Free TranslationFree Translation
Synonyms, antonyms, pronunciation

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




Rebuff   /rɪbˈəf/  /ribˈəf/   Listen
Rebuff

verb
(past & past part. rebuffed; pres. part. rebuffing)
1.
Reject outright and bluntly.  Synonyms: repel, snub.
2.
Force or drive back.  Synonyms: drive back, fight off, repel, repulse.  "Fight off the onslaught" , "Rebuff the attack"






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 |





"Rebuff" Quotes from Famous Books



... first to gain the bridge. He had followed the progress of events with sufficient accuracy to realize that Miss Iris Yorke had met with a distinct rebuff by the skipper, and, judging from his own experience of her physical weakness when she emerged into daylight, he was not surprised to hear ...
— The Stowaway Girl • Louis Tracy

... depending upon the kind of barrage which some of the men whom he knew in America might lay down for him. True, the Negro artilleryman had been left behind in America. At Camp Taylor he was spurned and rejected. But he refused to accept rebuff. He won his way into the heart of commanding officer and subaltern, gained his training, made a superior record, witnessed the outpouring of the entire white soldiery of the camp to present arms and salute him as he went away to service, and arrived in France in breathless ...
— Kelly Miller's History of the World War for Human Rights • Kelly Miller

... received a rebuff, but was always answered to the best of your ability, dear mamma. I think of that now when tempted to impatience with my little girl's sometimes wearisome questioning, and resolve to try to be as good a mother to her as you were to me; and still are," she added with ...
— Christmas with Grandma Elsie • Martha Finley

... we know this," says the graduating world. "Do you suppose that is what we borrow your book for, to have you spell out your miserable elementary astronomy?" At which rebuff I should shrink distressed, but that a chorus of voices an octave higher comes up with, "Dear Mr. Ingham, we are ever so much obliged to you; we did not know it at all before, and you ...
— The Brick Moon, et. al. • Edward Everett Hale

... welcome each rebuff That turns earth's smoothness rough, Each sting that bids nor sit nor stand, but go! Be our joys three parts pain! Strive, and hold cheap the strain; Learn, nor account the pang; ...
— The World's Best Poetry Volume IV. • Bliss Carman

... the clerk, going on, without noticing the rebuff, "and the council, wad be agreeable that you should hae the auld stanes at Donagild's Chapel, that ye was wussing ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin

... Half of a precious day was already lost. Judge Brewster refused the case. To whom could she turn now? In despair, almost desperate, she drove up-town to Riverside Drive and forced an entrance into the Jeffries home. Here, again, she was met with a rebuff. Still not discouraged, she returned to Judge Brewster's office. He was out and she sat there an hour waiting to see him. Night came and he did not return. Almost prostrated with nervous exhaustion, she returned to their deserted little flat ...
— The Third Degree - A Narrative of Metropolitan Life • Charles Klein and Arthur Hornblow

... conflicting opinions, which were barren of practical effects upon the life. As usual, he made no secret whatever of his preference. A nobleman accustomed to flattery on all sides must have been rather taken aback on the receipt of this very outspoken rebuff from plain John Wesley: 'To speak the rough truth, I do not desire any intercourse with any persons of quality in England. They can do me no good, and I fear I can do none to them.'[739] One can fancy the amazement of Lady Huntingdon, who exacted and received no small amount ...
— The English Church in the Eighteenth Century • Charles J. Abbey and John H. Overton

... had learned to be meek, so that when he was after anything desirable he might be able to take a rebuff, and not mind it. ...
— Fated to Be Free • Jean Ingelow

... Army of the Tennessee met the entire rebel Army, secretly thrust to its rear, on its flank, and upon its advance center, with its idolized commander killed in the first shock of battle, and at nightfall found the enemy's dead and wounded on its front, we see that no disaster—no temporary rebuff—could discourage this Army. Every man was at his post; every man doing a hero's duty. They proved they might be wiped out but never made to run. They ...
— The Battle of Atlanta - and Other Campaigns, Addresses, Etc. • Grenville M. Dodge

... had bowed, "Well, since you insist, I'm afraid it will have to be 'Thank you, no.'" Mr. Brainerd had felt the snub perhaps more than his wife, although he was most convincing in reassuring her that upon trying again, say with some one of the Whitman family, there would be small danger of such a rebuff. Mrs. Brainerd, however, had not tried again and had, with what stoicism she could command, resigned herself to the path God had ordered for her feet. So Mr. Brainerd's end at Woodbridge was not a brilliant one, but he did not shrink or cry aloud, and it was generally ...
— Tutors' Lane • Wilmarth Lewis

... her own reasons for uneasiness; more reasons I fancy than I then guessed. For she seemed to have lost her voice. She stammered and made but poor replies; and Madame Claude being deaf and stupid, and we boys too timid after the rebuff we had experienced to fill the gap, the conversation languished. The Vidame was not for his part the man to put himself out on a ...
— The House of the Wolf - A Romance • Stanley Weyman

... her good night and went his way with a lilting song of triumph in his heart which not even the chilling rebuff of the leave-taking was sufficient ...
— The Quickening • Francis Lynde

