the dogs had eaten freely of the bear's flesh, and they continued their journey northward. During their walk the doctor tried to draw from Altamont the object of his expedition, but the American gave only evasive answers. ...
— The Voyages and Adventures of Captain Hatteras • Jules Verne
... declined to interfere. This may have been prudent policy, but Hawthorne felt for the sufferers, and the memorial that he submitted to our government on their account has a dignity, a clearness and cogency of statement, worthy of Blackstone or Marshall. It is in marked contrast to the evasive reply of Secretary Cass, both for its fine English and for the directness of its logic. It is published at length in Julian Hawthorne's biography of his father, and is unique for the insight which it affords as to Hawthorne's mental ability ...
— The Life and Genius of Nathaniel Hawthorne • Frank Preston Stearns
... heard the carriage ordered for two o'clock—they were all going to a tennis-party some miles distant. Under the circumstances she might walk about the grounds without being noticed. He did not think any of the gardeners would question her, and, if they did, he could trust her to give an evasive answer. And then he would like her to see the place—just to know what she thought ...
— Victorian Short Stories, - Stories Of Successful Marriages • Elizabeth Gaskell, et al.
... William had been publicly proclaimed a traitor. Both the Stanleys took the field; but whilst William was in treaty with Richmond, Thomas professedly supported Richard. On the morning of Bosworth (August 22), Richard summoned Stanley to join him, and when he received an evasive reply ordered Strange to be executed. In the battle it was William Stanley who turned the scale in Henry's favour, but Thomas, who had taken no part in the fighting, was the first to salute the new king. Henry VII. ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 8, Slice 2 - "Demijohn" to "Destructor" • Various
... Stancy was distracted between his desire to preserve Dare from the consequences of folly, and a gentlemanly wish to keep as close to the truth as was compatible with that condition, his answers had not appeared to Paula to be particularly evasive, the conjuncture being one in which a handsome heiress's shrewdness was prone to overleap itself by setting down embarrassment on the part of the man she questioned to a mere lover's difficulty in ...
— A Laodicean • Thomas Hardy
... more fully awake, I remembered something else which hitherto I had not associated with the latter phenomenon. I remembered that lithe and evasive pursuing shape which I had detected behind me on the road. Even now, however, it was difficult to associate one with the other; for whereas the dimly-seen figure had resembled that of a man (or, more closely, that of a woman) the eyes had looked out upon me from a point low down near the ...
— The Green Eyes of Bast • Sax Rohmer
... meanwhile the occupiers of the most dignified positions in the Established Church seem to have drifted into the somewhat ignoble attitude of avoiding the disagreeable subject of vivisection altogether. When we invite them to help us we receive either no reply at all, or a reply that is carefully evasive, or we are damned with faint praise while assured that the writer is too busy to give the subject the attention it needs before any public utterance is possible upon it. All of which methods of dealing with the matter display ...
— Great Testimony - against scientific cruelty • Stephen Coleridge
... darling," was the soothing but evasive answer. For Olive had a tincture of the old Rothesay pride, and had formed a somewhat disagreeable idea of the position the struggling artist and her blind mother would fill as charity-guests at Farnwood Hall. So, after a little conversation with Mrs. Fludyer, she contrived that the ...
— Olive - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik, (AKA Dinah Maria Mulock)
... a smile as skilful as his voice. "Well, I guess your having mine proves this one is yours." He rode up and received the coil which the Virginian held out, unloosing the disputed one on his saddle. If he had meant to devise a slippery, evasive insult, no small trick in cow-land could be more offensive than this taking another man's rope. And it is the small tricks which lead to the big bullets. Trampas put a smooth coating of plausibility over the whole transaction. "After the rope corral we had to make this ...
— The Virginian - A Horseman Of The Plains • Owen Wister
... tried to learn where the chums were going without asking directly, but they had given evasive answers, and at last, as though believing confidence would beget confidence, he announced that he was going to join his brother Chris, who had a store ...
— Comrades of the Saddle - The Young Rough Riders of the Plains • Frank V. Webster
... the few inquiries from the great city Rachel had evasive answers ready; they were soon over, and I was left to experience the fascination of a beautiful woman whom I had never seen nor could hope ever to see. To be sure, in certain lights and under certain angles of reflection an indistinct outline of a not ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 10 • Various
... greatest followers, Manet and Sargent, seem incomplete. Manet, with his abridgments, his suppressions, his elliptical handling, never had the smiling confidence of Hals in facing a problem. The Frenchman is more subtle, also more evasive; and there is no hint in him of the trite statement of a fact that we encounter in Bartholomew Van der Heist—himself a great painter. Hals had not the poetic vision of Rembrandt, but he possessed a more dexterous hand, a keener eye. Judged according ...
