Free TranslationFree Translation
Synonyms, antonyms, pronunciation

  Home
English Dictionary      examples: 'day', 'get rid of', 'New York Bay'




Insubordination   /ɪnsəbˌɔrdənˈeɪʃən/   Listen
Insubordination

noun
1.
Defiance of authority.
2.
An insubordinate act.  Synonym: rebelliousness.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








Advanced search
     Find words:
Starting with
Ending with
Containing
Matching a pattern  

Synonyms
Antonyms
Quotes
Words linked to  

only single words



Share |





"Insubordination" Quotes from Famous Books



... they are in a bad way; but I don't see what they come back for," added Butters, pleased to find that the lieutenant had nothing more to say about his insubordination. ...
— A Lieutenant at Eighteen • Oliver Optic

... result of this new mentality was a general insubordination. Mme. Vigee Lebrun relates that on the promenade at Longchamps men of the people leaped on the footboards of the carriages, saying, "Next year you will be behind and ...
— The Psychology of Revolution • Gustave le Bon

... not more fortunate than he had been in attempting to raise Babylon once more to the foremost rank; their want of power, their discord, the insubordination and sedition that existed among their Cossaean troops, and the almost periodic returns of the Theban generals to the banks of the Euphrates, sometimes even to those of the Balikh and the Khabur, all seemed to conspire to aggravate the helpless state into which Babylon had sunk since the close of ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 6 (of 12) • G. Maspero

... a very general remark, at the present time, throughout our country, and the complaint comes back, especially from the great West, through those who are familiarly acquainted with society there, that there is a growing spirit of insubordination in the family, and, of course, in the State; and it is ascribed to laxity and neglect in the Mothers as much as in the Fathers. Its existence is even made the matter of public comment on such occasions as the celebration of the landing of our Pilgrim Fathers, ...
— Mrs Whittelsey's Magazine for Mothers and Daughters - Volume 3 • Various

... about doing nothing, as though it were a holiday. The dinner, the election, and the rumour together had altogether demoralized them. But some of them at least were there, and they showed no signs of absolute insubordination. 'Mr Grendall has not been here?' he asked. No; Mr Grendall had not been there; but Mr Cohenlupe was in Mr Grendall's room. At this moment he hardly desired to see Mr Cohenlupe. That gentleman was privy to many of his transactions, but was by no means privy ...
— The Way We Live Now • Anthony Trollope

... know whether it is or not." She was silent for a moment, considering it. "But anyhow," she came back to the issue, "we have our hands on this money, so we'll get the suit. You're in the army now, Ann. You're enlisted under me, and I'll have no insubordination. You know—into the jaws of death!—Even so into the jaws of Elizabeth Barrett Browning—and ...
— The Visioning • Susan Glaspell

... Foedor, who commanded a company, begged and entreated his own men to set an example by continuing the march: they threw down their arms, and lay down beside them. Just as they had given this proof of insubordination, fresh murmurs, sounding like an approaching storm, rose from the rear of the army: they were caused by the sight of Souvarow, who was riding from the rear to the vanguard, and who arrived at the ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - VANINKA • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE

... day, and, as you know, have to teach classics, English, and divinity. In the afternoon the boys are taken by the French, mathematical, and chemical masters. But you are nominally responsible for the whole, and any case of insubordination or idleness during afternoon school will be reported to you by the master in charge, and you must deal with it as though you had been in ...
— The Master of the Shell • Talbot Baines Reed

... Aunt Susan," retorted the monster of infant depravity, slipping his bare toes through a rent in the rug, and doubling up with delight at his insubordination. ...
— Virginia • Ellen Glasgow

... work—stoppage of food—and a man or woman who has refused to work once is known by a thumb-marking system in the Company's offices all over the world. Besides, who can leave the city poor? To go to Paris costs two Lions. And for insubordination there are the prisons—dark and miserable—out of sight below. There are prisons now ...
— When the Sleeper Wakes • Herbert George Wells

... madness, and till they are removed and the people are treated with kindness and humanity, and above all, till justice is fairly administered amongst them, the Government of England will in vain endeavour to subdue the spirit of insubordination either by the bayonet or the halter. The only remedy there as well as in England consists in giving the people free and equal means of choosing their own representatives, to make wise, just, and liberal laws for them ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 2 • Henry Hunt

... would be insubordination, Pedro, would it not? which, in time of war, is punishable, I think, with death. I would never think of asking permission, or tempting you to disobey. I will be sure to tell my father that you positively refused to let me go. Adieu, ...
— The Rover of the Andes - A Tale of Adventure on South America • R.M. Ballantyne

... mentioned here, that Martin Alonzo Pinzon had wilfully parted company from the admiral while on the coast of Cuba: covetousness being probably the cause of this most undutiful proceeding. But, indeed, there is another instance of the insubordination of the mariners, which makes the wonder only still greater how Columbus could have brought them across ...
— The Life of Columbus • Arthur Helps

... have seen, a formalist, and when pressed on some points of Sir Aymer de Valence's discipline, he did not hesitate to throw out hints, which, connected with those in the knight's letter to his uncle, made the severe old earl adopt too implicitly the idea that his nephew was indulging a spirit of insubordination, and a sense of impatience under authority, most dangerous to the character of a young soldier. A little explanation might have produced a complete agreement in the sentiments of both; but for this, fate allowed neither time nor opportunity; and the old earl was unfortunately induced ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott

... words could have done the preliminary flourish of his whip by means of which a skilful charioteer gets his team under hand without touching them; "but it is very lucky that we always come to agree in the end," she added, more significantly still. It was well to crush insubordination in the bud. Not that she did not share the sentiment of her sisters; but then they were guided like ordinary women by their feelings; whereas Miss Leonora had the rights of property before her, and the ...
— The Perpetual Curate • Mrs [Margaret] Oliphant

... had betrayed unmistakable symptoms of insubordination that morning, quailed under the flowing rebuke. He was a man of muscular strength and meagre intellect; words hit him ...
— The Maids of Paradise • Robert W. (Robert William) Chambers

... league took sides with Alexander. But its most daring act of insubordination was the leading back in triumph of the Milanese to the scene of their former glory. The outer walls of Milan had not been entirely levelled to the ground, and the city arose as if by magic from ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume VI. • Various

... Karl, stepping forward; "and you shall get something besides hard words if you continue in your insubordination." ...
— Debit and Credit - Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag • Gustav Freytag

... would ask, love, that I would not grant," he said tenderly, softly smoothing the golden hair; "but for my daughter's own sake I must compel her obedience. What would become of her if left to the unrestrained indulgence of such a temper and spirit of insubordination as she has shown ...
— Grandmother Elsie • Martha Finley

... her good, mother," he answered; "and I think so still; she is so strongly inclined to impertinence and insubordination that I must do all in my power to train her to proper submission to lawful authority ...
— Elsie at Nantucket • Martha Finley

... the added danger to which the master-of-the-horse had exposed him by using his insubordination to point such a moral to his commander; but the face of the dictator gave no sign that he had even heard the taunting challenge. Calmly he gave his orders for cautious scouting, for breaking camp, and for the army to resume its ...
— The Lion's Brood • Duffield Osborne

... doings, reliable or unreliable, that have been handed down to us, are extremely comical, looking at them from our religious standpoint in these days; for instance, Drake's method of dealing with insubordination, his idea of how treason was to be stamped out, and the trial of Doughty, ...
— Drake, Nelson and Napoleon • Walter Runciman

... that early epoch of the revolution, was very troublesome to lead and to rule. Insubordination appeared to be the rule in its ranks; and hierarchical obedience a very rare exception. My remark may perhaps appear severe: well, Gentlemen, read the contemporary writings, Grimm's Correspondence, for example, and you ...
— Biographies of Distinguished Scientific Men • Francois Arago

... These facts account for all the misleading and false reports which we have hitherto received concerning the expedition. We have been purposely and systematically kept in the dark in regard to it. Left to itself, Arnold's army would have disbanded through insubordination, or perished of starvation and hardship in the wilderness. Comforted and replenished by His Majesty's own subjects, it is now marching with ...
— The Bastonnais - Tale of the American Invasion of Canada in 1775-76 • John Lesperance

... with them, seven had been discharged for drunkenness and insubordination, their share forfeited to the fund for sick and disabled workmen; three had gone out from loss of faith in the plan, accepting Winston's offer to sell; four had died, and thirteen had left from various other causes. So that there had been a much greater degree ...
— Hope Mills - or Between Friend and Sweetheart • Amanda M. Douglas

... along weakened the French operations in Spain, operated in full force during the campaign of 1812. The jealousy of the Marshals, and, still more, their insubordination to King Joseph, prevented that timely concentration of force by which the Emperor won his greatest triumphs. Discordant aims and grudging co-operation marked their operations. Military writers have often been puzzled to account for the rash moves of Marmont, ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose

... command his company; but woe to him if he failed in shouldering a musket or brandishing a bayonet at need. To onlookers this legion, composed at first of but one thousand men, seemed a wild, unruly set; but this was not the case. Drunkenness and insubordination were unknown among the ranks. Woe to a soldier who wronged a civilian. Three were shot for petty theft during the brief Roman campaign. Still, while Garibaldi felt within himself his own superiority to those around, Mazzini, who also felt it, might as well have proposed an Indian chief to command ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 17 • Charles Francis Horne

... in regard to domestics, is, their pride, insubordination, and spirit not conformed to their condition. They are not willing to be called servants; in some places, they claim a seat, at meals, with the family; they imitate a style of dress unbecoming their condition; and their manners and address ...
— A Treatise on Domestic Economy - For the Use of Young Ladies at Home and at School • Catherine Esther Beecher

... habeas corpus, which was promptly granted by the court. General Jackson summarily ordered the arrest of Judge Hall also; and that he and the assemblyman both be deported beyond the military lines, as persons liable to incite insubordination and mutiny within the martial jurisdiction. Intelligence of the treaty of peace at Ghent soon followed, and martial law once again yielded ...
— The Battle of New Orleans • Zachary F. Smith

... President, and Washington could be relied on to appoint a strong Federalist bench. Hence, whatever might happen subsequently, when the new plan first should go into operation, and when the danger from insubordination among the states would probably be most acute, the judiciary would be made to throw its weight in favor of consolidation, and against disintegration, and, if it did so, it was essential that it should be protected against anything ...
— The Theory of Social Revolutions • Brooks Adams

... those instances in which parents are convinced that the church does not furnish a normal and healthy atmosphere for the child's spiritual life? There are churches where the Sunday school is simply a training school in insubordination, confusion, and irreverence, or where religion is so taught as to cultivate superstition and to lead eventually either to a painful intellectual reconstruction or to a barren denial of all faith. There are churches of one type so devoted to the entertainment ...
— Religious Education in the Family • Henry F. Cope