... to her physical self, her voice, her movements, was at work on Farrell, so that he felt his hour with her a delight after his hard day's work. And she too rested in his presence, and his friendship. It was not possible now for her to rebuff him, to refuse his care. She had tried, tried honestly, as Cicely saw, to live independently—to 'endure hardness.' And the attempt had broken down. The strange, protesting feeling, too, that she was doing some wrong to George ...
— Missing • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... foolish act on the part of the officials. Nurses were sorely needed, and here was Mary Seacole, who had far greater experience of nursing British soldiers than any woman living, refused employment. She declared in her little book of adventures,[1] published soon after the war ended, that at her last rebuff she cried as she walked ...
— Noble Deeds of the World's Heroines • Henry Charles Moore

... rebuff at Washington produced a profound indignation throughout wide sections; yet it may be questioned whether the arguments on which the railway scheme was based were sufficiently solid to justify such encouragement to the investment of floating capital as the passage of the bill would ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 122, December, 1867 • Various

... would probably have sufficed to disarrange the plans of Duller in Natal, but coming a few hours after a serious rebuff in the centre, of which the story must now be told, it loomed fearfully on his near horizon. Soon after he landed at Capetown he ordered the weak and vulnerable detachments at Naauwpoort and Stormberg to be withdrawn to De Aar and Queenstown. The movement opened to the enemy ...
— A Handbook of the Boer War • Gale and Polden, Limited

... the bay again, "I haven't yet told you every thing. Take the silver wreath and knock at Holy Friday's window. When she asks 'Who is there?' say that you came on foot and have lost your way on the moor. She will rebuff you. But you mustn't stir from the spot. Say to her: 'I won't go away, for ever since I was a little child I have always heard of Holy Friday (Venus) and—I didn't have steel shoes made with calf-skin straps, ...
— Roumanian Fairy Tales • Various

... considerable concession to Habibullah's independence of attitude was displayed in the fact that he was styled in the treaty "His Majesty''; but, in the circumstances, it seems to have been thought diplomatic to accede to the amir's determination to insist on this matter of style. But the rebuff showed that it was desirable in the interests both of the British government and of Afghanistan that an opportunity should be made for enabling the amir to have personal acquaintance with the highest Indian authorities. A further step, calculated to strengthen ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia

... the last flexure of our way we reached; And, to the right hand turning, other care Awaits us. Here the rocky precipice Hurls forth redundant flames; and from the rim A blast up-blown, with forcible rebuff Driveth them back, ...
— Purgatory • Mary Anne Madden Sadlier

... path which led to the valleys. She now crossed over and sat down with a peace-making laugh. She attempted to take Isabel's hand, but it was quickly withdrawn. Fearing that this movement indicated a receding confidence Mrs. Conyers ignored the rebuff and pressed her inquiry in a new, ...
— The Mettle of the Pasture • James Lane Allen

... according to my ideas, would have bowed and gone upon his way; but Sir Montague Hockin would have no rebuff. He seemed to look upon me as a child, such as average English girls, fresh from little schools, would be. Nothing more annoyed me, after all my thoughts and dream of some power ...
— Erema - My Father's Sin • R. D. Blackmore

... and bombast of political and other public humbugs. For this they are not only seldom thanked, but frequently are kicked. Of course this sort of thing is wrong. A Reporter should be independent enough to meet the approaches of gentlemen of the Nincompoop persuasion with a flat rebuff. He should never gloss over a political humbug, whether he belongs to "our side" or not. He is not thanked for doing it, and, furthermore, he loses the respect and confidence of his readers. There are many amiable gentlemen ornamenting the ...
— The Complete Works of Artemus Ward, Part 1 • Charles Farrar Browne

... with Mrs Causand in the morning after Rip's discomfiture, and then went to prosecute my studies in the schoolroom. This was the first time that my tutor and I had met since his rebuff. Monsieur Cherfeuil had not yet taken his place at his desk. As I passed the assistant who assisted me so little, I gave him my usual smile of greeting; but his countenance, instead of the good-humoured return, was black as evil passions could make it. However, I paid but little attention to this ...
— Rattlin the Reefer • Edward Howard

... notable triumph which more than anything else brought her through the trial with her purpose unshaken and her faith even a little strengthened. It was not a complete triumph, and in trying to push it too far she suffered a slight rebuff; but there was hope to be had from it, it seemed to open a prospect of successes more ample. She made Quisante send back Aunt Maria's five hundred pounds before Mr. Mandeville's operations had resulted either in safety ...
— Quisante • Anthony Hope

... to bed in a vile humor, and slept badly; wondering, in the long wakeful hours, what new rebuff I should meet ...
— The Legacy of Cain • Wilkie Collins

... and did not forget the whip this time. She had a fresh rebuff when she reached the road. Instead of the saddle horses she expected to see, Dr. Morton and Ernest were awaiting ...
— Chicken Little Jane on the Big John • Lily Munsell Ritchie

... admitted in this Note that the declaration of the barred zones was caused by the fact that all was not well with us, we could hardly expect England would fall in with the proposal made at our suggestion by Mr. Wilson, and thus allow us so easy a diplomatic triumph. The President, however, after his rebuff from England, was bound, in order to maintain his prestige, to bring all possible pressure to bear on us, in the hope of compensating by diplomatic success in Berlin for his failure in London. My subsequent attitude was laid down, but at the same time made more difficult, ...
— My Three Years in America • Johann Heinrich Andreas Hermann Albrecht Graf von Bernstorff