— Promenades of an Impressionist • James Huneker
... action unless a conducting substance were mixed with it, and so incorporated and packed that there would be good electrical contact throughout. This proved to be a most knotty and intricate puzzle—tricky and evasive—always leading on and promising something, and at the last slipping away leaving the work undone. Edison's remarkable patience and persistence in dealing with this trying problem and in finally solving it successfully won ...
— Edison, His Life and Inventions • Frank Lewis Dyer and Thomas Commerford Martin
... caught him watching her with furtive glances in which, she imagined, she detected a glint of speculation. But of this she was not quite sure, for when she bluntly questioned him concerning his moods he had invariably given her an evasive reply. Fearing that there might have been a recurrence of the old trouble with the Two Diamond manager—about which he had told her during her first days at the cabin—she ventured a question. He had grimly assured her that he anticipated no further trouble in that direction. ...
— The Two-Gun Man • Charles Alden Seltzer
... Helena, do you love my son?" "Good madam, pardon me," said the affrighted Helena. Again the countess repeated her question, "Do you love my son?" "Do not you love him, madam?" said Helena. The countess replied, "Give me not this evasive answer, Helena. Come, come, disclose the state of your affections, for your love has to the full appeared." Helena on her knees now owned her love, and with shame and terror implored the pardon of her noble mistress; ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles Lamb and Mary Lamb
... villa near Tunbridge Wells? He talked about the discovery of his old tutor Smirke, freely enough, and of his wife, and of his Anglo-Norman church, and of his departure from Clapham to Rome; but, when asked about Blanche, his answers were evasive or general; he said she was a good-natured, clever little thing—that, rightly guided, she might make no such bad wife after all; but that he had for the moment no intention of marriage, that his days of romance were over, ...
— The History of Pendennis, Vol. 2 - His Fortunes and Misfortunes, His Friends and His Greatest Enemy • William Makepeace Thackeray
... intervals the mountaineers urged the big fellow to attempt the feat, but he always put them off with some evasive reply, or was too ...
— The Shepherd of the Hills • Harold Bell Wright
... its face. These portraits are racier than many anecdotes, and more complete than many a volume of sententious memoirs. You can see whether you get a stronger and clearer idea of Robertson the historian from Raeburn's palette or Dugald Stewart's woolly and evasive periods. And then the portraits are both signed and countersigned. For you have, first, the authority of the artist, whom you recognise as no mean critic of the looks and manners of men; and next you have the tacit ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 2 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... spent his time in the library, and did not inquire concerning his wife's occupations. Isabella and he had had an hour's interview, during which he tried to elicit from her some sentiment of proper horror for Heathcliff's advances: but he could make nothing of her evasive replies, and was obliged to close the examination unsatisfactorily; adding, however, a solemn warning, that if she were so insane as to encourage that worthless suitor, it would dissolve all bonds of relationship between ...
— Wuthering Heights • Emily Bronte
... leaving to inference their religious connection, and giving no ground to call in question the ecclesiastical status and revenues conferred by the church act. This answer was considered by the free church evasive; and its more ardent supporters on the spot pronounced the course of the local presbytery jesuitical and dishonest. They affirmed that the church of Scotland alone was entitled, by colonial law, to state support; and that the retention of its emoluments was a virtual adherence ...
— The History of Tasmania, Volume I (of 2) • John West
... of my parents, and to relieve myself from liability. For this purpose, after arranging for the means to purchase, I employed counsel to make a definite offer for my parents and myself. To his proposal, the following evasive and offensive answer ...
— The Fugitive Blacksmith - or, Events in the History of James W. C. Pennington • James W. C. Pennington
... tone of pathos giving deep character to some splendid pageant, which praises whilst it commemorates, proclaiming conquest while the grass has not yet grown on quiet houses of the children of the sword who no more wield the sword. Evasive, cautious, secretive, creator of her own policy, she had sacrificed her womanhood to the power she held and the State she served. Vain, passionate, and faithful, her heart all England and Elizabeth, the hunger for glimpses of what she had never ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... dependency of New York." M. de Denonville, in reply, denied the pretensions of the English to sovereignty in New France, and pointed out the impropriety of hostile communications between inferiors, while the kings whom they served remained on amicable terms. He rendered, however, some sort of evasive explanation on the subject of his preparations ...
— The Conquest of Canada (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Warburton
... of politeness, and servants do not understand it. As for myself, I naturally prefer the German tongue; it is blunt and honest and lacks the finesse of the French, which is full of evasive words and meanings. However, French predominates at court. Besides, heaven help the foreigner who tries to learn all the German tongues to be found in the empires of the Hohenzollern and Hapsburg. Luncheon will be served to you in the dining hall; the first door to the right at the foot ...
