"Smirk" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... said Mr. Slope, with a very deanish sort of smirk on his face. "Country gentlemen do deceive one another ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... drawing her away from the door and down the stairs. "He must be trying to teach himself to dance. I suppose he wants to learn how, so he'll be able to dance at the party," she added, with smirk. Then Mother Stina began to shake with laughter. "He came near frightening the life out of me," she confessed. "Thank God he can be young for once!" When she had got over her fit of laughing, she said: "You're ...
— Jerusalem • Selma Lagerlof
... is easily done, and it is as much to your brother as to myself. It is a letter which, methinks, Fulk would not have read out of the family, of which I may call myself one," and he gave a sort of smirk at Agnes;—"but he writes so crabbedly, that I, for one, cannot read two lines,—and I would not willingly give it to a clerk, who might be less secret. So methought, as 'twas the Baron's affair, I would even bring it here, and profit ...
— The Lances of Lynwood • Charlotte M. Yonge
... intruding, I hope," one plump cowbird remarked with a smirk as he settled himself near the Muley Cow's forelegs, when she stopped ...
— The Tale of the The Muley Cow - Slumber-Town Tales • Arthur Scott Bailey
... 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, With his cursed smirk, as he nodded applause, And kept off the old ...
— Introduction to Robert Browning • Hiram Corson
... not go near her so long as that odious actor is hanging about. His smirk at me the ...
— Money Magic - A Novel • Hamlin Garland
... that Mr. Hoopdriver was not one of your fast young men. If he had been King Lemuel, he could not have profited more by his mother's instructions. He regarded the feminine sex as something to bow to and smirk at from a safe distance. Years of the intimate remoteness of a counter leave their mark upon a man. It was an adventure for him to take one of the Young Ladies of the establishment to church on a Sunday. Few modern young men could have merited less the ...
— The Wheels of Chance - A Bicycling Idyll • H. G. Wells
... that sweet brook, to hear them sing; They thought their music quite the thing. "And now," said they, "we will draw near," For much they wished to see and hear What was this fuss and noise about, So joined the party to find out. The Frogs received them with a smirk, And gave their hands with nervous jerk. Bowing and smiling in return, The Ducks prepared ...
— The Ducks and Frogs, - A Tale of the Bogs. • Fanny Fire-Fly
... smiled, and smirk'd, and bow'd, None could please her of all the crowd; Lung and Tung she thought too loud; Opulent Tin was much too proud; Lofty Long was quite too tall; Musical Sing sung very small; And, most remarkable freak of all, ...
— Successful Recitations • Various
... swimming," Henrietta Hen remarked with a silly smirk. "If it weren't for getting my feet wet I'd be tempted to learn myself. No doubt my son ...
— The Tale of Henrietta Hen • Arthur Scott Bailey
... and the forlorn souls all about me, for a time at least, laid down their burdens and found rest and comfort in their Father's house. It did me more good than the preaching of all the bishops in London, or the finest pageant at St. Paul's; and I am truly glad I went, though the saucy conductor did smirk at me over ...
— Shawl-Straps - A Second Series of Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag • Louisa M. Alcott
... Solomon, lurk Around the corner to see him work— Sitting cross-legged, like a Turk, Drawing the waxed end through with a jerk, And boring the holes with a comical quirk 15 Of his wise old head, and a knowing smirk. But vainly they mounted each other's backs, And poked through knot holes and pried through cracks; With wood from the pile and straw from the stacks He plugged the knot holes and calked the cracks; 20 And a bucket of water, which one ...
— Story Hour Readings: Seventh Year • E.C. Hartwell
... young fellow with a sly, twisted smirk which gives him the appearance of perpetually winking his eye, detaches himself from a group on the right. All join in with urging exclamations: "Go on, Peters! Go to it! Pedal up, Pete! Give us a rag! ...
— The Straw • Eugene O'Neill
... potentate, who was devouring the withered lady with his eyes. He wagged his head in assent. Just then the dancer paused before us, and thrusting forward her greasy forehead, enveloped us with a sphinx-like smirk. As I hastily pressed a two-franc piece above her eyebrows Safti addressed her animatedly in Arabic. I caught the word "Smain." The lady smiled, and made a guttural reply; then, with a somnolent wink at me, she waddled onward, flapping ...
— Smain; and Safti's Summer Day - 1905 • Robert Hichens
... his life rooted out, is likely to look out upon his fellows from the point of view of a philanthropist? Do you suppose that the man, into whose soul the irons of bitterness have gnawed and eaten their way, is likely to come out with a smirk and look around him for the opportunity of doing good? Rubbish! My aim is to encourage suffering wherever I see it, to create it where I can, to make sinners and ...
— The Malefactor • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... Raphael's grand gods and goddesses, his exquisite Eros and radiant Psyche of the Farnesina, are indeed succeeded but too soon by the Olympus of Giulio Romano, an Olympus of harlots and acrobats, who smirk and mouth and wriggle and sprawl ignobly on the walls and ceilings of the dismantled palace which crumbles away among the stunted willows, the stagnant pools, and rank grass of the marshes of Mantua. But this is no more the fault of antiquity than it is ...
— The Contemporary Review, Volume 36, September 1879 • Various
... prepossessing face was swollen and unshapely, and its owner moved with a limp and a muttered curse towards the place assigned him. He was followed by a sallow-faced, long-nosed man, with black oily hair and an affected smirk which twitched the corners of his thin lips. Singling out his master's family with a furtive glance from a pair of sinister greenish eyes, he made a low bow ...
— Prisoners of Hope - A Tale of Colonial Virginia • Mary Johnston
... is but a few hours, but eleven domestics range themselves in a row to wait upon our departure and to smirk and extend their palms for tips as we prepare to go. No country under the sun save the Caucasus could thus muster eleven expectant menials on the strength of one meal served and but three hours actual occupation ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens
... glowing. She anticipated the look that came into their faces when she left polite small-talk behind and soared up into the cold, rarefied atmosphere of business. She delighted in seeing the admiring and tolerant smirk vanish and give way to a startled ...
