"Vexatious" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... He had, according to the testimony of his own friends, usurped the functions of the legislature, raised taxes without the consent of Parliament, and quartered troops on the people in the most illegal and vexatious manner. Not a single session of Parliament had passed without some unconstitutional attack on the freedom of debate; the right of petition was grossly violated; arbitrary judgments, exorbitant fines, and unwarranted imprisonments were grievances of daily occurrence. If these things do not justify ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIII • John Lord
... he himself remained with his youngest son, Prince Philip, a boy of fourteen years, a prisoner in the hands of his victorious enemies. "At this news," says Froissart, "the kingdom of France was greatly troubled and excited, and with good cause, for it was a right grievous blow and vexatious for all sorts of folk. The wise men of the kingdom might well predict that great evils would come of it, for the king, their head, and all the chivalry of the kingdom were slain or taken; the knights and squires who came ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume II. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... worthless. They were furnished with no stabling for horses. They could not be built near enough to render assistance to each other; the besieger was in danger of being himself besieged in them. In short, from these vexatious methods of warfare the English reaped nothing but disappointment and disgrace. The Sire de Bueil, one of the defenders, perceived this when he was reconnoitring.[843] In fact it was so easy to pass through the enemy's lines that merchants were willing to run ...
— The Life of Joan of Arc, Vol. 1 and 2 (of 2) • Anatole France
... course," said Vane; and then, as he hurried down the stairs, it seemed as if there was to be quite a vexatious re-opening of ...
— The Weathercock - Being the Adventures of a Boy with a Bias • George Manville Fenn
... found that she had missed the only train by which she could return home. A cab would be too much of an expense; she had no choice but to walk the three or four miles. The evening was close; walking rapidly, and with the accompaniment of vexatious thoughts, she reached the gates of the Hall tired perspiring, irritated. Just as her hand was on the gate a bicycle-bell trilled vigorously behind her, and, from a distance of twenty ...
— The House of Cobwebs and Other Stories • George Gissing
... Jackson; but it was with great regret that I found it necessary to resolve so; for the land to the westward appeared so indented as to render the necessity of our departure at this moment particularly vexatious. ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia - Performed between the years 1818 and 1822 • Phillip Parker King
... a rap on the table with her hand. "How vexatious you are!" she exclaimed. "Well, the next day was the sixteenth; so the festivities of the year were over, and the feast itself was past and gone. I see people busy putting things away, and fussing about still, so how can I make out what will be ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... various ways the relation of master and slave is disturbed by the presence of our army, and he considers it particularly vexatious that this, in part, is done under cover of an act of Congress, while constitutional guaranties are suspended on the plea of military necessity. The truth is, that what is done and omitted about slaves is done and omitted on the same military necessity. ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln
... this lymphatic, unimaginative race. They obey the laws—a criminal requires imagination. They never start a respectable revolution—you cannot revolt without imagination. Among other things they pride themselves on their immunity from vexatious imposts. Yet whisky, the best quality of which is worth tenpence a bottle, is taxed till it costs five shillings; ale, the life-blood of the people, would be dear at three-pence a gallon and yet costs fivepence a pint; tobacco, which could profitably ...
— South Wind • Norman Douglas
... names of quality, or passion. Myrtilla tried them, almost all: 'Prudence,' she felt, was somewhat small; 'Retirement' seemed the eyes to hide; 'Content,' at once, she cast aside. 'Simplicity,'—'twas out of place; 'Devotion' for an older face; Briefly, selection smaller grew, 'Vexatious! odious!'—none would do! Then, on a sudden, she espied One that she thought she had not tried: Becoming, rather,—'edged with green,'— Roses in yellow, thorns between. 'Quick! Bring me that!' 'Tis brought. 'Complete, Superb, enchanting, tasteful, neat,' In all the ...
— The Bed-Book of Happiness • Harold Begbie
... defended the property intrusted to their care; they scorned to run away, and before they could all be killed, they had torn to pieces half-a-dozen of the Texians, and dreadfully lacerated as many more. The evening was, of course, spent in revelry: the dangers and fatigues, the delays and vexatious of the march were now considered over, and high were their anticipations of the rich plunder in perspective. But this was the only feat accomplished by this Texian expedition: the Mexicans had not been deceived; they had had intelligence of the real nature of the expedition, and advanced parties ...
— Travels and Adventures of Monsieur Violet • Captain Marryat
... provoked to death at being baulked in the occasion that seemed to present itself of putting them into a difficulty. The Duke, whose thoughts are steadily directed to the public good, and to that alone, will lend himself to no such vexatious purposes; he looks at the position of the Government in relation with foreign powers, and deals with it as a national and not as a party question. It is in this spirit that he constantly and inflexibly acts, though not failing to give Ministers a pretty sharp ...
— The Greville Memoirs (Second Part) - A Journal of the Reign of Queen Victoria from 1837 to 1852 - (Volume 1 of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville
... up a creed for popular use, a short and simple document of this kind would have been suitable enough. The undecided bishops received it with delight. It contained none of the vexatious technical terms which had done all the mischief—nothing but familiar Scripture, which the least learned of them could understand. So far as Arianism might mean to deny the Lord's divinity, it was clearly condemned already, and the whole question might now be safely left at ...
— The Arian Controversy • H. M. Gwatkin
... some empty words involved many in danger. At an entertainment given by Africanus, the governor of the second Pannonia, at Sirmium, some men having drunk rather too much, and thinking there was no witness of their proceedings, spoke freely of the existing imperial government, accusing it as most vexatious to the people. And some of them expressed a hope that a change, such as was wished for by all, might be at hand, affirming that this was portended by omens, while some, with incredible rashness, affirmed that the auguries of their ancestral ...
— The Roman History of Ammianus Marcellinus • Ammianus Marcellinus
... surprise, a letter on my table which I had written to you about a fortnight ago, the stupid porter never took the trouble of getting the letter forwarded. I suppose you have been abusing me for a most ungrateful wretch; but I am sure you will pity me now, as nothing is so vexatious as having written a letter ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume I • Francis Darwin
... British uniform I have never felt grief like this." The prisoners publicly declared that had they continued under our hero's command they would have escaped their doom, "being the victims of unruly passions inflamed by vexatious authority." ...
— The Story of Isaac Brock - Hero, Defender and Saviour of Upper Canada, 1812 • Walter R. Nursey
... germinate the seeds himself, he may probably, if he require large quantities of the article, produce it at a somewhat cheaper rate than if he bought it from the maltster; but few persons who have the slightest knowledge of the vexatious restrictions of the Inland Revenue authorities would be likely to place his premises under the espionage ...
— The Stock-Feeder's Manual - the chemistry of food in relation to the breeding and - feeding of live stock • Charles Alexander Cameron
... though manifestly designed to confuse the public mind and trade on the reputation of this Club, can scarcely deceive our members or even the book-loving public. It, nevertheless, is an annoyance, and the more vexatious because scarcely calling for other ...