... that they are from this moment under military law, and feeling it to be most essential for the well-being of the service that the strictest order and discipline be preserved by every one under his command, declares it to be his determination to punish, with the utmost severity, any act of insubordination and drunkenness. ...
— The Wreck on the Andamans • Joseph Darvall

... to talk in that way!" said Janetta, addressing him, because at that moment she could not bear to look at Mr. Colwyn. "It was not that that made Miss Polehampton angry. It was what she called insubordination. Miss Adair did not like to see me having meals at a side-table—though I didn't mind one single bit!—and she left her own place and sat by me—and then Miss Polehampton was vexed—and everything followed naturally. It was not just my being friends with Miss Adair that ...
— A True Friend - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant

... when Governor Fletcher of New York was appointed military chief of Connecticut. His attempt, in 1693, to enforce his military authority over Connecticut troops engaged in protecting the northern frontier, resulted in his failure, and in his angry report to the home authorities of Connecticut's insubordination and disloyalty. The colony at great expense sent Major Fitz-John Winthrop to England to answer these charges. He was successful in proving that Connecticut had not exceeded her charter rights in ...
— The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut • M. Louise Greene, Ph. D.

... who thought in continents, dreamed dreams and conceived great ideas. Sir John Macdonald busied himself with what concerned the immediate interests of the hour in which he was then living, and yet Sir John Macdonald was a leader who permitted no insubordination. Sir Georges Cartier, a man not to be named in the same breath with Howe as a statesman, was, nevertheless, a thousand times of more moment and concern with his band of Bleu followers in the House of Commons, than a dozen Howes, and the consequence is that we find for four years ...
— George Brown • John Lewis

... claims now the right to lecture (venia docendi), and I doubt whether they would submit to those restrictions which, in Germany, the Faculty imposes on every Privat-docent. Privat-docents in German Universities have been rejected by the Faculty for incompetence, and silenced for insubordination. I know of no such cases at Oxford during my residence of more than thirty years, nor can I think it likely that they should ...
— Chips From A German Workshop, Vol. V. • F. Max Mueller

... they will, one day), these parts of the population must, for years and years, be ruined. They couldn't get the means of existence, in competition with the English workmen. Their inferior manual dexterity, their lazy habits, perfect unreliability, and habitual insubordination, would ruin them in any such contest, instantly. They are fit for nothing but soldiering—and so far, I believe, the successors in the policy of your friend Napoleon have reason on their side. Eh bien, mon ami, quand vous venez a Paris, nous nous mettrons ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster

... divine precepts are rejected, sin ceases to appear sinful, or righteousness desirable. Those who refuse to submit to the government of God are wholly unfitted to govern themselves. Through their pernicious teachings, the spirit of insubordination is implanted in the hearts of children and youth, who are naturally impatient of control; and a lawless, licentious state of society results. While scoffing at the credulity of those who obey the requirements of God, the multitudes eagerly accept ...
— The Great Controversy Between Christ and Satan • Ellen G. White

... provoking insubordination are meant the writings of the clergy against the proposed marriage law, we declare, without endorsing the language which some may have adopted, that in opposing it the clergy simply did their duty. We write to your Majesty that the law is not Catholic. Now, if the law is not Catholic, ...
— Pius IX. And His Time • The Rev. AEneas MacDonell

... quite angry at the insubordination, and pondered over a way of making himself respected; for to-day he had had the other big boys against him. He dashed over the playground like a circling gull, his body inclined and his arms stretched ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo

... decrete, &c. Que quiconque ecrira, imprimera, publiera, ou repandra toute piece ayant une tendance a produire du mecontentement parmi la population de couleur libre, ou de l'insubordination parmi les esclaves de cet Etat, sera sur conviction du fait, pardevant toute cour de juridiction competante condamne a l'emprisonnement aux travaux forces pour la vie ou a la peine de mort, a la ...
— A Ramble of Six Thousand Miles through the United States of America • S. A. Ferrall

... crusades, who made popes, who controlled the opinions of the age. Abelard was obliged to fly, and sought an asylum amid the rocks and sands of Brittany. The Duke of this wild province gave him the abbey of St. Gildas; but its inmates were ignorant and disorderly, and added insubordination to dissoluteness. They ornamented their convent with the trophies of the chase. They thought more of bears and wild boars and stags than they did of hymns and meditations. The new abbot, now a grave ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume VII • John Lord

... us—all but me. I wouldn't taste it. If I understood the fascination of it, if I could follow the process, if I could sympathize at all with you, then I might appreciate the difficulty and realize the force of the temptation. But I can't! Other vices, take theft or treachery, or cowardice, or insubordination; the seed of hatred suffered to grow till the black Death Flower of Murder be born; covetousness, sins of temper, all these I understand. And in some degree those other temptations to which ...
— Ringfield - A Novel • Susie Frances Harrison

... of their arrival they were assigned to different gangs for different mines, and on the second, to give the newcomers an idea of what insubordination brought about, they were treated to the revolting sight of the punishing ...
— The Boy Nihilist - or, Young America in Russia • Allan Arnold

... the highest office of art, so that, while his drawing was bad in style, his execution scrappy and amateurish and deficient in breadth and subordination, his compositions were often masterly, fine in conception, and harmonious in line, in the pen-and-ink study; but the want of ensemble and the insubordination of the insistent detail generally made his work less imposing when it was on canvas than in the first study. His habit of finishing from corner to corner, without having the whole work broadly laid out before him to guide him ...
— The Autobiography of a Journalist, Volume II • William James Stillman

