"Grumble" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... surrounded by the cells, the refectory, and the domestic buildings of the monks. The erection of the castle is dated in the twelfth century, and from this time we may consider the older abbey buildings around the church to have been deserted and left to ruin; but we can hardly grumble at a transfer which has given us so curious a combination of military and monastic architecture in ...
— Stray Studies from England and Italy • John Richard Green
... kept fine, more or less. Inger got the potatoes in by herself, and Isak had the roofing done before the rain came on in earnest. The goats were brought in of a night into the hut and all slept there together; they managed somehow, they managed everyway, and did not grumble. ...
— Growth of the Soil • Knut Hamsun
... say that I wasent mad with Jim Allcorn, as sum peepul supposed; but it do illustrate the onsertainty of human kalkulashuns in this subloonery world. The disappintments of life are amazin', and if a man wants to fret and grumble at his luck he can find a reesunable oppertunity to do so every day that he lives. Them sort of constitutional grumblers ain't much cumpany to me. I'd rather be Jim Perkins with a bullit hole through me and take my chances. Jim, you know, ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume III. (of X.) • Various
... take a last look at the lonely house, 'if it had only been Edward Kornicker who was thus cast adrift, to kick his way through the world with empty pockets, and without a soul to say to him God speed, or 'I'm sorry for you,' it would have been right and proper, and no one would have any cause to grumble or find fault; but this being a girl, with no money, and consequently with no friends, no experience, as I have, it's a very hard case—a very ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, June 1844 - Volume 23, Number 6 • Various
... prevent him from wandering far afield. At the objections stage, as at every other step in the selling process, you should dominate the other man. Tactfully keep him concentrated on the subject and on your application. If he starts to grumble that some man he has engaged previously was "no good," you can smile and reply, "You would not give me credit for anybody else's fine work, and of course you do not blame me for ...
— Certain Success • Norval A. Hawkins
... there in plenty—meat, bread, and wine. They are not used to lie soft; they will not grumble at having clean straw to ...
— La Vendee • Anthony Trollope
... that of a pretty little girl? Really, I am half ashamed to name him, for fear you should be angry with me for doing so. It is—it is the pig! The resemblance is not exactly a flattering one to you, perhaps, but we are all alike, and it would be worse than foolish to grumble at being created as we are. Moreover, there is one difference; the pig, who thinks of nothing but eating, has a very much larger stomach than we have, which is some ...
— The History of a Mouthful of Bread - And its effect on the organization of men and animals • Jean Mace
... about the sentiment," said Rose, "but I am sure about the pie. If that were missing at dinner-time I know who would grumble. So I'll go, and attend to my duties." She had risen, and was confronting Scarlett. "Good-bye," she said, "and ...
— The Tale of Timber Town • Alfred Grace
... out to find the car almost lost to sight in the crush; but Mr. van Buren, who is like a great, handsome Viking, pushed the people aside, and said things to them in Dutch which made some laugh and others grumble. ...
— The Chauffeur and the Chaperon • C. N. Williamson
... marked 'Settlers' Effects' had no more part in the show than a new boy his first day at school. But two years in Canada and one run home will make him free of the Brotherhood in Canada as it does anywhere else. He may grumble at certain aspects of the life, lament certain richnesses only to be found in England, but as surely as he grumbles so surely he returns to the big skies, and the big chances. The failures are those who complain ...
— Letters of Travel (1892-1913) • Rudyard Kipling
... Moore! Here am I taking you home to get well in peace and quiet, and Ellen has filled the house up with half a dozen girls, more or less. Writes me to come home and be 'made a lion of;' as sensible as most women!' And the grumble subsided. He broke out again shortly: 'Louise Meller—Lois Berkeley—Susy—' the other names were drowned in the rattle of the starting train. The captain finished his letters, and Clement Moore took up his broken dreams, but this ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol 6, No 5, November 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... sister's strong will were forcing him to carry out his design. And his sister seemed almost hard-hearted to him, as if she were thrusting him away to get rid of him. He did not, indeed, dare to say this openly, but he began to grumble and complain a good deal about it, and Barefoot looked upon this as suppressed grief over parting—the feeling that would gladly take advantage of little obstacles and represent them as hindrances to the fulfilment of a purpose one ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VIII • Various
... that house, will depend on the manner in which you defend yourselves in this. A stout vigilance for a short time will secure your certain happiness for ever. But every thing depends on your present exertions. Don't complain and take advantage of my absence, and call me a hard master, and grumble that you are placed in the midst of a howling wilderness, without peace or security. Say not, that you are exposed to temptations without any power to resist them. You have some difficulties, it is true; but you have many helps and many comforts to make this ...
— Stories for the Young - Or, Cheap Repository Tracts: Entertaining, Moral, and Religious. Vol. VI. • Hannah More
... Chasseloup and Lariboisiere. Marshal Lefebvre grew weary of the long and able preparations of his colleagues, and wished to begin the actual assault. Authorization for this step was asked of the emperor. "You only know how to grumble, to abuse your allies, and change your opinion at the will of the first comer," wrote Napoleon to the old warrior. "You treat the allies without any consideration; they are not accustomed to be under fire, but that ...
— Worlds Best Histories - France Vol 7 • M. Guizot and Madame Guizot De Witt
... of the sea made me think again of the low grumble of restless lions. The sound was hateful. Why should it steal in here—why haunt me even in this one spot in all the world where a world-tired man had found a moment's peace in ...
