"Grumbler" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... easy of management than aught we have yet extracted from electricity or steam, with the aid of children whose strength was never overtasked, but who loved their employment as sport and pastime, sufficed to create a Public-wealth so devoted to the general use that not a grumbler was ever heard of. The vices that rot our cities here had no footing. Amusements abounded, but they were all innocent. No merry-makings conduced to intoxication, to riot, to disease. Love existed, and ...
— The Coming Race • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... constitutional grumbler, it was with the greatest difficulty that Moodie could get him to do anything beyond bringing a few pails of water from the swamp for the use of the house, and he often passed me carrying water up from the lake without offering to relieve me ...
— Roughing it in the Bush • Susanna Moodie
... brother-in-law as well as his cousin, and Isabella, Edward's consort, was his niece. Unluckily, the personality of the great earl was not equal to his pedigree or his estates. Proud, hard to work with, jealous, and irascible, he was essentially the leader of opposition, the grumbler, and the frondeur. When the time came for a constructive policy, Thomas broke down almost as signally as Edward himself. His ability was limited, his power of application small, and his passions violent and ungovernable. Greedy, selfish, domineering, ...
— The History of England - From the Accession of Henry III. to the Death of Edward III. (1216-1377) • T.F. Tout
... understand me in this matter. We have not a particle of sympathy with the ordinary grumbler, by which we mean that class of persons whose noses are not only stuck up at any and every encroachment on their worn-out ideas of what is right and wrong, but, like crabbed terriers, snap at the heels of every man that passes. Nor do we ...
— Life in Canada Fifty Years Ago • Canniff Haight
... his prosperity he never forgot prudence, modesty, and moderation. Hearing one day an old veteran officer complain that the King ignored his thirty years of service while he enriched "a miserable actor," Farinelli secured promotion for the grumbler, and, giving the commission to the abashed soldier, mildly taxed him for calling the King ungrateful. According to another anecdote, he requested an embassy for one of the courtiers. "Do you not know," said the King, "that this grandee is your deadly enemy?" "True," ...
— Great Singers, First Series - Faustina Bordoni To Henrietta Sontag • George T. Ferris
... long, sharp nose stuck downward, morosely and ominously. This was Alexandra, the servant of old of the student bird-houses; the friend and creditor of all the students; a woman of sixty-five, argumentative, and a grumbler. ...
— Yama (The Pit) • Alexandra Kuprin
... than cream jugs are used. Cream is something of a nuisance, and if people don't take lemon they can take tea as Li Hung Chang does. For a guest to have a preference and emphasize it, is downright rude. To be asked to a lady's house is glory enough for any one. The grumbler can go to a restaurant and take a cup and drink it up for ...
— Breakfasts and Teas - Novel Suggestions for Social Occasions • Paul Pierce
... came. What kindness I've known has been from my own people; a poor bird will pull out its own feathers to cover another. But I can't complain; I have had bad days, but there are folks who have had worse. And the women have always been good to me. Bengta was a grumbler, but she meant it kindly; Karna sacrificed money and health to me—God be thanked that she didn't live after they took the farm from me. For I've been a landowner too; I had almost forgotten that in all my misery! Yes, and old Lise—Begging Lise, as they ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo
... "Not so, cher grumbler, for I have two ears, and while Sir Lionel's rather mournful notes entered first; your pretty nothings were blown in upon them so quickly, by some more mirthful sprite as to send his to my memory, while yours ...
— A Heart-Song of To-day • Annie Gregg Savigny
... long-expected arrival of the Chevalier should, it was hoped, check the growing jealousies in the camp;" a party arose, headed by Lord Huntley, Lord Seaforth, and the Master of Sinclair, who soon obtained the name of the Grumbler's Club, and who rendered themselves odious to the sincere ...
— Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745. - Volume I. • Mrs. Thomson
... queer old fellow was on his way to Sofia. He seemed slightly deformed, his face was distinctly ugly, broad, clean-shaven, with a pair of black, piercing eyes that gave him a most striking appearance. His grey hair was long, his nose aquiline, his teeth protruding and yellow; and he was a grumbler of the most pronounced type. He growled at the food, at the service, at the draughts, at the light in the restaurant, at the staleness of the bread we had brought with us from Paris, and at the butter, which he declared to be only ...
— The Golden Face - A Great 'Crook' Romance • William Le Queux
... GRUMBLER. A discontented yet often hard-working seaman. Also, the gurnard, a fish of the blenny kind, which makes a rumbling noise when struggling to disengage ...
— The Sailor's Word-Book • William Henry Smyth
... grumbler, answered he, but I'll bet you don't! immediately delivering me one pistol, and taking up and unlocking the other himself. Accordingly I placed the plate against the wall, fired, and was not far from the centre. Upon my honour ...
