"Testy" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... these disappeared, and vivid hissing jets of ignited gas shot forth in abundance. The hissing annoyed me; why, I could not divine; but as the heat increased I cooled from the state of excitement produced by the testy destruction of my papers, model, and specimen. I sat down at the fire; had I not better, said I, have made my wants known to the servant, than have acted as I have done? No, I hate asking for what, as a duty should have been ready to my hands. I endeavoured to persuade myself that I did not ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 19, Issue 529, January 14, 1832 • Various
... any one testy, and Aspinall, had he known it, would have been less surprised than he was to have his head almost snapped off as the two fellow-fags sat at work in their ...
— Follow My leader - The Boys of Templeton • Talbot Baines Reed
... How can I tell?" was Bryant's somewhat testy answer. "One thing is certain, however; he won't be here again this ...
— The Story of Leather • Sara Ware Bassett
... His testy master goeth about to take him; When lo! the unback'd breeder, full of fear, 320 Jealous of catching, swiftly doth forsake him, With her the horse, and left Adonis there: As they were mad, unto the wood they hie them, Outstripping crows that strive to overfly ...
— Venus and Adonis • William Shakespeare
... stage of the journey, I am bound to say the old aunt's testy humour returned, and she scarce spoke a single word for three hours. As for her companion; being prodigiously in love at the time, no doubt he did not press his aunt for conversation, but thought unceasingly about his Dulcinea, until the coach ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... made Halbert a frequent neglecter of hours; and his mother, though angry and disappointed when she saw him not at table, was so much accustomed to his occasional absence, and knew so little how to teach him more regularity, that a testy observation was almost all the censure with ...
— The Monastery • Sir Walter Scott
... who saw him a thorough Detestation of aged Avarice. The Petulancy of a peevish old Fellow, who loves and hates he knows not why, is very excellently performed by the Ingenious Mr. William Penkethman in the Fop's Fortune;[5] where, in the Character of Don Cholerick Snap Shorto de Testy, he answers no Questions but to those whom he likes, and wants no account of any thing from those he approves. Mr. Penkethman is also Master of as many Faces in the Dumb-Scene as can be expected from a Man in the Circumstances ...
— The Spectator, Volume 2. • Addison and Steele
... himself. He was as gentle as a dove, and as tender as a lamb. A cross word from his father, when he had made a cross stitch, would almost break his heart; but half a word of kindness revived him again—and he seldom went long without it; for the old man, though rendered rather testy and crabbed in his temper, by his many troubles and disappointments, was naturally of a loving, compassionate disposition, and, moreover, regarded Hans as the ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 4, September, 1850 • Various
... granted that Trenholme was of gentle extraction, he treated him with the generosity of pride in the matter of rations; but he assumed airs of a testy authority which were in exact proportion to his own feeling of physical and social inferiority. Seen truly, there was a pathos in this, for it was a weak man's way of trying to be manful but his new labourer, ...
— What Necessity Knows • Lily Dougall
... he was bad, so were others bad. There were many worse than he. Such were the excuses she made for her late husband. Old Mr. Wharton, who really thought that in all his experience he had never known any one worse than his son-in-law, would sometimes become testy, and at last resolved that he would altogether hold his tongue. But he could hardly hold ...
— The Prime Minister • Anthony Trollope
... indicative of the extent to which politics ruled the day to note that in Knickerbocker's History of New York, Washington Irving turns aside from the ostensible object of a humorous sketch of early New York to ridicule President Jefferson. William the Testy, a dreamer, a speculative philosopher, an impractical inventor, with a smattering of all knowledge, was easily recognised as the President of the United States. His suggestion of windmills as a means of defence was a burlesque on Jefferson's ...
— The United States of America Part I • Ediwn Erle Sparks
... gentleness in the formerly so testy and proud companion, all now with a single mind desire him to stay, nay, refuse to let him go. He turns from them resolutely: "Detain me not! It would ill profit me to tarry! Never more for me repose! Onward and ever onward lies my way, to look backward were ...
— The Wagnerian Romances • Gertrude Hall
... seaweed; while Mavis sat on a dry bit of rock, looking large, red, overblown, and adored her family. The little boy soon became, frankly, a nuisance, wanting his sister's shells, refusing to catch daddy, wishing to paddle in his boots; and Dale, testy at last, very hot and perspiring said: "Ma lad, if you wear out my patience, you'll ...
— The Devil's Garden • W. B. Maxwell
... products is an element in the culture of the community. But it is more than that; it is both a pledge and a stimulus to excellence in future production. Artists in all fields are popularly stigmatized as a testy lot—irritabile genus—but their techiness does not necessarily mean opposition to criticism, but only to uninformed and unappreciative criticism, especially if it be cocksure and blatant. There is nothing that the true artist craves so much—not even praise—as understanding of ...
— The Booklover and His Books • Harry Lyman Koopman
... engaged in this occupation there was a testy rap at the door, and Mrs. Driver appeared. She eyed my manoeuvres with the rejection form with a severe frown. After a preliminary sniff she embarked upon a rapid lecture on what she called my irregular ...