— The Maids of Paradise • Robert W. (Robert William) Chambers
... would stand gloating,[14] and hanging down his head in a sullen, pouching manner; a body might read, as we used to say, the picture of ill-luck in his face; and when his father did demand his answer to such questions concerning his villainy, he would grumble and mutter at him, and that should ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... self-control, thought, effort to fulfil that aspiration even in part. For to be discontented with the divine discontent, and to be ashamed with the noble shame, is the very germ and first upgrowth of all virtue. Men begin at first, as boys begin when they grumble at their school and their schoolmasters, to lay the blame on others; to be discontented with their circumstances—the things which stand around them; and to cry, "Oh that I had this!" "Oh that I had that!" But by that way no deliverance lies. That discontent only ends ...
— Sanitary and Social Lectures and Essays • Charles Kingsley
... have hornless heads, like hinds and does. Thus wethers have small horns, like ewes; and oxen large bent horns, and hoarse voices when they low, like cows: for bulls have short straight horns; and though they mutter and grumble in a deep tremendous tone, yet they low in a shrill high key. Capons have small combs and gills, and look pallid about the head, like pullets; they also walk without any parade, and hover chickens like hens. Barrow- hogs have ...
— The Natural History of Selborne • Gilbert White
... "Attica." My companions were all single men; good, reliable fellows who were working for a principle and would ordinarily have declined such a lodging- place, but under the circumstances were not apt to grumble, but made the best of it. It was like camping out, and all its mischances were turned into fun. My roommates were called "the Admiral," "the Dutchman," "the General" and "the Parson,"—nicknames given each one of them for ...
— Brook Farm • John Thomas Codman
... whatever of the argosy which lay somewhere at its bottom. But the man was stout in heart and full of hope. He set his seamen to work to drag along the coast, and for weeks they went on fishing up seaweed, shingle and bits of rock. No occupation could be more trying to seamen, and they began to grumble one to another, and to whisper that the man in command had brought them ...
— How to Get on in the World - A Ladder to Practical Success • Major A.R. Calhoon
... soldiers in Mafeking were disposed to grumble at the small part they seemed to be playing in the great tussle in which England was engaged, the authorities were satisfied that for so small a town to have kept occupied during the first critical month of the war 10,000—and at later stages never ...
— South African Memories - Social, Warlike & Sporting From Diaries Written At The Time • Lady Sarah Wilson
... darned glad as you've brought A—-; you might have left that other critter to home, though, jest as well—we doosn't want him blowin' out his little hide here; lazin' about, and doin' nothin' day nor night but eat and grumble; and drink, and drink, as if he'd got a meal-sack in his little guts. Why, Timothy, how be you?" he concluded, smiting him on the back a downright blow, that would have almost felled an ox, as he was getting out ...
— Warwick Woodlands - Things as they Were There Twenty Years Ago • Henry William Herbert (AKA Frank Forester)
... sleeve was ever above the elbow. Countrymen came down from distant villages into towns and cities, to see perverters whom they had never heard of, and to learn the righteousness of hatred. When heretics waxed fewer the religious began to grumble that God, in losing his enemies, had ...
— Citation and Examination of William Shakspeare • Walter Savage Landor
... questions.) This, however, I have corrected in all the copies struck off after the first lot of 2500. I daresay there will be a new edition in the course of nine months or a year, and this I will correct as well as I can. As yet the publishers have kept up type, and grumble dreadfully if I make heavy corrections. I am very far from surprised that "you have not committed yourself to full acceptation" of the evolution of man. Difficulties and objections there undoubtedly are, ...
— More Letters of Charles Darwin Volume II - Volume II (of II) • Charles Darwin
... prigs you are," interrupted Eric, "Mae is jolly. Do stop your reasoning about her. If you are bound to be a potato yourself to help save the masses from starvation, don't grumble because she grew a flower. Come, let us ...
— Mae Madden • Mary Murdoch Mason
... read that in your old book," Perry would grumble. "Anybody could do that!" Nevertheless, he hearkened and remembered against the time when the conduct of the boat should be handed over to the hands of the efficient second mate. When Joe became insufferably informative Perry blandly asked him questions about the engine, such as, "What's the ...
— The Adventure Club Afloat • Ralph Henry Barbour
... dirty," went on Aunt Caroline, "but they are worth it. They give atmosphere. If you have a house like this, you have to have fireplaces. That is what I tell my maids when I engage them. So that they cannot grumble afterwards. Fireplaces are dirty, I tell them, but—what are you ...
— The Window-Gazer • Isabel Ecclestone Mackay
... Let me not hear a snarl, Or a growl, or a grumble come out of your heads; To work now, instanter! Trot, gallop, and canter, And finish this job ere you go ...
— In The Yule-Log Glow, Vol. IV (of IV) • Harrison S. Morris
... dad away out of his reach. He would not shoot her,—he would not dare. Nor would he dare come to the cabin and finish the job he had begun. But he had managed to kill Frank—poor old Frank, who would never grumble and argue ...
— The Quirt • B.M. Bower
... for Elisabeth held him fast; and now his manly love for Elisabeth held him faster still. But even the chains which love had rivetted are capable of galling us sometimes; and although we would not break them, even if we could, we grumble at them occasionally—that is to say, if we are merely human, as is the case with so many ...
— The Farringdons • Ellen Thorneycroft Fowler
... ought not to grumble at my luck. I believe I am the only officer who has been taken prisoner and, as it looks as if I am to be kept as a hostage, my life would seem to be safe. I certainly expected nothing but instant death when they rushed down upon me. I have no doubt that, by this time, a messenger has reached ...
— Through Three Campaigns - A Story of Chitral, Tirah and Ashanti • G. A. Henty
... whilst I'm away. You see she don't take much to Mrs. Eagles; that ain't her sort of friend. Not as she's got any pride left about her, poor girl don't think that. I tell you, Sidney, she's a dear good girl to her old father. If I could only see her a bit happier, I'd never grumble again as long as ...