— Anna St. Ives • Thomas Holcroft
... Assouan, and even Anglo-Saxon ice thaws rapidly upon the Nile. They were fortunate in being without the single disagreeable person who in these small boats is sufficient to mar the enjoyment of the whole party. On a vessel which is little more than a large steam launch, the bore, the cynic, or the grumbler holds the company at his mercy. But the Korosko was free from anything of the kind. Colonel Cochrane Cochrane was one of those officers whom the British Government, acting upon a large system ...
— A Desert Drama - Being The Tragedy Of The "Korosko" • A. Conan Doyle
... strictly obeying the ship's orders, never even spoke to the man at the wheel? Now to come to the next point. This correspondent girds at my having had a special cabin and a special steward. Why! the envious grumbler! if he had been as specially unwell as I was—but there, I own I lose patience with him—didn't I go out as a "Special," and if a Special doesn't have everything special about him, he is simply obtaining ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101, July 25, 1891 • Various
... only that grumbler, Bob Harris, remarked that we stood one to ten: 'Ye fool,' says Mick Grady, 'just tell 'em they know to compliment men!' And I sang out your old words: 'If the opposite side isn't God's, Heigh! after ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... you old grumbler," laughed Frank. "Come on, I'll give you some action. We have several hours of good daylight left before dinnertime. I'll take you on at tennis. Della and I will play you and Jack, and we won't give you time ...
— The Radio Boys with the Revenue Guards • Gerald Breckenridge
... escort had followed him without his paying any attention to it: but when he set off at a gallop, he perceived, that his grenadiers were galloping after him, and stopped. "What do you do there?" said he to one of them: "Go about your business!" The old grumbler[92], who knew that apprehensions were entertained for the life of his general, appeared disposed not to obey. The Emperor then took hold of him by his hairy cap, and, giving it a hearty shake, repeated with a smile his order to him to retire: "Go all of you away: I am surrounded by none but good ...
— Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. I • Pierre Antoine Edouard Fleury de Chaboulon
... little grumbler!" Lady O'Gara said with her infectious gaiety. "Come for a good trot. I know what will happen to you: you'll get chilblains if you sit by the fire in cold weather. Your hands will be dreadful to look at, and your feet will be ...
— Love of Brothers • Katharine Tynan
... British birth and military profession. His face was ardent, his pantaloons were of white flannel, his expression of countenance was that of habitual discontent, but with a twinkle of geniality in the eye which redeemed the Grumbler from the usual tedium of his tribe. He accosted ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, No. 19, May, 1859 • Various
... world will not take them at their own estimate; so they cry out upon this place and upon that, saying it does not know the things belonging to its peace and that it will be too late soon and that people will be very sorry then that they did not make more of the grumbler, whoever he may be, inasmuch as he will make it hot for them and ...
— The Note-Books of Samuel Butler • Samuel Butler
... I,' replied my father. 'I see the sons of bankers and merchants gazetted every month, and I do not see what claims they have to urge, unless they be golden ones. However, I have not served my king fifty years to turn grumbler at this time of life. I suppose that the people at the head of affairs know what is most proper and convenient; perhaps when the lad sees how difficult, nay, how impossible it is that he should enter the army, ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow
... made for the fact that these accounts come from those interested in the land, who were always ready to make the most of misfortune with a view to further protection, and the farmer is a notorious grumbler. It seems, however, that most landlords and tenants believed that the high prices would last for ever, and lived accordingly, and, as we have seen, many made no profit at all because of their increased burdens. As a matter of fact, both were grumbling because ...
— A Short History of English Agriculture • W. H. R. Curtler
... not be sick, you must not be a grumbler, my dear old troubadour. You must cough, blow your nose, get well, say that France is mad, humanity silly, and that we are crude animals; and you must love yourself, your kind, and your friends above all. I have some very sad hours. I look at ...
— The George Sand-Gustave Flaubert Letters • George Sand, Gustave Flaubert
... pessimist, nor misanthrope, nor grumbler; I bear it all, the burden of Public Affairs, the immensity of Space, the brevity of Life, and the thought of the all-swallowing Grave—all this I put up with without impatience. I accept the common lot. ...
— More Trivia • Logan Pearsall Smith
... chronicled in the pages of history, for they are the Spartans of the nineteenth century. They are swift to help those who need help, but unsparing with their scorn for those who are unworthy. The treatment meted out to the grumbler and mischief-maker usually presents more of the elements of comedy than anything else, and it is his own fault if he does not get off lightly. But if he cuts up rough, tries to strike or kick his ...
— Campaign Pictures of the War in South Africa (1899-1900) - Letters from the Front • A. G. Hales
... that the swim is—well, perfection. Still, the first day the ladies would not swim. They had the trunks to open, they said, and the closets to arrange. And the four men and the fourteen boys went to that bath of baths alone. And as Felix, the cynic grumbler, ran races naked on the beach with his boy and the boy beat him, even Felix was heard to say, "How little man needs here ...
