"Monosyllabic" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the bank and discovered that Morley had not reported for work. Having presented his card to a chilly, monosyllabic little man, he was shown, after a short wait, into a private office where, surrounded by several tons of mahogany, ...
— The Winning Clue • James Hay, Jr.
... apt to become monosyllabic when a certain train of thought was forced on him. Also a short deep line of frown appeared under the white scar: but Christopher had not yet learnt to pay full heed to these signs: also he had a predilection for getting ...
— Christopher Hibbault, Roadmaker • Marguerite Bryant
... was spoken by 7,006,495 people in the province in 1901, is a monosyllabic language, with, according to some authorities, three different tones; so that any given syllable may have three entirely different meanings only distinguishable by the intonation when spoken, or by accents or diacritical marks when written. There are, however, very many ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various
... the muscularity of the male: the variations of ethical codes: the natural grammatical transition by inversion involving no alteration of sense of an aorist preterite proposition (parsed as masculine subject, monosyllabic onomatopoeic transitive verb with direct feminine object) from the active voice into its correlative aorist preterite proposition (parsed as feminine subject, auxiliary verb and quasimonosyllabic onomatopoeic past participle ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... carelessly—but none the less peremptorily—inviting her women guests to see their rooms. Doris walked by her hostess's side towards the house. Every trace of animation and charm had now vanished from that lady's manner. She was as languid and monosyllabic as before, and Doris could only feel once again that while her clever husband was an eagerly welcomed guest, she herself could only expect to reckon as his appendage—a piece ...
— A Great Success • Mrs Humphry Ward
... first shy and silent, Eunane only giving me more than a monosyllabic answer to my remarks, and even Eunane never speaking save in reply to me. A trivial incident, however, broke through this reserve, and afforded me a first taste of the petty domestic vexations in store for me. The beverage most to ...
— Across the Zodiac • Percy Greg
... on the Sunday, and was well entertained with a fat chicken and a bit of bacon, for the Laffans were well-to-do people. She thoroughly enjoyed her dinner, though she spoke little and that little monosyllabic; but Margret was taciturn even as a girl, and her solitary habit for years seemed to have made speech more difficult for her. Mrs. Jack heaped her plate with great heartiness and made quite an honoured guest of her. ...
— An Isle in the Water • Katharine Tynan
... surer guide perhaps than physiology, we are again completely baffled. The Coptic has been identified through many etymologies with the old Egyptian; and of the Coptic, though it became a dead language in the twelfth century, much literature remains. It is an uncultivated and formal tongue, with monosyllabic roots and rude inflexions totally different from the neighboring languages of Syria and Arabia, totally opposite to the copious and polished Sanscrit. The last fact at once severs Egypt from India, and destroys every presumption of affinity that may ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 3, February, 1851 • Various
... condescension on his part? Would it not be familiar? And would he not thereby lose his importance?" And in consequence of such reflections, he always remained in the same dumb state, uttering from time to time a few monosyllabic sounds, and thereby earning the name of the ...
— Best Russian Short Stories • Various
... wondered if Angela had become aware of the increased vision afforded him by the felled trees, and was careful to keep her strange friend away. He noticed some slight change in her disposition—a queer light in her eye and a mocking ring in the monosyllabic replies which she gave to any questions he found it necessary ...
— Colorado Jim • George Goodchild
... price of indigo or Ionian Bank shares, while their wives seem to be mentally summarising the exact cost of each other's toilettes. Their daughters, or somebody else's daughters, are desperately jerking out monosyllabic responses to feeble remarks concerning the weather, lawn tennis, operatic dbutantes, the gravel in the Row, the ill-health of the Princess, and kindred topics from a couple of F.O. men. Little Snapshot, the wit, on the other side of the Gorgon, has tried ...
— Facts About Champagne and Other Sparkling Wines • Henry Vizetelly
... all that was said, and said little or nothing himself. His followers respected this privacy, and left him alone. He was their prophet, and had a right to seclusion. He was their chieftain, and while he sat in his monosyllabic solitude, his ragged tail reclined in various attitudes about him, and occasionally one man spoke, or another swore. Newspapers and tobacco were their resource ...
— Democracy An American Novel • Henry Adams
... whether. As in V, iv, 30, the 'where' of the Folios represents the monosyllabic pronunciation of this word common in the sixteenth century. In Shakespeare's verse the 'th' between two vowels, as in 'brother,' 'other,' 'whither,' is frequently mute.—/basest metal./—The Folio spelling is 'mettle,' and the word here may connote 'spirit,' ...
— The New Hudson Shakespeare: Julius Caesar • William Shakespeare
... melancholy or despair; on the contrary it is the impression of strength, power, courage, and unassailable allegiance to truth. He is careless of appearance because he has something far better worth the while of his attention; he is aloof and remote, monosyllabic and sometimes even inaccessible, because he lives almost entirely in the spiritual world, seeking Truth with a steady perseverance of mind, Goodness with the full energy of his heart, and Beauty with the deep ...
— Painted Windows - Studies in Religious Personality • Harold Begbie
... Orde and introduced. They were very awkward, and somewhat embarrassed, but they all looked her straight in the eye, and Carroll felt somehow that back of their diffidence they were quite dispassionately appraising her. After a few gracious speeches on her part and monosyllabic responses on theirs, they blundered away. In spite of the scant communication, these interviews left something of a friendly feeling ...
— The Riverman • Stewart Edward White
... dangling half a yard from the floor, she seemed a child. McEachern, looking at her, found it hard to realize that nineteen years had passed since the moment when the doctor's raised eyebrows had reproved him for his monosyllabic reception of the news that the baby ...
— The Intrusion of Jimmy • P. G. Wodehouse
... answered in the same gay strain, speaking to his wife, however, in the hope of rousing her. It was all lost labour. The little woman only replied by faint smiles which vanished almost as they came, and by monosyllabic answers of the briefest description, without taking her eyes off the dishes which she thought tasteless; and it was to the priest, who was the fourth person present, that she addressed her complaints, almost ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... us not, however, forget, that a people celebrated in remote antiquity, a people from whom the Greeks themselves borrowed knowledge, had perhaps a language, the construction of which recalls involuntarily that of the languages of America. What a structure of little monosyllabic and disyllabic forms is added to the verb and to the substantive, in the Coptic language! The semi-barbarous Chayma and Tamanac have tolerably short abstract words to express grandeur, envy, and lightness, ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America • Alexander von Humboldt
... highly monosyllabic in everything pertaining to the management of the vessel and the prospects for ...