— The Nether World • George Gissing
... will think perhaps we will come here to this country. But it is father I am thinking of, the old lion, the old king, the dear, grand old father. He won't understand, he'll be so puzzled. No other place will suit him; he won't say a word; it's not the way of the O'Shanaghgans to grumble. He won't utter a word; he will go away, and he will—die. His heart will be broken; ...
— Light O' The Morning • L. T. Meade
... by themselves. John Bull dislikes keeping the idle, bastard children of other nations. He readily protects all those who tread upon English soil, but in return for this kindness he expects them, like bees, to be all workers. Drones, ragamuffins, and rodneys cannot grumble if they get kicked out of the hive. If 20,000 Englishmen were to tramp all over India, Turkey, Persia, Hungary, Spain, America, Egypt, Greece, Cyprus, South Africa, Germany, or France, in bands of from, say two to fifty men, women, and children, in ...
— Gipsy Life - being an account of our Gipsies and their children • George Smith
... waves which they could see, both from Captain Ben's bungalow and from this old house to which they had come to play. And now, as all six peered out of the attic window of the old house, there was an unexpected flash of lightning, followed by a grumble ...
— Six Little Bunkers at Cowboy Jack's • Laura Lee Hope
... singer. The pupil was apt, the master was exceedingly skilful; and, accordingly, Mrs. Walker's progress was very remarkable: although, for her part, honest Mrs. Crump, who used to attend her daughter's lessons, would grumble not a little at the new system, and the endless exercises which she, Morgiana, was made to go through. It was very different in HER time, she said. Incledon knew no music, and who could sing so well now? Give her a good English ballad: it was a thousand times ...
— Men's Wives • William Makepeace Thackeray
... it," said Gogyrvan Gawr, "I can of course lock up the pair of you, in separate dungeons, until the wedding day. Meanwhile, it occurs to me you should be the last commentator to grumble." ...
— Jurgen - A Comedy of Justice • James Branch Cabell
... persons who grumble about the fogs!" he thought, contemptuously, while he was thus yielding himself heart and sense to ...
— Lady Rose's Daughter • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... at the very instant he struck me, and it was only the head of the lance that went through my arm. Still, it made a hole big enough to be uncommonly painful; the more so because it gave it a frightful wrench as the man dropped the lance. However, there is nothing to grumble at; and I may consider myself lucky indeed to have got off with a flesh wound when so many good fellows ...
— One of the 28th • G. A. Henty
... Libby, and affording food for speculation to Mrs. Barnes over her knitting. In the winter Captain Ephraim polished him up in his old tricks, and taught him some new ones. But by this time he had grown so big that Mrs. Barnes began to grumble at him for taking up too much room. He was, as ever, a model of confiding amiability, in spite of his ample jaws and formidable teeth. But one day toward spring he showed that this good nature of his would not stand the test of seeing ...
— Kings in Exile • Sir Charles George Douglas Roberts
... on at the rate of three miles an hour. What could you expect? She was tired—that old ship. Her youth was where mine is—where yours is—you fellows who listen to this yarn; and what friend would throw your years and your weariness in your face? We didn't grumble at her. To us aft, at least, it seemed as though we had been born in her, reared in her, had lived in her for ages, had never known any other ship. I would just as soon have abused the old village church at home for not ...
— Youth • Joseph Conrad
... sister, we must not grumble about the rain, for it is needed; and there are the verandas for you young folks to sport ...
— Elsie's Vacation and After Events • Martha Finley
... time for cooking. The decrees of an order for a detail are inexorable. A soldier must take it as it comes, for none ever know but what the next duties may be even worse than the present. As a general rule, soldiers rarely ever grumble at any detail on the eve of an engagement, for sometimes it excuses them from a battle, and the old experienced veteran never ...
— History of Kershaw's Brigade • D. Augustus Dickert
... crumpets. You sit with parish officers, caressing and caressed, the idol of the table, and the wonder of the day. I pine in the solitude of sickness, not bad enough to be pitied, and not well enough to be endured. You sleep away the night, and laugh, or scold away the day. I cough and grumble, and grumble and cough. Last night was very tedious, and this day makes no promises of much ease. However, I have this day put on my shoe, and hope that gout is gone. I shall have only the cough to contend with, and I doubt whether I shall get rid of that ...
— Dr. Johnson's Works: Life, Poems, and Tales, Volume 1 - The Works Of Samuel Johnson, Ll.D., In Nine Volumes • Samuel Johnson
... was. At length he found one—a meek young man from Trumbull County—who agreed to pay for his board in praying. For a while all went smoothly, but the boarding-master furnished his table so poorly that the boarders began to grumble and to leave, and the other morning the praying boarder actually "struck!" Something like the following dialogue occurred ...
— The Complete Works of Artemus Ward, Part 1 • Charles Farrar Browne
... grumble, those old salts, for as soon as one had shot off his grievance his neighbour would follow with another, each more bitter ...
— Rodney Stone • Arthur Conan Doyle
... every minute of my life, although I could find plenty to grumble at if I liked. Listen to me, Tims. How would it be to strike a bargain? Let me go on without any upsets from Milly until I'm forty. I'm sure I sha'n't care what happens to me at forty. Then Milly may have everything her own way. What ...
— The Invader - A Novel • Margaret L. Woods
... to grumble, and especially in a cheerful, open, light, and smiling city, crammed with works Of art, ancient and modern, its architecture a study of all styles, and its foaming beer, said by antiquarians to be a good deal better than the mead drunk in Odin's ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... speak of the want of propriety In forming our city so crooked and long; Our ancestors, bless them, were fond of variety— 'Tis naughty to say that they ever were wrong! Tho' strangers may grumble, and thro' the streets and stumble, Take care they don't tumble through crevices small, For trap-doors we've plenty, on sidewalk and entry, And no one stands sentry ...
