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Complain   Listen
verb
Complain  v. i.  (past & past part. complained; pres. part. complaining)  
1.
To give utterance to expression of grief, pain, censure, regret. etc.; to lament; to murmur; to find fault; commonly used with of. Also, to creak or squeak, as a timber or wheel. "O loss of sight, of thee I most complain!"
2.
To make a formal accusation; to make a charge. "Now, Master Shallow, you'll complain of me to the king?"
Synonyms: To repine; grumble; deplore; bewail; grieve; mourn; regret; murmur.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Complain" Quotes from Famous Books



... I to disdain my teacher? He is a fool who scorns his master. I ought to keep and cherish the lesson which Love teaches me, for great good may soon come of it. But I am frightened because he beats me so. And dost thou complain, when no sign of blow or wound appears? Art thou not mistaken? Nay, for he has wounded me so deep that he has shot his dart to my very heart, and has not yet drawn it out again. [213] How has he pierced thy body with it, when no wound appears without? Tell me that, for I wish to know. ...
— Four Arthurian Romances - "Erec et Enide", "Cliges", "Yvain", and "Lancelot" • Chretien de Troyes

... and other gentlemen complain, that thereby an easy passage is opened into their country for strangers, who, in time, by their suggestions of liberty, will weaken that attachment of their vassals which it is so necessary for them to support and preserve. That ...
— The Jacobite Rebellions (1689-1746) - (Bell's Scottish History Source Books.) • James Pringle Thomson

... an exaggeration. I am sometimes away from home for more than a week at a time and Godfrey does not always complain about Crossan ...
— The Red Hand of Ulster • George A. Birmingham

... and the whole ragged regiment of the squalider vices. The evil of his temperament now and always was of the dull smouldering kind, seldom breaking out into active flame. There is a certain sordidness in the scene. You may complain that the details which Rousseau gives of his youthful days are insipid. Yet such things are the web and stuff of life, and these days of transition from childhood to full manhood in every case mark a crisis. These insipidities test the education of home and family, and ...
— Rousseau - Volumes I. and II. • John Morley

... without exception, are of one heart—that our societies are in peace—that the work of our blessed Lord is reviving in many of the circuits, although the cause in Kingston suffers, and my dear brethren there complain, in consequence of my connexional engagements and ...
— The Story of My Life - Being Reminiscences of Sixty Years' Public Service in Canada • Egerton Ryerson

... may complain of this; for myself I regard it a matter for congratulation. We can never have too many arms, public or private, against the criminal. To this some people may answer that, by continually publishing the details of crimes, ...
— The Mystery of the Yellow Room • Gaston Leroux

... a strong, forcible, and really eloquent way, giving the grain of the wood without the varnish. They contended very seriously and sensibly, that although the working men of England and Scotland had many things to complain of, and many things to be reformed, yet their condition was world-wide different ...
— Sunny Memories Of Foreign Lands, Volume 1 (of 2) • Harriet Elizabeth (Beecher) Stowe

... thought how the twentieth century was to become known as the Century of The Home, with the home brew, and the subscription editions, and the sagacities of women. If he should complain that there is no honor and fine living in all of this, we shall have to agree with him. But we can answer that by guile we have preserved our joys, and cleared our way out from the shadows of his big totem pole. If we have ...
— Nonsenseorship • G. G. Putnam

... made more of a stir than you can imagine. They tell me you are more wicked than Cleopatra, and yet you complain that ...
— Mummery - A Tale of Three Idealists • Gilbert Cannan

... bad of Aunt Philippa; only she had lost her temper, and was feeling utterly aggrieved, and Mrs. Fullerton, who was a meddlesome, good-humoured woman, and who had nothing of which to complain in life except a little over-plumpness and too much money, was agreeing with her like a ...
— Uncle Max • Rosa Nouchette Carey

... to a vast expense in entertaining such a crowd of visitors. Being very saving of her own means, she generally contrived to bring the expense of this magnificence upon others. The honor was a sufficient equivalent. Or, if it was not, nobody dared to complain. ...
— Queen Elizabeth - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott

... it after you left me on the Belvidere—just as I heard it on another moonlight night, when Major Hynd was here with me. Our return to this house is perhaps the cause. I don't complain; I ...
— The Black Robe • Wilkie Collins

... moment Johnston reached his field he began to quarrel with his generals and complain to the Government at Richmond. He made no serious effort to unite his forces for the defense of Vicksburg and continuously wrote and telegraphed to the War Department that his authority was inadequate to really command so extended a territory. He made no effort to throw the ...
— The Victim - A romance of the Real Jefferson Davis • Thomas Dixon

... Willierm. Tyr. l. i. c. 8, p. 634, who strives hard to magnify the Christian grievances. The Turks exacted an aureus from each pilgrim! The caphar of the Franks now is fourteen dollars: and Europe does not complain ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 5 • Edward Gibbon