— Atlantis • Gerhart Hauptmann
... dissyllabic, but there are not wanting evidences of a former monosyllabic tendency. The syllable bu, bun, or bung, for instance, occurs in a considerable number of words conveying ...
— A Manual of the Malay language - With an Introductory Sketch of the Sanskrit Element in Malay • William Edward Maxwell
... to tell them what he had heard: the footfalls, below and above, the extraordinary conversation which had broken for a moment the silence of the inner hall. The account was bare, the phrases monosyllabic. He reported only what had been registered on the sensitive tympanums of his ears, to the last whisper of footfalls stealing past the dark wall of the shop. Of all the formless tangle of thoughts, suspicions, interpretations, and the special ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1920 • Various
... later Blake growled out a monosyllabic assurance that he was now safely over his attack. Yet all the efforts of Lord James to jolly him into a cheerful mood utterly failed. Throughout the trip he continued to brood, and did not rouse out of his sullen taciturnity until the train was ...
— Out of the Primitive • Robert Ames Bennet
... hand for a quadrille, though I saw, or fancied I saw, the scowl on Mr. Vernor's sour countenance grow deeper as I led her away. My perseverance was not rewarded by any very interesting results, for my partner, who was either distressingly shy, or acting under constraint of some kind, made monosyllabic replies to every remark I addressed to her, and appeared relieved when the termination of the set enabled her to rejoin her ...
— Frank Fairlegh - Scenes From The Life Of A Private Pupil • Frank E. Smedley
... was not able to live on laughter, as they appeared to be, so presently turning to my acquaintance, who had told me his name was the plain monosyllabic An, and clapping my hand on his shoulder as he stood lost in sleepy reflection, said, in a good, hearty way, "Hullo, friend Yellow-jerkin! If a stranger might set himself athwart the cheerful current of your meditations, may such a one ask how far 'tis to the nearest wine-shop or ...
— Gulliver of Mars • Edwin L. Arnold
... here; but it was so evident from his manner that he had not yet said all he had to say upon the subject that his companions contented themselves with mere simple monosyllabic murmurs of polite congratulation, and then awaited in silence a ...
— The Log of the Flying Fish - A Story of Aerial and Submarine Peril and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... the advantages of savage life. We would not forego the hard-earned gains of civil society because there is something in most of them which tends to contract the natural powers, although it vastly aids them. We would not, for instance, return to the monosyllabic utterance of barbarous men, because in any formed language there are a thousand snares for the understanding. Yet we must be most watchful of them. And in all things, a man must beware of so conforming himself as to ...
— Friends in Council (First Series) • Sir Arthur Helps
... being as monosyllabic as possible; but it was not her natural attitude toward the world, and by the time the veal had arrived (it was Wednesday night) she was laughing whole-heartedly at Kid's ingenuous conversation. Miss McCoy's vocabulary ...
— Just Patty • Jean Webster
... an illustration nearer home and kept thinking of it as he murmured monosyllabic contributions while the doctor went on—"My own belief is that if the November election were delayed six months, Fremont ...
— Westways • S. Weir Mitchell
... slowly and painstakingly what of his great stiffness. Hal did the talking. John Thornton was whittling the last touches on an axe-handle he had made from a stick of birch. He whittled and listened, gave monosyllabic replies, and, when it was asked, terse advice. He knew the breed, and he gave his advice in the certainty that it ...
— The Call of the Wild • Jack London
... arbitrary sounds with particular ideas, whether those ideas were nouns, verbs, or interjections. As the words of all languages can be traced back into roots which are monosyllables, we may presume these sounds to have all been monosyllabic accordingly. The clustering of two or more together to express a compound idea, and the formation of inflections by additional syllables expressive of pronouns and such prepositions as of, by, and to, are processes which would or might occur as matters of course, being simple results of a mental ...
— Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation • Robert Chambers
... arising from the fact that she had always been a favorite. She cried only from grief, and partially ameliorated bodily pain by jumping and by other excessive muscular movements. Like most mutes, she articulated a number of noises,—50 or more, all monosyllabic; she laughed heartily, and was quite noisy in her play. At this time it was thought that she had been heard to utter the words doctor, pin, ship, and others. She attached great importance to orientation, and seemed quite ill at ease ...
— Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine • George M. Gould
... round the fires smoking and slapping different parts of their persons, swearing volubly in English. For the Cree language is devoid of invective. In the morning we are a sorry crowd, conversation is monosyllabic and very much to the point. It is the first serious trial to individual good-humour. When each one of your four million pores is an irritation-channel of mosquito-virus it would be a relief to growl at somebody about something. But the sun and smiles come out at the same time, and, having bled together, ...
— The New North • Agnes Deans Cameron
... His monosyllabic answer was calm: "Do." Then as she laid her hand on the knob of the door to enter the room: "Can ...
— Nan of Music Mountain • Frank H. Spearman
... and notwithstanding all her efforts to second Mr. O'Brien's attempt at cheerfulness, she felt that she failed most signally. Neither of them could induce Mat O'Brien to enter into conversation; his gloomy silence or brief monosyllabic replies compelled even his brother at last to ...
— Lover or Friend • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... this potentate see Indian newspapers, passim. The proper way to read the verses is to make an immense emphasis on the monosyllabic rhymes, which indeed ought to be shouted ...
— Nonsense Books • Edward Lear
... his feet, obeying the monosyllabic summons, and followed Mr. Boner around the partition. Mr. Boner rated a private office, where he could worm information, trade secrets, and occasional concessions from travelling salesmen. There was nothing social about the place. As Joe turned the partition corner and stood in the doorway, ...
— Stubble • George Looms
... maintain that, the larger, the sublimer, your subject is, the more impertinent rhyme becomes to it: and that this impertinence increases in a sort of geometrical progression as you advance from monosyllabic to dissyllabic and on to trisyllabic rhyme. Let me put this ...
— On The Art of Reading • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... speech by either of them since the monosyllabic greeting at the door. He saw that she had prepared herself for such an announcement; but the way she took it reminded him of a door shaken by the impact of a terrific blow. A little shiver, for all her force of repression, moved her from ...