— Poems • George P. Morris
... thereunto belonging; nor in Physic without the concurrent knowledg of the sick mans habit, disease, cause, remedies, and many other particulars necessary to make a clear judgment upon the success? Yet notwithstanding, many will censure and grumble at the actions of the States-men, though their proceedings have been never so wise, and prudent, and oft-times from muttering and whispering, fall to down-right distast, and mutiny against their Superiors. ...
— A Short View of the Frauds and Abuses Committed by Apothecaries • Christopher Merrett
... grumble in the grate and a blue flame shot up the chimney. Nan stretched out her hand for the matches and lit a cigarette. Then she blew a cloud of speculative smoke into ...
— The Moon out of Reach • Margaret Pedler
... this composition is, that thoughtless people grumble more than is fair about railroad management in the United States. When we consider that every day and night of the year full fourteen thousand railway-trains of various kinds, freighted with life and armed ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... submit in such cases no writer would grumble, But give you his hearty permission, When two correspondents on one mark should stumble, To make to ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 52, October 26, 1850 • Various
... almost all in, but as farmers always grumble about something, they are now growling about the lightness of the crop. All the young part of our household are wrapt up in uncertainty concerning the Queen's illness—for—if her Majesty parts cable, there will be ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume V (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart
... her husband closed the mouth of the wife; and, as the former descended to the place where Esther had resumed her employment, she was content to grumble forth her dissatisfaction, instead of expressing ...
— The Prairie • J. Fenimore Cooper
... imaginary dialogue between Cato and Laelius. We found the first portion rather heavy, and retired a few moments for refreshment (pocula quoedam vini).—All want to reach old age, says Cato, and grumble when they get it; therefore they are donkeys.—The lecturer will allow us to say that he is the donkey; we know we shall grumble at old age, but we want to live through youth and manhood, in spite of the troubles we shall groan over.—There was considerable ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 7, May, 1858 • Various
... Don't grumble at me then, gentle reader, and swear at me that this damned fellow wasn't half clever enough to think all these smart things, and realise all these fine-drawn-out subtleties. You are quite right, he wasn't, yet it all ...
— Aaron's Rod • D. H. Lawrence
... boys grumble because they only have a half-holiday every other day, and four months of the year vacation. It will be interesting to see which educational method is to produce the men who are to win the next Waterloo. ...
— Germany and the Germans - From an American Point of View (1913) • Price Collier
... lanes. We have suffered; we shall suffer; but our suffering is nought and less than nought weighed against the suffering on the Continent. Why, in the midst of a war of unparalleled horror, we grumble if a train is late! We can talk calmly of fighting Germany to a stand-still, even if the job takes two years, and it behooves us to talk so, and to prepare for the task; and for myself I am convinced that we could make good the word. But France and Belgium will not use that tone, if Russia does. ...
— New York Times, Current History, Vol 1, Issue 1 - From the Beginning to March, 1915 With Index • Various
... mean to do for me, old fellow?' asked Mr Lenville, poking the struggling fire with his walking-stick, and afterwards wiping it on the skirt of his coat. 'Anything in the gruff and grumble way?' ...
— The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby • Charles Dickens
... dinner, and even when he was driving. Neither his own parents nor Prince Chiaromonte looked upon this as a serious drawback in the matter of marriage. A man who slept all day and all night was a man out of mischief, not likely to grumble nor to make love to his neighbour's wife; he would therefore be a model husband. When he fell asleep in the drawing-room in summer, his consort would sit beside him and brush away the flies; in winter she would be careful to cover him up lest he should catch cold; at mass she could prick him ...
— The White Sister • F. Marion Crawford
... there have been as many as twenty thousand men, besides donkeys, working on the roads at one time. Unaccustomed to public improvements of this nature, and, no doubt, failing to see their advantages in a country practically without vehicles, the people have sometimes ventured to grumble at the rather arbitrary proceeding of making them work for nothing, and board themselves; and it has been found expedient to make them believe that they were doing the preliminary grading for a railway that was shortly coming to make them all prosperous ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle V1 • Thomas Stevens
... pleasantness above honesty, is one that all of us have to guard against. And when we have held to a custom merely because it is old, have refused to consider fairly the reasons for its change, and are inclined to grumble when the change is carried out, we shall be none the worse for thinking of the people, young and old, who, in the time of Harrison and Shakspere, the "Forgotten Worthies"[82] and Raleigh, no doubt 'hated those nasty new oak ...
— Early English Meals and Manners • Various
... potatoes in. If they came on well, it would be a few pounds in my pocket; if the crop was a failure, I'd have a better show with Mary next time she was struck by an idea outside housekeeping, and have something to grumble ...
— Joe Wilson and His Mates • Henry Lawson
... and as many as you can get," Trent answered shortly. "I have a 100 pound note with me. I shall not grumble if I get little change out of it, but I want value ...
— A Millionaire of Yesterday • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... no troubles to confide?" said Mr Wentworth; "a man and a boy are very different things. Come, aunt Dora, I'll see you safe to your inn. What should I have to grumble about? I have plenty to do, and it is Easter; and few men can have ...
— The Perpetual Curate • Mrs [Margaret] Oliphant
... his dinner. His wife understood this well, and always bore with him at such moments, coming down to him in the dressing-room behind the back parlor, and ministering to his wants. I fear he took some advantage of her goodness, knowing that at such moments he could grumble and scold without danger of contradiction. But the institution was established, and Cecilia never rebelled against its traditional laws. On the present day he had much to say to her, but even that he could not say without some few symptoms ...
