"Nonchalance" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... well say they were heavy, my dear fellow—five and eight hundred dollars a week!" says the Don, with a nonchalance that would win the admiration of a ...
— The Humors of Falconbridge - A Collection of Humorous and Every Day Scenes • Jonathan F. Kelley
... usually odd it is true, and I certainly did not pay much attention to it; but that sort of obscure intention, which seemed to lurk in his nonchalance like a wary old carp in a pond, had never before come so near the surface. He had distinctly aroused my expectations. I would have been unable to say what it was I expected, but at all events I did not expect the absurd developments he sprung upon me no later than the break ...
— Falk • Joseph Conrad
... again?" queried Winsome, with careless nonchalance, swinging her bonnet by its strings. "Well, you can come back and kiss grannie's hand some other day. You are something ...
— The Lilac Sunbonnet • S.R. Crockett
... not lose his smile. He sat down. He nodded across the room to Harlan with as much nonchalance as though he had been seeing ...
— The Ramrodders - A Novel • Holman Day
... this Arthur? Had a few weeks' work and a close connection with the really serious things of life made this change in him? Her face beamed at the thought, which seeing, but not understanding what underlay this evidence of joy, he bent and kissed her, saying with some of his old nonchalance: ...
— Masterpieces of Mystery In Four Volumes - Detective Stories • Various
... with a sort of nonchalance, which Corny did not at all like. But Mademoiselle, who was summoned to Corny's private council, gave it as her opinion, that M. de Connal was already quite in love—quite as much as a French husband ever was. She was glad that her brother-in-law ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. IX - [Contents: Harrington; Thoughts on Bores; Ormond] • Maria Edgeworth
... in the military activities which marked the winning of Mexican Independence from Spain in the eighteen-twenties, and also in the incessant Indian wars. He was a fighter by necessity, but also by choice. They shed blood with grace and nonchalance in those days, and the Delcasars were always known as ...
— The Blood of the Conquerors • Harvey Fergusson
... hold on, as I believe it is called, without assistance. Miss E., however, who was more observant, hooked her parasol into one of the ropes, which she subsequently caught. We were now to be taught a new lesson—the extreme nonchalance with which the officers of a Government steamer treat the passengers who have the misfortune to choose these boats instead of making the voyage on board merchant vessels. Some minutes elapsed before any notice was taken of us, or any assistance afforded in getting up our baggage; ...
— Notes of an Overland Journey Through France and Egypt to Bombay • Miss Emma Roberts
... we find already outlined with surprising definiteness, and at the same time with an almost childlike naivete, a careless, mirth-provoking nonchalance, in the Carmina Vagorum. They remind us of the Italian lyrics which Lorenzo de' Medici and Poliziano wrote for the Florentine populace; and though in form and artistic intention they differ from the Latin verse ...
— Wine, Women, and Song - Mediaeval Latin Students' songs; Now first translated into English verse • Various
... the greatest habitude, to discover the smallest connexion between the sexes here. No familiarity, but under the veil of friendship, is permitted, and love's dictionary is as much prohibited, as at first sight one should think his ritual was. All you hear, and that pronounced with nonchalance, is, that Monsieur un tel has had Madame un telle. The Duc de Nivernois has parts, and writes at the top of the mediocre, but, as Madame Geoffrin says, is manqu'e par tout; guerrier manqu'e, ambassadeur manqu'e, homme d'affaires manqu'e and auteur manqu'e—no, he is not homme ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole Volume 3 • Horace Walpole
... man who is expressing his American temperament best in his business—is the one who is expressing in it the most courage for himself and for others and for his government. He has big beliefs every few minutes a day, and he acts on them with nonchalance. ...
— Crowds - A Moving-Picture of Democracy • Gerald Stanley Lee
... avocations, and to join Hester and Rachel in the garden for social intercourse. The Gresleys liked Rachel. Listeners are generally liked. Perhaps also her gentle, unassuming manner was not an unpleasant change after the familiar nonchalance of the Pratts. ...
— Red Pottage • Mary Cholmondeley
... stopped, which he need not have done, seeing that Macartney with complete nonchalance continued ...
— Love and Lucy • Maurice Henry Hewlett
... listened to Tesla and looked at the cafe. The inn was filled with people—elaborately dressed women and shiningly groomed men—grouped about white-linened, silver-laden tables; an ornamental grimacing little multitude come to the cafe as to some grave rite, moving to the tables with an unctious nonchalance. Women dressed in effulgent silks, their flesh gleaming among the spaces of exotic plumage, gleaming through the flares of luxurious satin distortions. A company that gestured, grimaced with the charm of lustful marionettes. Flesh reduced to secrecy. Lust, dream in hiding. From the ...
— Erik Dorn • Ben Hecht
... traversing the folds of my drab merino pelisse, and now lingering on the plain trimming of my cottage bonnet. Young ladies have a remarkable way of letting you know that they think you a "quiz" without actually saying the words. A certain superciliousness of look, coolness of manner, nonchalance of tone, express fully their sentiments on the point, without committing them by any positive rudeness in word ...
— Jane Eyre - an Autobiography • Charlotte Bronte
... my place of concealment, I became conscious of the half-suppressed chirping of a woodpecker, and, to my intense joy, a moment later a Williamson's sapsucker swung to a pine bole a little below me and began pecking leisurely and with assumed nonchalance for grubs in the fissures of the bark. From my hiding-place behind some bushes I kept my eye on the handsome creature. An artist might well covet the privilege of painting this elegant bird as he scales the wall of a pine tree. Presently ...
— Birds of the Rockies • Leander Sylvester Keyser
... case, and the particular character of the most suspicious facts presented by the plaintiff; he was severe upon Mr. Clapp, showing a shrewd and thorough knowledge of the man, and the legal species to which he belonged. The Longbridge lawyer put on an increase of vulgar nonchalance for the occasion, but he was unable to conceal entirely his uneasiness under the sharp and well-aimed hits of one, so much his superior in standing and real ability. Mr. Grant dwelt particularly upon the suspicious appearance of the facts connected with ...