— The Brick Moon, et. al. • Edward Everett Hale
... beer he preferred it to be beer, and not porridge. He did not relish in his mouth the same thing that the wind was distributing impartially into ears and eyes. He said he could take in—at the pores—enough of that to suit his liking. But he was no grumbler, as a rule. He worked hard and incessantly, Colonel Barter determining to keep his men of the Yorkshire Light Infantry quite up to the mark. It was necessary to take every precaution against surprise, and for commanding officers to remain eternally on the qui ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 2 (of 6) - From the Commencement of the War to the Battle of Colenso, - 15th Dec. 1899 • Louis Creswicke
... not surprised at that. It would need an angel out of heaven to get on with him sometimes. What induced me ever to marry such a grumbler I don't know. I wonder if Monsieur What-is-it?—Gard—would come back if ...
— A Maid of the Silver Sea • John Oxenham
... don't like writing to the Bishop of London: it is making a fuss, and looks as if I regretted the part I had taken on Church Reform, which I certainly do not—but I should be much annoyed if the Bishop were to consider me as a perpetual grumbler against him and his measures—I really am not: I like the Bishop and like his conversation—the battle is ended, and I have no other quarrel with him and the Archbishop but that they neither of them ever ask me to dinner. You see a good deal of the ...
— Sydney Smith • George W. E. Russell
... it was the last greeting he was ever destined to give his master. A bullet flew past with a sharp zip, the poor beast started and shivered, and a thin stream of blood trickled down his shoulder. Poor "Lam!" he was unclean and unsavoury, an inveterate grumbler, and possessed apparently of a chronic cold in his nose; his temper was none of the best—he had kicked, and on one occasion had attempted to bite, he had fought his comrades in the lines, and had got the picketing ropes into dire confusion; ...
— Soldiers of the Queen • Harold Avery
... of a high moral standard, and be careful at this early age to avoid the common fault of giving a dog a bad name. If it is said on all sides that a child has an uncontrollable temper, is an inveterate grumbler, is lacking in all power of concentration, or has a tendency to deceit, it is likely that the child will act up to his reputation. He comes in time to regard this failing of his as part of himself just as much as is the colour of his hair or the length of his legs. It may be said of a schoolboy ...
— The Nervous Child • Hector Charles Cameron
... journey, and told out their private affairs. The man of business knit his brows and said that he "must reach C—— by a certain time or the consequences would be most disastrous." The fashionable lady wrapped herself in her furs and bestowed withering looks on the crying baby. The grumbler grumbled, and was sure somebody was to blame somewhere. The funny man bubbled and sparkled as usual, and sent rays akin to sunshine over lugubrious faces. The profane man opened his mouth and out came toads and scorpions, and the tobacco-chewers made dark pools on the floor ...
— Divers Women • Pansy and Mrs. C.M. Livingston
... unites a glance of fire, and eyes of a vivacity the like of which never was seen. When you handle any matter in which he takes an interest, then his eyes, his lips, his hands, everything about him speaks. You would be quite wrong to picture in him an everlasting grumbler. Not at all; he laughs with those who laugh, he chats and jokes with children, he rallies his housekeeper."[139] He was not so civil to all the world, and occasionally turned upon his pursuers with a word of most sardonic ...
— Rousseau - Volumes I. and II. • John Morley
... gad-fly unseemly, I am certain that we must have here Old Reason, the grumbler, extremely Annoyed by our joy and our cheer. He tells us in tones of monition Of the clouds and the tempests to come: Let us drive him away to perdition, That he bore us no more with ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 4 • Charles Dudley Warner
... was almost microscopic saw all its picturesque details of speech and character and incident. He was the eye of the mighty Victorian age, as Tennyson was its ear, and Browning its psychologist, and Carlyle its chronic grumbler. ...
— Outlines of English and American Literature • William J. Long
... I tried to dine. Don Ferdinando entered as usual, and sat mute through his unchanging meal; the grumbler grumbled and ate, as perchance he does to this day. I forced myself to believe that the food had a savour for me, and that the wine did not taste of drugs. As I sat over my pretended meal, I heard the sirocco moaning without, and at times a splash of rain against the window. ...
— By the Ionian Sea - Notes of a Ramble in Southern Italy • George Gissing
... sympathise with a middle-aged grumbler, who, after reading Mr. Palgrave's Memoir and Introduction, should exclaim, 'Why was there not such an edition of Scott when ...
— Spenser - (English Men of Letters Series) • R. W. Church
... jealous of all who had the better luck to belong to the expeditionary force. That they were not under orders for the East was the daily burden of complaint in every barrack-room and guard-house upon the Rock. The British soldier is an inveterate grumbler; he quarrels perpetually with his quarters, his food, his clothing, and his general want of luck. Just now the bad luck of being refused a share in an arduous campaign, with its attendant chances of hardships, sufferings, perhaps ...
— The Thin Red Line; and Blue Blood • Arthur Griffiths
... say you, old grumbler? You shall stay here and guard the lady, if you are so much afraid of your beautiful self; and I will take command ...