... punning etymologies in their squibs against the poor man] ... The real author of the Regii Sanguinis Clamor neither lives among the Dutch,—is not "stabled" among them, to use your own expression—nor has he, I believe, anything in common with them ... Vehemently and almost tragically you complain that I have upbraided you with your blindness. I can positively affirm that I did not know till I read it in your own book that you had lost your eyesight. For, if anything occurred to me that might seem to look that way, I referred to the mind [Note ...
— The Life of John Milton, Volume 5 (of 7), 1654-1660 • David Masson

... good-nature—qualities, he observes, precious in all ranks of society, and which ought to make amends for many defects; but for Gall, they had only to palliate a certain roughness of character, which might wound the susceptibility of delicate persons, although the sick and unfortunate never had to complain; and, indeed, the doctor ought, in strict justice, to have more merit in our ideas, from never having once lost sight, in his writings, of either decency or moderation, particularly when it is remembered how severely he was attacked in ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 12, Issue 346, December 13, 1828 • Various

... rag except what's on his back! Must I ask him to sleep in the stable, sir? Those mountain people are sensitive to the very core, you know that, and his feelings would be immeasurably hurt if he suspected I complain of his clothes. But, Bob, it's impossible! You're both of a size; help an old ...
— Sunlight Patch • Credo Fitch Harris

... Polly Hymnia! Or haply as there stood beside the maid One loftier form in sable stole array'd, If with regretful thought he hail'd in thee Chisholm, his long-lost friend, Mol Pomene! 35 But most of you, soft warblings, I complain! 'Twas ye that from the bee-hive of my brain Did lure the fancies forth, a freakish rout, And witch'd the air ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... if I am to wed young. Our estates are encumbered. We have more state to keep up than we well know how to manage. We have had troubles and losses even as the Trevlyns have. I have known this well. I cannot complain of my father. Nevertheless I chose my Kate without any dowry before all the world beside, and I am prepared to abide by my choice. But we shall have to wait; we shall have to possess our souls in patience. ...
— The Lost Treasure of Trevlyn - A Story of the Days of the Gunpowder Plot • Evelyn Everett-Green

... any moment might be my last, to see what a sinner I was in His sight, and led me to seek forgiveness through the merits of Christ for all my past sins. That I believe I have obtained, and now I crave a like forgiveness from you whom I have so cruelly wronged. Should you withhold it, I dare not complain; but I have hopes that you, who are a follower of our Lord Jesus Christ, will not do so. One more request, and I have done. Comfort, I beg of you, my mother when she has to bear the bitter sorrow of knowing how shamefully the son she loves so dearly has acted. By this post I write also ...
— Little Frida - A Tale of the Black Forest • Anonymous

... * * * Thus through life with thee I'll glide, Happy still what'er betide, And while plodding sots complain Of ceaseless toil and slender gain, Every passing hour shall be Worth a golden ...
— Choice Specimens of American Literature, And Literary Reader - Being Selections from the Chief American Writers • Benj. N. Martin

... voyage of three years, and in a leaky ship. Costly wardrobe is not required; but, O woman! if you are not willing, by all that ingenuity of refinement can effect, to make yourself attractive to your husband, you ought not to complain if he seek in other society those pleasant surroundings ...
— The Wedding Ring - A Series of Discourses for Husbands and Wives and Those - Contemplating Matrimony • T. De Witt Talmage

... year we find our young astronomer starting for a Continental tour, and we, who complain if the Channel passage lasts more than an hour or two, may note Halley's remark in writing to Hooke on June 15th, 1680: "Having fallen in with bad weather we took forty hours in the journey from Dover to Calais." The scientific distinction which he had ...
— Great Astronomers • R. S. Ball

... made of the troops stealing water mellons. Such practices must be punished. A few unprincipled rascals may ruin the reputation of a whole corps of virtuous men. The General desires the virtuous to complain of every offender that may be detected in invading people's property in an unlawful manner, whatever his station or from whatever part of the country ...
— The Campaign of 1776 around New York and Brooklyn • Henry P. Johnston

... magnet, and my heart is as true to you as steel. I shall make my absence as brief as possible. Not a day, not an hour, not a minute, shall I waste either in going or returning. Oh, this business; but I wont complain, for we must have something for our hive besides honey—something that rhymes with it—and that we must have it, I must bestir myself. You will find me a faithful correspondent. Like the spider, I shall drop a line by (almost) every post; and mind, ...
— Searchlights on Health - The Science of Eugenics • B. G. Jefferis and J. L. Nichols

... what did he complain of? Hadn't he been coddled enough to please him? Did he want four or five more women ...
— Richard Vandermarck • Miriam Coles Harris

... in Jesus, having Him live in us as closely as though actually eaten, is the same as Jesus' own life on earth being lived in His Father, dependent upon the Father. And when the crowds take His words literally and complain that none can understand such statements, He at once explains that, of course, He does not mean literal eating—"The flesh profiteth nothing" (even if you did eat it): "it is the Spirit that gives life:" "the words ... are Spirit and life." The taking of Jesus through His words ...
— Quiet Talks about Jesus • S. D. Gordon