— Book-Lovers, Bibliomaniacs and Book Clubs • Henry H. Harper
... to the care of the Abbot of Pontigny, and exhorted him to bear with resignation the hardships of exile. When Thomas surrendered his bishopric into the hands of the Pope, his resignation was hailed by a part of the consistory as the readiest means of terminating a vexatious and dangerous controversy, but Alexander preferred honor to convenience, and refusing to abandon a prelate who had sacrificed the friendship of a king for the interests of the Church, reinvested him with the ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume VI. • Various
... "Oh, how vexatious!" he cried, as he ground his teeth. "After all that work, after being so sure, to be out here on this wretched shelf like an old ...
— Cutlass and Cudgel • George Manville Fenn
... majesty of the throne. Julian was tormented by the importunities of a multitude, particularly of Egyptians, who loudly redemanded the gifts which they had imprudently or illegally bestowed; he foresaw the endless prosecution of vexatious suits; and he engaged a promise, which ought always to have been sacred, that if they would repair to Chalcedon, he would meet them in person, to hear and determine their complaints. But as soon as they were landed, he issued an absolute ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... laughable enough, but it was also vexatious, that such peaceful people as we were should be considered so terrible. I sent a bullet after the ship, to induce her to stop; she then hoisted the English flag, but never slackened her speed; so that finding we could get no satisfaction, we thought it advisable to take advantage of the ...
— A New Voyage Round the World in the Years 1823, 24, 25, and 26. Vol. 1 • Otto von Kotzebue
... and hope you will arrive in a rainbow and pair, to signify that we are not to be totally drowned. It has rained incessantly, and floated all my new works; I seem rather to be building a pond than a gallery. My farm too is all under water, and what is vexatious, if Sunday had not thrust itself between, I could have got in my hay on Monday. As the parsons will let nobody else make hay on Sundays, I think they ought to make ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole Volume 3 • Horace Walpole
... supplanted at Court by a newer invention. The mere fact that, from of old, it had been looked upon as the worst sort of bad manners to have more than three diners on a sofa, and as scarcely less ridiculous to have fewer than three, had made the custom vexatious in the extreme, as it constrained all entertainers to arrange for nine guests or eighteen or twenty-seven and ruled out any other more convenient intermediate numbers. In the progressive circles of society and at the ...
— The Unwilling Vestal • Edward Lucas White
... future? We do not set foot in the right path with impunity; honorable resolves always carry us further, thank God! than we counted on going. Suppose even that the border States which refuse to unite with the South design to impose on the North certain vexatious conditions, they will be none the less turned from their former alliances, they will have none the less begun to move in a new direction. We should do wrong if we did not recognize how honorable is the conduct ...
— The Uprising of a Great People • Count Agenor de Gasparin
... consideration of the vexatious as well as unforeseen incident that the city's dogs give unseemly expression to their inward feelings for the hideous around the pedestal of Hans Schulze's statue, an appropriation is demanded for an iron railing around the same. Surely no one will refuse a deserving ...
— Lucky Pehr • August Strindberg
... and weary month, full of vexatious delays and nerve-racking demands from his creditors, left its mark on Wiley's face; but in six weeks the mine and mill were running. Three shifts of men broke the ore at the face and sent it up the shaft to the grizzly and from there it was fed down through the enormous rock-crusher and ...
— Shadow Mountain • Dane Coolidge
... sacerdotal celibacy, recommending that priests be allowed to marry, and calling for the suppression of many of the cloisters. It is further urged that foundations for masses and for the support of idle priests be abolished, that various vexatious provisions of the Canon Law be repealed, and that begging on any pretext be prohibited. The twenty-fourth article deals with the Bohemian schism, saying that Huss was wrongly {72} burned, and calling for union with the Hussites who deny transubstantiation and demand the cup for the ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith
... Squeers, rubbing his knees, 'and when he begins to be useful in a certain sort of way, this young scoundrel of a Nickleby comes and carries him off. But the most vexatious and aggeravating part of the whole affair is,' said Squeers, dropping his voice, and drawing his chair still closer to Ralph, 'that some questions have been asked about him at last—not of me, but, in a roundabout kind of way, of people in our village. ...
— The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby • Charles Dickens
... vexatious!" said Margaret Dunscombe; "here I've got this beautiful piece of blue satin, and can't do anything with it; it just matches that blue morocco—it's a perfect match—I could have made a splendid thing of it, and I have got some cord and tassels that would just do—I ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Susan Warner
... so vexatious that even Mr Vavasor was disturbed by it. As it was not term time he had no signing to do in Chancery Lane, and could not, therefore, bury his unhappiness in his daily labour,—or rather in his labour that was by no means daily. So he sat at home till ...
— Can You Forgive Her? • Anthony Trollope
... instant to be propitiated. Putting his hat aside he sat down, and having introduced himself, made reference to Ballarat and his acquaintance with the lawyer's father: "Who directed me to you, sir, for advice on a vexatious affair, in which I have had the misfortune ...
— Australia Felix • Henry Handel Richardson
... developed intelligence, and produced wealth. But burghers under the feudal rule were obliged to pay heavy tolls and taxes. For example, for protection on a journey through any patch of territory, they were required to make a payment. Besides the regular exactions, they were exposed to most vexatious depredations of a lawless kind. As they advanced in thrift and wealth, communities that were made up largely of artisans and tradesmen armed themselves for their own defense. From self-defense they proceeded farther, and extorted exemptions and privileges ...
— Outline of Universal History • George Park Fisher
... studies, too, I made equal progress, in spite of my original dislike to friend Euclid and his vexatious propositions. ...
— Crown and Anchor - Under the Pen'ant • John Conroy Hutcheson
... must be owned, had reason to roar—became calmed at the evident innocence of the servants and the gentle sounds of this British lamb. He therefore went to the rescue, and explained the matter to No. 2, who in his turn meekly expostulated: "Very vexatious! Dear me! My capital boots made expressly for Alpine climbing! But we must make the best ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Volume 11, No. 26, May, 1873 • Various
... and I can hardly return it in this condition. It is really vexatious," she replied, wondering how to lead the conversation back to the place where it was interrupted. She might have succeeded, but fate seemed against her. A passenger, who knew them both, strolled ...
— Thurston of Orchard Valley • Harold Bindloss
... them in the same words, about their health and her own, and the health of Her Majesty, "who, thank God, was better today." And each visitor, though politeness prevented his showing impatience, left the old woman with a sense of relief at having performed a vexatious duty and did not return to her the ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... as glad to talk to him of her book as he was to lose the thought of his vexatious conversation, which had been even more annoying that he had ...
— Heartsease - or Brother's Wife • Charlotte M. Yonge
... came about,—and what a train of vexatious disappointments, in one stage or other of my life, have pursued me from the mere loss, or rather compression, of this one single member,—shall be laid before the reader ...
— The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman • Laurence Sterne
... was about twenty-five feet high. The sides of the kloof here were also very steep. Well, I came to the top of the nullah and looked all round. No signs of the lion. Evidently I had either overlooked him further down, or he had escaped right away. It was very vexatious; but still three lions were not a bad bag for one gun before dinner, and I was fain to be content. Accordingly I departed back again, making my way round the isolated pillar of boulders, beginning to feel, as I did so, that I was pretty well done up with excitement and fatigue, ...