— The Old Bell Of Independence; Or, Philadelphia In 1776 • Henry C. Watson
... of the schoolboys, including Michael and Jacob, were playing ball on the fine lawn in front of the school house, a dispute occurred between the young grumbler and another boy, and Mike ventured to suggest to Jacob, as kindly as he could, that he ...
— Mike Marble - His Crotchets and Oddities. • Uncle Frank
... the only grumbler; the others read and talked, resigning themselves to their fate, and waiting the next adventure which should befall them in ...
— The Wizard of the Sea - A Trip Under the Ocean • Roy Rockwood
... Loyalty means that you are for your organization and its officers and noncommissioned officers—not against them; that you always extend your most earnest and hearty support to those in authority. No soldier is a loyal soldier who is a knocker or a grumbler or a shirker. Just one man of this class in a company breeds discontent and dissatisfaction among many others. You should, therefore, not only guard against doing such things yourself but should discourage such actions ...
— Manual for Noncommissioned Officers and Privates of Infantry • War Department
... "Bah! What a grumbler you are, Noll! Nothing seems to satisfy you! Haven't we turned the tables completely upon that fat ...
— A Dash from Diamond City • George Manville Fenn
... in addition to your being unsentimental, and all that, you are becoming a confirmed grumbler!" exclaimed Cyn, as she caught one of the boughs of the tree overhead and turned a merrily-protesting face ...
— Wired Love - A Romance of Dots and Dashes • Ella Cheever Thayer
... it," quoth the Saxon, even in that day a grumbler; "but I take it, the main difference between thee and me is, that I can say what mislikes me out like a man; and it would fare ill with thy limbs or thy life if thou wert as frank in the grim land of ...
— Harold, Complete - The Last Of The Saxon Kings • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... of emigrants he was leading made very good progress on their journey towards the settlement. The only grumbler was Mrs Clagget, as she trudged on with a long stick in her hand, sometimes by the side of the Diceys, and at others addressing her remarks to Mrs Jones. However, as it was so evident that she talked for the sake of keeping her tongue in motion, ...
— The Voyages of the Ranger and Crusader - And what befell their Passengers and Crews. • W.H.G. Kingston
... Thersites opens a debate in an assembly called by the Over-Lord; this could not possibly pass unchallenged among listeners living in the feudal age. When a prince called an assembly, he himself opened the debate, as Achilles does in Book I. 54-67. That a lewd fellow, the buffoon and grumbler of the host, of "the people," nameless and silent throughout the Epic, should rush in and open debate in an assembly convoked by the Over-Lord, would have been regarded by feudal hearers, or by any hearers with feudal traditions, as an intolerable poetical license. Thersites would ...
— Homer and His Age • Andrew Lang
... heart. "Indeed and I do!" he cried contritely. "I'm a born old grumbler, mavourneen, I know—contrariness in person! But in this case ... come, love, do try to grasp what I'm after; it means so much to me." And he held out his hand to ...
— Australia Felix • Henry Handel Richardson
... for efficiency, was done without reluctance. The outposts were seldom caught napping. Digging and tree-felling—for the men had learned the value of making fortifications and good roads—were taken as a matter of course. Nor was the Southern soldier a grumbler. He accepted half-rations and muddy camping-grounds without remonstrance; if his boots wore out he made shift to march without them; and when his uniform fell to pieces he waited for the next victory to supply himself with a new outfit. He was enough of a philosopher ...
— Stonewall Jackson And The American Civil War • G. F. R. Henderson
... his life during his tenure of it cannot have been a pleasant one. Every crank with an infallible recipe for catching sunbeams in cucumber-frames and turning them into potatoes, or whatever might be the fashionable food at the moment; every grumbler who imagined that every rise in prices must be entirely due to the malignity of men and not to the scarcity of the article; every politician with a grudge to satisfy or an axe to grind—all these pounced upon Lord DEVONPORT as a victim made ready to their hands, and gave him ...
— Punch, 1917.07.04, Vol. 153, Issue No. 1 • Various
... sample, was a huge, good-natured, flax-headed lubber; lazy, sentimental, full of harmless brag, a grumbler by nature; an experienced, industrious, ambitious, and often quite picturesque liar, and yet not a successful one, for he had had no intelligent training, but was allowed to come up just any way. This ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... to hasten, my German hurried me on. Soon, with three others, I found myself by poor old Bill Shoebridge, a good old grumbler of some fifty summers, who had been cruelly sent out to us in December, and had kept his end up well, with, at times, many grumblings. He was painfully ...
— The 23rd (Service) Battalion Royal Fusiliers (First Sportsman's) - A Record of its Services in the Great War, 1914-1919 • Fred W. Ward
... admirably the weekly communication between England and South Africa, are so powerful, handsome, and commodious, their captains and crews are so attentive and obliging, their food and cabin accommodation so ample and luxurious, that it seems impossible for anyone, excepting a confirmed grumbler, to find any reasonable fault with any of their arrangements, where all are so good. Passengers will select the particular vessel by which they desire to travel, rather by the convenience of the date fixed for sailing, than from any particular choice of the name of the ...