... thing that I heard of him was that he had made a great friend of the ealdorman since he came here, being often at his house. It was not so long before I met him there, though my pride, which would not let me risk another rebuff, kept me away for some days. I had an uneasy feeling that I should fare no better, and I could find good reason enough to justify the thought in some ways, as any one may see from what had ...
— A Prince of Cornwall - A Story of Glastonbury and the West in the Days of Ina of Wessex • Charles W. Whistler

... personage, who was explaining it to a party of his friends. I don't know how well acquainted this gentleman might be with the subject; but he seemed anxious not to impart his knowledge too extensively, and gave a pretty direct rebuff to an honest man who ventured an inquiry of him. I think that the railway, and the hotel within the abbey grounds, add to the charm of the place. A moonlight solitary visit might be very good, too, in its way; but I believe that ...
— Passages From the English Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... keep her toes out of the flames,—how to climb up out of these lowlands of sorrow. She was pretty well stranded after years of vagabond life. Excuse me, Martha, but we all knew Sam; and after our rebuff she was in a fit state to swallow Thinkright's cheerful theories whole. I don't claim much knowledge of what I can't see or touch, but it wouldn't surprise me if the Power that Is let us sidetrack ourselves on purpose ...
— The Opened Shutters • Clara Louise Burnham

... fash yoursel' aboot HIM," continued the girl, without heeding the rebuff. "It's no' the meestreess' wish that he's keepit here in the wing reserved for married folk, and she's no' sorry for the excuse to pit ye in his place. Ye'll be married yoursel', I'm hearin'. But, I ken ye's nae mair to be lippened tae ...
— The Bell-Ringer of Angel's and Other Stories • Bret Harte

... down unmindful of the storm that came much subdued through the thickness of the walls. And, as young creatures, however tried and sorrowful, will do, they entered into a friendly chat. And before an hour had passed Capitola thought herself well repaid for her sufferings from the storm and the rebuff, in having formed the ...
— Capitola the Madcap • Emma D. E. N. Southworth

... Jeekie and his tribal gods, Alan lit his pipe and sat a while thinking of Barbara and all the events of that tumultuous day. Notwithstanding his rebuff at the hands of Mr. Haswell and the difficulties and dangers which threatened, he felt even then that it had been a happy and a fortunate day. For had he not discovered that Barbara loved him with all her heart and soul as he loved Barbara? And as this was ...
— The Yellow God - An Idol of Africa • H. Rider Haggard

... afterward told me, her goddaughter, whom she had brought from her province. She announced me as "Madame Salere," and returned into the anteroom to tell me, "Madame says she does not know you." I began to think I was doomed to rebuff among the crowd who deserve it. However, to make assurance sure, I said, "Ask if she has received a letter from me." As I spoke Madame Sand opened the door, and stood looking at me an instant. ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. X (of X) - America - II, Index • Various

... spirit would have been overwhelmed by the load of such distresses— would have yielded or snapped. But this extraordinary young woman held firm, and fought her way to victory. With an amazing persistency, during the eight years that followed her rebuff over Salisbury Hospital, she struggled and worked and planned. While superficially she was carrying on the life of a brilliant girl in high society, while internally she was a prey to the tortures of regret and of remorse, she yet possessed ...
— Eminent Victorians • Lytton Strachey

... reflected. On his part he was wondering how Porson would receive the suggestion of a substantial loan. It seemed too much to risk. He was proud, and did not like to lay himself open to the possibility of rebuff. ...
— Stella Fregelius • H. Rider Haggard

... drawing-room, and Burns in some way grossly insulted the fair hostess. Next day he wrote a letter of the most abject and extravagant penitence. This, however, Mr. and Mrs. Riddel did not think fit to accept. Stung by this rebuff, Burns recoiled at once to the opposite extreme of feeling, and penned a grossly scurrilous monody on "a lady famed for her caprice." This he followed up by other lampoons, full of "coarse rancour against a lady, who had showed him many kindnesses." The Laird of Friars Carse ...
— Robert Burns • Principal Shairp

... mine ears of them with some slight rejoinder, and that without delay; for that if even now, I being not yet come to[214] the third part of my travail, they[215] are many and presume amain, I opine that, ere I come to the end thereof, they may, having had no rebuff at the first, on such wise be multiplied that with whatsoever little pains of theirs they might overthrow me, nor might your powers, great though they be, ...
— The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio • Giovanni Boccaccio

... much-needed rest; a man of character, gentle and simple in his affections, strong and purposeful in his labours, who, as he himself says, "fought for the locomotive single-handed for nearly 20 years," and "put up with every rebuff, determined not to be ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood

... that this was a rebuff for him, and could not but understand it as a left-handed hit at his employer. So he was silent. Mary felt that Mr Pinch was not remarkable for presence of mind, and that he could not say too little under ...
— Life And Adventures Of Martin Chuzzlewit • Charles Dickens

... doubts: he could not really believe that she would behave as she was doing if there were no love for him in her heart, and he pursued his suit with the intense ardour natural to him. Occasionally she became alarmed, and tried to rebuff him by a cold, irritable manner; but he continued to treat her with the utmost gentleness. No doubt, she was not altogether without feeling: an absolutely cold woman could not have exercised dominion over a man of the stamp of Balzac; and though she is always ...
— Honore de Balzac, His Life and Writings • Mary F. Sandars