— Fanny Herself • Edna Ferber
... cat that would eat you if he dared, is a pretty revelation. Ca donne furieusement a penser. [Footnote: Ca donne furieusement a penser: "That makes one think very hard."] It gives you a suspicion of just how far the polish we most of us smirk over will go. My cats at San Lorenzo knew some few moments of peace between two and three in the afternoon. That would have been the time to get up a testimonial to the kind soul who fed them. Try them at five and they would ignore you. But try them ...
— Short Stories and Selections for Use in the Secondary Schools • Emilie Kip Baker
... proportion and thickness of his body. He was, in fact, half a head taller than she, and Stella stood five feet five. His gray eyes met hers squarely, with a cool, impersonal quality of gaze. There was neither smirk nor embarrassment in his straightforward glance. He was, in effect, "sizing her up" just as he would have looked casually over a logger asking him for a job. Stella sensed that, and resenting it momentarily, failed to match his manner. She flushed. Fyfe smiled, a broad, friendly grin, in ...
— Big Timber - A Story of the Northwest • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... covered himself with glory!) How it befell, one summer's day, The King of the Cubans passed that way, King January's his name, they say, And fell in love with the Princess May, The reigning belle of Manhattan. Nor how he began to smirk and sue, And dress as lovers who come to woo, Or as Max Maretzek or Jullien do, When they sit, full bloomed, in the ladies' view, ...
— Fifth Avenue • Arthur Bartlett Maurice
... (God help 'em!) 'at wander throo th' streets, An cut sich a dash an a swell,— Who simper an smirk at each chap 'at they meet, Flingin baits to drag victims to Hell. They may laff, they may shaat, they may join in a dance, They may spooart ther fine clooas an seem gay; But ther's sorrow within,—yo may see at a glance,— Poor ...
— Yorkshire Lyrics • John Hartley
... grim self communing, "the skunk found out somehow that she was going abroad, and planned to accompany her. I could see it in the smirk on his face as soon as he discovered her whereabouts on the platform. If he means to summer at Maloja, I guess my thousand dollars was expended to no good purpose, and the quicker I put up another thousand to pull things straight ...
— The Silent Barrier • Louis Tracy
... than Janet, and having the smirk of a perfunctory greeting upon her flabby face, stood within the room assigned to Mistress Katherine. As her eyes fell upon the maid, she stepped back surprised, and with a confusion she essayed to hide in her coarse voiced acknowledgment of ...
— Mistress Penwick • Dutton Payne
... but at a glance from Stoddard he drew back and concealed his smirk. Then for half an hour with his most telling arguments and the hypnotic spell of his eyes Whitney Stoddard outdid himself to win her over while Rimrock sat by and smiled. He had tried that himself in days gone by and he knew Stoddard was wasting his breath. ...
— Rimrock Jones • Dane Coolidge
... the store and see what you can do to bring her to her senses," the money-lender proposed, with a smirk which twisted his sallow visage into a grimace. "If you can bring her to reason, we'll both get—get what's ...
— Dixie Hart • Will N. Harben
... buttons, beside a bead-work table bearing a bronze box with a miniature of Beatrice Cenci in the lid. Lily felt for these objects the same distaste which the prisoner may entertain for the fittings of the court-room. It was here that her aunt received her rare confidences, and the pink-eyed smirk of the turbaned Beatrice was associated in her mind with the gradual fading of the smile from Mrs. Peniston's lips. That lady's dread of a scene gave her an inexorableness which the greatest strength ...
— House of Mirth • Edith Wharton
... may not have seen her, ere this," observed Pao-yue with a smirk, "yet when I look at her face, it seems so familiar, and to my mind, it would appear as if we had been old acquaintances; just as if, in fact, we were now ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... catching the trace of a smirk in Hank's eyes, the rascal shook his fist at the steward of the ...
— The Motor Boat Club and The Wireless - The Dot, Dash and Dare Cruise • H. Irving Hancock
... curiosity,—reasons well enough founded, for instantly grins, broader than before, widened the mouths of the two married ladies, while even Miss Thrale began a titter that half choaked her, and Augusta, nodding to me with an arch smirk, said, "Miss Burney, I wish ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 1 • Madame D'Arblay
... rifle to me, and I passed it to a trooper. He stepped forward now to regain it with something of a smirk on ...
— Hira Singh - When India came to fight in Flanders • Talbot Mundy
... erasures that would confound and overcome a lawyer. When customers did not die, it was pastime to be dallying with the living. In adding up a bill with haste, how many times will four and four make nine? They generally did with Jehu. The best are liable to errors. It cost a smirk or smile; Jehu had hundreds at command, and the accident was amended. How easy is it sometimes to give no bill at all! How very easy to apply, a few months afterwards, for second payment; how much more easy still to pocket it without a word; or, if discovered ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXVIII. February, 1843. Vol. LIII. • Various
... eyes grew dim with rapture, alarm, and ineffable delight. I was ashamed in presence of the old woman, who began to smirk and wink odiously, and I flew like an arrow to the loneliest nook of the garden. There I threw myself on the grass beneath the hazel-bushes and read the note again, repeating the words by heart, and then re-reading them over and over, while the ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries: - Masterpieces of German Literature Translated into English, Volume 5. • Various
... figures in the tapestry had an uncanny look; especially one, a hunter, who might have passed for an assassin, just taking aim at his victim. The smile on his startlingly red lips, in reality only a self-satisfied smirk, was fairly devilish in that light, and his ghastly face horribly life-like. The lamp burned dimly in the damp heavy air, the wind sighed and moaned along the corridors, and strange, frightful sounds came from the deserted chambers ...
— Captain Fracasse • Theophile Gautier
... force himself, between twice ascertaining their position, to wait for a period that felt like an eternity, walking about miserably, and smoking flavourless cigarettes;—then he would stand amazed, incredulous, when, with a smirk (as it almost struck him) of ironical complacence, they would attest that his eternity had lasted something near a quarter of ...