— A Winter Tour in South Africa • Frederick Young
... about the unconscious power of thought waves, and certainly one grumbler can often spread dissatisfaction through an entire community. Perhaps the black looks which Ingred encountered from the disappointed tennis-players in her form turned into naughty sprites who whispered treason in the ears of the juniors, or perhaps it was a mere ...
— A Popular Schoolgirl • Angela Brazil
... are a grumbler. Make haste and dive to the bottom of the question. I am quite impatient, for the first time, to know if money (or its ...
— Essays on Political Economy • Frederic Bastiat
... fitted just now to stand no nonsense. We met an American who was travelling as a matter of duty, and had found, as far as travel was concerned, I suspect, that he belonged to the class represented by the grumbler in paradise, whose "halo didn't fit his head exactly." He had found nothing in India, he said, but a lot of rubbish, but checked himself at once, "except the Taj. Now that building—that is—perfectly satisfactory," as if he had ordered a suit of clothes from his tailor and had nothing ...
— Round the World • Andrew Carnegie
... carriage of the boy was losing its bright upright fearlessness—his shoulders were learning to bend, his head to slouch forward. One needed but to glance at him to see that Geoffrey Tudor was fast becoming that most disagreeable of social characters, a grumbler! And with grumbling unrepressed, and indulged in, come worse things, for it has its root in that true "root of all ...
— Great Uncle Hoot-Toot • Mrs. Molesworth
... if for judgment, he was not only acquitted of intentional disrespect; the last grumbler was anxious ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 1 • Lew. Wallace
... far from being as nattle and querulous as the famous ill-natured grumbler so racily pictured by Benjamin Preston, of Bradford; but, like most of the dwellers upon earth, she was a little bit touched with the same complaint. When the rain was over, we came away. I cannot say that the weather ever "cleared ...
— Home-Life of the Lancashire Factory Folk during the Cotton Famine • Edwin Waugh
... was dead, the kingly answer of the sovereign was that the statesman's assertion was a big lie. George roared this at Walpole, and then was for turning round in his bed and settling down to sleep again. Walpole, however, persisted in disturbing the royal slumbers, and assured the drowsy grumbler that he really was George the Second, King of England. He produced for George's further satisfaction a letter from Lord Townshend, describing the time, place, and circumstances of the late King's death. Walpole tendered the usual ceremonial ...
— A History of the Four Georges, Volume I (of 4) • Justin McCarthy
... eaten. Yet our practical narrative cannot ignore the matter. Certain delicate subjects, however, are best treated dialectically, and perhaps we could not here do better than record a dialogue which we think we must have overheard between Grumbler and Cheerful, two dramatic characters not unknown to readers of the ...
— Uppingham by the Sea - a Narrative of the Year at Borth • John Henry Skrine
... face would put to shame the most inveterate grumbler. Her buoyant spirits were infectious. Her ringing, merry laugh was cheering to ...
— Marguerite Verne • Agatha Armour
... this point, "how will you protect your ten-acre farms from invidious neighbors, from wandering guerrillas?" We will advise them, dear grumbler, to protect themselves. That is one of the responsibilities which freemen have to take as the price of freedom. In the department of Norfolk, where seventeen thousand blacks are supporting themselves on scattered farms, we believe not a pig ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 80, June, 1864 • Various
... sincere republican, saw and dreaded for his country's sake the secret views and inordinate ambition of Bonaparte. He was a grumbler by nature; yet he never evinced discontent in the discharge of his duties as a soldier. He swore and stormed, but marched bravely to the cannon's mouth: he was indeed courage personified. One day when he was in the trench at St. Jean d'Acre, standing up, and by his tall ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... dawn in the United States over a people full of hope and aspiration and good cheer. Such a condition means contentment and happiness. The carping grumbler who may here and there go forth will find few to listen to him. The majority will wonder what is the matter ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... returned, and drank and ate there in token of revenge. He pledged the young bride in a bumper, and drank perdition to her under his breath. He made responses of smothered maledictions as her father gave her away in the chapel, and my lord vowed to love, honour and cherish her. He was not the only grumbler respecting that marriage, as Mr. Warrington knew: he heard, then and afterwards, no end of abuse of my lady and her grandfather. The old gentleman's City friends, his legal adviser, the Dissenting ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... a recent graduate from West Point, is a modest gentleman, and no grumbler. He says that privately he was treated by fellow-cadets with proper consideration, but reluctantly admits that he was publicly slighted. He can afford to be untroubled and magnanimous. How is it with his fellows? Will not shame ere long mantle their cheeks at the recollection of ...
— Henry Ossian Flipper, The Colored Cadet at West Point • Henry Ossian Flipper
... The grumbler followed, but, no sooner was he alone with stout Woodes, than the captain sprang upon him with the agility of a leopard. He was thrown to the ground, held, and bound by two officers. Then he was stripped and whipped ...