— Not George Washington - An Autobiographical Novel • P. G. Wodehouse
... am," I pulled on my boots and joined the others in the lower hall, and the three of us, Mr. Webster, Roger, and I, hurried down the street in time to the old man's testy exclamations, which burst out fervently and often profanely whenever his lame foot struck the ground harder than usual. "Pirates—mutineers—young cubs—laying abed— cockcrow—" and so on, until we were in a ...
— The Mutineers • Charles Boardman Hawes
... used to remark, and Burton endorsed the saying, "no man is great unless he is also superbly dressed." As Jacob stuttered, one of his correspondents thought his name was J. J. J. J. J. Jacob, and terribly offended the testy General by writing it so. A brave and self-confident, but rancorous old man, Jacob by his senseless regulations brought the Indian army to the verge of ruin. This peccadillo was passed over, but a more serious offence, his inability to play whist, was remembered against him by his brother ...
— The Life of Sir Richard Burton • Thomas Wright
... disjointed members of a sentence thrown out, ending in a cough; at length his voice forced its way into a slow, but absolute tone of a man who feels the weight of his purse, if not of his ideas, every portion of his speech being marked by a testy puff of ...
— Stories by Modern American Authors • Julian Hawthorne
... an answer altogether unexpected. Again the officer found himself gazing into the strange, refined face and wonderful eyes. The man was not blind, of that he was certain. Neither was his voice harsh or testy. Rather was it soft and polite, of one merely stating a fact. Yet how could it be? He remembered the cigar clerk. Neither cigar nor sun! From what manner of land could the man come? A detective has a certain gift of intuition. Though ...
— The Blind Spot • Austin Hall and Homer Eon Flint
... the minister's colt for a gallop over to the parish capital, where there was a dancing-school ball. There had been a nest of Owls in some hole in the spire; but we never doubted for a moment that the noise of snoring, blowing, hissing, and snapping proceeded from a testy old gentleman that had been buried that forenoon, and had come alive again a day after the fair. Had we reasoned the matter a little, we must soon have convinced ourselves that there was no ground for alarm to us at least; for the ...
— Recreations of Christopher North, Volume 2 • John Wilson
... Terrible, terrific terura. Terrify timegigi. Territory teritorio. Terror teruro. Terrorise terurigi. Test provi. Testament testamento. Testator testamentanto. Testify atesti. Testimonial atesto, rekomendo. Testy kolerema. Tetanus tetano. Tether ligilo. Text teksto. Textile teksa. Textual lauxteksta. Texture teksajxo. Thaler talero. Than ol. Thank danki. Thankfully danke. Thankfulness dankeco. Thankless sendanka. ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes
... this? Bru. All this! Ay, more: fret till your proud heart break; Go, show your slaves how choleric you are, And make your bondmen tremble. Must I budge? Must I observe you? Must I stand and crouch Under your testy humor? By the gods, You shall digest the venom of your spleen, Though it do split you; for, from this day forth, I'll use you for my mirth, yea for my laughter, When you are waspish. Cas. Is it come ...
— McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... and a singing coffee-pail welcomed the three as the door swung wide, and the section-boss, who was urging Marylyn to "rustle some grub," turned with a testy word. But he fell silent when he saw Lounsbury, and edged into the dusky ...
— The Plow-Woman • Eleanor Gates
... voice grated also on old Judge Bowman, who threw down his book and looked up over his bowed spectacles. He was a testy old fellow, with a Burgundy face and shaggy white hair, a chin and nose that met together like a parrot's, and an eye like a hawk. It was one of his principles to permit none of his intimates to speak ill of his friends in his hearing. Criticisms, therefore, by an outsider like Cobb were especially ...
— The Fortunes of Oliver Horn • F. Hopkinson Smith
... this! ay, more. Fret till your proud heart break. Go show your slaves how choleric you are, And make your bondmen tremble. Must I budge? Must I observe you? Must I stand and crouch Under your testy humour? By the gods! You shall digest the venom of your spleen, Though it do split you; for from this day forth I'll use you for my mirth, yea, for my laughter, When you ...
— The Canadian Elocutionist • Anna Kelsey Howard
... adapted from a previous epigram about 'meddling and muddling;' but here is the identical phrase: Coleridge wrote in the 'Courier:' 'The writer, whilst abroad, was once present when most bitter complaints were made of the ——government. "Government!" exclaimed a testy old captain of a Mediterranean trading-vessel, "call it blunderment or plunderment or what you like—only not a government!"'—Coleridge's 'Essays on his own Times,' p. 893. Disraeli is sometimes credited with the epigram ...
— Hours in a Library - New Edition, with Additions. Vol. II (of 3) • Leslie Stephen
... in that unpleasant state of prickly heat when testy old gentlemen could commit slaughter with ecstasy. Had it been the maid holding a candle who had dared to advise, he would have overturned her undoubtedly, and established a fresh instance of the impertinence, the uselessness and weakness ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... they were finally evaporated by the heat of the sun; and Mr. Firedamp's hair was standing on end at the bare imagination of the mass of malaria that must be engendered by the operation. Mr. Toogood had begun explaining his diagrams to Sir Simon Steeltrap; but Sir Simon grew testy, and told Mr. Toogood that the promulgators of such doctrines ought to be consigned to the treadmill. The philanthropist walked off from the country gentleman, and proceeded to hold forth to young Crotchet, ...