— Elinor Wyllys - Vol. I • Susan Fenimore Cooper
... was ready, he drew some arabesque forms with his pencil on the board. He then took an exquisite little saw he had invented for this work, and fell upon the board with a rapidity that, contrasted with his previous nonchalance, looked like fury. But he was one of your fast workmen. The lithe saw seemed to twist in his hand like a serpent, and in a very short time he had turned four feet of the board into open-work. He finished the edges off with his cutting tools, and ...
— Put Yourself in His Place • Charles Reade
... Could a man be happy long away from a hobby so entrancing, a toy so intricate and marvelous, a setting so splendid? Is it strange that, absorbed in that wondrous satisfying hobby, he should make love with the nonchalance of an animal? At which point I seem to have come dangerously near to the topic of the singular position of the American woman, about ...
— Your United States - Impressions of a first visit • Arnold Bennett
... arrived when he was shown upstairs, even though Laurie himself was late. (This was partly deliberate. He thought it best to show a little nonchalance.) There was only a young clergyman in the room with the ladies; and the two ...
— The Necromancers • Robert Hugh Benson
... ship. Carlos and Castro had entered with a tall, immobile, gold-spectacled Spaniard, dressed all in white, and with a certain air of noticing and attentive deference, bowing a little as he entered the cabin in earnest conference with Tomas Castro. Carlos had preceded them with a certain nonchalance, and the Spaniard—it was the Senor Ramon, the merchant I had heard of—regarded him as if with interested curiosity. With Tomas he seemed already familiar. He stood in the doorway, against the strong light, ...
— Romance • Joseph Conrad and F.M. Hueffer
... stood before him, I leaning against the wall of the house with an air of studied nonchalance mingled with mild interest, at least that is what I meant to do, and Marut smiling sweetly and staring at the heavens. Whilst I was wondering what exact portion of my frame was destined to become acquainted with that spear, of a sudden Simba gave it up. ...
— The Ivory Child • H. Rider Haggard
... et critique francais, nous a raconte dans un de ses livres l'anecdote suivante, qui donne une impression frappante de l'independance et de la nonchalance d'un hotelier espagnol. La scene se ...
— French Conversation and Composition • Harry Vincent Wann
... of the gaol leant forward and repeated the order to a warder, who had already heard it perfectly and dived below, apparently through the solid floor of the court. The next moment Mr. Hall appeared, with easy nonchalance, and leant forward in a graceful attitude on the bar of the dock, while the clerk of arraigns proceeded to acquaint him with the crime of ...
— The Queen Against Owen • Allen Upward
... his surprise, Prince Michael did not hesitate an instant in obeying that imperative summons. An expression of annoyance flitted across his florid features when he found Poluski standing near the trembling waiter; but he tackled the situation with nonchalance. ...
— A Son of the Immortals • Louis Tracy
... slight whiteness about his high cheek-bones. In his valiant khaki he has more than any of us the air of being on the eve. He is visibly bracing himself to a stupendous effort. He smokes a cigarette with ostentatious nonchalance. We all think we know these symptoms. We turn our eyes away, considerately, from Mr. Grierson. Which of us can say that when our turn comes the thought of danger will not ...
— A Journal of Impressions in Belgium • May Sinclair
... morning. He darted little quick questioning glances at his brother and at his sons, but whatever complaint or sarcasm may have trembled upon his lips, was effectually stifled by De St. Quentin's ministrations. With the nonchalance born of long custom, the official covered the royal chin with soap, drew the razor swiftly round it, and sponged over the surface with spirits of wine. A nobleman then helped to draw on the king's black velvet haut-de-chausses, a second assisted in arranging them, while a third drew the night-gown ...
— The Refugees • Arthur Conan Doyle
... delicately to sweep the hearth with the brass-handled brush proper to it, remarked with an obvious affectation of nonchalance— ...
— The Price of Love • Arnold Bennett
... of driving hard bargains is a good thing for teaching a man to suppress his feelings and feign indifference, yet the civil nonchalance with which Meadows, on his return from Newborough, walked into the Merton's parlor cost him ...
— It Is Never Too Late to Mend • Charles Reade
... "Nothing much." Nonchalance sat well upon the Kid. "Just a case of raising hell and putting a chunk under. See that bend down there? That's where she'll jam millions of tons of ice. Then she'll jam in the bends up above, millions of tons. ...
— The God of His Fathers • Jack London
... pulled out an enormous double-case silver watch with an air of perfect nonchalance, and awaited the result. For a few seconds the gypsy was overwhelmed by the lad's coolness; then he burst into a gruff laugh and rushed at him. He might as well have run at a squirrel. The boy sprang ...
— Freaks on the Fells - Three Months' Rustication • R.M. Ballantyne
... care of you properly and gave you everything that you wanted?" he said easily, stooping to a little table to light a cigarette. The coolness of his words and manner were like a dash of cold water. She had been prepared for anything but this calm nonchalance in a situation that was intolerable. His tone conveyed the perfunctory regret of a host for an unavoidable absence. Her fear gave way to rage, her body stiffened, ...
— The Sheik - A Novel • E. M. Hull
... learned to raise chickens, it is a hard and slow struggle to get any killed. I say in an off-hand manner, with assumed nonchalance: "Ellen, I want Tom to kill a rooster at once for tomorrow's dinner, and I have an order from a friend for four more, so he must select five to-night." Then begins the trouble. "Oh," pleads Ellen, "don't kill dear Dick! ...
— Adopting An Abandoned Farm • Kate Sanborn
... camp for a few days, set out homeward, riding on a camel through the Berber desert to Korosko, a distance of five hundred miles. After an absence of exactly four months he turned up for duty at the Cavalry Barracks, Windsor, with as much nonchalance as if he had been for a trip to the United States in ...
