"Deprecatory" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... with a little deprecatory air. "He isn't my real uncle. He's just Jim, but I've always called him Uncle Jim ever since I was a little girl. And I love him dearly; don't I, Uncle Jim?" and she turned toward him as he entered the door ...
— The Underdog • F. Hopkinson Smith
... Saturday morning, and I went on busying myself about things at home. Pretty soon there came a deprecatory cough from the stairway—the local method of announcing a visitor. Outside of Manila knocking or ringing does not seem to appeal to the Filipinos. In the provinces the educated classes come to the foot of the stairway and call "Permiso!" and the lower-class ...
— A Woman's Impression of the Philippines • Mary Helen Fee
... Valentine, in a deprecatory tone; "don't say at the bottom, that sounds unkind. I'm sure I never wished ...
— Fated to Be Free • Jean Ingelow
... la Vega tells us that Atahuallpa's envoy addressed the Spanish commander in the most humble and deprecatory manner, as Son of the Sun and of the great God Viracocha. He adds, that he was loaded with a prodigious present of all kinds of game, living and dead, gold and silver vases, emeralds, turquoises, &c., &c, enough to furnish out the ...
— The History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William H. Prescott
... pause that lasted so long that those who had held their breath to listen, again breathed deeply. When the answer came, it was strangely deprecatory, uncertain, unassured. ...
— Vera - The Medium • Richard Harding Davis
... father, who considered the game too cruel, he afterwards relinquished this for target-shooting, in which he succeeded equally well. I was talking one day with him on this subject and remarked that I had recently shot two crows with my rifle. "What did you do it for?" interposed his father, in a deprecatory tone. So I explained to him that crows were outside of the pale of the law; that they not only were a pest to the farmers but destroyed the eggs and young of singing birds,—in fact, they were bold, black robbers, whose livery betokened ...
— Cambridge Sketches • Frank Preston Stearns
... it in the fields, was a splendid Taoist temple fit for a capital. In this village we were delayed for nearly an hour while my three men bargained against half the village for the possession of a hen that was all unconscious of the comments, flattering and deprecatory, that were being passed on its fatness. It was secured eventually for 260 cash, the vendors having declared that the hen was a family pet, hatched on a lucky day, that it had been carefully and tenderly reared, and that nothing in the world could induce them to part with it for a cash less than 350. ...
— An Australian in China - Being the Narrative of a Quiet Journey Across China to Burma • George Ernest Morrison
... Church and State and life and death, to think much about tutors. I myself was not averse to Master Snowdon, though he was to my mind, which was ever fain to seize knowledge as a man and a soldier should, by the forelock instead of dallying, too mild and deprecatory, thereby, perhaps, letting the best of her elude him. Still Master Snowdon was accounted, and was, a learned man, though scarcely knowing what he knew and easily shaken by any bout of even my boyish argument, until, I think, he was in some terror of me, and like one set ...
— The Heart's Highway - A Romance of Virginia in the Seventeeth Century • Mary E. Wilkins
... disturbances in the main, however, have made them dubious as to our skill, energy and intelligence rather than as to our good-will. Americans, taken individually and collectively, are to the Chinese—at least such was my impression—a rather simple folk, taking the word in its good and its deprecatory sense. In noting the Chinese reaction to the proposed Pacific Conference, it was interesting to see the combination of an almost unlimited hope that the United States was to lead in protecting them from further aggressions and in rectifying existing ...
— China, Japan and the U.S.A. - Present-Day Conditions in the Far East and Their Bearing - on the Washington Conference • John Dewey
... do! How dare you say such things to me, Bob Peet? How dare you?" She paused, breathless, but with flashing eyes and burning cheeks; while Bob meekly mopped his face and head with a red cotton handkerchief, and shook the water from his ears, eyeing her the while with humble and deprecatory looks. ...
— Captain January • Laura E. Richards
... a contentious spirit, inquiring why he did not find it more profitable to secure the prizes for himself, Wang Ho replied that his enterprise consisted in forecasting the winning numbers for State Lotteries and not in solving enigmas, writing deprecatory odes, composing epitaphs or conducting any of the other numerous occupations that could be mentioned. As this plausible evasion was accompanied by the courteous display of the many weapons which he always wore at different convenient points of his attire, the incident invariably ended ...
— Kai Lung's Golden Hours • Ernest Bramah
... open air of the deck some officers will, upon provocation, bear themselves boldly and defyingly enough towards their commander; yet, ten to one, let those very officers the next moment go down to their customary dinner in that same commander's cabin, and straightway their inoffensive, not to say deprecatory and humble air towards him, as he sits at the head of the table; this is marvellous, sometimes most comical. Wherefore this difference? A problem? Perhaps not. To have been Belshazzar, King of Babylon; and to have been Belshazzar, not haughtily but courteously, therein certainly must ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville
... mullioned windows the last flicker of the winter sunset interchanged with the reverberation of a royal fire; the bed was open, a suit of evening clothes was airing before the blaze, and from the far corner a boy came forward with deprecatory smiles. The dream in which I had been moving seemed to have reached its pitch. I might have quitted this house and room only the night before; it was my own place that I had come to; and for the first time in my life I understood the force of ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 20 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... a deprecatory shake of his head.) What does a slip of a girl like that know about housekeeping and her not home a half-year yet from the boarding-school in the big town, and with no mother nor nobody to train her. (He stares in a puzzled ...