— Famous Privateersmen and Adventurers of the Sea • Charles H. L. Johnston
... hear these words, for he was beginning to explore the top of the mountain, and making plans for converting the place into a stronghold. Bart heard them, however, and turned to the grumbler. ...
— The Silver Canyon - A Tale of the Western Plains • George Manville Fenn
... the least obtrusive form of speech and action, as well as dress, but she must have smiled over the fierceness with which weaker sisters were attacked, and perhaps have sought to change the attitude of this chronic fault- finder; "a sincere, witty and valiant grumbler," but always a grumbler, to whom the fashions of the time seemed an outrage on common sense. He devotes a separate section of his book to them, and the delinquencies of women in general because they were "deficients or redundants ...
— Anne Bradstreet and Her Time • Helen Campbell
... 'Now, grumbler,' retorted the intrepid child, putting her gloved hand suddenly over her father's mouth; Stanway submitted. The picture of the two in this delicious momentary contact remained long in Twemlow's mind; and he thought that ...
— Leonora • Arnold Bennett
... house up. Which would he absurd. My wife soothes me and says that of course I shall get used to the clock. I shall never get used to it. Lately she has ceased even to mention the clock. My daughter thinks I am becoming a grumbler in my latter years. My son smiles indifferently. I admit that my son's secretary is more sympathetic. Like most people who are both idle and short of sleep, I usually look very well, spry and wideawake. My friends remark on my ...
— Mr. Prohack • E. Arnold Bennett
... plenty, while he nurses his hunger, but would a thousand times rather pay allegiance to those who save him from absolute starvation? And Zaphnath, in his nightly wanderings and his daily errands of espionage, thinkest thou he overhears a public grumbler who fails to curse him and his Pharaoh, and to extol the men from the Blue Star, and the unfortunate farmer, who, until now, has been able to give ...
— Pharaoh's Broker - Being the Very Remarkable Experiences in Another World of Isidor Werner • Ellsworth Douglass
... and immediately Dandy, in order to gratify his master, gave him a pretty smart blow upon the end of his nose. He hoped this would satisfy the grumbler, and bring the sport to a happy termination. As usual, the blow excited the pugnacity of Master Archy; and setting the rules of the art at defiance, he rushed upon his companion with all ...
— Watch and Wait - or The Young Fugitives • Oliver Optic
... that," cried the boy. "I've always been a discontented grumbler ever since I've been here, Joe. But, I say, don't call me Dyke. It sounds as if you were getting formal with me, and as if we were not as we used to be before ...
— Diamond Dyke - The Lone Farm on the Veldt - Story of South African Adventure • George Manville Fenn
... grumbler, it is quite certain he cannot do worse than you do. My jaws ache now with trying to eat the food you gave us this morning. Another week and you would have starved the whole band ...
— The Lion of the North • G.A. Henty
... girl, "isn't this funny! We have the first volume of 'The Grumbler' and the second of 'The Grandfather.' I don't believe I can piece them together," with a ...
— A Little Girl of Long Ago • Amanda Millie Douglas
... turns the world over into the hands of the cook. And into what better hands could you fall? To you, my fat, jolly, four-meals-a-day friend, Mr. Gourmand, but more especially to you, my somber, lean, dyspeptic, two-meals-a-day friend, Mr. Grumbler, the cook is indeed a valuable friend. The cook wields a scepter that is only second in power to that of love; and even love has become soured through the evil instrumentality of the good-looking or bad-cooking cook. This is no jest, it ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 484, April 11, 1885 • Various
... in the mutiny were and he drove those into the camp first. The others followed. In five minutes they were all at their places at table munching quietly. Another man, even with equal determination, might have not succeeded. But the greediest grumbler among them understood that this young man had first been as valiant to secure their rights as he was now ready to ...
— The Rainy Day Railroad War • Holman Day
... himself with this melodious grumbler one evening, and, having been much dispirited by the proceedings of the day, was scraping consolation out of its deepest notes, when his landlady (who was fortunately deaf, and had no other consciousness of these performances than a sensation ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens
... "You are a grumbler born," he said, "and so fond of it that you squeal before you're hurt, just for the pleasure of squealing. One thing I can tell you, for Mister Daniel said it in so many words: he's the same in politics as his father; and that's Liberal; and since the Liberals of yesterday are the Radicals ...
— The Spinners • Eden Phillpotts
... Clamart or Romainville, the excitement of holidays and the crowd. He was one of those who went about for a whole week before the fifteenth of August, gazing at the black lamps and their frames, and the scaffoldings. Nor did his wife complain. At all events, she no longer had that chronic grumbler prowling around her chair for whole days, with schemes for gigantic enterprises, combinations that missed fire in advance, lamentations concerning the past, and a fixed determination not to work at anything to ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... preparation for the table—in a way peculiarly her own. One could never be with her many minutes without hearing some bright fancy, some quick stroke of repartee, some ludicrous way of putting a thing. But whether she told of the grumbler who could find nothing to complain of in heaven except that "his halo didn't fit," or said in her quick way, when the plainness of a lady's dress was commended, "Why, I didn't suppose that anybody could go to heaven now-a-days without an overskirt," or wrote ...