— Crotchet Castle • Thomas Love Peacock
... technical knowledge was quite sufficient, with the help of his admirable talents and of his insinuating address, to procure clients. He rose very rapidly into business, and soon entertained hopes of being called within the bar. He applied to Lord Burleigh for that purpose, but received a testy refusal. Of the grounds of that refusal we can, in some measure, judge by Bacon's answer, which is still extant. It seems that the old Lord, whose temper, age and gout had by no means altered for the better, and who loved to mark his dislike of the showy, quick-witted young men ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... accomplishments. She's a natural-born tyrant. I tried to escape her this morning; had got as far as one foot out of bed when she bore down upon me, calmly, devilishly calmly, pointed to my offending foot, and said: "Back, sir!" Then we argued a bit—I'm afraid I was a trifle testy—and finally she laid hands upon my ankle in the most scientific manner and had me on my back before I could think of the proper adjectives to apply to ...
— The Place Beyond the Winds • Harriet T. Comstock
... M. Botte, which seems to have been a favourite, is a rather conventional extravaganza with a rich, testy, but occasionally generous uncle; a nephew who falls in love with the charming but penniless daughter of an emigre; a noble rustic, who manages to keep some of his exiled landlord's property together, ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 - From the Beginning to 1800 • George Saintsbury
... husband is not only an unbeliever, but one very froward, peevish, and testy, yea, so froward, &c., that I know not how to speak to him, or behave ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... He was invariably testy when indigestion had him in its claw, and his tone gave warning that this was a bad moment Still Petro was bursting with his subject. He could not bear to postpone the fight. Instead of putting it off, he resolved to be exceedingly careful in ...
— Winnie Childs - The Shop Girl • C. N. Williamson
... used to say in the spring, "The Lord is calling me to Italy," and a testy parson once remarked, "The Lord always calls you at very convenient times, Radstock." I don't feel as if the Lord had called me here at a ...
— My War Experiences in Two Continents • Sarah Macnaughtan
... it now, that'll do. I was invited here to breakfast, and I'd like to have it," cried the old gentleman, in a testy voice, which the good-natured gleam in his sharp eyes denied. So everybody pranced into the dining-room, and Bea was placed behind the coffee-urn, and couldn't do a thing but blush, and look too happy and overcome to ...
— Six Girls - A Home Story • Fannie Belle Irving
... became well, that repentant and unwilling robber was obliged to make up for lost time. His first most important enterprise was to obtain entrance into the house of a large cattle dealer in York, the testy old person by the way, whose negro servant he had endeavoured in vain to rob upon the highway. It became known to the Rev. Mr. Jonas that there was a strong box in the old gentleman's house, and the same was full of 'yellow shiners.' It was secured, the clergyman observed, by three padlocks besides ...
— The Four Canadian Highwaymen • Joseph Edmund Collins
... whether grave or mellow, Thou'rt such a touchy, testy, pleasant fellow; Hast so much wit and mirth and spleen about thee, There is no living with ...
— The History of "Punch" • M. H. Spielmann
... means not bad habits but bad roads) as one of those works of charity which rich merchants must do for the salvation of their souls. Thomas Paycocke's choice of roads no doubt reflects many a wearisome journey, from which he returned home splashed and testy, to the ministrations of 'John Reyner my man' or 'Henry Briggs my servant', and of Margaret, looking anxiously from her oriel window for his return. In his own town he leaves no less than forty pounds, of which twenty pounds was to go to amend a section ...
— Medieval People • Eileen Edna Power
... then answered with artful frankness: "I am trying to get back into my normal condition. I have been out of balance somehow, ever since this business commenced; have been as testy as an old woman of eighty. It is time I began to redeem myself. But I must not detain you. I see you begin to look uneasy. Until to-morrow, I commend you to the tender mercies of Simon ...
— The Diamond Coterie • Lawrence L. Lynch
... Apply it to a criminal case. Ha! ha! if peradventure a Cacti be rejected, because he had seen the accused commit the crime for which he is arraigned. Then, his mind would be biased: no impartiality from him! Or your testy accused might object to another, because of his tomahawk nose, or a cruel squint ...
— Mardi: and A Voyage Thither, Vol. I (of 2) • Herman Melville
... take my words deep. For instance, not long ago I missed some stock, an', happenin' into Greaves's place one Saturday night, I shore talked loud. His barroom was full of men an' some of them were in my black book. Greaves took my talk a little testy. He said. 'Wal, Gass, mebbe you're right aboot some of these cattle thieves livin' among us, but ain't they jest as liable to be some of your friends or relatives as Ted Meeker's or mine or any one around heah?' That was where Greaves ...
— To the Last Man • Zane Grey
... dogs, your master long has felt A keen distemper in the royal pelt— A testy, superficial irritation, Brought home, I fancy, from some foreign nation. For this a thousand simples you've prescribed— Unguents external, draughts to be imbibed. You've plundered Scotland of its plants, the seas You've ravished, ...