— Faces and Places • Henry William Lucy
... presumptuous for a mere idler, an individual whose enterprise and industry have been sapped by the insidious nonchalance of the Beachcomber, to tell of practical details of cultural pursuits—the enthusiasm, the disappointments, the glowing anticipations, the realisation of inflexible facts, the plain emphatic truths which others have reason to know ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield
... incommoding yourself as to stand up?" or "Pray step into the next room, madam, where the wife of one of our staff will attend you," or "Pray allow me to slip this penknife of mine into the lining of your coat" (after which he would extract thence shawls and towels with as much nonchalance as he would have done from his own travelling-trunk). Even his superiors acknowledged him to be a devil at the job, rather than a human being, so perfect was his instinct for looking into cart-wheels, carriage-poles, horses' ...
— Dead Souls • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... her jest and explained, much as he had done to me, his reasons for wishing to keep his visit to Wellingsford a secret. Meanwhile Marigold had brought in decanters and syphons. Betty attended to Boyce's needs with a provoking air of nonchalance. If a notorious German imbrued in the blood of babes had chanced to be in her hospital, she would have given him his medicine with just the same air. Although no one could have specified a lack of courtesy towards a guest—for ...
— The Red Planet • William J. Locke
... he, with true Eastern nonchalance where the opposite sex was concerned. "Her head and arms ache now that her bonds are removed. If Allah wills it, she should revive presently. And we cannot remain here. Whether she live or die let us ...
— The Wheel O' Fortune • Louis Tracy
... morning and afternoon he remained in his apartments. Breakfast over, the Rhamdas told him his part in certain ceremonies, such as need not be detailed here. They were very solicitous as to his food and comfort, and as to his feelings and anticipations. His nonchalance pleased them greatly. Afterward he had a bath ...
— The Blind Spot • Austin Hall and Homer Eon Flint
... entirely of farmers, with their wives, sons, and daughters, opened a door to admit us. Mrs. Petulengro, however, appeared to feel not the least embarrassment, but tripped along the aisle with the greatest nonchalance. We passed under the pulpit, in which stood the clergyman in his white surplice, and reached the middle of the church, where we were confronted by the sexton dressed in long blue coat, and holding in his hand a wand. ...
— The Romany Rye • George Borrow
... to be said. Deep as was my chagrin, I held my tongue as to my opinion of the way affairs had been managed, and parted with the young detective with apparent nonchalance. ...
— The House by the Lock • C. N. Williamson
... once lost their tonic force in the woolly cushion of her apathy. If she continued to live, it was by inertia; to cease from life would have required an effort. She did not regret the vocation which she had abandoned; she felt no curiosity about the fortunes of the newspaper. A tragic nonchalance held her. ...
— Hilda Lessways • Arnold Bennett
... as if the Nevada were on a holiday trip within the Golden Gate. At eight in the evening we could hear each other speak, and a little later, through the great masses of hissing drift we discerned black water. At nine Captain Blethen appeared, smoking a cigar with nonchalance, and told us that the hurricane had nearly boxed the compass, and had been the most severe he had known for seventeen years. This grand old man, nearly the oldest captain in the Pacific, won our respect and confidence from the first, and his quiet and masterly handling ...
— The Hawaiian Archipelago • Isabella L. Bird
... very small, but she concealed her embarrassment beneath an excessive nonchalance. "Why, in Boston don't people use their banisters? We find them ...
— Kildares of Storm • Eleanor Mercein Kelly
... protested with a nonchalance that rang a little flat. "You must be awfully tired. Hadn't we better put ...
— The Real Adventure • Henry Kitchell Webster
... in speaking of the waiting crowds, said, "I doubt if they would take such trouble to get into paradise." The young and lovely debutante accepted the homage of the time, which then as now expressed itself in bouquets, letters, and jewels, without number, with as much nonchalance as if she had been a stage goddess ...
— Great Singers, First Series - Faustina Bordoni To Henrietta Sontag • George T. Ferris
... Josephine did not finish her sentence. The words she uttered were, however, so full of poignant surprise and disappointment that I felt constrained to inquire with a guilty attempt at nonchalance: ...
— The Opinions of a Philosopher • Robert Grant
... which to spread its picnic lunches and bring the glow of simple, friendly intercourse into the romantic lights of the poetic, historic, or tragic past. There were splendid Catholic processions and ceremonials that seemed organized as a part of the stage scenery that ensconced itself, also, with the nonchalance of easy possession, in the vast salons of historic palaces where tapestried walls and richly painted ceilings, arched high overhead, with statues dimly seen in niches here and there, and the bust of some crowned Antoninus, or radiant Juno, gleaming from a shadowy corner, all made up the mise-en-scene ...
— Italy, the Magic Land • Lilian Whiting
... realising his appalling error endeavoured to pass it off by humming the Jewel Song from Faust. For a moment his nonchalance amazed everyone then as though a veil had been suddenly snatched from their eyes they gave a great cry: 'This is Spout! What Humour! What ...
— Terribly Intimate Portraits • Noel Coward
... unnatural dullness of the eyes about him: they were ordinarily clear eyes, of an ordinary gray. His very age was moderate: a putative thirty-six, not more. ("Not less," I would have said in those days.) He assumed no air of nonchalance. He did not deal out the cards as though they bored him, but he had no look of grim concentration. I noticed that the removal of his cigar from his mouth made never the least difference to his face, for he kept his lips pursed out as steadily as ever when he was not smoking. And this ...
— James Pethel • Max Beerbohm
... this course by the insolent nonchalance of the two young men. They weren't paying any more attention to him than they were to the inanimate sticks of furniture ...
— Officer 666 • Barton W. Currie
... Wingrave alone remained unaffected. He was carefully and correctly dressed in clothes borrowed from his new tailor, and he showed not the slightest signs of strangeness or gaucherie amongst his unfamiliar surroundings. He looked about him always, with the cold, easy nonchalance of the man of the world. Of being recognized he had not the slightest fear. His frame and bearing, and the brightness of his deep, strong eyes, still belonged to early middle age, but his face itself, worn and hardened, was the face of an elderly ...
— The Malefactor • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... from a blanket heaved by the husky athletes. "Why seek ye to question the ways of T. Haviland Hicks, Jr.? You have your Prodigious Prodigy—your smashing full-back is distributing the 'Varsity over the scenery with charming nonchalance that promises dire catastrophe for other teams, once he makes the ...