... write his memoirs in 1789, and it is to some of their fragments, which had been preserved by his family, and were handed over to M. Kurd de Schloezer, that we owe this delightful little book. Frederic the Great used to complain that ...
— Chips From A German Workshop. Vol. III. • F. Max Mueller

... softly, "I did not dare tell Salemina, and I should not confess it to you save that I am afraid Lady Baird will complain of me; but I was dreadfully rude to the Reverend Ronald! I couldn't help it; he roused my worst passions. It all began with his saying he thought international marriages presented even more difficulties ...
— Penelope's Experiences in Scotland • Kate Douglas Wiggin

... the climate. Lying in nearly the same degree of latitude with Lisbon, the intense heat which oppresses in that city is here alleviated by refreshing sea-breezes; by which means, though I believe there is no occasion at any season to complain of cold, it is only in the very height of the dog-days, if then, that a person, not actually engaged in violent exercise, is justified in ...
— The Campaigns of the British Army at Washington and New Orleans 1814-1815 • G. R. Gleig

... The doctor turned pale when he saw the foot: then, making four servants hold me, and taking his knife, he lifted the eschar, and dug the mortified flesh from my foot just as one cuts the damaged part out of an apple. The pain was great, but I did not complain. It was otherwise, however, when the knife reached the living flesh, and laid bare the muscles and bones till one could see them moving. Then the doctor, standing on a chair, soaked a sponge in hot sweetened wine, and let it fall drop by drop into ...
— The Red True Story Book • Various

... forth little or no notice. What if they did suffer and perish? Society covered their wrongs and injustices and mortal throes with an inhibitive silence, for it was expected that they, being lowly, should not complain, obtrude grievances, or in any way make unpleasant demonstrations. Yet, if the prominent of society were disgruntled, or if a few capitalists were caught in the snare of ruin which they had laid for others, they at once bestirred themselves and made the whole nation ...
— Great Fortunes from Railroads • Gustavus Myers

... thanks to Heaven, sound and hearty, and the little inconveniences which attend a uniform course of devotion and penitence prolong life rather than shorten it. So, at least, the physician of the convent tells me when I complain to him. ...
— Faustus - his Life, Death, and Doom • Friedrich Maximilian von Klinger

... not that I complain of all those inexplicable diseases, opprobria medicinae, so pusillanimously submitted to by civilized humanity and its physicians,—chicken-pox, measles, whooping-cough, mumps. I complain, indeed, of no diseases, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 108, October, 1866 • Various

... his wherefores, a fine pain unknown to the brute beast. If these questionings come from us with greater persistence, with a more imperious authority, if they divert us from the quest of lucre, life's only object in the eyes of most men, does it become us to complain? Let us be careful not to do so, for that would be denying the ...
— The Life of the Fly - With Which are Interspersed Some Chapters of Autobiography • J. Henri Fabre

... me." What a solemn responsibility!—How often we complain of darkness, of feebleness, of failure, as if there was no help for it. And God has promised in answer to our prayer to supply our every need, and give us His light and strength and peace. Would ...
— The Ministry of Intercession - A Plea for More Prayer • Andrew Murray

... to Brabantio, it implies merely that Othello was a Moor, that is, black. Though I think the rivalry of Roderigo sufficient to account for his wilful confusion of Moor and Negro,—yet, even if compelled to give this up, I should think it only adapted for the acting of the day, and should complain of an enormity built on a single word, in direct contradiction to Iago's 'Barbary horse.' Besides, if we could in good earnest believe Shakspeare ignorant of the distinction, still why should we adopt one disagreeable possibility ...
— Literary Remains, Vol. 2 • Coleridge

... of self-confidence. If I could not run loose with guilty knowledge of my being a Mekstrom Carrier, it was equally impossible for anybody to kidnap me and carry me across the country. I'd radiate like mad; I'd complain about the situation at every crossroad, at every filling station, before every farmer. I'd complain mentally and bitterly, and sooner or later ...
— Highways in Hiding • George Oliver Smith

... years past your subjects have in consequence had constantly to complain of innumerable acts of petty tyranny at the ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 1 (of 6) - From the Foundation of Cape Colony to the Boer Ultimatum - of 9th Oct. 1899 • Louis Creswicke

... have not stolen from him his good name, I shall not complain, as I may have some use for it when we reach America, of which now, God be praised! ...
— Homeward Bound - or, The Chase • James Fenimore Cooper

... when his fair deceiver appeared he would let her see by his significant applause that he recognized her, but bore no malice for the trick she had played on him. After all, he had kissed her—he had no right to complain. If she should recognize him, and this recognition led to a withdrawal of her prohibition, and their better acquaintance, he would be a fool to cavil at her pleasant artifice. Her vocation was certainly a more independent and original one than that he had supposed; for its social quality ...
— Selected Stories • Bret Harte