... and their right to recede from the Union, this able State paper is full and conclusive. The language of the President is that of a father addressing his wayward children, but determined to punish with the utmost severity the first open act of insubordination. As a composition it is splendid, and will take its place in the archives of our country, and will dwell in the memories of our citizens alongside of the farewell address of the 'Father of his Country.' It is not known which of the members of the ...
— Fifth Avenue • Arthur Bartlett Maurice

... things prevailing; and Colonel Palmer became convinced that Scindia was really anxious to return to his own dominions, where his troops, so long deprived of their natural leaders, were in a state of insubordination. If the Nana were but released from his prison at Ahmednuggur, something might be done, he said. He might be able to supply sufficient money to enable Scindia to leave; and the alarm Nana's liberation would give, to Bajee, would compel him to change his ...
— At the Point of the Bayonet - A Tale of the Mahratta War • G. A. Henty

... organization, but is to be attributed as well to the fact that the Labadists migrated in obedience to no high and lofty impulse, but because in their nomadic passage from place to place, under the pressure of religious and civil proscription, due in most cases to acts of insubordination, there seemed no place remaining for them except the shores of the New World. No history of communism can be complete that does not include the experiment entered upon by Jean de Labadie and his followers in the Old World, and by the Labadist colonists in America. It is unfortunate that more ...
— Journal of Jasper Danckaerts, 1679-1680 • Jasper Danckaerts

... more efficient than his father in resisting Canute and the Danes. Edmund was active and fearless, and he soon acquired very extensive power. In fact, he seems to have held the authority of his father in very little respect. One striking instance of this insubordination occurred. Ethelred had taken offense, for some reason or other, at one of the nobles in his realm, and had put him to death, and confiscated his estates; and, in addition to this, with a cruelty characteristic of him, he shut up the unhappy ...
— William the Conqueror - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott

... army welcomed him with respect and consideration, and heard with interest and feeling his account of the misfortunes of those under his leadership, and how they were due to their own ignorance, violence, and insubordination. With the few who survived from the multitude he joined the crusading army, and regained the ardent hopes which had almost vanished ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 6 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality. French. • Charles Morris

... almost up to the present day. In the Reform Club of London, framed and glazed over against Magna Charta, is the American Declaration of Independence, kindred trophies they are of the same essentially English spirit of stubborn insubordination. But the American side of it has gone on unchecked by the complementary aspect of the English character which ...
— An Englishman Looks at the World • H. G. Wells

... soldier. I will do nothing but applaud when I see the germs of civil war; of insubordination, of discord, of disorder, of robbery, and of barbarism that exist here, to the shame of our times and of our ...
— Dona Perfecta • B. Perez Galdos

... had demanded of the President his removal. I do not know whether this is so or not, but I do know of their unconcealed hostility to their chief. At last he placed them in arrest, and preferred charges against them of insubordination and disrespect. This act brought on a crisis in the career of the general commanding. He had asserted from the beginning that the administration was hostile to him; that it had failed in its promises of men and war material; that the President himself had shown duplicity if not treachery ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan

... Kentuckian. Knowing him to be hot-headed and rash, there was great anxiety about him, and one impulsive fellow suggested that they all sign a letter to him expressing their belief in his innocence and their confidence in his cause. This would not do, said the colonel; it was tantamount to insubordination. Individually they were at liberty to write, but it must not be done as a regiment; and so it resulted that only two or three wrote to him, and ...
— Marion's Faith. • Charles King

... thought day after day is intense and worries me, and will soon make me an old man, if not in years. It was the sudden shock of the affair just after receiving the messenger of peace from Ghat. I saw at once that there was a great deal of insubordination in the lesser chieftains, which made travelling in this country very insecure. I remembered the remark of my taleb, "All the Touaricks are the Divan, and each has his own opinion, and carries it out ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson

... dissipation going forward than amours with Stubenmaedchen. I do not hear of any drunkenness, gaming or horse racing; nor do the professors themselves, who ought to be the best judges of what is going on, complain of the insubordination of their pupils. But what I principally admire in this, and indeed in other German Universities, is that there are no distinctions of rank, such as gold tassels, etc., no servile attention paid to sprigs ...
— After Waterloo: Reminiscences of European Travel 1815-1819 • Major W. E Frye

... hardy; your enemies timid and enervated; you were expert in battle, your enemies unskillful; your leaders were experienced, your soldiers warlike and disciplined. Booty excited ardor, bravery was rewarded, cowardice and insubordination punished, and all the springs of the human heart were in action. Thus you vanquished a hundred nations, and of a mass of conquered kingdoms compounded ...
— The Ruins • C. F. [Constantin Francois de] Volney

... 8.—Prisoners of war shall be subject to the laws, regulations, and orders in force in the army of the State into whose hands they have fallen. Any act of insubordination warrants the adoption as regards them of such measures of severity as may be necessary. Escaped prisoners, recaptured before they have succeeded in rejoining their army, or before quitting the territory occupied by the army that captured them, are liable to disciplinary punishment. ...
— Letters To "The Times" Upon War And Neutrality (1881-1920) • Thomas Erskine Holland