— T. Haviland Hicks Senior • J. Raymond Elderdice
... and receives a salutation from the actress haughty and cold enough to check the forwardest; puts on the air of languid nonchalance which is considered (or was before the little experiences of the Crimea) fit and proper for young gentlemen of rank and fashion. So he sits down, and feasts his foolish eyes upon his idol, hoping for a few ...
— Two Years Ago, Volume I • Charles Kingsley
... the event, he recorded it with a vividness well set off by his own nonchalance. Again and again he was to repeat this triumph of depicting the wild, and the wild in a condition of activity and ...
— George Borrow - The Man and His Books • Edward Thomas
... the enterprise to myself, and clambered up the steep bank with a quicker pulse than when I first levelled a rifle at a Highland deer. My intended victims might have prided themselves on their superior nonchalance; and, indeed, as I approached them, there seemed to be a sneer on their ghastly mouths and winking eyes. Slowly they rose, one after the other, and waddled to the water, all but one, the most gallant or most ...
— The Book of Enterprise and Adventure - Being an Excitement to Reading. For Young People. A New and Condensed Edition. • Anonymous
... mate, a low-caste Hindoo; and the principal thinks it unnecessary to respond to the question a second time. Now, what is to be done? What do they mean? Have they fowl and hoecake? Have they not fowl and hoecake? Here, to be sure, is a very bivium of perplexities. The lady at last, with quiet nonchalance, demands the production of a gharib-parwar and a dharm-antar, thus unconsciously ordering a "cherisher of the poor" and an "incarnation of justice," the pretty appellations used to designate herself. "Queer things for breakfast!" Khudabakhsh and ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 15, - No. 87, March, 1875 • Various
... allowed this story to pass uncontradicted. Perhaps a few believed it; perhaps they had foreseen the future. It may have been that they knew that Millicent Chyne, surrounded by the halo of whatever story she might invent, would be treated with a certain careless nonchalance by the older men, with a respectful avoidance by the younger. Truly women have the deepest punishment for their sins here on earth; for sooner or later the time will come—after the brilliancy of the first triumph, after the less pure satisfaction ...
— With Edged Tools • Henry Seton Merriman
... and practised hand. Instinctively, furthermore, she would seek to extract from such a situation all the fun it promised. Taken off her guard, for the span of ten heart-beats she sat up straight and stared; but with the eleventh her attitude relaxed. She had regained her outward nonchalance, and resolved ...
— My Friend Prospero • Henry Harland
... tavern, it was with an effort he suppressed his chagrin and vexation and assumed that air of nonchalance which became him well. Smilingly he bade Susan and the other occupants of the chariot farewell, shook Barnes by the hand, and turned to the ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham
... short distance behind these two personages, rode a man who appeared by his dress and deportment to be their attendant. He sat with perfect nonchalance on a stout Andalusian horse, but by the looks of suspicious alertness, which he now and then cast around, it might be inferred that this apparent ease was not in strict unison with his inward feelings. At the moment of which we speak, he was singing ...
— Gomez Arias - The Moors of the Alpujarras, A Spanish Historical Romance. • Joaquin Telesforo de Trueba y Cosio
... many years ago. In certain respects travellers fare well. They may feast like Lucullus on fresh trout and on the dainty aniseed cakes which are a local speciality. But hygienic arrangements were almost prehistoric, and although politeness itself, mine host and hostess showed strange nonchalance towards their guests. Thus, when ringing and ringing again for our tea and bread and butter between seven and eight o'clock, the chamber—not maid, but man—informed us that Madame had gone to mass, and everything was locked up till ...
— In the Heart of the Vosges - And Other Sketches by a "Devious Traveller" • Matilda Betham-Edwards
... Thus, by this nonchalance, they conspired to hide from themselves the seriousness of that which had passed between them. The grotesque, pretentious little apartment was mysteriously humanised; it was no longer the reception-room of a furnished flat by chance hired for a month; ...
— The Pretty Lady • Arnold E. Bennett
... It was, in the country, a word of opprobrium, but at Beaumanoir it was laughed at with true Gallic nonchalance. Indeed, to show their scorn of public opinion, the Grand Company had lately launched a new ship upon the Great Lakes to carry on the fur trade, and had appropriately and mockingly named her, ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... nature, against the circumstances which had conspired to place her in this position; against the man for his apparent lack of interest in her welfare, moved her, though she might have left the man out of it, for certainly he could not be held responsible. Yet his nonchalance, his serenity—something about him—irritated her. Didn't he know she was getting wet? Why didn't he offer her shelter? It did not occur to her that perhaps he knew of no shelter. But while her indignation over his inaction grew she saw that he was doing ...
— The Trail to Yesterday • Charles Alden Seltzer
... equipages were there, at the other end of the shaded avenue, and, following in their wake, were those of the court. Olympia cast aside her nonchalance, and raised her head that she might be seen. The crisis had come! She was now to quaff the intoxicating drink of success, or drain the poisoned chalice ...
— Prince Eugene and His Times • L. Muhlbach
... to this abrupt anticlimax so suddenly that I was taken aback. The man was watching me intently for all his apparent nonchalance, and I felt more than ever the necessity for being on my guard. If I could only fathom how much he knew. Of two things I felt fairly sure: the fellow believed me to be Semlin and was under the impression ...
— The Man with the Clubfoot • Valentine Williams
... the other hotel, dad," suggested Nell, with a nonchalance intended to conceal the fact that this was the point she and Susie had been aiming ...
— Affairs of State • Burton E. Stevenson
... sight, listened in nonchalance, stopping to watch the group for a minute as they would look into a shop window. The exhibition stirred no religious feeling in them, for their minds, with the tenacity of childhood, associated religion ...
— Jonah • Louis Stone
... Calvert quite loudly and in an insolent tone, he said, "'Tis a good thing the coffee is of the best, or, my word of honor, I would not come to a place which gentlemen seem to have abandoned and to which canaille flock." And with that he leaned back and looked about him with a fine nonchalance. There was a little murmur of suppressed ejaculations and menaces from those nearest who had heard his words, but it soon subsided at the sight of Monsieur de Beaufort's handsome face and ...