— The Puppet Crown • Harold MacGrath
... NAUTILUS scudding before a strong south-east breeze, Jim, true to his name, sulky as a toad-fish. The good wind harped on the rigging as Mammerroo tirelessly lagged after the ever evasive tune. Jim heard him not. Billy, in a rage, was inclined to bundle the boy and his battered instrument overboard, for he saw in the race north nothing ...
— Tropic Days • E. J. Banfield
... her cheeks "crimson with confusion." Yesterday, at such a question, she would have made an evasive answer; but now, so much was she one with the charming creature of her thoughts, she forgot to be cautious. She cast her mother a pensive glance from her ...
— Missy • Dana Gatlin
... the Gaffat people heard of the arrival of Mr. Stern at Massowah, they went in a body to the Emperor and begged him not to allow Mr. Stern to enter Abyssinia. His Majesty gave an evasive answer, but did not comply with the request; on the contrary, he seems to have rejoiced at the idea of an enmity existing between the Europeans in his country, and chuckled at the prospect of the advantages he might reap from their ...
— A Narrative of Captivity in Abyssinia - With Some Account of the Late Emperor Theodore, - His Country and People • Henry Blanc
... happened to his friend's old home.... Alas, in Paris, the lapse of half a year suffices to alter the most familiar scene! In rue Bonaparte, the former house porters had left; their place had been taken by a stout, sulky woman who gave evasive replies to Fandor's questions. He extracted from her the information that the tenant of the fourth floor flat had died, that his furniture had been cleared out very soon after his death, and the flat had been ...
— Messengers of Evil - Being a Further Account of the Lures and Devices of Fantomas • Pierre Souvestre
... She ended by ruining her niece who had blindly entrusted her interests to her, but Mme. Descoings repaid for her foolish doings by an absolute devotion,—all the while continuing to place her money on the evasive combinations. One day her hoardings were stolen from her mattress by Philippe Bridau. On this account she was unable to renew her lottery tickets. Then it was that the famous trey turned up. Madame Descoings died of grief, December 31, 1821. Had it not been ...
— Repertory Of The Comedie Humaine, Complete, A — Z • Anatole Cerfberr and Jules Franois Christophe
... the raid were now assembled, but the task of the British columns was, apparently, greatly facilitated. Instead of having to chase evasive and elusive commandos now in this direction and now in that, the leaders had but to pin De Wet down to the left bank of the Orange at Zand Drift and to leave him to gaze longingly at the further shore. Nothing could now save him but a sudden fall of the swollen ...
— A Handbook of the Boer War • Gale and Polden, Limited
... like so many doctors; he seemed to be afraid to tell the whole truth about his patient. He stuck to evasive optimism and then neutralized the reassurances he uttered by emphasizing the necessity of being notified if Mrs. MacDonald showed ...
— The Ranch at the Wolverine • B. M. Bower
... for she believed from his evasive reply that Mrs. Montague did not now believe her to ...
— True Love's Reward • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... already heard enough to put him into a fever of anxiety for the safety of Gemma and his other friends. The studied politeness of the officers, the dull game of fencing and parrying, of insidious questions and evasive answers, worried and annoyed him, and the clumsy tramping backward and forward of the sentinel outside the door jarred detestably upon ...
— The Gadfly • E. L. Voynich
... incorrect; fallacious, fallible; groundless, unproved; non sequitur [Lat.], it does not follow. deceptive, sophistical, jesuitical; illusive, illusory; specious, hollow, plausible, ad captandum [Lat.], evasive; irrelevant &c 10. weak, feeble, poor, flimsy, loose, vague. irrational; nonsensical &c (absurd) 497. foolish &c (imbecile) 499; frivolous, pettifogging, quibbling; finespun^, overrefined^. at the end of one's tether, au bout de son latin. Adv. intuitively &c adj.; by intuition; illogically ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... him as long as he lived; that of Lord Marnell they had only heard a rumour which they could not believe, of his having joined an insurrection in the West; that Master Carew was had up to London and strictly examined by the council, but that his answers were so ingeniously evasive that they could lay hold of nothing, and nothing had been found in his house which could criminate him; he had accordingly been dismissed with a caution. Sir Ralph Marston had privately declared that ...
— Mistress Margery • Emily Sarah Holt
... support of the Creed of Pope Pius: "The new articles are deduced from Scripture; that is, in our opinion, and that most expressly in our Lord's several and solemn addresses to St. Peter." So again Sherlock's answer to this paragraph from the Notes is evasive,—for it is very possible, nay, it is, and has been the case, that a man may believe in the facts and doctrines contained in the New Testament, and yet not believe the Holy Scripture to be ...
— Coleridge's Literary Remains, Volume 4. • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... November a French squadron appeared before Salee, to claim satisfaction for an act of piracy committed by the inhabitants of that town. The Caid asked for six days to take the orders of the Emperor of Morocco; and the Caid of Rabat sent a similar evasive reply. The next day the French bombarded the place for seven hours, the fire being returned by both forts of Rabat and Salee. The Admiral, however, confined his chastisement to the latter, which he thoroughly performed, and fired the ...
