"Wince" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... a grammatical objection. You know the way in which it makes you wince, if ever you have lived in Australia or New Zealand or Canada, to hear people talk of "the colonies" or "the colonials." The people who use the words do not realise that there is anything unpopular ...
— Letters from France • C. E. W. Bean
... so sorry." Just for an instant she laid her fingers gently on his arm; and the light touch made him wince. "You said when you came in that you had been detained, and you looked so serious I thought it must have been something dreadful which had kept you. I don't wonder you find all this"—she waved her small white fan ...
— Afterwards • Kathlyn Rhodes
... special distinction was nothing of the kind and was meant in quite another way. Once I was received in private audience by an emperor. Last week I was telling a jealous person about it, and I could see him wince under it, see him bite, see him suffer. I revealed the whole episode to him with considerable elaboration and nice attention to detail. When I was through, he asked me what had impressed me most. ...
— The $30,000 Bequest and Other Stories • Mark Twain
... shirt-making and amateurish hospital committees which all well-meaning English women vaguely grasped at before the stern necessities brought them organised work to do. Amaryllis wrote constantly to John—all through August—and many of the letters contained loving allusions which made him wince with pain. ...
— The Price of Things • Elinor Glyn
... much amused and had a good laugh at this naive confession, even Colonel Vereker sharing in the general mirth, in spite of his profound melancholy and the pain he felt from his wounded leg, which made him wince every now and again, I noticed, during the narration of the story Garry O'Neil had thus told, with the utmost good humour, it must be confessed, at his own expense, as, indeed, he had made us understand beforehand that ...
— The Ghost Ship - A Mystery of the Sea • John C. Hutcheson
... She stands beside that crumbling mother in her hate, And, though we know so well—she and I, O we know— That she could love no mother nor partake in anguish, Yet she is flouted when the King forsakes her dam, She must protect her very flesh, her tenderer flesh, Although she cannot wince; she's wild in her cold brain, And soon I must be made to pay a cruel price For this one gloomy joy in my uncherished life. Envy and greed are watching me aloof (Yes, now none of the women will walk with me), Longing ...
— Georgian Poetry 1913-15 • Edited by E. M. (Sir Edward Howard Marsh)
... of the telephone interrupted him; Jimmy saw the majority of the old men wince as at a blow. He had a vivid recollection of the hourly ringing of the telephone on the fatal morning of July fourth, it seemed so long ago, and the deadly messages ...
— Death Points a Finger • Will Levinrew
... untrodden since: Tedious land for a social Prince; Halting, he scanned the outs and ins, Endless, labyrinthine, grim, Of the solitude that made him wince, Laying wait ...
— Goblin Market, The Prince's Progress, and Other Poems • Christina Rossetti
... not wince. But her eyes filled and her voice was husky as she spoke: "Tom, I want your soul again—the one that used to speak to me in the old days." She bent over him, and rubbed her cheek against his and there she left him, ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White
... her hand for a minute in such a close grasp that it hurt her, but she did not wince. Ah! if she might just have this pleasantly satisfying relation with the man whose presence in her life meant warmth and light and even happiness on the hard road of everyday routine, and then have somehow besides the contentment which comes of accomplishment along a line of chosen activity—and ...
— Under the Country Sky • Grace S. Richmond
... had changed to unfriendliness, and unfriendliness in some instances to actual hostility. Her slightest advance was met by a barrier of coldness that froze her, and she quickly had come to wince under each fresh evidence of enmity as from a blow in the face. Thoughts of Mrs. Toomey's friendship and the belief that this antagonism was only temporary and would disappear when the local authorities had brought out the ...
— The Fighting Shepherdess • Caroline Lockhart
... the pangs of teething begin, it is the same. The healthy child left to itself would wince occasionally at the slight pricking pain, and then turn its entire attention elsewhere, and thus become refreshed for the next trial. But under the adult influence the agony of the first little prick is often magnified until the result ...
— Power Through Repose • Annie Payson Call
... worked by the pointed, tulip-flame Of a tallow candle, and became So absorbed, that his old clock made him wince Striking the hour a moment since. Its echo, only half apprehended, Lingered about the room. He ended Screwing the little rubies in, Setting the wheels to lock and spin, Curling the infinitesimal springs, Fixing the filigree hands. Chippings Of precious stones lay strewn about. The table ...
— Sword Blades and Poppy Seed • Amy Lowell
... course, to tell who he was, if asked, but had not foreseen just the form of the inquiry; and while he had thought more of his race than of his illegitimate birth, he realized at this moment as never before that this question too would be always with him. As put now by Judge Straight, it made him wince. He had not read his ...
— The House Behind the Cedars • Charles W. Chesnutt
... higher aim, for sometimes the happiness of other people—at least their visible happiness—clashes with some other duty. Then she does not fail. She gives her hard refusal in pleasant but firm words, and she tells the truth even if it makes some one wince. She is not a genius, but, on the whole, I hardly know another girl so full of the best life. That her highest aim is the true one is without question, and that her minor aim is the true one for her must also be admitted. Whether ...
— Girls and Women • Harriet E. Paine (AKA E. Chester}
... Springs was certainly the last thing in the world for him to consider seriously. His last interview within its walls could still make him wince when he recalled it, word by scalding word. No, there was no place for a Rennie—and a Rebel Rennie to make matters blacker—under the righteous roof ...
— Ride Proud, Rebel! • Andre Alice Norton
... a week later, when there came from my grandfather a curt note bidding me be sent to Riverview. It was decided at once that I must go. I myself looked forward to the change with a boy's blind longing for adventure, and said farewell to the man who had been so much to me with a willingness I wince to think upon. ...
— A Soldier of Virginia • Burton Egbert Stevenson
... other ridicule to wince about. The neighbors laughed at him and his employer about their whole plan; they had never heard of keeping cows on less than three acres per cow, or, at least, five acres for two; they had never seen such deep digging; they had never known any body take ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851. • Various
... Maurice, making rapid prods which caused Beauvais to wince. "Now, back; farther, farther. I do not like the idea of having my back to ...
— The Puppet Crown • Harold MacGrath
... there. The disdain and calmness of martyrs, The mother of old, condemned for a witch, burned with dry wood, her children gazing on, The hounded slave that flags in the race, leans by the fence blowing, covered with sweat. I am the hounded slave, I wince at the bite of the dogs, Hell and despair are upon me, crack and again crack the marksmen, I clutch the rails of the fence, my gore dribs, thinn'd with the ooze of my skin, I fall on the weeds and stones, ...
— Poems Every Child Should Know - The What-Every-Child-Should-Know-Library • Various
... seized a long pole, and in a dozen blows had broken everything to atoms. Idols, red cloth, incense sticks, bowls of sacrificial rice and swords lay in a shapeless heap. And with ugly kicks my men ground the ruin into yet smaller pieces. Somehow it made me wince. It was a brutal sight; to treat gods, even if they be false, ...
— Indiscreet Letters From Peking • B. L. Putman Weale
... the fifth-rate social ideal, the fixed idea of making smart acquaintances and getting into the monde chic, especially when it was foredoomed to failure and exposure? They showed so what they were after; that was what made the people they wanted not want them. And never a wince for dignity, never a throb of shame at looking each other in the face, never any independence or resentment or disgust. If his father or his brother would only knock some one down once or twice a year! Clever as they were they never guessed the impression they made. ...
— The Pupil • Henry James
... question for a poor sailor-man. If he went for the doctor he deserted his post; if he didn't go his charge might die. He made one more attempt to awaken her, and, seizing a flower-glass, splashed her freely with cold water. She did not even wince. ...
— Many Cargoes • W.W. Jacobs
... an acre of arable land (at the side of the field), giving the tenant a fair price for it. First it had to be enclosed so as to be parted off from the open field. The cost of the palings made the vicar wince; his lady set it duly down to debit. She planted one-half potatoes, as they paid thirty pounds per acre, and on the rest put in hundreds of currant bushes, set a strawberry bed and an asparagus bed, on the principle that luxuries of that kind fetch a high price ...
— Hodge and His Masters • Richard Jefferies
... be most happy (with a half-frown and a wince) to play Panurge to your lordship's Pantagruel, on board the ...
— Alton Locke, Tailor And Poet • Rev. Charles Kingsley et al
... matron who preceded her, paused for a moment, and looked at her with a wince in his thin features that might be taken for an indication of either pleasure or pain. He' closed the sympathetic eye, and wiped it—but this not seeming to satisfy him, he then closed both, and blew his ...
— The Black Prophet: A Tale Of Irish Famine • William Carleton
... eyes that for two months had looked into his with frank confidence. He had made her acutely conscious of his displeasure. Only last night, when his lack of consideration and his unwonted irritability had made her wince several times during the evening and after Saint Hubert had gone to his own tent, he, had looked up to find her eyes fixed on him with an expression that, in his dangerous mood, had excited all the brutality of which he was capable, and had filled him with a desire to torture her. The ...
— The Sheik - A Novel • E. M. Hull
... to gloat over the fact that he had found her out before she had any inkling of how he felt toward her; he actually believed that! He tried not to wince at the thought of her at Fort Bliss, a Federal prisoner, charged with conspiring against the government. She must have known the risk she took, he kept telling himself. The girl was no fool, was way above the average in intelligence. That was ...
— Starr, of the Desert • B. M Bower
... aim was excellent, and Tom was too helpless to avoid the missile, which struck him heavily, the edge of the heel catching him on the chin, and making him wince. ...
— The Vast Abyss - The Story of Tom Blount, his Uncles and his Cousin Sam • George Manville Fenn
... country for a few filthy bohunks!" sputtered her father. He spat into the sawdust box and crammed a charge of tobacco into his pipe with his uninjured hand, though the pain of holding the pipe in his left hand made him wince. "I won't recognise them by so much as a wink. They have my answer, and I imagine it was ...
— The Return of Blue Pete • Luke Allan
... that, and he saw Graham wince. His own hands clenched. What a power in the world a brave woman was! And what evil could be wrought by a woman without moral courage, a selfish woman. He brought himself ...
— Dangerous Days • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... her fingers into her mouth, and Sheldon winced as he saw her blow, like a boy, a sharp, imperious whistle—the call she always used for her sailors, and that always made him wince. ...
— Adventure • Jack London
... enthusiasm, fired four or five parting shots from his pistol. As the reports crashed through the heavy air, you should have seen the crowd vanish down the hole! The sight made me wince, for they must have gone down like a cataract, all heaped together. But they were tough, and I trust no heads were broken. The effect on the eight fellows on the sleds came near being disastrous. I expected to see them leap off and run, which no doubt they would have done if Edmund had not ...
— A Columbus of Space • Garrett P. Serviss
... a painful moment! Everyone seemed to wince and as it were shrink together. The same fearful, incredible thought flashed like lightning through every head in the court, the thought of possibly fatal coincidence, and not one person in the court dared to look at the soldier's ...
— The Schoolmaster and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... cruelty, While I am living my cross I'll embrace." Peacefully now lies the lord in his dressing-gown, Jacob, once more, is restored to his place. Brother again the Pomyeshchick has christened him. "Why do you wince, little Jacob?" says he. "Barin, there's something that stings ... in my memory...." 180 Now they thread mushrooms, play cards, and drink tea, Then they make brandy from cherries and raspberries, Next for a ...
— Who Can Be Happy And Free In Russia? • Nicholas Nekrassov
... shiver. "Laughing"—over Jack's body! Margaret was in her stride back to her mistress-ship again yet her eye changed instantly with her mood when she saw me wince. Indeed, her mind flashed after my mind like a hawk after a pigeon, but I dodged the trouble by looking casually around to ...
— The Yeoman Adventurer • George W. Gough
... his business. It made no difference to him whether Mr. McLean was rich or poor. That matter was one he could settle to suit himself. It was a comfort to know she "had given her heart to a steadfast, loyal, and honest man." And so, having stirred up his son-in-law and made him wince to his heart's content, the old statesman bade him stand no longer in the way, but tell the young gentleman that he, too, would be glad to know him; and this letter, that evening, "old Chesterfield" placed in his daughter's hand and then magnanimously gave her his blessing. ...
— 'Laramie;' - or, The Queen of Bedlam. • Charles King
... in this strain he stood in dark contrast to Morton, and the girl could not but wince under the revelation he was unconsciously making. "Anthony, you have talked in that strain ever since we came East. Nothing but using people, using people, all the time. You've been constantly running after those who could 'be of use to us!' and ...
— The Tyranny of the Dark • Hamlin Garland
... wince while the mountaineer kneaded his bruised chest with the liquid ointment. The burning presently gave way to a ...
— The Guns of Bull Run - A Story of the Civil War's Eve • Joseph A. Altsheler
... of animal pain came from the enclosure behind us. Its depth and volume testified to the puma. I saw Montgomery wince. ...
— The Island of Doctor Moreau • H. G. Wells
... companions trudged on side by side to the south gate of Gloucester. There the pressure of a crowd brought them to a halt for a few minutes. There was a noise of yelling and booing, and some exclamations that caused the sailor's companion to wince. ...
— Sea-Dogs All! - A Tale of Forest and Sea • Tom Bevan
... both hands upon his stick, and his face was like the face of a sphinx. Only Lucille, who knew him best of all those there, saw him wince for a moment before this reminder of his ...
— The Yellow Crayon • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... excited, wringing her hands, offering aid; but in spite of Jeanne, Dunwody raised Josephine in his arms. As he did so he felt her wince. Her arm dropped loosely. "Good God! It is broken!" he cried. "Oh, why did you do this? Why did you? You poor girl, you poor girl! And it was all my fault—my fault!" Then suddenly, "Sally!—Eleazar!" ...
— The Purchase Price • Emerson Hough
... poised nervous organisation such as ourselves, Comrade Windsor," said Psmith, smoothing his waistcoat thoughtfully, "these scenes are acutely painful. We wince before them. Our ganglions quiver like cinematographs. Gradually recovering command of ourselves, we review the situation. Did our visitor's final remarks convey anything definite to you? Were they the mere casual badinage of a parting guest, or was ...
— Psmith, Journalist • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... two twenty-five-cent cigars and indulge in a ten-cent shine each day, and still not cost the taxpayers so much as they were accustomed to pay for his conviction and jail entertainment. And, as subsequent events proved, it made the taxpayers wince. ...
— Moon-Face and Other Stories • Jack London
... It made Stella wince, for it took her back to that dreadful day. She could not bear to think that Billy Dale's blood lay on her and Monohan, neither could she stifle an uneasy apprehension that something more grievous yet might happen on Roaring Lake. But at least she had done what ...
— Big Timber - A Story of the Northwest • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... to see him here," said Fred, as he accepted the brown and calloused hand which the man, who had been kidnapped by orders of the combine, thrust out toward him, to wince under the hearty ...
— Fred Fenton on the Track - or, The Athletes of Riverport School • Allen Chapman
... and disposition, his tastes, aversions, proclivities, ambitions, and eccentricities in a way which sometimes made Luigi wince and the others laugh, but both twins declared that the chart was artistically drawn ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... regular Western-ocean weather set in. It was early spring in the third year since our departure from this part of the world, and the north-easter blew with bitter severity, making even the seasoned old captain wince again; but, as he jovially said, "it smelt homey, n' HE warn't a-goin' ter growl at thet." Neither were any of us, although we could have done with less of a sharp edge to it all ...
— The Cruise of the Cachalot - Round the World After Sperm Whales • Frank T. Bullen
... eminent contemporaries ever quite knew how generous his enthusiasm for them had been, how free from any under-current of envy, or impulse to avoidable criticism. He could not endure even just censure of one whom he believed, or had believed to be great. I have seen him wince under it, though no third person was present, and heard him answer, 'Don't! don't!' as if physical pain were being inflicted on him. In the early days he would make his friend, M. de Monclar, draw for him from memory the likenesses ...
— Life and Letters of Robert Browning • Mrs. Sutherland Orr
... plainsman's yell of exultation split the night like the yelp of a coyote, and he brought his hand down on Wade's back with a force which made the latter wince. "By the great horned toad, that's talkin! That's the finest news I've heard since my old mammy said to the parson, 'Call him ...
— Hidden Gold • Wilder Anthony
... her hand for an instant; the unconscious inference of this speech made him wince. She understood, then, that she was going to do something which her old kinswomen would think was a hurt to their pride, and so would be silent over it in consequence. And yet she did not hesitate. She must indeed ...
— Halcyone • Elinor Glyn
... Dangerfield, with a startling laugh, observing Irons wince, and speaking as the puff of smoke crossed his face, 'he'd lodge a bullet in the cur's heart, as suddenly as I've shot that tree;' the bullet had hit the stem right in the centre, 'and swear he ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... strenuous years in Africa—Africa South, East, West. What years they were!" He sighed. "Only the luck came too late to save my brother." He was gazing at the loch, and could hardly have noticed Lancaster's wince ...
— Till the Clock Stops • John Joy Bell
... "restoration" of him. He has scarcely vanished when a third party, "happy to catch us just at dinner-time," is announced; he comes with a mouthful of lies, and a pocketful of trash, and seeing that we are beginning to wince, is retiring, but suddenly recollecting himself, pulls up at the door to ask whether it be true that we have not bought Coco's Augustus, since, if we have been so lucky as to purchase it, Coco has in that case cheated him by pretending ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 367, May 1846 • Various
... father's arms, and then care tenderly for her. One great boot had fallen from Tessibel's many times frozen foot. The little toe marked and cut by frost, limply hanging independent of its fellows, made Young wince. ...
— Tess of the Storm Country • Grace Miller White
... such acute sensibility to the strictures of English writers, and receive their criticisms with so much suspicion, Mr. Mackay is unable fully to determine. He is forced to believe that it is only their anxiety "to stand well in English opinion which causes them to wince"; particularly as "French and Germans may condemn, and nobody cares what they say." This is but a part of the truth. Unquestionably, Americans do, as Mr. Mackay says, "attach undue importance to what English travellers may say"; but this does not account for the universal ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 23, September, 1859 • Various
... thoughtfully, "he will of course be compelled to use discretion about his patrons. The rabble, of course——" He broke off with a wave of his hand which, although not pointedly, seemed to indicate Cousin Egbert, who once more wore the hunted look about his eyes and who sat by uneasily. I saw him wince. ...
— Ruggles of Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson
... and more than ever unable to remove his eyes from the rifle, which might perhaps now hasten to improve its waning opportunity. Something at least had been gained: in the occupation of his mind in this attempt at self-defense he was less sensible of the pain in his head and had ceased to wince. But he was still dreadfully frightened and his teeth rattled ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Vol. II: In the Midst of Life: Tales of Soldiers and Civilians • Ambrose Bierce
... would wince to wade and wallow—and I hate a horse or steer! But we stand the kings of herders—he for There and I for Here; Though he rides with Death behind him when he rounds the wild stampede, I will chop the jamming king-log and I'll match him deed for deed; And for me the greenwood savor, and the ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VI. (of X.) • Various
... parts of this fanciful tale which made Lena wince, as she saw how much clearer an idea of right and wrong, truth and justice, had this little boy of seven than had her own brother of more than twice his age. If Percy could but think that it was "mean and sneaky" to endeavor to hide a fault, could but see how much nobler and ...
— Bessie Bradford's Prize • Joanna H. Mathews
... to sit upon their haunches, to wince and draw back. The amazed and frightened riders did not know what to do; so from mouth to mouth there flowed only the fearsome and helpless words, ...
— In Desert and Wilderness • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... a small, and, in itself, an unimportant Kingdom with Mediterranean sea-front, called Galavia," said Blanco. Benton's start was slight, and his features if they gave a telltale wince at the word became instantly casual again in expression. But his interest was no longer forced by courtesy. It hung from that ...
— The Lighted Match • Charles Neville Buck
... then? Had it never been lost? Had she but imagined Burke's action in confiding it to her? She closed her eyes for a space, for her brain was swimming. The terrible, parching heat seemed to have turned into a wheel—a fiery wheel of torture that revolved behind her eyes, making her wince at every turn. The pain was intense; when she tried to move, it was excruciating. She sank down with her head almost on the iron box and waited in dumb endurance ...
— The Top of the World • Ethel M. Dell
... her first meeting with him, but the shunning and snubbing of a young man by a pretty girl have never yet, if done in a certain way, prevented him from continuing to be in love with her. Mamie did it in the certain way. Joe did not wince, therefore it hurt all the more, for blows from which one cringes ...
— The Conquest of Canaan • Booth Tarkington
... the office, I continued faithful to my first love. I have introduced pieces of word-painting into the most commonplace business letters which have, I am told, considerably astonished the recipients. My refined sarcasm has made defaulting creditors writhe and wince. Occasionally, like the great Silas Wegg, I would drop into poetry, and so raise the whole tone of the correspondence. Thus what could be more elegant than my rendering of the firm's instructions to the captain of one of their vessels. It ...
— The Captain of the Pole-Star and Other Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... he said—so often that Lanyard would almost wince from that formula of introduction—"a promising lad, though it's sad I should be to say it, instead of proud as I am. For I've made you: but for me you'd long since have matriculated at La Tour Pointue and graduated with the canaille of the ...
— The Lone Wolf - A Melodrama • Louis Joseph Vance
... few of you are thinking. "Ha! there is the Parson at it again! always hammering away at Communion. Can he not leave us alone? Let him talk to us of other matters; let him preach to us some real stinging gospel truth, and make us wince. Anything but this eternal preaching about coming to Communion." Now I will tell you why I preach about this, and hammer, hammer, at it. Because it is good stinging gospel truth, and the grumbling that is going on is because your ...
— The Village Pulpit, Volume II. Trinity to Advent • S. Baring-Gould
... parties regretted this, and shook their heads over it, prophesying that no good could come of it. Miss Garscube's will had never been crossed in her life, and she was a "clever" woman: Lord Arthur would not submit to her domineering ways, and she would wince under and be ashamed of his want of intellect. All this was foretold and thoroughly believed by people having the most perfect confidence in their own judgment, so that Lord Arthur and his wife ought ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 17, - No. 97, January, 1876 • Various
... asleep," she murmured, the tears standing in her eyes and raining in her heart. Her mother she could judge impartially; her mother's disregard of the changes which had come to assume so much importance in her own and Arthur's lives often made her wince. But the same disregard in a man did not offend her; it had the reverse effect. It seemed to her, to the woman in her, the fitting roughness of the colossal statue. "That's a man!" she now said to herself proudly, as ...
— The Second Generation • David Graham Phillips
... intuitive perception of where the greatest danger lay. The savages at that moment were whirling round him and darting at him in all directions, but he singled out this chief at once and bore down upon him like a thunderbolt. The chief was a brave man. He did not wince, but, drawing the arrow to its head as the other approached, let it fly full at his breast. The white man dropped on the neck of his steed as if he had been struck with lightning; the arrow passed close over ...
— The Wild Man of the West - A Tale of the Rocky Mountains • R.M. Ballantyne
... war had been nothing to this. With their own people around them, with hope and love to sustain them, the women of Richmond did not wince under the pinch of want. But now, surrounded by enemies, with not a pound of flour, or a cent of currency, actual starvation—as well as humiliation—stared them in the face. The few who went to draw rations, sat down in blank despair. They could ...
— Four Years in Rebel Capitals - An Inside View of Life in the Southern Confederacy from Birth to Death • T. C. DeLeon
... back in his big leather-covered chair. "You think that I blow my own horn too loudly," he continued, "but, after all, who knows how to blow it half so well as I do? For the same reason some over-sensitive nerve of yours may wince at my behaviour at times, my lack of dignity or reserve; but have I ever lost a vote—I put it to you plainly—or the shadow of a vote by an occasional resort to spectacular advertising? It pays to advertise in politics, we all know that!—but it was honest advertising ...
— One Man in His Time • Ellen Glasgow
... her occupation, and clapping her hands, with the result that she stuck her needle into her finger with such violence that it brought the tears to her eyes and made her wince. ...
— The Adventurous Seven - Their Hazardous Undertaking • Bessie Marchant
... whack on the back that made Ted wince. "Let's beat it quick for the recruiting station. Are ...
— The Brighton Boys with the Submarine Fleet • James R. Driscoll
... towered over the Prince, seizing his hand with a grip that made the latter wince, Mrs. Wellington could not help noticing a veiled expression of contempt in the nobleman's face. She was aware that to him, her husband represented, of course, the highest plane of existence that Americans attain to, and she could see ...
— Prince or Chauffeur? - A Story of Newport • Lawrence Perry
... abroad that Newton owed His public office to Lord Halifax, Your secret lover. Coarseness, as you know, Is my peculiar privilege. I'll be plain, And let them wince who are whispering in the dark. They are hinting that he gained his public post Through you, his flesh and blood; and that he knew You were his patron's mistress! Yes, I know The coffee-house that hatched it—to be scotched, Nay, killed, before one snuff-box could ...
— Watchers of the Sky • Alfred Noyes
... with dark pines and sun He stood between the armies, and his shout Rolled from the empyrean above the host: "Bid any little flea ye have come forth, And wince at death upon my finger-nail!" He turned his large-boned face; and all his steel Tossed into beams the lustre of the noon; And all the shaggy horror of his locks Rustled like locusts in a field of corn. The meagre ...
— Collected Poems 1901-1918 in Two Volumes - Volume I. • Walter de la Mare
... are in the habit of swearing?" said Janetta, with a direct simplicity, which made Wyvis smile and wince at the same time. ...
— A True Friend - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... Before the sudden wince in his daughter's eyes he reverted instantly to an air of semi-jocosity. "So, under all existing circumstances, little girl," he hastened to affirm, "you can hardly blame a crusty old codger of a father for preferring ...
— Little Eve Edgarton • Eleanor Hallowell Abbott
... fervour made the shelter sweet To hardy herd as well as naked swain; So that Orlando, well beneath the heat Some deal might wince, opprest with plate and chain. He entered, for repose, the cool retreat, And found it the abode of grief and pain; And place of sojourn more accursed and fell, On that unhappy day, than ...
— Orlando Furioso • Lodovico Ariosto
... man, every inch of you!" Mr. Mason said in a loud tone, as he slapped the physician on the shoulder with a force that caused him to wince with absolute pain. "You're a man; an' if the people in this town don't know it already, they shall find it out from yours truly. I reckon we can ante up a little something in this 'ere matter, so the kid won't go home empty-handed; for I tell you there's ...
— Dick in the Desert • James Otis
... wiry hand seized his right ear with a grip that made him wince, while a voice with a thrill of evil satisfaction in it, exclaimed in a ...
— The Bishop's Shadow • I. T. Thurston
... great deal," said the doctor, shortly, as he busied himself pressing the sides of a little speck of a wound which pierced the boy's skin, now with one nail, now with both at the same time, and making Mark wince. ...
— Dead Man's Land - Being the Voyage to Zimbambangwe of certain and uncertain • George Manville Fenn
... was speaking very sternly to her, and that, alone, made Wyn desire to take her part. She could not bear to hear anybody scold a person so timid and humble. And at every decisive phrase Mr. Erad uttered, Wyn could see her wince. ...
— Wyn's Camping Days - or, The Outing of the Go-Ahead Club • Amy Bell Marlowe
... was enough to make the woman wince and lose colour. Before she replied Lanyard saw the tip of her ...
— Alias The Lone Wolf • Louis Joseph Vance
... the least traceable to literary form nor dependent upon a brilliant command of diction. The characters in his book are warm, passionate human beings, and the air they breathe is real air. The critic may wince and make faces over lapses from taste, and protest against a literary style which cannot be defended from any point of view; yet there is Mary in flesh and blood, and there is Caskoden, a veritable prig of a good fellow—there, indeed, ...
— When Knighthood Was in Flower • Charles Major
... rather toughness of skin and hardness of bones; for I have seen men, women, and children, naturally born of so hard and insensible a constitution of body, that a sound cudgelling has been less to them than a flirt with a finger would have been to me, and that would neither cry out, wince, nor shrink, for a good swinging beating; and when wrestlers counterfeit the philosophers in patience, 'tis rather strength of nerves than stoutness of heart. Now to be inured to undergo labour, is to be ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne
... she was or what had happened, she made a tentative attempt to move, only to wince as the pains, borne of her struggle and of lying on the bare ground, seized her. Stiff and sore, weakened, with head throbbing and stabbing, the whole horrible adventure came back to her. She tried to rise, but she was totally helpless and her least ...
— Louisiana Lou • William West Winter
... much obliged to you, Miss Cuyler," Van Bibber said. He tried to raise his hat, but the efforts of the gentleman who had struck him from behind had been successful and the hat came off only after a wrench that made him wince. ...
— Van Bibber and Others • Richard Harding Davis
... country. Surgeon-Captain Emery was a man well over forty, but to-day his eyes glowed with that concentrated fire which burns in the heart at twenty, and he shook de Marmont by the hand with a vigour which made the younger man wince with the pain of ...
— The Bronze Eagle - A Story of the Hundred Days • Emmuska Orczy, Baroness Orczy
... understandingly. To Joe's delight he found that in throwing his swift one, the spitter, and his curves he had no pain. But his celebrated fadeaway made him wince when he twisted his arm into the peculiar position necessary to get the ...
— Baseball Joe in the Big League - or, A Young Pitcher's Hardest Struggles • Lester Chadwick
... to blot. You mistake your heart if you think you can write a lampoon. Your whips are rods of roses. [1] Your spleen has ever had for its objects vices, not the vicious,—abstract offences, not the concrete sinner. But you are sensitive, and wince as much at the consciousness of having committed a compliment as another man would at the perpetration of an affront. But do not lug me into the same soreness of conscience with yourself. I maintain, and will to the last hour, that I never writ ...
— The Best Letters of Charles Lamb • Charles Lamb
... me wince, and I must have shown the wound, for when I looked at her her countenance wore an expression of regret and repentance. "You must forgive me," she declared. "If we were to be thrown together you would have to forgive me fifty ...
— A Little Union Scout • Joel Chandler Harris
... Davis' first terrific blow, that must have laid him flat had it landed. Side-stepping neatly, he struck Davis a light and glancing blow over the right ear. There was little force behind it and Davis did not even wince. ...
— The Boy Allies Under the Sea • Robert L. Drake
... will be now," replied the informant; "but when he took the boy away he was a middle-aged man. About his age," she added, pointing to the editor in a fashion which made that worthy man wince and the proprietor desire to laugh unconsumedly; "and not so very unlike him neither, being one as had no hair ...
— The Middle Temple Murder • J.S. Fletcher
... the General Markow, Brigadier, Insisting on removal of the prince Amidst some groaning thousands dying near,— All common fellows, who might writhe and wince, And shriek for water into a deaf ear,— The General Markow, who could thus evince His sympathy for rank, by the same token, To teach him greater, had his own ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron
... boisterous rough? I will not struggle, I will stand stone-still. For Heaven's sake, Hubert, let me not be bound! Nay, hear me, Hubert! drive these men away, And I will sit as quiet as a lamb; I will not stir, nor wince, nor speak a word, Nor look upon the irons angrily. Thrust but these men away, and I'll forgive you, Whatever torment you do put me to. Hub. Go, stand within; let me alone with him. 1 Att. I am best pleased to be away ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick
... ofttimes as the hammer smites away the roughnesses in our character. But we must yield to the sore work and let it go on, or we shall never have our place as living stones in Christ's beautiful temple. We must not wince under the sharp chiselling of sorrow. Says ...
— Making the Most of Life • J. R. Miller
... even a man wince. It cut the dying woman before me like the blow of a whip. "Please forgive me, Jack; I didn't mean to make you angry; but it's ...
— The Best Ghost Stories • Various
... rather to wince under these words, but, as if anxious to exculpate himself, he replied, "An officer has no option in carrying out the instructions received from ...
— Neville Trueman the Pioneer Preacher • William Henry Withrow
... face of her! And the twitched lip and tilted head! Yet he did neither wince nor stir,— Only—his hands clenched; and, instead Of words, he answered with a stare That stammered not in aught it said, As might his voice if ...
— Green Fields and Running Brooks, and Other Poems • James Whitcomb Riley
... the proud and independent Englishman, who vied with each other in feats of sumptuous hospitality during these periods of relaxation, did much better on the score of moral responsibilities. They broke, generally, nine out of the ten commandments without a wince, but kept the other very scrupulously, and would flash up and call their companions to a duel who doubted them on that point. But of the practical things of religion, as they are depicted by Paul and the Apostles, they lived in utter disregard; these things were ...
— Personal Memoirs Of A Residence Of Thirty Years With The Indian Tribes On The American Frontiers • Henry Rowe Schoolcraft
... to consciousness but kept his eyes closed, thinking it best to feign death. Dr. Zackland cut off the hair in the neighborhood of the wound in the rear of Belton's head and began cutting the skin, trying to trace the bullet. Belton did not wince. ...
— Imperium in Imperio: A Study Of The Negro Race Problem - A Novel • Sutton E. Griggs
... Major, leaning forward to give the boy a slap on the knee that made him wince. "And what about your despised British ...
— Trapped by Malays - A Tale of Bayonet and Kris • George Manville Fenn
... a wince. "I've noticed," he said, "that there's a certain kind of gossip that rarely gets about unless there's some cause for it—on the principle of no smoke without fire. If you've heard anything, it's ...
— The Street Called Straight • Basil King
... that question, and ended the querulous dispute between me and Conscience, under the shape of the neglected and irritated Greek muse, which had been going on ever since I had commenced my walk about Athens. The old spinster saw me wince at the idea of the author of Dora and Ulysses, and tried to follow up her advantage by farther hints of time lost, and precious opportunities thrown away. "You might have written poems like them," said she; "or, no, not like them perhaps, but you might have done a neat prize poem, ...
— Notes on a Journey from Cornhill to Grand Cairo • William Makepeace Thackeray
... sentence was more full of meaning than the speaker dreamed. The words, falling upon Flockart's ears, caused him to wince. Was her ladyship really trying to rid herself of his influence? He laughed within himself at the thought of her endeavouring to release herself from the bond. For her he had never, at any moment, entertained either admiration or affection. Their association ...
— The House of Whispers • William Le Queux
... day," said I, forgetting her objection to the epithet until it was out. But Catherine did not wince. Her fixed eyes were ...
— No Hero • E.W. Hornung
... home of the Pope, has begun to wince under the Vatican's rule, as her national back is getting raw by the saddle of this diabolical creed. The inhabitants of Italy have been for the past few years protesting against the high-handedness of Catholicism, and the officials have begun to take ...
— Thirty Years In Hell - Or, From Darkness to Light • Bernard Fresenborg
... a heavy hand was laid upon his shoulder, and the gripping fingers of that hand caused him to wince and try to tear himself away. A sudden fear smote his heart as he looked up into the blazing eyes of the man before him. He was beginning to respect that towering form with the great broad shoulders and the hand ...
— The Unknown Wrestler • H. A. (Hiram Alfred) Cody
... of one," retorted the welsher savagely, even amid his successes. "A clear fleecing of one. If one gets the better of a dandy chap like that, and brings him down neat and clean, one ought to have the spice of it. One ought to see him wince and—cuss 'em all!—that's just what they'll never do. No! not if it was ever so. You may pitch into 'em like Old Harry, and those d——d fine gentlemen will just look as if they liked it. You might ...
— Under Two Flags • Ouida [Louise de la Ramee]
... he hates me; every word I speak to him—still more every word to her—galls him. But he controlled himself when I made him tell me the story—I had no reason to complain—though every now and then I could see him wince under the knowledge I must needs show of the persons and places concerned—a knowledge I could only have got from her. And she stood by meanwhile like a statue. Not a word, not a look, so far, though she had been forced to touch ...