— Calvert of Strathore • Carter Goodloe
... his way to Covent Garden Market, and promised him just enough to bring her a taxi or something on wheels, into which she would have got if it had materialised, and been whirled away to safety and bed after adieux to her host uttered with the nonchalance necessary to allay the ...
— Leonie of the Jungle • Joan Conquest
... peculiarities and each others' statesmen. But South-Eastern Europe is still under the morning clouds, and they are inclined to take seriously what we in the West make fun of. However, there is one man whose presence in the Cabinet the Croats cannot be expected to regard with good-humour or with nonchalance. The reconciliation of Croatia will be much more easily effected if Mr. Pribi[vc]evi['c] resigns. His merits as a demagogue and political writer are undeniable. He would make an excellent Whip. But he prefers to ...
— The Birth of Yugoslavia, Volume 2 • Henry Baerlein
... all rather absurd. But when one member of this life-partnership business is stiff with constraint, you can't expect the other member to fall on his neck and weep. And Dinky-Dunk, for all his nonchalance, looked worried and hollow-eyed. He was in the saddle again, and headed back for Casa Grande, when he caught sight of Peter at work on the windmill. So he loped over to my hired man and had a talk with him. What they talked about I couldn't tell, of course, but it seemed ...
— The Prairie Mother • Arthur Stringer
... The nonchalance of boys who are sure of a dinner, and would disdain as much as a lord to do or say aught to conciliate one, is the healthy attitude of human nature. A boy is in the parlor what the pit is in the playhouse; independent, irresponsible, looking out from his ...
— Essays, First Series • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... terrified by her uncanny wooer: she comments questioningly on his "violent tenderness almost amounting to frenzy": she notes uneasily his "keen inexplicable gaze which imposes even on our Directors": How would this eager nature, this masterful energy, consort with her own "Creole nonchalance"? She did well to ask herself whether the general's almost volcanic passion would not soon exhaust itself, and turn from her own fading charms to those of women who were his equals in age. Besides, when ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... how near he had come to being impressed by what Charlie had said. Of course, there could be nothing in it; certainly not, from such a source. It was the old John M. Hurd who turned again to face his visitor, who with but one card left to play awaited breathlessly but with outward nonchalance the effect ...
— White Ashes • Sidney R. Kennedy and Alden C. Noble
... generally gay, generally in spirits; and her girl companions knew well that there was no one so reserved, and that the inmost self of her, if such a thing existed, dwelt far away from any ken of theirs. Every now and then she would have vehement angers and outbreaks which contrasted with the nonchalance of her ordinary temper; but it was hard to ...
— Helbeck of Bannisdale, Vol. I. • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... rapid power of intuition which passion will develop at moments in the least wise among mortals, while a great man at such a time possesses it to the full. He guessed the terrible truth revealed by the Duchess's nonchalance, and his heart swelled with the storm like a lake rising ...
— The Thirteen • Honore de Balzac
... pagan-like, as did its sisters the Greek republics, through nonchalance and voluptuousness. We find, indeed, from time to time, a Francis Morosini, who like Aratus and Philopoemen, renews the heroism and victories of ancient days; but, after the seventeenth century, its bright career is over. The city, municipal and circumscribed, ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume 7 - Italy, Sicily, and Greece (Part One) • Various
... a trig outing suit and little patent-leather shoes, toss a bundle, done up in a sheet, over her shoulder and walk away in the procession with the most fascinating nonchalance. ...
— Complete Story of the San Francisco Horror • Richard Linthicum
... carelessness and want of heart the repose and inactivity of their King Henry, had compelled him to arouse himself, and to revive by the same means the pretensions of some of his predecessors on the crown of France." "Les Anglais, impatiens de repos a leur ordinance, blamans de nonchalance et de manque de coeur le repos et l'oisivete de leur Roi Henri, l'avaient oblige de se reveiller."—M. Laboureur, Life of Charles VI, translated from the Latin of a contemporary ecclesiastic. Whatever be the ...
— Henry of Monmouth, Volume 2 - Memoirs of Henry the Fifth • J. Endell Tyler
... time given to vacillation. All his methods were, as a rule, very direct. Underneath his easy nonchalance he was of a very decided nature. His thin face at times could suddenly become very keen. His true character was hidden by the cultivated lazy expression of his eyes. Bunning-Ford was one of those men who are at their best ...
— The Story of the Foss River Ranch • Ridgwell Cullum
... this clump of uniforms in relief on the grass must present a blur that will be an enticing target for them. I dare not go back to the wall, but it might be discreet to lie down. There is no disgrace in offering them a small elevation of corpus." I stretched myself on the sward, acted nonchalance, and ...
— Romantic Spain - A Record of Personal Experiences (Vol. II) • John Augustus O'Shea
... others who feel as I do about crossing the street, but they never betray it. I watch to see and when they cross, they just cross—that's all. Not with nonchalance exactly, but with ease and assurance. Once I actually saw a man, a native son, I'm sure, roll a cigarette as he crossed at a point where even the traffic ...
— Vignettes of San Francisco • Almira Bailey
... before Francis came sauntering bare-headed round the corner of the house, his hands in his pockets, and a cigar in his mouth. He gave a glance round, not seeing his visitor at once, and then with a nod, came toward her, still smoking. His nonchalance, I believe, was forced and meant to cover uneasiness. For all that had passed to make him forget Kirsty, he yet remembered her uncomfortably, and at the present moment could not help regarding her as an angelic bete noir, of whom he was more afraid ...
— Heather and Snow • George MacDonald
... into their blue-quilted shells. Like the Persians, they seem nipped and miserable in the cold; looking at them, standing about with humped backs and pinched faces this morning, I wonder, with the Chinaman's happy nonchalance about committing suicide, why they don't all seek relief within the nice warm tombs at the end of the village. Surely it can be nothing but their rampant curiosity, urging them to live on and on in the hopes of seeing something new ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens
... The nonchalance[160] of boys who are sure of a dinner, and would disdain as much as a lord to do or say aught to conciliate one, is the healthy attitude of human nature. A boy is in the parlor what the pit is in the playhouse;[161] independent, irresponsible, looking ...