— The Cardinal's Snuff-Box • Henry Harland
... cultivate his sense of beauty. After his engagement to Clara he gives her fair warning that he has the "very mischievous habit" of being a great admirer of beautiful women and girls. "They make me positively smirk, and I swim in panegyrics on your sex. Consequently, if at some future time we walk along the streets of Vienna and meet a beauty, and I exclaim, 'Oh, Clara! see this heavenly vision,' or something of the sort, ...
— Chopin and Other Musical Essays • Henry T. Finck
... happen to have that proof with you?" called out Frank. Upon hearing this, the other hastened up, though there was a satisfied smirk on his face, as though he had ...
— The Outdoor Chums at Cabin Point - or The Golden Cup Mystery • Quincy Allen
... hands. "Does he ever come? He's a man, soon going to college, and you are only 'kids.' I'm older than he is really; a woman is always older than a man, but he doesn't like me. We are not en rapport." Clemence tried hard to suppress a smirk of self- consciousness at the use of the French term, while the two younger sisters jeered and booed with the callous brutality of ...
— A College Girl • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... smile became a little fixed. Yet there came nothing of a smirk into it, nothing the least bit superior.... Was this the explanation of the little girl's odd yearning toward pens and desks? How came she to revere the Bard, where even to hear his name? Was it possible that Mrs. Garland's changeling ...
— V. V.'s Eyes • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... see the holy ones air their smug pieties and admire them and smirk over them, and at the same moment frankly and publicly show their contempt for the pieties of the Boer—confidently expecting the approval of the country and the ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... his absent-mindedness, he stumbled and staggered in his gait. In his portraits we can read the same double story. In some the prevailing tone is dignity; in others there is the faint suggestion of a smirk. His faults were those often found in men of genius. He was nearly always in a hurry, and was never in time for dinner. He was unsystematic in his habits, and incompetent in money matters. He was rather imperious in disposition, and sometimes overbearing in his conduct. He was impatient at ...
— History of the Moravian Church • J. E. Hutton
... masonry. As all visitors to the mansion are aware, these paintings represent women of middle age, of a date some two hundred years ago, whose lineaments once seen can never be forgotten. The long pointed features, narrow eye, and smirk of the one, so suggestive of merciless treachery; the bill-hook nose, large teeth, and bold eye of the other suggesting arrogance to the point of ferocity, haunt the beholder afterwards ...
— Tess of the d'Urbervilles - A Pure Woman • Thomas Hardy
... smile was the main points about her. I've seen a lot of diff'rent kinds of smiles, meanin' and unmeanin'; but this chronic half-smirk of Madame Roulaire's was about the most unconvincin' performance I've ever watched. Why, even a blind man could tell she didn't really mean it! Outside of that, she was just a plain, pie faced sort of female with shrinkin', apologizin' ways and a set of store teeth ...
— Odd Numbers - Being Further Chronicles of Shorty McCabe • Sewell Ford
... the little. The low hills are a-smirk with flowers and greenery; the dominating peaks, austere and desolate, holding a ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Volume 8 - Epigrams, On With the Dance, Negligible Tales • Ambrose Bierce
... account my niece a peasant girl?" he asked. "Would you have her smirk and squirm at every piece of flattery you utter? So that she weds your Highness what shall ...
— Love-at-Arms • Raphael Sabatini
... have no apprehensions of gentlemen of your appearance," said the divine, with a smirk. "It is the natives ...
— The Spy • James Fenimore Cooper
... exterior seriousness in looks and motions gives dignity, without excluding wit and decent cheerfulness, which are always serious themselves. A constant smirk upon the face, and a whifing activity of the body, are strong indications of futility. Whoever is in a hurry, shows that the thing he is about is too big for him. Haste and hurry are ...
— The PG Edition of Chesterfield's Letters to His Son • The Earl of Chesterfield
... am I to wage war?"—And, in fact, during my last visit I found that Alexyei Sergyeitch had aged very greatly; even the pupils of his eyes had acquired a milky hue—like that in infants—and on his lips there appeared not the discerning smile of former days, but that strainedly-sweet, unconscious smirk which never leaves the faces of very old people even in ...
— A Reckless Character - And Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... but this is a bonnie welcome to give a fellow that has come so far to see you such a hot morning." Joe said a deal more of the same make; and all the time he was saying it, the old man laid himself back in his great chair, and kept twiddling his thumbs, and glancing up at Joe with a half-smirk on his face, as if he had got something very ...
— The Squire of Sandal-Side - A Pastoral Romance • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... posing with a nonchalant shoulder against the wall, his slender, nicely manicured fingers stroking his scrubby moustache (now that he had discarded the beard of Sir Francis, together with his mask) and not quite hiding the smirk of his contemptible satisfaction—the satisfaction of one who had lied needlessly, meanly, out of sheer spite, and successfully, since his lie, being manufactured out of whole cloth, could never be controverted save by the worthless word ...
— Nobody • Louis Joseph Vance
... noticed it," says the shopman, with a smirk. "You were so taken up with that fine student that . . . it's queer ...
— The Darling and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... midst of her distress she put on a complacent smirk, straightened her emaciated form, and sat there, looking like the very ghost of pride, wrapped in ...
— The Young Surveyor; - or Jack on the Prairies • J. T. Trowbridge
... most extraordinary sight. No English fair in the palmiest days of fairs ever presented such an array of attractions. Behind the temple are archery galleries in numbers, where girls, hardly so modest-looking as usual, smile and smirk, and bring straw-coloured tea in dainty cups, and tasteless sweetmeats on lacquer trays, and smoke their tiny pipes, and offer you bows of slender bamboo strips, two feet long, with rests for the arrows, and tiny cherry-wood arrows, bone-tipped, and feathered ...
— Unbeaten Tracks in Japan • Isabella L. Bird
... I dress too well," said Humphreys with his ghastly smirk. "You think that I care too much for appearances. I do. It is a weakness of mine which comes from a ...
— The End Of The World - A Love Story • Edward Eggleston
... then, from a Zincala— Unmake yourself from being child of mine! Take holy water, cross your dark skin white; Round your proud eyes to foolish kitten looks; Walk mincingly, and smirk, and twitch your robe: Unmake yourself—doff all the eagle plumes And be a parrot, chained to a ring that slips Upon a Spaniard's thumb, at will of his That you should prattle o'er his ...