... at that age when propinquity makes sentiment inevitable. She could scarcely keep her eyes from him during hours in camp, and on the drive she rode with him four times as long as he wished for. She bothered him, and yet she was so good and generous he could not rebuff her; he could ...
— The Eagle's Heart • Hamlin Garland

... playfully taxed with hardness of heart, she repelled the charge with a vigour that pointed the Captain straight to the real fact. Having apprehended it, he thought himself in no way bound to observe an over-strict reticence as to Coxon's "cheek" and his deserved rebuff. ...
— Half a Hero - A Novel • Anthony Hope

... passed. She was used to it now. And she sat shrinking at his rebuff, but curious and half fearful at what he might have ...
— The One-Way Trail - A story of the cattle country • Ridgwell Cullum

... transformed by her influence. His life had regained direction and certainty. No rebuff of the Speaker, no insult of a member, angered him. He was always in his seat, ready, whenever opportunity offered, to do battle against wrong knowing that Ida was watching him. Between times he went with her about the city, and his quiet ...
— A Spoil of Office - A Story of the Modern West • Hamlin Garland

... times' rebuff I would not be a king—enough Of woe it is to love; The paths of power are steep and rough, ...
— The Certain Hour • James Branch Cabell

... John's next rebuff and knowledge of the world was of another sort. He was again walking the road at twilight, when he was overtaken by a wagon with one seat, upon which were two pretty girls, and a young gentleman sat between them, driving. It was a merry party, and John could hear them laughing and singing as they ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... N (the walnut tree) I walked round the garden wall to the point marked EC, but could there find no landmark at all from which to measure. A century ago something may have stood there, but now it was a bare spot. Here was another rebuff which seemed to upset my theory altogether, and Monday ...
— Jethou - or Crusoe Life in the Channel Isles • E. R. Suffling

... bent on rebuffing him, but you see her strength failed her, and she spoiled her effect by the smile she mingled with the rebuff. The smile indeed was so charming that he remembers nothing but it, and so she not only gains nothing, but loses ...
— April's Lady - A Novel • Margaret Wolfe Hungerford

... masterpiece. Nobody is coerced, nobody is made use of for selfish purposes, nobody plays a hypocritical or selfish part. All bring their talent to the common stock, and contribute knowingly and gladly to the common wealth. Even self-love itself is obliged to help on the general action, under pain of rebuff ...
— Amiel's Journal • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... her—that he had loved her from the first time he had seen her in that old orchard. He spoke humbly but not fearfully, for he believed that she loved him, and he had little expectation of any rebuff. ...
— Kilmeny of the Orchard • Lucy Maud Montgomery

... colloquy he could with the greatest difficulty conceal. For one wild moment he had thought of calling her back while he made a personal appeal to Revelstoke; but the conviction borne in upon him by her resolute bearing that she would refuse it, and he would only lay himself open to another rebuff, held him to his seat. Yet he could not entirely repress his ...
— Trent's Trust and Other Stories • Bret Harte

... continued to press for damages. The Alabama claims were based on the assertion that the law of neutrals required Great Britain to prevent any hostile vessel from starting, in her waters, upon a cruise against the United States. In the face of official rebuff and popular sneers Charles Francis Adams formulated the claims. His successor, Reverdy Johnson, reached a sort of settlement which the Senate declined to ratify, and which Sumner denounced. It was Sumner's contention that the Civil War was prolonged by British aid and that a ...
— The New Nation • Frederic L. Paxson

... his words as a direct rebuff. There was a little lump in her throat that she had to get rid of before ...
— Gunsight Pass - How Oil Came to the Cattle Country and Brought a New West • William MacLeod Raine

... true, and I was obliged to give a cold rebuff to the man who had befriended me. It is possible Richard Bristed did not care to be recognized by his brother's agent, but I did not think of ...
— Strange Visitors • Henry J. Horn

... out praise or blame: They bore it all in complacent guise, As though an artificer, after contriving 200 A wheel-work image as if it were living, Should find with delight it could motion to strike him! So found the Duke, and his mother like him: The lady hardly got a rebuff— That had not been contemptuous enough, 205 With his cursed smirk, as he nodded applause, And kept off ...
— Selections from the Poems and Plays of Robert Browning • Robert Browning

... all too soon; Madame was ill and could see no one. I was not, however, to be baffled by one rebuff. Handing the basket I held to the girl, I urged her to take it in and show her mistress what it contained, saying it was a rare article which might never again ...
— A Strange Disappearance • Anna Katharine Green

... the only direction in which I could hope for success, I had to confess my defeat to the King, whose curiosity was only piqued the more by the rebuff. He adjured me not to let the matter drop, and, suggesting a number of persons among whom I might possibly find the unknown, proposed also some theories. Of these, one that the benevolent was a disguised lady, who ...
— From the Memoirs of a Minister of France • Stanley Weyman

... last for ever, and the time came when once more the grim face of toil confronted me. I must own that I had now little stomach for hard labour, yet I made several efforts to obtain it. However, I had a bad manner, being both proud and shy, and one rebuff in a day always was enough. I lacked that self-confidence that readily finds employment, and again I found myself mixing with the spineless residuum ...
— The Trail of '98 - A Northland Romance • Robert W. Service