— Essays • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... whispered accents it would be difficult to believe that they were about to engage in a most desperate enterprise. In another room lay Cummings and Moriarity, completely dressed. The former, with his habitual sang froid, was whispering to Moriarity, who, somewhat excited, was calmed by his companion's nonchalance, and as the hour for the work drew near became like him. A stealthy step, noiseless as an Indian's, interrupted the conversation, and the faint rap on the door gave them ...
— Jim Cummings • Frank Pinkerton
... Richmond," he said, with great nonchalance, "I axe you—do you prefer that I should disband the Army of the ...
— Christmas Eve on Lonesome and Other Stories • John Fox, Jr.
... contrast! Patty, dainty, graceful and sweet, was the very antithesis of tall, gawky Azalea, with her countrified dress and badly made black shoes. Her careless air, too, was unattractive,—for it was not the nonchalance of experience, but the unselfconsciousness of sheer ignorance of urban ...
— Patty and Azalea • Carolyn Wells
... said my hero, lighting the cigar and blowing the first puff toward the ceiling, his face admirably set with nonchalance, "do you know of a family named Annesley—Colonel Annesley?" I knew it would take only a certain length of time for this question ...
— The Man on the Box • Harold MacGrath
... many times at the extraordinary nonchalance with which he faced the remainder of that terrible day. He wrote several letters, and was aware that he wrote them carefully and well. He had his usual evening bath and changed his clothes, making perhaps a little more careful toilet ...
— The Moving Finger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... smiling manner which is generally attributed to men of the world, especially to those who have travelled far on adventurous and forbidden paths. In another age he might have worn lace cuffs and a sword, and have just returned from a gambling house where he had lost or won a fortune with equal nonchalance. ...
— Mary Minds Her Business • George Weston
... them on Cherry Hill or in Chatharn Square. Pat Ryder and Johnnie Ahearn of the Third and Fourth Districts are just the men for the places. Ahearn's constituents are about half Irishmen and half Jews. He is as popular with one race as with the other. He eats corned beef and kosher meat with equal nonchalance, and it's all the same to him whether he takes off his hat in the church or pulls it down over his ears ...
— Plunkitt of Tammany Hall • George Washington Plunkitt
... Tom easily, rubbing her cheeks as if to wipe away the kisses pressed upon it, and advancing to greet Evie with a nonchalance which for once was a trifle overdone, though neither of her friends was in the least danger of mistaking her real feelings. "The same to you, and many of them," she continued, sitting down without waiting for an invitation, and smiling round in genial fashion. "It really was as good ...
— Tom and Some Other Girls - A Public School Story • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... chastity. His mind was clean with the cleanliness of knowledge. He could not pretend to misunderstand the girl. She was nothing but a child in years. The immaturity of her body showed through her extreme clothes, and even her sharp, painted little face was immature, for all its bold nonchalance. She was smiling; but one sensed behind her deliberate smile a ...
— The Purple Heights • Marie Conway Oemler
... up with an air of easy nonchalance into the faces of the two men who smoked their short pipes, and uttered ever and anon some short ejaculation, such as, "Hem!" "Ah!" "Zounds!" and so forth, while the sow exhibited a familiarity with her superiors only to be acquired by mixing in the best society. There was a respectful deference ...
— The Humourous Story of Farmer Bumpkin's Lawsuit • Richard Harris
... New World passed from Acapulco, Guayaquil, and Lima, to Spain, he says: "These will soon cease whenever an active government, willing to protect commerce, shall construct a good road from Panama to Porto Bello. The aristocratic nonchalance of Spain, and her fear to open to strangers the way to the countries explored for her own profit, only kept those countries closed." The court forbade, on pain of death, the use of plans at different times proposed. They wronged their own colonies by representing the coasts as dangerous ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 344, August 5, 1882 • Various
... transitory humour. Mr. Blensop was now in what seemed the most equable and blithe of tempers. His very posture at the telephone eloquently betokened as much: he had thrown himself into the chair with picturesque nonchalance, sitting with body half turned from the desk, his right hand holding the receiver to his ear, his left thrust carelessly into his trouser pocket, thus dragging back the lapel of that impeccable morning-coat and exposing the bright cap of his ...
— The False Faces • Vance, Louis Joseph
... assumed a dogged expression, which showed that the old Jewish blood still heat true, under all its affected shell of Neo-Platonist nonchalance; and there was a quiet unpleasant earnest in his ...
— Hypatia - or, New Foes with an Old Face • Charles Kingsley
... McGrath, the youngest champion of reform in the building, was putting on a bold front. He laughed and he talked and he whistled. He took people up and down with as much nonchalance as if he did not know that up at the top of that shaft angry eyes were straining themselves for a glimpse of the car, and terrible curses were descending, literally, upon his ...
— Lifted Masks - Stories • Susan Glaspell
... his ordinary train. It was not exactly the kind of letter he had expected, and Emmeline shared his doubts. The handwriting seemed just passable; there was no orthographic error; but—refinement? This young person wrote, too, with such singular nonchalance. And she said absolutely nothing about her domestic circumstances. Coburg Lodge, Tulse Hill. A decent enough ...
— The Paying Guest • George Gissing
... invitation he moved up to the fire in nervous haste, and with a deprecating smile; dropped suddenly into a chair, and tilted it back in imitation of Callum's easy nonchalance; but finding the character difficult to maintain in view of his feet, he suddenly came down to the horizontal once more, and in so doing descended upon poor Bruce's tail. That unoffending canine uttered a yelp of pain, echoed by Scotty, ...