— No Clue - A Mystery Story • James Hay
... four accents; the even, the raised, the lessened, and the returning, which multiply every word into four; as difficult, says Mr. Astle, for an European to understand, as it is for a Chinese to comprehend the six pronunciations of the French E. In fact, they can so diversify their monosyllabic words by the different tones which they give them, that the same character differently accented signifies sometimes ten ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli
... brooding autumn dusk he came to their doorstep, dismounted, lifted his hat, smiled that wonderful smile of his, and made a bow that any courtier might have been proud to make. Behind him, on a brown horse, was Pedro, his lieutenant—the same monosyllabic Pedro, faithful unto death, and now as clean as ...
— The Bad Man • Charles Hanson Towne
... adorned with pictures by Frith and Goodall. Sally, who unfortunately knew no fear, talked defiantly; she addressed herself principally to her brother, and she questioned him persistently, although the replies she received were generally monosyllabic. As he chewed his meat with reflection and precaution, broke his bread with deliberate and well- defined movements, and filled his mouth with carefully chosen pieces, he gradually ventured to decide that he would ...
— Spring Days • George Moore
... distinction to be engaged in conversation by this distinguished gentleman, yet Eva would fain have sent him far away, and her replies must have sounded monosyllabic enough; but the sweet shyness that overpowered her so well suited the modest young girl, who had scarcely passed beyond childhood, that he did not leave her until the 'Rai' began, and then quitted her with the entreaty that she would remove the cap which had hitherto rendered ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... is that we are justified in considering the main portion of the Malayan as original, or indigenous, its affinity to any Continental tongue not having yet been shown; and least of all can we suppose it connected with the monosyllabic, or Indo-Chinese, with ...
— The Expedition to Borneo of H.M.S. Dido - For the Suppression of Piracy • Henry Keppel
... the little drawing-room where Felicia Melrose, it seemed, had been giving the Penfolds a difficult half hour. For as soon as the Tathams had stepped into the garden, she had become entirely monosyllabic; after a drive from Duddon at Harry Tatham's side, during which, greatly to her host's surprise, she had suddenly and unexpectedly found her tongue, talking, in a torrent of questions, all the ...
— The Mating of Lydia • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... Steadman, with a monosyllabic laugh which expressed intense bitterness. 'Say forty years during which I have felt myself upon the edge of a precipice every day and every hour. Security! But perhaps you are right, my lady, I am growing old and nervous, ...
— Phantom Fortune, A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... pokes his gold-headed cane in among your treasures, blind to the fact that you are clutching both arms around them, that no gleam of flashing gold may reveal their whereabouts to him. You draw yourself up in your shell, projecting a monosyllabic claw occasionally as a sign of continued vitality; but the pachyderm does not withdraw, and you gradually lower into ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume IV. (of X.) • Various
... card-table, and watched the game with the funereal expression he always wore when he desired to exhibit his entire correctness of demeanour. To Mrs. Rushworth's placid remarks during the deals he made the politest of monosyllabic replies. Meanwhile his dingy white tie, which he never could arrange properly (he dressed for dinner each night without a murmur) had worked up beyond his collar, and encircling his lean neck like a pussy-cat's ribbon, gave him a peculiarly ...
— The Beloved Vagabond • William J. Locke
... Ferdinand breathed right into Adele's translucent Listener those three Words which hold all Records as monosyllabic Trouble-Makers. ...
— Ade's Fables • George Ade
... of the river. During the ride Steve's bearing toward the third member of the party was too plain to escape notice, for he never looked at nor directed a word to Allison unless it was in reply to a direct question, and then his answers were almost monosyllabic. But Allison, who, as usual, gave his undivided attention to the country through which they were passing, in attitude toward the boy was ...
— Then I'll Come Back to You • Larry Evans
... of Aristotle, though not into ten, but into forty categories, or genera, or great classes, such as World, Element, Animal, and apparently species of animals, such as Bird, Fish, Beast: for each of these great classes he devised a monosyllabic name—e.g., De for Element, Za for Fish; each of these genera is subdivided into species indicated by the addition of a consonant, and these are again subdivided into subordinate species distinguished ...
— The Life and Times of John Wilkins • Patrick A. Wright-Henderson
... vessel as she sped along in the quiet night. The Duke was extended on a transom, and Claudius on the one opposite, while Barker tipped himself about on his chair at the end of the table. The Duke was talkative, in a disjointed, monosyllabic fashion. ...
— Doctor Claudius, A True Story • F. Marion Crawford
... there are other languages, as the Chinese, and the monosyllabic tongues of south-eastern Asia, which possibly are connected lineally with it; the Japanese; the Malay-Polynesian, a well-developed family; the Hamitic (of which the Egyptian or Coptic is the principal member); the Dravidian ...
— Outline of Universal History • George Park Fisher
... critics, bred up on BENEDETTO CROCE, to hear the old authentic leonine ecstasy of SALA, "monarch of the florid quill!" Mr. Punch, once hailed by the D.T. as "the Democritus of Fleet Street," on the strength of his "memorable monosyllabic monition," in turn salutes the immortal protagonist ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, March 10th, 1920 • Various
... Benda came. He had been tolerably well informed of everything that had taken place. In the hall he met Agnes. Though generally quite monosyllabic, Agnes was now inclined to be extremely communicative, but she could merely confirm ...
— The Goose Man • Jacob Wassermann
... making such a lengthened exposition—the speeches he preferred were monosyllabic—completed his sins against training with a long draught ...
— Under Two Flags • Ouida [Louise de la Ramee]
... only a monosyllabic reply, and Lady Jane, with a little gesture of apology, continued her conversation ...
— Nobody's Man • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... the interview with Doubler at Doubler's cabin, Langford had been strangely silent regarding his plans. Not once had he referred to the nester, and his silence had nettled Duncan. Langford had ignored his hints, had returned monosyllabic replies to his tentative questions, causing the manager to appear to be an outsider in an affair in which he felt ...
— The Trail to Yesterday • Charles Alden Seltzer
... noun it undergoes various changes. In its monosyllabic forms it drops its vowel after a short (un-accented) vowel, as in auga-t (the eye), but keeps it after a long vowel, as in ā-in (the river), trē-it (the tree). The dissyllabic forms drop their initial vowel almost everywhere; not, however, after the -ar, -r, ...