— The Claverings • Anthony Trollope
... repaired to the bishop's, and prayed him to put a stop to this state of violence. 'What do you suppose,' said he to me, 'those fellows can do with all their outbreaks? Why, if my blackamoor John were to pull the nose of the most formidable amongst them, the poor devil durst not even grumble. Have I not forced them to give up what they called their commune, for the whole duration of my life?' I held my tongue," adds Guibert; "many folks besides me warned him of his danger; but he would not deign to ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume II. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... shaken out of their somnolence and compelled to look in the direction of Weimar; and when it was a question of taking sides, where was the force that could hope to make headway against the combined strength of Goethe and Schiller? The odds were too great; there was nothing to do but to grumble a little and then—acquiesce in the new leadership. As for the Dioscuri, they had the wisdom to see that one sharp campaign was enough; that for the rest they could further the good cause much more effectively by admirable ...
— The Life and Works of Friedrich Schiller • Calvin Thomas
... chorus, clamor, hue and cry, plaint; lungs; stentor. V. cry, roar, shout, bawl, brawl, halloo, halloa, hoop, whoop, yell, bellow, howl, scream, screech, screak[obs3], shriek, shrill, squeak, squeal, squall, whine, pule, pipe, yaup[obs3]. cheer; hoot; grumble, moan, groan. snore, snort; grunt &c. (animal sounds) 412. vociferate; raise up the voice, lift up the voice; call out, sing out, cry out; exclaim; rend the air; thunder at the top of one's voice, shout at the top of one's voice, shout at the pitch of one's breath, thunder ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... said to herself. "They shall have a happy day for once. I suppose John'll grumble, but the Lord has sent me this money, and I mean to use part of it to make one good day ...
— The Children's Book of Christmas Stories • Various
... and so we stand there and grumble. Now and then one of us stumps up the narrow hallway to the second story where the Democrat makes its lair, and looks on with an abused air while two young lady compositors claw around the bottom of the boxes for enough type to set ...
— Homeburg Memories • George Helgesen Fitch
... to grumble at, my friend?" inquired Professor Woddle. "You are comfortably housed, well fed, and have a constant source of excitement in the ...
— The Wizard of the Sea - A Trip Under the Ocean • Roy Rockwood
... shoulders. "As a life it is detestable, though were it for a short time only there would be nothing to grumble about. We are fairly fed; we have each a patch of ground, where we can grow vegetables. The twelve men in these huts can visit and talk to each other. When that is said all is said. Oh, by the way, we are ...
— Condemned as a Nihilist - A Story of Escape from Siberia • George Alfred Henty
... Don't grumble! Don't be incessantly croaking from morning to night at the war and the administration and the generals, and everything else! Things have gone better on the whole than you imagine, and your endless growling ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. III, No IV, April 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... it would!" said Enid laughing. "Much too nice for us. They choose the driest books possible for schools. Patty, why don't you grumble too? It's quite aggravating to see ...
— The Nicest Girl in the School - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil
... like me to do anything that they think hard or unsuitable, such as saddling a horse or bringing in water. The days go very fast; it was 3:30 today before I knew that it was 1. It is a calm life without worries. The men are so easy to live with; they never fuss, or grumble, or sigh, or make a trouble of anything. It would amuse you to come into our wretched little kitchen before our disgracefully late breakfast, and find Mr. Kavan busy at the stove frying venison, myself washing the supper ...
— A Lady's Life in the Rocky Mountains • Isabella L. Bird
... sovereign. But, unfortunately for the success of his schemes, only the most energetic support of the Pekin government in money and men could have enabled him to hold his own; and as he did nothing but report victories in order to gain a hearing for his policy, he could not grumble when he was not sent the material aid of which he stood most in need. His unreasonable action had done much to unite all foreign nations against China. French, American and Spanish subjects had been the victims of Chinese ignorance and cruelty, as well as English, and they all saw that ...
— China • Demetrius Charles Boulger
... that, it may be poisoned." Of course we had to be careful of spies, but I stuck the bottles in my pack when the officer wasn't looking. Well, we marched to the depot and were soon packed into the small uncomfortable coaches. We started to kick and grumble, but Rust said: "You are lucky to have coaches at all. Last time I went up I rode in a cattle-car," and he pointed out a lot of cars on which was painted "Capacity, so many horses, so many men." After that we ...
— Into the Jaws of Death • Jack O'Brien
... seemed all steel. He was one of those sanguine spirits that don't admit into their minds the notion of ultimate failure. He was supported, too, by a natural and indomitable gayety. Whatever most men grumble or whine at he took as practical jokes played by Fortune partly to try his good humor, but more ...
— It Is Never Too Late to Mend • Charles Reade
... new poetic diction into which we have now fallen, after all our abuse of the far more manly and sincere "poetic diction" of the eighteenth century; they will find no loitering by the way to argue and moralise, and grumble at Providence, and show off the author's own genius and sensibility; they will find, in short, two real works of art, earnest, melodious, self-forgetful, knowing clearly what they want to say, saying it in the shortest, the simplest, the calmest, the most ...
— Famous Reviews • Editor: R. Brimley Johnson
... natives of Cebu, those of Matan fled. The invaders burned their village, for which the natives threatened retaliation, saying they would burn the houses of the Spanish settlement. Meanwhile the food problem assumed threatening dimensions, and the men became discontented and began to grumble because they were not allowed to take anything from the natives without pay. "And although the governor and captains, the religious and other chief persons ... tried to encourage them with good words and promises," a mutiny was arranged among certain men, which, "if God in his infinite mercy ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1803, Volume II, 1521-1569 • Emma Helen Blair
... you, you unfilial thing and..." Madame Hsing shouted. "People lay down their lives for their fathers; and you are prompted by a few harmless remarks to murmur against heaven and grumble against earth! Won't you behave in a proper manner? He's in high dudgeon these last few days, so mind he doesn't give ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... the distance behind them. It came nearer as the sound of the motor approached. The motor's mutter became a grumble. It was definitely a truck. They could hear those other sounds that trucks always make in addition ...