... singular physiognomy. He looked not so much like a young old man as like an old young man. Henry Murger's warmest desire was to write in the celebrated and influential "Revue des Deux Mondes," which we all abuse so violently when we have reason to complain of it, and which has but to make a sign to us and we instantly fall into its arms. I was then on the best terms with the "Revue des Deux Mondes." Monsieur Castil-Blaze, being from the same neighborhood with me, had obtained ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 83, September, 1864 • Various

... would not be more reasonable to mend our state than to complain of it; and how far this may ...
— The Querist • George Berkeley

... bequeathed their writings to their followers for their instruction and guidance. And what was the date of Philo? He himself gives us a clear note of time; in A.D. 40 he was sent on an embassy to the Emperor Caligula at Rome, to complain of a persecution to which the Jews were being subjected by Flaccus; he describes himself as being, in A.D. 40, "a grey-headed old man." The Rev. J.W. Lake puts him at sixty-five or seventy years of age at that period, and consequently would place his birth twenty-five ...
— The Freethinker's Text Book, Part II. - Christianity: Its Evidences, Its Origin, Its Morality, Its History • Annie Besant

... foul and stagnant, and often give rise to violent diseases among the operatives. From two to four hundred persons are often confined in workshops six hundred feet long, with no means of ventilation except windows on one side only. The air is breathed and re-breathed, until the operatives complain of languor and headache, which they attribute to overwork. The real cause of the headache is the inhalation of foul air at every expansion of the lungs. If the proprietors would provide efficient means ...
— The People's Common Sense Medical Adviser in Plain English • R. V. Pierce

... manner imagine yourself mad; so that he, who derides you, hangs his tail not one jot wiser than yourself. There is one species of folly, that dreads things not in the least formidable; insomuch that it will complain of fires, and rocks, and rivers opposing it in the open plain; there is another different from this, but not a whit more approaching to wisdom, that runs headlong through the midst of flames and floods. Let the loving mother, the virtuous sister, the father, the wife, together with all the ...
— The Works of Horace • Horace

... hope, in a year or so's time," he said. "If you wish to please me, there are two things which you have to remember, and which I expect from you. One is absolute, implicit obedience, the other is absolute, unvarying truth. You will never, I think, have cause to complain of me, if you remember ...
— The Governors • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... and she said that she did not venture to taste the Charlotte-Russe, fearing it might turn out to be nothing but sponge-cake and custard, without jelly or whipped cream. But if it was all like this, nobody could complain of it;" and, absorbed in the gratification of her palate, Miss Debby gave her auditor a ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various

... that you complain that you want to return to Paris, to your mistresses. Undeceive yourselves. I shall keep you under arms until you are eighty. You were born to the bivouac, and you shall ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 5 (of 6) - The Modern Regime, Volume 1 (of 2)(Napoleon I.) • Hippolyte A. Taine

... 'what is so grievous to them which makes them complain so loud?' 'I shall tell thee right briefly' he answered. 'These people have no hope of death and their blind life's so vile that they are envious of any other lot. The world allows no report of them to last: mercy and justice disdain them. Let us not speak ...
— Dante: "The Central Man of All the World" • John T. Slattery

... This very just observation cannot be too forcibly urged, or too frequently recollected. The deficiency of which most men have reason to complain, is not that of ability, but of industry and application. Genius is pursued and coveted, because it is imagined to be a sort of creating energy which produces at will, and without labour.—It is therefore desirable to indolent minds. But this ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 13 • Robert Kerr

... I have it yet. And now it creaks and creaks and snaps in the night. We all creak and creak thus as we grow old; ah, you should hear my wardrobes. 'Elles cassent les dos,' and I lie in my warm bed in the winter nights and listen to my antiques groan and complain. Poor old things, they belonged to the 'Empire' Period; ...
— Vanished towers and chimes of Flanders • George Wharton Edwards

... Kate had heard about him she found nothing to complain of in Laramie's manners. But he was, she told herself, on his good behavior, and under the circumstances would naturally try to appear at his best. Little as she relished her assignment of making things pleasant for him, the ...
— Laramie Holds the Range • Frank H. Spearman

... positions which never change, in which men die still unpromoted, save when a miracle intervenes. It was not so good a position for a family of six as it had been for a family of two, but he did not complain. He and Nettie went shabby, but the children were clothed in the best, as was ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. VI., No. 6, May, 1896 • Various

... perspicuity at first, had been a good deal dissipated. I cannot say I was chagrined or downcast by the contrast which the reality of a pensionnat de demoiselles presented to my vague ideal of the same community; I was only enlightened and amused; consequently, I felt in no disposition to complain to Mdlle. Reuter, and I received her considerate invitation ...
— The Professor • (AKA Charlotte Bronte) Currer Bell

... Werner, you know that many of the country-folk complain of the governor's tyranny. In my opinion, it would be well for some of you, who can trust one another, to meet in secret, and take counsel how to throw off ...
— Historical Tales, Vol 5 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality, German • Charles Morris

... what you complain of, and she's better without them. It serves every purpose that I'm ...
— What Maisie Knew • Henry James