— Long Odds • H. Rider Haggard
... words might well serve as a mild tonic for "current pessimism"; not even the paper famine has brought them to fulfilment. Elsewhere in the volume is an instructive paper on "The Neutrality of Sweden" (valuable but vexatious, as are all the indictments of our insular apathy in the matter of influencing foreign opinion), and two or three interesting studies of French life and letters under the conditions of war. In fine, a book full ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, May 10, 1916 • Various
... Catherine occupied my mind all the week following that vexatious adventure. Her image glittered on the leaves of the folios over which I bent in the library, close to my dear tutor; so much so that Plotinus, Olympiodorus, Fabricius, Vossius spoke of nothing else to me than a tiny damsel in a lace chemise. ...
— The Queen Pedauque • Anatole France
... than with a brawling woman in a wide house." "It is better to dwell in the wilderness than with a contentious and angry woman." The meaning of all these sayings must be that women are of a very irritable and vexatious character. But did Solomon really believe in the strong terms he used towards them. We should say not to judge by his life, for he had "seven hundred wives, and three hundred concubines;" and although he ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 1 (of 2) - With an Introduction upon Ancient Humour • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... rendered our domicile far from uncomfortable. Our forts gradually extended at the back of the enemy's town, on a ridge of swelling ground; while they kept pace with us on the same side of the river on the low ground. The inactivity of our troops had long become a by-word among us. It was indeed truly vexatious, but it was in vain to urge them on, in vain to offer assistance, in vain to propose a joint attack, or even to seek support at their hands; promises were to be had ...
— The Expedition to Borneo of H.M.S. Dido - For the Suppression of Piracy • Henry Keppel
... insensibly acquired, and that every man had his share of the general result," they attacked with reasoning based upon premises drawn from the book of Genesis. De Maistre especially excelled in ridiculing the philosophic or scientific theory. Lamennais, who afterward became so vexatious a thorn in the side of the Church, insisted, at this earlier period, that "man can no more think without words than see without light." And then, by that sort of mystical play upon words so well known in the higher ranges of theologic reasoning, he clinches ...
— History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom • Andrew Dickson White
... Paris; finally abandoned his native land in 1629, and betook himself to seclusion in Holland in order to live there, unknown and undisturbed, wholly for philosophy and the prosecution of his scientific projects; here, though not without vexatious opposition from the theologians, he lived twenty years, till in 1649, at the invitation of Christina of Sweden, he left for Stockholm, where, the severe climate proving too much for him, he was carried off by pneumonia next year; Descartes' philosophy ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... for motions and defences for hastening and retarding hearings. His lordship said, that the rule of the court allowed time enough for any one to proceed or defend; and if, for special reasons, he should give way to orders for timing matters, it would let in a deluge of vexatious pretenses, which, true or false, being asserted by the counsel with equal assurance, distracted the ...
— A Book About Lawyers • John Cordy Jeaffreson
... the Dominican estate named after "St. Isidore the Laborer." There, near where the Pasig river flows out of the Laguna de Bay, Lam-co's descendants were to be tenants until another government, not yet born, and a system unknown in his day, should end a long series of inevitable and vexatious disputes by buying the estate and selling it again, on terms practicable for them, to those who ...
— Lineage, Life, and Labors of Jose Rizal, Philippine Patriot • Austin Craig
... one of the most vexatious petty problems with which a traveler is confronted. It is an undemocratic custom which every sensible man deplores but sees no way around. Waiters, porters, and other functionaries who are in positions to receive tips draw very small salaries, if any. They depend ...
— The Book of Business Etiquette • Nella Henney
... of a feeling of exhilaration such as he had not known for many weeks, as he swung into Bradbury Avenue late that afternoon on his way to the Rathbawne residence. The duties of the day had been inordinately petty and vexatious, but he had dispatched them one and all with something approaching enthusiasm,—a touch of the old Quixotic energy with which he had taken office. The morning conversation in Governor Abbott's room had braced and toned him. He forgot ...
— The Lieutenant-Governor • Guy Wetmore Carryl
... "Ain't it too vexatious," complained the irritated convalescent, "that I don't wear out nothin'? This hat, now—it's as good as the day it was bought, despite my havin' had it so long. I can't in conscience throw it away an' get another, much as I'd like to. The trimmin' was on the front the ...
— Flood Tide • Sara Ware Bassett
... excellent opportunities he has had to learn what the political settlements of Mexico really mean. If no, then he has a meaning beneath his words, and that meaning is the conquest of Mexico. We do not charge duplicity upon President Buchanan, but it is vexatious and humiliating to be compelled to choose between such charge and the belief of a degree of simplicity in him that would be astonishing in a yearling politician, and which is astounding in a man who has held high office for well-nigh forty years. Let us ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 5, No. 28, February, 1860 • Various
... been sustained by I know not how many laws, breaking in upon the plainest principles of general expediency. At the last session of Parliament, the manufacturers petitioned for the repeal of three or four of these statutes, complaining of the vexatious restrictions which they impose on the wages of labor; setting forth, that a great variety of orders has from time to time been issued by magistrates under the authority of these laws, interfering in an oppressive manner with the minutest details of the manufacture,—such as limiting the ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster
... certain that his erratic and irritable temper, partly exasperated by long disappointment and by constant physical misery, that his peasant-bred lack of delicacy, and his absorption in his work, made a perpetual and vexatious strain on Mrs. Carlyle's forbearance throughout the forty years of their life together. The evidence, however, does not show that the marriage was on the whole really unfortunate or indeed that it was not mainly a ...
— A History of English Literature • Robert Huntington Fletcher
... centred in Milo[vs], who was then the reigning Serbian Prince. The difference in their eyes between the two people was that the Serbs had gained their independence. It was not as great an independence as the Macedonians fancied, for in addition to the vexatious remains of Turkish suzerainty there was the Greek ecclesiastical rule. During the reigns of Kara George and Milo[vs] the Greeks insisted on having their language used for the liturgy in all the Serbian towns, especially in Belgrade; after that period Greek and Slav were used for half ...
— The Birth of Yugoslavia, Volume 1 • Henry Baerlein
... perhaps, two or three dunces, whose intellects and moral feelings are of such a stamp, as to render them rather impracticable subjects for academical discipline, have contrived some plan of impotent resistance to the college authorities, or some plot of petty and vexatious annoyance, in order to give vent to their mortification, when such silly resistance has been proved to be ineffectual. Wishing for the screen or protection of numbers, they will try to persuade their companions, that they will be wanting in manly spirit, or in social feeling, if they refuse to join ...
— Advice to a Young Man upon First Going to Oxford - In Ten Letters, From an Uncle to His Nephew • Edward Berens
... preached a quite Socratic reverence for law, as law, and I remember that once when I had got back from Canada in the usual disgust for the American custom- house, and spoke lightly of smuggling as not an evil in itself, and perhaps even a right under our vexatious tariff, he would not have it, but held that the illegality of the act made it a moral of fence. This was not the logic that would have justified the attitude of the anti- slavery men towards the fugitive slave act; but it was in accord with ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... sister, who promptly, recognizing the trouble, pounces on the offending comforter, which has fallen to the floor, and with a perfunctory wipe replaces it in baby's mouth. It is done just as we have written it, many thousand times, and yet the problem of infant mortality is represented as a vexatious mystery. The newspapers solicit charitable aid, and write eloquent appeals regarding the necessity of sending a few babies to the seashore in the summer time or to supply a few with ice during the hot spells. A hundred other energetic enthusiasts send forth their laudable effort to raise the standard ...