— Operation Terror • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... the last to grumble at this," he quietly interrupted, "for you have spent some very pleasant half-hours already, listening to what you have termed my 'cock-and-bull' stories. You know the English Provident Bank, of course, in Oxford Street; ...
— The Old Man in the Corner • Baroness Orczy
... resort in summer, but is thronged every winter afternoon with people promenading or sitting under the snow-powdered trees in an arctic fairyland, while the mercury in the thermometer is at a very low ebb indeed. It is fashionable in Russia to grumble at the cold, but unfashionable to convert the grumbling into action. On the contrary, they really enjoy sitting for five hours at a stretch, in a temperature of 25 degrees below zero, to watch the fascinating horse races on ...
— Russian Rambles • Isabel F. Hapgood
... away from home; never running about streets and going to Governor's houses to swill sack; never"—but here the voice of the discontented woman, who, in her excitement, had risen from her seat and walked away, was lost in the pantry, or rather subdued into an inarticulate grumble; and Spikeman, after waiting awhile, and finding it improbable that the conversation would be resumed, knocked in a peculiar manner on the door, which was almost ...
— The Knight of the Golden Melice - A Historical Romance • John Turvill Adams
... from the South at break of day, Bringing to Winchester fresh dismay, The affrighted air with a shudder bore, Like a herald in haste, to the chieftain's door, The terrible grumble, and rumble, and roar, Telling the battle was on once more, And ...
— Poems Every Child Should Know - The What-Every-Child-Should-Know-Library • Various
... than wine. And so to-day more than ever the Downs have come to stand as a symbol of an England half lost, which might seem to be passing away, but that is, as indeed these hills assure us, eternal and indestructible, the very England of our hearts, which cannot die. There are some doubtless who grumble at this invasion and are fearful lest even this last nobility should be destroyed by the multitude or this last sanctuary desecrated by the rapacity of the rich, or this last silence broken by the brutal ...
— England of My Heart—Spring • Edward Hutton
... needed all his Money to buy more Poland Chinas and build other Cribs. If she wanted a Summer Kitchen or a new Wringer or a Sewing Machine, or Anything Else that would lighten her Labors, Henry would Moan and Grumble and say she was trying to ...
— More Fables • George Ade
... much, prattler," said Gervique, "and look out on your side. When we have got by them, it'll be time to grumble. ...
— A Winter Amid the Ice - and Other Thrilling Stories • Jules Verne
... it is. It's always the case. But here's the soup. I hope you have brought a good appetite. You can't expect such a meal here as you would get in New York; but they do fairly well. I, for one, don't grumble about the food in London, as most Americans do. Londoners manage to keep alive, and that, after all, is ...
— One Day's Courtship - The Heralds Of Fame • Robert Barr
... and father, and Bryce. No one suspected our affection. Mother used to grumble about my going 'at all hours' to St. Jude's church; but that was because St. Jude's is so very High Church, and mother is a Methodist Episcopal. It was the morning and evening prayers she objected to. No one had ...
— The Man Between • Amelia E. Barr
... and if you drink nothing but water, or the very mildest beer, and live on very plain food, and never lose your temper, and go to church every Sunday, and always remain content in the position in which Providence has placed you, and never grumble nor swear; and always keep your clothes decent, and rise early, and use every opportunity of improving yourself, you will get on very well, and never ...
— The Two Paths • John Ruskin
... the stores of corn collected for public distribution[584] or otherwise, to leave to each family sufficient for its needs, and to purchase the remainder from the owners at a fair market price. Co-operate with these orders of ours cheerfully, and do not grumble at them. Complain not that your freedom is interfered with. There is no free-trade in crime[585]. If you work with us you will earn good renown for yourselves; if against us, the King's reputation will gain by your loss. It is the sign of a good ruler to make men act righteously, ...
— The Letters of Cassiodorus - Being A Condensed Translation Of The Variae Epistolae Of - Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator • Cassiodorus (AKA Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator)
... British farmer. He was neither big nor burly; he spoke English as well as I did; and there was nothing in his dress which would have made him a fit subject for a picture of rustic life. When he spoke, he was able to talk on subjects unconnected with agricultural pursuits; nor did I hear him grumble about the weather and the crops. It was pleasant to see that his wife was proud of him, and that he was, what all fathers ought to be, his children's best and dearest friend. Why do I dwell on these details, relating to a man whom I was not destined ...
— The Legacy of Cain • Wilkie Collins
... had not the least trouble in selling this sketch to the Chronicle-Abstract. The editor probably understood its essential cheapness perfectly well; but he also saw how thoroughly readable it was. He did not grumble at the increased price which Bartley put upon his work; it was still very far from dear; and he liked the young Downeaster's enterprise. He gave him as cordial a welcome as an overworked man may venture to offer when Bartley ...
— A Modern Instance • William Dean Howells
... came home. Indeed it seems as if I were. London in this part of it, in hot weather, makes a man weary for green woods, a sliding river, and a Book of Verses underneath a Bough. Well, perhaps I shall have all of them by Wednesday afternoon. You will think I can do nothing but grumble. All the same, into what was the mere dull routine of uncongenial work before, your influence has come with a current of new energy; like the tide from the sea swelling up into the inland river.—I'm at it again! Rivers on ...
— Robinetta • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... she gets an order she must obey it cheerfully and readily, not in a slow, sullen manner. Scouts never grumble, ...
— How Girls Can Help Their Country • Juliette Low
... a life I live! Well, I'm just loafing, Agrafena Kondratyevna; you know yourself, my family's large, business is dull. But I don't grumble; it's a sin to grumble, ...