— Shapes of Clay • Ambrose Bierce
... subdued and docile, and Neville rejoiced over what he considered the yielding of his will to the hallowed influences of the good Spirit of God. At other times he seemed wilful and wayward, or even petulant and testy, giving evidence of the resistance of his human will to the Divine drawings of which he was the subject. At such times the faith of Neville was sorely tried; but his patience and forbearance were never ...
— Neville Trueman the Pioneer Preacher • William Henry Withrow
... He might bestow her on some poor relation Of his sixth cousin, as he did her sister, 70 And I should be debarred from all access. Then as to what she suffers from her father, In all this there is much exaggeration:— Old men are testy and will have their way; A man may stab his enemy, or his vassal, 75 And live a free life as to wine or women, And with a peevish temper may return To a dull home, and rate his wife and children; Daughters and wives call this foul tyranny. I shall ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... gave the impression that she was ordering veal cutlets, maidenhair ferns, wax floor-polish, chiffon ruching, and closed carriages, from one and the same invisible interlocutor, who seemed impartially unable to supply any of these needs without rather testy exhortation. Mrs. Emery was one of the women who are always well served by "tradespeople," as she now called them, "and a good reason why," she was wont ...
— The Squirrel-Cage • Dorothy Canfield
... the testy rejoinder of the old Commodore, who, with his daughter Rose, had accompanied her Ladyship on the day in question ...
— An Algonquin Maiden - A Romance of the Early Days of Upper Canada • G. Mercer Adam
... not closely with the other hounds: He'll venture on a lion in his ire; Curst Choler was his dam, and Wrong his sire. This Choler is a brach that's very old, And spends her mouth too much to have it hold: She's very testy, an unpleasing cur, That bites the very stones, if they but stur: Or when that ought but her displeasure moves, She'll bite and snap at any one she loves: But my quick-scented'st dog is Jealousy, The truest ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan
... was testy, petulant, and unhappy. The prophecy of Cochran had taken a stronger hold on his mind than he was willing to acknowledge. I was called upon to read aloud chapters in the Bible, and especially in the Book of Revelation, Knotty passages in the pamphlet I was also required to read from time to time. ...
— Jack in the Forecastle • John Sherburne Sleeper
... was seated on the porch of his house in Gentryville, Indiana, one spring afternoon when a small boy called to see him. The Squire was a testy old man, not very fond of boys, and he glanced up over his book, impatient ...
— Historic Boyhoods • Rupert Sargent Holland
... town of Saardam in hot water and produced more tartars and brimstones than any ten families in the place; and so truly did he inherit this family peculiarity, that he had not been a year in the government of the province before he was universally denominated William the Testy. His appearance answered to his name. He was a brisk, wiry, waspish little old gentleman, such a one as may now and then be seen stumping about our city in a broad-skirted coat with huge buttons, a cocked hat stuck on the back of his head, and a cane as high as his chin. His face was broad, ...
— Little Masterpieces of American Wit and Humor - Volume I • Various
... waken little Gottfried," said Philippina in a testy, morose tone. "And get out of ...
— The Goose Man • Jacob Wassermann
... the keeper of the king's conscience in the flowing raiment of a chorister, and heard him give "Glory to God in the highest!" as though he were a hired singer. "God's body! God's body! My Lord Chancellor a parish clerk?—a parish clerk?" was the duke's testy expostulation with the Chancellor. Whereupon More, with gentle gravity, answered, "Nay; your grace may not think that the king—your master and mine—will with me, for serving his Master, be offended, and thereby ...
— A Book About Lawyers • John Cordy Jeaffreson
... the last; but when I heard this fatal command, which, if obeyed, might bury assailant and defender in common ruin, I ordered the remnant to throw down their arms, while I struck the flag and warned the rash and testy ...
— Captain Canot - or, Twenty Years of an African Slaver • Brantz Mayer
... speaking, expected that he would break a blood vessel, by giving himself up to such unbounded fury. It seems the family at Tottenham did not know of the precaution that is used upon such occasions, by a testy old baronet of this county, who does not live a hundred miles from Stoneaston, which I am credibly informed is as follows—whenever the baronet has one of these sudden and violent paroxysms of passion, which is not very unfrequently, her ladyship prevails upon him to sit down ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 1 • Henry Hunt
... Testy and impatient, the commissioner decided that she should be taken back to her parents, but only on one condition: she must promise never to ...
— Fromont and Risler, Complete • Alphonse Daudet
... critic could not detest and abhor a pun, or the insinuation of a pun, more cordially than my father;—he would grow testy upon it at any time;—but to be broke in upon by one, in a serious discourse, was as bad, he would say, as a fillip upon the ...
— The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman • Laurence Sterne
... see, however much his lady persisted in obedience and admiration for her husband, that my lord tired of his quiet life, and grew weary, and then testy, at those gentle bonds with which his wife would have held him. As they say the Grand Lama of Thibet is very much fatigued by his character of divinity, and yawns on his altar as his bonzes kneel and worship him, many a home-god grows heartily sick ...