... overtures; but if the host does not wish to continue the acquaintance he will not return the call in person, but simply send his card by post. This distant rejoinder practically ends the brief acquaintance without any discourteous rebuff. It is one of the mistakes of the vulgar to be rude and gruff in order to repel an undesired acquaintance. In reality, nothing freezes out a bore more effectually than the icy calm of dignified courtesy. There are exquisitely polite ways of sending ...
— Etiquette • Agnes H. Morton

... love, despite the rebuff she had already received, determined once more to appeal to the Sultan for the release of his prisoner. But the monarch had grown moody and thoughtful, as we have seen, when he realized that his slave loved another; and every word she now uttered in his behalf was bitterness ...
— The Circassian Slave; or, The Sultan's Favorite - A Story of Constantinople and the Caucasus • Lieutenant Maturin Murray

... very severely, monsieur, both for the friendliness of my effort to spare you a rebuff, and for the attraction which intellect always has for me. I put confidence in the generosity of youth, and you have disappointed me. And yet, if I did not speak unreservedly (which would have been ...
— The Deserted Woman • Honore de Balzac

... said Little O'Grady earnestly, and all unmindful of any possible rebuff, "what's out ...
— Under the Skylights • Henry Blake Fuller

... of resonant name. The accomplished hostess was ever ready with that smile she bestowed only upon a few favourites, and her daughter—well, he had misunderstood, and so came to grief one evening of mid-season. A rebuff, the gentlest possible, but leaving no scintilla of hope. At the end of the same season she gave her hand to Sir Something Somebody, ...
— Denzil Quarrier • George Gissing

... nothing of the interview at Fenchurch Street, nor had she any clue at all which could explain the mystery. Could it be that Tom had informed her guardian of their engagement, and had received such a rebuff that he had abandoned her in despair? That was surely impossible; yet why was it that he had ceased to walk through the square? She knew that he was not ill, because she heard her two companions talking of him in connection ...
— The Firm of Girdlestone • Arthur Conan Doyle

... a rebuff from her sister would have caused Grace a fit of crying, but she was too happy for that to-night. She slipped quietly away into her mamma's rooms, and when ready for bed came to the door again with a pleasant "Good-night, Lulu, ...
— The Two Elsies - A Sequel to Elsie at Nantucket, Book 10 • Martha Finley

... in German met with another rebuff. Under the prompting of his parental friends in Villa Elsa he concluded at length to attend a course of lectures given by a celebrated professor who was, however, known to be of an exceptionally cantankerous disposition. ...
— Villa Elsa - A Story of German Family Life • Stuart Henry

... Erskine pleaded. When this brilliant advocate, then a junior, unknown even to his brethren at the bar, was assailing Lord Sandwich as the prosecutor of his client with equal eloquence and courage, and even in defiance of a rebuff from the Judge, the latter, Lord Chief Justice Mansfield, leant over the bench and inquired in a whisper, "Who is that young man?" "His name is Erskine, my lord," replied the clerk. "His fortune is made," observed the Judge as he resumed ...
— The Life of Admiral Viscount Exmouth • Edward Osler

... start will carry a man far. Under the conditions of either war or peace, it is astonishing how many times all things come in balance for the man who is less fearful of rebuff than of being counted a cypher. One of Britain's great armored leaders, Lt. Gen. Sir Giffard Martel, digested the lesson of his whole life experience into this sentence: "If you take a chance, it usually succeeds, presupposing good judgment." Finally, it comes to that, for the willingness to accept ...
— The Armed Forces Officer - Department of the Army Pamphlet 600-2 • U. S. Department of Defense

... The rifles, however, remained under guard of savages appointed by the subchief's son. When the night meal was out of the way nothing remained but to seek hammocks and sleep, for further attempts at conversation by Lourenco met with the same silent rebuff from every cannibal addressed. None showed active hostility by either look or manner, but it was plain that between wild and civilized men stood a wall—a wall not too high for the jungle dwellers to leap over in deadly action if occasion should be given. Wherefore the whites held themselves ...
— The Pathless Trail • Arthur O. (Arthur Olney) Friel

... would be like brother and sister, or the dearest friends—she, simple, fond, and charming—he, happy beyond measure at her good behaviour. But this would all vanish on a sudden. Either he would be too pressing, and hint his love, when she would rebuff him instantly, and give his vanity a box on the ear: or he would be jealous, and with perfect good reason, of some new admirer that had sprung up, or some rich young gentleman newly arrived in the town, that this incorrigible flirt would set her nets and baits to draw in. ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray

... give him the necessary opportunity to unburden himself) and he does nothing but stare at me in a fixed and dreadful way, and remains mute. Of course I know that I am to blame on account of my former indifference—even antagonism—to him. He is afraid of rebuff. I have extended encouragement to him by all the slight means in my power, and Netta has openly handed him my photo, observing that she knew he would like to have it. I have even gone to the length of asking Henry ...
— Our Elizabeth - A Humour Novel • Florence A. Kilpatrick

... hours, and a curious and vivid companion he made. He was so intensely avid of life, so intolerant of the old, of anything different to that which he personally desired or saw, that at times it was most difficult to say anything at all for fear of meeting a rebuff or at least a caustic objection. As I was very pleased to note, he had a passion for seeing, as all youth should have when it first comes to the great city—the great bridges, the new tunnels just then being completed or dug, the harbor and bay, Coney Island, the two new and ...
— Twelve Men • Theodore Dreiser