— Plays • Alexander Ostrovsky
... ten shillings, and makes three pounds a week and his expenses besides, so it pays HIM pretty well. Well then, the shearers go to the squatters. "All right," say they, "we'll shear your sheep, but it's going to be twenty shillings instead of seventeen and six." The squatters grumble, but they've got to have their sheep shorn, and they pay the twenty shillings. Next year, I'm told, the word is to go round that it's to be twenty-two and sixpence. Well sir, we're to see ...
— Lady Bridget in the Never-Never Land • Rosa Praed
... put on white shirts, and wore frills to them. But the boatswain did not care for him; he knew his duty, he did his duty, and if the captain was satisfied, he said, that the whole ship's company might grumble. As for the master, he said, the man was very well, but having been brought up in a collier, he could not be expected to be very refined; in fact, he observed, pulling up his shirt-collar—"it was impossible to make a silk purse out of a sow's ear." The master ...
— Peter Simple and The Three Cutters, Vol. 1-2 • Frederick Marryat
... again, "But he will not grumble because too much sugar is used in the house. So let him take it then, ...
— The Home • Fredrika Bremer
... do well. The attendance now ranges from 45 to 60 and I am not able to do anything except the school work. Four of the children have had chills and fever, and I have had to rise at night to care for them. I have been trying to do the work of three people and not complain. Still I'd like to grumble a little, if I could find the right one to talk to. I am beginning to feel a little like Josiah Allen's wife, when she said, 'Betsy Bobbet, you're a ...
— The Choctaw Freedmen - and The Story of Oak Hill Industrial Academy • Robert Elliott Flickinger
... used to his condition, and to find out amusements in new ways. Thus mercifully does a kind Providence temper people's minds to the afflictions He sends. They are often more dreadful to think of than to bear; for God can give patience and cheerfulness and comfort to those that do not grumble and repine. ...
— The Fairy Godmothers and Other Tales • Mrs. Alfred Gatty
... the paste 'pon this here pie, then I'll hear what you've got to grumble at," answers the wise woman; and five minutes later she sat down and folded her hands and shut her eyes and heard what ...
— The Torch and Other Tales • Eden Phillpotts
... to know he had hardly left his lodgings before their hush was interrupted by the grumble ...
— The False Faces • Vance, Louis Joseph
... we used to call it in those days), the nation flushed out in its usual hot-headed anger. The talk was all against the philosophers after that, and the people were most indomitably loyal. It was not until the land-tax was increased, that the gentry began to grumble a little; but still my party in the West was very strong against the Tiptoffs, and I determined to take the field and win ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... as the men, had breakfasted. A species of sullen discontent pervaded the ship, and the recent kind feelings toward Raoul Yvard had nearly vanished in disappointment. Some began to grumble about the chances of the other ships falling in with the lugger, while others swore "that it mattered not who saw her; catch her none could, who had not an illicit understanding with the Father of Lies. She was ...
— The Wing-and-Wing - Le Feu-Follet • J. Fenimore Cooper
... to the appointment of Dr. Michaelis, says "there is no chance of his clubbing together with the big industrialists and misguided agitators." So long however as they are clubbed separately we shall not grumble. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, July 25, 1917 • Various
... are perfectly satisfactory, Evelyn. If I am satisfied, who should have the right to grumble? The pain of losing you is better than the pleasure of winning anybody else.... So you think, Evelyn, you will never return ...
— Sister Teresa • George Moore
... have wholesome meat, And drink good wine, if any; His entertainment's free and neat, His choyce of friends not many; Jack is a loyall-hearted man, Well parted and a scholar; He'll grumble if things please him not, But never grows to choller. ...
— Cavalier Songs and Ballads of England from 1642 to 1684 • Charles Mackay
... long cloaks and crooked staffs, murmuring their surprise and incredulity at what the angel had said; some pretending to grumble at being awakened from sleep, others anxious to prove the ...
— In the Yule-Log Glow, Book II - Christmas Tales from 'Round the World • Various
... terrible despot of "society," middle-class public opinion, and once more justifies the contempt in which we Socialists of a past generation always held that public opinion. At the same time, we have no reason to grumble at the symptom itself. ...
— The Condition of the Working-Class in England in 1844 - with a Preface written in 1892 • Frederick Engels
... have been in a very much worse way had the wind come from another quarter, and driven us towards the land," he replied, gravely. "Some of the people had begun to grumble because we had been drifted so far off-shore. We may now be thankful that we were not caught nearer to it, and have already made so much offing. We shall very likely have it round again, and then we shall ...
— Old Jack • W.H.G. Kingston
... old Nun and his grandson also did so with sparkling eyes. The tribe of Ephraim, whose lofty pretensions had been a source of much vexation, was willingly allowed precedence on this march, and only the men of Judah were heard to grumble. Doubtless there was reason for dissatisfaction; for Hur, the prince of their tribe, and his young wife walked as if oppressed by a heavy burden; whoever asked them anything would have been wiser to have chosen ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... when he once gets into the thick of it, he will go through with it. He had such a reputation as an oddity at Lexington that there were a lot of remarks when he was made colonel and sent here; but there is no doubt that he has proved himself the right man so far, and although his men may grumble they ...
— With Lee in Virginia - A Story of the American Civil War • G. A. Henty
... even the most well-beaten paths new at the thousandth time of traversing them is our ignorance of what may be waiting round the next turn of the road. The veil that hangs before and hides the future is a blessing, though we sometimes grumble at it, and sometimes petulantly try to make pinholes through it, and peep in to see a little of what is behind it. It brings freshness into our lives, and a possibility of anticipation, and even of wonder and ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... sort of continuous fete to everybody. She put on no airs over the preference shown her, and was altogether so kind and friendly and sweet that no one could quarrel with her even in thought, and Johnnie herself had to forgive her, and be contented with a little whispered grumble to Dorry now and then over the ...