— George Eliot; A Critical Study of Her Life, Writings & Philosophy • George Willis Cooke
... disappointed, and for a moment we are both silent. We have sat down side by side on the sofa. Vick is standing on her hinder legs, with her forepaws rested on Roger's knee. Her tail is wagging with the strong and untiring regularity of a pendulum, and a smirk of welcome and recognition is on her face. Roger's arm is round me, and we are holding each other's hands, but we are no longer in heaven. I could not tell you why, but we are not. Some stupid constraint—quite of earth—has fallen upon me. Where are all ...
— Nancy - A Novel • Rhoda Broughton
... trimmings and feather boas and all other adornments irrelevant to the structure of the human body; flappers who swung scarlet bows on their plaits and otherwise assailed their Presbyterian environment by glad cries of the appearance; and on all these faces the smirk of superior sagacity that vulgar people give to the untriumphant ideal. "I must work out the ethics of suicide this evening," thought Ellen chokingly, "for if the world's like this it's the wisest thing to do. But not, ...
— The Judge • Rebecca West
... work all day, trying to make and secure the money that gives her and her family everything they want, and which wearies me body and soul, to expect her to let me stay at home, and be quiet. I know I ought to dress and go into Gnu's house, and smirk at his wife, and stand up in a black suit before him attired in the same way, and talk about the same stocks that we discussed down town in the morning in colored trowsers. That's a social duty, I suppose. And I ought to see various slight young gentlemen whirl my wife ...
— The Potiphar Papers • George William Curtis
... part because of this face—plump, pinkly tinted cheeks, lustrous, curling hair of some repellent composition, eyes with a hard glitter, each lash distinct in blue-black lines, and a small, tip-curled black mustache that lent the whole an offensive smirk. Garbed now in a raincoat, he, too, was posed before the emporium front, labelled "Rainproof or You Get Back Your Money." So frankly evil was his mien that Merton Gill, pausing to regard him, suffered a ...
— Merton of the Movies • Harry Leon Wilson
... Thought you was some stuff, didn't you?" The man paused for breath, and Connie scrutinized his face, but could not remember to have seen him before. He shifted his glance to the other, who had returned to the edge of the bunk, and was regarding him with a sneering smirk. ...
— Connie Morgan in the Fur Country • James B. Hendryx
... about it! But that hanging up of the gittern—. One would fain have put it off, had falling hairs, and marriage-vows, and obesity have permitted it. Nay, is it not so, old friend of the grizzled beard? Dost thou not envy that smirk young knave with his five lustrums, though it goes hard with him to purchase his kid-gloves? He dines for one-and-twopence at an eating-house; but what cares Maria where he dines? He rambles through the rye with his empty pockets, and at the turn of the field-path Maria ...
— The Bertrams • Anthony Trollope
... the princess wishes to see you." Then, maliciously: "You will suffer this time. I assure you she is not used to such treatment. It was glorious, though, to see you resent such an affront. Men usually smirk and smile foolishly and thank her when ...
— When Knighthood Was in Flower • Charles Major
... a tall person, wearing a silk travelling-cap. He had a face of stupid benignity and a self-satisfied smirk; and he was formally trying to put at his ease, and hopelessly confusing the loutish youth before him. "You say you saw the whole accident, and you're probably the only passenger that did see it. You'll be the ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... concerts and At Homes and picture-galleries and what-not. She talked of presenting her at Court, with an air of significance which the General loathed. The question in her eye and smile—the General called it a smirk—the very transparent question was as to whether it was not better to wait and present Nelly on ...
— Mary Gray • Katharine Tynan
... the colour in the cheek," he answered, with a smirk at what he took to be the quickness of ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... Mrs. Ocklebourne, with a smirk at her hostess, who was supremely uncomfortable, "and I do so want to know your dear wife, bishop. So does Major Joicy. He's tremendously interested in the Something Society, which looks after the poor black things out in Nigeria—that is ...
— The Scarlet Feather • Houghton Townley
... He was looking at the vacant spots which many small pictures had left on the walls, paintings by famous masters of the XVIII century. The banded brigand must also have passed these by as too insignificant to carry off, but the smirk illuminating the Count's ...
— The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... no fool like an old fool, as the saying is! Just watch her smirk! I'm mighty glad Ellen Robinson's there to relieve me of the responsibility. She'll be over after a while, and then we'll know who he is. There goes Julia in. She watched him out o' sight! Well, I wonder what ...
— Cloudy Jewel • Grace Livingston Hill
... of pleasure.] Rejoicing. — N. rejoicing, exultation, triumph, jubilation, heyday, flush, revelling; merrymaking &c. (amusement) 840; jubilee &c. (celebration) 883; paean, Te Deum &c. (thanksgiving) 990[Lat]; congratulation &c. 896. smile, simper, smirk, grin; broad grin, sardonic grin. laughter (amusement) 840. risibility; derision &c. 856. Momus; Democritus the Abderite[obs3]; rollicker[obs3]. V. rejoice, thank one's stars, bless one's stars; congratulate oneself, hug oneself; rub one's hands, clap one's hands; smack the ...
— Roget's Thesaurus • Peter Mark Roget
... thing to have to enjoy herself in a foreign language, and spend the holidays with a maiden lady and a snuffy old Pere, because there wasn't enough money to come home. Yes," concluded Pixie, with a smirk of satisfaction, "I've had my trials, and now I'm to be crossed in love, and have my young lover rent from me. ... You couldn't have the audacity to call life easy ...
— The Love Affairs of Pixie • Mrs George de Horne Vaizey
... ready. She greatly liked the new fun, the hopping and whirling to Winnie's steady "One, two, three! One, two, three!" There was a grown-up, affected smirk on her delicate little face, at which Mrs. Tennyson laughed every time she looked out. I think Lu would have hopped and minced up and down the walk until night, if Winnie's mother hadn't told them ...