— The International Monthly Magazine - Volume V - No II • Various
... no real home since my mother died," was the evasive reply. "My home is wherever night overtakes me. I cannot tell you any more now, so please do not ask me. I know you ...
— The King's Arrow - A Tale of the United Empire Loyalists • H. A. Cody
... It would be evasive to shirk mention of the fact that many of the most devoted servants of health and morals object to public discussion of the facts of sex. They discard enlightenment about sex as relatively unimportant because a clean ancestry, decency in the family and neighborhood, and noble needs in friendship, ...
— The Sexual Life of the Child • Albert Moll
... moral code; it was everything or nothing. Morality can tell us that murder is worse than stealing, and group most sins in an order all must approve, but it cannot group Helen. The surer its pronouncements on this point, the surer may we be that morality is not speaking. Christ was evasive when they questioned Him. It is those that cannot connect who hasten to cast the ...
— Howards End • E. M. Forster
... it is to be a man of one idea! I gave him an evasive answer and rushed away to make the necessary preparations for my journey. I was absurdly, boyishly happy. No doubt as to my success crossed my mind. It was to be my final and triumphant adventure. Unless the High Powers stove a ...
— Simon the Jester • William J. Locke
... that this consolatory Biblical reflection disposes of the matter. Politicians, as also diplomatists, are often obliged to give evasive answers to inconvenient questions, but it is not possible for any man, when dealing with a point of primary importance, deliberately to make and to repeat a statement so absolutely untrue as that ...
— Political and Literary essays, 1908-1913 • Evelyn Baring
... "That sounds evasive," said Heyst after a short silence. "Well, the good fellow did pray and after he had confessed to it I was struck by the comicality of the situation. No, don't misunderstand me—I am not alluding to his act, of course. And even the idea of Eternity, Infinity, Omnipotence, being called upon to defeat ...
— Victory • Joseph Conrad
... alluded to by his friend. The element of mystery attached itself rather to the young lady's mother, who gave him the impression that for undiscoverable reasons she avoided his society. He regretted her evasive deportment, for he found something agreeable in this shy and scrupulous little woman, who struck him as a curious specimen of a society of which he had once been very fond. He learned that she was of old New England ...
— Confidence • Henry James
... come from up North!" he said. And that, I promptly realized, was an evasive way of answering an honest question, especially as there was a California license-number on the ...
— The Prairie Mother • Arthur Stringer
... could come," was her rather evasive answer, and she gazed at the table decorations as if pondering something ...
— The Rhodesian • Gertrude Page
... the change in him. His cheeks, which used to be full and almost florid, were shrunken and pale; a short grizzly beard had grown over his chin, and his eyes, which had been frank and humorous, were fierce and evasive. Six weeks in prison had made a different man of him, and, like a dog which has been changed by sickness and neglect, he knew ...
— The Eternal City • Hall Caine
... a large rent in her train). You have no eyes, I tell you, let me help. It must be found, or I am all undone! In vain my cushion I have cut in two—'twas void of all but stuffing.... Gracious Heavens, to think that all my future bliss depends on the evasive ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 98, February 1, 1890 • Various
... scouts feared that they would lose the way; besides it was a dangerous ride, as a large party of Indians were known to be camped on Walnut Creek, on the direct road to Fort Hays. It was evident that Curtis was trying to induce me to volunteer. I made some evasive answer to Curtis, for I did not care to volunteer after my long day's ride. But Curtis did not let ...
— The Life of Hon. William F. Cody - Known as Buffalo Bill The Famous Hunter, Scout and Guide • William F. Cody
... vein of something evasive in Mary's character that she let me hear first of her engagement to Justin through the Times. Away there in Scotland she got I suppose new perspectives, new ideas; the glow of our immediate passion faded. The thing ...
— The Passionate Friends • Herbert George Wells
... vaguely evasive, "you know how that is; fellows are like sheep—stampede into a country, and then one makes a break, and they stampede out. Now that Benson has sold, a lot more of them ...
— The Desert Fiddler • William H. Hamby
... aiding us a little under Edmund's direction, and soon we had the sleds out of the tangle and properly attached. Then we replaced the natives on their seats, and entered the car. Edmund began to fumble with his apparatus. After some ten minutes' work he said, in an evasive way, that the damage was not serious enough to prevent the working of the car, but I thought I caught an expression of extreme anxiety in his face. Still, his manner indicated that he considered ...