— An Icelandic Primer - With Grammar, Notes, and Glossary • Henry Sweet
... change, the most elementary principles of which have yet to be established for the Australian languages, will suffice to account for the variations in the names as recorded. Otherwise the words are in most cases reduced to monosyllabic roots from which it seems hopeless to attempt ...
— Kinship Organisations and Group Marriage in Australia • Northcote W. Thomas
... in many respects that some anthropologists suppose it to have a separate origin. Phlegmatic and matter-of-fact by nature, exact and careful in practical matters, and to a high degree imitative and industrious, the Chinese are singularly devoid of imagination and indisposed to philosophy. Their monosyllabic and uninflected language, belonging to one of the earliest strata of human speech, and ill fitted to express abstract or poetical ideas, is an index to their whole nature. If an awakening, as various signs appear to indicate, is now at hand for them, no one ...
— History of Religion - A Sketch of Primitive Religious Beliefs and Practices, and of the Origin and Character of the Great Systems • Allan Menzies
... briskly and we carried on a brief monosyllabic conversation while the other prisoners were completing their work. From him I learned that I was certainly in great danger. But he urged me to cheer up. Then he asked me the number of my cell, which I gave. He replied that he was ...
— Sixteen Months in Four German Prisons - Wesel, Sennelager, Klingelputz, Ruhleben • Henry Charles Mahoney
... an attractive and interesting evening. The whole of the village, without distinction, appeared to be there. And they mixed. Indian women in the silk stockings, high heels and glowing frocks of suburbia, danced (and danced well) with high cheek-boned, monosyllabic Finns in grey sweaters, workaday trousers and coats and bubble-toed boots. A vivid Canadian girl in semi-evening dress went round in the jazz with a guard of the Royal train. A policeman from the train danced ...
— Westward with the Prince of Wales • W. Douglas Newton
... minutes, neither found aught worth saying; or else the words wherewith fitly to clothe their thoughts were denied them. The girl seemed very weary, and sat with head drooping and hands clasped idly in her lap. To Maitland's hesitant query as to her comfort she returned a monosyllabic reassurance. He did not again venture to disturb her; on his own part he was conscious of a clogging sense of exhaustion, of a drawn and haggard feeling about the eyes and temples; and knew that he was keeping awake through main power of ...
— The Brass Bowl • Louis Joseph Vance
... maidenhood, from among whom he was expected to make his choice, were at length seated in various constrained attitudes about the room, a dead silence fell, broken only by an occasional nervous remark from Mrs. McNally, and a monosyllabic response from the wooer. The relief was general when the "decent body," engaged to help for the day, opened the door with a very black hand, kicked it still further back with a gaping shoe, and finally entered the room bearing a ...
— North, South and Over the Sea • M.E. Francis (Mrs. Francis Blundell)
... compels, she calmly pursues her exciting calling. The new-comer is well worthy the rank, by general acclaim, of "Queen of the El Dorado." In no way does she notice the eager crowd. She is an impartial priestess of fortune. Maxime waits only to hear her speak. She is silent, save the monosyllabic French words of the game. Is she Cuban, Creole, French, Andalusian, Italian, or a wandering gypsy star? A jewelled dagger-sheath in her corsage speaks of Spain or Italy. Maxime notes the unaccustomed eagerness with which Hardin recklessly plays. ...
— The Little Lady of Lagunitas • Richard Henry Savage
... that she constrained Erling at least to appear interested, although, poor man, his heart was behind him, and he had much difficulty in resisting the desire to turn round when he heard Hilda's voice—which, by the way, was heard pretty constantly, for Glumm was so uncommonly gruff and monosyllabic in his replies that she had most of ...
— Erling the Bold • R.M. Ballantyne
... Yajus, and the Samans are thy abode. Thou art the five kinds of sanctified libations (used in sacrifices). Thou art the seven woofs used in the Vedas. Salutations to thee in thy form of Sacrifice.[145] Libations are poured on the Homa fire in accompaniment with the seventeen monosyllabic sounds. Thou art the soul of the Homa. Salutations to thee! Thou art that Purusha whom the Vedas sing. Thy name is Yajus. The Vedic metres are thy limbs. The sacrifices laid down in the three Vedas are thy three heads. The great ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... each night. As for Stanley, he referred everything to Keith—the weather prospects, where they should go for the day, what should be eaten and drunk, any point about politics or fashion, life or literature or what not, that happened to be discussed. And he looked upon Donald's monosyllabic reply to his inquiry as a final judgment, ending all possibility of argument. Mildred held out long. Then, in spite of herself, she began to yield, ceased to dislike him, found a kind of pleasure—or, perhaps, fascinated interest—in the nervousness his silent and indifferent ...
— The Price She Paid • David Graham Phillips
... suburban London or appalling provincial towns passed now and then with a shudder, where the funereal square bricks-up the Church, that Arctic hen-mother sits on the square, and the moving dead are summoned to their round of penitential exercise by a monosyllabic tribulation-bell. Fenellan's graphic sketch of the teetotaller woman seeing her admirer pursued by Eumenides flagons—abominations of emptiness—to the banks of the black river of suicides, where the one most wretched light is Inebriation's ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... Chevalier's whims; so that Angela, a stranger in her own house, knew not where to turn for comfort. Often during her sleepless nights the Chevalier's carriage stopped before the door, the heavy strong-box was carried upstairs, the Chevalier flung out a few harsh monosyllabic words of command, and then the doors of his distant room were sent to with a bang—all this she heard, and a flood of bitter tears started from her eyes. In a state of the most heart-rending anguish she called upon Duvernet ...
— Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... a sudden he shone glorious; all tongues were busy with him, all eyes regarded him, every one wished for the honour of his friendship. Humplebee looked uncomfortable. He had the sniffy beginnings of a cold, the result of yesterday's struggle in icy water, and his usual diffident and monosyllabic inclination were intensified by the position in which he found himself. Clappings on the shoulder from bigger boys who had been wont to joke about his name made him flush nervously; to be addressed as 'Humpy,' or 'Beetle,' or 'Buz,' even though in a new tone, seemed to gratify him as little as ...