... the distant bay, boding a stormy night; and Godefroy began to complain that black deeds were done in the dark, and we were forty leagues away from ...
— Heralds of Empire - Being the Story of One Ramsay Stanhope, Lieutenant to Pierre Radisson in the Northern Fur Trade • Agnes C. Laut

... out of a cup—I think the baby was drinking the same—two or three children were stretching big nets on the top of the cliff—they, too, looked miserable little specimens of humanity, bare-legged, unkempt, trousers and jackets in holes; however, the woman was quite cheerful—didn't complain nor ask for money. The men accepted two francs to drink our health. One wonders how children ever grow up in such an atmosphere without light or air or ...
— Chateau and Country Life in France • Mary King Waddington

... part will not complain of British good faith. Although the fighting was continued in the district for nearly a month, not one of his villages was burnt, while all damage done to his crops was liberally compensated. He was guaranteed against reprisals, and at the end of the operations ...
— The Story of the Malakand Field Force • Sir Winston S. Churchill

... restoration of them to those who claim them Wherever I go, and whenever I speak on the subject, and when I speak here, I desire to speak to the whole North, I say that the South has been injured in this respect, and has a right to complain; and the North has been too careless of what, I think, the Constitution peremptorily and emphatically enjoins upon her as ...
— The Fugitive Slave Law and Its Victims - Anti-Slavery Tracts No. 18 • American Anti-Slavery Society

... fools to complain. It is a general liquidation, without risks and without costs." Their mirth had something revolting in it; for it was now the last and most acute ...
— Other People's Money • Emile Gaboriau

... having ascertained the sum total, he locked it, replaced it very methodically in its cover, opened a buffet in the wainscoting, and, having placed the Countess' jewel-case and my strong box in it, he locked it; and immediately on completing these arrangements he began to complain, with fresh acrimony and maledictions of ...
— The Room in the Dragon Volant • J. Sheridan Le Fanu

... the children by the hand, Tears standing in their eye, And bade them straightway follow him, And look they did not cry; And two long miles he led them on, While they for food complain: "Stay here," quoth he, "I'll bring you bread, When I come ...
— More English Fairy Tales • Various

... that because a king of England may, by maladministration, discharge the subjects of England from their allegiance, that therefore the subjects of Scotland may take up arms against the King of Scotland, he having not infringed the compact of government as to them, and they having nothing to complain of for themselves. Thus I thought their own arguments were against them, and Heaven seemed to concur with it; for although they did carry the cause for the English rebels, yet the most of them left their bones here ...
— Memoirs of a Cavalier • Daniel Defoe

... but sit around and complain about the loneliness and the coarse food and the discouraging outlook. Then they'd finally go away—go back to where ...
— Burned Bridges • Bertrand W. Sinclair

... other, and both at the same time broke out into a fit of laughter. After they had drank the coffee they told the waiter that they wished to speak to the proprietor, who came immediately, supposing that they wished to complain ...
— Celebrated Women Travellers of the Nineteenth Century • W. H. Davenport Adams

... conditioned.... After much delay, one of the circle took up the Declaration of 1776, and read it aloud with spirit and emphasis, and it was at once decided to adopt the historic document, with some slight changes. Knowing that women must have more to complain of than men under any circumstances possibly could, and seeing the Fathers had eighteen grievances, a protracted search was made through statute books, church usages, and the customs of society to ...
— Woman and the Republic • Helen Kendrick Johnson

... won't complain, for he is taking meself and Molly home fast. Only cold and hunger are not kind helpmates, Mr. Hobbs, ye ...
— Choice Readings for the Home Circle • Anonymous

... Marcus Schouler a visit early that morning before he had gone out. Marcus had sworn at her, excitedly vociferating; "No, by damn! No, he hadn't a thing for her; he hadn't, for a fact. It was a positive persecution. Every day his privacy was invaded. He would complain to the landlady, he would. He'd move out of the place." In the end he had given Maria seven empty whiskey flasks, an iron grate, and ten cents—the latter because he said she wore her hair like a ...
— McTeague • Frank Norris

... mee, to bee a verie maine want in all our Grammar schooles generally, or in the most of them; whereof I haue heard som great learned men to complain; That there is no care had in respect, to traine vp schollars so as they may be able to expresse their minds purely and readily in our owne tongue, and to increase in the practice of it, as well as in the Latine or Greeke; whereas our chiefe indeuour should ...
— Early English Meals and Manners • Various

... faded rose inspired her with such grief that you would have thought she must die in pain of it. It was a wonder how a young creature (who had had a snug home or been at a comfortable boarding-school, and had no outward grief or hardship to complain of) should have suffered so much—should have found the means of getting at such an ocean of despair and passion (as a runaway boy who will get to sea), and having embarked on it should survive it. What a talent she must have had for weeping to be able to ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray

... never complain. I didn't say a word when Yardsley had my Cruikshanks torn from their shelves and chucked into a clothes-basket and carried into the butler's pantry, did I? Did I say as much as one little word? I wanted to say one little word, I admit, but ...
— The Bicyclers and Three Other Farces • John Kendrick Bangs