— The History of Henry Esmond, Esq. • W. M. Thackeray
... from time to time those rarer flowers whose beauty and sweetness repay the conscious culture of the soul? It seems difficult to imagine that a man who succeeded in charming so many different acquaintances, and in remaining life-long friends with the testy and inconsiderate Pirkheimer, should have altogether failed to create a relation kindly and even beautiful with his Agnes, whose portrait we surely have at her best in the drawing at Bremen. Considerations as to the general position of married women in those days need not prevent us of our natural ...
— Albert Durer • T. Sturge Moore
... earnest voice, Wherever thou art hid, Thou testy little dogmatist, Thou pretty Katydid Thou mindest me of gentlefolks,— Old gentlefolks are they,— Thou say'st an undisputed thing In such ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... I do, for there's no standing against this frankness; and, to be as frank with you, my lord, I was wrong myself to be so testy—I ask pardon, too. A M'Leod never thought it a disgrace to crave a ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. IV • Maria Edgeworth
... me," he said, apologetically. "What our fine young friend here told me was like some one stepping on my gouty foot. I've been maybe a little too zealous—too exacting. Then I'm old and testy ... What does it matter? How could it have been prevented? Alas! it's black like that hideous Benton ... But we're coming out into the light. Lodge, didn't you tell me this Number Ten bridge ...
— The U.P. Trail • Zane Grey
... attended much to the manners of the canine race, he may have remarked the very different manner in which the individuals of the different sexes carry on their quarrels among each other. The females are testy, petulant, and very apt to indulge their impatient dislike of each other's presence, or the spirit of rivalry which it produces, in a sudden bark and snap, which last is generally made as much at advantage as possible. But these ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott
... wondrously delighted with the salt marshes which spread their reeking bosoms along the coast, at the bottom of Kip's Bay, counseled by all means to return thither, and found the intended city. This was strenuously opposed by the unbending Ten Broeck, and many testy arguments passed between them. The particulars of this controversy have not reached us, which is ever to be lamented; this much is certain, that the sage Oloffe put an end to the dispute, by determining to explore still farther in the route which the mysterious porpoises had so clearly ...
— Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete • Washington Irving
... no despicable one, and the members of the Council were brought by it to a milder disposition than that disclosed by the testy reply of their President to Fray Miguel's opening discourse. Garcia Padilla undertook the apology of the Council, protesting that many excellent Provisions in favour of the Indians had emanated from that body, whose intentions were good; ...
— Bartholomew de Las Casas; his life, apostolate, and writings • Francis Augustus MacNutt
... Justice Brisac, and uncle of the two brothers, Charles (the scholar) and Eustace (the courtier). Miramont is an ignorant, testy old man, but a great admirer of learning and scholars.—Beaumont and Fletcher, The Elder ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer
... case which I observe was that of four children of a person called John Goodwin, a mason. The eldest, a girl, had quarrelled with the laundress of the family about some linen which was amissing. The mother of the laundress, an ignorant, testy, and choleric old Irishwoman, scolded the accuser; and shortly after, the elder Goodwin, her sister and two brothers, were seized with such strange diseases that all their neighbours concluded they were bewitched. They conducted ...
— Letters On Demonology And Witchcraft • Sir Walter Scott
... one exception, however, in a testy old huntsman, as hot as a pepper-corn; a meagre, wiry old fellow, in a threadbare velvet jockey-cap, and a pair of leather breeches, that, from much wear, shone as though they had been japanned. He was very contradictory ...
— Bracebridge Hall • Washington Irving
... a testy spirit manifested that I did not care to provoke. I could have met his assertion with facts and inferences of a character to startle any one occupying his position, who was in a calm, reflective state; but to argue with him then would have ...
— Ten Nights in a Bar Room • T. S. Arthur
... nearest doctor! Run!" So Mr. Krook addresses a crazy little woman who is his female lodger, who appears and vanishes in a breath, who soon returns accompanied by a testy medical man brought from his dinner, with a broad, snuffy upper lip and a ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... her afternoon slumber, was inclined to be testy. As far as she was concerned, she was very much against the idea of Constance marrying any one, for the girl's presence saved her a great deal of trouble in many ways; the consultations with the housekeeper, ...
— Adrien Leroy • Charles Garvice
... had eaten and drunk their fill, they put the beast on a waggon, and themselves mounted their steeds. All were gay and talkative, except the Assessor and the Notary, who were more testy than the day before, quarrelling over the merits of that Sanguszko gun and that Sagalas musket from Balabanowka. The Count and Thaddeus also rode on in no merry mood, being ashamed that they had missed and had retreated; ...
— Pan Tadeusz • Adam Mickiewicz
... that when, the Sunday following the announcement, Grant came with his father and Kenyon in the rattling old buggy up to the Nesbit home on Elm Street, Amos Adams found a rollicking, frivolous, mischievous host—but Grant Adams found a natty, testy, sardonic old man, who made no secret ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White
... might have seen your face; And over all, to frighten thieves, was hung Well clean'd, altho' but seldom us'd, my gun. Ah! that damn'd gun! I took it down one morn— A desperate deal of harm they did my corn! Our testy Squire too loved to save the breed, So covey upon covey eat my seed. I mark'd the mischievous rogues, and took my aim, I fir'd, they fell, and—up the keeper came. That cursed morning brought on my undoing, ...