— The House of Cobwebs and Other Stories • George Gissing
... Japanese language was then undergoing a transition. In order to fit it to the Chinese ideographs for literary purposes, it was being deprived of its mellifluous polysyllabic character and reduced to monosyllabic terseness. The older words were disappearing, and with them many of the old traditions. Temmu saw that if the work of compilation was abandoned solely to princely and official litterateurs, they would probably sacrifice on the altar of the ideograph much that was ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... if she had received a sudden dash of cold water square in the face. She quite gulped from the shock of it. How in the world was she to adapt herself to this brand-new set of conditions on such short notice—on no notice at all? How was she to be anything but awkwardly monosyllabic? ...
— Martha By-the-Day • Julie M. Lippmann
... vapid remarks. The great feature of the evening being a melodramatic dirge, supposed to be sung by a condemned felon—a triumphant lamentation and delineation of brutal character,—so eloquent and thrilling, in its monosyllabic groans of anguish, that it is a wonder the kidneys, consumed in such numbers, are ever digested. But, alas!—such is life—those most swayed by animal propensities see the least warning therein:—as, ...
— Christmas Comes but Once A Year - Showing What Mr. Brown Did, Thought, and Intended to Do, - during that Festive Season. • Luke Limner
... unequal to any other reply than this lazy monosyllabic assent. Probably to assure herself that it is not the assent of a mere automaton, she reverses the form ...
— The Mystery of Edwin Drood • Charles Dickens
... speech the old man made during his visit, unless an occasional monosyllabic reply to a question could be thought so. He remained, by Sir Edward' positive order, until the following day; for having delivered his message, and receiving its answer, he was about to take his departure that evening, thinking he might get a good piece on his ...
— Precaution • James Fenimore Cooper
... Fan's monosyllabic replies were scarcely audible; she was very pale, and kept her eyes religiously fixed on the table before her. At length she ventured to glance at him, and could not help noticing, in spite of her distress, that ...
— Fan • Henry Harford
... a new atelier in North London by a well-known Academician, the successes at the current 'Academy,' the fame of certain leading artists. At least Cuningham talked; Fenwick's contributions were mostly monosyllabic; he seemed ...
— Fenwick's Career • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... cognation, but to be phenomena, in part relating to stage of culture and in part adventitious. It must be remembered that extreme peculiarities of grammar, like the vocal mutations of the Hebrew or the monosyllabic separation of the Chinese, have not been discovered among Indian tongues. It therefore becomes necessary in the classification of Indian languages into families to neglect grammatic structure, and to consider lexical elements only. But this statement must be clearly understood. ...
— Indian Linguistic Families Of America, North Of Mexico • John Wesley Powell
... monosyllabic sounds, and the onlookers watched the safe discharge of Conyngham's personal effects with a characteristic placidity of demeanour which was at once tolerant and gently surprised. That any one should have the energy ...
— In Kedar's Tents • Henry Seton Merriman
... only returned monosyllabic responses. He was wrapped in overflowing delight at the thought of that audience with the Pope, which, unable as he was to confide in any one, he strove to arrange and picture in his own mind, even in its pettiest details. And meantime the footsteps of the two men rang out ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... innocent sources of amusement, in which it was once his boast their retirement was so rich, now interested him. In vain Lady Armine sought his society in her walks, or consulted him about her flowers. His frigid and monosyllabic replies discouraged all her efforts. No longer did he lean over her easel, or call for a repetition of his favourite song. At times these dark fits passed away, and if not cheerful, he was at least serene. But on the whole he was an altered man; and his wife could no longer ...
— Henrietta Temple - A Love Story • Benjamin Disraeli
... cutting strange capers, with faces of earnest gravity. People smiling whenever spoken to, and without hearing what was said; and on-lookers smiling, by a sort of photographic process, at fun in which they had no concern. Introductions, where the lady was self-possessed and bewitching, the gentleman monosyllabic and poker-like; others, where he was off-hand, ogling, and facetious; she, timid, credulous, and blushing. All kinds of costumes, from the solitary dress-coat, and low-necked ball-dress, worn respectively by Mr. and Mrs. Van Brueck from Albany, to ...
— Bressant • Julian Hawthorne
... last is the most trying speculation of all. How big a boy's feet invariably look in a fashionable sister's eyes! how long his arms, and how shapeless his hands! Poor blushing youth, is not the ordeal worst for himself, at that period when he scarcely dares trust the most modest of monosyllabic discourses to be articulated by those lips that are warning a waiting public of the dawn of whiskerdom! Freddy, once so lithe and graceful and pretty, had been transformed into an ungainly being, all length, without breadth or thickness. ...
— The Doctor's Daughter • "Vera"
... some difficulty the strong feeling of irritation that seized him at these monosyllabic answers. He knew that it would have been highly unreasonable on his part to have displayed annoyance, for had he not himself taught her to give a simple "Yes" and "No" ...
— The Rebellion of Margaret • Geraldine Mockler
... of medium height, slender, dark. He was taciturn to the point of monosyllabic conversation, and the perpetual, smiling sneer on his face had gotten on ...
— The Range Boss • Charles Alden Seltzer
... several attempts to introduce interesting subjects of conversation, but receiving only monosyllabic replies, relapsed in his turn into silence. With every moment that passed, the girls felt less able to imagine the reason for the appearance of a visitor who showed so little interest in the affairs of the family; for Mr Farrell asked no questions, paid no attention to the general conversation, ...
— The Fortunes of the Farrells • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... were seated Perkins plied Diotti with all manner of questions; "How did it happen?" "How did you escape?" and the like, all of which Diotti parried with monosyllabic replies, finally saying: "I was dissatisfied with my playing and ...
— The Fifth String, The Conspirators • John Philip Sousa
... was broken. Mr Pickering sank back in his chair in a punctured manner. And Claire, making monosyllabic replies to her friend's remarks, was able to bend her mind to the task of finding out how she stood on this important Pickering issue. That he would return to the attack as soon as possible she knew; and the ...