— The Eugenic Marriage, Vol 2 (of 4) - A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better Babies • W. Grant Hague
... De Off., lib. i., ca. xlii.: "Primum improbantur ii quaestus, qui in odia hominum incurrunt: ut portitorum ut f[oe]neratorum." The Portitores were inferior collectors of certain dues, stationed at seaports, who are supposed to have been extremely vexatious in their dealings ...
— Life of Cicero - Volume One • Anthony Trollope
... exasperated at this vexatious perseverance of the painter, who he imagined had come to tease and insult him, "I would," said he, "sacrifice a cock to Esculapius, were I assured that any person had been taken up for extirpating such a troublesome Goth as you are from the face of the earth. As for your boasted Cleopatra, which ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett
... pretences. But not to sleep immediately. Directly Dangle was alone he began, with infinite disgust, to scrutinise his darkling eye, for he was a neat-minded little man in spite of his energy. The whole business—so near a capture—was horribly vexatious. Phipps sat on his bed for some time examining, with equal disgust, a collar he would have thought incredible for Sunday twenty-four hours before. Mrs. Milton fell a-musing on the mortality of even big, fat men with dog-like eyes, and Widgery ...
— The Wheels of Chance - A Bicycling Idyll • H. G. Wells
... Calvinist, and who had secretly become his wife (1685) encouraged him in this design and suggested to him the cruel scheme of tearing away children from their parents, to bring them up in the Roman Catholic faith. The vexatious confiscations, the galleys, the torture of the wheel, the gibbet,—all were successively but unsuccessfully resorted to as a means to convert them. The unhappy Protestants' sole aim was to escape from ...
— Picturesque Quebec • James MacPherson Le Moine
... these things to herself, unwilling to increase the prejudices against her lover entertained by all around her, who exclaimed against the steps pursued on his account as illegal, vexatious, and tyrannical, resembling the worst measures in the worst times of the worst Stuarts, and a degradation of Scotland, the decisions of whose learned judges were thus subjected to the review of a court composed indeed of men of the highest rank, and who were not trained to the study ...
— Bride of Lammermoor • Sir Walter Scott
... merry and drunk. Then Hjalte said, "Manifold splendour and grandeur have I seen here; and I have now witnessed with my eyes what I have often heard of, that no monarch in the north is so magnificent: but it is very vexatious that we who come so far to visit it have a road so long and troublesome, both on account of the great ocean, but more especially because it is not safe to travel through Norway for those who are coming here in a friendly disposition. ...
— Heimskringla - The Chronicle of the Kings of Norway • Snorri Sturluson
... generosity, had suggested Ewart as a possible artist. Ewart had produced at once an admirable sketch for the sacred vessel surrounded by a sort of wreath of Millies with open arms and wings and had drawn fifty pounds on the strength of it. After that came a series of vexatious delays. The chalice became less and less of a commercial man's chalice, acquired more and more the elusive quality of the Holy Grail, and at last even ...
— Tono Bungay • H. G. Wells
... accepting precarious situations whence he fights the battle, carried along by the devious tide of Paris—that great harlot who takes you up or leaves you stranded, smiles or turns her back on you with equal readiness, wears out the strongest will in vexatious waiting, and makes ...
— Z. Marcas • Honore de Balzac
... "How vexatious!" he said. "Listen, my dear," he said eagerly. "Go and tell Susanna Moiseyevna, that it is very necessary for me to speak to her—very. I will only keep her one minute. Ask her ...
— The Duel and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... General as parties to that arrangement. It rests, therefore, of necessity, on the basis of a letter only. You will perceive that this is nothing more than a continuation of the order of Berni, only leaving the prices unfixed; and like that, it will require a constant and vexatious attention ...
— The Writings of Thomas Jefferson - Library Edition - Vol. 6 (of 20) • Thomas Jefferson
... notwithstanding the cure I thought Mr. Chute had made upon them, are of very little use to me. You have no notion how it mortifies me: when I am wishing to withdraw more and more from a world of which I have had satiety, and which I suppose is as tired of me, how vexatious not to be able to indulge a happiness that depends only on oneself, and consequently the only happiness proper for people past their youth! I have often deluded you with promises of returning to Florence for pleasure, I now threaten you with it for your plague; for if I am to become a tiresome ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2 • Horace Walpole
... of each party was catchy. Both congratulated Germany for its victories and France for its republic. Cuba also was remembered. But here the likeness ceased. Democrats praised Hoffman, arraigned Grant, sympathised with Ireland, demanded the release of Fenian raiders and the abolition of vexatious taxes, declared the system of protection a robbery, and resolved that a license law was more favourable to temperance than prohibition. On the other hand, Republicans praised the President, arraigned the Governor, applauded payments on the national debt and ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander
... considerable experience in the use of the alcoholic solutions of aniline dyes for staining bacteria, and having for some months used solutions in glycerine instead, I have come to much prefer the latter. Evaporation of the solvent is avoided, and in consequence a freedom from vexatious precipitations is secured, and more uniform and reliable results are obtained. There is, moreover, with the alcoholic mixtures a tendency to "creep," or "run," by which one is liable to have stained more than he wishes—fingers, ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 417 • Various
... distraite).—"The squire—yes, very true—quite proper." (Then, looking up, and with naivete) "Can you believe me? I never thought of the squire. And he is such an odd man, and has so many English prejudices, that really—dear me, how vexatious that it should never once have occurred to me that Mr. Hazeldean had a voice in the matter! Indeed, the relationship is so distant, it is not like being her father; and Jemima is of age, and can do as she pleases; and—but, as you say, it is quite proper that he should ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... ships, I found the ice so close that a boat could not have passed beyond the Cape; but a light air drifting the ice slowly to the eastward at this time, gave me some hopes of soon being enabled to make our escape from this tedious as well as vexatious confinement. At a quarter past eight it was high water by the shore; about this time the ice ceased driving to the eastward, and shortly after returned in ...
— Three Voyages for the Discovery of a Northwest Passage from the • Sir William Edward Parry
... you hear, sir?), a vexatious, capricious, thankless, troublesome, Animal; but I hope you'll do better in the time to come, and I bless you and forgive you!' Here, she quite forgot that it was Pa's turn to make the responses, and clung ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens
... add prematurely, declared to be transmissible. It is quite true that, however decidedly the question may be set at rest in this country, our commerce, should we act upon the principle, of the disease not being transmissible, would be subject to vexatious measures, at least for a time, on the part of other states; but let England take the lead in instituting a full inquiry into the whole subject, by a Committee of the House of Commons; and if the question be decided against quarantines and cordons by that body, other countries ...
— Letters on the Cholera Morbus. • James Gillkrest
... Administration had evidently expected. The struggle was protracted for three months; and it signalized Mr. Wilson's first serious conflict with the Senate—that same Senate which was destined to play such a vexatious and destructive role in his career. At this time, however, Mr. Wilson had reached the zenith of his control over the law-making bodies. It was early in his Presidential term, and in these early days Senators are likely to be ...