— Clover • Susan Coolidge
... responsibility put upon him during the construction of his "big ditch," as his enemies sarcastically called it, might well have made him complain of the official burdens he had to bear; but neither by looks nor words did he indicate the slightest disposition to grumble. Nature had endowed him with a genius for success. He loved literature, he delighted in country life, he was at home among farmers, and with those inclined to science he analysed the flowers and turned with zest to a closer study of rocks and soils. No man ever enjoyed more thoroughly, ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander
... cultivating and improving what they think most valuable?—Is true happiness any part of your family view?—So far from it, that none of your family but yourself could be happy were they not rich. So let them fret on, grumble and grudge, and accumulate; and wondering what ails them that they have not happiness when they have riches, think the cause is want of more; and so go on heaping up, till Death, as greedy an accumulator as themselves, gathers ...
— Clarissa, Volume 1 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... on and Beatrice is now counted as quite an old nurse. She finds her work in the bungalows very pleasant and the soldiers find her most obliging. She works hard and is never tempted to grumble. ...
— Daisy Ashford: Her Book • Daisy Ashford
... little pleasure out of that encounter. Then ensued some cudgel-playing; but the heads broken were of so little note, and the wounds given so trifling and unsatisfactory, that no wonder the company began to hiss, grumble, and show other signs of discontent. "The masters, the masters!" shouted the people, whereupon those famous champions at length ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... parents were spending the summer at Mount Holly Inn, and, among other instances of his growing restiveness, Daniel was inclined to grumble at having to bolt his dinner, dress hurriedly in his sun-baked room on Park avenue, and make the suburban car journey nightly in order to reach her side. Sometimes he balked and called her up by 'phone instead, and though she professed ...
— The Mermaid of Druid Lake and Other Stories • Charles Weathers Bump
... about and among them were several human skulls. Tarzan raised his eyebrows. "A man-eater," he murmured, "and from appearances he has held sway here for a long time. Tonight Tarzan will take the lair of the man-eater and Numa may roar and grumble upon ...
— Tarzan the Untamed • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... but wait until they are full of freight and passengers. The latter are boarded on them from the time they take passage, if they wish,—often a week or ten days. Berths are often engaged by "loafers," who eat and sleep on board, and grumble at the detention, but who suddenly decamp ...
— Hatchie, the Guardian Slave; or, The Heiress of Bellevue • Warren T. Ashton
... and he presently—talking all the while—produced a card, and said in the politest way, "I think that is yours, madam?" and you remarked that this was the four of clubs, whereas you selected the five, he exclaimed, with pretence of irritation, "Well, what is there to grumble at?" and, looking again, you saw that it had changed to the five of clubs. There was nothing to do but to applaud and wonder. He swallowed cards, and produced them with a slight click from his elbow, the middle of his back, and his ...
— Love at Paddington • W. Pett Ridge
... our orator, "the Rebels keep their best generals for their Home Guard. Lee and Early, and the rest of the crew, are lambs and sucking doves to Generals Starvation, Wear-'em-out, and Grumble,—especially that last-named fellow, who is the worst of the three, because he comes under our own colors, and we feel shy about firing on our own men. I believe we are all too apt to think that muscles are the vital forces, and that man lives by beef; but, boys, muscles ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 89, March, 1865 • Various
... shall I ever find a city like you? Never, till now, did I feel how inexpressibly dear you were to me. You have been my father and my brother and my mistress and my tailor and my shoemaker and my hatter and my cook and my wine-merchant! You and I never misunderstood each other. I did not grumble when I saw what fine houses and good strong boxes you gave to other men. No! I rejoiced at their prosperity. I delighted to see a rich man,—my only disappointment was in stumbling on a poor one. You gave ...
— Paul Clifford, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... war, a safe and honourable peace? But no termination of a struggle is entitled to be called either the one or the other, which, resulting merely from the experience of common exhaustion and mutual inability, leaves the parties to grumble over the relics of their animosity, and to brood on their misfortunes, till new means and spirits be produced to resume the conflict. There is much wisdom in the language which a deceased statesman used, when he spoke of "making peace in the spirit of peace," as the only remedy for the political ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 16 • Robert Kerr
... were talking, having got through my grumble, Kolgrim came along the shore with some Saxon noble whom he had met; and this stranger was asking questions about each ship that he passed. I suppose that Kolgrim had answered many such curious folk already; for when he came ...
— King Alfred's Viking - A Story of the First English Fleet • Charles W. Whistler
... to examine one of them:—The Heirs of Tranby Chase. It weighed four or five pounds. The publishers would never have had to grumble at its brevity, or have been compelled to use large type and wide margins to "bulk up." It was written in the thin, early Victorian handwriting not often met with in this generation of writers. It subscribed faithfully to the great canons of publication—for instance, ...
— In the Mist of the Mountains • Ethel Turner
... she hadn't loved Katy so dearly, I think her patience must have given way. But she bore her trials meekly, except for an occasional grumble when alone with Bridget. Dr. Carr had to eat a great many queer things in those days. But he didn't mind, and as for the children, they enjoyed it. Dinner-time became quite exciting, when nobody could tell exactly what any dish on the table was made of. Dorry, who was a sort ...
— What Katy Did • Susan Coolidge
... saying that his men were very discontented with her low condition, and especially when they saw that she had children; and of the daughter, that she was born most unfortunately; and he did nothing but grumble. But the lady, hearing these words, without changing countenance or her demeanor in any way, said, "My lord, do with me what you think your honor and your comfort demand, and I shall be satisfied with everything, as I know that I am less ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 5 • Various |