— Poems • Robert Southey
... merriment has long since departed, leaving it dull as any thrice-repeated joke) are advised to skip the first two books, which are very tedious fooling, and to be content with an abridged version of the stories of Wouter van Twiller, William the Testy and Peter the Headstrong. These are the names of real Dutch governors of New Amsterdam, and the dates given are exact dates; but there history ends and burlesque begins. The combination of fact and nonsense and the strain ...
— Outlines of English and American Literature • William J. Long
... him that she was taking his suggestion about writing to the papers seriously, it jumped with his peculiar sense of humour—which had never developed beyond the stage into which it had blossomed in his subaltern days—to egg her on "to draw" the testy old gentleman by threats of publicity. It was his masculine mind, therefore, that was really responsible for her "unnatural" action in that matter. In bygone days when there was any mischief afoot the principle used to be, chercher la femme, and when she was found the ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... oblige me to ask for them? Can't you bring them as I have told you? It makes me so late with my work." And, having delivered himself of these testy remarks, he threw himself into an arm-chair and proceeded ...
— The Thin Red Line; and Blue Blood • Arthur Griffiths
... fretted vanity of a petty German Prince, he could confront with composure the stupid rancour of those who could not comprehend him, in the most wooden of heavy Dutchmen he could awaken a slow understanding, the most testy royal temper he knew how to appease, and, through all, wear an air of dignity and ...
— His Grace of Osmonde • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... am not disposed as yet to be tame, And therefore I am loth to be under a dame. Now you are a bachelor, a man may soon win you, Methinks there is some good fellowship in you; We may laugh and be merry at board and at bed, You are not so testy as those that be wed. Mild in behaviour and loth to fall out, You may run, you may ride and rove round about, With wealth at your will and all thing at ease, Free, frank and lusty, easy to please. But when you be clogged and tied by the toe So fast that you shall not have pow'r to let go, You ...
— The Growth of English Drama • Arnold Wynne
... "I didna mean to say anything unkind. Christie mustna be so testy. Don't tell me that you like milk better than tea. Christie will enjoy hers all the better if you take one too." And she placed it ...
— Christie Redfern's Troubles • Margaret Robertson
... me a delightful story about her. Her father was a testy old country gentleman, very ...
— Memoirs of Arthur Hamilton, B. A. Of Trinity College, Cambridge • Arthur Christopher Benson
... erected what time the plague of riches smote him and the old home on Cherry Street became too small for the collective family chest), and there was quiet dignity in the quaintly columned facade of the Bohun mansion, now occupied solely by old Colonel Bohun, lonely and testy, reputed the richest as well as the most miserable man in the county. But as to his wealth, I doubt if rumour runs by more than tradition; Blinky Lockwood's new-found hundred-thousands are growing rapidly toward the million mark, unless Blinky's a worse business man than the town takes ...
— The Fortune Hunter • Louis Joseph Vance
... England of his day. Jonson continued active in the service of the court in the writing of masques and other entertainments far into the reign of King Charles; but, towards the end, a quarrel with Jones embittered his life, and the two testy old men appear to have become not only a constant irritation to each other, but intolerable bores at court. In "Hymenaei," "The Masque of Queens," "Love Freed from Ignorance," "Lovers made Men," "Pleasure Reconciled to Virtue," and many ...
— Every Man In His Humour • Ben Jonson
... was sensitive. The life of a lawyer in great practice is very trying to the spirit, but no one ever saw Mr. Choate discomposed or ruffled, and the sharp contentions of the most protracted and hotly contested trial never extorted from him a testy remark, a peevish exclamation, a wounding reflection. He never wasted any of his nervous energy in scolding, fretting, or worrying. Such invincible and inevitable sweetness of temper would have made the most commonplace ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 11, No. 63, January, 1863 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... They, who had been co-lords with his father, withdrew confused and perplexed. Messrs. Davidson and Slocum were on the point of resolving their perplexity into wrath, as they went down the great stone stairway to the waiting carriage, but Mr. Crockett, the testy and snappish, muttered ecstatically: "The son of a gun! The little son ...
— The Little Lady of the Big House • Jack London
... New York are city editors, bilious of stomach, testy of speech, and inconsiderate of reporters' feelings and professional pride. Such editors, when a reporter has failed, through no fault of his own, in successfully interviewing a celebrity, will sometimes send ...
— The Wreck of the Titan - or, Futility • Morgan Robertson
... he said, deserting for the moment his air of good-fellowship and returning to the quick, testy manner of speaking which was so characteristic of him in matters of decision. "I take it you have said nothing to Larkin, or anyone else, ...
— Aces Up • Covington Clarke
... thought that, laughing as loud as the Lytteltons do, they would have loved Lear? Alfred says none of them think him a bit funny and was quite testy when I said his was the only family in ...
— Margot Asquith, An Autobiography: Volumes I & II • Margot Asquith
... a silly word. In a natural world there is no place for the supernatural.' He grew testy. 'Can I ever teach you, Helen, not to employ words ...