— The Life and Letters of Walter H. Page, Volume I • Burton J. Hendrick
... to think," but that, too, was no use. What made his depression so vexatious and irritating was that it had a kind of casual, external character—he felt that. Some person or thing seemed to be standing out somewhere, just as something will sometimes obtrude itself upon the eye, ...
— The Brothers Karamazov • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... independence when men are not afraid to dress like vagabonds and behave a little extravagantly, if it suits their taste. It must be said, however, that the police regulations or St. Petersburg, without being onerous or vexatious, are quite as good as those of any large city in Europe. When men are deprived of their political liberties, the least that can be done for them is to let them enjoy as much municipal freedom as may be consistent with public peace. I ...
— The Land of Thor • J. Ross Browne
... myself, I had spent the day in making inquiries at the offices of the octrois—those local custom-houses which stand at every entrance into a town or village in France, for the gathering of trifling, vexatious taxes upon articles of food and merchandise. At one of these I had learned, that, three or four weeks ago, a young Englishwoman with a little girl had passed by on foot, each carrying a small bundle, which had not been examined. It was the octroi on the road ...
— The Doctor's Dilemma • Hesba Stretton
... printing. Each of these associations may be subjected to serious loss and inconvenience, by the passage of legislative enactments abridging the privileges they now enjoy, or requiring them to submit to some vexatious and expensive regulation. Hence, when they receive notice that 'The New York Printing Company' is ready to do their printing, they know that they must consent, and pay the most exorbitant rate for the work ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe
... willingness to accept the appointment, and was assured that it would be offered to him. He then returned to Berlin. He did not take up his residence in Luebben until June in the following year, owing partly to domestic affliction, and partly to the vexatious delay in preparing his official house for his reception, arising from the dilatoriness and indifference of the magistrates in the matter. He had expressed hope, when he saw the house, which was unfit for any ...
— Paul Gerhardt's Spiritual Songs - Translated by John Kelly • Paul Gerhardt
... morning. It was a shorter way than he had come, that by which her conductor took her, and in parts easy enough; but in other parts requiring his skill as well as hers to get her over them. He said not a word further; he served her in silence: the vexatious thing was, that he was able to serve her so much. Many a time she had to accept his hand to get past a rude place; often both hands were needed to swing her over a watercourse or leap her down from a rock. She was agile and light of foot; she did what ...
— Wych Hazel • Susan and Anna Warner
... dull dragging of heavy weights. The engine of the nail works rent all other sound with an unaccustomed, harsh blast.... Jasper Penny was conscious of a deep, involuntary relief when he reached the comparative tranquillity, the secession of vexatious problems, ...
— The Three Black Pennys - A Novel • Joseph Hergesheimer
... Valley, Clover felt that it would grievously mar her contentment. There was no use in planning anything till they knew how he would feel and act. In any case, she realized that they were bound to consider him before themselves, and make it as easy and as little painful as possible. If he were vexatious, they must be patient; if sulky, ...
— Clover • Susan Coolidge
... very vexatious and improper lawsuit their mother brought against me. Do you know that some wretched impostor, who, it appears, is a convict broke loose before his time, has threatened me with another, on the part of one of those young men? You never heard ...
— Night and Morning, Volume 4 • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... write much, and I fancy that you will not care to read much, if you are indeed about to leave Queen Anne. That is a very vexatious business. You will probably be less inclined to write an answer to my letter, than to read it: but answer it you will: and you need trouble yourself to say no more than how you are, and where, and when, you are going, if indeed you leave where you are. And do not cross your letter, pray: and ...
— Letters of Edward FitzGerald to Fanny Kemble (1871-1883) • Edward FitzGerald
... as a hatter, who after selling a hat to Lord Salisbury, might complain that he had been induced to provide headgear for a Conservative. At the same time, both Colonel Taylor and his friends were well aware, from a vexatious experience, that phenomena of the kind found at B—— are very often associated with private matters, which the members of a family concerned might object to see published, just as they might object to the publication of ...
— The Alleged Haunting of B—— House • Various
... but, soon after, the slackening became such that there was no continuing without rendering the piece perfectly ridiculous. It was recommenced twice, thrice, four times; a full half-hour was occupied in ever-increasingly vexatious efforts, but always with the same result. The preservation of allegretto time was absolutely impossible to the worthy man. At last the orchestral conductor, out of all patience, came and begged him not to conduct at all; he had hit ...
— The Orchestral Conductor - Theory of His Art • Hector Berlioz
... to decide upon going, and upon going instantly, without the least consultation, the least inquiry as to the suitableness of the arrangement, the visit of Miss Poinsett abruptly and ungraciously terminated, for example—all this was vexatious, distressing: a mode of management which out of the simplest incidents of domestic life contrived to extract some degree ...
— Sybil - or the Two Nations • Benjamin Disraeli
... for anger; yet she did not shew less kindness to the object of this vexatious circumstance: she held him in her arms while she sat at table, and repeatedly said to him, (though he had not the sense to thank her) "That she would always be ...
— A Simple Story • Mrs. Inchbald
... had the place to himself again, and the work went on as usual. The stock did well, and there were no vexatious interruptions. The fine weather held, and every morning when Claude got up, another gold day stretched before him like a glittering carpet, leading...? When the question where the days were leading struck him on the edge of his bed, he hurried to dress and get ...
— One of Ours • Willa Cather
... reflected the resplendent sun. With useless repentance he vainly deplored the irreparable mischief saying to himself: "Oh! how far better was it to employ at the barbers my lost edge of such exquisite keenness! Where is that lustrous surface? It has been consumed by this vexatious and ...
— The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci, Complete • Leonardo Da Vinci
... step toward freedom and the establishment of equal rights, is found in the abolition of a great variety of small and vexatious taxes, substituting therefor a land-tax, payable alike by the small and the great proprietor; and in the abolition of internal duties on the exchange of the raw materials of manufacture. With each of these we find increasing tendency toward the ...
— The trade, domestic and foreign • Henry Charles Carey
... way; Flew only through your heart, but made no stay: 'Twas but a dream, where truth had not a place; A scene of fancy, moved so swift a pace, And shifted, that you can but think it was;— Let then, the short vexatious ...
— The Works Of John Dryden, Volume 4 (of 18) - Almanzor And Almahide, Marriage-a-la-Mode, The Assignation • John Dryden
... the next inn, I shall grow as scurrilous as Dr. Smollett, and be dignified with the appellation of the Younger Smelfungus. Well, let those make out my diploma that will, I am determined to vent my spleen, and like Lucifer, unable to enjoy comfort myself, tease others with the details of my vexatious. You must know, then, since I am resolved to grumble, that, tired with my passage, I went to the Capuchin church, a large solemn building, in search of silence and solitude; but here again was I ...
— Dreams, Waking Thoughts, and Incidents • William Beckford
... Amber was not brought up according to the prescribed maxims of Mesdames Appleton and Hamilton; and as effects cannot be satisfactorily comprehended without the causes are made known, so it becomes necessary, not only that the chapter should be written, but, what is still more vexatious, absolutely necessary that it ...