— The Silver Maple • Marian Keith
... 10,000 to 15,000 trees, but at the harvest time neighbours assist each other. It appeared to me to be an easy, pleasant life; the work is all done under shade, and occupies only a few weeks in the year. The incorrigible nonchalance and laziness of the people alone prevent them from surrounding themselves with all the luxuries of a tropical country. They might plant orchards of the choicest fruit trees around their houses, grow Indian corn, and rear cattle and hogs, as intelligent settlers from Europe would certainly do, instead ...
— The Naturalist on the River Amazons • Henry Walter Bates
... the street door shut Arithelli sat down, hiding her face in her hands. Once she shivered involuntarily. Directly she found herself alone the mask of her assumed nonchalance had fallen suddenly. As long as there was an audience she had worn a disguise on her soul as well as her body. She had been feeling moody and depressed all day, and this last episode was the climax. Everything she had was ...
— The Hippodrome • Rachel Hayward
... which your gait will lose nothing in stateliness if you can manage to adopt the goose-step. On your return to the wicket you will probably find, if the weather is mild and the grass dry, that the fieldsmen are reclining on the ground; it will enhance your reputation for nonchalance and good-fellowship if you can contrive to give one of them a playful pat with your bat in passing, especially if he is a total stranger to you ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 158, June 2, 1920 • Various
... heaps of nuggets. Gold reigns here. Silver is a meaner metal hardly attainable. Bank notes are a flimsy possibility of the future. Piles of yellow sovereigns and the coinage of every land load the tables. Sallow, glittering-eyed croupiers sweep in, with affected nonchalance, this easy-gained harvest of ...
— The Little Lady of Lagunitas • Richard Henry Savage
... saddle with ostentatious offhandedness, though in a prayerful frame of mind, and presently climbed on as if nothing was the matter. I certainly anticipated Westminster Abbey rather than a peerage; but the horse, with a nonchalance greater than my own, inasmuch as it was genuine, turned quietly round as I pressed the rein against his neck, and sailed away across the plain at his own inimitable canter. Then I looked back to see the bullock drivers disgustedly resume the work ...
— Such is Life • Joseph Furphy
... alone," said Judy with great nonchalance, "I bid you good afternoon," and she walked on, trying to keep ...
— Molly Brown's Orchard Home • Nell Speed
... barrels, and pretty fencers. The Duke of St. James was not sufficiently acquainted with the geography of the mansion to make a premature retreat, an operation which is looked upon with an evil eye, and which, to be successful, must be prompt and decisive, and executed with supercilious nonchalance. So he consoled himself by a little chat with Lord Mildmay, who sat smiling, handsome, and mustachioed, with an empty glass, and who was as much out of water as he was out of wine. The Duke was not very learned in Parisian society; but still, with the aid of the Duchess de Berri ...
— The Young Duke • Benjamin Disraeli
... on dignity, treated all men alike, much like old neighbours; whose speech had not seldom a rustic flavour about it; who always seemed to have time for a homely talk and never to be in a hurry to press business; and who occasionally spoke about important affairs of State with the same nonchalance—I might almost say irreverence—with which he might have discussed an every-day law case in his office ...
— Abraham Lincoln • Lord Charnwood
... to make to the Grand Seignior?" he asked, with affected nonchalance, when the first salutations with the physician had been exchanged. "I would not be wanting in the forms when I appear before ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... Honeywood are great adepts in this sort of pastime; so, also, are Miss Bouncer and her brother. For although the latter does not shine as a mimic, yet, as he is never deserted by his accustomed coolness, he has plenty of the nonchalance and readiness which is a requisite for charade acting. The Miss Honeywoods and Mr. Bouncer have therefore suggested to Mr. Verdant Green and his sisters, that to get up a little amateur performance would be "great fun;" ...
— The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green • Cuthbert Bede
... pass in total ignorance of this important item of his own body. He felt himself to be a bag full of disconcerting and dangerous mysteries. Or he might have expressed it that he had been smoking in criminal nonchalance for nearly half a century on the top of a powder magazine. He was deeply impressed by the rapidity and assurance of the doctor's diagnosis. It was wonderful that the queer fellow could in a few minutes single out an obscure organ no bigger ...
— Mr. Prohack • E. Arnold Bennett
... state of nerves bordering on stage fright, from the time that Tommy brought home the news, a condition which Pearl did her best to relieve by assuming a nonchalance which she did not feel, regarding ...
— Purple Springs • Nellie L. McClung
... perfect agony. While his wife basked in the sun on the pavement, trailing her skirt with nonchalance and impudence, shameless and unconcerned, he followed behind her, pale and shuddering, repeating that it was all over, that he would be unable to save himself and would be guillotined. Each step he saw her take, seemed to him a step nearer punishment. Fright ...
— Therese Raquin • Emile Zola
... saying that it was charity:—that the Lord gave it to us. Knowing the amount of this to be that he did not sell it, but was willing to receive a present, we gave him ten or twelve reals, which he pocketed with admirable nonchalance, saying, "Dios se lo pague." Taking leave of him, we rode out to the Indians' huts. The little children were running about among the huts, stark naked, and the men were not much better; but the women had generally coarse gowns, of a sort of tow cloth. The men are ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... am all right," he said, and his manner was as courteous as though he had been in a drawing-room; but, in spite of his nonchalance, Grafton saw him stagger when ...
— Crittenden - A Kentucky Story of Love and War • John Fox, Jr.
... he bent and held back until the bride had passed. Now he turned and smiled in her face, and now he offered her the helping hand. But she met his courtesies, and the whole punctilious fabric of his behavior, with the utmost absence and nonchalance. He had, it seemed, been too long in contempt to recover soon his former position of husband and beloved. For long days she had contemplated his naked soul, limited, weak, incapable. He had shown a certain capacity for sudden, explosive temper, but not for courage of any kind, or force. Nor ...
— IT and Other Stories • Gouverneur Morris
... a half," from the man below, a tall, lean fellow, casting the sounding-pole. With a rhythmic nonchalance he plants the long black and white staff at the ship's side, draws it up dripping, plunges it down again, draws it up, and sends it down hour after hour. He never seems to tire; he never seems to ...