... her nest among the rocks, she seemed to be unfitted for even so much intercourse with the world as that. And in the demand which she reiterated over him she hardly spoke as a lady would speak. Would not all they who were connected with him at home have a right to complain if he were to bring such a woman with him to England as the mother of his wife. "I can't answer such a question as that on the spur of ...
— An Eye for an Eye • Anthony Trollope

... his great fame Akiba was the most modest of men. While still a student at Jamnia Akiba was noted for his humility. R. Jochanan ben Nuri told how he had occasion several times to complain of Akiba to the Patriarch and how each time Akiba took his reprimand meekly. Nay more. Despite these reproofs Akiba was all the more affectionate towards R. Jochanan, so that the latter was moved to exclaim in admiration, "Reprove a wise man and he will love thee!" (Prov. ...
— The Menorah Journal, Volume 1, 1915 • Various

... dollars!" Joe exclaimed, as he counted the bills. "We can't complain but that your subscribers are doing the thing ...
— Down the Slope • James Otis

... my dearly beloved friends, how are you? How are your goods selling? So you complained against me, did you, you tea tanks, you scurvy hucksters? Complain, against me? You crooks, you pirates, you. Did you gain a lot by it, eh? Aha, you thought you'd land me in prison? May seven devils and one she-devil take you! ...
— The Inspector-General • Nicolay Gogol

... I am old enough in state affairs to understand how people can be supplanted, without being actually deprived of office. First, he will produce a commission, couched in terms somewhat obscure and equivocal; he will stretch his authority, for the power is in his hands; if I complain, he will hint at secret instructions; if I desire to see them, he will answer evasively; if I insist, he will produce a paper of totally different import; and if this fail to satisfy me, he will go on precisely as if I had never interfered. Meanwhile he will have accomplished ...
— Egmont - A Tragedy In Five Acts • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

... breach of promise of marriage; they made a little arrangement with regard to costs, unprofessional if you like, but still nothing to bring down upon them the denouncement to which they have been made subject. So far as Mr. Pickwick was concerned, he had absolutely nothing to complain of in their conduct; and I venture to say it was most reprehensible in him under the circumstances to use the language which he did upon the occasion which I have quoted. But against Mr. Pell there is absolutely nothing to be said. He perhaps ...
— The Law and Lawyers of Pickwick - A Lecture • Frank Lockwood

... being on the stage, I mean," said Cashel. "You complain of my fighting; but I should have a precious bad time of it if I didn't lick the chaff out of ...
— Cashel Byron's Profession • George Bernard Shaw

... Compared with the evil done by the insect pest, the cobra's death toll is small. This venomous serpent is found only in hot countries, particularly in India, while mosquitoes know no favorite land or clime—unless it be Jersey. Arctic explorers complain of them. In Alaska, it is recorded by a scientist that "mosquitoes existed in countless millions, driving us to the verge of suicide or insanity." A traveler on the north shore of Lake Superior, when the snow was ...
— The Home Medical Library, Volume V (of VI) • Various

... to his own notion of what's honest," he said. "But no man's got a right to complain if a fellow with a different ...
— The Deluge • David Graham Phillips

... nothing but the Englishman's excitement—the weather—to break the weary monotony of an eventless voyage. So far, however, as gales of wind could offer a distraction, the Alabama had little of which to complain, and the vessel rolled and tumbled about in the heavy seas in a manner which sorely tried the endurance of, at all ...
— The Cruise of the Alabama and the Sumter • Raphael Semmes

... to carry her off to his palace under the lake. But when it was seen how poor Kathleen took Barry's going to heart, few were so unfeeling as to laugh. She never had been as merry as most young girls, and now she grew sad and silent and very weary-looking. She did not complain, but her eyes seemed heavy with the tears she would not shed, and the roses went fading and fading out of her cheeks, till her father became alarmed, and would bid her eat more, and spin less—to get up early in the morning and drink new milk, "with a drop of mountain-dew in it." ...
— Stories and Legends of Travel and History, for Children • Grace Greenwood

... found the sea, the wood, and the meadows happy and beautiful—in winter as in summer, in storm as in sunshine. In the foggy days of November, in the sharp winds of March, in the snows and sleet and rain of February, we used to hear other people complain of the bad weather; we used to hear them fret for change. But we despised them for their ignorance where we were so learned. There was no bad weather for us. In March, what so delicious as breasting ...
— Aylwin • Theodore Watts-Dunton

... Clancy. "If you hadn't been close enough to pick me up, I'd now be in the hands of Hogan and Wynn, along with Katz—and Hogan and Wynn would have the money. I guess, taking it by and large, we haven't anything to complain of." ...
— Owen Clancy's Happy Trail - or, The Motor Wizard in California • Burt L. Standish

... you'll ever complain for want of that," Sally told her very seriously. "But can you afford to run the risk of the police coming here to find Sarah Manvers, who disappeared last week after breaking into a house—burglarising ...
— Nobody • Louis Joseph Vance