— A Columbus of Space • Garrett P. Serviss
... general way, sir,' Mr Wegg was beginning slowly and knowingly, with his head stuck on one side, as evasive people do begin, when the other ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens
... ever heard the name of Melchior in his tribe. Timothy replied that he had, and that at the gathering he had seen him and his wife. Timothy at one time thought that the man was about to reveal everything, but of a sudden he stopped short, and gave evasive answers. To a question put by Timothy, as to where they were to take the child if they obtained possession of her, the man had replied, that she would go over the water. Such were the contents of the letter, and I eagerly awaited ...
— Japhet, In Search Of A Father • Frederick Marryat
... had overpowered him, and all this was kept from her knowledge? Starting up under the excitement of this apprehension, she was approaching the door, when it opened, and Agnes Barker came in. The young woman looked more than usually excited that morning. The fire, which always lay smouldering in her evasive eyes, was kindled up, and a flush lay redly on her cheek, an evil flush, such as we may imagine the poison in a laurel plant to spread over its blossoms. In her hand she held a few leaves of verbena and rose geranium, encircling a white rose-bud, and a crimson rose, which had evidently been ...
— Mabel's Mistake • Ann S. Stephens
... in the meantime, with such evasive answers, and finding resistance useless, indeed uncalled for, as I was unconscious of any crime, I now went peaceably along with the men. Whither they were conducting me the reader will readily guess; it was ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, XXII • various
... happened to be with Josephine when Hortense came in, and was the first to be questioned by her, gave her only an evasive and jocose reply, and withdrew. Hortense then turned to her mother, who was leaning over on the divan, her eyes reddened with weeping and her heart oppressed with grief. To her, Bonaparte had given no evasive answer, ...
— Queen Hortense - A Life Picture of the Napoleonic Era • L. Muhlbach
... "cunning" little puckers around her lips, her bright tender eyes, the angelic texture of her robes, and the musical tinkle of her voice. But Leonidas had no confidant, and what healthy boy ever trusted his sister in such matter! "YOU saw what she was like," he said, with evasive bluntness. ...
— Openings in the Old Trail • Bret Harte
... Secretary of State, had resigned because the drift of President Wilson's policy was not toward mediation but the strict maintenance of American rights, if need be, by force of arms. The German reply was still evasive and German naval commanders continued their course of sinking merchant ships. In a third and final note of July 21, 1915, President Wilson made it clear to Germany that he meant what he said when he wrote that he would maintain the rights of American citizens. Finally after much discussion ...
— History of the United States • Charles A. Beard and Mary R. Beard
... apprehension, He confronts the assassin band, in meek majesty He puts the question, "Whom seek ye?" They say to Him, "Jesus of Nazareth." In guileless innocence, He replies, "I am He!" "Art thou the King of the Jews?" asks Pilate, a few hours after. An evasive answer might again have purchased immunity from suffering and indignity, but once more the lips which scorned the semblance ...
— The Mind of Jesus • John R. Macduff
... Conrad is always an analyst; that sets him apart from other writers of sea stories. Chance is different in theme, but not as different in treatment as in construction. His pattern of narration has always been of an evasive character; here the method is carried to the pitch of polyphonic intricacy. The richness of interest, the startling variety, and the philosophic largeness of view—the tale is simple enough otherwise for a child's enjoyment—are a few of its qualities. Coventry ...
— Ivory Apes and Peacocks • James Huneker
... man, who, in a few years, had unravelled more apparently insoluble mysteries, and caused the arrest of more hitherto evasive scoundrels, than his predecessors had managed to secure in a decade. The name of Gimblet was known and detested wherever a coiner carried on his forbidden craft, or a blackmailer concocted his cowardly plans; burglars and forgers cursed freely when he was mentioned, and ...
— The Ashiel mystery - A Detective Story • Mrs. Charles Bryce
... you note that another prospect glances obliquely at persons or objects, or that he habitually turns his eyes to one side or the other while keeping his head still, judge him to lack the characteristic of frankness. He is likely to be evasive and shifty in his dealings. Perhaps the sign you have perceived indicates no more than that your prospect is "stalling." It is evidence, nevertheless, that his mind is not meeting your ideas squarely. You will need to compel ...
— Certain Success • Norval A. Hawkins
... his age. Unlike his father, he was usually amiable in his private character, and grave and dignified in his bearing; but, like his father, he had monstrously exaggerated notions of the rights of a king, and was evasive, and not to be trusted. If his word could have been relied upon, his history might have had ...
— A Child's History of England • Charles Dickens
... of patients averaged 238; the annual expenditure, L12,000. Mr. Haslam, the resident apothecary, ruled supreme. He was responsible for the dreadful condition in which the notorious Norris was discovered. "There is," says Sydney Smith, "much evasive testimony, to shift from himself the burden of this atrocious case; but his efforts tend rather to confirm than to shake the conviction which the evidence produces.... The conduct of Haslam with respect to several other patients was of a ...