... The gloomy taint in Hugh Price's blood was his religion, which was austere and wrathful. He could assume a character of firmness when he chose to do so, and then, despite his silk, lace, and ruffles, he became terrible. One day when Robert had exhibited a strong spirit of insubordination, he took his arm and, sitting on a chair, held him standing before him for a long time, gazing into his face. The little fellow met his glance without quailing, though he could feel his heart within his bosom ...
— The Real America in Romance, Volume 6; A Century Too Soon (A Story - of Bacon's Rebellion) • John R. Musick

... Beaufort expedition, or of the evacuation of Missouri by the Confederate troops, or of the victory recently gained in Kentucky. They do not know that the United States have accomplished the prodigy of putting half a million of men under arms, that acts of insubordination have nearly ceased, that volunteers for three years have everywhere replaced the three months' volunteers. They do not know that the finances of the country are prosperous, and that Mr. Chase, the Secretary of the Treasury, ...
— The Uprising of a Great People • Count Agenor de Gasparin

... slaves went ashore for a time in chained gangs for the sake of the fresh air and the walking exercise; but they spent the greater part of the day chained to the benches, and always slept on them at night. At one place there had been some insubordination amongst the garrison, so the governor paraded the whole of his gaunt, dishevelled, whip-scarred crew through the town, in order to impress the disloyal ones with the power ...
— Sea-Dogs All! - A Tale of Forest and Sea • Tom Bevan

... glance. A frown marred her white brow, her lips were set and her hands clenched. Pity for his physical ills fought a while with pity for her own mental torment. At last she threw back her beautiful head, and the manner of that action was instinct with insubordination. ...
— Love-at-Arms • Raphael Sabatini

... thing was attempted at Santa Inez, but not much difficulty was found in quelling the disturbance. Some signs of insubordination were shown at the neighboring missions, San Luis Obispo in the north, and Santa Barbara, San Buenaventura and San Fernando south of the scene of the trouble; but there was no disturbance after the ...
— Old Mission Stories of California • Charles Franklin Carter

... conscious of power, and equally conscious that forgiveness was impossible. The fleet under Lord St Vincent was on the point of corruption, when it was restored to discipline by the singular firmness of the admiral, who, by exhibiting his determination to punish all insubordination, extinguished this most alarming disaffection, and saved the naval name ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLII. Vol. LV. April, 1844 • Various

... possibly obtain audience. It was in vain that even Burley himself, when he saw the dissension proceed to such ruinous lengths, exerted his stern and deep voice, commanding silence and obedience to discipline. The spirit of insubordination had gone forth, and it seemed as if the exhortation of Habakkuk Mucklewrath had communicated a part of his frenzy to all who heard him. The wiser, or more timid part of the assembly, were already withdrawing ...
— Old Mortality, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott

... change in the course of Teutonic destiny, this breakdown of the Frankish empire, was wrought by two destroying forces, one from within, one from without. From within came the insubordination, the still savage love of combat, the natural turbulence of the race. It is conceivable that, had Charlemagne been followed on the throne by a son and then a grandson as mighty as he and his immediate ancestors, the course of the whole broad earth would have been altered. The Franks would ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 5 • Various

... unlike a pulpit. Precisely at ten the bell rings, the manager steps into his box, brings down his gavel, and the work of the day begins. Quiet prevails. No loud talking is allowed, and no confusion. A bank late is fined two dollars; a party violating the rules, or guilty of insubordination, is fined two dollars and reported to the hank. On repetition, he is expelled the Clearing House. The daily transactions of the Clearing House varies from ninety-eight to one hundred millions. The system is so ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe

... a good deal of sympathy for the girl who was defying her family in receiving the attentions of a man of no antecedents, although, having done the same thing herself, she was the more strongly bound outwardly to discountenance any such insubordination. ...
— The Philistines • Arlo Bates

... below, of the sadness superinduced by the reflection that in these days people were found everywhere, and poetry was thwarted; again of heat, again of thirst, of beauty, and of chill. There was the enunciation of matronly advice; there was the outcry of girlish insubordination; there were sighings for English ale, and namings of the visible ranges of peaks, and indicatings of geographical fingers to show where Switzerland and Piedmont met, and Austria held her grasp on Lombardy; and "to this point we go to-night; yonder to-morrow; farther the ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... day was hurried and unsatisfactory. He was not of himself, and consequently not master of anybody else. When evening came, there were symptoms of insubordination through the whole school. Poor Ralph was sick at heart. He felt that if there had ever been the shadow of an alliance between himself and Bud, it was all "off" now. It seemed to Hartsook that even ...
— The Hoosier Schoolmaster - A Story of Backwoods Life in Indiana • Edward Eggleston

... hand, experience is a severe taskmaster, and it taught me to be somewhat insubordinate in my notions. I fear I must confess that this spirit of insubordination ...
— Sketches From My Life - By The Late Admiral Hobart Pasha • Hobart Pasha

... independence of man's dominion. They point triumphantly, in proof of the policy of their system, to the "spoiled slave," as they term many of those in whose training the opposite course has been pursued. More trouble, vexation, and insubordination, they confidently allege, has been caused by permitting slaves to learn to read, ...
— Autographs for Freedom, Volume 2 (of 2) (1854) • Various

... this intellectual progress must necessarily be the great towns of Ireland; and those great towns have a remarkable and happy characteristic, as contrasted with the cities of Catholic Europe. Abroad, even in Catholic countries, if there be in any part of their territory scepticism and insubordination in religion, cities are the seat of the mischief. Even Rome itself has its insubordinate population, and its concealed free-thinkers; even Belgium, that nobly Catholic country, cannot boast of the religious loyalty of its great towns. Such a calamity is unknown to the Catholicism of Dublin, ...
— The Idea of a University Defined and Illustrated: In Nine - Discourses Delivered to the Catholics of Dublin • John Henry Newman