— The Drone - A Play in Three Acts • Rutherford Mayne
... who you ARE," he returned. "You and I—" With a deprecatory gesture, as though good taste forbade him saying who we were, he stopped. "But the ship's surgeon!" he protested, "he's an awful bounder! Besides," he added quite ...
— The Red Cross Girl • Richard Harding Davis
... up," Murphy was constrained to mentally label him "some man," and he regretted his deprecatory words of a few minutes before. Plainly, there was no "show-off stuff" in Trevison. His feat of riding down the wall of the cut had not been performed to impress anyone; the look of reckless abandon in the otherwise serene eyes that held Murphy's steadily, ...
— 'Firebrand' Trevison • Charles Alden Seltzer
... and humbled by these words; her enthusiasm faded away and she looked at Helen with a deprecatory ...
— Stepping Heavenward • Mrs. E. Prentiss
... Iemon were the antagonists. Natsume and Imaizumi sat at the sides of the board. Kwaiba, confident in his powers, readily accepted the deprecatory answer of Iemon at its face value. The game was to be on even terms. Iemon really was an expert of the sixth grade; certainly of several grades superiority to Kwaiba.[21] The latter's brows knit as his ...
— The Yotsuya Kwaidan or O'Iwa Inari - Tales of the Tokugawa, Volume 1 (of 2) • James S. De Benneville
... his solemn almost deprecatory smile, set me off and I laughed till the tears ran ...
— Tramping on Life - An Autobiographical Narrative • Harry Kemp
... such beautiful clothes, while mine are so poor," sighed Lisette, in a deprecatory tone, but with a wistful glance over the daintily made traveling suit, at the tasteful hat, and expensive boots ...
— His Heart's Queen • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... at Mr. Gryce, I looked to see how he was affected by it. Evidently much, for the bow with which he greeted her words was lower than ordinary, and the smile with which he met her earnest look both deprecatory and reassuring. His glance did not embrace her cousin, though her eyes were fixed upon his face with an inquiry in their depths more agonizing than the utterance of any cry would have been. Knowing Mr. Gryce as I did, ...
— The Leavenworth Case • Anna Katharine Green
... said, reaching out an anxious, deprecatory hand, "don't ye think you're jest a leetle mite hard on that boy ...
— The Calico Cat • Charles Miner Thompson
... little self than ever. He was so irascible that even the comfortable cat and dog became aware that something unusual was amiss, and, instead of dozing securely, they learned to keep a wary and deprecatory eye on their master and the toes of ...
— A Knight Of The Nineteenth Century • E. P. Roe
... Sir," he hesitated with a deprecatory smile, pointing with his thumb to the kitchen door, "but Rawson aint really up to cooking stuff like this here sparrow grass—not yet. P'raps I had better take ...
— On the Fringe of the Great Fight • George G. Nasmith
... orphan who had not been content with her lot some one brought a broom, and she was carefully swept and smoothed out. Then they lifted her tenderly, and carried her to the coroner. That functionary was standing in the door of his office, and with a deprecatory wave of his hand, he said to the man who was ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Volume 8 - Epigrams, On With the Dance, Negligible Tales • Ambrose Bierce
... The deprecatory look was lost upon Mr. Belcher. "Where did you get your clothes?" he inquired. "Come, now; give me the name of your tailor. I'm green in the city, ...
— Sevenoaks • J. G. Holland
... said the Professor, with a deprecatory motion of his hand. "I cannot see, however, how it affects your relation to ...
— Round the Red Lamp - Being Facts and Fancies of Medical Life • Arthur Conan Doyle
... observed, my wife," said Defarge, in a deprecatory manner, "the anguish of his daughter, which must be ...
— A Tale of Two Cities - A Story of the French Revolution • Charles Dickens
... came out from the dining-room. He was two or three years younger than Blake and had a muscular figure, but he looked shaky and his face was weak and marked by dissipation. Smiling in a deprecatory ...
— Blake's Burden • Harold Bindloss
... child!" Blondin made a deprecatory motion of his hands. "Of course, I think you're very wise," ...
— Harriet and the Piper - (Norris Volume XI) • Kathleen Norris
... not deep darkness of the night, and heard their voices talking. As he went towards them Gaspare was speaking vehemently. He threw up one arm in a strong, even, and excited gesture, and was silent. Then Artois heard Ruffo say, in a voice that, though respectful and almost deprecatory, was yet firm like ...
— A Spirit in Prison • Robert Hichens
... Deprecation — N. deprecation, expostulation; intercession, mediation, protest, remonstrance. V. deprecate, protest, expostulate, enter a protest, intercede for; remonstrate. Adj. deprecatory, expostulatory^, intercessory, mediatorial^. deprecated, protested. unsought, unbesought^; unasked &c (ask) &c 765. Int. cry you mercy!, God forbid!, forbid it Heaven!, Heaven forefend, Heaven forbid!, far be it from!, hands off!, &c ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... broke from him—not an intrusive chuckle, quite the contrary; a deprecatory and inadvertent ...