— Lill's Travels in Santa Claus Land and other Stories • Ellis Towne, Sophie May and Ella Farman
... or little children—it's the same rule in art, only varying the objects—are smirking. In fact,' said Miss La Creevy, sinking her voice to a confidential whisper, 'there are only two styles of portrait painting; the serious and the smirk; and we always use the serious for professional people (except actors sometimes), and the smirk for private ladies and gentlemen who don't care ...
— The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby • Charles Dickens
... that if I had the power I'd do this to all of you! I'd do this to all of you! I'd do this to all of you! You just wait, you young scamp! I'll catch you. My heart boils, it boils, it boils over! And now I must smirk before the mistress as if I were a fool. What a life! What a life! The sinners in hell do not suffer as I suffer in this ...
— Plays • Alexander Ostrovsky
... was wasted, however, for almost before the last words were out of its mouth the sloth-bear was snoring peacefully with a contented smirk on ...
— Dick, Marjorie and Fidge - A Search for the Wonderful Dodo • G. E. Farrow
... said with his vain smirk. "No weight whatever. This entire platform together with its huts is lighter than air. If I should tear loose this little door it would float out of my hands instantly and go straight up to the stars. The substance—I have called it Fleotite—is not ...
— The Floating Island of Madness • Jason Kirby
... round the bar, and a few looked at the drop-curtain as if they thought their ascetic glances would cause it to roll up and disappear. The overture at length ended. The stage was disclosed, and a man came forward with a smirk, and a wriggle of gigantic feet, to ...
— Flames • Robert Smythe Hichens
... matters in his mind, he passed easily and leisurely along the whole length of Oxford Street. No one could have judged from his dressy appearance, the constant smirk on his face, and his confident air, how very miserable that poor little dandy was; but three-fourths of his misery were really occasioned by the impossibility he felt of his ever being able to indulge in his propensities for finery and display. Nothing better had he to occupy his ...
— Ten Thousand a-Year. Volume 1. • Samuel Warren
... admire as great painters, and even if we consider them worthy of only secondary honors, it matters not, they remain indelibly impressed on our minds. After one has seen Steen's pictures it is impossible to see a drunkard, a buffoon, a cripple, a dwarf, a deformed face, a ridiculous smirk, a grotesque attitude, without remembering one of his figures. All the degrees of stupidity and of drunkenness, all the grossness and mawkishness of orgies, the frenzy of the lowest pleasures, the cynicism of the vulgarest vice, the buffoonery of the wildest rabble, all the most brutal ...
— Holland, v. 1 (of 2) • Edmondo de Amicis
... the Boxes where TRIP in his lace Is aping his master, and keeping his place. Do but note how the Puppy flings back with a yawn, Like a Duke at the least, or a Bishop in lawn! Then sniffs at his bouquet, whips round with a smirk, And ogles the ladies at large—like a Turk. But the music comes in, and the blanks are all filling, And TRIP must trip up to the seats at a shilling; And spite of the mourning that most of us wear ...
— Collected Poems - In Two Volumes, Vol. II • Austin Dobson
... was to fall aff the flower-pot; but syne I came to, and says I, wi' a polite smirk, 'I'm thinking your leddyship,' says I, 'as ...
— The Little Minister • J.M. Barrie
... adroit, dexterous, deft, clever, ingenious. Skin, hide, pelt, fell. Sleepy, drowsy, slumberous, somnolent, sluggish, torpid, dull, lethargic. Slovenly, slatternly, dowdy, frowsy, blowzy. Sly, crafty, cunning, subtle, wily, artful, politic, designing. Smile, smirk, grin. Solitary, lonely, lone, lonesome, desolate, deserted, uninhabited. Sour, acid, tart, acrid, acidulous, acetose, acerbitous, astringent. Speech, discourse, oration, address, sermon, declamation, dissertation, ...
— The Century Vocabulary Builder • Creever & Bachelor
... lifted his glass with an odd little smirk, some touch of a strange, prim old satyr lurking in his oddly inclined head. Nay, more than satyr: that curious, rather terrible iron demon that has fought with the world and wrung wealth from it, and which knows all about ...
— Aaron's Rod • D. H. Lawrence
... been a little less well-bred, I think she would have bridled. As it was, she really did smirk a little, in ...
— The Chauffeur and the Chaperon • C. N. Williamson
... I apprehend the mood: There was the blameless shrug, permissible smirk, The pen's pretence at play with the pursed mouth, The titter stifled in the hollow palm Which rubbed the eye-brow and caressed the nose, When I first told my tale; they meant, you know— 'The sly one, all this we are bound believe! ...
— Browning as a Philosophical and Religious Teacher • Henry Jones
... even beamingly. In the brief interval which had elapsed since Sam had seen him last, an extraordinary transformation had taken place in this young man. His wan look had disappeared. His eyes were bright. His face wore that beastly self-satisfied smirk which you see in pictures advertising certain makes of fine-mesh underwear. If Eustace Hignett had been a full-page drawing in a magazine with "My dear fellow, I always wear Sigsbee's Super-fine Featherweight!" printed ...
— The Girl on the Boat • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... no sooner departed than the fair conqueress, opening the door of a closet, called forth a young gentleman whom she had there enclosed at the approach of the other. The name of this gallant was Tom Smirk. He was clerk to an attorney, and was indeed the greatest beau and the greatest favourite of the ladies at the end of the town where he lived. As we take dress to be the characteristic or efficient quality ...
— The History of the Life of the Late Mr. Jonathan Wild the Great • Henry Fielding
... 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 the ...
— Selections from the Poems and Plays of Robert Browning • Robert Browning
... novice's smirk," she remarked. "A moment ago I heard him tell his neighbour that he preferred not to discuss the war. He probably thinks that there is a spy under ...
— The Devil's Paw • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... a clear sky, and it fell with terrible effect on Felix. For a moment the knife trembled in his grasp with an almost irresistible impulse. He could hardly restrain himself, as he heard those horrible, incredible words, and saw the loathsome smirk on the speaker's face by which they were accompanied, from leaping then and there at the savage's throat, and plunging his blade to the haft into the vile creature's body. But by a violent effort he mastered ...