... said, in a jesting tone, "that I asked her to marry me. After all, I had saved her son, had I not?... So... I thought. What a rebuff!... It produced a coolness between ...
— The Crystal Stopper • Maurice LeBlanc

... hand, they have received a rebuff due to their lack of poise, they should carefully examine into the reasons for this, in order to guard against such an occurrence in ...
— Poise: How to Attain It • D. Starke

... left him, settling herself by the side of Mrs. Leyburn. He had a momentary sense of rebuff. The man, quick, sensitive, sympathetic, felt in the woman the presence of a strength, a self-sufficingness which was not all attractive. His vanity, if he had cherished any during their conversation, was not flattered by its close. But as he leant against the window-frame waiting ...
— Robert Elsmere • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... After this rebuff the Jews funked; their hearts "melted and became as water." Joshua rent his clothes, fell upon his face before the ark, and remained there until the evening. The elders of Israel did likewise, and they ...
— Bible Romances - First Series • George W. Foote

... shall not tell father what we have been talking about, if that is what you mean,' said Duffy, a little indignantly. The tears were shining in her eyes, for she was very fond of her brother, and always ready to help him whenever she was allowed, and so she felt this scornful rebuff the more keenly. ...
— That Scholarship Boy • Emma Leslie

... great rock in the weary desert. My sigh of relief bespoke my feelings and I longed to take his hand, but the moment had not yet come. Something was wanting to a perfect confidence between us, and I was in too sensitive a frame of mind to risk the slightest rebuff. ...
— The House of the Whispering Pines • Anna Katharine Green

... absolutely. What I foresaw has happened. The result of the performance has surpassed my anticipations. A critic pretended that I played Virginie of L'Assommoir instead of Dona Clorinde of L'Aventuriere. May Emile Augier and Zola absolve me! It is my first rebuff at the Comedie; it shall be my last. I warned you on the day of the dress rehearsal. You have gone too far. I keep my word. By the time you receive this letter I shall have left Paris. Will you kindly accept my immediate resignation, ...
— My Double Life - The Memoirs of Sarah Bernhardt • Sarah Bernhardt

... only half a mile across, the passage of Watchapreague taxed me severely. Waves washed over my canoe, but the gallant little craft after each rebuff rose like a bird to the surface of the water, answering the slightest touch of my oar better than the best-trained steed. After entering the south-side swash, the wind struck me on the back, and seas came tumbling over and around the boat, ...
— Voyage of The Paper Canoe • N. H. Bishop

... after such a rebuff, I knew that no circumstance could ever persuade me to occupy Captain West's brass bed. And it was this Captain Nathaniel West, whom I had not yet met, who had now kept me freezing on pier-ends through four miserable hours. The less I saw of him on the voyage the better, was my decision; and it was ...
— The Mutiny of the Elsinore • Jack London

... Councillor made it his duty to mention the subject to William. William, after his fashion, treated the matter very lightly. "I am confident," he said, "that this is a villany; and I will have nobody disturbed on such grounds." After this rebuff, Young remained some time quiet. But when William was on the Continent, and when the nation was agitated by the apprehension of a French invasion and of a Jacobite insurrection, a false accuser ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 4 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... for after the scene in the hut upon the Hills Thornly had gone away for a week, and upon his return he had told Janet he would send her a message when again he needed her. The man's tone had been most kindly, but it seemed a rebuff from which the girl had not been able to recover. Once or twice she had stolen to the hut, when she was sure the master was away; always the key was in its hiding place. Softly she had gone in and ...
— Janet of the Dunes • Harriet T. Comstock

... put in force at once, to be met with a stern rebuff from the officer in question, a sour-looking personage, who refused him point-blank, and sent Samson to the ...
— Crown and Sceptre - A West Country Story • George Manville Fenn

... couldn't help feeling after it was all over that my sense of humour had received a shock from which it was not likely to recover in a long time. There was but little consolation in the reflection that my irritating visitors deserved something in the shape of a rebuff; I could not separate myself from the conviction that my integrity as a gentleman had suffered in a mistaken conflict with humour. My headache, I think, was due in a large measure to the sickening fear ...
— A Fool and His Money • George Barr McCutcheon

... tears; but Johnnie only coloured, and, shutting up the volume of Caesar, put it in its place again, and resumed the occupation of making a willow-wand into a bow, on which he had been engaged when his father summoned him. If Honorius had met with such a rebuff, he would have remained bitterly hurt and ashamed for the rest of the day, and Willie in the same case would have been utterly humbled and discouraged. Not so 'Jean-sans-terre.' What his cogitations were, his brothers could not decide; but the result was, that when he ...
— Holiday Tales • Florence Wilford

... new Republican leaders would be able to preserve the laissez faire attitude toward the railroads and the corporations; and whether the forces of dissent represented in Populism and radical Democracy had received a death blow or only a rebuff. ...
— The United States Since The Civil War • Charles Ramsdell Lingley

... cabin the next morning. They had arranged to spend the following day and night at Boomville and Carter's Hotel, where they were to give their farewell dinner to Heavy Tree Hill. They talked but little together: since the rebuff his enthusiastic confidences had received from Van Loo, Barker had been grave and thoughtful, and Stacy, with the irritating recollection of Van Loo's criticisms in his mind, had refrained from his usual rallying of Barker. Oddly enough, they spoke chiefly of Jack Hamlin,—till ...
— The Three Partners • Bret Harte