— In Connection with the De Willoughby Claim • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... his visiting list, and walking quite without haste, held it in the glowing coals of the fireplace until it disappeared in a flash of flame up the chimney. I sprang to my feet indignant, but too late to make even a motion outwards saving the sheet. Macpherson regarded us both with that self-deprecatory smile which had several times lighted up ...
— The Triumphs of Eugene Valmont • Robert Barr
... he awoke, and, somewhat ashamed of himself, he sprang up, ready to apologize, but the hunter waved a deprecatory hand. ...
— The Great Sioux Trail - A Story of Mountain and Plain • Joseph Altsheler
... his wants or his fancies require my presence. But he is manifestly afraid of my displeasure; and if at one time he tries my patience by his unreasonable exactions, and fretful complaints and reproaches, at another he depresses me by his abject submission and deprecatory self-abasement when he fears he has gone too far. But all this I can readily pardon; I know it is chiefly the result of his enfeebled frame and disordered nerves. What annoys me the most, is his occasional attempts at affectionate fondness ...
— The Tenant of Wildfell Hall • Anne Bronte
... their volume, but their quality, which makes them snores of Monte so ondesir'ble. Some folks snores a heap deprecatory, an' like they're apol'gizin' for it as they goes along. Others snores in a manner ca'mly confident, an' all as though the idee that any gent objects would astonish 'em to death. Still others snores plumb deefiant, an' ...
— Faro Nell and Her Friends - Wolfville Stories • Alfred Henry Lewis
... dialogue, in which the lady bears at least her full half share. Those of Mr and Mrs Quilp, however, were an exception to the general rule; the remarks which they occasioned being limited to a long soliloquy on the part of the gentleman, with perhaps a few deprecatory observations from the lady, not extending beyond a trembling monosyllable uttered at long intervals, and in a very submissive and humble tone. On the present occasion, Mrs Quilp did not for a long time ...
— The Old Curiosity Shop • Charles Dickens
... been extraordinary," observes Mr. Croker, "that Lord Chesterfield, in 1137, when he was on terms of the most familiar friendship with Lady Suffolk, should have published a deprecatory character of her, and in revenge too, for being disgraced at court-Lady Suffolk being at the same time in disgrace also. But, unluckily for Walpole's conjecture, the character of Eudosia (a female savant, as the name imports,) has not the slightest resemblance ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole
... time abus'd by many gross superstitions and insignificant rites, in imitation of the pagan robigalia) upon which days, (about the Ascension, and beginning of Spring especially) prayers were made, as well deprecatory of epidemical evils, (amongst which blasts and smut of corn were none of the least) as supplications for propitious seasons, and blessings on the fruits of the earth. Whether there was any peculiar Office, (besides those for Ember-weeks) appointed, I do not know: But the pious ...
— Sylva, Vol. 1 (of 2) - Or A Discourse of Forest Trees • John Evelyn
... printed it in 1893 under the title of "The Self-limitation of the Word of God as manifested in the Incarnation." With characteristic modesty he says in his preface: "I can claim but little of the work as strictly original." This is far too deprecatory; the essay is a singularly lucid statement and attempted solution of a most difficult theological problem, in which all who believe in the Deity of Christ must be deeply interested, and I can bear personal testimony to its helpfulness. It was only the other day that ...
— Letters to His Friends • Forbes Robinson
... vague, misty idea," she answered, with a laugh that was plainly intended to be deprecatory of her own power. "Supposing these Chinese—you say they're awfully keen and astute—supposing they've got a plot amongst themselves for handing Baxter and the Frenchman over to the police—the authorities—with their ...
— Ravensdene Court • J. S. (Joseph Smith) Fletcher
... for one moment more,—silent; her eyes brilliant, her face beautiful with inspired thought,—then with a quiet, half-deprecatory gesture, in response to the fresh outbreak of passionate cheering, she retired from the platform. Pasquin Leroy, whose eyes had been riveted on her from the first to the last word of her oration, now started as from a dream, and rose up half-unconsciously, passing his hand across his brow, ...
— Temporal Power • Marie Corelli
... tremendously sweet," he declared bluntly. "As matters stand, we happen to have a half-brother of Panchito up on the ranch—or, at least, we did have when I enlisted. He's coming four, and he ought to be a beauty. I'll break him for you myself. However," he added, with a deprecatory grin, "I—I realize you're not the sort of girl who accepts gifts from strangers; so, if you have a nickel on you, I'll sell you this horse, sight unseen. If he's gone, I'll ...
— The Pride of Palomar • Peter B. Kyne
... appreciated the generous spread. But I did not. It smacked of extravagance. All the same, it was a remarkable feat to have produced it so quickly, and I congratulated the steward on his smartness in a somewhat ominous tone. He gave me a deprecatory smile and, in a way I didn't know what to make of, blinked his fine dark eyes in the direction of ...