... That sign of insubordination brought the young sergeant to his feet once more in an instant. His under lip trembled slightly, but he strode in among ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys as Sergeants - or, Handling Their First Real Commands • H. Irving Hancock

... passed. But this way of dealing with the message was far too mild and moderate to satisfy the implacable malice of Howe. In his courtly days he had vehemently called on the King to use the Dutch for the purpose of quelling the insubordination of the English regiments. "None but the Dutch troops," he said, "are to be trusted." He was now not ashamed to draw a parallel between those very Dutch troops and the Popish Kernes whom James had brought over from ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 5 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... insubordination of McClellan's pets, have almost exclusively brought about the disasters at Manassas and at Bull Run, and brought the country to the verge of the grave. But the people are not ...
— Diary from March 4, 1861, to November 12, 1862 • Adam Gurowski

... the following year, the prisoners of Norman Cross began to show a spirit of general insubordination. There had been from time to time individual cases of attempted outbreak, some few successful, but for the most part ending in recapture. No one can wonder that, among so many men, in the full vigour of ...
— The French Prisoners of Norman Cross - A Tale • Arthur Brown

... continually went out of his way to insult Private Rocke, hoping to provoke him to some act of fatal insubordination. ...
— Capitola the Madcap • Emma D. E. N. Southworth

... the domain of the crown, in spite of disaster and temporary losses, until in the sixteenth century France was second to no other country in Europe for power and material resources. United under a single head, and no longer disturbed by the insubordination of the turbulent nobles, lately humbled by the craft of Louis the Eleventh, this kingdom awakened the warm admiration of political judges so shrewd as the diplomatic envoys of the Venetian Republic. "All these provinces," exclaimed one of these agents, in a report made to the Doge and Senate ...
— The Rise of the Hugenots, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Henry Martyn Baird

... journalists the prisoner's life had simply been one long abomination. He had already earned his living by thievery in his childhood at the time when he had roamed the streets, an unhappy, forsaken vagrant; and later on he had proved a bad soldier and a bad worker. He had been punished for insubordination whilst he was in the army, and he had been dismissed from a dozen work-shops because he incessantly disturbed them by his Anarchical propaganda. Later still, he had fled his country and led a suspicious life of adventure ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola

... then; but it was evident to the commander of the Isabel that the "crew" of his vessel was in a lamentable state of insubordination. All his orders were questioned, and the boat was liable to go to the bottom in an emergency, because his commands were not promptly obeyed. He was not a little astonished at Cyd's conduct, for in the boat of Master Archy he was in the habit ...
— Watch and Wait - or The Young Fugitives • Oliver Optic

... Athens, Theseus at once took active measures to quell the insubordination which existed on all sides. He expelled Menesthius from office, rigorously punished the ringleaders of the revolt, and placed himself once more upon the throne. But his hold upon the people was gone. His former services were ...
— Myths and Legends of Ancient Greece and Rome • E.M. Berens

... interference infuriated Huerta. For the moment he had to content himself with formulating a long string of serious charges against Villa, ranging from military insubordination to burglary, highway robbery, and rape. It was even given out at headquarters that Villa had struck his ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 21 - The Recent Days (1910-1914) • Charles F. Horne, Editor

... Ishmael had foreseen, that the overloaded hive would swarm, and leave him saddled with the difficulties of a young and helpless brood, unsupported by the exertions of those, whom he had already brought to a state of maturity. The spirit of insubordination, which emanated from the unfortunate Asa, had spread among his juniors; and the squatter had been made painfully to remember the time when, in the wantonness of his youth and vigour, he had, reversing the order of the brutes, cast off his own aged and ...
— The Prairie • J. Fenimore Cooper

... Public Schools. When they become wives and mothers, they have none of the habits or character necessary to govern their household and to train their children properly. Hence arise that growing neglect or laxity of family discipline; that insubordination, that lawlessness, and precocious depravity of Young America; that almost total lack of filial reverence and obedience with the children of this generation. Exceptions there happily are; but the number of children that grow up without any proper ...
— Public School Education • Michael Mueller

... Brittany. Charles had a standing quarrel with his son Louis, who early showed his power to inspire dread, but gave no signs of the policy which he triumphantly pursued, after he became king, of putting down feudal insubordination. His young wife Margaret, daughter of James I. of Scotland, was twelve years old when he, a boy of thirteen, was married to her. He aroused such terror and aversion in her mind that she died at twenty-one of a broken heart. Louis—to whom, much to his disgust, ...
— Outline of Universal History • George Park Fisher

... he is tried in the lawcourt, and if he is found guilty the people decide what punishment or fine shall be inflicted on him; but if he is acquitted he resumes his office. The Generals have full power, when on active service, to arrest any one for insubordination, or to cashier him publicly, or to inflict a fine; the latter ...
— The Athenian Constitution • Aristotle

... scarcely a time for such inactive musing, when affairs of the deepest moment required the ruler's decision; for within that very hour Hutchinson had received intelligence of the arrival of a British fleet bringing three regiments from Halifax to overawe the insubordination of the people. These troops awaited his permission to occupy the fortress of Castle William and the town itself, yet, instead of affixing his signature to an official order, there sat the lieutenant-governor so carefully scrutinizing the black waste ...
— Twice Told Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... the next morning. With threatening tones, the principal ordered the young men to name him who had guided them to so unheard-of a deed, who had misled them into disobedience and insubordination. But all were still; none wished to be a traitor, not even when the principal promised to all full pardon, full impunity, if they would but name the instigator ...
— The Empress Josephine • Louise Muhlbach