— The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss • George L. Prentiss
... the grumbler, the gossip, the thief, the criminal, are poor, empty, starved, wayward minds, and their brains are small, poorly nourished, sickly brains. The young wife with a moment of leisure who has a starved, ...
— The Eugenic Marriage, Vol. 3 (of 4) - A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better Babies • W. Grant Hague
... a mere child," remonstrated Lilias, forgetting for the moment that it was Mrs Stirling, the grumbler for the countryside, that was speaking. "What ill can he get among the hills? And, besides, what work could he do? It's health for him to wander about among the hills. It makes ...
— The Orphans of Glen Elder • Margaret Murray Robertson
... knew was simply that ills bravely borne seemed aided by some mysterious power outside their bearers; whereas the craven and the grumbler seemed but to add to their own burden. For the rest, though he would not say it for the pain it gave her, the knowledge of his growing weakness was already a solace to him, and he watched with hidden ...
— Winding Paths • Gertrude Page
... himself lived, not entirely secluded, but in a measure shut off from contact with other peoples—by continual going abroad and never-ceasing friction with his neighbours, by perpetual disheartenment with the perplexities of his colonial empire, has become less of a critic than a grumbler; and to do him justice he is, in speech, infinitely more contemptuous of his own government than he is of the American or any other. The American on the contrary remains cheerfully, light-heartedly, garrulously ...
— The Twentieth Century American - Being a Comparative Study of the Peoples of the Two Great - Anglo-Saxon Nations • H. Perry Robinson
... to quote Ecclesiastes, I shall go!" said Rose, pouting. "I wish that book wasn't in the Bible! I'm sure such an old grumbler ought to have ...
— We Two • Edna Lyall
... the general characteristics of the German peasant, it is easy to understand his relation to the revolutionary ideas and revolutionary movements of modern times. The peasant, in Germany as elsewhere, is a born grumbler. He has always plenty of grievances in his pocket, but he does not generalize those grievances; he does not complain of "government" or "society," probably because he has good reason to complain of ...
— The Essays of "George Eliot" - Complete • George Eliot
... confirmed the strong impression his merit had made upon the mind of Mr. Johnson. "It is so very difficult," said he, always, "for a sick man not to be a scoundrel. Oh! set the pillows soft, here is Mr. Grumbler a-coming. Ah! let no air in for the world, Mr. Grumbler will ...
— Anecdotes of the late Samuel Johnson, LL.D. - during the last twenty years of his life • Hester Lynch Piozzi
... but this cannot redeem a grumbler. Plump he sits down in the warmth of its very blaze, and complains that it snaps, perhaps, or that it is oak and maple, when he paid for all hickory. You can trust him to put out your wood-fire for you as ...
— Bits About Home Matters • Helen Hunt Jackson
... mean!" returned self-complaisant Roland. "I say, Jenkins, isn't it a shame about Arthur Channing? Galloway has his money back from the very thief himself, as the letter said, and yet the old grumbler won't speak out like a man, and say, 'Shake hands, old fellow,' and 'I know you are innocent, and come back to the office again.' Arthur would return, if he said that See if I don't ...
— The Channings • Mrs. Henry Wood
... her hand on his shoulder). Not a farce, Paul! It is really true! When we get to Berlin tomorrow evening, you will no longer find Glyszinski at our rooms! Are you satisfied now? Have I finally succeeded in pleasing you, you grumbler! ...
— The German Classics, v. 20 - Masterpieces of German Literature • Various
... Bulls of literature mostly lack, and which John Bunyan, the king of them all, only reached within the limits, still more limited than Borrow's, of purely religious, if not purely ecclesiastical, interests. A born grumbler; a person with an intense appetite for the good things of this life; profoundly impressed with, and at the same time sceptically critical of, the bad or good things of another life; apt, as he somewhere says himself, "to hit people when he is not pleased"; illogical; constantly ...
— Essays in English Literature, 1780-1860 • George Saintsbury
... supported by sinners who felt the burthen of the old faith; and the most free and enlightened governments are often generated by the discontented, the disappointed, and the dissolute. Now, in the Isle of Fantaisie, unfortunately for our revolutionizer, there was not a single grumbler. ...
— The Voyage of Captain Popanilla • Benjamin Disraeli
... restrained action, the emaciation or obesity of a character.[3233] Frequently no trouble is taken to find a suitable name, this being either Chrysale, Orgon, Damis, Dorante, or Valere. The name designates only a simple quality, that of a father, a youth, a valet, a grumbler, a gallant, and, like an ordinary cloak, fitting indifferently all forms alike, as it passes from the wardrobe of Moliere to that of Regnard, Destouche, Lesage or Marivaux.[3234] The character lacks the personal badge, the unique, authentic appellation serving ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 1 (of 6) - The Ancient Regime • Hippolyte A. Taine
... remarked to the owners when he saw that Joe was this voyage to form one of his crew: "The old fellow would be worth his pay if he never put his hand to work. He keeps a crew in good humour with his yarns and stories; and if there is a grumbler on board he always manages to turn the laugh against him, and to show him to the others in his true light as a skulker and a sneak. He looks after the boys and puts them up to their duty, and acts generally ...