— The Desert Valley • Jackson Gregory
... consider. Pitt asked him abruptly, if he wanted a quarter of an hour: he replied, "he did not want to inform either his head or his heart, for both were satisfied what to do; but that he would ask the King's leave." He wants to fight Pitt. He is a most testy little old gentleman, and about eight years ago would have fought Alderman Perry. It was in the House, at the time of the excise: he said we should carry it: Perry said he hoped to see him hanged first. "You see ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole
... who rejected these favorite instruments of political success was unable to find compensation in personal popularity or the graces of manner. Cold and repellent, he leaned backward in his desire to do the right, and alienated men by his testy and uncompromising reception of advances. And yet there never was a president more in need of conciliating, for already the forces of the opposition were forming. Even before his election he had been warned that the price of his victory would be an organized opposition ...
— Rise of the New West, 1819-1829 - Volume 14 in the series American Nation: A History • Frederick Jackson Turner
... even then, was the remarkable thing in me—certainly it has been remarked about me again and again. Nobody has known that it was an effort (a habit of effort) to throw the light on the outside,—I do abhor so that ignoble groaning aloud of the 'groans of Testy and Sensitude'—yet I may say that for three years I never was conscious of one movement of pleasure in anything. Think if I could mean to complain of 'low spirits' now, and to you. Why it would be like complaining ...
— The Letters of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett, Vol. 1 (of 2) 1845-1846 • Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett
... I reckon. It won't hurt him to tell the truth. He was as testy as a snapping turtle—you know that. Plenty of folks disliked him. Most likely the person who attacked him was a tramp who hoped to find money. By the way, did anybody look to see if there had been ...
— Reels and Spindles - A Story of Mill Life • Evelyn Raymond
... fanned the flames of discontent. Even the most radical did not yet whisper the terrible word Revolution, or suggest that they aspired to independence. They simply demanded their "rights" which the arrogant and testy British Tories had shattered and were withholding from them. At the outset rebels seldom admit that their rebellion aims at new acquisitions, but only at the recovery of ...
— George Washington • William Roscoe Thayer
... testy. "I assure you, Joe, the particular assignment was quite important. We simply cannot afford to move, here in the West, until we know what the Sov-world will do. Your task was a delicate one, obviously. You simply couldn't ...
— Frigid Fracas • Dallas McCord Reynolds
... pointers in a drawing-room, lap dogs in a vis-a-vis, and monkeys in a lady's boudoir, my love of comfort and propriety enters strong protest; an emancipated parrot attracts my sympathy far less than bright-eyed children feeding their testy pet, for I dread the cannibal temptation of those soft fair fingers, when brought into collision with Polly's hook and eye; gigantic Newfoundlanders dragging their perpetual chains, larks and linnets trilling the faint song of liberty behind their prison bars, cold ...
— The Complete Prose Works of Martin Farquhar Tupper • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... covered them with his broad hand, and swept them into his own pocket! At that sinister action Waife felt his heart sink into his shoes; but his face was as calm as a Roman's, only he resumed his pipe with a prolonged and testy whiff. ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... despatched: the first soldier, because sentence had passed upon him; the second, who had lost his way, because he was the cause of his companion's death; and the hangman, for not having obeyed the order which had been given him. Such as have had to do with testy and obstinate women, may have experimented into what a rage it puts them to oppose silence and coldness to their fury, and that a man disdains to nourish their anger. The orator Celius was wonderfully choleric by nature; and to one who supped in his company, a man of a gentle and sweet conversation, ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne
... not delight to moralize on false hair, masks, rapiers, pomandens, perfumes, dice, bowls, fardingales, etc? Did he not sketch for us, with enjoyment and with satire, too, the fantastic fops, the pompous stewards, the mischievous pages, the quarrelsome revellers, the testy gaolers, the rhapsodizing lovers, the sly cheats, and the ruffling courtiers that filled the streets of Elizabethan London, persons who could have been found nowhere else nor in any other age? No one ...
— Tobacco; Its History, Varieties, Culture, Manufacture and Commerce • E. R. Billings
... Creation, with all the advantages of a glorious Birth, has a double right and power to defend all that approach you for sanctuary; your very Beauty is a Guard to all you daigne to make safe: for You were born for Conquest every way; even what Phanatick, what peevish Politician, testy with Age, Diseases, miscarried Plots, disappointed Revolutions, envious of Power, of Princes, and of Monarchy, and mad with Zeal for Change and Reformation, could yet be so far lost to sense of Pleasure, as not to turn a Rebel to Revenge the ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. I (of 6) • Aphra Behn
... Miramont, one, that though he cannot read a Proclamation, yet dotes on Learning, and loves my Master Charles for being a Scholar; I hear he's coming hither, I shall meet him; and if he be that old, rough, testy blade he always us'd to be, I'le ring him such a peal, as shall go near to shake their Belroom, peradventure beat'm, for he is fire and flax; and so have ...