— 'Twixt Land & Sea • Joseph Conrad
... that," she had said to Adam with a deprecatory tone in her voice, as the two stood before it. "It's only because you think I am, and because you've kept on saying it over and over until you believe it. It's the gown and the peach blossoms in the jar ...
— Colonel Carter's Christmas and The Romance of an Old-Fashioned Gentleman • F. Hopkinson Smith
... signature to a petition for a pardon for a man whose family suffered while he was in the penitentiary. Hendricks signed the paper and handed it back to her, and his blue eyes were fixed impersonally upon her, and he smiled his curious, self-deprecatory smile and sighed, "As we forgive our debtors." Then he reached for a paper in his desk and seemed oblivious to her presence. No one else was near them, and the woman hesitated a moment before turning to go and repeated, "Yes, Bob—as we forgive our debtors." She tried to show him the ...
— A Certain Rich Man • William Allen White
... made a comforting sort of little noise, half sympathetic and half deprecatory. "Yes, I know," said the old lady, "but I can't help thinking about him a great deal at this time of the year. I don't understand why he was taken away from us. He was always such a good boy—he would have been just like Charles, ...
— The Child of the Dawn • Arthur Christopher Benson
... 'will you oblige me by coming into the study for a while? I am not in the mood for sleep, and perhaps you are not. And I will admit frankly that I should prefer not to be alone at present. Yes,' he added, with a faint deprecatory smile, 'my theories about death are thoroughly philosophical, but one cannot always act up to ...
— Hugo - A Fantasia on Modern Themes • Arnold Bennett
... equals of the best people they had met in France and in Haiti; they had been guests at the dinners of ministers and at the soires of savants in the French capital; there was nothing about them of that deprecatory sort which one sees so constantly in men and women with African blood in their veins in lands where their race has recently been held ...
— Volume I • Andrew Dickson White
... which, like the house, was very small, but full of roses and other sweet-smelling things. Madame—for Barbara noticed that most people seemed to call her so—was busy watering her flowers, and had on big gloves and an apron. When she saw the girl coming, she came forward to welcome her, saying, with a deprecatory movement ...
— Barbara in Brittany • E. A. Gillie
... difficulties in this matter. For, in the first place, neither you nor your friend, although you seem interested in the case, have entered into the matter very fully with me. With that, of course, I shall not quarrel,' said Mr. Purvis, spreading out his hands in a deprecatory fashion. 'I only mean to say that before taking any definite steps to trace this story to its source I must, if you will forgive me, ask certain questions about the child; and, further, these inquiries which I propose ...
— Peter and Jane - or The Missing Heir • S. (Sarah) Macnaughtan
... went away, a few moments later, and left him still intermittently chuckling, the impression remained with me that he had had some such deprecatory and ...
— Beasley's Christmas Party • Booth Tarkington
... is a stranger," was Leopold's deprecatory remark. "Present him, your highness, that I may welcome ...
— Prince Eugene and His Times • L. Muhlbach
... anything about it, you see, Levi," added Dock, in deprecatory tones. "I only tell you what the old man told me. He knows you ...
— Freaks of Fortune - or, Half Round the World • Oliver Optic
... the pistols by the barrels, crossed them, and presented the butts to Austin. Austin waved them away with a deprecatory gesture and ...
— Viviette • William J. Locke
... cases is the refuge of simple disinclination to think the matter out. Pure laziness suggests it. It is too much trouble to frame an answer, or give the desired information, and the 'greel admi' comes naturally to the lip. It is often deprecatory, meaning 'I am ignorant and uninformed,' you must not expect too 'much from a poor, rude, uncultivated man like me.' It is often, also, a delicate mode of flattery, which is truly oriental, implying, and often conveying in a tone, a look, a gesture, that though the speaker ...
— Sport and Work on the Nepaul Frontier - Twelve Years Sporting Reminiscences of an Indigo Planter • James Inglis
... wore nothing but wide trowsers, apparently, from their coarseness and patches, made out of some old topsail; they were clean, and confined at the waist by a bit of unstranded rope, which, with his composed, deprecatory air at times, made him look something like a ...
— The Piazza Tales • Herman Melville
... returned to the palace after the coronation, the pipe-bearer, an old native retainer, approached him on his knees, and was shocked at being ordered to get up and act like a man. The older natives to this day approach a chief or chiefess only with humble and deprecatory bows; and wherever a chief or chiefess travels, the native people along the road make offerings of the fruits of the ground, and even of articles of clothing and adornment. One of the curious sights of Honolulu to us travelers, last spring, was to ...
— Northern California, Oregon, and the Sandwich Islands • Charles Nordhoff
... he said, "we had better all be thinking of going to bed." And he smiled with a feeble and deprecatory smile. ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume XXI • Robert Louis Stevenson
... back still toward him, she gave vent to a sigh far too intense in its nature to have reference to such trivialities as plants. She repeated it twice, and at the second time Mr. Gunnill, almost without his knowledge, uttered a deprecatory cough. ...
— Odd Craft, Complete • W.W. Jacobs
... easily, I became, for a period, subject to fits; and in one of these I lost the power of speech. I, Alresca, could make no sound; and for seven years that tenor whom in the future people were to call 'golden-throated,' and 'world-famous,' and 'unrivalled,' had no voice." He made a deprecatory gesture. "When I think of it, Carl, I can scarcely believe it—so strange are the chances of life. I could hear and understand, ...