— A Chapter of Adventures • G. A. Henty
... methods of that new harvest that the President has boldly led our attention in his admirable Proclamation of Amnesty. It is to the details of it that each loyal man has to look already. It is but a few weeks since we heard a sentimental grumbler, at a public meeting, lamenting over the discomforts of the freed slaves in the Southwest, as he compared them with their lost paradise. Men of his type, to whom the present is always worse than the past, succeed in persuading themselves that the incidental hardships of transition are to ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 13, No. 76, February, 1864 • Various
... King, "and that shall soon be settled." And thereupon he flew with his Queen to the residence of the bear, and called to him from the entrance, "Old grumbler, why have you insulted my children? That shall cost you dear, for we will decide the matter by a ...
— Childhood's Favorites and Fairy Stories - The Young Folks Treasury, Volume 1 • Various
... grief. Time was when they had been apt to confess to one another that papa was occasionally rather "trying," a vague expression which scarcely involved a lapse of filial duty on the part of the grumbler. But to hear them to-day one would have supposed that they had never been tried; that life with Lord Calderwood in a small house in Chapel-street, Mayfair, had been altogether a ...
— The Lovels of Arden • M. E. Braddon
... all over the Colony, that the emigrants generally are very difficult to satisfy in the matter of rations; and that the man who had been the worst fed at home, was the most difficult to please abroad. An Irishman is generally found the chief grumbler here; a Scotchman ranks second; while an English peasant, who has all his life fared better than either, is found, in Australia, to be most easily satisfied. I do not attempt to explain or account for this; I have, however, not only frequently observed ...
— Trade and Travel in the Far East - or Recollections of twenty-one years passed in Java, - Singapore, Australia and China. • G. F. Davidson
... had many imitations, as the Historian, here named; the Rhapsody, Observator, Moderator, Growler, Censor, Hermit, Surprize, Silent Monitor, Inquisitor, Pilgrim, Restorer, Instructor, Grumbler, &c. There was also in 1712 a Rambler, anticipating the name of Dr. ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... the vanguard of cavalry to start at an appointed time. Then, to the intense disappointment of the valiant young troops, the orders were countermanded and the whole army settled back into its quarters. Dick, who persistently refused to be a grumbler, knew that a cause must exist for such an action, but before he could wonder about it long Colonel Winchester told him, Warner and Pennington to have their horses saddled, and be ready to ride at a ...
— The Tree of Appomattox • Joseph A. Altsheler
... in the cause of France,' returned the Emperor. Then, turning to us, he took old Tremeau by the ear. 'Ah, old grumbler,' said he, 'you were one of my Egyptian grenadiers, were you not, and had your musket of honour at Marengo. I remember you very well, my good friend. So the old fires are not yet extinguished! They still burn up when you think that your Emperor is wronged. And you, Colonel Despienne, you ...
— The Exploits Of Brigadier Gerard • Arthur Conan Doyle
... the government in proportion to his wealth; and his wealth marks roughly the amount of government protection that he needs. In practise, however, the working out of an income tax is so complex that every grumbler can find in its intricacies some cause of complaint. The present tax is therefore described here by an expert statistician, Mr. Joseph A. Hill, the United States Government official at the head of the Division of Revision and Results of ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 21 - The Recent Days (1910-1914) • Charles F. Horne, Editor
... contemporaines," vol. I., 137-156. ("Une visite a l'Ecole normale en 1812," Napoleon's own words to M. de Narbonne.) "Tacitus is a dissatisfied senator, an Auteuil grumbler, who revenges himself, pen in hand, in his cabinet. His is the spite of the aristocrat and philosopher both at once.... Marcus Aurelius is a sort of Joseph II., and, in much larger proportions, a philanthropist and sectarian in commerce with the sophists and ideologues of his ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 6 (of 6) - The Modern Regime, Volume 2 (of 2) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... guessed that Zeke's star was not in the ascendant. There was but little fighting required, but much digging of intrenchments, drill, and monotonous picket duty. Zeke did not take kindly to such tasks, and shirked them when possible. He was becoming known as the champion grumbler in the mess, and no one escaped his criticism, not even "Old Put"—as General Putnam, who commanded the Connecticut quota, was called. Jarvis, on the other hand, performed his military duties as he had worked the farm, and rapidly acquired the bearing of a soldier. ...
— Taken Alive • E. P. Roe
... rouse the cook," he said to himself, with a smile. "That fellow little thinks how useful he is in keeping up my spirits. The most inveterate croaker and grumbler in the world—and yet, according to his own account, the only cheerful man in the whole ship's company. John Want! John Want! Rouse ...
— The Frozen Deep • Wilkie Collins |