— Uneasy Money • P.G. Wodehouse
... passing-through a toll-bar, said to the keeper, "How do you like your eggs dressed?" Without waiting for the answer, he rode off; but twenty- five years later, riding through the same bar, kept by the same man, the traveller looked steadfastly at him, and received the monosyllabic answer, "Poached." A long parenthesis is twenty-five years; and we, gazing back over a far wider gulf of time, shall endeavor to look hard at the Sphinx, and to convince that mysterious young lady,—if our voice ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey
... chair tilted back and feet on the rail. A gleam of a cigar lighted up the face, and I saw that it was Farrar. I sat down beside him, and we talked commonplaces for a while, Farrar's being almost monosyllabic, while now and again feminine voices and feminine laughter reached our ears from the far end of the porch. They seemed to go through Farrar like a knife, and he smoked furiously, his lips tightly compressed the while. I had ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... could be found in a day's cruise, did not appear at all convinced by what his chum Bill, the boatswain, had said, for he returned again to the conversation after the latter had apparently ended it with his monosyllabic "aye." ...
— The Penang Pirate - and, The Lost Pinnace • John Conroy Hutcheson
... there, that artistic sense, one might almost call it thrill of satisfaction—-was a Frenchman! All that was expressed on the part of this appreciative listener, being uttered by him instantaneously in a half-whispered, monosyllabic ejaculation. As we have already explained upon an earlier page, the Readings which took place in Paris, and which were in behalf of the British Charitable Fund in that capital, were given there before a densely crowded but very select audience ...
— Charles Dickens as a Reader • Charles Kent
... charmed freedom of the domestic circle, Clarence forgot Susy's capricious commands of yesterday, and began to address himself to her in his old earnest fashion, until he was warned by a significant knitting of the young lady's brows and monosyllabic responses. But in his youthful loyalty to Mrs. Peyton, he was more pained to notice Susy's occasional unconscious indifference to her adopted mother's affectionate expression, and a more conscious disregard of her wishes. ...
— Susy, A Story of the Plains • Bret Harte
... more definitely with its dusty treasure, it is better to reserve, when we are speaking with precision, the term 'grain' for the seeds of the grasses: the difficulty is greater in French than in English: because they have no monosyllabic word for the constantly granular 'seed'; but for us the terms are all simple, and already in right use, only not quite clearly enough understood; and there remains only one real difficulty now in our system of nomenclature, that having taken ...
— Proserpina, Volume 1 - Studies Of Wayside Flowers • John Ruskin
... of civility that left nothing openly to complain of. I assumed an indifference and impartiality of manner that no exigency of affairs, no pressing haste, could discompose or disturb; and my bow of recognition to Soult or Massena was as coolly measured as my monosyllabic ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 1 (of 2) • Charles Lever
... morning made her mother feel particularly well and happy at breakfast-time. She talked on, planning village kindnesses, unheeding the silence of her husband and the monosyllabic answers of Margaret. Before the things were cleared away, Mr. Hale got up; he leaned one hand on the table, as if ...
— North and South • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... to him? What was Donnegan but a worthless tramp? Without any answer to that last monosyllabic query, the brakie hunched forward, and began to work his way ...
— Gunman's Reckoning • Max Brand
... monosyllabic, and the Canipers, realizing that he was much shyer than themselves, became hospitable. Notya made the droll remarks of which she was sometimes capable, and Miriam showed off without fear of a rebuke. It was a comely party, ...
— Moor Fires • E. H. (Emily Hilda) Young
... Her monosyllabic answers were perfectly colorless, and, with this last, she picked up an empty dish, and vanished. I endeavored to laugh, but there was no response in the eyes of the woman opposite. She dropped her fork, and pushed ...
— Gordon Craig - Soldier of Fortune • Randall Parrish
... Carrick when a comparatively smooth piece of road permitted more than monosyllabic profanity, "seems odd that we've seen ten women to one man so far. These are all 'has beens.' No young chaps workin' in the fields. What do you make ...
— Trusia - A Princess of Krovitch • Davis Brinton
... an uncultivated and formal tongue, with monosyllabic roots and rude inflexions, totally different from the neighbouring languages of Syria and Arabia, totally opposite to ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 53. Saturday, November 2, 1850 • Various
... fall, in his hesitating, monosyllabic way, some observation which I considered of value. Of the purely commercial side of the industry he knew next to nothing, but then he could tell me a thing or two concerning the psychology of popular ...
— The Rise of David Levinsky • Abraham Cahan
... man. To begin with, he struck her as being the most variable person she had ever encountered. At times he was brilliant and masterful, talked round and over every one, and would have been domineering if he had not been extraordinarily kindly; at times he was almost monosyllabic, and defeated Miss Garvice's most skilful attempts to draw him out. Sometimes he was obviously irritable and uncomfortable and unfortunate in his efforts to seem at ease. And sometimes he overflowed with a peculiarly malignant wit that played, ...
— Ann Veronica • H. G. Wells
... might do very well together. Mrs. Robarts did attempt to bring about a joint conversation, which should include the three, and for ten minutes or so she worked hard at it. But it did not thrive. Miss Grantly was monosyllabic, smiling, however, at every monosyllable; and Lucy found that nothing would occur to her at that moment worthy of being spoken. There she sat, still and motionless, afraid to take up a book, and thinking ...
— Framley Parsonage • Anthony Trollope
... parasite was so full of himself, and so anxious to display himself to advantage, that with all his practice it was some time before he perceived he did not make all the way he could wish with Lothair; who was courteous, but somewhat monosyllabic and absent. ...
— Lothair • Benjamin Disraeli
... allowing it to himself even at the break between two sentences or two paragraphs; nor did he permit himself ever to use the same word twice, either in the same sentence or in two consecutive sentences, though belonging to different paragraphs: with the exception of the monosyllabic auxiliaries.[27] All this is well enough, especially the first two precepts, and a good way of breaking through a bad habit. But M. Comte persuaded himself that any arbitrary restriction, though in no way emanating from, and therefore necessarily ...
— Auguste Comte and Positivism • John-Stuart Mill
... wistfully at him, and her fair face, slightly troubled in its expression, had moved him to an exertion of his best powers to please her, and make everything bright and gay around her. Instinct told him that some secret annoyance fretted her—and watching her looks, and noting the monosyllabic replies she gave to Lord Roxmouth whenever that distinguished personage addressed her, he decided, with a foolish thrill at his heart, that the report of her intended marriage with this nobleman could not be true—she ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli
... withdrew a little from the conversation. Crookes, as ever monosyllabic, took himself on in a little while, and Sweeny, his chair tipped back against the wall, his hands clasped behind his head, listened to Freye explaining to Cressler the plans of the proposed clique and the lines of ...