— The Works of Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher - Vol. 2 of 10: Introduction to The Elder Brother • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher
... very Grosly, my chief Delight was, that they never reviled me so much as when I was in my greatest Glory, as Dogs never are so apt to Bark at the Moon, as when she is at the Full. Besides, let me tell you, testy Sir, with the old Poet Nomina mille, mille nocendi Artes. 'Tis so easy to be malicious, and at the same time so mean, that true Worth never Triumphs so eminently over its Enemies, as when they expose their Weakness and Envy by reviling it. It is true, many Scriblers busied themselves ...
— A Dialogue Between Dean Swift and Tho. Prior, Esq. • Anonymous
... replied a testy voice, 'I am very sorry for it, but what am I to do? I can't build it up again. The chief magistrate of the city can't go and be a rebuilding of people's houses, my good sir. Stuff ...
— Barnaby Rudge • Charles Dickens
... Farmer Ogden had warned him off and refused to listen to any explanation, though he must have known whom he was expelling—yes, like a very village Hampden, he had thrust the unwelcome surveyor out at his gate with such a trembling, testy, rheumatic arm, that Harold had felt obliged to ...
— My Young Alcides - A Faded Photograph • Charlotte M. Yonge
... will seek for no comfort, nor yet receive none, but in their tribulation (be it loss or sickness) are so testy, so fuming, and so far out of all patience that it profiteth no man to speak to them. And these are as furious with impatience as though they were in half a frenzy. And, from a custom of such behaviour, they may fall into one full and whole. And this kind ...
— Dialogue of Comfort Against Tribulation - With Modifications To Obsolete Language By Monica Stevens • Thomas More
... seen, two or three times in the week, jogging along before the square-topped chaise, upon some highway that leads into the town, with the parson seated within, with slackened rein, and in thoughtful mood, from which he rouses himself from time to time with a testy twitch and noisy chirrup that urge the poor beast into a faster gait. All the while the little wife sits beside him, as if a twittering sparrow had nestled itself upon the same perch with some grave owl, and sat with him side by side, watching for the big eyes to turn upon her, and chirping some ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 89, March, 1865 • Various
... myself." "I tell thee there never was no catechising here. I lived here all these years, and was clerk for nearly all the time." "I cannot help that," I said; "I am sure there was catechising in your church on a Sunday when I, a boy, was here." The old Churchman became testy, and my pertinacity made him irate, as he thundered out that "never had there been catechising in that church in all his day." I rose to leave him, telling him that I was very disappointed, but ...
— The Parish Clerk (1907) • Peter Hampson Ditchfield
... call before the retiring board any day, and there was nothing in his short-remaining time of service to shore up longer the hope of advancement in rank as compensatory honor in his retirement. He was a testy little old man, charged for instant explosion, and it was generally understood by everybody but the colonel himself that the department had sent him off to Fort Shakie to get him out ...
— The Rustler of Wind River • G. W. Ogden
... mother; how tiresome you are, Hannah, everlastingly repeating the same word over and over again! You shall not make us miserable. We intend to be happy, now, Nora and myself. Do we not, dearest?" he added, changing the testy tone in which he had spoken to the elder sister for one of the deepest tenderness as he turned and addressed ...
— Ishmael - In the Depths • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... he had taken the Lindsay school for a year, had written him a testy, amazed letter, asking him if he ...
— Kilmeny of the Orchard • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... when the inquest was opened at ten-o'clock that morning. It seemed to Copplestone that it would have been a physical impossibility to crowd more people within the walls than had assembled when the coroner, a local solicitor, who was obviously testy, irritable, self-important and afflicted with deafness, took his seat and looked sourly on the crowd of faces. Copplestone had already seen him in conversation with the village doctor, the village police, Chatfield, and Marston Greyle's solicitor, and he began to ...
— Scarhaven Keep • J. S. Fletcher
... son, but this lump of grief in the form of a daughter. And as if her sex were not enough[13], her almost inconceivable beauty and accomplishments have only added to my calamity: nay, they are the very root of it, and the essence of its sting. For all has come to pass, exactly as that testy old rishi said. For though she is, as thou seest, beautiful as the moon, and like it, full of arts[14], and above all, a dancer that would turn even Tumburu green with envy, all this nectar has become poison by the curse of ...
— An Essence Of The Dusk, 5th Edition • F. W. Bain
... Catholic but not very courteous reply, and reported it to a renegado of Antiquera. The latter, eager, like all renegados, to show devotion to his newly-adopted creed, volunteered to return with the courtier and have a tilt of words with the testy diplomatist. They found Don Juan playing a game of chess with the alcayde of the Alhambra, and took occasion to indulge in sportive comments on some of the mysteries of the Christian religion. The ire of this ...
— Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada • Washington Irving
... ein Amerikaner—ein correspondent," I explained to the row of angry faces; and while my German friend soothed and reassured his testy compatriots, I moved away, glad enough to escape another visit to jail. Those personally conducted jail tours were not so bad, I had found, with a handsome gendarme at your side; but a howling crowd ...
— The Log of a Noncombatant • Horace Green
... with a testy, balked gesture. "Yes! enjoyin' th' racket an' dhrunk like th' rist, I guess! . . . 'Tis a foine sort av town-constable ...
— The Luck of the Mounted - A Tale of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police • Ralph S. Kendall |