— The Great Taboo • Grant Allen
... not the velvety glow of newness. There was a growing bald spot, scarcely hidden by the Hyperion Polish curls; there were crows'-feet around the bold, insolent eyes, and the man's smile was lean and wolfish when the glittering white teeth flashed through the professional smirk of the traveling artist. The old, easy assurance was still there, but cognac had dulled the fires of genius; the tones of the violin trembled, even under the weakening but still magic fingers, and the splendid sapphire and diamond cluster ring of old was ...
— A Fascinating Traitor • Richard Henry Savage
... thought would envy you giggle and smirk and nudge each other and make suggestions that are supposed to be mirth-compelling. And then and there you decide to do differently next summer. A sunburned nose may be a treasurable possession away from town, but back among the hosts of the city it is a different matter. ...
— The Woman Beautiful - or, The Art of Beauty Culture • Helen Follett Stevans
... thrown at his head. However, O'Hagan rose to his feet, made a bow to the company, and made an apology to the drover. He stood there, a blackguard on the face of him, but a gentleman in spite of that undefinable and vaguely repulsive smirk which played about his straight and refined mouth. He slunk away into ...
— War and the Weird • Forbes Phillips
... in the habit of envying, lead contentedly an existence like that above described. Jane Osborne scarcely ever met a man under sixty, and almost the only bachelor who appeared in their society was Mr. Smirk, the celebrated ladies' doctor. ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... fed With largesse yet of living wine and bread. Come, let us praise him: here is nought to hide. Make bare the poor dead secrets of his heart, Strip the stark-naked soul, that all may peer, Spy, smirk, sniff, snap, snort, snivel, snarl, and sneer: Let none so sad, let none so sacred part Lie still for pity, rest unstirred for shame, But all be scanned of all men. ...
— A Midsummer Holiday and Other Poems • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... to smirk and stare about the room; and whenever they didn't laugh or jest enough with her, she would plant herself right in the middle of the floor, and turn herself about in all her finery to attract notice, and say, ...
— Weird Tales from Northern Seas • Jonas Lie
... Still, to a practised eye, they betrayed an inmate who can get through his money, and make very little show for it. The walls were covered with coloured prints of racers and steeple-chases, interspersed with the portraits of opera-dancers, all smirk and caper. Then there was a semi-circular recess covered with red cloth, and fitted up for smoking, as you might perceive by sundry stands full of Turkish pipes in cherry-stick and jessamine, with amber mouthpieces; while a great serpent hookah, from which Frank could no more ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... shrinking all his mind within, he thought: "Tradition, handed down for hours and hours, Tells that our globe, this quivering crystal world, Is slowly dying. What if, seconds hence When I am very old, yon shimmering doom Comes drawing down and down, till all things end?" Then with a wizen smirk he proudly felt No other mote of God had ever gained Such giant ...
— Little Masterpieces of American Wit and Humor - Volume I • Various
... he was a fellow of unusual quickness and penetration. They knew nothing of Sherlock Holmes in those days, but there was a good deal said of Talleyrand. And if you could have caught Frank off his guard, he would have confessed with a smirk that, if he resembled any one, it was the Marquis de Talleyrand-Perigord. It was on the occasion of Archie's first absence that this interest took root. It was vastly deepened when Kirstie resented his curiosity at breakfast, and that same afternoon there occurred ...
— Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... my votive work No burning faith I find; The deeper thinkers sneer and smirk, And give my toil no mind; From nod and wink I read they think That I am ...
— Poems of the Past and the Present • Thomas Hardy
... not a traitor to your mind. Who, knowing innocence in danger, dares Not turn his eye, for fear of smirk, or stares, By other courts, is Justice's statue blind, That to the wall, not Bench, should be assigned. Oft, Precedent is Folly with gray hairs; So you, recalling Junius, heard the prayers Of friendless Stilow; then, what ...
— Freedom, Truth and Beauty • Edward Doyle
... boy of fifteen, with hair the color of fresh sawdust, white eyebrows, and an uncommonly wide-awake look. Ringdove, his father's successor, could never teach Perry the smirk, the grace, and the seductiveness of the counter, so the boy had found his place in the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various
... The Pathan's smirk grew to a grin. He liked grandly to have the notion fathered on himself; and his complacency of course was suggestive of the hakim's trustworthiness. But the ...
— King—of the Khyber Rifles • Talbot Mundy
... the young lady!—dear me, no!" he said, with a smirk. "Loyalty, you know. What do ...
— The Paternoster Ruby • Charles Edmonds Walk
... played cards, for a while, at the same table as Penton, and saw him smirk down upon his guests as no one, surely, but W. W. Penton ever smirked. Evan felt that he would suffocate unless he got away from that table. He wished he could stand on a chair and reveal the character of the ...
— A Canadian Bankclerk • J. P. Buschlen
... forgotten them, and how well I know them, these little details out of the past! the darkish sponge-like holes in the travertine, the reversed capital on the Trinita dei Monti steps, the caryatides of the Stanza dell' Incendio, the scowl or smirk of the Emperors and philosophers at the Capitol: a hundred details. I seem to have been looking at nothing else these fifteen years, during which they have ...
— The Spirit of Rome • Vernon Lee
... immediately suited, but in a few days my new groom came. He was a tall, good-looking fellow enough; but if ever there was a humbug in the shape of a groom Alfred Smirk was the man. He was very civil to me, and never used me ill; in fact, he did a great deal of stroking and patting when his master was there to see it. He always brushed my mane and tail with water and my hoofs with oil before he brought me to the door, to make me look smart; ...
— Black Beauty • Anna Sewell
... to stand their refusals, and pretend to believe their lying excuses, and appear to make quite light of it, though every failure stunned him like a blow of a bludgeon, and as he strutted jauntily off with a bilious smirk, he was well nigh at his wits' end. It was dark as he rode out by the low road to Chapelizod—crest-fallen, beaten—scowling in the darkness through his horse's ears along the straight black line ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... an energy that amazed his faithful follower. The nightmare horror of the situation had affected him much as a sudden blow in the parts about the waistcoat might have done. But, now, as Spike would have said, he caught up with his breath. The smirk faded slowly from the other's face as he listened. Not even in the Bowery, full as it was of candid friends, had he listened to such a trenchant summing-up of his mental ...