— The Ghost - A Modern Fantasy • Arnold Bennett
... graves in the Caribbean. Before them lay untold possibilities of wounds and mutilation, of disease, suffering, and horror. What woman that knew them could look on unmoved at the sight of these men, so grave and earnest, so quietly resolute, so deprecatory of anything like braggadocio or over-confidence? It filled Christine Latimer with a fierce pride in herself and them; in a race that could breed men so gentle and so brave; in a country that was founded so surely on the devoted ...
— Love, The Fiddler • Lloyd Osbourne
... said Aunt Martha severely. Ruth felt that she was shaking a deprecatory finger at him. "Your manners have been neglected." But Aunt Martha's voice gave the words an exactly ...
— The Range Boss • Charles Alden Seltzer
... that he has been making, and is now going out to sell," was her low answer given with a quick deprecatory gesture such as I doubt if she ever ...
— A Strange Disappearance • Anna Katharine Green
... physicians was that he was a conceited, arrogant, aristocratic man, and he was avoided except for his medical opinion, which was usually very sound. Those admitted to the sanctum of this man's real self knew him to be really modest and self-deprecatory, anxious to do right and almost obsessed by the belief that he knew ...
— The Foundations of Personality • Abraham Myerson
... man, victorious over his constitutional timidity, does but the more brightly illustrate the local law and the tyranny of the public feeling. How often do we find him, when on the brink of uttering 'odious truth,' obliged to pause, and to propitiate his audience with deprecatory phrases, entreating them to give him time for utterance, not to yell him down before they had heard his sentence to the end. [Greek: Me thoryzeite]—'Gentlemen of Athens! for the love of God, do not make an uproar at what ...
— The Uncollected Writings of Thomas de Quincey—Vol. 1 - With a Preface and Annotations by James Hogg • Thomas de Quincey
... his face, and seemed to accentuate its pallor. He made a deprecatory gesture. Then, as if in that gesture he had expended his last grain of strength, he swayed suddenly as he stood. He made as if to reach a chair, but at the second step he stumbled, and without further warning he ...
— The Tavern Knight • Rafael Sabatini
... husband, which was received by that gentleman with a modest and deprecatory cough, coupled with an urgent request that his ...
— The Right Stuff - Some Episodes in the Career of a North Briton • Ian Hay
... had sprung forth in Watt's brain, for nothing less has the steam engine given to man. One reads with a smile the dear modest man's deprecatory remarks about the condenser in after years, when he was overcome by the glowing tributes paid him upon one occasion and hailed as having conquered hitherto uncontrollable steam. He stammered out words to the effect that it came in his way and he happened to find it; others had missed ...
— James Watt • Andrew Carnegie
... a gentle, deprecatory air about him that reminded Wyn strongly of Polly herself. But this manner was almost the only characteristic that father and ...
— Wyn's Camping Days - or, The Outing of the Go-Ahead Club • Amy Bell Marlowe
... half pain, half amusement, covered the face of the major, but he made no other reply than by a profound and graceful bow. Courteous and deprecatory as it was, it apparently exasperated Mistress ...
— Thankful Blossom • Bret Harte
... scrambled out of Kirkwood's arms and lingered to take a roll in the sandy path, coming up a moment afterward to be received with blighting sarcasms upon his appearance. After his ignominious wetting he was quite unable to bear up under them, and slunk to the rear with deprecatory blinks and waggings of his tail whenever one of ...
— In Exile and Other Stories • Mary Hallock Foote
... little porch and clambering vines, set back in its own garden behind a picket fence. Presently, from the direction of the lines of light in the shutters, came the sound of voices, Lem's deep and insistent, and another, pitched in a high nasal key, deprecatory and protesting. There was still another, a harsh one that growled something unintelligible, and Wetherell guessed, from the fragments which he heard, that the judge before sitting down to his duty was trying to dissuade the stage driver from a step that was foolhardy. He guessed likewise ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... murthur" on the floor, and snuffled out a deprecatory question "if that was the proper way to be ...
— Handy Andy, Vol. 2 - A Tale of Irish Life • Samuel Lover
... national punishment averted by animal sacrifices, or even by human sacrifices, is repugnant to rather than conformable with natural reason. There exists no discernible connection between the one and the other. We may suppose that eucharistic, penitential, and even deprecatory sacrifices may have originated in the light of nature and reason, but we are unable to account for the practice of piacular sacrifices for substitutional atonement, on the same principle. The ethical principle, that one's own sins ...
— Christianity and Greek Philosophy • Benjamin Franklin Cocker
... The children were off directly after dinner, intent on holiday festivities, so that Polly and I had the house to ourselves. I felt that we needed it. I invited my partner into the den, lighted a pipe for consolation, unlocked the drawer in which the farm ledger is kept, gave a small deprecatory cough, and said:— ...