— Newton Forster • Frederick Marryat
... each other, and who might have divided, when they had reached Neath, and gone to different mines, to inquire for the witnesses. These thoughts disturbed me. Those, also, which had occurred when I first heard of the vexatious way in which things were situated, renewed themselves painfully to my mind. My own obstinacy in resisting the advice of Mr. Burges, and the fear of injury to my own reputation, and to that of the cause I had undertaken, were again before ...
— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the - Abolition of the African Slave-Trade, by the British Parliament (1839) • Thomas Clarkson
... "This is vexatious work," exclaimed Harry, as he and Headland were walking the quarter-deck during the first watch, when the frigate lay becalmed about ten or a dozen ...
— Won from the Waves • W.H.G. Kingston
... (always including mutton as being easy of digestion for dyspeptic people) were still warm, though cut pretty near to the bone, would, by most persons, particularly aldermanic "bodies," be considered sufficiently vexatious; how doubly annoying then must it be to come so late as to find the meats more than half cold, and, perhaps, but little of them left even in that anti-epicurean state! Whoever has been unfortunate enough to miss a fine fat haunch ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 14, Issue 380, July 11, 1829 • Various
... however, his twenty pounds were exhausted; and, at the end of three years, he drew for twenty pounds more. It is vexatious to say that his bill was dishonoured; and he never received another shilling from any one. It is scarcely possible to conceive that so harsh a measure could have been the result of intention; but it subjected this extraordinary boy to the severest privations. To take up the dishonoured bill, he ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLII. Vol. LV. April, 1844 • Various
... majority of one hundred and thirty-six was with the government. The only hope of the opposition was now in delay; and factious divisions were made on every point possible as the bill went through the committee. The opposition was most vexatious. Praed made twenty-two speeches against the bill, Sugden eighteen, Pelham twenty-eight, Peel forty-eight, Croker fifty-seven, and Wetherell fifty-eight. Of course the greater part of these speeches ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume X • John Lord
... active spirited & decisive, I yet flatter my self, notwithstanding the present vexatious Situation of our Affrs at the northwd we shall humble our Enemies this Campaign. I am truly mortified at their leaving this place because I think we were fully prepared for it, & I believe the Cowardly Rascals knew it. May Heaven ...
— The Writings of Samuel Adams, vol. III. • Samuel Adams
... opposite purpose—viz., that I might fulfil them to the letter; thus and no otherwise it happened that I showed so much scrupulosity about the exact value and position of his words, as finally to draw upon myself the vexatious reproach of ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey
... the company strolled among the fruit trees and along the banks of the river; but at length, as an end must come to all pleasures, our party, who had left the right of the line in the morning, galloped back to their quarters, satisfied that picket duty was not necessarily the most vexatious in the service. ...
— Three Years in the Sixth Corps • George T. Stevens
... no sign of affection to be given? Is she always to be regarded as stern and cross, vexatious and disagreeable?" Lucy slowly turned round her head and looked up into her companion's face. Though she had as yet no voice to speak of affection she could fill her eyes with love, and in that way make to her future ...
— Framley Parsonage • Anthony Trollope
... was in my hand, but I sat down again and watched him quietly until he was out of sight. I would wait, I said to myself; I would rather wait until he came to his senses; and then I laughed a little angrily, though the tears were in my eyes. It was vexatious, it was bitterly disappointing, it was laying on my shoulders a fresh burden of responsibility and anxiety. The happiness that a quarter of an hour ago seemed within my reach had vanished and left me worried and perplexed. And yet, in spite of the pain Mr. ...
— Uncle Max • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... am ill at ease; and as I walked to-day, far and fast in the sun-warmed lanes, my thoughts came yapping and growling round me like a pack of curs—undignified, troublesome, vexatious thoughts; I chase them away for a moment, and next moment they are snapping at my heels. Experiences of a tragic quality, however depressing they may be, have a vaguely sustaining power about them, when they ...
— The Silent Isle • Arthur Christopher Benson
... "behind that wall lies a carboniferous bed, undiscovered by our soundings. It is vexatious that all the apparatus of the mine, deserted for ten years, must be set up anew. Never mind. We have found the vein which was thought to be exhausted, and this time it shall be worked to ...
— The Underground City • Jules Verne
... was unimpeachable, from approaching the outposts, without special permission for the purpose. If any one had a complaint or request to make of the colonel, he procured one or more of the persons he had selected to come to his quarters on his behalf. This measure prevented frivolous and vexatious applications, and the still more dangerous approach of enemies in disguise. All these measures were entirely new; and, within eight or ten days, the whole system appeared to be in complete operation, and the face of things was ...
— Memoirs of Aaron Burr, Complete • Matthew L. Davis
... they would have none. John Randolph, chairman of the Committee of Ways and Means, reported, March 2, 1802, against the entire system of internal duties, in the old words of the Pennsylvania radicals, as vexatious, oppressive, and peculiarly obnoxious; as of the nature of an excise which is hostile to the genius of a free people, and finally because of their tendency to multiply offices and increase the patronage of the executive. The repeal was imperative upon the Republican party. On April ...
— Albert Gallatin - American Statesmen Series, Vol. XIII • John Austin Stevens
... of justice, or, to use McWriggler's classic language, 'a fizzle.' But he knew, as well as we do, what led to that result; for, as I remarked a few moments ago, the whole proceedings were a farce. Between the vexatious objections of Murdon, the pettifogger, who had charge of the defence, and of Sealy, who, I believe, had entered into a conspiracy with the former to defeat the ends of justice by browbeating and cajoling the other two magistrates, the trial ...
— From Wealth to Poverty • Austin Potter
... is a cause for rejoicing, and for applauding the might of your sorceries, Messire Manuel, whereas you are plainly thinking of vexatious matters." ...
— Figures of Earth • James Branch Cabell
... more ill-timed than this quarrel, or more vexatious to Leicester. The Count—although considering himself excessively injured at being challenged by a simple captain and an untitled gentleman, whom he had attempted to murder—consented to waive his ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... myself with others, for years, I have come to the conclusion that I am blessed with a rapid discernment. Before Mrs. Flowerdew (I have written the delightful name on every corner of my blotting-paper) honoured me with her hand, I brought this power to bear on her incessantly. Under all kinds of vexatious circumstances I have been witness of her unassailable good temper. I have seen her wear a new bonnet in a shower of rain. These clumsy hands of mine have spilled lobster-salad upon her dress. That little wretch of a brother of hers has pulled her back hair down. Her sister Sophonisba has abused ...
— The Cockaynes in Paris - 'Gone abroad' • Blanchard Jerrold
... Psyche into a great chamber heaped high with mingled grain, beans, and lentils (the food of her doves), and bade her separate them all and have them ready in seemly fashion by night. Heracles would have been helpless before such a vexatious task; and poor Psyche, left alone in this desert of grain, had not courage to begin. But even as she sat there, a moving thread of black crawled across the floor from a crevice in the wall; and bending nearer, ...
— Good Stories For Great Holidays - Arranged for Story-Telling and Reading Aloud and for the - Children's Own Reading • Frances Jenkins Olcott
... a vexatious reflection. The sting of poverty itself could not be so sharp as the pain of being known ...