... compactly. "It's just the malice of being inferior against the man in control. It's just the spirit of insubordination and boredom with duty. This trouble's as old as ...
— Soul of a Bishop • H. G. Wells

... resistance from this quarter of their dominions, than from every other. [80] Navagiero, the Venetian ambassador to Spain, early in the sixteenth century, although a republican himself, was so struck with what he deemed the insubordination of the Barcelonians, that he asserts, "The inhabitants have so many privileges, that the king scarcely retains any authority over them; their liberty," he adds, "should rather go by the name of license." [81] One example among many, may be given, of the tenacity ...
— History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella V1 • William H. Prescott

... muskets, ten pieces of cannon, and a considerable amount of ammunition fell into the hands of the victors. This success left it open to the Vendeans either to march against Leigonyer—the remnant of whose army was in a state of insubordination at Doug, and could have offered no opposition, but must have retreated to Saumur—or to clear the country ...
— No Surrender! - A Tale of the Rising in La Vendee • G. A. Henty

... to be delegated to pupils. Gardiner Lyceum. Its government. The trial. Real republican government impracticable in schools. Delegated power. Experiment with the writing books. Quarrel about the nail. Offices for pupils. Cautions. Danger of insubordination. New plans to ...
— The Teacher - Or, Moral Influences Employed in the Instruction and - Government of the Young • Jacob Abbott

... distinguished record into account; I am overlooking your insubordination and the folly of your reasoning. Perhaps your feeling about Haldgren does you credit; but Haldgren is dead. Now I am giving you another chance: I order you to come forward and receive this honor, which is an honor to the ...
— The Finding of Haldgren • Charles Willard Diffin

... turning of startled heads, a hasty thrusting back of chairs, the gathering rose in involuntary deference. That is, five rose as one; and, after a moment during which his spirit of insubordination faltered and failed, the Englishman got awkwardly to his feet and stood abashed ...
— Red Masquerade • Louis Joseph Vance

... sincerity that was afterwards accepted and admired from end to end of Utah, he was determined to vindicate the essential supremacy of the civil law over the ecclesiastical domination in the territory; and every act of insubordination against that law was resented and punished by him, unforgivingly. He promptly sentenced me to three months in the County jail and a fine ...
— Under the Prophet in Utah - The National Menace of a Political Priestcraft • Frank J. Cannon and Harvey J. O'Higgins

... which becomes a second nature to the regular soldier, disgust and discontent might have taken the place of high spirit and good-will. But at the same time wilful misbehaviour was severely checked. Neglect of duty and insubordination were crimes which Jackson never forgave, and deliberate disobedience was in his eyes as unmanly an offence as cowardice. He knew when to be firm as well as when to relax, and it was not only in the administration of discipline that he showed his tact. He was the most patient of instructors. So ...
— Stonewall Jackson And The American Civil War • G. F. R. Henderson

... front, but it was not always carefully tended. Every village has a chief or headman, who assigns each man his location and watches over the general good of his people. When Cossacks are demanded for government service the headman makes the selection, and all cases of insubordination or ...
— Overland through Asia; Pictures of Siberian, Chinese, and Tartar - Life • Thomas Wallace Knox

... that, sir, I can't say. All I learned was that it was the result of some faculty squabble in one of the science departments; the grounds for the dismissal were insubordination ...
— Ministry of Disturbance • Henry Beam Piper

... praises bestowed upon our government. Beware how you forfeit this exalted character. Beware how you give a fatal sanction, in this infant period of our Republic, scarcely yet twoscore years old, to military insubordination. Remember that Greece had her Alexander, Rome her Caesar, England her Cromwell, France her Bonaparte, and that if we would escape the rock on which they split we must ...
— Henry Clay's Remarks in House and Senate • Henry Clay

... upon this came forward, and in the name of all the others said they would not go away until they knew what orders Cavalier was about to give the troops, that they might consult among themselves whether they should obey them or not. This insubordination was too much ...
— Massacres Of The South (1551-1815) - Celebrated Crimes • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... limb of the moon appear to these different parties?—I said you just let that thing alone; it's plenty time to get in a sweat about it when it happens; as like as not it ain't going to do any harm, anyway. His reception of these instructions bordered on insubordination, insomuch that I felt obliged to take his number and report him. I found the astronomer of the University gadding around after comets and other such odds and ends—tramps and derelicts of the skies. I told him pretty ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine

... not have surprised any fair-minded person that many Southern people for a time clung to the accustomed idea that the landowner must also own the black man tilling his land, and that any assertion of freedom of action on the part of that black man was insubordination equivalent to criminal revolt, and any dissent by the black man from the employer's opinion or taste intolerable insolence. Nor should it be forgotten that the urgent necessity of negro labor for that summer's crop could hardly fail to sharpen ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. 31, No. 1, May 1908 • Various

... our men have died; the rest are in a state of insubordination. We are on a short allowance of water, and we fear that our provisions will not hold out. Our frail punt has been so damaged by a gale that we ...
— The Cruise of the Mary Rose - Here and There in the Pacific • William H. G. Kingston