— The Fat of the Land - The Story of an American Farm • John Williams Streeter
... of the papers but the question is how to get our subject in them in a way to promote it. I can recommend the following method: Write something in editorial style just about as you want it to appear and send it to the editor with a deprecatory note to the effect that it is only raw material but perhaps it could be whipped into an editorial by his able pen. The chances are that the first time he is hard up for one he will use it—probably beheaded or with the end off or the middle amputated to show that the editor is ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume V • Ida Husted Harper
... her on eager feet, And therewithal an air so grave and mild, Coupled with such a deprecatory bleat Of injured confidence, that soon the Child Filled the lone shore with louder merriment, And e'en the ...
— Collected Poems - In Two Volumes, Vol. II • Austin Dobson
... only in manner, and, as it seemed, quite unconsciously. Than the terms in which it was expressed, nothing could be more deprecatory. It was simply that I would consent to take charge of her daughter during ...
— Carmilla • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... "passed from hand to hand," until he reached Dublin. The following spring O'Donnell appeared in force before Dublin, and demanded the fugitive, who, as a last resort, had been sent for safety into Scotland. From the place of his exile he addressed three deprecatory poems to the offended Lord of Tyrconnell, who finally allowed him to return to Lissadil in peace, and even restored him ...
— A Popular History of Ireland - From the earliest period to the emancipation of the Catholics • Thomas D'Arcy McGee
... shoulders and spread his hands with a deprecatory gesture: "I know not, my dear madame. Les enfants et moi, we have our dinner at two o'clock: we did not comprehend that madame would return to-night," as ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, September 1880 • Various
... it was shady," I cried; and then it occurred to me that, in spite of my studies at Brandscombe and out here, my Hindustani was very imperfect, for the man smiled in a deprecatory way which seemed to mean that he hoped my lord would not be angry with him for not understanding ...
— Gil the Gunner - The Youngest Officer in the East • George Manville Fenn
... planned, little sister?" asked Jack, gently, when the silence had lasted a long time. She looked up with a start as if her thoughts had been far away, then said with a deprecatory smile, "I hardly know myself, Jack. I don't mind confessing to you, though I couldn't to any one else, it was so big I couldn't see ...
— The Little Colonel's Chum: Mary Ware • Annie Fellows Johnston
... Ned," Mac would say, in a deprecatory tone that amused me vastly, "I really pity the poor little devil, and can't help doing all in my power for him. He's such a soft little ass,—confound Thorne! he makes me mad with his cursed suspicions!—and then the boy is out of place here in this rough-and-tumble tiltyard. ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 6, No. 33, July, 1860 • Various
... gentleman replied, with a deprecatory gesture. "In truth, it is very poor since the war—so poor that soon I shall abandon this seringal and go out to spend the rest of my life on the coast. With rubber selling at a mere five hundred dollars a ton in New York and the artificial ...
— The Pathless Trail • Arthur O. (Arthur Olney) Friel
... tool-box - who unaccountably appeared one day at a special desk of his own, erected close to that of the Chief, with whom he held familiar converse. He lived in the parlour, and went out for his walks, and never took the least notice of us - even of us, the first boy - unless to give us a deprecatory kick, or grimly to take our hat off and throw it away, when he encountered us out of doors, which unpleasant ceremony he always performed as he passed - not even condescending to stop for the purpose. Some of us believed that the classical attainments of this phenomenon ...
— Reprinted Pieces • Charles Dickens
... Emma Gray that he had no talent whatever for plotting, Captain Wopper went off with a deprecatory expression of countenance to reveal himself to Mrs Roby. Great was his anxiety. He entered her presence like a guilty thing. If, however, his anxiety was great, his surprise and consternation were greater when she received his revelation ...
— Rivers of Ice • R.M. Ballantyne
... made floating custard for dessert this evening, and when Miss Eliza helped it, she helped it with a deprecatory air, as though despite its superlative value as a custard which she very well knew, it really was not fit to be offered to a guest: it might do for just the family. Timothy ate as many as three meals every week of his life in this very dining-room, but not being a member of ...
— The Heart of Arethusa • Francis Barton Fox
... Crime of somebody! Silver Bones! All was explained. With a faint deprecatory chuckle, as if to say that he would have enjoyed this had life put him in the habit of enjoying anything, Merlin doddered away to the back of his shop where his treasures were kept, to get this latest investment which he had picked ...
— Tales of the Jazz Age • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... a deprecatory gesture the Count answered, "I am convinced that Miss Maddison is all—indeed, more than all—your eloquence has painted. On the other hand, I trust that you will not be disappointed in my ...
— Count Bunker • J. Storer Clouston
... of progress, especially the progress of Woman's Cause. I was told among other things that I had an intolerable habit of dropping my voice at the end of a sentence in the most feminine, apologetic and even deprecatory manner which would probably lose Woman the ...
— Twenty Years At Hull House • Jane Addams
... public business; OLD MORALITY led off with proposal to take Tuesdays and Fridays for morning sittings and Opposition mustered in great force; Mr. G. present, glowing with his own eulogy on ARTEMIS. OLD MORALITY moved Resolution with deprecatory deferential manner; only desire was to do his duty to QUEEN and Country and meet the convenience of Honourable Gentlemen sitting in whatever part of the House they might find themselves. Evidently ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100, March 28, 1891 • Various
... every day. Susan, watching him when Ella's friends gathered about him, watching the honest modesty with which he evaded their empty praises, their attempts at lionizing, could not but thrill to know that HER praise stirred him, that the deprecatory, indifferent air was dropped quickly enough for HER! It was intoxicating to know, as she did know, that he was thinking, as she was, of what they would say when they next had a moment together; that, whatever she wore, he ...