... in the habit of waiting for it. The two brothers came out along with their sisters, and signed to the lads who had been holding their horses to bring them up. In the meantime, Buck English, unabashed by the rebuff he had received, once more approached, and just as the car had come up, tendered his gallantry—as he called it—with ...
— The Tithe-Proctor - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton

... the glitter of his city distinctions. But their admiration, if they felt any, was not flatteringly expressed. Adele, indeed, was always graciously kind, and, seeing his confirmed godlessness, tortured herself secretly with the thought that, but for her rebuff, he might have made a better fight against the bedevilments of the world, and lived a truer and purer life. All that, however, was irrevocably past. As for Rose, if there crept into her little prayers a ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 102, April, 1866 • Various

... judge. But away from the bench, once quit of the courthouse and the town, the man who attempted to accost him on his way to his carriage or sought to waylay him at his own gate, had need of all his courage to sustain the rebuff his presumption incurred. ...
— Dark Hollow • Anna Katharine Green

... with this change, Mr. Farebrother felt sure that it was chiefly connected with the debts which were being more and more distinctly reported, and he began to fear that any notion of Lydgate's having resources or friends in the background must be quite illusory. The rebuff he had met with in his first attempt to win Lydgate's confidence, disinclined him to a second; but this news of the execution being actually in the house, determined the Vicar to ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot

... and Fahy. It never had an integration policy to defend, had in fact consistently opposed the imposition of one, and was not, therefore, under the same psychological pressures to react positively to the secretary's latest rebuff. Determined to defend its current interpretation of the Gillem Board policy, the Army resisted the Personnel Policy Board's use of the Air Force plan, Secretary Johnson's directive, and the initial recommendations of the Fahy Committee (p. 360) to pry out ...
— Integration of the Armed Forces, 1940-1965 • Morris J. MacGregor Jr.

... however, doomed to failure, for no workingman's party can succeed, except in isolated localities, without the cooperation of other social and political forces. Standing alone as a political entity, labor has met only rebuff and defeat at the ...
— The Armies of Labor - Volume 40 in The Chronicles Of America Series • Samuel P. Orth

... artisan sought social intercourse with a philosopher, she was expected to have prepared herself by mental training to be congenial. When a citizen of Mizora became ambitious to rise, she did not have to struggle with every species of opposition, and contend against rebuff and repulse. Correct language, refined tastes, dignified and graceful manners were the common acquirements of all. Mental culture of so high an order—I marveled that a lifetime should be long enough to acquire it ...
— Mizora: A Prophecy - A MSS. Found Among the Private Papers of the Princess Vera Zarovitch • Mary E. Bradley

... brave little heart, and so he turned his back upon the field and fled to Boston, half beaten, but unconsciously collecting his forces for the strife of another day. He did not know it then, nor did she, but his love was not vanquished; it had met its first rebuff, that was all. ...
— The Daughter of Anderson Crow • George Barr McCutcheon

... of the ice; but the girl's mode of receiving the attentions of the second lover varied considerably. She did not drop her eyes shyly under his gaze, but stared him full in the face by way of a slight rebuff. Neither did she prepare for him a savoury rib, so that he was obliged to help himself—which he did with much coolness, for the laws of hospitality in Eskimo-land ...
— The Walrus Hunters - A Romance of the Realms of Ice • R.M. Ballantyne

... thought it mischievous moonshine; and, instead of giving Durie the encouragement which he wanted, he wrote to the English agent at Frankfort, instructing him to show Durie no countenance whatever. Durie felt the rebuff sorely. In England, he writes, he must depend now chiefly on Roe, who could still do much privately, apart from Laud's approbation. "Mr. Hartlib will send anything to Durie which Roe would have communicated to him in ...
— The Life of John Milton Vol. 3 1643-1649 • David Masson

... Wordsworth's poetry, that "it is his aversion." That may be: but whose fault is it? This is the satire of a lord, who is accustomed to have all his whims or dislikes taken for gospel, and who cannot be at the pains to do more than signify his contempt or displeasure. If a great man meets with a rebuff which he does not like, he turns on his heel, and this passes for a repartee. The Noble Author says of a celebrated barrister and critic, that he was "born in a garret sixteen stories high." The insinuation is not true; or if it were, it is low. The allusion degrades the person who makes ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin

... The acid rebuff of the old E left the administrative board hanging in a vacuum of indecision, frustration. Angry ...
— Eight Keys to Eden • Mark Irvin Clifton

... rebuff of her chilling silence when he came in, and when she twitched herself loose from his embrace he came near regretting his extreme virtue. He spent ten minutes trying to explain, without telling all of the truth, and he felt his good opinion ...
— Lonesome Land • B. M. Bower

... After which rebuff, James was more willing than he had hitherto been to act in accordance with the advice of the scout. Accordingly, as they rowed down the lake, the boats with the Royal Scouts, although keeping up with the others, maintained their position in the ...
— With Wolfe in Canada - The Winning of a Continent • G. A. Henty

... making rolls and entertaining a caller with a cup of tea. Penrod lingered a few moments, but found even his attention to the conversation ill received, while his attempts to take part in it met outright rebuff. His feelings were hurt; he passed broodingly to the front part of the house, and flung himself wearily into an armchair in the library. With glazed eyes he stared at shelves of books that meant to him just what the wallpaper meant, and he sighed from the abyss. ...
— Penrod and Sam • Booth Tarkington