... to 20,000,000 people having performed the high and important function of electing their Chief Magistrate for the term of four years without the commission of any acts of violence or the manifestation of a spirit of insubordination to the laws. The great and inestimable right of suffrage has been exercised by all who were invested with it under the laws of the different States in a spirit dictated alone by a desire, in the selection of the agent, to advance the interests of the country and to place beyond jeopardy ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various

... everybody; Levett hates Desmoulins, and does not love Williams; Desmoulins hates them both; Poll (Miss Carmichael) loves none of them." Frank Barker complained of Miss Williams's authority, and Miss Williams of Frank's insubordination. Intruders who had taken refuge under his roof, brought their children there in his absence, and grumbled if their dinners were ill-dressed. The old man bore it all, relieving himself by an occasional growl, but reproaching ...
— Samuel Johnson • Leslie Stephen

... shall send for you again. If then you still continue to defy me I will take measures to have you, Miss Harlowe, removed from your charge of Harlowe House as being unfit for the responsibility, while you, Miss Brent, will be expelled from Overton College for disobedience and insubordination. That will do for this morning." Miss Wharton dismissed them with ...
— Grace Harlowe's Problem • Jessie Graham Flower

... who would have murdered one unarmed Indian but who quailed before his single hand. "If any man thinks I am a coward," said he, "let him test it." "Lincoln," was the reply, "you are larger and heavier than any of us." "That you can guard against," responded the captain. "Choose your weapons!" The insubordination ended, and the word "coward" was never associated with Lincoln's name again. He afterward said that at this time he felt that his life and character were both at stake, and would probably have been lost had he not at the supreme moment forgotten the officer and asserted the man. His ...
— The Every-day Life of Abraham Lincoln • Francis Fisher Browne

... and rioting about—indeed, twenty-two feet of this great work is all a deep and happy holiday serenity and Sunday-school procession, and then we come suddenly upon eleven and one-half feet of turmoil and racket and insubordination. This latter state of things is not an accident, it has its purpose. But for it, one would linger upon the Pope and the Doge, thinking them to be the motive and supreme feature of the picture; whereas one is drawn along, almost unconsciously, ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... that the story might "go no further" she interpreted with the elasticity usually accorded to such requests; and proceeded, at the first opportunity, to retail the whole shocking occurrence to her pupil as an example of the ingratitude and insubordination of the common people. For Theresa was nothing if not conservative and aristocratic. From such august anachronisms as the divine right of kings and the Stuart succession, down to humble bobbing of curtseys and pulling of forelocks in to-day's village street, ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet

... do not think that aggressions on property, and crime in general, have increased since emancipation, but rather decreased. They appear to be more frequent, because they are made more public. During slavery, all petty thefts, insubordination, insolence, neglect of work, and so forth, were punished summarily on the estate, by order of the manager, and not even so much as the rumor of them ever reached beyond the confines of the property. Now all offences, whether great or trifling, are to be taken cognizance ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society

... had had a dispute with Chouteau that morning, who, on being ordered to go for firewood, had insolently refused, alleging that it was not his turn. Now that everything was so rapidly going to the dogs, insubordination among the men had increased to such a point that those in authority no longer ventured to reprimand them, and Jean, with his sober good sense and pacific disposition, saw that if he would preserve his influence with his squad ...
— The Downfall • Emile Zola

... and of all necessaries still continued in the American camp, and the discontent of the troops, gradually increasing, was matured into a dangerous spirit of insubordination. The men, indeed, bore incredible hardships and privations with unexampled fortitude and patience, but the army was in a state of constant fluctuation; it was composed, in a great measure, of militia ...
— Life And Times Of Washington, Volume 2 • John Frederick Schroeder and Benson John Lossing

... house was at an end if a flagrant act of insubordination like this was to be allowed to pass unnoticed. Besides, if allowed to spread, other fellows would go over to the enemy, and the "moral" effect of the strike would be at ...
— The Cock-House at Fellsgarth • Talbot Baines Reed

... people to work it; thirdly, the expense of supporting the people, with the contingencies of sickness and death; fourthly, the uncertainty of climate and contingencies of frost, and a backward season and consequent late or unmatured crop; fifthly, insubordination on the part of the slaves, which is not improbable at any time; sixthly, suspension of friendly relations between the United States and Great Britain; and lastly, a rupture between the American States themselves, which I think no one will be disposed now to consider impossible. ...
— Official Report of the Niger Valley Exploring Party • Martin Robinson Delany

... constructed, admits of the driver having a certain amount of control over his horse; he is well above the animal, and can get a good purchase to pull him up from, when the acceleration is becoming dangerous, or there is a tendency to the grosser insubordination of a "kicking match." Not so in a pony-carriage: low down upon the ground, even under their very heels, you are completely at the mercy of your team; and the facility of egress in the event of a runaway only ...
— Kate Coventry - An Autobiography • G. J. Whyte-Melville

... disobedience. The insubordination and insolence of Bouquet angered him; and darting forward, he collared his rebellious subordinate, and flung him backward down ...
— The Boy Life of Napoleon - Afterwards Emperor Of The French • Eugenie Foa

... de Richelieu, aims only at hindering the completion of her abbeys on his lands; she cannot even manage her Sisterhood, since we find her wandering in search of a protector or an assistant; they are torn by divisions, and their insubordination is such that at length she is compelled to return in hot haste, and, with many tears, expel the contumacious sisters ...
— The Cathedral • Joris-Karl Huysmans



Words linked to "Insubordination" :   defiance, contumacy, disobedience, resistance, noncompliance, subordination



Copyright © 2024 e-Free Translation.com