— Saturday's Child • Kathleen Norris
... hand Conniston's optimism saw ahead of him, in the new field of work, the dim, shadowy, and at the same time alluring outline of a new and rare opportunity. He had not forgotten the things which Mr. Crawford had said of his big project. And in spite of his own deprecatory answer to Mr. Crawford's straightforward question, Greek Conniston had not forgotten all of the engineering he had absorbed during four years in the university. There was work to be done, there were men wanted, ...
— Under Handicap - A Novel • Jackson Gregory
... birthdays she received remembrances from everybody. I used to make her presents without knowing why or even thinking of it. Flossy's name was on all the Christmas lists, and she used to shed tears over the kindness of her friends, and write the prettiest notes to them, so plaintive and self-deprecatory. Then they took her to drive, or did something more for her. Flossy read poetry and cried over it. She wrote poetry too, and other people ...
— The Love Affairs of an Old Maid • Lilian Bell
... that to neither side was the situation in the slightest degree embarrassing. Dr. Leete addressed the young man in a tone devoid, of course, as any gentleman's would be, of superciliousness, but at the same time not in any way deprecatory, while the manner of the young man was simply that of a person intent on discharging correctly the task he was engaged in, equally without familiarity or obsequiousness. It was, in fact, the manner of a soldier on duty, but without the military stiffness. As the youth left the room, I ...
— Looking Backward - 2000-1887 • Edward Bellamy
... to understand, Alick, that I am not concerned in this business," said he, in a deprecatory tone. "I had no idea what the colonel intended to do until I went ...
— Up the River - or, Yachting on the Mississippi • Oliver Optic
... rose. A moment later the youth followed her. Back into its sheath under his countenance his soul slipped, and he stood before the girl smiling a half deprecatory smile. But the girl's face was racked with sorrow. She had seen tragedy. Her pain wounded him and he winced in his heart. Wherefore he smiled quite genuinely, and stepped back, and threw a kiss at the girl as he said: "It's nothing, Laura! Don't mind! ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White
... relief; Mrs Sudberry did not scold when, about an hour later, he entered the hall or porch of the White House with the deprecatory air of a dog that knows he has been misbehaving, and with the general aspect of a drowned rat. His wife had been terribly anxious about his non-arrival, and the joy she felt on seeing him safe and well, induced ...
— Freaks on the Fells - Three Months' Rustication • R.M. Ballantyne
... some difficulty in mounting, and the crowd laughed good-humouredly, though here and there a man flung jibes at them; while one, jolting in his saddle as his broncho reared, turned to Grant with a little deprecatory gesture. ...
— The Cattle-Baron's Daughter • Harold Bindloss
... and rows of little yellow rouleaux—a hundred times more gold than Mr. Ledbetter had seen in all his life before. The light of two candles, in silver candlesticks, fell upon these. The pause continued. "It is rather fatiguing holding up my hands like this," said Mr. Ledbetter, with a deprecatory smile. ...
— Twelve Stories and a Dream • H. G. Wells
... deprecatory formula, used because the writer is going to indulge in a series of what ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton
... emergency, lest it run down backward, slip off the road. The calf of your leg begins to ache from the pressure on the foot-brake, and with an unsuccessful effort to be courteous you bellow at the passenger, who has been standing beside the car looking deprecatory, "Will you please block the back wheels with a stone—hustle ...
— Free Air • Sinclair Lewis
... little man with the drab shorts disappeared; he returned immediately on its conclusion, and whispered Mr. Anthony Humm, with a face of the deepest importance. 'My friends,' said Mr. Humm, holding up his hand in a deprecatory manner, to bespeak the silence of such of the stout old ladies as were yet a line or two behind; 'my friends, a delegate from the Dorking Branch of our society, Brother ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... smiling countenance, he saw there was no danger of his letting slip, even for a moment, his admirable power of self- command. The Duc de la Santoisie, meanwhile, settling his mustache, and gracefully waving one hand, on which sparkled a large diamond ring, bent forward a little with a courteous, deprecatory gesture. ...
— Ardath - The Story of a Dead Self • Marie Corelli
... of God;" the commencement of all the chapters of the Koran but one [the ninth], and of prayer and thanksgiving. ["Bismillah" (in full, Bismillahi 'rrahmani 'rrahiem, i.e. "In the name of Allah the God of Mercy, the Merciful") is often used as a deprecatory formula. Sir R. Burton (Arabian Nights, i. 40) cites as an equivalent the "remembering Iddio e' Santi," of Boccaccio's Decameron, ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Vol. 3 (of 7) • Lord Byron
... Mr. Power's turn. Anticipating Dare, who was advancing with a deprecatory look to seize the photograph, he also grasped it. When he saw whom it represented he seemed both amused and startled, and after scanning it a while handed it to the young man with a ...