... confidence in his ability to steer through anything led him astray. In the evening by the camp-fire light Prof. read aloud from Miles Standish. Although a heavy wind blew sand all over us, no one seemed to complain. ...
— A Canyon Voyage • Frederick S. Dellenbaugh

... that ought to grieve nobody, so long as I do not complain, and it is of something graver you ...
— Figures of Earth • James Branch Cabell

... or mart has now fairly begun. Merchants are desperately busy buying and selling, chiefly exchanging goods against slaves. All complain ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson

... the loss of a few ribbons and a quantity of hair, of which the manolus most assiduously set about easing themselves. This operation is a source of considerable amusement to those who stand aloof from the field of strife. We had been happy in securing good places, and had nothing to complain of but the immediate vicinity of an amateur, or aficionado, who kept his tongue in continual motion, and favored his neighbors with a tremendous display of ...
— The International Monthly Magazine - Volume V - No II • Various

... a cash," lady Feng replied. "Had I even any money, I wouldn't let them have it; so just let them go and lodge any charge they fancy. You needn't either dissuade them or intimidate them. Let them go and complain as much as they like. But if they fail to establish a case against me, they'll, after all, be punished for trying to make the corpse the means of extorting money ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin

... did not complain: it was his habit to be quiet: old Jehan Daas had said ever to him, "We are poor: we must take what God sends,—the ill with the good: ...
— Stories of Childhood • Various

... as good a day's work the morrow with what I'm working on the day there'll be no cause to complain of you." ...
— The Northern Iron - 1907 • George A. Birmingham

... However brutal his treatment, I know of no case where the law has stepped in to rescue the young victim. This is partly, no doubt, because the boys, few of whom can speak the English language, do not know their rights, and seldom complain to outsiders—never to the authorities. Probably, in some cases, the treatment is less brutal than I have depicted; but from the best information I can obtain from trustworthy sources, I fear that the reality, if anything, exceeds the picture I ...
— Phil the Fiddler • Horatio Alger, Jr.

... But my anger coiled, preparing its fangs. My Lesbian friend next took a hand. She hated Daniel's sister. And Daniel despised her midget husband. And she saw a chance for a poisonous thrust: I must complain to the wife of Daniel's pursuit! But before I did that I begged him to fly to London with me. "Why not stay in the city just as we have?" he asked. Then I turned submarine and revenged his repulse In the arms of my dilettante friend. Then up to the surface, Bearing the letter ...
— Spoon River Anthology • Edgar Lee Masters

... I fell asleep again, and such apprehension I had of it that when I rose and trussed up myself thinking that it had been no dream. Till in the daytime I found myself very well at ease, and remembered that I did dream so, and that Mr. Creed was with me, and that I did complain to him of it, and he said he had the same pain in his left that I had in my right... which ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys

... certainly good defining, and the passage we have Italicized has the true Transcendental ring. Indeed, the book is a system of Kantian Ethics, as the author herself says in her Preface; and the tough old Knigsberg professor has no reason to complain of his gentle expounder. Unlike most British writers,—with the grand exception of Sir William Hamilton, the greatest British metaphysician since Locke and Hume,—she understands Kant, admires and loves him, and so is worthy to develop his knotty sublimities. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various

... like a mad man. The terrified villagers took to the bush, where they remained in fear and trembling until the crazy Americano had taken his departure. That evening the village priests appeared at headquarters to complain to the ...
— Where the Strange Trails Go Down • E. Alexander Powell

... Kearney, speaking for himself and the Texan, "had you been one of us prisoners from Mier up to Mexico, the diet you complain of would have seemed ...
— The Free Lances - A Romance of the Mexican Valley • Mayne Reid

... noticed the peculiarity in Mr. Clifford before we became intimate, and I have often caught myself at the trick. Before that operation my testicles would swell and become sore and hurt me, and have seemed to do so since, just as a man will sometimes complain that his amputated leg hurts him. Then, too, my breasts would swell, and about the nipples would become hard and sore and red. Since the operation there has never been a day that I have been free from sharp, shooting pains down the abdomen to the scrotum, ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 2 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis

... "I had debts enough to frighten a minister of finance. Now, I mean to have thirty thousand a year before the first stroke of midnight. Oh! he is excellent, I have nothing to complain of. He does it well.—In a week we give a house-warming; you must come.—That morning he is to make me a present of the lease of the house in the Rue Saint-Georges. In decency, it is impossible to live in such a house on less than thirty ...
— Scenes from a Courtesan's Life • Honore de Balzac

... corps, the carrying of water across the desert, and the greatest hardships for the troops, all of which Charles Napier shared uncomplainingly in person. Under his leadership British regiments and Bombay sepoys alike did wonders. Who could complain for himself when he saw the spare frame of the old general, his health undermined by fever and watches, his hooked nose and flashing eye turned this way and that, riding daily at their head, prepared to stint himself of all but the barest necessaries and ...
— Victorian Worthies - Sixteen Biographies • George Henry Blore