... hundred men and boys stood in line, waiting their turn upon the bridge ladder and the travelling rings, that hung full of struggling and squirming humanity, groping madly for the next grip. No failure, no rebuff, discouraged them. Seven boys and girls rode with looks of deep concern—it is their way—upon each end of the seesaw, and two squeezed into each of the forty swings that had room for one, while a hundred counted time and saw that none ...
— The Battle with the Slum • Jacob A. Riis

... was the face he put upon it. We can wear what appearance we please before the world until we are found out, nor is the world's praise knocking upon hollowness always hollow music; but Mrs Mountstuart's laudation of his kindness and simplicity disturbed him; for though he had recovered from his rebuff enough to imagine that Laetitia could not refuse him under reiterated pressure, he had let it be supposed that she was a submissive handmaiden throbbing for her elevation; and Mrs Mountstuart's belief in it afflicted ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... breast—as the flatness and shortness of puisne noses was to the firmness and elastic repulsion of the same organ of nutrition in the hale and lively—which, tho' happy for the woman, was the undoing of the child, inasmuch as his nose was so snubb'd, so rebuff'd, so rebated, and so refrigerated thereby, as never to arrive ad mensuram suam legitimam;—but that in case of the flaccidity and softness of the nurse or mother's breast—by sinking into it, quoth Paraeus, as into so much butter, the nose ...
— The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman • Laurence Sterne

... if she'll go to our school," thought Dolly; and for a moment the impulse seized her to stop and "scrape acquaintance." Then she remembered that shaking head, and fearing a rebuff, she walked ...
— Two Little Women • Carolyn Wells

... stranger; this rarely occurred, because she walked with briskness, and refrained from glancing at other pedestrians. (Generally the intruder was a youth anxious to make or sustain a reputation for gallantry, and he accepted the sharp rebuff with docility.) But news came from Miss Loriner that Lady Douglass, after years of the luxury of imagining herself in delicate health, was now genuinely ill, and Henry went down from town each evening by a late train to make inquiries, returning ...
— Love at Paddington • W. Pett Ridge

... eyes ever shifted from the face of the man to that of the girl. Once, while Donald and his host were engaged in an animated discussion, he awkwardly attempted to draw Rose into personal conversation; but he relapsed again into moody silence when he received a frank, though smiling, rebuff. Clearly the meal was not an enjoyable one ...
— 'Smiles' - A Rose of the Cumberlands • Eliot H. Robinson

... a first rebuff," he was saying complacently to himself; "the girl will reflect, and that old schemer will think better of it. Her round eyes fairly blinked at the sight of my gold; it dazzled her like the noonday sun. Besides, ...
— A Cardinal Sin • Eugene Sue

... rebuff, Gregory was very quiet, and soon rose and excused himself, saying that he had taken longer walks than usual and ...
— Opening a Chestnut Burr • Edward Payson Roe

... had observed, rather wonderingly, the frank helpfulness with which Southerners would identify themselves with each others' affairs, and she felt sure that in speaking to Jim she ran little risk of rebuff. Jim had known the Masons always, was of their blood; to put his shoulder to their wheel would seem to him the right, and natural thing to do. Therefore Blanche made her request with confidence, and Jim, who had never in his life questioned ...
— Princess • Mary Greenway McClelland

... was like the rest of his kind; he did not consider himself beaten at the first rebuff. Although the old woman grumbled and complained as much as she could, he was just as persistent as ever, and went on begging and praying like a starved dog, until at last she gave in, and he got permission to lie on the floor for ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf (Vol 2 of 17) - Folk-Lore, Fables, And Fairy Tales • Various

... Bracy," said Front-de-Boeuf, well pleased with the rebuff which his companion had received; "the ...
— Ivanhoe - A Romance • Walter Scott

... the one to discharge his pistol, so the other could not resist without committing an outrage upon tradition. One wonders what had been the result if some mannerless reformer had declined his assailant's invitation and drawn his sword. Maybe the sensitive art might have died under this sharp rebuff. But none save regicides were known to resist, and their resistance was never more forcible than a volley of texts. Thus the High-toby-crack swaggered it with insolent gaiety, knowing no worse misery than the fear of the Tree, so long as he followed the rules of his craft. But let a touch of ...
— A Book of Scoundrels • Charles Whibley

... youth's idealisms. Let us check not the onset of his knight-errantry. And the world does these things—not purposely, not even knowingly, but thoughtlessly. Many a young man has had his life's work kept back and the ardor of it chilled by rebuff ...
— The Young Man and the World • Albert J. Beveridge

... in a rage, feeling that he had at all events got the worst of this encounter, and that it was entirely his own fault for having laid himself open to the rebuff. ...
— Soldiers of the Queen • Harold Avery

... young wives who went to their husbands with the same assurance of confidence and trust as to their hopes and ambitions with which a child would approach its mother, only to meet with a brutal rebuff for even venturing to have an ambition which did not directly enhance the husband's comfort or ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden



Words linked to "Rebuff" :   pooh-pooh, rejection, discourtesy, defend, scorn, offensive activity, cold shoulder, offence, cut, turn down, reject, oppose, silent treatment, disdain, fight down, fight, freeze off, offense, spurn, fight back



Copyright © 2024 e-Free Translation.com