— Vixen, Volume III. • M. E. Braddon
... the platform was quite sufficiently crowded, and crowded, evidently, with homeward-bound Americans, mostly women. Gregory tended to think of America and its people with the kindly lightness common to his type. Their samenesses didn't interest him, and their differences were sometimes vexatious. He had a vague feeling that they'd really better have been Colonials and be done with it. Professor Blackburn last night had reproved this insular levity. He was going over with an array of discriminations that Gregory had likened to an explorer's ...
— Tante • Anne Douglas Sedgwick
... senses) as the opening of a theatre; he was so good-humoured, took so much pains, corrected so good-humouredly, and produced, as I thought and think, a prologue so superior to the common run of that sort of trumpery, that it is quite vexatious to see him attacked for it. Some part of it is a little too much laboured, and the whole too long; but surely it is good and poetical.... You cannot imagine how I grew to like Lord Byron in my critical intercourse with him, and how much I am convinced ...
— The Works of Lord Byron: Letters and Journals, Volume 2. • Lord Byron
... petty annoyances and vexatious of life attendant upon residents abroad, that it must require some strong motives to induce them to remain. Wherever the English settle they raise the price of everything, much to the annoyance of the rentiers ...
— Olla Podrida • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)
... that men suffer under the conventionalities, "adds, on the whole," says our canny, prudent Scot, "to the respectability of human nature." Tu ha ragione (right you are), Dr. Mitchell, there. For the conventional, whether found among Fijians as they were, or in Mayfair as it is, whenever it is vexatious and merely serves as a cordon to separate "sassiety" from society, detracts from the respectability of humanity, and is in itself vulgar. If every man in society were a gentleman and every woman a lady, there would be no more conventionalism. Usus est tyrannus (custom is a ...
— The Gypsies • Charles G. Leland
... first, when the vexatious sense of the city of the Doges reduced to earning its living as a curiosity-shop was in its keenness, there was a great deal of entertainment to be got from lodging on Riva Schiavoni and looking out at the far-shimmering lagoon. There was entertainment ...
— Italian Hours • Henry James
... prophetic son of David, whose tomb the fortune of war had placed in their hands. But the Seljukian Turks, those irreclaimable barbarians, who had no sympathy with the believers in Christ, laid on them such burdens and vexatious restraints as were altogether intolerable. The cries of the unhappy pilgrims had long resounded throughout all Christendom; and the indignation which was universally felt against the bigoted Mussulmans was inflamed in no slight degree by ...
— Palestine or the Holy Land - From the Earliest Period to the Present Time • Michael Russell
... had been created, was in early times criminally, and at a later period at least pecuniarily, liable for an unjust sentence.[632] We shall elsewhere have occasion to dwell on the value which the equestrian order attached to this immunity, and we shall see that its relief at the freedom from vexatious prosecution is of itself no sign of corruption. One of our authorities does indeed emphatically assert the ultimate prevalence of bribery in the equestrian courts:[633] and circumstances may be easily imagined ...
— A History of Rome, Vol 1 - During the late Republic and early Principate • A H.J. Greenidge
... which authority was given to custom-house officers to make search for smuggled goods; since they were general in their terms and authorized the search of any premises by day, they might have been made the means of vexatious visits and interference. In February, 1761, an application for such a writ was brought before the Superior Court of Massachusetts, which was not subject to popular influence. James Otis, advocate-general of the colony, resigned ...
— Formation of the Union • Albert Bushnell Hart
... slavery under another nation; the ascending up of the smoke of any burning thing for ever and ever, for the continuation of a conquered people under the misery of perpetual subjection and slavery; the scorching heat of the sun, for vexatious wars, persecutions and troubles inflicted by the King; riding on the clouds, for reigning over much people; covering the sun with a cloud, or with smoke, for oppression of the King by the armies of an enemy; tempestuous winds, or the motion of clouds, for wars; thunder, or the voice of a cloud, ...
— Observations upon the Prophecies of Daniel, and the Apocalypse of St. John • Isaac Newton
... with my very most troublesome belief in not such great geographical changes as you believe; and in mammalia we certainly know more of MEANS of distribution than in any other class. Nothing is so vexatious to me, as so constantly finding myself drawing different conclusions from better judges than myself, from ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume I • Francis Darwin
... to know what was Jeremiah's attitude to the law-book discovered and published in 621, but unfortunately the problems that gather round the authenticity of the text of Jeremiah are so vexatious that we cannot say with certainty. On the one hand, we know that, though at that time a prophet of five years' standing, he was not consulted on the discovery of the book (2 Kings xxii. 14); on the other hand, xi. 1-14 explicitly ...
— Introduction to the Old Testament • John Edgar McFadyen
... endanger his success in the examination by encroaching upon hours of necessary study; his leisure was largely sacrificed to Bibel und Natur, and many an evening of calm golden loveliness, when he longed to be amid the fields, passed in vexatious imprisonment. The name of Reusch grew odious to him, and he revenged himself for the hypocrisy of other hours by fierce scorn, cast audibly at ...
— Born in Exile • George Gissing
... this little performance was enough to make Pope's relations to the Addison set decidedly unpleasant. Addison is said (but the story is very improbable) to have enjoyed the joke. If so, a vexatious incident must have changed his view of Pope's pleasantries, though Pope professedly appeared as his defender. Poor old Thersites-Dennis published, during the summer, a very bitter attack upon Addison's Cato. He said afterwards—though, considering the relations of the men, ...
— Alexander Pope - English Men of Letters Series • Leslie Stephen
... When a vexatious litigant began to contest the will by which Mr. Vane was Lord of Stoken Church, and Mr. Vane went up to London to concert the proper means of defeating this attack, Mrs. Vane would gladly have compounded by giving the man two or three thousand acres or the ...
— Peg Woffington • Charles Reade
... Captain Landais, without any show of reason, claimed that the command, by right of seniority of commission, belonged to him. On the first night out the Alliance and Bonhomme Richard collided and were obliged to return to port for repairs. Vexatious delays prevented the sailing of the ...
— Dewey and Other Naval Commanders • Edward S. Ellis
... pictures, horses, antique relics and similar curiosities to take much interest in government; he suffered from religious mania, and was constantly afraid of being murdered; and his daily hope and prayer was that he might be spared all needless trouble in this vexatious world and have absolutely nothing to do. And now he committed an act of astounding folly. He first revived the Edict of St. James, ordered the nobles throughout the land to turn out all Protestant pastors {1602-3.}, ...
— History of the Moravian Church • J. E. Hutton
... however, it seemed to change its mind upon the subject; for it wrought and wore away a passage for itself on our side of the island, and by that means took part, as it were, with the O'Hallighans leaving the territory which had been our property for centhries, in their possession. This was a vexatious change to us, and, indeed, eventually produced very feudal consequences. No sooner had the stream changed sides, than the O'Hallaghans claimed the island as theirs, according to their tenement; and we, having had it for such length of time in our possession, could not ...
— The Ned M'Keown Stories - Traits And Stories Of The Irish Peasantry, The Works of - William Carleton, Volume Three • William Carleton
... rough handling, the jars, the tension of the heartstrings that sap the foundations of a woman's life and consign her to an early grave; and a Cherokee rose-hedge is not more thickly set with thorns than a literary career with grievous, vexatious, tormenting disappointments. If you succeed after years of labor and anxiety and harassing fears, you will become a target for envy and malice, and, possibly, for slander. Your own sex will be jealous ...