— Chapters in the History of the Insane in the British Isles • Daniel Hack Tuke
... insinuation: "You will give just a hint that as to Poland, since the emperor has become acquainted with it, he attaches to it no value." The sacrifice of a fourth of the Prussian monarchy seemed too bitter for King Frederick William; he replied to the envoy with evasive answers. Napoleon became disdainful as regards the Prussians. It was with Austria that he determined henceforth to treat concerning the affairs of Prussia. "See now my plan, and what you must say to M. de Vincent," wrote he on ...
— Worlds Best Histories - France Vol 7 • M. Guizot and Madame Guizot De Witt
... "General Wool, I think General Sherman has a right to a written answer from you, for he is surely compromised." Upon this Wool handed me the letter. I opened and read it, and it denied any promise of arms, but otherwise was extremely evasive and non-committal. I had heard of the arrival at the wharf of the Governor and party, and was expecting them at Wool's room, but, instead of stopping at the hotel where we were, they passed to another hotel on the block above. I went up and found there, ...
— The Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman, Complete • William T. Sherman
... it, and stowed it away in the hut beside the kite. The astonishment of the natives, when they came out next morning to stare and wonder, according to custom, was very great. Leo resolved to make a mystery of it, looked solemn when spoken to on the point, and gave evasive replies. ...
— The Giant of the North - Pokings Round the Pole • R.M. Ballantyne
... Claire's answers were politely evasive, and presently he began to grow restless, and finally pulled out his watch, and jumped ...
— The Independence of Claire • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... him, Hujir evasive thus replies: "Through all the extended earth his glory flies! Whenever dangers round the nation close, Rustem approaches, and repels its foes; And shouldst thou see him mix in mortal strife, Thou'dst ...
— Persian Literature, Volume 1,Comprising The Shah Nameh, The - Rubaiyat, The Divan, and The Gulistan • Anonymous
... an evasive answer. He reflected that once he had married her it would probably be easy to detach Karen from these most undesirable associates. He hoped that she would take to Betty. Betty would be an excellent antidote. "And you think ...
— Tante • Anne Douglas Sedgwick
... time we had to make sure of the position France would take. To our direct question whether in case of a German-Russian war she would remain neutral, France answered that she would do what she had to do in her own interests. [Laughter.] That was an evasive if not a negative answer ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War from the Beginning to March 1915, Vol 1, No. 2 - Who Began the War, and Why? • Various
... plays in prose seem at times almost surcharged with a meaning which is nevertheless often so mockingly intangible and evasive, that we dare to wonder at last whether the secret they persist in hiding in this tantalizing fashion would really reward our efforts to grasp it; and we find comfort in Lowell's apt saying that "to be misty is not to be mystic." Ibsen is mystic, no doubt, but on occasion ...
— Inquiries and Opinions • Brander Matthews
... traits has been given by Mrs. Lippincott. "She impressed me," says this writer, "at first as exceedingly plain, with the massive character of her features, her aggressive jaw and evasive blue eyes. But as she grew interested and earnest in conversation, a great light flashed over or out of her face, till it seemed transfigured, while the sweetness of her rare smile was something quite indescribable. But she seemed to me to the last lofty and cold. I felt that her head was among ...
— George Eliot; A Critical Study of Her Life, Writings & Philosophy • George Willis Cooke
... this declaration of independence, and Stanwell, with his evasive laugh, asked her if, meanwhile, she should object to his investing a part of his ill-gotten gains in theatre tickets for the ...
— The Hermit and the Wild Woman and Other Stories • Edith Wharton
... "Is it safe to buy land in Argentina?" But the drift of this query too often is merely self-interest; in other words, it really means "Can I successfully speculate in land?" Clearly the matter is solely a personal one, no other consideration is thought of, so one is tempted to give an evasive answer. Should the questioner, however, be a young fellow, with God's gift of health and plenty of truth and grit in him, who wants not only to acquire the land, but to work it, then, indeed, there is but one answer, and that is in the affirmative—let ...
— Argentina From A British Point Of View • Various
... a concave speculum hung slantingly high over his head; a movement in this caught my attention sharply, and I looked up to see, distorted and made fantastic but bright and beautifully colored, the magnified, reflected, evasive rendering of a palace, of a terrace, of the vista of a great roadway with many people, people exaggerated, impossible-looking because of the curvature of the mirror, going to and fro. I turned my head quickly that I might see more clearly ...
— In the Days of the Comet • H. G. Wells
... intense and wondering scrutiny. When he spoke it was in a different tone, as though he were carefully weighing his every word, as though he were a little uncertain of the ground on which he stood. There was something of evasive vagueness in his tone, whilst his eyes were fixed on Cuthbert's face as though he would ...
— The Lost Treasure of Trevlyn - A Story of the Days of the Gunpowder Plot • Evelyn Everett-Green
... was deemed evasive, and therefore unsatisfactory, filled the Independents with joy, the Presbyterians with sorrow. The former disguised no longer their wish to dethrone the king, and either to set up in his place his son the duke ...