— A Laodicean • Thomas Hardy
... Herbert, with a deprecatory gesture—"you forget that there is no system of telegraphy by which you could be reached. I may be poor, sir, but I'm just as much of a baron as you are, and I will take the liberty of saying right ...
— The Water Ghost and Others • John Kendrick Bangs
... opened to an enormous width a naturally large pair of hazel eyes, while his tall companion in fustian trousers and Belcher neckcloth spoke thus patronizingly of Robert Burns and Saint Augustine, now replied, with rather a deprecatory and shamefaced aspect, "I am sorry I was not thinking of dinner. I was not so mindful of you as I ought to have been. The landlady asked me what we would have. I said, 'What you like;' and the landlady muttered something about—" here ...
— Kenelm Chillingly, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... daughters and nieces of the reformed in smiles and white aprons ladling the nutritious and attractive compound, earning thus an honest wage; she saw a neatly balanced account-book and a triumphant report; she saw herself the respected and deprecatory idol of a millennial village. She wavered, hesitated, ...
— A Philanthropist • Josephine Daskam
... sleepily insistent, and shortly the captain gave over his deprecatory contortions. He fetched a pink quilt with yellow dots on it to the freckled man, and a black one with red roses on it to ...
— Men, Women, and Boats • Stephen Crane
... and, lifting one shoulder, threw her spirited head sideways, in a pretty deprecatory way, with elevated eyebrows and an expression intended to show the otherwise untranslatable character of her impression. But it showed quite as pleasantly the other fact, that she was the daughter of a foreigner, an old French military explorer, and that she had retained ...
— Sally Dows and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... This concession to my conscience comforted me greatly, and I prepared for my journey with a lightness that was almost buoyancy. The chairman and two of the committee met me at the junction. They were most deprecatory and apologetic, and mentioned with evident sorrow the absence of several of the members which might cause a postponement of the conference until the following day. I bore up under this intelligence with ...
— The Romance of an Old Fool • Roswell Field
... him thronged a troop of students, who, holding back, allowed him to precede them: the passengers in the streets saluted him, and some, students, who pressed forwards and hurried past him homewards, saluted him quite reverentially. He returned their salutations with a surprised and almost deprecatory air, and yet he knew, and could not conceal from himself, that he was one of the best beloved, not only in the good city of Leipzig, but in all ...
— Christian Gellert's Last Christmas - From "German Tales" Published by the American Publishers' Corporation • Berthold Auerbach
... well past forty, and he was a parson to boot. A gravely sedate demeanour would have seemed the more fitting facial expression for his age and the generally accepted nature of his calling,—a kind of deprecatory toleration of the sunshine as part of the universal 'vanity' of mundane things,—or a condescending consciousness of the bursting apple-blossoms within his reach as a kind of inferior earthy circumstance which could neither be altered ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli
... situation; that the richest man in Wall Street should appear in person to plead for a humble and weaker brother. He knew he could not escape recognition, his face was too well known, but, he trusted, for the sake of Spear, the reporters would make no display of his visit. With a deprecatory laugh, he explained why he had come. But the outburst of approbation he had ...
— Once Upon A Time • Richard Harding Davis
... and chairman stuck out deprecatory heads and coaxed the mob. Carl's manager was an old circus-man. He had removed his collar, tie, and flashy diamond pin, and was diligently wrapping the thong of a black-jack about his wrist. Their mechanic was crawling under the side of the tent. Carl caught ...
— The Trail of the Hawk - A Comedy of the Seriousness of Life • Sinclair Lewis
... particular morning she was more than ordinarily careless in recitation. Miss Marble gave her a sharp word and propounded the same question to Amy Carringford. The latter returned the correct answer, and then gave the red-faced Stella a deprecatory smile. ...
— Janice Day, The Young Homemaker • Helen Beecher Long
... N. deprecation, expostulation; intercession, mediation, protest, remonstrance. V. deprecate, protest, expostulate, enter a protest, intercede for; remonstrate. Adj. deprecatory, expostulatory[obs3], intercessory, mediatorial[obs3]. deprecated, protested. unsought, unbesought[obs3]; unasked &c. (see ask &c. 765). Int. cry you mercy! God forbid! forbid it Heaven! Heaven forefend, Heaven forbid! far be it from! hands off! &c. ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... the stones were "Um mani panee," and meant, as far as I could make out, "the Supreme Being." As the old gentleman repeated the mystic syllables, he bobbed and scraped towards a strange-looking monument close by, in an abject, deprecatory way, as if in extreme ...
— Diary of a Pedestrian in Cashmere and Thibet • by William Henry Knight
... Some persons on the Committee objected to certain phrases as susceptible of an inference favourable to the principle of mixed education. Mr. O'Connell joined in the objection and succeeded in reducing the petition to a single paragraph, deprecatory of the Tenth Clause of the Bill. I refused to have any more to do with the petition, and it was dropped. After the lapse of a fortnight, Mr. Maurice O'Connell proposed another, simply praying that the tenth clause, which vested the appointment ...
— The Felon's Track • Michael Doheny |