— St. Elmo • Augusta J. Evans
... emotions subsided, and they could talk again. She leant upon the wall, and he sat upon it so that he could keep an eye open for any returning dogs. Two, at any rate, were up on the hillside and keeping up a vexatious barking. ...
— Tales of Space and Time • Herbert George Wells
... side, it was in 862 that the Russians invited help from their less dreaded neighbours around Upsala against their more vexatious neighbours around Kiev, and in September of the same year Ruric arrived at Novgorod and founded the Mediaeval Kingdom of Russia, which in the tenth century under Oleg, Igor, and Vladimir was first the plunderer, then the open enemy, and finally the ally ...
— Prince Henry the Navigator, the Hero of Portugal and of Modern Discovery, 1394-1460 A.D. • C. Raymond Beazley
... people; it would teach them to look upon him with respect, as a person possessed of the spirit of command; and it would, I am persuaded, stifle a hundred cabals, both in parliament and elsewhere, which, if they were cherished by his apparent remissness and indecision, would produce to him a vexatious and ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 350, December 1844 • Various
... injudicious, extremely harsh, and in its effects (though not in its intentions) very oppressive and vexatious to the clergy.... We cannot believe that we are doing wrong in ranging ourselves on the weaker side, in the cause of propriety and justice. The Mitre protects its wearer from indignity; but it ...
— Sydney Smith • George W. E. Russell
... 'This vexatious and unjust practice of tenants against landlords had been too common, and had too long been favoured by the party spirit of juries; who, being chiefly composed of tenants, had made it a common cause, and a principle, if it could in any way be avoided, never ...
— Richard Lovell Edgeworth - A Selection From His Memoir • Richard Lovell Edgeworth
... 'It may be vexatious to be eclipsed not only in beauty, but in style, by a strange governess,' said Mrs. Prendergast. 'That set all the mothers and daughters against her, and there have been some spiteful little attempts at mortifying her, which have made Sarah and me angry ...
— Hopes and Fears - scenes from the life of a spinster • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Of the three million called for service on the first draft, all but 150,000 were accounted for, and of those missing most were aliens who had left to enlist in their own armies. The problem of the slacker and of the conscientious objector, although vexatious, was never serious. The educative effect of the training upon the country was very considerable. All ranks and classes were gathered in, representing at least fifty-six different nationalities; artisans, millionaires, and ...
— Woodrow Wilson and the World War - A Chronicle of Our Own Times. • Charles Seymour
... their triumph, the Basilian fathers commenced in earnest the task of Church reform, and passed several decrees of a character vexatious to the Pope, particularly one for the total abolition of annates. A second breach was the consequence. Eugenius, under pretence of furthering the negotiation then pending for the reunion of the Greek and Latin branches of the ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... boat returned, we got our breakfast, and were impatient to leave the place, lest some other vexatious accident should befall us. It is situated on the north side of Tiarrabou, the south-east peninsula, or division, of the island, and at the distance of about five miles south east from the isthmus, having a large and commodious harbour, ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 12 • Robert Kerr
... nothing more to say. He muttered something further about the cruelty of the case, and then slunk away out of the club, and made his way home to the dull gloomy house in Manchester Street. There was no comfort for him there;—but neither was there any comfort for him at the club. And why did that vexatious Secretary of State send him messages about blue books? As he went, he expressed sundry wishes that he was back at the Mandarins, and told himself that it would be well that he should ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope
... have been put to shame. But by means of your wisdom I made the magic for the sake of a jest and for the sake of a little Butterfly, and—behold—it has also delivered me from the vexations of my vexatious wives! Tell me, therefore, O my Lady and Heart of my Heart, how did you come to be so wise?' And Balkis the Queen, beautiful and tall, looked up into Suleiman-bin-Daoud's eyes and put her head a little on one side, just like the Butterfly, and said, 'First, ...
— Just So Stories • Rudyard Kipling
... idle threat; but all the same it is very vexatious." But Bessie would not let him dwell on the grievance. She began telling him about Tom, and a funny scrape he had got into last term; and this led to a conversation about her home, and here Bessie ...
— Our Bessie • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... battle to the Greeks; since their flesh is not of stone, nor of iron, that when they are struck, it should withstand the flesh-rending brass; neither does Achilles, the son of fair-haired Thetis, fight, but at the ships he nourishes his vexatious spleen." ...
— The Iliad of Homer (1873) • Homer
... "That's vexatious," said the doctor. "Don't be put out, Denham, I think I see how it is. The poor fellow was no doubt scared by the alarm of the lion in the night, and very likely we shall see him come creeping in before it is time ...
— Dead Man's Land - Being the Voyage to Zimbambangwe of certain and uncertain • George Manville Fenn
... reads the Duchess novels. I think, however, she has the grace to be ashamed of it, for she blushed scarlet when I handed her 'A Modern Circe.' I could have told her that such a blush on such a cheek would almost atone for not being able to read at all, but I refrained. It is vexatious all the same, for, though one doesn't expect to find perfection here below, the 'nut-brown mayde,' externally considered, comes perilously near it. After she had gone I discovered a slip of paper which had blown under some stones. It proved to be an itinerary. ...
— A Cathedral Courtship • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... in general to improve; but I have been troubled for many weeks with a vexatious catarrh, which is sometimes sufficiently distressful. I have not found any great effects from bleeding and physick; and am afraid, that I must expect help from brighter days and ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... "Vexatious; and yet, I think it is a matter upon which we ought almost to congratulate ourselves. Read those two letters, and give us your candid ...
— Varney the Vampire - Or the Feast of Blood • Thomas Preskett Prest
... arrogance, and ungratefulness were the outstanding traits of Agricola's character. Luther said that Agricola, swelled with vanity and ambition, was more vexatious to him than any pope; that he was fit only for the profession of a jester, etc. December 6, 1540, Luther wrote to Jacob Stratner, courtpreacher in Berlin: "Master Grickel is not, nor ever will be, ...
— Historical Introductions to the Symbolical Books of the Evangelical Lutheran Church • Friedrich Bente
... happen that the King of Sardinia, becoming judge and party, would devour the oyster and leave the shells to the rival aspirants? It was unlikely, added this far-seeing observer, that the Italian populations should have got so innured to their chains as to prefer the harsh, vexatious government of Austria to the happy lot which Sardinian domination would secure to them, but even if they had become demoralised to this extent, they could not resist the providential advance of a temperate, robust ...
— The Liberation of Italy • Countess Evelyn Martinengo-Cesaresco
... "It is vexatious to be shut up here, in the dark, Maud," he said, "when every minute may bring an attack. This side of the house might be defended by you and Beulah, aided and enlightened by the arm and counsels of that young 'son of liberty,' little Evert; whereas the stockade in front may really need ...
— Wyandotte • James Fenimore Cooper
... invariably. "They was a good deal in the open air, and it tells," was her tribute to the memory of this plate. She developed the subject further, incidentally. "Tryin' on is a change, of course, but liable to temper, and vexatious when the party insists on letting out and no allowance of turn-over. The same if too short in front. What was I a-sayin'?... Oh, Mrs. Prichard—yes! You was inquiring, ma'am, about the length of time I had known her. Just four years this ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan |
