Online dictionaryOnline dictionary
Synonyms, antonyms, pronunciation

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




Brag   Listen
noun
Brag  n.  
1.
A boast or boasting; bragging; ostentatious pretense or self glorification. "Caesar... made not here his brag Of "came," and "saw," and "overcame.""
2.
The thing which is boasted of. "Beauty is Nature's brag."
3.
A game at cards similar to bluff.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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

Synonyms
Antonyms
Quotes
Words linked to  

only single words



Share |
Add this dictionary
to your browser search bar





"Brag" Quotes from Famous Books



... brought herself to go to him, he was in no state to give aid. The O'Beirnes were out of the question; she could not tell them. Youth has no pity, makes no allowance, expects the utmost, and a hundred times they had heard James brag and brawl. They would not understand, they would not believe. And Uncle ...
— The Wild Geese • Stanley John Weyman

... unpopular and a nuisance and a danger in the view of his fellows. The underlying idea underneath courtesy and social regulations is to avoid anger and humiliation. Controversial subjects are avoided, and one must not brag or display concern because these things cause anger and disgust. Politeness and tact are essential to turn away wrath, to avoid that ego ...
— The Foundations of Personality • Abraham Myerson

... away from Scott for a while and visit his comrades in the field. There was nothing in the least unusual in it, said Margaret, in her home letters,—for this had she married a soldier. The boys, of course, gloried in the opportunity and bragged about it, or would brag about it when they next got away from their kind in the army to their kind in civil life,—boys who could only vainly long for such opportunities and vaguely loathe those who had enjoyed them. As for Agatha, she ...
— Under Fire • Charles King

... "is too short to allow one to brag about everything. I do the best I can." They took the corner and went at a good pace through the town. "By Jove," he went on, enthusiastically, "you have no idea how ...
— Love at Paddington • W. Pett Ridge

... cut in, "you must all remember that our Caius not only never boasts but is absurdly reticent about anything he has done of such a kind that most men would brag of it. Towards his chums and cronies he is open-hearted and as unreserved as a friend could be about everything else, but especially close with them about such matters. So I know nothing of his powers concerning which ...
— Andivius Hedulio • Edward Lucas White

... in all names can tickle the town, Anacreon, Tom Little, Tom Moore, or Tom Brown,—[25] For hang me if I know of which you may most brag, Your Quarto two-pounds, or your ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Vol. 7. - Poetry • George Gordon Byron

... belittle me ner mek light of me ternight. I kain't endure hit. Heven't ye got no idee how master much I loves ye? Don't ye see thet ther two of us war made fer each other? I don't aim ter brag none—but ye knows I'm ther only man hyar-abouts thet understands ye—thet holds ye in ...
— A Pagan of the Hills • Charles Neville Buck

... never myself visited the Gulf of Honduras, but among seamen there are always a hundred stories floating about. In a manner of speaking, there is no such shop for gossip as the sea. In every port you meet 'em, in taverns where sailors drink and brag— the liquor being in them—and one man talks and the rest listen, not troubling themselves to believe. It is good to find one's self ashore, you understand? And a good, strong-flavoured yarn makes the landlord and all the shore-keeping folk ...
— Poison Island • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch (Q)

... single ill-won penny to cross his threshold; yet he will not refuse or close his door against great riches, if they are the gift of fortune and the product of virtue: what reason has he for grudging them good quarters: let them come and be his guests: he will neither brag of them nor hide them away: the one is the part of a silly, the other of a cowardly and paltry spirit, which, as it were, muffles up a good thing in its lap. As he is capable of performing a journey upon his own feet, but yet would prefer to mount a carriage, just so he will be capable of being ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to prose. Volume II (of X) - Rome • Various

... is like all egomaniacs before him. He wants to brag. We get into a Subterro Jetjeep and drive about twenty miles through the underground countryside to the entrance to a cave guarded by some extra tall Subterrors. Hitler the Third leads us into the spelunker's nightmare and we finally ...
— Operation Earthworm • Joe Archibald

... have discovered a shorter and more prudent method to become scholars and wits, without the fatigue of reading or of thinking. The most accomplished way of using books at present is twofold: either first to serve them as some men do lords, learn their titles exactly, and then brag of their acquaintance; or, secondly, which is indeed the choicer, the profounder, and politer method, to get a thorough insight into the index by which the whole book is governed and turned, like fishes by the tail. For to enter the palace of learning at the great gate requires ...
— A Tale of a Tub • Jonathan Swift

... said—"your class. Many year' ago we have another class which Europe didn' like. That was when the American was ter-ri-ble! He was the—what is that you call?—oh, yes; he 'make himself,' you say: that is it. My frien', he was abominable! He brag'; he talk' through the nose; yes, and he was niggardly, rich as he was! But you, you yo'ng men of the new generation, you are gentlemen of the idleness; you are aristocrats, with polish an' with culture. An' yet you throw your money away—yes, ...
— His Own People • Booth Tarkington

... to brag of anyhow," replied Miss Polly with that careful penetration which never sees below the surface of things. "To tell the truth I've always had a sort of leanin' toward geraniums myself—especially rose geraniums. I don't know why on earth," she concluded with ...
— Life and Gabriella - The Story of a Woman's Courage • Ellen Glasgow

... so far as to brag at his own table, while champagne from his cellars was flowing and his guests smoked his fragrant Havanas, of the prowess to be shown by him at the prospective duel. He applied names like "Daemelsack"[18] to Kahle, of whom ...
— A Little Garrison - A Realistic Novel of German Army Life of To-day • Fritz von der Kyrburg

... is struck in the second chapter, where all three of them writing lies home—Davis and Herrick, sentimental equivocations, Huish the strongest of brag with nobody to send it to. In a burst of weakness Davis tells Herrick what a villain he has been, through rum, and how he can not let his daughter, "little Adar," know it. "Yes, there was a woman on ...
— The Delicious Vice • Young E. Allison

... Sir Gainus, nigh cousin to the emperor, said, Lo, how these Britons be full of pride and boast, and they brag as though they bare up all the world. Then Sir Gawaine was sore grieved with these words, and pulled out his sword and smote off his head. And therewith turned their horses and rode over waters and through woods till they came to their bushment, ...
— Le Morte D'Arthur, Volume I (of II) - King Arthur and of his Noble Knights of the Round Table • Thomas Malory

... 'You needn't brag about it,' returned Fledgeby, disappointed in his desire to heighten the contrast between his bed and the streets. 'But you're always bragging about something. ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens

... then, that Brag is a good dog, but Holdfast is a better. Bear that in mind, will you?" repeated Mr. Jaggers, shutting his eyes and nodding his head at Joe, as if he were forgiving him something. "Now, I return to this young fellow. And ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens

... the matter of valor there is no brag or bravado in a Pole, so thoroughly and seriously brave are ...
— Cousin Betty • Honore de Balzac

... raillery of the Chief Trader. "Oh, ho," he began, "me freebooter, me captain av the looters av the North!" The Trader snarled at him. "What d'ye mean, by such talk to me, sir? I've had enough— we've all had enough—of your brag and bounce; for you're all sweat and swill-pipe, and I give you this for your chewing, that though by the Company's rules I can't go out and fight you, you may have your pick of my men for it. I'll take my pay for your ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... by ten years, I should say, than either Von Heeringen or Von Zwehl; too young, I judged, to have got his training in the blood- and-iron school of Bismarck and Von Moltke of which the other two must have been brag-scholars. Both of them, I think, were Prussians, but this general was a Saxon from the South. Indeed, as I now recall, he said his home in peace times was in Dresden. He seemed less simple of manner than ...
— Paths of Glory - Impressions of War Written At and Near the Front • Irvin S. Cobb

... with another slave who had been captured in war. They generally sell them to the Arab slave-dealers to take down to the coast, but this man was the son of a chief who had gone to war with the fellow who owned me, and had been killed; and he kept this chap as his slave as a sort of brag, I think. ...
— A Chapter of Adventures • G. A. Henty

... at most, and they were those pretty little upstarts who talk at random, and brag about their vice, and whom one could soon not leave a leg to stand upon, were one to take the trouble, have related their impressions to me with ironical complaisance, and I found nothing in what they told me that reassured me, nor could I discover anything serious, ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume II (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant

... seemed to me anything to brag of. Dad says the Spanish-American War grew a crop of newspaper-made heroes, manufactured by reporters who really took more risks and showed more nerve than the men ...
— The Unspeakable Perk • Samuel Hopkins Adams

... took over all the equipment and installations the Fenris Company had abandoned, and tried to make a living out of the planet. At least, they stayed alive. There are now twenty-odd thousand of us, and while we are still very poor, we are very tough, and we brag ...
— Four-Day Planet • Henry Beam Piper

... there are foolish people who assume that gushing women are shallow, but this is jumping at conclusions. A recent novel gives us a picture of "a tall soldier," who, in camp, was very full of brag and bluster. We are quite sure that when the fight comes on this man with the lubricated tongue will prove an arrant coward; we assume that he will run at the first smell of smoke. But we are wrong—he stuck; and when the ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 2 of 14 - Little Journeys To the Homes of Famous Women • Elbert Hubbard

... to the notes of accordion and fiddle, the evening would pass in rude and harmless jollity, unless too many tin cups or gourds of fiery liquor excited the always ready pugnacity of the men. They were ready to brag of their valor, and to put their boasts to the test. They were "half horse, half alligator," according to their own favorite expression, equally prepared with knife or pistol, fist, or the trained thumb that gouged out an antagonist's ...
— American Merchant Ships and Sailors • Willis J. Abbot

... horizon half round the compass to a lighted red square not more than two miles away. "Mis' Carson died in the spring. Carson stayed until he was too poor to get away. There's three children—oldest's Katy, just eleven." Dan's words failed, but his eyes told. "Somebody will brag of them as ancestors some day. They'll deserve it if ...
— O Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1919 • Various

... of the World, give answer? They are whimpering to and fro— And what should they know of England who only England know?— The poor little street-bred people that vapour and fume and brag, They are lifting their heads in the stillness to yelp at ...
— Kipling Stories and Poems Every Child Should Know, Book II • Rudyard Kipling

... but died an hour before this chance, I had lived a blessed time; for from this instant There's nothing serious in mortality: All is but toys: renown and grace is dead; The wine of life is drawn, and the mere lees Is left this vault to brag of. ...
— Shakespearean Tragedy - Lectures on Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth • A. C. Bradley

... is said to catch mice, but it is not known to attack squirrels. He certainly could not have strangled the chipmunk, and I am curious to know what would have been the result had he overtaken him. Probably it was only a kind of brag on the part of the bird,—a bold dash where no risk was run. He simulated the hawk, the squirrel's real enemy, and no ...
— Locusts and Wild Honey • John Burroughs

... to talk about for a year," Madge said, as we chatted the whole thing over, "and you can no longer brag that the K. & A. has never had a robbery, even ...
— Master Tales of Mystery, Volume 3 • Collected and Arranged by Francis J. Reynolds

... as for you, for me she cannot with all the Art she has, make me more miserable, or much more fortunate, I have no state left, a benefit that none of you can brag of, and there's the Antidote against a Widow, nothing to lose, but that my soul inherits, which she can neither law nor claw away; to that, but little flesh, it were too much else; and that unwholsom too, it were too rich else; and to all this contempt of what she do's I can laugh at her tears, ...
— Wit Without Money - The Works of Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher • Francis Beaumont

... the sense of marvelling exultation which the deliberate survey of their adventure always roused in her.... It was characteristic that she merely added, in her steady laughing tone: "Or, not counting the flat—for I hate to brag—just consider the others: Violet Melrose's place at Versailles, your aunt's villa at ...
— The Glimpses of the Moon • Edith Wharton

... die, boy, I may let you off the birching which your impertinence merits. You have all the old brag ...
— Jack Harkaway and his son's Escape From the Brigand's of Greece • Bracebridge Hemyng

... himself with conscious justice, of course there was the very great value of moon-mail cachets to devotees of philately. There was the value of the tourist facilities to anybody who could spend that much money for something to brag about afterward. There were the solar-heat mines—running at a slight loss—and various other fine achievements. There was even a nightclub in Lunar City where one highball cost the equivalent of—say—a week's pay for a secretary like ...
— Operation: Outer Space • William Fitzgerald Jenkins

... and know how to play a losing game at billiards as well as most men. Look here now! Daly's dead. We can't bring him to life again, can we? If you shoot me, you'll be nothing to the good, and have every spare man in the three colonies at your heels. This is a game of brag, though the stakes are high. I'll play a card. Listen. You shall have a hundred fivers—500 Pounds in notes—by to-morrow at four o'clock, if you'll let Mrs. Knightley and the doctor ride to Bathurst for the money. What do ...
— Robbery Under Arms • Thomas Alexander Browne, AKA Rolf Boldrewood

... rounds of shot were left to Drake! Gun after gun fell silent, as the night Deepened—"Yet we must follow them to the North," He cried, "or they'll return yet to shake hands With Parma! Come, we'll put a brag upon it, And hunt them onward as we lacked for nought!" So, when across the swinging smoking seas, Grey and splendid and terrible broke the day Once more, the flying Invincible fleet beheld Upon their weather-beam, and dogging them Like their own shadow, the dark ships of Drake, Unswerving ...
— Collected Poems - Volume One (of 2) • Alfred Noyes

... it, and hang it up in the parlor, and kneel down to it as a relic of the past. He says that people who have got old ruins ought to be very thankful that there is any of them left, but it's no use in them trying to fill up the missing parts with brag. ...
— Pomona's Travels - A Series of Letters to the Mistress of Rudder Grange from her Former - Handmaiden • Frank R. Stockton

... the fighting which had lasted twenty-four hours, the heavy batteries from the Levis shore opened upon the town, emptying therein the fatal fuel. Mixed feelings possessed me. I had at first listened to Clark's delighted imprecations and devilish praises with a feeling of brag almost akin to his own—that was the soldier and the Briton in me. But all at once the man, the lover, and the husband spoke: my wife was in that beleaguered town under that monstrous shower! She had said ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... something to brag about, didn't I?" demanded Washer, his intemperate little pompadour bristling, and his waxed mustache as waspish as if ...
— Five Thousand an Hour - How Johnny Gamble Won the Heiress • George Randolph Chester

... knows what it is, for I'll lay 'e's bin there. And you'd make a 'orse into cat'smeat on skewer. My eye, but just ain't you a nice-spoken pair! I ain't goin' to foller you two like a shadder, Your 'eads is a darned sight too swelled up with brag. If you don't want to bust and go pop like a bladder, Why you'd best take my tip—put 'em both ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 102, May 14, 1892 • Various

... way into the stables, where he lingered to slap his mare on the back and brag about her, and then Mark had to be introduced to the pig. 'What I call a 'andsome pig, yer know,' he remarked; 'a perfect picture, he is' (a picture that needed cleaning, Mark thought)—'you come down to me in another three weeks or so, and we'll try a bit off of that chap'—an observation ...
— The Giant's Robe • F. Anstey

... tide? how fritter the capital just at the turn of doubling? Soon it grew irksome even to think of you; yet still when I did, I said, 'Life is long, I shall win riches; he shall share them some day or other!'—Basta, basta!—what idle twaddle or hollow brag all this must seem ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... furniture. The Down-Easters, as the yankees are termed generally, whittle when they are making a bargain, as it fills up the pauses, gives them time for reflection, and moreover, prevents any examination of the countenance—for in bargaining, like in the game of brag, the countenance is carefully watched, as an index to the wishes. I was once witness to a bargain made between two respectable yankees, who wished to agree about a farm, and in which whittling was ...
— Diary in America, Series One • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)

... controversy; animated with the vitality and enthusiasm of youth; harking back to the past that we may deal more wisely with the present and the future; recording and appreciating Jewish achievement, not to brag, but to bestir ourselves to emulation and to deepen the consciousness of noblesse oblige; striving always to be sane and level-headed; offering no opinions of its own, but providing an orderly platform for the discussion of mooted questions that really ...
— The Menorah Journal, Volume 1, 1915 • Various

... our times that did behold This motion strange of this unwieldy plant Now boldly brag with us that are men old, That of our age they no advantage want, Though in our youth we saw an ...
— The Works of Christopher Marlowe, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Christopher Marlowe

... said, "in fighting a fellow who is altogether out of condition, and has a very small amount of pluck to make up for it. I was convinced when we first met that he had nothing behind his brag, though I certainly did not expect to beat him as easily as I did. Well, I hope we shall be good friends in future. I have no enmity against him, and there is no reason why we should not get on well ...
— By Conduct and Courage • G. A. Henty

... must be currant, and the good thereof 740 Consists in mutual and partak'n bliss, Unsavoury in th'injoyment of it self If you let slip time, like a neglected rose It withers on the stalk with languish't head. Beauty is natures brag, and must be shown In courts, at feasts, and high solemnities Where most may wonder at the workmanship; It is for homely features to keep home, They had their name thence; course complexions And cheeks of sorry grain ...
— The Poetical Works of John Milton • John Milton

... puff, gasp; spout; inflate, puff up, distend; explode, shatter; (Colloq.) boast, brag, bluster, vaunt, gasconade; rant, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming

... dolly's jacket!" cried Susie, dancing around and hugging it in glee. "It will, mamma! A real live baby! Now Tilde needn't brag of theirs. We will take ...
— Children of the Tenements • Jacob A. Riis

... the learned Pilot discoursed to his pupil, being only too glad to have an excuse for showing off his superior knowledge; and Sammy drank it all in, having in mind the time when he should return to his far-away home and brag of his adventures to the simple ...
— How Sammy Went to Coral-Land • Emily Paret Atwater

... brag too much," the Doctor laughed. "You'll find you are pretty shaky. Sister Francesca has a little room fixed for you and some clean clothes; how ...
— Lucia Rudini - Somewhere in Italy • Martha Trent

... mother's death, so she and Duncan had lots of time to tell each other all they knew. Eliphalet, he got to know a good deal about the girls she went to school with, and Kitty, she learned all about his family. He didn't tell her about the title for a long time, as he wasn't one to brag. But he described to her the little old house at Salem. And one evening toward the end of the summer, the wedding-day having been appointed for early in September, she told him that she didn't want to bridal tour at all; she just wanted to go down to the little old house at Salem to spend ...
— The Best Ghost Stories • Various

... said an experienced orchardist to me the other day. We were talking about the recently started theory that the best bearing orchards are to be found on the low lands of the prairies. "You just wait and see if these brag orchards ever bear another crop! It will be as it was after the severe winter of 1874 and '75, when the following autumn many of our orchards bore so profusely. The succeeding year the majority of the trees were as dead as smelts, and the balance never had vigor enough afterward ...
— Prairie Farmer, Vol. 56: No. 3, January 19, 1884. - A Weekly Journal for the Farm, Orchard and Fireside • Various

... is gittin' about Thet our bladder is bust an' the gas oozin' out, An' onless we can mennage in some way to stop it, Why, the thing's a gone coon, an' we might ez wal drop it. Brag works wal at fust, but it ain't jes' the thing For a stiddy inves'ment the shiners to bring, An' votin' we're prosp'rous a hundred times over Wun't change bein' starved into livin' on clover. Manassas done sunthin' tow'rds drawin' ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 54, April, 1862 • Various

... ag'in," said Tom Ross, who had been in deep thought. "In dang'rous times it's doin' a heap jest to live, an' a man who dies off at thirty-two, all through his own foolishness, ain't much to brag about." ...
— The Forest Runners - A Story of the Great War Trail in Early Kentucky • Joseph A. Altsheler

... might have mention'd several facts, Like episodes between the acts; And tell who loses and who wins, Who gets a cold, who breaks his shins; How Dan caught nothing in his net, And how the boat was overset. For brevity I have retrench'd How in the lake the Dean was drench'd: It would be an exploit to brag on, How valiant George rode o'er the Dragon; How steady in the storm he sat, And saved his oar, but lost his hat: How Nim (no hunter e'er could match him) Still brings us hares, when he can catch 'em; How skilfully Dan mends his nets; ...
— The Poems of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Volume I (of 2) • Jonathan Swift

... to overcome nature? I do not brag on my heroism as others do. I do fear death, the devil and his imps. I have often dreamed of him as pursuing me. There must be something to it, as my father believed likewise. I want the good time of life here. We don't know of the ...
— Cupology - How to Be Entertaining • Clara

... sensible, the Morrison o' the Morrisons had only to reach his hand to her and say, 'Coom, lass!' But noo that she is back wi' head high and notions alaft, he'd no accept her! She's nowt but a draft signed by Sham o' Shoddy and sent through the Bank o' Brag and Blaw! No! He'd no' accept her! And now back wi' ye to yer tickety-tack! I hae my orders, and the Queen o' Sheba might yammer and be ...
— All-Wool Morrison • Holman Day

... by no means sure that the reader will assent to all my propositions, yet I think we shall agree in my first rule for success,—that we shall drop the brag and the advertisement and take Michael Angelo's course, 'to confide in one's self and be something of ...
— Ralph Waldo Emerson • Oliver Wendell Holmes

... last men in the world to brag was Lieutenant Carroway. Nothing but the great thirst of this morning, and strong necessity of quenching it, could ever have led him to speak about himself, and remember his own little exploits. But the farmer was pleased, and said, "Tell us ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore

... in Canada, the land beloved of God; We are the pulse of Canada, its marrow and its blood: And we, the men of Canada, can face the world and brag That we were born in Canada beneath ...
— Flint and Feather • E. Pauline Johnson

... to the Admiral, after the election was over, "Do you know, I had a mind to have stood myself; if I had, what would you have said?"—"That it was all a game of brag, and that, as you had the shuffling of the pack, there was no knowing what knave ...
— The Life And Letters Of Maria Edgeworth, Vol. 1 • Maria Edgeworth

... His opponent, with brag, bluster, pomposity, cheap wit, and insincerity, served him as a magnificent foil. Never again were wind and tide so ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 7 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Orators • Elbert Hubbard

... Now get your backs into this. It's team work that counts. You've each got your choice; either you can lie like the devil to hide the fact that you were a member of the Cedar Branch crew in 1899, or you can go away and brag about it. It's up to ...
— The Rules of the Game • Stewart Edward White

... sleeps his brother?—the cruise it was o'er, But ah, for death's grip that welcomed him ashore! Where's Sid, the cadet, so frank in his brag, Whose toast was audacious—"Here's Sid, and Sid's flag!" Like holiday-craft that have sunk unknown, May a lark of a lad go lonely down? Who takes the census under the sea? Can others like old ensigns be, Bunting I hoisted to flutter at the gaff— Rags in end that once were ...
— John Marr and Other Poems • Herman Melville

... what a fellow of Link's stamp might do. He is just fool enough to brag about what he hoped to do rather than go and do it. It's an outrage that he should call you a ...
— Dave Porter At Bear Camp - The Wild Man of Mirror Lake • Edward Stratemeyer

... other men. "The kid is bound to be a regular, all right. He doesn't brag, and I don't believe he's looking for any write-up in ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys in the Ranks - or, Two Recruits in the United States Army • H. Irving Hancock

... them how you raised the flag, The green above their crimson rag, And should they talk of Yankee brag, We'll tache them how to rue it. Go tell them how all day you stud, Wid both your nate feet in the mud, As if it had been Saxon blood And you wor fightin' ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 1, Saturday, April 2, 1870 • Various

... Some brag of their Chloris, and some of their Phillis, Some cry up their Caelia, and bright Amaryllis: Thus Poets and Lovers their Mistresses dub, And Goddesses fram'd from the Wash-bowl and Tub; But away with these Fictions, and Counterfeit Folly: ...
— Wit and Mirth: or Pills to Purge Melancholy, Vol. 5 of 6 • Various

... quickly in the West, madam," said Dave. There was nothing in his voice to suggest that he had caught the note in hers. "Most of our business men—at least, those bred in the country—have thrown a lasso in their day. You should hear them brag of their steer-roping yet in the Ranchmen's Club." Irene's eyes danced. Dave had already turned the tables; where her mother had implied contempt he had set up a note of pride. It was a matter of pride among these square-built, daring Western men that they had graduated into their office ...
— The Cow Puncher • Robert J. C. Stead

... god is a boy, None but cowherds regard him, His dart is a toy, Great opinion hath marred him: The fear of the wag Hath made him so brag; Chide him, he'll flie thee And not come nigh thee. Little boy, pretty knave, shoot not at random, For if you hit me, slave, ...
— Lyrics from the Song-Books of the Elizabethan Age • Various

... Brag. How canst thou part sadnesse and melancholy my tender Iuuenall? Boy. By a familiar demonstration of ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare

... Suppose I am a poltroon, let us say. With fierce mustache, loud talk, plentiful oaths, and an immense stick, I keep up nevertheless a character for courage. I swear fearfully at cabmen and women; brandish my bludgeon, and perhaps knock down a little man or two with it: brag of the images which I break at the shooting gallery, and pass among my friends for a whiskery fire-eater, afraid of neither man nor dragon. Ah me! Suppose some brisk little chap steps up and gives me a caning in St. James's Street, with all the heads of my friends ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.

... a good one, Mr. Horsley," he said as he returned the livery man's brag team, "but it has two drawbacks." "Oh, indeed; and may I inquire what they are?" ...
— The New Pun Book • Thomas A. Brown and Thomas Joseph Carey

... Ackerman, Brag, Comet, Craig, Holder, Petoka, Carey, Baroka, Barcelona, Bawdin, Firstoka (Gellatly No. 1). These have made a good showing, as the majority of the trees or bushes under 4 to 6 inch crown diameter of these varieties, are doing well and carrying good crops, while many above these diameters ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the 41st Annual Meeting • Various

... the threatened event; and they were all unmercifully ridiculed when the day passed over quietly. Walpole in one of his amusing letters speaks of a party who went "to an inn ten miles out of town, where they are to play at brag till five in the morning, and then come back—I suppose, to look for the bones of their husbands and families under the rubbish!" Jokers who were out late amused themselves by bawling in the watchmen's voice, "Past four ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli

... I haven't the polish that those Eastern fellows put on, or that is put on them, but out here in the mountains I amount to somebody—you must let me brag a little, Sylvia—and if a man doesn't bow pretty low to Mrs. William Plummer, I'll have to get out my old six-shooter—I haven't carried one now for ten years—and shoot all the hair off ...
— The Candidate - A Political Romance • Joseph Alexander Altsheler

... remember'd it at leisure. I don't want to brag, but I hope I've been found faithful. It's rather hard to tell poor John Bur, the workhouse boy, after clothing, feeding, and making him your man of trust, for two and twenty years, that you wonder he don't run away from you, now ...
— John Bull - The Englishman's Fireside: A Comedy, in Five Acts • George Colman

... money in the world would be useless, if he hadn't Laverick Wells to spend it in. With regard to the vapourings of a 'certain gentleman,' he thought it would be very odd if some of them could not take the shine out of him, observing that 'Brag' was a good dog, but 'Holdfast' was a better, with certain other sporting similes and phrases, all indicative of showing fight. The steam is soon got up after dinner, and as they were all of the same mind, and all agreed ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees

... Northern Fury, And they mangled up the air, Till a native of Missouri Would have owned his brag was fair. Though the plunges kep' him reelin' And the wind it flapped his shirt, Loud above the hawse's squealin' We could hear ...
— Roosevelt in the Bad Lands • Hermann Hagedorn

... it, with variations, until I threw myself into your arms? It was an awful blow to my pride—considering that heretofore I've certainly had my fair share of attention, and even a little more than that—to have to do all the love-making, and I'm certainly not going to go brag about it—' This time the conversation really did get interrupted, for Austin would not for one instant submit to such a "garbling of statistics" and took the quickest means in his power to put an end ...
— The Old Gray Homestead • Frances Parkinson Keyes

... months after, and brag that I had meant to thrash the man, and then didn't. And why? Because my father had made a bigger ass of himself than I supposed. My dear, ...
— Tales and Fantasies • Robert Louis Stevenson

... sir," replied Ross in answer to the invitation; then, after a pause, he added: "we didn't want to brag about ...
— The Submarine Hunters - A Story of the Naval Patrol Work in the Great War • Percy F. Westerman

... have confessed to you, talking of my talents, my utter inability to remember in any comprehensive way what I have read. I can vehemently applaud, or perversely stickle, at parts; but I cannot grasp at a whole. This infirmity (which is nothing to brag of) may be seen in my two little compositions, the tale and my play, in both which no reader, however partial, can ...
— Figures of Several Centuries • Arthur Symons

... should all have been British, or Irish, and worn red coats, and ate blood-puddings, and drank ale, and hurrahed for King George forevermore. This is the truth, fellow-citizens, for I cannot tell a lie,—you know I cannot tell a lie. But I don't want to brag over you, and if you will still be good Yankee Christians, brave and industrious, I will still be the father of your country, world without end, Amen! Band, please ...
— Stories of Many Lands • Grace Greenwood

... I want to brag about myself," he went on. "I don't fancy myself—in that way. I'm not specially proud of doing things—it's the things themselves that I care for. If some men had made a great fortune, they would ...
— The Market-Place • Harold Frederic

... style, it bein' my opinion that where a man's a born gentleman he's got a heap of reason fo' to be grateful but none to brag," said Cavendish. ...
— The Prodigal Judge • Vaughan Kester

... one; though, by vast odds, the most terrific of all mortal disasters have immemorially and indiscriminately befallen tens and hundreds of thousands of those who have gone upon the waters; though but a moment's consideration will teach, that however baby man may brag of his science and skill, and however much, in a flattering future, that science and skill may augment; yet for ever and for ever, to the crack of doom, the sea will insult and murder him, and pulverize the stateliest, stiffest ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville

... disputed during many centuries. Our name is part of our proof, and there has been a Richard Royson associated with Westmoreland ever since Coeur-de-Lion returned from Palestine. That is the kind of family asset a boy will brag of. Joined to a certain proficiency in games, it supplies a ready- made nickname. But the wonderful and wholly inexplicable thing is that while I have been standing here, watching our head-light dancing over the desert, the fantastic conceit has invaded ...
— The Wheel O' Fortune • Louis Tracy

... for exaltation in the minds of descendants also has a certain influence — young men in quarrels sometimes brag of the number of heads taken by their ancestors, and the prowess or success of an ancestor seems to redound to the courage of the descendants; and it is an affront to purposely and seriously belittle the head-hunting results ...
— The Bontoc Igorot • Albert Ernest Jenks

... my father sent for me. It's true, I dare say, that he bragged, for he was given to bluster an' blow. An' he's old now. I can't help it if he bragged about me. But if he has, an' if he's justified in his stand against you sheepmen, I'm goin' to do my best to live up to his brag." ...
— To the Last Man • Zane Grey

... and handsome, her eyebrows lifted up; Her chin is very neat and pert, and smooth like a china cup; Her hair's the brag of Ireland, so weighty and so fine, It's rolling down upon her neck ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner

... raised my dashed spirits again, and I said, confidently: "You must find our system of baggage-checks delightful." I said this because it is one of the first things we brag of to foreigners, and I had the habit of it. "By-the-way," I ventured to add, "I suppose you meant to say you brought two checks when I asked you for them at the train just now? But you really ...
— A Traveler from Altruria: Romance • W. D. Howells

... tell you a dog story—only now, since I've mentioned him, I must tell you a circumstance about Cees. He was a middlin' size broot, with fox ears and yaller spots over his eyes, and could out bark and out brag all creation when he was inside the yard. If another dog was goin' along he'd run up and down the palins and bark and take on like he'd give the world if that fence wasent there. So one day when he was showin' off in that way I caught him by the nap ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume III. (of X.) • Various

... you like," he said, with a laugh. "I'm not much to look at. And, Jane, neither you nor Lassiter, can brag. You're paler than I ever saw you. Lassiter, here, he wears a bloody bandage under his hat. That reminds me. Some one took a flying shot at me down in the sage. It made Wrangle run some.... Well, perhaps you've more to tell me than I've got ...
— Riders of the Purple Sage • Zane Grey

... handles, including his neighbours' nerves; he has no mercy or pity or consideration for anyone serving him, and yet he's the kindest heart towards children and animals, and the good he does to them is about the only thing he don't brag about." ...
— Elizabeth Visits America • Elinor Glyn

... 'ad laid one," he replied. "And it began to brag so much about it that I couldn't stand it, so I took the egg, and it looked so lonely all by itself in my 'and that I took the others to keep ...
— The Red Horizon • Patrick MacGill

... it? You Karamazovs brag of being an ancient, noble family, though your father used to run about playing the buffoon at other men's tables, and was only admitted to the kitchen as a favor. I may be only a priest's son, and dirt in the eyes of noblemen like you, but don't insult ...
— The Brothers Karamazov • Fyodor Dostoyevsky

... drive her the very first week she was here. Gilbert is my sister Julia's son, and a fine young fellow he is. It ain't good manners to brag of your own relations, but I'm always forgetting and doing it. Gil was a great pet of mine. He was so bright and nice-mannered everybody liked him. Him and Anne were a fine-looking couple, Nora May. Not but what they had their shortcomings. ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1905 to 1906 • Lucy Maud Montgomery

... do that easily enough, but you'll never live to brag about it. If the officers don't hang you, Hank Hazletine will make daylight shine through your hide! He is ...
— Two Boys in Wyoming - A Tale of Adventure (Northwest Series, No. 3) • Edward S. Ellis

... me all night to tell you in detail, Kenneth. But I did it. It's no mere brag to say that I could walk into the Chicago, Peoria & Davenport general offices here to-morrow morning and organize a through service over the P. S-W. and the three stub lines within twenty-four hours, ...
— Empire Builders • Francis Lynde

... shingles led to Divisional Island. Blue rollers swung themselves on the air below the cliffs; and on the pebbles an owl skipped and danced, showing off in the beautiful evening sunlight. This was a daily performance, Thornhill told me. It had been General Peebles' birthday, and the brag about the cake was splendidly ...
— The Leicestershires beyond Baghdad • Edward John Thompson

... I'm his son; and when I am a man I may be like him. Verner, do I brag, To think I some time may be like my father? If so, then is it he that teaches me; For, ever as I wonder at his skill, He calls me boy, and says I must do more Ere I become ...
— The Universal Reciter - 81 Choice Pieces of Rare Poetical Gems • Various

... unfortunately, like an unskilful general, he confided more in the number than the spirit or discipline of his forces. Arnall, Concanen, and Henley, were wretched auxiliaries; yet they could not complain of indifferent pay, since Arnall used to brag, that, in the course of four years, he had received from the treasury, for his political writings, the sum ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Vol. VII - Historical and Political Tracts—Irish • Jonathan Swift

... their vittles many a time an' I'm obleeged to tell ye it's hard work. Too much hair in the stew! They stick their paws in the pot an' grab out a chunk an' chaw it an' bolt it, like a dog, an' wipe their hands on their long hair. They brag 'bout the power o' their jaws, which I ain't denyin' is consid'able, havin' had an ol' buck bite off the top o' my left ear when I were tied fast to a tree which—you hear to me—is a good time to learn Injun language 'cause ye pay ...
— In the Days of Poor Richard • Irving Bacheller

... fair Lesley, Return to Caledonie! That we may brag we hae a lass There's nane again ...
— Hollyhock - A Spirit of Mischief • L. T. Meade

... brag away. Everything over there is ten times bigger and better than here—the apples are the size of pumpkins, and the brooks are so wide you can't see across them, and it takes you years to ride round a single farm! We know! You needn't ...
— A harum-scarum schoolgirl • Angela Brazil

... want to seem to brag, Carrie, but you saw the coat that just walked out on Mrs. Gronauer? My little mother she was a humpback, Carrie, not a real one, but all stooped from the heavy years when she was helping my father to get his start. Well, anyway, that little ...
— The Vertical City • Fannie Hurst

... monarch's crown, That not the midnight of Earth's blackest sin Can dim. All beauty emanates from soul, And all deformity. The piteous straw Where sickness writhes in suffering and want— The cold, bleak dwelling where the winds have will To brag o'er man's debasement, if possess'd In fortitude and patience, with the heart Clear in its honour, stedfast in its faith, Is to the eye of angels, beautiful as day; And this fair spot with all its waken'd charms ...
— Eidolon - The Course of a Soul and Other Poems • Walter R. Cassels

... the robins brag about the sweetness of their song, Nor do they stop their music gay whene'er a poor man comes along. God taught them how to sing an' when they'd learned the art He sent them here To use their talents day by day the dreary lives o' men to cheer. An' rich or poor an' sad or gay, the ugly ...
— The Path to Home • Edgar A. Guest

... When you bid all your friends to the marriage of a poor couple, that is to say, your Wits and Necessities—alias, a poet's Whitsun-ale—you shall swear that, within three days after, you shall not abroad, in bookbinders' shops, brag that your viceroys, or tributary-kings, have done homage to you, or paid quarterage. Moreover, when a knight gives you his passport to travel in and out to his company, and gives you money for God's sake—you will swear not to ...
— Calamities and Quarrels of Authors • Isaac D'Israeli

... about ME. Yes, she made it, and as against me, of course, against all of us, at sight of me; so that if Eliza has bragged at Eastridge about New York, she has at least bragged in New York about Eastridge. I didn't clearly, for Mrs. Chataway, come up to the brag—or perhaps rather didn't come down to it: since I dare say the poor lady's consternation meant simply that my aunt has confessed to me but as an unconsidered trifle, a gifted child at the most; or as young and handsome and dashing at the most, and not ...
— The Whole Family - A Novel by Twelve Authors • William Dean Howells, Mary E. Wilkins Freeman, Mary Heaton Vorse, Mary Stewart Cutting, Elizabeth Jo

... that there are some forty-five or more, and that though I belong among the original thirteen, it has been my happiness to journey in all the others, in most of them, indeed, many times, for the sake of making my country's acquaintance. With no spread-eagle brag do I gather conviction each year that we Americans, judged not hastily, are sound at heart, kind, courageous, often of the truest delicacy, and always ultimately of excellent good-sense. With such belief, or, ...
— Red Men and White • Owen Wister

... carpeted reception-room would stand on the hustings and publish a fear that he might be boring his audience. One familiar with the trade of electioneering, as it has always been conducted by men, would strut and shout and brag, never for a moment worrying whether or not he came anywhere near the truth or feeling the slightest qualm, though he deafened his hearers with his trumpeting or bored them to complete extinction, and would refuse to be silenced even by ...
— Some Everyday Folk and Dawn • Miles Franklin

... he run the plow deep and straight when he wasn't much taller than the handles. I had done talked it over with him and asked him would he, and he looked right in my eyes in his dependable way and said yes he would. That finished it and he wasn't but eleven; but I don't want to brag on him to you. If you listen to mothers' talk the world are full of heroes and none-suches." Again Miss Wingate received the smile from over Mother Mayberry's glasses and this time it was tinged with a ...
— The Road to Providence • Maria Thompson Daviess

... Nimble, "if they had been good fellows, they would have invited us, as our mother did cousin Blackie, and have set before us the best they had. I could find it in my heart to dig them out of their holes, and give them a good bite." This was all brag on Nimble's part, who was not near so brave as he wished Silvy and Velvet-paw ...
— Lady Mary and her Nurse • Catharine Parr Traill

... 'a' paid for what was in 'em; and if she's ben bakin' fruit cake this hot day, why Maryabby used to be so font o' fruit cake her folks were afraid she'd have fits 'n' die. I shall be watchin' here as usual to-morrow morning', 'n' if Maryabby don't drive int' Eunice's yard before noon I won't brag any more for a year ...
— The Village Watch-Tower • (AKA Kate Douglas Riggs) Kate Douglas Wiggin

... remarkable deeds of courage and valor as they tossed off horn after horn of mead and ale. Each time their mighty valor grew until there was no limit set to their attainments. It is possible that their boastful pledges may have given rise to the term, to brag. ...
— Yule-Tide in Many Lands • Mary P. Pringle and Clara A. Urann

... Phocion, who did not speak at all, was a great deal nearer hitting the mark than Demosthenes. (Laughter.) He used to tell the Athenians—"You can't fight Philip. You have not the slightest chance with him. He is a man who holds his tongue; he has great disciplined armies; he can brag anybody you like in your cities here; and he is going on steadily with an unvarying aim towards his object: and he will infallibly beat any kind of men such as you, going on raging from shore to shore with all that rampant nonsense." Demosthenes said to him one day—"The Athenians ...
— On the Choice of Books • Thomas Carlyle

... so I refused telling aught. To you, sir, now I will tell everything and anything; only it is but little. The gun was my father's before it was mine, and long ago he and John Barton had a fancy for shooting at the gallery; and they used always to take this gun, and brag that though it was ...
— Mary Barton • Elizabeth Gaskell

... some people accused him of these things, and from what I knew of the man I could not believe that he was above such deeds. Ham was an apt scholar, and improved upon the precept and example of his father. I had heard him brag of cheating the customers, of mean tricks put upon the inexperience of women and children. If he had been a young man of high moral purposes, I might have hoped that we had seen the end ...
— Down The River - Buck Bradford and His Tyrants • Oliver Optic

... was in part to keep the other from her that he himself sought her: the major did not take to Vavasor. There was a natural repulsion between them. Vavasor thought the major a most objectionable, indeed low fellow, full of brag and vulgarity, and the major thought Vavasor a supercilious idiot. It is curious how differently a man's character will be read by two people in the same company, but it is not hard to explain, seeing his carriage to the individual affects only the man who is the object ...
— Weighed and Wanting • George MacDonald

... profane with impious shag, Nor poison thee with nigger-head and twist, Nor with Kentucky, though the planters brag That it hath virtues all the ...
— Pipe and Pouch - The Smoker's Own Book of Poetry • Various

... who not alone for novelties sake, but also out of a sweet tooth'd liquorish appetite, long to see what is prepared for them. And I beleeve that although the Kings Cook had drest it, yet there will be one or another of them that will be discommending something, and brag that she could have made it much delicater, if there be then any one that seems not fully to beleeve her, immediately she cites two or three Ladies for her witnesses, who have given her the greatest praise and commendations for her dressing of such ...
— The Ten Pleasures of Marriage and The Confession of the New-married Couple (1682) • A. Marsh

... Martyrs were compell'd to take The Shapes of Beasts, like Hypocrites at Stake, I'll bait my Scot so, yet not cheat your Eyes; A Scot within a Beast is no Disguise. No more let Ireland brag her harmless Nation Fosters no Venom since that Scots' Plantation; Nor can our Feign'd Antiquity obtain, Since they came in England has Wolves again. Nature her self does Scotch-men Beasts confess, Making their Country such a Wilderness; A Land that brings in Question ...
— Quaint Gleanings from Ancient Poetry • Edmund Goldsmid

... It is true that we cannot turn the cheek to the smiter; it is true that we cannot give our cloak to the robber; civilisation is too complicated, too vain-glorious, too emotional. The robber would brag, and we should blush; in other words, the robber and we are alike sentimentalists. The command of Christ is impossible, but it is not insane; it is rather sanity preached to a planet of lunatics. If the whole world was suddenly ...
— Varied Types • G. K. Chesterton

... She wrote him a kind letter enclosing the money. It takes but little imagination to understand what such a creature would do with the cash; that he would hasten to celebrate the success of his cunning by a revel at which he could brag to some loose companion how neatly he had cheated a generous and noble woman. But he did something more, almost inconceivable in its baseness; he took that letter to the Queen's Proctor and showed it to that archive of centuried insapience ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 24, November, 1891 • Various

... Pluck a stake out of one of the hedges: and tug at it, though it may come easy: this, if she turn back, will look terrible, and account for your not following us faster. Then, returning with it, shouldered, to brag to the family what you would have done, could you have overtaken us, rather than your young lady should be carried off by such a ——— And you may call me names, and curse me. And these airs will make you look valiant, and in earnest. You see, honest Joseph, I am always ...
— Clarissa, Volume 3 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson

... and reflections. He was more his own master than on the preceding day, having had time to recover himself, we cherishing hopes that the Marechal would be sent to the right about. It was here that I heard of the brag of the Marechal de Villeroy concerning the struggle he had had with Dubois, and of the challenges and insults he had uttered with a confidence which rendered his ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre

... was a good example," said Dorg Seay. "Under a white foreman, I'll bet that's a good lot of darkies. They were just about the right shade—old shiny black. As good cowhands as ever I saw were nigs, but they need a white man to blow and brag on them. But it always ruins one to give him ...
— The Outlet • Andy Adams

... of all those who were still fighting for their lives they were by far the most valiant, for the others had already fallen under the arrows of Ulysses. Agelaus shouted to them and said, "My friends, he will soon have to leave off, for Mentor has gone away after having done nothing for him but brag. They are standing at the doors unsupported. Do not aim at him all at once, but six of you throw your spears first, and see if you cannot cover yourselves with glory by killing him. When he has fallen we need not ...
— The Odyssey • Homer

... should you wonder More at the strength of body than of mind; 'Tis equally the same to see me plunge Headlong into the Seine, all over armed, And plow against the torrent to my point, As 'twas to hear my judgment on the Germans, This to another man would be a brag; Or at the court among my enemies, To be, as I am here, quite off my guard, Would make me such another thing as Grillon, A blunt, hot, ...
— The Works Of John Dryden, Vol. 7 (of 18) - The Duke of Guise; Albion and Albanius; Don Sebastian • John Dryden

... torture begins, before you brag!" this to Miriam. Then turning to some of the soldiers, he cried: "Strip her, don't leave a rag upon her, and treat her from top to toe ...
— The Mark of the Beast • Sidney Watson

... the German philosophers, and passed along by later French and English thinkers, of man against circumstance, of spirit against form, of the present against the past. What splendid affirmation, what inspiring audacity, what glorious egoism, what generous brag, what sacred impiety! There is an eclat about his words, and a brave challenging of immense odds, that is like an army with banners. It stirs the blood like a bugle-call: beauty, bravery, and a sacred cause,—the three things that win with us always. ...
— Birds and Poets • John Burroughs

... up in a moment, unhurt, except for a knock on the eye against his gun, which he was carrying before him; and after a minute's rueful look he joined heartily in the shouts of laughter of his father and brother at his expense, "Ah, Charley, brag is a good dog, but holdfast is a better. I never saw a more literal proof of the saying. There, jump up again, and I need not say look ...
— On the Pampas • G. A. Henty

... tracker," he muttered. "I'm as good as Walter Butler or Tim Murphy, and my friend, the Weasel, now with Morgan's riflemen, is no keener forest-runner than am I. Oh, I do not mean to brag, or say I can match my cunning against such a human bloodhound ...
— The Maid-At-Arms • Robert W. Chambers

... buying the boat," he said, "but that's hopeless. The more we paid for it the louder the owner would brag. The Germans would be 'on' in a minute. We've simply got to steal it. It's up to you to find out the man's proper name and address, and we'll send him the money from the first British ...
— The Ivory Trail • Talbot Mundy

... my wife had been a stenographer in a factory that made tin cans. She liked that work. She could make her fingers dance along the keys. When she read a book at home she didn't think the writer amounted to much if he made mistakes about punctuation. Her boss was so proud of her that he would brag of her work to visitors and sometimes would go off fishing leaving the running of the business ...
— Marching Men • Sherwood Anderson

... stool—you squealer!" said Red Hannigan. "I heard you brag about being Barlow's stool, and I heard everything else you bragged about to Joe Ellison's girl. I'd bump you off right now if I had my gat with me and if I had any chance at a get-away. But I'll be looking after you, and the gang will be looking after you, till ...
— Children of the Whirlwind • Leroy Scott

... when we go to bed we'll just remind the angels that we don't need so much looking after now that we're living here. I'll never forget how s'prised Hec Abbott was when he found out that we'd all been 'dopted together. I wonder what Hec is doing about now? He can't brag any more about the good times they have at his house. We are just—what in the world is that coming ...
— The Lilac Lady • Ruth Alberta Brown

... wood-craft often baffle his own; and, therefore, though he fights against him sturdily and conscientiously, and, as a rule, triumphs over him, he does not generally, being what I have described him, brag of these victories, nor, indeed, does he care to talk about them. "There, but for the grace of God, goes Velveteens," must be the mental exclamation of many a good keeper when he hears his enemy sentenced ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 104, January 28, 1893 • Various

... will hear much about it," Chris said. "You may be sure the Boers will not say much; they make a big brag over every success, but they won't care to publish such a thing as this. Probably their papers will only say: 'An explosion of a trifling nature occurred on the Portuguese side of Komati-poort. Some barrels ...
— With Buller in Natal - A Born Leader • G. A. Henty

... tree," answered my cousin, not to be outdone, for boys are wont to brag of their honourable scars, "and it hurt a great deal, but I mean falling from higher still. One of the sailors I talked to on board ship had fallen from a mast, and he told me that he went over and over; the first time he went over seemed quite a long time, and between that and ...
— The Story of the White-Rock Cove • Anonymous

... of brag, which was perhaps pardonable tinder the circumstances, Douglas reminded the Senate of his efforts to secure the admission of California and of his prediction that the people of that country would form a free State constitution. A few months ...
— Stephen A. Douglas - A Study in American Politics • Allen Johnson

... place, he chose they should be removed now. It looks ill for the court when he is sturdy. They wished, too, to have had Pitt, if they could have had him Without consequences; but they don't find any recruits repair to their standard. They brag that they should have had Lord Waldegrave; a most notorious falsehood, as he had refused every offer they could invent the day before he was taken ill. The Duke of' Cumberland orders his servants to say, that so far from joining them, he believes if Lord Waldecrave could have been ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole Volume 3 • Horace Walpole

... to death of doctor; such a terrible amount of brag and big talk, always about himself; always dread his calls; can never get so far as to return; a regular thorn ...
— Woman's Endurance • A.D.L.

... self-love to each country and nation. Upon this account it is that the English challenge the prerogative of having the most handsome women, of the being most accomplished in the skill of music, and of keeping the best tables: the Scotch brag of their gentility, and pretend the genius of their native soil inclines them to be good disputants: the French think themselves remarkable for complaisance and good breeding: the Sorbonists of ...
— In Praise of Folly - Illustrated with Many Curious Cuts • Desiderius Erasmus

... van Winkle will ever be associated in the loving memory of play-goers his Bob Acres in Sheridan's "Rivals," thought by many to be his capital part—a personification where all the foibles of the would-be man-of-the-world: his self-conceit, his brag, his cowardice, are transformed into virtues and captivate our hearts, dissolved in the brimming humor which yet never overflows the just measure, so degenerating ...
— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 8 (of 8) • Various

... lady Chia, "every one says that there's nothing you haven't gone through and nothing you haven't seen, and don't you even know what this gauze is? Will you again brag ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin

... the devil do I care about his opinions? let him preach and stick to his controversy with Father Tom—from whom he hadn't so much to brag of—but as for you, Fergus, you are, to spake plainly, a thorough ass. What d—d stuff you have been letting out of you! Go and find, if you can, some purer world for yourself to live in, for, let me tell you, you are not fit for this. ...
— The Tithe-Proctor - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton

... beforehand in the fire, then he fixed a tool-hole of large bore on an anvil. His comrade had taken from against the wall two sledge-hammers weighing twenty pounds each, the two big sisters of the factory whom the workers called Fifine and Dedele. And he continued to brag, talking of a half-gross of rivets which he had forged for the Dunkirk lighthouse, regular jewels, things to be put in a museum, they were so daintily finished off. Hang it all, no! he did not fear competition; before meeting ...
— L'Assommoir • Emile Zola

... a certain part of the open court was set aside for gaming purposes. It made no difference how severe the weather was, these gaming tables were always in full blast. A man could amuse himself with any game at cards that he desired. There were "farrow bank," "chuck-a-luck," "brag," "eucher," "draw poker," "straight poker," "seven-up," "five-up," and most prominent of all, a French game, pronounced in Fort Delaware "vang-tu-aug," meaning twenty-one. All these were games for "sheepskins"—bets, five ...
— History of Kershaw's Brigade • D. Augustus Dickert

... but a breath will fan it into flame! Without it, the soul would cease to be a soul; its permanent eradication would be equivalent to annihilation! If conscience can be eliminated, man has nothing to brag of over a tadpole! We are no more safe from it than from memory! Who can be sure that what he has forgotten has ceased to survive? The sweet perfume of a violet may revive a bitter memory dormant for fifty years! At a word, a look, a glance, conscience—abused, suppressed, despised, ...
— The Redemption of David Corson • Charles Frederic Goss

... he wood be if he gnew what i was saying. then father began to laff and to tell what he and Gim Melcher and Bill Yung and Beanys father and Pewts father done when they was boys and he asted if all of them fellers wasent pretty good men and Aunt Sarah sed none of them is mutch to brag of and father laffed and sed that shows you aint a good judge ...
— Brite and Fair • Henry A. Shute

... Giant Jim, the big negro Grandfather used to have to oversee his hands on the lower place? Jim, you know, in consideration of his elevation, was granted several privileges not allowed the others. Among them was the privilege of getting drunk every Saturday night. Then it was he would stalk and brag among those he ruled while they looked at him in awe and reverence. But he had the touch of the philosopher in him and would finally say: 'Come, touch me, boys; come, look at me; come, feel me—I'm nothin' but a common man, although I ...
— The Bishop of Cottontown - A Story of the Southern Cotton Mills • John Trotwood Moore

... nauseated him. The advertisements of "Psychics," "World-famous Mediums," "Palmists," "Horologists," and only the devil himself knows what else, filled him with disgust, added to his already poor opinion of sick humanity. Of these Viola now formed a part—as an actress shares the envy, the brag, the selfish, blatant struggle for success which is reflected in the advertising columns of dramatic journals. He ran down each column of "display ads" of The World of Spirit, timorously, almost expecting to see a notice of "the marvellous psychic Miss Viola Lambert, ...
— The Tyranny of the Dark • Hamlin Garland

... that he was ruined in the Contest, and obliged to give up all he had to his Creditors; which effectually answered the Purpose of Sir Timothy, who erected those Nuisances in the Farmer's Orchard with that Intention only. Ah, my dear Reader, we brag of Liberty, and boast of our Laws: but the Blessings of the one, and the Protection of the other, seldom fall to the Lot of the Poor; and especially when a rich Man is their Adversary. How, in the Name of Goodness, can a poor Wretch obtain Redress, ...
— Goody Two-Shoes - A Facsimile Reproduction Of The Edition Of 1766 • Anonymous



Words linked to "Brag" :   crowing, gas, vaporing, hyperbolise, bluster, amplify, overstate, puff, triumph, swash, vaunt, self-praise, magnify, gloat, line-shooting, boast, jactitation, exaggerate, boasting, gasconade, bragger, bragging, hyperbolize, shoot a line, tout, superior, boss



Copyright © 2024 Dictionary One.com