— The History of England from the First Invasion by the Romans - to the Accession of King George the Fifth - Volume 8 • John Lingard and Hilaire Belloc
... the selectmen of North Dormer, and a distant Hatchard relative at Springfield. "If you'd only gone to school!" she sighed. She followed Charity to the door, and there, in the security of the threshold, said with a glance of evasive appeal: "I know Mr. Royall is... trying at times; but his wife bore with him; and you must always remember, Charity, that it was Mr. Royall who brought you down from the Mountain." Charity went home and opened the door of Mr. Royall's "office." He was sitting there by the stove reading Daniel ...
— Summer • Edith Wharton
... give some evasive explanation, when Mali interposed with her simple, unthinking translation. "Them say, Missy Queenie very good and kind. Make them sad to think. Make them cry to see her. Make them cry to see Missy Queenie Korong. Too ...
— The Great Taboo • Grant Allen
... United States nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty and property without due process of law, nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws." The court was too evasive or too stupid to observe that the first clause of this amendment was an affirmation to the effect that all persons born and naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 6, 1921 • Various
... another evening prowl with the young female panther before the evasive chance was grasped, and the storm-tossed, overdue Monarchic hoped to dock within ...
— Winnie Childs - The Shop Girl • C. N. Williamson
... this precise statement from you. It encourages me to ask again the nature of the freak which took you into this house. You say that it was not from any dread on your sister's account? What, then, was it? No evasive answer will satisfy ...
— The Filigree Ball • Anna Katharine Green
... even in the involved heart of the city. He had tried once or twice himself, but never with encouraging success, chiefly, he was told, because his paper was not good enough. Many people, he added, would not scruple to mislead me with evasive ambiguity on this one subject owing to an ill-balanced conception of what constituted true dignity, but he was unwilling that his countrymen should be thought by mine to be sunk into a deeper ...
— The Mirror of Kong Ho • Ernest Bramah
... as was evident by its outburst in the debates between Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Stephen A. Douglas.[8] The main question was whether, according to the Constitution, Congress could prohibit slavery in the territories. Lincoln contended that it could but Douglas was evasive, as he hoped to reconcile his popular sovereignty with the Dred Scott decision. Lincoln, on the other hand, showed that the public estimate of the Negro had become decidedly lower than it was prior to the industrial revolution, ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 7, 1922 • Various
... a few feet of these steel piles were left exposed above the surface, their gradual settling serving as a reliable index to the evasive movements of the extensive quicksand underneath. At other points wooden piles were driven ...
— The Young Engineers in Arizona - Laying Tracks on the Man-killer Quicksand • H. Irving Hancock
... the party was non-committal on the issues of the hour. There was much opposition to both candidates. Many anti-slavery Whigs could not bring themselves to vote for Taylor, who was a slave-owner; Democrats who had supported the Wilmot Proviso, disliked the evasive doctrine of Cass. ...
— Stephen A. Douglas - A Study in American Politics • Allen Johnson
... the editors. They were polite, they admitted the justice of her stand, but they were evasive. Mrs. Knefler opened her paper the next morning after she had made the rounds, to find not a single word about the danger to ...
— How To Write Special Feature Articles • Willard Grosvenor Bleyer
... Majesty's answer," said the ambassador, "to my most gracious master; yet, let me say, that, as it is in no degree different from the evasive replies which have already been returned to his just complaints, I cannot hope that it will afford the means of re-establishing peace and friendship betwixt ...
— Quentin Durward • Sir Walter Scott
... sent for me?" Lester queried, stopping short. The man made an evasive answer, which aroused his suspicions that all was not as ...
— Mischievous Maid Faynie • Laura Jean Libbey
... Master," declaring that "Master" couldn't do this and "Master" couldn't do that; that the other side was too late or too soon; that his particulars were too meagre or too full; or his answers to interrogatories too evasive or not sufficiently diffuse, and went on generally as if the whole object of the law were to raise as many difficulties as possible in the way of its application. As if, in fact, it had fenced itself in with such an undergrowth of brambles that no amount of ability ...
— The Humourous Story of Farmer Bumpkin's Lawsuit • Richard Harris
... minutes late, so that he had less to spare for his daughter's disappointment than Mrs Leicester, who on her arrival took up the lamentation with all her heart. She attacked her nephew at once upon the subject, whose replies were at first wavering and evasive, till he caught Flora's eye, and then he answered with a dogged sort of resolution, exceedingly amusing to me who understood his position, and at last got quite cross with his aunt for persisting in her entreaties. I declared, for my part, that I was dependent ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 363, January, 1846 • Various
... than three hours. It was manifest that nothing but force could now remove the boy and his supporters, but the Begum tried to gain more time in the hope of support from a popular insurrection from without, which might take off the British troops from the garden; and she sent evasive messages to the Resident by her wakeels, urging him to come once more to her, since it was impossible for her to make her way to him without danger of collision between the troops of the two States. He refused to put himself again in her power, ...