— The Magnetic North • Elizabeth Robins (C. E. Raimond)
... bottom and profusely ornamented at the side with silver buttons. He is jostled by a fellow-countryman, who gathers his serape across his left shoulder and breast so adroitly as to partially conceal his shabby attire, while he puffs his cigarette with assumed nonchalance, exchanging a careless word in the mean time with the gypsy-like woman who offers bananas and zapotas for sale. Dainty senoritas trip across the way in red-heeled slippers of Cinderella-like proportions, ...
— Aztec Land • Maturin M. Ballou
... he laughed, for his old nonchalance had returned to him. "I've been full of business since nine o'clock. I have an appointment out at La Muette at two, and I'll have to get back ...
— The Golden Face - A Great 'Crook' Romance • William Le Queux
... chair when he could succeed in making every American in the room sit uncomfortably. And this time, without any one to thwart him, he went on to his heart's content, disposing of the subject as one would strip a rose of its petals, with as much seeming nonchalance and ease, and with precisely the same design, to make a rose no rose. Leaf after leaf fell under Mr. Stackpole's touch, as if it had been a black frost. The American government was a rickety experiment; go to pieces presently,—American institutions an alternative ...
— Queechy • Susan Warner
... Chrissy meant—that a study of it would discourage an aspirant to good society from smiling up at it between her ankles. She forgave the divined intention of the gift, for the gift itself was precisely what her soul had been craving. She borrowed it for the day with affected nonchalance—Tilda never gave herself away—and hugged the volume in her pocket as she and Arthur Miles and 'Dolph explored the coombe's downward ...
— True Tilda • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... fairly besieged by his friends, who joked him about his arrest, and then, out of genuine concern, wanted to know if his prospects were seriously damaged. To each interrogatory, Henry waved his hand with absolute nonchalance. As far as he knew, only six people were in the secret—himself, his wife, Judge Barklay, Standish, Mr. Archer and Aunt Mirabelle—and he wasn't anxious to increase the number. His aunt might not have believed it, but this was more on her account ...
— Rope • Holworthy Hall
... leisurely appraising eyes, then nodded understanding. There was no intimation that he was not ready to listen, but he did not seem quite ready to talk. His white shirt-bosom was remarkably broad as he leaned back in his chair in the slightly lolling fashion of large, good-humored men. For all the nonchalance of his attitude, he looked, from evening tie to thin-soled dress-boots, beautifully spruce, as Aurora had remarked, and made an appropriate pendant to her in ...
— Aurora the Magnificent • Gertrude Hall
... inquisitor, and so effectually attacked, battled with, and exposed him, as to render him quite harmless in future. The minister of Great Haughton was made of different metal to the "old reading parson Lewis," or Lowes, to whose fate Baxter refers with such nonchalance. As the only clergyman of the Church of England, that I am aware of, who was executed for witchcraft, Lewis's case is sufficiently interesting to merit some notice. Stearne's (vide his Confirmation of Witchcraft, ...
— Discovery of Witches - The Wonderfull Discoverie of Witches in the Countie of Lancaster • Thomas Potts
... manner in which he applies his white hand, studded with brilliants, to his perfumed hair. Observe the graceful emphasis with which he offers up the prayers for the King, the Royal Family, and all the Nobility; and the nonchalance with which he hurries over the more uncomfortable portions of the service, the seventh commandment for instance, with a studied regard for the taste and feeling of his auditors, only to be equalled by that displayed by the sleek divine who succeeds him, who murmurs, in a voice ...
— Sunday Under Three Heads • Charles Dickens
... the audience rose, and my gentleman, with the nonchalance assurance of his character, a total disregard of the feelings and convenience of others, and an entire complaisance for his own, stepped forward into the second seat from the door, on which there were previously four people, its full compliment. But he had noticed they were not all so athletic ...
— Anna St. Ives • Thomas Holcroft
... the door of his own particular den on the right of the landing, stepped inside, closed the door, switched on the light—and Jimmie Dale's debonair nonchalance dropped from him as a mask instantly—and it was another Jimmie Dale—the ...
— The Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard
... Dane, "I never heard that silly story before." And he went on eating his dinner with extraordinary nonchalance and an ...
— The Motor Maid • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson
... methods and the rollicking humour of Charles and his circle. He insinuated himself into the intimacy of the King's boon companions: availed himself of the easy access to the King, which Charles's nonchalance permitted, and knew how to suggest what might be useful to him as a diplomat, in the careless intercourse of the table, and amidst the jests of a carouse at Court. Bristol did his best to aid the Spanish diplomat. Charles's facile temper made him ...
— The Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon V2 • Henry Craik
... across the park space in the furtive manner of one going to a shameful rendezvous, and upon my hailing him he at first essayed to sheer off. When he saw who it was he came up with a rather swaggering and nonchalant effect. I may observe here that nobody has a monopoly of nonchalance in ...
— From a Bench in Our Square • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... The nonchalance and dolce-far-niente air of nature and society hint at infinite periods in the progress of mankind. The States have leisure to laugh from Maine to Texas at some newspaper joke, and New England shakes at the double-entendres ...
— A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers • Henry David Thoreau
... will break the hearts of half the girls in town.... Careful! here comes Willits—not another word.... Oh, Mr. Willits, here you are! I was just going to send for you. I want to talk to you about that mare of yours—is she still for sale?" His nonchalance ...
— Kennedy Square • F. Hopkinson Smith
... The nonchalance of the Princess Petrovska had disappeared in a flash, and Foyle noted her quick change of countenance. She had recollected she was carrying Lady Eileen Meredith's jewels. They would inevitably be found, if she were searched. ...
— The Grell Mystery • Frank Froest
... there was Hurstwood, reading as usual. He seemed to take his condition with the utmost nonchalance. His beard was at least ...
— Sister Carrie • Theodore Dreiser
... that they would not be favorably impressed with such a wholesale exhibition were each one to repeat the same performance as yourself," retorted Mr. Howe, assuming an air of nonchalance. ...
— Lady Rosamond's Secret - A Romance of Fredericton • Rebecca Agatha Armour |