... negotiation on the subject, with a disavowal, however, of any disposition to view in an unfriendly light whatever countervailing regulations the United States may oppose to the regulations of which they complain. The wisdom of the Legislature will decide on the course which, under these circumstances, is prescribed by a joint regard to the amicable relations between the two nations and to the just interests of the ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 4 (of 4) of Volume 1: James Madison • Edited by James D. Richardson

... was about away, back in the time of Stephenson," continued the tall scout, who, once he began to complain, could only be shut off with ...
— The, Boy Scouts on Sturgeon Island - or Marooned Among the Game-fish Poachers • Herbert Carter

... love: Which being known,—as what is hid from Jove?— He inly storm'd, and wax'd more furious Than for the fire filch'd by Prometheus; And thrusts him down from heaven. He, wandering here, In mournful terms, with sad and heavy cheer, 440 Complain'd to Cupid: Cupid, for his sake, To be reveng'd on Jove did undertake; And those on whom heaven, earth, and hell relies, I mean the adamantine Destinies, He wounds with love, and forc'd them equally To dote ...
— The Works of Christopher Marlowe, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Christopher Marlowe

... "But I must not complain. I was honoured by a superior man's friendship. He has withdrawn it. He has the right.—Now I must look to the future. You will, I think, be glad to hear that I am not in that destitute condition which generally awaits the Catholic deserter. My prospects ...
— Helbeck of Bannisdale, Vol. II • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... to complain about having worked so many years and taken nothing but debt, though I feel the want of money so continually (much more, doubtless, than I ought to feel it), let me remember that I come in free, gratis, to the work of hundreds and thousands of better men than myself who often were much worse ...
— The Note-Books of Samuel Butler • Samuel Butler

... depending upon my being asleep he yielded to complaint, and groaned very much. Emma roused me and told me she feared he was suffering very much. I had slept half an hour. I went and stood near him, and he then ceased to complain, and said, "Oh, it was only a little twitch." I felt at that time as if I was an oppression to him, and I was going away, but he desired me to stay. I sat down and rubbed it, which healed the pain, and towards morning I put on the blister. Between five and six he ate some toasted bread ...
— A Week at Waterloo in 1815 • Magdalene De Lancey

... shore. For although the ultimate of love was forbidden her, she had come into her kingdom, and was immeasurably happier than the millions of women whose love had run its course and turned cold, or been cast back at them. After all, there were so few people who were really happy, why should she complain because her love could not come to rice and old shoes, instead of being a beautiful secret thing, the more perfect, perhaps, because Commonplace, that ogre whose girth increases from year to year, and who ...
— Senator North • Gertrude Atherton

... MR. WELD TAYLOR should have to complain of the general ignorance of public schoolboys; but I know I may on behalf of the head boy of Tonbridge say, he will be happy to acknowledge any contribution from MR. WELD TAYLOR, which he may be disposed to give, towards ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 212, November 19, 1853 • Various

... at him he vanishes! In a few days these three young men sicken, a low fever consumes them, their stomachs swell, they die. Eighteen young men, the flower of my village, have died thus this year. These effects always follow the visit of a Curumber at night." "Why not complain to the Government?" I said. "Ah, no use, who will catch them?" "Then give them the 200 rupees they ask this once on a solemn promise that they exact no more" "I suppose we must find the money somewhere," he said, turning ...
— Five Years Of Theosophy • Various

... not the least reason that we should take you away from your usual occupations; and you are generally so busy of an afternoon. Miss Lovel and I can see everything there is to be seen, without any escort; and I have always heard you complain that ...
— The Lovels of Arden • M. E. Braddon

... here is one of the most difficult, the versification could scarcely be improved. No nobler theme ever engaged the pen of poet. It is the soul-elevating idea, that no man can consider himself entitled to complain of Fate while, in his adversity, he still retains ...
— Harvard Classics Volume 28 - Essays English and American • Various

... whose thoughts were beginning to work. "Far as I can see you did the very same thing; so anyway you can't complain." ...
— Hocken and Hunken • A. T. Quiller-Couch

... compass or avoid, if thou shalt propose unto thyself any of those things as either good, or evil; it must needs be that according as thou shalt either fall into that which thou dost think evil, or miss of that which thou dost think good, so wilt thou be ready both to complain of the Gods, and to hate those men, who either shall be so indeed, or shall by thee be suspected as the cause either of thy missing of the one, or falling into the other. And indeed we must needs commit many evils, if we incline to any of these things, more ...
— Meditations • Marcus Aurelius

... very secondary place in Lady Cinnamond's mind when her husband was in question, and it was seldom that Sir Arthur had to complain of his wife's not being present to receive him when he returned from his duties. She ran into his snuggery now like a girl, and broke into the liquid Spanish which formed such an effective defence against the ears of aides-de-camp ...
— The Path to Honour • Sydney C. Grier



Words linked to "Complain" :   squawk, quetch, report, bleat, croak, plain, bitch, holler, backbite, kick, inveigh, charge, yammer, murmur, sound off, beef, nag, deplore, grouch, lament, complainer, yawp



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