— The Intrusion of Jimmy • P. G. Wodehouse
... on whose face there was a heartless smirk of satisfaction at this opportunity of gratifying M'Clutchy, was about to enter the first cabin, there arose from the trembling creatures a loud murmur of wild and unregulated lamentation, which actually startled the bailiff's, who looked as if they were about to be assaulted. An ...
— Valentine M'Clutchy, The Irish Agent - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton
... while when there are so many real women, ready made, out where I come from. This girl would be exactly the wife for you, though. Just as she is, she'd help you mince about from parlor to parlor, and smirk and jabber and waste time. She's been educating for the job ever since she was born." He laid his hand in gracious, kindly fashion on his friend's shoulder. "Think it over. And if you want my help it's yours. I can show her what a fine ...
— The Fashionable Adventures of Joshua Craig • David Graham Phillips
... beside Thurid, and ere the devilish smirk had faded from his handsome face I had caught him full upon the mouth with my clenched fist; and as the good, old American blow landed, the black dator shot back a dozen feet, to crumple in a heap at the foot of Kulan Tith's throne, spitting blood and teeth from ...
— Warlord of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... he? But he was very good, I thought. Dress your ladies in cheerful dresses, not quite so vulgar as Chalon's. . . . I heard from my sister that you had finished Wilkinson to the perfect content of all: I had charged her particularly not to allow Mrs. W. to intercede for any smirk or alteration whatever. ...
— Letters of Edward FitzGerald - in two volumes, Vol. 1 • Edward FitzGerald
... towards him, and Cleggett saw the man's face for the first time. It was a face that Cleggett never forgot. Cleggett judged the man to be a Frenchman; he was dark and sallow, with nervous, black eyebrows, and a smirk that came and went quickly. But the unforgettable feature was a mole that grew on his upper lip, on the right side, near the base of his flaring nostril. Many moles have hairs in them; Pierre's mole had not merely half a dozen hairs, but a whole crop. They ...
— The Cruise of the Jasper B. • Don Marquis
... round to see the bow hangin' down his back, "Our old forefathers went through worse trials than this when they eat their cartridge boxes and friz themselves at Valley Forge," and he fingered some of them bows and ornaments on his breast agin with a vain, conceited smirk of satisfaction. I wuz at my wits' end; I glanced at the door; there wuz no lock on it; what should I do? Religion and common sense wouldn't move him, and as for my sharpest weepon—good vittles—here I wuz hampered, I couldn't cook 'em for ...
— Around the World with Josiah Allen's Wife • Marietta Holley
... time that hatred of inequalities which, repulsive though it is in theory, is yet the true nerver of the strong right arm of progress. It is as characteristic of the homely, human countenance of Democracy as the supercilious smirk is of the homely, inhuman countenance of caste. Arthur did not want to get up where Ross was seated in such elegant state; he wanted to tear Ross, all the Rosses down. "The damn fool!" he fumed. "He goes lounging about, wasting the money we make. It's all wrong. And if we ...
— The Second Generation • David Graham Phillips
... footstep close at hand made them both turn their heads. Along the winding path came Da Souza, with an ugly smirk upon his white face, smoking a cigar whose odour seemed to poison the air. Trent turned upon him with ...
— A Millionaire of Yesterday • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... man as it tugs at the woman; the smirk of the well-fitted prince is no different from the smirk of the Sunday-clad peasant; and the veins of the elders tingle with the same thrill that sets their fresh-frocked grandchildren skipping. Never trust people who pretend that they have ...
— Dream Days • Kenneth Grahame
... remaining from seventy dollars greenbacks swapped for six hundred and ninety miles of travel at ten cents a mile. I hastily stepped aside. A subtle fragrance and a rustle warned me that I was obstructing a representative of the fair sex. So did the smirk and smile of the ...
— Desert Dust • Edwin L. Sabin
... young man of Dunbar, Who playfully poisoned his Ma; When he'd finished his work, He remarked with a smirk, "This will cause ...
— Toaster's Handbook - Jokes, Stories, and Quotations • Peggy Edmund & Harold W. Williams, compilers
... passed, the conversation broke loudly and generally: "And did you notice that slimpsy thing she wore last night? Indecent, if you ask me, with not a petticoat under it, I'll be bound!... Always wears shoes twice too small for her ... What men can see in her ... How they can endure that perpetual smirk!..." They were at last discussing the Klondike woman, and whatever had befallen our guest of honour I knew that those present would never regain their first awe of the occasion. It ...
— Ruggles of Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson
... Miscellany![10]—to Southwell town Per coach for Mrs. Pigot frank it down, So may'st them prosper in the paths of Sale,[11] And Longman smirk and critics cease ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Vol. 7. - Poetry • George Gordon Byron
... at. The pheasant, partridge, gotwit, reeve, ruff, rail, The cock, the curlew, and the quail, These, and thy choicest viands, do extend Their tastes unto the lower end Of thy glad table; not a dish more known To thee, than unto any one: But as thy meat, so thy immortal wine Makes the smirk face of each to shine, And spring fresh rose-buds, while the salt, the wit, Flows from the wine, and graces it; While Reverence, waiting at the bashful board, Honours my lady and my lord. No scurril jest, no open scene is laid Here, for to make the face afraid; But temp'rate mirth dealt forth, ...
— A Selection From The Lyrical Poems Of Robert Herrick • Robert Herrick
... singularly fine & aristocratic disrespect for homely & unpretending English. Every time I use "go back" you get out your polisher & slick it up to "return." "Return" is suited only to the drawing-room—it is ducal, & says itself with a simper & a smirk. ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... toil," was the sharp response. "Small use are her hands in any kitchen. We had better make up our minds to wed her to a fine gentleman, who wants naught of his wife but to dress up in grand gowns, and smirk and simper over her fan; for no useful work will he get out of her. If rushes are wanted, she had better go quickly and ...