— Marcella • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... steps by which my admiration of him grew to affection, my affection to uneasiness, and my uneasiness to resentment. I only know that I took to flushing scarlet when I saw her wince, and to making about him, when I was alone with her, remarks that were less and less tolerant and more and more critical. My temper grew readier to bite out at him, my amusement less easily beguiled. I don't know whether he noticed it. Most probably he did, for he always noticed ...
— The Tale Of Mr. Peter Brown - Chelsea Justice - From "The New Decameron", Volume III. • V. Sackville West
... Jimmy's gestures that began it. Viola had never been able to control his gestures; she had never been able to get used to them; and there were two in particular that made her wince still as she had winced in the beginning. She had contracted the habit of wincing in response to them. Whenever Jimmy jerked his thumb over his shoulder you saw her blink; and whenever he cracked his knuckles she shrank back. The blink followed the jerk, and ...
— The Belfry • May Sinclair
... odd times was he ill at his ease. Going through the town of Aix, we came upon a beggar walking, fast by one hand to a cart-tail, and the hangman a lashing his bare bloody back. He, stout knave, so whipt, did not a jot relent; but I did wince at every stroke; and my master hung ...
— The Cloister and the Hearth • Charles Reade
... And he gave his delicate cousin a hearty slap on the back, which made the poor fellow wince—for it hurt him not a little. "Good-by!" Jolly cried. And chirping ...
— The Tale of Jolly Robin • Arthur Scott Bailey
... then?" and Melinda turned sharply upon him, with a look in her black eyes which made him wince as he replied: "Family interference—must have money, you know! But, zounds! don't I pity her!—tied to that ...
— Ethelyn's Mistake • Mary Jane Holmes
... the usual instrument of torture in West-country schools made the old gentleman wince; especially when they were followed ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley
... an accusation, but the Countess de Mattos did not wince under the lash. Even a coward may be brave in a hand-to-hand fight for life; and it was only physically that she ...
— The Castle Of The Shadows • Alice Muriel Williamson
... leaving the fourth to his own devices—and that, too, was quite in keeping with the type of human vultures they were. They kept firing at Bud, and once he felt Sunfish wince and leap forward as if a spur had raked him. Bud shot again, and thought he saw one horseman lurch backward. But he could not be sure—they were going at a terrific pace now, and Sunfish was leaving them farther and farther ...
— Cow-Country • B. M. Bower
... weak all over, and Jenkins had to beat him all the time, to make him go. He had been a cab horse, and his mouth had been jerked, and twisted, and sawed at, till one would think there could be no feeling left in it; still I have seen him wince and curl up his lip when Jenkins thrust in the frosty bit on a ...
— Beautiful Joe • Marshall Saunders
... malicious desire on Hagar's part to play upon this man—this scoundrel, as he believed him to be—and make him wince still more. A score of things to say or do flashed through his mind, but he gave them up instantly, remembering that it was his duty to consider Mrs. Detlor before all. But he did say, "If you were old friends, you will wish to meet ...
— An Unpardonable Liar • Gilbert Parker
... of view, though it's lucky that I should have been present with these dark warriors of mine when you were taken. They suffered heavily in the battle by Andiatarocte, and but for me they might now be using you as fuel. Don't wince, you know their ways and I only tell a fact. In truth, I can't make you any promise in regard to your ultimate fate, but, at present, I need you alive more than ...
— The Masters of the Peaks - A Story of the Great North Woods • Joseph A. Altsheler
... indeed! Pies, pies, cakes, pies, frosted cakes, cakes sweating golden, fruity promises, and cakes as icy as the hand of charity. Pinton was happy, glutton that he was, and he soon filled the pockets of his overcoat. What Mrs. Hallam might say in the morning he cared not. Let the galled jade wince, his breakfast appetite would be unwrung; and then he started violently, lost his balance, and almost fell to ...
— Visionaries • James Huneker
... trust shall be a spider's web. Behold, God will not cast away a perfect man; but the dwelling-place of the wicked shall come to naught." This is savage cruelty, pouring nitric-acid into sword-gashes. Nothing moves your plain man; for he delights in making people wince. He is not angry, but natural, and his naturalness is something worse than the choleric man's anger. He is saying: "Ah, Job, see now—comfort, comfort? Why the house of the wicked shall come to naught." And has not Job's ...
— A Hero and Some Other Folks • William A. Quayle
... Too well she knew that furrow between his eyes and wanted unspeakably to tuck him back into bed, lower the shades, and prepare him a vile mixture good for exactly everything that did not ail him. But Sara could be wise even with her son. So instead she flung up the shade, letting him wince at the clatter, dragged off the bedclothes into a tremendous heap on the chair, beat up the pillows, and turned the mattress ...
— The Vertical City • Fannie Hurst
... We wince under little pains, but Nature in us, through the excitement attendant upon them, seems to brace us to endure with fortitude greater agonies. A curious circumstance, that will serve as an illustration of this, is told by an eminent surgeon of a person upon whom it became ...
— The Atlantic Monthly , Volume 2, No. 14, December 1858 • Various |