— The Pit • Frank Norris
... the tea at Miss Lang's—a stately meal, when the two ladies were grand; Lord Northmoor became shy and frozen, monosyllabic, and only spasmodically able to utter; and Mary felt it in all her nerves and subsided into her smallest self, under the sense that nobody ever ...
— That Stick • Charlotte M. Yonge
... strong analogies in their general principles of structure, which may be compared to those discoverable between the individual members of two other great classes of languages, by no means connected among themselves by what is called family relation. I allude to the monosyllabic and the polysynthetic languages, the former prevalent in Eastern Asia, the latter throughout the vast regions of the New World. If we have sufficient evidence for constituting such a class of dialects under the title of African languages, we have likewise reason—and ...
— History of the Negro Race in America From 1619 to 1880. Vol 1 - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George W. Williams
... and of the ideograph. In fact, the Chinese language is but an extension of these three methods of expression. The objects were originally designated by a rude drawing, and then, to modify the meaning, different characters were attached to the picture. Thus a monosyllabic {128} language was built up, and the root word had many meanings by the modification of its form and sometimes by the change of its position. The hieroglyphic writings of the Egyptians, Moabites, Persians, and Assyrians went through these methods of language development, ...
— History of Human Society • Frank W. Blackmar
... to note as a very curious phonetic peculiarity, that we have in the English language a large number of monosyllabic words ending is sh, all of which are expressive of some violet action or emotion. I quote a few which have occurred without search, in alphabetical order. "Brush, brash, crash, crush, dash, gash, gush, hash, gnash, lash, mash, pash, push, quash, ...
— Notes and Queries, No. 28. Saturday, May 11, 1850 • Various
... bursting into speech less monosyllabic but no less vehement: "Mr. Tinker, did you ever ...
— Harlequin and Columbine • Booth Tarkington
... These monosyllabic ejaculations broke forth like the vexed clucking of a frightened blackbird; after which relief, the Abbe resumed his fitful striding up and down the box-bordered alley. This lasted until the hour of twilight, when Augustine, the servant, as soon ...
— A Woodland Queen, Complete • Andre Theuriet
... fetch a cup. When he returned, it was to find her talking monosyllabic English to a group ...
— The Nest Builder • Beatrice Forbes-Robertson Hale
... origin of language, H.P. Blavatsky makes some statements which are quoted here and which should be borne well in mind in considering what follows. "The Second Race had a 'Sound Language,' to wit, chant-like sounds composed of vowels alone." From this developed "monosyllabic speech which was the vowel parent, so to speak, of the monosyllabic languages mixed with hard consonants still in use among the yellow races which are known to the anthropologist. The linguistic characteristics developed ...
— AE in the Irish Theosophist • George William Russell
... mind he ate his breakfast in almost complete silence, making only monosyllabic replies to the trader's cheerful ...
— Corporal Cameron • Ralph Connor
... monosyllables pieced into words in the stiffest, most unwieldy manner, stuck together, as it were, with nothing to join them, wherefore this kind of language has been called agglutinative. Chinese belongs to the former class of languages, the "monosyllabic," Turkish to the latter, the "agglutinative." Further, the Turanians were probably the first to invent writing, but never went in that art beyond having one particular sign for every single word—(such is Chinese writing with its forty thousand signs or thereabouts, as many as ...
— Chaldea - From the Earliest Times to the Rise of Assyria • Znade A. Ragozin
... of the cuckoo which has ousted the legitimate nest-holder, The whistle of the railway guard dispatching the train to the inevitable collision, The maiden's monosyllabic reply to a polysyllabic proposal, The fundamental note of the last trump, which is presumably D natural; All of these are sounds to rejoice in, yea, to let your very ribs re-echo with: But better than all of them is the absolutely last chord of the ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 4 (of 4) • Various
... Normans never could or would take to, had the effect of compressing many words of two syllables into one. Thus haegel, twaegen, and faegen, became hail, twain, and fain. —In these and other ways it has come to pass that the present English is to a very large extent of a monosyllabic character. So much is this the case, that whole books have been written for children in monosyllables. It must be confessed that the monosyllabic style is often dull, but it is always serious and homely. We can find in our translation of the Bible whole verses that are ...
— A Brief History of the English Language and Literature, Vol. 2 (of 2) • John Miller Dow Meiklejohn
... Souls' Day, when she has been to place a bunch of chrysanthemums on her baby's grave, are the only manifestations of sensibility that I have discovered in her. From the second of January to the second of November she is a human creature tied to a bell-rope, with an immovably stolid face and a monosyllabic vocabulary in which ...
— The Ink-Stain, Complete • Rene Bazin
... her alone with Lucinda and she read it to herself three times and then read it aloud to her companion. Lucinda, whose thorough knowledge of the imperious will and impervious eardrums of her mistress rendered her, as a rule, extremely monosyllabic, not to say silent, vouchsafed no comment upon the contents of the epistle, and after a few minutes Aunt Mary herself took ...
— The Rejuvenation of Aunt Mary • Anne Warner
... two, three, or more explanations. This is especially true of some of our commonest monosyllabic surnames. Bell may be from Anglo-Fr. le bel (beau), or from a shop sign, or from residence near the church or town bell. It may even have been applied to the man who pulled the bell. Finally, the ancestor may have been a lady called ...
— The Romance of Names • Ernest Weekley
... 289. Most monosyllabic adverbs add -er and -est to form the comparative and superlative, just as adjectives do; as, high, ...
— An English Grammar • W. M. Baskervill and J. W. Sewell
... chief accent affects also combinations of two monosyllabic words which make an iambus, and combinations like ego illi, age ergo, in which the second syllable of the second word ...
— The Student's Companion to Latin Authors • George Middleton
... both mentally and physically. Dr. Langden Downe reports several cases of this sort where the children had lived to be twenty-two years old and still remained infants, symmetrical in form, just able to stand beside a chair, utter a few monosyllabic sounds, and to be amused with toys. Dr. F. R. Lees, referring to the injury inflicted upon the liver by alcohol, says: "And recollect, whatever injury you inflict upon this organ, to your posterity ...