— A Journey through the Kingdom of Oude, Volumes I & II • William Sleeman
... said, 'Are here among my comrades in the camp.' That made a mystery and I questioned him: He gave no answer—or evasive ones— Seeming to shrink from question, and to wrap Himself ...
— The Feast of the Virgins and Other Poems • H. L. Gordon
... water to handle the musket if Blackbeard sneaks back to bang at us with his pistols," was the evasive reply. The mention of the corpse had given old Trimble a distaste for the task. To his petulant question, Bill Saxby protested that he couldn't swim a blessed stroke and he ...
— Blackbeard: Buccaneer • Ralph D. Paine
... nom-de-plume, a mere identification mark; but behind it lies a shifty and evasive personality. In a former letter he frankly informed me that the name was not his own, and defied me ever to trace him among the teeming millions of this great city. Porlock is important, not for himself, but for the great man with whom ...
— The Valley of Fear • Arthur Conan Doyle
... we could obtain assistance. They were more ready to hear the accounts we had to give than to say anything about themselves; indeed, when once or twice Mudge inquired how long they had been in the colony, and why they came out, they made evasive answers, and turned the subject. They were, in reality, convicts; assigned servants, who received no wages, but were allowed thus much of liberty as long as ...
— Twice Lost • W.H.G. Kingston
... the assembly laughed again. The sound ran over the room like a scudding cloud across a meadow, and when the sheriff stood again to set his censorious eye upon someone responsible, the last ripple was on the farther rows. Nobody can catch a laugh in a crowd; it is as evasive as a pickpocket. Nobody can turn with watchful eye upon it and tell in what face the ribald gleam first breaks. It is as impossible as the identification of the first stalk shaken when a breeze assails a field ...
— The Bondboy • George W. (George Washington) Ogden
... capital had worn an unwonted aspect. In this city of military discipline public meetings had been held day after day, and the streets had been blocked by excited crowds. Deputations which laid before the King demands similar to those now made in every German town received halting and evasive answers. Excitement increased, and on the 13th of March encounters began between the citizens and the troops, which, though insignificant, served to exasperate the people and its leaders. The King appeared to be wavering between resistance and concession until the ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe
... The fingers of that worthy domestic closed as naturally upon the honorarium, as if a degree in the learned faculty had given him a right to clutch it; but his answer concerning Alan's proposed departure was at first evasive, and when he was pushed, it amounted to a peremptory assurance that he could not be permitted to depart to-morrow; it was as much as his life was worth, and his ladies would ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott
... evasive one, but was sufficient to awaken the suspicions of the emigrants. My question destroyed the beautiful picture which ...
— Camp-Fire and Cotton-Field • Thomas W. Knox
... England had now changed hands; and the ministry at once sent to Sheer-Ali, to demand that he should receive a British resident. It was late in the year, and the Ameer—acting, no doubt, on the advice of his Russian friends—sought to gain time by evasive answers. The British government—who saw through the ruse—ordered the envoy to advance, with a strong escort. This obliged the Ameer to come to a final decision; and the die was cast by the escort being stopped, by force, on ...
— For Name and Fame - Or Through Afghan Passes • G. A. Henty
... Jeff's grin took on flesh visibly. It was a pleasure—even to one beset by grievous perplexities—it was a pleasure to hear such noble big words fall thus trippingly from human lips. His answer, tho, was in a measure evasive, not ...
— Sundry Accounts • Irvin S. Cobb
... some evasive response to this raillery and then became silent. Soon quiet prevailed in the encampment; only out of the recesses of the forest came the menacing howl of ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham
... I had a lovely time to-day, with all the beautiful sights out in the country; I wish you could see how much more there is in nature since we have studied Christian Healing," was the evasive reply. ...
— The Right Knock - A Story • Helen Van-Anderson
... return some evasive reply, when the hustle caused by a party entering the next box seemed to attract the attention of all four gentlemen, who exchanged glances of much meaning. The new party beginning to converse together, Sir Mulberry suddenly assumed the character of a most attentive ...
— The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby • Charles Dickens
... party, seized on this idea as hatred seizes the arm which is offered to it. The king felt the blow; Dumouriez saw through the perfidy, and could not repress his choler against Servan in the council-chamber. His reproaches were those of a loyal defender of his king. The replies of Servan were evasive, but full of provocation. The two ministers laid their hands upon their swords, and but for the presence of the king, and the intervention of their colleagues, blood would have ...
— History of the Girondists, Volume I - Personal Memoirs of the Patriots of the French Revolution • Alphonse de Lamartine |