— The Lost Treasure of Trevlyn - A Story of the Days of the Gunpowder Plot • Evelyn Everett-Green
... the habit of ridin' in these here kind of wagons," remarked Lem with a smirk. "I hope ...
— The Motor Girls • Margaret Penrose
... But I'm too clumsy fer a dancer. I ain't got Arthur's luck." "Do you call it luck to be a disgrace to your folks, And git locked up in jail!" "Oh, come now, Alice, 'Disgrace' is a mite strong. Why, the jail was a joke. Art's all right." "All right! All right to dance, and smirk, and lie For a livin', And then in the end Lead a silly girl to give you What warn't hers to give By pretendin' you'd marry her— And she a pupil." "He'd ha' married her right enough, Her folks was millionaires." "Yes, he'd ha' married her! Thank ...
— Men, Women and Ghosts • Amy Lowell
... do," laughed Charles, tauntingly, with a wink at his companions; "a pretty piece of heraldry, a bold escutcheon, a dainty poniard—pale as a lily, and how he did sigh and drop his lids and smirk and smirk and dance your latest galliard to surpass De Grammont. Ask brother James ...
— Mistress Nell - A Merry Tale of a Merry Time • George C. Hazelton, Jr.
... blinked, and wet his lips with his tongue, and at sight of Jimmie Dale's mask, perhaps because it suggested a community of interest, tried to force a smirk. ...
— The Further Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard
... cried one of the women. She was dressed as a Spanish dancer and in one hand held a tambourine and castanets. "They fight," she gave a little smirk of ...
— Port O' Gold • Louis John Stellman
... upon the portraits of the great writers of the past, hoping for inspiration. Useless! Upon Emerson's face there was a faint smile of most infuriating benevolence. Lamb—but I am getting tired of his smirk, which might be of irony or kindness. He would look savage enough today, hearing his constantly returning Dissertation on Roast Pig thump the door-mat four times a week; for that, he can be assured, is the way editors ...
— Old Junk • H. M. Tomlinson
... own excuse, Madam," he answered, smiling and unabashed. "Have I your Majesty's leave to present it?" he continued, with a smirk and ...
— In Kings' Byways • Stanley J. Weyman
... on business lines. It is not the sons of the land who bleed for Britannia's honour; mercenaries from the four corners of the world—including blacks—carry on the war as a trade for England's business world and nobility. England might well smirk as she uttered blessings on the Triple Entente, for has she not borne the brand of perfidy for centuries? Her breast conceals the meanest pedlar's ...
— What Germany Thinks - The War as Germans see it • Thomas F. A. Smith
... that we were talking of the boy, her interest in the conversation vanished, even more quickly than her appetite. She had to go, she said suddenly; she was so sorry, and the discontented curiosity of her look gave place again to the smirk of affected politeness. ...
— Oscar Wilde, Volume 2 (of 2) - His Life and Confessions • Frank Harris
... look in her eyes was sickening. But was Pat nauseated? Not he! The big goon was lapping it up like a famished feline. His simpering smirk stretched from ear to there as ...
— Lighter Than You Think • Nelson Bond
... It was remarkable to me to see how easily and simply she carried herself in a dress and a company entirely strange to her. She had no mauvaise honte, for she made no pretence; she was not self-conscious, for she deceived nobody; she did not smirk nor make herself in any way ridiculous. She was still herself, put in a position where—as she had the wit to see—staidness was the natural thing; therefore staid she was. I would have defied any fine gentleman of London to have known her for the little half-naked ...
— The Fool Errant • Maurice Hewlett
... exclaimed Alfred, with a smirk of well-assumed satisfaction—"that, indeed! Well, I think I may say, Daddy, that all's right ...
— The Story Of Kennett • Bayard Taylor
... schools; and under the protection of the Stars and Stripes, which he would drag down, has made himself so emphatically one of the "capitalists," whom he hates, that he resides on New York's famous "Riverside Drive," and was able to testify with a smirk, "I flatter myself that I am not a failure." (See printed "Testimony" of the trial of the five Assemblymen for ...
— The Red Conspiracy • Joseph J. Mereto
... off, and Bugs Butler, with a final smirk, left Sally and dived under the ropes. There was a stir of interest in the audience, though the newspaper men, blase through familiarity, exhibited no emotion. Presently Mr. Burrowes reappeared, shepherding a young man whose face was hidden ...
— The Adventures of Sally • P. G. Wodehouse
... companion for Miss Hall, we thought that till the nurse went to America we would request the governess to dine with us. On Anne's departure, I signified to the head waiter that from that time Miss Hall would take her dinner with the children; whereupon, with a smirk and sniff of the most insolent disdain, and an air of dignity that had been hurt, but was now comforted, the bloated superior servant replied, "Well, ma'am, to be sure, it always was so in them famullies where I have lived; the governess ...
— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble
... to the Queen, and she will list to me. I'll not smirk and caper like St. Ouen's; I'll bear me like a man not speaking for himself. I'll speak as Harry her father spoke—straight to the purpose. . . . No, no, no, I'm not to be wheedled, even by a Pawlett, and you shall not ask me. If you want ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... who had just dined at the station and drunk a little too much lay down on the velvet-covered seat, stretched himself out luxuriously, and sank into a doze. After a nap of no more than five minutes, he looked with oily eyes at his vis-a-vis, gave a smirk, and said: ...
— The Schoolmistress and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... living from the soil, and lived in some obscure abode—and so they dream, but don't unload. They like to take a check in hand, and, headed by the village band, present it to some charity—'twould mean five cents to you or me; then they're embalmed in song and ode; they smirk and ...
— Rippling Rhymes • Walt Mason
... curiously, a smirk of suspicion crossing his narrow fox face. "Oh! You'll bring it to-morrow, will you?" he sneered. "Well, do you know that to-morrow's New Year's Eve and that this mantilla's got to be delivered to-night? They have been telephoning all day for it. To-morrow, eh? Well, don't ...
— Felix O'Day • F. Hopkinson Smith |