— Almost A Man • Mary Wood-Allen
... had come to seem to me a very singular personage. I am obliged to say that the signs of a fanatical temperament were not more striking in my hostess than before; it was only after a while that her air of incorruptible conformity, her tapering, monosyllabic correctness, began to appear to be themselves a cold, thin flame. Certainly, at first, she looked like a woman with as few passions as possible; but if she had a passion at all, it would be that of Philistinism. She might have been—for there are guardian-spirits, I suppose, of all ...
— The Author of Beltraffio • Henry James
... as the stem, there appear to be three Conjugations, but Dr. Strong gives four based on past tense, thus: i. Verbs with monosyllabic roots, 2. Verbs with roots in a, 3. Verbs with roots in i, 4. Verbs with ...
— The Mafulu - Mountain People of British New Guinea • Robert W. Williamson
... expresses the sense and reproduces the rhythm of the stanza, but does not attempt to copy the metre in every detail. This is known as cro cummaisc etir casbairdne ocus lethrannaigecht, and consists of seven-syllable lines with trisyllabic rhymes, alternating with five-syllable lines having monosyllabic rhymes. Literally translated the sense would run, "Darerca my mother / she was not a bad woman // Beoit the wright my father / of ...
— The Latin & Irish Lives of Ciaran - Translations Of Christian Literature. Series V. Lives Of - The Celtic Saints • Anonymous
... fight within the dark chamber, and while they had been dragging Tarzan to the inner court, no word had been spoken, but now several of them exchanged grunting, monosyllabic conversation in a language unfamiliar to the ape-man, and presently they left him lying upon the concrete floor while they trooped off on their short legs into another part of the temple beyond ...
— The Return of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... that I have brought men—fluent conversationalists—round here for a pleasant evening's debate only to see them become abstracted and monosyllabic ...
— Our Elizabeth - A Humour Novel • Florence A. Kilpatrick
... into the most secret compartment of his pocketbook, and to avoid the girl herself and yet feel like committing assault and battery with intent to kill, because some other man occasionally rides with her for an hour or two, he is extremely sensitive to averted glances and chilly tones and monosyllabic conversation. ...
— The Uphill Climb • B. M. Bower
... impatience is the more obvious inasmuch as everyone recognizes more or less clearly that he is likely to set the reserved witness suggestive questions and so to learn things that the witness never would have said. Not everybody, indeed, who makes monosyllabic replies in court has this nature, but in the long run, this common characteristic is manifest, and these laconic people are really not able to deliver themselves connectedly in long speeches. If, then, the witness has ...
— Robin Hood • J. Walker McSpadden
... series of councils in the long house, or town-hall. Croghan made the Indians a present from the Governor of Pennsylvania; and he and Gist delivered speeches of friendship and good advice, which the auditors received with the usual monosyllabic plaudits, ejected from the depths of their throats. A treaty of peace was solemnly made between the English and the confederate tribes, and all was serenity and joy; till four Ottawas, probably from Detroit, arrived with a French flag, a gift of brandy ...
— Montcalm and Wolfe • Francis Parkman
... number of English monosyllables, and the simplicity of style which he described as "one of the greatest perfections in any language," which seemed to him best exemplified in the English Bible, and which he himself practised so brilliantly, has in English a very marked monosyllabic character. ...
— An Apology For The Study of Northern Antiquities • Elizabeth Elstob
... pronounced as two syllables (ni-ais, li-en, pri-ere, pri-ons, jou-et), in others as one (biais, rien, bar-riere, ai-mions, fou-et); and even the same word is sometimes variable (ancien, hier, duel). In general such combinations are monosyllabic if they have developed from a single vowel in ...
— French Lyrics • Arthur Graves Canfield
... "sai" and a nod to include us both. Her pleasure was undisguised, however, and as we rode down the valley she chattered volubly between the business of driving in half a dozen horses and a herd of sheep. The monosyllabic replies of the hunter were delivered in a voice which seemed to come from a long way off or from out of the earth beneath his pony's feet. I was interested to see what greeting there would be upon his arrival at the yurt. His two daughters and ...
— Across Mongolian Plains - A Naturalist's Account of China's 'Great Northwest' • Roy Chapman Andrews
... pleasures out of a small income and a 'fund of anecdote.' His reputation indicated an anecdotist of the table, prevailing in the primitive societies, where the art of conversing does not come by nature, and is exercised in monosyllabic undertones or grunts until the narrator's well-masticated popular anecdote loosens a digestive laughter, and some talk ensues. He was Marsett's friend, and he boasted of not letting Ned Marsett ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... emotions of pleasure and of pain; and rarely give vent to feelings of either. The most ludicrous scenes scarcely ever cause them to laugh, or the most interesting recitals draw from them more than their peculiar monosyllabic expression of admiration. ...
— Chronicles of Border Warfare • Alexander Scott Withers
... elegiac does not require any stop at the end of the couplet, nor does it affect any special ending; words of seven syllables or less are used by it indifferently. The trisyllabic ending, which is all but unknown to Ovid, occurs continually in Catullus; even the monosyllabic, which is altogether avoided by succeeding poets, occurs once. [124] Another licence, still more alien from Roman usage, is the retention of a short or unelided syllable at the end of the first penthemimer. [125] Catullus's ...
— A History of Roman Literature - From the Earliest Period to the Death of Marcus Aurelius • Charles Thomas Cruttwell
... first half an hour it was doubtful whether the evening was going to be a success. Drexley was gloomy, and had not altogether lost the air of having been forced to do something which bored him. He was polite, but monosyllabic and gloomy, and his interest in the play was obviously feigned. Douglas wisely left him to Cicely, and devoted himself to her little friend, and he soon had the pleasure of seeing Drexley thaw. Cicely only laughed at his momentary lapses, and she was far too charming a companion to be ignored. Before ...
— The Survivor • E.Phillips Oppenheim
... study of the clouds, she tried to make friends with Miss Drake and Mrs. Fotheringham. But neither effort came to good. Alicia, so expansive, so theatrical, so much the centre of the situation, when she chose, could be equally prickly, monosyllabic, and repellent when it suited her to be so. Diana talked timidly of dress, of London, and the Season. They were the subjects on which it seemed most natural to approach Miss Drake; Diana's attitude was inquiring and propitiatory. ...
— The Testing of Diana Mallory • Mrs. Humphry Ward |
